CHAPTER III.

CAPTURED.

AT the open door of the office Alf paused; the room was empty and dark, but in the corner stood the safe, still apparently fast locked; so at least the key had not been found.

All the other lower rooms had been overhauled and looted, everything valuable having been carried away, unless indeed it had proved too big to be handled.

Alf then went upstairs, but there seemed to be no one anywhere. Even the servants' rooms were empty, their cupboards and drawers open, and garments scattered about, as though they had dressed in great fear and haste.

Last of all, he went to the nursery. By this time the horrible silence of the house was getting upon the boy's nerves, and for the first time he felt his courage giving way, as he stood in the dear familiar room, now so lonely and deserted.

He turned and was about to descend the stairs again, when he fancied he heard a little sound somewhere close by.

"Anyone here?" he called, with a shudder at the sound of his own voice.

Then the door of a big wall-cupboard opened softly, and Bert's fair head and white face appeared.

In an instant the boys were locked in a close embrace, and for a minute or two neither could say a word. But at last Alf mastered his feelings and began to question Bert, learning from him that the workmen had come to the house in force, and had gone all over it, making a great noise and alarming him greatly.

He said that soon after Alf had left for the town, the nurse went to see if she could do anything for Mr. or Mrs. Oliver, promising to return to Bert very soon.

But she had not come back, and meanwhile the child had heard the talk of the ruffians on the stairs, and their threats to bring a bomb or dynamite and blow up the safe, since they could not open it otherwise.

Then, for fear of their coming in and finding him, Bert hid in the cupboard, and only found courage to come out when he heard his brother's voice.

"Then you don't know what has become of dad and mother and nurse?" asked Alf.

"No, I don't know anything," replied Bert.

"Well, happily Yakov Ivanitch will be here presently with his own men and some Cossacks, and perhaps they'll find out what has become of all our people."

"Ach, so? Will they, indeed?" said a harsh voice behind them. "Well, it is well to know what is likely to happen, then one is prepared."

The boys, turning quickly, saw that the speaker standing in the doorway was the man with the great red scar, the brutal face, and heavy, powerful form.

"So it's you we have to thank, young gentlemen, if the whole nest of police hornets comes buzzing about our ears?"

"Not both of us," retorted Alf stoutly; "my brother had nothing at all to do with it."

"Oh, indeed! So it was you alone? Well, whoever it was, I think we won't wait here for your friends to arrive. Lucky I happened to think of taking one more look round! Come along, both of you!"

And grasping in his huge hands the collar of each boy, he dragged them, in spite of their struggles and hearty kicks at his shins, down the stairs and into the back yard, where a sledge was waiting, with a horse harnessed, and Alf recognised both as his father's.

"Where art thou taking us, thou ruffian?" cried Alf.

"That's not your business," replied Red-scar. "I am not here to be questioned; get into the sledge."

"I cannot leave my pony behind," said Alf stoutly. "He is in the stable, and I must go and fetch him."

The man hesitated. "There is no time to lose," he urged.

"It will not take long," rejoined Alf, "and my brother can come with me."

"What! And lock yourselves into the stable and wait for the police?" snarled Red-scar. "No, thank you But the pony is worth money, so you may fetch him, and I shall hold your brother as hostage for your return."

Once in the stable, Alf deliberately fed his pony, for Sharik had made a double journey, at high speed for him, and might have to run far again directly. His saddle and bridle were still on him, so his young master took all the time at his disposal in giving him a good feed of oats, unheeding, until the good little animal had partly satisfied its hunger, the calls and curses of the man.

But at last, fearing on Bert's account to anger Red-scar further, he led Sharik out, knotted a leading strap round his arm, and without replying to the horrible language of the ruffian, got into the sledge beside Bert, while Red-scar scrambled on to the driver's seat.

Alf looked eagerly in the direction of the town as they emerged into the high road. He was hoping, almost against hope, that the rescuers might appear, even now, at the eleventh hour. But no one was in sight along the white snow road. Their driver turned the horse's head in the opposite direction, and with a sharp cut of the whip set the pace at a gallop.

"Whither art thou taking us?" asked Alf presently.

"After a while you will see," replied the man, with a brutal laugh.

"Be assured of one thing, thou hideous ruffian," said the boy indignantly, "that ere long thou and thy fellows shall smart for this. My father hath ever been a just and kind master to his workmen; and for this ill return they shall, without doubt, pay the price."

"Crow not so loud, my chicken!" sneered the man, his cruel red smile scorning to stretch all round his head. "Troublesome cockerels now and again get their necks twisted."

"The wicked old cocks always do," retorted the lad, nothing daunted; "and so, please God, shalt thou, too, one fine day; and the sooner the better for the rest of us!"

"Wait a bit, my fine young gentleman!" snarled the fellow over his shoulder. "Your turn will come presently. Hideous ruffian, am I? That makes one more thing to thank you for, you stuck-up young monkey!"

It was after three o'clock in the morning by Alf's watch when, in the middle of a pine forest, Red-scar pulled up the panting horse before the door of a rude shanty, a woodman's log hut, built of whole pines roughly trimmed with an axe, and with the crevices stuffed with moss and lichen.

Out of a chimney smoke curled upwards in fantastic shapes, and dispersed in the wintry sky.

"Get down," said Red-scar. He had scrambled out of the driver's narrow seat, and now threw back the furred apron that had protected his young passengers.

"What is this place?" asked Bert, shivering as he stood in the snow of the little clearing round the hut.

But the man did not condescend to reply. He strode to the door of the hut and thumped on it with the handle of his whip.

It opened, showing the light inside, and holding the door open—Stepan the fitter. "Come in, come in!" he said, with some show of heartiness, as the lads, stiff with cold, stood shivering on the threshold. "There is a good fire in the stove here, and I will make some tea to warm you. What about the horses, Gavril?" he added, turning to Red-scar, whose real name the boys now heard for the first time.

"That means Gabriel in English, Bert," said Alf, with an attempt at a smile. "Nice specimen of an archangel, isn't he?"

"The horses?" repeated Red-scar, from the door; "the shed will be all right for them. There is plenty of straw, and I have stopped up all the cracks and mended the door, so that it shuts quite tight. Also I brought hay and oats," and he stepped to the sledge and dragged two sacks out of the front of it. "They made a good footstool for me," he added, "and kept my feet warm."

Stepan, while his companion was occupied with the horses, busied himself in making the tea.