“MY BACK AGAINST THE DOOR, MY HAND ON MY REVOLVER.”—Page [94].

IN THE CAUSE
OF FREEDOM

BY
ARTHUR W. MARCHMONT

AUTHOR OF
“BY WIT OF WOMAN,” “THE QUEEN’S ADVOCATE,”
“A COURIER OF FORTUNE,” ETC.

With a frontispiece in colours by
ARCHIE GUNN

NEW YORK
FREDERICK A. STOKES COMPANY
PUBLISHERS

Copyright, 1907, by
ARTHUR W. MARCHMONT
April, 1907
All Rights Reserved

CONTENTS

CHAPTER I
A CHANCE MEETING

“DO you mean to take me for a spy?”

I had hard work to prevent myself laughing at the man to his face; and it is no light matter to laugh at these self-satisfied, bullying officials in Russian Poland. Some of them have too much power.

“Do I understand that you refuse to answer my questions and shew me your papers?”

“And what if I do?” He had burst into my room in the little inn at Bratinsk as I sat reading my paper over a cigar, and without any preface had fired his questions at me with the peremptory incivility of the average police agent. My temper had taken the intrusion badly.

He shrugged his shoulders and raised his eyebrows. “I am a police agent from Warsaw and must know your business in Bratinsk.”

At that I saw light. I recalled a paragraph I had just read in the Warsaw paper. I pointed to it. “Is this the key to your visit?”

“Ah, you have read it,” he replied with that offensive manner in which these people always contrive to imply that everything you say or do is a matter of suspicion.

“I’ll read it again now with more interest,” said I. I did so very deliberately, to gain time to cool my temper and see how it could possibly affect me.

“We are in a position to state that a raid was made two nights ago upon a house in the Kronplatz, which has long been suspected to be the Warsaw headquarters of a branch of the dangerous patriotic society known as the ‘P.F.F.’ (Polish Freedom Fraternity). The house was deserted at the time, but important papers were found which revealed the existence of a conspiracy of wide and far-reaching extent. The complete break-up of the powerful organization of the Freedom Fraternity is likely to be the result of the raid, and several well-known patriots are said to be implicated by the discoveries. Among the names rumoured is that of Count Peter Valdemar, once well known as the ‘Stormy Petrel’ of Polish politics.”

“Do you take me for Count Peter Valdemar?” I asked.

“I did not come here to be fooled,” was the angry reply. “If you will not comply with my demands, you must accompany me to Warsaw.”

I saw the prudence of not angering him. “I am Robert Anstruther, an Englishman, and have been here about three weeks, shooting over the estate of my friend, Count Ladislas Tuleski.”

“Your passport?”

“Here it is. You have a very unpleasant manner,” I could not help adding, as I took out my pocket book. By a curious chance I had three passports; my own and that of my chum, Robert Garrett and his sister, Margaret. They were to have come out with me on their way to Turkey, but had been prevented at the last moment. I picked mine out and handed it to him. “It’s properly viséd, you’ll see.”

He assumed a very profound air as he read it. “You speak Polish very well for an Englishman,” he said.

“I speak also German and French, and some Russian.”

“You have no trace of the vile English accent.”

“Is that meant for a compliment?” I asked lightly. It was no use to get angry again.

“And you are a friend of Count Ladislas Tuleski? You are, no doubt, aware that he is a suspect.”

I smiled as I thought of my friend’s airy impulsiveness and almost butterfly repudiation of responsibility. “I am surprised he should be suspected of doing anything seriously.”

“He is,” was the snappy reply. “And his friends are naturally objects of interest just now. Where is he?”

“I don’t know. I heard of him last in London.”

“And you are from London? It is at least a coincidence. Do you know Count Peter Valdemar?”

“I believe I met him once.” I remembered that I had seen him at my friend’s hotel in London.

“Another coincidence,” he returned drily. There was a pause during which he regarded me fixedly, pretty much as though I were a criminal. “You would perhaps, like to shew me all your papers, to satisfy me of the truth of your story.”

That was what an American would call “the limit.”

I got up and opened the door. “I have told you the truth and I don’t allow any man to question my word. You’d better go before I lose my temper.”

I stood six feet without bootheels; I had been the heaviest number five in my college eight that Corpus had had for years; and was in the pink of condition. He saw that I meant business and rose.

“I don’t question your word,” he began.

“Are you going?”

He went out into the corridor. “We shall probably require you to come to Warsaw.”

“If you wish to arrest me do it, and be hanged to you.”

“You mustn’t talk like that, and had better leave Bratinsk. So long as you stay here you will be under surveillance—” the rest of his sentence was lost, for I slammed the door in his face.

The attempt at any kind of surveillance over my movements would drive me out of Bratinsk like a shot; and I should have been much more annoyed by the incident but for the fact that I had been daily expecting my visit to be brought to a close by the weather. I had been very lucky to hit such an open season; but it was late in December, and the snow was so long overdue that by leaving at once I should miss very little sport.

I determined to go, therefore. I had a pig-sticking fixed for the following day; and that should be the last.

It was not at all unlikely, too, that Warsaw would afford me some excitement. The papers were full of hints about impending troubles from the strikers and revolutionary party, consequent upon the ominous unrest in St. Petersburg; and I settled that I might as well go there for a couple of days to see the fun, and then rush home for Christmas.

With this plan in my thoughts I strolled up to the railway station to see about trains.

As I reached the building the stationmaster, a very busy little official, named Blauben, came running up to me.

“Ah, mister, mister,”—he knew this one word of English and thought it the correct way to address an Englishman—“you can do me a service. I beg of you. I am in sore perplexity.”

“What is the matter?”

“A country-woman of yours. She sets me at defiance and does not understand a word I say. The last train for three hours has gone and the law is that I shut the station. She will not go out.”

“Do you want me to put her out for you?”

“No, no; you can explain to her that the law requires the station to be shut now; and they are very strict because of this last conspiracy they have discovered. No one is allowed to remain, mister. Besides, my wife is waiting for me; and you know her. She is not patient when the dinner is kept waiting. Ah, mister?”

“Where is she?”

I pictured to myself a typical strong-minded British matron, or spinster, stern of feature, sturdy of will, Baedeker in hand, insistent upon her rights, and holding the station grimly against the chattering officious little Pole; and I looked for some fun. But, instead, he led me up to a girl, who contradicted in every particular my anticipation. She was some twenty years of age, well-dressed and as pretty as a painting; straight, regular features, flaxen hair and blue eyes; glorious eyes meant for laughter, but now clouded with trouble and nervous agitation. A picture of pale, shrinking misery that went straight to my heart.

“Here is an English mister who will explain,” said the stationmaster with elaborate gesture.

I raised my hat and as she glanced at me, the colour flushed into her cheeks and her large eyes seemed to dilate with a new fear connected with my presence. In a moment it flashed into my thoughts that she had understood him quite well.

“The stationmaster tells me you are a country-woman of mine,” I said in English; “and has asked me to explain that the station is to be closed now.”

There was a pause, her look one of blank dismay. She bit her lip and then stammered slowly with a rich foreign accent, “Zank you, sir; I cannot go. I wait for ze train and zomeone.”

I accepted this as though it were the purest English and gave a free translation of it to the station master. But he was bluntness itself. His wife was waiting for him, and he had the law on his side.

I turned to the girl again and said, trying German this time: “They have curious laws in this country, and one of them requires the station to be closed.”

Her face lighted with unmistakable relief and she answered in the same language: “My servant has gone to make some arrangements, I only wish to wait for a train.”

I interpreted this also; but the man was obdurate. “She cannot wait here. No one is allowed—by law.”

“But I must wait,” she broke in, and blushed vividly and trembled at having given away the fact that she understood him.

“Let me offer a suggestion. I am an Englishman, Robert Anstruther, and if you will permit, I will wait with you outside until your servant returns. These officials are obstinate just now because of some plot that has been discovered; and he will only send for the police if you do not comply.”

At the mention of the police she rose quickly, all the colour left her face and her lips quivered.

The stationmaster beamed his thanks upon me as he bowed us out and turned the key upon us.

“These little officials are very touchy,” I said, when we stood outside and I saw she was quite undecided what to do.

She paused, and then said impulsively: “I don’t know what you will think. I—I am so ashamed.”

“I hope not. There is no need.”

“I mean about—I am not English.”

“Are you not? You answered me in English,” I said gravely.

A little blush signalled vexation. “As if you did not know. It is no subject for laughter.”

“God forbid that I should laugh. You are too evidently in deep trouble.”

“And you know that I understood him all the time.”

I bowed. “I ask no questions.”

“I should like to explain, but I cannot. Oh, how humiliating!” she cried, and the distress and trouble in her tone touched me deeply.

“I am only a stranger, but if I can help you, I beg you to give me the opportunity.”

“You cannot. You cannot; oh, I——” She left the sentence unfinished and turned away to stare along the road leading to the village, her arm resting upon a gate near. “If he comes back——” I heard her murmur; but the rest of the sentence was lost.

She was a mystery, and a very fascinating mystery too. Who could she be? Why travelling alone? What was her trouble? Why pretending to be English? Why had she started so at the mention of the police? These and a dozen other questions rushed into my mind in the minute or two that followed. I cudgelled my wits for something to say; some way of breaking down the barrier that prevented her making some kind of use of me.

The visit of the police agent having turned my thoughts to the subject of the conspiracy, I wondered whether she could be in any way connected with it. A fugitive, perhaps? But the idea was preposterous. She was surely the very incarnation of innocence; about as well fitted for a conspirator as I was for a police agent.

She turned suddenly and broke in upon my thoughts by saying, hurriedly and nervously, this time in Polish: “Thank you, sir, for what you have done and also for your offer; but I must not detain you longer.”

I smiled. “You are not detaining me; but I will go, of course, if you wish.”

She hesitated. I hoped it was from reluctance to dismiss me. Then she put out her hand impulsively and said with an air of constraint and a very wistful look: “My secret is safe with you, I know.”

“I should like to make it a condition of silence that you let me help you further.”

“No, no. That is impossible; impossible,” she cried quickly. “My—my servant will be back soon.” The fear in her eyes increased as she spoke of him.

“Well, don’t forget the name—Anstruther. I’m at the Petersburg Inn, should you—or your friends think me likely to be of any use.”

She shook her head. “No, no. Thank you. Thank you.”

I raised my hat and turned away. I would have given a lot to be able to find some excuse for staying with her; and when I looked after her, chance found me a reason to go back. She was walking slowly in the direction of the village, her back towards me, and I saw her handkerchief fall.

I picked it up and hurried after her. Hearing my step she turned so quickly as to suggest alarm.

“You have dropped this,” I said, handing her the little dainty lace trifle. As I held it out the initials “V.D.” embroidered in the corner, lay uppermost.

She took it hurriedly, glanced from the initials to my face, and then thanked me.

Just then a man came hastily round a bend in the path some twenty paces ahead of us. She bit her lip at sight of him and her nervous confusion increased.

“My—my servant. You must go, please.”

Surprised that she should shew such fear of a servant, I drew aside with a smile and she walked on.

Then I looked at the servant; and the mystery about her at once became clearer and yet deeper.

It is one of the freaks of my otherwise treacherous memory, never to forget a face; and despite his disguise I recognized the man at once. I knew him by his remarkable eyes—small, piercing and almost black in hue.

It was Count Peter Valdemar, the “Stormy Petrel” of Polish politics; the originator of a dozen conspiracies. He was dressed as a servant, wore a close-cropped red wig, and was clean shaven.

I recalled the police agent’s words instantly; and the danger to the girl appealed to me. For her sake I resolved to warn him.

They spoke together, and from his glances in my direction, I guessed she was telling him what I had done. As I approached them, he assumed the deferential air of a servant.

“A word with you,” I said.

He was full of surprise. “With me, sir?”

I drew him aside. “I have no desire to pry into your affairs, but I wish to warn you that you are in great danger of discovery here.”

“Danger! Of what? Surely you are mistaken, sir?” He spoke with a flourish of the hand and a bow, but his piercing eyes were fixed intently upon mine.

“I am a friend of Count Ladislas Tuleski, and I met you once or twice in his rooms in London a year ago. You are Count Peter Valdemar. This morning a police agent from Warsaw visited me, and regarded me as a suspect because of my friendship with the Count, and because I admitted that I had known you. Take the warning from me as a friend; and be on your guard. If I have recognized you, others may.”

It was safer for us both not to be seen together, so I walked off leaving him a very much surprised Count indeed.

CHAPTER II
ON THE DEVIL’S STAIRCASE

I HAD not walked three hundred yards towards the village when I met the police agent hurrying stationwards at a pace which would quickly bring him face to face with Count Peter and his companion.

This must be prevented at any cost, so I stopped him.

“I wish to speak to you.”

“They told me you had gone to the station.”

This was all right, for it showed he was following me. “Our interview ended hastily this morning because I thought you doubted my word and I was angry. I see now that you were doing your duty. Come back with me to the inn, and let us talk things over.”

“You can say what you have to say here,” he answered. He was a surly dog: but I dared not let him pass me.

“Scarcely that; because I can adopt your suggestion and prove to you, by letters and so forth, that I am what I told you; an Englishman and not a spy.”

“Why do you change like this?” His suspicious tone again.

“The reason is simple. I have decided to leave here to-morrow probably, and don’t wish to be bothered by your spies meanwhile. It is simpler to convince you with proofs.” I linked my arm in his. “Come along, we must understand one another better. I am not the suspicious individual you think and you are no doubt a better fellow than I deemed.”

He was a little beast, only fit to be kicked; but I thought of the girl and smothered my natural inclinations.

By the time we reached my rooms I had worked some of his suspicions loose; and when I laid before him letters from my sister and friends at home, and showed him such things as my cheque book, letter of credit, and so on, he was sufficiently satisfied to have a bottle of wine with me.

Over this his tongue was loosened and we discussed the conspiracy, which he admitted was widespread and in some respects more dangerous than any which had threatened the Empire for years. Its especial danger lay in the skill with which the leaders had attempted to blend industrial discontent with political intrigue; and so form a union among vast masses of the population in many industrial cities.

The practical grievances of the workers and the many wrongs of the rural population were being used by the democratic theorists, the dreamers and the political agitators to foment discontent; and I knew enough of Russia to be aware that such highly inflammable materials as these might easily be heaped together and then fanned into one huge simultaneous explosion all over the Empire, terrible enough to startle the world.

In Russian Poland the cause was the old one—national independence; and it was in this that Count Peter Valdemar had taken a part and that my friend Ladislas was involved.

I repeated my surprise that my friend should be regarded as dangerous.

“He is a leader; and at such times any man may be a source of danger,” was the reply.

“And this Count Peter—where is he?” I asked casually.

“He is probably making for the German frontier, with the intention of flying to England. He was at Warsaw; but disappeared. Your country has much to answer for in harbouring all these plotters.”

“If it comes to that we have a few anarchists of our own, and they are harboured on this side of the Channel.”

“Not in Russia. But I don’t think the Count will escape us this time. He is well known to so many of us.”

“And if you catch him?” A significant smile answered me and a tilt of the eyebrows.

“You have a wonderful police system,” said I, admiringly.

“We shall catch him on the frontier, sir. Make no mistake. No man can get through the net we have spread there.”

I emptied my glass. “Well, here’s luck to all who deserve it. And now, about myself?”

“I will communicate with Warsaw; and meantime go where you will or stay here if you prefer.”

I had succeeded in detaining him nearly a couple of hours, and by this time the Count and his companion ought to be out of the place; so I ordered my horse, resolved to go for a ride to test the truth of the little beggar’s assurance that I was not to be watched.

I chose the southern road and as the ground was very hard I went at a leisurely pace. I was not followed; and as soon as I had satisfied myself of this, my thoughts slipped back to the incident at the railway station, and a pair of blue eyes that had looked with such desolate wistfulness into mine. Would the Count get away? Had they gone already? Would chance ever bring us together again? Could I not do something on my own account to help chance? That was more my way; and I set to work thinking how I could use my friendship with Ladislas to accomplish my end.

I was still following this train of thought when I reached the hill known locally as the “Devil’s Staircase.” Bratinsk stands on a plateau; and about five miles to the south, this hill, one of the most dangerous I have ever seen on account of its fearful gradient and deadly twists and turns, leads to the plains below. From the top there is a fine view over the Batak Levels, a stretch of fertile country extending for miles to the foot-hills beyond. It was a favourite spot of mine and on reaching it now I dismounted, tethered my horse near and strolled to smoke a cigar and continue my reverie.

I was inclined to shake hands with myself at the thought of using Ladislas. He would surely be able to tell me enough of Count Valdemar to put me on the track; and I was just thinking how to describe the girl whose initials I believed to be “V. D.” when I caught the grating of wheels, followed rapidly by the throbbing sound of horses’ feet.

Some one must be in a deuce of a hurry, I thought, as I looked back along the road. Some one was, surely enough. Not a couple of hundred yards from the brink of the hill came a light caleche with two occupants drawn by a pair of horses at full gallop. What was the fool of a driver about? To dash down the Devil’s Staircase at that mad pace meant death. No horses ever foaled could make the sharp turns and twists of that zigzag, treacherous, deadly incline at a gallop.

I shouted a warning at the top of my voice; and then my heart seemed to leap in my breast and every vein in my body to chill like ice as the occupants of the caleche looked up, and I recognized Count Peter Valdemar and the girl who had been in my thoughts all that day.

As the runaways reached me I leapt down on to the road and I made a spring for the reins of the horse nearest me. I missed them and was rolled over and over, while the frightened beasts dashed on, the Count tearing and tugging and straining at the reins in a futile effort to stop them.

I jumped up and ran down the hill in pursuit. Just below, the road made an S-shaped curve, and the horses were round this and out of sight like a flash; and while I was racing after them round the first bend, I heard a shout in a man’s voice, a girl’s scream, and then the crashing sound of a smash.

I reached the scene in a few moments. The wreck had come at a point where the road turned at less than a right angle; and the sight of it sickened me with fear.

One horse was down, lying against a bank, bleeding profusely and kicking spasmodically in what I judged to be a death struggle. The other was on its feet and was plunging and tugging to free itself from the reins and harness which had got entangled in the wreck of the caleche. Under the body of the vehicle lay the Count, and as I did not for the moment see his companion, I guessed that she must be hidden under the wreckage too.

With a big effort I hoisted the vehicle sufficiently to drag out the Count; but the girl was not there.

Then I saw her lying behind a bush by the roadside. I ran to her and laid my finger on her pulse. With intense relief I found the beat; feeble it is true, but steady; and I poured some brandy into the cup of my flask and managed to get a little of it between her lips. A trembling sigh escaped her; and I returned to the Count.

The police agent was right. The Count would never cross the German frontier—he had crossed the farther one. I knew enough of first aid work to ascertain the cause. His neck was broken; and I guessed he had been thrown sideways on to his head, snapping the vertebrae. I drew the body to the side of the road and threw one of the rugs over it.

Next I freed the sound horse—thinking he might be needed—soothed him a bit and tethered him to a tree.

By this time the girl was fast recovering and I went back to her. I was administering another dose of the brandy when she opened her eyes.

“You!” she said.

“Yes, fortunately. Don’t worry about things. May I help you to sit up and take this, or can you manage it alone? That’s good,” I smiled as she sat up unaided.

“What has happened? Oh, I remember. The hill and then——” and she put her hands before her eyes for a moment.

“You have had a wonderful escape.”

The word confused her. “Did we escape then? Is he not following us? My uncle thought—oh, I understand; I thought you meant—but is he hurt?”

“Yes, badly.”

I had placed her so that her back was towards the wrecked carriage and the Count’s body; but at my words she turned and looked round. Her eyes were wide with horror. “Is he dead?” she asked.

“But for a miracle you would have shared his fate.”

She was silent for a moment and lifted her hands and let them fall with a sigh. “He would rather have had it so than have been captured; and he feared that this time. He was a hard, desperate man.”

There was no sign of any strong emotion or great personal grief in this reference to him. It was far better so under the circumstances. But I did not quite know what to say.

Then she surprised me. “He told me to come to you if anything happened to him. You recognized him, he said.”

“Yes, as Count Peter Valdemar. I warned him this morning.”

“He told me. You are a friend of—Count Ladislas Tuleski?” She said this with just a suspicion of hesitation.

“An intimate friend. Do you know him?”

“Yes—I know him,—oh, yes: I——” she hesitated, glanced at me and stopped.

“He is one of my most intimate friends and one of the best fellows in the world,” I said enthusiastically.

She made no reply, but glanced swiftly at me again and lowered her head.

“I think I can walk now,” she said presently; and I helped her to rise. “I am not hurt, you see. It was only fright and shock.”

“Thank God it was no worse,” I cried. She did not seem to hear this. “Now, what do you wish to do?”

“I don’t know. What ought I to do? My uncle—do you know the Count was my uncle?—or, rather, not my own uncle, no real blood relation.”

“No, I had no idea.”

“When the trouble came at Warsaw he had to fly, and he was carrying certain papers with instructions to friends of the Fraternity to Cracow. A raid is expected there; and there are papers which threaten us all. Even my own dear mother is in danger. He told me to carry those papers through to Cracow at any cost; to get your help if need be, and to say that your friend, Count Ladislas, was also involved. I was to tell you this, if you showed any reluctance to help me. But now what can we do?” and she looked the picture of dismay.

“You were travelling as an English girl?”

“Yes, as Miss Mary Smith. He got passports for me in that name and for himself as Ivan Grubel, my servant.”

“Where are they?”

“He has them and the rest of the papers. They are sewn into his coat.”

“Why did he make all this methodical preparation?”

“He was recognized, I think, in Bratinsk. That was why we were driving away. He expected to be pursued.”

“If I get the coat, can you find the papers?”

“Yes, but—he is—dead;” and she shuddered.

“We have to think of the living. Yourself, my friend, and your mother.”

It is not a pleasant thing to strip the coat off a dead man; but it had to be done. So I went and did it as quickly as I could. I took it back to her and she was hurriedly searching for the papers when she gave a little gasp of alarm and shrank close to me as a horseman appeared, picking his way very gingerly down the hill. It was my friend, the police agent from Warsaw. In a moment he took in the scene. He recognized me at once, and my companion a moment later.

“Ah, this is better luck than I expected. A smash, eh? So you didn’t get far away after all? I knew I should catch you, but didn’t hope to do it so soon. Where’s Count Peter Valdemar?”

“You again, is it?” I said, with a smile. “This young lady, a country-woman of mine, Miss Mary Smith, has met with an accident and her servant, named Ivan Grubel, has been killed. The horses ran away.”

“Killed, eh? That’s his coat then. Give that to me.” My companion caught her breath and clutched my arm.

“You guessed too fast, my friend; you did so this morning, you know, as I showed you afterwards. This coat is mine;” and with that I slipped my arms into it and put it on.

“Yes, it’s easy to see it’s yours by the way it fits you,” he sneered. My arms were some three inches too long for the sleeves and the body was ridiculously short. “I know you by this time. You must give me that coat. I saw the woman there searching the pockets for something.”

“If you want it, you’d better come and take it. I shan’t give it up unless you do.”

“For your own sake don’t mix up any more with this. If you are an Englishman, go away and leave me to deal with this woman. But give me that coat. You know to whom it belonged; and I must have it.”

He dismounted and walked toward me.

“You had better keep your distance,” I said quietly.

“You resist? Then I must do my duty. You are my prisoner.”

The threat of arrest seemed to scare the girl badly, but without a second’s hesitation she tried to shield me by taking everything on her own shoulders.

“I alone am responsible,” she cried, stepping forward. “Give up the coat, Mr. Anstruther. It is I who should be the prisoner.”

She acted pluckily, like the little brick she was, and with the best intentions in the world. But it was a huge mistake. She had practically given the whole thing away.

The significant leer of triumph on the police agent’s face made it plain that he appreciated this.

CHAPTER III
VOLNA DRAKONA

I LOST no time in undeceiving the police agent. “You are plucking unshot birds,” I said. “There is not going to be any arrest either of this lady or myself. You can end the thing anyhow you please, short of arresting either of us.”

I was glad that that made him lose his temper. “Do you dare to disobey me?” he cried furiously.

I became personal and heaped fuel on the fire of his anger. “Don’t be a foolish little person. You don’t know how idiotic you look. You can do nothing. You are six inches shorter than I am, and I don’t care a kopeck for your authority as a policeman.”

He swore fluently and stamped his feet with rage. “You will answer for this,” he shouted, using a very foul epithet. “I thought this morning you were a spy. Now I know it. You shall not insult me. In the name of the Czar, I call on you to submit.”

I laughed at him with intentional aggravation. “You are a worse fool than I thought. I am a British subject; I have done no wrong; and I care no more for your Czar than I do for you. You have just insulted me grossly and the best thing you can do is to clear out.”

“You are a revolutionary, in league with this woman and the carrion there;” and he jerked his thumb toward the dead body.

I took no notice of this coarseness, but untethered the unhurt horse and led it over to my companion.

“We are going,” I said to him. “I have told you that this is Miss Mary Smith; I have her passport here in my coat.” I rummaged in the pockets, found two passports, and handed them to him.

He glanced at them and then pocketed them with a grin of self-satisfaction at his astuteness.

“Where are you going?”

“That is our own business. I will not let you follow us. Return me those passports,” I said, threateningly. He did not see my object but backed away toward his horse. “Come, quick.”

He hesitated a moment and then mounted hurriedly. “As they were in your coat they will connect you with these people,” he said with a cunning leer.

I did not care a rap for this now; whether he kept or returned them. We could not possibly use them again, so I shrugged my shoulders and turned away. “Go to the devil,” I said.

But he had a surprise for me. As my back was turned a pistol shot rang out, and the horse I was holding plunged and tore loose from me, limped down the hill and fell to the ground.

“Now we’ll see about your tall talk, Mr. Englishman. You and the woman there will just march on ahead of me into Bratinsk; and if either of you so much as look round, I’ll fire. Mind that. By God.”

His weapon was levelled at my head and my companion again showed the stuff she was made of. With a little cry she dashed right in front of me dead in the line of fire.

“You must not shoot,” she said, quite steadily. “This gentleman has done nothing but help me after the accident.”

“We’ll find out all about that at Bratinsk,” replied the man. “Now march, you two.”

It was an ugly situation; but I did not take the police agent as seriously as did “Mary Smith.” They are bullies to the core, so long as it is safe to bully; and this fellow was a particularly brutal brute of his brutal class.

There is one thing they are all afraid of, however, the censure of their superiors; and their superiors hate the investigation which follows when anything happens to foreigners in general, and Englishmen and Americans in particular.

I felt quite confident, therefore, that he would not fire, and that the chief danger we ran was that his weapon might go off by accident. Moreover, he was probably as bad a shot as they nearly all are. So I put up a bluff.

I drew my companion to one side and looking the man square in the face I walked a couple of paces toward him. Instead of shooting he backed his horse and warned me again. This satisfied me.

“You can fire if you like. You know I am an Englishman and if you shoot me there’ll be a row.”

“Do as I say,” he shouted with an oath.

I paused and then said very deliberately: “I’ll see you in hell first. Fire at me if you dare.”

A little gasp of alarm from the girl was lost in a volley of oaths from the police agent.

Then the luck veered once more to our side. Inadvertently his spur touched his horse’s flank and the animal, taking his loud tones as addressed to it, began to fidget and prance so that he could not have taken aim had he wished. The figure he cut was quite laughable.

But it was my chance and I took it. I picked up a stone and flung it at the horse. This set it kicking and plunging desperately so that the none too skilful rider was nearly unhorsed. Choosing my moment I ran up, seized the hand which held the revolver and wrenched the weapon away without any trouble at all.

That was the end of the fighting so far as he was concerned; for he drove his spurs home and clattered away up the hill.

I judged that he was afraid I might now do the shooting which he had threatened so glibly; and mingled with his fear was the belief that, as he had shot our horse and had thus destroyed the means of our flight, he could safely ride off to fetch assistance.

“That’s a good riddance anyhow,” said I with a laugh, when he had disappeared. “I think you’re the pluckiest girl I ever knew.”

“I was so frightened,” she declared.

“Yes, so frightened that you actually put yourself right in front of his revolver. That’s the kind of fright I mean; only I call it pluck.”

“It was nothing. But you should not have taken any part in this miserable affair. You have compromised yourself with the police and may get into all kinds of trouble.”

“Don’t you think we had better start for Cracow? That fellow won’t be away longer than he can help, and I have to get a little scheme ready for him before he returns. The sooner we start the safer.”

“But what can we do about——” and she glanced to where the Count’s body lay.

“If we are to think of the living, we can do nothing. He has been recognized and when the police return they will care for the body and something can be done from Warsaw.”

“It seems heartless to leave him,” she murmured in distressed perplexity.

“There is no other way; so if you please we will start. I’ll tell you my plan as we walk. Your mother’s safety is in the balance, remember.” She yielded then and we set out.

“I think we shall get through without any great trouble. There is a train from Bratinsk somewhere about eight o’clock, which will put us in Cracow in a few hours.”

“But I have no passport now, to pass the frontier.”

“Fortunately, I can arrange that. My first plan is to send the police off on a false scent. There is a peasant family, not a mile from the top of the hill—where my horse is, by the way—and they will do anything for me. I helped them out of some trouble when I was here last year, and they think a lot of it. With this police agent away from Bratinsk for a few hours, we can get off secretly and safely.”

At the top of the hill I found my horse, put “Miss Smith” on his back and handed her the coat which had been the first cause of trouble.

“I shall need the coat for my plan; so find the papers which are sewn into it and be ready to rip them out the moment we reach the cottage.”

“But you?” she protested.

“No protest, please. I am good for more than a mile at fair speed.”

“You do all this for a stranger,” she said, her eyes lighting as she looked down at me.

“Oh, we shan’t always be strangers. Keep him going. I can’t talk and run at the same time. Be merciful;” and with that we set off at a good round trot. I held to the stirrup and so had no difficulty in keeping up.

In about five minutes we turned off the road and the cottage was soon in sight. By good fortune the man I sought, Michel, was in the patch of garden and greeted me with a smile. I came to the point at once.

“Michel, you have often asked for a chance of repaying that little debt. You can do it now. I want you and your sister, Testa, to help me. You are to ride my horse and your sister yours, and start at once. Ride down the Devil’s Staircase, strike out any way you like at the bottom; ride for four or five hours; you in the name of Ivan Grubel, your sister as Mary Smith, an English girl. At the end of the ride, which must be as near a railway station as you can manage, turn my horse adrift to go where he will; and then make your way home secretly. And no one must know of your absence. You’ll do this?”

“Why yes, Excellency. Testa, Testa;” and he ran in calling his sister.

“Now for the coat? It will be the best possible thing to create the false trail with.”

“The papers are here in the lining.”

“Get them out then at once, please. We have no minutes to lose.” I handed her a knife and she found them.

Michel came round the cottage a minute later leading the horse for his sister just as Testa herself appeared ready to start.

“Good-evening, Excellency,” she said, her brown eyes dancing at the thought of an adventure.

“You grow stronger every day, Testa, and prettier,” I said. “Now, Michel, wear this coat, take care that every one has a full view of it; and when you get rid of the horse, strap it on his back. Mind, you two, my liberty may depend upon you. God-speed.”

“Trust me,” replied Michel as he mounted.

I helped Testa to the saddle. “Don’t look scared, child,” I said; for her face had clouded at my words. “I shall be in no danger if you do this thing well. Off with you.”

“By the help of the Virgin,” returned Testa; and away they went helter-skelter towards the Devil’s Staircase.

As soon as they were out of sight we set off for Bratinsk, across the fields; and I explained the next part of my plan. This was to use the two passports of Bob Garrett and his sister.

“I have not told you my real name,” said my companion.

“We scarcely seem to have had time to speak of anything yet. We’ve been pretty busy, you see.”

“It is Volna Drakona. My father is dead; my dear mother is in feeble health. I have a half-brother and half-sister—Paul and Katinka.”

“The passports will give you another sort of brother till we get to Cracow. Only for a few hours, however, if all goes well. Volna! I have never heard that name before.”

“It is my mother’s——” she said simply. Then, “You like it?”

“It is southern in its sweetness.”

“My mother is from the South. Do you think I could write to her and let her know that all is well with me? She may hear of my uncle’s death, and the anxiety will almost kill her. We are deeply attached to one another.”

“There is no reason why you should not. And from Cracow it may be safe to telegraph.”

“You speak as if we were quite certain of getting through.”

“Why shouldn’t we? I have had another thought. My servant is at Bratinsk and I shall use him to create another scent for the police. I shall send him off toward Warsaw in my name while we go to Cracow as the two Garretts. I look for no trouble in Bratinsk. The police agent is not likely to think we shall venture to return there. I expect he will just get the help he needs and rattle back to make the arrest. He will then follow Michel and his sister; and as this will take up some hours at least, we ought to be clear away and near Cracow before he even returns to Bratinsk.”

“You make it seem very simple and easy.”

“So it ought to be; but I shall feel better when we are in the train speeding west. There is one thing, by-the-by, you had better make some kind of change in your appearance. I can do it easily by shaving my beard and changing my clothes. Do you think you could buy something in Bratinsk? Your description is sure to be telegraphed in all directions.”

We discussed the means of doing this and had scarcely settled matters when we reached Bratinsk. Having arranged where to meet, I went to the inn and Volna to procure the change of costume.

The dusk was beginning to fall and deeming it best to be cautious, I entered the inn by a side door and succeeded in slipping up to my rooms unnoticed.

My servant, Felsen, was not there; but afraid to lose time in waiting, and unwilling to risk asking for him, I set to work and shaved off my beard and moustache. As I changed my clothes, I found the police agent’s revolver; and took it with me.

As Felsen always looked after my things I did not notice anything amiss, except that he seemed to keep them very carelessly; but as soon as I went into the sitting room, which opened from the bedroom, I scented trouble.

Every drawer and cupboard in the place had been ransacked, and papers and books were all left in the greatest confusion.

The reason was plain. It was the result of a police visit. My friend of the Devil’s Staircase had set his comrades to work. Instinctively I ran back into the bedroom and destroyed the evidences of my shaving operation, and was in the act of leaving the room when I heard voices approaching it.

I had barely time to step into a cupboard when the door was opened and two men entered. One was Felsen, the other a stranger. His curt, sharp tone and manner suggested the police.

They passed through into the sitting room beyond.

“Your master has not been back then, it seems?”

“I shouldn’t think he’ll come back after what you say.”

“He’ll probably be brought back.” This with a sneer. “We know how to deal with spies and traitors.”

There was a pause and then Felsen said: “I suppose if he’s caught he won’t be let out for a long while.”

“Our prison doors only open one way easily,” chuckled the other.

“Then I may as well look after myself, I suppose.”

“Yes. He’s evidently made a fool of you.”

“Well, it’s my turn now. Have a cigar?”

I heard matches struck and smelt my best cigars.

“We can wait downstairs as well as here,” said the police agent. “I’ll lock the doors this time to make sure.” He came into the bedroom, locked the door on the inside and then went back. The other door was then locked and the two men went downstairs.

Fortunately he had left the key in the bedroom door, and the instant the way was clear, I went out, crept along the corridor and down the back stairway to the door by which I had entered.

I gained the street safely and walked away toward the railway station, trusting to the gloom of the evening and my shaven face to save me from recognition.

By the action of the police and the fact that they were already on the look-out for me had crumpled up my plan. And there was still worse to come.

CHAPTER IV
A HORSEDEALING TRANSACTION

AS I hurried to the station I tried to think over the position coolly and carefully.

In the first place, I was now a fugitive from the police; but as I had done no wrong, the fact had a sort of fascination for me. The scent of adventure and the prospective excitement attracted me, and the idea of a trial of wits with the authorities roused every combative instinct in my nature.

Even had there been no one else involved, I should have gone through with the thing for its own sake. But there was Volna. Her safety and that of her mother depended upon me; and that fact was the most powerful incentive I could have had to urge me to my utmost effort. The thought of helping such a splendid girl was just a sheer delight.

Those papers had to be got to Cracow. The mother’s safety required this; and the risk involved in the attempt formed the spice of the adventure. I had powerful and influential friends both at home and on the continent who would readily help me to get out of any bother so far as matters had gone at present; but it might be a very difficult thing if in the present excited state of the empire, I was caught helping the “P.F.F.” by carrying seditious documents for revolutionary purposes. Volna also had run no great risk as yet. The mere fact that she was travelling with Count Peter Valdemar was not by itself likely to involve her in any serious consequences. If the papers could have been destroyed, therefore, we could easily have put an end to the complication. But this was impossible. Their delivery in Cracow was imperative.

We stood thus at the dividing line between safety and risk; and there was nothing for it but to go through with the matter to the end.

My experience at the inn had its lesson. I recognized that I must move very warily indeed in making any inquiries at the station. The fussy little stationmaster, Blauben, might recognize me despite the change in my appearance; and I did not at all relish the prospect of interviewing him.

But in this one respect the luck was with me. I was surprised to see a small crowd of people at the generally deserted station, and it was an easy matter to mingle with them without being observed.

That was all the luck there was, however, as the reason for the crowd spelt further disaster to my plans of escape. The place was in a hubbub of excitement; and I soon learnt that there had been a very serious accident on the line at a place called Pulta, some seven or eight miles west of Bratinsk.

As a result of this the line to Cracow was blocked. There would be no train going west that night.

The people in the station were travellers from the opposite direction who had been put out and told, with the usual courtesy of the railway authorities, that they must shift for themselves until the line was clear. They might think themselves lucky, I overheard little Blauben tell one man, if they got on by noon the following day.

This was check with a vengeance; if not checkmate.

I hung about for some time with the object of ascertaining the chance of getting a train in the other direction—anything to get out of Bratinsk—and was pretending to study one of the time bills when I caught my own name.

“Know the Englishman, Anstruther? Of course I do.” It was Blauben’s voice. “If he comes here, I’ll stop him.”

“We think he may try and bolt.”

“How’s he going to bolt? There’s no train west and nothing east except the midnight express. But what’s it all about?” The reply was given in low tone and escaped me. But part of the stationmaster’s answer was enough.

“Spy? Rubbish. Why he was here shooting last year. You people would find spies growing on gooseberry bushes. No. I have already told a hundred of you that there will be no train”—this to a questioner in a tone of exasperation; and I saw him hurry off gesticulating frantically. I could do no good by waiting longer, so I slipped out of the station, and went back to the village to meet Volna.

After all, the accident at Pulta might not prove an unmitigated evil. The few sentences I had overheard showed that the police were watching the station for me; and an attempt to leave would probably have landed us right into their hands.

Then it occurred to me that we might even turn the accident to good account. If we could get to Pulta soon, we could give an excellent reason for our presence; that we wished to inquire about some friend supposed to have been in the wrecked train; and, as the line from there to Cracow would be open, we could do the journey after all by rail.

Pulta by the road was some ten miles, and a rough hilly road it was. Too far and too rough for Volna to attempt to walk. To hire any kind of conveyance was of course out of the question; as it would lay a trail which even a blind policeman could follow. I had a spare horse at the inn; but for the same reason I dared not attempt to take it out of the stable.

In that part of Poland, however, one deal can always be made without exciting any comment or surprise. Any one will trade a horse with you, and at any time of the day or night. I believe a man would not be in the least surprised to be called out of bed at midnight for the purpose; and I am sure he would gladly get up for the sheer pleasure of the deal. It is the one great pastime, or as near to a pastime, as the older men of that district care to get.

But to obtain a saddle was another matter; while even to have asked for such a thing as a side saddle would have stirred enough curiosity to set the gossips’ tongues click-clacking all over the village. There was nothing for it therefore except that Volna should ride bare-back; and as I should have to lead her horse, there was no use in getting one for myself.

Volna was waiting for me when I reached the appointed place. She had made a considerable change in her appearance. A long fur cloak covered her dress, and in place of her former dainty headgear she was wearing a close fur turban.

Wishing to try the effect of my own altered appearance, I assumed a sort of slouching walk and made as if to pass her.

“Did you think I should not know you?” she asked.

“I was rather hoping you would not. I am supposed to be disguised.”

She laughed. “I should know you anywhere.”

“Then we must trust that other eyes are not so keen as yours,” said I, feeling a little crestfallen.

“Or that they are not so interested in recognizing you. What about the train?”

“None but bad news;” and I told her what had occurred and how I proposed to manage. She agreed at once, but was for walking.

“I think I can walk ten miles,” she declared readily.

“There is no need. It is a rough, hilly road; and there is a man at the other end of the village from whom I can buy a horse without any chance of rousing suspicions.”

“It would not be more hilly for me than for you, would it?”

“I think you had better have the horse.”

“Then I will say no more,” she agreed. “I am afraid my disguise is not much more successful than yours,” she added, as we walked on.

“It might have been awkward if neither had recognized the other, mightn’t it?”

“I hadn’t thought of that.”

“You would have to hide your face, if you don’t want to be known.”

“I expect I look an awful fright.”

“The more disguised you are the better,” said I. She laughed. “It is good to hear you laugh in the midst of all—this uncertainty.”

“It cannot be so very dreadful if you can manage to pay such neat compliments Mr.—Anstruther.”

“You find that name a bit troublesome, eh?”

“Don’t you think you are worth taking some trouble for? But it is hard.”

“Lucky that I’m going to change it while we are together.”

“Change it?”

“We’ll talk that all over on the road to Pulta. Here’s the place where I hope to get the horse. It may take a little time. Will you wait for me?”

There is a rough kind of recognized procedure in horsedealing in that district; but as I had had more than one experience of the kind I knew how to act.

I crossed to the house and seeing a light in the stable behind, guessed I should find the man bedding his horses. He did not know me, but I had heard of him.

“Good-evening, Andreas,” I said in a rather surly tone, as if I had a grievance against him; and without another word I walked up to the four horses one after the other and looked them over. He took no notice, but went on forking the bedding. This was all strictly in accordance with etiquette.

I came out of the last stall shrugging my shoulders and laughing contemptuously. “Blauben is a little fool. He said I should find some horses here. Good-night. There isn’t one worth a couple of roubles.”

The last sentence he understood to mean that I might possibly deal. He dashed his fork on the ground and came toward me, saying very angrily: “What’s that? Who are you? Who sent you here?”

“Old Blauben at the station.”

“And do you think you know anything about horses? You don’t know even how to look at them?”

“I have a chestnut that’s worth the whole string. I thought there was something to buy here. I suppose he thought I wanted meat for a bouillon factory. Good-night.”

“Wait, there, wait, you long imp of ignorance. Do you want to make a match with your chestnut? Where is it?”

I laughed. “If these crocks of yours saw mine they’d learn how to move. Here, smoke, you old owner of dogs’ meat;” and I handed him a cigar.

“Holy Virgin, what do I hear?” he cried, throwing up his hands, and putting a lantern near my face. He knew well enough now that I had come to trade; and was happy. But we kept up the farce a little longer; he abusing my chestnut and I his four nags.

His next object was to find out which horse I had selected; but I kept this from him carefully. At length I pointed to one that I would not have had as a gift.

“I’m going to give my dogs a treat one day, I think they could manage with that. How much for it, if I give you back the hide and the feet?”

He grinned. “You know a fine horse when you see one, after all,” he said. “You shall have him—three hundred roubles.” About £30 this.

“Kopecks, you mean. Good-night.”

“Wait, wait. Was there ever such an impatient fool as you? Do you really want him?”

“No, only I didn’t want this long walk for nothing: and I’m taking some horses to Noshti Fair.”

“Isn’t there one of the others you’d care for? Don’t be in a hurry.”

“I’m in no hurry. What about these others?”

Then the real bargaining began. He put a price on the horse I wished to have; and we chaffered and smoked and swore and abused one another in the way these bargains are made. I dared not hurry the matter too much. He would boast all over the village the next day of the fool who had given him the price he asked; and the transaction would become public property, with the result that the police might get wind of it.

It was safer to waste the time necessary to drive a hard bargain. And so we wrangled until I had fought the amount down to a fair price, when we spent another ten minutes squabbling whether he should give me an old bridle or merely a rope halter.

When I had gained my point and was riding the horse away he swore so violently that he was a heavy loser by the deal, that I knew he had made enough profit to boast about. I thought it best to alter his opinion, therefore.

“Do you know the history of this horse?” I asked knowingly. “No, you can’t or you’d know that I’ve cheated you. Do you know that he came from General Kolwich’s stable and was sold for four hundred roubles? I should have paid that for him, had you pressed me. I shall get five for him. But you should learn to know a horse when you see one.”

He pushed his cap back and scratched his head, and invoked the name of the Deity in a despair that was almost pathetic.

I rode off with a chuckle. I knew that I had struck deep into his pride as a horse trader, and that he would now keep his lips as close as a rat trap about the whole transaction. He would brood over it, and wait for the day when he could get even with me; but though the skies fell, he would never speak of that horse again to any one.

The bargaining had taken nearly an hour, and I feared the sands of Volna’s patience would be running out fast.

She greeted me with a sigh of relief. “I had begun to fear all sorts of things.”

“You have never had to buy a horse in these parts. It’s an acquired art and can only be accomplished with many lies and much time. But we’ll be off now. You can manage to ride bare-back, I hope?”

She smiled. “I have ridden bare-back ever since I was a child.”

“Then you haven’t had time yet to forget.”

“Is that a reflection on my youth or another compliment?”

“It’s about the truth, that’s all.”

“I’m nearly one and twenty,” she declared with a delightful air of dignity.

“It is a great age,” I agreed. “I remember how I felt at the time. One is never so old again, they say, until quite late in life.”

I helped her to mount. “Bare-back riding is a little undignified for one and twenty, I’m afraid. Now we are really off and in our new characters. Do you know who you are?”

“Miss Margaret Garrett, an English girl who is very troubled what to do with the r’s in her name.”

“We can alter that. My friend always calls his sister Peg.”

“Peg! what a woodeny name.”

“Short for Peggy—we think that rather pretty.”

She repeated it several times and laughed.

“Why do you laugh?”

“You have queer notions of what is pretty.”

“Mine’s worse, I’m called Bob.”

“Bob! Yes, that is much worse. Bob. Bob. Bob. It’s very short, and easy; but it’s very funny.”

“My sister always calls me Bob—every one does, in fact.”

“You have a sister then. What is her name?”

“Sylvia.”

“Now that is a pretty name.”

“Not always. She gets called Silly, sometimes.”

“That’s monstrous. Is she angry?”

“Not a bit. You see these are really pet names.”

“Oh!” She was silent a moment, and then said: “And are we to be Bob and Peggy to one another?”

“I guess so, except when we quarrel. Then it will be Robert and Margaret. But it will only be until to-morrow.”

“To-morrow?”

“When we reach Cracow, you know.”

“Shall we get there to-morrow?”

“We ought to.”

“All right—Bob.” She said it with a sly little laugh.

“You’ll soon get used to it, Peggy. And now I’ll get you to carry my heavy coat, and if you’ll shake him up we’ll trot for a bit. The sooner we’ve put a mile or two between us and Bratinsk the better.”

CHAPTER V
AT PULTA

WE kept up a fair pace for nearly an hour, the horse moving at a slow, loping canter, with spells of walking for me to recover breath; and in this way we covered six or seven miles, which brought us to the foot of the steep rugged hills that divide Bratinsk from Pulta.

“We’ve about a mile and a half climb here, then a stretch of a mile or so along the top, and after that a tremendous hill down into Pulta,” I told “Peggy,” as we pulled up.

“Are you not tired?”

“No. I could cover a lot of ground at that jog trot. I’m pretty tough, you see.”

“Ride up the hill and let me walk.”

“Not a bit of it. We’ll push on as we are, if you don’t mind.” I had no breath left for talking, so I plodded on in silence. There had been so much to do in the interval since we had left the Devil’s Staircase that I seemed to have had no time to think of anything except the pressing affair of the moment. But I had time now, as I strode up the hill; and for the first time I seemed to awake to a recognition of the supreme confidence and unquestioning trust which Volna showed in me.

The night was very dark; we were miles from everywhere; she knew nothing of me, and had only seen me first some eight or nine hours before; and yet she rode by my side as contentedly as though we had been friends for life, and were just out for a sort of conventional picnic in conventional hours. The pluck of it appealed to me as much as anything.

“You are a wonderful girl, Peggy,” I exclaimed involuntarily.

“Peggy? Do you know, I think I begin to like that name. I have been saying it over and over to myself during the ride. But why am I wonderful? I wish I could get used to saying Bob. But I have a sort of something in the throat that seems to jump up and stop me.”

“Ah, that’s a spasm of the naming tissues. One only has it when a name is fresh. You’ll get over that. The best cure is to say it often.”

“Is it, Bob? But why am I wonderful?”

“You do this unconventional thing as though it were the most ordinary thing in the world!”

“Do you mean I oughtn’t to trust—my brother Bob? You see, I just can’t help myself. I had to trust you. Besides, if you knew”—she broke off, and after a pause added a little eagerly—“you understand, don’t you?”

“I understand that chance has given me a very delightful sister.”

“Why, didn’t you begin by keeping my secret from that stationmaster—about Mary Smith. I felt like—like nothing I ever felt before when he brought you up and said you were English.”

“You tried your best to speak English.”

“It was like—like a glorious dream come true when you looked so grave and answered me in German. I’m not used to having people do kind things for me, except my dear mother. And when we stood outside the station, I—well, I’d have given anything just to have unloaded my whole stock of trouble to you.”

“Poor Peggy!”

“No, not Peggy, she hasn’t any troubles of that sort yet. They are—Bob’s. But it’s poor Volna; and Peggy will soon be Volna again.”

I did not know how to answer this. There was such a touch of sadness in it: so I said nothing.

“May I tell you?” she asked presently.

“Sylvia always tells me hers; so I know how to keep a secret.”

“I told you I had a half-sister and brother, didn’t I?”

“Are they like you at all?”

“No, no. They are both members of this terrible Fraternity—revolutionaries. My father was one and lost his life in the cause. My uncle, Count Peter—he was the brother of my father’s first wife—has always dominated our family: even my poor dear mother.”

“Is she involved with the Fraternity, too?”

“No, and yet yes. She has no sympathy with the movement at all; but my uncle influenced her and she has given large sums of money. She is rich, you know, and, if it is found out, the government would be glad to get any pretext for confiscating her fortune. They would throw her into prison, and it would kill her.”

“But surely your uncle was not so mad as to leave anything implicating her in existence.”

“I wish I could think that. It may be so; but only this morning he warned me that if these papers did not get to Cracow and a raid was made there, things would be found which would place her in danger.”

I thought some things about Count Peter which I did not express. “I hope he was exaggerating matters,” I said.

“We have not been happy at home because I would never join in any of these miserable conspiracies. My sister Katinka, and Paul too, always upbraided me.”

“You put your sister first, I notice.”

“She influences Paul. She is very strong willed, and very—very zealous for the ‘Fraternity.’”

“I don’t think you would make a very formidable conspirator, you know.”

“It is not that, exactly. I am too much of a coward, I know. But mother’s fortune comes to me and—oh, this miserable money; they want it for the cause.”

“Phew!” I whistled. “I begin to understand.”

“You thought it strange, I expect, that I was so little affected by my uncle’s fate; but I——”

“Don’t say any more if it worries you,” I said when she paused.

“Oh, I must tell you; only—the fact is, I was always afraid of him and he brought me away from home this time, saying only that I was to go on a visit to some friends; but when we were near Bratinsk he told me what the real object was and—and that mother and he had agreed that I was to be married.”

“Married!” I exclaimed.

“Married to a man who is high up in the Fraternity, and that I should not go back home until—until that was done.”

I thought more things about Count Peter—stronger and harsher things too, this time.

“I had not heard this an hour before you saw me at the station.”

“No wonder you looked troubled.”

“I stayed there hoping to get a train back to Warsaw. I meant to run away. There is another reason, a terrible entanglement, which made me so eager to get back.”

“Involving you?”

“Yes, I’ll tell you all about it some time. It closely concerns my mother’s safety, too.”

“What brought your uncle to Bratinsk?”

“Affairs of the Fraternity; to consult with one of the leaders.”

“Well, I won’t say all I think of your uncle for having involved you in all this.”

“He is dead. Perhaps if he had not been killed he would have listened to me.”

“Perhaps!” But I had my own opinion. “You are right. Volna has had her troubles.”

“I could not feel so sorry for him as I should, if—if things had been different. I am glad I have told you. It’s such a relief to have told some one. And now you know all about me.”

“Did you manage to write to your mother from Bratinsk?”

“Yes, just a short note—that all was well with me.”

“We must try to keep it so, too. Here we are at the top of the hill. Now we’ll push along again: and then, the first train for Cracow.”

We soon covered the flat along the top and I pointed out to her the twinkling lights of Pulta below us.

“How quickly we’ve come,” she cried.

“We must have a straight story to tell. I shall say we are driving in from Vashtic—a place on the other side of Pulta—and that our carriage broke down and we had to continue the journey in this fashion. I shall ask whether Mr. Trevor, a tall fair man, was in the train at the time of the wreck. But you’ll leave the lies for Bob to tell of course.”

“How bluntly you put it.”

“Oh, we can’t help telling some. But it’s in a good cause; so we must hope they’ll pass as white ones.”

I began to understand that night that artistic lying is really a very difficult accomplishment, when inquisitive officials have to be satisfied.

I found the railway station at Pulta in the hands of the police. It had been taken into custody so to speak. When anything happens in Russian Poland, it immediately becomes an object of suspicion; and any one seeking information is at once suspected of complicity. An officer stopped us and asked in a peremptory manner: “Who are you and what do you want?”

“There has been an accident, I believe.”

“Who are you and what do you want? Answer.” A little more sharpness in the tone.

“I am an Englishman, Robert Garrett, and this is my sister. We wish to know whether a friend, Mr. James Trevor, of London, has been hurt in the accident!”

“What accident?”

“The accident to the Cracow express!”

“Who told you there had been an accident?”

“I heard it at Vashtic.”

“Who told you there had been an accident?” he repeated.

“It seemed to be generally known. The servants in the house where I was staying heard it somewhere.”

“What are the servants’ names?”

“I don’t know. I think the man who told me was called Paul. But what I want to know——”

“Where were you staying at Vashtic?” he interrupted.

“What can that matter. Mr. Trevor of London——”

“Ah! You refuse to answer?” He turned away and beckoned to a companion, with whom he conferred, nodding toward us. Then turned to me again. “How did you get here?”

“I started in a caleche but the wheel came off and we had to finish the journey in this fashion.”

“Which wheel?”

“The left hind wheel.”

“Whose carriage was it?”

“I hired it from Gorlas Malstrom.” My inventive faculty for names was getting strained.

“Where does he live?”

“At Vashtic close to the hotel.”

“Which hotel?”

“The Imperial.” I remembered the name of a place where I once had lunch.

“Are you staying there?”

“I am not going back.”

“How long were you there?”

“Not more than an hour or two.”

“Where were you before?”

My local geography not being strong enough to stand a fusillade of this kind, I threw up an earthwork of anger.

“Look here, do you want me to give you a history of my tour with all particulars of my hotel bills since I left London?”

“Ah, you refuse to answer,” he said again, stolidly regarding me with a gloomy stare of suspicion.

“Oh, no; but I’ve had enough of your impertinent curiosity. I am an Englishman, let me see your superior officer.”

“Go away,” he said curtly.

“I demand to see——”

“Go away; or you will be arrested.”

Then I had an inspiration. I said, with a show of great indignation: “Very well. I’ll go, and what’s more I’ll go by the first train to Cracow and lay the matter before the British Consul. When is the first train? You’ll see whether you can smash up English travellers in your infernal trains and then refuse their friends any information.”

This appeared to make an impression. He hesitated, spoke to his companion, and then said: “Come back in the morning. There is no train until eleven o’clock.”

I had gained the information I needed; but I kept up my pretence of anger, muttering and grumbling and mumbling about what the British Consul would do, and so on, as I turned the horse’s head and moved off.

“Bad luck again,” I whispered to Volna. “No train to-night. You may as well try to get a night’s rest.”

“It’s a dark wood that has no clearing,” she said cheerily. “You need rest too, I am sure.”

We went off to find a hotel: and presently Volna whispered: “One of the men is following us.”

“The best thing we can do is to make use of him, then,” said I; and I halted to let him come up. It was the companion of the man who had questioned me, and I resolved to try a different method with him.

I took out a gold piece and let him see it. “You have been told off to follow me, I suppose?”

He glanced at the money and thought I was going to bribe him. “I have only my duty to do,” he said.

“If you’ll be guide instead of follower and show me where my sister and I can get rooms, I’ll give you this.”

He was my man instantly. “There will be no difficulty about that. The accident on the line has filled up the place, but I can manage it for you. You are English?” he said, as we walked.

“I only wanted to see if my poor friend, Trevor, was in that smash. But you heard what passed?”

He shrugged his shoulders and grinned. “You did not ask in the right way;” and he glanced at the money I had given him. “To-morrow it will be all right. There is a train to Cracow at eleven o’clock. I shall be there. No Englishman was hurt in the accident. You may feel quite at ease.”

“I am glad to hear that,” I said. I was; but not for the reasons he thought.

He earned his gold piece; for he soon found accommodation for us and for the horse; and bade us good-night, repeating his assurances that all would be well in the morning.

CHAPTER VI
VERY SISTERLY

VOLNA was down before me the next morning waiting in a little room where we had had supper.

“I guessed Bob would be tired so I would not have him called,” she said. “I have been up an hour or more.”

“And Peggy, how is she?”

“Hungry. And breakfast is ready.”

“You slept well?”

“When I had stopped thinking. I couldn’t help it,” she said in answer to my shake of the head. “I was saying my lesson over and over, lest I should forget it. Do you know it?”

“Lesson?”

“All the names you mentioned so glibly last night at the station.”

I laughed. “Oh, we shan’t need to remember. We shan’t have any more bother. That man’s hint as to how to ask questions will carry us through. You’ll see.”

“Well, we must be quick, it’s nearly ten o’clock.”

“We’ve half an hour. And we’re developing a knack of doing a good deal in half an hour.”

“I think I shall be a little afraid of you.”

“Why?”

“You tell them so readily.”

“Ah, that’s Bob Garrett. Don’t worry about him. He won’t tell them to you.”

“I know that.”

“I think that for a pair of dangerous conspirators we keep up our spirits capitally.”

“I shouldn’t be able to without you. I don’t know what I should have done, indeed, nor how to thank you.”

“Wouldn’t a man be a brute who didn’t do his best to look after his sister?”

“You make light of everything.”

“Well, you can thank me at about six or seven o’clock this evening. We shall be in Cracow then, and the papers will be out of our hands and off our minds.”

“And after that?”

“By Jove. I don’t know. I haven’t thought about that. One thing at a time and—Cracow first. We must go.”

We walked up to the station and found a most welcome change in the attitude of the police. Our friend of the preceding night was looking out for us, and he had evidently let it be known that there were gold pieces to be earned. Everybody received us with smiles. Even the man who had acted the inquisitor’s part overnight came up and was almost profuse in his apologies.

He had not known that I was an English milord; my appearance at that time and in such a way had aroused curiosity; duty compelled them all to be suspicious; there were dangerous people about; I had probably heard of the discovered plot; and so on.

I understood. I took out some gold coins and fingered them carelessly. His eyes lighted with greed as he gazed at them.

“About the accident?” I asked.

“There has been a bad accident; but no one of the name of Trevor, no Englishman at all, was in the train. I have made a special investigation,” he added insinuatingly.

“I’m sorry to have given you the trouble; but thank you.”

“It is no trouble, only a pleasure to be of some small service to an English milord.”

“I am greatly relieved,” I said. “You will probably have had to pay some one for the work. Permit me to repay you;” and I gave him a fifty rouble note. His good will was cheap at a five pound note; but he seemed amazed at so generous a tip. His face beamed as he pocketed it.

“Really it is not necessary,” he said. “If I can be of any further assistance, pray tell me.”

“My sister and I were thinking of going to Cracow,” I said indifferently. “Is the line safe, do you think?”

“You still wish to see the British Consul there?” This with just a shade of anxiety.

“Oh, dear no—unless it is to express my high opinion of the courtesy shown me here. Last night is forgotten. I quite understand.”

“The train will start at eleven. It is usual—a mere form of course in your case—to ask for passports when issuing tickets for stations beyond the frontier.”

“Here they are;” and I took them out of my pocket book making sure that he should see there was plenty of money in it. “Robert Garrett and Margaret Garrett, my sister.”

He just glanced at them and with a bow to Volna, returned them.

“Shall I show you where to get your tickets?” He was making everything delightfully smooth for us.

“I suppose we shall reach Cracow by about four?” I asked casually, as I took out my cigar case.

“Scarcely that, I fear. The traffic is disorganized and the direct line has been closed. You will travel by way of Bratinsk and change there; and then go round by the loop which joins the main line again at Solden.”

The ill news was so unexpected that it caught me right off my guard. To go to Bratinsk meant walking right into the hands of the men who were hunting for us.

To cover my sudden confusion, I let my cigar case fall, and as the official stooped to pick it up, I caught Volna’s look of dire dismay, and shot her a warning glance.

“You smoke of course,” I said to him, and as we lit our cigars, I was thinking how on earth to get out of the difficulty.

Then Volna gave another proof of her quick-wittedness. “Ought you to smoke just yet, Bob?” she asked in a snappy sisterly tone. “You know what the doctor said about your heart.”

I took the cue. “You’re always interfering, Peggy,” I said, very testily. “I wish you wouldn’t.”

The police official affected not to hear this little interchange of family amenities and discreetly looked away.

“I only do it for your good,” she rapped back, with a great air of superiority. “You complained of that feeling, you know. But please yourself. You always do.”

“Rubbish. It’s only because you know I want to go and you want to stay.” She shrugged her shoulders and turned away.

“If you are going, the time is close,” said the official.

“Of course I am going;” and I scowled at Volna and took out some money. “Where do we get the tickets?”

He was turning to show me when I let the coins fall and the cigar drop from my lips as I pressed one hand to my heart—which, by the way, was as sound as a bell—and clutched him with the other for support.

“I knew it by the look about your eyes. I saw it coming,” said Volna, unsympathetically, as she stooped to pick up the money, and the man helped me to a seat. “You will do these things. Please lay him straight down and get him some water, or better, a drop of brandy.” She took off my hat and fanned me with her handkerchief. “It’s nothing serious,” she said to the others who came round. “He’ll be better in a moment. Thank you,” this to the man who came back with the brandy. “Give him air, please.” She was most business-like and sisterly—as though I had been in the habit of fainting daily and she of restoring me.

I came round, of course; but not until the train had left and the question of our return to Bratinsk was settled.

“Perhaps you are satisfied now,” I said to Volna most ungraciously, as I sat up.

“How absurd you are, Bob. I didn’t give you the cigar.”

“When is the next train?” I asked the official.

“Not until to-night.”

“There you are,” I said to Volna with a brotherly readiness to put all the blame on her. “What now?”

“This gentleman said there was some fine scenery here; and a ride or drive would do you good.”

“Scenery!” I cried with a fine contempt. “Well, I suppose we can’t sit about the station all day. But do as you please;” and she walked out of the station. I could have laughed at the excellent affectation of sisterly discontent.

The police official sympathized with me—it was I who had tipped him—and expressed his feeling with a deprecating smile and shrug and a lifting of the brows.

“I suppose it’s the only thing to do,” I murmured as I rose.

“It is perhaps for the best after all that you did not catch the train. There is you baggage,” he said.

“Baggage?”

“Remembering what you said last night about the accident to your carriage on the way from Vashtic, and thinking you might need the baggage in it, I sent out this morning to have it brought here.”

“Did you? That’s really very friendly and obliging,” I managed to answer quite cordially, while wishing him at the devil for his interference.

“What shall we do with it?”

“Oh, just keep it at the station here till I come back for that evening train. You’ll know it easily. Two leather portmanteaus; one marked ‘R. G.’ and one ‘M. G.,’ London. I’ll go and tell my sister. She’ll be as delighted as I am at your thoughtfulness. It was only that which made her wish to remain here for the day.”

I went after Volna, who was walking toward the little town.

“That’s a nice thoughtful fellow. He has sent out some one to find our luggage in the broken-down trap and bring it in. I told him how glad you’d be.”

“Should I go back and thank him?”

“I don’t think it’s necessary, you can do that when we get back this evening. We are going for a ride now—and the sooner we’re off the better.” I went to the stable where my horse was, thinking how to get over the rather awkward difficulty of securing a second animal.

I did not intend to return to Pulta; and if I hired the horse I should not be able to return it. To buy it might create suspicion, as a man does not purchase a horse merely to go for a ride—even in that horse-bartering region; and I had no wish to turn horse-thief.

I put a bold face on the matter and went into the stable whistling. An ostler was grooming my horse and the owner of the place looking on.

“That’s a nice looking animal of yours,” he said.

“Yes; and as good as he looks.”

“No doubt. Andreas knows a good horse.”

“Andreas? Who’s he?”

“At Bratinsk. Where you got him, I suppose.”

I scented danger and fenced. “I suppose you know most of the horses round about here. Will you smoke?” And I gave him a cigar.

“I know this one. I sold him to Andreas.”

“Did you? Well, I don’t care anything about Andreas, but I know he’s a good horse and I want to hire one as good for my sister to ride to-day.”

“I can find you one. There he stands.” I had a look at him. A good horse I saw at a glance. “I like his looks,” I said.

The ostler took him out and ran him up and down. Then an idea occurred to me, involving some of the white lies of necessity however. I expressed a very exaggerated admiration.

“Carry a lady?”

“Carry a baby,” was the reply.

“Then I tell you what I’ll do if you’ll agree. We’re going to Cracow for a couple of days and coming back; and when we come back we shall want two horses. I’ll buy him from you if you can find me a couple of saddles, and if we can come to terms for your taking care of both the horses while we stay here.”

It did not take very long to conclude the bargain, and Volna and I were soon mounted.

Just as we were starting my friend of the police came up.

“Going for the ride then?” he asked knowingly.

“Oh, yes. By the way, has that luggage of mine come in yet?”

“No. They ought to have been back long before now.”

“That’s a nuisance. My sister has to do without her habit.”

“She looks very charming,” he replied, with a bow.

“What time must we be back for that train?”

“Six o’clock. But why not ride to Solden, it’s not more than twenty miles or so. You could take the train there.”

“Oh, no. We’re going the other way.”

“Are you ever coming, Bob?” asked Volna, sharply.

He stepped aside with another significant shrug of the shoulders and with a laugh I rode off.

“You do the vinegary sister to the life,” I said.

“There was cause then. I caught sight of that police agent from Bratinsk in the distance.”

“By Jove!” I exclaimed; and we clattered off through the narrow streets and as soon as we were clear of the town gave our horses their heads.

CHAPTER VII
THE LUCK TURNS

VOLNA was thoroughly at home in the saddle, and it was easy to see that she had been accustomed to horses all her life. She had a perfect seat; and that firm hand and control which bring out the best there is in a horse and make him understand that the master is up.

It was delightful to watch her; and as we kept at it in that first rattling stretch, I believe that in the sheer exhilaration of the ride, we forgot everything, even the unwelcome appearance of the police agent from Bratinsk.

But neither the pace nor the oblivion could last for ever, and when we drew rein at the foot of a hill we came back to a recollection of the load of our worries.

“Wasn’t that glorious?” she cried, her cheeks glowing, and her eyes shining, as she stretched forward and patted her horse’s neck.

“You ride magnificently. How you would enjoy a run with the hounds in England!”

“I have read about it. I love horses. I can keep in the saddle all day. I have done it at home.” Then her face clouded. “How selfish! I had almost forgotten,” she added.

“We are doing all we can,” I replied. “Are you sure that the man you saw was that police agent?”

“Could I forget him?”

“You don’t think he saw us?”

“No. He was talking very earnestly to some one. But I recognized him instantly.”

“I’d give something to know what brought him to Pulta.”

“He was following us, surely.”

“We must hope not. If Michel did his work properly, my horse with your uncle’s coat will have been found a good many miles on the other side of Bratinsk; and his men should be hunting for us there. But I can’t say I like the look of the thing.”

“What shall we do?”

“We’d better try and think what he’ll do. I had intended to take the hint which the man at Pulta dropped, to ride to Solden, and take the train from there. But if the other man picks up our trail there, he’ll set the wires going and we shall find some one waiting for us at Solden.”

“How far is it to Cracow? Could we ride all the way? I could ride all day and all night too, if necessary, as long as the horses will last out.”

“We don’t know the road. I don’t even know where we are now. When you saw that man, I just rattled off at hazard. I know Cracow is pretty well west of Pulta, a little bit south too, and I guess we are on the right road. I am accustomed to take long rides and besides having a fairly good bump of location, always carry this;” and I showed her a small compass on my watch chain.

“I always ride by the sun, but then I know the country round Warsaw for ever so many miles.”

“We should be in a pretty pickle if we were lost,” said I.

“The pickle would be much hotter if it was a police preserve.”

“By Jove, it would. And the worst of it is that if that fellow hears of us at Pulta, he’ll know the names we’ve taken.”

“Poor Bob, I’m getting him into very troubled waters.”

“It’s not Bob or Peggy I’m thinking of, it’s Volna, and Volna’s mother. Cracow seems a mighty hard place to reach; but I’m going to get there somehow.”

I was silent for a while thinking over the problem. Volna’s suggestion was the best if we could do it—to ride all the way to Cracow. But it was no light undertaking. If I had known the way, I should not have hesitated; but the days were short and although the sun was shining brightly enough then, the weather looked as though it were going to change. It was warmer; and when a spell of frost breaks in that country, it generally indicates that rain or snow is coming. To be lost in a rain or snow storm would be a very ugly development indeed.

There was moreover the awkward question whether we were likely to be pursued. On the other hand to stop at Solden appeared to be even more risky.

Seeing me thus thoughtful, Volna broke in. “You are not going to keep anything from me, are you. Don’t do that, please? Do you think that man is likely to ride after us from Pulta?”

“That was just in my mind. I should say it will depend upon how soon he learns anything about us. He is more likely to trust to the wires.”

“It’s getting very exciting. He may telegraph ahead and have people sent out to stop us. I suppose I ought not to say so, but I am beginning to feel a sort of keen enjoyment.”

“I have made up my mind. We’ll stick to the horses and avoid the trains. But we’ll try and mislead any one who may follow us.”

We had already passed several people on the road. I stopped the next comer.

“Is this the road to Solden?” I asked the man, evidently a farmer.

“Yes, one of them.”

“Straight road?”

“As straight as roads are in these parts,” he replied, with a grin.

“I mean do I have to turn to the left or right?”

“You’ll be turning most of the time. You’re from Pulta, aren’t you?”

“It’s not where I’m from but where I’m going that concerns me.”

“All right. I know the lady’s horse;” and on he drove without any more.

“Everybody seems to know everybody else’s horse about here,” I said. “If it weren’t awkward it would be comical. We’ll ride on and try the next man.”

The next was another farmer. A surly Russian who understood Polish with difficulty and spoke it unintelligibly. So I thanked him and rode on no wiser.

Three or four miles later brought us to a village.

“Had we not better get some food here?” asked Volna. “I will go and buy it, and perhaps can find out at the same time what road we ought to take.” So we dismounted, and I waited with the horses.

Presently a priest came by, and bade me good-day with a smile.

“You have a picturesque place here, Father,” I said. “What is it called?”

“Kervatje,” he answered, and we began to talk. I learnt that his name was Father Ambrose, and after some while he asked, “You are a foreigner?”

“An Englishman. My sister is with me. We were going to Solden, but I fear have lost the way.”

“Oh, no. Solden lies across the hills there. A rough road but fairly direct. The only point of difficulty is just over the brow of the hill where the road forks. Take that to the right or you will go astray and might find yourselves in Cracow, after some forty miles or so, that is——” and he smiled pleasantly.

“I’ll remember what you said,” I replied, “and am much obliged to you.”

“It is a pleasure. I have been in England; and speak English a little. But I read much.” We then chatted about London and the incidents of his visit until Volna came up.

“My sister,” I said. As he greeted her I saw him start and look very closely at her.

“How do you do?” he said in English, to her complete discomfiture, holding out his hand. I read her signals of distress and sailed in to the rescue.

“My sister is unfortunately dumb,” I said.

“How sad,” he exclaimed, throwing up his hands. Then he looked puzzled. “She bears a remarkable resemblance to a very beautiful woman whom I knew in the long ago. Twenty years and more. She is a Pole, and is now the Countess Drakona. How very strange.”

“Yes, these chance likenesses are very extraordinary,” I said, gravely. “Come, Peggy, we must get on,” I added to Volna, in English, and put her in the saddle again.

“How very sad,” he repeated, mournfully. “And yet how clever of her to be able to make herself understood in buying things.”

“The education of the dumb in England is almost perfect. Signs are their language, you know,” I replied, as I shook hands with him and mounted.

He looked after us very thoughtfully, and when presently I turned, he waved his hand to me and I saw him walk a few paces and then enter the shop where Volna had made her purchases.

“I think we’ll rattle on again for a bit. He’s going to find out that yours is a singular form of aphasia, and only affects your knowledge of English. Perhaps he’ll class it as a case for the scientists; but more likely as one of suspicious ignorance.”

“Who can he be?” asked Volna.

“He gave me his name as Father Ambrose.”

“I have heard my mother speak of him.”

“He spoke of her as a very beautiful woman.”

“And she is still beautiful.”

“And he said how closely you resembled her.”

Volna laughed. “Bob mustn’t be conventional. That’s a sort of ball-room dandy’s speech. And no brother talks like it.”

“Brothers don’t always say all they think.”

“But they keep their thoughts to themselves.”

“I know what I think about my sister,” said I.

She smiled again, and glanced at me. “Don’t you think I bought a huge parcel, Bob?”

“If we eat all that, it will last us farther than Cracow. But I know what it means generally, when a girl goes shopping.”

“Yes, she thinks of things that are necessary. There are loaves in there for the horses.”

“I never thought of them,” I admitted.

“One of us must think sensibly,” she retorted.

“True for you. But did you find out anything about the road to Solden?”

“No. A woman served me, and she knew nothing.”

“Well, I found out from the priest. At the top of the hill yonder the road forks and that to the left will take us to Cracow, forty miles.”

“I wonder what he is thinking now he knows I am no mute.”

“Men make all sorts of mistakes, and I shouldn’t be in the least surprised if he believes we are just—running away together.”

“Bob! How ridiculous!” she cried, with a merry laugh, her cheeks aflush. “Let us get on;” and she shook the reins, and dashed on ahead from me.

When we reached the forked roads at the top of the hill I glanced at my watch. It was nearly half-past three, and we had still forty miles to cover on an unknown road; it had taken us some three hours to do about twenty miles in daylight with the horses fresh—how long would they take to finish the journey mostly in the dark? I shook my head dubiously over the sum.

“We’ll ride on a couple of miles or so and then find a spot for our picnic; but we can’t spare more than half an hour at the outside.”

Black bread, sausage, and village cheese do not make an epicurean lunch; but Volna and I had rich hunger sauce, and were more than satisfied. We fed the horses while we were eating, to save time, and in half an hour we were ready for the road again. There was no longer any doubt that the weather was going to change. As we mounted there were very ominous banks of dark sullen clouds. Rain or snow would fall within a few hours: but I could only hope it would be rain.

“I fancy we’ve shaken off any pursuit even if any one started out to follow us,” I said.

“We are going to have some weather, too, that will help us. I hope Bob doesn’t mind riding in the wet.”

“You guessed the thought in my mind, eh?”

“No. I’m used to reading weather signs. The rain never hurts me. I’ve been out for hours in it. But we shan’t have much for an hour or two, you’ll find.”

“We’d better make the most of our time then.”

We rode as fast as we dared push the horses in view of the distance to be covered. I eased my animal up the hills, and now and again took a spell of half a mile or so on foot; but despite this, I was concerned to find that before we had covered another twenty miles he began to show signs of fatigue.

Then the storm burst upon us. It was rain, not snow; but rain in almost tropical force. It would not have been so bad, had we known the road; but we had already had to stop several times to make sure we were going right.

For two hours we plodded through a pelting storm until I was drenched and feared that Volna must be in the same condition.

“I wouldn’t care if I could see,” she said once. It was pitch dark, and we could only go at a walking pace.

“I shouldn’t care if you were not wet,” I answered, “though I confess I’d like to know where we are.”

“I am not very wet,” she said. “My fur cloak protects me. We shall get somewhere in the end.”

“In England we have a civilized habit of putting up sign posts,” I grumbled, as we came to another forked road and I was at a loss which to choose. “All the roads seem to be twins in this place.”

Which way to choose I could not even guess. I tried to judge which was the better road; but both appeared equally bad.

“Let the horses decide,” said Volna.

“Yours is the fresher of the two, and better able to use his instinct.”

“Yours is much keener to get to a stable,” she laughed.

I walked mine back a little distance and then gave him his head. He walked deliberately to the side of the road, and began to crop the grass.

Volna tried hers then; and he went as far as the fork where he waited for the other to join him. Then they both moved on to the left.

“So be it,” said I, and we let them go as they would.

“It’s not raining so fast,” declared Volna, presently. “Shall we draw up under a tree and give them the rest of the bread?”

“It’ll be nice soft food,” I laughed.

“I can wring my cloak, too, and ease the weight from my horse a little.”

We pulled up under a tree and gave the horses the bread, munching a crust ourselves, and making the best of things. Volna’s pluck was inextinguishable; and she laughed and joked over her plight as she wrung out the wet.

I struck a match and looked at my watch, and was startled to find it was nearly ten o’clock.

I told Volna and we started again. The rain was much less and the darkness had lifted somewhat; but I led my horse now instead of riding.

Presently I felt the road getting suspiciously soft and grassy, and some minutes afterwards I stumbled up against a gate which blocked the way and led into a wood.

There was nothing for it but to go back to the forked road. To make matters worse, the rain started again and came pouring down even more violently than before.

Nor was that the worst. We got off the road again, and once more were brought to a standstill by a gate.

“It looks as though we were lost,” I said.

“We’ve about reached the bottom of our troubles, I should think,” replied Volna, still cheery. “But if the chance offered, I should like to put off the rest of the ride till daylight. And look, there’s a light.” She pointed to it gleefully, away to our left.

We made our way to it with trouble, and found that it came from the lower window of a small house.

I rapped at the door; and the light was instantly extinguished.

I had to knock again twice, and then a window above was opened, and a woman put her head out.

“Who are you, and what do you want? Are you the police?”

“Police? No. We have lost our way, and want shelter.”

“There’s no one in the house but me. How many are you?”

“Two. Myself and my sister. We can pay you well.”

She drew her head in for a minute, and then looked out again and said. “Are you sure you’re only two? Let’s see you.” We stood back that she could do so. “I’ll come down,” she said.

When she opened the door the light she held revealed to me one of the most forbidding faces I have ever seen on a woman’s shoulders.

“You’ve got horses, have you? You must stall them in the shed.”

She handed me a lantern, and Volna came with me. When we had fumbled our way to the shed, and tied the horses up, giving them some hay we found in the place, we went back to the house.

She admitted us without more delay and as soon as we were inside, locked and bolted the door. “A lone woman needs to be careful,” she said in explanation, as she led us into a room at the side where a fire was burning.

Two glasses and a spirit bottle were on the table, and a smell of rank tobacco smoke hung about the place.

Volna went in first, and the woman, having placed the light upon the table, stood holding the door for us to pass.

“We are much obliged to you,” I said, and as I turned to her I caught sight of a man’s face peering through the half closed door of a dark room across the passage.

“I’ll do my best for you,” she answered. “Dry yourselves by the fire. I’ll be back in a moment.” With that she went out, and I heard her turn the key softly upon us.

It might mean nothing; but—well, I did not tell Volna.

CHAPTER VIII
WHAT HAPPENED IN THE COTTAGE

VOLNA walked up to the wood fire, took off her fur turban, shook it, and laughed.

“Were you ever as wet before? I never was.”

“I wonder if the woman can find you something to put on while the clothes are dried. What do you make of her?”

“She about fits the place,” she replied, glancing round the room.

A wooden bench, a couple of wooden armchairs, a square table and a black oak chest of drawers with some unpainted shelving over it for crockery, pots, and pans, constituted the furniture; and for decoration a couple of crude coloured prints, scriptural in subject and grimy with age, hung over the fireplace with a piece of broken looking glass on a string between them.

“Rough,” I said, in answer to her look.

“It might be dirtier. It is always a good sign when a woman’s care can be traced.”

“She said she was a lone woman, so she can’t have much else to do except look after the place.”

Volna smiled. “Didn’t you see those?” and she pointed to a pair of men’s boots by the chest of drawers. “Probably wood cutter or charcoal burner or something of that sort; often very honest people.”

I thought of the man’s face I had seen and said nothing.

“Have you your flask?” I took it out. “Good, then I shall warm some water and you must have a hot drink;” and in a minute she had cleaned a small saucepan and had the water on the fire.

“I wish the woman would come back,” I grumbled. “I want you to get your wet clothes off.”

“I shouldn’t call her,” replied Volna.

“Why not?”

“I shouldn’t let her know that we know she locked the door.”

“Did you notice that?”

“That’s deliciously man-like, Bob. Of course we’re in a very queer place; but we may as well pretend we see nothing odd and suspect nothing. We’re not really blind, however.”

“I begin to think Peggy’s more wonderful than ever,” said I with a chuckle.

The woman came in then with a bundle of clothes on her arm; and her manner was very different. She was a hideous creature truly; the upper part of her face seamed with what might have been two knife slashes, and one cheek quite disfigured with marks like those which vitriol leaves. When she spoke or smiled her mouth drew up to the side, disclosing long yellow fangs of teeth.

“Ah, that’s right; a hot drink you’re making. You’re both wet to the skin, aren’t you? I’ve rummaged up some clothes for you. I’ll make you as comfortable as I can; but I’m only a poor woman——”

“You’re a very kind one,” said Volna, looking at the clothes she had brought.

“They are only rough, you know; but the best I can manage.”

“Water’s hot, Bob,” cried Volna. “Get me a cloth to wipe these glasses,” she said to the woman; and the moment her back was turned Volna slipped the papers from her dress and handed them to me. We mixed some brandy and water and I insisted upon her drinking some.

“I’ve set a candle in the room opposite for you,” said the woman.

“Call me when you’re ready, Peggy;” and I went off with the clothes she had brought for me.

I had just completed the change when I heard a stealthy step in the passage. I was listening for it, indeed, and had not shut the door. Some one tried to shut it for me. I stopped that and pulled it wide open. It was the man whose face I had seen before—long, thin, cadaverous and cunning, with close set, ferrety eyes.

“Come in,” I said, cheerfully.

He started very uneasily and then mumbled: “I thought you didn’t know it was open.”

“All right. I suppose these are your things. I’m much obliged to you.”

“They’re my best,” he answered. “You’re welcome.”

Now he was some four inches shorter than I, whereas the clothes were quite long enough for me; and the discrepancy did not escape me, nor tend to lessen my suspicions.

He stood watching me silently as I finished the change and took out the contents of my pockets. But I was careful not to let him see that I had a weapon.

In the silence I could hear the rain streaming down.

“It’s a fearful night,” I said; “your wife said you weren’t at home.”

“Just come in.”

“You managed to keep dry.”

He pretended not to hear me. “It won’t last much longer. How did you come here?”

“We got off the road in the dark and saw a light in your window.”

“Strangers here, maybe?” I caught a quick furtive glance with a gleam of considerable interest in the shifty eyes.

“I don’t think I’ve ever been in this particular spot before; but I shall know better when I see it by daylight. Anybody can get lost in the dark.”

“Going far?”

“Out for a ride and got caught in the storm. Will you see to the horses for me?”

“I have. Couple of good ones. One of them is nearly done up. You’ve come far?”

At that moment Volna opened the door of the other room and called me. She burst into a merry laugh at the sight of me and I grinned back at her.

“You look as if you were made up as a peasant for theatricals,” I said.

“I don’t know what you’re like. But I’m dry. Think of it, Bob, dry once more.”

I carried in my wet things and they were soon steaming by the fire with hers. The woman hustled about and put some black bread and vile cheese on the table; while the man stood fidgetting about sheepishly by the door.

“It’s all I’ve got to eat; but I can make you some coffee.”

“The very thing,” said Volna.

“Fetch the coffee, Ivan,” said the woman. The man hesitated, glanced at her, and then shuffled away.

“Come on, Bob, I’m famished,” cried Volna, sitting down and cutting some bread.

“Ivan says your horse is done up,” said the woman. “You must be a long way from home.”

“Further than you think,” replied Volna. “We’re English.”

“You didn’t ride from England?” she asked stupidly.

“You dear soul, there’s the sea between England and here.”

“But you’re strangers?”

“Some more bread, Bob?” and as she bent down to cut it she whispered in French to me: “She’s asked that question a dozen times, trying to pump me all the time.”

“Strangers?” I said to the woman. “Of course we are. Tourists. Don’t know a soul for many a mile about here and not a soul knows us. But you needn’t be afraid. We can pay you;” and I took out a handful of money and tossed a gold piece across to her.

It was worth the money to see the greedy avaricious light that leapt in her eyes. But Volna looked puzzled and a little alarmed at this act of mine.

“What a time that man is getting the coffee,” the woman said. “I suppose he can’t find it;” and she went out of the room.

“Why did you do that?” asked Volna.

“Why not? It was the answer she wanted, and it’s quite a relief to be able to tell the truth.”

“Do you suspect anything?”

“I think the man is a long time finding such a thing as coffee and I wonder they don’t keep it here with the rest of their eatables;” and Volna shewed that she understood me.

The two came back wrangling: she scolding him for his delay; he protesting he didn’t know where she kept things. They were clumsy actors, however.

The woman made some coffee then and set it on the table. “I’m thinking where I’ll put you to sleep,” she said. “You can have our bed and welcome,” she added to Volna; “but for your brother, I’ll have to make one up somehow. You see we’re only poor folks. But we’ll manage. Come, Ivan.”

I was stirring my coffee and put it to my lips as they went out; and the woman turned and saw me. This time instead of locking the door upon us, they left it ajar.

It was becoming as plain as print.

I set down the cup, untasted, of course, and talked in a fairly loud tone about the kindness of the two and how good the coffee tasted; and Volna taking her cue from me agreed.

Then we all but emptied the two cups into a jug and hid it away, and went on talking unconcernedly. Presently I stole to the door and listened. The two were in the upper part of the house.

Volna, I could see now, was beginning to grow nervous.

“It’s all right. We can act much better than they, and there isn’t a thing to fear.”

Her brow wrinkled. “I think Peggy doesn’t want to be left alone, Bob,” she said.

“You’ll have to make shift with that wooden settle; but you may go to sleep without a thought.”

“What do you think they mean to do?”

“They’ve half done what they meant and we shall soon know the rest. The coffee is drugged of course, and they think we’ve drunk it. Now, lie down and just go off to sleep. I’ve dried my last three cigars and am going to smoke one of them.”

I settled her on the wooden bench and having lighted my cigar, rummaged about and found an oily rag with which I cleaned my revolver very carefully, reloaded it and kept it at hand.

I then sat down by the fire smoking and thinking and waiting. It was evident enough that we had got into the hands of some very ugly customers. I recalled several strange tales of dark deeds done in these wild and lonely parts of the country; and the circumstances now lent themselves readily to villainy.

They had got from us the fact that we were strangers, and I had purposely made no hesitation in shewing that we had plenty of money. That they had tried in their clumsy way to drug us, I had no doubt whatever; and the only question was what they meant to do next.

The fear in the woman’s first question whether we were the police, and her statement that the man was not in the house, gave a clue to their character; and the change in manner, the assumption of friendliness, the suggestiveness of sending the man to find the coffee; indeed all these circumstances fitted together too well to leave any doubt that some devilment was on foot.

I did not feel the least alarmed, however. I felt myself more than a match for the two in any rough and tumble that was to come; I was thoroughly on my guard; and had a weapon and knew well enough how to use it. As a matter of fact it was we rather than they who were laying the snare.

Somewhere between half an hour and an hour passed without a sound in the house. I had finished my cigar and tossed it away and was gazing into the flickering embers of the fire, when I heard the stairs creak slightly. A glance shewed me that Volna was asleep; a tribute this, indeed, to her trust in me.

I dropped my head as though I, too, were asleep and breathed heavily. I was very curious to know what was to happen.

In a short while the door was pushed open noiselessly and the woman put her head in. I had already set her down for the head of the firm, as the more courageous of the pair of rascals.

She looked at us both for some moments and then entered and crept towards Volna. Not daring to let her go too near, I shifted my position and grunted, as if uneasy in my sleep. This drew her attention to me, as I intended, and she stopped and stared at me.

Next she moved to the table and took up the two cups one after another; glanced from them to us in turn; and concluding that we had drunk the contents, set them down with a slight grunt of satisfaction.

The logs slipped in the fire at that moment with a shower of sparks. She started and took a quick step towards the door.

Thinking she was going I moved, breathed very heavily and blinked at her as though almost overcome with sleep.

“I came for the light,” she said in a low voice. “Our candle’s out.”

For answer I nodded, waved my hand clumsily to signify she could take it, attempted to rise and fell back in my chair, huddled together as if completely overcome with stupor.

She stood with the lamp in her hand as if planning what to do next; a look of diabolical evil on her hideous face. Then slowly and cautiously she came towards me. Having satisfied myself that she had no knife or weapon I shut my eyes and let her hold the light close to my face. I could feel her breath as she bent forward to listen to my breathing.

After a moment she moved away and crossed to Volna, whom she examined with the same scrutiny. A low sigh of satisfaction escaped her, as she turned away and went out of the room, carrying the lamp with her. I heard the stairs creak as she crept up them.

Then I woke Volna. “Don’t be frightened. Pretend to be asleep. Something is going to happen; the woman has been in to make sure that we are asleep; and will no doubt be back in a moment.”

I went back to my chair and waited, ready to resume my extremely uncomfortable position at a moment’s notice.

Shortly afterwards the stairs creaked again, more noisily this time; probably under the heavier weight of them both; but instead of entering the room the steps went along the passage. Then I heard sounds in the distance; just muffled confused noises of knocking and stamping. What caused them I could not conjecture.

Soon after they had ceased, the footsteps came again into the passage, and a moving streak of light shewed through the door of our room. This time something weighty was set down with a heavy bump just outside the door; a most unaccountable rustling followed; and then the two whispered together. In the pause a pungent odour of paraffin came from the lamp they had.

All sorts of weird conjectures crowded into my thoughts as to the possible meaning of this development. Volna had heard it all and looked at me in bewilderment. I motioned her to keep silence.

Another journey was made up the creaky staircase. It was the man who went, and while he was away the woman looked in upon us. I saw to my surprise this time that she wore her bonnet.

As the man’s tread was on the stairs again she drew back and in a whisper loud enough to reach us, she said: “It’s all right, you coward. They’re both off fast enough. You can do it safely now. The man first, mind.”

The next moment the door was pushed wide open and they both entered stealthily.

CHAPTER IX
A VERY TIGHT CORNER

THE suspense of the two or three moments which followed the entrance of the pair constituted an ordeal not to be forgotten. That Volna mastered herself sufficiently to pass through it without a sign or sound, was the greatest proof of her courage she could have given.

It was less trying for me. I had witnessed the woman’s former visit, and, despite her ominous whisper to her husband, had come to the conclusion that no attempt was to be made on our lives. Moreover I was armed. But Volna knew nothing of this. I had only been able to whisper a hurried and very indefinite warning to her, calculated, despite my assurance, to work up her fears to a high strain.

They stood still for some moments; the man slightly in front of his wife, who set a candle she was carrying down behind her. The faces of both then caught the red gleam from the embers of the fire; and so evil looking a couple I hope never to see again.

The man’s long, thin, cunning face was strained and intense, and his narrow treacherous eyes glanced from me to Volna and back from Volna to me, as if in doubt which to attack first. Just behind him stood the tall, gaunt, and angular form of the woman inciting him; her eyes gleaming with excitement, her lips parted and drawn in a snarl to one side, and every line, cicatrice and seam of her scarred repulsive features brought into strong relief by the ruddy gleam of the log fire. She looked a veritable hag of evil, utterly detestable, deadly, and loathsome.

“The man first,” she whispered, jogging her accomplice.

He glanced half round to her, irritable, and then I saw that he was carrying a length of cord.

He began to creep slowly toward me until Volna, as she confessed afterwards, could endure it no longer. She sprang up and called me.

In another moment I was on my feet; and before the two could recover from their astonishment, I sprang past them, slammed the door, and set my back against it, my hand on my revolver.

“Now perhaps you’ll tell me what this means?”

The woman was for fighting and stood at bay like a beast, just robbed of its intended victim. But the man was of poorer stuff, and cowered ashen white and speechless.

“Mayn’t we move about our own house?” asked the woman. “Ivan, if you’re a man, you won’t stand this.”

But Ivan had no sort of fight in him. He clapped his hands to his face and sank into my chair by the fire. The hag looked his way and swore at him with a snarl of contempt.

“Come now, what does this mean?”

“It means that if you don’t like it, you can clear out, the pair of you;” and she turned fiercely on Volna. “Coming here with your lies about being lost, and wanting to rob poor and honest folk, and then trumping up a lying accusation. Who are you, I’d like to know.”

Her assurance was as brazen as her courage was unquestionable; I own I was at a loss what to do.

“That won’t do with me. Your one chance is to tell the truth,” I said.

“You’re a man, aren’t you, to call a woman a liar? Do you hear that, Ivan?” and she went to him and shook him. “Get up, pig: don’t sit shaking there when you hear me abused by this thief of the night.” She hauled him to his feet; and Volna took the opportunity of crossing to my side.

“You mustn’t talk like that here,” he said with a sort of hang-dog manner.

“I’d rather talk to you than to the woman there. Now you——”

“You hear that, Ivan. Strike him for that. You deal with him and I’ll look after the wench.” She pushed him toward me and seemed for the moment to infect him with some of her own desperate courage.

“If you don’t like it, go,” he said.

“No, they shan’t go now,” interrupted the fury. “We daren’t let them go now, you fool. You know. Go on.”

He still hung back, however, and then she suddenly wrenched open a drawer and took out a formidable looking chopper.

“Here, Ivan, now will you do it? Down with the man and leave the wench to me. It will be death if we don’t do it and get away.”

The remnants of his courage awoke when he felt the weapon in his hand; and I heard Volna catch her breath at the look which gradually stole into his beady, cruel eyes, as he looked at me.

Goaded by the woman’s taunts and the fear-thoughts which her words had started, he took a couple of stealthy steps toward me while the woman went round the table to reach Volna.

Just as he was raising his weapon to rush at me, I whipped my revolver out and covered him.

“Drop that; you murderous devil,” I cried, in a ringing tone.

With a cry of fear he started back and let the chopper fall on the brick floor. In a moment I had possession of it, and handed my pistol to Volna.

“If she moves, use it,” I said.

But the sudden turning of the tables had knocked the fight even out of the virago of a woman. The man no longer counted. He stumbled back and cowered against the wall, getting as far away from me as possible, and just stared at me beside himself with fright.

“Now we can talk,” I said.

“We didn’t mean anything,” declared the woman. “We were only trying to frighten you so that we might get safely out of the room. I’m sure I tried to do all I could for you; giving you food and——”

“That’ll do. Go to that end of the room.” She obeyed me. “Now answer my questions. Why did you come stealing into the room just now—before this time?”

“I only wanted to see you were all right and to fetch the lamp. I’ve done my best for you,” she murmured in a whining, canting, fawning tone.

“You won’t answer, eh? Well, I’ll give your man a chance. Now you, tell me what was that rope for that you brought in?”

The woman tried to reply, but I silenced her. The man glared at me speechless and helpless.

“Your only chance is to tell the truth. You were going to tie me up with it? Confess.”

“No, no, no,” he gasped through his pallid lips.

“You had two ropes; one for me and one for my sister here.”

“No, no, no,” he repeated.

“You know I speak the truth. But if you won’t confess that, tell me why you drugged that coffee you gave me.”

The woman broke out again declaring by all the saints that I must be mad to ask such a question. The man only gazed stupidly at me in silence.

“Let him drink it then,” said Volna; and the woman’s start at the shrewd suggestion told me that it had struck home.

“Yes, that’s the test,” I agreed readily. “Will you get that jug?”

Volna took out the jug and poured the coffee back into the cups.

They both watched her intently as she did this, turning now and then from her to me, with swift glances of speculative fear.

“Now if this is not drugged or poisoned, drink it;” and I took one of the cups and held it toward the man; “Quick,” I cried, so sternly that he trembled. His eyes were everywhere except on my face, and his lips moved convulsively.

“Drink it, fool,” said the woman with a sneer.

He stretched out his hand toward the cup, and then with a swift gesture struck at it and dashed it to the ground.

“I knew it. I need no more proof,” I declared.

“I’ll drink it,” cried the woman, making a snatch at the cup on the table. But I caught her hand, and Volna took away the cup.

“No, no, that is for the police,” I said.

At the mention of the police an angry oath leapt from her lips and she strove desperately to wrench her hand from my grip to get the cup. I had to use some violence to thrust her back.

Foiled in the effort to destroy the traces of the drug, her rage completely mastered her; and being unable to vent it upon us, she turned upon the man. With a running accompaniment of abuse and reproaches as the cause of the trouble she seized him and shook him till his teeth rattled like castanets, and then clouted and kicked him and tore at him with her nails like a fiend incarnate until he fell huddled up on the floor howling to her to stop.

Volna opened the door and went out to escape the din and repulsive sight and then called me hurriedly.

In a moment the whole infernal scheme of the two was made clear. The heavy burden which we had heard set down outside the door and which had so puzzled me was explained, as well as the mysterious rustling which had set me wondering.

The one was a cask half full of petroleum; the other a huge heap of shavings, chips and hay, ready saturated with petroleum.

“They meant to bind us in our sleep and fire the house. I did not think there could be such fiends,” said Volna, trembling.

It was too obvious to question. The heap of shavings laid ready for lighting told its own story; and with the petroleum thrown into the room where we were to have been left bound and unconscious, nothing could have saved us.

Volna clung to my arm faint and cold with the horror of it. “Let us go,” she whispered.

“That is why the woman was dressed to go out. I see it now. That fear of hers of the police, the noise we heard outside; they were expecting the police and meant to fly on our horses. Such devils ought not to be allowed to escape.”

But it was obvious that we dared not run the risk of denouncing them.

“Let us go,” said Volna again. “The very air of the place makes me faint and ill.”

I went back into the room.

“I have found out all your infernal scheme. Get out of here, and keep out of sight, lest I take the law in my own hands;” and I drew the revolver again to emphasize my words.

The man was seemingly afraid to move; so I dragged him to his feet, hauled him to the door and flung him down in the passage. “Upstairs with you and if I catch so much as a glimpse of you I’ll shoot you like the murderous skunk you are.”

He crawled away from my feet and slunk up the creaking staircase shaking in every limb and casting frightened glances behind him.

“What are you going to do?” asked the woman, coming to the door.

“Hold your tongue,” I thundered. “Go to the villain you egged on to do this thing. Quick, or——” She was scared by my rage and went without another word.

“Shall I change?” asked Volna.

I nodded. “And bring me my things. I’ll stop on guard here.”

I heard the two muttering and wrangling in the room above; but neither made any attempt to come down; and in some few minutes we were ready.

“We’ll go together and get the horses,” I said to Volna; and was in the act of opening the door when I started involuntarily as some one beat a loud peremptory summons on the panel.

“Open the door there, open,” called a voice.

Volna started and clutched my arm. “What shall we do?”

If it was the police, we were caught like rats in a trap.

“We must brazen it out,” I said.

“The papers?” she whispered. The knocking was repeated more loudly and insistently than before. “Open there, at once. I say.”

“See if there’s fire enough to burn them.”

She ran back into the room.

“Who is there?” I called.

“The police. Open or we shall break in.”

To shew hesitation would be fatal. So I unfastened the door and threw it open.

At that moment, Volna came back and shook her head.

Two men entered. “You are our prisoners,” cried the first comer. “If you resist the consequences will be on your heads.”

“We don’t resist. I’m glad you’ve come.”

They seized and held us both; the man who took me snatching the revolver which was still in my hand.

“Ah, a police weapon,” he said, significantly, and shewed it to his companion, who appeared to be in command.

“Search them both for any more weapons,” came the order, sharp and ringing.

“Wait a moment. There is a mistake here,” I said.

“You’ve made it then, in letting us net you here so easily;” and they both laughed.

“What is the charge against us?” I asked.

It was about as tight a corner as fate in an ill-natured mood could have devised for us.

CHAPTER X
THE HAG TO THE RESCUE

I KNEW enough of the methods of the police not to lay too much emphasis at the outset upon the fact that they had blundered. The police are pretty much the same all the world over. Charge them with blundering, and they will exhaust every resource to disprove the charge; and in the meantime, you who have made it are getting badly squeezed.

Moreover, I was not certain that it was a blunder. I hoped they were after the villainous couple who lived in the house, and that in the haste and confusion of the moment we had been mistaken for them. But it was quite possible Volna and I had been tracked, and were really the prisoners they sought.

In any case it was highly dangerous for us to be in their hands, and we should need to keep cool heads to get out again, without the fact becoming known that we were fugitives.

As it was, only an accident prevented the incriminating papers from being immediately found. Just the luck that I had told Volna to try and burn them and had not taken them back from her. The search to which she was subjected was little more than formal; but my pockets were all overhauled, and my papers taken out and examined.

I was not so foolish as to resist; but I began to feel pretty indignant when papers, money, and all, were retained by the leader.

“How did you get this?” he asked, holding up the police revolver. He appeared to attach great importance to my possession of it. This interested me greatly. That I had taken it from the police agent on the Devil’s Staircase would certainly be known; and if he was in search of us, it was a sufficient proof that we were the persons wanted. I had to get at that indirectly.

“If you will permit me I will give you an exact report of what has happened here, and that will account for everything.”

“All I want is a plain answer to my question. No long round-about, lying story.”

There was no help for it. I must lie. So I did it boldly. “Most fortunately I got the revolver here,” I said.

“You’re a cool hand,” was the sneering reply. “But it won’t do you any good to lie to me.”

“Fortunately, I mean, because it saved my life and that of my sister here. We were attacked——”

“Do you mean there are any others in the house?” he broke in.

“Certainly I do. The two wretches who appear to have been living here are in a room above.”

Both the man and his wife had kept as quiet as mutes all this time. But they had evidently been listening, for at that moment the door above was opened, and the two came out.

“Is that the police? Is that the police?” cried the woman. “Heaven, and the blessed Virgin above be praised. We’ve been nearly murdered by the two villains there. You’ll protect us now, won’t you? Praise to the Holy Saints for having sent you to our assistance.”

“What’s all this?”

The couple came running down the stairs and threw themselves on their knees; the woman pouring out a voluble account of how they had been attacked by us and their lives threatened, mingled with thanks for their deliverance, entreaties to protect them, and an urgent warning to pay special attention to me as a dangerous and murderous villain.

I foresaw a very awkward complication. When two parties accuse each other, the police rule is to arrest both.

The leader was obviously perplexed. “What is your name?” he said to me; and before I could reply the woman burst in.

“Ivan Krempel, and that’s Nita, his wife,” she cried. “They’ve been using the house for days and days past.”

I attempted to deny this; but he silenced me. “And your names,” he asked the woman.

“This is my husband, Peter Vranowski, the woodcutter; I am Anna his wife. We came last week from Potzden in Silesia, and have been lodging here with these Krempels. We thought they were honest folks like ourselves.”

“You are the man I am searching for,” he said, turning to me. “Ivan Krempel, and his wife, Nita.”

This was good news in a way. He was not after the Garretts, and I could safely use that name.

“I can understand your perplexity,” I said calmly. “But this woman is lying. We are English; Robert Garrett and Margaret Garrett, brother and sister. Caught by the storm to-night, we came here for shelter, and narrowly escaped death at the hands of these two.”

“But these people say you are the Krempels.”

“So they are. So they are. The holy Virgin knows I speak the truth,” protested the old hag.

“The proof is in your hands. Our passports are among the papers which you have taken from me.”

“Go into the room there, all of you,” he answered, after a pause. I led the way with Volna and the rest followed. “Get a light,” he said to Volna, the candle having been extinguished in the former scrimmage.

“I don’t know where to look for one. There was a lamp here, but the woman took it away.”

“Listen to her. Listen to her. Oh, the liar, when she carried it upstairs with her own hands,” cried the hag.

“Go upstairs and see if it’s there,” he told his man, who went and returned carrying it.

“The woman was right in that,” said the officer significantly.

“She would very naturally know where she herself took it,” I exclaimed; but he was as pig-headed as his class, and repeated his statements, adding to my concern, “I don’t see how I can decide this. It’s beyond me.”

“There are my papers,” I reminded him. “But surely you have only to look at that man and his wife, and contrast them with my sister and myself to see the difference. You must have some description of them.”

He mumbled to himself and began to finger my papers. “I don’t see anything here to guide me.”

“Those are the passports;” and I pointed to them.

He unfolded them. “I don’t read English,” he said.

“You can read the names at any rate and, of course, as a responsible official so near the frontier you know a passport by sight.”

“He stole that from an Englishman. He boasted of it to us,” interjected the woman, who had been watching closely.

“How am I to know this is yours?” he asked immediately, taking the cue suggested.

“There are twenty proofs in those papers, that I am an Englishman; as well as on myself. See, the pocket book there has the address of a London maker. Here, the tab on my coat has my tailor’s name in London. Don’t you hear that I speak with a foreign accent?”

He examined the pocket book, and the tab on my coat; and appeared to be impressed. “They seem right; but you may have stolen them,” he said grudgingly.

I pressed the advantage. Picking out a couple of Sylvia’s letters I shewed him they were in English, and addressed to me.

“That is not Robert—that is B-o-b,” he said suspiciously.

“Robert in England is shortened into Bob,” I explained; but he shook his head.

“Here is one on the same paper, Wyrley Court, Great Malverton. It is from my mother, ‘My dear son Robert.’ You can read that?” and I stuck at him until I had deepened the impression. Then I told him briefly what had happened in the cottage, pointed to the heap of soaked shavings, the two ropes and a cask of petroleum.

This was not done without many interruptions from the woman, who vociferously denied the whole story.

“You say you were to be drugged? How do you know?” I told him of the attempt to make the man drink a cup of the coffee. This appealed to him; and he smiled grimly.

“Have you still the cup you saved?”

Volna got it and handed it to him.

“The woman shall drink it now,” he declared. But the old hag swore that it was we who had made the coffee, not she; and that we had tried to rob her.

“Why should we wish to rob a woodcutter,” I asked. I had his ear now and he began to have a glimmer of reason. “Besides, our horses are outside in the shed.”

“They are our horses,” asserted the woman.

“Go and look at them. See if a woodcutter, just a week here from Silesia, as she says, would possess two such animals and saddles. One is a side saddle, too.”

He sent his man out; and sat silent. Matters were going better, so I left him to absorb the points I had made.

“Will you drink that coffee?” he asked the woman suddenly, very sternly.

“Why should I drink the poison we refused before?” she cried, and pointing her scraggy finger at Volna added: “She made it, let her drink it.”

“You see,” I said; and he nodded in agreement.

Then his man came back and reported that the horses were two good ones and that the saddles were soaked as if they had been exposed to the fury of the storm; thus bearing out my story.