CHAPTER IV.BRUCE ANGRY.
It was high noon when they reached the Place Vendome, having taken their time in returning. As they approached the hotel, Browning came out, and stood on the marble steps, smoking a cigar. Rattleton began to grin as they drew near, and the big fellow scowled blackly at them. They took off their hats, and saluted him, with mock courtesy.
“Behold, he hath risen!” cried Frank.
“At last, at least, at loost!” gurgled Harry.
“Before you, gentlemen,” said Diamond, “you see a most imposing man.”
“That’s right,” nodded Merry; “he’s imposed on everybody he could borrow money from.”
“He had a very strong face,” observed Rattleton. “I believe he could travel on it.”
“It looks as if he’d been traveling on it,” smiled Frank.
“I should advise the gentleman to turn farmer,” said Harry.
“Yes,” said Frank; “he might be able to raise a beard.”
Browning did not seem to take this chaffing in good part, for he scowled blackly, uttered a growl, swung down the steps, and started off.
“Where are you going, old man?” called Frank.
Browning did not answer, or turn his head, but continued walking away.
“He’s niffed,” said Jack. “That’s queer, for him.”
“He’ll get over it,” declared Rattleton.
But Frank was perplexed and disturbed.
“I don’t like it, fellows,” he declared. “Never saw Bruce take a joke that way before.”
“Oh, he’d thought it a fine thing if it’d been on somebody else,” said Harry. “Let him go. I’m hungry. Let’s have some lunch.”
He caught hold of Frank’s arm, attempting to draw him into the hotel, but Merry would not go.
“I don’t like it,” he confessed. “I don’t care to carry a joke so far that any of my real friends will take offense.”
“Bosh! If Browning is mad about that, it will do him good to let him alone till he recovers.”
Frank continued watching Bruce striding away across the square, and into the Rue Castiglione.
“Go order lunch, fellows,” he said. “I’m going to bring Browning back.”
“Don’t be fool enough to chase after him!” advised the Virginian.
But Frank would not listen, and away he started after the big Yale man, who was striding along as if he had an important engagement to keep. It was near the obelisk that stands by the beautiful fountain in the Place de la Concorde that Frank overtook his college chum. Bruce had paused a moment in the midst of this most beautiful square in the whole world, probably, utterly unaware that he had been followed, when Merry came up, and put a hand on his shoulder.
“Come, old man,” said Frank; “come back to the hotel, and have lunch with us.”
Browning wheeled about, and scowled at Merry.
“Who are you addressing?” he growled, like an angry dog.
“Oh, come!” exclaimed Merry; “drop it! Don’t take a joke from a friend to heart in this manner.”
“Friend!” rumbled the big fellow, with scorn and contempt. “Do you call yourself my friend? Bah!”
Merriwell was astonished more than ever, but he was not willing to think Bruce in earnest.
“Of course I call myself your friend!” he exclaimed. “Are you going to get sore over a harmless joke?”
“I am done with you!” declared Browning dramatically. “I understand your boasted friendship now! You would make a laughing-stock of any friend you might have! Don’t grin at me! I am in earnest! I see through your hollow friendship now! I understand you at last! Leave me! I am done with you!”
“Surely, you do not mean that, Browning?”
“Surely I do!”
“Impossible!”
“Do you think so? Well, you’ll see! I shall look for another hotel! I shall go it alone, and no thanks to you, Frank Merriwell! Don’t dare ever again call me your friend! I am your enemy! All I ask is that you keep away from me, now and forever!”
Frank caught his breath, astounded beyond measure. Browning was glaring at him in the fiercest manner imaginable, and he seemed angry enough to smite Merry full in the face.
“Look here, Bruce,” said Frank, “I had no idea you could be so thin-skinned. If I had thought you’d take it this way, I would not have——”
“It’s too late to tell what you would not have done! You’ve done it!”
“But without a thought of——”
“I advise you to think next time. We were enemies when you first came to Yale, and we’ll be enemies when you return there, if you are lucky enough to get back. I can make it pretty hot for you, and I think I will.”
Frank’s face flushed, and he drew off a bit.
“If you are willing to let a little thing like a joke ruin our friendship——”
“Little thing!” again interrupted Browning. “What do you call a little thing? I didn’t come here to Paris with you to be made a guy! I don’t come here to stand as a butt for your wretched jokes! You have been pretty popular in your day, but you’re outgrowing it, and you won’t cut so much ice in the future. I’m no sycophant, to crawl round after you, and let you impose on me just as you please!”
“You are quite unreasonable, old man. I scarcely looked for anything like this from you, and I think you’ll come to your senses in time.”
“Think what you like; from this time, you and I are quits!”
Then Browning turned, and crossed the square toward the Champs-Élysées, leaving Merry there by the fountain. As he walked away, the big fellow grinned, and muttered:
“You didn’t expect that, did you? Oh, I’ll get back at you, Frank Merriwell! You’ll find there is somebody else who can play at that little game! I wonder how you like it!”
Frank Merriwell stood there in the midst of the Place de la Concorde, and watched Browning depart. On one side lay the swiftly flowing Seine, spanned by a bridge five hundred feet in length; on the opposite side, to the north, a beautiful street disclosed the majestic portal of Madeline. To the left was the Garden of the Tuileries, while to the right opened the Champs-Élysées. The fountain tinkled and splashed in the sunshine, and over the smooth, hard pavement cabs came and went like swarms of insects. It seemed that this splendid square, where crowds of joyous people seemed forever crossing and recrossing, had been appropriately named, “The Place of Peace,” but there Frank Merriwell had failed to make peace with his offended comrade, and, as he stood reflecting, he remembered all the horrors that had taken place there on that spot where fell the shadow of the obelisk.
There had been erected the hideous guillotine, the glittering blade of which had descended upon the necks of thousands of the aristocracy of France, among whom were Marie Antoinette and Louis XVI. The very ground beneath the stones was soaked with human blood, for there, day after day, the imbruted mob had gathered to sing, and laugh, and shout, as head after head of old and young, weak and strong, proud and beautiful, rich and famous, had rolled from the gory scaffold to mingle in the common basket.
Frank shuddered with horror as he thought of the “knitting women” and “The Vengeance,” described by Dickens. He closed his eyes for a moment, and his vision showed him the scaffold, and he could hear those women calmly counting the blood-dripping heads as they continued to knit, knit, knit, and the scarlet blade rose and fell, cutting short the thread of a human life each time it descended. He saw the long lines of tumbrels rumbling through the streets, surrounded by the armed guard and the howling mobs, all headed toward this blood-cursed spot, bearing helpless and innocent victims to doom.
In fancy, he saw a royal carriage enter that square, and stop near the raised platform, above which rose the blood-red post of the guillotine, and he saw Louis XVI. alight from the carriage, to be immediately surrounded by his executioners. He saw Louis remove his coat and cravat, and then object when they tried to bind his hands. He saw the confessor remonstrate with Louis, till, at last, the doomed man stretched out his hands, saying: “Do what you will; I will drink the cup to the dregs!” Frank pictured him, with a firm step, ascending to that blood-soaked platform. Then the drums beat, to drown his words; the spring was touched, and the fearful knife slid down the grooves.
Then came Marie Antoinette, not in a closed carriage, like the king, but in an open cart, the same as the poorest wretch of them all. For a moment she had recoiled from the cart, which she saw beyond the gate of the courtyard, and then she had advanced up the steps, with firm and steady tread, armed guards on every hand, a hooting mob welcoming her appearance. And thus she had ridden through the streets to that fearful square, now called “The Place of Peace.” On the scaffold, she had looked over the seething mob to the Garden of the Tuileries, and the scenes of her former happiness, while a tear had rolled down her pale cheek. “Farewell, my children!” she had murmured; “I go to join your father.” Then she bowed her head, the knife fell, and the frightful deed was done.
France may erect fountains in the midst of that beautiful square, but all the water in the world will not wash away the blood that has been shed there!
Frank Merriwell gave himself a shake, as if throwing off these gruesome thoughts, and banishing the horrid visions. Browning had disappeared.
“I was a fool to let him go like that!” muttered Merry. “If I am to blame, I’m willing to apologize, and I feel sure Browning will accept an apology.”
Then he hurried across the square, and followed Bruce. Frank fancied he must soon overtake Browning, but he was surprised to traverse the entire length of the Elysian Fields before catching a glimpse of the big Yale man.
Browning was turning into a side street as Frank observed him. He seemed walking as if to keep an appointment with some one. Puzzled not a little by what had happened, and by Browning’s mysterious behavior, Frank followed at a distance.
At last, Browning came to a little café, and he entered, without once looking back. Merry decided that it was an ordinary drinking-saloon, and he wondered if Browning had gone in there for the purpose of indulging freely in intoxicants.
After a moment of hesitation, Merry followed. The moment Frank stepped inside the door, he decided it was a cheap place, indeed. From the outside, it did not look so bad; but, once inside, it reminded him of the den of the Red Flag, where he had found the well-known ruffians of Paris assembled.
A few men were drinking at tables. They looked at Frank suspiciously as he glanced them over. He saw nothing of Browning. A door opened into another room. To that door he advanced. A man met him, and asked, in French, what he wanted.
“I am looking for a friend,” answered Merry, likewise in French.
“Have you the sign?”
“The what?”
“The sign.”
“No; I don’t know what——”
“Then you cannot enter.”
At this moment, a voice from within cried out something in very bad French, and the man at the door suddenly stepped aside, saying:
“Enter.”
Frank hesitated a moment, and then stepped into the room. Immediately the door closed behind him with a click.
Frank stood there looking around in the dim light which came through a curtained window. He saw there were several persons in the room. At the farther end was a passage.
“L’espion!”
The word was hissed through the gloom, and it put Frank on the alert in a moment.
Somebody had called him a spy! What did it mean? All around him, men rose up, and, in that moment, he realized he had walked into grave peril. Out in the passage, a door opened, admitting a faint gleam of light. Somebody passed through the door, and Frank was certain he recognized Bruce Browning hurriedly leaving.
“Browning!” he called. “Browning, stop!”
He leaped toward the passage.
Slam! The door closed, and the departing person was gone.
Bang! Another door slammed in his face, and he was kept from entering the passage.
Like a flash, Frank whirled about. Somewhere, he fancied, he heard a person hammering on a door, the blows echoing along the closed passage. He was not armed, and he realized that some sort of danger beset him. It was startling, because it was so unexpected and mysterious. Out from the men who had risen, one advanced. Even in the gloom of the place, to which Frank’s eyes were not yet accustomed, there seemed something familiar about this person.
“It is Frank Merriwell!” exclaimed an exulting, triumphant voice. “We are met again!”
The hammering which echoed through the passage became a crash, as if a door had fallen before an assault. Then followed something like a sodden blow, and a groan. What queer thing was happening beyond the door at Frank Merriwell’s back?
“Yes, we are met again!” exulted the man that confronted Frank. “Look at me! You know me!”
The man bent forward, and Frank’s eyes seemed to pierce the gloom. In amazement, Merry started back against the door.
“Martin Brattle?” he exclaimed, in doubt. “It can’t be!”
“Oh, but it is!” declared the man. “You thought me dead; but, you see, I am not. I have followed you here. I have come for Elsie!”
“Elsie!”
“Yes. Where is she?”
“She is not in Paris.”
“You lie! I know she is here! You shall send a message that will bring her to you—and to me!”
“Are you crazy, Brattle? Did your fall rob you of reason? Elsie Bellwood is in England. She did not accompany me to France.”
“And you think you can make me believe that? Bah! I know you, Frank Merriwell! You are a great bluffer, but the game will not go now!”
Then he turned to the other men, crying, in broken French:
“Down with the spy! Don’t let him escape! I have told you who he is! Down with him!”
And they sprang, like famished tigers, at Frank!
Frank Merriwell felt that it was to be a fight for life against terrible odds. He leaped aside, caught up a chair, swung it over his head, and splintered it with a blow that stretched one of his assailants on the floor.
Then Frank laughed! It was the old-time, reckless laugh that broke from his lips in moments of great danger. It sounded weird and uncanny now, and, for a single instant, it seemed to check the assault of his many foes.
“At him!” screamed Brattle. “Capture him! Down with him!”
Merry flung the broken chair at the man who was urging the others on. It struck him, and sent him sprawling and spluttering.
“Come on, my fine fellows!” invited Frank. “Or, if you won’t come on, I’ll come to you!”
He did! With a leap, he was among them. Never had the young Yale athlete used his hard fists to better advantage. He was fresh and unhampered, and he cracked about him at the heads of those men, leaping, darting, ducking, diving, striking all the time. One man he smashed on the ear, another he hit in the eye, a third he struck fair and full in the pit of the stomach, having dodged a blow himself. And Frank laughed again, exulting in the fury of the fight.
Those Frenchmen were astonished, for they had not conceived that one lone Yankee could make such a fight. They had fancied it would be the easiest thing in the world to leap on the American, crush him down, bind him, make him captive. But he was like a whirlwind among them, and he sent them flying in all directions.
“Mon Dieu!“ they cried. “He is a fury! He is a madman!”
“I am a trifle mad,” admitted Frank, as he skilfully kicked one fellow full in the face, sending him flying across a table. “It starts me a bit to be jumped on in this manner. Good morning! Have you used Pear’s soap?”
With this question, he came round at a fellow who had tried to grapple him behind, hitting him a smashing blow that flung him bodily against the partition. There were yells, and groans, and curses. Men were scrambling over each other on the floor, struggling up, and falling again. There came the crash of glass and the splintering of wood.
Somebody struck at Frank with a chair, but he dodged the blow, so that it did not fall fairly, although he felt it on his shoulder. Then he wrenched the chair from the man’s hands, and beat him down with his own weapon.
“I think I shall enjoy this after awhile!” he exclaimed. “It’s a real lively time!”
“Fight as much as you like!” snarled the voice of Brattle. “You can’t get out! We have you, and you’ll be used all the worse for making such a row!”
“Come over where I can get another crack at you!” invited Merry. “If I could hit you once more, real hard, I wouldn’t mind what happened after that!”
“I’ll get a crack at you before I’m done, see if I don’t!”
“You will follow your friend Harris, and he won’t trouble anybody again!”
“You killed him?”
“No; he drowned himself.”
“I’ll not follow him till I have settled with you! Down with him, men!”
A door opened and closed, and a huge form loomed in the gloom of the place.
Frank saw it, and cried:
“Browning! You are just in time! Come on, old man, give me a hand!”
The gigantic form loomed at Merry’s side, and then Frank was struck a terrible blow that stretched him on the floor.
“Treachery!” he gasped, trying to struggle up. “Browning, you have turned——”
They piled upon him. With a fearful effort, he flung them right and left.
“Hold!”
There was a sudden burst of light, as the door leading to the passage flew open. A man entered, bearing a lamp that was lighted. Struggling to his feet, Frank Merriwell saw the Mystery was there, having entered from the passage!
The strange man was dressed in black from his head to his feet. His hair and his beard were black as the raven’s wing, and his deep-set eyes seemed like pools of ink, while his face was pale as marble. His appearance caused the ruffians to desist for a moment from their attack on Frank. There was something terrible in the demeanor of the man who called himself Mr. Noname. Before him Martin Brattle shrank and cowered.
But one of the ruffians uttered a snarl, crying, in French:
“Down with them both! They are both spies!”
The mob crouched like tigers about to spring.
“Back!” rang out the deep voice of the mysterious man.
They paused.
“Back!” he cried, lifting one hand above his head. “I hold a bomb here, and, by the eternal heavens, I’ll drop it, and blow this building to atoms, if you do not keep off!”
That stopped them. They could see a round object in his uplifted hand, and a sudden fear seized upon them. There was something in his pose and manner that awed them.
“Now,” said the strange man, speaking to Frank Merriwell, “the time for you to depart has come. No one will lift a hand to stop you. The way is open.”
Frank realized that the Mystery had appeared at the proper moment to save him, and he was thankful, but cool.
“And you,” he asked, “what will you do?”
“I will go with you. Never fear for me. Nothing can harm me. But I shall blow them to pieces if they try to stop us!”
Frank stepped past him, and entered the passage. Still holding his hand uplifted, the Man of Mystery retreated backward into the passage.
With a swift movement, he placed the lamp on a shelf, and closed the door, crying loudly, in perfect French:
“The first man who tries to enter by that door will be blown to a thousand fragments!”
He stepped softly to Frank’s side.
“Follow!” he said.
At the end of the passage was the door by which Merry had fancied he saw Browning departing. Now it was shattered and broken, as if it had been struck by a battering-ram, and Frank remembered the blows which had resounded through the passage, and the crash that had been followed by groans. Frank also remembered the gigantic figure that had appeared in the darkened room where the battle was taking place, and how he had thought it Browning returned to his aid. But the giant had struck him down with a blow, and he could not believe Bruce had done that.
Out by the shattered door they passed, and found themselves in a yard that was surrounded by a high stone wall. In the wall was an iron gate, but it opened at the touch of the Mystery. Beyond the gate, they were beneath some drooping trees, which seemed to lack the sunlight which was shut off by the crowding buildings.
The Man Without a Name did not pause. He led the way to a door, and, to Frank, it seemed that all portals yielded like magic to his touch, for the door flew open before him. Soon they had passed on, and emerged upon a narrow street.
“You are free,” said the Mystery. “But go not back to that place. It is a nest of serpents.”
“My friend—he went in there.”
“Your friend?” said the Mystery questioningly. “Who is your friend?”
“Bruce Browning.”
“Who is your friend?” repeated the strange man. “You can be sure of no friend but me. I am ever constant. Other friends may fail you, but I will not.”
“But he is back there!”
“How do you know?”
“I followed him in there.”
“And found him not. Trust not friends whom you fail to find in your hour of need.”
“I cannot go away while he may be in peril!”
“You cannot go back, and escape with your life! It is a devils’ nest! The vipers of Paris are there. They plot, and rob, and slay. Among them is an enemy who has followed you across the ocean. He has paid them to destroy you. Keep away from the nest of vipers. Even though you saw your friend go in there, did you not see him come out?”
“Who are you?” cried Frank, amazed. “How is it you know so much? How is it you are always near when I am in peril?”
“There is a tie that binds us.”
“What tie?”
“Fate.”
“I do not understand this mystery.”
“It is not for you to understand now. The time may come when the scales will fall from your eyes, and you shall know all.”
The man seemed ready to turn away, but Frank put out a hand appealingly.
“Can’t you tell me more?” he pleaded. “I thought you had perished in the fire in London.”
“Fire cannot destroy me. My time has not come.”
“Why is it that the sound of your voice seems to awaken echoes of memory within me? Why is it I feel a strange thrill run over me when you are near? Why is it I trusted you from the very first, even though you seemed an enemy?”
“Does not your heart answer those questions?”
“My heart struggled with the problem, but cannot answer it. I am mystified—bewildered—dazed.”
“I tell you the time will come when the scales shall fall from your eyes, and the mystery be revealed unto you. I have proved that I am worthy of trust, have I not?”
“Yes—yes!”
“Trust me, and wait.”
“But why do men shrink before you? I am sure it was more your presence than the bomb that cowed those tigers.”
“The bomb!” said the strange man. “There was no bomb!”
“No bomb?”
“No; nothing but this.”
In his extended hand, the Man of Mystery held an oval-shaped cake of dark-colored substance.
“What is it?” wondered Frank.
“Soap!”
“What?”
“Soap—nothing more!”
“Impossible!” gasped Merry. “Impossible that you cowed those ruffians with a cake of soap!”
“It is the bomb with which I threatened them. When I entered the passage by that broken door to go to your rescue, I found the lamp and the cake of soap on a shelf. The lamp I lighted, and the cake of soap I took with me. You witnessed the result.”
“Astounding!” gasped Frank. “It is almost beyond belief! Talk of nerve—that takes the cake!”
“We shall meet again,” said the Mystery. “Go back to the hotel now, and do not worry about any false friend. Farewell, for a time.”
Then the man turned, and walked away along the narrow street.
Frank hesitated, watching him. When the man was far along the street, Merry hurried after him. He was in time to see the strange being reach the corner, and enter a closed carriage that seemed waiting for him. Away rolled the carriage.