IN WHICH THE SPECIAL DETECTIVE TAKES UP THE HUNT
After dinner, Ashton-Kirk smoked a cigar with his friend; then he
retired to dress for the journey to Marlowe Furnace. When he reappeared
he wore a rough, well-fitting grey suit, a grey flannel shirt, a cloth
cap and a pair of springy tan shoes. In his hand he held a heavy
hickory stick, which he balanced like a swordsman.
“You looked primed for work,” approved Bat Scanlon, as he stood up and
buttoned his coat across his big chest.
“Your story of the doings in and about Schwartzberg holds out a promise
of entertainment,” smiled Ashton-Kirk. “And I’ve noticed that things of
that sort are always more appreciated if they are prepared for and met
half-way.”
“Good!” praised Mr. Scanlon, who was in high good humour at his success
in gaining the interest of the specialist in the unusual. “Fine! That’s
the kind of talk I like to hear. It puts a man somewhere. Locking
himself up and shivering never got anybody anything yet. And then
going mad and rushing out to have unseen parties chop at him is even
worse. When I taught boxing to the boys out at Shaweegan College I used
to hand them this advice: ‘Always keep after your man--don’t let him
get settled. And the best guard for a blow is another blow--started
sooner.’”
“Excellent,” agreed Ashton-Kirk. “And it’s a thousand pities you
didn’t impress it upon young Campe. If you had, he’d never have been in
his present state of mind and body.”
The huge shoulders of Scanlon shrugged in disbelief.
“Campe was past all reason when I got to him,” maintained he. “To talk
candidly would only have spoilt any chance I had of doing him a good
turn.”
The 8.4 was a dusty ill-kept train, which started and stopped with
a series of jerks. After an hour on board of it, among a lot of
uncomfortable, sour-looking passengers, the two got off at Marlowe
Furnace. The station was a shed-like structure with a platform of
hard-packed earth, and a brace of flaring oil lamps. An ancient, with
a wisp of beard and thumbs tucked under a pair of braces, watched them
get off.
“The station agent,” said Scanlon.
The train went panting and glaring away into the darkness; it had
disappeared around a bend when the station official nodded to Scanlon.
“Evening,” greeted he.
“Hello,” said Scanlon.
“Back again, I see.”
“Yes--once more.”
“Nobody asked for you to-night.”
“That so?” said Scanlon, his glance going to Ashton-Kirk.
The detective dug carelessly at the hard-packed earth of the platform
with the tip of the hickory stick.
“The person who asked for my friend the last time he stopped off here
was a stranger to you, I understand.”
The ancient official took one of the thumbs from under a brace and
raked it thoughtfully through the wisp of beard.
“Don’t remember ever seeing him before,” stated he.
“I suppose you couldn’t recall what he looked like?”
The ancient looked injured.
“I’m sixty-seven year old,” said he, “but I got good eyesight, and a
better memory than most. That man I talked to that night was a stranger
at the Furnace. If I’d ever set an eye on him before I’d remembered
him. He was fat and white and soft looking. And he talked soft and
walked soft. When he went away, I’d kind of a feeling that I’d been
talking to a batter pudding.”
“Have you seen him since?” asked the crime student.
The old man shook his head.
“No. And I don’t know how he got here or went away, unless he drove or
come in a motor. He didn’t use the trains.”
The road down toward the river was steep, and lined with trees
upon each side; their interwoven branches overhead, as Scanlon had
explained, were dense enough to keep out most of the light. “It’s
pretty much the same kind of a night as the one I used when I first
came here,” said Bat. “Stars, but no moon.”
The wooden bridge, with a peaked roof over it, crossed the river at the
foot of the road; the square openings upon either side showed the dark
water flowing sullenly along.
“Look,” and Bat Scanlon pointed out at one of the windows of the
bridge. “There are the lights of Schwartzberg.”
Some distance away--perhaps a mile--and high above the west bank of
the river, hung a cluster of lights. So lonely were these, and so
pale and cold that they might well have marked the retreat of some
necromancer, in which he pored over his dark books of magic.
“It’s a peculiar thing,” said Ashton-Kirk, his eyes upon the far-off
lights, “what various forms fear takes. Here is a man who, apparently,
is in constant terror of some one, or something, and yet we find him
lodged stubbornly in a place where a secret blow might be levelled at
him with the greatest ease.”
“That struck me more than once,” spoke Mr. Scanlon. “And I felt like
putting it to him as a question shaped something like: ‘Why stay here
when there’s places where there’s more folks? Why stick around a spot
where there’s always some one cutting in with an unwelcome surprise,
when you can get good house-room in places where there’s plenty of
burglar alarms?’”
Their feet sounded drearily upon the loose planks of the bridge; and
when they emerged at the far end they found themselves upon a narrow
road which ran off into the darkness.
“On, over the hills, in and out, and up and down, until it lands you at
Schwartzberg gate,” said Scanlon.
They climbed to the top of a hill; the sky was thick with stars, and
the light from them touched the high places with pale hands. But the
hollows were black and deep looking; mystery followed the course of the
slowly running river.
“What is there round about Campe’s place?” asked the crime specialist.
“Is this the only road that leads there? What are his neighbours like?”
“To the first of those questions,” said Mr. Scanlon, “I reply,
fields--also hills--also woods. There are roads passing Schwartzberg
upon either side. As to neighbours, there’s a few farmers, and their
help. And then there’s the man who flags the bad crossing down by the
river, and the inn.”
“Ah, yes, you mentioned the inn before,” said Ashton-Kirk.
“A big, old-fashioned place--built back in the old days.”
“With a wide hearth and a hearty old landlord, whose father and
grandfather owned the house before him.”
“Well, that’s how it ought to be, to be in the picture; but it happens
that this landlord has been here for only about six months.”
Scanlon heard the hickory stick slashing at a clump of dried brush;
then the crime specialist spoke:
“How far away is it?”
“A couple of miles.”
“Maybe it’d be as well if we went there and bespoke a bed, if they’ll
take us in,” said Ashton-Kirk.
Scanlon seemed surprised.
“I guess they’ve got room,” said he. “But I had it in my mind you were
going to Schwartzberg.”
“I will pay it a visit, if I’m permitted, when I’ve had a chance to see
something of its surroundings. Your story, you see, shows plainly that,
whatever the nature of Campe’s danger, it comes from the outside.”
Scanlon seemed struck by this; then he nodded and said:
“I guess that’s right. But don’t you think a good chance to pump Campe
for some inside information would be better than anything else?”
“In its proper place, perhaps. But I want to look over the outside,
uninfluenced. Five minutes’ talk with a man in Campe’s state of
mind might colour one’s thoughts to such an extent that it would be
difficult to see anything except with his eyes.”
“That sounds sensible enough,” agreed Bat. “And if there’s anything in
the world you don’t want to get doing, it’s seeing things as he sees
them.”
They followed the narrow road for some distance, and then the big man
turned off into a path which led through a stretch of farm land.
“This is a short cut,” said he. “I followed it frequently when I was
out with the gun. It’ll bring us to a road a bit beyond this wood; and
the road leads on to the inn.”
A hundred yards further on they topped the crest of a hill; before them
loomed a dense growth of trees which covered the slopes round about.
“It’s a fine kind of a place in summer, I should think,” said Scanlon,
as they halted. “But of an autumn night when the air gets chill, the
stars look far away, and there’s a pretty well settled belief that some
queer things are about, it’s got its weak side. When I was staying in
Canyon, I swore in as a deputy one night and started out into the hills
with the magistrate to look for two lads who’d held up a train and got
away with a bag full of money. That country was much wilder than this,
and was further away from anywhere; but,” with a look at the gloomy
wooded slopes, “believe me, it couldn’t compare with this for that
uncertain feeling.”
As they stood gazing about, Ashton-Kirk’s head suddenly went up. He
bent forward in the attitude of listening.
“What is it?” asked the big man.
“Hark!”
Far away, among the hills to the north, came a deep muttering, Scanlon
clutched the crime specialist’s arm.
“That’s it!” he cried. “Listen to it lift. It’s the thing I heard
roaring in the night.”
Low, growling, ominous at first, the sound grew in volume. Then it
pealed like a mighty voice, rolling and echoing from hill to hill,
finally subsiding and dying in the muttering with which it began.
“According to custom,” remarked Scanlon, in an uneasy tone, “Campe is
now due to take his gun in hand and dash for the gate. And, if he does,
they’ll do more than slash him. I’ve got an idea they’ll get him this
time.”
As he said the last word, a shaft of brilliant light shot from the
tower of Schwartzberg, and flashed to and fro across the countryside.
Then came the quick, far-off pulsation of a rifle; in the widening beam
of white light they saw a woman crouching down as though in fear; and
then they caught the figure of a man, running as though for his life.