The officers, with their prisoners, had reached the railway track, and
were leisurely walking toward the little station when a commotion in a
group of people on the shingle, a couple of hundred yards ahead,
attracted their attention. Smith, who had accompanied the officers,
started to investigate. He had proceeded but a short distance when his
movement was accelerated by seeing Mr. Harris and Sam hastening down
the slope toward the little group before mentioned.
Upon arrival at the station, one of the officers, Simms, hurried
forward to ascertain the cause of the trouble, for evidently something
serious had happened. The two prisoners were thus left, handcuffed, it
is true, but under guard of only one officer, whose attention was also
attracted by the excitement ahead. The officer gave his prisoners
little attention, for he believed they were perfectly secure, as
Jack's right wrist was handcuffed to the officer and Rutley was linked
to Jack.
Rutley soon found that he could "slip the bracelet" and, nudging Jack,
displayed his free hand. Jack gave him a significant wink, at the same
time gently nodded his head for him to "break." For an instant Rutley
was tempted to strike down the unsuspecting officer, and attempt to
release Jack, but the chance of detection in the act, and inviting
instant pursuit was so great, that he decided to try to escape alone.
Silently he stepped apart; farther, then he slipped behind the
station.
A swift, noiseless dash to a culvert, through it and up along a small
ravine, soon put him out of sight of the officers. His last view of
them convinced him that they were still unmindful of his escape.
Arriving at a considerable elevation, to where a clump of brush
concealed him from the view of those below, he paused and took a hasty
glance around. The sweep of the slope was too clear and unobstructed
for any possibility of escape to the woods that covered the hill a
couple of hundred yards distant, without him being seen. His
determination was daring and instant.
He would enter "Rosemont house," seek a hiding place, secure some sort
of disguise, and in the night effect his escape.
Following the depression he soon appeared on a level with the house.
Taking advantage of such cover as was afforded by shrubbery and
hedges, and cowering close to earth, he quickly traversed the space
that had separated him from the house. Throwing himself prostrate
among some ivy that grew in thick profusion along the basement of the
south side as a protection from the Winter rain, he lay there
effectually concealed and listened with tense nerves for sounds of
pursuit.
The silence was unbroken save for the spasmodic whirr of a lawn mower
on a distant part of the grounds. Having recovered his wind, he looked
up. Above him was an open window, but screened. If he could enter by
that window he might gain the loft without discovery, and once there
he felt satisfied that a good hiding place could be found. The front
entrance would be easier, but the risk of being seen crossing the
piazza was too great. He decided to try the window. Arising from his
concealment, and refreshed by his short rest, enthusiasm bounded
through his veins.
"I will get away yet," he muttered between his clenched teeth. "I saw
the women following Harris down to the shore and the house must be
deserted by all save the servants, and they are likely in the
kitchen."
Another swift glance at the window, and mentally estimating its height
from the ground, he felt certain that an entrance through it was
practicable. There was no time to be lost.
The "water table" afforded a footing, and by the aid of an iron
trellis erected to support a climbing vine, he reached the window.
There an obstacle was encountered. He tried to raise the screen, but
it would not budge. In his exasperation he nearly tore his finger
nails off trying to raise it from the bottom. Realizing that he was
becoming excited he at once forced a calmness which he deemed highly
essential, if he was to succeed. Every moment, too, was fraught with
danger of discovery.
Pushing his hand against one side of the screen edgewise in an attempt
to loosen it, the thing suddenly fell in. The thick carpet smothered
the noise. He had unwittingly pressed against the edge that inclosed
the springs, and in so doing released the other edge of the screen
from the groove. Noiselessly he sprang inside. It was the library. He
turned and cautiously scanned the hillside. No persons were in sight.
Then he quietly replaced the screen.
His daring coolness and nerve were now under full control. He stole
out of the room, into the hall, with every sense alert to avoid
discovery. His goal was the attic. He knew that the only way to reach
it was by the service stairs, which he could use from the second
floor. Before him was the main stairs. Without a moment of hesitation
he leaped up the soft, thick, velvet-covered steps, his footfalls as
silent as the tread of a cat.
A door was ajar on his left; he cautiously pushed it open and entered.
He saw at once that it was Sam's room. He glanced about, then opened a
dresser drawer. "Ha, a revolver!" It was the work of a moment to
examine the magazine.
"Empty!" he exclaimed, with disgust, and was about to replace it when,
on second thought: "It may do for a bluff." Another hasty look and he
picked up a hunting knife, which he also appropriated. A slight noise
at that moment startled him and caused him to look around alarmed. He
slipped behind a door for concealment. After a moment of tense
suspense, and the quietness continuing unbroken, he stole out of the
room.
So far everything was in his favor. Further along two doors, a few
feet apart, were open. He had passed one on his way to the attic
stair, when, of a sudden, he heard a slight sound, as of a person
moving lightly in the room. He instantly turned aside and passed
through the second open doorway. Virginia stood before him. She was at
that moment hastening from the room, absorbed in thoughts of
Constance.
With a stifled, painful cry of "Oh!" she shrank from him in a vague
terror. Her face paled and her eyes expanded in manifest fright.
Speech deserted her. The power of motion fled and the shawl intended
for Constance fell from her arm. She appeared paralyzed.
Rutley softly closed the door behind him and locked it and put the key
in his pocket. The dressing room door received the same attention.
Then he turned to her. He was surprised to meet her, but observing the
terror his presence inspired, he at once determined to force her to
aid him to escape. He misjudged her character. For one moment he stood
silently watching her. All the sharp intensity of his gaze
concentrated on her frightened eyes; then he laughed low and
gloatingly--"Ha, ha, ha. The girl that took on cold feet and betrayed
her pal! I meant to say 'colleague,'" he corrected, with a sneer of
apology. The smirk of his offensive stare and more offensive words
irritated. She began to recover from her sudden fright and became
immediately aware that her present situation required not only
coolness but the most adroit handling. She accordingly nerved herself
for the encounter.
Again he leered at her, and continued in the same soft, guarded, but
suave voice: "To be caught alone and in a trap with her intended
victim is one of the dispensations of an inscrutable and just
Providence."
Virginia was regaining her self-possession every moment now. Courage
was surging through her nerves in increasing power. Her eyes commenced
to blaze.
"Your effrontery is offensive. Your meaning an enigma!" she
indignantly replied.
"Indeed! Then I'll make it plain," he hissed. "I want you to cover my
flight for liberty.
"You see I have escaped," he went on rapidly. "The officers are
baffled--my trail so far is undiscovered."
"You mistake!" she corrected, with surprising coolness and decision.
"By the dispensation of an inscrutable, but just Providence, the
blackguard's trail is blazed--the trap is sprung and you cannot
escape!"
Rutley's eyes snapped fire. He saw that a policy of sneering and
bullying persuasion to aid him would fail ignominiously. He must use
force. His aspect became black and threatening.
"Damn you!" he hissed. "See here, moments are precious. The game too
desperate. Beware! You must find a place of concealment for me. The
loft has storerooms. Come, and in the darkness of tonight you must aid
me to clear from the premises."
"Never!" she resolutely exclaimed, her eyes ablaze with indignation.
"Soft! Not so loud, my fair partner," Rutley cautioned. "You led me
into this scrape. You must help me out of it."
"Let me pass!" And she motioned for him to stand aside.
He did not move.
"Do you deny me?" she said, sternly.
"Not so fast, my dear. I intend to keep you near me, as a hostage for
my escape. No harm shall befall you if you are tractable," he went on.
"And I again warn you that you must speak guardedly and softly or I
shall be compelled to gag you and bind you and carry you to a place of
concealment. Oh, I'll see to it that you shall not have the
satisfaction of betraying my hiding place."
"Incarnate monster; dare you imprison me?"
"Only for a few hours, until the dead of night blackens all objects
alike--then I shall go forth, leaving a note to announce your hiding
place. Do you prefer to be hidden in a trunk, or shall it be among the
old rummage in the loft?" Though his manner of address was faultlessly
polite, his face was as colorless and impassive as marble, and his
voice low, calculating and cold.
Virginia paled as she took in the meaning of this purpose, and her
voice quivered with a note of fear, as drawing her slender form erect
in semblance of defiance she said: "Would you strike down a
defenseless girl?"
"I am troubled with no qualms of conscience when dealing with an
enemy, be that enemy man, woman or a scorpion. Come! We have wasted
too much time already."
He stepped lightly toward her.
Virginia anticipated his move and placed the table between them. Many
small articles incident to a lady's toilet were on the table. Rutley
perceived that should the table be upset in a scuffle, he could not
hope for time to gather up and rearrange the toilet articles, and then
the spilt powders and perfumes on the carpet would surely indicate a
struggle having occurred in the room.
Virginia was also alert to the importance of the table in the
situation. Her fine instinct of the purport of his thoughts quickened
her measure of defense. She grasped the edge of the table with both
her hands. Rutley saw her purpose, drew back and side-stepped.
Virginia also side-stepped, but kept close to the table and directly
opposite him. She realized that the danger of her position was very
great.
In the cabin she had been armed and prepared for an extreme emergency.
Now she was without defensive weapons of any kind save her native wit,
her courage and the table to which she clung.
Never taking his eyes from her, Rutley stood for a moment, indecisive
and silent. Yet his mind was working furiously.
"A woman stands in my way," he inaudibly muttered with clinched teeth.
"Time is pressing. I will force her into submission!"
The intense strain on his nerves drew a cold dew of perspiration that
glistened on his brow. Slowly he drew the revolver from his pocket.
Slowly he raised it and pointed it at her, then hissed, as he glared
at her: "Remove your hands from the table and assist me to escape."
Virginia again drew herself erect, her eyes sparkling with defiance
and her face aglow with courage.
"I know my death would only add one more crime to your record," she
said, with a faint quiver in her soft voice, and after a slight pause,
she went on more steadily: "But you dare not shoot and your threats
are vain."
As he gazed on her slight form drawn erect; those pure, brave,
steadfast, blue eyes; those features, delicate and tense with a sense
of the danger of her position, she affected him strongly; thrilled him
with an admiration which, with all his virile power and hardened
senses, he could not mask. "You are daring a desperate man," he
resumed. "One who means to halt at no crime to secure his flight to
liberty."
The softened expression of his features, softened in spite of himself,
led Virginia to think that his words were not meant to be taken too
seriously, and so hope and fear alternated with amazing swiftness on
her expressive face, which at last settled into a look of credulity
and prompted her to hazard a smile at his threat.
"Beware!" he hissed, struggling to appear fierce. "Do not mistake me!"
"Oh, no; I do not mistake you," she replied, again smiling faintly,
"for I know you are too much of a man to redden your hands with the
life of a puny, defenseless girl."
The artless play of her features to entice him from his desperate
purpose was exquisite, and not without temporary success.
"Her witchery is unnerving me," he silently muttered, as he felt his
will-power was dominant no longer.
As their eyes remained fastened on each other he felt an awe seize
him, and he for the moment forgot his design. He drew back and said,
almost submissively: "God, you are brave, and beautiful as brave. I
can't harm you." And he slowly lowered the revolver.
Even then a sudden recovery from his weakness developed a new plan of
attack. Virginia's unerring instinct, however, warned her to mistrust
his flattering declaration. "It's a subterfuge," she thought,
"cunningly devised to draw me away from the table." She remained
silent, but more watchful, if possible, than before.
On abandoning a bullying policy, Rutley had moved step by step toward
the table opposite to Virginia, and finally placed his left hand on
it. His assumed admiration was well sustained and his changed line of
persuasion, though its sincerity she doubted, promised in the end
success.
"The wrongs I have done," he continued, "had better not have been
done, I acknowledge, but they are mended. Worse might have been. Our
meeting in this room was accidental. My presence in this house is
known only to you. Will you aid me to escape?"
"Aid you to escape!" she repeated, in tones that had lost their
agitation, and which now seemed natural and only to carry a note of
indignation. "You, the man who nearly wrecked my brother's home,
betrayed his trust and would have robbed him of his life. You, the man
who kidnapped his child, caused his wife to lose her reason, and whose
death may yet add murder to your other crimes--dare ask me to help you
escape?"
"Yes," he slowly replied. And feeling that his hand rested firmly on
the table, he began cautiously to lean forward, meanwhile saying in a
soft, insinuating voice: "I dare ask you to help me escape, for I
mistake if in a nature where such courage and gentleness exist there
beats a heart irresponsive to the cry of distress.
"I am down, and standing on the threshold of a long term of
imprisonment. Again I appeal to you and offer this weapon as a pledge
of good faith," and he laid the revolver on the table.
The tension on Virginia's nerves relaxed, her voice became steadier,
calmer and more natural. "Why did you vilify the character of
Constance, a frail, innocent woman, whose piety and goodness made her
incapable of doing you harm by thought, word or deed?"
"Revenge on Thorpe," he replied, "for closing my office."
As the words slowly issued from between his lips, his weight on the
table increased--he felt his control of it was now sure.
Virginia's eyes searched him thoroughly, and aside from the fact that
flattery was distasteful to her, his cold, calculating, unemotional
eyes glittering with a sinister purpose, startled her and confirmed
her impression of his insincerity.
To maintain a safe distance, but still clinging to the table, she
instinctively drew backward, suspicious of some sudden movement, but
she made no effort to secure the revolver. Rutley noticed the change
and coolly pressed forward.
Virginia drew further backward. She saw through his artifice and once
more began to fear him. The strain on her nerves was becoming severe
and her countenance warmed with contending emotions. He had pleaded
for aid to escape and expressed himself as sorry for his misdeeds. Yet
she believed his protestations were not sincere.
Nevertheless, considering how much she was in his power, the great
scandal his testimony in court would create, the complete undoing of
all his wicked schemes, and the possibility of him leading a better
life, was fast weighing in his favor, besides only brute revenge would
be gratified by his long imprisonment, and his punishment, therefore,
only an empty satisfaction.
Rutley read her thoughts and a cunning smile played about his mouth.
He never really intended to trust his liberty in her keeping, and
since she was the only person with actual knowledge of his
whereabouts, he did not propose to jeopardize his chance of escape by
allowing her freedom. For his own safety, he was bound to conceal her
as well as himself, at least until darkness set in. His humble appeal
was but a ruse to gain her sympathy, and his simulated penitence for
his wickedness was an artifice, but it succeeded in touching the
tender cords of the girl's heart.
Her vigilance abated. Her hand slipped from the table. She
straightened up and cast her eyes to the floor, as one often does when
mentally absorbed in weighing the potency of some great question. The
moment he had maneuvered for, and waited for, and watched for, had
arrived.
The spring of a cat upon an unsuspecting mouse could not have been
swifter, more sudden or unerring. The cloven hoof was revealed. Before
she had time to even guess at his purpose, his hand was upon her
mouth, while his other arm was thrown around her form, binding her
arms to her sides. He forced her into a wicker chair that stood
conveniently near and held her down sideways with the aid of his knee.
This method permitted him to withdraw his arm from around her form and
to snatch a doily from the table which he quickly wadded and forced
into her mouth, gagging her effectively. Then his eyes swept the room
for something that would serve as a cord to bind her.
[Illustration: Rutley--"I could even kiss those red, ripe, cherry
lips."]
On the floor, distant a couple of yards, lay the shawl that Virginia
had let fall from her nerveless arm when Rutley entered the room. He
wriggled the chair toward it, and by extending his foot drew the shawl
to his grasp.
It was a summer shawl, of generous proportions. The fabric was
silk-wool mixture, of fine network weave, and consequently light and
strong. Twisting it into a rope he bound her arms and limbs, meantime
saying in a low, guarded voice, and with the utmost sauvity and
coolness:
"I'll not be ruder or rougher than is necessary, my beauty. There! Now
you are secure. I could even kiss those red, ripe cherry lips without
fear of protest, but I'll not contaminate them by contact with those
of a blackguard. No, no! Don't thank me for that, honey dear, for I'm
content to witness your mute appreciation of my motive."
After he had bound her, he drew back a pace or two and critically
surveyed his work.
"You must pardon me, dear heart, for deeming it prudent to make that
gag a little more secure," and taking a handkerchief from his pocket
he bound it over her mouth, knotting the ends at the back of her head.
"Rest assured, brave little girl," he resumed, in that same low,
hissing voice, "I'm not a sneak thief, a burglar or a rake, though I
do aspire to membership in that proud and great American order 'The
Honorable Grafter'."
Having completed gagging her, he stood off a pace and chuckled.
"There, I think that will do!"
In the silence that followed Rutley was startled to hear a low,
cautious voice on the lawn below say: "He is either in the house or up
there in the timber."
"They've tracked me here," Rutley viciously hissed, his manner changed
to intense alertness. He grasped the revolver and went on, "While I
have been dallying with you, precious time was lost, damn you! I'll
see that you don't stand between me and liberty again!"
Virginia was again terrified and helpless at a moment when aid of the
most determined and daring character was within call.
Then a second voice said: "The officers do be kapin' a lookout down be
the river, and if he's in the water, sure they'll nab him. D'yees
think he'd likely be up on the hill top in the brush?"
"I cannot say," replied the first voice, "but it looks to me as though
he could not have crossed that open space unseen."
Both of the men had spoken in low and serious tones and were
recognized by the intent listeners in the room above as Sam and Smith.
They were evidently baffled and in a quandary as to the direction
Rutley had taken after escape from the officer, and approached the
house to warn the servants of Rutley's escape.
"Maybees," resumed Smith in the same low, cautious voice, "he whint up
the hill be way ave the ravine, over beyant there."
Sam made no reply. He had caught sight of the profile of Virginia's
face. Her eyes, terrified and tensely drawn, were askance and looking
in his direction. The handkerchief over her mouth he first mistook as
an evidence of physical suffering. He stepped back a pace, thinking to
obtain a better view. He was disappointed.
What he had seen was a reflection of her face in the "dresser mirror,"
that by some strange chance had been adjusted at an angle which
deflected objects downward.
He had aimlessly halted at a point directly in line of the reflection
cast by the mirror over the casement, and upon looking up saw through
the screened window the reflection.
Those terrified eyes he had seen, suddenly set him in a ferment.
"Probably--by God!" he muttered under his breath.
"Phwat be yees lookin' at? Sure, I can say nothin'," exclaimed Smith.
"I'll just step in the house and 'phone for a sheriff's posse to
search the timber, and prevent his escape from the hill. You wait
near-by for me."
Sam had spoken loud as a ruse to deceive Rutley, for he felt morally
certain that the cause of that frightened look in Virginia's eyes was
the presence of the man he was after.
"Sure, I will that, and kape me eyes on the ravine, too."
As Sam started for the front door, Smith stalked about, with a stick
in his hand, warily glancing from side to side and ready to fight on
the instant.
Rutley prepared for a struggle, for he believed that Sam would ramble
through the house. "Virginia must be concealed, but where?" He could
not carry her to the attic, for Sam might meet him with her in his
arms. "Ah, the closet!"
Thrusting the revolver in his pocket, he swiftly opened the door. Then
he placed a chair within for her comfort, and without further
hesitation gathered her in his arms and carried her to the closet.
After seating her on the chair, and while drawing some of Mrs. Harris'
skirts about her, he said to her in a low voice: "After I dispose of
that meddlesome fool, I'll carry you to the loft and doubtless we'll
find room in one of the large trunks stored there to conceal you; and
I warn you, on peril of your life, to sit still!"
He then cautiously closed the door.
His next step was to remove the revolver from his pocket and carefully
examine it. "It's a desperate bluff, but I'll try it."
There were two doors to the room other than the door of the closet;
one opened into the hall, the other into a large bathroom and through
to the bedroom beyond. He took the keys from his pocket and unlocked
both doors, which he had fastened on meeting Virginia, and then placed
the large cane arm chair, which he piled with cushions, to the right
side of the table and a few feet from the hall door.
His movements were swift, silent and deliberate. Down behind the back
of the chair he crouched and watched both doors with tigerish
steadiness. He had barely taken his position when footsteps were heard
in the hall. They passed the door, then returned, halted, and the next
instant low taps sounded on the door.
Simultaneously the closet door back of Rutley cautiously opened and
Virginia stepped forth gagless and free. She had been more frightened
than hurt or helpless, and had not discovered it until imprisoned in
the closet. Left to herself, she immediately struggled to free her
limbs from bondage. One foot was unexpectedly loosed and then the
other. Her hands quickly followed, and the twisted shawl fell to the
floor.
Rutley had depended partly on her fear of him to remain passive, for
the shawl was not long enough to permit her limbs being bound together
and securely tied with a knot. Having freed her hands, it was the work
of a moment to remove the gag from her mouth.
She stood motionless and silent save for the palpitation of her heart,
which seemed thunderous in its beat. Rutley had not heard her, his
attention being wholly absorbed by the sounds in the hall, and being
back of him, she had time to quiet her agitation and analyze the
situation.
Again low raps sounded on the door.
"What shall I do?" she inaudibly muttered, "for to aid me Sam will
walk in to his death. Oh, heaven inspire me!"
As the hall door slowly opened, she tried in her agony to shriek a
warning, but not a sound escaped her lips. Terror and apprehension had
for the moment bereft her of voice.
Suddenly, like a divine flash, she remembered Jack Shore's blanket
device in the cabin at Ross Island. She turned half around, silently
stooped and picked up the shawl from the closet floor. She was very
nervous and her agitation caused a trifling delay, which to her
appeared hours, in untwisting the wrap and spreading it out, suspended
on her two hands before her.
Sam cautiously appeared around the door. He was keenly alert, for he
fully expected an encounter with Rutley, being quite satisfied that no
other person would dare to gag Virginia, but when in that swift glance
he saw her only in the room, and she with the gag removed and
fingering a shawl, his surprise was so great that he forgot his
caution. He pushed the door open wider and entered the room. His lips
parted to speak.
That instant Rutley said sharply, "Hands up!"
Sam's hands went up, and he looked into the muzzle of a revolver,
pointed at him from behind the chair.
Rutley stood up. At almost the same moment Virginia swiftly approached
from behind and threw the net over his head, and shrieked, "Help!
Help!"
In the furiousness of his rage to throw off the shawl, Rutley's hands
became entangled in the net, and he shouted, "Oh, hell!"
Sam sprang upon him and wrenched the revolver from his hand. Then, as
he leaped back a couple of paces, said to Rutley: "Hands up! It's my
turn now, old chappie!"
Rutley paid no heed to the command and at last cleared from the net
with a snarl.
"He, he, he--a devil is toothless when hell is without fire!" Then with
a fiendish leer, drew the knife from his breast pocket. "Damn you!"
said he, crouching for a spring on Sam, "you've crossed my path once
too often!"
Swiftly Sam looked at the revolver and exclaimed with deep chagrin,
"Empty!" He, however, gripped it by the muzzle and prepared for the
encounter.
The men slowly circled each other for an opening. Suddenly they
clinched, and in the struggle Sam was fortunate to seize Rutley's
knife hand.
It was then that Virginia again proved her great courage and
resourcefulness. Watching her chance, she hooked her left forearm
under Rutley's chin about his throat, and simultaneously pressing her
little right clenched fist against the small of his back, pulled his
head backward, and screamed, "Help! Help!" [The act is a form of
garrotte used in asylums and when resolutely applied quickly reduces
the most powerful and refractory subject to submission.]
The suddenness of the attack and from such an unexpected quarter,
accompanied by the choking pressure on his throat, caused Rutley to
loosen his grip on the knife, which fell to the floor, and he
exclaimed with a gurgling sound, "Oh, God!"
Sam instantly locked his arms around his body.
Rutley was powerless. His arms were firmly bound to his sides in a
grip of iron. Meantime Smith stalked back and forth looking for
trouble. He had arrived in front of the main entrance when the cry of
"Help, help!" broke upon the still air. It proceeded from the second
story of the house, and he at once recognized it as the voice of
Virginia.
"By hivvins, the girl do be in throuble!" he muttered anxiously. "Ave
it do be the blackguard we be lookin' for--sure!" And without further
hesitation, Smith rushed up the steps and into the house.
Again the cry of "Help!" rang out.
"I'll help ye, darlint, be me soul, I will that. Hould him for wan
minnit, and I'll attind to him. Oh, the skulkin' blackguard! 'E do be
a bad divil, so 'e do. Just lave him to me, darlint; lave him to me,
and I'll settle his nerves wid this bit of fir."
By this time Smith had mounted the stairs, when he was again startled
to hear her cry: "Help! Oh, hasten, or blood will be shed!"
"I'm comin', darlint. Hould him wan minnit and I'll attind to him."
Upon entering the room, he at once seized Rutley's hands and twisted
them behind his back.
"A bit of stout cord, miss, is what we want to bind the divil."
"Hold him!" and she flew to the linen closet.
"Hould him, is it!" exclaimed Smith, with a laugh. "Sure, miss, yees
nadn't hint that to me at all, at all. Indade, miss, it's a nate bit
ave wurruk well done, and I do be proud of yees, too, so I do."
Virginia soon entered the room with a stout piece of cord, which she
handed to Sam, saying, "Oh, I'm so thankful for your opportune
arrival!"
On seeing Rutley thoroughly secured, and her excitement subsiding,
Virginia expressed her gratefulness to Sam and Smith for rescuing her
from what she believed to be a terrible fate, then snatching up the
shawl from the floor, flew down the stairs with a cry of pain on her
lips for Constance.
Having at last securely bound Rutley's hands, Sam signalized the event
with a broad grin.
"There, old chappie! I don't think you will break away a second time."
"Sure, ave 'e do, 'twill be after this bit of Arigin fir's been
splintered on his hid," answered Smith.
Rutley made no reply. He seemed absorbed in thought, and though
chagrin and disgust on his face betrayed a sense of his plight, no
expression of bitterness escaped him. His dauntless, debonair spirit
was still unbroken.
"I had her bound and shut up in the closet," he muttered to himself.
It was an involuntary exclamation in an undertone, and at the moment
he seemed quite oblivious to his position.
"Yees did!" explosively exclaimed Smith. "The likes of yees, a dirty,
thavin' blackguard, to bind the young lady and shut her up in a
closet! Sure, if I had seen yees do it, there'd be somethin' doin'."
And Smith flourished his stick in a threatening manner.
"The sissy is no match for a fool-killer," grinned Sam, as he wound
the cord several additional turns around Rutley's arms and body.
"Outclassed by a slip of a girl," Rutley muttered abstractedly, and
enslaved by her witchery; "surely hell hath no cunning to match her
genius for strategems!"
"Indade, the divil's imp is azey mark for the wit ave an Arigin girl,
an' be the token ave it, yees'l go back and jine yees mate with the
bracelets," said Smith ironically.
"Aunty is coming!" exclaimed Sam in a listening attitude. "We must get
him out of the house at once!"
"March, yees blackguard, march!" promptly ordered Smith, laying his
hand roughly on Rutley's arm to urge him along.
"Hands off!" sharply exclaimed the latter, shaking Smith's hand off
and regarding him with a haughty stare; then, in a cutting
high-pitched voice, he went on: "No liberties, flannel-mouthed
cur--scat!"
"He is game," muttered Sam.
The stigma uttered in tones of withering contempt fairly lashed Smith
into a foaming passion. He instantly dropped his stick, tore off his
coat, spat on his hands, and while squaring off to Rutley, pranced
about, beside himself with rage, and when he at last found speech, he
said explosively: "Flannel-mouthed cur, is it yees be callin' me?
Sure, Oi'll attind to yees blackguard. Och, sure Oi wouldn't strike
yees wid yees hands tied, ye murtherin' villain! Oi mane to be fair
wid yees, too, so Oi do, though ye little desarve it, and be the token
ave it, Oi'll sit ye free to recave the batin' that will make yees
respect my nation!" and in the heat of his rage and quite forgetful of
place and environment, furiously untied the knot Sam had made to
fasten the cord which he wound several times around Rutley's body, and
then giving it a vigorous pull, sent Rutley spinning around like a
top.
The thing was done so quick that Sam in his surprise was unable to
check Smith, and had difficulty in restraining him from untying
Rutley's hands also.
"Hold, Smith! Have it out with him some other time, not now or here,"
he said, laying his hand on Smith's arm, and then observing Smith with
an angry stare, directed at him, Sam grinned and went on mockingly:
"His lordship wants you to keep your hands off."
"'E do, do 'e?" replied Smith, his anger abating, and breaking into a
hoarse laugh; "sure, Oi would not touch yees at all, at all except wid
a pair ave steel nippers." Then he put on his coat, picked up the
stick and commenced to poke Rutley toward the door, saying meanwhile,
much to Rutley's frowning mortification, but helpless resistance:
"March, yees blue-blooded gintleman, with the appetite for a
pinitintiary risidence. March, yees thavin' ruffian, march!"
Scowling and turning, yet maintaining his always haughty bearing,
Rutley passed "off the stage" by the back stairs, accompanied by his
guards, but as Sam had declared, "game to the last."
In order to avoid creating excitement by appearing within view of the
little sorrowful group, now near the front of the house, they placed
him in a vine-covered arbor, which was convenient and, leaving Smith
to guard him, Sam hurried off to inform the officers of their capture.