"Go on!" shouted Stuyvesant impatiently, imperiously, to his coachman, as, never caring what street he took, he too darted around the same corner, and his tall white form vanished on the track of the civilian.
But the sound of the heavy fall, the muttered curse, and the sudden question in the nearest group, "What"s wrong with Sackett?" had reached Miss Perkins"s ears, for while once more the little team was speeding swiftly away, the strident voice of the lone pa.s.senger was uplifted in excited hail to the coachman to stop. And here the Filipino demonstrated to the uttermost that the amenities of civilization were yet undreamed of in his darkened intellect--as between the orders of the man and the demands of the woman he obeyed the former. Deaf, even to that awful voice, he drove furiously on until brought up standing by the bayonets of the patrol in front of the English Club, and in a fury of denunciation and quiver of mingled wrath and excitement, Miss Perkins tumbled out into the arms of an amazed and disgusted sergeant, and demanded that he come at once to arrest a vile thief and deserter.
CHAPTER XIV.
That night the sentries all over the suburbs of Ermita and Malate were peering into every dark alleyway and closely scrutinizing every human being nearing their posts. Few and far between were these, for the natives were encouraged to remain indoors after nine o"clock, and the soldiers forbidden to be out. The streets were deserted save by occasional carriage or carromatta bearing army or navy officers, or what were termed the foreign residents--English or German as a rule--from club or calls to their quarters.
"Lights out" sounded early at the barracks of the soldiery, for they were up with the dawn for breakfast that they might be through with their hardest drills before the heat of the day. The "pool rooms,"
as the big _Americanos_ called these "wide open," single-tabled billiard saloons that flourished in almost every block, were required to put up their shutters at nine o"clock, and every discoverable establishment in which gambling had prevailed in other form had long since been closed by a stony-hearted chief of police, whose star was worn on each shoulder rather than the left breast, and who, to the incredulous amaze of Spaniard and Filipino alike, listened unmoved to the pleas of numerous prominent professors of the gambling industry, even when backed by proffers of a thousand a week in gold. That the "_partida de billar_" had not also been suppressed was due to the fact that, like Old Sledge in the Kentucky Court, its exponents established it to be, not a game of chance, but skill, and such, indeed, it proved to every Yankee who put up his money against the bank. With an apparently congenital gift of sleight of hand, developed by years of practice at pitch penny from toddling babyhood to c.o.c.k-fighting adolescence, the native could so manipulate the tools of his game that no outsider had the faintest "show for his money," while, as against each other, as when Greek met Greek, it became a battle of the giants, a trial of almost superhuman skill. It was the one game left to adult Tagalhood in which he might indulge his all-absorbing and unconquerable pa.s.sion to play for money. All over town and suburbs wandered countless natives with wondering game-c.o.c.ks under their arms, suffering for a chance to spur if not to "sc.r.a.p," for even the national sport had been stopped. Never in all the services in all the churches of Luzon had such virtue been preached as that practised by these heartless, soulless invaders from across the wide Pacific--men who stifled gambling and scorned all bribes. "Your chief of police is no gentleman," declared certain prominent merchants, arrested for smuggling opium, and naturally aggrieved and indignant at such unheard-of treatment. "He did not tell us how much he wanted! He did not even ask us to pay!" Retained in responsible positions in the office of the collector of customs, two Spanish officers of rank were presently found to have embezzled some twelve thousand dollars in some six weeks of opportunity. "But this is outrage! This is scandalous!" quoth they, in righteous wrath on being bidden to disgorge and ordered before a court-martial. "We have nothing but the customary perquisite! It is you who would rob us!" From highest to lowest, in church, in state, in school,--in every place,--there seemed no creed that barred the acquisition of money by any means short of actual robbery of the person. As for thieving from the premises, the Filipino stood unequalled--the champion sneak-thief of the universe.
And the sentries this night, softly lighted by a waning old moon, were on the lookout everywhere among the suburbs for two malefactors distinctly differing in type, yet equally in demand. One, said the descriptions, compiled from the original information of Zen.o.bia Perkins, Spinster; residence 259 Calle Real, Ermita; occupation, Vice-President and Accredited Representative for the Philippine Islands of the Patriotic Daughters of America, and the additional particulars later obtained from Lieutenant Gerard Stuyvesant, aide-de-camp to General Vinton, 595 Calle Real, Malate--one, said the descriptions, was a burly, thick-set, somewhat slouching American, in clothing of the sailor slop-shop variety, a man of five feet six and maybe forty years, though he might be much younger; a coa.r.s.e-featured, heavy-bearded man, with gray eyes, generally bleary, and one front tooth gone, leaving a gap in the upper jaw next the canine, which was fang-like, yellow, and prominent; a man with harsh voice and surly ways; a man known as Sackett among seamen and certain civilians who probably had made their way to Manila in the hope of picking up an easy living; a man wanted as Murray among soldiers for a deserter, jail-bird, and thief.
The other malefactor was less minutely described. A native five feet eight, perhaps. Very tall for a Tagal, slender, sinewy, and with a tuft of wiry hair and sixteen inches of shirt missing. "For further particulars and the missing sixteen inches, as well as the hair, inquire at Colonel Brent"s, Number 199 Calle San Luis, Ermita."
It seems that soon after dark that eventful evening Mrs. Brent and Miss Porter had seen Maidie comfortably bestowed in the big, broad, cane-bottomed bed in her airy room, and had left her to all appearances sleeping placidly towards eight o"clock, and then gone out to dinner.
Whatever the cause of her agitation on receiving at Brent"s hands the little card photograph of herself, it had subsided after a brief, low-toned conference with Sandy, who quickly came and speedily hastened away, and a later visit from Dr. Frank, whose placid, imperturbable, restful ways were in themselves well-nigh as soothing as the orange-flower water prescribed for her. Even the little night-light, floating in its gla.s.s, had been extinguished when the ladies left her.
The room a.s.signed to Marion was at the north-west corner of the house.
Its two front windows opened on the wide gallery, that in turn opened out on the Bagumbayan parade. Its west windows, also two in number, were heavily framed. There were sliding blinds to oppose to the westering sun, translucent sh.e.l.ls in place of brittle gla.s.s to temper, yet admit, the daylight, and hanging curtains that slid easily on their supporting rods and rendered the room dark as could be desired for the siesta hours of the tropic day.
The dinner-table, brightly lighted by lamps hung from hooks securely driven in the upper beams (lath and plaster are unknown in this seismic land), was set on the rear gallery overlooking the _patio_, and here, soon after eight, Brent, his little household, the doctor, and two more guests were cosily chatting and dining, while noiseless native servants hovered about and Maidie Ray presumably slept.
But Maidie was not sleeping. Full of a new anxiety, if not of dread, and needing to think calmly and clearly, she had turned away from her almost too a.s.siduous attendants and closed her eyes upon the world about her. A perplexity, a problem such as never occurred to her as a possibility, one that sorely worried Sandy, as she could plainly see, had suddenly been thrust upon her. Hitherto she had ever had a most devoted mother as her counsellor and friend, but now a time had come when she must think and act for herself.
The little card photograph picked up by the men on the scene of the scuffle at the edge of the Bagumbayan had told its story to her at least and to Sandy. It could only mean that Foster, he who spent whole days and weeks at their New Mexican station to the neglect of his cattle-ranch, he who had "listed in the cavalry and disappeared--deserted, maybe--at Carquinez, had eluded search, pursuit, inquiry of every kind, and, all ignorant, probably, of the commission obtained for him, had, still secretly, as though realizing his danger, followed her to Manila.
This then must have been the tall stranger who called himself an old friend and would give no name, for it was to Foster, in answer to his most urgent plea,--perhaps touched by his devoted love for her lovely daughter,--that Mrs. Ray had given that little vignette photograph long months before. There, on the back, was the date in her mother"s hand, "Fort Averill, New Mexico, February 15, 1898." Well did Marion remember how he had begged her to write her name beneath the picture, and how, for some reason she herself could not describe, she had shrunk from so doing. There had been probably half a dozen pictures of Foster about their quarters at Averill,--photographs in evening dress, in ranch rig, in winter garb, in tennis costume,--but only one had he of Maidie, and that not of her giving.
Now, what could his coming mean? What madness prompted this stealth and secrecy? If innocent of wilful desertion, his proper course was to have reported without delay to the military authorities at San Francisco and told the cause of his disappearance or detention. But he had evidently done nothing of the kind. They would surely have heard of it, and now he was here, still virtually in hiding and possibly in disguise, and one unguarded word of hers might land him a prisoner, a war-time deserter, within the walls of the gloomy carcel in Old Manila.
Sandy she had to tell, and he was overwhelmed with dismay, had galloped to Paco to see his colonel and get leave for "urgent personal and family reasons," as he was to say, to spend forty-eight hours in and about Manila. If a possible thing, Sandy was to trail and find poor Foster, induce him to surrender himself at once, to plead illness, inexperience,--anything,--and throw himself on the mercy of the authorities. Sandy would be back by nine unless something utterly unforeseen detained him at East Paco. Meantime what else could she do?--what could she plan to rescue that reckless, luckless, hare-brained, handsome fellow from the plight into which his misguided, wasted pa.s.sion had plunged him?
From the veranda the clink of gla.s.s and china, the low hum of merry chat, the sound of half-smothered laughter, fell upon the ear and vexed her with its careless jollity. Impatiently she threw herself upon the other--the left--side, and then--sat bolt upright in bed.
Not a breath of air was stirring. The night was so still she could hear the soft tinkle of the ships" bells off the Luneta,--could almost hear the soothing plash of the wavelets on the beach. There was nothing whatever to cause that huge mahogany door to swing upon its well-oiled hinges. She heard them close it when they went out; she saw that it was closed when they were gone, yet, as she turned on her pillow and towards the faint light through the northwest windows, that door was slowly, stealthily turning, until at last, wide open, it interposed between her and the outward light at the front.
Many an evening lately she had lain with hands clasped under the back of her bonny head looking dreamily out through that big open window, across the gallery beyond and the open cas.e.m.e.nts in front, watching the twinkle of the electric lights above the distant ramparts of the old city and the nearer gleam of the brilliant globes that hung aloft along the west edge of the Bagumbayan.
Now one-half of that vista was shut off by the ma.s.sive door, the other was un.o.bscured, but even as with beating heart, still as a trembling mouse, she sat and gazed, something glided slowly, stealthily, noiselessly between her and those betraying lights, something dark, dim, and human, for the shape was that of a man, a native, as she knew by the stiffly brushed-up hair above the forehead, the loosely falling shirt--a native taller than any of their household servants--a native whose movements were so utterly without sound that Maidie realized on the instant that here was one of Manila"s famous veranda-climbing house-thieves, and her first thought was for her revolver. She had left it, totally forgotten, on the little table on the outer gallery.
Even though still weak from her long and serious illness, the brave, army-bred girl was conscious of no sentiment of fear. To cry out was sure to bring about the instant escape of the intruder, whereas to capture him and prevent his getting away with such valuables as he had probably already laid hands on became instantly her whole ambition. The side windows were closed by the sliding blinds. Even if he leaped from them it would be into a narrow court shut in by a ten-foot, spike-topped stone wall. He had chosen the veranda climber"s favorite hour, that which found the family at dinner on the back gallery, and the quiet streets well-nigh deserted save by his own skilled and trusted "pals,"
from whose shoulders he had easily swung himself to the overhanging structure at the front. He would doubtless retire that way the moment he had stowed beneath his loose, flapping _ropas_ such items as he deemed of marketable value.
He was even now stealthily moving across the floor to where her dressing-table stood between the westward windows. The man must have the eyes of a cat to see in the dark, or else personal and previous knowledge of the premises. If she could only slip as noiselessly out by the foot of the bed, interpose between him and the door and that one wide-open window, then scream for help and grab him as he sprang, she might hope to hold him a second or two, and then Brent and Dr. Frank would be upon him.
All her trembling was from excitement: she knew no thought of fear. But strong and steady hands were needed, not the fever-shattered members only just beginning to regain their normal tone. She slid from underneath the soft, light coverlet without a sound. The st.u.r.dy yet elastic bottom of platted cane never creaked or complained. She softly pushed outward the fine mosquito netting, gathered her dainty night-robe closely about her slender form, and the next minute her little bare feet were on the polished, hard-wood floor, the ma.s.sive door barely five short steps away. She cautiously lifted the netting till it cleared her head, and then, crouching low, moved warily towards the dim, vertical slit that told of subdued light in the salon.
There was no creak to those thick, black-wood planks with which Manila mansions are floored. Her outstretched hand had almost reached the k.n.o.b when her knee collided with a light bamboo bedroom chair. There was instant bamboo rasp and protest, followed by instant vigorous spring across the room, and instant piercing scream from Maidie"s lips.
Something dusky white shot before her eyes, something inky black and dusky white was s.n.a.t.c.hed at and seized by those nervous, slender, but determined little hands. Something dropped with clash and clatter on the resounding floor. Something ripped and tore as an agile, slippery, squirming form bounded from her grasp over the cas.e.m.e.nt to the veranda, over the sill into the street, and when Brent and the doctor and the women-folk came rushing in and lamps were brought and Brent went shouting to sentries up and down the San Luis and shots were heard around the nearest corner, Maid Marion, Second, was found crouching upon the cane-bottomed chair that had baffled her plans, half-laughing, half-crying with vexation, but firmly grasping in one hand a tuft of coa.r.s.e, straight black hair, and in the other a section of Filipino shirt the size of a lady"s kerchief--all she had to show of her predatory visitor and to account for the unseemly disturbance they had made.
"Just to think--just to think!" exclaimed Mrs. Brent, with clasping hands, "that this time, when you might most have needed it, Mr.
Stuyvesant should have gone off with your pistol!"
CHAPTER XV.
But there was little merriment when, five minutes later, the household had taken account of stock and realized the extent of their losses.
Maidie"s had evidently been the last room visited. The dressing-table and wardrobe of the opposite chamber--that occupied by Colonel and Mrs.
Brent--had been ransacked. The colonel"s watch and chain,--too bulky, he said, to be worn at dinner in white uniform,--his Loyal Legion and Army of the Potomac insignia, and some prized though not expensive trinkets of his good wife were gone. Miss Porter"s little purse with her modest savings and a brooch that had been her mother"s were missing. And with these items the skilled pract.i.tioner had made good his escape.
On the floor, just under the window in Maidie"s room, lay a keen, double-edged knife. The stumps of two or three matches found in the colonel"s apartment and others in Miss Porter"s showed that the thief had not feared to make sufficient light for his purpose, and from the floor of Marion"s room, close to the bureau, just where it had been dropped when the prowler was alarmed, Miss Porter picked up one of the old-fashioned "phosphors" that ignite noiselessly and burn with but a tiny flame.
Marion"s porte-monnaie was in the upper drawer, untouched, and such jewelry as she owned, save two precious rings she always wore, was stored in her father"s safe deposit box in the bank at home. The colonel was really the greatest loser and declared it served him right, both provost-marshal and chief of police having warned him to leave nothing "lying around loose."
At sound of the shots on the Calle Nueva, Brent had sallied forth, and, rushing impetuously into the dimly lighted thoroughfare, had narrowly missed losing the top of his head as well as his watch, an excited sentry sending a bullet whizzing into s.p.a.ce by way of the colonel"s pith helmet, which prompted the doctor to say in his placid and most effective way that more heads had been lost that night than valuables, and one bad shot begat another.
Sentries down towards the barracks, hearing the three or four quick reports, bethought them of the time-honored instructions prescribing that in case of a blaze, which he could not personally extinguish, the sentry should "shout "Fire!" discharge his piece, and add the number of his post." Sagely reasoning that nothing but a fire could start such a row, or at least that there was sufficient excuse to warrant their having some fun of their own to enliven the dull hours of the night, Numbers 7 and 8 touched off their triggers and yelled "Fire;" 5 and 6, nearer home, followed suit, and in two minutes the bugles were blowing the alarm all over Ermita and Malate, and rollicking young regulars and volunteers by the hundred were tumbling out into the street, all eagerness and rejoicing at the prospect of having a lark with the _Bomberos_, the funny little Manila firemen with their funnier little squirts on wheels.
It was fully half an hour before the officers could "locate" the origin of the alarm and order their companies back to bed, an order most reluctantly obeyed, for by that time the nearest native fire-company was aroused and on the way to the scene. Others could be expected in the course of the night, and the Manila fire department was something that afforded the Yankee soldier unspeakable joy. He hated to lose such an opportunity.
But for all his professional calm, Dr. Frank was by no means pleased with the excitement attending this episode. For an hour or more officers from all over the neighborhood gathered in front of Brent"s and had to be told the particulars, "Billy Ray"s daughter" being p.r.o.nounced the heroine everybody expected her to be, while that young lady herself, now that the affair could be called closed, was in a condition bordering on the electric. "Overwrought and nervous," said Miss Porter, "but laughing at the whole business."
What Frank thought he didn"t say, but he cut short Sandy"s visit to his sister, and suggested that he go down and tell the a.s.semblage under the front gallery that they would better return to whist--or whatever game was in progress when the alarm was given. The colonel could not invite them in as matters stood, and they slowly dispersed, leaving only a senior or two and Lieutenant Stuyvesant to question further, for Stuyvesant, coming from afar and arriving late, was full of anxiety and concern.
Despite his temporary escape, circ.u.mstances and the civil authorities (now become decidedly military) had thrown him into still further a.s.sociation with the woman whom he would so gladly have shunned--the importunate Miss Perkins. He had taken a turn round the block--and refuge in the English Club--until he thought her disposed of at home and his carriage returned. He had come across the little equipage, trundling slowly up and down the street in search of him, had dined without appet.i.te and smoked without relish, striving to forget that odious woman"s hints and aspersions, aimed evidently at the Rays, and had gone to his own room to write when a corporal appeared with the request from the captain in charge of the police guard of Ermita to step down to the office.
It was much after nine then and the excitement caused by the alarm was about over, the troops going back to barracks and presumably to bed. The captain apologized for calling on him that late in the evening, but told him a man recognized as Murray, deserter from the cavalry, was secreted somewhere in the neighborhood, and it was reported that he, Stuyvesant, could give valuable information concerning him. Stuyvesant could and did, and in the midst of it in came Miss Perkins, flushed, eager, and demanding to know if that villain was yet caught--"and if not, why not?"
Then she caught sight of Stuyvesant and precipitated herself upon him.
That man Murray had hatefully deceived her and imposed upon her goodness, she declared. She had done _everything_ to help him at the Presidio, and he had promised her a paper signed by all the boys asking that the P. D. A."s be recognized as the organization the soldiers favored, and showed her a pet.i.tion he had drawn up and was getting signatures to by the hundreds. That paper would have insured their being recognized by the government instead of those purse-proud Red Cross people, and then he had wickedly deserted, after--after--and Stuyvesant could scarcely keep a straight face--getting fifty dollars from her and a ring that he was going to wear always until he came back from Manila--an officer. Oh, he was a smart one, a smooth one! All that inside of three days after he got to the Presidio, and then was arrested, and then, next thing she knew, he had fled,--pet.i.tion, money, ring, and all.
Another soldier told her the signatures were bogus. And that very night she recognized him, spite of his beard, and at sight of her he had cut and run. ("Well he might!" thought Stuyvesant.) And then Miss Perkins yielded to the strain of overtaxed nerves and had to be conducted home.
She lived but a block or two away, and it was Stuyvesant who had to play escort. The air, unluckily, revived her, and at the gateway she turned and had this to add to her previous statements.
"You think the Ray people your friends, lieutenant, and I"m not the kind of a woman to see a worthy young man trifled with. You"ve been going there every day and everybody knows it, and knows that you were sent away to Iloilo in hopes of breaking you of it. That girl"s promised in marriage to that young man who"s got himself into such a sc.r.a.pe all on her account. He"s here--followed her here to marry her, and if he"s found he"s liable to be shot. Oh, you can believe or not just as you please, but never say I didn"t try to give you fair warning. Know? Why, I know much more about what"s going on here than your generals do. _I_ have friends everywhere among the boys; _they_ haven"t. Oh, very well, if you won"t listen!" (For Stuyvesant had turned away in wrath and exasperation.) "But you"d be wiser if you heard me out. I"ve _seen_ Mr.
Foster and had the whole story from his lips. He"s been there every day, too, till he was taken sick----"
But Stuyvesant was out of the gate and at last out of hearing, and with a vicious bang to the door, the lady of the P. D. A."s, so recently victimized by the astute Sackett, retired to the sanct.i.ty of her own apartment, marvelling at the infatuation of men.