The moon had now come up, flooding the valley with silver radiance. We
found our horses at once, and Tish leaped into the saddle. Being heavier
and also out of breath from having stumbled over a log, I was somewhat
slower.
Tish was therefore in advance of me when we started, and it was she who
caught sight of him first.
"He's got a horse, Lizzie," she called back to me. "We can get him, I
think. Remember, he is unarmed."
Fortunately he had made for the trail, which was here wider than
ordinary and gleamed white in the moonlight. We had, however, lost some
time in fording the stream, and we had but the one glimpse of him as the
trail curved.
Tish lashed her horse to a lope, and mine followed without urging.
I had, unfortunately, lost a stirrup early in the chase, and was
compelled, being unable to recover it, to drop the lines and clutch
the saddle.
Twice Tish fired into the air. She explained afterward that she did this
for the moral effect on the fugitive, but as each time it caused my
horse to jump and almost unseat me, at last I begged her to desist.
We struck at last into a straight piece of trail, ending in a wall of
granite, and up this the trail climbed in a switchback. Tish turned to
me.
"We have him now," she said. "When he starts up there he is as much gone
as a fly on the wall. As a matter of fact," she said as calmly as though
we had been taking an afternoon stroll, "his taking this trail shows
that he is a novice and no real highwayman. Otherwise he would have
turned off into the woods."
At that moment the fugitive's horse emerged into the moonlight and Tish
smiled grimly.
"I see why now," she exclaimed. "The idiot has happened on Mona Lisa,
who must have returned and followed us. And no pack-horse can be made to
leave the trail unless by means of a hornet. Look, he's trying to pull
her off and she won't go."
It was true, as we now perceived. He saw his danger, but too late. Mona
Lisa, probably still disagreeable after her experience with the hornets,
held straight for the cliff.
The moon shone full on it, and when he was only thirty feet up its face
Tish fired again, and the fugitive stopped.
"Come down," said Tish quietly.
He said a great many things which, like his earlier language, I do not
care to repeat. But after a second shot he began to descend slowly.
Tish, however, approached him warily, having given her revolver to me.
"He might try to get it from me, Lizzie," she observed. "Keep it pointed
in our direction, but not at us. I'm going to tie him again."
This she proceeded to do, tying his hands behind him and fastening his
belt also to the horn of the saddle, but leaving his feet free. All this
was done to the accompaniment of bitter vituperation. She pretended to
ignore this, but it made an impression evidently, for at last she
replied.
"You have no one to blame but yourself," she said. "You deserve your
present humiliating position, and you know it. I've made up my mind to
take you all in and expose your cruel scheme, and I intend to do it. I'm
nothing if I am not thorough," she finished.
He made no reply to this, and, in fact, he made only one speech on the
way back, and that, I am happy to say, was without profanity.
"It isn't being taken in that I mind so much," he said pathetically.
"It's all in the game, and I can stand up as well under trouble as any
one. It's being led in by a crowd of women that makes it painful."
I have neglected to say that Tish was leading Mona Lisa, while I
followed with the revolver.
It was not far from dawn when we reached the camp again. Aggie was as we
had left her, but in the light of the dying fire she looked older and
much worn. As a matter of fact, it was some weeks before she looked like
her old self.
The girl was sitting where we had left her, and sulkier than ever. She
had turned her back to Mr. Oliver, and Aggie said afterward that the way
they had quarreled had been something terrible.
Aggie said she had tried to make conversation with the girl, and had,
indeed, told her of Mr. Wiggins and her own blasted life. But she had
remained singularly unresponsive.
The return of our new prisoner was greeted by the other men with brutal
rage, except Mr. Oliver, who merely glanced at him and then went back to
his staring at the fire. It appeared that they had been counting on him
to get assistance, and his capture destroyed their last hope. Indeed,
their language grew so unpleasant that at last Tish hammered sharply on
a rock with the handle of her revolver.
"Please remember," she said, "that you are in the presence of ladies!"
They jeered at her, but she handled the situation with her usual
generalship.
"Lizzie," she said calmly, "get the tin basin that is hanging to my
saddle, and fill it with the water from that snowbank. On the occasion
of any more unseemly language, pour it over the offender without mercy."
It became necessary to do it, I regret to state. They had not yet
learned that Tish always carries out her threats. It was the one who we
felt was the leader who offended, and I did as I had been requested to.
But Aggie, ever tender-hearted, feared that it would give the man a
severe cold, and got Tish's permission to pour a little blackberry
cordial down his throat.
Far from this kindness having a salubrious effect, it had the contrary.
They all fell to bad language again, and, realizing that they wished the
cordial, and our supply being limited, we were compelled to abandon the
treatment.
It had been an uncomfortable night, and I confess to a feeling of relief
when "the rift of dawn" broke the early skies.
We were, Tish calculated, some forty miles from breakfast, and Aggie's
diet for some days had been light at the best, even the mountain-lion
broth having been more stimulating than staying. We therefore
investigated the camp, and found behind a large stone some flour,
baking-powder, and bacon. With this equipment and a frying-pan or two we
were able to make some very fair pancakes--or flapjacks, as they are
called in the West.
Tish civilly invited the girl to eat with us, but she refused curtly,
although, on turning once, I saw her eyeing us with famished eyes. I
think, however, that on seeing us going about the homely task of getting
breakfast, she realized that we were not the desperate creatures she had
fancied during the night, but three gentlewomen on a holiday--simple
tourists, indeed.
"I wish," she said at last almost wistfully--"I wish that I could
understand it all. I seem to be all mixed up. You don't suppose I want
to be here, do you?"
But Tish was not in a mood to make concessions. "As for what you want,"
she said, "how are we to know that? You are here, aren't you?--here as
a result of your own cold-heartedness. Had you remained true to the very
estimable young man you jilted you would not now be in this position."
"Of course he would talk about it!" said the girl darkly.
"I am convinced," Tish went on, dexterously turning a pancake by a swift
movement of the pan, "that sensational movies are responsible for much
that is wrong with the country to-day. They set false standards.
Perfectly pure-minded people see them and are filled with thoughts of
crime."
Although she had ignored him steadily, the girl turned now to Mr.
Oliver.
"They don't believe anything I tell them. Why don't you explain?" she
demanded.
"Explain!" he said in a furious voice. "Explain to three lunatics?
What's the use?"
"You got me into this, you know."
"I did! I like that! What in the name of Heaven induced you to ride off
the way you did?"
Tish paused, with the frying-pan in the air. "Silence!" she commanded.
"You are both only reaping what you have sowed. As far as quarreling
goes, you can keep that until you are married, if you intend to be. I
don't know but I'd advise it. It's a pity to spoil two houses."
But the girl said that she wouldn't marry him if he was the last man on
earth, and he fell back to sulking again.
As Aggie observed later, he acted as if he had never cared for her,
while Mr. Bell, on the contrary, could not help his face changing when
he so much as mentioned her name.
We made some tea and ate a hearty breakfast, while the men watched us.
And as we ate, Tish held the moving-picture business up to contumely and
scorn.
"Lady," said one of the prostrate men, "aren't you going to give us
anything to eat?"
"People," Tish said, ignoring him, "who would ordinarily cringe at the
sight of a wounded beetle sit through bloody murders and go home with
the obsession of crime."
"I hope you won't take it amiss," said the man again, "if I say that,
seeing it's our flour and bacon, you either ought to feed us or take it
away and eat it where we can't see you."
"I take it," said Tish to the girl, pouring in more batter, "that you
yourself would never have thought of highway robbery had you not been
led to it by an overstimulated imagination."
"I wish," said the girl rudely, "that you wouldn't talk so much. I've
got a headache."
When we had finished Tish indicated the frying-pan and the batter.
"Perhaps," she said, "you would like to bake some cakes for these
friends of yours. We have a long trip ahead of us."
But the girl replied heartlessly that she hoped they would starve to
death, ignoring their pitiful glances. In the end it was our own
tender-hearted Aggie who baked pancakes for them and, loosening their
hands while I stood guard, saw that they had not only food but the
gentle refreshment of fresh tea. Tish it was, however, who, not to be
outdone in magnanimity, permitted them to go, one by one, to the stream
to wash. Escape, without horses or weapons, was impossible, and they
realized it.
By nine o'clock we were ready to return. And here a difficulty presented
itself. There were six prisoners and only three of us. The men, fed now,
were looking less subdued, although they pretended to obey Tish's
commands with alacrity.
Aggie overheard a scrap of conversation, too, which seemed to indicate
that they had not given up hope. Had Tish not set her heart on leading
them into the great hotel at Many Glaciers, and there exposing them to
the taunts of angry tourists, it would have been simpler for one of us
to ride for assistance, leaving the others there.
In this emergency Tish, putting her hand into her pocket for her
scissors to trim a hangnail, happened to come across the policeman's
whistle.
"My gracious!" she said. "I forgot my promise to that young man!"
She immediately put it to her lips and blew three shrill blasts. To our
surprise they were answered by a halloo, and a moment later the young
gentleman himself appeared on the trail. He was no longer afoot, but was
mounted on a pinto pony, which we knew at once for Bill's.
He sat on his horse, staring as if he could not believe his eyes. Then
he made his way across the stream toward us.
"Good Heavens!" he said. "What in the name of--" Here his eyes fell on
the girl, and he stiffened.
"Jim!" cried the girl, and looked at him with what Aggie afterward
characterized as a most touching expression.
But he ignored her. "Looks as though you folks have been pretty busy,"
he observed, glancing at our scowling captives. "I'm a trifle surprised.
You don't mind my being rather breathless, do you?"
"My only regret," Tish said loftily, "is that we have not secured the
Indians. They too should be taught a lesson. I am sure that the red man
is noble until led away by civilized people who might know better."
It was at this point that Mr. Bell's eyes fell on Mr. Oliver, who with
his hands tied behind him was crouching over the fire.
"Well!" he said. "So you're here too! But of course you would be." This
he said bitterly.
"For the love of Heaven, Bell," Mr. Oliver said, "tell those mad women
that I'm not a bandit."
"We know that already," Tish observed.
"And untie my hands. My shoulders are about broken."
But Mr. Bell only looked at him coldly. "I can't interfere with these
ladies," he said. "They're friends of mine. If they think you are better
tied, it's their business. They did it."
"At least," Mr. Oliver said savagely, "you can tell them who I am, can't
you?"
"As to that," Mr. Bell returned, "I can only tell them what you say you
are. You must remember that I know nothing about you. Helen knows much
more than I do."
"Jim," cried the girl, "surely you are going to tell these women that we
are not highway robbers. Tell them the truth. Tell them I am not a
highway robber. Tell them that these men are not my accomplices, that I
never saw them before."
"You must remember," he replied in an icy tone, "that I no longer know
your friends. It is some days since you and I parted company. And you
must admit that one of them is a friend of yours--as well as I can
judge, a very close friend."
She was almost in tears, but she persisted. "At least," she said, "you
can tell them that I did not rob that woman on the pass. They are going
to lead us in to Many Glaciers, and--Jim, you won't let them, will you?
I'll die of shame."
But he was totally unmoved. As Aggie said afterward, no one would have
thought that, but a day or two before, he had been heartbroken because
she was in love with someone else.
"As to that," he said, "it is questionable, according to Mrs.
Ostermaier, that nothing was taken from you, and that as soon as the
attack was over you basely deserted her and followed the bandits. A full
description of you, which I was able to correct in one or two trifling
details, is now in the hands of the park police."
She stared at him with fury in her eyes. "I hope you will never speak to
me again," she cried.
"You said that the last time I saw you, Helen. If you will think, you
will remember that you addressed me first just now."
She stamped her foot.
"Of course," he said politely, "you can see my position. You maintain
and possibly believe that these--er--acquaintances of yours"--he
indicated the men--"are not members of the moving-picture outfit. Also
that your being with them is of an accidental nature. But, on the other
hand--"
She put her fingers in her ears and turned her back on him.
"On the other hand," he went on calmly, "I have the word of these three
respectable ladies that they are the outfit, or part of it, that they
have just concluded a cruel hoax on unsuspecting tourists, and that they
justly deserve to be led in as captives and exposed to the full ignominy
of their position."
Here she faced him again, and this time she was quite pale. "Ask
those--those women where they found my engagement ring," she said. "One
of those wretches took it from me. That ought to be proof enough that
they are not from the moving-picture outfit."
Tish at once produced the ring and held it out to him. But he merely
glanced at it and shook his head.
"All engagement rings look alike," he observed. "I cannot possibly say,
Helen, but I think it is unlikely that it is the one I gave you, as you
told me, you may recall, that you had thrown it into a crack in a
glacier. It may, of course, be one you have recently acquired."
He glanced at Mr. Oliver, but the latter only shrugged his shoulders.
Well, she shed a few tears, but he was adamant, and helped us saddle the
horses, ignoring her utterly. It was our opinion that he no longer cared
for her, and that, having lost him, she now regretted it. I know that
she watched him steadily when he was not looking her way. But he went
round quite happily, whistling a bit of tune, and not at all like the
surly individual we had at first thought him.
The ride back was without much incident. Our prisoners rode with their
hands tied behind them, except the young lady.
"We might as well leave her unfastened," the young man said casually.
"While I dare say she would make her escape if possible, and
particularly if there was any chance of getting filmed while doing it,
I will make myself personally responsible."
As a matter of fact she was exceedingly rude to all of us, and during
our stop for luncheon, which was again bacon and pancakes, she made a
dash for her horse. The young man saw her, however, in time, and brought
her back. From that time on she was more civil, but I saw her looking at
him now and then, and her eyes were positively terrified.
It was Aggie, at last, who put in a plea for her with him, drawing him
aside to do so. "I am sure," she said, "that she is really a nice girl,
and has merely been led astray by the search for adventure. Naturally my
friends, especially Miss Tish, have small sympathy with such a state of
mind. But you are younger--and remember, you loved her once."
"Loved her once!" he replied. "Dear lady, I'm so crazy about her at this
minute that I can hardly hold myself in."
"You are not acting much like it."
"The fact is," he replied, "I'm afraid to let myself go. And if she's
learned a lesson, I have too. I've been her doormat long enough. I tried
it and it didn't work. She's caring more for me now, at this minute,
than she has in eleven months. She needs a strong hand, and, by George!
I've got it--two of them, in fact."
We reached Many Glaciers late that afternoon, and Tish rode right up to
the hotel. Our arrival created the most intense excitement, and Tish,
although pleased, was rather surprised. It was not, however, until a
large man elbowed his way through the crowd and took possession of the
prisoners that we understood.
"I'll take them now," he said. "Well, George, how are you?"
This was to the leader, who merely muttered in reply.
"I'd like to leave them here for a short time," Tish stated. "They
should be taught a severe lesson and nothing stings like ridicule. After
that you can turn them free, but I think they ought to be discharged."
"Turn them free!" he said in a tone of amazement. "Discharged! My dear
madam, they will get fifteen years' hard labor, I hope. And that's too
good for them."
Then suddenly the crowd began to cheer. It was some time before Tish
realized that they were cheering us. And even then, I shall have to
confess, we did not understand until the young man explained to me.
"You see," he said, "I didn't like to say anything sooner, for fear of
making you nervous. You'd done it all so well that I wanted you to
finish it. You've been in the right church all along, but the wrong
pew. Those fellows aren't movie actors, except Oliver, who will be
freed now, and come after me with a gun, as like as not! They're real
dyed-in-the-wool desperadoes and there's a reward of five thousand
dollars for capturing them."
Tish went rather white, but said nothing. Aggie, however, went into a
paroxysm of sneezing, and did not revive until given aromatic ammonia
to inhale.
"I was fooled at first too," the young man said. "We'd been expecting a
holdup and when it came we thought it was the faked one. But the
person"--he paused and looked round--"the person who had the real jolt
was Helen. She followed them, since they didn't take her for ransom, as
had been agreed in the plot.
"Then, when she found her mistake, they took her along, for fear she'd
ride off and raise the alarm. All in all," he said reflectively, "it has
been worth about a million dollars to me."
We went into the hotel, with the crowd following us, and the first thing
we saw was Mrs. Ostermaier, sitting dejectedly by the fire. When she saw
us, she sprang to her feet and came to meet us.
"Oh, Miss Tish, Miss Tish!" she said. "What I have been through!
Attacked on a lonely mountain-top and robbed of everything. My reason is
almost gone. And my earrings, my beautiful earrings!"
Tish said nothing, but, reaching into her reticule, which she had taken
from the horn of her saddle, she drew out a number of things.
"Here," she said. "Are your earrings. Here also is Mr. Ostermaier's
cigar-case, but empty. Here is some money too. I'll keep that, however,
until I know how much you lost."
"Tish!" screeched Mrs. Ostermaier. "You found them!"
"Yes," Tish said somewhat wearily, "we found them. We found a number of
things, Mrs. Ostermaier,--four bandits, and two lovers, or rather three,
but so no longer, and your things, and a reward of five thousand
dollars, and an engagement ring. I think," she said, "that I'd like a
hot bath and something to eat."
Mrs. Ostermaier was gloating over her earrings, but she looked up at
Tish's tired and grimy face, at the mud encrusted on me from my accident
the day before, at Aggie in her turban.
"Go and wash, all of you," she said kindly, "and I'll order some hot
tea."
But Tish shook her head. "Tea nothing!" she said firmly. "I want a
broiled sirloin steak and potatoes. And"--she looked Mrs. Ostermaier
full in the eye--"I am going to have a cocktail. I need it."
Late that evening Aggie came to Tish's room, where I was sitting with
her. Tish was feeling entirely well, and more talkative than I can
remember her in years. But the cocktail, which she felt, she said, in no
other way, had gone to her legs.
"It is not," she observed, "that I cannot walk. I can, perfectly well.
But I am obliged to keep my eyes on my feet, and it might be noticed."
"I just came in," Aggie said, "to say that Helen and her lover have made
it up. They are down by the lake now, and if you will look out you can
see them."
I gave Tish an arm to the window, and the three of us stood and looked
out. The moon was rising over the snow-capped peaks across the lake, and
against its silver pathway the young people stood outlined. As we looked
he stooped and kissed her. But it was a brief caress, as if he had just
remembered the strong hand and being a doormat long enough.
Tish drew a long breath.
"What," she said, "is more beautiful than young love? It will be a
comfort to remember that we brought them together. Let go of me now,
Lizzie. If I keep my eye on the bedpost I think I can get back."