I
They rushed to the water’s edge, as the two men who had been chasing
Neuburg came tumbling down the slope through the trees.
“The feller’s an Indian!” they shouted. “Led us on a faked trail right
up to the top, while he doubled back an’ made for the water. We only
saw him when he’d got way out on it. Sakes, I wantter get that big
feller just to cry quits.”
“You won’t,” said Clement. “We’re marooned.”
“No, we ain’t!” shouted another man. “There’s another motor boat--look!”
“_He_ knew that wasn’t any good,” said Clement, “or he’d taken it.”
Indeed, the motor boat that had been left behind was the one they had
watched Siwash and Neuburg tinkering with.
“Let’s have a look at it, anyhow!” cried one man, and he made a run at
it.
“Not so fast!” snapped Clement, and, as the men stopped,
bewildered--“Fetch out the woman and the half-breed. Tell ’em to get
into that boat first.”
Mrs. Wandersun was led out, Siwash following. She glanced round,
hesitated when she saw there were no boats at the stringpiece. A hand
urged her towards the motor boat.
She screamed.
“Get in,” said Clement curtly. “We’re in a hurry.”
“No!” cried the woman. “No!”
“Shut up, you fool!” cried Siwash.
“No nonsense! In with you!” snapped Gatineau, as he drew the woman
towards the boat. She struggled.
“It’s murder!” she shouted. “You know it’s murder!”
“She’s crazy,” said Siwash, and with a forced calmness walked towards
the boat.
“She isn’t,” Clement grinned at him. “How was she to know you hadn’t
finished fixing it yet?” As Siwash turned, snarling at the trap into
which he had fallen, Clement said to the men: “All right, get aboard
and see what you can do with her--she’s apparently not quite ready for
killing people _yet_.”
In five minutes he was looking at a dynamite cartridge, fixed cunningly
near the gasoline tank. There was a time fuse by it, but not yet
connected up.
“The hand of Nachbar,” said Gatineau, holding up the cartridge.
“Yes,” agreed Clement, feeling sick. “That was to be the ‘accident’ in
the wilds.”
“Sure,” agreed Gatineau. “Miss Reys was to be sent off in a hurry in
that boat for something. Somewhere, when the time fuse expired--within
sight of Sicamous, prob’bly--the dynamite would send up the gas tank.
Boat and girl would just vanish before the eyes of men in a sheet of
flame--a natural, brilliant, devilish accident.”
Clement, almost physically ill, shook his fist at the lake.
“By God!” he cried. “That man must not be allowed to get free! We’ve
got to find him, Gatineau, and settle with him. We’ve _got_ to get him.”
II
It was more than an hour before they were out on the lake, pushing
towards Sicamous.
They did not go straight to that place. They had reasoned it out that
Neuburg dare not go there. He would know that Sicamous was warned, and
that only arrest awaited him.
They cut through the lake at their best speed, searching the shore on
either side, swinging into little inlets and out again, in their search
for the motor boat that had carried Neuburg.
A man in the bow shouted and pointed. They turned their eyes to the
lakeside below a clearing. Piled high, with the boats she towed
knocking at her rudder post, was the motor boat. Above the motor boat
in the clearing was a shack. As they drove towards it, Gatineau rapped.
“Heck! See the reason? He landed here. There’s a telephone.”
They made the shore; three of them piled out of their boat; two sat
with guns ready for anything.
They ran to the shack, calling out, but nobody came to meet them. They
hammered at the door post; there was no answer. They went in through
the door into a living-room. It was empty.
Here they saw the trail of Neuburg. A cupboard had been forced and
food taken from it, hurriedly, so that other food was scattered. On
the table were two empty cartridge boxes, and several of the shells
had fallen on the floor as the big man had emptied the cartons in a
hurry. The telephone receiver dangled helplessly, and the wire had been
snipped off short.
They pushed into the two bedrooms, one was stark empty, one seemed so,
but Gatineau heard a whimper. Bending swiftly, he jerked a boy of ten
from under the bed. Even as the little detective yanked the boy to his
feet the kid pulled a gun, and only Gatineau’s agility saved him from a
bullet in the stomach.
Clement grabbed the gun and shouted: “Here, stow that, sonny! You
aren’t Buffalo Bill, you know.”
“I ain’t a bit afraid of you,” said the kid, pretending that what they
thought crying was merely dust in his eye.
“No need, kiddo,” grinned Gatineau. “We ain’t the bad men; we’re just
plain policemen.”
“Ho,” said the kid, visibly disappointed. Then he brightened. “That
other feller wuz bad as bad.”
“Worse!” chuckled Clement. “He was a robber and a murderer, and
everything.”
Young Canada swelled visibly with pride.
“Golly--an’ he might have gunned me any time, ’cos I was here, see? _I_
didn’t run away.”
There was an uproar from the front of the shack, men shouting at each
other, threatening. Clement and Gatineau went out. In the clearing was
a wild-eyed homesteader, brandishing a club and threatening to brain
the man they had put on guard. Again Clement played a soothing part.
“Easy on him, old son!” he shouted. “We don’t mean harm. We’re the
police.”
“That’s right, pop,” said young Canada, leaning over the porch rail.
“You stop being mad; there ain’t no call for it. I’m just putting
things straight with these fellers here. Put up your gun, pard.”
The manly tone was smothered in a flutter of skirts. A woman ran in
from the scrub, yelling: “Jimmy! My Jimmy!” And Jimmy, the gunman,
was in his mother’s embrace. A little girl and a smaller boy followed
timidly.
Neuburg, they found, had run his boat ashore in the creek under the
homestead while the man was back in the woods working. He had walked
into the living room and held up the woman and her two youngest
children.
“I was in the bedroom,” said Jimmy, the daring. “I saw what was what,
so I nipped under the bed.”
Neuburg had stolen the food, packing it in his pockets, found the
revolver, and stolen it and cartridges. Then he had ordered them out of
the house while he spoke on the telephone. They had run straight to the
husband.
“Then you didn’t hear who he called up on the ’phone?” said Gatineau.
“I was under the bed----” began Jimmy.
The father interrupted angrily. “How could she hear? That’s why he
drove my wife out.”
“Damn!” muttered Clement. “I’d give a hundred dollars to know who he
called up on that ’phone, and what he said.”
“Give ’em to me, then,” said Jimmy.
“What’s that?” gasped everybody.
“I keep on telling yer I was under that bed, an’ heard,” said Jimmy in
contempt.
“Magnificent!” shouted Clement. “Who did he ring up?”
“A Revelstoke number. Ast fer a feller named Locust.”
“Lucas!” shouted Clement. “What did he say?”
“Said something about things was all gone bust, and that he, this Lucas
feller, must meet him at the Three Pins with all he could get hold of.
Then he got out.”
“To the mountains,” said Gatineau.
“Why?”
“Three Pins is a difficult and little known pass. I know it. A hard
journey, but it can be reached from here-and Revelstoke.”
“Can we get there quicker than by following Neuburg’s trail?”
“Sure! But why worry? We can put a cordon round him. We’ve got him.”
“I’ve got to see him taken with my own eyes before I believe that. Also
I want to do some of the taking myself. I owe Neuburg something. And
then there’s Lucas ‘with all he can get hold of.’”
“Well, what about it? What do you think that means?”
“I think it means £145,000 of easily negotiable securities and cash,”
said Clement. “Remember The Chief’s wire. I’m going to see with my own
eyes that Miss Heloise Reys does not lose it.”
III
A motor trolley jerked them up along the mountain track, and dropped
Clement, the detective and two men at a little wayside station that
seemed to be clinging by sheer strength to the rocks under the
snow-clad crags.
A guide and horses met them, and they rode off along the mountain
trails, skirting ravines and river gorges by paths that seemed to poise
them on the lip of sickening drops. They climbed up and up until the
air took on the nip of the everlasting snows. They pushed forward until
they seemed lost in a Dantesque hell of bleak gray rock and somber
spruce furred valleys.
When night came down, they camped fireless for fear of giving the alarm
to the huge, ugly and indomitable rogue who must even then be pushing
his way through the mountain passes in their neighborhood. They had
time on their side. They knew they must be ahead of him.
In the chill mists of dawn they were up and away again, striking
through the stark, craggy Valleys for the lonely pass under the Three
Pins. Toiling up from the Arrowhead district, on the other shoulder of
the range must be the shady bank clerk, Lucas. Would they be present at
the rendezvous of the two criminals? Would they be there at the right
time and at the right place?
It was noon before the guide pointed to a curious mountain with three
sharp points, the Three Pins. They dismounted and pressed through the
wild and rocky forests with infinite caution. Quite suddenly the guide
put up his hand. They crept to his side.
There beneath him sat a man.
He was a young man, lolling on a rock and smoking. He was dressed with
a nattiness that was incongruous amid that bleak scenery. But beside
him was a haversack, and his city-cut clothes showed evidences of rough
wear. It was Lucas.
One of the men sighted his rifle on him, but Gatineau’s hand went out.
He whispered:
“Not yet. Wait for Neuburg.”
They waited, watching the young man in that aching silence, in that
almost startling clearness of air.
An hour, and suddenly the young man sprang up.
A bird call had abruptly sounded.
The young man stood looking about. The call sounded again. He grabbed
his haversack and began to move.
Clement was impatient to get out at him; again Gatineau checked him.
“Neuburg’s here. That was his call,” he said. “He’s in hiding. He’s
waiting to see whether Lucas’s movement draws anything.”
Lucas walked eagerly up the trail, with all eyes watching him. There
was no movement or sound on the mountainside above him. A minute
passed. Suddenly they saw Neuburg standing above the trail.
He had slipped silently out of the shadow, and was standing quietly
looking round. Lucas changed direction at once, and ran up to him.
Gatineau, too, began to move. The men with them spread out to form a
half-circle about the little detective, who headed straight through the
spruce, going with the skill of a trapper towards the big murderer.
They dipped to a hollow, rose to a point where they could see the two
men. Neuburg was talking rapidly. As he talked he put his hand behind
him, raised it with a revolver, and fired straight at Gatineau in cover.
Gatineau shouted and fell. Two shots rang out. Lucas fell dead and
Neuburg began to run.
He dived straight for the bush, crashing the branches aside with his
huge figure. In a moment he had plunged into the gloom. Clement was
after him, and one of the men cut across to head the big fellow.
In front, Clement heard the crashing of the murderer’s passage, and
even at times caught the back swing of the branches. Once he saw the
brute, sighted and fired. Once a revolver spat and a bullet screamed
close to his head. They scrambled into a rocky pocket and out again.
Ahead there came a sudden shout, the explosion of two guns close
together, and a great scream of rage and fear.
Clement broke cover to see a man struggling in the great arms of
Neuburg. Neuburg was trying to break the fellow’s back with knee and
hands. Clement shouted and leaped forward. Neuburg turned, snarling
like an animal, and flung his victim at the Englishman’s knees.
Clement went down, but was up and running again at once. They were
among rocks now, heading for a small torrent that roared down the
mountain side. Neuburg dodged in and out of the rocks making for the
stream, and there was blood along his trail. That was slowing him; he
was hit.
By the stream Clement got him in the open and shouted and fired.
Neuburg turned and with blazing revolver came back.
He charged like a bull. His revolver spat once, twice, but already
Clement had jumped to cover behind a tree. The revolver spoke again,
and then the murderer snarled in rage, dropped it and came on with his
empty hands. Clement fired at his legs twice, apparently missed, and
then flung his own empty pistol at the oncoming brute.
It struck him in the chest, and he brushed it aside as though it had
been a gnat. Then he closed with Clement.
They went down, Clement battering with his one useful fist at the gross
face. Neuburg ignored all blows and ground him back and into the
earth, held him there, and felt blindly with his right hand for a piece
of rock.
He found it and struck. Clement just had time to wriggle his head,
and only his hat was crushed in. The great arm went up again with the
huge, jagged splinter of stone. It poised, waiting its certain chance.
Clement tried to struggle, but with knee and arm the giant man held him
rigid. The arm with the rock heaved to strike.
Some one--the guide--came leaping straight from the blue at the poised
Neuburg. The man simply took a header straight at the murderer. Head
and shoulders and fists struck, and Neuburg went over. Clement wriggled
up like a flash and flung himself on the huge brute.
Another man limped up at a run and hurled himself into the wriggling
mass.
They fought and squirmed to hold the bull-like creature down. He shook
them off. They went at him like terriers, clutching at leg or arm.
A great fist flailed out and sent one man backwards into the bush.
Clement shifted and caught him round the neck. He found himself being
lifted into the air. He clung tighter, the other man gripped with
clawing fingers at a thick arm. The arm swung and shook and the man
went into the bushes spreadeagled. The great body whirled and Clement
found himself spun off against a rock.
The first man was at it again, but once more Neuburg was running.
He ran with a lurching step towards the torrent. They yelled at him to
stop, to throw up his hands. He lumbered onward. When he reached the
torrent, a man fired. Neuburg staggered, steadied himself, then jumped
clear out into the boiling fall.
They saw him hang swaying amid the welter of white and angry water, his
feet slipping on a slab of rock on the very lip of the fall. Then the
giant arms were flung wide, and he toppled into the stream.
They saw his body just for one minute, turning over and over in the
torn and angry water at the bottom of the fall, three hundred feet
below. Then it was gone.
Mr. Neuburg was finished.
They found Gatineau, by the body of the dead Lucas, making the best of
a flesh wound along the ribs.
“As you thought, Mr. Seadon,” he said, “Lucas skipped with the
securities. They’re all here, £145,000 pounds worth of them.”
“Well, that point is cleared up,” said Clement. “We’d better head for
Banff now, and Miss Reys.”
“_And_ Mrs. Neuburg, alias Méduse Smith,” grinned Gatineau, who had
learned much from the wanderers. “I’m going to arrest _one_ of the
family, anyhow.”