  Bill burst into the hall and almost collided with Osceola, who had just stepped out. “What’s the matter?” hissed the Seminole. “The phone woke me.” “Got a gun?” “Yep—what is it?” “Come on. Deborah’s kidnapped—they’re evidently after Dorothy. They’re in the house now!” The last sentence was hurled at Osceola as the two lads, both barefoot and in pajamas, raced downstairs and across the broad entrance hall to the front door. “Wire was cut while Dorothy phoned,” panted Bill, pushing back the bolt and twisting the key in the lock. Osceola uttered not a word, but he was first through the open door and took the porch steps at a single leap, Bill at his heels. They sprinted down the turf along the driveway, and were nearing the stone wall that bounded the Bolton property, when a car without lights swung into the road from the Dixon place and sped toward Stamford. Without slackening in speed, the young chief spoke quietly. “Don’t fire. The wall hides the wheels—Debby might get hurt.” “Could you—see her?” “No. But I heard that little gat of Dorothy’s go just now. She’s still in the house.” By this time they were crossing the road in two bounds and side by side they hurdled the Dixons’ white picket fence like hounds let loose from a leash. Leaping flowerbeds and vaulting shrubs they flew over the garden, darted through an opening in the high box hedge and came on to the smooth turf where ancient elms cast mottled shadows in the moonlight. Then from the white shingled house directly ahead came the terrified screams of women, punctuated by the bark of revolver shots. As they dashed up to the house, a wire screen flew out of a second story window and a slender, boyish figure dove head first out after it. Two or three feet below the window sill the porch roof sloped downward at a slight angle. The diver seemed to land on her hands, crumple up, turn a complete somersault and come swiftly upon her feet again with the ease and precision of an acrobat. “Look out, Dorothy!” yelled Bill, as a revolver was thrust out of the window. With the agility of a springbok, she leaped aside, firing from her hip. The bark of the four shots was almost simultaneous. There came a shriek of pain from the window, the automatic rattled to the roof, and the hand that had held it disappeared. Bill lowered his gun. “Wait here till she’s parked,” he ordered. “Then smash a porch window and go in. I’ll tackle them from above.” With the butt of his smoking revolver between his teeth, he took a running leap and went up a pillar with an ease and swiftness that demonstrated his seaman’s training. His hands caught the gutter, his body swung up and sideways and springing to his feet he ran along the slanting roof to Dorothy. “Did he hit you?” “Missed by a mile!” “Good—” Bill picked her up. “Come on—” “But, Bill—I’m in pajamas—” “So am I—down you go!” He dropped her into Osceola’s waiting arms. As she landed safely and the young Seminole stood her on her feet, he called: “They must have another car, Dorothy. Put it on the fritz!” Then without waiting to see whether this rather cryptic command was understood, much less executed, he zigzagged up the roof to the side of the house. With his back pressed against the shingles, he moved sideways to the window and peered in. The room was full of smoke, but he made out a figure slipping through the doorway into the hall, and fired. The door slammed and someone shot home the lock on the other side. From below came a crash of broken glass. “Good old chief!” muttered Bill and went in through the open window. He realized instantly that the bed was on fire. He grabbed the flaming sheets and threw them on the floor, kicking a handsome rug out of the way. Determined to save the rug, if possible, for a moment he was at a loss how to put out the flames. He did not enjoy the thought of stamping out a fire with his bare feet. The room was dark, after the brilliance of the moonlight out of doors, and the acrid smoke stung his eyes and set him coughing. Flames began to shoot upward from the smouldering mattress. His eye sighted a wall switch by the head of the bed, and an instant later he clicked the room into bright illumination. The door to the bathroom was open and Bill caught the sheets by the ends which the fire had not yet reached, dragged them across the room and tossed the blazing mass into the bath tub. He turned on both taps, and ran back to the bedroom. He next seized the mattress, doubled it over at the center, and endeavored to smother the flames. In this he was only partly successful, for the charred padding continued to smoulder and smoke. In exasperation he rolled it up, carried it to the window and thrust it forth. Quick as a flash, he was on the porch roof and not until he had flung it to the ground did he pause to fill his lungs. But he was impatient to discover what was happening to Osceola below stairs, while he had been engaged with this inopportune blaze. He darted back into the smoke-laden chamber, and made for the door to the hall. It was locked. He picked up his automatic from the chair where he had dropped it and was about to fire into the lock when the handle rattled. Someone in the hallway was trying the door. “Open up or I’ll shoot—” snapped Bill, and was seized immediately afterward with a spasm of coughing that left him almost helpless. The key turned in the lock and the door swung inward, disclosing Osceola and a leveled automatic. Directly behind him stood Dorothy. “Gosh!” she exclaimed. “You still here! Where’s the fire?” The cool draught of air started by the opening of the door momentarily cleared the atmosphere and Bill composed himself with an effort. “In your bed—if this is your room,” he wheezed. “I put it out—darn it. Where’s that man gone? The one who locked me in?” “Got away,” grunted Osceola. “And the other one, too.” “Did they have another car?” “Yes, but Dorothy got to it first and put the engine out of business. She—” Shrieks and howls from above their heads cut him short. He turned to Dorothy. “You’d better run upstairs and let those maids out so I can get straight with Bill. They’ll wake New Canaan if you don’t. The poor things have been raising the roof ever since those thugs locked them in their rooms. Now they’ve smelled smoke and probably think the house is on fire.” “Right-o! I’ll go up and quiet ’em.” Dorothy hurried off toward the rear staircase. Bill leaned against the wall and stared at the mess in the room. “Either the guy we winged, or his pal, set fire to Dorothy’s bedding. He hoped it might give us a job putting it out and they’d have a chance to make their getaway. So far as I’m concerned they did exactly that. You don’t seem to have had any better luck.” “You’re right on that, too. When Dorothy beat it round the house to scout for their car, I went through the living room window. And it will take some mending, that window! I smashed it with a porch chair.” “Never mind the window—what did you do then?—faint?” “Don’t try to be funny—I beat it inside and up the front stairs. Just as I reached this floor, I saw the two thugs flit round the corner to the back hall, and the service stairs. They had got out of sight by the time I got to the top of the stairs, but I heard the creak of the swinging door and knew they were on their way out through the kitchen. So I plunged down after them. And let me tell you, boy, plunged is just what I did. When I woke up, Dorothy was pouring a pitcher of water over my head.” “When you woke up!” “Why, you see, one of the guys must have grabbed a broom some fool maid had left standing in the back hall, and he had laid the darned thing slantwise across the stairs, about a quarter of the way down, with the broom end jammed into the banisters. I never saw it in my hurry, and I took the rest of the flight head first. I’ve got a bump on my bean the size of an egg. Why I didn’t break my neck is a mystery to me!” “Oh, you were born to be hung,” said Bill airily. “But let’s hear the rest of what happened.” “Look here, old chap, I’ve been driven nearly frantic by this mess—here we are—I fall down stairs, you fight a tuppenny fire—and we’re supposed to be doing something—anything—to—to—” “Oh, I know it—don’t you suppose I know how you feel? Gosh, it’s got me the same way. But we’ll get her back soon. Meanwhile, we have to check up on each other, don’t we? It’s the only way we can get started on the real business.” Bill spoke as encouragingly as he could, but he had no idea how to go about tracing Deborah ... any more than had his friend. “Sure, you’re right, Bill. Only when I think of Deb in the hands of those—Well, I’ll go on. Nothing important happened after that tumble I took. Dorothy brought me round, and those lads had beat it for parts unknown with at least a five minute start. She told me that after she’d fixed their car, which was the same one Number 57 went off in this morning, she hiked round to the porch again. She’d just got in through the window I smashed when she heard my fall—and found me. Just about that time, she smelled smoke, so as soon as I could stand, we searched for it—you know the rest.” As he finished, Dorothy came up to them. “They’re all quiet, now,” she said, referring to the maids. “What’s next on the program? Have you got a plan of any kind?” “We know what to do, all right—and that’s find Deborah—” admitted Bill bitterly, “but how to do it is another question, and I, for one, don’t know the answer.” |
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