Only Miss Brewster herself could have answered the question of her
whereabouts at the exact moment of Van Lew's asking. She was left
behind, standing aghast in the midst of tumults, on the platform of the
Crow's Nest. Terrified, like the others, at the sudden outburst of
violence, she had ventured from the car to look for Lidgerwood's
messenger, and in the moment of frightened bewilderment the _Nadia_ had
been whisked away.
Naturally, her first impulse was to fly, and the only refuge that
offered was the superintendent's office on the second floor. The
stairway door was only a little distance down the platform, and she was
presently groping her way up the stair, praying that she might not find
the offices as dark and deserted as the lower story of the building
seemed to be.
The light of the shop-yard fire, and that of the burning box-car nearer
at hand, shone redly through the upper corridor windows, enabling her
to go directly to the open door of the superintendent's office. But when
she reached the door and looked within, the trembling terror returned
and held her spell-bound, speechless, unable to move or even to cry out.
What she saw fitted itself to nothing real; it was more like a scene
clipped from a play. Two masked men were covering with revolvers a
third, who was tied helpless in a chair. The captive's face was ghastly
and blood-stained, and at first she thought he was dead. Then she saw
his lips move in curious twitchings that showed his teeth. He seemed to
be trying to speak, but the ruffian at his right would not give him
leave.
"This is where you pass out, Mr. Lidgerwood," the man was saying
threateningly. "You give us your word that you will resign and leave the
Red Butte Western for keeps, or you'll sit in that chair till somebody
comes to take you out and bury you."
The twitching lips were controlled with what appeared to be an almost
superhuman effort, but the words came jerkily.
"What would my word, extorted--under such conditions--be worth to you?"
Eleanor could hear, in spite of the terror that would not let her cry
out or run for help. He was yielding to them, bargaining for his life!
"We'll take it," said the spokesman coolly. "If you break faith with us
there are more than two of us who will see to it that you don't live
long enough to brag about it. You've had your day, and you've got to
go."
"And if I refuse?" Eleanor made sure that the voice was steadier now.
"It's this, here and now," grated the taller man who had hitherto kept
silence, and he cocked his revolver and jammed the muzzle of it against
the bleeding temple of the man in the chair.
The captive straightened himself as well as his bonds would let him.
"You--you've let the psychological moment go by, gentlemen: I--I've got
my second wind. You may burn and destroy and shoot as you please, but
while I'm alive I'll stay with you. Blaze away, if that's what you want
to do."
The horror-stricken watcher at the door covered her face with her hands
to shut out the sight of the murder. It was not until Lidgerwood's
voice, calm and even-toned and taunting, broke the silence that she
ventured to look again.
[Illustration: "Well, gentlemen, I'm waiting. Why don't you shoot?"]
"Well, gentlemen, I'm waiting. Why don't you shoot? You are greater
cowards than I have ever been, with all my shiverings and
teeth-chatterings. Isn't the stake big enough to warrant your last
desperate play? I'll make it bigger. You are the two men who broke the
rail-joint at Silver Switch. Ah, that hits you, doesn't it?"
"Shut up!" growled the tall man, with a frightful imprecation. But the
smaller of the two was silent.
Lidgerwood's grin was ghastly, but it was nevertheless a teeth-baring of
defiance.
"You curs!" he scoffed. "You haven't even the courage of your own
necessities! Why don't you pluck up the nerve to shoot, and be done with
it? I'll make it still more binding upon you: if you don't kill me now,
while you have the chance, as God is my witness I'll hang you both for
those murders last night at Silver Switch. I know you, in spite of your
flimsy disguise: _I can call you both by name_!"
Out in the yard the yellings and shoutings had taken on a new note, and
the windows of the upper room were jarring with the thunder of incoming
trains. Eleanor Brewster heard the new sounds vaguely: the jangle and
clank of the trains, the quick, steady tramp of disciplined men,
snapped-out words of command, the sudden cessation of the riot clamor,
and now a shuffling of feet on the stairway behind her.
Still she could not move; still she was speechless and spell-bound, but
no longer from terror. Her cousin--her lover--how she had misjudged him!
He a coward? This man who was holding his two executioners at bay,
quelling them, cowing them, by the sheer force of the stronger will, and
of a courage that was infinitely greater than theirs?
The shuffling footsteps came nearer, and once again Lidgerwood
straightened himself in his chair, this time with a mighty struggle that
broke the knotted cords and freed him.
"I said I could name you, and I will!" he cried, springing to his feet.
"You," pointing to the smaller man, "you are Pennington Flemister; and
you," wheeling upon the tall man and lowering his voice, "you are Rankin
Hallock!"
The light of the fire in the shop yard had died down until its red glow
no longer drove the shadows from the corners of the room. Eleanor shrank
aside when a dozen men pushed their way into the private office. Then,
suddenly the electric lights went on, and a gruff voice said, "Drop them
guns, you two. The show's over."
It was McCloskey who gave the order, and it was obeyed sullenly. With
the clatter of the weapons on the floor, the door of the outer office
opened with a jerk, and Judson thrust a hand-cuffed prisoner of his own
capturing into the lighted room.
"There he is, Mr. Lidgerwood," snarled the engineer-constable. "I nabbed
him over yonder at the fire, workin' to put it out, just as if he hadn't
told his gang to go and set it!"
"Hallock!" exclaimed the superintendent, starting as if he had seen a
ghost. "How is this? Are there two of you?"
Hallock looked down moodily. "There were two of us who wanted your job,
and the other one needed it badly enough to wreck trains and to kill
people, and to lead a lot of pig-headed trainmen and mechanics into a
riot to cover his tracks."