UNSEEN ENEMIES
The amazing uproar lasted only for seconds, and then intense silence
once more settled over the palisade. There was no one in sight, and
Dexter could not imagine what calamitous events were taking place on
the other side of the cliff. But as his glance swept back and forth
along the brink of the precipice, the momentary quiet was suddenly
shattered by a second shot.
In a flash he stooped to grasp his pistol. "I'm going up," he
announced, and hurriedly belted his holster about his waist. "You
stay here, Alison, and I'll come back for you when I can."
Without waiting for her reply, he set his foot in the nearest cranny
and started to clamber onward. The remaining distance was not far,
and he went up in a rush and scrambled over the final escarpment. He
reached the top, and crouched warily on the brink of the cliff to
survey the open ground beyond.
The plateau dipped back for a mile or more to the base of the ringing
mountain peaks, and on the snow-sheeted meadow were outlined the
figures of two men. One was a couple of hundred yards away, running
as fast as legs would fly, heading for a distant cedar thicket and
the notch that gave exit towards the northern end of the valley
below. Nearer the cliff top another man was standing, with pistol in
hand. The second intruder, short and stocky in build, was clad in
the tunic of the mounted police. Dexter observed the silhouette of
his broad back, and laughed aloud.
"Hello, colonel!" he called.
The thick-set figure swung around to stare dumbly at the man on the
crest behind him. "Dexter!" he blurted out in astonishment.
"By the way the other fellow keeps on going, I should judge that
you're not shooting as well as you used to," remarked the corporal
blandly.
"I just pitched a couple across his bows, as they say, hoping he'd
halt," explained Devreaux. "Rather take him back alive if I can. If
I know a pink complexion, that man's Crill."
"Unquestionably," agreed the corporal, his glance following the
fleeing outlaw. The man was out of pistol range, still plowing up
the snow as he sprinted for the shelter of the timber. "A person
with a double chin should know better than to overexert himself,"
Dexter resumed calmly. "He'll drop in his track by the time he
reaches the notch."
"Sure he will," assented Devreaux. "No sense winding ourselves in
hundred-yard dashes. We can trail comfortably behind, sure to land
him before night." He nodded with satisfaction. "Bit of luck--what?
Funny thing how I walked into him like this, after all these days of
futile hunting. I was coming up the draw from the south, and as I
stepped into the open, there was Crill staggering towards the cliff
with a big rock in his arms. When he saw me he dropped it and ran--
"The rock was to be bounced off my head," interrupted Dexter. "You
appeared at exactly the right second."
"Eh?" exclaimed the colonel.
"We've taken Crill's full measure," observed Dexter. "Runs from a
man in the open, but is willing to do casual, cold-blooded murder
when his victim is unable to defend himself. I was climbing up the
cliffside, you know."
"It'll be a pleasure to lay hands on him," grunted the
superintendent. "Luckily, we've got him."
"Unless his friends cut in ahead of us." The corporal gazed across
the plateau, and saw the fugitive dart into the cover of a distant
patch of trees. "I have a strong suspicion that he's not traveling
alone."
Devreaux thrust his pistol back in the holster, and turned abruptly
upon the departing trail. "Let's go," he said. He started to move
forward, but with his first step he halted and whirled to look behind
him.
An avalanche of stones rattled down the slope of the cliff, and as he
faced the direction of the sound, a small, white-clad figure came
suddenly into view above the brink of the precipice. His mouth
dropped open, and stood motionless with peering, blinking eyes, his
face ludicrous with amazement. "Alison!" he exploded at last.
"Where did you come from?"
The girl did not answer. She lifted herself to her feet, crossed the
top of the cliff, and stopped in front of Dexter. "Whatever you may
do to me later," she said in a tremulous voice, "at least I owe my
life to you."
"Miss Rayne and I happened to meet down below here," the corporal
explained uncomfortably, turning to Devreaux. And then as he
observed the superintendent's expression of bewilderment, he found
his lips twitching at the corners. "She seemed to be lost from you,
colonel."
"Lost!" muttered the officer. "Yes. We were crossing a steep slope
down by the lower pass, and I stepped on a slide of glacier ice that
was hidden by snow. Went down on the glare, and rolled and coasted
about a half mile to the bottom. Smashed my carbine so it wasn't
even worth salvage, and nearly cracked my neck in the bargain. And
when I had gathered myself up and labored back to the top, the girl
was gone. It happened last evening, mind you, and I was all night
and most of the day working back the trail. I'll say this much for
the young lady: when she's in a hurry she can cruise with the best of
us."
Devreaux turned to glower at the girl. "And I warn you now," he said
with asperity, "I'm going to forget to be polite and use the wrist
irons if you get 'lost' this way another time."
She flushed darkly, and averted her head, as though to hide the glint
of tears upon her lashes. "What would be the use?" she replied in a
tired, hopeless voice. "You're men--hard and ruthless--and I--I
haven't a chance. You can order me to come and go as you please and
threaten me with handcuffs, and I have nobody--there's nothing I can
do about it--nothing."
"Exactly!" asserted the colonel. "And now we must go." He turned on
his heel and set off across the meadow; and Alison Rayne sighed
despondently, and followed him in mute resignation.
Dexter looked after her for a moment with a pensive frown and then,
gloomily shaking his head, he hastened forward and caught step with
her.
"How did you get the message that brought you to this place?" he
asked suddenly, watching her face with slantwise curiosity.
"What message?" interrupted Devreaux brusquely.
The corporal gave a hurried account of his adventures in the cabin on
the further side of the valley, telling of the boy he had found
there, and of the voice that aroused him from sleep. "Reminded me of
the queer business at the other cabin," he remarked. "Sounded like
telephone talk--only there was no telephone." He faced the girl with
searching gaze. "The young man informed me that he didn't know you,
and pretended to be asleep and dreaming; but he said 'Alison' as
distinctly as I say your name now. And he advised you to make your
way to this mountain, where a friend would be waiting."
"What have you to say to that, Alison?" demanded Devreaux.
The girl cast a fleeting glance towards Dexter, and he fancied for a
second that he saw a sardonic gleam in her velvet eyes. "I should
say that Corporal Dexter is a little mixed up about who was
dreaming," she observed in a quiet tone.
"Whoever was dreaming," returned the policeman, "it came true. You
were advised not to return to the cabin, but to strike across country
for Saddle Mountain. And here you are."
Devreaux swung around abruptly, his weather-seamed countenance grown
stern and forbidding. "You're going beyond the limits of patience,"
he declared in a crusty voice. "I want to know how you people
communicate with each other."
She met his formidable stare without the slightest show of alarm.
"We people?" she echoed. "Really, Colonel Devreaux, I don't see what
reason you have for trying to make out that I belong to a gang, or
something." She sighed and shook her head, and smiled forlornly as
she encountered the officer's scowling stare. "But I admit," she
added, "that there are times when I almost wish I did. It's
discouraging not to have anybody."
"I insist on knowing how that message was relayed to you," the
superintendent persisted, unmoved by the gentle appeal of her half
veiled eyes.
"You followed my tracks all the way up the valley to this place," she
reminded him. "Wherever I went, you must have gone also. So if I'd
met any one, or stopped anywhere to telephone, or held any
conversation of any sort with anybody, why you couldn't have helped
knowing about it, could you?"
The colonel regarded her tensely, with anger and something like
reluctant admiration mingling in his baffled glance. "You say you
came to this particular place only by accident?" he asked after an
interval.
"I don't want to make a long trip to Fort Dauntless," she coolly
replied, "and as you seem so determined to take me there, why
I--naturally I wandered as far as I could--anywhere to get away."
"Humph!" grunted Devreaux. "That's frank enough, anyhow. Just
wanted to escape from the clutches of the police? Weren't expecting
to meet a friend here?"
"You keep forcing me to repeat that I have no friends," she
complained. "I--"
She stopped with a startled gasp, and gazed blankly overhead, as
suddenly, without warning, the stillness of the misty afternoon was
punctured by a shrill shining sound--the crackling hum of a bullet in
flight.