A PROMISE THAT IS A THREAT
The silence in that little gray home out there on the snow-blown prairies
lasted for ten long moments. To those who waited time seemed to creep at
a snail's pace. Drew Lane, shifting uneasily in his chair, was about to
suggest something--he will never know what--when, sudden as before, all
thoughts were drawn to the mysterious talking reflector against the wall.
The instant a voice broke the silence in that corner, Drew Lane leaped to
his feet. Tom Howe, crouching like a cat, remained motionless in his
chair. There was something menacing, sinister, altogether terrible about
that voice. The words, more spoken than whispered, caused Johnny's blood
to freeze in his veins.
"Listen, you Hell hounds!" Those were the words. "Listen! You whisper, do
you? Well, so do we! You narrow-cast, and you think we can't listen.
Well, we can!
"Listen!" The voice became more terrible. "You have been on our trail
long enough! Public enemies! Bah!"
As if choked with words, the voice ceased for a second. Everyone in the
room had turned into a statue. Only the cat was unconscious of it all. He
purred loudly in his place among the cushions. And the windmill, poor
thing of rusty steel, it uttered one more unearthly scream.
"Listen!" The voice was hoarse with hate. "We got you, see? Got all of
you. You'll never leave that place, see? Not one of you all! Christmas
Eve. It's a laugh!" There came a hoarse chuckle that was terrible to
hear. "Hang up your stockings! Get 'em up quick! We're coming to fill
'em, and we'll fill 'em right with machine gun slugs! That's how they'll
be filled!
"Good-night, everyone!" The speaker's voice dropped to a mocking
imitation of a radio announcer. "Good-night. And a Merry Christmas to
all!"
For a full moment the silence in that little parlor, that through the
years had witnessed so much of joy and sorrow, was profound.
"It's a joke," Spider said hoarsely at last.
"It's no joke!" Drew Lane's lips were white. "I know that voice.
"I only wish," he said slowly, "that you ladies were out of it. Those
fellows have machine guns. If they cut loose, they'll riddle this place."
"I'm a detective's daughter." Joyce Mills stood up square shouldered and
slim.
"And I a slain policeman's widow." Madame LeClare stood up at her side.
"And I his child." Alice was not smiling as she joined the two. There was
a glint of fire in her dark eyes.
"Is--is that Iggy the Snake?" Madame LeClare asked.
"Beyond doubt it is." Drew's eyes were gleaming. "He and his gang, the
men who killed Jack LeClare, the men we swore to get. And with God's help
we'll get them yet!" He set his teeth hard.
"You ladies can shoot?" he said in a changed voice.
"As well as any man!" Madame held up her head proudly.
"That's good! Let's see." Drew moved to the cupboard by the stairs. "The
Captain showed me a new sort of gas bomb. Yes, here it is. Puts 'em out
completely for a full half hour. Be swell if we could use it."
"But they'll be a respectful distance away," Tom Howe objected. "How can
we?"
"That's right. Have to trust our automatics, I guess. Here!" Drew handed
one of his guns to Johnny.
"And you." Tom passed a thing of blue metal to Madame LeClare as if it
were a bouquet of roses. She accepted it with a bow.
"There's no phone--no way of spreading an alarm." Drew spoke calmly. "No
one passes this way at night. They've got till morning. Johnny, has the
place a cellar?"
"Only a hole for vegetables--no windows."
"No use to us. They'd burn the house. Smother us like rats. We'll have to
stand our ground, every one at a window. This is the way our forefathers
fought savages." His voice had grown husky.
"These are more savage than they!" Madame LeClare added.
"We might make a dash for it. Try getting away in the cars," Tom Howe
suggested.
"They may be all set to mow us down as we come out," Drew objected.
"We've not been watching, you know. But we'd better be, right now!" His
tone changed. "We'll set a watch at the windows. There's one on every
side. We'll watch in pairs. Misery loves company. You and you there; you
and you--" He pointed them to their places rapidly.
Johnny found himself settled upon a cushion behind the low window in the
small southwest room. At his side, so close he fancied he felt her heart
beat, was Alice LeClare. He thanked Drew for that. If the watch were to
be long, here was pleasant company. Then, too, he had learned by the
glint in her dark eyes that, if worse came to worst, if he were wounded,
out of the combat, this splendid girl would fight over him as bravely and
savagely as any Indian fighter's wife had fought over her fallen man.
It was strange, the silence of the place, once they were all settled and
the lights out. The fire in the cracked old stove shone red. The little
clock that had ticked the good Captain's boyhood quite away, as if it
would end the suspense and bring the dawn at once, raced more furiously
than before. The girl at Johnny's side breathed steadily, evenly, as if
this were but the night before Christmas and she waiting for Santa Claus
in the dark.
"What a girl!" Johnny thought.
His eyes strayed through the open door at his back. Through it he caught
the square of light from the north window. A semi-circle of shadow above
its sill he knew to be Spider's head. Spider was watching there alone.
His post was an important one. That window looked out upon a small barn
and the towering cottonwood tree. The tree was fully six feet through.
The Captain had told of swinging from its branches as a child.
"It's strange," Johnny whispered to the girl, "sitting here in this quiet
little gray house where men and women have lived their lives away without
a breath to disturb their calm, waiting for an attack. It--why, it's like
the silence that must have hung over the fields of poppies in France
during the Great War."
"Do you think they'll truly come?" Alice whispered back. "Or was it just
a scare? They may be in Chicago, you know. The Whisperer is."
"They are not a mile away. They will come. Drew believes they'll come,
and Drew seldom makes a mistake."
"Promise me--" She pressed his arm. "If I go to--to--to the Last Round-Up
and you--you are spared, you'll look after the boys and--and help Gluck
to be a good brave cop when he grows up." There was a little tremor in
her voice.
"I promise!" Johnny whispered huskily.
A moment later Johnny's eyes swept the wide white field before him, then
the narrow road that lay beyond. For a space of seconds his eyes remained
fixed upon a dark spot on that road. "Does it move?" he asked himself. In
the end he decided that it did not.
Breathing more easily, he turned to look through the door at his back,
into the room beyond. He started and stared. Something was missing. The
dark semi-circle that had been Spider's head was gone.
"That's queer!" he muttered low. To Alice he whispered: "Keep a sharp
watch. I'll be back." Next instant he was gliding noiselessly across the
floor.
Ten seconds and he was staring at a vacant spot where the other boy had
been. "Spider!" He all but said the name aloud. "Spider! He is gone!"
Instinctively his hand sought the latch to the door close beside that
north window. It gave to his hand. "It--it's not locked," he whispered.
"But it _was_ locked. I locked it myself." Spider was gone, sure enough,
not alone from his post, but out of the building.
At once his head was in a whirl. What was he to make of it? Was Spider
yellow, after all? Had he decided to make a break all by himself? With
his uncanny power of climbing, of getting through places unobserved, he
would almost surely escape. "And yet--" he whispered, "is that like
Spider?" He could not feel that it was. He recalled times when the boy
had appeared utterly fearless, absolutely loyal.
"And yet, he was only a boy from the city streets. Supposing--" Doubt
assailed him. Supposing Spider had only pretended to be loyal. Supposing
that during all this time he had been in league with Iggy the Snake and
his gang? Supposing it had been he who had tipped off the gang to their
plans for a Christmas party!
"Yes, and suppose it wasn't!" he whispered almost fiercely.
One fact stood out clearly. Spider's post was vacant. It must be filled
at once.
After locking the door, he slid over to Drew's side.
"Spider's gone," he said.
"Gone? Where?" Drew did not raise his voice.
"Who knows? His place is empty."
"You take it," was Drew's instant command. "Take Alice with you. I'll
move over where you were.
"Gone!" he murmured as Johnny glided away into the darkness. "Spider's
gone!"