Stranway was searching desperately now through his other pockets on the chance that he might merely have misplaced the automatic. No—it was gone! He had had it when he had left his rooms to go to Dominic Court, for he remembered distinctly having put it in his pocket—but it was gone now. It must have dropped from his pocket when he was crawling under the car out there on the road with Flint! In any case it was gone, and he was weaponless. With a pistol he might have held the top of the stairs, but now—— There were four of them! He might account for one or two, but after that—what?
For an instant upon Stranway came fear, deadly, cold, such as he had never known before—not for himself, there was no room for thought of self now, but for the Orchid whose only hope lay in him. Her hair seemed to float again across his cheek, the dark eyes, wistful, full of tender light and trust, to look into his own, and through that agony of fear flashed pictures of long years of the might-have-been, of love and happiness, full of her presence and companionship. For a moment it unnerved him—and then there swept upon him a seething fury, a mad desire for vengeance, a fierce elemental passion that overrode all else.
Like a crouched tiger, Stranway, his body poised a little forward over the topmost stair, waited silently. Up one stair after another came the footsteps—of one man. The masquerading butler, beyond question! Stranway could just make out the other's shape, irregular, without form, just something a little blacker than the surrounding blackness. Then, suddenly, little flickering gleams of light began to come from the hall below—other footsteps—the bumping of tin cans—smothered oaths. The other three, carrying candles and the kerosene, were not far behind the leader!
But on the stairway itself there was as yet just the one shadow upon which Stranway's eyes were set. The shadow bulked larger, coming nearer and nearer. The man could be no more than three steps below him—he could hear the other's breathing now.
Nearer—another step—another! And then Stranway's arms shot out, and, wrapping themselves around the other's knees, tightened like bars of steel. It was lightning quick, the space of time it might take a watch to tick, while Stranway's shoulders heaved upward as though his whole body had been loosed like some Titanic spring. There was a cry, wild, terror-stricken—and from shoulder high he hurled the other from him down the stairs.
There was a thud, a queer crunching sound—an instant's silence—then a chorus of cries, the rush of feet, and the flickering lights had gathered around the foot of the stairs.
Fighting for his breath, and back a little from the edge of the top stair now, Stranway watched the scene below, thankful for a moment's respite. Candles in hand, the three men stared dazedly at the curled heap at their feet, at each other, and, through the darkness, toward the head of the stairs; then they bent over the quasi-butler and began to examine him more closely. "That's blasted queer!" growled one. "He must have fallen the whole length somehow. Nice mess for us! Looks like he's broken his neck."
"No; he hasn't!" It was Jake's voice now. "He's stunned, that's all. He's coming around now."
A touch fell on Stranway's shoulder—it was the Orchid.
"Ewen," she breathed in his ear, "I can't stay in there! I must do something to help. Tell me what to do! I can walk better now."
His hand closed over hers.
"Try the end of the hall and see if there's a way to get out on the roof," he whispered; "or try the front room windows for a balcony."
There was the faintest rustle of garments—too low for the preoccupied men below to hear—and she was gone.
Stranway's eyes had never left the group below him at the foot of the stairs. They had set their candles down, and had propped the man up now in a sitting posture against the wall; and, as Jake had said, the fellow seemed to be coming around, for he moaned and lifted his hand to his head.
"What happened you?" demanded Jake. "Did you trip? I told you to take a light."
The man appeared to rouse himself with a sudden effort.
"Trip, you fool!" he snarled. "I didn't trip! There's some one else up there—besides her. Do you hear? There's some one else—and you've got to get him, or we're done. He's trapped up there and he can't get away. Go on—get him—get him!"
A low, sullen, vicious oath purled from Jake's lips: "Didn't I tell you I felt like some one was watching me down there? And I'll bet he was, too—and that he sneaked in after we left the room! If he heard what we said, he's got enough on us to send us to the chair!"
"Maybe!" put in one of the others, with a nasty laugh. "Only he'll never get the chance. Come on, now—rush him!"
The man sprang forward as he spoke, Jake close beside him, the third man in the rear. On they came racing up the stairs; but it was not until they were almost on the top tread that, in the darkness, for the candles below did little more than multiply the shadows, they caught their first glimpse of Stranway—and coincidentally Stranway's fist shot out and smashed with all his weight behind the blow into the nearest face. The man staggered and reeled backward—but at the same instant, and from just behind the first man, another one leaped forward.
Stranway gave back a step to elude this second rush; and again, with every pound that was in him, struck once more—and missed. The man had outguessed him by dropping cleverly to his knees on the top stair. And from this man there came then a jeering laugh—but it was lost the next instant in a fierce exchange of blows, and panting breaths, and the short, hoarse grunts of straining men, as Stranway, carrying the fight to his antagonists, drove in upon them with savage ferocity.
As long as he could keep them on the stairs only two could get at him at once, and even then they were in each other's way. That was why, he kept telling himself now as he fought, he had chosen the head of the stairs to make his stand; kept telling himself over and over that they must not gain a footing on the landing—for a little while at least. He couldn't hold the stairhead forever, of course; the odds were too heavy—but for a little while—until, pray God, she should have found some way out.
It was dark, brutally dark. If he could only see a little, so that he might hoard his strength and waste fewer blows! Two of the men were still on the top stair—at times like elusive shadows! But the other one—where was the other one? He could not make out the third man at all now.
Something gripped and twined around his ankles—a grim, instant answer to his question. The third man had crawled upon him from between the others' legs! And then, as Stranway strove desperately to free himself from this new attack, while still fighting to hold back the other two, a cry, still with rage, pain and impotence, came up the stairs from the disabled man below:
"Ah, finish him! You haven't got all night! Put a bullet in him, and have done with it!"
The grip on Stranway's legs tightened—he could not loose himself, and in another second he would be thrown. Better to force the issue than wait for that!
It would give her a little more time before the inevitable end—just a minute or two more time. He drew his body backward from the knees up—and then, head down like a battering ram, he flung himself suddenly forward in a plunging dive full into the shoulders of the men on the step below him.
There was a crash, the sound of rending wood as the banister sagged—another crash—and the four men were sprawling in a tangled heap upon the stairs.
Up out of the ruck Stranway struggled to his feet. But he was surrounded now, and now he could only fight on blindly while his strength held out. They were pounding at his face, raining blows upon his head. He felt himself swaying, and giddy flashes swam before his eyes. And then there came a yell again from the disabled man below, but this time it was unmistakably a yell of warning. It was answered by a hoarse, mirthless laugh, the tongue-flame and roar of a revolver shot, a scream—and some one came leaping up the stairs—and Stranway's opponents seemed to melt away from before him, as, evidently in sudden panic, not only at the unexpected attack, but because their presence in the lonely house had obviously been discovered now, they dashed past the newcomer, and rushed headlong down the stairs.
Flint? No, it wasn't Flint! Who, then? The question came and went in a confused way through Stranway's mind, as he jumped back to the landing and threw himself face downward upon the floor. The fight wasn't over yet! Rallied by the frantic yells of their disabled leader, as he screamed out to them that they had only to deal with one man more, from below came a volley of shots. The newcomer flung himself down beside Stranway. Only the leader of the band lay in full view in the candle light, in full range below at the foot of the stairs—the others were scattered farther back along the hall, and were firing out of the darkness.
"You didn't come any too soon, whoever you are," Stranway panted grimly. "If you've got another revolver, I'll take a hand."
"I've only one!" The man fired as he spoke; then, anxiously: "Where is she? Is she safe?"
But it was the Orchid herself who answered suddenly from somewhere behind them.
"Yes, I'm safe," she said.
"Thank God!" ejaculated the man soberly; then, peremptorily: "Get into a room somewhere out of danger until we've settled with this rabble."
"Yes—in a moment!" she replied tensely. "But, first, there is something else. Ewen, are you hurt? I could not find a way out. I could not see, but I could hear—and it was terrible! Tell me, tell me, are you hurt?"
"No," Stranway answered quickly. "No; not a bit—but you must get back there into that room at once! Please! At once!"
She made no answer, but the next instant, to Stranway's relief, he heard the closing of a door. And now he could smile with grim complacence at the shots that were coming up from the hall below, for, lying flat here on the floor, the bullets must necessarily, from the angle at which they were fired, pass harmlessly overhead. The man beside him, though perhaps no more effectively, fired in turn, coolly, methodically, at the flashes as they came up out of the darkness, and twice reloaded his revolver.
Perhaps five minutes passed, and then in a lull in the firing, the leader's voice calling to his companions, but calling now in piteous entreaty, once more reached the head of the stairs:
"Help me out of here, you cowards! My leg's broken, and my back's hurt! Help me out of here, before they drill me full of holes!"
The man at Stranway's elbow laughed—and in the laugh was something that it was not good to hear.
"Have no fear, Hastvik," he called, a softness in his voice that was deadly in its menace and its irony. "I could have shot you on the way up—or finished you with any shot I have fired from here—you should be reassured, should you not?"
"Hastvik!" The man's head lifted, and his eyes strained wildly up the staircase. "Hastvik! Who calls me Hastvik?"
Again the man beside Stranway laughed.
"I do!" he said. "Do you not recognise the voice—Hastvik?"
"Who are you?" Hastvik screamed.
"Who am I?" said the other, and there was a rasp now in his voice. "I am—Kyrloff."
Hastvik with an agonised effort, his face contorted, jerked himself forward from his sitting posture against the wall.
"Kyrloff—eh!" He broke into oaths. "Well, I might have known it! I should have finished you that night on the river bank when we pulled you out of the water—I've cursed myself that I didn't ever since!"
"You threw me back again because you thought that I was already dead," said Kyrloff hoarsely. "But there was enough murder done that night, Hastvik, wasn't there? Enough murder done that night! My wife—that you killed, you hell-hound! No, have no fear, Hastvik, I shall not shoot you—unless you move—or one of those others tries to move you. That would be too easy a way out for you. You've had nineteen years of freedom—you know why—but the law is ready and waiting for you now."
Kyrloff—Sanctuary! The last account! That entry in the Red Ledger! The story of that night! Stranway's brain was correlating it all now. This was Kyrloff—the man who had given sanctuary to Charlebois. And below was the man who——
Stranway's mind veered abruptly as he stared fixedly at Hastvik. Had the man's face gone whiter, more a ghastly, bloodless colour? In the faint candle light he could not tell; but Hastvik's shoulders and head had slumped suddenly back against the wall, and the man lay there motionless now as though he had fainted.
A silence had fallen—the other three, hidden below, had evidently been intent upon the scene. But now, suddenly, there came a shot, and, with a muttered exclamation, Kyrloff, who had unconsciously edged a little forward, drew hastily back.
"Hit?" asked Stranway.
"No," Kyrloff answered.
Stranway spoke again quickly:
"Have you plenty of cartridges?"
"Yes," Kyrloff replied.
"Good!" said Stranway. "They can't get up here, and we've nothing to fear, then, unless they carry out their original plan of setting fire to the house. They've, I don't know how many, cans of kerosene below there."
"I stumbled into the cans coming up," said Kyrloff. "But they won't set fire to the house and leave Hastvik there, and they can't move him without coming into the light, or get at the cans either. They're welcome to try! I wish they would! I'd like to get that first fellow back there—ah!" The flash of his revolver cut a lane of light down the staircase; there was an answering yell of pain—and then a hail of bullets came streaming up from below. "Winged him, that's all!" growled Kyrloff. "But I've about got his position now, and next——"
"Do you hear that?" Stranway grasped suddenly at Kyrloff's arm. "There's some one outside!"
From the roadway without came the sound of approaching motor cars, and, a moment later, the sharp whir of tires on the gravel driveway. But the three men below had heard it too! With a rush they sprang from their concealment, making past the light and down the hallway for the head of the lower flight of stairs. Kyrloff flung his arm forward to fire—and the hammer clicked on an empty shell. He jumped to his feet with a bitter oath.
"After them!" he cried.
For a moment all was wild confusion: rushing feet, slamming doors, cries, hoarse shouts from outside the house—and Hastvik, returned to consciousness again, if indeed he had ever lost it, shrieking in frantic appeal:
"Don't leave me—don't leave me—you blasted curs! Do you hear—Jake!—Blackie—you——" He burst into a torrent of wild blasphemy.
Kyrloff had dashed down the stairs past Hastvik and disappeared along the hall; but Stranway, as the door opened and he heard the Orchid's voice, turned and stepped quickly toward the room in which she had taken refuge.
"Ewen!" she called. "Are you there?"
He reached out in the darkness, and drew her to him. She was trembling, and he brushed back the hair from her forehead tenderly.
"We are safe now," he said. "Quite safe, dear. They have come—Flint, I think, and some of our men from the Court, for there is more than one car outside. Listen! There they are coming up the stairs now."
The pound of feet as a number of men raced up the lower staircase reached them; and then a voice shouted out anxiously:
"Mr. Stranway! Mr. Stranway! Where are you?" Then, suddenly: "Good God, what's this!"
Stranway stepped to the head of the stairs. Flint and three of the organisation's men were bending over Hastvik.
"I'm here!" said Stranway.
Flint turned and peered up the stairway.
"You're safe—you're all right?" he cried excitedly.
"All right," said Stranway.
"And the Orchid—is she——"
"Safe," Stranway answered; and then abruptly: "Carry that man down stairs at once, Flint. I imagine he is in rather a bad way, but keep your eye on him just the same. He has probably got a revolver in his pocket, though he was in a predicament where he dared not use it!"
"Leave him to us!" Flint replied, a sudden gruffness in his voice; and, motioning to his men to pick Hastvik up, led the way toward the lower stairs.
Stranway turned to the Orchid.
"It's strange," he said musingly. "They all seem to know that you were here. Kyrloff knew—and Flint knew when he called up to me just now. But Flint didn't know when I left him an hour ago."
"You didn't ask him about—Charlebois," she said, in a low voice.
Stranway shook his head. He had feared that there could be but one reply, and he dreaded any further shock to her until she should have recovered, at least in some measure, from the experience she had just been through.
"No," he said slowly.
Quick in her intuition, she spoke:
"Was it because—of me?"
For a moment he held her close to him again, and laid her head upon his shoulder, his cheek against hers—it seemed the only answer he could make. Then, releasing her, he took her hand.
"Come," he said. "We will go downstairs."