CHAPTER XV.BUYING THEIR RELEASE.
Our business just now is with Parson Stanard, the scholarly geologist and chemist, sitting all by himself in his silent tent and diligently analyzing his hematites and gottabites and outasights. The Parson made a curious figure; you would have laughed if you could have seen him. A solitary candle gave the flickering light by which he worked.
The Parson was a trifle agitated about that candle, because, as you know, it is the correct thing for a scholar to burn “midnight oil.” The midnight part was all right, but it took a long stretch of the imagination to convert tallow into kerosene. That kind of chemistry was too much for even the Parson.
However, it had to be borne. The Parson was seated in tailor fashion, in spite of which posture he was managing as usual to display his sea-green socks to the light. He had a row of bottles in a semicircle about him, like so many soldiers on parade; and at that moment he was engagedin examining a most interesting and complicated filtrate.
Parson Stanard was at the climax of his important night’s work. It will be remembered he was testing for potassium nitrate. He had it. He had put some of the substance in the fire and gotten the violet flame he wanted. Then, to make sure, he reached forward and took one of the bottles.
But the Parson never made that test. If the Banded Seven had seen him at that moment they would assuredly have been frightened, for his face underwent a most startling and amazing transformation. He had picked up the bottle; glanced at its label. And the next instant his eyes seemed fairly to pop up out of his head. His jaw dropped, his hands relaxed, and the wondrous and long-sought powder was scattered over the floor.
The Parson was ordinarily a quick thinker, but it took a time for that thought, whatever it was, with all its horrible import, to flash across his mind. And meanwhile his face was a picture of consternation.
Then suddenly he leaped to his feet with a perfect gasp of horror, knocking the candle over and making the bottles rattle.
“By the thunderbolts of Jove!” he cried. “By the hounds of Diana! By the distaff of Minerva!”
The Parson was striding up and down his tent by this time, utterly regardless of chemistry, geology, and possible discovery in the bargain.
“By the steeds of Apollo!” he muttered. “By the waters of the Styx, by the scepter of Zeus, by the cap of Mercury, by the apple of Venus and the bow of Ulyssus! By the nine immortals and the Seven Hills of Rome!——”
At this stage of the proceedings the agitated chemist was out in the company street, and striding away in the darkness.
“By the eagle of Ganymede, by the shield of Mars, by the temple of Janus, by the trident of Neptune!”
During this the gentleman was speeding out of camp, causing the sentry, who thought he was crazy, so much alarm that he forgot to challenge. By the time he recovered the Parson was gone and only an echo of his voice remained——
“By the forge of Vulcan, by the cave of Æolus, by the flames of Vesta!”
Not to continue the catalogue, which it would be found contained all the mythology from Greek and Sanskrit toHindoostanee, suffice it to say that the agitated scholar strode straight down the road to Highland Falls with all the speed that a scholar could assume without loss of dignity and breath. Also that he turned off the road at the precise place his comrades had and vanished in the woods.
“They said they were going to bury it in the icehouse,” muttered the Parson. “It is there I shall endeavor to intercept them and inform them of this most extraordinary conditions of affairs. Yea, by the all-wise, high-thundering Olympian Zeus.”
The more excited the Parson got the more Homeric epithets it was his custom to heap upon the helpless head of his favorite divinity; he was very much excited just now.
Fortunately, the Parson did not know just where the icehouse was; he had never been to it but once, and he wandered about the woods hunting in vain for at least half an hour. Then he sat down in despair and gasped for breath, and listened. And in that way he was suddenly made aware of the whereabouts of the object of his search.
A sound came to his ears, a loud laugh in the distance.
“Ho, ho! You fools! Dig a tunnel, hey? Ho, ha! Well, suppose you dig it. I’ve a revolver here, and I’llblow the blamed head off the first man that comes out. How do you like that. Guess again, Mark Mallory.”
The Parson sprang up as if he had sat down on the proverbial haystack with a needle in it. That voice was the voice of the “enemy,” Bull Harris! A moment later the Parson was creeping toward the sound with stealthiness that would have done credit to an Apache.
“We are in the hands of the enemy,” he gasped. “By the all-wise, high-thundering, far-ruling Olympian Zeus!”
“Ho, ho!” roared the voice, nearer now. “Think you can break the door down, hey? Well! well! Guess I’ll have to put a new log against it. How do you like that! That’s right! Whack away! Bully! Keep it up and you may get out by to-morrow night. Ho! ho!”
The unfortunate Zeus got a few more epithets then, and the Parson crept nearer still. In fact, he got so near that peering out of the bushes, he could spy the clearing with the little building and the two figures dancing gayly in front of it. Bull Harris was fairly convulsed with joy.
“I’ve got my revenge!” he roared. “I’ve got it! I told you I’d get it! Didn’t I tell you so? I told you I’d have you B. J. plebes out of here if I died for it. And now my time’s come! Hooray! You’ll be found to-morrow, beyondcadet limits, and out you go. You can’t deny it! How do you like it?”
“You’ll go to Halifax! you ole coyote,” growled a smothered voice from the inside.
“Me! Ho, ho! What do I care? I’ve nothing to lose. I’m ready to go. But you—ho, ho! Ask that fool Mallory how he likes it.”
“Very well,” responded a cheery voice. “You must remember that we’ve got the treasure.”
“Much good it’ll do you,” chuckled Bull. “You’ll be in State’s prison in a week or so. Ho, ho! Let’s tell ’em, Chandler. The secret’s too good a one to keep. Ask Texas what became of the revolver he dropped in the hotel last night playing burglar. The revolver with the initials J. P. on it.”
That was a thunderbolt. From the way it struck the horrified prisoners dumb. Bull knew it, and laughed with yet more malignant glee.
“You can’t prove it!” roared Texas furiously.
“Can’t I?” chuckled Bull. “You’d hate to have me try. It would take all your gold to get you out of that scrape, I fancy. Ho, ho! Court-martial! State’s prison! I guess I’ve got the best of it for once.”
“It’s the first time,” growled Texas.
During all this the Parson had been hiding in the bushes, trembling, gasping, slowly taking in the situation, the dilemma his friends were in. All thoughts of the excitement under which he had originally set out were gone. He was cudgeling his head to see what he was to do to turn the tide of battle.
It was a difficult problem, for Chandler had a revolver and the Parson had none. This was evidently a case where cunning and not brute force were to tell, and the Parson knitted his learned brows thoughtfully. Meanwhile the conversation was going on, and taking a new turn. Bull Harris had a proposition.
“I suppose you fellows are ready to acknowledge you’re beaten,” he sneered. “And I suppose you’ve got sense enough to see what a fix you’re in.”
To tell the truth, the whole Seven saw it clearly, but they were not ready to acknowledge it to Bull.
“I just want to say,” the latter continued, after a moment’s pause, “that there’s a way for you fools to get out of this. If you don’t choose to do it you may as well make up your minds to stay all night.”
“I suppose,” responded Mark, laughing at this introductionto a very obvious offer. “I suppose you think we’re going to let you get hold of our treasure. I suppose you think we’ll purchase our freedom with that.”
“That’s what I do,” said Bull, “else you stay.”
“We’ll stay,” laughed Mark, coolly. “And you can go to blazes.”
This proposition was not lost upon the Parson, lying in the bushes outside. The Parson had drunk in every word of it, and for some reason began to gasp and wriggle with suppressed excitement as he realized the meaning of the offer. As Mark spoke the last time the Parson slid back into the woods and stole softly around to the rear of the little building.
A few moments later, Mark, to his astonishment, heard a faint whisper in one of the crevices at the back. “Say, Mark!” That voice Mark would have known had he heard it in China. He ran to the spot and there was a minute’s quick conversation. At the end of it the Parson turned and crept way again, unseen by the two in front.
Perhaps five minutes later Bull Harris, who was still crowing merrily, was electrified to learn that the plebes had reconsidered their first defiance—that the gold was his!
“I guess we’ll have to give it up,” said Mark, briefly. “You’ve got us, and that’s all that there is to it.”
“Do you mean,” cried Bull, unable to hide his joy, “that if we let you out and give you the revolver you are willing to give up the treasure altogether?”
“Yes,” said Mark. “We are.”
“But how am I trust you?” demanded Bull. “If I open the door how do I know you won’t——”
“I’ve said I wont!” interrupted Mark, with angry emphasis. “You know me, I guess.”
It was a funny thing. Bull himself would have lied all day without his conscience troubling him. But somehow or other he was sure that Mark wouldn’t. In spite of his cousin’s protestations, he stepped forward, removed the barricades and turned the key.
The six plebes came out, looking sheepish enough. Texas received his lost revolver meekly, though he felt like braining Bull with it. A minute later the six hurried off into the woods, leaving Bull and his cousin to gloat for hours over the chest of gold they left inside.
Truly, it was a triumph for Bull.