Blindfolded, Earle Ashley Walcott [non fiction books to read .TXT] 📗

floor impatiently.

"With Mr. Wilton," there was the slightest emphasis on the words, "to accompany the party, I shouldn't think it would be necessary for me to go."

"It is either you or I," said Mrs. Knapp.

"You will be needed to protect Mr. Horton," said I sarcastically.

"Oh, what a task!" she said gaily. "I shall be ready." And she turned away before I could put in another word, and I walked down the room with Mrs. Knapp.

"And so Mr. Knapp is coming home to-morrow?" I said.

Mrs. Knapp gave me a quick look.

"Yes," she said. There was something in her tone that set me to thinking that there was more than I knew behind Mr. Knapp's sudden return.

"I hope he is not ill," I said politely.

Mrs. Knapp appeared to be considering some point deeply, and did not answer for a little. Then she shook her head as though the idea was not to her liking.

"I think you will find him all right when you see him. But here--you must meet Mr. and Mrs. Carter. They are just from the East, and very charming people, and as you are to do them the honors on Monday evening, you should know them."

Mr. and Mrs. Carter had pleasant faces and few ideas, and as the conversational fire soon burned low I sought Mrs. Knapp and took my leave. Luella was nowhere to be seen.

"You must be sure that you are well-guarded," said Mrs. Knapp. "It quite gives me the terrors to think of those murderous fellows. And since you told me of that last plot to call you down to Borton's, I have a presentiment that some special danger is ahead of you. Be cautious as well as brave."

She had followed me into the hall, and spoke her warning freely. There was a sadness in her eyes that seemed as though she would dissuade me from my task.

I thanked her as she pressed my hand, and, with no Luella awaiting me by the stair, I took my way down the stone steps, between the bronze lions, and joined Porter and Barkhouse on the sidewalk.


CHAPTER XVI

AN ECHO OF WARNING

"All quiet?" I asked of my guards, as we took our way down the street.

"All quiet," said Porter.

"You'd better tell him," said Barkhouse.

"Oh, yes," said Porter, as if in sudden recollection. "Dicky Nahl was along here, and he said Terrill and Meeker and the other gang was holding a powwow at Borton's, and we'd best look out for surprises."

"Was that all?"

"Well, he said he guessed there was a new deal on hand, and they was a- buzzin' like a nest of hornets. It was hornets, wasn't it, Bob?"

"Hornets was what he said," repeated Barkhouse stolidly.

"Where's Dicky now?" I asked.

"I ain't good at guessing," said Porter, "and Bob's nothing at all at it."

"Well," said I, "we had better go down to Borton's and look into this matter."

There was silence for a time. My guards walked beside me without speaking, but I felt the protest in their manner. At last Barkhouse said respectfully:

"There's no use to do that, sir. You'd better send some one that ain't so likely to be nabbed, or that won't matter much if he is. We'd be in a pretty fix if you was to be took."

"Here comes Dicky, now," said Porter, as a dark figure came swinging lightly along.

"Hullo!" cried Dicky, halting and shading his eyes from the gaslight. "I was just going up to look for you again."

"What's up, Dicky?"

"I guess it's the devil," said Dicky, so gravely that I broke into a laugh.

"He's right at home if he's come to this town," I said.

"I'm glad you find it so funny," said Dicky in an injured tone. "You was scared enough last time."

I had put my foot in it, sure enough. I might have guessed that the devil was not his Satanic Majesty but some evil-minded person in the flesh whom I had to fear.

"Can it be Doddridge Knapp?" flashed across my mind but I dismissed the suspicion as without foundation. I spoke aloud:

"Well, I've kept out of his claws this far, and it's no use to worry. What's he trying to do now?"

"That's what I've been trying to find out all the evening. They're noisy enough, but they're too thick to let one get near where there's anything going on--that is, if he has a fancy for keeping a whole skin."

"Suppose we go down there now," I suggested. "We might find out something."

Dicky stopped short.

"Caesar's ghost!" he gasped; "what next? Wouldn't you like to touch off a few powder-kegs for amusement? Won't you fire a pistol into your mouth to show how easy you can stop the bullet?"

"Why, you have been down there and are all right," I argued.

"Well, there's nothing much to happen to me, but where would you be if they got hold of you? You're getting off your _cabesa_, old fellow," said Dicky anxiously.

"If I could see Mother Borton I could fix it," I said confidently.

"What! That she-devil?" cried Dicky. "She'd give you up to have your throat cut in a minute if she could get a four-bit piece for your carcass. I guess she could get more than that on you, too."

Mother Borton's warnings against Dicky Nahl returned to me with force at this expression of esteem from the young man, and I was filled with doubts.

"I came up to tell you to look out for yourself," continued Dicky. "I'm afraid they mean mischief, and here you come with a wild scheme for getting into the thick of it."

"Well, I'll think better of it," I said. "But see if you can find out what is going on. Come up and let me know if you get an inkling of their plans."

"All right," said Dicky. "But just sleep on a hair-trigger to-night."

"Good night," I said, as I turned toward my room, and Dicky, with an answering word, took his way toward the Borton place.

I had grown used to the silent terrors of my house. The weird fancies that clung around the gloomy halls and dark doorways still whispered their threatening tales of danger and death. The air was still peopled with the ghosts of forgotten crimes, and the tragedy of the alley that had changed my life was heavy on the place. But habit, and the confidence that had come to me with the presence of my guards, had made it a tolerable spot in which to live. But as we stumbled up the stairway the apprehensions of Dicky Nahl came strong upon me, and I looked ahead to the murky halls, and glanced at every doorway, as though I expected an ambush. Porter and Barkhouse marched stolidly along, showing little disposition to talk.

"What's that?" I exclaimed, stopping to listen.

"What was it?" asked Barkhouse, as we stopped on the upper landing and gazed into the obscurity.

"I thought I heard a noise," said I. "Who's there?"

"It was a rat," said Porter. "I've heard 'em out here of nights."

"Well, just light that other gas-jet," I said. "It will help to make things pleasant in case of accidents."

The doors came out of the darkness as the second jet blazed up, but nothing else was to be seen.

Suddenly there was a scramble, and something sprang up before my door. Porter and I raised the revolvers that were ready in our hands, but Barkhouse sprang past us, and in an instant had closed with the figure and held it in his arms.

There was a volley of curses, oaths mingled with sounds that reminded me of nothing so much as a spitting cat, and a familiar voice screamed in almost inarticulate rage:

"Let me go, damn ye, or I'll knife ye!"

"Good heavens!" I cried. "Let her go, Barkhouse. It's Mother Borton."

Mother Borton freed herself with a vicious shake, and called down the wrath of Heaven and hell on the stalwart guard.

"You're the black-hearted spawn of the sewer rats, to take a respectable woman like a bag of meal," cried Mother Borton indignantly, with a fresh string of oaths. "It's fire and brimstone you'll be tasting yet, and you'd 'a' been there before now, you miserable gutter- picker, if it wasn't for me. And this is the thanks I git from ye!"

"I'll apologize for his display of gallantry," said I banteringly. "I've always told him that he was too fond of the ladies."

I was mistaken in judging that this tone would be the most effective to restore her to good humor. Mother Borton turned on me furiously.

"Oh, it's you that would set him on a poor woman as comes to do you a service. I was as wide-awake as any of ye. I never closed my eyes a wink, and you has to come a-sneakin' up and settin' your dogs on me." Mother Borton again drew on an apparently inexhaustible vocabulary of oaths. "Oh, you're as bad as him," she shouted, "and I reckon you'd be worse if you knowed how." And she spat out more curses, and shook her fist in impotent but verbose rage.

"Come in," I said, unlocking the door and lighting up my room. "You can be as angry as you like in here, and it won't hurt anything."

Mother Borton stormed a bit, and then sullenly walked in and took a chair. Silence fell on her as she crossed the threshold, but she glowered on us with fierce eyes.

"It's quite an agreeable surprise to see you," I ventured as cheerfully as I could, as she made no move to speak. My followers looked awkward and uncomfortable.

At the sound of my voice, Mother Borton's bent brows relaxed a little.

"If you'd send these fellows out, I reckon we could talk a bit better," she said sourly.

"Certainly. Just wait in the hall, boys; and close the door."

Porter and Barkhouse ambled out, and Mother Borton gave her chair a hitch that brought us face to face.

"You ain't so bad off here," she said, looking around critically. "Can any one git in them winders?"

I explained that the west window might be entered from the rear stairway by the aid of the heavy shutter, if it were swung back and the window were open. I added that we kept it closed and secured.

"And you say there's a thirty-foot drop from this winder?" she inquired, pointing to the north.

I described the outlook on the alley.

She nodded as if satisfied.

"I reckon you don't think I come on a visit of perliteness?" she said sharply, after a brief silence.

I murmured something about being glad to entertain her at any time.

"Nonsense!" she sniffed. "I'm a vile old woman that the likes of you would never put eyes on twice if it wasn't for your business--none knows it better than me. I don't know why I should put myself out to help ye." Her tone had a touch of pathos under its hardness.

"I know why," I said, a little touched. "It's because you like me."

She turned a softened eye on me.

"You're right," she said almost tenderly, with a flash of womanly feeling on her seamed and