"Stream?--d.a.m.n it, it"s mire. His horse"ll throw himself. Who----?"
He leaned forward in the saddle searching the distance for the ident.i.ty of the oncoming horseman. His horse shot forward, and Bill"s was hard put to it to keep pace.
"Can"t we shout a warning?" cried Bill, caught in his brother"s anxious excitement.
"Warning be d.a.m.ned," snapped Charlie over his shoulder. "This is no time to be shouting around. We don"t----Hallo! He"s realized where he"s heading. He"s----. Oh, the hopeless, seven sorts of d.a.m.ned idiot.
Look! Look at that! There he goes. Poor devil, what a smash. Hurry up!"
The two men made a further call upon their horses, urged by the sight of the horseman beyond the slough. He had crashed headlong into the half-dry watercourse at the very edge of the culvert.
The man"s disaster was quite plain, even at that distance. He had evidently been unaware of his danger in leaving the trail for a cross-country run to avoid those he saw approaching him. As he came down to the slough, all too late he had realized whither he was heading. Then, instead of keeping on, and taking his chances of getting through the mire, he had made a frantic effort to swing his horse aside and regain the culvert. His reckless speed had been his undoing. His impetus had been so great that the poor beast under him had only the more surely plunged to disaster, from the very magnitude of its effort to avoid it.
Charlie was the first to reach the culvert. In a moment he was out of the saddle.
The stranger"s floundering horse struggled, and finally scrambled to its feet. The rider was close beside it, but lay quite still where he had fallen. To Charlie"s critical eye there was little doubt as to what had happened. The adjacency of the edge of the culvert warned him of what had befallen. The rider must have struck it as he fell.
As Bill dismounted he pointed at the stranger"s horse.
"Grab it," cried Charlie. The next moment was kneeling beside the fallen man.
Then, in a moment, the wondering Bill, looking on, beheld a sight he would never forget.
Charlie bent down over the silent figure. He reached out and placed an arm under the man"s body and turned him over. The next instant a cry, half-stifled in his throat, a cry as of some dumb creature mortally wounded, a cry full of hopeless, dreadful pain rose from the kneeling man, and its agony smote the sympathetic brother as though with a mortal blow.
Then came words, a rush of words, imploring, agonized.
"Kate! Kate! Oh, Kate, why did you do it? Why? Oh, G.o.d, she"s dead!
Kate! Kate! Speak to me. For G.o.d"s sake speak to me. You"re not dead.
No, no. Not dead. It can"t be."
The man"s hand caressed the soft pale cheek under it. He had thrust back the prairie hat which still retained its position, pressed low upon the head, and a ma.s.s of dark, luxuriant hair fell away from its place, coiled tightly about the small head.
At that moment the horrified voice of Bill broke in.
"Charlie! Charlie! I can hear horses galloping in the distance!" he cried, alarmed, without actually realizing why. And some sort of desperate instinct made him thrust his hand into his revolver pocket.
For an instant only Charlie looked up at him in a dazed, only half-understanding. Then his eyes lit with a stirring alarm as he turned a listening ear to windward.
The next moment his arms were flung about the body of the disguised woman at his feet, and, with a great effort, he lifted her and struggled to his feet.
Bill stared in stupid wonderment when he beheld the figure of Kate Seton clad in man"s clothing, but he continued to hold on to the horses, and, with a hand on his revolver, awaited his brother"s commands.
At that moment Kate opened her eyes and gazed into the dark face above her. In a moment the ardent eyes of Charlie smiled down at her. Then the injured woman"s lips opened, and, as they formulated her halting words, his smile gave place to something like panic. She was still in a fainting condition, but power was vouchsafed her to impart a story which drove him to something like a frenzy of activity.
"It"s the police," she gasped. "It"s--it"s shooting. They"re--behind.
They"re right after me--O-oh!"
She had fainted again with her last word, and the dead weight in the man"s arms became almost unsupportable.
But now there was no longer any uncertainty. Kate was alive. The police were behind. At all costs--the woman he loved must be saved.
Charlie looked up at Bill, and his voice became harshly commanding.
"Quick! On your horse, man," he cried, almost fiercely. "That"s it,"
as Bill flung himself into the saddle without question. "Here, now take her. You"re strong. Get her across your saddle in front of you.
There, that"s it--lift. So. Gently. Get her right across your lap.
That"s it. Now take my horse and lead it. So."
Bill obeyed like a well-disciplined child, and with equal enthusiasm.
He leaned down from the saddle and lifted the fainting woman out of his brother"s arms. She was like a babe in his powerful arms. He laid her across his knee. Then, as his brother pa.s.sed the reins of his own horse up to him, he took them and slung them over his supporting arm.
The command died out of Charlie"s tones, and his whole att.i.tude became an irresistible appeal.
"Now, Bill," he cried, urgently. "Down there, along the bank of the slough." He pointed away southwards. "Along there, into that bush. Get into hiding and remain till the coast is clear. Then get her back to her home. Leave the police to me, and--and remember she"s all I care for--in the world."
Bill waited no further word. Once he understood what was required of him he could do it--he would do it--with all his might. He moved off with all the confident air of his simple, purposeful nature.
Charlie watched him go. He saw him vanish amid the shadows of the bush. Then he turned to Kate"s horse and sprang into the saddle.
For a moment he sat there watching and listening. But his purpose was not quite clear. It had not been clear to Bill, who had asked no question, feeling such to be superfluous at the moment.
But his own purpose was clear enough to Charlie"s devoted mind. There must be no chance of Kate"s discovery by the police. Whatever had happened before, there must be no chance of harm to her now. His mind was quite clear. His thought flowed swiftly and keenly.
The distant sound of galloping horses was growing. The summit of the rising ground over which they must come was not more than two hundred yards behind him.
He waited. The clatter of hoofs was growing louder with each pa.s.sing second. The police must certainly be near the top of the rise now.
Bill was well away. He was well in the bush by this time.
Hark! Yes. There they were. The moon was hidden just now, but even so Charlie could see the bobbing figures at the hilltop.
Suddenly he rammed his heels into his horse"s flanks and dashed off up the slope which he had so recently descended. As he went he drew his revolver and fired two shots in swift succession in the direction of the hors.e.m.e.n approaching. Well enough he knew, as he raced on toward the village, that the police were beyond his range, but his purpose was that there should be no doubt in their minds that he--he was their quarry--that he was the man they had already been pursuing so far.
Ten men made up the tally of the pursuers riding with Inspector Fyles.
McBain was not among them. He had remained with the abandoned buckboard while the rest of the police were scouring the neighborhood for the fugitives from the first encounter.
As Fyles came over the rise, and beheld the culvert below him, and heard the two defiant shots hurled in his direction, a thrill of satisfaction swept through him. The man was less than three hundred yards ahead of him with a long hill to climb, and something over a mile to go before the village, and the possibility of safety, was reached.
There was no match in the country for Peter when it came to a long, uphill chase. He told himself the man hadn"t a dog"s chance with Peter hard on his heels.
"We"ve got him, boys," he cried to his men, in his moment of exuberance. "He ought to have been half a mile on by the start he got.
It"s the poor devil of a horse playing out. He"s beat--beat to death.
Now, boys, hard on my heels for a spurt."
Peter leaped ahead under the sharp reminder of the spur, and, in a few moments, the clatter of iron-shod hoofs left the wooden culvert behind it, and the race up the hill began.
The moon now blazed out, as though at last it had definitely decided to throw its weight in against the fugitive. The summer clouds were lifting and vanishing with that wonderful rapidity with which, once the brilliant moon gains sway, she seems to sweep all obstruction from her chilly path.