Sam had followed Virginia and stood unseen within ten yards of her
when that morning she sat under the maple after she had left
Constance. He noted how absorbed she was in thought--noted her grave,
white, shocked face, and her bowed head. His sympathy went out to her.
Oh, what wouldn't he then have given to be able to clasp her in his
arms, to comfort her--the woman he so madly loved! Though free and
impulsive in his manner with other women, to her he was as coy and
modest and respectful as a boy of fifteen.
He lingered near the premises for a time, from an impelling sympathy
to be near her in her trouble, and hoping she would re-appear, but in
that he was disappointed.
He returned again in the evening, resolved to call on her. He ascended
the piazza steps and crossed to the door, but somehow at the moment
could not muster courage to push the button. After meditating for a
moment, he turned and softly passed along the piazza. On reaching the
south extension he halted, for the sound of a door softly closing
caught his ear, and then he saw Virginia emerging from the side
entrance, closely veiled. In a moment Sam was all alertness.
He wondered at her veiled appearance at that hour, about half past
ten, and at her avoiding the main front entrance. He followed at a
distance and saw her enter a Washington and Twenty-third street car.
He boarded the next one that came along.
Fortunately the interval between the two cars was short, there having
been a breakdown on Fifth and Washington streets, resulting in the
cars being bunched. Sam stood at the front end of the car beside the
motorman, and in the darkness--the front inside blinds being down--was
able to keep a sharp lookout at the car just ahead.
At the intersection of Washington and Twenty-third streets, the
forward car stopped, and he distinctly saw a woman alight. "Virginia!"
he muttered, and as his car passed on, he saw her walking toward the
park entrance. One block further along Twenty-third street Sam
alighted, and rapidly retraced his steps to Washington street. On
rounding the corner, and coming into view of the park entrance, where
blazed an arc light, he caught sight of her again, entering the
gateway.
Sam briskly covered the distance, keeping well under the line of
shadows.
"Did you notice the path a lady took, who entered the park a minute
since?" he inquired of a park policeman.
"Yes; that way!" and the policeman waved his hand to the left.
"Thank you," and Sam followed the direction indicated. A strange
foreboding hurried him on. He was then fully aroused to something
extraordinary about to happen. He walked on the grass whenever
possible to muffle the sound of his footfalls, and soon was rewarded
by making out the dim form of a woman some distance ahead, being still
in the range of the gate arc light. There was no mistaking the figure.
From that moment he never lost sight of her.
To avoid suspicion of shadowing her, he took a diverging path and
boldly clambered over the hill, and proceeded toward the children's
playgrounds, apparently away from her. Passing on and in the direction
of the reservoirs, he at length stopped at the fountain.
He was the "man near the fountain" whom she discovered while she was
standing under the cedar.
Sam had stopped but a moment when, to his amazement, he discovered
Virginia suddenly had disappeared down the hillside. He at once
followed her, and was the man she again saw on the driveway beneath
her. Again she disappeared, and he shrewdly suspected, into the deep
shadow of the clump of firs nearby.
He was straining his eyes diagonally up the slope, trying to penetrate
the gloom, when a low scream of terror assailed his ears, and was
quickly followed by a low, reassuring masculine voice. He determined
to get near them. He threw himself flat against the bank and, shielded
some by the unmowed grassy slope, dragged himself along for about
fifty feet, to where the driveway, rounding westward, divided them
from the long flight of steps. He passed within fifty feet of the
couple, then cautiously pulled himself near the summit. The ridge was
strategically of great value. It enabled him to flank them unseen.
He immediately availed himself of its cover and sneaked slowly and
cautiously along the side of the crest to a point which he judged to
be near enough to them, and then he peered above the summit. The
couple were between him and the dim city lights. He strained his ears
to catch their words, and drew himself closer, inch by inch, fearing
discovery, yet desperately anxious to catch the purpose of the
meeting, and when he saw the glittering knife, his alarm gave
expression in the low whistle.
When he sprang on in pursuit of Jack, it was with a determination to
ascertain who he was, where he lived, and, if possible, to gain some
knowledge of his purpose in this meeting with Virginia at such an
unseasonable time and place.
The few words of low-spoken conversation he had heard gave him no clue
to the real object of the meeting; but he was convinced that some
grave and momentous purpose was involved to have induced Virginia to
keep so perilous an appointment alone.
"Did she make the appointment?" The thought was no sooner uttered than
it gave place to another equally as suggestive, for just then thoughts
raced through Sam's brain with amazing rapidity. "Or, rather, was she
not compelled to meet the stranger by some power which he had obtained
over her--some secret of her life which she feared--a deathly fear, of
disclosure, and which this man knew, and its power he knew only too
well, how to wield."
The more he thought about it, the more the mystery, for such it
appeared to him, deepened. He determined to fathom it. Inured to a
rough, open-air life on the Texas plains, his constitution was hard
and tough, and well seasoned for the job presented--and, it must be
confessed, it was to his liking.
Sam felt his blood tingle as his enthusiasm rose to the prospect of a
genuine adventure, and he hurried along, over the soft, yielding
grass, to catch sight of the fellow ahead. A clump of low bushes
suddenly confronted him. It was an unusually dark spot, and then, for
the first time, he thought of the ugly knife the stranger had
displayed, and realized that he himself was unarmed.
He almost halted--wary of running into an ambush, and cautiously made a
wide detour, meanwhile alert for any sudden surprise from the
direction of the bush. Discovering no sign of a crouching figure
there, he hastened on, and finally caught sight of a moving shadow, as
it crossed a faint shaft of light shot from a window of a dwelling on
Ford street, to his left.
"Ah, I guess so. That's the party," he muttered to himself, and from
that moment Sam was as keen on the trail as a sleuth on the scent,
never losing sight of his quarry, but himself avoiding, as he
believed, discovery.
Occasionally, as the moon cleared from an obscuring cloud, he could
make out the man halting under the shelter of a fir or clump of
saplings, evidently to listen for sounds of a pursuer, and then,
seemingly satisfied, again move on.
So far the direction of his course was toward the reservoir, but of a
sudden he turned, and sharply cutting across Sam's front, swiftly
entered the deep gloom of a cluster of cedars, where he was lost to
the eyes of the pursuer.
It was plain that his man intended to avoid exit by the main gate, or
by Park avenue, a circumstance to cause Sam keen chagrin, for he hoped
by an adroit move to get a good square look at the fellow's face as he
would pass under the entrance arc light.
To the right, a foot path wound its way to the main gate. To the left
of a cluster of dark firs stretched a comparative level, past the bear
pit, and right down to the deer corral; but what park features lay
beyond and between the firs and corral, he could not determine. In his
effort to mislead Sam, the fugitive had doubled on his track, and at
that moment was but a short distance west of the starting point. Sam
reasoned that this man would not cross that smooth, grassy plot, nor
emerge from his retreat and go down the path, but most likely would
take a direct course through the cluster of firs, and under the
shelter of their dark shadow strike the fence directly opposite, and
so reach the Barnes road, a hundred yards or so west of the park gate.
It was obvious that time was an important factor. There being no
possible place of concealment between his present position and the
firs, he must either go back and take a circuitous route, or boldly
approach by the path. He chose the latter. Skirting the firs--for he
dared not enter the cluster's gloomy precincts in his defenseless
condition--he soon passed them and discovered a succession of
odd-looking shrubs, trained to fantastic growths by the gardener. They
afforded excellent cover right down past the bear pit to the deer
corral fence, which ran along the brow of the hill; farther down, a
second fence, which still exists, bounded the deer corral and
separated the park from the Barnes road. A little further along and
against the upper picket fence (since removed), a mass of tangled ivy
and Virginia creeper foliage, revelled in wild luxuriance.
The vines had seized upon and had grown about and over some dwarf
locust trees, forming a series of natural bowers, rather picturesque
by daylight, but at night, dismally dark and forbidding.
Sam hesitated, which was well for him, for under the shadow of these
dark vines, Rutley and Jack Shore had met by previous arrangement.
They were silently watching him.
"I cannot shake him off. He tracks me like a bloodhound," Jack
informed his companion, in a whisper.
"The meddlesome fool!" replied Rutley. "If he will not stop following
you--why--he carries his life in his hands."
"No, no! Not that. We don't want any killing in ours, Phil, anything
but that. Who is he?"
"Sam Harris. I saw him follow Virginia and was sure he would run foul
of you."
"The simpleton is harmless anyway. He is moving to the fence. See him?
Hist!"
After studying the wild growth for a few moments, Sam decided to
approach it by way of the fence. There he suddenly dropped to his
knees and crept noiselessly--very close beside the fence, toward the
tangle. As he neared it he could make out its black cavernous
recesses. Twice he paused, his eyes strained with the utmost tension
of watchfulness against a surprise, for he now fully believed that the
man he was attempting to shadow was a desperate character.
However, he crept nearer, hardly stirring a blade of grass, so
cautious was his progress--so silent his movements. He listened
intently, scarcely breathing, lest its sound should betray his
presence. His hands gently touched a vine to part the leaves--instantly
he was greeted with a hiss and a rattle, and then something glittered
close to his eyes, which in the moment of his startled alarm he
believed to be the glitter of a reptile's fangs. It caused him to bolt
suddenly with a panicky feeling at his heart, and then it brought from
Jack a soft chuckle of merriment.
"He's not as plucky as the girl. We must throw him off the scent at
any cost," whispered Rutley, "or we will be trapped." Suddenly he laid
his hand on Jack's arm and continued with a low, sardonic laugh: "I
have it, Jack. You lead him down on the Barnes road; I'll meet him
there," and without any further delay Rutley slipped down the steep
slope to his automobile, which lay in the deep shadow of the canyon
walls, a little further to the west, where he waited with the evil
purpose in his heart for the climax.
Sam was no coward. He had faced dangerous situations fearlessly, but
that hiss and rattle, in the stillness of a dark, lonely and
forbidding place, fairly raised his hair, and lent a lightness to his
feet that amazed him, when he halted and noted the distance covered in
the few moments of his flight.
"One of those deadly reptiles got out of the park zoo," he thought,
"sneaked his way into that jungle--I guess so!" and he wiped the beads
of perspiration from his face as he added aloud: "An almighty close
call! But," and he looked up at the dark sky, and then around and
about, and as gathering confidence returned to him, continued: "I
shall not give up yet, not yet. I guess not."
Yet it was apparent his pursuit of the stranger had signally failed,
and he stood motionless wondering what course then best for him to
adopt.
True, he was in a dilemma, and instinctively realized that to remain
in the park was useless. So, without forming any practical conclusion,
and for the purpose of keeping active, he again moved toward the
fence. It was then he conceived the notion to climb over the fence and
make a short descent to the gate, in order to catch sight of Virginia,
for she could not be far away yet, and to follow her and secretly to
protect her on her return to her home. With that object in mind, he
climbed the fence, and, securing a position on its top, looked
cautiously about. He was some distance to the west of the tangle of
vines, from which he was screened by the foliage of a small tree that
grew nearby.
[Illustration: Sam--"One of those deadly reptiles got out of the Park
Zoo."]
The gate light threw a faint glimmer along the fence, and on the
Barnes road in the gorge below. He peered down the steep hillside, and
looked up and down the road. There being no one in sight, he let his
legs slip quietly down the other side of the fence, and gradually
lowered himself, without sustaining other injury than a few trivial
scratches. As he brushed mechanically the debris which had clung to
his clothes, he was surprised to see the figure of a man step out,
seemingly from the fence itself, and slip down the hillside, and
climbing the lower fence, cross the almost dry bed of the stream,
close to the road, and proceed cityward.
Sam was sure the man, whoever he was, had not been on the corral side
of the fence a moment before, and to give the mysterious appearance a
deeper significance, the point of exit was about the location of the
tangled vines. The appearance of the man differed from the one he had
followed, inasmuch that one had on a long coat and bushy beard, the
other wore a short pilot coat and mustache. For a moment Sam was
puzzled, and he scratched his head. Suddenly he broke out in an
unconscious whisper to himself, as though urged on by some
supernatural agency, for afterward it surprised him when he thought of
that moment: "Damned if I don't think he's the same party I've been
after, disguised."
And he made straight for the place, as near as he could estimate,
where the man had emerged.
It was a few moments before he found it, but a close examination soon
revealed two yielding pickets of the fence. True, just sufficient to
admit a man's body sideways, but there it was, as he afterwards
discovered, and perfectly screened from observation by masses of
slender leaf-laded branches and twigs. The inner, bushy part being
skilfully cut away. The trick employed to evade him was now palpable.
The hiss, the buzzing rattle, the glitter--"Ah; it was the glitter of a
steel blade"--and at the thought he shivered, as with an icy chill, for
he realized how dangerously near a death-trap he had ventured. As the
reaction came, his face flamed with the hot blood of indignation and
chagrin at the smart dodge by which he had been temporarily baffled.
In the distance, down near the park entrance, was still dimly visible
the retreating form of a man. Sam determined to follow him.
He slid and partly tumbled down the steep hillside, sprang over the
lower fence, and crossed the bed of the creek and on to the road--and
was so intent on his mission that he did not hear or see, until it was
almost upon him, a dark, noiseless machine, approaching from the rear.
He moved hastily aside to let it pass, but to his intense
astonishment, the automobile followed him with evident intention of
running him down. Again he sprang aside, but too late. The front wheel
grazed his left leg and swung him around on to the rear wheel, which
hurled him violently to the ground.
Having accomplished his purpose, Rutley at once stopped the machine,
alighted, and examined Sam.
He was soon joined by Jack, who asked, in a low voice: "Have you
killed him?"
"I don't think so. Bad gash on the side of his head, though."
"Dangerous?"
"Impossible for me to say."
"Just unconscious?" anxiously inquired Jack.
"Yes; but I don't think he will interfere with us again for some time.
What shall we do with him?"
"Take him home."
"Good idea," grunted Rutley. "It becomes you decidedly well, Jack,
after being a villain, to play the good Samaritan. Well, take this
handkerchief and bind his wound," and he raised Sam's head while Jack
bound up the wound.
"It will make old Harris feel under an obligation to me."
"And you can touch him for the loan of ten thousand, to square
accounts," added Jack. And again Rutley laughed.
"Come, let's pack him on to the machine."