 The Perils of Pauline, Chapter 9, by Charles Goddard. A flutter of polite alarm attended Senior Baskinelli's invitation. From the sheltered glitter of a Fifth Avenue drawing-room to Chinatown was a plunge a little too deep. But Baskinelli was insistent, and Pauline was his ardent and efficient recruiting officer. Quite a troop train of limousines carried the invaders to the un-celestial haunts of the celestials. Baskinelli rode in the car with Pauline and Owen. He had cast off the dignity of the master musician and assumed an air of whimsical recklessness. Harry and Lucille were in the following car. Oh, please stop fidgeting! exclaimed Lucille. I'm as nervous as you are! I know! said Harry. But I hate to have her alone with that little black snake for five minutes. Owen is with them! Owen is worse! The machines drew up in Chatham Square, and the little procession that moved across to Doyer Street, dainty slippers on blackened cobblestones, light laughter tinkling under the thunder of the L, human brightness brushing past the human shadows from the midnight dens, made contrasts picturesque as a pageant in a catacomb. Pauline, on the arm of the chattering Baskinelli, led the way. Isn't this splendid! she exclaimed. I'm sure you won't disappoint me, Senor Baskinelli. I hope you aren't going to show us a happy Chinese family at supper. Only the most dreadful sight amuses me. Ali, but we must not take risks. replied Baskinelli. There are some of the beings in the world, Miss Marvin, so exquisitely precious that a man would commit sin if he placed them in peril. But only the worst and wickedest places. She admonished Baskinelli. He leaned suddenly very near to her. Do you really mean that, Miss Marvin? He asked. Indeed I do. She answered. Very well, but first we shall go to the new restaurant. It is yet too early for the worst and the wickedest to be abroad or rather to seek their lairs. They climbed a brightly lighted staircase into one of the ordinary Chinese restaurants of the better sort, which are conducted almost entirely for Americans, and where Boston baked beans are as likely as not to nudge almond cakes on the bill of fare, and champagne flow as commonly as tea. They gathered around one of the larger of the cheaply inlaid tables, and Baskinelli took command of the feast. Harry sat in grim silence, watching Pauline like a protecting dragon. Lucille was sick at heart and repentant of coming. The others chatted merrily among themselves. But by common consent Pauline seemed to have been surrendered to the attentions of the evening pest, who had become a midnight host. He leaned toward her with an ardor that he did not even attempt to disguise. You are the most wonderful woman in— Please make it the universe, pleaded Pauline. There are so many most wonderful women in the world. No, let us say chaos. He whispered. The chaos of a man's heart can be ruled only by the charming uncertainty of woman. The intensity of his words brought to Pauline again the twinge of alarm. Unconsciously she looked around for Harry. It was the last thing in the world she had meant to do. She was angry at herself in an instant, for his fixed, guarding gaze was upon her. She met his eyes and turned quickly to Bascinelli. Chaos? I've always loved that word. She flashed. There must be so many lovely adventures where there are no laws. I said the chaos in a man's heart could be ruled by woman, said Bascinelli. The impudence of this sudden love-making moved her unexpectedly to defiance. Please let it be ruled, Signore Bascinelli. She said, turning away from him. Bascinelli had sense enough to see that he had gone too far. He turned to the others as the soft-footed Orientals began to spread the mixed and mysterious vivans on the table. He glanced at Owen. By the slightest movement imaginable, by the least uplift of his black brows, Owen answered. For the first time Bascinelli knew that the lovely quarry he pursued had a protector, no mean, no weak protector. But the arrival of the repast quickly covered the general embarrassment. Everybody could see that Pauline and Harry had had a quarrel and that Pauline was flirting outrageously with Bascinelli simply for revenge. That is, everyone except Harry could see it. Pardon me, but is it what you call a graft investigation that you are making, Miss Hamlin? No, but the food is so funny, there are so many queer things present, but unidentified. Laughed Lucille, like a reception to a foreign artist, interrupted Harry with a vindictive glare, or shall we say like the conversation of an unhappy guest, said Bascinelli, smiling, turning to note the entrance of a little party of newcomers at the further end of the restaurant. A dashing, well-dressed, fiery-eyed foreigner, the tips of whose waxed mustachios turned up like black stalagmites from the corners of his connoverous mouth, was accompanied by two nondescript figures, who seemed to me embarrassed more by the fact that they had been recently cleansed and shaved than by their rough red shirts and mismatched coats and trousers. The man of the tilted mustachios gave brief, imperative orders to the waiters, whose languid steps seemed to be quickened by his words as by an electric battery. The other two sat silent, like docile dogs in leash. Only for an instant Bascinelli's eyes rested upon the group. And having tasted the food of the gods, how would you like it to visit the gods themselves? Pauline agreed enthusiastically. You mean a Joss House, a Chinese church, don't you? Yes. The Joss House that most visitors see in Chinatown is the little one up under the roof at the meeting of doiers and pale streets, at the toe of the twisted horseshoe made by these tiny thoroughfares of black fame, where, in spite of all the modern magic of reform, men still die silently in the hush of secluded corridors, and women vanish into the darkness that is worse than death. The little Joss House is interesting in the same way that an Indian village at a state fair is interesting. Behind its gaudy staginess and commercial appeal, it still holds something of reality from which the imagination can draw a picture of an ancient worship that has held a race of millions in thrall for thousands of years. But it was not to the little Joss House that Senor Bascinelli guided the party. In the little Joss House the bells are pounded without respite. The visitors come and go at all hours of the day and night. Give the few set hours when the Joss sacrifices profit to true prayer. Bascinelli took his guests to the Joss House of the Golden Screens. Save for its greater size and more splendid accrutement, it was little different from the other. But it was walled in its back alley seclusion, deep behind the outer fronts of Mott Street by a secrecy almost sincerely sacred. The motor-cars remained far behind across the square as Bascinelli led the party through the dismal streets and stopped before a dark doorway. A dim light flared behind the door and a Chinaman in American dress admitted them. I am beginning to be really bored, said Pauline. Wait! Give her the wicked a chance! Said Bascinelli. They climbed three flights of dingy, narrow stairs lighted with flaring gas jets. Wonderful! Jeered Pauline! Not even a secret passage or a subterranean den. The others followed her laughing lead up the stairs. A Chinaman came out of the door on the second landing, stopped, started in innocent curiosity at the dazzling visitors and went down the stairs. Everything was as still and commonplace as if they had been in the hallway of a Harlem flat building. The silence was not broken or the seeming safety disturbed in the slightest by the soft opening of the first landing door after they had passed. That is, after all but Owen had passed. No one but Owen saw the piercing black eyes and the tilted mustachios of the face that appeared for an instant at the door. There was a corridor, not so well lighted, at the top of the third flight of stairs. In the dim turns the women drew their skirts about them, a bit wary of the black short walls. The passage narrowed. They could move now only in single file, and even then their shoulders brushed the walls. Only a far, dull glow from a red lamp over a door at the end of a passage lighted their way. Bascinelli tapped lightly on the door. It was opened by a venerable Chinaman in the flowing robes of a priest. He looked at them doubtfully. Bascinelli spoke three words that his companions did not hear. The priest vanished. Quickly the door was reopened and they stepped into the dim, smoky, stifling presence of the joss. The choking scent of the punk always at the folded feet of the idol was almost suffocating. The place had other odours less noxious and less sweet. Women were lounging in the room as if it had been a place of rest. Three priests were on their knees before the joss swaying forward till their foreheads almost touched the floor. Their outstretched arms moved in mystic symmetry with their rocking bodies. A great brass bell hung low beside the idol, but no priest touched the bell. The joss itself was almost the least impressive thing in the room. It stood, or squatted, six feet high, on a block pedestal at the side of the room. The simple hideousness of the painted features served no impressive purpose, but as contrast to the exquisite decorations of the room. Arms of carved wood, so delicately wrought, that it seemed a touch would break the graven fibres, reflect with inlay of pearl and covering of gold. One of the peculiar features of the room was a suit of ancient Chinese armor, a relic that had been rusted and pitmarked by time, but now stood brightly polished beside the statue of the god. A huge two-edged sword was held upright in the steel glove. By the dim light behind the idol the shadow of the sword was cast across the blank face of Bascinelli as he moved forward. He stepped back quickly. The shadow fell between him and Pauline. Again the ancient priest answered a summons at the door. Then he parlayed for a moment, then opened it to the three swarthy foreigners who had been in the restaurant. Bascinelli turned for just an instant to glance at the tall man with the tilted mustache, then resumed immediately his conversation with Pauline. Why do all the Chinaman run away like that? She asked. It is the end of the service. You see the priest are going too. There was a furtive haste about the departure of the orientals, and there was a quavering in the manner of the oldest priest, the only one who remained, that seemed born of a hidden fear. The old priest lifted one of the lamps from the wall bracket and set it on the floor beside the idol. He knelt near it and began to pray. The three Italians waited only a moment, then followed the Chinese out of the room. It is late. We ought to be going. Pleaded Lucille, complete silence had fallen on the room, and her words, a little tremulous, had instant effect on the other women. What about it Bascinelli? Had we better be going? Asked one of the men. Yes, sir. Yes. I beg only a moment. I wish to show Miss Pauline that you mean Miss Marvin, do you not? Blazed Harry, striding to Bascinelli's side and glaring down at him. I was interrupted. I had not finished my words. They are at best awkward. I beg— You beg nothing. said Harry through clenched teeth, then slowly, grimly. I want to tell you, you little leper, that if anything happens here tonight, it's going to happen to you. He was so near to the musician that the others did not hear. Bascinelli backed away, Pauline with the swift, inexplicable yet unerring instinct of women, moved as if to seek the shelter of Harry's towering frame. He did not see her. He had whirled at the sound of the opening of a door, a peculiar door set diagonally across a corner of the room behind the joss. Through the yellow silk curtains that hid the entrance came two China men as fantastically hideous as the embroidered dragons on the tapestry. Put those men out. They cannot come in here. They are full of opium. Stop. Let them come in. We are going. said the mild voice of Owen. The understanding look of Bascinelli met his. Bascinelli frowned and Owen smiled. They were playing perfectly their roles. The two China men shuffled into the room. The priest rose in jabbering protest. They argued with him accurately. A few feet away one could see that their cheap linen robes covered the ordinary street garb of the China men. That the ugly lines on their faces were painted as on the face of the joss. Bascinelli was laughing. The others watched the argument in silence. Everyone but the host and Owen and Pauline seemed a little nervous. Suddenly the lamp on the floor went out. There was another at the farther side of the room. But its dim light made the scene more weird than darkness could have made it. Well I thought we were going. Snapped Harry's strident voice. We are. replied Bascinelli. Miss, er, I am afraid to speak. Miss Marmon shall we go? Pauline took his arm. Ali, but I have forgotten the most precious sight of the evening. Suddenly exclaimed the musician. Only a moment. Look here. Pauline did not notice that Owen softly shut the door upon the receding footsteps of the others. Bascinelli guided her back to the little door behind the screen, the door from which the China men had entered. Bascinelli drew aside the curtain. There! That is one form of adventure. Pauline looked through the curtain. A suffocating narcotic odor came to her. What she saw was stifling not only to the senses, but to the soul. She turned away. Pauline. Harry's voice rang through the little choked room like a thunderblast. We are coming. We are quite to safe. Called Bascinelli with the sneer tinge in his tone. Very well then. Hurry. Harry's manner aroused Pauline's temper again. She purposefully lingered. The two China men were arguing violently now with the priest. Harry had closed the door and followed the others down the outer passage. Miss Marvin, Pauline. Called Bascinelli with sudden passion. Have you a heart of stone? Can you not see me helpless in your presence? Do you know what love is? He stepped towards her and tried to take her in his arms. But she was stronger and far braver than he. She thrust him aside and fled through the door. Bascinelli followed, protesting, pleading. Strangely as she fled through the narrow corridor, the low, flaring gas jets were extinguished one by one. She groped in the darkness. Bascinelli's pleading voice became almost a consolation, a protection. Her elbow struck something in the passageway. Something shrank at the touch. She heard a quick, drawn breath that was not Bascinelli's. She tried to run. The tiny passageway choked her flight. She plunged helplessly between invisible but gripping walls. She reeled and screamed. There was the sound of a struggle behind her. She heard Bascinelli crying for help. But oh, so quietly. She reached the stairs. The stairs were blocked by a closed door. The door was barred. But there was a light left burning by the door. Her weak hands beat upon the panels helplessly, hopelessly. How should she know that there were two doors locked and sealed beyond? Her wild screams rang through the long passage, through the dark, above the shuffle and beat and cursing of the staged fight. In the dim light she could see the three Italians grappling with the other men. Bascinelli's voice called to her reassuringly. It might well. Bascinelli was in no danger. She placed her softly clothed shoulder to the door and strove to break it. She screamed again. Harry! Harry! Dole crashes answered. There was the crack and cleaving of splintered wood. Hold on, I'm here. She heard. She fell beside the door. Strong arms seized her. For an instant she felt that she was saved, but she looked up into the lowering face of a man with tilted moustachios. From the wide thick lips came threats and curses. From the outer passageway sounded the crashing of the doors. She let herself be lifted. Then, with sudden exertion of her trained strength, she broke the grasp of the man. The door fell open. Harry, bloody and tattered, stood there, alone. Polly? Uh, where are the others? They'll kill you! Run! She cried. Harry ran forward into the black corridor. A knife thrust, sheathed in silence, ripped his shoulder, gave him his clue. He had one man down and trampled, but another was upon him, and yet a third. A sharp pain dulled the pulsing of his throat. He felt a tickle down his beard and swinging arm. Harry fought blindly in the dark. Polly? He panted. There was no answer. In the jaws-house of the golden screens the two Chinamen, days with opium, set of purpose, were still arguing with the trembling priest. The door fell open, and a white woman with bleeding hands fell at their feet. Ha! She has come back! Cried one of the Chinese in his own tongue. There was the sound of steps in the outer passage. Quick, inside! With the Chinamen, pointing to the den, they lifted Pauline. The old priest stopped them. Not there! Not there! He cried. Anyone would look in there! They dragged her back. The priest hurried to the outer door and locked it. There was the blunt, battering thrust of a body against the door. Open, or I'll break it in! yelled the voice of Harry. The priest opened the door. In deferential silence he saluted the battle-grimmed newcomer. Battered, panting, bleeding, Harry lunged at the man, gripped him. Quick, where is she? You'll die like a spiked rat. Where? He roared. The two other Chinamen were kneeling before the jaws. There was a moment silent, then a strange sound, like a cry heard a far off. Harry strode to the little pedestal where the suit of armor stood. Where is she? Or I'll rip this place to cockles. He thundered. We do not know what you mean, said the priest. The two Chinamen began to jabber. Other figures reeled from the room behind the curtains. But over all their clamor sounded again the faint cry, distant, but near. In a flash Harry caught from the mailed glove the heft of the sword. As he rushed across the room the Chinese withered away from him. There was a crash as the great sword fell upon one of the windows. Through the broken pain Harry shouted for help. His voice was like a clarion in the silent streets. He turned in time. Three Chinamen with drawn knives were upon him. He swung the unwieldy sword above his head. Its sweep saved him. He dashed at the jaws. Again he lifted the sword. A gasp, and then a wail of fear sounded through the room. He struck. The head of the statue thutted to the floor. The Chinese rushed upon him. They were desperate now in the face of the violation of their god. Yet he was behind their god, prying open the secret door to the hollow within the statue. It's all right, Polly. He said as he drew her gently forth, he stood above her with his back to the wall, swinging the sacred sword against the onslaught of fanatic men. They fell before him, but more came on. His hands could hardly hold the mighty weapon. For more than half an hour he had been fighting. He was weakening, but he braced himself and swung for the last time. There came a hammering at the door. It crashed in. Police clubs whistled right and left. The Chinese fled into their secret lairs. And I guess that will be all. Panted Harry in the taxi that took them home. I don't think you'll ask for any more adventures after this one. Why didn't you pick up the Joss's head? It would have looked so nice and dreadful in the library. But the glory of her golden hair nestled upon his torn shoulder, and he knew that he would go through all the perils in the world for happiness like this. End of Chapter 9 BASKINELLY'S QUARRY For several months after old Mr. Marvin's death, Owen had kept to his cubby-hole room adjoining the financier's small, plain furnished work-a-day office. But recently he had got the habit of doing his work in the library, where the tall, pure statues looked down upon his skulking head and the grand old books that had borne their messages of good from generation to generation held their high thoughts in stately contrast to his skilled and cruel plots. Above the bowed, bald head that was planning the death of a young girl to gain her fortune stood a figure of Persephone, child of innocence, and sunlight shadowed by black robes of dice. Upon the coward, who feared all but the darkest and most devious passages of crime, shown high, clear brows of Caesar and Aurelius, gray folios of Shakespeare held up to the ambitious ingrate the warning titles of Lear and Hamlet and Macbeth, and by his side brooded ever that mystic relic of the farther past, the mummy, from whose case had stepped a daughter of the pharaohs in the likeness of Pauline. But Owen thought little of contrasts. He was opening his mail on a morning in early May when he came across an envelope addressed in the awkward scrawl of Hicks. He tore it apart nervously, for if Hicks could be moved to right, it must be a matter of concern. Dear Owen, no doubt he suspects you of foul play. He has seen his attorneys and is about to take steps to have you removed from the trusteeship. The paper crackled in Owen's trembling hand, so the Basconelli incident had gone a little too far. Harry Marvin had sense enough to know that he would not have to fight three murderous Italians and a rabble of Chinese, unless there had been a plot behind Pauline's peril. It might be best to go directly after Harry, to put him out of the way first. And yet, Owen pondered, there was no proof of anything wrong. Pauline was admittedly plunging into these adventures of her own free will. Nothing could be proved against him or Hicks. He resumed his work. Among the letters lay an advertising dodger which had been dropped through the door. Owen glanced at it carelessly at first, then, with keen interest, he read it over. One ascension from Palisades, Signore Pantella, the famous Italian aeronaut, will make parachute drop from height never before attempted. The ascension was to be made that afternoon from one of the amusement parks on the New Jersey shore of the Hudson. This is Providence. He muttered to himself, catching up the dodger. Going through the door and up the stairs, he tapped at the door of Pauline's room. When there came no answer, he entered swiftly, laid a paper on the table, and glided back to the hall, back to the library. From there he called up Hicks. Hicks domiciles were so many and suddenly changeable, that he claimed nothing so dignified as a regular telephone number. But he had scribbled on the bottom of his note the number of a saloon on the lower west side. He was there when Owen rang. Hello, hello, is that you, Hicks? I want to see you. What? No, right away. Broke. You always are. You'll get the cash all right. What's that? Come here? Not on your life. I'll come to you. Not half that time. I'll take the motorcycle. All right. Good-bye. He hung up the receiver, went up to his room, and got into cycling-kit. As he came downstairs he met Pauline, who was returning from a shopping trip. Good morning, Owen, she said brightly. Do you know I believe there is more peril in a dry-good store than on a pirate yacht? Parts of my new hat are left. Only the becoming ones. She sped on up the stairs. After her first imperative inquiries of the mirror concerning what she considered her wild appearance, she picked up the letters on her dressing table and began to run through them. The large black type of an advertising dodger loomed among the letters. Pauline tripped down the stairs. The hairy, seated on the steps enjoying the spring sunshine and puffing a leisurely cigarette, appeared a mysterious vision. He knew by the elaborate way in which she took her seat beside him and hid the piece of paper in her hand that she had some new whim in fermentation, something to ask him that she knew he wouldn't want to do. Yes. He said, moving along the step away from her. I know you've just bought me the loveliest cravat, and that I'm the nicest brother in the world, that I look so handsome in springy things and, well, what is it? Pauline pouted at the other end of the step. I'm going up in a balloon and jump down, said Pauline, from a height never before attempted. Pauline, I—you were going to do nothing of the— No, I wasn't going to, until you grew so great and grand. I just wanted to go over and see him fly. She tossed the dodger over to him. He glanced at it. Well, if you promise you aren't plotting any more pranks, I'll take you. That's a worthwhile brother. It's a pink one. Pink one? Cravat, of course. Hairy groaned. Ah, give it to the cook. He pleaded. He wears them alive. If that fellow goes up to two-thirty, you'd better hurry. I'll be ready before you are. She rose quickly, but Owen, looking, listening, had time to close the door unseen, unheard. At the rear of a little west-side saloon he signaled with his horn and hicks came out. He was a bit shabbier than usual, and he had been drinking, but he was not intoxicated. Owen locked his machine and taking his arm walked him rapidly up the avenue. What do you mean by writing to me? Demanded, Owen. Haven't I told you never to put words on paper? Oh, I guess you got that house wired so nobody'll catch you. Runted, hicks. Live wires, too. Clever butlers, footmen, maids, chauffeurs, cooks, you're safe enough. You forget. Those are your wires. They don't know they're working for me. Hicks, are you out of your head? Have you told Bemis that you and I are working together? Sure not, but that butler is no fool, Mr. Owen. Was it from him you found out that Harry had the lawyers after us? No. Queer thing that, that. It wasn't. Who, then? The little Espinoza. Espinoza? In New York? Yes. Met her at the Trocadero a week ago. She'd seen old Calderwood already. I guess she blackmails him, the old reprobate, and him the noble counselor at law for Mr. Harry Marvin. So you put her on the scent, for us? Why not? The young fellow's been acting suspicious for a long time. You did very well. How about some money? I haven't seen the colour of a role since you put that fool Baskinelli into the game. Ain't you coming across? Certainly. Here. Said Owen, handing over enough to sate even the predatory greed of Hicks. Now, what I want you to do is to find me in someone among your horse racing friends who is down and out enough to take a little cash job at certain slight risks. Yes? What? I want a good rider on a wild horse. He could make a thousand dollars in an afternoon if the horse should happen to get wild at the right time and do the right thing. Hmm. Muse, Hicks. I wonder if Eddie Caboff has still got his Louvres stable down on Tenth Avenue. We might go see. After ten minutes' walk, Hicks brought up in front of a bill plastered door and a fence. He held it open for Owen and they passed across a vacant lot to a large dilapidated-looking stable at the further end. The short, dark man who sat in a tilted chair against the doorway and puffed lazily at a pipe seemed to embody the spirit of the building and the business done there. He was a man who had once, in the days of racing, been called a sport. He might still be called horsey and would consider the term a compliment. But Eddie Caboff's fame and fortune had both dwindled since the good old bedding days when little swindling games larded the solid profits of crooked races. One by one his thoroughbreds had given up their stalls to truck horses, just as Eddie's diamond studs had given place to plain buttons. His beady black eyes watched the two newcomers on their way across the lot. But he gave no sign of recognition until Hicks and Owen reached the door. Hello, Eddie. Said Hicks, Caboff got up slowly and extended a flabby hand to his acquaintance. He was introduced to Owen, who let Hicks do the talking. What's new, Eddie? Nothing. Still got that wild horse you never was able to sell? Can you still manage him yourself? I guess I could, but he ain't safe to take among traffic. Hicks stepped close to Caboff, talking in rapid whispers. The little man turned white. No, no, I'm too old for that kind of game. He said, Owen drew from his pocket a roll of yellowbacks. The biggest roll Eddie Caboff had seen since the days of easy money. There's much to try it. Said Owen, and as much again if you make good. Caboff's glance wavered a moment between the penetrating eyes of Owen and the money in his hand. Take it. It's yours. The flabby hand closed almost caressingly around the roll. We'll go in and have a look at the brood. He said they followed him through a line of stalls to a large padded box at the far end of the barn. A beautiful bay saddle horse occupied the box. Caboff entered and called the animal, which answered by flying into a seeming fury, plunging about the box, kicking, rearing and snapping. Same old devil. Muddered Hicks. He'll do. The sight of an apple in Caboff's hand calmed the animal. It came to him and ate docilely while he slipped a bridle over its head. Once outside the stall, however, it began another rampage. Hicks held a last whispered conversation with Caboff, giving him minute instructions. I can just try it, you know. Said Caboff. I can't guarantee they'd get away with it. As much again if you do, you know. Said Owen, as he started briskly away with Hicks. The place that Pantella had chosen for the start of his balloon ascension was a field upon the crest of the palisades above the amusement park. Pantella had brought with him from abroad a reputation for daredevil adventures in the air, and he had proved his reckless courage in the several brief ascensions that he had already made on this side. Today, with his promise of the longest parachute drop on record, people flocked to the field from New York and all adjacent New Jersey. I wish you wouldn't always invite that velvet pod servant on our trips. Grumbled Harry to Pauline, as Owen went for his dustcoat. Owen is my trustee and guardian. You have no right to speak of him as a servant. Besides, when he's along, he keeps you from being silly. Harry stamped out to the garage, swung a new touring car around to the door, and soon, with Owen and Pauline, was speeding for the ferry. Signor Pantella was super-intending the filling of the great gas bag. He was a tall, lith man in pink tights beneath which his muscles bulged angularly like the gas-filling the balloon bag. A Latin rapidity of speech and motion added to the pink tights made him comically frog-like, and even the abittus of metals on his breast could not save his dignity. He bustled about giving orders to the workmen who were preparing to cut their ropes, then flitting back to the crowd to answer the questions of impromptu admirers. Owen had left the car and was standing between Owen and Harry near the rapidly-filling bag. I wish I could talk to him, too. He's so cute and hippity-hoppy, she said. Owen stepped to Pantella's side. Would you permit the young lady to see the balloon basket? He asked. With pleasure. Said the airman after a glance at Pauline. He led the way to the basket and helped Pauline up so that she could look at the equipment, the anchor with its long coil of rope, the sandbags, and water-bottles. She was plainly fascinated as Pantella explained the manner of his flight and his drop through the air. As she saw them attach the basket to the tugging bag she was thrilled. At this moment there was a flurry of excitement on the outskirts of the crowd. A horseman on a beautiful bay-mount that was evidently unmanageable came plunging and swerving down the field. The crowd broke and scattered in front of the menacing hooves that flew in the air as the vicious animal reared. The horseman, clad in a somewhat threadbare riding suit, was a small man with beady black eyes that turned from side to side as he swayed in the saddle. He seemed to be afraid of his mount and to be looking for help. But it was remarkable that apparently so poor a rider held his seat and actually managed to bring the beast to a nervous stand some fifty yards from the balloon. The little man looked around over the heads of the crowd. He caught sight of Owen beside Pauline near the balloon basket. The lifting of his riding-cap might, or might not, have been a salute and signal. Oh, I wish I hadn't promised Harry not to go up. I know Senor Pannatello would take me. Side Pauline. Harry had turned away to watch the actions of the strange horseman. You might scare him a little, Owen suggested. Those words were the greatest risk he had taken in all his deeply-laid plots. Pauline caught at the suggestion eagerly. She sprang lightly from the little platform into the balloon car. A murmur of mingled astonishment, applause and alarm rose from the crowd. Two of the workmen were cutting the last ropes that held the basket to earth. And others were holding it with their hands awaiting the airmen. Pantella purposefully delayed the moment of mounting the basket. The tugging of the huge balloon against the strength of a dozen men gave impress to his feet and he liked the state of suspense. But the sound from the surprise throng called his attention now to a scene that made him forget affectation and effect. He started to run toward the basket, shouting preemptory orders. Out of the car! Out of the car! Instantly, madam, you are risking your life! His excitement infected the crowd, surging it seemed to sweep with it the rider on the rested horse. Four, as a hand was suddenly lifted in the midst of the crowd, the horse apparently overcame the legs braced to spring. It shot forward directly at the balloon basket. The hand that had been raised was the hand of Raymond Owen. All was happening so swiftly that neither Harry nor Pantella reached the basket before the maddened animal. The crowd had given way and panic before it. Cries of fright were mingled with cries of pain as the beast charged straight upon the men holding the basket, felling and crushing them with shoulder and hoof. For an instant a few desperate hands held to the wrenching car. Pantella had all but reached the platform. Harry was within arm's length of it. When, with a writhing twist, the bag jerked, the basket sideways and upward, knocking to the ground the last two men who had held it and whirling forth into the deathly emptiness of space, a cowering, stunned girl whose white face peered and white hands pleaded over the basket rim, peered down upon the upturned faces of thousands who would have risked their lives to aid, but who stood helpless in their pity, hushed in fear. For a moment Harry had stood dazed. It was as if the twanging taunt of the ropes, as the bag tore almost from his grasp the most precious being in the world, had snapped the fibers of action in him. The days passed quickly, but in the moment of its passing the balloon risen now five hundred feet in the air had swept its way westward over a mile of ground. Harry turned to look for his motor car. Standing as he was at the spot from which the balloon had ascended, he now faced a human barricade. With a shout of warning he charged at what seemed to be a vulnerable point in the files of wedged shoulders. The wall resisted. The throng was lost to all but the dimming view of the balloon. Harry swung right and left with his broad shoulders. He tore his way through. The car was standing where he had left it on the outskirts of the field. As he approached it he saw Owen emerge from the crowd and hurry toward a runabout that had just been driven upon the field. What's the matter? Yelled a man in the machine and Harry recognized the voice of Hicks. Miss Mothen carried away in the balloon cried Owen in a tone of excitement that was not all feigned. He joined Hicks beside the runabout. Harry sprang to the seat of his touring car. It seemed to leap forward. He shot past the two conspirators and heard Owen's voice calling after him. Wait! Where are you going? I'll go with you. You're too late. shouted Harry bitterly over his shoulder. An envelope of dust sealed itself around the spinning wheels of the big machine as he took the road after the balloon. Steadfast but hopeless he fixed his eyes upon the unconquerable thing in its unassailable element, a thing that seemed to be fleeing from him as if inspired by a human will. Death rode beside him at his breakneck speed but he did not know it. He knew only that he must follow that black beacon in the sky, that he must be there when its flight was over, when the end came. He did not know that Owen and Hicks in the runabout were also following, that they too watched with an interest as deep as his, with a hope as poignant as his hopelessness, the dizzy voyage of Pauline. End of CHAPTER X CHAPTER XI From Cloud to Cliff. Wonder what he thinks he can do. growled Hicks as they sat in the runabout and watched Harry pass them. Trying to break his own neck for nothing. replied Owen. If he keeps up that speed, we'll get both birds with one sandbag. I hope so. He didn't speak did he? You can see by the way he acts he don't want us around, even now. Doesn't matter what he wants, it's what he does. You don't think he can save her? He might, and I don't want her saved this time Hicks, you understand? I can't afford it this time, I've said too much. Well? Where did you get this runabout? Upper East Side Private Party, I didn't want to do any business near home. That's right, how much is this machine worth? Asked Owen, irrelevantly. Oh, six or seven hundred? It ain't new, why? If anything should happen to it, there wouldn't be any trouble provided the bill was paid, was there? I got an idea the owner would grab it three hundred for this year, buggy, but why? And if this automobile disappeared, vanished no trace of it, you're sure there wouldn't be any investigation? Pursued Owen. Yes, it would be all right I tell you, but I want to know what your scheme is. How can you use this machine to get rid of Harry? Tell me. Hicks insisted. Never mind, yet. How do you make the course to the balloon now? I guess she'll go over Quirksboro and then up between Hoxie and Brent. Then we can pass him at Quirksboro. How do you figure that? He'll stop for gasoline. He hasn't got enough to go more than two miles beyond there. I saw that he hadn't when we set out. What do you want to pass him for? Why not let him both break their own merry little necks and us pick him up and do the weeping afterwards? That's our music. You fool. Don't you think a balloon never came down safe yet? Don't you know that young devil has got his head full of schemes to beat me out again? I tell you, we've got to make sure of this trick. We've got to get him. Unconsciously, Hicks brought the machine to a stop as both men strained their eyes at the balloon, now traversing a lower course more slowly. They saw Pauline stand erect in the basket and lift the heavy anchor over the side. Harry, going at terrific speed on the deserted road, saw the drop of the anchor with a thrill of hope. At least, even if it was useless in itself, it showed him that Pauline was brave and calm enough to use her wits. He waved again, but there was no answering signal. Suddenly the balloon itself was lost to sight from the road. At the lowering angle, drawn downward partly by the anchor and partly by the gradual loss of gas, it swung over the hills. The road led between two hills. Beyond, it curved to the east and north. As he reached the curve, Harry was surprised that the balloon was not in sight. When after circling another hill, Harry had still failed to pick it up, he was alarmed as well as puzzled. The hills had muddled his senses of direction, but he knew that he was near the river again, back on the verge of the palisades. This added to his fears. There was but one thing to do, though, follow the road. He went on slowly. Suddenly he uttered a cry and threw on full speed. Over the top of a high jagged cliff, set like a rampart between two bastion knolls, he saw the upper half of the gas bag. It veered and tossed in the wind like a tethered thing. The basket was invisible, but Harry knew that the anchor had caught on the cliff side. As he neared it, he discovered that what was a cliff on one side was the river wall on the other. He thanked heaven that the road led to the top of it. He turned the machine up the road, which threaded narrow ledges through growths of bramble and stunted trees. He saw and turned sick in soul and body, for the pulling of the balloon held the basket almost inverted, and Pauline was not in the basket. The anchor had doubled itself into rock or root far down the cliff side. From it the balloon dragged toward the river instead of toward the shore. The taut rope writhed fifty feet out from the top of the declivity. To the edge of the cliff crawled Harry. He moved rapidly, but at the utmost verge he paused and covered his eyes with his hand. At last he looked down. To Pauline on her wild flight had come increasing calm. As she felt the balloon reaching lower levels, though it still soared high above the hills, she even allowed herself a little hope. Leaning over she watched the shining blades of the anchor dance through the air. North-eastward she could see the waves of the great river dancing. On the little anchor hung her hope of life. In the water, beyond the farthest cliff, lay her final peril. She had lost track of Harry and the other automobile long ago. She had given up all hope of aid from any living thing. The balloon moved slowly above the palisade. The anchor dragged on the landward side of the knolls. These were sheer rock that the steel talons clawed in vain. The balloon moved out over the river, then suddenly glided back. An eddy of breeze from the water had turned its course. The anchor dangled along the river wall of the precipice. Pauline seized the rope. She alternately pulled and loosened it, trying to hook the anchor to tree or shrub. Suddenly she was flung forward, almost out of the basket. The balloon had stopped with a jerk. Hopefully, fearfully, she pulled in the rope. The anchor held. The balloon was tugging and swaying wildly, but its tether did not break. She looked down at the ledge. Between her and that narrow footing, the only thoroughfare was two hundred feet of swaying rope. She pulled upon the rope again. She dropped two more of the heavy ballast bags over the side, and the bag shook and groaned upon its stays as it dragged the anchor deeper into the rock. She put her feet over the edge of the basket. With her hands clutching the rim, she lowered herself. Taking her hands from the basket and grasping the rope, she started down. The raw hemp tore her hands. The fearful strain upon her arms made her sick and faint. Only desperation nerved her after the first ten yards. The wrenching of the balloon whirled and jostled her. At first, holding only by her hands, she was flung out from the aft hell-yard like a flag. Then instinct told her to wrap her feet around it, and she trembled on. She looked down once, saw the far-swaying river, and looked quickly up again. It was not until her groping feet touched the rock of the ledge that she opened her eyes again. At the top of a slender rope whirled and veered and battled a balloon with an empty basket. The sound of creaking ropes mingled in her ears with the chugging of a motor-car. The chugging seemed a long way off, but its noise seemed to make her dizzy. She sank in a dead faint upon the narrow ledge beside the hooked anchor. Pauline! Pauline! It's I, Harry. Can you hear me? Pauline! There came no sound in answer. Only the creaking of the balloon rope in the air. The rasping of the anchor fluke upon the stone. He sprang up and back to the motor and began throwing out the robes, blankets, tools, and chains. He laid a blanket on the ground and began to slash it into strips with his pocketknife. In the ends of the strips he cut slits and linked the slits with the chains to form a rope. He paused only once in his frantic labor. That was when he rushed back to the edge of the cliff to look again and call again in vain. He fastened the chain at the end of his strange line to a sapling growing some ten feet back of the verge and with a throb of relief saw the other end drop to within a few feet of the unconscious girl. He tested the strength of the cable by pulling on it with all his might. It did not give. He put himself over the cliffside and began the descent. Owen and Hicks had not only lost the balloon, but had lost Harry, too. They could follow him only by the deep cut tracks of his flying car, and these were as likely to be over marshes and fields as on the highway. More than once Hicks urged that they turn back. We can't do no good, he argued. If they ain't dead they ain't. That's all. I've got to be sure. Muddered Owen. The little runabout had a hard fight to climb the cliff that Harry's big car had taken so easily. But as they came through the grove into view of the balloon and the empty basket, the two felt amply rewarded for their worry and trouble and toil. My George, it has happened. It's done. Muddered Owen. No artist gazing on a finished masterpiece. No conqueror, thanking the fates for victory, could have spoken with more triumphant fervor. But Hicks was out of the machine and running to Harry's car. He saw the shreds of the blankets. He saw the knife. Finally he caught a glimpse of the chain that was fastened to the sapling. Don't be so sure. Come on, but come quiet. He caught down on his hands and knees and crawled to the edge of the cliff. Owen followed him. Together they drew back with gasps of surprise and anger. Hicks sprang to his feet. His big-bladed knife flashed in his hand. He sawed excitedly at the small chain. A low curse escaped him as the blade bent on the links. Owen had dashed to Harry's auto. He was back with a pair of heavy pliers. In a flash he had cut the chain. The end of it shot over the cliff. There was a startled cry from below. It was several minutes before Hicks and Owen looked down again. The man they thought they had just killed and the girl whom they had marked to die stood on the ledge in each other's arms, oblivious of life or death or foe or friend, of everything but love. Pauline was still a quiver with the shock of her waking. A cry ringing above her had brought her from her swoon, and she had looked up to see the terrible balloon still reeling over her and to find Harry dangling from a rope's end not ten feet away. She rose weakly and stretched out her arms to him. Be still. Don't move, dear. He called softly. You can't help me. You! There was a sudden snapping sound from over the top of the cliff. The chain end of the line fell upon his shoulders. He dropped joltingly to the ledge and lunged forward toward a further fall. It was the soft arms of Pauline that caught and held him, both trembling a little as their lips met. From overhead came the sound of a starting automobile. Harry shouted at the top of his voice. There was no answer. He stopped quickly and picked up the severed end of the lifeline. Look! It wasn't broken. It was cut. He cried, Good Heaven, Polly! Who is it that hates us like that? For answer she merely nestled nearer in his protecting arms. They sat down on the ledge and Harry's keen eyes watched the tantrums of the balloon in the wind. It was pulling fiercely toward the river now, but the anchor held fast. Suddenly Harry sprang up. Pauline started to follow his example, but he motioned her to stay where she was. In his hand gleamed the revolver that he had carried ever since the battle in Baskinelli's Den. Who is it? whispered Pauline. Can you see someone? He raised the revolver in the air, took aim, and fired. The balloon rope at his feet suddenly slacked and he caught at its sagging loop to keep the anchor from loosening. He fired twice again at the balloon bag, and Pauline, clinging to his shoulder, saw the monster that had held her aslave to its elemental power, that like some winged gorgon had held her captive in a labyrinth of air, crumple and wither and fall at the prick of a bullet, saw it collapse into a mass of tangled leather and rope, and slide in final ruin down the smooth cliff. She looked at Harry with a whimsical smile that she could not suppress, even on the dizzy heights of danger. Did you really think I would fly away again? She asked. Hopeless ward. He said. Pitiful case. Miss Pauline Marvin, crazy heiress, thinks she's funny when she's merely getting killed. No, Miss Flippancy, I wanted a line to slide the rest of the way on. He announced as he gave the anchor rope a twist around a rock. Pauline's merriment vanished like a flash. Oh, I can't do it again, Harry. I can't! She cried tremulously. It will be easy this time. He told her. Here, give me your hands. With a piece of the blanket rope he tied her wrists together and placed her arms about his shoulders. Using a rope that sagged away to the wrecked balloon on the road far below. He placed a leg over the ledge, wrapped it around the rope and bracing the other foot against the rock wall, started joyously on his fearful task. Joyously, for if ever man rejoiced at the gates of death, it was Harry Marvin. To him the chance to risk his life today was a blessing and a boon. That was what he had prayed for, hopelessly, on the long motor dash in the wake of the balloon. Just the chance to try and save her. To die with her was all he asked. To die fighting for her was all he wanted. And here he was, holding her in his arms on a stout rope, already halfway down the cliff. At the bottom he let her feel the firm earth once more. Now you can open your eyes. He said. With his torn hands he started to lift her arms from his neck, but she clung there, weeping. Oh, Harry, you are so patient, so good and brave, and I have made you risk your life again for me. Sure, that's it, worry about me now. He grumbled, although he held her tenderly and close. When will you find out that my life doesn't matter? It's yours that counts. I will never, never do it again, said Pauline, like a naughty child. You used to say that when you were four years old. It was usually a lie. Said Harry, I love you, said Pauline, irrelevantly. Then why in the dickens don't you marry me? He demanded. Because she stopped, steps sounded from the roadway. They peered through the thicket that concealed them, and saw Owen approaching. Pauline hailed him. He turned toward the thicket in obsequescence haste. Thank heaven, Miss Marvin. He cried. It must be a miracle, and you were safe too. He added, turning to Harry. How did you know I was ever in danger? inquired Harry grimly. We heard shots. Explained Owen. We saw the balloon fall, and we knew what you had done. It was magnificent. I congratulate you. Congratulate Pauline, said Harry. She slid out of heaven, while I only slid downhill. Where is your car, Mr. Marvin? Up on the hill, if the kind persons who cut the chains didn't take it with them. Owen did not change color. Well, I'll go and see if it's there. If not, I'll find Hicks and his runabout. He's waiting somewhere about. He set off briskly up the road. Pauline, you still trust that man? asked Harry. One has to trust one's guardian, doesn't one? He tossed his hands above his head in a gesture of give it all up. That's right, keep him there. said a rough voice, and a wiry man with white handkerchiefs tied over his face below the eyes, spraying with crunching strides through the bushes. Keep up your hands, I say. He thundered at Harry as he leveled a revolver. Pauline was beside him, and Harry dared not move. But Pauline dared. With the resourceful courage that always inspired her, she whipped his revolver out of his hip pocket and fired at the intruder's head. His hat fluttered off into the road. He sprang at Pauline and rested the gun from her. As Harry rushed him, he had no time to fire, but the butt of one revolver crashed on the young man's forehead. Harry sank unconscious in the road. Pauline knelt beside him. She was screaming for Owen, even for Hicks. Hicks was instantly beside her, but not to aid or rescue. For Hicks was the man with the handkerchief mask. He half-dragged, half-carried Pauline to a thicket that concealed the runabout. He drew a roll of tire-tape from under the seat and bound it cruelly around her lips. He took ropes and tied her hands and feet, placed her in the seat beside him, and started the machine. If Harry, struggling to rise out of the dust of the road, could have seen Pauline now, bound and gagged beside Hicks in the runabout, he would have known her to be in greater peril than ever the balloon had brought her. Pauline was not long unhidden. As the quick ear of Hicks caught the sound of wheels, he grasped her roughly by the arm and thrust her into the bottom of the machine. Without taking his hand from the lever or slackening speed, he pulled a blanket over her and tucked it in with one hand. Don't move, either. He growled. Or you know. A farmer on his wagon came around a bend. His cheery good morning brought only a grunt from Hicks. But the sound of the kind voice thrilled Pauline. She struggled under the blanket and almost reached a sitting posture before Hicks crushed her back. The runabout had flashed by, but the farmer had seen something that alarmed even his stall at mind. When a half-mile up the road he came upon a young man, dazed and wounded, staggering through the dust, he drew rain and leaped out. A draught of whiskey from the farmer's bottle braced Harry. You passed them on the road? He cried. A machine with a man in it and something else, something in the bottom of it that moved, said the farmer. A horse? Said Harry. Quick! One of yours will do. The farmer hesitated. Harry thrust money into his hand. Quick! He shouted. Together they unharnessed the team. Coatless and hatless, tattered, wounded and stained, Harry swung himself to the bareback of a stirrupless steed and galloped out on what he knew was the most dangerous of all the pathways of Pauline. End of Chapter 11 From Cloud to Cliff The Perils of Pauline Chapter 12 by Charles Goddard This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Chapter 12 The Old Grigsby House Pays Penance To young Bassett of the American, the excitement of existence since he became a reporter and joined the jihous of the truth wagon had consisted mainly of chasing pictures in the afternoons and going to strings of banquets at night. He had no more enthusiasm for photographs than he had for banquets. Word painting and graining was his art. And so, when a big story walked up and beckoned to him, he was as happy as a boy in love. It had been a dull day for news. The evening papers were barren of suggestions, and the assignments had run out before Bassett's name was reached. That meant another afternoon of dismal lingering in the office without even a photograph to chase. Bassett flung himself disgustedly into a chair and straightened a newspaper with a vicious crackle as the last of the other reporters hurried out. He thought he caught a gleam of merry pity in the reporter's eye. Never mind. Let him laugh. Let him wait. One of these days he'll be the one getting the real stuff and putting it through, too, from tip to type, without a rewrite man or a copy-reader touching it. Let him wait. In a balloon, where? The suddenly vibrant voice of the city editor talking over the telephone caused Bassett to lower his paper and hushed even the chatter of the office boys. Palisades? Panatella? Yes? Who's the girl? You don't know? The paper dropped from Bassett's hands. Much obliged. I'll have a man over there, but you go right ahead. The city editor clicked down the receiver and whirled in his chair. Oh, Bassett! Our Weehawken man says a young woman has been carried off by Panatella's balloon. They've lost the balloon. Get a car and get over there quick. Go as far as you like, only find the girl and let me hear from you. Quick! Bassett jumped to a phone and ordered a high-powered machine to meet him at 96th Street. He ran down William Street, with his straw hat under his arm, and dived into the subway. An express had him at 96th Street in a few minutes. His machine was there. They dashed for the ferry and were on the aviation field before the bewildered crowd that had witnessed the runaway flight of the balloon had dispersed. Bassett jumped out and mingled with the people. They knew nothing except the general direction toward the west that the balloon had taken. Bassett had pursued for a long way, but had seen the gas bag turn to the north and disappear in the hills. The automobilists had returned, most of them. Two, who had been with the girl before she leaped into the basket, had not returned. Bassett got back in the car beside the driver and they glided off on the westward road. Often in the farmhouses along the route had seen the balloon, but the houses were further and further apart as Bassett's course was drawn northward and often he missed the trail. The trail was blazed by the wheel-ruts of a giant touring car and a small runabout that frequently left the highways and plowed across the fields. He lost them in the middle of a field that was marshy where the automobiles left the road and rocked dry at the middle and further side. After a half-hour's maneuvering he ordered the driver to go back to the road. Maybe they'd done the same thing, turned around and come back. Suggested the chauffeur, Hello! What kind of rig is that? He added as a wagon appeared around a bend in the road. The peculiar thing about the rig was that while it was a tongued wagon with wiffle trees for two horses, there was only one horse. The driver, a bearded farmer, was urging the patient animal on, although it was impossible for it to do more than plod in its awkward harness. What's the matter? Called Bassett cheerily as the machine drew alongside and stopped. I don't know. Replied the farmer, shaking his grizzled beard. If I was a young fellow like you I'd go right off and find out. I'll go right away. What's up? I don't know. I ain't known anything like it in this part of the country in fifty years. First down yonder on the old river road I meet an automobile with a man driving it and something alive and moving lying in a blanket by his feet. I ain't got more than a half-mile back from there when I find a fine young feller with his good clothes, what he's got left, tore to pieces, no shoes or hat on him and his head bleeding bad from cuts. Where are they? Did you see a automobile? He yells at me. I tells him what I had saw and he takes my off-hust there and goes galloping up the road. What road? Cried Bassett. He circled this here field and climbed the hill, then take the first turn. Which way? West, if you don't want to jump in the river. What? We're back at the river. Gassed Bassett? That's about my luck. The balloon's gone over the river, it's in New York and some Harlem reporter is leading it down to his office on a leash to have it photographed and I'm hoodoo, that's all. I don't know, said the farmer. But if he asked me, I'd say that feller in the automobile was making for the woods beyond Quirksboro. It's lonely up through there and he had something in that there machine that he wanted to keep lonely, I'm guessing. Bassett motioned to the driver to go on. She might as well see what it is, the balloon's gone home for supper. He said bitterly. In five minutes they reached the turn where the farmer had last seen Harry Marvin disappear. They took the turn into an ill-kept, dust-heavy road that had cast its blight of brown upon the reeds bartering it. The woods became more and more dense and the road more narrow. In some places the dust was crusted as it had dried after the last rain and the men in the automobile could see that the wheels of another machine and the hooves of a galloping horse had plunged through this crust but a short time before. Around a bend in the road, going at full speed, Bassett sighted Harry Marvin for the first time. He stood up beside the driver and hailed him but Harry did not even turn around. The beat of his horse's hooves drowned the sound. The deep lines of the runabout's wheels and the dust held his gaze and his senses to one thing alone, the rescue of Pauline. He urged the poor beast to its last tug of strength. Weak and dizzy from his wound he knew that he could go but a little way afoot. The road's high, close-set wall of trees was broken for the first time by a little clearing. Harry's passing glance showed him that there was a house in the clearing. He was exhausted and a thirst but his eyes swept back to the wheel-tracks on the road. The runabout had gone on. Harry, without drawing rain, was about to follow. But suddenly, weirdly, the rickety walls of the deserted house gave forth a sound, a rattle and a crash, and from a shuttered window beside a low-sealed door bellied a sheet of smoke. Harry reigned the foaming horse and sprang off. Freed from his weight the animal staggered on a few paces and fell, panting in the dust. Harry did not see it. He was battering at the door of the burning house. Hicks could hardly be called a nervous or a timid man. He was certainly not a coward like Owen. But neither did he have the shrewd, scheming mind which was the bulwark of the craven secretary's weakness. At the moment when they discovered the young lovers safe at the foot of the cliff after the escape from the balloon and rock ledge, the two arch conspirators were two very different men. Owen was shaking like a leaf in his terror of discovery, but thinking of a hundred schemes to save himself. Hicks was deadly cool and thinking of just one thing, immediate and cold-blooded murder. But now, although he thought he had killed Harry, although he knew he had Pauline gagged and bound in the bottom of the runabout, Hicks was afraid. He was afraid of the incompleteness of the thing. He was eager to have done with the girl as well as with the man. And now this latest plan of Owens was but another chapter of procrastination. The incident of the farmer's curiosity had unnerved him too. He put back over his face one of the white handkerchiefs that he had taken off when he began the flight. There's no more pity the poor girl's stuff in this. He said gruffly to Pauline, If you don't get quiet I'll kill you. I mean what I say. He still had the instinctive crook sense to conceal his natural voice. Hicks was afraid. But as mile after mile fell behind them and the westerning sun gave promise of the early shelter of dark, he began to gain confidence. He mumbled to himself reminiscently. The old Grigsby house, eh, nobody but. He checked himself. Nobody but somebody would have thought of that. The old Grigsby house, in front of which the runabout came to a stop after many miles of travel, was set back from the road about three hundred yards. In front of it, and on either side, the trees had been cut away, but a tangle of riotous shrubbery lined the path to the door. Behind the house the trees had been left untouched, and now, in its tottering condition, the venerable building literally rested on two of the great elms, like an old man on crutches. The windows were few and shuttered. The black steel blinds were dead as the eyes of a skull. The steel was not rusted, and only a little weather-stained. There were no steps to the door. It opened on the ground level, with a cracked board serving as both porch and foot-mat. The signs of attempted preservation were what gave the place its ominous air. There was a menace in the steel shutters of the old Grigsby house, and in the fact that the path to the door was kept clear. Up this path Hicks carried Pauline. Before he lifted her in his arms he tested her bonds. He did not know that Pauline was too terrified to conceive the simplest plan of action. Compared with the fear that possessed her now, the torturing suspense of the balloon flight seemed like peace and safety. Hicks held her with one arm, while with the other he unlocked the low door. Swinging heavy on strong hinges, it opened into a narrow hall, mildewed with the dampness of decay, the dust of disuse. He carried Pauline up the stairs, which groaned and bent under his steps and pushed open a door. There was a broken chair, a table, a cot, a wash stand, with pitcher and bowl, and a small oil lamp set in a bracket on the wall. Hicks laid Pauline on the cot and lighted the lamp using the same match for a cigarette. He seemed spurred by a desire to get away as if the tottering grimy halls held memories too grim for even his hardened soul. After testing the shutters of the window, which were locked on the outside, he stepped back to the cot and cut Pauline's bonds and removed the bandage from her lips. As she fell back in a half-swoon, he hurried through the door, closed and locked it and went down the stairs. Halfway down he stalked abruptly, stood for a moment listening, then hastened on, dropping his cigarette over the banister. He did not see where it fell, he did not care. His only aim was to get out, to get away. He had heard a sound as he came down the stairs that turned his fear to terror. It was the distant grumble of an automobile horn. He locked the door and sped down the bramble walled path to the runabout. He had left it in the middle of the road so that as he leaped in and started again it left no swerve of its wheel-ruts toward the old Grigsby House. It was five miles to the nearest town, but Hicks made it in twenty minutes and without hearing again the threatening automobile horn. The first thing he did was to telephone to Owen. For half an hour Owen had been locked in the library of the Marvin House, the events of the early afternoon, the failure of his best-laid plans, the suspense of waiting the result of Hicks' final move, had made him a nervous wreck. He had lighted a dozen cigars and thrown them away. As many times he had picked up the telephone only to set it down again without calling a number. At last he had taken out the thin tube of light pills, had drawn the shades, switched on the electric lights, and sat down to wait for the half-piece that Morphean brought to his conscience. As he leaned back in his chair, awaiting the effect of the drug, the mummy in its case stood in front of him. He closed his eyes in a pleasant stupor. He opened them in terror. For a moment his hands were outstretched in front of him with claw-like fingers clutching at thin air. Then he covered his eyes with them to shut from view the mummy which stood over him, its upraised hand pointing to him the finger of accusation, its woman's eyes blazing with anger, its cold lips speaking a message that chilled his blood. The telephone bell jangled again and again before Owen found courage to open his eyes. When he did so he clutched at the instrument, eager for the sound of a human voice. Hello? Yes, this is Owen. He glanced apprehensively over his shoulder at the mummy, its hand was lowered and it stood motionless as before. He turned excitedly back to the telephone. It's you. Ix, what news? She's at Grigsby's? What do you mean? Somebody after you? Not him? I give you my word, there hadn't been anything on that road for two months. What have you done? What? Nothing? You should have called the police from Jersey. I've gone to pieces. Stay over there. I'll join you tonight. Yes, go back to the house and watch. What? All right. Pauline, left alone, began to regain her courage. After a few moments she was able to stand up and move slowly about her prison room. She tried the door and the window shutters mechanically. She searched the room for something that might be used to batter down the door. There was nothing. She sat on the cot and tried to think. She sprang up again, trembling. The dry, choking smell of smoke had reached her. Hicks' lighted cigarette had fallen among the wisps of old wallpaper in the hall. She ran to the door, baffled, piteous, alone she turned and looked on death. Over through the cracks in the floor flashed now the golden daggers of flame in sheaths of stifling smoke. She cowered, choking, by the outer wall of the room. The flame daggers grew into scimitars. The inner wall caught fire. There was no outlet for the suffocating smoke. She sprang to the middle of the room and seized the broken chair. With all her might she crashed it against the door. It fell in pieces at her feet. She picked up a leg of the chair and running to the window pounded upon the shutters. She screamed and beat upon the shutters. It was the rattle and crash upon the shutters that made Harry reign in his horse before the old Grigsby house. He saw smoke burst from the lower windows and battering on the locked door he heard her screams. It was to him she called again in her peril, as she had called before, in the wreck of the yacht, in the den of Basconelli, and even this day from the rim of the runaway balloon. Always inspired by that call he had found their way to safety. He thrust the full weight of his mighty body against the door which held like solid rock. He came the cries again. I'm coming Polly, I'm here. He dashed to where a heavy tree-limb had fallen, carried it to the door, raised it, and charged with it as a battering-gram. He might as well have slapped the door with his flat palm. He looked at the windows once the smoke poured, smoke mingled with flame. If crazed by the cries from above he raised the limb to try to break the shutters. He stopped and let it fall. The toot of an automobile horn and the excited voice of young Bassett stopped him. What's doing? Gasp the reporter. Is anybody in there? Harry pointed to the shuttered window of the upper room. The cries came again, and with the sound of the woman's voice Bassett turned sick. He made a dizzy charge at the door, but Harry caught him back. All three together. He said. They flung their strength at the portal, but still it held. Bassett turned away sobbing. He looked up to see Harry spring into the big car which he forced through the brambles. What are you doing? You're crazy! He yelled the chauffeur, running toward the machine. Get her, if I can't, after the smash. As Harry's answer, the car lunged on at full speed. The impact rocked the burning house. Frame and door crashed down together before the battering car. It plowed for half its length into the smoke and fire, stopped an instant, quivered and backed out again, splendid ruin. On Harry's forehead a deep cut streamed. It sprang to catch him, but he climbed out unhelped. Together they leaped the shattered wall. Through searing smoke they climbed the quaking stairs and burst into the shuttered room. The lamp still flickered dimly in its bracket. Pauline. Called Harry, chokingly. Pauline, answer me. There was no answer. On hands and knees he groped over the hot floor. He found her by the window where she had fallen, and flames choked them as they fled. Outside he knelt beside her, chafing her hands when she awakened. He had turned her so that she did not see the towering glare of the flames as the old Grigsby house furnished burnt pennants for its crime. Pauline raised her arms and touched tenderly his bleeding brow. He lifted her into the car that Bassett and the driver had patched up. Home, James! said Bassett with a tired grin. But stop it a telephone somewhere, and let me tell my boss I've got a piece for the paper. End of Chapter 12 The old Grigsby house pays pennants. The Perils of Pauline Chapter 13 by Charles Goddard This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Chapter 13 Double Cross Ranch I tell you, Harry, I can't endure it. I couldn't face anyone I know. I want to run away, far, far away, where nobody ever heard of balloons, or automobiles, or me. Polly, you aren't afraid of a little talk, are you? Everyone is saying how brave you were, and here, when the danger's over, I find you a flimsy little coward. She picked up one of a pile of newspapers that lay on the stand beside her, and thrust it before Harry's eyes with a manner at once questioning and rebuking. He read the headlines. Every girl carried off in balloon. Miss Pauline Marvin has remarkable experience after accident on Palisades. Harry laughed and patted her hand reassuringly. Oh, but that's only one of them! Wailed Pauline. Look at this one! Pauline Marvin, lost in the sky. Can any woman live after that? She cried. Why, it's no crime to be lost in a balloon. Did Harry— See? They tell it just as it was. They make you a real heroine. A man might live it down, dear, but a woman never. To be lost in the sky is altogether too giddy. Margaret, she called, the maid stepped quickly forward. You may pack my things, Margaret, and be sure to put in some warm winter ones. Is the snow on mountains cold like real snow, or is it like the frosting on cake? She inquired, turning again to Harry. What are you up to this time? He demanded. Montana, first! She proclaimed with a melodramatic flourish. And if I am followed by my fame or my relatives, I shall go on. To the end of the world! Harry had long ago abandoned the idea of laughing at her whims. Even the most fantastic of her projects was serious to her. He merely looked at her in mute suspense, awaiting the fall of the blow. You needn't begin to see trouble yet! She laughed. But I am going, Harry. I'm going to accept Mary Haines' invitation and visit her and her nice, queer husband on their ranch. You remember Mrs. Haines, that dear Western girl that we met on the steamer when she was on her honeymoon? Well, it's pretty tough just at this time. Objected, Harry. Business is bothersome. And I had to be here. But if you insist— Oh, you're not coming with me, stated Pauline cheerily. In the first place you are not invited, and in the second place you are not needed in the least. Now get me a telegraph blank. He came back with the desired paper and a fountain pen, and she scribbled, Mrs. Mary Haines, Rockvale, Montana, Care Double Cross Ranch, arrive Thursday at 8 a.m. We'll explain haste when see you, Pauline Marvin. Run down and phone that to the telegraph office, she told Harry. And now for the packing, Margaret, she thrust a tiny foot in a pink slipper over the edge of the bed. But you are illness, Marvin, protested the nurse, with a first faint assertion of authority. That's so, said Pauline. How can we get around that? Oh, yes. It's time for your airing, dear. And when you come back I shall be well unpacked. Plenty of air, suggested Harry sarcastically from the doorway. If it takes you as long to pack as it does to put on your hat. Pauline flung him a laughing grimace, and he strode off to the library. As he was repeating the brief message to the telegraph office, he did not hear the light footfalls that ceased at the library door. Nor could he see the drawn gray face of Owen, who heard the message spoken over the telephone, and was passing up the stairs with his slow, dignified tread, when Harry came into the hall. Good morning, Mr. Harry. I see you're quite yourself again. Yesterday was a terrible day. You do look done up. Had Harry, curtly, as he picked up his hat? Owen's step was not slow or dignified after the door shut upon Harry. He sprang up the last stairs and into his own room. Here on a small riding desk was another telephone. He snatched it up nervously and gave the call number of the place where he had held his first conference with Hicks. He held a brief conversation over the wire, snapped down the receiver, sprang to a wardrobe for his hat and stick, and hurried from the house. The dullness that a sleepless night had left in his eyes had disappeared. The fear that had shaken him ever since the uncanny reappearance of Harry and Pauline was dissipated, or at least concealed by a new hope, a new plan of destruction. He knew only that Pauline was going away, and that she must be followed, no matter wither her whims might lead. Hicks was seated in a corner of the rendezvous, drinking whiskey and water. He was plainly in a black mood. You got a pretty fat roll yesterday, Hicks, but— Owen drew out his wallet. Here's a little. Get yourself ready to make a trip tomorrow. I'll let you know the time and the train. Hicks looked covetously at the bells, but he demurred. You mean we're after them too again? Hicks, we must be after them, because one of them will soon be after us. Where are they going now? Rockvale, Montana, that is, the girls going. What I haven't found out yet is where the Harry goes to, and if he stays here, I'll stay, and you'll go west. After Pauline? Ahead of her. And then what? Then you will have to use your own judgment, but don't get excited and kill her, Hicks. He accompanied the sharp warning with the alleviating roll of yellow blacks, which Hicks quickly deposited in an inside pocket. The next morning they shook hands at the gate of the Pennsylvania station, Hicks looking a bit uncomfortable but much improved in a suit of new clothes, and carrying a suitcase hurried to catch the flyer for the west. A few hours later Owen was wishing a happy journey to Pauline at the same station rail. Mary Haynes stood in the low doorway of the double-cross ranch house and gazed down the sun-baked road to where, in the far distance, a little wisp of dust was visible. Laughing she turned and called to someone inside the house, a towering, slow-moving, but quick-eyed man in a flannel shirt with corduroys tucked into the tops of spurred boots appeared on the stoop. Hal Haynes was so tall that his broad-brimmed hat grazed the porch roof of the house. Hal! Hal! She cried eagerly. What do you think? Pauline Marvin is coming to visit us! Pauline Marvin! Oh, the little girl we met on the ship that I had to yarn to about the Wild West! Yes, of course! How you did lie to her! Goodness! I hope that's not why she's coming. She'll be awfully disappointed. Oh, I don't know, as it's necessary to disappoint her, said Haynes. If the state of Montana don't know how to entertain a lady from the east as she likes to be entertained, it's time to quit being a state at all. Hal! Mrs. Haynes, I'd her husband sternly. I want you to remember who Pauline Marvin is. I'm not going to have her frightened by any of your wild jokes. Haynes burst into a ringing laugh. Honest, my dear! I promised that young lady, if she ever came to Rockville, she'd see all the Wild West I told her about. I'd give her my word! You don't want to make me out a liar, do you? You can say that conditions have changed greatly in the last two years. Oh, come! Just one little hold up the day she gets here. She'll think it's great. She'll think she's the lost heiress that was carried off in the mountains, the one I told her about. I tell you, I will not hear a word of it. She may be ill or something. It would scare her to death. Oh, ask her if she's ill before I let the boys rob the buck-boy. What do you say, mother, just this once? His boyish joy in the prank brought laughter to her eyes, and he knew that his sins would be condoned. Four days later Hicks, who looked as far from home in his excellent clothes as the clothes looked far from home in Rockville, alighted from a lumbering local train. He made an inquiry of a man on the platform, and carrying a heavy suitcase, slouched up the main street of the town. Ham Dalton's place was the one the man had directed him to, and Hicks, after engaging the best rooms in the house for seventy-five cents, scrubbed a little of the dust of travel from his person and went down to the bar and gambling room. The drink of whiskey he got made even his trained throat writhe, and he strolled over to the poker table to join a group of calm and plainly armed spectators of high play. From the conversation he learned that the dam at Redgut was washed out, that Case Egan, a noted rancher, was in jail for shooting a deputy sheriff, and that Hal Haynes was expecting a millionaireous gow, visitor from New York. Why don't she be on? Drawled one of the players. Tomorrow's express. Since when did the express stop at Rockville? Since the president on a road told it to stop for this here young person. Replied the informant crushingly. Hicks was scanning the faces of the men about him with a purposeful eye. Especially he watched one, a lean man in red shirt and leather breeches, booted and spurred, who stood near the table. Hicks approached him. Hello, Patton. He said. The man whirled so sharply that the revolver he had drawn in whirling caught in Hicks' coat and jerked him into the middle of the room. The poker game went on without a sound or sign of interruption. The bartender took a casual look at Hicks and the gunman, and went on talking to a customer as before. Hello, Hicks. Said Patton, putting up the gun. I much obliged I didn't kill you. We don't greet old friends quite so hasty out here, boy, as you do in New York, especially when we haven't heard our right name in some years. He added in a lowered voice. How long have you been here, Patton? Eight, nine, twelve years. Ever since that friend of yours, Mr. Owen, paid me ten thousand dollars for getting rid of a certain, what he called a certain, obstacle. Which you didn't get rid of? No. He made the mistake of paying me in advance, and it didn't seem necessary to harm anybody. Got any of the money left? The lean gunman held his head back and gaffawed. Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha! Near here, I guess, but it ain't mine. They dropped between this bar and that table. Do you want a little job? Asked Hicks. But let's go in the back room. They strolled into an empty wine room and ordered drinks. What kind of a job? Asked Patton. Hicks leaned across the table and whispered rapidly. His old acquaintance drew back, with a sudden suspicion. But no fool in this time. Warned Hicks. Only part money in advance. He produced five thousand dollars in bills from his trouser's pocket. But secreted it again, quickly, as the waiter appeared. Patton got up and sauntered out into the bar room, returning presently with three men of his own brand, broad-built, grim-eyed ruffians of the far north country, three of Case Egan's cattlemen. In the meantime, Mrs. Haynes was flustered not only by the prospect of meeting her distinguished friend, but by the tumultuous staging of the great hold-up scene that was to mark Pauline's welcome. Hal had been up at three o'clock in the morning rehearsing the boys in their parts. He had set off at five o'clock for the station. As Pauline trimmed in her travelling suit of grey and blithed in the clear western air, tripped from the express, all Rockfell was there to meet her. Hal Haynes, mighty man that he was in the region, was read with pride as the girl who could stop the express at Rockfell, gave him her hand in happy greeting. As he helped her into the two-seated buck-board, no one in the crowd noticed the man who had arrived the night before, standing on the platform and pointing out the girl to Tom Patton, who was seen to mount and ride rapidly away. I hope you saved some of that lovely Wild West for me, Mr. Haynes, said Pauline, as the finest pair of horses in the double-crossed stable whisked them along the road to the ranch. Very little left, Miss Marvin. Very little left. Still, whoa, there, what's this? At a bend in the road five masked and mounted men had dashed from cover and quickly surrounded the buck-board with a small circle of leveled gun-barrels. Pauline had time to cry out only once before she felt herself gripped by powerful hands and dragged from the wagon seat, where Hal Haynes sat shaking with laughter. He stood up and started to draw his revolver slowly. From behind him a lasso was thrown lightly and the noose tightened around his arms. He kept on laughing, although he was a little afraid the boys were overdoing matters. He knew his wife would never forgive him for this actual kidnapping of Pauline. He certainly had never intended it. And she was really frightened. He could tell that by her cries as she was thrust across the pommel of the masked leader's horse, and the horse was spurred to a tearing gallop down the road. Haynes tried to shout a command and call the joke off, but the riders had all followed after their leader, and he was alone in the buck-board. They needn't have been so realistic with their knots. He said, as he struggled to free himself from the rope. It was ten minutes before he wriggled free. He picked up the lines and drove on toward the ranch, a little nervous now over the receptions he would get, but still laughing. At the fork where the road to the mountains left the main highway, Haynes flashed out his revolver in real excitement. Another group of five masked men had driven their horses out of a clump of small trees. They fired their revolvers as they surrounded the buck-board. Then suddenly, discovering that there was no woman passenger, they tore off their masks and came up with quick, eager inquiries. Perhaps for the first time in his life, Hal Haynes knew what fear was. Not fear for himself, but for another. Boys, there was another party on the road. They took her. I took him for you. He said, in a stifled voice, Come on, Cabot, give me your horse. Take the rig back and tell Mrs. Haynes. He sprang into the saddle and, filling their revolvers as they rode, the band of gestures, who had suddenly turned so grimly serious, dashed back toward town. Two miles from where Tom Patton had swung Pauline to his saddle-bow, they picked up the train-hoofs that left the road and made toward the mountains. The men who had set out so gaily a few hours before rode silently, fiercely now. Mile after mile swept behind them as they held to the trail. Sometimes it followed the roads, sometimes it broke over open country. At last it reached the hills and stopped at the river. Patton's band had ridden in the water upstream. After a mile of it, the leader ordered three of them out to the south side. They left silently, rode five miles across country and separated, each taking a different route. Patton and one companion kept on with Pauline, who was now almost insensible. At last they left the stream on the north bank and climbed into the higher hill country where they entered a thicket and stopped. With Patton, his companion dismounted and lifted Pauline from the other saddle. With a swift daring and dexterity born of fear, she flung aside his arms and sprang toward the horse he had just left. She tried to mount, but her strength was gone. They tied her feet with a rope and seated her on a great fallen tree while they cleared away a tangle of bushes and began to tug with their combined strength at a giant rock which the bushes had concealed. The stone moved inch by inch until behind it Pauline saw, with a chill shutter, the black opening of a cave. She flung herself from the log, pleading piteously. They cut the rope that bound her feet and led her to the cave. As the giant stone was rolled back into its place, she uttered one wild, far-echoing cry. Then darkness. For many minutes Pauline lay prostrate. A dim light from some hidden orifice in the top of the cave behind a shelving wall seemed to become brighter as her eyes became more accustomed to the shadows. She arose and began to inspect the cave. It was a chamber of rock about forty feet long and twenty feet wide. The bottom and roof converged slightly toward the end furthest from the giant boulder that formed the door. But even there the cave was twenty-five feet high. The boulder door was set into the rock portal and not a wisp of light came through the bush that covered the crevice. Pauline, after a brief hopeless test of her frail strength against the weight of the granite mass, moved slowly along the wall to the extremity of the chamber. Here about seven feet from the floor ran a ledge of rock between two and three feet in width. And from this ledge upward the wall slanted at an angle of forty-five degrees to the wide shelf or fissure. It was from this fissure that the faint light came. Pauline groped her way back along the other wall to the front of the cave again. Despairing she sat down on the chill stone. The events the last few hours had left her in a state of mental vertigo. The hold-up of the buck-board and her carrying off by the bandits seemed fantastically impossible. So this was her escape from scenes of adventure. This was the great safe quiet west where she should forget her perils in New York and wait for others to forget them. She thought of her promise to Harry that she would not try to get into any more scrapes. In her former dangers, even when there seemed hope, she had a buoying trust that there was one man who could save her. He had always saved her. In his protecting shelter she had come to feel almost immune from harm. But with Harry three thousand miles away and totally ignorant of her need of him, no sense of imagined protection sustained her now. She took it for granted that Mr. Haynes had been made a prisoner or killed. She knew the word would reach Mrs. Haynes and the latter would invoke all the powers in the state to find her. But she was sure she would be dead before anyone unearthed this fearful hiding-place. The light at the far end of the cave grew steadily more dim, and Pauline judged that the day was waning. A rustling sound caught her ear. Sounds are animate or inanimate. This was unmistakably the sound of a living thing. Pauline trembled a little, but she stood up. Was it man or beast that she had for companion in the mysterious cave? She took a faltering step forward. The sound seemed to come nearer. The cave had gone almost pitch dark, and suddenly, from the mid-level of the back wall, from the rock ledge, there flashed upon the side of the imprisoned girl two beady, burning eyes. End of Chapter 13, Double Cross Ranch