CAPTIVE AND CAPTORS
"Girls," Betty clutched Mollie by the arm and spoke in a tense
undertone, "isn't that the spy?"
The girls gasped, looked, and set off on a dead run. The spy's back
was to them. He seemed to be waiting for somebody and he did not see
the girls till they were almost upon him.
Then, with an exclamation, he dodged around the corner of the house
and commenced to run like a deer.
"Amy!" gasped Betty, as they pursued, fleet of foot, "you go to the
camp for help! I'll try to cut him off!"
With the strategy of a general, Betty dodged a couple of dirt piles--it
was a row of small houses, in process of construction near the
camp--slipped across between two of the houses and did actually
succeed in cutting the spy off.
She caught a fleeting glimpse of him as he dodged into a doorway with
the evident intention of hiding till they got tired of the hunt.
Also, it was certain he had not seen Betty and had no idea that she
had seen him.
With wildly beating heart, but no thought of turning back, the Little
Captain picked up a big piece of wood that could serve excellently as
a weapon and ran for the doorway through which the spy had
disappeared.
Cautiously she opened the door, and the next moment thought her heart
would stop beating altogether as she took in the situation. The man
was fumbling desperately with the knob of the inside door. Evidently
it was locked. He had fallen into a trap!
Breathlessly Betty closed the door and leaned her full weight upon
it. If the girls would only come! They might together manage to hold
it. But alone----
"Betty, Betty, where are you?" cried a voice close at hand and the
Little Captain gave a gasp of dismay. As long as the man had not
known he was trapped, there might be a chance that he would remain
quiet, hoping they would pass without thinking to look into the
house. But now! Some one was pushing against the other side of the
door. He was trying to get out!
"Hurry!" she cried agonizedly as Mollie and Grace ran up to her. "Put
your weight against the door--quick."
So used were they to obeying her without question that they threw
their full weight upon the door, bracing and holding with all their
might.
"He's in there," gasped Betty. "I've sent Amy for help. If we can
hold on--just a few minutes----"
The man was hurling himself against the door with all the force of
desperation, but the girls had not spent most of their life in the
open for nothing. They held on gallantly, though in their hearts they
knew that if help were very long in coming, there could be but one
answer. They were three against one, it is true, but then they were
girls and he was a man, and a desperate man.
"Oh, why does it take her so long?" Grace cried after one
particularly vigorous lunge which it had taken all their combined
strength to withstand. "I don't think we can keep this up much
longer----"
"Hush," gasped Betty, "I thought I heard voices."
"Oh, I hope you did!"
They listened breathlessly for a moment--then the wonderful truth
dawned. Help was coming, and coming swiftly! There was no sound, save
the regular thud-thud of running feet, but the most beautiful music
in the world would have had no charms in comparison with that
rhythmic sound.
Their prisoner must have heard it too, for he redoubled his efforts
to escape and they had to turn all of their attention to the holding
of the door.
"If they should come too late!" gasped Mollie.
"Don't talk," hissed Betty, through clenched teeth. "We've got to
hold him."
And they did!
A moment later several guards, headed by a man not in uniform, came
in sight around the corner of the building and as Will afterward
expressed it "the game was all over but the shouting."
For it was Will who headed the relief party and took charge of the
capture. And so excited were the girls, that they forgot even to
wonder until it was all over.
Adolph Hensler was not easy to handle, even after he found himself
looking into the muzzles of two loaded revolvers. Even then he tried
to escape and the guard was forced to shoot a couple of bullets over
his head before he was scared into submission.
The girls walked home behind captive and captors, too breathless and
excited even to think. They had not gone far before they met Amy
coming toward them, trembling all over from fatigue and excitement.
"They got him, didn't they?" she asked, linking her arm through
Betty's and biting her lip to keep it steady. "I was so afraid they
would be too late."
"So were we," said Grace, examining a big black and blue bruise on
her arm. "We could have held out just about a minute longer."
"How did you do it, Amy?" cried Mollie. "Did you have to go all the
way back to camp to find help?"
"No, I met it coming," she answered.
They stared at her incredulously.
"I was about half way to camp," she explained, "when I saw Will and
the three soldiers coming toward me. When I had managed to gasp out
what I'd come for they didn't say a word--just put on full speed and
ran."
"Mighty lucky for us they did," said Mollie, but Betty interrupted
eagerly.
"Doesn't it seem strange to you," she said, "that an armed guard
should be coming in this direction just when we needed them? And that
Will should be at the head of them?"
"Why, Betty, what do you mean?" Mollie was beginning when Grace
interrupted.
"Oh, do you think it can be true?" she cried, seeing Betty's meaning
and clinging to it desperately. "Oh, Betty, Betty, if it only is!"
"What are you talking about?" cried Mollie impatiently. "Can what be
what?"
"Let's wait," said Betty, quickening her pace, "and let Will tell the
story!"