THE FIRST SHOT.
Mrs. Orban's words were brave, her whole bearing courageous, but
she was more frightened than she had ever been in her life before.
It is doubtful whether she really believed her own assertion that
nothing more would happen that night, though she tried to. As a
matter of fact her prophecy was correct. Scared by the screams of
the women, the unpleasant guest must have promptly run away. He was
probably alone, and, uncertain as to who was in the house, had fled
from the chance of being peppered by a revolver.
It was found in the morning that nothing was missing except the
servants' watches, their few small trinkets that were lying on the
dressing-table, and Mary's rings. The extraordinary silence with
which he had perpetrated the theft, his skill in taking the rings
off Mary's hand as it lay outside the coverlet, were not at all
unprecedented--the natives were known to be silent and subtle as
snakes in their doings.
Mrs. Orban sent Eustace down to the plantation as soon as she knew
every one would be astir. Mr. Ashton, the field manager, was
suffering from fever, so that it was useless to go to him; but on
hearing the story, Robertson, the chief engineer, returned with the
boy to look into the matter.
Investigations were in vain; the man had left no tracks around the
house, no footprints on the veranda.
The servants were so terrified that they declared they would not
stay another night in the house. They wanted to be sent to Cooktown
immediately--a five days' journey by sea. Robertson, a big burly
Scotsman, roughly told them that such a thing was impossible. They
could not get away for another week, when the schooner might be
expected to bring provisions. He lectured them on their cowardice
in wanting to run away and leave their mistress alone at such a
time, but the girls would not listen to reason; they said they
would hire horses and ride all the way to the first civilized place
they could find.
Then Mrs. Orban tried persuasion. Had they not better wait at least
to see whether anything could be heard of their lost possessions?
She would offer a reward to any one finding the thief or restoring
the stolen goods to their owners--the offer should be made known
all over the plantation.
The suggestion carried the day, and the bargain was made. Mrs.
Orban felt that at all costs she must keep the maids until Mr.
Orban's return, for the work and the solitude would have been too
much for her to stand, brave as she had proved herself to be.
The offering of a reward was greatly against Robertson's advice. He
pointed out that it would only prove an incentive to further
robbery. The plantation hands were an unprincipled lot, and if
they discovered that they could get money by stealing things and
bringing them back, as if they had discovered them in the
possession of some one else, there would be no end to the thefts,
and no tangible means of getting hold of the thieves unless they
were caught red-handed.
But so anxious was Mrs. Orban to keep the servants that she
disregarded Robertson's opinion, and the reward was duly offered.
The engineer had one proposal to make, which was accepted. With
Mrs. Orban's leave, he said, he, with his wife and two little
children, would come up the hill and sleep in the house until Mr.
Orban's return. There would be safety in numbers; and if the night
visitor came again, some one to deal with him better than by
screaming at him.
In spite of the fuller house, and the fact that Robertson's
eight-year-old boy was sleeping in Peter's bed that night, Eustace
did not feel particularly happy in the hours of darkness before
him, after the party had broken up and said good-night.
The door between his mother's room and his own was left open, by
way of companionship for them both, but the boy was so overtired as
to be restless and unable to go to sleep. To his excited fancy
there were unusual sounds about. The creaking of unwarping boards,
the soughing of the night breeze round the house, even Sandy
Robertson turning round in his bed, with an impatient but sleepy
flump at the heat, were noises that set his hair on end and made
him feel cold and damp all over again and again. Once or twice he
stole from his bed to peer into his mother's room, but she always
seemed asleep; or he would look stealthily out of the window, as if
he could possibly have seen anything in the dark.
Robertson, with his wife and baby, was in Nesta's room at the other
side of the house. It occurred to Eustace that if anything did
happen--anything needing immediate action--Robertson was very far
away and ungetatable. The boy sat up in bed hugging his knees,
making feverish plans as to what he should do supposing the night
visitor came again and he should see him.
Unknown to his mother, Eustace had taken the revolver he had been
entrusted with the night before to bed with him. He meant to sleep
with it under his pillow, but every time he got up to make his
investigations he took it, gripped tightly in his hand ready for
immediate use.
When the first gray light stole into the room at last, Eustace
began to feel drowsy. Almost against his will he lay back on his
pillow and fell asleep. He had determined to watch the night
through, but a great heaviness overpowered him, and he lay like a
log.
It seemed to him he had hardly closed his eyes--indeed, it cannot
have been much later, for there was but little difference in the
light--when a resounding pistol report rang through the silent
house. Eustace awoke with an instant consciousness of having slept
on his self-imposed sentry work. He felt queer and oddly shaken as,
with a cry of dismay, he sprang out of bed and rushed into his
mother's room.
"Oh, what is it?" exclaimed Mrs. Orban, frightened out of her wits
by the noise.
She stared at Eustace, who stood, revolver in hand, gazing blankly
round the room.
"I don't know," he began, stopped abruptly, and added in a choked
voice, "Oh, look! look!"
He was staring towards the window. Outside on the veranda,
crouching on all fours in the dusk, was a dark figure. With a
strange, sudden movement it raised itself and stretched out an arm
towards the room--standing lank, tall, and horribly sinister.
Without a moment's hesitation Eustace raised his hand and fired.
There was a splintering of glass, a wild howl of pain, and the
figure dropped like a stone.
"Eustace," cried Mrs. Orban in a horrified voice, "what have you
done?"
"I had to fire first," returned the boy in an odd, sullen tone.
The figure outside moved, and with a succession of dreadful yells
began rapidly crawling along the veranda towards the stairs.
At the bedroom door appeared the entire household, Robertson
leading the way, his usually ruddy face ghastly with astonishment.
"What on earth is happening?" he asked, staring at Eustace and his
mother.
"I've shot something," Eustace faltered. "It is going down the
steps--"
Robertson waited to hear no more. Seizing the boy's revolver, he
took a short cut through the house for the veranda steps.
"What was it?" asked the frightened women, as they huddled together
in the doorway.
"I don't know," Eustace answered--"a black-fellow of some sort. I
wonder if I--I killed him."
There had fallen a sudden silence outside; the awful howling had
ceased.
Eustace sat down on the edge of his mother's bed feeling sick and
shivery. To have killed a man--a white fellow, black-fellow, any
sort of fellow; it was horrible!
The most extraordinary sounds arose from the veranda. Had Robertson
gone mad, or what could be the matter with him?
"Ho-ho-ho! ha-ha-ha! ho-ho-ho-ho!" he roared.
Every one stood as if paralyzed. There was something terribly
uncanny about the laughter. It seemed so ill-timed, so jarring and
unkind.
Robertson appeared at the broken window.
"Upon my word, Eustace," exclaimed the Scotsman, "it's the best
joke ever I heard or saw. Come and look at your black-fellow and be
proud of yourself."
"I can't!" said Eustace, his knees knocking together as he
attempted to stand, and he fell back on the bed.
"Oh, what is it, Mr. Robertson?" asked Mrs. Orban.
"Why, it's nothing but a miserable, half-starved dingo-dog that
must have prowled up to the house in search of food," Robertson
said. "You marked him well--I will say that for you, Eustace. He
was dead before I could reach the steps."
"Thank God it was not a human being," exclaimed Mrs. Orban.
"A dingo!" cried Eustace, sitting up suddenly with a perplexed
expression in his eyes. "Then who fired the first shot? I mean the
one that woke me."
The relief faded from Mrs. Orban's face. It was a startling
question, an uncomfortable reflection that the first shot had not
been accounted for.
"Yes, by the way," she said, "there was that other shot. It seemed
to come from Eustace's room, and I was frightened out of my wits. I
was thankful to see him safe and sound a minute later."
"I heard two shots distinctly," Robertson said, looking grave; "but
of course I fancied Eustace had fired twice at the dingo."
"Not I," said Eustace. "I never saw the beast till I came into
mother's room; and I didn't fire till it stood up against the
window and looked like a human being."
"H'm," said Robertson. "It strikes me I had better have a look
round. Just stay here till I come back."
The women all looked scared. It was not a pleasant idea that the
person who fired that first shot was possibly lurking about
somewhere in the shadows. They listened breathlessly as Robertson
made the tour of the house, momentarily expecting a fresh
commotion, the firing of shots and a struggle. Mrs. Robertson was
dreadfully upset, and held her two children close; the maids
huddled together in a corner. Mrs. Orban stood, revolver in hand,
near Becky's bed with such quiet dignity that somehow Eustace was
steadied.
The chances were that, finding himself hunted by Robertson, the man
would try to effect an escape on to the veranda this way as a short
cut to the steps.
If the visitor were the same as that of the night before, it was
all important he should be captured--otherwise this disagreeable
night raid might be repeated.
But no shots and no sound of a scuffle were heard. Robertson
returned to say that he had investigated every nook and cranny that
a man might have hidden in, and found no trace of any one having
entered the house anywhere.
The little gathering stared about with questioning, bewildered
eyes, and no one felt any happier for the news. The fact remained
that a shot had been fired by a mysterious being who had apparently
vanished into air. For what purpose had that shot been fired? At
what? At whom?
"I can't make it out," said Robertson. "There seems no sense in a
fellow coming and letting off fireworks in the middle of the night
for nothing."
"Perhaps it is a trick of some sort," suggested Mrs. Orban; "some
one trying to frighten us. But I don't see that that is possible."
"Nor I," said Robertson. "People aren't in the habit of playing
practical jokes without some purpose in them hereabouts. All the
same, it doesn't seem much good all of you staying up like this. If
you'll just get back to your beds, I'll watch for the rest of the
night. It may be a better way of trapping a chap, if he hasn't got
clean away by now. That is the most likely thing, of course--his
firearm probably went off inadvertently as he was coming round the
veranda, and he knew he had done for himself, so made tracks at
once. He might come back as soon as he thought the house was quiet
again, but I don't expect him."
No one felt much inclined to take Robertson's practical advice. At
the same time it seemed foolish to stay up and exhaust themselves
for nothing, and Mrs. Orban agreed that every one should go to bed.
Eustace went very reluctantly. He would have liked to stay up and
share Robertson's watch like a man; it seemed so childish to be
sent to bed after taking part in such an excitement. He wondered
what Nesta would have thought of it had she been there.
"Goodness, wouldn't she have been scared!" he reflected. "I do
wonder what she would have done."
At least there would be plenty to tell her when she came home. She
might be having a jolly time; but Eustace guessed, when it was all
over, she would be disappointed at having been out of such
adventures as these. There was a sort of glow about the realization
that they were such very real adventures--experiences that did not
come every day and to every one. The only stupid part about it was
having to go to bed.
Mrs. Orban felt no glow in her realization of the situation. She
longed for her husband, and wondered how she was going to bear his
absence much longer. If this sort of thing were to go on she felt
that it would break her nerve entirely.
Having kissed Eustace and sent him away, she felt too restless to
get into bed. Sleep she knew would be impossible; and taking a
book, she was just sitting down with the set purpose of making
herself read awhile, in order to quiet her mind, when a sharp cry
reached her from the next room.
"Mother! mother!" Eustace cried, "come here--quick!"