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

hell for it this minute," cried Mother Borton savagely.

"Hush!" I said. "You mustn't excite yourself. Can't I get you a minister or a priest?"

Mother Borton spat out another string of oaths.

"Priest or minister! Not for me! Not one has passed my door in all the time I've lived, and he'll not do it to-night. What could he tell me that I don't know already? I've been on the road to hell for fifty years, and do you think the devil will let go his grip for a man that don't know me? No, dearie; your face is better for me than priest or minister, and I want you to close my eyes and see that I'm buried decent. Maybe you'll remember Mother Borton for something more than a vile old woman when she's gone."

"That I shall," I exclaimed, touched by her tone, and taking the hand that she reached out to mine. "I'll do anything you want, but don't talk of dying. There's many a year left in you yet."

"There's maybe an hour left in me. But we must hurry. Tell me about your trouble--at Livermore, was it?"

I gave her a brief account of the expedition and its outcome. Mother Borton listened eagerly, giving an occasional grunt of approval.

"Well, honey; I was some good to ye, after all," was her comment.

"Indeed, yes."

"And you had a closer shave for your life than you think," she continued. "Tom Terrill swore he'd kill ye, and it's one of the miracles, sure, that he didn't."

"Well, Mother Borton, Tom Terrill's laid up in Livermore with a broken head, and I'm safe here with you, ready to serve you in any way that a man may."

"Safe--safe?" mused Mother Borton, an absent look coming over her skinny features, as though her mind wandered. Then she turned to me impressively. "You'll never be safe till you change your work and your name. You've shut your ears to my words while I'm alive, but maybe you'll think of 'em when I'm in my coffin. I tell you now, my boy, there's murder and death before you. Do you hear? Murder and death."

She sank back on her pillow and gazed at me with a wearied light in her eyes and a sibyl look on her face.

"I think I understand," I said gently. "I have faced them and I ought to know them."

"Then you'll--you'll quit your job--you'll be yourself?"

"I can not. I must go on."

"And why?"

"My friend--his work--his murderer."

"Have you got the man who murdered Henry Wilton?"

"No."

"Have you got a man who will give a word against--against--you know who?"

"I have not a scrap of evidence against any one but the testimony of my own eyes," I was compelled to confess.

"And you can't use it--you dare not use it. Now I'll tell you, dearie, I know the man as killed Henry Wilton."

"Who was it?" I cried, startled into eagerness.

"It was Black Dick--the cursed scoundrel that's done for me. Oh!" she groaned in pain.

"Maybe Black Dick struck the blow, but I know the man that stood behind him, and paid him, and protected him, and I'll see him on the gallows before I die."

"Hush," cried Mother Borton trembling. "If he should hear you! Your throat will be cut yet, dearie, and I'm to blame. Drop it, dearie, drop it. The boy is nothing to you. Leave him go. Take your own name and get away. This is no place for you. When I'm gone there will be no one to warn ye. You'll be killed. You'll be killed."

Then she moaned, but whether from pain of body or mind I could not guess.

"Never you fear. I'll take care of myself," I said cheerily.

She looked at me mournfully. "I am killed for ye, dearie."

I started, shocked at this news.

"There," she continued slowly, "I didn't mean to let you know. But they thought I had told ye."

"Then I have two reasons instead of one for holding to my task," I said solemnly. "I have two friends to avenge."

"You'll make the third yourself," groaned Mother Borton, "unless they put a knife into Barkhouse, first, and then you'll be the fourth belike."

"Barkhouse--do you know where he is?"

"He's in the Den--on Davis Street, you know. I was near forgetting to tell ye. Send your men to get him to-night, for he's hurt and like to die. They may have to fight. No,--don't leave me now."

"I wasn't going to leave you."

Mother Borton put her hand to her throat as though she choked, and was silent for a moment. Then she continued:

"I'll be to blame if I don't tell you--I _must_ tell you. Are you listening?"

Her voice came thick and strange, and her eyes wandered anxiously about, searching the heavy shadows with a look of growing fear.

The candle burned down till it guttered and flickered in its pool of melted tallow, and the shadows it threw upon wall and ceiling seemed instinct with an impish life of their own, as though they were dark spirits from the pit come to mock the final hours of the life that was ebbing away before me.

"I am listening," I replied.

"You must know--you must--know,--I must tell you. The boy--the woman is--"

On a sudden Mother Borton sat bolt upright in bed, and a shriek, so long, so shrill, so freighted with terror, came from her lips that I shrank from her and trembled, faint with the horror of the place.

"They come--there, they come!" she cried, and throwing up her arms she fell back on the bed.

The candle shot up into flame, sputtered an instant, and was gone. And I was alone with the darkness and the dead.


CHAPTER XXVII

A LINK IN THE CHAIN

I sprang to my feet. The darkness was instinct with nameless terrors. The air was filled with nameless shapes. A spiritual horror surrounded me, and I felt that I must reach the light or cry out. But before I had covered the distance to the door, it was flung open and Corson stood on the threshold; and at the sight of him my courage returned and my shaken nerves grew firm. At the darkness he wavered and cried:

"What's the matter here?"

"She is dead."

"Rest her sowl! It's a fearsome dark hole to be in, sor."

I shuddered as I stood beside him, and brought the lamp from the bracket in the hall.

Mother Borton lay back staring affrightedly at the mystic beings who had come for her, but settled into peace as I closed her eyes and composed her limbs.

"She was a rare old bird," said Corson when I had done, "but there was some good in her, after all."

"She has been a good friend to me," I said, and we called a servant from below and left the gruesome room to his guardianship.

"And now, there's another little job to be done. There's one of my men a prisoner down on Davis Street. I must get him out."

"I'm with you, sor," said Corson heartily. "I'm hopin' there's some heads to be cracked."

I had not counted on the policeman's aid, but I was thankful to accept the honest offer. In the restaurant I found five of my men, and with this force I thought that I might safely attempt an assault on the Den.

The Den was a low, two-story building of brick, with a warehouse below, and the quarters of the enemy, approached by a narrow stairway, above.

"Step quietly," I cautioned my men, as we neared the dark and forbidding entrance. "Keep close to the shadow of the buildings. Our best chance is in a surprise."

There was no guard at the door that stood open to the street, and we halted a moment before it to make sure of our plans.

"It's a bad hole," whispered Corson.

"A fine place for an ambush," I returned dubiously.

"Well, there's no help for it," said the policeman. "Come on!" And drawing his club and revolver he stole noiselessly up the stairs.

I felt my way up step by step, one hand against the wall and my shoes scraping cautiously for a resting-place, while my men followed in single file with the same silent care.

But in spite of this precaution, we were not two-thirds the way up the flight before a voice shot out of the darkness.

"Who's there?"

We stopped and held our breath. There was a minute of silence, but it was broken by the creak of a board as one of the men shifted his weight.

"There's some one here!" cried the voice above us. "Halt, or I'll shoot! Peterson! Conn! Come quick!"

There was no more need for silence, and Corson and I reached the landing just as a door opened that let the light stream from within. Two men had sprung to the doorway, and another could be seen faintly outlined in the dark hall.

"Holy Mother! it's the cops!" came in an awe-stricken voice at the sight of Corson's star.

"Right, my hearty!" cried Corson, making a rush for the man, who darted down the hall in an effort to escape. The two men jumped back into the room and tried to close the door, but I was upon them before they could swing it shut. Four of my men had followed me close, and with a few blows given and taken, the two were prisoners.

"Tie them fast," I ordered, and hastened to see how Corson fared.

I met the worthy policeman in the hall, blown but exultant. Owens was following him, and between them they half-dragged, half-carried the man who had given the alarm.

"He made a fight for it," puffed Corson, "but I got in wan good lick at him and he wilted. You'll surrinder next time when I tell ye, won't ye, me buck?"

"Aren't there any more about?" I asked. "There were more than three left in the gang."

"If there had been more of us, you'd never have got in," growled one of the prisoners.

"Where's Barkhouse?" I asked.

"Find him!" was the defiant reply.

We began the search, opening one room after another. Some were sleeping-rooms, some the meeting-rooms, while the one we had first entered appeared to be the guard-room.

"Hello! What's this?" exclaimed Corson, tapping an iron door, such as closes a warehouse against fire.

"It's locked, sure enough," said Owens, after trial.

"It must be the place we are looking for," I said. "Search those men for keys."

The search was without result.

"It's a sledge we must get," said Owens, starting to look about for one.

"Hould on," said Corson, "I was near forgetting. I've got a master-key that fits most of these locks. It's handy for closing up a warehouse when some clerk with his wits a-wandering forgits his job. So like enough it's good at unlocking."

It needed a little coaxing, but the bolt at last slid back and the heavy doors swung open. The room was furnished with a large table, a big desk, and a dozen chairs, which sprang out of the darkness as I struck a match and lit the gas. It was evidently the council-room of the enemy.

"This is illigant," said the policeman, looking around