Back over that terrible road of drifting snow the old grave digger made his way as swiftly as his trembling limbs could carry him.
He had endeavored to mark carefully the spot where he had made that lonely grave, but the snow was drifting so hard with each furious gust of wind as to make it almost impossible to find it upon retracing his steps.
Quaking with terror, and with a prayer on his lips to Heaven to guide him, old Adam sat down his lantern, and by its dim, flickering light peered breathlessly around.
There was the blasted pine tree and toward the right of it the stump. The grave must be less than a rod below it.
With a heart beating with great strangling throbs, he paced off the distance, and then stood quite still, holding his lantern down close to the frozen earth.
For an instant his heart almost ceased beating—there was no sign of the little mound, with the leafless branch of bush he had been so careful to place there.
Then, suddenly a moan from beneath his very feet fell upon his ear, causing him to fairly gasp for breath.
"Thank God! I have found it!" he cried.
In an instant he had thrown off his coat, thin though it was, and set to work as he had never worked in all his life before—against time.
He had thrown in the earth loosely, taking care to leave the head exposed, for he felt as sure as he did of his own existence that life was not yet extinct in the body of the young girl for whom he was forced to prepare that grave at the point of a revolver in the hands of the two desperate strangers.
He had taken his own life in his hands when he had announced the work finished satisfactorily, for had the man stepped from the coach to examine the work he would have found the deep hole which left the head uncovered.
The cold winds and the drifting snow blew into the old grave digger's face, but he worked on with desperate zeal, realizing that another life might depend upon the swiftness of his rescue.
At last, after what seemed to him an eternity of time, he reached the body, and quickly lifted it from its resting place.
Half an hour later he reached his own humble cottage home, bearing the slender burden in his strong arms.
His good wife had waited up for him. She could never sleep when Adam was away from home.
She heard his footstep on the crunching snow and hastened to open the door for him, starting back with a cry of great surprise as she caught sight of the figure in his arms.
"Is it some neighbor's little girl lost in the storm, Adam?" she cried, clasping her hands together in affright.
"Don't ask any questions now, Mary," he exclaimed, delivering the burden into her willing, motherly arms, and sinking down into the nearest chair, thoroughly exhausted. "I'll tell you all about it later, when I get my breath and my nerves are settled. Do everything you can to revive the poor young creature. She is freezing to death."
As old Adam's kindly wife threw back the dark cloak which had enveloped the fair young face and form, an exclamation of surprise broke from her wondering lips.
"She is a stranger hereabouts," she observed, but she wisely obeyed her husband's injunctions, making no further remark, knowing she would hear all about it in good time.
In less time than it takes to tell it, the beautiful young stranger was put to bed in the little spare room up under the eaves, wrapped in flannel blankets, with bottles of hot water at the feet, and a generous draught of brandy, which the grave digger's wife always kept in the house for emergencies, forced down her throat.
"She will soon return to consciousness now," she exclaimed to her husband, who stood beside the bedside anxiously watching her labors; "see that flush on her cheeks. We will sit down quietly and wait until she opens her eyes. It won't be long."
And while they waited thus, Adam told his wife the story he had to tell concerning the young girl—this fair, hapless, beautiful young stranger whose wedding he had witnessed and burial he had assisted in within the hour, first binding his wife to solemn secrecy.
The good woman's amazement as she listened can better be imagined than described. For once in her life she was too dumfounded to offer even a theory.
As they glanced toward the bed, to their amazement they saw the girl's eyes fastened upon old Adam with an expression of horror in them, heartrending to behold, and they realized that she had heard every word he had said.
In an instant they were on their feet bending over the couch.
"Is it true—they buried me—and—you—you—rescued me?" she asked, in a terrified whisper, catching at the old man's hands and clutching them in a grasp from which he could not draw them away, her teeth chattering, her violet eyes almost bulging from their sockets.
"Since you have heard all, I might as well confess that it is quite true," he answered. "And God forgive that brute of a husband you just married. He ought to swing for the crime as sure as there is a heaven above us. There will be no end of the good minister's wrath when he hears the story, my poor girl."
Again the beautiful young stranger caught at his hands.
"He must never know!" she cried, incoherently. "Promise me, by all you hold dear, that both you and your wife will keep my secret—will never reveal one word of what has happened this night."
"It is not right that we should keep silent upon such an amazing procedure. That would be letting escape the man who should be punished, if there is any law in the land to reach him for committing such a heinous crime."
"I plead with you—I, who know best and am the one wronged, and most vitally interested, to utter no word that would cause the story to become blazoned all over the world. Let me make my words a prayer to you both—to keep my pitiful secret."
It was beyond human power to look into those beautiful violet eyes, drowned in the most agonized tears, and the white, terrified, anxious face, without yielding to her prayer.
"I do not know what good reason you may have for binding us to secrecy," he said, slowly and reluctantly, "but we cannot choose but to give you the promise—nay, the pledge—you plead for. I can answer for my Mary as well as myself—the story of to-night's happenings shall never pass our lips until you give us leave to speak."
"Thank you! Oh, I thank you a thousand times!" sobbed the girl. "You have lifted a terrible load from my heart. If the time ever comes when I can repay you, rest assured it shall surely be done."
She tried to rise from her couch, but the good wife held her back upon her pillow with a detaining hand, exclaiming:
"What are you about to do, my dear child?"
"Go away from here," sobbed the girl, again attempting to arise from the couch, but falling back upon the pillow from sheer weakness.
She did not leave that couch for many a day. What she had undergone had been too much for her shattered nerves.
Brain fever threatened the hapless girl, but was warded off by the faithful nursing of old Adam's faithful wife.
And during those weeks the good woman could learn nothing of the history of the beautiful young stranger, who persistently refused to divulge one word concerning herself. She would turn her face to the wall and weep so violently when any allusion was made to her past that the grave digger's wife gave up questioning her.
One morning the bed was empty. It had not been slept in. The girl had fled in the night.
Who she was, or where she had gone, was to them the darkest, deepest mystery. Would it ever be revealed? They could not discuss it with the old minister or any of the neighbors, for their lips were sealed in eternal silence concerning the matter.
"I feel sure the end of this matter is not yet," said old Adam, prophetically. "When the girl comes face to face with the dastardly villain she wedded that night, it will end in a tragedy."
"God forbid!" murmured his wife with a shudder; but down in her own heart she felt that her husband had spoken the truth; the tragic end of this affair had not yet come.
Faynie had indeed departed from that humble home as she had entered it, in the dark, dim silence of the bitter-cold night.
She made her way as best she could to the station which, fortunately enough, was not far distant. The station master was old and anxious to get home, and therefore paid little heed to the little dark-robed figure who bought a ticket to New York, and soon after crept silently aboard of the train which steamed into the little depot of the hamlet, almost buried in the snowdrifts across the hills.
Weak and faint from her recent illness, Faynie, the beautiful, petted little heiress of a short time before, huddled into a corner of the seat by the door, and drawing her veil carefully over her face, wept silently and unheeded as the midnight express bore her along to her destination.
She was going home to Beechwood; going back to the home she had left in such high spirits to join the lover who was to be all in all to her forever more; the lover who was to shield her henceforth and forever from the world's storms, and was to be all devotion to her and love her fondly until death did them part. And this had been the end of it. Her high hopes lay in ruins around her. Her idol had been formed of commonest clay, and lay crumbled in a thousand fragments at her feet.
Surely, no young girl's love dream ever had such a sad awakening, and was so cruelly dispelled.
She would go home to her haughty old father, tell him all, then lie down at his feet and die. That would end it all. Even in that moment lines she had once read came back to her with renewed meaning:
"And this is all! The end has come at last!The bitter end of all that pleasant dream,That cast a hallow o'er the happy past,Like golden sunshine on a summer stream."Sweet were the days that marked life's sunny slope,When we together drew our hearts atune,And through the vision of a future hope,We did not dream that they would pass so soon."In happy mood fair castles we upreared,And thought that life was one long summer day;We had no dread of future pain, nor fearedThat shadows e'er should fall athwart our way."But sunken rocks lie hid in every stream,And ships are wrecked when just in sight of land;So we to-day wake from our pleasant dreamTo find our hopes were builded on the sand."I do not blame you that you do not keepThe troth you plighted e'er your heart you knew;Better the parting now than wake to weep,When time has robbed life's roses of their dew."Another face will help you to forget,The idle dream that had its birth in trust,And other lips will kiss away regret,For broken faith and idols turned to dust,"Ah, well, you chose, perhaps, the better way;Another love may in your heart be shrined;And I—I shall go down my darkened way,Seeking forever what I ne'er shall find."
"And this is all! The end has come at last!The bitter end of all that pleasant dream,That cast a hallow o'er the happy past,Like golden sunshine on a summer stream.
"Sweet were the days that marked life's sunny slope,When we together drew our hearts atune,And through the vision of a future hope,We did not dream that they would pass so soon.
"In happy mood fair castles we upreared,And thought that life was one long summer day;We had no dread of future pain, nor fearedThat shadows e'er should fall athwart our way.
"But sunken rocks lie hid in every stream,And ships are wrecked when just in sight of land;So we to-day wake from our pleasant dreamTo find our hopes were builded on the sand.
"I do not blame you that you do not keepThe troth you plighted e'er your heart you knew;Better the parting now than wake to weep,When time has robbed life's roses of their dew.
"Another face will help you to forget,The idle dream that had its birth in trust,And other lips will kiss away regret,For broken faith and idols turned to dust,
"Ah, well, you chose, perhaps, the better way;Another love may in your heart be shrined;And I—I shall go down my darkened way,Seeking forever what I ne'er shall find."
It was two o'clock by the church belfry when she reached Beechwood, and a quarter of an hour later when she reached the great mansion that stood on the brow of the hill.
She remembered that one of the rear doors, seldom used, was never fastened, and toward this she bent her faltering footsteps. It yielded to her touch, and like a ghost she glided through it and up the wide, familiar corridors, her tears falling like rain at every step.
She knew it was her father's custom to spend long hours in his library, sometimes far into the gray dawn. He found this preferable to the presence of his sharp-tongued second wife, who was always nagging him for more money, or to put his property into her name as proof positive of his unbounded, undying affection for her.
In his library, among his books, there was no nagging. Here he found peace, silence and quiet.
Therefore, toward the library, late as the hour was, Faynie made her way, stealing along quietly as a shadow.
The door stood slightly ajar, and a ray of light, a narrow, thread-like strip, fell athwart the dim corridor.
When Faynie reached the door she paused, trembling with apprehension, a feeling of intense dread, like a presentiment of coming evil, stealing over her like the shadow of doom.
She was prepared for his bitter anger, for the whirlwind of wrath that would be sure to follow, but she would cast herself on her knees at his feet, and with head bowed, oh, so lowly, so piteously, wait for the hurricane of his rage to exhaust itself. Then she would bend over her head still lower, her pride crushed, her pitiful humiliation complete, and sue on her bended knees, with her hands clasped for his pardon and his love again.
She would plead for it for the sake of the fair, hapless young mother whom she had loved and lost in his early youth. Surely, for her sake he would find mercy, perhaps pardon, for the child she had left behind her, the fair, petted, hapless daughter, who had been so lonely, and whose heart yearned so for love ever since he had brought in a second wife to rule over his household.
Ay, from that hour he and his daughter had seemed to drift apart.
Nerving herself for the ordeal, the girl crept to the door and timidly swung it back.
There was a figure bending over the writing desk; not the tall form of her father, but her stepmother.
Faynie drew back with a startled cry.
In a single instant, with the swiftness of a lioness, the woman who had been examining the desk, cleared the space that divided her from the girl, and clutched her by the shoulder.
"You!" she panted, in a voice that was scarcely human, it was so full of venomous hatred. "You!" she repeated, flinging the girl from her, as though she had been something vile to the touch. "How dare you come here?"
Faynie looked at her for a moment with dilated eyes gazing out from her pale face.
Had her stepmother suddenly gone mad? was the thought that flashed through the girl's brain.
"I—I have come back to my father, and—and to his home—and mine. Any explanation I have to offer will be made to him alone."
The woman laughed a sneering, demoniac laugh, and her clutch on the girl's shoulder grew stronger, fiercer.
"How lovely, how beautifully worded, how dutiful!" she sneered. "By that I judge that you have not been keeping abreast of the times, or you would have known, girl, that your father is dead, and that he has disinherited you, leaving every dollar of his wealth to me."
"Dead!" Faynie repeated the words in an awful whisper.
It seemed to her that every drop of blood in her veins seemed suddenly turned to ice. A mist swam before her eyes and she put out her hand gropingly, grasping the back of the nearest chair for support.
She did not even hear the last of the sentence. Her thoughts and hearing seemed to end with that one awful word.
"That is what I said," replied her stepmother, nonchalantly, "and you are his murderess, girl, quite as much as though you had plunged a dagger in his heart. Your elopement caused him to have a terrible hemorrhage. He knew all the details about it in less than an hour's time, learning from one of the servants how you stole out of the house and met the tall man at the gate, who took you off in a closed carriage, and just as he made this discovery one of the maids handed him your note, which you left pinned to the pillow, addressed to him. He had no sooner read it than he fell into a rage so horrible that it ended as I have said, in a hemorrhage. Within ten minutes' time your name, which he cursed, was stricken from his will, and he left everything to me, disinheriting you. Do you comprehend the force of my remark?"
The steady, awful look in the young girl's eyes made the woman quail in spite of her bravado. "I—I do not care for my father's wealth, but that he should curse me—oh, that is too much—too much. Oh, God, let me die here and now, that I may follow him to the Great White Throne and there kneel before him and tell him all my pitiful story!"
"That is a pretty theory, but people cannot go to and come at will from the Great White Throne, as you call it. You had better get back to the realities of life on this mundane sphere, where you find yourself just at present. I repeat for the third time that you are disinherited. I cannot seem to make you grasp that fact. This home and everything in it belongs absolutely to me."
Faynie heard and realized, and without a word, turned and staggered like one dying toward the door, but her stepmother put herself quickly before her.
"Sit down there. I have something else to say to you," she added in a shrill whisper, pushing the girl into the nearest seat.
"I must go. I will not listen," cried Faynie, struggling to her feet.
"Yes, you shall listen and comply with my proposition," exclaimed her stepmother, her glittering eyes fastened on the beautiful face of the girl she hated so intensely.
We must return for one brief instant, dear reader, to our hero, Lester Armstrong, whom we left as he was being hurried off to the hospital on the night which proved so thrillingly eventful.
At the first rapid glance, the surgeon had believed his patient dying, but upon examination after he had reached the hospital, it was discovered that his injury was by no means as serious as had been apprehended; but a trouble quite as grave confronted the patient.
"An injury to the base of the brain, such as he has received, no matter how slight, might, in this instance, produce either insanity or partial loss of memory, which is almost as bad," said the surgeon. "It will soon be determined when consciousness, returns to him."
This indeed proved to be the case. Just as daylight broke Lester Armstrong opened his eyes, looking in amazement around the strange apartment in which he found himself.
A kindly-faced nurse bent over him, who, in answer to his look of inquiry, said:
"You had a severe fall and hurt yourself last night and was brought to the hospital. You are doing finely. Can you remember anything about the incident?"
Lester looked up vacantly into the dark-gray eyes. "I—I was in a hurry to close my books at the office; that is all I recollect," he murmured.
From documents found in his pockets, it was learned that he had some connection with the great dry goods house of Marsh & Co., and the senior member of the firm was notified. Within an hour Mr. Marsh responded in person. He was greatly distressed over the occurrence and took it deeply to heart.
"I think as much of that young man as if he were my own son. Do everything in human power for him. Let no pains be spared. I will stand every expense," he said, and then and there he also confided a startling secret to the surgeon.
"I am a lone man in this world, without one kindred tie on earth. Some little time since I made my will. I left every dollar I possessed on earth to my young cashier, Lester Armstrong, though he never even dreamed of such an existing state of affairs. I never intended that he should know that I had made him my heir for perhaps years to come yet."
"Lester Armstrong!" exclaimed the surgeon. "Why, that is not the name he is entered here under, Mr. Marsh. The friend who was with him did not call him that."
"Then the friend who was with him evidently did not know him. I identify him as my cashier, Lester Armstrong."
The surgeon bowed courteously.
"I would also suggest no mention whatever of this affair be given to the newspapers," continued the gentleman. "They would make a sensational story out of it, and I detest notoriety."
"Your wishes shall be respected, sir," replied the surgeon, who had a great reverence for men of wealth.
His prediction proved quite correct. When Lester Armstrong arose from that bed of sickness ten days later, his mind, although as bright and keen as ever on some subjects, on others was hopelessly clouded. Even the slightest recollection of beautiful Faynie Fairfax, the little sweetheart whom he had loved better than his own life, was completely obliterated from his mind. He did not even remember such a being had ever existed.
Another event had transpired on the eventful night of his injury. The humble boarding house where he had made his home so many years, had been destroyed by fire, and the people had gone none knew whither. This was indeed a trying blow to Lester, for the fire had completely wiped out all of his savings which he had kept in the little haircloth trunk in his room. But, without a murmur, he took up the burden of life over again and went back to his work at his desk.
In going over his accounts he suddenly came across the name of Faynie Fairfax.
The pen fell from his fingers and he brushed his hand over his brow.
"What a strangely familiar ring that name has to me!" he muttered, "but I cannot imagine who it can be. Her checks seem to be paid in here. I must remember to notice who she is when next she comes to this window."
Life had dropped into the same old groove again for Lester Armstrong, the only difference in the routine of his daily life being that he was not obliged to take his daily trips to Beechwood any more, for the reason that his employer, Mr. Marsh, had taken up his residence in the city again.
But in less than a fortnight another event happened.
Mr. Marsh died suddenly, and to the great surprise of every one, Lester Armstrong was named as his sole heir. At first the young man was dumfounded. He could not believe the evidence of his own senses, when first the news was conveyed to him.
The papers contained columns concerning the young man's wonderful luck. Those who knew Lester Armstrong said the great fortune which had come to him would not spoil him.
There was one who read this account with amazed eyes, and that was Halloran.
"Great God!" he muttered, his hands shaking, his teeth chattering. "Kendale told me that Armstrong was taken to the hospital in a precarious condition and died there."
He made all haste to Kendale's lodgings. The latter, who was still masquerading under the name of Lester Armstrong, had been on a continuous spree ever since the night he had wedded the little beauty, and Halloran had let him take his course, saying to himself that there was plenty of time in the future to carry out their scheme.
For once he found Kendale partially sober. He knew by Halloran's face that something out of the usual order of events had transpired.
"What is the matter?" he cried; "what's up now?"
For answer Halloran laid the paper before him, pointing to the column, remarking, grimly:
"The game's up now, and we've gone through all this trouble for nothing. Your cousin, Lester Armstrong, is not dead, but instead is alive and well."
The papers which contained the account gave another bit of unfortunate information, stating that Lester Armstrong had suffered from loss of memory since he had received the fall on that fatal night.
"Well," said Halloran, as his friend laid down the paper, "you see, the game's up."
"By no means," exclaimed Kendale, perfectly sober by this time. "It's a poor rule that won't work both ways," he added, excitedly.
"I don't understand your cause for rejoicing," returned Halloran, gloomily.
"Don't you?" cried Kendale. "Then let me make it clear to you. We not only have one fortune through the girl that I tied myself to, and can, as her husband, collect all in good time, but with a little strategy I can come in for the Marsh millions. We can decoy Armstrong into a coach, and let the world find out his fate after that if it can. I will coolly take his place, just as I did in that other affair, and who is there to question that I am not he."
"But they know you there. You worked a week in the employ of Marsh & Co. You forget that."
"It was at one of their branch stores," was the reply, "and they had never heard of Armstrong there, and had never seen him. I left in a week. I did not resemble my cousin so much at that particular time for the reason that my mustache was shaven off then. Without that you would be surprised to see what a wide difference there is between us."
"It is a great scheme, if you are sure that you can carry it through," said Halloran, breathing hard and eying his companion fixedly.
"Trust that to me," replied Kendale, jumping up and walking the floor to and fro excitedly.
It was midnight when Halloran left Kendale's apartments. During those long hours the two plotters had concocted a diabolical scheme, which they meant to carry out ere the morning light dawned.
All unconscious of the nefarious plot against his life, Lester Armstrong was up with the sun the next morning, and was down to the office at an early hour transacting the great amount of business that he found upon his hands, contingent upon being the head of the firm of which he had for so many years been but an humble cashier.
Despite the sudden wealth which had come to him, all that day he felt a strange depression of the heart, a strong impression of impending evil, which he could not shake off. Even those about him noticed what a gloomy look there was in his eyes.
He was the last one to leave the great building that night, and as he stepped out upon the sidewalk, he muttered to himself: "I wonder what is about to happen to me, my heart feels so heavy, so depressed."
Lester Armstrong had no sooner stepped to the pavement than he was accosted by a man who stepped suddenly up to him.
"Mr. Armstrong?" he said, interrogatively, touching his hat respectfully.
"Yes," responded Lester, "what can I do for you?"
"I am here on a deed of mercy. A friend of mine, an employee of yours, sir, has met with a serious accident and calls for you repeatedly. I am a hackman, and I volunteered to come for you and ask you to let me take you to him. It is not very far. My cab stands right here."
"I will go to the poor fellow, certainly," responded Lester, hurrying to the vehicle in question and hastily entering it.
In a moment the driver had mounted the box and was off like the wind. It did not occur to Lester until he was well under way that he had not thought to inquire who the injured man was.
As the cab rolled swiftly along over the crowded thoroughfare, Lester leaned back and gave himself up to his own thoughts.
Wealth had come to him, and with it honors had crowded thick and fast upon him. The world of society held out its arms eagerly to him. Lovely young girls, matrons of the house, offered their congratulations to him with the most bewitching of smiles, and mothers with marriageable daughters from all over the city opened an account with the great dry goods house, whose sole owner was a young and handsome bachelor.
But for all this there seemed to be something sadly missing in his life, a want which he could hardly define, and it seemed to take the shape of something which he was striving to remember, but could not.
Only that morning he had been talking with some one in the office about it, and had been laughingly informed that there was a method that could bring back to his memory that which he desired so ardently to recollect. "If you will tell me how to unravel this tangle that is in my brain, you will have my everlasting gratitude," declared Lester, earnestly.
"It takes people with nerves of steel to accomplish it. A person who is nervous to the slightest degree would not dare to try it, for fear of turning suddenly insane from the terrible mental struggle. Do you still wish to know what it is?"
"Yes," responded Lester, "and I can use my judgment whether I dare try it or not."
"Very good," replied the gentleman, "then here it is: Counting five thousand backward will either restore your loss of memory, or, as I have taken care to warn you gravely in advance, cause you to go insane. It must be done rapidly, and in a given space of time. In my belief the remedy is by far worse than the malady. I feel, somehow, as though I ought not to have told you about it."
"Nonsense," said Lester. "You need have little fear of my trying it."
He thought of it, however, as the cab rolled rapidly along.
"I wonder if harm would result from my trying it?" he mused. "I have unusually strong nerves, and—and, if anything disastrous should come of it, there is not one soul on the wide earth that would be injured. There is no mother to weep, no fair young sister to grieve, no father or brother to be bowed down with sorrow. I am alone in the world. My foolhardiness would injure only myself—only myself."
He had been thinking so deeply that he had not noted the flight of time, nor that the street lamps had grown fewer and far between, at last ceasing altogether, and that they were traveling a country road. Suddenly the vehicle came to a stop. The driver jumped from his box and opened the door with a jerk, remarking:
"This is the place."
Lester alighted, looking about him in a rather mystified manner, but before he could make the inquiry that rose to his lips the driver hastened to say:
"The path that leads to the house, which is just beyond that clump of trees, is so narrow that we cannot drive there. We will have to walk. It is but a short distance. You will see the house at the first turn in the path."
And as the man uttered the words he gave a peculiar cough.
"Who is the person who sent for me?" Lester queried, stopping short. The man made an evasive answer, which aroused his suspicions that all was not as it should be.
"Why do you not answer my question? I refuse to proceed a step farther until you have satisfied me on this point," declared Lester, haughtily.
"That's your opinion. I think differently, my fine fellow," answered the man insolently. "I'd advise you to come along quietly."
Lester Armstrong saw at once that he had been lured into a trap. It was natural for him to jump to the conclusion that it was for robbery, owing to the fact of his coming into possession of the great Marsh fortune so recently, and a sudden sternness settled upon his face. He was not used to broils, but this fellow should see that he was not quite a stranger to the manly art of self-defense, and that he had an adversary worthy of his steel.
"Are you coming along peaceably with me, or shall I be obliged to call upon my pals for assistance?" he asked, grimly.
"I propose to defend myself against all odds," answered Lester, more than angry with himself for falling so easily into the trap that had been so cunningly set for him.
He had but a few dollars in money about him, and the disappointment of his assailant in not finding a large roll of bills would in all probability cause the man to take desperate chances in trying to make away with him. If he was armed he was at the fellow's mercy. There might be half a dozen accomplices in collusion with him, he had little doubt.
Again the cabby uttered that peculiar cough which was half a whistle, and in response two men, whose features were covered by black masks, sprang from the adjacent bushes.
Our hero put up a splendid defense, but the united strength of his three antagonists at length overpowered him.
What was there in the figure of one of the men that seemed so familiar to him? he wondered, and just as they were bearing him to the ground by their united efforts, he suddenly reached forward and tore the mask from his assailant's face.
One glance, and the horror of death seemed to suddenly freeze the blood in his veins. His eyes dilated and seemed to nearly burst from their sockets. The face into which he gazed was that of Clinton Kendale, his cousin.
"You!" he gasped, quite disbelieving the evidence of his own senses.
Kendale laughed a diabolical laugh, while his features were distorted into those of a fiend incarnate.
"I haven't the least hesitation in admitting my identity," he said, coolly. "Yes, you are in good hands, if you give us no trouble, and come along quietly, without compelling us to use further force."
"What is the meaning of this outrage?" cried Lester, white to the lips.
"That you shall learn all in good time, cousin mine," replied Kendale, mockingly.
In struggling out of their grasp to better protect himself, Lester fell headlong on the icy ground, striking his head heavily against the gnarled, projecting root of a tree and lying at their feet like one dead.
"He will give us little enough trouble now," said Kendale, grimly. "Lend a hand there, both of you, and get him into the house quickly. I am almost frozen to death here."
In less time than it takes to narrate it, Lester Armstrong was hurriedly conveyed into the house.
The place consisted of but two rooms, and into the inner one Lester was thrust with but little ceremony, and tossed upon a pallet of straw in the corner.
He had not entirely lost consciousness, as they supposed, but was only stunned, realizing fully all that was transpiring about him.
"Your scheme has worked like a charm, Halloran," said Kendale. "We have bagged our game more easily than I imagined we would. Now there is nothing in the way between me and the fortune that liberal old fool Marsh willed to my amiable cousin."
"Everything rests with the shrewdness with which you play your part," answered the man addressed as Halloran.
"You ought not to have any scruples on that score," exclaimed Kendale, boastfully. "After leaving my amiable cousin on the night of the accident, did I not go immediately to the pretty little heiress, Faynie Fairfax, and successfully pass myself off as the lover she was waiting to elope with? And the little beauty never knew the difference."
"I must own that you played your cards successfully in that direction," was the response, "but this will be a far different matter from hoodwinking a young, unsophisticated girl."
"Within a month from to-day I shall have the Fairfax fortune and the Marsh millions added to it," said Clinton Kendale, emphatically.
"I would put an eternal quietus upon my fortunate cousin here, did I not need his assistance in one or two matters concerning the method of running the business, which was known only to old Marsh and himself."
"Are you fool enough to think that he will divulge those secrets to you?" said Halloran, impatiently.
"They can be forced from him. I know how," returned Kendale, with a brutal laugh. "Come," he said, turning on his heel.
His companion followed him from the apartment, and the door closed with a resounding bang, and Lester lay there too horror-stricken to move hand or foot, fairly spellbound by the disclosures he had overheard as they stood over him, believing him unconscious.
All in an instant a great wave of awakened memory swept over him, opening out the flood-gates of recollection like a flash. He remembered his interview with his sweetheart, his darling Faynie, and how he was arranging to hurry back to marry her when the fatal accident occurred, and how, believing himself dying, he had confided all to his treacherous cousin, bidding him take the message to his darling, that even in death his only thought was of her.
Oh, merciful God! how horribly had his treacherous cousin betrayed that sacred trust, because of his fatal resemblance to himself! He cried out to God and the listening angels:
"Heaven help my beautiful darling and save her from the machinations of that desperate villain!"
He knew that Clinton Kendale would stop at nothing to gain his end, and his agony at the thought that he might be unable to prevent it in time almost drove him to the verge of madness.
He felt that they would hold him there until they tortured from him whatever secret he held which they wished to learn; then they would deliberately make away with him. Clinton Kendale would step into his place, personating himself so cleverly that the great world, under whose very eyes the terrible tragedy had taken place, would never know the difference. Even Faynie would not know how she had been tricked and cheated, and the last thought almost drove him to the point of frenzy, nearly succeeding in turning his tortured brain.
For hours Lester Armstrong lay like one stunned, turning over and over in his mind the awful revelation he had heard. That a human being, especially his cousin, Clinton Kendale, should have plotted so horribly against him seemed almost past believing. Then he remembered how treacherous he had been in his early days, and he wondered that he had been so mad as to have trusted him.
"Heaven save my darling from him!" he cried out in an agony too great for words. To realize that she was in the mercy of such a man was a sorrow so great that all else on earth paled before it. Then a mighty resolve came to him—to foil the villainous plot, weak though he was; he must make his escape and fly to his darling's aid.
He knew that Clinton Kendale would follow out his line of action, keeping him there as long as it was necessary—that is, until he learned all the secrets that he was so anxious to ascertain—then he would put him out of the way with as little compunction as he would a dog. He might expect little mercy at Kendale's hands, when two fortunes and a beautiful young girl hung in the balance.
For hours he lay there, turning the matter over in his mind. He knew he was terribly weak from the awful fall which he had received, and which had hurt his head the second time in almost the same place; but escape he must from the clutches of the conspirators, even though he were dying.
Suddenly the key turned in the lock, the door swung open and Kendale entered, bearing a lighted candle in his hand.
"Ah, you have come to, have you?" he remarked, seeing the other's eyes turn toward him; and before Lester Armstrong could answer he went on quickly: "You are the only one who knows the combination which opens the safe of the late Marsh & Co., and as I intend to open it to-morrow morning at the usual hour in place of your punctual self, it will be most necessary for you to give me the required information."
For one moment Lester Armstrong gazed steadily into the face of the fiend incarnate before him—a look before which the other quailed despite his apparent bravado.
"I am in your power and at your mercy," he said, "but though you torture me on the rack I shall never tell you what you want to know. That safe contains valuable papers which belong to others; they are secure in my keeping. You can kill me, but the secret of the safe combination will die with me."
Kendale laughed a little short, hard laugh.
"You are mad to thus defy me," he cried, harshly, "when you stop to consider that I can open it in any event. I can simply say the combination has slipped from my mind. Who is there to question Mr. Lester Armstrong, the head of the firm? No one—no one. It will be broken open quite as soon as workmen can be found to accomplish it."
The lines about the sufferer's mouth tightened; he clutched his hands hard. He knew the dare devil Kendale would stop at nothing—nothing.
"I will give you until daylight to decide. I promise you that it will go hard with you if you are not complaisant."
With that he turned on his heel and quitted the room.
During all the long hours of that never-to-be-forgotten night Lester Armstrong lay there on his pallet of straw praying for strength to foil the villain—for Heaven to direct him what to do.
For the Marsh millions he cared nothing; but his heart was wrung with anguish when he trusted himself to think of Faynie.
He knew that Kendale had kept the appointment made by himself, but for some reason the elopement could not have taken place. A thousand causes might have prevented its successful carrying out, though Kendale was sure of a satisfactory finish, he imagined.
Daylight broke at last; he could see it dimly through the dust-begrimed, boarded-up windows; but it was not until the sun had well risen that his cousin put in an appearance again. Lester was suffering intense pain from the terrible bruise on his head at the base of the brain, but he set his teeth hard together, determining that his mortal foe should not know it.
"Ah!" exclaimed Kendale, sneeringly. "Wide awake, I see!—probably the fixed habit of years. You have, no doubt, come to a more sensible frame of mind than I left you in last night, I trust, regarding the information I want concerning the combination of the big safe in the private office of Marsh & Co."
"I will never reveal it to you," cried Lester. "Never!"
For an instant a black, malignant scowl swept over Kendale's face, but after a moment's deep thought he turned on his heel again, laughing immoderately as he stepped to the door and held a low conversation with the two men who were still in the outer apartment, and in a trice they had joined Kendale, one of them still wearing the black mask which he had used the night before.
"We will proceed to relieve him of his private papers, keys, wallet, and so forth," said Kendale; and, as if in compliance with some previously arranged plan, the three set upon Lester, and in his almost helpless condition it was not difficult to overpower him and take from him his possessions, which Kendale quickly took charge of.
In the encounter, owing to his exhausted condition, Lester lost consciousness; and thus they left him, making him their prisoner by turning the key in the lock again when they reached the outer room.
"And now," said Halloran, removing the square of black linen from his face, "what's next on the programme?"
"Our friend, the cabby, will take me back to town with as much speed as possible. You, my dear fellow, will remain here on guard, making yourself as comfortable as is absolutely possible under the dismal circumstances of keeping guard and circumventing any attempt of our prisoner to escape. You know we have great need of him yet, in forcing him to disclose much that is advantageous to us. We can starve it out of him, if threats fail. As long as you have a good warm fire, plenty of provisions and plenty to read here you ought not to complain. You are having the easiest part of the bargain, Halloran, while I am doing all of the hazardous work."
"What if I should be suspected in therôleI am about to play for the Marsh millions? Why, it would mean State's prison instead of the fortune we have planned for so desperately."
"You will carry it through all right," declared Halloran, confidently.
"My nerve has never failed me so far, and I'm depending on that," said Kendale, mechanically.
Two hours later Kendale was breakfasting in a fashionable downtown restaurant, endeavoring to fortify himself with courage for the trying ordeal which he was about to face.
He had given Halloran his promise to abstain from touching even a drop of liquor, fully realizing it to be his mortal foe; but with Kendale a promise amounted to scarcely a flip of his white fingers when it ran contrary to his own desires.
He told himself that he must have a "bracer" to steady his nerves. It was not until a second and a third had been drunk that the proper amount of courage came to him to undertake the dastardly scheme. Half an hour later he walked boldly into the big dry goods emporium. He had no idea where the private office was, but his quick wits served him in this dilemma. Laying his hands on an errand boy who was just passing out, whose cap bore the name of Marsh & Co., he said, carelessly:
"Here, lad, take my coat up to the private office; I will follow you. Go slowly, though, through the crowd of shoppers."
With a respectful bow the boy took the coat from him.
It so happened that one of the rules of the house was that the employees must not use the elevators, and by the time Kendale had climbed the fourth flight of stairs he was thoroughly exhausted, the perspiration fairly streaming down his face.
"Don't you know enough to go by way of the elevator, you young idiot?" he roared, almost gasping for breath.
"You forget it's against the rules for us to do so, Mr. Armstrong," returned the lad.
"Rules be hanged!" cried his companion. "How many more floors up is it?"
The lad looked up into his face in the greatest amazement. Such a question on the lips of the head of the firm rather astounded him; but then, perhaps it had not occurred to the gentleman just how many flights of steps the boys were obliged to climb.
"We are only on the fourth floor, sir," he responded, "and it's up the other four flights, you know."
"Get into the elevator," commanded Kendale; and the boy turned, and walked over to it, closely followed by his companion, mentally wondering what in the world had come over courteous, kindly Mr. Lester Armstrong.