Rayton: A Backwoods Mystery Part 26

He halted, behind a thicket, and stood motionless for a few minutes, listening intently. Then he made a wide half circle to the right, and soon came out again upon the beaten road but now about a quarter of a mile beyond the captain's house. His feet were cold and he stamped vigorously on the road to warm them. The night was windless, but bitter.

Mr. Banks advanced stealthily toward the dark house. Not a glimmer of light showed in any window. He opened the front gate cautiously, closed it cautiously behind him, and went furtively up the narrow path between the snow-banked lawns. On the step of the little front porch he paused and listened. Then he grasped the k.n.o.b of the outer door and turned it.

The door opened noiselessly.

He entered the narrow porch and stood with his ear against the inner door. He could not hear anything. He fumbled for the k.n.o.b, found it, and learned that the inner door was locked. He hunted under the mat and in every corner of the porch for the key, having heard somewhere that keys were sometimes hidden away in just such foolish places. He did not find it. Again he listened at the door, this time with his ear against the keyhole. The house was silent as a tomb.

He left the porch, closed the outer door, and made his way to the left along the front of the house and around the corner to the woodshed.

Knowing that he could not possibly avoid leaving a trail in the snow, he shuffled his feet so as to make it an unreadable one. He did this so artfully that not one clear impression of his big New York hunting boots was left in his path. He opened the door of the shed without a check and felt his way between piles of stove wood to the door of the kitchen.

"I don't feel respectable," he murmured. "But I'll feel a darned sight worse if any one finds me sneaking 'round like this. I must get in, though, and have a look 'round."

The kitchen door was fastened tight. Banks twisted the k.n.o.b this way and that, all in vain. In spite of his c.o.o.nskin coat and fur cap he was beginning to feel extremely chilly. He promised himself a husky pull at a bottle of some kind or other should he ever manage to break into the house. He left the shed and tried a back window. He could not get a hold on the sash, however. He drew a heavy clasp knife from his pocket and forced the strong blade between the sill and the bottom of the sash. In this way he pried the sash up almost half an inch. The window had not been fastened. He returned to the shed, and after a few minutes of fumbling about in the darkness he found an axe. By using the thick blade of the axe in place of the knife he soon had the window on the move. He propped up the sash, put the axe back in its place, and returned to the window. With a shove of his right hand he forced it up to the top. This done, he paused for a moment and stood with every sense and nerve on the alert. He heard nothing, saw nothing, felt nothing.

"I wonder if my little idea is the right one," he murmured. "I wonder what I shall find."

He put his gloved hands on the sill, hoisted himself, tipped forward, and wriggled through the window into the dark and silent room. His hands touched the floor first. He pulled his legs across the ledge and was about to stand straight when his knife slipped from the pocket of his coat and clattered on the floor. Still crouched low, he groped forward, found the knife--and then!

It seemed to Harvey P. Banks that he had been asleep a long, long time on a very uncomfortable bed in a very stuffy room. The greatest trouble with the bed must be in the arrangement of the pillows, he reflected, for his neck was terribly stiff and sore. He did not open his eyes right away. There was a feeling in his head and eyes--yes, and in his mouth--suggestive of other awakenings, in the years of his gay youth. So he lay with his eyes closed, remembering that a too sudden opening of the lids under certain once familiar conditions was decidedly unpleasant. He tried to get his wits into line. Where was he? Where had he been last night? What had he been drinking? His poor head only throbbed in answer. So, at last, very cautiously, he raised his heavy lids. He gazed upon darkness--against utter darkness on every side. No.

Directly above his head was a faint sheen of gray. That was a window, no doubt; but what was a window doing above his head? That beat him, and he closed his eyes again and tried hard to remember things. The far-away past came clearly to him; but that did not help him. He knew that the things he remembered were of months--even of years--ago.

He was surprised to find that he wore heavy, fur-lined gloves, a fur cap pulled low over his ears and forehead, and a c.o.o.nskin coat. He put out his right hand and touched a wall of ice-cold dusty floor. He judged that the floor was not more than six inches below the level of his body.

He put out his left hand and touched a wall of ice-cold plaster. With a grunt of dawning dismay he sat up, and though his neck ached, and his head spun and throbbed with the effort, he leaned forward and touched his feet with his gloved hands. He felt his heavy shooting boots and a flake or two of pressed snow on their soles--and at that his brain awoke and the memory of his informal entrance into Captain Wigmore's house flashed clear. He uttered a low cry of wonder and consternation.

"What happened?" he whispered. "Did I fall and stun myself as I climbed over the window sill?"

His head behaved so badly at this point that he lay p.r.o.ne again on his hard couch. But now his brain was working clearly, though painfully.

Every incident of his attempt to enter the house, with a view to reading the mystery which he was sure it contained, was now as plain as a picture before his inner vision. He reviewed the whole adventure minutely, from the meeting with Wigmore to the opening of the window and the dropping of the knife upon the floor of the pitch-black room. But what had happened after that? Something sudden--and hard! Yes, there could be no doubt of the suddenness and hardness of the next occurrence.

But what was it? Had he toppled forward and struck his head against a piece of furniture? Or had something possessed of individual initiative hit him over the head? He sat up again, removed his gloves and cap, and felt all over his head with chilly, inquiring fingers. He could not find any lump or cut; but the back and top of the head were agonizingly tender to the touch.

"A sandbag--whatever that is," he muttered. "I have heard that they effect one somewhat in this way, if properly applied."

He laughed shortly and painfully. His head seemed to have recovered something of its normal position and balance. It felt more solid and steady, and the ache in it was duller. He fumbled through the pockets of his fur coat and found a pipe, tobacco pouch, and box of matches. His clasp knife was not there. Evidently he had not succeeded in picking it up, that time.

"Sorry for that," he muttered. "I could carve my way out of any place with that knife."

He opened the fur coat, and found the contents of his inner pockets intact--his watch, cigar case, three rifle cartridges, the stub of a pencil, a few pocket-worn letters, and a railway timetable. He knew each article by the feel of it. He opened the match box, and was glad to discover that it was full. Then he took out his watch and lit a match.

The hands of the watch marked the time as half-past two--and the fact that the watch had not run down proved to him that the hour was of the early morning. He had lain unconscious more than five hours. He wound the watch and returned it to his pocket. Then he struck another match, held it high, and gazed inquiringly around him. The match was of wax, and held its flame for nearly half a minute. He saw a small room, white and bare of walls, bare of floor, with a sloping ceiling, broken by the square of a little skylight. The only article of furniture in the place was a narrow couch upon which he sat. A door of unpainted spruce divided the wall at that end of the room where the ceiling reached its greatest height.

Harvey P. Banks dropped the b.u.t.t of the match to the floor and rubbed the spark out of it with his foot. He knew that he was in some one's attic; and he felt almost equally sure that it was the attic of Captain Wigmore's house. But who had hit him over the head and then carried him up and deposited him in this place? He had his suspicions, of course.

Perhaps the captain had sandbagged him. The old man might easily have returned to the house immediately after parting with him on the road. Or Timothy Fletcher? Why not Timothy Fletcher? Wigmore had been lying when he said that Fletcher had run away to New York. Banks had felt sure of that at the time the statement was made--and now he felt doubly sure of it. Very likely they had both taken a hand in the game. Neither one of them by himself could have carried Harvey P. Banks up to the garret.

Mr. Banks felt cold and sleepy and sore. The soreness was of spirit as well as of body and head. He had certainly made a mess of things. And he felt anxious--decidedly anxious. Who was to make the next move? And what was the next move to be? He would have paid high to find himself snug and safe in his own bed in Reginald Rayton's house. What was Reginald thinking? But he had proved one thing! He had proved, beyond a doubt, that the inmates of Captain Wigmore's house were mysterious and undesirable persons.

He lit a cigar, lay back on his hard couch, and smoked reflectively. His head was not yet steady enough to allow of action. After an inch or two of the cigar had turned to ash, he sat up and got noiselessly to his feet. He had not heard a sound since recovering consciousness. Perhaps the house was empty? He lit a match and tiptoed to the door. He turned the k.n.o.b cautiously. The door was locked.

"I guess it's not my turn yet," he murmured, and went back to the couch.

He drew his cap down about his ears, fastened his fur coat up to the chin, and lay flat on his broad back. But before the cigar was finished he was on his feet again. He lifted the couch and placed it with his head against the door. Then he extinguished the b.u.t.t of the cigar, lay down, and went to sleep.

Mr. Banks awoke suddenly. He was stiff and cold, but every sense was on the alert. His head felt much better than it had before his sleep. The room was full of gray light that filtered down from the snow-veiled window in the roof. He looked at his watch. It was seven o'clock. He listened intently, but could not hear a sound.

"I can see well enough now to take a hand in the game," he said. "So I guess it is my turn to play."

He lifted the cot away from the door and set it down at one side without a sound. Then he raised his right leg, drew his knee well back, presented the heel of his big boot at the lock of the door, and drove it forward with all the strength of his great hip and thigh. The lock burst, and fell in fragments; and the door, having been constructed so as to open inward, split, and tore itself from its hinges and flapped wide. Thick muscles had bested thin iron in a single effort.

"There! Confound you!" exclaimed Mr. Banks, staggering a little to recover the balance of his big body. He saw, beyond the gaping and twisted door, by the feeble light from his own room, a dark, bare hall and the unpainted rails around the top of a narrow staircase. He advanced one foot across the threshold, stooped forward, and listened intently. His big body, in its big coat of c.o.o.nskins, filled the width of the doorway and shut out much of the feeble illumination that descended from the skylight behind and above him. So he stood for a minute or two before he heard a sound save that of his own breathing.

And then! What is that? A single, furtive tap, as of something hard on a thin edge of wood, close in front of him. He turned sideways on the threshold so as to let the light from behind him reach the floor in front.

What was that, thin and black, slanting up at him between the rounds of the railing? It had a sinister look. It did not move. Behind it was the black gulf of the stairway. Mr. Banks hesitated for a moment, then began to edge forward.

"Stop where you are!" commanded a voice--the voice of old Captain Wigmore. "This thing is the barrel of a rifle. I am behind the rifle. If I press on the trigger, my dear Banks, I am sure to hit you somewhere, you are so unnecessarily large. In the belly, most likely. That's right!

Stand still."

"You, Wigmore!" exclaimed the New Yorker. "What is the meaning of this?

What are you talking about? You must be stark mad!"

The other laughed. It was a most discomforting sound. The laugh of a land crab--if the beast _could_ laugh--would doubtless resemble Captain Wigmore's expression of mirth.

"You seem to be indignant, my dear fellow," he said, with exasperating calm. "But what do you expect? I caught you breaking into my house when you were under the impression that I was not at home. Do you think I should have put you in my own bed, with a hot-water bottle at your feet, and carried your breakfast up to you this morning? No, no, my dear Banks! It is my duty to this country, and to society in general, to keep a firm hand on you until the officers of the law relieve me of the charge."

"You old hypocrite!" cried Banks. "You scheming, lying, old devil! Bring the officers of the law! The sooner they get here the better I'll be pleased. I have something to say to them."

Wigmore chuckled. "I haven't sent for them yet," he said. "I rather enjoy the prospect of looking after you myself for a little while. I can stand it--if you can."

Mr. Banks watched the barrel of the rifle out of the corner of his eye; but the menacing thing did not waver.

"Where is Timothy Fletcher?" he asked.

"So that is your bright suspicion, is it?" returned Wigmore cheerfully.

"He went to New York, I told you. Where do you think he is?"

"In this house, you old ape!" cried Banks.

Wigmore hooted.

CHAPTER XVI

THE LITTLE CAT AND THE BIG MOUSE

The light was stronger, though still gray and thin. It was the light of an unsunlit November day filtered through a small square of snow-drifted gla.s.s into a chilly garret. The light alone was enough to drop a man's heart to the depths; but it was not the only thing that depressed Harvey P. Banks. He was anxious, cold, and hungry. He was sickened with disgust of himself and hate of Captain Wigmore. His head ached, his neck and shoulders were sore. To add to all this he could now see the face and eyes of his jailer by the cheerless light. The sight was not one calculated to dispel his anxiety or warm his blood. The eyes gleamed balefully up from the gloom of the stairway, with a green gleam in them like the eyes of a cat watching its helpless prey. In front of the eyes showed the black barrel of the rifle.

"How long do you intend to keep up this farce?" inquired Banks.

"I can stand it as long as you can," was the crisp reply.

"Very likely; but I don't see that I have any say in the matter just now."