Part 5

He was holding back the plans of mobbing. The sheriff, acting on his orders, broke up every group of wild-talking men as soon as it formed. But Vladimir held the Strange People in the hollow of his palm. Half a dozen murmured words, and the men who had taken his lavished money would stand aside and let the simmering terror of the countryside burst out into the frenzy of a mob. And then the hills would be invaded by Christian men who would ferret out the Strangers and kill them one by one in the firm belief that they were exterminating the agents of Satan and the killers of innumerable children.

It did not matter that Vladimir’s hold was based on lies. The lies were much more exciting than the truth. The truth was dull and bare. The Strangers had been dancing about the fires. The constables had rushed out and they had fled, without attempting to resist or harm their attackers. One of them had stabbed himself when caught. And the truth was mysterious enough, and inexplicable enough, but it did not compare with the highly colored tales of human sacrifice and heathen orgies that had been embroidered upon the original tale.

* * * * *

Cunningham was inevitably in the thick of all these rumors. Men came rushing with news. A Stranger had been seen lurking about where children were playing. He was instantly suspected of planning to kidnap one of them. He had been shot at and now was being chased by dogs. A Stranger had stopped a doctor in the road and asked for bandaging for an injured arm. He had been shot by one of the constables the night before. Other Strangers guarded him lest the doctor try to arrest him while he dressed the wound.

That was in the morning. As the day went on the reports became more horrible. It became clear that if any Stranger showed his face he would be shot at as if he were a mad dog.

Word came from one place. Two Strangers had been seen and fired on. They vanished, leaving a trail of blood. From another place came another report. An old Strange woman had come out of the hills, to beg for medicines for their wounded. Dogs were set on her as she screamed her errand. She fled, and knives came hurtling from the brushwood, killing or wounding the dogs that were in pursuit.

Gray had promised much. With a drawn and anxious face he had told Cunningham that this day help must come. His telegrams must have produced results. They must have had some effect! He had long since dropped his pretense that his only mission in the hills was the study of the Strange People’s dialect. He was off in Bendale, struggling with a telephone, pleading with a long-distance operator to give him a connection to somewhere--anywhere outside.

Noon came and passed. The afternoon waned, with the inhabitants of the valley growing more and more hysterical in their hatred of the Strange People, and more and more detailed and convinced about the horrors they ascribed to them. The wholly imaginary menace of the Strangers was making it more and more difficult to prevent the formation of a mob. Men raved, wanting to protect their children by wiping out the hill folk. Women grew hysterical, demanding their annihilation.

Cunningham went to Vladimir. Vladimir blinked at him and licked his lips.

“Your servant is a prisoner among the Strange People,” said Cunningham, coldly. “I’m authorized to say he’ll be killed if a mob enters the hills.”

Vladimir smiled, and all his cruelty showed when he smiled.

“How are you authorized to speak for them?”

“Let that go,” said Cunningham grimly. “He’s alive and safe, but he won’t be if that mob goes in.”

The sheriff came in hurriedly.

“Mr. Vladimir----” he began.

Cunningham cut into his report with some sharpness.

“Sheriff, the Strange People are holding Vladimir’s servant prisoner, as a hostage. They’ll kill him if you raid the hills again.”

Vladimir laughed.

“He is vastly mistaken, sheriff. I had a servant here, it is true. But I sent him to Boston, on a mission. And I had word from him yesterday that he was quite safe and attending to my orders.”

He blinked at Cunningham and moved close to him.

“Fool,” he murmured gently, so that the sheriff could not hear, “do you think his life counts any more than yours?”

The sheriff glared at Cunningham hatefully.

“Tryin’ to scare me, eh?” he rumbled. “I got enough on you to arrest you. You’re in thick with them Strangers, you are. I reckon jail’s the best place for you. You won’t get no chance to talk about bribes there.”

Cunningham felt himself growing white with fury. His threat to Vladimir had been a bluff, and Vladimir had shown complete indifference to the fate of the man he had sent to murder Cunningham. But there was one thing he would not be indifferent to.

“You try to arrest me,” he said softly to the sheriff, “and I’ll blow your head off. And as for you, Vladimir”--he made his tone as convincing as he could--“I just tell you that you’d better call that mob off or I’ll tell them who the Strangers are and where they came from!”

Vladimir’s eyes flamed close to madness, while his cheeks went ashen.

“So they told you!” he purred. “Sheriff, go to the door. I wish to speak to this man privately.”

The sheriff, rumbling, moved away.

“My friend,” murmured Vladimir softly, “now I shall have to kill you. Not myself, of course, because that would be illegal. And dangerous. But I give you news. Today, while you and Gray were outside, a little note was tossed into your window. I heard the breaking glass and found it. It was from a girl, who signed, ‘Maria.’ She said that she loved you and would wait for you at a certain spot to flee with you.”

Cunningham’s heart stopped. Vladimir laughed at his expression.

“Oh, she was met,” murmured Vladimir. “She was met--and arrested. She is held fast. And tonight a story will go about and the women of the neighborhood will learn where she is. She is in the hotel here, safely bound. With such a tale as will be spread about, do you not think the women will pull down the whole hotel to tear her in bits? Now do you go and tell the secret of the Strangers! No one will believe you. But you believe me!”

He tossed a scrap of paper to Cunningham. And Cunningham knew that the story was true.

“Now,” said Vladimir, purring, “I shall give orders that you be arrested. If you are taken, she will be torn to bits. And that is how I kill you, my friend. That is how I kill you! For I do not want anyone to live who will remember or believe the secret of the Strangers.”

13

Then the news took a definitely dangerous turn. A farmer who was hastening to Coulters was stopped by a band of Strangers. They had taken his shotgun and shells from him, contemptuously tossing him half a dozen of the square lumps of gold. The gold would pay for the gun ten times over, but men raged. Another man came in foaming at the mouth, with a similar tale. He had seen a Stranger and raised his gun to fire as at a wild beast. A knife had flicked at him and gone through the fleshy part of his arm. They took his gun and shells, leaving gold to pay for them.

No one saw anything odd in firing on the Strangers at sight. But everyone grew hysterically excited at the thought of the Strangers taking guns with which to shoot back. Then a man rode up on a lathered horse, shouting hoarsely that twenty Strangers had raided a country store some six miles away. They had appeared suddenly. When they left they took half a dozen shotguns--the whole stock--three rifles, and all the ammunition in the store. They left gold to pay for the lot.

Cunningham heard all this as one would hear outside sounds during a nightmare. He was like a madman. He would have gone rushing through the place in search of Maria but that it was still broad daylight and there were twenty or more armed men in the place, all mad with excitement and fury. As it was, Cunningham was in a cold, clear-headed rage. He went to his own room and packed his pockets with cartridges.

Vladimir was right in one respect. The natives were in no mood to listen to the truth. They would believe nothing that he told them. He was suspect, in any event. They classed him with the Strangers, and they classed the Strangers with the beasts. Fighting such men was not fighting law and order. The sheriff was bribed. The rest were wild with rage and terror. They did not know they were catspaws for Vladimir. Even the sheriff probably knew but little of Vladimir’s plans.

He went into Gray’s room and searched for a possible second revolver. As he pawed grimly among Gray’s possessions he heard the sheriff speaking, through a partition. Gray’s room was next to that occupied by Vladimir, and Cunningham abruptly realized how Gray had obtained much information.

“I’m doin’ my best to hold ’em,” the sheriff was saying anxiously, “but it’s gettin’ to be a tough job. I’d better send for militia----”

“Fool!” snarled Vladimir. “What do I give you money for? There will be no fighting! We will march into the hills. We will pen up these folk--surround them. If your mob kills a few, what harm? Afterward you shall pick out your murderers--as many as you choose! They will confess to anything you choose, after I have spoken to them. And then the rest of the Strangers will move away. They will go away forever, with me! I will take them!”

“But it looks bad----”

“They will lick my boots,” rasped Viadimir. “They will crawl upon their knees and beg me for mercy. And I will give you four men to hang. They will confess to their crime. And I will take the rest away.”

Cunningham nodded grimly. At least this clarified the situation a little. Vladimir was afraid of the Strangers’ secret becoming known. He only wanted to get them away. If he could find Maria and she would tell him, and Gray brought the help he had promised----

Cunningham was not thinking for himself, except as his liberty meant safety for Maria, and secondarily for the Strange People. But he would have to go into every room in the hotel filled with armed and suspicious men. It was lucky he had two guns. There would surely be shooting. There would probably be a bullet or two for him.

“Now send your deputies to arrest Cunningham,” snapped Vladimir on the other side of the wall. “Tell them to shoot him if he resists. He was teaching the Strangers to shoot and advising them to resist arrest. That is enough.”

“I’ll send a bunch,” whined the sheriff uneasily. “He’s a desp’rit character. Talkin’ about accusin’ me of takin’ bribes....”

“You’ll be rich for life when this is over,” Vladimir purred. “Remember that!”

* * * * *

The door closed behind the sheriff. Cunningham grinned savagely. He was to have no chance at all. They had been sent to arrest him, after Vladimir had given him news that would ensure his resisting. He would resist, right enough! And then a wild and utterly reckless scheme sprang full-bodied into Cunningham’s head.

He swung the door to--and heard a squeaking on the other side of the partition as if a closet door had been opened. And then Vladimir spoke purringly in that unknown language of the Strangers!

There could be but one person to whom he would be speaking at such a time and in that language. Cunningham’s heart leaped violently. He heard voices downstairs--men coming up to arrest him in his own room.

He darted out in the hall and plunged into Vladimir’s room, a ready revolver upraised. Vladimir whirled and stared into its muzzle with ashen cheeks. For once there was no purred jibe upon his lips, because Cunningham’s face was the face of a killer after he had seen Maria in the clothes-closet, bound hand and foot and with a gag in her mouth. She had been staring at Vladimir in horror, but her eyes flamed at sight of Cunningham.

For the fraction of a second they gazed at each other. Then her eyes signaled frantic warning. Cunningham whirled and dashed his revolver blindly in Vladimir’s face as his hand came up with an automatic. Vladimir stumbled and crashed backward to the floor.

Footsteps crashed on the steps outside. Nearly all the men in the hotel, it seemed, were coming up in a body to see to the arrest of Cunningham. But he paid no attention. He was ripping away at the gag and tearing loose the bonds that held Maria fast.

“Vladimir told me you’d been captured,” he panted, “and said you’d be mobbed tonight. Now he’s sent a gang to arrest me, knowing I’d resist and get myself killed. We’ve got to make a break for it. All right?”

Maria’s eyes were like stars. Cunningham kissed her suddenly.

“My God!” he laughed shakily. “One can think of love-making even at a time like this! Listen!”

The crowd on the stairs had reached the top. They crowded down the hall before Cunningham’s own door. There they hesitated, shuffling uneasily. At last a voice called loudly, “Open in the name of the law!”

There was no answer from Cunningham’s empty room. They waited breathlessly. A man pounded cautiously on the panel of the door.

“Open in th’ name of th’ law!”

Still silence.

“M-maybe he j-jumped outer th’ window,” suggested someone uneasily.

“R-rush him,” urged a man safely in the rear.

Cunningham and Maria, two rooms away, heard a hand laid on the other room’s door. They heard it fling open with a crash and the scuttling of feet as the mob of hastily deputized men jumped to one side to be out of the way of possible bullets. Dead silence greeted them. And suddenly they crowded into the deserted place.

“Now!” said Cunningham sharply.

He darted out, Maria running with him. She fled to the stairs and down them, Cunningham two steps in the rear. A single straggler of the men who were to have arrested him remained in the hall. He turned his head stupidly at sound of their rush. His mouth dropped open, but before his shout they were half-way to the ground floor.

Cunningham stopped at the foot of the stairs to fire three times up at the ceiling of the second floor. A cloud of smoke filled the hall, and heads that had craned over the balustrade withdrew, in a panic. A dozen paces more and the fugitives were out in the roadway. Half a dozen horses were tethered there and Cunningham tore loose the reins and leaped on one. Maria sprang up lightly behind him and he kicked the animal madly with his heels. It sprang into a panic-stricken gallop and was off down the road.

They were nearly out of sight before the first of their pursuers had run out into the road behind them. Then half a dozen puffs of smoke showed that they were fired on, but an instant later they were out of sight around a bend in the road.

14

Cunningham laughed a little as the horse’s hoofs clattered beneath and the white road shot past. Maria was clinging to his shoulders.

“Safe so far,” he told her, “but now we have to take to the woods. The hand of every man is against us, Maria. Do you trust me to get you away?”

“Anywhere,” she said softly. “You know I do.”

A motorcar came racing toward them over the rough road. It was not fit going for an automobile and the car swayed and lurched from side to side with dangerous abandon. Cunningham swerved his horse out of the road. The car slowed and stopped with a screaming of brakes. Cunningham’s hand fell to his weapon.

Gray tumbled out of the cloud of dust that enveloped the machine.

“Cunningham,” he panted. “Just found--Vladimir had bribed the telegraph operator. None of my wires got through. Found an amateur radio fan and he sent my message. Relay League. Help’s coming. By airplane. Bendale is a town of lunatics. Wild yarns have gone into it and a mob is coming out to wipe out the Strangers. They think they’ve been burning children. You’ve got to get up to the Strangers. Tell ’em about planes. Tell them to get going and keep moving or there ’ll be a massacre. Help’s coming as fast as it can get here. But for God’s sake keep them away from the mob. They’ll be wiped out!”

“I’m going to get Maria away,” said Cunningham defiantly. “I’m going to get her out of this state and marry her. The Strangers and anybody else can go to the devil!”

Gray, choking upon the dust he had swallowed, gasped out a raging order.

“Don’t be a fool!” he cried. “Look at her clothes! She’s in the Strangers’ costume! You’ll be spotted if you’re seen, and three townships are raving crazy! A dog couldn’t get away from here like that! You’ll be shot at by every damned fool in three counties and arrested anywhere else you go! Get up in the hills and keep the Strangers moving! The planes may not get here until dark, and they can’t land in the hills in the darkness. I’m going to meet them at Hatton Junction and guide them here. You get up in the hills and keep the Strangers moving or there’ll be a massacre! That mob will even wipe out the children! Everybody’s crazy! You’ve got to save them, Cunningham! You’ve got to!”

And Cunningham knew that he was telling the truth. The Strange People might not fight, if he begged them not to. To desert them would mean a tragedy in the hills. The people about them were no more accountable than so many lunatics. But to ride among the Strange People with Maria upon his saddle! ... They would know that she loved him, and they would believe that she had told him their secret. They would never let him leave the hills again alive.

It was death either way, and probably for them both. He looked at Maria and found her eyes misty with tears.

“Let me go,” she said suddenly, with a sob in her throat. “You go away. I will go up to my people and tell them what this man has said. Without me, you can escape. My people will tell me to die, but you will not know who we are and you will never hate me or despise me....”

Cunningham caught her hand and laughed shortly.

“No, my dear,” he said grimly. “We won’t be separated. It’s a choice between being shot like mad dogs or facing your people. We’ll ride up into the hills. We’ll tell your people that help is coming to hold off the mob. Their lives will be safe and their secret too, for all of me. And if we die, it will be decently. I’ve two guns for the pair of us.”

He found himself laughing as he waved his hand at Gray and drove his horse at the steep slopes that led upward to the tree-clad heights in which the Strangers lurked.

As the trees closed over their heads he smiled again and swung Maria before him. He gave the horse its head and the animal dropped to a plodding walk. And they talked softly. They had but a little while to be alone and they had never talked the tender foolishness that lovers know. Now they were riding at a snail’s pace upward to the stern vengeance of the Strangers upon a woman of their number who had loved outside the clan.

They spoke in whispers, not to avoid detection but because there are some things that are too tender to be spoken aloud. And their eyes spoke other things for which nobody has ever found words. Maria’s arm was about Cunningham’s neck and her lips were never far from his own and it seemed as if all trouble and care were very far away, though they were riding up to death.

The trees rustled above them. Birds sang all about them. And they rode through an age-old forest upon a weary horse, a scarecrow of a man with a bandaged shoulder and a girl in barbaric finery, gazing at him with tear-misted eyes. And as they rode they talked softly, and now and then they smiled, and in every speech and glance and gesture there was an aching happiness and a wistful regret.

All this was very foolish, but it was the proper and authentic conclusion for a man who has followed the route to romance and adventure to its appointed ending.

But there came a little rustling in the undergrowth beside them as they went on climbing up to the heights. Then other rustlings. Far away there was a whistle as if someone signaled. And very suddenly an arm reached out from the thick brushwood and seized the horse’s bridle. One of the Strangers stepped into view and gazed steadily up into the muzzle of Cunningham’s revolver.

From all about them men materialized as if by magic. No man laid a hand on any weapon. They looked at the pair upon the horse gravely, without rancor but with infinite resolution.

And Stephan, Maria’s father, came into view and regarded them with weary, hopeless eyes.

“Why did you come back?” he asked in a queer and resolute despair. “You knew what we would have to do. Why did you come back?”

[Illustration: “He was hidden from view in a mass of stabbing figures.”]

15

The sun sank thunderously behind the mountain-range and tinted the tips of all the peaks with gold. Little fleecy clouds floated overhead in contented indolence. The wind of the heights was still. The pine-clad hills seemed very soft and restful as the shadows deepened on the eastern slopes, and contrasted strangely with the still-bright golden fields of the valleys yet unshadowed by the mountains.

Stephan held out a weary hand, pointing. A sullen column of smoke rose from a point far distant. He pointed again, where a thin wisp of vapor grew steadily thicker and denser.

“Our houses,” he said bitterly. “They are being burned. Vladimir has spoken, and we die.”

Cunningham clenched his fists as the sullen gray clouds rose slowly upward in the still air. Once he saw figures moving about the base of the smoke. Once he thought he heard yelling.

“I don’t think he’s told your secret,” he said after an instant. “That’s the mob. Gray promised that help would come. He said it was coming by airplane. And Vladimir----”

He told Stephan swiftly what Vladimir had said to the sheriff: that the Strangers were to be surrounded by the mob, and that then he would speak to them; that they would submit, and that some would go away in chains to be hung for the murder of his brother, and that he would take the others away with him forever; that they would follow when he spoke to them and obey him in all things.

Stephan’s eyes flashed fire for a second.

“Is life so sweet or peace so dear,” he quoted bitterly, “as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery?” He stopped short. “No,” he said quietly. “We will not obey him. No!”