The youth and the girl, shivering with cold and nervous excitement, craned their necks above the man"s shoulder.
"O-h-h!" gasped The Oskaloosa Kid. "He"s gone," and, sure enough, the dead man had vanished.
Bridge stepped quickly down the remaining steps, entered the rear room which had served as dining room and kitchen, inspected the two small bedrooms off this room, and the summer kitchen beyond. All were empty; then he turned and re-entering the front room bent his steps toward the cellar stairs. At the foot of the stairway leading to the second floor lay the flash lamp that the boy had dropped the night before. Bridge stooped, picked it up and examined it. It was uninjured and with it in his hand he continued toward the cellar door.
"Where are you going?" asked The Oskaloosa Kid.
"I"m going to solve the mystery of that infernal clanking," he replied.
"You are not going down into that dark cellar!" It was an appeal, a question, and a command; and it quivered gaspingly upon the verge of hysteria.
Bridge turned and looked into the youth"s face. The man did not like cowardice and his eyes were stern as he turned them on the lad from whom during the few hours of their acquaintance he had received so many evidences of cowardice; but as the clear brown eyes of the boy met his the man"s softened and he shook his head perplexedly. What was there about this slender stripling which so disarmed criticism?
"Yes," he replied, "I am going down. I doubt if I shall find anything there; but if I do it is better to come upon it when I am looking for it than to have it come upon us when we are not expecting it. If there is to be any hunting I prefer to be hunter rather than hunted."
He wheeled and placed a foot upon the cellar stairs. The youth followed him.
"What are you going to do?" asked the man.
"I am going with you," said the boy. "You think I am a coward because I am afraid; but there is a vast difference between cowardice and fear."
The man made no reply as he resumed the descent of the stairs, flashing the rays of the lamp ahead of him; but he pondered the boy"s words and smiled as he admitted mentally that it undoubtedly took more courage to do a thing in the face of fear than to do it if fear were absent.
He felt a strange elation that this youth should choose voluntarily to share his danger with him, for in his roaming life Bridge had known few a.s.sociates for whom he cared.
The beams of the little electric lamp, moving from side to side, revealed a small cellar littered with refuse and festooned with cob-webs. At one side tottered the remains of a series of wooden racks upon which pans of milk had doubtless stood to cool in a long gone, happier day. Some of the uprights had rotted away so that a part of the frail structure had collapsed to the earthen floor. A table with one leg missing and a crippled chair const.i.tuted the balance of the contents of the cellar and there was no living creature and no chain nor any other visible evidence of the presence which had clanked so lugubriously out of the dark depths during the vanished night. The boy breathed a heartfelt sigh of relief and Bridge laughed, not without a note of relief either.
"You see there is nothing," he said--"nothing except some firewood which we can use to advantage. I regret that James is not here to attend me; but since he is not you and I will have to carry some of this stuff upstairs," and together they returned to the floor above, their arms laden with pieces of the dilapidated milk rack. The girl was awaiting them at the head of the stairs while the two tramps whispered together at the opposite side of the room.
It took Bridge but a moment to have a roaring fire started in the old stove in the kitchen, and as the warmth rolled in comforting waves about them the five felt for the first time in hours something akin to relief and well being. With the physical relaxation which the heat induced came a like relaxation of their tongues and temporary forgetfulness of their antagonisms and individual apprehensions. Bridge was the only member of the group whose conscience was entirely free. He was not "wanted"
anywhere, he had no unexpiated crimes to harry his mind, and with the responsibilities of the night removed he fell naturally into his old, carefree manner. He hazarded foolish explanations of the uncanny noises of the night and suggested various theories to account for the presence and the mysterious disappearance of the dead man.
The General, on the contrary, seriously maintained that the weird sounds had emanated from the ghost of the murdered man who was, unquestionably, none other than the long dead Squibb returned to haunt his former home, and that the scream had sprung from the ghostly lungs of his slain wife or daughter.
"I wouldn"t spend anudder night in this dump," he concluded, "for both them pockets full of swag The Oskaloosa Kid"s packin" around."
Immediately all eyes turned upon the flushing youth. The girl and Bridge could not prevent their own gazes from wandering to the bulging coat pockets, the owner of which moved uneasily, at last shooting a look of defiance, not unmixed with pleading, at Bridge.
"He"s a bad one," interjected Dopey Charlie, a glint of cunning in his ordinarily gla.s.sy eyes. "He flashes a couple o" mitsful of sparklers, chesty-like, and allows as how he"s a regular burglar. Then he pulls a gun on me, as wasn"t doin" nothin" to him, and "most croaks me. It"s even money that if anyone"s been croaked in Oakdale last night they won"t have to look far for the guy that done it. Least-wise they won"t have to look far if he doesn"t come across," and Dopey Charlie looked meaningly and steadily at the side pockets of The Oskaloosa Kid.
"I think," said Bridge, after a moment of general silence, "that you two crooks had better beat it. Do you get me?" and he looked from Dopey Charlie to The General and back again.
"We don"t go," said Dopey Charlie, belligerently, "until we gets half the Kid"s swag."
"You go now," said Bridge, "without anybody"s swag," and he drew the boy"s automatic from his side pocket. "You go now and you go quick--beat it!"
The two rose and shuffled toward the door. "We"ll get you, you colledge Lizzy," threatened Dopey Charlie, "an" we"ll get that phoney punk, too."
""And speed the parting guest,"" quoted Bridge, firing a shot that splintered the floor at the crook"s feet. When the two hoboes had departed the others huddled again close to the stove until Bridge suggested that he and The Oskaloosa Kid retire to another room while the girl removed and dried her clothing; but she insisted that it was not wet enough to matter since she had been covered by a robe in the automobile until just a moment before she had been hurled out.
"Then, after you are warmed up," said Bridge, "you can step into this other room while the kid and I strip and dry our things, for there"s no question but that we are wet enough."
At the suggestion the kid started for the door. "Oh, no," he insisted; "it isn"t worth while. I am almost dry now, and as soon as we get out on the road I"ll be all right. I--I--I like wet clothes," he ended, lamely.
Bridge looked at him questioningly; but did not urge the matter. "Very well," he said; "you probably know what you like; but as for me, I"m going to pull off every rag and get good and dry."
The girl had already quitted the room and now The Kid turned and followed her. Bridge shook his head. "I"ll bet the little beggar never was away from his mother before in his life," he mused; "why the mere thought of undressing in front of a strange man made him turn red--and posing as The Oskaloosa Kid! Bless my soul; but he"s a humorist--a regular, natural born one."
Bridge found that his clothing had dried to some extent during the night; so, after a brisk rub, he put on the warmed garments and though some were still a trifle damp he felt infinitely more comfortable than he had for many hours.
Outside the house he came upon the girl and the youth standing in the sunshine of a bright, new day. They were talking together in a most animated manner, and as he approached wondering what the two had found of so great common interest he discovered that the discussion hinged upon the relative merits of ham and bacon as a breakfast dish.
"Oh, my heart it is just achin"," quoted Bridge,
"For a little bite of bacon,
"A hunk of bread, a little mug of brew;
"I"m tired of seein" scenery,
"Just lead me to a beanery
"Where there"s something more than only air to
chew."
The two looked up, smiling. "You"re a funny kind of tramp, to be quoting poetry," said The Oskaloosa Kid, "even if it is Knibbs"."
"Almost as funny," replied Bridge, "as a burglar who recognizes Knibbs when he hears him."
The Oskaloosa Kid flushed. "He wrote for us of the open road," he replied quickly. "I don"t know of any other cla.s.s of men who should enjoy him more."
"Or any other cla.s.s that is less familiar with him," retorted Bridge; "but the burning question just now is pots, not poetry--flesh pots. I"m hungry. I could eat a cow."
The girl pointed to an adjacent field. "Help yourself," she said.
"That happens to be a bull," said Bridge. "I was particular to mention cow, which, in this instance, is proverbially less dangerous than the male, and much better eating.
""We kept a-rambling all the time. I rustled grub, he rustled rhyme--
""Blind baggage, hoof it, ride or climb--we always put it through."
Who"s going to rustle the grub?"
The girl looked at The Oskaloosa Kid. "You don"t seem like a tramp at all, to talk to," she said; "but I suppose you are used to asking for food. I couldn"t do it--I should die if I had to."
The Oskaloosa Kid looked uncomfortable. "So should--" he commenced, and then suddenly subsided. "Of course I"d just as soon," he said. "You two stay here--I"ll be back in a minute."
They watched him as he walked down to the road and until he disappeared over the crest of the hill a short distance from the Squibbs" house.
"I like him," said the girl, turning toward Bridge.