- The HEAVEN-KISSED HILL J.S.FLETCHER LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS 823 F636 Return this book on or before the Latest Date stamped below. A charge is made on all overdue books. University of Illinois Library (ДА ang 1 تر، با "Y 255 HEB 1966 001 - 6 APR 26 1986 APR 0 1 1986 27214 THE HEAVEN-KISSED HILL J. S. FLETCHER COPYRIGHT, 1924, BY GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY THE HEAVEN-KISSED HILL PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 803 F 63 h CONTENTS CHAPTER PAGE I The Cottage in the Quarry 9 II The Grizzled Man 27 III The Young Jero 45 IV Hidden Treasure 62 V Barred Out . 79 44 Brown 26 Sepit VI Breach o' the Peace 96 113 130 147 . . VII Zephany Shepperoe VIII Embassy of Melchisedech IX The Midnight Cry X Ambushed XI The White Flag XII Old Bowler Identifies 164 182 199 سار mal able 4zrc.com 1 THE HEAVEN-KISSED HILL THE HEAVEN-KISSED HILL CHAPTER I The Cottage in the Quarry TI \HE actualities of this amazing adventure began one May evening, whereon my friend Colstervine walked into our flat in Maida Vale and told us that his partner was dead. Colstervine is a stockbroker who looks as if he had spent all his life in hunting big game. A great all-bone-muscle-and-sinew sort of a man, six feet in his stockings, and as tough as hickory; his partner, Chisholm, was a little, plethoric person, and it didn't surprise me to hear that the end of him had come through apoplexy, and with startling sudden- ness. “But that's upset all my plans,” continued Colstervine, when he had got through his first announcement. “You see, I was going off 9 ΙΟ The Heaven-Kissed Hill to-morrow to my little place on the South Downs. All arrangements made, all my grub, and so on, in the place; bed aired, nothing to do but walk in. And now, of course, I can't go. Tied down here tight for a couple of months, anyhow.” Only those who knew Colstervine would have realised exactly what this meant. Colstervine is one of those men who have a passionate love of what we will call tent life. The place of which he spoke was well known to all his friends, though only by repute—some utterly out-of-the-way ramshackle cottage or other that he had discovered and fitted up in the wilds, and to which he made periodical retreats, living there a Robinson Crusoe life, but with- out even a dog or a parrot to bear him com- pany. Yet, things being as they were, there was nothing to say. But Colstervine said something, turning to my wife, as if she-a two months' bride-were already the better horse. “Look here, Mrs. Cresswell,” he said, “why shouldn't you and Dick go down there? What's to stop you? You've nothing to do but give your maid a holiday and lock up your flat. The Cottage in the Quarry II As I say, everything's in the cottage already- larder filled with all manner of grub, chiefly in tins, drinks in the cupboard-here's the key: all arrangements made with the old woman- name of Squeech, and lives two miles off who comes to clean up, and who's expecting me to-morrow afternoon. Nothing whatever to do but walk in, hang up your hats, make your- selves at home, and be as happy as the birds about you. Go!” Marjorie looked at me; already I saw the spirit of adventure in her eyes. But I affected to look at nothing but Colstervine. “My dear fellow!" I said. “We've only just got back from a somewhat lengthy and far- flung honeymoon!" Colstervine has a way of dealing bigly and rapidly with things. He waved one of his great hands with a gesture suggestive of fling- ing bundles of scrip about. "Pooh!” he retorted. “Go and have another! Lay you a fiver to a farthing you never saw such a spot in your first one as this little para- dise of mine is! I was so looking forward to getting to it to-morrow! In this weather -ah!” 12 The Heaven-Kissed Hill “Is it so very charming, Mr. Colstervine?” asked Marjorie. “Charming?” Colstervine spread out his hands like a Frenchman and grew eloquent. “No other place in all England like it! Luckiest day I ever had in my life when I struck it—by pure accident, too. Picturesque old cottage, mostly wood, overgrown with roses and things, in a queer, worked-out old quarry, top of a high hill-a heaven-kissed hill, to vary Shakespeare by a termination. Am- brosial air, view of about a few thousand square miles, more or less, over land and sea—and absolute, total, utter solitude! Solitude such as-oh, well, I reckon that if you once get there you'll never want to go away. “Where is this crystallisation of all that's perfect, Colstervine?" I inquired. “Is it easily approachable?" Colstervine became intensely practical. "Tell you how to go straight there, and how to be there within half a day, without fuss or hurry,” he answered. “Take a taxi to Victoria. Get the ten-ten to Wrychester-lovely old spot, that. Get another taxi there-plenty at the station. Tell the man to drive you to The Cottage in the Quarry 13 Woke Cross Roads. Get out. Look round. You'll see, north of you, a high curving hill and, a little to your north-east, on the highest part of the hill, a round coppice or wood- Woke Clump. Make for it, on foot, lanes, footpaths, open hillside, two miles' stiff walk- ing. Then “Look here, Colstervine,” I broke in, “you'd have to show me all that on a map. Not this instant," I added hastily, as he tore from his pocket a well-thumbed ordnance survey sheet, and thrust it at me. “There's a question before that. What about luggage? Evidently this is not the place you can run wheels right up to” you know “Luggage, eh?” he remarked, with a glance at Marjorie. “Hm, luggage, now? You see, I never take any that I can't carry myself. Rough suit of clothes, flannel shirt, necessaries, know-" “Women never travel without luggage, Col- stervine,” I said severely. “How could one get, say, a good-sized, old-fashioned port- manteau to this oasis? For I gather that while train and taxi can carry us over the principal stages of the journey, the last one is- 14 The Heaven-Kissed Hill “It can be done, it can be done!” declared Colstervine, suddenly. “At Woke Cross Roads there is an old chap who owns a stout donkey. A portmanteau, oh, yes! Never did that myself, I carry all I want in a knapsack, on my shoulders. But it can be done. And now listen.” At the end of ten minutes Colstervine had solved all difficulties, and given us every neces- sary working particular. I began to rub my chin. For all along, I had seen that Marjorie was already wild to be setting out on this suddenly-suggested expedition. “Hm!” I said. “You have a princely way with you, Colstervine. And, as you say, we've nothing to do but give the damsel a holiday and lock up the flat. To-day is Thursday. I daresay I could plunge into solitude for—at least a week-end.” Colstervine pulled a key out of his pocket and thrust it into my right hand. “Cupboard in parlour-specially patent lock,” he said. “Carefully selected, small- yet ample-stock of sound wines, old whisky, all and everything. I'll drop old woman Squeech a wire, saying she's to expect you two The Cottage in the Quarry 15 “Of course you did !” she answered per- instead of me to-morrow afternoon, and bid- ding her serve you well. And I guess that when you get there you'll stop a week, and weep when you quit. I always do! Bless- ings!” Then, as suddenly as he had come, Colster- vine was gone, and dangling the key of his cup- board on my finger, I looked at Marjorie. “Did I really say we would go?" I inquired, weakly. emptorily. “And we are going, I'm dying to go. And I'm going to pack precisely what we shall need for such an outing, just now.' “Don't forget,” said I, “that it will have to be borne, finally, by a donkey. I am not quite sure of what burden a donkey is capable But she made the obvious retort, and retired into her chamber, and I, spreading out Colster- vine's ordnance survey sheet, proceeded to make myself acquainted, as well as I could, with the geography of the district into which we were being driven. Half-an-hour's study of the subject, the sheet being supplemented by reference to my own resources in the way of maps and gazetteers, convinced me that Col- 16 The Heaven-Kissed Hill stervine's cottage was as near an approach to a desert island as modern humanity could find. It was near nowhere, and for my part, I began to put together a bundle of books, a pack or two of cards, and enough tobacco to last a moderate man for at least a week. In the midst of this, Colstervine, from his club, rang me up on the telephone. “I say!” he said, when I had let him know that I was all ears. “Just struck me if you do find it pretty lonely there—and there isn't a soul to speak to, close by, anyhow—there's an awfully interesting chap on the other side -top side, you know—of the hill. A Scots- man- 1—Macpherson. About twice my size. Recently come down there as a sheep-farmer. Delightful person. Ideal. Worth cultivating. Thickest brogue or whatever you call it-you ever heard in your life. Takes you about an hour to get into it—but quite paying if you're patient. Go see him. Most hospitable man. Got all that?" “Every word!” I answered. “It may be the saving of us. I say!” “Well?" inquired Colstervine. The Cottage in the Quarry 17 "Is this shanty of yours burglar-proof-and that sort of thing?” I asked. “Had new doors and windows put in when I bought it,” he replied. "Splendid locks, and so on. Tell the missis she can rest in absolute safety. Stand a siege, that place. I say, Dick -one thing—I'd better tell you. That old Squeech woman says the spot is haunted don't let her frighten you. Eh?” “The place is now more highly recommended than before,” I said. “Good-bye, Colstervine.” I turned to Marjorie, who just then appeared at my elbow. “Colstervine,” I remarked, "has just rung me up to tell me of the additional delights in his Paradise. Our only neighbour is a Scotsman twice as big as Colstervine him- self, and the cottage is haunted. You'd better think.” “Can't think and pack,” she retorted. “Give me anything that you want putting into the portmanteau. And let's see didn't he say the ten-ten at Victoria? Then we must have break- fast at eight-thirty, sharp. I suppose we shall lunch at Wrychester?" We did lunch at Wrychester next day-very peacefully and comfortably, in the shadow of 18 The Heaven-Kissed Hill the old and grey cathedral; the hour that we spent over that lunch was almost the last serene sixty minutes that we were to know for the next two days. Up to then our adven- ture had been uneventful—the journey from London—the glance around the old cathedral city—the quiet lunch-all this was ordinary. But if we had known what lay before us, when, lunch being over, we got ourselves and our portmanteau into an old-fashioned fly-in- finitely preferable to a taxi-cab—and ordered its driver to take us to Woke Cross Roads, we should most certainly have remained in the old- world hotel which we were quitting-and been thankful for its security and shelter. It was a perfect spring afternoon, and the drive, away into hills, was delightful. To us it was all new country; neither of us had ever been in that corner of England before, and although we were almost fresh from much travelling in other parts we were both keenly alive to the new impressions. Each successive village and hamlet was a revelation, but I was quick to note that within an hour of leaving Wrychester we had left hamlets and villages behind, and were getting into what appeared The Cottage in the Quarry 19 to be an unusually lonely, unpopulated region. One looked round in vain for church spire or tower, or the high gables of big houses; an isolated farmstead, here and there, or a cottage by the wayside, was all the sign of human habitation that we saw. And finally, after a somewhat lengthy spell in a woodland road, from the depths of which we could see nothing at all, our driver turned a corner, pulled up by a group of two or three cottages, set in trim little gardens, and announced that we had reached Woke Cross Roads. We saw Colster- vine's heaven-kissed hill then; it rose right be- fore us, like a great rampart, curving away from west to north-east, and shutting out all the land behind; also we saw his landmark of trees, Woke Clump. It looked ... far off. When the fly and its driver had gone slowly away, our next job was to find the old chap who owned the stout donkey. We found him-in one of the cottages. To our infinite joy he not only knew where Colstervine's hermitage was, but engaged to bring up all our impedimenta of portmanteau, small bags, and coats there and then. And he showed us where to go. “You keeps that there clump o' trees on top 20 The Heaven-Kissed Hill o'the hill ever before you,” says he, illustrating his precepts with an ash plant. “Make for that by this here lane and across the fields and over the hillside: don't let he ever 'scape ye- so long as he be a-loomin' up there, top of hill, you be right. And when you come to he do ye work round to the far side till you comes out top of everything and there you do see old quarry hole, and in there be Mister Colster- vine's cottage, and a very nice place he make of that, sure-ly, and I be up there as fast as my old ass stir his stumps.” “How far do you call it?" asked Marjorie. "Oh, dunno, missie,” he answered, with true rustic indifference to distance. “Med be two, or med be three mile-dunno ’zactly. 'Bout a nice walk." We went off by a lane that climbed and wound. It was not a straight lane, nor a well- floored one. Sometimes it seemed to turn round on itself, sometimes it fell away into hollows, now and then it led us to brooks which we had to cross by stepping-stones. But some- how or other it led us up that long rampart of hill, and when at last, after crossing some fields, we came out on the open hillside with the land- The Cottage in the Quarry 21 mark-clump only a mile or so in front, we found that we were already at a considerable altitude, and that far away to the south lay a great expanse of shining sea, and that east and west we could see for what Marjorie called hundreds of miles. The view, indeed, was glorious, and we both looked at each other. "Dick!” said Marjorie. “We're going to enjoy this. Colstervine's a brick for thinking of it. What views! And what air!" "Air!” said I. “Um!I should say that if we're going to breathe this all day we shall be hard and fast asleep by eight o'clock every night. This hill-top air is positively intoxicat- ing. And we aren't at the top yet.” “There's the clump, anyhow," she answered, "and the cottage is close by.” We made on to the clump of trees—a great group of ash, elm, and beech-growing in a ring; and restraining a natural desire to linger there for the sake of the view, which, in truth, seemed to embrace half the southern counties, pressed forward to find Colstervine's beloved retreat. Within ten minutes we were looking down upon it, and since all this is about it, it will be well if some account of its situation is 24 The Heaven-Kissed Hill “Sunday morning, nine o'clock, ma'am," replied Mrs. Squeech. “Which, if you care for a hot joint, ma'am, on that day, I could bring up a nice bit of sirloin or a small shoulder o' mutton, or a little leg o'lamb, ma'am.” “What does Mr. Colstervine do?" asked Marjorie. Mrs. Squeech's unimpaired eye turned in the direction of the well-stored larder. "Mr. Colstervine, ma'am, is a powerful one for they cold things,” she said, with a sniff. “He've enough o’tongues and such like in there to feed a regiment! But of course I left Mrs. Squeech and Marjorie to settle these wholly unimportant details, and took a look round the cottage. Clearly, when Col- stervine bought it, he had spent a lot of money on it. All the doors and windows were new, strong, substantial; every window in the place was fitted with strong inner shutters. All the rooms were fittingly and well furnished with fine old stuff that he had doubtless picked up in the Wrychester antique furniture shops. It was an ideal spot for a week-end cottage, and an ideal cottage, and the silence that wrapped it round could almost be felt. The Cottage in the Quarry 25 We began to feel it-literally-when Mrs. Squeech had departed, and the old man and his donkey had come and gone. Then, at last, we were really alone; as much alone, I think it seemed to both of us, as if we had suddenly been set down on some atoll in the far Pacific. We were neither of us used to loneliness, nor to solitudes such as this, and though we said nothing, eachas mutual confession later on proved-felt that the world was a long way off, and I am not sure that we did not already throw wistful thoughts in the direction of the sleepy streets of Wrychester, seven miles away. But there were things to do compensations, and amusing ones. We thoroughly examined the cottage and all its contents. Colstervine had truly said that his larder was well stocked; he himself was a great trencherman, and there was every delicacy there in tins and jars and pots—that man could think of, from caviare to anchovies. The cupboard in the parlour was similarly equipped-Colstervine had a fine taste in wines. It amused us to get ready our own supper, and to wash up the china and silver; this was playing at keeping house in real fashion. And by the time that was over 26 The Heaven-Kissed Hill the dusk was changing to darkness; we went outside the cottage as the night fell, and hung over its little fence, listening. There was not a breath of air to move the feathery pines; in all that vast expanse around us not a sound. “Colstervine was right!” I said suddenly. “This is solitude!” At ten o'clock Marjorie yawned and went promptly to bed. I mixed a glass of our host's old whisky, and lighted a last pipe. And perhaps ten minutes later, as I was glancing over Colstervine's shelf of books, I started cursing myself as I did so for yielding toI didn't know what I had fancied-mere fancy, I believed that I had heard a stealthy, cat-like footstep somewhere outside. Foolish! yet The next instant there came a low, gentle, but unmistakable tapping at the cottage door. . 30 The Heaven-Kissed Hill A man stood in the porch-stood in an atti- tude that suggested considerable doubt and uncertainty: he looked, by his mere attitude, as if he was not by any means sure of his exact bearings. I took him all in at a glance superficially, that is. A very decent, respect- able-looking man, something above middle age, brown and wrinkled of skin, grizzled as to hair and beard, the sort of man of whom you would have said at one glimpse, that here was a fellow that had seen many lands and sailed most of the seas—there was seafarer written big all over him. As for the rest, he wore a good, I should say nearly new, suit of blue serge, a hard felt billycock hat, a black silk tie done up in a sailor's knot: I noticed that his linen was clean and glossy. And there was a gold chain across his double-breasted waistcoat-not an obtrusive one, but one of those old-fashioned, long, thin chains, such as our grandmothers used to festoon about their necks—I remember having a queer fancy as I looked at him, that he must have coils and coils of that chain stowed away in his waistcoat pocket, where, presum- ably, his watch lay also. He could see well into the hall from where The Grizzled Man 31 he stood, and I saw that he not only took in a sharp realisation of myself but of Marjorie as well; I saw, too, a flash of something across his face and in his eyes that you would see in the eyes and face of a man who looks at some development of circumstances that surprises and disappoints. And for the moment he seemed to be struck dumb. “Yes?" I said. “Are you-were you He seemed to catch gratefully at my feeble suggestion, came half a step nearer, and sud- denly, as if realising the presence of a lady, took off his hat. "Flint,” he said. “Flint-he used to live in this cottage. Matter of—a many years ago. But”-his eyes were wandering round the little hall by that time—“I reckon he don't live here now? Begging yours and the lady's pardon for making so free as to inquire, master." “Oh, that's all right,” I answered. "No there's no Flint lives here now. This cottage belongs to Mr. Colstervine of London. We're his friends-staying here. Are you seeking somebody named Flint?” The man kept his hat in his hands, pressed ! 32 The Heaven-Kissed Hill agone, that is. against his broad chest; there was something curiously deferential in his manner. He looked from one to the other of us and nodded. "Flint,” he said. "Dan Flinthe lived in this cottage when I last see him. Twenty years Mother's—I dunno rightly what relation he was something akin to mother. But I was raised here—partly. And”—he paused at that, and seemed to think a long time; when he went on, it was as if he had suddenly remembered something. “Paid off at Southampton I was, yesterday, master, and this morning, thinks I, I'll go and see if old Dan Flint be alive in his cottage,' and so I makes for Portsmouth, and grad’ally makes across here—and here he ain't.” “You've walked from Portsmouth?” I ex- claimed. “Why— Marjorie broke in there. “Dick!" she whispered from the stair. “Why don't you ask the poor man to sit down?” I wondered then why I hadn't. But I atoned by motioning him to come in; he entered at once, pretty much as a well-bred dog might walk into a drawing-room, and, pointed by me The Grizzled Man 33 into the parlour, perched himself, respectfully, on the edge of the nearest chair. “If you've walked all the way from Ports- mouth, you must be tired,” I said. “Will you- He interrupted me with a deprecating mo- tion of his right hand. “Well, not from Portsmouth, master,” he said. "I makes first for Portsmouth. Then I comes to this here town 'twixt here and the sea—the town with a big church in it.” “Wrychester?” I suggested. “Wrychester it is,” he continued. “And then I walks up here. And till you opens the door, I was in hopes that—when it did open- I should find old Dan Flint. But-'tis all changed, and he's gone-evident.” “I'm afraid we can't tell you anything about him,” I said. “Perhaps you may hear of him in the village below. But it's a long walk from Wrychester, and you'd no doubt do with a drink. Will you have one?” The door of the cupboard in which Colster- vine kept his store of wines and spirits hap- pened to be wide open-I had left it open when I got out the whisky for myself—and I 34 The Heaven-Kissed Hill saw the man's eyes travel over its orderly arrangement of shelves and cases. But I saw something else, too; this man was no drinker. His eyes were apathetic, almost uninterested, at the sight of liquor. At the same time he looked pleased. "Tis very true I be main hungry and thirsty, master,” he said apologetically, “if a drink's handy.” Marjorie had come down the stair and fol- lowed me into the parlour, listening. And when the man mentioned that he was hungry, she whisked out across the hall and into the kitchen, and through the open doors I saw her spreading food, and chuckled inwardly at the sight. “My wife'll give you some supper in a minute,” I said. “In the meantime, what do you say to a drop of rum? You're a seafaring man, aren't you?” The very faintest glisten came into his eyes at the mention of rum, and he nodded his head in assent to both my propositions. “Used the sea, master, I have, ever since I was a nipper that high, high," he replied. “Two and forty year of it, now. All over the world. 36 The Heaven-Kissed Hill That he was hungry was evident, but he ate and drank quietly and decently. The food and drink seemed to refresh him mightily, and he began to talk to us freely about his remi- niscences of the cottage in which fate had so curiously thrown us together. “I see the difference as soon as I set foot in this here old quarry to-night, master,” he said. “When I was a nipper this quarry was in its last workings, and old Dan Flint, he live in this cottage. But when I last come here, twenty years agone, there weren't no more workings, and old Dan, he just live here doing nothing. And the grass and the shrubs was a-growing up all over the place, and this here cottage, 'twas what you might call falling to pieces, but old Dan, he said, 'twould last his time, and so, I make no doubt, it did, him being apparently gone, and it now a gentleman's house.” He looked thoughtfully round the cosy kitchen, and his head wagged sideways to- wards the hearth. “Old Dan Flint,” he remarked, "he always sit in that corner. Had a cheer there-com- fortable—what he never let nobody else sit in. The Grizzled Man 37 >> I can see him now, a-setting there, so to speak, of course. Lived with him two year when I was a nipper. And come to see him, time and again, till twenty years agone, since when I never see him no more. And yet never knew, from the first, what relation he was. But some- thing on the mother's side, sort of what they call distant. “ “Is your name Flint?" inquired Marjorie. Our guest shook his head gravely, as if this had been a most important proposition. “No, ma'am,” he replied. “No, my name ain't Flint. My name is Kiffin, William Kiffin. Don't rightly know who I was to start out with. But,” he added, as if the thought gave him some curious natural satisfaction, "I do know that now old Dan Flint fare to be dead, I ain't got a single living relative in the world! That is, to be sure, as far as I knows of.” “Nobody hereabouts?" I suggested. “Not anywheres, master,” he replied. "I suppose you remember some of the people round about here, though, don't you?" I asked. “People in the village at the foot of the hill, for instance?" 38 The Heaven-Kissed Hill He looked doubtful, screwing up his eyes over his plate and evidently trying to think. “Mrs. Squeech?” suggested Marjorie. He brightened at that, and for the first time since he had entered the cottage I saw the ghost of a smile on his face. “I 'member she,” he said suddenly. “Her was a squinting female, and old Dan, last time I see him, he said her wanted to wed him for his bit of money. Said, too, as her finished Squeech off with rat poison because he wouldn't bring home his money reg'lar of a Saturday night. But 'tis all twenty year agone, and I ha' seen half the world since then!” “Will you have a drop more rum, Kiffin?" ' I said, as he made an end of his supper and drained his glass. He shook his head in token of a negative that I saw to be genuine. “No, I thank’ee kindly, master,” he said. “I never touches more than one glass o' that commodity at one time, and yours was a gen’- rous 'lowance. I done princely well, many grateful thanks to you and your good lady, and may the Lord reward you. An' old Dan 40 The Heaven-Kissed Hill rest till morning. Such a decent, quiet man! didn't you notice that he said his grace before and after his supper?” “Um!” said I. “He could go down to Mrs. Squeech's village-as he knows these parts that's probably what he intended.” “I believe they all go to bed at nine o'clock in these country places,” remarked Marjorie. “And even if he went there, how do we know he'd find a lodging?” "An utter stranger, you know,” I suggested, doubtfully. “And this isn't our house.” “It's just what Colstervine would do,” said Marjorie. “Exactly what he'd do!” “Oh, all right, then,” said I. “After all, Wrychester's a long way off, and I dare say he'd get no accommodation nearer. Som" I went back to the kitchen. Our visitor was standing, hat in hand, where I had left him. He was looking thoughtfully at the spot by the hearth whereon old Dan Flint used to sit in his comfortable, strictly-reserved chair. “Kiffin,” I said, “I think you'd better take a shake-down here for the rest of the night. It's past eleven, and you can't walk back to The Grizzled Man 41 Wrychester at this time. Could you get a few hours' rest on that sofa?” He showed no surprise at my invitation. Instead, he glanced at the sofa, a big, roomy affair that almost filled one side of the kitchen, and then turned to me with an informing smile. “I've rested on a many worse and harder spots in my time, master,” he answered quietly. “I'd be main thankful! But-" “Well?” I asked, seeing him hesitate. "I've given a lot o'trouble already,” he said. “Your good lady—” “There'll be no trouble at all,” interrupted Marjorie, coming in behind me. “I can give you some blankets and a rug; it'll be better, anyway, than walking miles and miles through the night.” "Then I thanks you kindly, ma'am,” he said. “A lie down, and a sleep, is what 'ud come uncommon grateful.” We got him some coverings and cushions, bade him good night, and left him. I locked up the house and the parlour cupboard, and eventually followed Marjorie upstairs. She was in a high state of grace, consequent upon The Grizzled Man 43 and the coppice than I cared about, gladsome as the sounds were. I got up, intending to close the windows for the rest of the night. The dawn was breaking in the east, and in the quarry, and over our garden, and around the belt of pines white mists were curling like fairy phantasms. I stood by the windows for a mo- ment watching—and suddenly, from amongst the tall macrocarpus trees that fringed the gar- den, a man emerged, dodged like a weasel into the high bushes close by, and vanished. It was, perhaps, fortunate that I had not then drawn back the curtains; I was looking through a crack between them. And a mo- ment later I saw the man's head above the bushes, where they lessened in height; he was making for the coppice that was before the entrance to the quarry. As he reached it other figures—men-came out of its shadows, as if to join him. I counted them as they stood for an instant silhouetted against the white mist- wreaths. One-two-three-four. Four in all. And all looking our way. I went noiselessly downstairs, and with a gentle tap at the kitchen door opened it and entered. Kiffin was sitting up, half-dressed, 44 The Heaven-Kissed Hill in his sofa-bed, staring straight at me. I mo- tioned him to speak low, and I spoke low myself. “Kiffin!” I said. "There are men-four men—hanging about outside the cottage, and obviously watching it. Do you know anything about them?” His brown face turned the colour of his grey shirt, his jaw dropped, leaving his mouth cav- ernous, and he lifted a hand to his head, and rose, staggering, to his feet. CHAPTER III The Young Jew I WAS so certain that the man was going to faint, or to collapse altogether, that I made, there and then, for the cupboard in the parlour and sought for some brandy. When I got back to him, he had dropped into a sit- ting posture on the side of his improvised bed, and was staring at the window: his face was as ghastly as before, and it only began to re- gain something of its colour when he had gulped down the drink that I handed to him. He shook his head, looked at me apologetically, and motioned with his hand toward his heart. “Touches me, there, anything of that sort, master,” he muttered. "Sudden, like." “I didn't want to frighten you,” I said. “But now that you're better—what about these men? Do you know anything? There are four of them-outside. And one was in this garden, and seemed, from his movements, to have been at this very window." 45 46 The Heaven-Kissed Hill His face went grey again at that, and he glanced at the window as if half expecting to see something there. Then he looked at me. "Men?” he said. “Four of 'em? Four? And here. Then” “You'd better out with it, Kiffin," I insisted as he paused. “Are they following you?" "Followed!” he muttered. "Followed? Aye, that'll be the word—followed. And yet- “Who are they, and what are they follow- ing you for?” I demanded. “Come, now!” But I saw even then that I was not going to get any direct answer from him; at any rate, not just then. He began to look this way and that, and to shift his stockinged feet about on the floor. “And again, it mayn't be so, master,” he said. “In these here places, there's game- keepers, and watchers, and such-like about o' nights—it might be some o' them that you've seen. Likely as not 'twould be so, master.” “Gamekeepers don't sneak under windows and dodge about like weasels,” I said severely. “This man I saw was after something or some- body in here. Come, now, Kiffin! Is there 48 The Heaven-Kissed Hill there,” he replied. “I'm not without 'em, master!” “Well?” I said sharply. “You'll not turn me out o' your door—" he began. "I'm not going to turn you out of the door," I answered. “I'm not going to open the door, till I know what's outside. If you know- "I couldn't say, master," he protested. “Upon my soul's word, master, I couldn't say! And as I said—it might be keepers and such- like.” Seeing that I was not going to get more out of him just then, I went back to my room and looked out of the window. It was at that time just a quarter to five, and the sun was showing above the eastern rim of the old quarry -a fine, hot sun, under whose beams the gossa- mer-like mists on the edge of the pines were melting and disappearing. I could now see all over the quarry, at any rate in front of the cottage, and all along the face of the pine cop- pice at its entrance, and I searched every yard of what I could see, and saw nothing of the four men. And when I presently went to a room at the back and from its windows made 1 The Young Jew 49 a similar inspection, I saw nothing—to all ap- pearance we were as much alone as on the pre- vious evening. I watched for a long time, on both sides, my eyes alert for the stirring of branches, movements among shrubs, for a wisp of smoke from pipe or cigarette: again, I saw nothing. And I began to wonder whether Kiffin's suggestion might not have been right, and if the men I had certainly seen had been game-watchers, one of whom out of mere curi- osity had peeped in at the lower windows. The early morning wore on. Marjorie awoke. I told her of what had happened. She sided with Kiffin's notion about gamekeepers and such-like, and pooh-poohed my ideas about his being followed. “What was he so frightened about, then?” I demanded. "Bowled clean over!” "You gave the poor man a shock, of course,' she said. "Perhaps he was half-asleep. Let him have his breakfast and go his ways; if we're going to imagine all sorts of things sim- ply because we see men in the quarry, we shall be suffering from nerves before the week-end's over.” We went down together, eventually, to see The Young Jew 51 "Didn't I say so?” I retorted. “Do? What can we do? If he is being followed—well, he is! What would you do?” “I think we should just take a look round, you and I,” she said. “Just a stroll round the quarry, and a careful look down the hillside. If we see nothing suspicious, well, then, there's no reason why he shouldn't go on his way. Out- side the quarry there, by that coppice, we can see for miles over the hillside." “Come on, then," I replied. “The good Samaritan business is all very well, but we don't want the man hanging about here all the morning.” I went out to the kitchen and found him just risen from his breakfast, and peering furtively out of the window. "Look here, Kiffin,” I said, “we're just going to take a thorough look round, and see if there is any- one about. If not, the coast's clear for you. But I wish you'd tell me straight out, is it likely anybody's followed you?” “ 'Tain't what you'd call likely, master,” he answered promptly. "Not nohow likely, as the words go. But-it might be.” “Why should anybody follow you?” I persisted. 52 The Heaven-Kissed Hill “As I said before, master, a man has ene- mies,” he answered. “I've—some. “Look here!” said I. “Let's be plain. If your enemies are outside there, are you afraid of facing them?” He began to work his jaws, as if he were chewing something; at last he shook his head. "Couldn't say, master,” he answered. “De- pends. But I think it was gamekeepers, you see.” I bade him lock the door after us, if he pleased, to make himself safe, in case anybody was dodging about outside, and Marjorie and I quitted the cottage, walked through the gar- den, and out into the quarry. We heard him lock the door-we heard more; he shot the heavy bolt with which Colstervine had strength- ened it. “There!" I exclaimed. “You heard that? He's both locked and bolted himself in! What's that look like?” Marjorie made no reply. But when we had walked a few yards across the level of the quarry she spoke in little more than a whisper. "Dick?" she said. “Well?” said I. The Young Jew 53 “Which of us two has the sharper eye for things?” she asked. “Come on!" I answered. “You see some- thing?" “Pay no attention,” she said. “There's a man watching us from the edge of that coppice. I've seen him ever since we left the cottage. Let's walk straight on to the entrance to the quarry, as unconcernedly as we can." I have already said that the quarry was en- tered by a sort of tunnel; roofless, of course; some fifteen to twenty yards in length, cut, originally, through the slope of the hill, and that immediately facing it was a coppice of growing pine and fir. We passed through this tunnel, sauntering along as if bent on no par- ticular business; once or twice Marjorie stopped to gather wild flowers. And then, all of a sudden, as we came to where the tunnel narrowed before finally debouching on the open hillside, four men appeared, breaking out upon us as if from nowhere, and ranging themselves in something like military formation between us and the coppice in front. "Don't show surprise, Dick,” whispered Marjorie. “And keep cool, and be wary.” 54 The Heaven-Kissed Hill I did my best to look at the four strangers with no more than the slightly interested curi- osity which was permissible under the circum- stances. As for Marjorie, she affected a sudden interest in a great clump of gorse that rose just there, but I knew that she was taking stock of the men through its branches. They were coming towards us slowly, diffidently; we got a good look at them. And they were as queer a lot, and as villainous a lot, and as jail- bird a lot, as a man could see, and for one mo- ment I wished I had my good old service re- volver in my pocket. Yet there was something-an indefinable something—about the four, severally and col- lectively, which convinced me that we ourselves were in no danger. Indeed, they seemed more inclined to be frightened of us than we were of them. They were all young fellows of little more than the hobble-de-hoy stage, and of the type which one calls hooligan in London, and corner-boy in Ireland. Two wore old and dirty cast-off officers' tunics; one covered himself in an ancient trench-coat; out of the four only one had a fairly decent suit; he it was who detached himself from the rest and came forward to The Young Jew 55 meet us--a little, middling-sized Jew, with bright, beady eyes, a nose several sizes too large for him, and crisp, curling rings of hair, black and oily, under his old billycock hat. He raised that hat, and made us a bow as politely as you please, and the smile that accompanied these actions was wide-and wheedling. “May I have a word with you, mithter?” he asked, coaxingly. “Jutht a word-on bith- neth?” I purposely gave him what was meant to be a cool, supercilious, and somewhat prolonged inspection. And I knew at once that he had seen service, in some sort, for under my frown- ing stare he instinctively began to pull himself to attention, and his long, dirty fingers moved towards the seams of his trousers. “Well?” I said curtly. "What is it?" “You're living in that little cottage, ain't you, mithter?” he answered, almost eagerly, and with the same wheedling smile. “We thee you and the lady come out of it, jutht now. And—you've got a man in there. Came latht night, didn't he, mithter?-one of uth thee him through the window thith morning. Kiffin!" “Well?” I repeated. 56 The Heaven-Kissed Hill He looked round at his companions, who were gradually edging nearer-a slinking, shifty-eyed lot. “We want Kiffin,” he said. I purposely hesitated in answering him, watching him meanwhile as if I scarcely un- derstood his demand. The other three crept up and stood around and behind him, looking from me to Marjorie; there was a certain curi- ous speculation and uncertainty in their restless glances, and they reminded me of boys who, having thrown a ball into somebody's garden, wonder if it is going to be given back to them. But the little Jew chap regarded me steadily enough, and I saw at once that he had plenty of brain-power behind his black beady eyes, and had got to be reckoned with. “What do you want with Kiffin?” I demanded. He smiled-queerly—and a glance of com- prehension passed between him and the others. "Thatth our bithneth, mithter,” he answered, quietly. “The thing ith—we want him. And we mean to have him. That ith what we've followed him from Portthmouth for.” “Oh, you followed him from Portsmouth, The Young Jew 59 way. All we thay ith thith, let Kiffin treat uth fair and reathonable and no harm'll come to him. But if not—we thall put him through it -proper!” Then, for the first time, one of the others spoke-a dark-featured, surly looking fellow, who for the last minute or two had been stead- ily kicking his toe in the turf. “ 'Tain't us as is in any wrong,” he growled. “We ain't done nothing. Kiffin, he done it- cruel! And knows it.” “What's he done?” demanded Marjorie. All four looked at each other, and all re- lapsed into silence. “If he's wronged you, and you'd only tell suggested Marjorie. The little Jew turned on me with a know- ing look that would have done credit to a diplomatist. “Mithter!” he said. "You get Kiffin to come outthide! Let him treat uth fair_he knowth what about and we'll treat him fair. We can't thay no better, can we, mithter? And we don't want to make no trouble for you and your good lady—we don't, mithter. But we want Kiffin, and we'll have him!” us 60 The Heaven-Kissed Hill “And I suppose that you'd go to the length of-breaking into the cottage, eh?” I asked. “You may as well speak straight out.” “Never mind what we might do, mithter," he answered. “Thith here ith a conferenth- there needn't be no unpleathantneth if-' I exchanged a glance with Marjorie, and together, without another word, we turned back towards the cottage. “What's it all mean?” said Marjorie. “Mean?” I answered. “Money! The prob- ability is that our guest, who says his grace so punctiliously, has done these chaps, somehow or other, and they want their own. And they're going to have it out of Kiffin one way or an- other way. An ugly situation for him.” “You'll not get him to come out to them,” she said. Although I said nothing to her on the point, I was somewhat doubtful if Kiffin would let us in. I had already seen enough of him to know that he was a man of observation and resource; he would have noticed, I felt sure, that the doors of the cottage--two of them, one front, one back—were particularly strong and well endowed with locks and bolts; and The Young Jew 61 . that all the windows, upstairs and down, were fitted with inside shutters across each of which a heavy iron bar could be slipped; the whole place, indeed, was relatively impregnable, and as it was well victualled a garrison could hold out in it for some time until help came. Now Kiffin was inside, and he must have seen his enemies as they talked to us, and ... But he let us in, locking and bolting the door again the instant we had covered the threshold. And I saw then that he was fright- ened no longer; he looked as if he had made up his mind about something or other. So I spoke straight out. “Kiffin!” I said sternly. “Those fellows want you! You've got to go out and speak to them- now!” “Neither now nor at any time, master,” he answered quietly. “Out of this house I do not go!" Hidden Treasure 63 but when you went up there and talked to them, in the open, I saw what it was. Would you have me go out and be knifed? I'm not going, while there's what there is outside. Espe- cially,” he added, with a glance around us, “especially when there's stout doors and barred shutters 'twixt me and that!” Marjorie and I looked at each other. “Give him their message, Dick,” she said, suddenly. “Yes,” said I. “Look here, Kiffin, these fellows want you, and they mean to have you. But they've assured us- “Assured!” he interrupted, turning his eyes towards the ceiling. “Their assurance? Oh, Lord!” “Assured us that if you'll only talk to them, they'll be reasonable,” I continued. “They want an explanation from you. You've evi- dently had some transaction with them that isn't to their liking. They've promised me that if you'll have it out with them you shall come to no harm. I think they meant that; I'm sure they did. If, as I suspect, it's money He interrupted me again, shaking his head. “Master,” he said, "you don't know nothing 64 The Heaven-Kissed Hill about it, nor yet about them. I'm safe here, and out of this place I'm not going while they're hanging around, at any rate. Four against one!-and such a four! I'd have a knife in my throat before ever I crossed that bit o' garden. No!” I saw that he was convinced of the truth of what he was asserting, and I hesitated, utterly perplexed. “If you'd only tell me what it's all about?” I suggested. “Not worth while, master, while, master,” he answered promptly. “My business. And this here situa- tion—unfortunate, I grant you, for you and your kind lady—it can't go on for ever, nor for long. There'll be somebody coming round.” “That's doubtful,” said I. “We're miles out of the way.” “You'll have a woman that comes to work," he suggested. “She "Nobody will come before to-morrow," said Marjorie. “Keepers, then,” he retorted. 'Tain't be- lievable that somebody'll not come round. And then we sends for the police.” "It's more than possible that nobody will >> 1 1 ! Hidden Treasure 65 come near the place before the woman comes to-morrow morning,” said I. “And if these fellows are still hanging about, do you sup- pose they'll let her get within earshot? They could easily tell her that we've gone away for the day, and that she's not to come until Mon- day. You're putting us in a very unpleasant position. Do you think we wish to be kept prisoners?” “We can stand a siege, master,” he replied, coolly. “I've been taking a look round while you and your good lady was out, and there's enough provisions in this cottage to last us three for a fortnight and more, if need be. Likewise good liquºr-wines and spirits—and plenty of it. So—there we are! 'Tis the for- tune o' war, master, and lucky we should con- sider of ourselves to be so well purvided. We ain't likely to go hungry, nor yet without a sup o' good stuff to wash it down! And, as I say, somebody's sure to come. Master, we can hold out!” I think Marjorie and myself must at that moment have been staring at him like a couple of fools; certainly I felt as if I were open- 68 The Heaven-Kissed Hill four young ruffians?" I asked. “A bit cow- ardly, eh?” "Well, what are we to do?" she asked. “This is all rot!" "It strikes me that we haven't much choice in the matter," I retorted. “It's not what we are going to do, but what's going to be done with us. There's that chap sitting in our kitchen, and there are four other chaps waiting for him outside. He won't go out, and they can't get in. At least-" Just then a firm, decided knock sounded on the front door. With one accord Marjorie and I stuck our heads out of the window. There, a few feet below us, half in, half out of the porch, stood the young Jew. I coughed: he looked up, expectant. “It's no good,” I said, "He won't come out to you." He smiled queerly, gave me a knowing look, and came under the window. “Not under a thafe conduct, mithter?” he asked. “Such ath I give you, jutht now?" “Not under anything!" I replied. “He says you'll murder him.” He lifted his right forefinger, and medita- tively rubbed the side of his big nose. Hidden Treasure 69 “We will murder him if he don't come to, mithter,” he answered. “He'th no more chance o' getting away from uth, now we have come acroth him, than a rat hath of ethcaping from a good trap. We've got Kiffin! But I'm all for negothiationth, mithter-mythelf. Com- promithe.” “Well?” said I. “What I thuggetht ith thith here,” he con- tinued. "Can't be plethant for you and your good lady to have thith bithneth going on “It's extremely unpleasant,” I said. “I wish you and Kiffin would take your business elsewhere!” “Dependth entirely on him, mithter,” he an- swered. "We're agreeable. And what I thay ith thith. You're a gentleman, you are, and you'll play fair. Do you come out again, mithter, and we'll put our cathe before you, truthful, and you'll thee how cruel bad we been done by Kiffin. But—if he'll come to termth- reathonable and proper termth-we'll treat with him, through you. And then- "You go away,” I said. “Go back to the mouth of the quarry. I'll speak to Kiffin- and then we'll come out to you." 70 The Heaven-Kissed Hill He went off at once, and Marjorie and I went downstairs. Kiffin had pulled the heaviest table in the hall in front of the door, and was standing on it, peering through the glass tran- som above the lintel. There was a patent ven- tilator in that transom, and he had opened it. “Now-Kiffin,” I said, with as much stern- ness as I could muster. “I suppose you over- heard all that that Jew chap said just now? Very well—we're going out to hear exactly what it is they want. If I consider that their claim—whatever it may be--against you is a just one, I shall side with them. And we shall fetch the police. Now pull that table out of the way." He still stood on the table, and before he descended from it he cast another look through the transom. Apparently he made sure that the Jew had gone away up the quarry, for he got down looking quite satisfied and drew the table back to its proper place in the middle of the hall. "I ain't no objection in the world to your going out, master,” he said. “Always pur- viding as you leaves me in. But I don't think you'll fetch no police. 'Cause why? You Hidden Treasure 71 won't be allowed to! And if folks will stick their heads into hyæna's cages—well, 'tain't no business o’mine. On'y, if I might humbly ad- vise I should say stay where you was. In comfort—and lux’ry. I says again, master- we can hold out.” “Oh, rot!” said I, angrily. “This is getting a bit too much. I'm going to have the whole lot of you off my premises. Open that door- as you're standing by it.' He turned the key and drew the bolt at once, and Marjorie and I walked out—to hear bolt shot and key grate the instant we had passed the threshold. “I wonder if this is a wise thing?" muttered Marjorie. "Locked out!” "What else is there to do?" said I. “We shall at any rate get some explanation of all this infernal mystery! And, as I said, if I find that Kiffin's done those chaps any way—as I guess he has ! -I shall side with them. Any- how, I'm going to have Kiffin out of that cot- tage, even if these fellows have to drag him out. Come on! -let's hear what it's all about, and then, perhaps, we shall know where we are." 72 The Heaven-Kissed Hill We went forward to the mouth of the quarry, where the young Jew and his three companions were waiting for us. I have al- ready said that they were a particularly vil- lainous-looking lot-villainous is, perhaps, rather too strong a term; hang-dog would suit them better—but unpresentable as they were, both Marjorie and I now noticed that we had somehow or other gained favour with them, and as we drew near they welcomed us with smiles—sheepish on the part of three, coaxing and confidential on that of the fourth, their self-constituted leader, who, as if doing the honours, pointed us courteously to a block of stone that lay amidst the herbage. “We take it uncommon kind of you to come out, mithter—and lady,” he said. “We're poor fellowth, but honetht, which Kiffin, in there, he ain't. He done uth a fair bloomin' treat, Kif- fin, mithter, and no error, ath you'll thee, if you'll lithen a bit. You thee” “Look here, my lads,” I broke in. “If you want me to do anything for you, you've just got to tell me the truth. There you are—and there's Kiffin in our cottage. I don't want him Hidden Treasure 73 there, and I don't want you here. Now then, straight out, what's all this about?” By that time all four had grouped on the grass before us, squatting or kneeling, and all intently interested in us and the event of the moment. And when I demanded full explana- tion the three subordinates turned like one man on the little Jew, who, on his part, gave the sharpest-looking of the lot a warning glance that began with him and ended in the direction of the cottage. “Keep your opticth on that door, Fakoe," he commanded. “If you thee ath much ath a hair of Kiffin He turned abruptly on me: “That'th all right, mithter," he went on. “We're going to take you into our confidenth. Ve been talking about you and your good lady, and we like your lookth—you'll play thtraight with uth-you ain't the thort to thee poor fellowth put on ath we been. Mithter! you ain't any idea of what it ith that Kiffin'th after?” “Idea!" I exclaimed. "Not the remotest! What is he after?” “I'll tell you, mithter.” He paused for a 74 The Heaven-Kissed Hill “Do you moment, looking round his men with a subtle grin. “Thwag!” “Swag?” I said. “What swag?” “Thwag that'th hidden away, thomewhere in thethe part'th, mithter,” he answered. “That'th it—that'th Kiffin'th little game. Thwag!” mean money?-hidden about here?” I asked. “That it?" He smiled, shrugging his shoulders, and spreading out his expressive fingers. “Oh, well—diamanth and pearlth and watcheth—that thort o' thing, mithter; moneyth worth, anyhow,” he replied. “And, by all accounth—hith accounth—a nithe bit, too! Look here, mithter, Kiffin got hiththelf into your cottage latht night, we know he did. And no doubt give himthelf out ath a rethpec- table thailor man? Of courth!but he wath having you for the mug, mithter. He ain't no rethpectable thailor man, Kiffin-leathtwayth if he ever wath, it'th a long time ago. He'th an old lag, Kiffin-he done time!—been doing time motht of hith time, thelp me if he ain't! Ath if we didn't know !” He looked round his myrmidons again, and they all laughed hoarsely; evidently this reflec- 76 The Heaven-Kissed Hill thelf. Well, when we get'th demobbed, we knockth about Portthmouth a while doing noth- ing, all four of uth with a bit of money. And we get'th—never mind how nor where—to know Kiffin. And one day we are with him in a thertain pub, mithter, having a drink or two, and he leadth the converthation, artful like, to how we could put a bit of the ready in our pocket'th. You put it to yourthelf, mithter, how he come round uth. He'th a tongue like oil, Kiffin, and we're thimple chapth. Here we are with him, and him thandin' drinkthFa- koe there, what’th now a-watching the cottage door, and Dex-that'th Dex with the red hair and faulty eye--and Greever, and me, all palth.” “What's your name?” I asked, after making mental notes of the others. “Better let me get a clear understanding.” “My nameth Melchithedech, mithter,” he an- swered, blandly. “Melky for short. Well, ath I thay, me and Fakoe, and Dex, and Greever, there we are with Kiffin. And he pitcheth uth a tale—and mind you, mithter, we believe it'th a true one, 'cauth of what they call corrobora- tive evidenth. Maybe you ain't heard about it, Hidden Treasure 77 mithter, but thome yearth ago I can't thay how many, exactly—there wath a big burglary at one o' the printhipal jewellerth shopth in Portthmouth, and all the betht of the thtock thtolen? Thouthandth o'poundth worth, mith- ter, and never recovered, and nobody ever nabbed for it. Now then, Kiffin, he tellth uth that he knew of an old friend of hith that knew where that thtuff had been planted, away up here on thethe hillth, and that thith here friend hadn't no occathon for it himthelf, being on hith latht legth, but would thell the thecret for a conthideration. And Kiffin thaid that if we'd come in with him, we'd buy the thecret and find the thwag, and claim the reward that wath thtill good.” “Oh!” I exclaimed, seeing daylight through this tangle. “Ah! So Master Kiffin didn't propose that you should appropriate the swag when you found it? You weren't to convert it to your own use?” The three subordinates uttered sounds in- dicative of dissent, and Melchisedech shook his head knowingly. “No, mithter," he answered. “There wath a reward of a thouthand poundth offered, and 78 The Heaven-Kissed Hill we wath to share it. But Kiffin, he hadn't the money to buy up the thecret, and tho he in- vited uth to come in. And we did, mithter! We put'th our poor bit'th of money together, all we had, mithter and lady, and hand'th it over to Kiffin, and while Fakoe, and Dex, and Greever there wait’th at the pub, I goeth with Kiffin to a thertain thtreet in Portthea to get the thecret and the particularth. And Kiffin done me!-me what never wath done before ! done me a treat, and before my very eyeth, and with our money in hith pocketth!” “What did he do?” I asked. “Dithappeared, mithter, in Commercial Road,” replied Melchisedech. “Dithappeared! -like dew in thummer!” 80 The Heaven-Kissed Hill kept a sharp Jook-out on the cottage, shifted his angle of vision sufficiently to give his leader a careless glance. “Five quid—and all I got!” he replied. “It wath about all we all got, mithter,” said Melchisedech. “Thirty-one pound ten we raithed amongtht uth, and Kiffin he wath to make it up to fifty. Then we wath all to go equal thareth in the reward—thee? Good bith- .neth—if Kiffin had played thtraight. But ath I thay, he thlipth me and go'th off with our money in hith pocket. You can't wonder that we want Kiffin, mithter!” Marjorie and I looked at each other. I saw at once that she and I had a mutual feeling about what we had just heard. Unpromising as they were in appearance, the truth seemed more likely to lie with these fellows than with the respectable-looking gentleman in our cot- tage. But I wanted to know more. "Look here!” I said. “Did Kiffin tell you who it was that had this secret to tell?" “Not prethithely, mithter, he didn't,” re- plied Melchisedech. “But he give uth a hint or tho, and knowing Kiffin, we put two and two together, d’ye thee? Our notion ith that Kiffin 82 The Heaven-Kissed Hill “Greever there—he done it. Uncommon clever, mithter, ith Greever, though he don't look it, do yer, Greever? Greever, he hap- penth to be in Farnham, a bit of a town be- tween Portthmouth and Eathtleigh, yethter- day, on bithneth, and he thee Kiffin. And when he onth thet hith opticth on him he didn't take 'em off again-did yer, Greever?” “No blinkin' fear!” growled Greever. "Ain't he got ten quid o' mine?" “Jutht tho,” said Melchisedech, triumph- antly. “Tho Greever, he followth Kiffin. Fol- lowth him firtht to Havant, and then to Wry- chethter. What did he do, Greever, when he thtruck Wrychethter?" “Turned into the first pub,” replied Greever, promptly. “And what did you do, Greever?” asked Melchisedech, admiringly, and with a glance at us which was meant to draw out respectful attention. “What you do, eh?” “Telephoned to you,” answered Greever. “There and then!” “Ain't he a thmart un, mithter?” demanded Melchisedech, rapturously. “Didn't “Didn't lothe no time, did he? He'd make a good 'tec, would Barred Out 83 Greever, if he'd give hith mind to it. And what you done nexth, Greever, when you rung me up?" “Hung round till he come out, and followed him,” replied Greever. "Followed him till he gets into this here cottage.” Marjorie and I exchanged another glance. “Oh!” I said. “So—you actually saw him arrive here?” Greever gave me a calm and critical inspection. “I see you let him in,” he answered, “and I see your lady set his supper for him. Them window-blinds o' yourn don't fit tight. And I see you give him blankets and things for a shake-down on the sofa, and so, of course, I knows he's safe for the night.” “Ain't he a thmart ’un?” repeated Melchise- dech. “Kiffin—he ain't no clath again Greever, when it cometh to it! And tho, you thee, mith- ter, ath thoon ath Greever knowth hith man ith thafe, he hopth it back to Wrychethter and meetth uth—we come on by the latht train, me and Dex and Fakoe-and of courth we cometh up here. To thay good morning to Kiffin, of 84 The Heaven-Kissed Hill courth-which we ain't had that pleathure yet. But it'th got to be thaid, mithter.” There was a brief spell of silence. While it lasted, all with the exception of Fakoe, who, having been detailed for the purpose, never took his squinting eyes off the cottage, watched Marjorie and myself most intently, as if wait- ing for words of super-wisdom. “So that's all, is it?” I said at last. “The whole story? Kiffin's done you out of thirty odd pounds, and you believe that he knows where some stolen stuff is hidden away up here, and that he's after it? Is that the situation?” “You couldn't ha' put it clearer, mithter,” replied Melchisedech. “That ith the thitua- tion!” “Very well,” I continued. “Since there's only one thing to be done: my wife and I are now going for a walk. We'll drop in on the policeman in the village at the foot of the hill, tell him to telephone his superintendent, get assistance, and come up here. Then you can hand Kiffin over. That's the plan of campaign -sure and simple.” I rose from the block of stone on which Mar- jorie and I had been sitting; she rose too. We Barred Out 85 looked round the group. Already their faces had fallen, and their eyes wore a different ex- pression. And Melchisedech shook his head. "The poleeth?” he said, haltingly. “No, mithter—that won't do! We ain't going to have no poleeth in at thith game—not if we can help it! That ’ud thpoil everything, mith- ter. No-we can't do with no poleeth!” "No blinkin' fear!” muttered Greever. There was another brief spell of silence. We stood and looked at them: they stood and looked at us. "Oh, very well!” I said at last. “Do as you like—but I'm going for the police, on my own hook. I'm not going to have Kiffin in my house, nor you hanging about for him. And if you won't be wise enough to fetch the police yourselves, while you've good grounds for doing so—then I shall!” I said all this with as much boldness and determination as I could muster, taking a high tone in the faint hope that it would carry us through. But I knew already that it wouldn't —the situation had wholly changed. The mere mention of an appeal to the duly constituted authorities had roused everything in these four 86 The Heaven-Kissed Hill that we least wished to see. Once again they were the furtive-eyed, watchful, suspicious lot that we had encountered in the early morning. I had moved slightly towards the entrance to the quarry as I finished speaking; Marjorie moved with me. There was a sharp glance of the Jew's beady eyes from left to right, and he and his satellites lined up in front of us. He spoke then-and his tone was as peremp- tory as you please. “We can't have that, mithter!” he said. “We don't want no unpleathantneth-ethpe- thially with a lady in the cathe—but we can't have no poleeth fetched here. Thith ith our bithneth, mithter, and we mutht do it in our way.” “Do you mean to interfere with mine?” I demanded. “We don't want to interfere with nobody, mithter,” he answered. “But-we ain't going to let anybody interfere with uth. We're going to have Kiffin out o' that cottage, one way or another, and we're not going to allow anything to thtop uth! Be reathonable, mithter! You mutht thee that we don't want no poleeth here!” Barred Out 87 “Are you going to stop me and my wife from leaving this quarry?" I said. "Come on, now-yes or no?" “You've hit it, mithter," he replied, with ready candour. "We are! We ain't going to allow nothing other than what we like’th until we've got Kiffin. Look here, mithter-lithen to reathon. We know thith plathe —we give it a good look round firtht thing thith morning. 'Tain't likely ath anybody'll come thith way- it'th clean out o' the way of anything or for anybody. We're not at all likely to be inter- rupted, and we got Kiffin in a trap. We thall have him and when we done with him, we'll hop it. Don't make trouble, mithter. We we thought ath how you'd thide with uth—and bring Kiffin to hith thentheth.” I was boiling with rage at the restriction of our liberty, but a warning cough from Mar- jorie made me restrain myself. "How the devil can I bring Kiffin to his senses?" I demanded. “I've told you already he won't come out to you.” “Yeth, but you hadn't heard our thtory then, mithter,” he persisted. “Now that you have, we thought prapth you'd talk to Kiffin and tell 88 The Heaven-Kissed Hill him it ain't no good. He'th either got to come to termth or we thall put him through it.” “How are you going to get at him?" asked Marjorie. They all turned from me to her, looking her up and down in silence. Then they looked at each other and still kept silence. “Look here!” said I. “If-if I go and talk to Kiffin, on your behalf—what are your terms? You want your money back?” “We'll have our money back, mithter, with- out your talking to Kiffin,” replied Melchise- dech. "Now that we've run Kiffin down you can bet your thtarth that he'll never get away from uth! We want more than that!” “What, then?” I asked. “We want to know where that thwag ith hid- den,” he answered. "He'll know. He ain't come here for nothing, Kiffin ain't. Did he tell you why he did come here, mithter? Did he now?” “He said he came to see an old friend of his, Dan Flint,” I replied. “A man who used to live in that cottage. “Aye, when, mithter?” he said scornfully. “Fakoe there, when we come to it latht night, Barred Out 89 he knew thith plathe; been here before, hadn't yer, Fakoe? If there ever wath a man called Dan Flint lived here, it mutht have been a long time ago, for Fakoe, he knew that cottage when it wath all tumble-down, till a London gent bought it and done it up. No, mithter, Kiffin, when he come latht night, wathn't after no Dan Flint'th, he wath after what he'th after now—that thwag. And tho, being ath we've trapped him, we're going to have our money out of him and the thecret about where the thtuff'th hidden. If not-" He gave me a significant look as he paused, but Greever, less punctilious, voiced his feelings in plain language. “We shall do him in!” he growled. “I'll have my ten quid or his blinkin' blood!” “You're all threatening murder, you know,” I said. “You'd far better have told the police all about it. As it is, you'll all get into the hands of the police.” “No, we than't, mithter, begging your par- don,” retorted Melchisedech, with complete as- surance. “Not if Kiffin playth thtraight. If he'll do that, we've nothing to do but give infor- mation ath to where the thtuff ith and claim the 90 The Heaven-Kissed Hill 1 ! reward; nobody can't touch uth, thee, mithter? It all dependth on Kiffin.” I hesitated a little; then motioned to Mar- jorie and turned to the cottage. “Very well,” I said. “I'll speak to Kiffin again. You want him to keep his bargain?” “It ’ud be much pleathanter for everybody, and for you and your good lady, mithter, if he would,” answered Melchisedech. “Mithter! Tell him that he hathn't an earthly! He'th thrapped! And we're all round him, like tho many terrierth. Either he com’th out-or we go in! And if we go in- He gave me another look, more sinister than significant, and Marjorie and I, for the second time that morning, retreated to the cottage. But we paused before reaching it. “I say, you know!” I said, looking round, though we were well out of earshot. “This is a lot more serious than it seems. We're abso- lutely at the mercy of those four of those four young devils ! -absolutely!" "And of Kiffin,” she answered. "What on earth's to be done?" I asked. “There's only one way out of this quarry, through that entrance, and they'll never let us Barred Out 91 pass. While we were talking I was examining every side. There isn't a place that one could scale. We're literally imprisoned! And there's no likelihood of anybody coming near us before to-morrow morning.” “Something will happen before that, Dick,” she said. “Do you think those men are armed?” “I guess they'll all have some particularly ugly knives, if they've nothing else," I an- swered. “That's the sort of thing they carry. If only we had a couple of revolvers!” “Is there anything of that sort in the cot- tage?” she suggested. “No idea,” said I. “Colstervine never men- tioned it. What licks me is, what are we you and I-going to do? I can't tackle those chaps single-handed—they'd knife me without the least compunction, and “It's not going to come to that,” she broke in. “If we've got nothing else we've got our wits. We must circumvent the whole lot- Kiffin as well as those four. If we could only get Kiffin out “It would probably mean murder,” I said. 92 The Heaven-Kissed Hill “However, let's hear what the scoundrel has to say.” We went forward to the cottage. And here, in view of what is yet to be told, let me set down some further particulars of its exact sit- uation in the quarry. It stood almost in the centre, a four-square building in the middle of a little garden, the front part of which was given up to shrubs, trees, flowers, the hinder part to vegetables, the whole being enclosed in a high hedge of privet and macrocarpus. There was, accordingly, a good deal of cover imme- diately around the cottage itself. But outside the surrounding hedge, and from it right up to the sides of the quarry, there was compara- tively bare ground, broken only by stunted shrub and by hummocks of refuse over which grass and bramble and their like had grown. It was, therefore, impossible for anybody to quit the cottage and make for the edges of the quarry unobserved—that is, under such sur- veillance as the lynx-eyed four whom we had just left would be sure to exercise, things being what they were. And here was another factor in the situation which had to be taken into account,I had just remarked to Marjorie Barred Out 93 that there wasn't a place anywhere along the thirty-feet-high sides of that quarry that we could climb, even if we could escape the watch- fulness of Melchisedech and his gang. An ex- pert cragsman might have done it, but we couldn't; for us there was no way out but that tunnel-like entrance in front of the cottage. And there the cordon was tightly drawn and resolute. Utterly outfaced by these perplexities, I paused again as we came to the gate of the front garden. What were we to do in this annoying situation ?-literally pinned down and helpless. “Look here!” I said, in sheer desperation. "Before we talk to this infernal Kiffin just let's think what's best for ourselves! Never mind Kiffin and never mind those murderous young miscreants behind us. What ought we to do for our own safety? It's beastly to think of being cooped up in that cottage with Kiffin, but mightn't it be best to follow his advice and just stick in till somebody comes?” “When is that likely?-to-day at any rate?" answered Marjorie. “And, in my opinion, if Kiffin won't treat those four men they will do 94 The Heaven-Kissed Hill something desperate before the morning's over.” “They can't get in,” said I. “The cottage is strong enough. Kiffin knows that.” "No," she answered. “But—they can set it on fire.” I hadn't thought of that, but I saw the pos- sibilities of it at once. Smoke Kiffin out of his lair!yes, that was certainly one way of doing things. “They've said they'll have him, you know,” added Marjorie. “And—they will. And—if we can't persuade him to do a deal with him, I think they'll move. They know that there's always the chance of interruption. I wish “What?” I demanded, eager for any man- ner of suggestion. “I wish we could think of some way of trick- ing them, getting round them, doing them in some fashion,” she said. “I thought once how would it be if we gave—those four-some of Colstervine's stock of-say, whisky? Would it send them to sleep?" I laughed aloud—for the first time since Kiffin had come knocking at our door. “Bless your innocent heart!” said I. “It ’ud CHAPTER VI Breach o' the Peace WE E turned away from that cottage, feel- ing, I think, as a man might feel who, seeking his way to a presumably easy entrance, finds himself suddenly and unexpectedly faced by a blank and doorless wall. It had never occurred to me that Kiffin would bar us out. We had shown him a good deal of kindness and consideration the night before, and I could scarcely believe—however much of a scoundrel he might be—that his professions of gratitude were entirely hypocritical. Yet here was the fact—he was there, safely posted in our cot- tage, and we were outside it, and he would not even answer a call from us. We went off in silence-I, on my part, too amazed and indignant for words. We were in as disagreeable a predicament as we well could be. Here was one scamp intrenched in our sole refuge; there, fifty yards away, 96 98 The Heaven-Kissed Hill evidently sitting on the ground. When we came nearer we saw why. They were having a picnic. On a slab of stone they had a big, crusty loaf of bread, flanked by a substantial wedge of cheese; each man's cheek was bulging as he munched. Melchisedech smiled at us. “Any luck, mithter?” he asked. “Ith Kiffin in hith right thentheth yet?” “Look here!” said I-angrily, no doubt. “This stupid business has got to come to an end—we've had enough of it! Kiffin's barred and bolted himself in, and we can't get a word out of him. He's not going to admit us—to our own cottage !—and so we're without shelter --and without food. You talk about his right senses—you've got to come to yours, and let us go for the police. That's that!” “Not jutht yet, mithter, it ain't,” he an- swered coolly. “We ain't going to have no poleeth here—not were it ever tho. There'th a lot to be done before that. And ath to food- well, you and your good lady are ath welcome to what we've got ath flowerth ith in May- 'tain't much, but it'th thomething,” he con- tinued with a grin, as he pointed to the bread and cheese. “Help yourthelveth, mithter 102 The Heaven-Kissed Hill quarry. “Make a good battering ram, that, mithter! We are going to break in that front door! Or—the back one if it theemth eathier." “Very nice for my friend's property!" I said. “But you'll find it a bit difficult to smash in either.” “We'll have a thtiff try, anyway,” he re- torted. “And ath for your friend'th property, mithter, you thouldn't ha' let a fellow like Kif- fin into your friend'th houthe. I thouldn't if it had been me. But Kiffin ith in, and Kiffin'th got to be fetched out, and we'll get about it.” He got to his feet and turned away to give some order in an undertone to his three satel- lites. Marjorie and I emboldened, no doubt, by the lunch of which we had partaken under such singular circumstances-exchanged glances. We were thinking of the same thing _would there be any chance of escape while these fellows were engaged in their assault on Kiffin? But Melchisedech quickly made it clear that we were not going to be favoured in that way. Greever and Fakoe, picking up the shaft, advanced on the cottage; Melchisedech and Dex, hands in pockets, remained where they were. Breach o' the Peace 103 “That'th the plan o' campaign, mithter,” ob- served Melchisedech. "Them two'll break in the door, while we keep an eye on you and your good lady. We can't afford to take no rithkth, mithter, we can't indeed. We're hoping to get the little affair over pretty quick now, mithter, and then you'll be at liberty again. And, of courthe, if only Kiffin had been thenthible, there'd ha' been no occathion for thith bother- blame Kiffin, mithter, not uth.” “What do you suppose will happen if they do break that door in?” I asked. “We think that Kiffin'll come to hith then- thith, mithter,” he answered gravely. "He'll thee he ain't got an earthly! And then we thall talk bithneth.” "And if he won't talk business?” I suggested. “Then it'll be a very bad job for Kiffin, mithter,” he replied with calm assurance. “A very bad job indeed. Kiffin'll get a few incheth of cold thteel into him." "That would be a bad job for you too- eventually,” said I. “You know it would! Why risk it?" “We've got to take thome rithkth in motht 104 The Heaven-Kissed Hill thingth, mithter,” he remarked, with an air that was either patient or philosophic, and per- haps both. “And we'll take our chance thith time. But I think Kiffin'll thee reathon. Once break in on him—" He paused to concentrate his attention on the doings of Greever and Fakoe. They had advanced to the gate of the front garden by that time, carrying their battering ram; we expected, in another minute, to hear its first smashing blows on Colstervine's nicely painted door. But before ever Greever, who was at the front end of the shaft, could swing the gate open, we heard something vastly different. From one of the upstairs windows came a couple of sharp flashes, the sound of two shots, and at the same instant Fakoe let out a scream, dropped his end of the improvised ram, stum- bled, recovered himself, and clapping his right hand to his left forearm, turned and ran like a hare in our direction, with Greever in close attendance. “Got one of your men, anyway!" I said, with a purposely sardonic smile at Melchisedech. “Kiffin's not going to take it sitting down, you Breach o' the Peace 105 see. He's armed! And he's winged that chap.” He made no answer for the moment. Look- ing at him more closely, I saw that he was star- ing at the cottage with a queer expression in his eyes and on his shrewd face-it was as if he had seen something, and yet could not be- lieve that he had seen it. “Kiffin, you see” I began. He interrupted me, sharply. “Kiffin?” he said. “Kiffin! Mithter! Wath there two thotth fired there, or one?” “Two!” answered Marjorie, promptly. "Two. There were two flashes, at the same time, and from different corners of the window.” Melchisedech's jaw dropped, and his eye- brows went up. “Then it ain't Kiffin alone!” he exclaimed. "Kiffin'th got a pal with him! Kiffin'th let thomebody into that cottage! And- The discomfited vanguard came running up, breathless. Fakoe was tearing off his coat as he drew near. His face was white with fear or shock, but when he had turned up the sleeve of his shirt, evidently under the conviction that 106 The Heaven-Kissed Hill a bullet had gone through his arm, I saw at once that he had got no more than a scratch. A red mark across the outer surface of the forearm showed where the shot, no doubt from an automatic pistol, had just grazed him. Nev- ertheless, as soon as he saw it, he broke out into fierce cursing of Kiffin, and lavish prom- ises of what he'd give him when he came within arm's length. “Thut it, Fakoe! There'th a lady prethent,” said Melchisedech. “And you ain't hurt, you're on'y frightened. There'th thomething a lot more important than that. Were there two men fired at you from that window, or on'y one?” Neither Greever nor Fakoe knew. Fakoe, indeed, knew nothing but that a bullet had touched him, nor was he at all interested in anything else. Greever thought there were two shots fired in rapid succession; he had heard one whistle uncomfortably close to his own head. But as to whether the shots came from two weapons- “There's no doubt about that,” said Mar- jorie, decisively. “There were two separate flashes--simultaneous flashes one from the Breach o’ the Peace 107 right, and the other from the left hand of the window. I saw them distinctly.” "And tho did I!” observed Melchisedech. “Ain't no uthe denying it. Then there ith two men in that houthe! Kiffin'th got another fel- ler with him ath bad ath himthelf. And yet I'll take my tholemn oath there ain't nobody got in there thith morning, nor thinth we came. Mithter! Ye didn't hear no thoundth in the night?” "Nothing of that sort," I answered. I, too, had observed that there were two flashes at the same time, from different corners of the window, and I was already convinced that Kif- fin had an accomplice with him. “I heard noth- ing, in fact, except that I once heard Kiffin snoring. And I can't think how he could admit anybody, and hide a man without our knowledge.” “It's possible," murmured Marjorie at my elbow. “There are places that we never went into this morning—that lean-to shed at the back, and the box-room on the ground floor- he could have hidden somebody. Anyway, from what we saw just now, there must be two men in the cottage.' 108 The Heaven-Kissed Hill We looked round at the gang. They had drawn together and were talking in low tones. . Greever seemed to be advocating some plan; Fakoe, still viciously furious about his mere scratch of a wound, was excitedly supporting him. But Melchisedech, whose brains ap- peared to be of a peculiarly cool sort, shook his head. It was plain that in everything he was the master-spirit of the gang, and though Fa- koe turned away grumbling, and Greever looked black, I could see that they accepted their leader's decision without question. And Melchisedech came over to us. It was clear from his ruminative expression that he was occupied with thoughts and plans of strategy. “Mithter!” he said. “I hadn't exthactly kcounted on Kiffin carrying a gun-I never thee one on him when we had our dealingth with him. And I didn't count, neither, on hith having a pal with him. Thircumthtan- theth alterth catheth, don't they, mithter?” "Well?" said I. "I mutht know a bit more, mithter,” he con- tinued, falling into an easy, lounging position as if we were about to have a comfortable and Breach o' the Peace 109 careless chat. “Now, ath regardth that cot- tage, mithter?-ith there food in it?” “Food!” I exclaimed. “There's enough to last Kiffin and his pal—if he has got one, and it seems certain he has—for a month!” “Tinned thtuff, I reckon?” he suggested. “All sorts of good things,” I answered. “They can live like fighting cocks in there." “Any drink?” he asked with a sharp glance of his beady eyes. “There's a cupboard full of wines and spirits,” I replied. “And there are two or three cases of bottled ale. I tell you, the place is handsomely provisioned. If you think you can starve them out, you're jolly well mistaken!" “I didn't thay I did, mithter,” he observed. “I'm only wanting to know. But—what about water-thupply? You may have food, and you may have liquor, mithter—but what about water?” I knew nothing about that—but Marjorie did, and she made quick answer. “There's no shortage of water,” she said. “The well's in the back garden, but the pump Breach o' the Peace III ain't the leatht fear of anybody coming along, mithter, and we can afford to wait. Tho we're going to let thingth thlide till nightfall, and then, mithter, we thall have Kiffin and hith pal, whoever he ith, out o’that cottage, quick! Ath you'll thee, mithter. Tho—we mutht make the betht of it.” "You mean we must make the best of it!" said I, angrily. “We're to be shut out, go without our dinner" “It'th the fortune o' war, mithter,” he inter- rupted, coolly. "I gueth you've been in far worthe cathe than thith-I have! And ath for your lady, we'll do the betht we can for her. Now, I'm going to thend Greever down to the nearetht village for thome thupplieth for our- thelveth, and if you'll jutht write down on a bit o' paper what you'd like, and give him the coin, he'll bring you anything. Get plenty, mithter-he'th a thtrong chap, Greever, and ain't afraid of a weight.” Making the best of a bad job, Marjorie and I consulted, finally scribbling a small list of things on which we could certainly manage to exist until we could regain Colstervine's larder. I gave it and money to Melchisedech and pres- 114 The Heaven-Kissed Hill and pots, patches of colour in the woman's garments- the faded scarlet of the man's waistcoat-his fur cap—her glittering earrings, barbaric in size and shape—the scraggy horse—the tilt- cart, heaped up with such wares as these gipsy hawkers sell—baskets, mats, tin pans all jingling as the wheels creaked over the un- even turf—these combined to make a picture such as may be seen at most times in spring and summer months on the heaths of Surrey and the Downs of Sussex; it was a touch of caravan life, completed, in this instance, by a nondescript dog, who, tied thereto by a strand of old clothes-line, trotted, with evident un- willingness, at the tail of the cart. Man, woman, horse, dog-four living things. We looked on them, I assure you, as if we had been cast away on a desert island for long, weary years, and at last, with infinite surprise, had set eyes on something other than the arid waste and featureless solitude. All this, to be sure, sprung up in us in the hope that in this á nomad huckster and his wife we should find friends—I think that neither of us until that moment had ever realised how eagerly one Zephany Shepperoe 115 snatches at any possibility of friendship where none seems forthcoming. The cavalcade wheeled round to the left on entering the quarry, making a straight line across the grass-grown surface for a sheltered spot that lay between the cottage and the cliff- like walls. It struck me at once that the man and woman had been there before, and were repairing to a familiar camping ground. But ere the wheels had creaked and the tilt-cart swayed over many yards, Melchisedech and his satellites were on their legs and hurrying across; they came up to the new arrivals on one side as Marjorie and I approached on the other. The man pulled up his horse, and he and the woman looked from the gang to us, and from us to the gang with sharp and questioning glances. And I was thankful to see that in the eyes of both there was that which assured me that they were folk of courage and de- termination. There was curiosity and puzzled surmise in both dark faces as they were turned on Marjorie and myself, but an obvious lower- ing and disdain as they calmly inspected the four hang-dog young ruffians who came semi- circling before the horse. 116 The Heaven-Kissed Hill Melchisedech, as usual, stood out in advance of his lieutenants—to give him due credit there was nothing of the craven about him; the air he now adopted was that of calm, but firm expostulation; he might have been a polite, but determined young gamekeeper, about to warn off an unconscious trespasser. "Good evening, mate,” he began, suavely enough. “Wath you and your mithith think- ing about camping out in thith old quarry?" The man thus addressed glanced once more at us—half-quizzically. But his eyes were con- temptuous when he turned them on the Jew. “Thinking about it?” he answered, having previously spat vehemently on the grass at Melchisedech's feet. "No, we ain't thinking about it, me lad !--not nohow. We are going to camp in this quarry, as we done for many a long year, and shall do again, for as long as we like. Who's again it?" “ 'Tain't convenient, mate, on thith occa- thion,” said Melchisedech, firmly. “Thith here quarry ith engaged for the night. We've bithneth here, mate-me and my three palth. We can't do with nobody camping out here. Take a word of advithe, mate-go farther.” ! 1 118 The Heaven-Kissed Hill to-night, mate!” announced Melchisedech. “We can't have it. Push your horthe round and get out! There'th plenty o' room on the hillthide. Thith quarry'th occupied.” Something of a black flush came over Mr. Shepperoe's naturally dark skin, and a queer and not too pleasant smile began to hover about the corners of his thin lips. Without a word he divested himself of his rough jacket, and having hung it deliberately on the horse's collar, began to turn up his shirt sleeves. “That's it, Zeph!” said Mrs. Shepperoe, with calm approval. “Give 'em one all round, dearie! They'll not want another,” she added, turning her attention to me with a knowing wink. “Hit that big-nosed feller first, Zeph.” Mr. Shepperoe, however, was evidently one of those fighters who believe that a due warn- ing should preface a decisive blow. Revealing an arm that resembled polished mahogany, and a fist as hard as iron, he stepped nearer to the gang, letting out at the same time a mighty below. “Stand clear!” Then followed precisely what I had been fearing for the last few minutes. Melchis- $ 120 The Heaven-Kissed Hill out a highly respectable, breech-loading sport- ing gun, and she was calmly covering Melchis- edech in a very business-like manner. Shepperoe stepped back, keeping his eye on his assailants. Without relaxing his watch he twisted his right arm and hand round behind him towards the cart. “Gi'e me the gun, Nance,” he murmured. The four men shrank farther and farther back before the sweep of Shepperoe's levelled weapon. And for the fiftieth time that day I longed for my own revolvers, lying idly far away in Maida Vale, for I realised that if I had had but one of them I should have been able to compel these knife-carrying young scoundrels to anything; of a bullet or a charge of shot they were as frightened as the average hooligan is of the cat-o’-nine-tails. Every man Jack of the four, under Shepperoe's gun, was all of a trem- ble. But Melchisedech, retreating with the others, made shift to bring up a faint, ex- postulating smile. "Put it down, mate!” he said. “We ain't-" Shepperoe let out another bellow. For a Zephany Shepperoe 121 somewhat slender, though sinewy and wiry man, he possessed a thunderous voice. “Clear!” he shouted. “Get out every mother's son o’ye if ye don't want daylight through yer blarsted carcasses! Nance ! bring out that other gun, old gel!” I was not sure, then, whether this admoni- tion was a piece of bluff on Mr. Shepperoe's part, or if there really was a second gun amongst his miscellaneous belongings. But as Mrs. Shepperoe turned with great willingness and activity to the things behind her under the tilt, Melchisedech and his friends evidently accepted the warning as equivalent to demon- stration; without further waiting they turned tail and fled back to the entrance to the quarry, and Shepperoe, dropping his weapon into the pit of his left arm, twisted round on Marjorie and myself. And I saw then that he was a man of some sense of humour, for he smiled not altogether wryly. “I've seen some queer things in my time, master,” he remarked, “and so, to be sure, has my old woman there, but blow me if I ever come across the likes o' this! What's it all about, master?-four blood-thirsty young cut- Zephany Shepperoe 123 Shepperoe, still sticking to his gun, was now leaning against the shafts of his cart. Regard- ing me whimsically, he tapped the double- barrel. “From what you say, master,” he remarked, “I reckon you ain't got nothing o' this sort about you?” “No!” said I, “I wish I had!” He nodded in the direction in which Mel- chisedech and his gang had gone. “They ain't, neither?" he asked. "No," I replied. “Nothing but their knives. But—the man in the cottage--and there may be two men there—he-or they.' “Guns?” he interrupted quickly. "Revolvers, I think,” I said. “They fired on these fellows this morning.” He turned slowly and gave the cottage a long, thoughtful inspection. “Queer state of things,” he muttered at last. “However, there's no doubt more to be told about it. And here we're a-going to camp- gang or no gang. Let's be plain, master—are you and the lady in any danger, yourselves?” “I don't know about absolute danger," I answered. “We're in a queer position. We 124 The Heaven-Kissed Hill can't get into the cottage. Those fellows won't let us leave the quarry. And night's coming on!” He laid his hand on the horse's reins and began to move him forward. “Aye, well, master,” he said. “As long as we've got firearms But do you and your lady come along of we—they'll not come nigh while they know I've got this gun, and another in the cart.” "You have another in the cart?” I exclaimed joyfully. “I have so, master,” he answered. “And plenty o' cartridges, too—and a couple o’ licenses, for that matter. And if you'll accept of a cup o' tea we'll talk while we drink it.” Marjorie, walking at the other side of the cart, was already in close converse with Mrs. Shepperoe; I overheard that good, if somewhat truculent lady make an offer of hospitality simultaneously with her husband. We went along with them to a spot with which they were, evidently well acquainted; they showed us there something that we had not previously noticed -a spring of clear, drinkable water. And while one lighted a fire and the other filled a Zephany Shepperoe 125 kettle, I went back to where we had left our own provisions and carried them over to our new acquaintance's camp. As for Melchis- edech and his gang, I saw nothing of them on this short excursion-either they had with- drawn into the coppice in front of the quarry or betaken themselves to some quiet spot amongst the bushes to plot further mischief. For the second time that day we made a picnic meal in strange company. But this time it was with folk who were sympathetic. Mrs. Shepperoe was especially soher firm advice was that Zeph and myself should take the two guns, stalk that little Jew and his cut-throat associates, and let daylight into all four. But Mr. Shepperoe, to whom by that time we had imparted the whole story in all its details, was for other methods. “As long as them chaps has nothing but knives, and we've two good guns, master,” he remarked, “we've the whip hand of 'em. I know their sort—they'll not run the risk of ; getting peppered, not they! Careful enough of their own skins they is, however quick they'd be to carve a piece out of a man with them 126 The Heaven-Kissed Hill knives. No-we can tackle them. But the thing is—that cottage!" “How to regain possession, you mean?” I suggested. “Not so much that, master, as what's in it,' he answered. “Appears from what you and your good lady tells us, there'll be two men in there. And armed. Now what might you suppose they're after ?” “Heaven knows!” said I. “Aye, just so!” said he. “Only—that don't help us-guesswork that is. Now, says you, this here Kiffin, he tells you that he come here to see if old Dan Flint was still alive. Well, me and my missus there, we remembers old Dan, and a rare old rascal he were! And I shouldn't wonder if there was something in this tale about stolen stuff being put away somewhere round here, for, to my knowledge, old Dan, he was mixed up with a bad lot. And from all you tell me, , I'm a-wondering of some- thing." “Yes—what?" I asked. “Well, if that there stuff mightn't be in the cottage itself,” he said. “Planted, you under- stand? The place was tumble-down when that Zephany Shepperoe 127 friend o' yourn buyed it; he done it up as you now see it. But-you dunno and I dunno what that there old varmint, Dan Flint, mayn't ha' put away under the old floorings. See?" “That would certainly account for Kiffin's anxiety to get in, and for his barring us out,” I answered. “It would so, master," he replied. “And if it is so, and if he's another man in with him, and whether he has or no, you can be certain that place is being turned upside down. And the thing now is, what's the best way to circum- went all parties?-them young rascals with their knives, and the old ’uns in the cottage with their pistols? We're between cross-fires, master!” “We've been that all day,” said I. "I don't know what we should have done if you hadn't turned up. But now, as you're armed- “Aye?” he broke in, giving me a keen look. "Aye, what then, now?” “I should suggest that we take a gun apiece, leave the quarry—they daren't stop us while we've guns—and go for the police,” I sug- gested. “We can get plenty of police at Wry- 128 The Heaven-Kissed Hill chester, surely. And they'll come in strength and turn the whole lot out.” To my surprise he shook his head. He glanced at his wife, at Marjorie, and at me, and there was a knowing smile in his eyes. “No, master!” he answered. “We'll not do that. To start with, for all that we have them guns, those chaps, if they saw we were bent on going, 'ud put up some sort of a fight, and the women might-I says might, mind you- they might get hurt. We can do better than that, master. Brains, master, brains !-that's better nor guns. And we don't want no fight -bloody fight, anyhow-if we can help it. What we want is circumwention, circumwen- tion! A good word that, master.” “His fav’rite word!” observed Mrs. Shep- peroe, aside, to Marjorie. “Dunno what it means, but 'tis allers on the end of his tongue. Circumwention!” “Well?” I asked. “How are we going to circumvent 'em?” He turned on his elbow-we were all perched on the turf around the stick-fire on the sheltered side of the cart—and pointed to the dog, which Zephany Shepperoe 129 was still attached to the tail-board by the bit of old clothes-line. “You see that there dog, master,” he answered. “Well, I gets him this very after- noon for nothing at a farm t'other side o' this range of hills--not so far off, neither, matter o' three or four mile. They'd tried him with sheep, and he's no good. They was going to shoot him, so me and the missus, we begged him. And never thinking how uncommon use- ful he'd come in this very night. But he will! And how, says you? This way, master. I reckon you're a scholard. Likely you've pencil and paper on you; if you haven't, we have, there in the cart. Write a letter, mister, setting out that you and your missus, and Zeph Shepperoe and his, is all in deadly peril at Flint's Quarry, and begging the reader to send police and other men-armed-at once. Then, as soon as it's dark, we ties it secure round that there dog's neck, and lets him go. And he will go-straight and sharp to where we got him!” 1 CHAPTER VIII Embassy of Melchisedech 1 I LOOKED round again at the proposed messenger. He was a nondescript animal; you could not take him for anything but a mongrel. There was something of the collie in him. What the rest of him was it was not easy to make out, but it was obvious that he was the offspring of a serious misalliance. While we supped Shepperoe had kept throw- ing him scraps of food; finally, Mrs. Shepperoe had flung him the remains of a shoulder blade of mutton, on which she and her lord had been feasting. He was busy with this now, but ever and anon he manifested interest in the entrance to the quarry, as if, hospitably as he was being treated, he had desires for what lay beyond. And clearly enough, he possessed a roving eye. “You think he'd go straight back to the place where you got him?" I asked. “Make a bee-line for it, that critter, master,” 1 | 1 130 Embassy of Melchisedech 131 affirmed the hawker. “ 'Cause why? Born and bred there; ain't never seen no other. He's p'ints, has that dog, on’y they don't lie in the direction of sheep. The man what I begged him of, he says as how sheep ain't in that dog's line; he don't seem to take no proper interest in 'em. So, as I say, they was going to get rid of him. And us, being just now without a dog to run under the cart, as is proper, we begs him. A few days with us, and he'd ha' settled down. But, as things is, he'll go straight back to his old master if I lets him loose.” “And his master is—who and what?" I asked. “Hind- foreman-on this here farm I'm talking about,” he answered. “Sheep farm on them Downs. And, of course, a dog what don't take no interest in sheep, he ain't no good on a farm o' that sort- don't earn his vittals.” A sudden notion, a vague hope, came to me. “A sheep farm!” said I. “You don't hap- pen to know the name of the farmer?” “I do, then, master,” he replied. “Big Scotch chap he is; seen him a time or two when we come this round. Macpherson his name is; come and took his farm a while ago. I dunno 1 Embassy of Melchisedech 133 pherson, telling him of our predicament, and of the present exact situation, and begging him to get whatever help he considered necessary, whether of police or his own men, and come speedily to our assistance. That done, the hawker—who in this, as in other matters, soon made it clear to us that he was a person of ingenuity and inventive power—fastened the missive around the dog's neck in such a fashion that it could neither slip off nor be torn off, and completed the operation by tying over the fastenings a gay-coloured handkerchief which he took from his own throat. “There, master!” he remarked, evidently highly satisfied with his arrangements. “That's the manner and notion of it, d'ye see? Home he goes, that there dog, and the first thing they notices, after their natural surprise at seeing of him again, is that there bit of a neckcloth of mine. And they takes it off of him. And then they sees the letter. 'What's this here? says they. 'A letter--for Mr. Mac- pherson! And, in course, they deliver it. And—there you are! Quicker nor post-office work that, master. And now we've nothing to 134 The Heaven-Kissed Hill do but wait till it's come back. Then-away he goes!” I glanced in the direction of the entrance to the quarry. We could see nothing of the gang, but I knew that they would be lurking about, watchful as ever. “I hope those fellows up there won't inter- fere with him,” I said. “If they noticed him slipping away “They'll not do that, master,” he answered. “We'll let it settle down to-night. Moonlight it is just now, to be sure, o' nights—but the moon won't be over the top o' them trees before ten o'clock, and till it rises it'll be dark enough in this quarry. Them fellers'll never see that dog, master-he'll be off and away without 'em knowing of it.” “That's all right then,” said I. “But-1 wish we knew what they were going to do. They'll not leave here as long as Kiffin's in that cottage.” The hawker made no reply to this for some minutes. He had filled and lighted a well- blackened, stumpy clay pipe, and now, having fixed up our message on the dog, he lay at full length by his fire, while Mrs. Shepperoe Embassy of Melchisedech 135 washed up her plates and dishes, and generally made things tidy. Marjorie and I watched Shepperoe with curiosity, wondering what he was thinking about. "Aye, well, master," he said at last, after much evident cogitation. “I dunno how a gen- tleman like you feels about it, but I ain't partic'ly concerned about rubbish like them fellows! If so be as we hadn't got my two guns, they'd be mighty unpleasant company with them knives, and in a way o' speaking they'd have us at their mercy. But we have the guns!-and they'll not interfere with us. I know their sort, master!—There's two things they're mortal afraid of-a bit o' lead, and a cat-o'-nine-tails! I could keep fifty of 'em off as long as I've got a gun. Nolwhat I'm thinking and figuring about is—what's going on in that cottage? What's this here Kiffin- and t’other man-what are they up to?" “I suppose they daren't come out—while those fellows are hanging round,” I suggested. “No,” he said, shaking his head. “ 'Tain't that, neither. According to what you says, master, about what happened when t'other: tried to stave the door in this morning, them Embassy of Melchisedech 137 Which, as I says, previous, we knew before ever that London friend o' yours bought it. 'Twas a main tumble-down, ramshackle old place when he laid out his money on it, sure-ly! He done it up from ground to roof-tree—but Lord bless 'ee, considering as that old varmint, Dan Flint, live in it before that, you don't know what there is under it. And 'tis my opinion them fellers is looking for what there may be, or what they know there is. And when they get what they want—if they do out they comes! Armed, master!” “And what then?” I inquired. “Aye, what then?” said he, with an enigmatic smile. “That, master, is the question? For we don't want no bloodshed. 'Twould be the easiest thing in the world, we having a couple of guns, to put up a fight wi' 'em. But when bullets and shots gets flying about things comes dangerous, and I reckon you don't want your good lady to run no risks, and I cert'ny ain't done with my old woman there—her's over good a mate for that! No, master-as I says before— circumwention! That's the ticket! Circumwention!" 138 The Heaven-Kissed Hill “Then we're to do what?” I asked: “You're such a clever chap- “Yes, ain't he the brain-piece on him!” ex- claimed Mrs. Shepperoe, admiringly. “Allers had, and will have for ever!” "Such a clever chap that I'll leave it in your hands,” I continued. “What do we do now?" “What we want to do, master, having a couple o' women-and our own skins-on our hands,” he answered, “is to sit tight and take care of ourselves—till the help comes that that there dog's presently going to call. They'll not touch us, while we've them guns, I says again. We sits here--and spectates. Same as you do when you goes to the theayter. We lets them -that lot up there and them two in the cottage -do the acting, and we sits by and watches. That's better.” “Well, supposing that the dog goes straight to his old home, and Macpherson gets the letter," I said. “How soon may we expect things to happen?-help to come?” "Somewhere before sunrise,” he replied, with cool confidence. “Macpherson has a lot o'men on his farm, and he'll know how to get police, too. So--we just waits." Embassy of Melchisedech 139 "I wish there was some shelter," I remarked, with a glance at Marjorie, who was somewhat lightly clad. “The day's been hot enough, but the nights are cold.” "Don't you go for to concern yourself about that, master," said the hawker. “Me and my old woman'll see your good lady's all right. Let's get this here dog started, when it gets a bit darker, and then you'll see our arrange- ments. We takes the goods out o' the cart; we rigs up a nice comfortable little nest under the tilt, and we've enough o'clean rugs and blankets for the King hisself. The women can sit in there and as for you and me, master, well, I reckon we'll keep a gun apiece handy, and do a bit o' sentry work. I've no doubt you've spent worse nights?” “That's very kind of you, Mr. Shepperoe,” said Marjorie. “You're a very resourceful man!” The hawker laughed, evidently very pleased with the compliment. "Folks what lives this sort o'life, ma'am,” he remarked, "has, nat’rally, to keep their wits about 'em. Life under the sun and moon ain't what it is under ceilings and roofs! And which 142 The Heaven-Kissed Hill were within and at work on some nefarious task or other, I had no doubt. “Dick!” whispered Marjorie, as we moved up and down in the darkness, eyes and ears on the stretch. “Do you think that message will really bring help?” “It'll bring help if it gets to Macpherson,” I answered. “It's—if !” “Is there any reason why it shouldn't?" she asked. “There's one danger I've thought of,” said I. “I mean, to the dog. “What?” she exclaimed. “He's a considerable stretch of country to cover," I replied. “Three or four miles, Shep- peroe said. There'll be gamekeepers about, probably. And gamekeepers have a nasty trick of shooting stray dogs.” “Even then, somebody would find the mes- sage,” she remarked. “I'd be sorry for the poor dog, but the message is—” “The message will get somewhere all right,” said I. “It's a question of time. My own im- pression is that we shall see developments here before morning.” 144 The Heaven-Kissed Hill as he and what I had been expecting. And having a gun all ready for him, and without waiting to consult Shepperoe, I called across the inter- vening space. “If that's you, Melchisedech, and you're alone, come out into the open and halt at ten paces,” I said in my best commanding manner. “No tricks, my lad, if you don't want soundly peppering! Now," I continued, promptly emerged upon an open stretch of turf, "what is it?" The moon just then topped the belt of pines, and we saw Melchisedech clearly. His attitude was placatory, not to say cringing. Evidently, he was chastened. "Mithter!” he said, in his most wheedling accents. "Mithter! You ain't a-going to dethert your old palth, are you, mithter?” I heard the hawker and his wife, busy with their belongings, chuckle as if with infinite pleasure the sound did credit to their sense of humour. Marjorie laughed, too. But I purposely put a lot of sternness into my reply. “Desert you!" I exclaimed. “What the deuce do you mean? What have I got to do with you and your pack?” The Midnight Cry 149 fication in Melchisedech's deep sigh. Plainly, he felt greatly relieved about something. “That’th prethithely what I wanted you to thay, mithter,” he answered joyfully. “And it'th what I expected of a gentleman. Then- you'll pretherve a thrict neutrality, mithter?- you and the gentleman with the cart? You won't interfere with uth when we go for Kiffin and that cottage? That'th it, ithn't it, mithter?” A sudden remembrance of my obligations to Colstervine emboldened me to an almost swaggering defiance, and I spoke without troubling to consult either the Shepperoes or Marjorie. “Look you here, Master Melchisedech!” said I. “I'll just tell you what it is. That cottage belongs to my friend Mr. Colstervine, and I'm in charge of it. If you and your pals go near it, you'll be sorry! Shepperoe and I have got what you haven't—a couple of good shot-guns. We've also got a fine supply of number twelve cartridges. So we're better equipped than you are. Now listen—if you and your gang go near that cottage, you'll get peppered kif not Take that in, Melchisedech—it's my ultimatum.' worse. 150 The Heaven-Kissed Hill “That's the way to talk to 'em!” observed Mrs. Shepperoe, in my rear. “That's what they understands. Plain language!" A brief silence followed, during which Mel- chisedech seemed to be consulting the moon. “Got that, Melchisedech?” I asked at last. “Shall I put it more plainly?” He turned then from the moon to me. “I'm thorry you uthe wordth like them, mithter,” he said, in his best deprecating manner. -"I didn't eckthpect you'd treat uth in that way-poor fellerth that'th been already treated uncommon cruel and on'y wantth their own back. If you'd conthent to talk it over, reathonable, mithter-? You thee- “Melchisedech!” I broke in on him, severely. “If you and your pals attempt to break into Mr. Colstervine's cottage, or to damage it in any way, Shepperoe and I shall open fire on you! That's flat!" “Without notice!” added Shepperoe. Melchisedech wavered. "You mean that, mithter?” he asked anxiously. “You ain't bluffing uth!” Marjorie pulled the tail of my jacket. The Midnight Cry 151 “Dick!” she whispered. “The other three are behind him in the bushes!” But I knew that already. I had been keep- ing my eyes skinned during the second stage of Melchisedech's embassy and had seen that Greever and Dex and Fakoe had crept, crawled, sneaked somehow close up in rear of their leader. “There's no bluff, Melchisedech!" I an- swered, slightly raising my voice. “Listen again the whole lot of you, for I see you're all there. Go near that cottage, and you'll feel some of this shot rattling about your carcasses ! And now be off —take my advice and go right away-go home. This game's up! Shep- peroe!” The hawker knew what I meant, and his gun was up to his shoulder on the instant. There was a scuffling in the bushes at the sight of it, and the sound of a hasty withdrawal. But the Jew, knowing now that all attempts at diplomacy had failed, threw back a menace, stripped of any pretence. “All right, mithter!” he exclaimed. “But if you ain't with uth, you're with them, and if you're on their thide you're not on ourth. Tho 152 The Heaven-Kissed Hill we'll take our own courthe, mithter-we ain't come to the end o’ what we can do. And let that hawker chap look to hiththself! If we don't cook hith goothe for him now we thall drop acroth him and hith mithith thome time, and-Fakoe! you blarthed fool, what you a-doing of?” A knife-flung with a precision that made me wonder if Fakoe had ever exercised his abilities in knife-throwing on the professional stage-flashed like an arrow between me and Shepperoe, sung merrily as it narrowly missed the two women behind us, and stuck itself with a savage thud in the woodwork of the cart. And simultaneously with that thud came the crack of the hawker's shot-gun, followed im- mediately by that of mine. One of the four scurrying young scoundrels screamed—the scream, no louder than that of a hunted rabbit, was lost at once in the beat of their feet as they raced away through the bushes towards the end of the quarry. An instant later the gang had disappeared—and in the ensuing silence I heard Mrs. Shepperoe make a queer sort of gurgling sound in her throat, and Marjorie The Midnight Cry 153 catching her breath. As for Shepperoe, he swore quietly. I flung out the used cartridges-conscious of a most unholy feeling of joy at the smell of powder. And I laughed. “Shepperoe!” I said. “We missed 'em!” He made no immediate reply to that- instead, walking over to the cart, he pulled out the knife, and in the flare of the naphtha lamp which he had lighted and hung up on the tilt, some little time previously, he silently invited our attention to it. And I saw at once that this was not one of the bowie-knives with which Marjorie and I knew Melchisedech and the gang to be furnished—this thing was a long, thin bit of steel, stiletto-like in shape, ground to a razor-like edge on both sides the blade, and venomous in appearance as the young ruffian that flung it. It made me momentarily sick as I thought of that knife, thrown with no ordinary force, driving its way. .. “Master!” said Shepperoe, gravely. “That ’ud ha' been kingdom come for whoever had got in the way on't! And—it might ha' bin your young missus, and it might ha' bin my old woman. And” 154 The Heaven-Kissed Hill He suddenly caught up his gun again and made a determined stride in the direction in which Melchisedech and the others had scurried off. But Mrs. Shepperoe caught at his arm. "Don't 'ee, Zeph, my dear!” she exclaimed. "Don't 'ee, now! No harm be done! —do 'ee bide here and see what comes next! Tis best, Zeph!" “Mrs. Sheppereo's right,” said I. “We shall do no good, Shepperoe, by going after them. They'll not come down here again-after this. And I've an idea.” “What?” he demanded, gloomily, and evi- dently not too well pleased to be interfered with. “What might that be, now?" “If there's anybody about on these hills,” I replied, “the sound of those shots will attract notice. Somebody may come. In the mean- time" “Aye!” he said. “There's something in that. There's generally a keeper or two about, mid- nights, down in them woods, at the bottom. And in the meantime He laid down his gun again, and motioning to his wife to assist him, went on with his preparations for converting the tilt of the cart The Midnight Cry 157 "You heard what Melchisedech said, just before Fakoe flung that knife?” I replied. “That they hadn't come to the end of what they could do? I've been afraid of their setting fire to the place all along.” "How would that benefit them?" she asked. “It would smoke out Kiffin, and whoever it is that's with him," said I. "And then they'd lay hands on Kiffin. Revenge on him is what they're so keen about-keener, no doubt, than about their money." Shepperoe called to us just then, and we went back to the tilt, where, with considerable pride, he showed us the comfortable arrange- ments he and Mrs. Shepperoe had made. “Let my old woman see to your good lady, now, master,” he said. “They'll be as warm and snug in there as if they were safe in a four-poster with silk curtains! And as for you and me He waited until the women had retired within the tilt, and then, going over to his cart, he rummaged about amongst its varied con- tents, presently returning to me with a black bottle, a couple of glasses, and a can of spring The Midnight Cry 159 rather hear a shell coming along than a knife whistling past my lug!" “Murderous!” said I. “A gallows-bird, that chap!” he commented. “The wood's made that he'll swing from, that! And the women! 'Twarn't half-a-foot off either on 'em, standing close together as they was. Turned me sick, master!” “Me, too,” said I. “I wish we'd fired a bit more carefully." “Well,” he remarked, reflectively. “One of ’em's got a pellet or two in him, and that'll not give him any comfort, and it'll be a warning to t'others. I know their sort-and 'tis my belief, master, as how they'll clear off.” “I'm not so sure," I replied. And I went on to tell him about the stuff that was stored away in the shed adjoining the kitchen, and of my idea as to what Melchisedech and his gang might do with the idea of forcing out the occupants of the cottage. He shook his head. “Aye!” he muttered. “There is that in it, to be sure. They might get at 'em in that way, and in the smoke and flame reckon on getting away themselves. But before long I'll just take a cast round and see if I can find out where The Midnight Cry 161 up his gun, and slipped away silently into the bushes. He must have had a tread as velvet- like as a cat's, for though I listened intently, I heard nothing of his going, no grating of his feet on the stones that cropped out among the herbage, no cracking of a dried twig, no rustling of a branch. Within a moment of his going the silence was profound, and although there were two living beings within a yard or so of me, I felt as if I had been suddenly plunged into intense solitude. With Shepperoe's second shot-gun in the crook of my left arm I began to do sentry-go in front of the tilt. This canvas-topped erec- tion had been set up at the end of the cart; the boxes and cases which carried the hawker's goods were ranged, sand-bag fashion, along its sides; each end was protected by a stout tar- paulin which acted as curtain; it was certainly a highly ingenious arrangement, and when car- peted with mats and rugs and furnished with mattresses and blankets made a retreat at which even the luxuriously-inclined would have found no need to grumble. Starting out on my patrol before the front, I paused once to listen at the crack of the tarpaulin--and without any The Midnight Cry 163 stillness. One, a shout, sudden and surprised; the other, an equally sudden scream. Then silence again. And with a mutual under- standing we seized on our guns, and ran, side by side, across the open space, and through the tunnel-like entrance towards the coppice that faced it. We went more cautiously there to pull ourselves up and handle our weapons as we rounded the corner. And there, for a second, we stood. There was a patch of shadowy open ground before us, and on it, faces downward, lay two men, still as a fallen tree that stretched itself close by. CHAPTER X Ambushed I HEARD Shepperoe catch his breath, quickly, as we came in sight of those two motionless figures, and I knew what this sound signified. The men were so still, so utterly without sign of life, that already he thought them dead. And so, indeed, did I-but at that very instant there was a faint sigh or moan from one, and a little stirring of his limbs, and we ran forward and looked closer in the light of the moon. The man, who was coming round, turned over slightly, and the moonbeams shone full on his face. At that the hawker let out a sharp exclamation. “Lord ha' mussy, if 'tain't young Bowler, keeper to Mr. Pellanty's!” he said in tones that suggested sheer amazement. “And him never wi’out his gun! And that'll be his dad-old Bowler, as they do call him. And never did I set eyes on him wi’out his gun, neither, master! 164 166 The Heaven-Kissed Hill once or twice, turned over and gripped his father's shoulder. “I dunno rightly how 'twas, hawker,” he answered, dully. “We hear a couple o’shots somewheres up here, a while ago, and we come up, thinking it med be poachers in this here coppice—young pheasant chicks is in there. But we didn't see nothing, nor hear nothing, and we sits down on that old tree stump to smoke our pipes, and then, all sudden-like, I just catches a sound behind me, and 'fore I could so much as turn, I gets a crack across my crown as stretches me out! And didn't know no more after that—till I sees you. And I reckon they give poor old father one o' them, too-here, father!” Shepperoe dived a hand into the capacious pocket of his coat and pulled out his rum bottle. With difficulty we got old Bowler-a grey-haired veteran-into a sitting posture and forced a little of the rum between his lips, after which, pouring some of the spirit into the palm of my left hand, I proceeded to bathe his fore- head. There was a fine contusion on that, stretching from over his right eyebrow to above his ear; I could feel it still swelling. But there Ambushed 169 suffered a misfortune, Master Bowler,” re- sponded the hawker. “You been cracked on the head, unbeknownst like, and 'twas a good job this here young gentleman and me hear you sing out and come up. But you've a-lost your guns and your cartridges, Master Bowler; there's been a pack o'scoundrels at you.” Old Bowler winked and twinkled his beady eyes a little more, and then, following his son's example, began a vigorous shaking of his head. And presently he let out one word, and repeated it with emphasis. “Powchers!” he said. “Powchers!” And making a mighty effort, and clinging to my arm, he struggled to his feet and stood, swaying a little, to cast keen, sweeping glances around him and across the broad stretches of moonlit hillside. He was a little wiry fellow, nearer seventy than sixty years, as I guessed, with the keen, watchful face of a woodcraft man; over it, as he presently turned on us, came a shade of chagrin. "Never been done afore like that in all my time!” he murmured. “Bill, lad, they done us fair and square! And they guns and the stuff for 'em is gonel Fair done!” 170 The Heaven-Kissed Hill 1 1 I was getting anxious about Marjorie and Mrs. Shepperoe by that time, and I suggested that as old Bowler was now revived we should all go down to the camp. Shepperoe and I each gave the elder victim an arm, the younger one marched well enough by himself. We heard nothing and saw nothing of Melchisedech and his gang on our way, but that it was they who had first stunned the gamekeepers and then stolen their guns and cartridges we had no doubt. Nor had I, personally, any doubt that before long there would be new develop- ments and probably bloodshed. That admirable and managing woman, Mrs. Shepperoe—who evidently slept fully attired, seeing that she was out of the tilt, wholly equipped, within a minute of being hailed- took old Bowler and his swollen skull into her charge at once and began to bustle about him, while Shepperoe, at her command, made up the stick fire and hung on the black kettle; tea, hot and strong, appeared to be Mrs. Shep- peroe's panacea for most ailments. And while husband and wife were thus engaged I talked to young Bowler, who was rapidly recovering, and now complained of nothing but a lump- Ambushed 173 was a-carrying o' that letter, I'll do what I can-I'll go for help myself. I'll get it-and proper, too. And-quick!" “Good lad!” exclaimed Shepperoe. He glanced knowingly at me. "But ” he said, and paused. “The captain there knows what I mean,” he concluded. “Yes,” I said. “Shepperoe means, Bowler, that now that those fellows have got your guns, they'll not let any of us out of this quarry. They're probably ambushed up there, at the exit, planning some new devilry—and there's no other way out. They'd shoot you!" Young Bowler laughed—showing a set of fine white teeth in the moonlight. “You're wrong there, sir," he said. “I reckon I know this quarry better nor Shep- peroe does! There is a way out-and in—to a man as can climb. In that far corner-down there. I'll take a cup o'that tea that Mother Shepperoe's brewing, and then I'll be off in a fashion that nobody'll know of. And I'll have them here in a couple of hours that'll settle them chaps, and the chaps in the cottage, too. Leave it to me I'll do it!” This was the best stuff I had heard talked Ambushed 175 “Relation of old Dan Flint's on the moth- er's side,” said I. “According to Kiffin.” Old Bowler ruminated a while. “If so be as I hadn't got this here plaguy crack on my cran’um,” he said presently, “I could tell 'ee the whole fam’ly sarcumstances o' they Flints, so I could. You'd likely see a woman here, master, what comes for to clean up-leastways, her does when Mr. Colster- vine's about.” “Mrs. Squeech," I suggested. “Yes- we've seen her." “Them Flints and Squeeches,” he continued, “is all rellytives. A Flint marries a Squeech, or a Squeech weds a Flint. They be all mixed up. But I don't bring to mind no Kiffins at all, 'longing to neither Flints nor Squeeches.' “Kiffin,” said I, “says that he was here, at this cottage, when he was a boy-in old Dan Flint's time.” “Aye, well,” remarked old Bowler, “to be sure, there was a passil o’ boys about this here place, one time or another, but 'tis in my mind as they was either Squeeches or Flints. In old Dan's time that was, sure-ly. But 'tis a long time agone, that, master-and after old 176 The Heaven-Kissed Hill Dan there come his son, Ben. Ben Flint, he live in that there cottage after they'd give up working the quarry. Let it go all to tumble- down-come, he did, 'cause why? Sometimes he was here, and sometimes he warn't. Being- away!” “Seafaring man?” I suggested. “In his younger days he was summat o' that,” he answered. “But latterly, and most of his time, he didn't use the sea, Ben didn't. He put in most of his time-elsewhere." “Just so," murmured Shepperoe. “Else- wheer! A good word!” “What do you mean by it?" I asked. “Where was elsewhere?" Old Bowler, who had by this time come round so far as to be able to smoke a pipe which Shepperoe had lent him, his own having been smashed in the assault at the coppice, sucked silently at its contents for a while. “Well, master,” he replied at last, "if so be as you want pertiklurs, elsewhere was some- times Portsmouth Gaol, or Lewes Gaol, or it med be Dartmoor, or it med be Portland. Ben Flint being, when all's added up, a main bad ’un! Housebreaker and a thief-that's what Ambushed 177 Ben Flint were. Allus mixed up with a ras- cally lot, from the time he were a young ’un. Deal o' trouble I've had wi' Ben Flint. Now and then when he were out, ye'll understand - he'd come and quarter hisself in this here old cottage, what was then falling to pieces, and he'd powch. Rabbits I takes no beed on, and hares—a hare or two now and again I ain't over pertiklur about. But if 'twas the right season-autumn, you'll bear in mind-he was a rare hand at getting at my pheasants, and of course flesh and blood couldn't bide that there. On'y-I never could catch him! He were a clever man, Ben!” “Cute, eh?” I said. “Sharp?” “Both, and more, master,” said he. “Oiliest- tongued varmint as ever I come across! And black-hearted. Bad, bad, master, all through him! I seen him, more nor once, in the dock, where they put such as him at sessions and 'sizes—more by token, I sees him very last time he was at 'sizes-Lewes, that were and I hears what the ol' judge says to him, when the jury finds him guilty, as of course he were. 'It's difficult to know what to do wi' you, Flint,' says the ol chap, and—sitting there in his Ambushed 179 “Shepperoel” said I. "We know that Kif- fin's got another man with him in the cottage. I think that man is Ben Flint!" "Same here, master,” he answered. "I been figuring on that this last five minutes. Birds of a feather! Of course, they'll ha' met.” “You may be sure it's Ben Flint," I said. "I'm beginning to see through things. Prob- ably it was Kiffin and Ben Flint who did that burglary at Portsmouth that the little Jew told me of. They secreted the swag up here, most likely in the cottage. Then they got into trouble again. Now they're free again. And I suppose Kiffin came first and ingratiated himself with me and my wife, and turned us out, and let Ben Flint in, and there you are!" “And there they are, master!” said Shep- peroe. “For I'll swear they ain't got away yet, though 'tis my opinion they'll make a try for it before the night's over. But a more serious question, master, is, where are those other chaps? Now that they've got those guns and two dozen cartridges, they'll not go away without a try for Kiffin. Master! they're somewhere about, and we'd best to keep a Ambushed 181 The door opened, just as the clouds cleared the moon and left everything clear in her beau- tiful radiance. A man appeared. Not Kiffin. A taller, bigger man. Appeared, for one in- stant. The next, two flashes of crimson fire burst from the thick cover in the garden, and with a sharp, startled cry he fell across the threshold of the porch. And out of the macro- carpus trees rushed four figures, and leaping across their victim, stormed into the open door. Before we could move, we heard the key turn and the bolt driven home. CHAPTER XI The White Flag THE whole of this business was begun and THE and finished so quickly that Melchisedech and his gang were safely in the cottage, with a barred and locked door between us and them, before Shepperoe and I had time to grasp the situation. Indeed, as we instinctively rushed forward to the fallen man, over whose body his assailants had leapt without as much as a glance at him, we saw the smoke from the captured shot-guns still curling about the trees and bushes of the garden, amongst which the Jew and his comrades had evidently remained in concealment since their assault on the game- keepers. There was a fine smell of gunpowder in the moonlit air, and if we wanted a pertinent reminiscence of old war-days, there it was in the figure stretched across the flagged path, half-in, half-out of the porch. "They dotie him, master!" muttered Shep- } 182 184 The Heaven-Kissed Hill “Where's Kiffin?” I broke in on him. “Where?" He glared at me as if I had put some un- usually impudent question to him—and he was one of those men who, if they glare in that fashion, make one think of a wild and des- perate animal, ready to spring. He was an evil-looking chap, too-his cap had fallen off, and his close-cropped, bullet-like head, small nose, and ugly mouth and chin were not good to look on. But after glaring at me he seemed to understand my meaning, and he spoke, in- offensively enough. “Kiffin?” he muttered. “In—there! If he ain't cut his lucky through the back. And if he ain't, then-he's a dead man!” I called the hawker to come on, and keeping close to the lower walls of the cottage hurried round to the back. There were two doors there; one admitted to the scullery; it was fast barred and chained; the other opened into the lean-to erection, a sort of extra wing, that I had spoken of to Marjorie as being full of wood, and that also contained a barrel of petro- leum; its outer door was open, and we went in amongst its contents. But the communi- 1 i 1 The White Flag 185 cating inner door between it and the cottage was securely fastened; a good stout door, too. Clearly Kiffin had not made his escape at the rear when the gang rushed in at the front. We stood by that inner door for a minute or two, listening. We could hear plenty of sound from inside the cottage—the trampling of feet on the stair, the smashing of wood, the crack of breaking glass; we could even hear Melchisedech's voice, shouting orders to his satellites. But we heard nothing to indicate that Kiffin and his pursuers had at last come to close quarters. “Come round to that man, Shepperoe,” I said. “We'll get something out of him. We quitted the wood-shed and went, as cau- tiously as before, back to the porch. My no- tion was to get, one way or another, an idea of the situation from the man we had left there. If Kiffin was still in that cottage, he had either been murdered already, or he would be mur- dered—in either case it behoved us, now that they were safely in what could only turn out to be a trap, to keep his murderers within four walls until help came. But the man was gone. The porch stood > The White Flag 189 “Yon side o' the hill-down amongst the woods. Give him a couple of hours.” “Come back to your cart, then,” said I. "And then we watch this door.” Taking advantage of the thick cover around the garden, we made our way back to the cart and the fire. The sound of the shooting had re-aroused Mrs. Shepperoe and Marjorie; both, standing by old Bowler, were anxiously looking out for our return. Marjorie ran for- ward to meet us. But I anticipated any ques- tion of hers by one of my own. “Have any of you seen a man get away from the cottage?” I asked, looking from one to the other. “A tall man, away amongst the bushes?” They had seen nothing since the flash of the guns. Nor heard anything. But before I could give an explanation and show the neck- lace, we all heard something—something that made the women shudder and turned Shep- peroe and myself sharp round in the direction we had just come from. And that was a scream—the shrill, terrified scream of a man in dire peril. “Kiffin!” muttered Shepperoe. "Kiffin! Master/they've got him!” 190 The Heaven-Kissed Hill Behind us Mrs. Shepperoe, once again engaged in the brewing of tea, uttered a sharp sigh. “Murder!” she breathed, with a definite em- phasis. “Murder! that's what that is. And didn't I say, all along, that if we got through this night without murder being done we should ha’ more luck than I looked for? Murdering on him! that's what them fellers is doing. And might ha' been us!” But here old Bowler, who had roused him- self from a nap at our return, shook his bruised head and put in an authoritative word. “No, missus!” he said, oracularly. “That ain't murder!-leastways, 'tain't murder so fur. That's a man in hagony—that's what that be! A-crying out, d'ye understand? under torture. They're a torturing on him for to make him speak, I reckon. A man what's being murdered don't cry out like that. There 'tis again! and they'm a dealing hard and cruel wi' he! I've heard a man cry out that way time or two afore now, and I do know what it siggerfys." Whatever it might signify, it was no pleas- The White Flag 193 just now there's nothing and nobody to stop 'em but you and me. Now then, supposing you and me goes up to 'em, under that bit o' towel or whatever it is they're shaking at us, what's to prevent 'em shooting us from them windows? As I say, I ain't no trust in 'em. If they didn't shoot us dead, they could make us as we couldn't do aught to stop their going. That sort don't keep no faith wi' nobody, mas- ter! What about that there knife?”' I felt that he was right; he was backed up, too, by approving and corroborative murmurs from Mrs. Shepperoe and old Bowler. But I had a sneaking belief in a certain sense of business in Melchisedech, and the flag was being waved more insistently than ever, with an obviously beckoning motion. “There's this about it, Shepperoe,” I re- marked. “Scoundrels though they are, this lot, they're all ex-service men, and they know the meaning of the white flag- “Master!” he broke in, “if it had been any o' them old Boches, now, I'd ha' gone forrard willing! But these here young guttersnipes, d'ye think they care a curse about what a gen- tleman like you 'ud call honour? I doubts it, 194 The Heaven-Kissed Hill and I says again, be wary o’ what you're doing.” But I had already made up my mind to re- spond. There may have been an overstrong curiosity in me; I may have put too much faith in the Jew. Anyway, I pulled out my handkerchief, knotted it to a length of stick that lay near the fire, and showed signs of moving. “Then in that case I'm with you, master," said Shepperoe. “But” “We'll go up to a safeish distance, Shep- peroe,” I answered. “After all, those shot- guns don't carry such a long way. Let's be sure of what they're after. We've got the whip-hand of them, when all's said and dones Come on!” Holding up my flag, I went forward to within fifty yards of the cottage. The flag thrust out of the window was waved vigorously -once; then it dropped over the sill, and above it, clearly seen in the full glare of the unclouded moon, appeared the pale features of Melchisedech. Shepperoe and I halted. “Well?” I called across the intervening space. “What now?” 1 The White Flag 195 The night was so still that Melchisedech's reply came to us audibly enough; it was audi- ble, too, to the group we had left by the camp fire. There was an undisguised note of tri- umph in it. "Mithter!” he shouted. "Mithter! We've got Kiffin!” “Well?”' I replied. “Didn't I alwayth thay we thould get Kif- fin, mithter?” he went on. “I told you! And we have got him—to hith thorrow! We done Kiffin a treat, mithter! And tho “Look you here, Melchisedech,” I broke in on these fiendish rejoicings, “I'm not going to barter talk with you! What have you done to that man?" “Never you mind what we done to Kiffin, mithter!” he retorted, with more impudence than he had ever previously shown during our eighteen hours' acquaintanceship. “I thaid we thould put him through it, and that'th enough; hith own mother 'ud be thick if thee thaw Kif- fin ath he ith jutht now. But we done with Kiffin—and we've got what we wanted, too, mithter, and tho, mithter, we want to be going!” 196 The Heaven-Kissed Hill can. Shepperve, at my elbow, made a growl of dissent. “Don't 'ee say a word to that, master!” he muttered. “Leastways, not to say that they As things is, they young varmints is trapped.” I considered matters a while. For some reason unaccountable to myself, I was curi- ously anxious about Kiffin. “I've told you already, Melchisedech, that I'm not going to have any talk with you un- less you tell me what you've done with Kiffin," I called. “Are you going to tell me?" “You can thee Kiffin for yourthelf, mithter, when we getth out o'thith plathe,” he called back. “Kiffin ith in the kitthin, mithter- give uth your word that you and that hawker- chap won't interfere with uth, and we'll be off.” “And suppose we don't?” I demanded. “Then we thall jutht forth our way, mith- ter,” he replied. “We've got gunth now, and thtuff to put in 'em “Melchisedech!” I called, in louder tones. “We're very well aware of what you've got. You've got two guns and about twenty car- tridges. We've got two guns and a box full of 198 The Heaven-Kissed Hill in the peak of my left shoulder and heard the rattle of pellets on the wood and metal of the gun that was resting over it; at the same moment Shepperoe winced and swore under his breath. Together we turned and ran—and behind us I heard Melchisedech's voice, audibly cursing his men for their bad marksmanship. “You were right, Shepperoe!” I panted, as we made off. “My fault! And—you're hit?" “A scratch, master!” he answered. "Noth- ing. But-" What he was going to say, I don't know. As we raced up to the Mrs. Shepperoe, always vigilant, screamed, pointing to some- thing behind us; Marjorie, too, saw, and ex- claimed loudly. And whipping round, I saw what it was they were gazing at. From the corner of the cottage a thick, murky column of white smoke was rapidly rising—a second more, and its convolutions were lurid with spirals and slabs of red flame. The wood-shed -and the petroleum—were on fire! to the camp, 200 The Heaven-Kissed Hill on it! Burned out, master that's what'll come of that!" “Is there nothing we can do?” I exclaimed. “If we could stop it spreading—” He glanced in the direction of the spring from which he and his wife had filled their kettle more than once during the night, and from it to a range of his buckets that formed part of his stock-in-trade. “There's water, and there's pails to carry it in,” he muttered. “But, Lord bless 'ee, mas- ter! we'd have that spring dry in no time, and we ain't enough hands to carry the water even if we'd a reseyvor to dip into! And the stuff in that shed was so dry as tinder, and then that barrel o' paraffin! That—but harkie there, now!” The stuff of which he was speaking blew up at that moment, and a vast column of flame shot up into the sky and illumined our faces as clearly as a sudden burst of vivid sunlight in the middle of a darkened sky. I remember catching a vivid impression of old Bowler sit- ting forward on his improvised couch, staring as if incredulously, at the sight before him, and of Mrs. Shepperoe, her gay-coloured shawl Old Bowler Identifies 207 They made straight for us, and a queer mixed lot they looked as they rushed up to the hawk- er's cart. There must have been twenty of them in all-grooms, footmen, game-watchers, labourers, a solitary policeman; there were even a couple of stalwart country women, who came running in at the rear. And each and all carried some sort of offensive weapon-a gun or two, axes, pick-axes, hedging-bills, a crow- bar, hatchets; I was more delighted to see that sort of thing than the guns. For as far as I could judge, there was still a chance-small perhaps, but thereof saving the cottage if we could cut away the burning shed at its rear and tear out the spreading flame in the thatched roof. But first-Kiffin. “Come on, you fellows!” I shouted, as this strange relief force came racing up, all in a state of high excitement. “The cottage first- there's a man in there tied up! We must get him out-then, round to the back. and on to that thatch!” We poured down to the cottage in a confused mass, and into the garden, where the branches were shrivelling and cracking with queer little popping noises. And so in at the open door, Old Bowler Identifies 211 cut away the burning thatch; others, with axe and hatchet, cut away the smouldering ruins of the wood-shed; others, more daring, fought the fire from within the cottage itself. Gradually we began to get the upper hand of it; bit by bit the flame was stamped out and the smoke subdued—at last, as dawn came breaking over the eastern edge of the pines, I saw that we were going to save the place, and half- exhausted, I turned up the quarry towards Shepperoe's camp. And going up there, and as Marjorie came hastening to meet me, I saw a strange sight. Coming at a great pace down the quarry, at the head of another assemblage, not quite so assorted as that led by young Bowler, was one of the biggest men I have ever seen in my life. He seemed to me to be nearer seven feet than six; he was correspondingly broad and big in chest and girth and thigh; his hand was more like a leg of mutton than an ordinary fist, and he strode the ground at such a rate and with such prodigious strides that the half-dozen men behind him had to trot to keep up to him. They were big men, too_shepherds, labourers—but amongst them were two blue uniforms. 1" WIDTH BEST ******* ******** Old Bowler Identifies 213 my smoke-blackened fist was enough to wrench a sapling out of the ground. “Man!” he exclaimed, staring at me, and from me to Marjorie, and from her to the smoke about the cottage, now fading into occa- sional puffs and wisps. “Man! A’m afeart ye'll ha'e had an awfu' nicht o''t!” "Pretty hot stuff, thank you, Mr. Macpher- son," I answered. “Battles, nearly murders, and next door to sudden deaths. But we've got over the worst, I think, and we've saved some of Colstervine's cottage for him—the best part of it, too. And we're glad to see you, Mr. Macpherson-and where did you come across that chap?" I pointed to Melchisedech, and the big man, turning, looked that worthy carefully over, stroking his great beard, meditatively. “Aweel,” he said at last. “Ye see, we saw the reek o' the fire, and we set off to find out what was going on. And we cam' across this little feller slippin' awa', and we didna like his looks. And so we juist made free to tak'a look into his box-and losh, man, d’ye ken there's a wealth o' precious stones in there a'm feart he's a thief!” “The Books You Like to Read at the Price You Like to Pay" There Are Two Sides to Everything- -including the wrapper which covers every Grosset & Dunlap book. When you feel in the mood for a good ro- mance, refer to the carefully selected list of modern fiction comprising most of the successes by prominent writers of the day which is printed on the back of every Grosset & Dunlap book wrapper. You will find more than five hundred titles to choose from-books for every mood and every taste and every pocket- book. Don't forget the other side, but in case the wrapper is lost, write to the publishers for a complete catalog. There is a Grosset & Dunlap Book for every mood and for every GEORGE W. OGDEN'S WESTERN NOVELS May be had wherever books are sold. Ask for Grosset & Dunlap's list. THE BARON OF DIAMOND TAIL The Elk Mountain Cattle Co. had not paid a dividend in years; 80 Edgar Barrett, fresh from the navy, was sent West to see what was wrong at the ranch. The tale of this tenderfoot outwitting the buckaroos at their own play will sweep you into the action of this salient western novel. THE BONDBOY Joe Newbolt, bound out by force of family conditions to work for a number of years, is accused of murder and circumstances are against him. His mouth is sealed; he cannot, as a gentleman, utter the words that would clear him. A dramatic, romantic tale of intense interest. CLAIM NUMBER ONE Dr. Warren Slavens drew claim number one, which entitled him to first choice of rich lands on an Indian reservation in Wyoming. It meant a fortune; but before he established his ownership he had a hard battle with crooks and politicians. THE DUKE OF CHIMNEY BUTTE When Jerry Lambert, “the Duke,' attempts to safeguard the cattle ranch of Vesta Philbrook from thieving neighbors, his work is appallingly handicapped because of Grace Kerr, one of the chief agi- tators, and a deadly enemy of Vesta's. A stirring tale of brave deeds, gun-play and a love that shines above all. THE FLOCKMASTER OF POISON CREEK John Mackenzie trod the trail from Jasper to the great sheep country where fortunes were being made by the flock-masters. Shepherding was not a peaceful pursuit in those bygone days. Ad. venture met him at every turn-there is a girl of course-men fight their best fights for a woman-it is an epic of the sheeplands. THE LAND OF LAST CHANCE Jim Timberlake and Capt. David Scott waited with restless thousands on the Oklahoma line for the signal to dash across the border. How the city of Victory arose overnight on the piains, how people savagely defended their claims against the “ sooners; good men and bad played politics, makes a strong story of growth and American initiative. TRAIL'S END Ascalon was the end of the trail for thirsty cowboys who gavo vent to their pent-up feelings without restraint. Calvin Morgan was not concerned with its wickedness until Seth Craddock's malevolence directed itself against him. He did not emerge from the maelstrom until he had obliterated every vestige of lawlessness, and assured himself of the safety of a certain dark-eyed girl. Ask for Complete free list of G. & D. Popular Copyrighted Fiction GROSSET & DUNLAP, PUBLISHERS, NEW YORK 1 bow JACKSON GREGORY'S NOVELS May be had whorevor books are sold. Ask for Grosset and Dunlap's list. DAUGHTER OF THE SUN A tale of Aztec treasure of American adventurers, who seek it-of Zoraida, who hides it. TIMBER-WOLF This is a story of action and of the wide open, dominated always by the heroic figure of Timber-Wolf. THE EVERLASTING WHISPER The story of a strong man's struggle against savage nature and humanity, and of a beautiful girl's regeneration from a spoiled child of wealth into at courageous strong-willed woman. DESERT VALLEY A college professor sets out with his daughter to find gold. They meet a rancher who loses his heart, and becomes involved in a feud. MAN TO MAN How Steve won his game and the girl he loved, is a story filled with breathless situations. THE BELLS OF SAN JUAN Dr. Virginia Page is forced to go with the sheriff on a night joumey into the strongholds of a lawless band. JUDITH OF BLUE LAKE RANCH Judith Sanford part owner of a cattle ranch realizes she is being robbed by her foreman. With the help of Bud Lee, she checkmates Trevor's scheme. THE SHORT CUT Wayne is suspected of killing his brother after a quarrel. Financial com- plications, a horse-race and beautiful Wanda, make up a thrilling romance. THE JOYOUS TROUBLE MAKER A reporter sets up housekeeping close to Beatrice's Ranch much to her chagrin. There is "another man who complicates matters. SIX FEET FOUR Beatrice Waverly is robbed of $5,000 and suspicion fastens upon Buck Thornton, but she soon realizes he is not guilty. WOLF BREED No Luck Drennan, a woman hater and sharp of tongue, finds a match in Ygerne whose clever fencing wins the admiration and love of the “Lone Wolf." GROSSET & DUNLAP, PUBLISHERS, NEW YORK PETER B. KYNE'S NOVELS May be had wherever books are sol d. Ask for Grosset & Dunlap's list. THE PRIDE OF PALOMAR When two strong men clash and the under-dog has Irish blood in his veins—there's a tale that Kyne can tell! And “the girl” is also very much in evidence. KINDRED OF THE DUST Donald McKay, son of Hector McKay, millionaire lum- ber king, falls in love with “Nan of the Sawdust Pile,” a charming girl who has been ostracized by her townsfolk. THE VALLEY OF THE GIANTS The fight of the Cardigans, father and son, to hold the Valley of the Giants against treachery. The reader finishes with a sense of having lived with big men and women in a big country. CAPPY RICKS The story of old Cappy Ricks and of Matt Peasley, the boy he tried to break because he knew the acid test was good for his soul. WEBSTER: MAN'S MAN In a little Jim Crow Republic in Central America, a man and a woman, hailing from the “States," met up with a revolution and for a while adventures and excitement came so thick and fast that their love affair had to wait for a lull in the game. CAPTAIN SCRAGGS This sea yarn recounts the adventures of three rapscal lion sea-faring men-a Captain Scraggs, owner of the green vegetable freighter Maggie, Gibney the mate and McGuff- ney the engineer. THE LONG CHANCE A story fresh from the heart of the West, of San Pasqual, a sun-baked desert town, of Harley P. Hennage, the best gambler, the best and worst man of San Pasqual and of lovely Donna. GROSSET & DUNLAP, PUBLISHERS, NEW YORK EDGAR RICE BURROUGH'S NOVELS May be had wherever books are sold. Ask for Grosset & Dunlap's list. TARZAN AND THE GOLDEN LION A tale of the African wilderness which appeals to all readers of fiction. TARZAN THE TERRIBLE Further thrilling adventures of Tarzan while seeking his wife in Africa. TARZAN THE UNTAMED Tells of Tarzan's return to the life of the ape-man in seeking vengeance for the loss of his wife and home. JUNGLE TALES OF TARZAN Records the many wonderful exploits by which Tarzan proves bis right to ape kingship. AT THE EARTH'S CORE An astonishing series of adventures in a world located inside of the Earth. THE MUCKER The story of Billy Byrne-as extraordinary a character as the famous Tarzan. A PRINCESS OF MARS , Forty-three million miles from the earth-a succession of the wierdest and most astounding adventures in fiction. THE GODS OF MARS John Carter's adventures on Mars, where he fights the fero cious “ plant men, " and defies Issus, the Goddess of Death. THE WARLORD OF MARS Old acquaintances, made in two other stories. reappear, Targ Tarkas, Tardos Mors and others. THUVIA, MAID OF MARS The story centers around the adventures of Carthoris, the son of John Carter and Thuvia, daughter of a Martian Emperor. THE CHESSMEN OF MARS The adventures of Princess Tara in the land of headless men, creatures with the power of detaching their heads from their bodies and replacing them at will. GROSSET & DUNLAP, PUBLISHERS, NEW YORK ZANE GREY'S NOVELS May be had wherover books are sold. Ask for Grosset & Dunlap's list. TO THE LAST MAN THE MYSTERIOUS RIDER THE MAN OF THE FOREST THE DESERT OF WHEAT THE U. P. TRAIL 1 WILDFIRE THE BORDER LEGION THE RAINBOW TRAIL THE HERITAGE OF THE DESERT RIDERS OF THE PURPLE SAGE THE LIGHT OF WESTERN STARS THE LAST OF THE PLAINSMEN THE LONE STAR RANGER DESERT GOLD BETTY ZANE LAST OF THE GREAT SCOUTS The life story of “ Buffalo Bill” by his sister Helen Cody Wetmore, with Foreword and conclusion by Zane Grey. ZANE GREY'S BOOKS FOR BOYS KEN WARD IN THE JUNGLE THE YOUNG LION HUNTER THE YOUNG FORESTER THE YOUNG PITCHER THE SHORT STOP THE RED-HEADED OUTFIELD AND OTHER BASEBALL STORIES GROSSET & DUNLAP, PUBLISHERS, NEW YORK UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS-URBANA 3 0112 045841498