BESIEGED
It was nine o’clock. A thermometer on the terrace
showed the mercury clinging stubbornly to a point above
zero; but the still air was keen and stimulating, and
the sun argued for good cheer in a cloudless sky. We
had swallowed some breakfast, though I believe no one
had manifested an appetite, and we were cheering ourselves
with the idlest talk possible. Stoddard, who had
been to the chapel for his usual seven o’clock service, was
deep in the pocket Greek testament he always carried.
Bates ran in to report a summons at the outer wall,
and Larry and I went together to answer it, sending
Bates to keep watch toward the lake.
Our friend the sheriff, with a deputy, was outside
in a buggy. He stood up and talked to us over the wall.
“You gents understand that I’m only doing my duty.
It’s an unpleasant business, but the court orders me to
eject all trespassers on the premises, and I’ve got to
do it.”
“The law is being used by an infamous scoundrel to
protect himself. I don’t intend to give in. We can
hold out here for three months, if necessary, and I advise
you to keep away and not be made a tool for a man
like Pickering.”
The sheriff listened respectfully, resting his arms on
top of the wall.
“You ought to understand, Mr. Glenarm, that I ain’t
the court; I’m the sheriff, and it’s not for me to pass
on these questions. I’ve got my orders and I’ve got to
enforce ’em, and I hope you will not make it necessary
for me to use violence. The judge said to me, ‘We deplore
violence in such cases.’ Those were his Honor’s
very words.”
“You may give his Honor my compliments and tell
him that we are sorry not to see things his way, but
there are points involved in this business that he doesn’t
know anything about, and we, unfortunately, have no
time to lay them before him.”
The sheriff’s seeming satisfaction with his position
on the wall and his disposition to parley had begun to
arouse my suspicions, and Larry several times exclaimed
impatiently at the absurdity of discussing my
affairs with a person whom he insisted on calling a constable,
to the sheriff’s evident annoyance. The officer
now turned upon him.
“You, sir,—we’ve got our eye on you, and you’d better
come along peaceable. Laurance Donovan—the description
fits you to a ‘t’.”
“You could buy a nice farm with that reward,
couldn’t you—” began Larry, but at that moment Bates
ran toward us calling loudly.
“They’re coming across the lake, sir,” he reported,
and instantly the sheriff’s head disappeared, and as we
ran toward the house we heard his horse pounding down
the road toward St. Agatha’s.
“The law be damned. They don’t intend to come in
here by the front door as a matter of law,” said Larry.
“Pickering’s merely using the sheriff to give respectability
to his manoeuvers for those notes and the rest
of it.”
It was no time for a discussion of motives. We ran
across the meadow past the water tower and through the
wood down to the boat-house. Far out on the lake we
saw half a dozen men approaching the Glenarm grounds.
They advanced steadily over the light snow that lay upon
the ice, one man slightly in advance and evidently the
leader.
“It’s Morgan!” exclaimed Bates. “And there’s Ferguson.”
Larry chuckled and slapped his thigh.
“Observe that stocky little devil just behind the leader?
He’s my friend from Scotland Yard. Lads! this
is really an international affair.”
“Bates, go back to the house and call at any sign of
attack,” I ordered. “The sheriff’s loose somewhere.”
“And Pickering is directing his forces from afar,”
remarked Stoddard.
“I count ten men in Morgan’s line,” said Larry, “and
the sheriff and his deputy make two more. That’s
twelve, not counting Pickering, that we know of on the
other side.”
“Warn them away before they get much nearer,” suggested
Stoddard. “We don’t want to hurt people if
we can help it,”—and at this I went to the end of the
pier. Morgan and his men were now quite near, and
there was no mistaking their intentions. Most of them
carried guns, the others revolvers and long ice-hooks.
“Morgan,” I called, holding up my hands for a truce,
“we wish you no harm, but if you enter these grounds
you do so at your peril.”
“We’re all sworn deputy sheriffs,” called the caretaker
smoothly. “We’ve got the law behind us.”
“That must be why you’re coming in the back way,”
I replied.
The thick-set man whom Larry had identified as the
English detective now came closer and addressed me in
a high key.
“You’re harboring a bad man, Mr. Glenarm. You’d
better give him up. The American law supports me,
and you’ll get yourself in trouble if you protect that
man. You may not understand, sir, that he’s a very
dangerous character.”
“Thanks, Davidson!” called Larry. “You’d better
keep out of this. You know I’m a bad man with the
shillalah!”
“That you are, you blackguard!” yelled the officer,
so spitefully that we all laughed.
I drew back to the boat-house.
“They are not going to kill anybody if they can help
it,” remarked Stoddard, “any more than we are. Even
deputy sheriffs are not turned loose to do murder, and
the Wabana County Court wouldn’t, if it hadn’t been
imposed on by Pickering, lend itself to a game like
this.”
“Now we’re in for it,” yelled Larry, and the twelve
men, in close order, came running across the ice toward
the shore.
“Open order, and fall back slowly toward the house,”
I commanded. And we deployed from the boat-house,
while the attacking party still clung together,—a strategic
error, as Larry assured us.
“Stay together, lads. Don’t separate; you’ll get lost
if you do,” he yelled.
Stoddard bade him keep still, and we soon had our
hands full with a preliminary skirmish. Morgan’s line
advanced warily. Davidson, the detective, seemed disgusted
at Morgan’s tactics, openly abused the caretaker,
and ran ahead of his column, revolver in hand,
bearing down upon Larry, who held our center.
The Englishman’s haste was his undoing. The light
fall of snow a few days before had gathered in the little
hollows of the wood deceptively. The detective plunged
into one of these and fell sprawling on all fours,—a
calamity that caused his comrades to pause uneasily.
Larry was upon his enemy in a flash, wrenched his pistol
away and pulled the man to his feet.
“Ah, Davidson! There’s many a slip! Move, if you
dare and I’ll plug you with your own gun.” And he
stood behind the man, using him as a shield while Morgan
and the rest of the army hung near the boat-house
uncertainly.
“It’s the strategic intellect we’ve captured, General,”
observed Larry to me. “You see the American invaders
were depending on British brains.”
Morgan now acted on the hint we had furnished him
and sent his men out as skirmishers. The loss of the
detective had undoubtedly staggered the caretaker, and
we were slowly retreating toward the house, Larry with
one hand on the collar of his prisoner and the other
grasping the revolver with which he poked the man
frequently in the ribs. We slowly continued our retreat,
fearing a rush, which would have disposed of us
easily enough if Morgan’s company had shown more of
a fighting spirit. Stoddard’s presence rather amazed
them, I think, and I saw that the invaders kept away
from his end of the line. We were far apart, stumbling
over the snow-covered earth and calling to one another
now and then that we might not become too widely separated.
Davidson did not relish his capture by the man
he had followed across the ocean, and he attempted once
to roar a command to Morgan.
“Try it again,” I heard Larry admonish him, “try
that once more, and The Sod, God bless it! will never
feel the delicate imprint of your web-feet again.”
He turned the man about and rushed him toward the
house, the revolver still serving as a prod. His speed
gave heart to the wary invaders immediately behind him
and two fellows urged and led by Morgan charged our
line at a smart pace.
“Bolt for the front door,” I called to Larry, and Stoddard
and I closed in after him to guard his retreat.
“They’re not shooting,” called Stoddard. “You may
be sure they’ve had their orders to capture the house
with as little row as possible.”
We were now nearing the edge of the wood, with the
open meadow and water-tower at our backs, while Larry
was making good time toward the house.
“Let’s meet them here,” shouted Stoddard.
Morgan was coming up with a club in his hand, making
directly for me, two men at his heels, and the rest
veering off toward the wall of St. Agatha’s.
“Watch the house,” I yelled to the chaplain; and
then, on the edge of the wood Morgan came at me furiously,
swinging his club over his head, and in a moment
we were fencing away at a merry rate. We both had
revolvers strapped to our waists, but I had no intention
of drawing mine unless in extremity. At my right
Stoddard was busy keeping off Morgan’s personal
guard, who seemed reluctant to close with the clergyman.
I have been, in my day, something of a fencer, and
my knowledge of the foils stood me in good stead now.
With a tremendous thwack I knocked Morgan’s club
flying over the snow, and, as we grappled, Bates yelled
from the house. I quickly found that Morgan’s wounded
arm was still tender. He flinched at the first grapple,
and his anger got the better of his judgment. We
kicked up the snow at a great rate as we feinted and
dragged each other about. He caught hold of my belt
with one hand and with a great wrench nearly dragged
me from my feet, but I pinioned his arms and bent
him backward, then, by a trick Larry had taught me,
flung him upon his side. It is not, I confess, a pretty
business, matching your brute strength against that of
a fellow man, and as I cast myself upon him and felt
his hard-blown breath on my face, I hated myself more
than I hated him for engaging in so ignoble a contest.
Bates continued to call from the house.
“Come on at any cost,” shouted Stoddard, putting
himself between me and the men who were flying to
Morgan’s aid.
I sprang away from my adversary, snatching his revolver,
and ran toward the house, Stoddard close behind,
but keeping himself well between me and the men who
were now after us in full cry.
“Shoot, you fools, shoot!” howled Morgan, and as we
reached the open meadow and ran for the house a shot-gun
roared back of us and buckshot snapped and rattled
on the stone of the water tower.
“There’s the sheriff,” called Stoddard behind me.
The officer of the law and his deputy ran into the
park from the gate of St. Agatha’s, while the rest of
Morgan’s party were skirting the wall to join them.
“Stop or I’ll shoot,” yelled Morgan, and I felt Stoddard
pause in his gigantic stride to throw himself between
me and the pursuers.
“Sprint for it hot,” he called very coolly, as though
he were coaching me in a contest of the most amiable
sort imaginable.
“Get away from those guns,” I panted, angered by
the very generosity of his defense.
“Feint for the front entrance and then run for the
terrace and the library-door,” he commanded, as we
crossed the little ravine bridge. “They’ve got us headed
off.”
Twice the guns boomed behind us, and twice I saw
shot cut into the snow about me.
“I’m all right,” called Stoddard reassuringly, still
at my back. “They’re not a bit anxious to kill me.”
I was at the top of my speed now, but the clergyman
kept close at my heels. I was blowing hard, but he
made equal time with perfect ease.
The sheriff was bawling orders to his forces, who
awaited us before the front door. Bates and Larry were
not visible, but I had every confidence that the Irishman
would reappear in the fight at the earliest moment
possible. Bates, too, was to be reckoned with, and the
final struggle, if it came in the house itself, might not
be so unequal, providing we knew the full strength
of the enemy.
“Now for the sheriff—here we go!” cried Stoddard—
beside me—and we were close to the fringe of trees that
shielded the entrance. Then off we veered suddenly to
the left, close upon the terrace, where one of the French
windows was thrown open and Larry and Bates stepped
out, urging us on with lusty cries.
They caught us by the arms and dragged us over
where the balustrade was lowest, and we crowded
through the door and slammed it. As Bates snapped
the bolts Morgan’s party discharged its combined artillery
and the sheriff began a great clatter at the front
door.
“Gentlemen, we’re in a state of siege,” observed
Larry, filling his pipe.
Shot pattered on the wails and several panes of glass
cracked in the French windows.
“All’s tight below, sir,” reported Bates. “I thought
it best to leave the tunnel trap open for our own use.
Those fellows won’t come in that way,—it’s too much
like a blind alley.”
“Where’s your prisoner, Larry?”
“Potato cellar, quite comfortable, thanks!”
It was ten o’clock and the besiegers suddenly withdrew
a short distance for parley among themselves. Outside
the sun shone brightly; and the sky was never bluer.
In this moment of respite, while we made ready for
what further the day might bring forth, I climbed up
to the finished tower to make sure we knew the enemy’s
full strength. I could see over the tree-tops, beyond the
chapel tower, the roofs of St. Agatha’s. There, at least,
was peace. And in that moment, looking over the black
wood, with the snow lying upon the ice of the lake white
and gleaming under the sun, I felt unutterably lonely
and heart-sick, and tired of strife. It seemed a thousand
years ago that I had walked and talked with the
child Olivia; and ten thousand years more since the
girl in gray at the Annandale station had wakened in
me a higher aim, and quickened a better impulse than I
had ever known.
Larry roared my name through the lower floors. I
went down with no wish in my heart but to even matters
with Pickering and be done with my grandfather’s
legacy for ever.
“The sheriff and Morgan have gone back toward the
lake,” reported Larry.
“They’ve gone to consult their chief,” I said. “I
wish Pickering would lead his own battalions. It would
give social prestige to the fight.”
“Bah, these women!” And Larry tore the corner
from a cartridge box.
Stoddard, with a pile of clubs within reach, lay on
his back on the long leather couch, placidly reading his
Greek testament. Bates, for the first time since my arrival,
seemed really nervous and anxious. He pulled a
silver watch from his pocket several times, something I
had never seen him do before. He leaned against the
table, looking strangely tired and worn, and I saw him
start nervously as he felt Larry’s eyes on him.
“I think, sir, I’d better take another look at the outer
gates,” he remarked to me quite respectfully.
His disturbed air aroused my old antagonism. Was
he playing double in the matter? Did he seek now an
excuse for conveying some message to the enemy?
“You’ll stay where you are,” I said sharply, and I
found myself restlessly fingering my revolver.
“Very good, sir,”—and the hurt look in his eyes
touched me.
“Bates is all right,” Larry declared, with an emphasis
that was meant to rebuke me.