In the Midst of Alarms
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If Stoliker felt like an innocent child, he did not look it. With clouded brow he eagerly scanned the empty fields, hoping for help. But, although the constable made no reply, there was an answer that electrified Yates, and put all thought of the beauty of the country out of his mind. The dull report of a musket, far in front of them, suddenly broke the silence, followed by several scattering shots, and then the roar of a volley. This was sharply answered by the ring of rifles to the right. With an oath, Yates broke into a run.
“They’re at it!” he cried, “and all on account of your confounded obstinacy I shall miss the whole show. The Fenians have opened fire, and the Canadians have not been long in replying.”
The din of the firing now became incessant. The veteran in Yates was aroused. He was like an old war horse who again feels the intoxicating smell of battle smoke. The lunacy of gunpower shone in his gleaming eye.
“Come on, you loitering idiot!” he cried to the constable, who had difficulty in keeping pace with him; “come on, or, by the gods! I’ll break your wrist across a fence rail and tear this brutal iron from it.”
The savage face of the prisoner was transformed with the passion of war, and, for the first time that day, Stoliker quailed before the insane glare of his eyes. But if he was afraid, he did not show his fear to Yates.
“Come on, you!” he shouted, springing ahead, and giving a twist to the handcuffs well known to those who have to deal with refractory criminals. “I am as eager to see the fight as you are.”
The sharp pain brought Yates to his senses again. He laughed, and said: “That’s the ticket, I’m with you. Perhaps you would not be in such a hurry if you knew that I am going into the thick the fight, and intend to use you as a shield from the bullets.”
“That’s all right,” answered the little constable, panting. “Two sides are firing. I’ll shield you on one side, and you’ll have to shield me on the other.”
Again Yates laughed, and they ran silently together. Avoiding the houses, they came out at the Ridge Road. The smoke rolled up above the trees, showing where the battle was going on some distance beyond. Yates made the constable cross the fence and the road, and take to the fields again, bringing him around behind Bartlett’s house and barn. No one was visible near the house except Kitty Bartlett, who stood at the back watching, with pale and anxious face, the rolling smoke, now and then covering her ears with her hands as the sound of an extra loud volley assailed them. Stoliker lifted up his voice and shouted for help.
“If you do that again,” cried Yates, clutching him by the throat, “I’ll choke you!”
But he did not need to do it again. The girl heard the cry, turned with a frightened look, and was about to fly into the house when she recognized the two. Then she came toward them. Yates took his hand away from the constable’s throat.
“Where is your father or your brother?” demanded the constable.
“I don’t know.”
“Where is your mother?”
“She is over with Mrs. Howard, who is ill.”
“Are you all alone?”
“Yes.”
“Then I command you, in the name of the Queen, to give no assistance to this prisoner, but to do as I tell you.”
“And I command you, in the name of the President,” cried Yates, “to keep your mouth shut, and not to address a lady like that. Kitty,” he continued in a milder tone, “could you tell me where to get a file, so that I may cut these wrist ornaments? Don’t you get it. You are to do nothing. Just indicate where the file is. The law mustn’t have any hold on you, as it seems to have on me.”
“Why don’t you make him unlock them?” asked Kitty.
“Because the villain threw away the key in the fields.”
“He couldn’t have done that.”
The constable caught his breath.
“But he did. I saw him.”
“And I saw him unlock them at breakfast. The key was on the end of his watch chain. He hasn’t thrown that away.”
She made a move to take out his watch chain but Yates stopped her.
“Don’t touch him. I’m playing a lone hand here.” He jerked out the chain, and the real key dangled from it.
“Well, Stoliker,” he said, “I don’t know which to admire most—your cleverness and pluck, my stupidity, or Miss Bartlett’s acuteness of observation. Can we get into the barn, Kitty?”
“Yes; but you mustn’t hurt him.”
“No fear. I think too much of him. Don’t you come in. I’ll be out in a moment, like the medium from a spiritualistic dark cabinet.”
Entering the barn, Yates forced the constable up against the square oaken post which was part of the framework of the building, and which formed one side of the perpendicular ladder that led to the top of the hay mow.
“Now, Stoliker,” he, said solemnly, “you realize, of course, that I don’t want to hurt you yet you also realize that I must hurt you if you attempt any tricks. I can’t take any risks, please remember that; and recollect that, by the time you are free again, I shall be in the State of New York. So don’t compel me to smash your head against this post.” He, with some trouble, unlocked the clasp on his own wrist; then, drawing Stoliker’s right hand around the post, he snapped the same clasp on the constable’s hitherto free wrist. The unfortunate man, with his cheek against the oak, was in the comical position of lovingly embracing the post.
“I’ll get you a chair from the kitchen, so that you will be more comfortable—unless, like Samson, you can pull down the supports. Then I must bid you good-by.”
Yates went out to the girl, who was waiting for him.
“I want to borrow a kitchen chair, Kitty,” he said, “so that poor Stoliker will get a rest.”
They walked toward the house. Yates noticed that the firing had ceased, except a desultory shot here and there across the country.
“I shall have to retreat over the border as quickly as I can,” he continued. “This country is getting too hot for me.”
“You are much safer here,” said the girl, with downcast eyes. “A man has brought the news that the United States gunboats are sailing up and down the river, making prisoners of all who attempt to cross from this side.”
“You don’t say! Well, I might have known that. Then what am I to do with Stoliker? I can’t keep him tied up here. Yet the moment he gets loose I’m done for.”
“Perhaps mother could persuade him not to do anything more. Shall I go for her?”
“I don’t think it would be any use. Stoliker’s a stubborn animal. He has suffered too much at my hands to be in a forgiving mood. We’ll bring him a chair anyhow, and see the effect of kindness on him.”
When the chair was placed at Stoliker’s disposal, he sat down upon it, still hugging the post with an enforced fervency that, in spite of the solemnity of the occasion, nearly made Kitty laugh, and lit up her eyes with the mischievousness that had always delighted Yates.
“How long am I to be kept here?” asked the constable.
“Oh, not long,” answered Yates cheerily; “not a moment longer than is necessary. I’ll telegraph when I’m safe in New York State; so you won’t be here more than a day or two.”
This assurance did not appear to bring much comfort to Stoliker.
“Look here,” he said; “I guess I know as well as the next man when I’m beaten. I have been thinking all this over. I am under the sheriff’s orders, and not under the orders of that officer. I don’t believe you’ve done anything, anyhow, or you wouldn’t have acted quite the way you did. If the sheriff had sent me, it would have been different. As it is, if you unlock those cuffs, I’ll give you my word I’ll do nothing more unless I’m ordered to. Like as not they’ve forgotten all about you by this time; and there’s nothing on record, anyhow.”
“Do you mean it? Will you act square?”
“Certainly I’ll act square. I don’t suppose you doubt that. I didn’t ask any favors before, and I did what I could to hold you.”
“Enough said,” cried Yates. “I’ll risk it.”
Stoliker stretched his arms wearily above his head when he was released.
“I wonder,” he said, now that Kitty was gone, “if there is anything to eat in the house?”
“Shake!” cried Yates, holding out his hand to him. “Another great and mutual sentiment unites us, Stoliker. Let us go and see.”
CHAPTER XVIII
The man who wanted to see the fight did not see it, and the man who did not want to see it saw it. Yates arrived on the field of conflict when all was over; Renmark found the battle raging around him before he realized that things had reached a crisis.
When Yates reached the tent, he found it empty and torn by bullets. The fortunes of war had smashed the jar, and the fragments were strewn before the entrance, probably by some disappointed man who had tried to sample the contents and had found nothing.
“Hang it all!” said Yates to himself, “I wonder what the five assistants that the Argus sent me have done with themselves? If they are with the Fenians, beating a retreat, or, worse, if they are captured by the Canadians, they won’t be able to get an account of this scrimmage through to the paper. Now, this is evidently the biggest item of the year—it’s international, by George! It may involve England and the United States in a war, if both sides are not extra mild and cautious. I can’t run the chance of the paper being left in the lurch. Let me think a minute. Is it my tip to follow the Canadians or the Fenians? I wonder is which is running the faster? My men are evidently with the Fenians, if they were on the ground at all. If I go after the Irish Republic, I shall run the risk of duplicating things; but if I follow the Canadians, they may put me under arrest. Then we have more Fenian sympathizers among our readers than Canadians, so the account from the invasion side of the fence will be the more popular. Yet a Canadian version would be a good thing, if I were sure the rest of the boys got in their work, and the chances are that the other papers won’t have any reporters among the Canucks. Heavens! What is a man to do? I’ll toss up for it. Heads, the Fenians.”
He spun the coin in the air, and caught it. “Heads it is! The Fenians are my victims. I’m camping on their trail, anyhow. Besides, it’s safer than following the Canadians, even though Stoliker has got my pass.”
Tired as he was, he stepped briskly through the forest. The scent of a big item was in his nostrils, and it stimulated him like champagne. What was temporary loss of sleep compared to the joy of defeating the opposition press?
A blind man might have followed the trail of the retreating army. They had thrown away, as they passed through the woods, every article that impeded their progress. Once he came on a man lying with his face in the dead leaves. He turned him over.
“His troubles are past, poor devil,” said Yates, as he pushed on.
“Halt! Throw up your hands!” came a cry from in front of him.
Yates saw no one, but he promptly threw up his hands, being an adaptable man.
“What’s the trouble?” he shouted. “I’m retreating, too.”
“Then retreat five steps farther. I’ll count the steps. One.”
Yates strode one step forward, and then saw that a man behind a tree was covering him with a gun. The next step revealed a second captor, with a huge upraised hammer, like a Hercules with his club. Both men had blackened faces, and resembled thoroughly disreputable fiends of the forest. Seated on the ground, in a semicircle, were half a dozen dejected prisoners. The man with the gun swore fearfully, but his comrade with the hammer was silent.
“Come,” said the marksman, “you blank scoundrel, and take a seat with your fellow-scoundrels. If you attempt to run, blank blank you, I’ll fill you full of buckshot!”
“Oh, I’m not going to run, Sandy,” cried Yates, recognizing him. “Why should I? I’ve always enjoyed your company, and Macdonald’s. How are you, Mac? Is this a little private raid of your own? For which side are you fighting? And I say, Sandy, what’s the weight of that old-fashioned bar of iron you have in your hands? I’d like to decide a bet. Let me heft it, as you said in the shop.”
“Oh, it’s you, is it?” said Sandy in a disappointed tone, lowering his gun. “I thought we had raked in another of them. The old man and I want to make it an even dozen.”
“Well, I don’t think you’ll capture any more. I saw nobody as I came through the woods. What are you going to do with this crowd?”
“Brain ‘em,” said Macdonald laconically, speaking for the first time. Then he added reluctantly: “If any of ‘em tries to escape.”
The prisoners were all evidently too tired and despondent to make any attempt at regaining their liberty. Sandy winked over Macdonald’s shoulder at Yates, and by a slight side movement of his head he seemed to indicate that he would like to have some private conversation with the newspaper man.
“I’m not your prisoner, am I?” asked Yates.
“No,” said Macdonald. “You may go if you like, but not in the direction the Fenians have gone.”
“I guess I won’t need to go any farther, if you will give me permission to interview your prisoners. I merely want to get some points about the fight.”
“That’s all right,” said the blacksmith, “as long as you don’t try to help them. If you do, I warn you there will be trouble.”
Yates followed Sandy into the depths of the forest, out of hearing of the others, leaving Macdonald and his sledge-hammer on guard.
When at a safe distance, Sandy stopped and rested his arms on his gun, in a pathfinder attitude.
“Say,” he began anxiously, “you haven’t got some powder and shot on you by any chance?”
“Not an ounce. Haven’t you any ammunition?”
“No, and haven’t had all through the fight. You see, we left the shop in such a hurry we never thought about powder and ball. As soon as a man on horseback came by shouting that there was a fight on, the old man he grabbed his sledge, and I took this gun that had been left at the shop for repairs, and off we started. I’m not sure that it would shoot if I had ammunition, but I’d like to try. I’ve scared some of them Fee-neens nigh to death with it, but I was always afraid one of them would pull a real gun on me, and then I don’t know just what I’d ‘a’ done.”
Sandy sighed, and added, with the air of a man who saw his mistake, but was somewhat loath to acknowledge it: “Next battle there is you won’t find me in it with a lame gun and no powder. I’d sooner have the old man’s sledge. It don’t miss fire.” His eye brightened as he thought of Macdonald. “Say,” he continued, with a jerk of his head back over his shoulder, “the boss is on the warpath in great style, aint he?”
“He is,” said Yates, “but, for that matter, so are you. You can swear nearly as well as Macdonald himself. When did you take to it?”
“Oh, well, you see,” said Sandy apologetically, “it don’t come as natural to me as chewing, but, then, somebody’s got to swear. The old man’s converted, you know.”
“Ah, hasn’t he backslid yet?”
“No, he hasn’t. I was afraid this scrimmage was going to do for him, but it didn’t; and now I think that if somebody near by does a little cussing,—not that anyone can cuss like the boss,—he’ll pull through. I think he’ll stick this time. You’d ought to have seen him wading into them d—d Fee-neens, swinging his sledge, and singing ‘Onward, Christian soldiers.’ Then, with me to chip in a cuss word now and again when things got hot, he pulled through the day without ripping an oath. I tell you, it was a sight. He bowled ‘em over like nine-pins. You ought to ‘a’ been there.”
“Yes,” said Yates regretfully. “I missed it, all on account of that accursed Stoliker. Well, there’s no use crying over spilled milk, but I’ll tell you one thing, Sandy: although I have no ammunition, I’ll let you know what I have got. I have, in my pocket, one of the best plugs of tobacco that you ever put your teeth into.”
Sandy’s eyes glittered. “Bless you!” was all he could say, as he bit off a corner of the offered plug.
“You see, Sandy, there are compensations in this life, after all; I thought you were out.”
“I haven’t had a bite all day. That’s the trouble with leaving in a hurry.”
“Well, you may keep that plug, with my regards. Now, I want to get back and interview those fellows. There’s no time to be lost.”
When they reached the group, Macdonald said:
“Here’s a man says he knows you, Mr. Yates. He claims he is a reporter, and that you will vouch for him.”
Yates strode forward, and looked anxiously at the prisoners, hoping, yet fearing, to find one of his own men there. He was a selfish man, and wanted the glory of the day to be all his own. He soon recognized one of the prisoners as Jimmy Hawkins of the staff of a rival daily, the New York Blade. This was even worse than he had anticipated.
“Hello, Jimmy!” he said, “how did you get here?”
“I was raked in by that adjective fool with the unwashed face.”
“Whose a—fool?” cried Macdonald in wrath, and grasping his hammer. He boggled slightly as he came to the “adjective,” but got over it safely. It was evidently a close call, but Sandy sprang to the rescue, and cursed Hawkins until even the prisoners turned pale at the torrent of profanity. Macdonald looked with sad approbation at his pupil, not knowing that he was under the stimulus of newly acquired tobacco, wondering how he had attained such proficiency in malediction; for, like all true artists, he was quite unconscious of his own merit in that direction.
“Tell this hammer wielder that I’m no anvil. Tell him that I’m a newspaper man, and didn’t come here to fight. He says that if you guarantee that I’m no Fenian he’ll let me go.”
Yates sat down on a fallen log, with a frown on his brow. He liked to do a favor to a fellow-creature when the act did not inconvenience himself, but he never forgot the fact that business was business.
“I can’t conscientiously tell him that, Jimmy,” said Yates soothingly. “How am I to know you are not a Fenian?”
“Bosh!” cried Hawkins angrily. “Conscientiously? A lot you think of conscience when there is an item to be had.”
“We none of us live up to our better nature, Jimmy,” continued Yates feelingly. “We can but do our best, which is not much. For reasons that you might fail to understand, I do not wish to run the risk of telling a lie. You appreciate my hesitation, don’t you, Mr. Macdonald? You would not advise me to assert a thing I was not sure of, would you?”
“Certainly not,” said the blacksmith earnestly.
“You want to keep me here because you are afraid of me,” cried the indignant Blade man. “You know very well I’m not a Fenian.”
“Excuse me, Jimmy, but I know nothing of the kind. I even suspect myself of Fenian leanings. How, then, can I be sure of you?”
“What’s your game?” asked Hawkins more calmly, for he realized that he himself would not be slow to take advantage of a rival’s dilemma.
“My game is to get a neat little account of this historical episode sent over the wires to the Argus. You see, Jimmy, this is my busy day. When the task is over, I will devote myself to your service, and will save you from being hanged, if I can; although I shall do so without prejudice, as the lawyers say, for I have always held that that will be the ultimate end of all the Blade staff.
“Look here, Yates; play fair. Don’t run in any conscientious guff on a prisoner. You see, I have known you these many years.”
“Yes, and little have you profited by a noble example. It is your knowledge of me that makes me wonder at your expecting me to let you out of your hole without due consideration.”
“Are you willing to make a bargain?
“Always—when the balance of trade is on my side.”
“Well, if you give me a fair start, I’ll give you some exclusive information that you can’t get otherwise.”
“What is it?”
“Oh, I wasn’t born yesterday, Dick.”
“That is interesting information, Jimmy, but I knew it before. Haven’t you something more attractive to offer?”
“Yes, I have. I have the whole account of the expedition and the fight written out, all ready to send, if I could get my clutches on a telegraph wire. I’ll hand it over to you, and allow you to read it, if you will get me out of this hole, as you call it. I’ll give you permission to use the information in any way you choose, if you will extricate me, and all I ask is a fair start in the race for a telegraph office.”
Yates pondered over the proposition for some moments.
“I’ll tell you what I’ll do, Jimmy,” he finally said. “I’ll buy that account from you, and give you more money than the Blade will. And when I get back to New York I’ll place you on the staff of the Argus at a higher salary than the Blade gives you—taking your own word for the amount.”
“What! And leave my paper in the lurch? Not likely.”
“Your paper is going to be left in the lurch, anyhow.”
“Perhaps. But it won’t be sold by me. I’ll burn my copy before I will let you have a glimpse of it. That don’t need to interfere with your making me an offer of a better position when we get back to New York; but while my paper depends on me, I won’t go back on it.”
“Just as you please, Jimmy. Perhaps I would do the same myself. I always was weak where the interests of the Argus were concerned. You haven’t any blank paper you could lend me, Jimmy?”
“I have, but I won’t lend it.”
Yates took out his pencil, and pulled down his cuff.
“Now, Mac,” he said, “tell me all you saw of this fight.”
The blacksmith talked, and Yates listened, putting now and then a mark on his cuff. Sandy spoke occasionally, but it was mostly to tell of sledge-hammer feats or to corroborate something the boss said. One after another Yates interviewed the prisoners, and gathered together all the materials for that excellent full-page account “by an eyewitness” that afterward appeared in the columns of the Argus. He had a wonderful memory, and simply jotted down figures with which he did not care to burden his mind. Hawkins laughed derisively now and then at the facts they were giving Yates, but the Argus man said nothing, merely setting down in shorthand some notes of the information Hawkins sneered at, which Yates considered was more than likely accurate and important. When he had got all he wanted, he rose.
“Shall I send you help, Mac?” he asked.
“No,” said the smith; “I think I’ll take these fellows to the shop, and hold them there till called for. You can’t vouch for Hawkins, then, Mr. Yates?”
“Good Heavens, no! I look on him as the most dangerous of the lot. These half-educated criminals, who have no conscientious scruples, always seem to me a greater menace to society than their more ignorant co-conspirators. Well, good-by, Jimmy. I think you’ll enjoy life down at Mac’s shop. It’s the best place I’ve struck since I’ve been in the district. Give my love to all the boys, when they come to gaze at you. I’ll make careful inquiries into your opinions, and as soon as I am convinced that you can be set free with safety to the community I’ll drop in on you and do all I can. Meanwhile, so long.”
Yates’ one desire now was to reach a telegraph office, and write his article as it was being clicked off on the machine. He had his fears about the speed of a country operator, but he dared not risk trying to get through to Buffalo in the then excited state of the country. He quickly made up his mind to go to the Bartlett place, borrow a horse, if the Fenians had not permanently made off with them all, and ride as rapidly as he could for the nearest telegraph office. He soon reached the edge of the woods, and made his way across the fields to the house. He found young Bartlett at the barn.
“Any news of the horses yet?” was the first question he asked.
“No,” said young Bartlett gloomily; “guess they’ve rode away with them.”
“Well, I must get a horse from somewhere to ride to the telegraph office. Where is the likeliest place to find one?”
“I don’t know where you can get one, unless you steal the telegraph boy’s nag; it’s in the stable now, having a feed.”
“What telegraph boy?”
“Oh, didn’t you see him? He went out to the tent to look for you, and I thought he had found you.”
“No, I haven’t been at the tent for ever so long. Perhaps he has some news for me. I’m going to the house to write, so send him in as soon as he gets back. Be sure you don’t let him get away before I see him.”
“I’ll lock the stable,” said young Bartlett, “and then he won’t get the horse, at any rate.”