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The City of Fire

by Grace Livingston Hill · English · Gutenberg #7008 · 589,880 chars · public domain (US)

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Title: The City of Fire

Author: Grace Livingston Hill


        
Release date: December 1, 2004 [eBook #7008]
                Most recently updated: March 15, 2018

Language: English

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/7008

Credits: Text file produced by Anne Folland, Tiffany Vergon, Charles Aldarondo,
        Charles Franks and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team
        
        HTML file produced by David Widger


*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE CITY OF FIRE ***




Produced by Anne Folland, Tiffany Vergon, Charles Aldarondo,
Charles Franks and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team









THE CITY OF FIRE

By Grace Livingston Hill


[DP Postprocessor's Note:

*renumbered chapters beginning with chapter 24: original text had two
chapters numbered 23

*changed Fenning to Fenner 3 times (11 instances of Fenner) on pages
120, 122, and 133 of the original.]




THE CITY OF FIRE




I


Sabbath Valley lay like a green jewel cupped in the hand of the
surrounding mountains with the morning sun serene upon it picking out
the clean smooth streets, the white houses with their green blinds, the
maples with their clear cut leaves, the cosy brick school house wide
winged and friendly, the vine clad stone church, and the little stone
bungalow with low spreading roof that was the parsonage. The word
manse had not yet reached the atmosphere. There were no affectations in
Sabbath Valley.

Billy Gaston, two miles away and a few degrees up the mountain side,
standing on the little station platform at Pleasant View, waiting for
the morning train looked down upon the beauty at his feet and felt its
loveliness blindly. A passing thrill of wonder and devotion fled through
his fourteen-year-old soul as he regarded it idly. Down there was home
and all his interests and loyalty. His eyes dwelt affectionately on the
pointing spire and bell tower. He loved those bells, and the one who
played them, and under their swelling tones had been awakened new
thoughts and lofty purposes. He knew they were lofty. He was not yet
altogether sure that they were his, but they were there in his mind for
him to think about, and there was a strange awesome lure about their
contemplation.

Down the platform was the new freight agent, a thickset, rubber-shod
individual with a projecting lower jaw and a lowering countenance. He
had lately arrived to assist the regular station agent, who lived in a
bit of a shack up the mountain and was a thin sallow creature with sad
eyes and no muscles. Pleasant View was absolutely what it stated, a
pleasant view and nothing else. The station was a well weathered box
that blended into the mountain side unnoticeably, and did not spoil the
view. The agent's cabin was hidden by the trees and did not count.
But Pleasant View was important as a station because it stood at the
intersection of two lines of thread like tracks that slipped among the
mountains in different directions; one winding among the trees and about
a clear mountain lake, carried guests for the summer to and fro, and
great quantities of baggage and freight from afar; the other travelled
through long tunnels to the world beyond and linked great cities like
jewels on a chain. There were heavy bales and boxes and many trunks to
be shifted and it was obvious that the sallow station agent could not do
it all. The heavy one had been sent to help him through the rush season.

In five minutes more the train would come from around the mountain and
bring a swarm of ladies and children for the Hotel at the Lake. They
would have to be helped off with all their luggage, and on again to
the Lake train, which would back up two minutes later. This was Billy's
harvest time. He could sometimes make as much as fifty cents or even
seventy-five if he struck a generous party, just being generally useful,
carrying bags and marshalling babies. It was important that Billy should
earn something for it was Saturday and the biggest ball game of the
season came off at Monopoly that afternoon. Billy could manage the
getting there, it was only ten miles away, but money to spend when he
arrived was more than a necessity. Saturday was always a good day at the
station.

Billy had slipped into the landscape unseen. His rusty, trusty old
bicycle was parked in a thick huckleberry growth just below the grade
of the tracks, and Billy himself stood in the shelter of several immense
packing boxes piled close to the station. It was a niche just big enough
for his wiry young length with the open station window close at his ear.
From either end of the platform he was hidden, which was as it should be
until he got ready to arrive with the incoming train.

The regular station agent was busy checking a high pile of trunks that
had come down on the early Lake train from the Hotel and had to be
transferred to the New York train. He was on the other side of the
station and some distance down the platform.

Beyond the packing boxes the heavy one worked with brush and paint
marking some barrels. If Billy applied an eye to a crack in his hiding
place he could watch every stroke of the fat black brush, and see the
muscles in the swarthy cheeks move as the man mouthed a big black cigar.
But Billy was not interested in the new freight agent, and remained in
his retreat, watching the brilliant sunshine shimmer over the blue-green
haze of spruce and pine that furred the way down to the valley. He
basked in it like a cat blinking its content. The rails were beginning
to hum softly, and it would not be long till the train arrived.

Suddenly Billy was aware of a shadow looming.

The heavy one had laid down his brush and was stealing swiftly,
furtively to the door of the station with a weather eye to the agent on
his knees beside a big trunk writing something on a check. Billy drew
back like a turtle to his shell and listened. The rail was beginning to
sing decidedly now and the telephone inside the grated window suddenly
sat up a furious ringing. Billy's eye came round the corner of the
window, scanned the empty platform, glimpsed the office desk inside and
the weighty figure holding the receiver, then vanished enough to be out
of sight, leaving only a wide curious ear to listen:

“That you Sam? Yep. Nobody about. Train's coming. Hustle up. Anything
doing? You _don't say_! Some big guy? _Say_, that's good news at last!
Get on the other wire and hold it. I'll come as quick as the train's
gone. S'long!”

Billy cocked a curious eye like a flash into the window and back again,
ducking behind the boxes just in time to miss the heavy one coming out
with an excited air, and a feverish eye up the track where the train was
coming into view around the curve.

In a moment all was stir and confusion, seven women wanting attention
at once, and imperious men of the world crying out against railroad
regulations. Billy hustled everywhere, transferring bags and suit cases
with incredible rapidity to the other train, which arrived promptly,
securing a double seat for the fat woman with the canary, and the poodle
in a big basket, depositing the baggage of a pretty lady on the shady
side, making himself generally useful to the opulent looking man with
the jewelled rings; and back again for another lot. A whole dollar and
fifteen cents jingled in his grimy pocket as the trains finally moved
off in their separate directions and the peace of Pleasant View settled
down monotonously once more.

Billy gave a hurried glance about him. The station agent was busy with
another batch of trunks, but the heavy one was nowhere to be seen.
He gave a quick glance through the grated window where the telegraph
instrument was clicking away sleepily, but no one was there. Then a stir
among the pines below the track attracted his attention, and stepping to
the edge of the bank he caught a glimpse of a broad dusty back lumbering
hurriedly down among the branches.

With a flirt of his eye back to the absorbed station agent Billy was off
down the mountain after the heavy one, walking stealthily as any cat,
pausing in alert attention, listening, peering out eerily whenever he
came to a break in the undergrowth. Like a young mole burrowing he wove
his way under branches the larger man must have turned aside, and so his
going was as silent as the air. Now and then he could hear the crash of
a broken branch or the crackle of a twig, or the rolling of a stone
set free by a heavy foot, but he went on like a cat, like a little
wood shadow, till suddenly he felt he was almost upon his prey. Then he
paused and listened.

The man was kneeling just below him. He could hear the labored
breathing. There was a curious sound of metal and wood, of a key turning
in a lock. Billy drew himself softly into a group of cypress and held
his breath. Softly he parted the foliage and peered. The man was down
upon his knees before a rough box, holding something in his hand which
he put to his ear. Billy could not quite see what it was. And now the
man began to talk into the box. Billy ducked and listened:

“Hello, Sam! You there! Couldn't come any quicker, lots of passengers.
Lots of freight. What's doing, anyhow?”

Billy could hear a faint murmur of words, now and then one gutteral
burst out and became distinct, and gradually enough words pieced
themselves together to become intelligible.

“... Rich guy! High power machine ... Great catch ... Tonight!... Got a
bet on to get there by sunrise.... Can't miss him!”

Billy lay there puzzled. It sounded shady, but what was the line anyway?
Then the man spoke.

“Sounds easy Sammy, but how we goin' to kidnap a man in a high power
machine? Wreck it of course, but he might get killed and where would be
the reward? Besides, he's likely to be a good shot--”

The voice from the ground again growing clearer:

“Put something across the road that he'll have to get out and move, like
a fallen tree, or one of you lie in the road beside a car as if you
was hurt. I'm sending Shorty and Link. They'll get there about eight
o'clock. Beat him to it by an hour anyway, maybe more. Now it's up to
you to look after details. Get anyone you want to help till Shorty and
Link get there, and pay 'em so in case anything gets them, or they're
late. I'll keep you wise from time to time how the guy gets on. I've got
my men on the watch along the line.”

“I'd like t' know who I'd get in this God forsaken place!” growled the
heavy one, “Not a soul in miles except the agent, and _he'd_ run right
out and telegraph for the State constab. Say, Sammy, who is this guy
anyway? Is there enough in it to pay for the risk? You know kidnapping
ain't any juvenile demeanor. I didn't promise no such stuff as this when
I said I'd take a hand over here. Now just a common little hold-up ain't
so bad. That could happen on any lonely mountain road. But this here
kidnapping, you never can tell how its going to turn out. Might be
murder before you got through, especially if Link is along. _You know
Link!_”

“That's all right, Pat, you needn't worry, this'll go through slick as
a whistle, and a million in it if we work it right. The house is all
ready--you know where--and never a soul in all the world would suspect.
It's far enough away and yet not too far--. You'll make enough out of
this to retire for life if you want to Pat, and no mistake. All you've
got to do is to handle it right, and you know your business.”

“Who'd you say he was?”

“Shafton, Laurence Shafton, son of the big Shafton, you know Shafton and
Gates.”

A heavy whistle blended with the whispering pines.

“You don't say? How much family?”

“Mother living, got separate fortune in her own right. Father just dotes
on him. Uncle has a big estate on Long Island, plenty more millions
there. I think a million is real modest in us to ask, don't you?”

“Where's he goin' to? What makes you think he'll come this way 'stead of
the valley road?”

“'Cause he's just started, got all the directions for the way, went over
it carefully with his valet. Valet gave me the tip you understand, and
has to be in on the rake-off. It's his part to keep close to the family,
see? Guy's goin' down to Beechwood to a house party, got a bet on that
he'll make it before daylight. He's bound to pass your mountain soon
after midnight, see? Are you goin' to do your part, or ain't you? Or
have I got to get a new agent down there? And say! I want a message on
this wire as soon as the job is completed. Now, you understand? Can you
pull it off?”

It was some time after the key clicked in the lock and the bulky form
of the freight agent lumbered up through the pines again before Billy
stirred. Then he wriggled around through the undergrowth until he found
himself in front of the innocent looking little box covered over with
dried grass and branches. He examined it all very carefully, pried
underneath with his jack knife, discovered the spot where the wire
connected, speculated as to where it tapped the main line, prospected a
bit about the place and then on hands and knees wormed himself through
the thick growth of the mountain till he came out to the huckleberry
clump, and recovering his bicycle walked innocently up to the station as
if it were the first time that day and enquired of the surly freight man
whether a box had come for his mother.

In the first place Billy hadn't any mother, only an aunt who went out
washing and had hard times to keep a decent place for Billy to sleep and
eat, and she never had a box come by freight in her life. But the burly
one did not know that. Just what Billy Gaston did it for, perhaps he did
not quite know himself, save that the lure of hanging round a mystery
was always great. Moreover it gave him deep joy to know that he knew
something about this man that the man did not know he knew. It was
always good to know things. It was always wise to keep your mouth shut
about them when you knew them. Those were the two most prominent planks
in Billy Gaston's present platform and he stood upon them firmly.

The burly one gave Billy a brief and gruff negative to his query and
went on painting barrel labels. He was thinking of other matters, but
Billy still hung around. He had a hunch that he might be going to make
merchandise in some way of the knowledge that he had gained, so he hung
around, silently, observantly, leaning on old rusty-trusty.

The man looked up and frowned suspiciously:

“I told you NO!” he snapped threateningly, “What you standin' there
for?”

Billy regarded him amusedly as from a superior height.

“Don't happen to know of any odd jobs I could get,” he finally
condescended.

“Where would you expect a job around this dump?” sneered the man with an
eloquent wave toward the majestic mountain, “Busy little hive right here
now, ain't it?”

He subsided and Billy, slowly, thoughtfully, mounted his wheel and rode
around the station, with the air of one who enjoys the scenery. The
third time he rounded the curve by the freight agent the man looked up
with a speculative squint and eyed the boy. The fourth time he called
out, straightening up and laying down his brush.

“Say, Kid, do you know how to keep yer mouth shut?”

The boy regarded him with infinite contempt.

“Well, that depends!” he said at last. “If anybody'd make it worth my
while.”

The man looked at him narrowly, the tone was at once so casual and yet
so full of possible meaning. The keenest searching revealed nothing in
the immobile face of the boy. A cunning grew in the eyes of the man.

“How would a five look to you?”

“Not enough,” said the boy promptly, “I need twenty-five.”

“Well, ten then.”

“The boy rode off down the platform and circled the station again while
the man stood puzzled, half troubled, and watched him:

“I'll make it fifteen. What you want, the earth with a gold fence around
it?”

“I said I needed twenty-five,” said Billy doggedly, lowering his eyes to
cover the glitter of coming triumph.

The thick one stood squinting off at the distant mountain thoughtfully,
then he turned and eyed Billy again.

“How'm I gonta know you're efficient?” he challenged.

“Guess you'c'n take me er leave me,” came back the boy quickly. “Course
if you've got plenty help--”

The man gave him a quick bitter glance. The kid was sharp. He knew there
was no one else. Besides, how much had he overheard? Had he been around
when the station telephone rang? Kids like that were deep. You could
always count on them to do a thing well if they undertook it.

“Well, mebbe I'll try you. You gotta be on hand t'night at eight o'clock
sharp. It's mebbe an all night job, but you may be through by midnight.”

“What doing?”

“Nothing much. Just lay in the road with your wheel by your side and act
like you had a fall an' was hurt. I wanta stop a man who's in a hurry,
see?”

Billy regarded him coolly.

“Any shooting?”

“Oh, no!” said the other, “Just a little evening up of cash. You see
that man's got some money that oughtta be mine by good rights, and I
wantta get it.”

“_I_ see!” said Billy nonchalantly, “An' whatcha gonta do if he don't
come across?”

The man gave him a scared look.

“Oh, nothin' sinful son; just give him a rest fer a few days where he
won't see his friends, until he gets ready to see it the way I do.”

“H'm!” said Billy narrowing his gray eyes to two slits. “An' how much
did ya say ya paid down?”

The man looked up angrily.

“I don't say I pay nothing down. If you do the work right you get the
cash t'night, a round twenty-five, and it's twenty bucks more'n you
deserve. Why off in this deserted place you ought ta be glad to get
twenty-five cents fer doin' nothin' but lay in the road.”

The boy with one foot on the pedal mounted sideways and slid along the
platform slowly, indifferently.

“Guess I gotta date t'night,” he called over his shoulder as he swung
the other leg over the cross bar.

The heavy man made a dive after him and caught him by the arm.

“Look here, Kid, I ain't in no mood to be toyed with,” he said gruffly,
“You said you wanted a job an' I'm being square with you. Just to show
I'm being square here's five down.”

Billy looked at the ragged green bill with a slight lift of his
shoulders.

“Make it ten down and it's a go,” he said at last with a
take-it-or-leave-it air. “I hadn't oughtta let you off'n less'n half,
such a shady job as this looks, but make it a ten an' I'll close with
ya. If ya don't like it ask the station agent to help ya. I guess he
wouldn't object. He's right here handy, too. I live off quite a piece.”

But the man had pulled out another five and was crowding the bills upon
him. He had seen a light in that boy's eye that was dangerous. What was
five in a case of a million anyway?

Billy received the boodle as if it had been chewing gum or a soiled
handkerchief, and stuffed it indifferently into his already bulging
pocket in a crumple as if it were not worth the effort.

“A'rright. I'll be here!” he declared, and mounting his wheel with an
air of finality, sailed away down the platform, curved off the high step
with a bump into the road and coasted down the road below the tunnel
toward Monopoly, leaving Sabbath Valley glistening in the sunshine off
to the right. With all that money in his pocket what was the use of
going back to Sabbath Valley for his lunch and making his trip a good
two miles farther? He would beat the baseball team to it.

The thick one stood disconsolately, his grimy cap in his hand and
scratched his dusty head of curls in a troubled way.

“Gosh!” he said wrathfully, “The little devil! Now I don't know what
he'll do. I wonder--! But what else could I do?”




II


Over in Sabbath Valley quiet sweetness brooded, broken now and again by
the bell-like sound of childish laughter here and there. The birds were
holding high carnival in the trees, and the bees humming drowsy little
tunes to pretend they were not working.

Most of the men were away at work, some in Monopoly or Economy, whither
they went in the early morning in their tin Lizzies to a little store or
a country bank, or a dusty law office; some in the fields of the fertile
valley; and others off behind the thick willow fringe where lurked the
home industries of tanning and canning and knitting, with a plush mill
higher up the slope behind a group of alders and beeches, its ugly stone
chimneys picturesque against the mountain, but doing its best to
spoil the little stream at its feet with all colors of the rainbow, at
intervals dyeing its bright waters.

The minister sat in his study with his window open across the lawn
between the parsonage and the church, a lovely velvet view with the old
graveyard beyond and the wooded hill behind. He was faintly aware of
the shouting of the birds in glad carnival in the trees, and the busy
droning of the bees, as he wrote an article on Modern Atheism for a
magazine in the distant world; but more keenly alive to the song on the
lips of his child, but lately returned from college life in one of the
great universities for women. He smiled as he wrote, and a light came
in his deep thoughtful eyes. She had gone and come, and she was still
unspoiled, mentally, physically, or spiritually. That was a great deal
to have kept out of life in these days of unbelief. He had been almost
afraid to hope that she would come back the same.

In the cool sitting-room his wife was moving about, putting the house
in order for the day, and he knew that on her lips also was the smile of
the same content as well as if he were looking at her beloved face.

On the front veranda Marilyn Severn swept the rugs and sang her happy
song. She was glad, glad to be home again, and her soul bubbled over
with the joy of it. There was happiness in the curve of her red lips,
in the softly rounded freshness of her cheek and brow, in the eyes that
held dancing lights like stars, and in every gleaming tendril of her
wonderful bright hair that burst forth from under the naive little
sweeping cap that sat on her head like a crown. She was small, lithe,
graceful, and she vibrated joy, health, eagerness in every glance of her
eye, every motion of her lovely hands.

Down the street suddenly sounded a car. Not the rattling, cheap affairs
that were commonly used in those parts for hard work and dress affairs,
with a tramp snuffle and bark as they bounced along beneath the maples
like house dogs that knew their business and made as much noise about it
as they could; but a car with a purr like a soft petted cat by the fire,
yet a power behind the purr that might have belonged to a lion if the
need for power arose. It stole down the street like a thing of the
world, well oiled and perfect in its way, and not needing to make any
clatter about its going. The very quietness of it made the minister
look up, sent the minister's wife to raise the shade of the sitting-room
window, and caused the girl to look up from her task.

The morning flooded her face, the song was stayed, a great light came
into her eyes.

The man who was driving the car had the air of not expecting to stop
at the parsonage. Even when he saw the girl on the porch he held to his
way, and something hard and cold and infinitely sad settled down over
his face. It even looked as though he did not intend to recognize her,
or perhaps wasn't sure whether she would recognize him. There was a
moment's breathless suspense and the car slid just the fraction past
the gate in the hedge, without a sign of stopping, only a lifting of
a correct looking straw hat that somehow seemed a bit out of place in
Sabbath Valley. But Lynn left no doubt in his mind whether she would
recognize him. She dropped her broom and sped down the path, and the
car came to an abrupt halt, only a hair's breadth past the gate,--but
still--that hair's breadth.

“Oh, Mark, I'm so glad to see you!” she cried genuinely with her hand
out in welcome, “They said you were not at home.”

The boy's voice--he had been a boy when she left him, though now he
looked strangely hard and old like a man of the world--was husky as he
answered gravely, swinging himself down on the walk beside her:

“I just got in late last night. How are you Lynn? You're looking fine.”

He took her offered hand, and clasped it for a brief instant in a
warm strong pressure, but dropped it again and there was a quick cold
withdrawing of his eyes that she did not understand. The old Mark Carter
would never have looked at her coolly, impersonally like that. What was
it, was he shy of her after the long separation? Four years was a long
time, of course, but there had been occasional letters. He had always
been away when she was at home, and she had been home very little
between her school years. There had been summer sessions twice and once
father and mother had come to her and they had taken a wonderful trip
together. But always there had seemed to be Mark Carter, her old friend
and playmate, in the background. Now, suddenly he seemed to be removed
to indefinite distances. It was as if she were looking at a picture that
purported to be her friend, yet seemed a travesty, like one wearing a
mask. She stood in the sunlight looking at him, in her quaint little cap
and a long white enveloping house apron, and she seemed to him like a
haloed saint. Something like worship shone in his eyes, but he kept
the mask down, and looked at her with the eyes of a stranger while he
talked, and smiled a stiff conventional smile. But a look of anguish
grew in his young face, like the sorrow of something primeval, such as a
great rock in a desert.

The minister had forgotten his article and was watching them through the
window, the tall handsome youth, his head bared with the glint of the
sun on his short cropped gold curls making one think of a young prince,
yet a prince bound under a spell and frozen in a block of ice. He was
handsome as Adonis, every feature perfect, and striking in its manly
beauty, yet there was nothing feminine about him. The minister was
conscious of all this as he watched--this boy whom he had seen grow
up, and this girl of his heart. A great still question came into the
father's look as he watched.

The minister was conscious of Lynn's mother standing in the doorway just
behind him, although she had made no noise in entering. And at once she
knew he was aware of her presence.

“Isn't that Mark Carter?” she asked just above a breath.

He nodded.

“And she doesn't know! You haven't told her?”

The minister shook his head.

“He will tell her. See, he is telling her now!”

The mother drew a shade nearer.

“But how do you know? See, she is doing the talking. You think he will
tell her? _What_ will he tell her, Graham?”

“Oh, he will not tell her in words, but every atom of his being is
telling her now. Can't you see? He is telling her that he is no longer
worthy to be her equal. He is telling her that something has gone
wrong.”

“Graham, what do you _think_ is the matter with him? Do you think he
is--BAD?” She lifted frightened eyes to his as she dropped into her low
chair that always stood conveniently near his desk.

A wordless sorrow overspread the minister's face, yet there was
something valiant in his eyes.

“No, I can't think that. I must believe in him in spite of everything.
It looks to me somehow as if he was trying to be bad and couldn't.”

“Well, but--Graham, isn't that the same thing? If he wants to be?”

The minister shook his head.

“He doesn't want to be. But he has some purpose in it. He is doing
it--perhaps--well--it might be for _her_ sake you know.”

The mother looked perplexed, and hesitated, then shook her head.

“That would be--preposterous! How could he hurt her so--if he cared. It
must be--he does not care--!”

“He cares!” said the man.

“Then how do you explain it?”

“I don't explain it.”

“Are you going to let it go on?”

“What can be done?”

“I'd do something.”

“No, Mary. That's something he's got to work out himself. If he isn't
big enough to get over his pride. His self-consciousness. His--whatever
he calls it--If he isn't big enough--Then he isn't _big_ enough--!” The
man sighed with a faraway patient look. The woman stirred uneasily.

“Graham,” she said suddenly lifting her eyes in troubled question, “When
your cousin Eugenie was here, you remember, she talked about it one
day. She said we had no right to let Lynn become so attached to a mere
country boy who would grow up a boor. She said he had no education,
no breeding, no family, and that Lynn had the right to the best social
advantages to be had in the world. She said Lynn was a natural born
aristocrat, and that we had a great responsibility bringing up a child
with a face like hers, and a mind like hers, and an inheritance like
hers, in this little antiquated country place. She said it was one thing
for you with your culture and your fine education, and your years of
travel and experience, to hide yourself here if you choose for a few
years, pleasing yourself at playing with souls and uplifting a little
corner of the universe while you were writing a great book; but it was
quite another for us to allow our gifted young daughter to know no other
life. And especially she harped on Lynn's friendship with Mark. She
called him a hobbledehoy, said his mother was 'common', and that coming
from a home like that, he would never amount to anything or have an
education. He would always be common and loaferish, and it wouldn't make
any difference if he did, he would never be cultured no matter how much
education he had. He was not in her _class_. She kept saying that over.
She said a lot of things and always ended up with that. And finally she
said that we were perfectly crazy, both of us. That she supposed
Lynn thought she was christianizing the boy or something, but it was
dangerous business, and we ought to be warned. And Graham, _I'm afraid
Mark heard it!_ He was just coming up on the porch as she finished and
I'm almost sure he heard it!”

The eyes of the minister gave a startled flicker and then grew
comprehending. “I wondered why he gave up college after he had worked so
hard to get in.”

“But Graham! Surely, if he had heard he would have wanted to show her
that she was wrong.”

“No, Mary. He is not built that way. It's his one big fault. Always to
be what he thinks people have labeled him, or to seem to be. To be that
in defiance, knowing in his heart he really isn't that at all. It's a
curious psychological study. It makes me think of nothing else but when
the Prince of the Power of the Air wanted to be God. Mark wants to be a
young God. When he finds he's not taken that way he makes himself look
like the devil in defiance. Don't you remember, Mary, how when Bob Bliss
broke that memorial window in the church and said it was Mark did it,
how Mark stood looking, defiantly from one to another of us to see if we
would believe it, and when he found the elders were all against him
and had begun to get ready for punishment, he lifted his fine young
shoulders, and folded his arms, and just bowed in acquiescence, as if
to say yes, he had done it? Don't you remember, Mary? He nearly broke
my heart that day, the hurt look in his eyes; the game, mistaken, little
devil! He was only ten, and yet for four long months he bore the blame
in the eyes of the whole village for breaking that window, till Bob told
the truth and cleared him. Not because he wanted to save Bob Bliss, for
everybody knew he was a little scamp, and needed punishment, but because
he was _hurt_--hurt way down into the soul of him to think anybody had
_thought_ he would want to break the window we had all worked so hard to
buy. And he actually broke three cellar windows in that vacant store by
the post office, yes, and paid for them, just to keep up his character
and give us some reason for our belief against him.”

The wife with a cloud of anxiety in her eyes, and disapproval in her
voice, answered slowly:

“That's a bad trait, Graham. I can't understand it. It is something
wrong in his nature.”

“Yes, Mary, it is sin, original sin, but it comes at him from a
different direction from most of us, that's all. It comes through
sensitiveness. It is his reaction to a deep and mortal hurt. Some men
would be stimulated to finer action by criticism, he is stimulated to
defy, and he does not know that he is trying to defy God and all the
laws of the universe. Some day he will find it out, and know that only
through humility can he make good.”

“But he is letting all his opportunities go by.”

“I'm not so sure. You can't tell what he may be doing out in the world
where he is gone.”

“But they say he is very wild.”

“They were always saying things about him when he was here, and most
of them were not true. You and I knew him, Mary. Was there ever a finer
young soul on earth than he with his clear true eyes, his eager tender
heart, his brave fearlessness and strength. I can not think he has sold
his soul to sin--not yet. It may be. It may be that only in the Far
Country will he realize it is God he wants and be ready to say, 'I have
sinned' and 'I will arise.'”

“But Graham, I should think that just because you believe in him you
could talk to him.”

“No, Mary. I can't probe into the depths of that sensitive soul and
dig out his confidence. He would never give it that way. It is a matter
between himself and God.”

“But Lynn--”

“Lynn has God too, my dear. We must not forget that. Life is not all for
this world, either. Thank God Lynn believes that!”

The mother sighed with troubled eyes, and rose. The purring of the
engine was heard. Lynn would be coming in. They watched the young man
swing his car out into the road and glide away like a comet with a wild
sophisticated snort of his engine that sent him so far away in a flash.
They watched the girl standing where he had left her, a stricken look
upon her face, and saw her turn slowly back to the house with eyes
down--troubled. The mother moved away. The father bent his head upon his
hand with closed eyes. The girl came back to her work, but the song
on her lips had died. She worked silently with a far look in her eyes,
trying to fathom it.

The eyes of her father and mother followed her tenderly all that
day, and it was as if the souls of the three had clasped hands, and
understood, so mistily they smiled at one another.

Billy Gaston, refreshed by a couple of chocolate fudge sundaes, a banana
whip, and a lemon ice-cream soda, was seated on the bench with the
heroes of the day at the Monopoly baseball grounds. He wore his most
nonchalant air, chewed gum with his usual vigor, shouted himself
hoarse at the proper places, and made casual grown-up responses to the
condescension of the team, wrapping them tenderly in ancient sweaters
when they were disabled, and watching every move of the game with a
practised eye and an immobile countenance. But though to the eyes of the
small fry on the grass at his feet he was as self-sufficient as ever,
somehow he kept having strange qualms, and his mind kept reverting
to the swart fat face of Pat at the Junction, as it ducked behind the
cypress and talked into the crude telephone on the mountain. Somehow he
couldn't forget the gloat in his eye as he spoke of the “rich guy.” More
and more uneasy he grew, more sure that the expedition to which he was
pledged was not strictly “on the square.”

Not that Billy Gaston was afraid. The thrill of excitement burned along
his veins and filled him with a fine elation whenever he thought of the
great adventure, and he gave his pocket a protective slap where the “ten
bones” still reposed intact. He felt well pleased with himself to have
made sure of those. Whatever happened he had that, and if the man wasn't
on the square Pat deserved to lose that much. Not that Billy Gaston
meant to turn “yellow” after promising, but there was no telling whether
the rest of the twenty-five would be forthcoming or not. He fell to
calculating its worth in terms of new sweaters and baseball bats. If
worst came to worst he could threaten to expose Pat and his scheme.

During the first and second innings these reflections soothed his soul
and made him sit immovable with jaws grinding in rythmic harmony with
the day. But at the beginning of the third inning one of the boys from
his Sunday-school class strolled by and flung himself full length on the
grass at his feet where he could see his profile just as he had seen it
on Sunday while he was listening to the story that the teacher always
told to introduce the lesson. He could see the blue of Lynn Severn's
eyes as she told it, and strangely enough portions of the tale came
floating back in trailing mist across the dusty baseball diamond and
obscured the sight of Sloppy Hedrick sliding to his base. It was a tale
of one, Judas, who betrayed his best Friend with a kiss. It came with
strange illogical persistence, and seemed curiously incongruous with the
sweet air of summer blowing over the hard young faces and dusty diamond.
What had Judas to do with a baseball game, or with Billy Gaston and what
he meant to do on the mountain that night?--and earn good money--! Ah!
That was it. Make good money! But who was he betraying he would like to
know? Well if it wasn't on the square perhaps he was betraying that
same _One_--Aw--Rats! He wasn't under anybody's thumb and Judas lived
centuries ago. He wasn't doing any harm helping a man do something he
wasn't supposed to know what. Hang it all! Where was Mark Carter anyway?
Somehow Cart always seemed to set a fella straight. He was like Miss
Lynn. He saw through things you hadn't even told him about. But this was
a man's affair, not a woman's.

Of course there was another side to it. He _could_ give some of the
money to Aunt Saxon to buy coal--instead of the sweater--well, maybe
it would do both. And he _could_ give some to that fund for the Chinese
Mission, Miss Lynn was getting up in the class. He would stop on the way
back and give her a whole dollar. He sat, chin in hand, gazing out on
the field, quite satisfied with himself, and suddenly some one back by
the plate struck a fine clean ball with a click and threw the bat with
a resounding ring on the hard ground as he made for a home run. Billy
started and looked keenly at the bat, for somehow the ring of it as it
fell sounded curiously like the tinkle of silver. Who said thirty pieces
of silver? Billy threw a furtive look about and a cold perspiration
broke out on his forehead. Queer that old Bible story had to stick
itself in. He could see the grieving in the Master's eyes as Judas gave
Him that kiss. She had made the story real. She could do that, and
made the boy long somehow to make it up to that betrayed Master, and he
couldn't get away from the feeling that he was falling short. Of course
old Pat had _said_ the man had money _belonging_ to _him_, and you had
to go mostly by what folks _said_, but it did look shady.

The game seemed slow after that. The two captains were wrangling over
some point of rule, and the umpire was trying to pacify them both. Billy
arose with well feigned languor and remarked, “Well, I gotta beat it.
Guess we're gonta win all right. So long!” and lounged away to his
wheel.

He purchased another soda at the drug store to get one of his fives
changed into ones, one of which he stowed away in his breast pocket,
while the remainder was stuffed in his trousers after the manner of a
man. He bent low over his handle bars, chewing rythmically and pedaled
away rapidly in the direction of Sabbath Valley.




III


The bells of the little stone church were playing tender melodies as he
shot briskly down the maple lined street at a break neck pace, and the
sun was just hovering on the rim of the mountain. The bells often played
at sunset, especially Saturday evenings, when Marilyn Severn was at
home, and the village loved to hear them. Billy wouldn't have owned it,
but he loved to hear those bells play better than anything else in his
young life, and he generally managed to be around when they were being
played. He loved to watch the slim young fingers manipulating the glad
sounds. A genius who had come to the quiet hill village to die of an
incurable disease had trained her and had left the wonderful little pipe
organ with its fine chime of bells attached as his memorial to the peace
the village had given him in his last days. Something of his skill and
yearning had fallen upon the young girl whom he had taught. Billy always
felt as if an angel had come and was ringing the bells of heaven when
Marilyn sat at the organ playing the bells.

This night a ray of the setting sun slanting through the memorial window
on her bronze gold hair gave her the look of Saint Cecilia sitting
there in the dimness of the church. Billy sidled into a back seat still
chewing and watched her. He could almost see a halo in yellow gold sun
dust circling above her hair. Then a sudden revulsion came with the
thought of “that guy Judas” and the possibility that he and the old
fellow had much in common. But Bah! He would go to the mountain just to
prove to himself that there was nothing crooked in it.

The music was tender that night and Billy felt a strange constriction in
his throat. But you never would have guessed, as Lynn Severn turned at
the end of her melody to search the dimness for the presence she felt
had entered, that he had been under any stress of emotion, the way he
grinned at her and sidled up the aisle.

“Yeah, we won awright,” in answer to her question, “Red Rodge and Sloppy
had 'em beat from the start. Those other guys can't play ball anyway.”

Then quite casually he brought forth the dollar from his breast pocket.

“Fer the Chinese Fund,” he stated indifferently.

The look in her face was beautiful to see, almost as if there were tears
behind the sapphire lights in her eyes.

“Billy! All this?”

He felt as if she had knighted him. He turned red and hot with shame and
pleasure.

“Aw, that ain't much. I earned sommore too, fer m'yant.” He twisted his
cap around on his other hand roughly and then blurted out the last thing
he had meant to say:

“Miss Lynn, it ain't wrong to do a thing you don't know ain't wrong, is
it?”

Marilyn looked at him keenly and laughed.

“It generally is, Billy, if you think it _might_ be. Don't ever try to
fool your conscience, Billy, it's too smart for that.”

He grinned sheepishly and then quite irrelevantly remarked:

“I saw Cart last night.”

But she seemed to understand the connection and nodded gravely:

“Yes, I saw him a moment this morning. He said he might come back again
this evening.”

The boy grunted contentedly and watched the warm color of her cheek
under the glow of the ruddy sunset. She always seemed to him a little
bit unearthly in the starriness of her beauty. Of course he never put it
to himself that way. In fact he never put it at all. It was just a fact
in his life. He had two idols whom he worshipped from afar, two idols
who understood him equally well and were understood by him, and for whom
he would have gladly laid down his young life. This girl was one, and
Mark Carter was the other. It was the sorrow of his young life that Mark
Carter had left Sabbath Valley indefinitely. The stories that floated
back of his career made no difference to Billy. He adored him but
the more in his fierce young soul, and gloried in his hero's need of
faithful friends. He would not have owned it to himself, perhaps, but
he had spoken of Mark just to find out if this other idol believed those
tales and was affected by them. He drew a sigh of deep content as he
heard the steady voice and knew that she was still the young man's
friend.

They passed out of the church silently together and parted in the glow
of red that seemed flooding the quiet village like a painting. She went
across the stretch of lawn to the low spreading veranda where her mother
sat talking with her father. Some crude idea of her beauty and grace
stole through his soul, but he only said to himself:

“How,--kind of--_little_ she is!” and then made a dash for his rusty old
wheel lying flat at the side of the church step. He gathered it up and
wheeled it around the side of the church to the old graveyard, threading
his way among the graves and sitting down on a broad flat stone where he
had often thought out his problems of life. The shadow of the church cut
off the glow of sunset, and made it seem silent and dark. Ahead of him
the Valley lay. Across at the right it stretched toward the Junction,
and he could see the evening train just puffing in with a wee wisp of
white misty smoke trailing against the mountain green. The people for
the hotels would be swarming off, for it was Saturday night. The fat
one would be there rolling trunks across and the station agent would
presently close up. It would be dark over there at eight o'clock. The
mountains loomed silently, purpling and steep and hazy already with
sleep.

To the left lay the road that curved up to the forks where one went
across to the Highway and at right angles the Highway went straight
across the ridge in front of him and sloped down to the spot where the
fat one expected him to play his part at eight o'clock to-night. The
Highway was the way down which the “rich guy” was expected to come
speeding in a high power car from New York, and had to be stopped and
relieved of money that “did not belong to him.”

Billy thought it all over. Somehow things seemed different now. He had
by some queer psychological process of his own, brought Lynn Severn's
mind and Mark Carter's mind together to bear upon the matter and gained
a new perspective. He was pretty well satisfied in his own soul that the
thing he had set out to do was not “on the level.” It began to be pretty
plain to him that that “rich guy” might be in the way of getting hurt or
perhaps still worse, and he had no wish to be tangled up in a mess like
that. At the same time he did not often get a chance to make twenty-five
dollars, and he had no mind to give it up. It was not in his unyellow
soul to go back on his word without refunding the money, and a dollar
of it was already spent to the “Chinese Fund,” to say nothing of sundaes
and sodas and whips. So he sat and studied the mountain ahead of him.

Suddenly, as the sun, which had been for a long time slipping down
behind the mountains at his back, finally disappeared, his face cleared.
He had found a solution.

He sprang up from the cold stone, where his fingers had been
mechanically feeling out the familiar letters of the inscription:
“Blessed are the dead--” and catching up the prone wheel, strode upon it
and dashed down the darkening street toward the little cottage near the
willows belonging to his Aunt Saxon. He was whistling as he went, for he
was happy. He had found a way to keep his cake and eat it too. It would
not have been Billy if he had not found a way out.

Aunt Saxon turned a drawn and anxious face away from the window at his
approach and drew a sigh of momentary relief. This bringing up boys was
a terrible ordeal. But thanks be this immediate terror was past and her
sister's orphaned child still lived! She hurried to the stove where the
waiting supper gave forth a pleasant odor.

“Been down to the game at M'nop'ly,” he explained happily as he flung
breezily into the kitchen and dashed his cap on a chair, “Gee! That ham
smells good! Say, Saxy, whad-ya do with that can of black paint I left
on the door step last Saturday?”

“It's in a wooden box in the corner of the shed, Willie,” answered his
Aunt, “Come to supper now. It'll all get cold. I've been waiting most an
hour.”

“Oh, hang it! I don't s'pose you know where the brush is--Yes, I'm
coming. Oh, here 'tis!”

He ate ravenously and briefly. His aunt watched him with a kind of
breathless terror waiting for the inevitable remark at the close: “Well,
I gotta beat it! I gotta date with the fellas!”

She had ceased to argue. She merely looked distressed. It seemed a part
of his masculinity that was inevitable.

At the door he was visited with an unusual thoughtfulness. He stuck his
head back in the room to say:

“Oh, yes, Saxy, I _might_ not be home till morning. I _might_ stay all
night some place.”

He was going without further explanation, but her dismay as she murmured
pathetically:

“But to-morrow is the Sabbath, Willie--!” halted him once more.

“Oh, I'll be home time fer Sunday-school,” he promised gaily, and was
off down the road in the darkness, his old wheel squeaking rheumatically
with each revolution growing fainter and fainter in the night.

But Billy did not take the road to the Junction in his rapid flight.
Instead he climbed the left hand mountain road that met the Forks and
led to the great Highway. Slower and slower the old wheel went, Billy
puffing and bending low, till finally he had to dismount and put a drop
of oil in a well known spot which his finger found in the dark, from the
little can he carried in his pocket for such a time of need. He did not
care to proclaim his coming as he crept up the rough steep way. And once
when a tin Lizzie swept down upon him, he ducked and dropped into the
fringe of alders at the wayside until it was past. Was that, could it
have been Cart? It didn't look like Cart's car, but it was very dark,
and the man had not dimmed his lights. It was blinding. He hoped it was
Cart, and that he had gone to the parsonage. Somehow he liked to think
of those two together. It made his own view of life seem stronger. So he
slunk quietly up to the fork where the Highway swept down round a curve,
and turned to go down across the ridge. Here was the spot where the
rich guy would presently come. He looked the ground over, with his bike
safely hidden below road level. With a sturdy set of satisfaction to his
shoulders, and a twinkle of fun in his eye, he began to burrow into the
undergrowth and find branches, a fallen log, stones, anything, and drag
them up across the great state highway till he had a complete barricade.

There had come a silverness in the sky over the next eastern mountain,
and he could see the better what he was doing. Now and again he stopped
cautiously and listened, his heart beating high with fear lest after
all the rich guy might arrive before he was ready for him. When the
obstruction was finished he got out a large piece of card board which
had been fastened to the handle bars of his wheel, and from a box also
fastened on behind his saddle he produced his can of paint and a brush.
The moon was beginning to show off at his right, and gave a faint
luminus gleam, as he daubed his letters in crudely.

“DETOUR to SABBATH VALLEY. Rode flooded. Brige down.”

His card was large, but so were his letters. Nevertheless in spite of
their irregularity he got them all on, and fastened the card firmly
to the most obvious spot in the barricade. Then with a wicked gleam of
mischief in his eye he looked off down the Highway across the ridge to
where some two miles away one Pat must be awaiting his coming, and gave
a single mocking gesture common to boys of his age. Springing on his
wheel he coasted down the humps and into the darkness again.

He reflected as he rode that no harm could possibly be done. The road
inspector would not be along for a couple of days. It would simply mean
that a number of cars would go around by the way of Sabbath Valley for a
day or so. It might break up a little of the quiet of the Sabbath day at
home, but Billy did not feel that that would permanently injure Sabbath
Valley for home purposes, and he felt sure that no one could possibly
ever detect his hand in the matter.

The road at the forks led four ways, Highway, coming from New York and
the Great North East, running North and South, and the Cross road coming
from Economy and running through Sabbath Valley to Monopoly. He had
made the Detour below the Cross Road, so that people coming from Economy
would find no hindrance to their progress. He felt great satisfaction in
the whole matter.

And now there remained but to do his part and get his money. He thought
he saw a way to make sure of that money, and his conscience had no
qualms for extracting it from so crooked a thief as Pat.

The clock on the church tower at Sabbath Valley was finishing the last
stroke of eleven when Billy came slickly up the slope of the road from
Sabbath Valley, and arrived on the station platform nonchalantly.

By the light of the moon he could dimly see Pat standing uneasily off by
the tracks, and the heads of two men down below in the bushes near the
lower end of the Highway where it crossed the tracks and swept on South
between two mountains.

Pat held his watch in his hand and looked very ugly, but nothing fazed
Billy. He didn't have to carry this thing out if he didn't want to, and
the man knew he knew too much to be ugly to him.

“There you are, you young Pill you!” was Pat's greeting, “What kinduva
time is this 'ere to be coming along to your expensive job? I said
_eight!_”

“Oh,” said Billy with a shrug and jumped to his wheel again, “Then I
guess I'll be going back. Good night!”

“Here! Wait up there, you young devil! You come mighty nigh dishing the
whole outfit, but now you're here, you'll earn your ten bucks I was fool
enough to give you, but nothing more, do you hear that?” and the man
leered into his freckled young face with an ugly gun in his hand.

Billy eyed the gun calmly. He had seen guns before. Moreover he didn't
believe the man had the nerve to shoot. He wasn't quite so sure of the
two dark shadows in the bushes below, but it was well to be on the safe
side.

“Keep yer shirt on,” said Billy impertinently, “and save yer powder. You
don't want the whole nation to know about this little affair of ours do
you _Pat?_”

The wide one glared.

“Well, you better not have anything like shooting going on, fer I've
got some friends back here a little way waiting to joy ride back with me
when my work's over. They might get funny if they heard a gun and come
too soon.”

“You little devil, you! I mighta known you'd give it away--!” he began,
but he lowered the gun perceptibly. “Every little skunk like you is
yella--yella as the devil--”

But Pat did not finish his sentence, for Billy, with a blaze in his eyes
like the lamps of a tiger, and a fierce young cat-like leap flew at the
flabby creature, wrenched the gun out of his astonished hand, and before
he could make any outcry held it tantalizingly in his face. Billy had
never had any experience before with bullies and bandits except in
his dreams; but he had played football, and tackled every team in the
Valley, and he had no fear of anything. Moreover he had spent long hours
boxing and wrestling with Mark Carter, and he was hard as nails and wiry
as a cat. The fat one was completely in his hands. Of course those other
two down across the tracks might have made trouble if Pat had cried
out, but they were too far away to see or hear the silent scuffle on the
platform. But Billy was taking no chances.

“Now, keep on yer shirt, Pat, and don't make no outcry. My friends can
get here's easy as yours, so just take it quiet. All you gotta do is
take that remark back you just uttered. I ain't yella, and you gotta say
so. Then you hand over those fifteen bones, and I'm yer man.”

It was incredible that Pat should have succumbed, but he did. Perhaps he
was none too sure of his friends in the bushes. Certainly the time was
getting short and he was in a hurry to get to his job on the Highway.
Also he had no mind for being discovered or interrupted. At any rate
with a hoarse little laugh of pretended courage he put his hand in his
baggy pocket and pulled out the bills.

“You win, Kid,” he admitted, “I guess you're all white. Anything to
please the baby and get down to biz. Now, sonny, put that gun away, it
don't look well. Besides, I--got another.” He put his hand insinuatingly
to his hip pocket with a grin, but Billy's grin answered back:

“That's all right, pard. I'll just keep this one awhile then. You don't
need two. Now, what's wanted?”

Pat edged away from the boy and measured him with his eye. The moon was
coming up and Billy loomed large in the darkness. There was a determined
set to his firm young shoulders, a lithe alertness about his build,
and a fine glint in his eye. Pat was really a coward. Besides, Pat
was getting nervous. The hidden telephone had called him several times
already. He could hear even now in imagination its faint click in the
moss. The last message had said that the car had passed the state line
and would soon be coming to the last point of communication. After
that it was the mountain highway straight to Pleasant View, nothing
to hinder. It was not a time to waste in discussion. Pat dropped to an
ingratiating whine.

“Come along then, Kid. Yes, bring your wheel. We'll want it. Down this
way, just over the tracks, so, see? We want you to fall off that there
wheel an' sprawl in the road like you had caught yer wheel on the track
an' it had skidded, see? Try her now, and just lay there like you was
off your feed.”

Billy slung himself across his wheel, gave a cursory glance at the
landscape, took a running slide over the tracks with a swift pedal or
two and slumped in a heap, lying motionless as the dead. He couldn't
have done it more effectively if he had practised for a week. Pat caught
his breath and stooped over anxiously. He didn't want a death at the
start. He wouldn't care to be responsible for a concussion of the brain
or anything like that. Besides, he couldn't waste time fooling with
a fool kid when the real thing might be along any minute. He glanced
anxiously up the broad white ribbon of a road that gleamed now in the
moonlight, and then pulling out his pocket flash, flooded it swiftly
over Billy's upturned freckled face that lay there still as death
without the flicker of an eyelash. The man was panic-stricken. He
stooped lower, put out a tentative finger, turned his flash full in the
boy's face again, and was just about to call to his helpers for aid when
Billy opened a large eye and solemnly winked.

Pat shut off his flash quickly, stuck it in his pocket backed off with a
low relieved, “All right Kid, you'll do. I guess you're all right after
all, now you jest lay--!” and slid away down the slope into the cypress
clump.

Billy with upturned face eyed the moon and winked; again, as if to a
friend up there in the sky. He was thinking of the detour two miles up
the road.

It was very pleasant lying there in the cool moonlight with the evening
breeze blowing his rough hair and playing over his freckles, and with
the knowledge of those twenty-four bucks safely buttoned inside his
sweater, and that neat little gun in his pocket where he could easily
close his fingers about it. The only thing he regretted was that for
conscience sake he had had to put up that detour. It would have been
so much more exciting than to have put up this all-night camouflage and
wait here till dawn for a guy that wasn't coming at all. He began to
think about the “guy” and wonder if he would take the detour to
Sabbath Valley, or turn back, or perhaps try Economy. That would be
disappointing. He would stand no chance of even hearing what he was
like. Now if he went through Sabbath Valley, Red or Sloppy or Rube would
be sure to sight a strange car, particularly if it was a _high power_
racer or something of that sort, and they could discuss it, and he might
be able to find out a few points about this unknown, whom he was so
nobly delivering for conscience sake--or Lynn Severn's--from an unknown
fate. Of course he wouldn't let the fellows know he knew anything about
the guy.

He had lain there fifteen minutes and was beginning to grow drowsy after
his full day in the open air. If it were not for the joke of the thing
he couldn't keep awake.

Pat stole out from the weeds at the slope of the road and whispered
sepulchraly:

“That's all right, Kid, jest you lay there and hold that pose. You
couldn't do better. Yer wheel finishes the blockade. Nobody couldn't get
by if he tried. That's the Kid! 'Clare if I don't give you another five
bucks t'morrer if you carry this thing through. Don't you get cold feet
now--!”

Billy uttered a guttural of contempt in his throat and Pat slid away
to hiding once more. The distant bells struck the midnight hour. Billy
thrilled with their sweetness, with the fact that they belonged to him,
that he had sat that very evening watching those white fingers among the
keys, manipulating them. He thought of the glint on her hair,--the halo
of dusty gold in the sunshine above--the light in her eyes--the glow of
her cheek--her delicate profile against the memorial window--the
glint of her hair--it came back, not in those words, but the vision of
it--what was it like? Oh--of course. Cart's hair. The same color. They
were alike, those two, and yet very different. When he had grown a man
he would like to be like Cart. Cart was kind and always understood
when you were not feeling right. Cart smoothed the way for people in
trouble--old women and animals, and well--girls sometimes. He had seen
him do it. Other people didn't always understand, but he did. Cart
always had a reason. It took men to understand men. That thought had
a good sound to the boy on his back in the moonlight. Although he felt
somewhat a fool lying there waiting in the road when all the time there
was that Detour. It would have been more a man's job if there hadn't had
to be that Detour, but he couldn't run risks with strange guys, and men
who carried guns, not even for--well, thirty pieces of silver--! But
hark! What was that?

There seemed to be a singing along the ground. Was he losing his nerve
lying here so long? No, there it was again! It couldn't be possible that
he could hear so far as two miles up that road. It was hard and smooth
macadam of course, that highway, but it couldn't be that--what was it
they called it?--vibrations?--would reach so far! It must be. He would
ask Cart about that.

The humming continued and grew more distinct, followed by a sort of
throbbing roar that seemed coming toward him, and yet was still very far
away. It must be a car at the Detour. In a moment it would turn down
the bumpy road toward Sabbath Valley, and very likely some of those old
broken whiskey bottles along the way would puncture a tire and the guy
would take till morning getting anywhere. Perhaps he could even get away
in time to come up innocently enough and help him out. A guy like that
might not know how to patch a puncture.

But the sound was distinctly coming on. Billy opened one eye, then the
other, and hastily scanned the sky in either direction for an aeroplane,
but the sky was as clear as crystal without a speck, and the sound was
distinctly drawing nearer.

A voice from the roadside hurtled sharply across:

“Hist! There! He's coming! Lay still! Remember you get five more bucks
if you pull this off!”

A cold chill crept down Billy's back on tiny needle-pointed fringe of
feet like a centipede. There was a sudden constriction in his throat
and a leaden weight on each eye. He could not have opened them if he
had tried, for a great white light stabbed across them and seemed to be
holding them down for inspection. The thing he had wanted to have happen
had come, and he was frightened; frightened cold clear to the soul of
him--not at the thing that was about to come, but at the fact that he
had broken faith with himself after all; broken faith with the haloed
girl at the organ in the golden light; broken faith--for thirty pieces
of silver! In that awful moment he was keenly conscious of the fact that
when he got the other five there would be just thirty dollars for the
whole! Thirty pieces of silver and the judgment day already coming on!




IV


Lynn Severn was restless as she sat on the porch in the cool dark
evening and heard unheeding the small village sounds that stole to her
ears. The laughter of two children playing hide and seek behind the
bushes across the way; the call of their mother summoning them to
bed. The tinkle of a piano down the street; the whine of a Victrola in
another home; the cry of a baby in pain; the murmur of talk on the porch
next door; the slamming of a door; the creak of a gate; footsteps going
down the brick pavement; the swinging to and fro of a hammock holding
happy lovers under the rose pergola at Joneses. She could identify
them all, and found her heart was listening for another sound, a smooth
running car that purred, coming down the street. But it did not come!

By and by she slipped out and into the church, opening one window to let
in the moonlight, and unlocking the organ by the sense of feeling. Her
fingers strayed along the keys in tender wandering melodies, but she
did not pull the stop that controlled the bells. She would have liked
to play those bells and call through them to Mark across the mountains
where he might be riding, call to tell him that she was waiting, call
to ask him why he was so strangely aloof, so silent, and pale in his
dignity; what had come between them, old friends of the years? She felt
she could say with the bells what her lips could never speak. But the
bells would cry her trouble to the villagers also, and she could not let
_them_ hear. So she played soft melodies of trust and hope and patience,
until her father came to find her, and linking his arm in hers walked
back with her through the moonlight, not asking anything, only seeming
to understand her mood. He was that way always. He could understand
without being told. Somehow she felt it and was comforted. He was that
way with everybody. It was what made him so beloved in his parish, which
comprised the whole Valley, that and his great sincerity and courage.
But always his sense of understanding seemed keenest with this
flower-faced girl of his. He seemed to have gone ahead of her way always
to see that all was right--or wrong--and then walked with her to be sure
she did not stumble or miss her way. He never attempted to reason her
out of herself, nor to minimize her trials, but was just there, a strong
hold when she needed it. She looked up with a smile and slipped her hand
in his. She understood his perfect sympathy, as if his own past youth
were touching hers and making her know that whatever it was she had to
face she would come through. He was like a symbol of God's strength to
her. Somehow the weight was lifted from her heart. They lingered on the
piazza together in the moonlight a few minutes, speaking quietly of
the morrow and its duties, then they went into the wide pleasant living
room, and sat down, mother and daughter near together, while the father
read a portion:

  “He that dwelleth in the secret place of the most High
    shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty.
  “I will say of the Lord, he is my refuge and my fortress:
    my God; in him will I trust.
  “Surely he shall deliver thee from the snare of the
    fowler, and from the noisome pestilence.
  “He shall cover thee with his feathers, and under his
    wings shalt thou trust.”

The words seemed to fill the room with a sweet peace, and to draw the
hearts of the listeners as a Voice that is dear draws and soothes after
a day of separation and turmoil and distress.

They knelt and the minister's voice spoke familiarly to the Unseen
Presence, giving thanks for mercies received, mentioning little
throbbing personalities that belonged to them as a family and as
individuals, reminding one of what it must have been in the days before
Sin had come and Adam walked and talked with God in the cool of the
evening, and received instruction and strengthening straight from the
Source. One listening would instinctively have felt that here was the
secret of the great strength of Lynn Severn's life; the reason why
neither college nor the world had been able to lure her one iota from
her great and simple faith which she had brought with her from her
Valley home and taken back again unsullied. This family altar was the
heart of her home, and had brought her so near to God that she _knew_
what she had believed and could not be shaken from it by any flippant
words from lovely or wise lips that only knew the theory of her belief
and nothing of its spirit and tried to argue it away with a fine phrase
and a laugh.

So Lynn went up to her little white chamber that looked out upon the
quiet hills, knelt awhile beside the white bed in the moonlight, then
lay down and slept.

       *       *       *       *       *

Out among the hills on the long smooth road in the white moonlight there
shot a car like a living thing gone crazy, blaring a whiter light than
the moonlight down the way, roaring and thundering as only a costly and
well groomed beast of a machine can roar and thunder when it is driven
by hot blood and a mad desire, stimulated by frequent applications from
a handy flask, and a will that has never known a curb.

He knew it was a mad thing he was doing, rushing across space through
the dark at the beck of a woman's smile, a woman who was another man's
wife, but a woman who had set on fire a whole circle of men of which
he was a part. He was riding against all caution to win a bet, riding
against time to get there before two other men who were riding as
hard from other directions to win the woman who belonged to an
absent husband, win her and run away with her if he could. It was the
culmination of a year of extravagances, the last cry in sensations, and
the telephone wires had been hot with daring, wild allurement, and mad
threat in several directions since late the night before.

The woman was in a great summer hotel where extravagances of all sorts
are in vogue, and it had been her latest game to call with her lute-like
voice over the phone to three of her men friends who had wooed her the
strongest, daring them all to come to her at once, promising to fly with
the one who reached her first, but if none reached her before morning
dawned she remained as she was and laughed at them all.

Laurence Shafton had closed with the challenge at once and given orders
for his car to be ready to start in ten minutes. From a southern
city about an equal distance from the lady, one Percy Emerson, of the
Wellington-Emersons, started about the same time, leaving a trail of
telegrams and phone messages to be sent after his departure. The third
man, Mortimer McMarter, a hot-headed, hot-blooded scot, had started with
the rest, for the lady knew her lovers well, and not one would refuse;
but he was lying dead at a wayside inn with his car a heap of litter
outside from having collided with a truck that was minding its own
business and giving plenty of room to any sane man. This one was not
sane. But of this happening not even the lady knew as yet, for Mortimer
McMarter was not one to leave tales behind him when he went out of life,
and the servants who had sent his messages were far away.

The clock in the car showed nearly twelve and the way was long ahead.
But he would make it before the dawn. He must. He stepped on the
accelerator and shot round a curve. A dizzy precipice yawned at his
side. He took another pull at the flask he carried and shot on wildly
through the night. Then suddenly he ground on his brakes, the machine
twisted and snarled like an angry beast and came to a stand almost into
the arms of a barricade across the road. The young man hurled out an
oath, and leaned forward to look, his eyes almost too blood-shot and
blurred to read:

“DETOUR to Sabbath Valley!”

He laughed aloud. “Sabbath Valley!” He swore and laughed again, then
looked down the way the rude arrow pointed, “Well, I like that! Sabbath
Valley. That'll be a good joke to tell, but I'll make it yet or land in
hell--!” He started his car and twisted it round to the rougher road,
feeling the grind of the broken glass that strewed the way. Billy had
done his work thoroughly, and anticipated well what would happen. But
those tires were costly affairs. They did not yield to the first cut
that came, and the expensive car built for racing on roads as smooth as
glass bumped and jogged down into the ruts and started toward Sabbath
Valley, with the driver pulling again at his almost empty flask, and
swaying giddily in his seat. Half a mile farther down the mountain, the
car gave a gasp, like the flitting soul of a dying lion, and came with
sudden grinding breaks to a dead stop in the heart of a deep wood.

Five minutes later another car, with a soft purring engine came up to
the Crossroads from Economy, slowed just a fraction as it crossed the
Highway, the driver looking keenly at the barricade, then stopping his
car with a sudden jerk and swinging out. He turned a pocket flash on
the big card board Billy had erected, its daubed letters still wet
and blurring into the pasteboard. He looked a bit quizzical over the
statement, “RODE FLOODED, BRIGE DOWN,” because he happened to know there
was no bridge and nothing to flood the road for several miles ahead. He
examined the barricade carefully, even down to the broken glass in the
road, then deliberately, swiftly, with his foot kicked away the glass,
cleared a width for his car, and jumping in backed up, turned and
started slowly down the condemned road to investigate. Something was
wrong down the highway, and the sooner it was set right the better.
There was one thing, he wished he had his gun with him, but then--! And
he swung on down for two miles, going faster and faster, seeing nothing
but white still road, and quiet sleeping trees, with looming mountains
against the sky everywhere. Then, suddenly, across the way in the blare
of his lights a white face flashed into view, and a body, lying full
across the road, with a bicycle flung to one side completing the block.
He brought his car to a quick stand and jumped out, but before he
could take one step or even stoop, someone caught him from behind, and
something big and dark and smothering was flung over his head. A heavy
blow seemed to send him whirling, whirling down into infinite space,
with a long tongue of living fire leaping up to greet him.

“Beat it, Kid, and keep yer face shut!” hissed Pat into Billy's ear, at
the same time stuffing a bill into his hand.

Billy had just sense enough left to follow the assisting kick and roll
himself out of the road, with a snatch at his machine which pulled it
down out of sight. He had a secret feeling that he was “yellow” after
all in spite of his efforts, letting a guy get taken this way without
even a chance to put up a fight. Where was that gun? He reached his hand
into his pocket and was steadied by the feeling of the cold steel. Then
he knew that the men were in the car and were about to start. They had
dumped the owner into the back seat and were going to carry him
off somewhere. What were they going to do? He must find out. He was
responsible. He hadn't meant to let anything like this happen. If
everything wasn't going to be on the square he might have to get into it
yet. He must stick around and see.

The men were having a whispered consultation over the car. They were
not used to that kind, but a car was a car. They tried to start it with
nervous glances down the road. It jerked and hissed and complained but
began to obey. The wheels were beginning to move. In a flash it would be
gone!

Billy scrambled noiselessly up the bank behind the car, his move well
covered by the noise of the engine. With a quick survey of the situation
he tucked himself hastily into the spare tire on the back, just as the
car gave a lurch and shot forward down across the tracks. He had all he
could do to maintain his position and worm himself into a firmer holding
for the first minute or two, and when he began to realize what he was
doing he found his heart beating like a young trip hammer. He slid a
groping hand into his pocket once more for reassurance. If anything
really happened he had the gun.

But his heart was heavy. Things had not gone right. He had planned to
carry this thing through as a large joke, and here he was mixed up in a
crooked deal if ever there was one. The worst of it was he wasn't out of
it yet. He wished he knew whose car this was and where they were bound
for. How about the license tag? Gripping his unstable seat he swayed
forward and tried to see it just below him. In the dim light it
looked like a New York license. It must be the guy they were after all
right,--they had telephoned about a New York man--yet--_Cart_ had a New
York license on his car! He was living in New York now,--and there must
be lots of other guys--!

A kind of sickening thud seemed to drop through his mind down to the
pit of his stomach as he tried to think it out. His eyes peered into
the night watching every familiar landmark--there was the old pine where
they always turned off to go fishing: and yes, they were turning _away_
from Economy road. Yes, they were going through Hackett's Pass. A chill
crept through his thin old sweater as the damp breath of ferns and rocks
struck against his face. His eyes shone grim and hard in the night,
suddenly grown old and stern. This was the kind of thing you read about
in novels. In spite of pricks of conscience his spirits rose. It was
great to be in it if it had to be. The consciousness of Sabbath Valley
bathed in peaceful moonlight, all asleep, of the minister and his
daughter, and Aunt Saxon, fell away; even the memory of bells that
called to righteousness--he was out in the night on a wild ride and his
soul thrilled to the measure of it. He fairly exulted as he reflected
that he might be called upon to do some great deed of valor--in fact
he felt he _must_ do a great deed of valor to retrieve his self respect
after having made that balk about the detour. How did that guy get
around the detour anyway? _Some guy!_

Hackett's Pass was far behind and the moon was going low when the car
stopped for a moment and a hurried consultation took place inside. Billy
couldn't hear all that was said, but he gathered that time was short and
the conspirators must be back at a certain place before morning. They
seemed somehow to have missed a trail that was to have cut the distance
greatly. Billy clung breathlessly to his cramped position and waited.
He hoped they wouldn't get out and try to find the way, for then some
of them might see him, and he was so stiff he was sure he would bungle
getting out of the way. But after a breathless moment the car started
on more slowly, and finally turned down a steep rough place, scarcely
a trail, into the deeper woods. For a long time they went along, slower
and slower, into the blackness of night it seemed. There was no moon,
and the men had turned off the lights. There was nothing but a pocket
flash which one of them carried, and turned on now and again to show
them the way. The engine too was muffled and went snuffing along through
the night like a blind thing that had been gagged. Billy began to wonder
if he would ever find his legs useful again. Sharp pains shot through
his joints, and he became aware of sleep dropping upon his straining
eyes like a sickening cloud. Yet he must keep awake.

He squirmed about and changed his position, staring into the darkness
and wondering if this journey was ever to end. Now they were bumping
down a bank, and slopping through water, not very deep, a small mountain
stream on one of the levels. He tried to think where it must be, but was
puzzled. They seemed to have traveled part of the way in curves. Twice
they stopped and backed up and seemed to be returning on their tracks.
They crossed and recrossed the little stream, and the driver was
cursing, and insisting on more light. At last they began climbing again
and the boy drew a breath of relief. He could tell better where he was
on the heights. He began to think of morning and Sabbath Valley bathed
in its Sabbath peace, with the bells chiming a call to worship--and _he
not there!_ Aunt Saxon would be _crazy!_ She would bawl him out! _He
should worry!_ and she would weep, pink weak tears from her old thin
eyes, that seemed to have never done much else but weep. The thought
turned and twisted in his soul like an ugly curved knife and made him
angry. Tears always made him angry. And Miss Lynn--she would watch for
him--! He had promised to be there! And she would not understand--and
there would come that grieved look in her eyes. She would think--Oh, she
would think he did not _want_ to come, and did not _mean_ to keep his
promise, and things like that--and she would have to think them! He
couldn't help it, could he? He _had_ to come along, didn't he?

In the midst of his miserable reflections the car stopped dead on a
level place and with a cold perspiration on his forehead Billy peered
around him. They must have reached the top of a ridge, for the sky was
visible with the morning star pinned against a luminous black. Against
it a blacker shape was visible, half hid in trees, a building of some
sort, solid, substantial, but deserted.

The men were getting out of the car. Billy gripped the gun and dropped
silently to the ground, sliding as stealthily into the shadows of the
trees as if he had been a snake.

Pat, stepped heavily to the ground and began to give directions in a low
growl. Billy crouched and listened.

“Let's get him shifted quick! We gotta beat it outta here! Link, it's up
to you an' Shorty to get this car over the state line before light, an'
you'll have to run me back to the Crossing first, so I can be at the
station in time for the early train. That'll be _going some!_”

“Well, I guess _anyhow not_,” said Link sullenly, “Whadda ya think we
are? Fools? Run you back to the Crossing in a pig's eye. You'll foot it
back if you get there, er come with us. We ain't gonta get caught with
this car on our hands. What we gonta do with it anyhow, when we get
crost the state line?”

“Why, you run it into the field off behind that row of alders. Sam's
got a man on the lookout. They'll have that little old car so she won't
recognize her best friend before you can count three, so you should
worry. And you'll run me back or you won't get the dough. See? _I'll_
see to that. Pat said I wasn't to run no risks fer not bein' back in
time. Now, shift that guy's feet out on my shoulder. Handle him quick.
Nope, he won't wake up fer two hours yet. I give him plenty of dope. Got
them bracelets tight on his feet? All right now. He's some hefty bird,
ain't he?”

They moved away in the direction of the building, carrying a long dark
shape between them, and Billy breathless in the bushes, watched, turning
rapid plans in his mind. Here he was in the midst of an automobile
getaway! Many the time he had gone with Mark and the Chief of Police
on a still hunt for car thieves, but this time he was of the party. His
loyal young heart boiled hot with rage, and he determined to do what he
could single-handed to stem the tide of crime. Just what he was going to
do he was undetermined. One, thing was certain, he must get the number
of that license tag. He looked toward the house.

The group had paused with their burden at the door and Pat had turned
on his pocket flash light for just an instant as they fumbled with an
ancient lock. In that instant the whole front of the old stone house was
lit up clearly, and Billy gasped. The _haunted house!_ The house on
the far mountain where a man had murdered his brother and then hanged
himself. It had stood empty and closed for years, ever since Billy could
remember, and was shunned and regarded with awe, and pointed out by
hunters as a local point of interest.

Billy regarded with contempt the superstition that hung around the
place, but he gasped when he saw where he was, for they must have come
twenty miles round about and it was at least ten across the mountains
by the short cut. Ten miles from home, and he had to foot it! If he had
only brought old trusty! No telling now whether he would ever see it
again. But what were bicycles at such a time as this!

The flash had gone out and the house was in darkness again, but he
could hear the grating of a rusty hinge as the door opened, and faint
footfalls of rubbered feet shuffled on a dusty floor. Now was his time!
He darted out to the back of the car, and stooping down with his face
close to the license, holding his old cap in one hand to shelter it
drew out his own pocket flash and turned it on the sign, registering the
number clearly on his alert young mind. The flash light was on its last
breath of battery, and blinked asthmatically, winking out into a thread
of red as the boy pressed it eagerly for one more look. He had been so
intent that he had not heard the rubbered feet till they were almost
upon him, and he had barely time to spring back into the bushes.

“Hist! What was that?” whispered Pat, and the three stopped motionless
in their tracks. Billy held his breath and touched the cold steel in his
pocket. Of course there was always the gun, but what was one gun against
three?




V


The whistle of the Cannery at Sabbath Valley blew a relief blast five
minutes ahead of midnight in deference to the church chimes, and the
night shift which had been working overtime on account of a consignment
of tomatoes that would not keep till Monday, poured joyously out into
the road and scattered to their various homes.

The outmost of these homegoers, Tom McMertrie and Jim Rafferty, who
lived at the other extreme of the village, came upon a crippled car,
coughing and crawling toward them in front of the Graveyard. Its driver,
much sobered by lack of stimulant, and frequent necessity for getting
out and pushing his car over hard bits of road, called to them noisily.

The two workmen, pleasant of mood, ready for a joke, not altogether
averse to helping if this proved to be “the right guy,” halted and
stepped into the road just to look the poor noble car over. It was the
lure of the fine machine.

“Met with an accident?” Jim remarked affably, as if it were something to
enjoy.

“Had toire thrubble?” added Tom, punching the collapsed tires.

The questions seemed to anger the driver, who demanded loftily:

“Where's your garage?”

“Garage? Oh, we haven't any garage,” said Jim pleasantly, with a mute
twinkle in his Irish eye.

“No garage? Haven't any garage! What town is this,--if you call it a
town?”

“Why, mon, this is Sawbeth Volley! Shorely ye've heard of Sawbeth
Volley!”

“No, I never heard of it!” said the stranger contemptuously, “but from
what I've seen of it so far I should say it ought to be called Hell's
Pit! Well, what do you do when you want your car fixed?”

“Well, we don't hoppen to hove a cyar,” said Tom with a meditative air,
stooping to examine the spokes of a wheel, “Boot, ef we hod mon, I'm
thenkin' we'd _fix_ it!”

Jim gave a flicker of a chuckle in his throat, but kept his outward
gravity. The stranger eyed the two malevolently, helplessly, and began
once more, holding his rage with a cold voice.

“Well, how much do you want to fix my car?” he asked, thrusting his hand
into his pocket and bringing out an affluent wallet.

The men straightened up and eyed him coldly. Jim turned indifferently
away and stepped back to the sidewalk. Tom lifted his chin and replied
kindly:

“Why, Mon, it's the _Sawbeth,_ didn't ye know? I'm s'proised at ye! It's
the Sawbeth, an' this is Sawbeth Volley! We don't wurruk on the Sawbeth
day in Sawbeth Volley. Whist! Hear thot, mon?”

He lifted his hand and from the stone belfry near-by came the solemn
tone of the chime, pealing out a full round of melody, and then tolling
solemnly twelve slow strokes. There was something almost uncanny
about it that held the stranger still, as if an unseen presence with
a convincing voice had been invoked. The young man sat under the spell
till the full complement of the ringing was finished, the workman with
his hand up holding attention, and Jim Rafferty quietly enjoying it all
from the curb stone.

When the last sweet resonance had died out, the Scotchman's hand went
slowly down, and the stranger burst forth with an oath:

“Well, can you tell me where I can go to get fixed up? I've wasted
enough time already.”

“I should say from whut I've seen of ye, mon, that yer roight in thot
statement, and if I was to advoise I'd say go right up to the parson,
His loight's still burnin' in the windo next beyant the tchurtch, so
ye'll not be disturbin' him. Not that he'd moind. He'll fix ye up ef
anybody cun; though I'm doubtin' yer in a bad wy, only wy ye tak it.
Good-night to ye, the winda wi' the leight, mon, roight next beyant the
tchurtch!”

The car began its coughing and spluttering, and slowly jerked itself
into motion, its driver going angrily on his unthankful way. The two
workmen watching him with amused expressions, waited in the shadow of a
tree till the car came to a stop again in front of the parsonage, and a
tall young fellow got out and looked toward the lighted window.

“Oh, boy! He's going in!” gasped Jim, slapping his companion silently on
the back. “Whatt'll Mr. Severn think, Tommy?”

“It'll do the fresh laddie gude,” quoth Tom, a trifle abashed but ready
to stand by his guns, “I'm thenkin' he's one of them what feels they
owns the airth, an' is bound to step on all worms of the dust whut comes
in thur wy. But Jim, mon, we better be steppin' on, fer tomorra's the
Sawbeth ya ken, an' it wuddent be gude for our souls if the parson shud
cum out to investigate.” Chuckling away into the silent street they
disappeared, while Laurence Shafton stalked angrily up the little path
and pounded loudly on the quaint knocker of the parsonage.

       *       *       *       *       *

The minister was on his knees beside his desk, praying for the soul of
the wandering lad who had been dear to him for years. He had finished
his preparation for the coming day, and his heart was full of a great
longing. As he poured out his desire he forgot the hour and his need for
rest. It was often in such companionship he forgot all else. He was that
kind of a man.

But he came to his feet on the instant with the knock, and was ready
to go out on any errand of mercy that was needing him. It was not an
unusual thing for a knock to come interrupting his midnight devotions.
Sometimes the call would be to go far out on the mountain to some one
who was in distress, or dying.

The minister swung the door wide and peered into the night pleasantly
almost as if to welcome an unexpected guest. In the sudden flood of the
porch light his face was illumined, and behind him the pretty living
room gave a sweet homely setting. The stranger stood for an instant
blinking, half astonished; then the memory of his rendezvous at break of
day brought back his irritation at the delay.

“Are you Parsons?” he demanded, just as if “Parsons” were at fault that
he had not been on hand before.

“Parsons?” said Mr. Severn reflectively. “I don't recall anyone of that
name hereabouts. Perhaps you are on the wrong road. There is a Parsons
at Monopoly.”

“Parsons is the name. Aren't you Parsons? A couple of men down the road
said you were, and that you could fix me up. They said right next the
church and that your light was still burning.” The visitor's tone was
belligerent.

Severn's face cleared with a smile.

“Oh, they must have said 'Parson,' they often call me that. Come in.
What can I do for you?”

The young man eyed him coldly and made no move to enter.

“Parson or Parsons, it makes no difference does it? Mr. Parson, if
you're so particular then, come out and look at my car. It seems to be
in bad shape, and be quick about it. I've got over two hundred miles to
make before daybreak, so get a hustle on. I'll pay you well if you don't
waste any time.”

A queer look descended upon the minister in twinkles of amusement around
his eyes and lips much like the smile that Tom MacMertrie had worn, only
there was not a rag of hurt pride about it. With entire pleasantness he
said:

“Just wait a moment till I get a light.”

As he turned to go Shafton called after him:

“Oh, by the way, got anything to drink? I'm thirsty as the devil.”

Severn turned, instant hospitality in his face.

“What will you have? Water or milk? Plenty of both.”

He smiled and Shafton looked at him in haughty amazement.

“Man! I said I wanted something to _drink!_” he thundered, “but don't
stand there all night doddering. I've got to get started!”

A slight lifting of the chin, a trifle of steel in the kind eyes, a
shade of coolness in the voice, as the clear comprehension of heaven had
sifted the visitor, and the minister said, almost sternly:

“Oh, I see,” and disappeared through a swinging door into the pantry.

It was about this time that Lynn Severn awoke to near consciousness and
wondered what kind of a queer noisy guest her father had now.

The minister was gone sometime and the guest grew impatient, stamping
up and down the piazza and kicking a porch rocker out of his path. He
looked at his watch and frowned, wondering how near he was to the end of
his detour, and then he started in pursuit of his man, tramping through
the Severn house as if it were a public garage, and almost running into
the minister as he swung the door open. Severn was approaching with a
lighted lantern in one hand and a plate of brown bread and butter, with
a cup of steaming coffee in his other hand.

Laurence Shafton stopped abruptly, a curse on his lips, but something,
either the genial face of the minister, or the aroma of the coffee,
silenced him. And indeed there was something about Graham Severn that
was worth looking at. Tall and well built, with a face at once strong
and sweet, and with a certain luminousness about it that almost seemed
like transparency to let the spirit shine through, although there was
nothing frail about his well cut features.

Laurence Shafton, looking into the frank kind eyes of the minister
suddenly became aware that this man had taken a great deal of trouble
for him. He hadn't brought any liquor, probably because he did not know
enough of the world to understand what it was he wanted, or because he
was playing a joke. As he looked into those eyes and noted with his half
befuddled senses the twinkle playing at the corners he was not quite
sure but the joke was on himself. But however it was the coffee smelled
good and he took it and blundered out a brief “Thanks.”

Eating his brown bread and butter, the like of which had never entered
his pampered lips before, and taking great swoops of the hot strong
coffee he followed this strange new kind of a man out to the car in the
moonlight, paying little heed to the careful examination that ensued,
being so accustomed to ordering all his needs supplied and finding them
forthcoming without delay.

Finally the minister straightened up:

“I'm afraid you won't go many miles to-night. You've burned out your
bearings!”

“Hell!” remarked the young gentleman pausing before the last swallow of
coffee.

“Oh, you won't find it so bad as that, I imagine,” answered the steady
voice of the minister. “I can give you a bed and take care of you over
to-morrow, and perhaps Sandy McPherson can fix you up Monday, although I
doubt it. He'd have to make new bearings, or you'd have to send for some
to the factory.”

But Lawrence Shafton did not wait to hear the suggestions. He stormed
up and down the sidewalk in front of the parsonage and let forth such a
stream of choice language as had not been heard in that locality in many
a long year. The minister's voice, cool, stern, commanding, broke in
upon his ravings.

“I think that will be about all, sir!”

Laurence Shafton stopped and stared at the minister's lifted hand, not
because he was overawed, simply because never before in the whole of
his twenty-four years had any one dared lift voice to him in a tone of
command or reproof. He could not believe his ears, and his anger rose
hotly. He opened his mouth to tell this insignificant person who he was
and where to get off, and a few other common arguments of gentlemen of
his class, but the minister had a surprising height as he stood in the
moonlight, and there was that something strange and spiritual about him
that seemed to meet the intention and disarm it. His jaw dropped, and
he could not utter the words he had been about to speak. This was
insufferable--! But there was that raised hand. It seemed like some one
not of this world quite. He wasn't afraid, because it wasn't in him
to be afraid. That was his pose, not afraid of those he considered his
inferiors, and he did not consider that anyone was his superior. But
somehow this was something new in his experience. A man like this! It
was almost as if his mere being there demanded a certain homage. It was
queer. The young man passed a hand over his hot forehead and tried to
think. Then the minister's voice went calmly on. It was almost as if he
had not said that other at all. Perhaps he had not. Perhaps he dreamed
it or imagined it. Perhaps he had been taking too much liquor and this
was one of the symptoms--! Yet there still ringing in his ears--well
his soul anyway,--were those quiet words, “That will be about all, sir!”
 Sternly. As if he had a _right_ to speak that way _to him_! To Laurence
Shafton, son of the great Wilson J. Shafton, of New York! He looked up
at the man again and found a sort of respect for him dawning in himself.
It was queer, but the man was--well, interesting. What was this he was
saying?

“I am sorry”--just as if he had never rebuked him at all, “I am sorry
that there seems to be no other way. If I had a car I would take you to
the nearest railway station, but there are no trains to-night, not even
twenty miles away until six in the morning. There are only four cars
owned in the village. Two are gone off on a summer trip, the third is
out of commission being repaired, and the fourth belongs to the doctor,
who happens to be away on the mountain to-night attending a dying man.
You see how it is.”

The young man opened his mouth to curse once more, and strangely enough
closed it again: Somehow cursing seemed to have lost its force.

“There is just one chance,” went on the minister thoughtfully, “that a
young man who was visiting his mother to-day may still be here. I can
call up and find out. He would take you I know.”

Almost humbly the great man's son followed the minister back to the
house and listened anxiously while he called a number on the telephone.

“Is that you Mrs. Carter? I'm sorry if I have disturbed you. What?
You hadn't gone to bed yet? Oh, waiting for Mark? Then he isn't there?
That's what I called up for. There is some one here in trouble, needing
to be taken to Monopoly. I was sure Mark would help him out if possible.
Yes, please, if he comes soon, ask him to call me. Just leave a note for
him, can't you? I wouldn't sit up. Mark will take good care of himself.
Yes, of course, that's the mother of it. Well, good-night, Mrs. Carter.”

The young man strode angrily out to the door, muttering--but no words
were distinct. He wanted to be away from the compelling calmness of
those eyes that seemed to search him through. He dashed out the screen
door, letting it slam behind him, and down the steps, intending
to _make_ his car go on at all odds until he reached another town
somewhere. It had gone so far, it could go on a little farther perhaps.
This country parson did not know about cars, how should he?

And then somewhere right on the top step he made a false step and
slipped, or was it his blindness of rage? He caught at the vines with
frantic hands, but as if they laughed at him they slipped from his
grasp. His feet clattered against the step trying for footing, but he
was too near the edge, and he went down straight into a little rocky
nook where ferns and violets were growing, and a sharp jagged rock stuck
up and bit him viciously as he slid and struggled for a firm footing
again. Then an ugly twist of his ankle, and he lay in a humiliating
heap in the shadow of the vines on the lawn, crying out and beginning to
curse with the pain that gripped him in sharp teeth, and stung through
his whole excitable inflamed being.

The minister was there almost at once, bending over him. Somehow he
felt as if he were in the power of somebody greater than he had ever met
before. It was almost like meeting God out on the road somewhere.
The minister stooped and picked him up, lightly, as if he had been a
feather, and carried him like a baby, thrown partly over his shoulder;
up the steps, and into that blasted house again. Into the bright
light that sickened him and made the pain leap up and bring a mighty
faintness.

He laid him almost tenderly upon a soft couch, and straightened the
pillows about him, seeming to know just how every bone felt, and how
every nerve quivered, and then he asked a few questions in a quiet
voice. “What happened? Was it your ankle? Here? Or _here?_ All right.
Just be patient a minute, I'll have you all fixed up. This was my job
over in France you know. No, don't move. It won't hurt long. It was
right here you said. Now, wait till I get my bottle of lotion.”

He was back in an instant with bandages, and bottle, and seemed to know
just how to get off a shoe with the least trouble.

An hour later the scion of a great New York family lay sleeping in
the minister's study, the old couch made up with cool sheets, and the
swollen ankle comfortably bandaged with cool wet cloths. Outside in the
moonlight the crippled car stood alone, and Sabbath Valley slept, while
the bells chimed out a single solemn stroke.




VI


Billy was doing some rapid thinking while he stood motionless in the
bushes. It seemed a half hour, but in reality it was but a few seconds
before he heard a low whistle. The men piled rapidly into the car with
furtive looks on either side into the dark.

Billy gave a wavering glance toward the looming house in the darkness
where the motionless figure had been left. Was it a dead man lying there
alone, or was he only doped. But what could he do in the dark without
tools or flash? He decided to stick with the machine, for he had no
desire to foot it home, and anyway, with his bicycle he would be far
more independent. Besides, there was the perfectly good automobile to
think about. If the man was dead he couldn't be any deader. If he was
only doped it would be some time before he came to, and before these
keepers could get back he would have time to do something. Billy never
doubted his responsibility in the matter. It was only a question of
expediency. If he could just “get these guys with the goods on them,” he
would be perfectly satisfied.

He made a dash for his seat at the back while the car was turning, and
they were off at a brisk pace down the mountain, not waiting this time
to double on their tracks, but splashing through the Creek only once and
on up to the road again.

Like an uneasy fever in his veins meantime, went and came a vision of
that limp inert figure of the man being carried into the haunted
house as it stood out in the flare of the flash light, one arm hanging
heavily. What did that hand and arm remind him of? Oh--h! The time when
Mark was knocked cold at the Thanksgiving Day Football game last year.
Mark's hand and arm had looked like that--he had held his fingers like
that--when they picked him up. Mark had the base-ball hand! Of course
that rich guy might have been an athlete too, they were sometimes. And
of course Mark was right now at home and in bed, where Billy wished
he was also, but somehow the memory of that still dark “knocked cold”
 attitude, and that hanging hand and arm would not leave him. He frowned
in the dark and wished this business was over. Mark was the only living
soul Billy felt he could ever tell about this night's escapade, and he
wasn't sure he could tell him, but he knew if he did that Mark would
understand.

Billy watched anxiously for a streak of light in the East, but none had
come as yet. The moon had left the earth darker than darkness when it
went.

He tried to think what he should do. His bicycle was lying in the bushes
and he ought to get it before daylight. If they went near the station he
would drop off and pick it up. Then he would scuttle through the woods
and get to the Crossroads, and beat it down to the Blue Duck Tavern.
That was the only place open all night where he could telephone. He
didn't like to go to the Blue Duck Tavern on account of his aunt. She
had once made him promise most solemnly, bringing in something about his
dead mother, that he would never go to the Blue Duck Tavern. But this
was a case of necessity, and dead mothers, if they cared at all, ought
to understand. He had a deep underlying faith in the principle of what
a mother--at any rate a dead mother--would be like. And anyhow, this
wasn't the kind of “going” to the Tavern his aunt had meant. He was
keeping the spirit of the promise if not the letter. In his code the
spirit meant much more than the letter--at least on this occasion.
There were often times when he rigidly adhered to the letter and let the
spirit take care of itself, but this was not one.

But if, on the other hand they did not take Pat all the way back to the
crossing by the station it would be even better for him, for the road on
which they now were passed within a quarter of a mile of the Blue Duck
Tavern, and he could easily beat the car to the state line, by dropping
off and running.

But suddenly and without warning it became apparent that Pat was to be
let out to walk to the station crossing, and Billy had only a second to
decide what to do, while Pat lumbered swearing down from the car. If he
got off now he would have to wait till Pat was far ahead before he dared
go after his wheel, and he would lose so much time there would be no use
in trying to save the car. On the other hand if he stayed on the car he
was liable to be seen by Pat, and perhaps caught. However, this seemed
the only possible way to keep the car from destruction and loss, so he
wriggled himself into his seat more firmly, tucked his legs painfully
up under him, covered his face with his cap, and hid his hands in his
pockets.

“You've plenty of time,” raged Pat, “You've only a little five miles
run left. It's a good half hour before light. You're a pair of cowards,
that's whut ye are, and so I'll tell Sam. If I get fired fer not being
there fer the early milk train, there'll be no more fat jobs fer youse.
Now be sure ye do as you're told. Leave the car in the first field
beyond the woods after ye cross the state line, lift yer flash light
and wink three times, count three slow, and wink three times more. _Then
beat it!_ And doncha ferget to go feed that guy! We don't want he should
die on us.”

The engine began to mutter. Pat with a farewell string of oaths rolled
off down the road, too sleepy to look behind, and Billy held his breath
and ducked low till the rolling Pat was one with the deep gray of the
morning.

The first streak of light was beginning to show in the East, and the
all-night revellers at the Blue Duck were in the last stages of going
home after a more than usually exciting season, when Billy like the
hardened promise-breaker he felt himself to be, boldly slid in at the
door and disappeared inside the telephone booth behind the last row of
tables in the corner. For leave it to a boy, even though he be not a
frequenter of a place, to know where everything needful is to be found!

He had to wait several minutes to get the Chief of Police in Economy,
and while he waited two gaunt habitues of the Tavern slid into seats at
the table to the left of the booth, ordered drinks and began to discuss
something in a low tone. Billy paid no heed till he happened to hear his
friend's name:

“Yep, I seen Mark come in with Cherry early in the evening. He set right
over there and gotter some drink. The girl was mad because he wouldn't
get her what she wanted to drink. I happened to be settin' direckly in
front and I heard her gassin' about it. She tossed her head and made her
eyes look little and ugly like a pig, and once she got up to go, and he
grabbed her hands and made her set down; and just set there fer sometime
alookin' at her hard an' holdin' her han's and chewin' the rag at her.
I don't know what all they was sayin,' fer he talked mighty low, an'
Ike called me to take a hand in the game over tother side the room, so
I didn't know no more till I see him an' Cherry beatin' it out the side
door, an' Dolphin standin' over acrost by the desk lampin' 'em with his
ugly look, an' pretty quick, Dolph he slid out the other door an' was
gone quite some time. When he come back Cherry was with him, laughin'
and makin' eyes, and vampin' away like she always does, an' him an' her
danced a lot after that--”

A voice on the end of the wire broke in upon this amazing conversation,
and Billy with difficulty adjusted his jaded mind, to the matter in
hand:

“'Z'is the Chief? Say, Chief, a coupla guys stole a
machine--Holes-Mowbrays--license number 6362656-W--Got that? New York
tag. They're on their way over to the State Line beyond the Cross Roads.
They're gonta run her in the field just beyond the woods, you know.
They're gonta give a flash light signal to their pal, three winks, count
three slow, and three winks more, and then beat it. Then some guy is
gonta wreck the machine. It's up to you and your men to hold the machine
till I get the owner there. He don't know it's pinched yet, but I know
where to find him, an' he'll have the license and can identify it.
Where'll I find you? Station House? 'Conomy? Sure! I'll be there soon's
I get'im. What's that? I? Oh, I'm just a kid that happened to get wise.
My name? Oh rats! That don't cut any ice now! You get on yer job! They
must be almost there by now. I gotta beat it! Gub-bye!”

Billy was all there even if he had been up all night. He hung up with
a click, for he was anxious to hear what the men were saying. They had
finished their glasses and were preparing to leave. The old one was
gabbling on in a querrilous gossipy tone:

“Well, it'll go hard with Mark Carter if the man dies. Everybody knows
he was here, and unless he can prove an alibi--!”

They were crawling reluctantly out of their haunts now, and Billy could
catch but one more sentence:

“Well, I'm sorry fer his ma. I used to go to school with Mrs. Carter
when we were kids.”

They were gone out and the room suddenly showed empty. The waiter was
fastening the shutters. In a moment more he would be locked in. Billy
made a silent dash among the tables and slid out the door while the
waiter's back was turned. The two men were ambling slowly down the road
toward Economy. Billy started on a dead run. His rubber soled shoes made
no echo and he was too light on his feet to make a thud. He disappeared
into the grayness like a spirit. He had more cause than ever now for
hurry. Mark! Mark! His beloved Mark Carter! What must he do about it?
Must he tell Mark? Or did Mark perhaps know? What had happened anyway?
There had evidently been a shooting. That Cherry Fenner was mixed up in
it. Billy knew her only by sight. She always grinned at him and said:
“Hello, Billee!” in her pretty dimpled way. He didn't care for her
himself. He had accepted her as a part of life, a necessary evil. She
wore her hair queer, and had very short tight skirts, and high heels.
She painted her face and vamped, but that was her affair. He had
heretofore tolerated her because she seemed in some way to be under
Mark Carter's recent protection. Therefore he had growled “Ello!” grimly
whenever she accosted him and let it go at that. If it had come to
a show down he would have stood up for her because he knew that Mark
would, that was all. Mark knew his own business. Far be it from Billy to
criticize his hero's reasons. Perhaps it was one of Mark's weaknesses.
It was up to him. That was the code of a “white man” as Billy had
learned it from “the fellas.”

But this was a different matter. This involved Mark's honor. It was up
to him to find Mark!

Billy did not take the High road down from his detour. He cut across
below the Crossroads, over rough ground, among the underbrush, and
parting the low growing trees was lost in the gloom of the woods. But he
knew every inch of ground within twenty miles around, and darkness
did not take away his sense of direction. He crashed along among the
branches, making steady headway toward the spot where he had left his
bicycle, puffing and panting, his face streaked with dirt, his eyes
bleared and haggard, his whole lithe young body straining forward and
fighting against the dire weariness that was upon him, for it was not
often that he stayed up all night. Aunt Saxon saw to that much at least.

The sky was growing rosy now, and he could hear the rumbling of the milk
train. It was late. Pat would not lose his job this time, for he must
have had plenty of time to get back to the station. Billy wormed himself
under cover as the train approached, and bided his time. Cautiously,
peering from behind the huckleberry growth, he watched Pat slamming the
milk cans around. He could see his bicycle lying like a dark skeleton of
a thing against the gravel bank. It was lucky he got there before day,
for Pat would have been sure to see it, and it might have given him an
idea that Billy had gone with the automobile.

The milk train came suddenly in sight through the tunnel, like a lighted
thread going through a needle. It rumbled up to the station. There was a
rattling of milk cans, empty ones being put on, full cans being put off,
grumbling of Pat at the train hands, loud retorts of the train hands,
the engine puffed and wheezed like a fat old lady going upstairs
and stopping on every landing to rest. Then slamming of car doors, a
whistle, the snort of the engine as it took up its way again out toward
the rosy sky, its headlight weird like a sick candle against the dawn,
its tail light winking with a leer and mocking at the mountains as it
clattered away like a row of gray ducks lifting webbed feet and flinging
back space to the station.

Pat rolled the loaded truck to the other platform ready for the Lake
train at seven, and went in to a much needed rest. He slammed the door
with a finality that gave Billy relief. The boy waited a moment more
in the gathering dawn, and then made a dash for the open, salvaging his
bicycle, and diving back into the undergrowth.

For a quarter of a mile he and the wheel like two comrades raced under
branches, and threaded their way between trees. Then he came out into
the Highroad and mounting his wheel rode into the world just as the sun
shot up and touched the day with wonder.

He rode into the silent sleeping village of Sabbath Valley just as the
bells from the church chimed out gently, as bells should do on a Sabbath
morning when people are at rest, “One! Two! Three! Four! Five!”

Sabbath Valley looked great as he pedalled silently down the street.
Even the old squeak of the back wheel seemed to be holding its breath
for the occasion.

He coasted past the church and down the gentle incline in front of the
parsonage and Joneses, and the Littles and Browns and Gibsons. Like a
shadow of the night passing he slid past the Fowlers and Tiptons and
Duncannons, and fastened his eyes on the little white fence with the
white pillared gate where Mrs. Carter lived. Was that a light in the
kitchen window? And the barn that Mark used for his garage when he was
at home, was the door open? He couldn't quite see for the cyringa bush
hid it from the road. With a furtive glance up and down the street he
wheeled in at the driveway, and rode up under the shadow of the green
shuttered white house.

He dismounted silently, stealthily, rested his wheel against the trunk
of a cherry tree, and with keen eyes for every window, glanced up to
the open one above which he knew belonged to Mark's room. Strong grimy
fingers went to his lips and a low cautious whistle, more like a bird
call issued forth, musical as any wild note.

The white muslin curtains wavered back and forth in the summer breeze,
and for a moment he thought a head was about to appear for a soft
stirring noise had seemed to move within the house somewhere, but the
curtains swayed on and no Mark appeared. Then he suddenly was aware of a
white face confronting him at the downstairs window directly opposite
to him, white and scared and--was it accusing? And suddenly he began to
tremble. Not all the events of the night had made him tremble, but now
he trembled, it was Mark's mother, and she had pink rims to her eyes,
and little damp crimples around her mouth and eyes for all the world
like Aunt Saxon's. She looked--she looked exactly as though she had not
slept all night. Her nose was thin and red, and her eyes had that awful
blue that eyes get that have been much washed with tears. The soft waves
of her hair drooped thinly, and the coil behind showed more threads of
silver than of brown in the morning sun that shot through the branches
of the cherry tree. She had a frightened look, as if Billy had brought
some awful news, or as if it was his fault, he could not tell which, and
he began to feel that choking sensation and that goneness in the pit of
his stomach that Aunt Saxon always gave him when she looked frightened
at something he had done or was going to do. Added to this was that
sudden premonition, and a memory of that drooping still figure in the
dark up on the mountain.

Mrs. Carter sat down the candle on a shelf and raised the window:

“Is that you Billy?” she asked, and there were tears in her voice.

Billy had a brief appalling revelation of Mothers the world over. Did
all Mothers--women--act like that when they were _fools_? Fools is what
he called them in his mind. Yet in spite of himself and his rage and
trembling he felt a sudden tenderness for this crumply, tired, ghastly
little pink rimmed mother, apprehensive of the worst as was plain to
see. Billy recalled like a flash the old man at the Blue Duck saying,
“I'm sorry for his ma. I used to go to school with her.” He looked at
the faded face with the pink rims and trembling lips and had a vision of
a brown haired little girl at a desk, and old Si Appleby a teasing boy
in the desk opposite. It came over him that some day he would be an old
man somewhere telling how he went to school--! And then he asked:

“Where's Mark? Up yet?”

She shook her head apprehensively, withholdingly.

Billy had a thought that perhaps some one had beat him to it with news
from the Blue Duck, but he put it from him. There were tears in her eyes
and one was straggling down between the crimples of her cheeks where it
looked as if she had lain on the folds of her handkerchief all night.
There came a new tenderness in his voice. This was _Mark's_ mother, and
this was the way she felt. Well, of course it was silly, but she was
Mark's _mother_.

“Man up the mountain had n'accident. I thought Mark ud he'p. He always
does,” explained Billy awkwardly with a feeling that he ought to account
for his early visit.

“Yes, of course, Mark would like to help!” purred his mother comforted
at the very thought of every day life and Mark going about as usual,
“But--” and the apprehension flew into her eyes again, “He isn't home.
Billy, he hasn't come home at all last night! I'm frightened to death!
I've sat up all night! I can't think what's happened--! There's so many
hold-ups and Mark will carry his money loose in his trousers pocket--!”

Billy blanched but lied beautifully up to the occasion even as he would
have liked to have somebody lie for him to Aunt Saxon:

“Aw! That's nothing! Doncha worry. He tol' me he might have t'stay down
t'Unity all night. There's a fella down there that likes him a lot, an'
they had somekinduva blowout in their church last night. He mightuv had
ta take some girl home out of town ya know, and stayed over with the
fella.”

Mrs. Carter's face relaxed a shade:

“Yes, I've tried to think that--!”

“Well, doncha worry, Mizz Carter, I'll lookim up fer ya, I know 'bout
where he might be.”

“Oh, thank you Billy,” her face wreathed in wavering smiles brought
another thought of school days and life and how queer it was that grown
folks had been children sometime and children had to be grown folks.

“Billy, Mark likes you very much. I'm sure he won't mind your knowing
that I'm worried, but you know how boys don't like to have their mothers
worry, so you needn't say anything to Mark that I said I was worried,
need you? You understand Billy. I'm not _really_ worried you know. Mark
was always a good boy.”

“Aw sure!” said Billy with a knowing wink. “He's a prince! You leave it
t'me, Mizz Carter!”

“Thank you, Billy. I'll do something for you sometime. But how's it come
you're up so early? You haven't had your breakfast yet have you?”

She eyed his weary young face with a motherly anxiety:

“Naw, I didn't have no time to stop fer breakfast,” Billy spoke
importantly, “Got this call about the sick guy and had to beat it. Say,
you don't happen to know Mark's license number do you? It might help
a lot, savin' time 'f'I could tell his car at sight. Save stoppin' to
ast.”

“Well, now, I don't really--” said the woman ruminatively, “let me see.
There was six and six, there were a lot of sixes if I remember--”

“Oh, well, it don't matter--” Billy grasped his wheel and prepared to
leave.

“Wait, Billy, you must have something to eat--”

“Aw, naw, I can't wait! Gotta beat it! Might miss 'im!”

“Well, just a bite. Here, I'll get you some cookies!”

She vanished, and he realized for the first time that he was hungry.
Cookies sounded good.

She returned with a brimming glass of milk and a plate of cookies. She
stuffed the cookies in his pockets, while he drank the milk.

“Say,--” said he after a long sweet draught of the foaming milk, “Ya,
aint got enny more you cud spare fer that sick guy, have ya? Wait, I'll
save this. Got a bottle?”

“Indeed you won't, Billy Gaston. You just drink that every drop. I'll
get you another bottle to take with you. I got extra last night 'count
of Mark being home, and then he didn't drink it. He always likes a drink
of milk last thing before he goes to bed.”

She vanished and returned with a quart of milk cold off the ice. She
wrapped it well with newspapers, and Billy packed it safely into the
little basket on his wheel. Then he bethought him of another need.

“Say, m'y I go inta the g'rage an' get a screw driver? Screw loose on
m'wheel.”

She nodded and he vanished into the open barn door. Well he knew where
Mark kept his tools. He picked out a small pointed saw, a neat little
auger and a file and stowed them hurriedly under the milk bottle. Thus
reinforced without and within, he mounted his faithful steed and sped
away to the hills.

The morning sun had shot up several degrees during his delay, and
Sabbath Valley lay like a thing new born in its glory. On the belfry a
purple dove sat glistening, green and gold ripples on her neck, turning
her head proudly from side to side as Billy rode by, and when he topped
the first hill across the valley the bells rang out six sweet strokes
as if to remind him that Sunday School was not far off and he must hurry
back. But Billy was trying to think how he should get into that locked
house, and wondering whether the kidnappers would have returned to
feed their captive yet. He realized that he must be wary, although his
instinct told him that they would wait for dark, besides, he had hopes
that they might have been “pinched.”

Nevertheless he approached the old house cautiously, skirting the
mountain to avoid Pleasant Valley, and walking a mile or two through
thick undergrowth, sometimes with difficulty propelling the faithful
machine.

Arrived in sight he studied the surroundings carefully, harbored his
wheel where it would not be discovered and was yet easily available, and
after reconnoitering stole out of covert.

The house stood gaunt and grim against the smiling morning. Its
shuttered windows giving an expression of blindness or the repellant
mask of death. A dead house, that was what it was. Its doors and windows
closed on the tragedy that had been enacted within its massive stone
walls. It seemed more like a fortress than a house where warm human
faces had once looked forth, and where laughter and pleasant words had
once sounded out. To pass it had always stirred a sense of mystery and
weirdness. To approach it thus with the intention of entering to find
that still limp figure of a man gave a most overpowering sense of awe.
Billy looked up with wide eyes, the deep shadows under them standing out
in the clear light of the morning and giving him a strangely old aspect
as if he had jumped over at least ten years during the night. Warily he
circled the house, keeping close to the shrubbery at first and listening
as a squirrel might have done, then gradually drawing nearer. He noticed
that the down stairs shutters were solid iron with a little half moon
peep hole at the top. Those upstairs were solid below and fitted with
slats above, but the slats were closed of all the front windows, and all
but two of the back ones, which were turned upward so that one could
not see the glass. The doors, both back and front, were locked, and
unshakable, of solid oak and very thick. A Yale lock with a new look
gave all entrance at the front an impossible look. The back door was
equally impregnable unless he set to work with his auger and saw and
took out a heavy oak panel.

He got down to the ground and began to examine the cellar windows. They
seemed to be fitted with iron bars set into the solid masonry. He went
all around the house and found each one unshakable, until he reached the
last at the back. There he found a bit of stone cracked and loosened
and it gave him an idea. He set to work with his few tools, and finally
succeeded in loosening one rusted bar. He was much hindered in his work
by the necessity of keeping a constant watch out, and by his attempts to
be quiet. There was no telling when Link and Shorty might come to feed
their captive and he must not be discovered.

It was slow work picking away at the stone, filing away at the rusty
iron, but the bars were so close together that three must be removed
before he could hope to crawl through, and even then he might be able to
get no further than the cellar. The guy that fixed this house up for a
prison knew what he was about.

Faintly across the mountains came the echo of bells, or were they in the
boy's own soul? He worked away in the hot sun, the perspiration rolling
down his weary dirty face, and sometimes his soul fainted within him.
Bells, and the sweet quiet church with the pleasant daily faces about
and the hum of Sunday School beginning! How far away that all seemed
to him now as he filed and picked, and sweated, and kept up a strange
something in his soul half yearning, half fierce dread, that might have
been like praying only the burden of its yearning seemed to be expressed
in but a single word, “Mark! Mark!”

At last the third bar came loose and with a great sigh that was almost
like a sob, the boy tore it out, and cleared the way. Then carefully
gathering his effects, tools, milk bottle and cap together, he let them
down into the dungeon-like blackness of the cellar, and crept in after
them, taking the precaution to set up in place the iron bars once more
and leave no trace of his entrance.

Pausing cautiously to listen he ventured to strike a match, mentally
belaboring himself at the wasteful way in which he had always used his
flash light which was now so much needed and out of commission. The
cellar was large, running under the whole house, with heavy rafters and
looming coal pits. A scurrying rat started a few lumps of coal in the
slide, and a cobwebby rope hung ominously from one cross beam, giving
him a passing shudder. It seemed as if the spirit of the past had arisen
to challenge his entrance thus. He took a few steps forward toward a dim
staircase he sighted at the farther end, and then a sudden noise sent
his heart beating fast. He extinguished the match and stood in the
darkness listening with straining ears. That was surely a step he heard
on the floor above!




VII


Laurence Shafton awoke late to the sound of church bells come alive and
singing hymn tunes. There was something strangely unreal in the sound,
in the utter stillness of the background of Sabbath Valley atmosphere
that made him think, almost, just for an instant, that he had stumbled
somehow into the wrong end of the other world, and come into the fields
of the blessed. Not that he had any very definite idea about what the
fields of the blessed would look like or what would be going on there,
but there was something still and holy between the voices of the bells
that fairly compelled his jaded young soul to sit up and listen.

But at the first attempt to sit up a very sharp very decided twinge of
pain caught him, and brought an assorted list of words which he kept for
such occasions to his lips. Then he looked around and tried to take in
the situation. It was almost as if he had been caught out of his own
world and dropped into another universe, so different was everything
here, and so little did he remember the happenings of the night before.
He had had trouble with his car, something infernal that had prevented
his going farther--he recalled having to get out and push the thing
along the road, and then two loutish men who made game of him and sent
him here to get his car fixed. There had been a man, a queer man who
gave him bread and butter instead of wine--he remembered that--and he
had failed to get his car fixed, but how the deuce did he get landed
on this couch with a world of books about him and a thin muslin curtain
blowing into the room, and fanning the cheeks of a lovely rose in a long
stemmed clear glass vase? Did he try to start and have a smash up? No,
he remembered going down the steps with the intention of starting, but
stay! Now it was coming to him. He fell off the porch! He must have had
a jag on or he never would have fallen. He did things to his ankle in
falling. He remembered the gentle giant picking him up as if he had
been a baby and putting him here, but where was _here_? Ah! Now he
remembered! He was on his way to Opal Verrons. A bet. An elopement
for the prize! Great stakes. He had lost of course. What a fool! If it
hadn't been for his ankle he might have got to a trolley car or train
somehow and made a garage. Money would have taken him there in time. He
was vexed that he had lost. It would have been great fun, and he had the
name of always winning when he set out to do so. But then, perhaps it
was just as well--Verrons was a good fellow as men went--he liked him,
and he was plain out and out fond of Opal just at present. It would have
been a dirty shame to play the trick behind his back. Still, if Opal
wanted to run away with him it was up to him to run of course. Opal was
rare sport and he couldn't stand the idea of Smart-Aleck McMarter, or
that conceited Percy Emerson getting there first. He wondered which had
won. It made his fury rise to think of either, and he had promised the
lady neither of them should. What was she thinking of him by now that he
had sent her no word of his delay? That was inexcusable. He must attend
to it at once.

He glanced around the pleasant room. Yes, there on the desk was a
telephone! Could he get to it? He sat up and painfully edged his way
over to the desk.

 “Safely through another week,
  God has brought us on our way--”

chimed the bells,

 “Let us now a blessing seek,
  Waiting in His courts to-day--”

But Laurie Shafton had never sung those words in his life and had no
idea what the bells were seeking to get across to him. He took down the
receiver and called for Long Distance.

 “Oh day of rest and gladness!”

pealed out the bells joyously,

  “Oh day of joy and light!
   Oh balm for care and sadness,
   Most beautiful, most bright--”

But it meant nothing to Laurie Shafton seeking a hotel in a fashionable
resort. And when he finally got his number it was only Opal's maid who
answered.

“Yes, Mrs. Verrons was up. She was out walking on the beach with a
gentleman. No, it was not Mr. Emerson, nor yet Mr. McMarter. Neither
of those gentlemen had arrived. No, it was not Mr. Verrons. He had just
telegraphed that he would not be at the hotel until tomorrow night.
Yes, she would tell Mrs. Verrons that he had met with an accident. Mrs.
Verrons would be very sorry. Number one-W Sabbath Valley. Yes, she would
write it down. What? Oh! The gentleman Mrs. Verrons was walking with?
No, it was not anybody that had been stopping at the hotel for long, it
was a new gentleman who had just come the night before. She hadn't heard
his name yet. Yes, she would be sure to tell Mrs. Verrons at once when
she came in, and Mrs. Verrons would be likely to call him up!”

He hung up the receiver and looked around the room discontentedly. A
stinging twinge of his ankle added to his discomfort. He gave an angry
snarl and pushed the wavering curtain aside, wishing those everlasting
bells would stop their banging.

Across the velvet stretch of lawn the stone church nestled among
the trees, with a background of mountains, and a studding of white
gravestones beyond its wide front steps. It was astonishingly beautiful,
and startlingly close for a church. He had not been so near to a church
except for a wedding in all his young life. Dandy place for a wedding
that would be, canopy over the broad walk from the street, charming
architecture, he liked the line of the arched belfry and the slender
spire above. The rough stone fitted well into the scenery. The church
seemed to be a thing of the ages placed there by Nature. His mind
trained to detect a sense of beauty in garments, rugs, pictures, and
women, appreciated the picture on which he was gazing. Where was this
anyway? Surely not the place with the absurd name that he remembered now
on the mountain Detour. Sabbath Valley! How ridiculous! It must be the
home of some wealthy estate, and yet there seemed a rustic loveliness
about it that scarcely established that theory.

The bells had ceased. He heard the roll of a deep throated organ
skillfully played.

And now, his attention was suddenly attracted to the open window of the
church where framed in English ivy a lovely girl sat at the organ. She
was dressed in white with hair of gold, and a golden window somewhere
back of her across the church, made a background of beaten gold against
which her delicate profile was set like some young saint. Her white
fingers moving among the keys, and gradually he came to realize that it
was she who had been playing the bells.

He stared and stared, filled with admiration, thrilled with this new
experience in his blase existence. Who would have expected to find a
beauty like that in a little out of the way place like this? His
theory of a great estate and a rich man's daughter with a fad for music
instantly came to the front. What a lucky happening that he should have
broken down close to this church. He would find out who the girl was and
work it to get invited up to her house. Perhaps he was a fortunate loser
of his bet after all.

As he watched the girl playing gradually the music entered his
consciousness. He was fond of music, and had heard the best of the world
of course. This was meltingly lovely. The girl had fine appreciation and
much expression, even when the medium of her melody was clumsy things
like bells. She had seemed to make them glad as they pealed out their
melodies. He had not known bells could sound like happy children, or
like birds.

His meditations were interrupted by a tap on the door, followed by the
entrance of his host bearing a tray:

“Good-morning,” he said pleasantly, “I see you're up. How is the sprain?
Better? Would you like me to dress it again?”

He came over to the desk and set down the tray on which was beautifully
brown buttered toast, eggs and coffee:

“I've brought you just a bite. It's so late you won't want much, for we
have dinner immediately after church. I suppose you wouldn't feel like
going over to the service?”

“Service?” the young man drawled almost insolently.

“Yes, service is at eleven. Would you care to go over? I could assist
you.”

“Naw, I shouldn't care to go,” he answered rudely, “I'm pulling out of
here as soon as I can get that machine of mine running. By the way, I've
been doing some telephoning”--he slung a ten dollar note on the desk. “I
didn't ask how much it was, guess that'll cover it. Now, help me to the
big chair and I'll sample your breakfast.”

The minister picked up the young man easily and placed him in the big
chair before the guest realized what was doing, and then turned and took
the ten dollar bill between his thumb and finger and flipped it down in
the young man's lap.

“Keep it,” he said briefly, “It's of no consequence.”

“But it was long distance,” explained the guest loftily, “It'll be quite
a sum. I talked overtime.”

“No matter,” said the minister pulling out a drawer of the desk and
gathering a few papers and his Bible. “Now, would you like me to look at
that ankle before I go, or will you wait for the doctor? He's likely to
be back before long, and I've left a call for him.”

“I'll wait for the doctor,” the young man's tone approached the insolent
note again, “and by the way, I wish you'd send for a mechanician. I've
got to get that car running.”

“I'm sorry,” said Severn, “I'm afraid you'll have to wait. The only one
in this region that would be at all likely to help you out with those
bearings is Carter. He has a car, or had one, of that make. He might
happen to have some bearings, but it is not at all likely. Or, he could
tow you ten miles to Monopoly. But Carter is not at home yet.”

The young man fairly frothed at the mouth: “Do you mean to tell me that
there is no one can mend a broken machine around this forsaken dump?
Where's your nearest garage? Send for a man to come at once. I'm willing
to pay anything,” he flourished a handful of bills.

The minister looked at his watch anxiously: “I'm sorry,” he said again,
“I've got to go to the service now. There is a garage at Monopoly and
their number is 97-M. You can phone them if you are not satisfied. I
tried them quite early this morning while you were still sleeping, but
there was nothing doing. The truth is the people around this region are
a little prejudiced against working seven days out of the week, although
they will help a man out in a case like yours when they can, but it
seems the repair man, the only one who knows about bearings, has gone
fifty miles in another direction to a funeral and won't be back till
to-morrow morning. Now, if you're quite comfortable I'll have to leave
you for a little while. It is time for my service to begin.”

The young man looked at his host with astonishment. He was not used to
being treated in this off-hand way. He could hardly believe his ears.
Throw back his money and lay down the law that way!

“Wait!” he thundered as the door was about to close upon the departing
minister.

Severn turned and regarded his guest quietly, questioningly:

“Who's that girl over there in the window playing the organ?” He pulled
the curtain aside and revealed a glimpse of the white and gold saint
framed in the ivy. Severn gave a swift cold glance at the insolent youth
and then answered with a slightly haughty note in his courteous voice,
albeit a quiver of amusement on his lip:

“That is my daughter.”

Laurence Shafton dropped the curtain and turned to stare at his host,
but the minister had closed the door and was already on his way to
church. Then the youth pulled back the curtain again and regarded the
lady. The man's daughter! And playing like that!

The rich notes of the organ were rolling out into the summer day, a
wonderful theme from an old master, grandly played. Yes, she could play.
She had been well taught. And the looks of her! She was wonderful at
this distance. Were these then wealthy people perhaps summering in this
quiet resort? He glanced about at the simple furnishings. That was a
good rug at his feet, worn in places, but soft in tone and unmistakably
of the Orient. The desk was of fumed oak, somewhat massive and dignified
with a touch of hand carving. The chairs were of the same dark oak with
leather cushions, and the couch so covered by his bed drapery that he
could not see it, but he remembered its comfort. There was nothing showy
or expensive looking but everything simple and good. One or two fine old
pictures on the wall gave evidence of good taste. The only luxury seemed
books, rows and rows of them behind glass doors in cases built into the
wall. They lined each space between windows and doors, and in several
spots reached to the ceiling. He decided that these people must have had
money and lost it. These things were old and had perhaps been inherited.
But the girl! She teased his curiosity. She seemed of a type entirely
new, and most attractive. Well, here was good luck again! He would stay
till church was out and see what she might be like at nearer view. It
might amuse him to play the invalid for a day or two and investigate
her. Meantime, he must call up that garage and see what could be done
for the car. If he could get it patched up by noon he might take the
girl out for a spin in the afternoon. One could judge a girl much better
getting her off by herself that way. He didn't seem to relish the
memory of that father's smile and haughty tone as he said “My daughter.”
 Probably was all kinds of fussy about her. But if the girl had any pep
at all she surely would enjoy getting away from oversight for a few
hours. He hoped Opal would call before they got back from their service.
It might be awkward talking with them all around.

But the organ was suddenly drowned in a burst of song:

  “Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the
   Holy Ghost, As it was in the beginning, is now and
   ever shall be--world without end, Amen!”

Somehow the words struck him with a strange awe, they were so distinct,
and almost in the room with him. He looked about half feeling that the
room was filled with people, and felt curiously alone. There was an
atmosphere in the little house of everybody being gone to church. They
had all gone and left him alone. It amused him. He wondered about this
odd family who seemed to be under the domination of a church service.
They had left him a stranger alone in their house. The doors and windows
were all open. How did they know but he was a burglar?

Some one was talking now. It sounded like the voice of his host. It
might be a prayer. How peculiar! He must be a preacher. Yet he had been
sent to him to fix his car. He did not look like a laboring man. He
looked as if he might be,--well almost anything--even a gentleman. But
if he was a clergyman, why, that of course explained the ascetic type,
the nun-like profile of the girl, the skilled musician. Clergymen were
apt to educate their children, even without much money. The girl would
probably be a prude and bore, but there was a chance that she might be a
princess in disguise and need a prince to show her a good time. He would
take the chance at least until after dinner.

So he ate his delicate toast, and drank his delicious coffee, and wished
he had asked that queer man to have his flask filled at the drug store
before he went to his old service, but consoled himself with numerous
cigarettes, while he watched the face of the musician, and listened idly
to the music.

It was plain that the young organist was also the choir leader, for her
expressive face was turned toward the singers, and her lovely head kept
time. Now and then a motion of the hand seemed to give a direction or
warning. And the choir too sang with great sweetness and expression.
They were well trained. But what a bore such a life must be to a girl.
Still, if she had never known anything else--! Well, he would like
to see her at closer range. He lit another cigarette and studied her
profile as she slipped out of the organ bench and settled herself nearer
the window. He could hear the man's voice reading now. Some of the words
drew his idle attention:

  “All the ways of a man are clean in his own eyes; but
   the Lord weigheth the spirits.”

Curious sentence that! It caught in his brain. It seemed rather true.
From the Bible probably of course, though he was not very familiar with
that volume, never having been obliged to go to Sunday School in his
childhood days? But was it true? Were all a man's ways clean in his
own eyes? Take, for instance, his own ways? He always did about as he
pleased, and he had never asked himself whether his ways were clean or
not. He hadn't particularly cared. He supposed some people would
think they were not--but in his own eyes, well--was he clean? Take for
instance this expedition of his? Running a race to get another man's
wife,--an alleged friend's wife, too? It did seem rather despicable
when one thought of it after the jag was off. But then one was not quite
responsible for what one did with a jag on, and what the deuce did the
Lord have to do with it anyway? How could the Lord weigh the spirit?
That meant of course that he saw through all subterfuges. Well, what of
it?

Another sentence caught his ear:

  “When a man's ways please the Lord, he maketh even his
   enemies to be at peace with him.”

How odd, the Lord,--if there was a Lord, he had never thought much about
it--but how odd, if there was a Lord for Him to care about a man's ways.
If he were Lord he wouldn't care, he'd only want them to keep out of his
way. He would probably crush them like ants, if he were Lord. But the
Lord--taking any notice of men's ways, and being pleased by them and
looking out to protect him from enemies! It certainly was quaint--a
quaint idea! He glanced again at the reverent face of the girl, the down
drooped eyes, the lovely sensitive mouth. Quaint, that was the word for
her, quaint and unusual. He certainly was going to enjoy meeting her.

“Ting-aling-ling-ling!” burst out the telephone bell on the desk. He
frowned and dropped the curtain. Was that Opal? He hobbled to the desk
painfully, half annoyed that she had called him from the contemplation
of this novel scene, not so sure that he would bother to call up that
garage yet. Let it go till he had sampled the girl.

He took down the receiver and Opal's voice greeted him, mockingly,
tauntingly from his own world. The little ivy leaved church with its
Saint Cecilia at the organ, and its strange weird message about a God
that cared for man's ways, dropped away like a dream that was past.

When he hung up the receiver and turned back to his couch again the girl
had closed the window. It annoyed him. He did not know how his giddy
badinage had clashed in upon the last words of the sermon.

It seemed a long time after the closing hymn before the little throng
melted away down the maple lined street. The young man watched them
curiously from behind his curtain, finding only food for amusement in
most of them. And then came the minister, lingering to talk to one
here and there, and his wife--it was undoubtedly his wife, even the
hare-brained Laurie knew her, in the gray organdie, with the white at
her neck, and the soft white hat. She had a pleasant light in her eyes,
and one saw at once that she was a lady. There was a grace about her
that made the girl seem possible. And lastly, came the girl.

She stepped from the church door in her white dress and simple white
hat, white even to her little shoes, and correct in every way, he could
see that. She was no country gawk! She came forth lightly into the
sunshine which caught her hair in golden tendrils around her face as if
it loved to hide therein, and she was immediately surrounded by half
a dozen urchins. One had brought her some lilies, great white starry
things with golden hearts, and she gathered them into her arms as if she
loved them, and smiled at the boys. One could see how they adored her.
She lingered talking to them, and laid her hand on one boy's shoulder,
he walking like a knight beside her trying to act as if he did not know
her hand was there. His head was drooped, but he lifted it with a grin
at last and gave her a nod which seemed to make her glad, for her face
broke forth in another smile:

“Well, don't forget, to-night,” she called as they turned to go, “and
remember to tell Billy!”

Then she came trippingly across the grass, a song on her lips. Some
girl! Say! She certainly was a stunner!




VIII


Opal Verrons was small and slight with large childlike eyes that could
look like a baby's, but that could hold the very devil on occasions. The
eyes were dark and lustrous with long curling black lashes framing
them in a face that might have been modeled for an angel, so round the
curves, so enchanting the lips, so lofty the white brow. Angelé Potocka
had no lovelier set to her head, no more limpal fire in her eye, than
had Opal Verrons. Indeed her lovers often called her the Fire Opal. The
only difference was that Angelé Potocka developed her brains, of which
she had plenty, while Opal Verrons had placed her entire care upon
developing her lovely little body, though she too had plenty of brains
on occasion.

And she knew how to dress! So simply, so slightly sometimes, so
perfectly to give a setting--the right setting--to her little self.
She wore her heavy dark hair bobbed, and it curled about her small head
exquisitely, giving her the look of a Raphael Cherub or a boy page in
the court of King Arthur. With a flat band of silver olive leaves about
her brow, and the soft hair waving out below, nothing more was necessary
for a costume save a brief drapery of silver spangled cloth with a
strap of jewels and a wisp of black malines for a scarf. She was always
startling and lovely even in her simplest costume. Many people turned to
watch her in a simple dark blue serge made like a child's girded with a
delicate arrangement of medallions and chains of white metal, her dark
rough woollen stockings rolled girlishly below white dimpled knees, and
her feet shod in flat soled white buckskin shoes. She was young enough
to “get away with it,” the older women said cattishly as they watched
her stroll away to the beach with a new man each day, and noted her
artless grace and indifferent pose. That she had a burly millionaire
husband who still was under her spell and watched her jealously only
made her more interesting, and they pitied her for being tied to a man
twice her age and bulky as a bale of cotton. She who could dance like
a sylph and was light on her little feet as a thistle down. Though wise
ones sometimes said that Opal had her young eyes wide open when she
married Ed Verrons, and she had him right under her little pink well
manicured thumb. And some said she was not nearly so young as she
looked.

Her hands were the weakest point in Opal Verron's whole outfit. Not that
they were unlovely in form or ungraceful. They were so small they hardly
seemed like hands, so undeveloped, so useless, with the dimpling of a
baby's, yet the sharp nails of a little beast. They were so plump and
well cared for they were fairly sleek, and had an old wise air about
them as she patted her puffy curls daintily with a motion all her
own that showed her lovely rounded arm, and every needle-pointed
shell-tinted finger nail, sleek and puffy, and never used, not even
for a bit of embroidery or knitting. She couldn't, you know, with those
sharp transparent little nails, they might break. They were like her
little sharp teeth that always reminded one of a mouse's teeth, and made
one shudder at how sharp they would be should she ever decide to bite.

But her smile was like the mixing of all smiles, a baby's, a
woman-of-the-world, a grieved child's, and a spirit who had put aside
all moral purpose. Perhaps, like mixed drinks it was for that reason but
the more intoxicating. And because she did not hide her charms and was
lavish with her smiles, there were more poor victims about her little
feet than about any other woman at the shore that summer. Men talked
about her in the smoking rooms and billiard rooms and compared her to
vamps of other seasons, and decided she had left them all in the shade.
She was a perfect production of the modern age, more perfect than others
because she knew how to do the boldest things with that cherubic air
that bereft sin of its natural ugliness and made it beautiful and
delicious, as if degradation had suddenly become an exalted thing, like
some of the old rites in a Pagan Temple, and she a lovely priestess. And
when each new folly was over there was she with her innocent baby air,
and her pure childlike face that looked dreamily out from its frame of
little girl hair, and seemed not to have been soiled at all. And so men
who played her games lost their sense of sin and fell that much lower
than those who sin and know it and are afraid to look themselves in the
face. When a man loses his sense of shame, of being among the pigs, he
is in a far country indeed.

But Opal Verrons sauntering forth to the Hotel piazza in company
with three of her quondam admirers suddenly lost her luxurious air of
nestling content. The hotel clerk handed her two telegrams as she passed
the desk. She tore them open carelessly, but her eyes grew wide with
horror as she read.

Percy Emerson had been arrested. He had run over a woman and a baby
and both were in a hospital in a critical condition. He would be held
without bail until it was seen whether they lived.

She drew in her breath with a frightened gasp and bit at her red lip
with her little sharp teeth. A pretty child with floating curls and
dainty apparel ran laughing across her way, its hand outstretched to a
tiny white dog that was dancing after her, and Opal gave a sharp cry
and tore the telegram into small bits. But when she opened the second
message her face paled under its delicate rouge as she read: “Mortimer
McMarter killed in an accident when his car collided with a truck. His
body lies at Saybrook Inn. We find your address on his person, with a
request to let you know if anything happens to him. What do you wish
done with the body?”

Those who watched her face as she read say that it took on an ashen
color and she looked years older. Her real spirit seemed to be looking
forth from those wide limpid eyes for an instant, the spirit of a coward
who had been fooling the world; the spirit of a lost soul who had grown
old in sin; the spirit of a soul who had stepped over the bounds and
sinned beyond her depth.

She looked about upon them all, stricken, appalled,--not sorry but just
afraid,--and not for her friends, but for herself! And then she gave a
horrid little lost laugh and dropping the telegram as if it had burned
her, she flung out her voice upon them with a blaze in her big eyes and
a snarl in her lute-voice:

“Well, I wasn't to blame was I? They all were grown men, weren't they?
It was up to them. _I'm_ going to get out of here! This is an _awful_
place!”

She gave a shudder and turning swiftly fled to the elevator, catching
it just as the door was being shut, and they saw her rising behind the
black and gold grating and waving a mocking little white hand at them
as they watched her amazed. Then one of them stooped and picked up the
telegram. And while they still stood at the doorway wondering some one
pointed to a brilliant blue car that was sliding down the avenue across
the beach road.

“She has gone!” they said looking at one another strangely. Did she
really care then?

       *       *       *       *       *

The dinner at Sabbath Valley parsonage was a good one. It was quite
different from any dinner Laurie Shafton had ever eaten before. It had a
taste that he hadn't imagined just plain chicken and mashed potatoes and
bread and butter and coffee and cherry pie could have.

Those were things he seldom picked out from a menu, and he met them as
something new and delicious, prepared in this wonderful country way.

Also the atmosphere was queer and interesting.

The minister had helped him into the dining-room, a cheery room with a
bay window looking toward the church and a window box of nasturtiums in
which the bees hummed and buzzed.

The girl came in and acknowledged the casual introduction of her father
with a quite sophisticated nod and sat down across from him. And there
was a _prayer_ at the beginning of the meal! Just as he was about to
say something graceful to the girl, there was a _prayer_. It was almost
embarrassing. He had never seen one before like this. At a boarding
school once he had experienced a thing they called “grace” which
consisted in standing behind their chairs while the entire assembled
hungry multitude repeated a poem of a religious nature. He remembered
they used to spend their time making up parodies on it--one ran
something about “this same old fish upon my plate,” and rhymed with
“hate.” He stared at the lovely bowed hair of the girl across the table
while it was going on, and got ready a remark calculated to draw her
smiles, but the girl lifted eyes that seemed so far away he felt as
though she did not see him, and he contented himself with replying to
his host's question something about the part of the chicken he liked
best. It was a queer home to him, it seemed so intimate. Even the
chicken seemed to be a detail of their life together, perhaps because
there was only one chicken, and one breast. Where he dwelt there were
countless breasts, and everybody had a whole breast if he wanted it, or
a whole chicken for the matter of that. Here they had to stop and ask
what others liked before they chose for themselves. This analysis went
queerly on in his mind while he sat waiting for his plate and wondering
over the little things they were talking about. Mrs. Severn said Miss
Saxon had been crying all through church, and she told her Billy had
been away all night. She was awfully worried about his going with that
baseball team.

A fleeting shadow passed over the girl's face:

“Billy promised me he would be there to-day,” she said thoughtfully,
“something must have happened. I don't think Billy was with the baseball
team--” then her eyes travelled away out the window to the distant
hills, she didn't seem to see Laurence Shafton at all. It was a new
experience for him. He was fairly good looking and knew it.

Who the deuce was this Billy? And what did she care about Miss Saxon
crying? Did she care so much for Billy already? Would it be worth his
while to make her uncare?

“Mrs. Carter wasn't out,” said Mrs. Severn as she poured coffee, “I hope
she's not having more trouble with her neuralgia.”

The minister suddenly looked up from his carving:

“Did Mark come back yesterday, Marilyn?”

The girl drew a quick breath and brought back her eyes from the hills,
but she did not look at the young man: “No, father he didn't come.”

Who the deuce was _Mark_? Of course there would be several, but there
was always _one_. Billy and Mark! It was growing interesting.

But Billy and Mark were not mentioned again, though a deep gravity
seemed to have settled into the eyes of the family since their names had
come up. Laurie decided to speak of the weather and the roads:

“Glorious weather we're having,” he chirped out condescendingly, “But
you certainly have the limit for roads. What's the matter with the
highway? Had a Detour right in the best part of the road. Bridge down,
it said, road flooded! Made the deuce of a time for me--!”

“Bridge?” remarked Marilyn looking up thoughtfully.

“Flood?” echoed the minister sharply.

“Yes. About two miles back where the highway crosses this valley. Put
me in some fix. Had a bet on you know. Date with a lady. Staked a lot
of money on winning, too. Hard luck,” Then he looked across at Marilyn's
attentive face. Ah! He was getting her at last! More on that line.

“But it'll not be all loss,” he added gallantly with a gesture of
admiration toward her, “You see I didn't have any idea I was going to
meet _you_.”

But Marilyn's eyes were regarding him soberly, steadily, analytically,
without an answering smile. It was as if she did not like what he had
said--if indeed she had heard it at all--as if she were offended at it.
Then the eyes look on an impersonal look and wandered thoughtfully to
the mountains in the distance. Laurie felt his cheeks burn. He felt
almost embarrassed again, like during the prayer. Didn't the girl know
he was paying her a compliment? Or was she such a prude that she thought
him presuming on so slight an acquaintance? Her father was speaking:

“I don't quite understand,” 'he said thoughtfully. “There is no bridge
within ten miles, and nothing to flood the road but the Creek, which
never was known to overflow its banks more than a few feet at most.
The highway is far above the valley. You must have been a bit turned
around.”

The young man laughed lightly:

“Well, perhaps I had a jag on. I'm not surprised. I'd been driving for
hours and had to drink to keep my nerve till morning. There were some
dandy spilling places around those mountain curves. One doesn't care to
look out and see when one is driving at top speed.”

Heavens! What had he said now? The girl's eyes came round to look him
over again and went through to his soul like a lightning flash and away
again, and there was actually scorn on her lips. He must take another
line. He couldn't understand this haughty country beauty in the least.

“I certainly did enjoy your music,” he flashed forth with a little
of his own natural gaiety in his voice that made him so universal a
favorite.

The girl turned gravely toward him and surveyed him once more as if she
were surprised and perhaps had not done him justice. She looked like one
who would always be willing to do one justice. He felt encouraged:

“If it hadn't been for this blamed foot of mine I'd have hobbled over to
the--service. I was sorry not to hear the music closer.”

“There is another service this evening,” she said pleasantly, “Perhaps
father can help you over. It is a rather good organ for so small a one.”
 She was trying to be polite to him. It put him on his metal. It made him
remember how rude he had been to her father the night before.

“Delightful organ I'm sure,” he returned, “but it was the organist that
I noticed. One doesn't often hear such playing even on a good organ.”

“Oh, I've been well taught,” said the girl without self-consciousness.
“But the children are to sing this evening. You'll like to hear the
children I'm sure. They are doing fairly well now.”

“Charmed, I'm sure,” he said with added flattery of his eyes which she
did not take at all because she was passing her mother's plate for more
gravy. How odd not to have a servant pass it!

“You come from New York?” the host hazarded.

“Yes,” drawled the youth, “Shafton's my name, Laurence Shafton, son of
William J., of Shafton and Gates you know,” he added impressively.

The host was polite but unimpressed. It was almost as though he had
never heard of William J. Shafton the multi-millionaire. Or was it?
Dash the man, he had such a way with him of acting as though he knew
everything and _nothing_ impressed him; as though he was just as good
as the next one! As though his father was something even greater than a
millionaire! He didn't seem to be in the least like Laurie's idea of a
clergyman. He couldn't seem to get anywhere with him.

The talk drifted on at the table, ebbing and flowing about the two
ladies as the tide touches a rising strand and runs away. The girl and
her mother answered his questions with direct steady gaze, and polite
phrases, but they did not gush nor have the attitude of taking him
eagerly into their circle as he was accustomed to being taken in
wherever he went. Nothing he said seemed to reach further than kindly
hospitality. When that was fulfilled they were done and went back to
their own interests.

Marilyn did not seem to consider the young man a guest of hers in any
sense personally. After the dinner she moved quietly out to the porch
and seated herself in a far chair with a leather bound book, perhaps
a Bible, or prayer book. He wasn't very familiar with such things. She
took a little gold pencil from a chain about her neck and made notes
on a bit of paper from what she read, and she joined not at all in the
conversation unless she was spoken to, and then her thoughts seemed to
be elsewhere. It was maddening.

Once when a tough looking little urchin went by with a grin she flew
down off the porch to the gate to talk with him; she stood there some
time in earnest converse. What could a girl like that find to say to a
mere kid? When she came back there was a look of trouble in her eyes,
and by and by her father asked if Harry had seen _Billy,_ and she shook
her head with a cloud on her brow. It must be _Billy_ then. Billy was
the one! Well, dash him! If he couldn't go one better than Billy he
would see! Anyhow Billy didn't have a sprained ankle, and a place in
the family! A girl like that was worth a few days' invalidism. His ankle
didn't hurt much since the minister had dressed it again. He believed he
could get up and walk if he liked, but he did not mean to. He meant to
stay here a few days and conquer this young beauty. It was likely only
her way of vamping a man, anyway, and a mighty tantalizing one at that.
Well, he would show her! And he would show Billy, too, whoever Billy
was! A girl like that! Why,--A girl like that with a face like that
would grace any gathering, any home! He had the fineness of taste to
realize that after he got done playing around with Opal and women like
her, this would be a lady any one would be proud to settle down to. And
why not? If he chose to fall in love with a country nobody, why could'nt
he? What was the use of being Laurie Shafton, son of the great William
J. Shafton, if he couldn't marry whom he would? Shafton would be enough
to bring any girl up to par in any society in the universe. So Laurie
Shafton set himself busily to be agreeable.

And presently his opportunity arrived. Mrs. Severn had gone in the house
to take a nap, and the minister had been called away to see a sick man.
The girl continued to study her little book:

“I wish you would come and amuse me,” he said in the voice of an
interesting invalid.

The girl looked up and smiled absently:

“I'm sorry,” she said, “but I have to go to my Sunday-school class in a
few minutes, and I was just getting my lesson ready. Would you like me
to get you something to read?”

“No,” he answered crossly. He was not used to being crossed in any
desire by a lady, “I want you to talk to me. Bother the Sunday-school!
Give them a vacation to-day and let them go fishing. They'll be
delighted, I'm sure. You have a wonderful foot. Do you know it? You must
be a good dancer. Haven't you a victrola here? We might dance if only my
foot weren't out of commission.”

“I don't dance, Mr. Shafton, and it is the Sabbath,” she smiled
indulgently with her eyes on her book.

“Why don't you dance? I could teach you easily. And what has the Sabbath
got to do with it?”

“But I don't care to dance. It doesn't appeal to me in the least. And
the Sabbath has everything to do with it. If I did dance I would not do
it to-day.”

“But why?” he asked in genuine wonder.

“Because this is the day set apart for enjoying God and not enjoying
ourselves.”

He stared.

“You certainly are the most extraordinary young woman I ever met,” he
said admiringly, “Did no one ever tell you that you are very beautiful.”

She gave him the benefit of her beautiful eyes then in a cold amused
glance:

“Among my friends, Mr. Shafton, it is not considered good form to say
such things to a lady of slight acquaintance.” She rose and gathered
up her book and hat that lay on the floor beside her chair, and drew
herself up till she seemed almost regal.

Laurie Shafton stumbled to his feet. He was ashamed. He felt almost as
he had felt once when he was caught with a jag on being rude to a friend
of his mother's:

“I beg your pardon,” he said gracefully, “I hope you will believe me, I
meant no harm.”

“It is no matter,” said the girl graciously, “only I do not like it. Now
you must excuse me. I see my class are gathering.”

She put the hat on carelessly, with a push and a pat and slipped past
him down the steps and across the lawn. Her dress brushed against his
foot as she went and it seemed like the touch of something ethereal. He
never had felt such an experience before.

She walked swiftly to a group of boys, ugly, uncomely, overgrown kids,
the same who had followed her after church, and met them with eagerness.
He felt a jealous chagrin as he watched them follow her into the church,
an anger that she dared to trample upon him that way, a fierce desire to
get away and quaff the cup of admiration at the hand of some of his own
friends, or to quaff some cup, _any_ cup, for he was thirsty, thirsty,
_thirsty_, and this was a dry and barren land. If he did stay and try to
win this haughty country beauty he would have to find a secret source of
supply somewhere or he never would be able to live through it.

The Sunday-school hour wore away while he was planning how to revenge
himself, but she did not return. She lingered for a long time on the
church steps talking with those everlasting kids again, and after they
were gone she went back into the church and began to play low, sweet
music.

It was growing late. Long red beams slanted down the village street
across the lawn, lingered and went out. A single ruby burned on one of
the memorial windows like a lamp, and went purple and then gray. It was
growing dusk, and that girl played on! Dash it all! Why didn't she quit?
It was wonderful music, but he wanted to talk to her. If he hobbled
slowly could he get across that lawn? He decided to try. And then, just
as he rose and steadied himself by the porch pillar, down the street in
a whirl of dust and noisy claxon there came a great blue car and drew
up sharp in front of the door, while a lute-like voice shouted gaily:
“Laurie, Laurie Shafton, is that you?”




IX


After Billy had listened a long time he took a single step to relieve
his cramped toes, which were numb with the tensity of his strained
position. Stealthily as he could he moved his shoe, but it seemed to
grind loudly upon the cement floor of the cellar, and he stopped frozen
in tensity again to listen. After a second he heard a low growl as if
someone outside the house were speaking. Then all was still. After a
time he heard the steps again, cautiously, walking over his head, and
his spine seemed to rise right up and lift him, as he stood trembling.
He wasn't a bit superstitious, Billy wasn't. He knew there was no
such thing as a ghost, and he wasn't going to be fooled by any noises
whatsoever, but anybody would admit it was an unpleasant position to be
in, pinned in a dark unfamiliar cellar without a flash light, and steps
coming overhead, where only a dead man or a doped man was supposed to
be. He cast one swift glance back at the cobwebby window through which
he had so recently arrived, and longed to be back again, out in the open
with the bells, the good bells sounding a call in his ears. If he were
out wouldn't he run? Wouldn't he even leave his old bicycle to any fate
and _run_? But no! He couldn't! He would have to come back inevitably.
Whoever was upstairs in that house alone and in peril he must save.
Suppose--!--His heart gave a great dry sob within him and he turned
away from the dusty exit that looked so little now and so inadequate for
sudden flight.

The steps went on overhead shuffling a little louder, as they seemed
further off. They were climbing the stair he believed. They wore rubber
heels! _Link_ had worn rubber heels! And Shorty's shoes were covered
with old overshoes! Had they come back, perhaps to hide from their
pursuers? His heart sank. If that were so he must get out somehow and go
after the police, but that should be his last resort. He didn't want
to get any one else in this scrape until he knew exactly what sort of a
scrape it was. It wasn't square to anybody--not square to the doped
man, not square to himself, not even square to Pat and the other two,
and--yes, he must own it,--not square to _Cart_. That was his first
consideration, Cart! He must find Cart. But first he must find out
somehow who that man was that had been kidnapped.

It seemed an age that he waited there in the cellar and everything so
still. Once he heard a door far up open, and little shuffling noises,
and by and by he could not stand it any longer. Getting down softly on
all fours, he crept slowly, noiselessly over to the cellar stairs, and
began climbing, stopping at every step to listen. His efforts were much
hampered by the milk bottle which kept dragging down to one side
and threatening to hit against the steps. But he felt that milk was
essential to his mission. He dared not go without it. The tools were
in his other pocket. They too kept catching in his sleeve as he moved
cautiously. At last he drew himself to the top step. There was a crack
of light under the door. Suppose it should be locked? He could saw out
a panel, but that would make a noise, and he still had the feeling that
someone was in that house. A cellar was not a nice place in which to
be trapped. One bottle of milk wouldn't keep him alive very long. The
haunted house was a great way from anywhere. Even the bells couldn't
call him from there, once anybody chose to fasten him in the cellar, and
find the loose window and fasten it up--!

Such thoughts poured a torrent of hot fire through his brain while his
cold fingers gripped the door knob, and slowly, fiercely, compellingly,
made it turn in its socket till its rusty old spring whined in
complaint, and then he held his breath to listen again. It seemed an
age before he dared put any weight upon that unlatched door to see if it
would move, and then he did it so cautiously that he was not sure it was
opening till a ray of light from a high little window shot into his eyes
and blinded him. He held the knob like a vise, and it was another age
before he dared slowly release the spring and relax his hand. Then he
looked around. He found himself in a kind of narrow butler's pantry with
a swinging door opposite him into the room at the back, and a narrow
passage leading around the corner next the door. He peeked cautiously,
blinkingly round the door jamb and saw the lower step of what must be
back stairs. There were no back stairs in Aunt Saxon's house, but before
his mother died Billy Gaston had lived in the city where they always had
back stairs. That door before him likely led to the dining-room. He took
a careful step, pushed the swing door half an inch and satisfied himself
that was the kitchen at the back. No one there. Another step or two
gave him the same assurance about the dining-room and no one there. He
surveyed the distance to the foot of the back stairs. It seemed long.
What he was afraid of was that light space at the foot of those stairs.
He was almost sure there was a hall straight through to the front door,
and he had a hunch that that front door was open. If he passed the steps
and anyone was there they would see him, and yet he wanted to get up
those stairs now, right away, before anything more happened. It was too
still up there to suit him. With trembling fingers he untied his shoe
strings, and slipped off his shoes, knotting the strings together and
slinging the shoes around his neck. He was taking no chances. He gripped
the revolver with one hand and stole out cautiously. When he reached
the end of the dining-room wall he applied an eye toward the opening of
light, and behold it was as he had suspected, a hall leading straight
through to the front door, and Shorty, with his full length profile cut
clear against the morning, standing on the upper step keeping lookout!
He dodged back and caught his breath, then made a noiseless dart toward
those stairs. If Shorty heard, or if he turned and saw anything he must
have thought it was the reported ghost walking, so silently and like a
breath passed Billy up the stair. But when he was come to the top, he
held his breath again, for now he could distinctly hear steps walking
about in the room close at hand, and peering up he saw the door was
open part way. He paused again to reconnoitre and his heart set up an
intolerable pounding in his breast.

He could dimly make out the back of a chair, and further against a patch
of light where the back window must be he could see the foot board of
a bed, the head of which must be against the opposite wall The door was
open about a third of the way. There was a key in the lock. Did that
mean that they locked the man in? It would be a great thing to get hold
of that key!

A moan in the direction of the bed startled him, and prodded his weary
mind. He gave a quick silent spring across in front of the door and
flattened himself against the wall. He knew he had made a slight noise
in his going, and he felt the stillness in the room behind the half open
door. Link had heard him. It was a long time before he dared stir again.

Link seemed to lay down something on the floor that sounded like a dish
and start toward the door. Billy felt the blood fly to the top of his
head. If Link came out he was caught. Where could he fly? Not down
stairs. Shorty was there, with a gun of course. Would it do to snap that
door shut and lock Link in with the prisoner? No telling what he might
do, and Shorty would come if there was an outcry. He waited in an agony
of suspense, but Link did not come out yet. Instead he tiptoed back to
the bed again, and seemed to be arranging some things out of a basket on
a little stand by the bed. Billy applied an eye to the crack of the door
and got a brief glimpse. Then cautiously he put out his stubby fingers
and grasped that key, firmly, gently; turning, slipping, little by
little, till he had it safe in his possession. Several times he thought
Link turned and looked toward the door. Once he almost dropped the key
as he was about to set it free from the lock, but his anxious fingers
were true to their trust, and the key was at last drawn back and safely
slid into Billy's pocket. Then he looked around for a place to hide.
There were rooms on the front, and a door was open. He could slide in
there and hide. It was dark, and there might be a closet. He cast one
eye through the door crack and beheld in the dim light Link bending over
the inert figure on the bed with a cup and spoon in his hand. Perhaps
they were giving him more dope! If he only could stop it somehow! The
man was doped enough, sleeping all that time! But now was the time for
him and the key to make an exit.

Slowly, cautiously he backed away from the door, down the hall and into
the next open door, groping his silent way toward a little half moon
in the shutter. He made a quick calculation, glanced about, did some
sleight of hand with the door till it swung noiselessly shut, and then
slipping back to the window he examined the catches. There was a pane of
glass gone, but it was not in the right place. If he only could manage
to slide the sash down. He turned the catch and applied a pressure to
the upper sash, but like most upper sashes it would not budge. If he
strained harder he might be able to move it but that would make a noise
and spoil his purpose. He looked wildly round the room, with a feeling
that something must help him, and suddenly he discovered that the upper
sash of the other window was pulled all the way down, and a sweet breath
of wild grape blossoms was being wafted to his heated forehead. With a
quick move he placed himself under this window, which he realized must
be almost over Shorty's head. It was but the work of an instant to grasp
Pat's gun and stick its nose well through the little half moon of an
opening in the shutter, pointed straight over Shorty's head into the
woods, and pull the trigger.

The report went rolling, reverberating down the valley from hill to hill
like a whole barrage it seemed to Billy; and perhaps to Shorty waiting
for his pard below, but at any rate before the echoes had ceased to roll
Shorty was no longer on the door step. He had vanished and was far away,
breaking through the underbrush, stumbling, and cutting himself, getting
up to stumble again, he hurled himself away from that haunted spot.
Ghosts were nothing to Shorty. He could match himself against a spirit
any day, but ghosts that could shoot were another matter, and he made
good his going without hesitation or needless waiting for his partner in
crime. He was never quite sure where that shot came from, whether from
high heaven or down beneath the earth.

As for Link, if he was giving more dope, he did not finish. He dropped
a cup in his hurry and darted like a winged thing to the head of the
stairs, where he took the flight at a slide and disappeared into the
woods without waiting for locks or keys or any such things.

“He seems a little nervous,” grinned Billy, who had climbed to the
window seat with one eye applied to the half moon, watching his victims
take their hurried leave. And lest they should dare to watch and return
before he was ready for them he sent another shot into the blue sky,
ricochetting along the hills; and still another, grimly, after an
interval.

Then swiftly turning he stole down the front stairs and took the key
from the lock, shut the door, pushing a big bolt on the inside. With
a hasty examination of the lower floor that satisfied him that he was
safely ensconced in his stronghold and would not be open to immediate
interruption he hurried upstairs again.

His first act was to open a window and throw back the shutters. The
morning sunlight leaped in like a friend, and a bird in a tree carolled
out gladly. Something in Billy's heart burst into a tear. A tear! Bah!
He brushed it away with his grimy hand and went over to the bed, rolling
the inert figure toward him till the face was in plain view. A sudden
fit of trembling took possession of him and he dropped nervelessly
beside the bed with his hands outstretched and uttered a sob ending in a
single syllable,

_“Cart!”_

For there on the bed still as the dead lay Mark Carter, his beloved
idol, and _he had helped to put him there!_

Thirty pieces of silver! And his dearest friend dead, perhaps! A Judas!
All his life he would be a Judas. He knew now why Judas hanged himself.
If Cart was dead he would have to hang himself! Here in this house of
death he must hang himself, like Judas, poor fool. And he would fling
that blood money back. Only, _Cart must not be dead!_ It would be hell
forever for Billy if Cart was dead. He _could not stand it!_

Billy sprang to his feet with tears raining down his cheeks, but his
tired dirty face looked beautiful in its anxiety. He tore open Mark
Carter's coat and vest, wrenched away collar, necktie and shirt, and
laid his face against the breast. It was warm! He struggled closer and
put his ear to the heart. It was beating!

He shook him gently and called,

“Cart! Cart! Oh, _Boy!”_ with sobs choking in his throat. And all
the while the little bird was singing in a tree enough to split his
feathered throat, and the sweet air full of wild grape was rushing into
the long closed room and driving out the musty air.

Billy laid Mark down gently on the dusty pillow and opened another
window. He stumbled over the cup and spoon, and a bottle fell from the
table and broke sending out a pungent odor. But Billy crept close to his
friend once more and began rubbing his hands and forehead and crooning
to him as he had once done to his dog when he suffered from a broken
leg. Nobody would have known Billy just then, as he stood crooning over
Mark.

Water! He looked around. A broken pitcher stood on the table half
filled. He tasted it dubiously. It was water, luke warm, but water! He
soused a towel he found on the washstand into it and slopped it over
Mark's face. He went through all the manoeuvres they use on the football
field when a man is knocked out, and then he bethought him of the milk.
Milk was an antidote for poisons. If he could get some down him!

Carefully he rinsed out a glass he found on the bureau and poured some
milk in it, crept on the bed and lifted Mark's head in his arms, put the
glass to his lips, and begged and pled, and finally succeeded in prying
the lips and getting a few drops down. Such joy as thrilled him when
Mark finally swallowed. But it was a long time, and Billy began to think
he must go for the doctor, leave his friend here at the mercy of who
would come and go after all. He had hoped he might keep his shame, and
Mark's capture from everybody, but what was that verse the teacher had
taught them once awhile ago? “Be sure your sin will find you out.” That
was true. He couldn't let Mark die. He must go for the doctor. Doc would
come, and he would keep his mouth shut, but Doc would _know_, and Billy
liked Doc. Well, he would have to get him! Mark would hate it so, too,
but Billy would have to!

It was just then that Mark drew a long deep breath of the sweet air,
sighed and drew another. Billy pressed the glass to his lips and Mark
opened his eyes, saw the boy, smiled, and said in a weak voice:

“Hullo, Billy, old boy, got knocked out, didn't I?” Then he closed his
eyes and seemed to go away again. But Billy, with wildly beating heart
poured some more milk and came closer:

“Drink this, Cart. It's good. Drink it. We gotta get them dirty bums,
Cart! Hurry up an' drink it!”

Billy understood his friend. Mark opened his eyes and roused a little.
Presently he drank some more, nearly a whole glass full and Billy took
heart of hope.

“Do ya think ya could get up now, Cart, ef I he'ped ya?” he asked
anxiously, “We gotta get after those guys ur they'll make a getaway.”

“Sure!” said Mark rousing again. “Go to it, Kid. I'm with you,” and he
tried to sit up. But his head reeled and he fell back. Billy's heart
sank. He must get him out of this house before the two keepers returned,
perhaps with Pat or some other partner in their crime. Patiently he
began again, and gradually by degrees he propped Mark up, fed him more
milk, and urged him to rise; fairly lifted him with his loving strength,
across the room, and finally, inch by inch down the stairs and out the
back door.

Billy felt a great thrill when he heard that door shut behind him and
knew his friend was out in the open again under God's sky. Nothing ever
quite discouraged Billy when he was out of doors. But it was a work of
time to get Mark across the clearing and down in the undergrowth out
of sight of the house, where the old bicycle lay. Once there Billy felt
like holding a Thanksgiving service. But Mark was very white and lay
back on the grass looking wholly unlike himself.

“Say, Cart,” said Billy after a brief silence of thought, “I gotta get
you on my machine. We gotta get down to Unity an' phone.”

“All right, old man, just as you say,” murmured Mark too dizzy to care.

So Billy with infinite tenderness, and much straining of his young
muscles got Mark up and managed to put him astride the wheel; but it
was tough going and slow, over rough places, among undergrowth, and
sometimes Billy had to stop for breath as he walked and pushed and held
his friend.

But Mark was coming to his own again, and by the time they reached a
road he was able to keep his balance, and know what he was doing. It was
high noon before they reached Unity and betook themselves to the drug
store. While Mark asked for medicine Billy hied him to a telephone
booth. His heart was beating wildly. He feared him much that Mark's car
was gone.

But the chief's voice answered him after a little waiting, and he
explained:

“Say, I'm the kid that phoned you early this morning. Didya get that
car aw'right?” Billy held his breath, his jaded eyes dropped shut with
anxiety and weariness. But the chief's voice answered promptly, “yes,
we got yer car all right, but didn't get the men. They beat it when they
heard us coming. What sort of men were they, do you know?”

“Aw, that's aw'right, Chief, I'll tell ya when I gi'down there. Can't
tell ya over the phone. Say, I'm Billy, Billy Gaston. You know me. Over
to Sab'th Valley. Yes. You seen me play on the team. Sure. Well, say
Chief, I'm here in Unity with the guy that owns the car. Mark Carter.
You know him. Sure! Mark! Well, he's all in, an' he wants his car to get
home. He's been up all night and he ain't fit to walk. He wants me to
come over and bring his car back to Unity fer him. I got my bike here,
See? Now, I ain't got a license of course, but I c'd bring his along.
That be aw'right Chief, just over to Unity? Aw'right, Chief? Thank ya,
Chief. Yas, I'm comin' right away. S'long!”

Billy saw Mark comfortably resting on a couch in the back room of the
drug store, where an old pal of his was clerk, and then stopping only
for an invigorating gulp or two of a chocolate ice cream soda, he
climbed on his old wheel and pedalled on his happy way to Economy. The
winds touched him pleasantly as he passed, the sunshine had a queer
reddish look to his feverish eyes, and the birds seemed to be singing in
the top of his head, but he was happy. He might go to sleep on the
way and roll off his wheel, but he should worry! Mark was safe. He had
almost sold him for thirty pieces of silver, but God had somehow been
good to him and Mark was alive. Now he would serve him all the rest of
his life,--Mark or God,--it seemed all one to him now somehow, so long
had he idealized his friend, so mixed were his ideas of theology.

But Billy did not go to sleep nor fall off his wheel, and in due time
he arrived in Economy and satisfied the Chief's curiosity with vague
answers, a vivid description of Link and Shorty, and the suggestion
that they might be found somewhere near the Haunted House on Stark's
mountain. He had heard them talking about going there, he said. He got
away without a mention of the real happening at Pleasant View or a
hint that he had had anything to do with the stealing of the car. Billy
somehow was gifted that way. He could shut his mouth always just in
time, and grin and give a turn to the subject that entirely changed
the current of thought, so he kept his own counsel. Not for his own
protection would he have kept back any necessary information, but for
Mark's sake. Yes--for Mark's sake--! Mark would not want it to be known.

It was in the early evening, and the sky was still touched by the after
glow of sunset, beneath the evening star, as Mark and Billy in the
reclaimed car, finally started from Unity for home.

In both their hearts was the thought of the bells that would be ringing
now in Sabbath Valley for the evening service, and of the one who would
be playing them, and each was trying to frame some excuse that would
explain his absence to her without really explaining _anything_.

And about this time the minister came forth from the parsonage,
much vexed in spirit by the appearance of the outlandish lady in her
outlandish car. She seemed to be insisting on remaining at the parsonage
as if it were a common hostelry, and he and his wife had much perplexity
to know just what to do. And now as he issued quietly forth from a side
door he could hear her lute-like voice laughing from his front porch,
and looking back furtively he saw to his horror that the lady, as well
as the gentleman, was smoking a cigarette!

He paused and tried to think just what would be the best way to meet
this situation, and while he hesitated his senior elder, a man of narrow
vision, hard judgments, yet staunch sincerity, approached him. The
minister had grown to expect something unpleasant whenever this man
sought him out, and to-night he shrank from the ordeal; but anything was
better than to have him see the visitor upon his front steps, so Severn
turned and hurried toward him cordially:

“Good evening, Harricutt. It's been a good day, hasn't it?” he said
grasping the wiry old hand:

“Not so pleasant as you'd think, Mr. Severn,” responded the hard old
voice harshly, “I've come on very unpleasant business. Very unpleasant
indeed; but the standard of the church must be kept up, and we must
act at once in this matter! It is most serious, most serious! I've just
called a meeting of the session to be held after church, and I've sent
out for this _Mark Carter_ to be present. He must answer for himself the
things that are being said about him, or his name must be stricken from
our church roll. Do you know what they are saying about him, Brother
Severn? Do you know what he's done?”

But the arrow had entered the soul of the minister and his voice was too
unsteady to respond, so the senior elder proceeded:

“He has been keeping company with a young woman of dissolute character,
and he has been to a place of public amusement with her and been seen
drinking with her. He affects dance halls, and is known to live a
worldly life. It is time he was cast out from our midst and become
anathema. And now, it is quite possible he may be tried for murder! Have
you heard what happened last night, Mr. Severn? Did you know that Mark
Carter, a member of _our church_, tried to _kill a man_ down at the Blue
Duck Tavern, and for jealousy about a girl of loose character? And now,
Brother Severn, what are we going to do about it?”

Said the minister, answering quietly, calmly:

“Brother Harricutt, we are not going to do anything about it just now.
We are going into the church to worship God. We will wait at least until
Mark Carter comes back and see what he has to say for himself.”

And about that minute, Mark, now thoroughly restored and driving
steadily along the road, turned to Billy and said quietly with a twinkle
in his eye:

“Kid, what made you put up that Detour?”




X


The service that evening had been one of peculiar tenderness. The
minister prayed so earnestly for the graces of forgiveness, loving
kindness and tender mercy, that several in the congregation began to
wonder who had been hard on his neighbor now. It was almost uncanny
sometimes how that minister spotted out the faults and petty differences
in his flock. Many examined their own hearts fearfully during the
prayer, but at its close the face of the senior Elder was stern and
severe as ever as he lifted his hymn book and began to turn the leaves
to the place.

Then the organ mellowed forth joyously:

 “Give to the winds thy fears,
   Trust and be undismayed,
  God hears thy prayers and counts thy tears
   God shall lift up thy head.”

Elder Harricutt would much rather it had been “God the All Terrible.”
 His lips were pursed for battle. He knew the minister was going to be
soft hearted again, and it would fall to his lot to uphold the spotless
righteousness of the church. That had been his attitude ever since he
became a Christian. He had always been trying to find a flaw in
Mr. Severn's theology, but much to his astonishment and perhaps
disappointment, he had never yet been able to find a point on which
they disagreed theologically, when it came right down to old fashioned
religion, but he was always expecting that the next sermon would be the
one wherein the minister had broken loose from the old dyed-in-the-wool
creeds and joined himself to the new and advanced thinkers, than whom,
in his opinion, there were no lower on the face of God's earth. And yet
in spite of it all he loved the minister, and was his strong admirer and
loyal adherent, self-appointed mentor though he felt himself to be.

Over on the other side of the church Elder Duncannon, tall, gaunt,
hairy, with kind gray eyes and a large mouth, reminding slightly of
Abraham Lincoln, sang earnestly, through steel bowed spectacles adjusted
far out on the end of his nose. Behind him Lemuel Tipton, also an elder,
sandy, with cherry lips, apple cheeks and a fringe of grizzled red
hair under his chin, sang with his head thrown back, looking like a big
robin. The minister knew he could depend on those two. He scanned his
audience. The elders were all present. Gibson. He had a narrow forehead,
near-sighted eyes, and an inclination to take the opposite side from the
minister. His lips were thin, and he pursed them often, and believed
in efficiency and discipline. He would undoubtedly go with Harricutt.
Jones, the short fat one who owned the plush mills and hated boys. He
had taken sides against Mark about the memorial window. No hope from
him! Fowler, small, thin, gray, with a retreating chin, had once lived
next to Mrs. Carter and had a difference about some hens that strayed
away to lay. Harricutt likely had him all primed. Jones, Gibson,
Harricutt--three against three. Joyce's vote would decide it. Joyce
was a new man, owner of the canneries. He was a great stickler
for proprieties, yet he seemed to feel that a minister's word was
law--Well--! _God_ was still above--!

The benediction held a tenderness that fairly compelled the waiting
congregation to attend with their hearts.

       *       *       *       *       *

“Let's go over there and hear that girl play,” suggested Laurie
suddenly, “Church is out and we'll make her play the bells. They're
simply _great_. She's some _player!”_

Opal leaned back in her chair and regarded him through the fringes of
her eyelashes, laughing a silvery peal that shivered into the reverence
of the benediction like a shower of icicles going down the back. Marilyn
heard and blended the Amen into the full organ to break the shock as the
startled congregation moved restlessly, with half unclosed eyes. Elder
Harricutt heard, shut his eyes tighter, and pressed severe lips together
with resistance. This doubtless was that woman they called Cherry. That
irreverent Mark Carter must be close at hand. And on the rose-vined
porch Laurence Shafton felt the sting of the laugh and drew himself
together:

“Oh, Laurie, Laurie!” she mocked, “You might as well be dead at Saybrook
Inn or imprisoned for killing a family as fall in love with that girl.
She isn't at all your kind. How would you look singing psalms? But come
on, I'm game! I can see how she'll hate me. Can you walk?”

They sauntered slowly over to the church in the fragrant darkness, he
leaning on a cane he had found by the door. The kindly, curious people
coming out eyed them interestedly, looking toward the two cars in front
of the parsonage, and wondered. It was a neighborhood where everybody
took a kindly interest in everybody else, and the minister belonged to
them all. Nothing went on at his house that they did not just love and
dote on.

“Seems to me that girl has an awful low-necked dress for Sunday night,”
 said Mrs. Little to Mrs. Jones as they walked slowly down the street,
“Did you catch the flash of those diamonds on her neck and fingers?”

“Yes,” said Mrs. Jones contemptuously, “paint on her face too, thick as
pie crust. I saw her come. She drove her own car and her dresses were
up to her knees, and such stockings! With stripes like lace in them!
And little slippers with heels like knitting needles! I declare, I don't
know what this generation is coming to! I'm glad my Nancy never wanted
to go away to boarding school. They say it's terrible, the boldness of
young girls nowadays.”

“Well, if you'd ask me, _I'd_ say she wasn't so very _young!”_ declared
Mrs. Little. “The light from the church door was full in her face when I
was coming down the steps, and she looked as if she'd cut her ey

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