MIKE CLINCH and his men "drove" Star Peak, and drew a blanket covert.
There was a new shanty atop, camp débris, plenty of signs of recent occupation everywhere,—hot embers in which offal still smouldered, bottles odorous of claret dregs, and an aluminum culinary outfit, unwashed, as though Quintana and his men had departed in haste.
Far in the still valley below, Mike Clinch squatted beside the runway he had chosen, a cocked rifle across his knees.
The glare in his small, pale eyes waned and flared as distant sounds broke the forest silence, grew vague, died out,—the fairy clatter of a falling leaf, the sudden scurry of a squirrel, a feathery rustle of swift wings in play or combat, the soft crash of a rotten bough sagging earthward to enrich the soil that grew it.
And, as Clinch squatted there, murderously intent, ever the fixed obsession burned in his fever brain, stirring his thin lips to incessant muttering,—a sort of soundless invocation, part chronicle, part prayer:
"O God A'mighty, in your big, swell mansion up there, all has went contrary with me sence you let that there damn millionaire, Harrod, come into this here forest.... Hewent and built unto hisself an habitation, and he put up a wall of law all around me where I was earnin' a lawful livin' in Thy nice, clean wilderness.... And now comes this here Quintana and robs my girlie.... I promised her mother I'd make a lady of her little Eve.... I loved my wife, O Lord.... Once she showed me a piece in the Bible,—I ain't never found it sence,—but it said: 'And the woman she fled into the wilderness where there was a place prepared for her of God.' ... That's whatyouwrote into your own Bible, O God! You can't go back on it. I seen it.
"And now I wanta to ask, What place did you prepare for my Eve? What spot have you reference to? You didn't mean my 'Dump,' did you? Why, Lord, that ain't no place for no lady.... And now Quintana has went and robbed me of what I'd saved up for Eve.... Does that go with Thee, O Lord? No, it don't. And it don't go with me, neither. I'm a-goin' to git Quintana. Then I'm a-goin' to git them two minks that robbed my girlie,—I am!... Jake Kloon, he done it in cahoots with Earl Leverett; and Quintana set 'em on. And they gotta die, O Lord of Israel, them there Egyptians is about to hop the twig.... I ain't aimin' to be mean to nobody. I buy hootch of them that runs it. I eat mountain mutton in season and out. I trade with law-breakers, I do. But, Lord, I gotta get my girlie outa here; and Harrod he walled me in with the chariots and spears of Egypt, till I nigh went wild.... And now comes Quintana, and here I be a-lyin' out to get him so's my girlie can become a lady, same's them fine folks with all their butlers and automobiles and what-not——"
A far crash in the forest stilled his twitching lips and stiffened every iron muscle.
As he lifted his rifle, Sid Hone came into the glade.
"Yahoo! Yahoo!" he called. "Where be you, Mike?"
Clinch slowly rose, grasping his rifle, his small, grey eyes ablaze.
"Where's Quintana?" he demanded.
"H'ain't you seen nobody?"
"No."
In the intense silence other sounds broke sharply in the sunset forest; Harvey Chase's halloo rang out from the rocks above; Blommers and the Hastings boys came slouching through the ferns.
Byron Hastings greeted Clinch with upflung gun: "Me and Jim heard a shot away out on Drowned Valley," he announced. "Was you out that way,Mike?"
"No."
One by one the men who had driven Star Peak lounged up in the red sunset light, gathering around Clinch and wiping the sweat from sun-reddened faces.
"Someone's in Drowned Valley," repeated Byron. "Them minks slid off'n Star in a hurry, I reckon, judgin' how they left their shanty. Phew! It stunk! They had French hootch, too."
"Mebby Leverett and Kloon told 'em we was fixin' to visit them," suggested Blommers.
"They didn't know," said Clinch.
"Where's Hal Smith?" inquired Hone.
Clinch made no reply. Blommers silently gnawed a new quid from the remains of a sticky plug.
"Well," inquired Jim Hastings finally, "do we quit, Mike, or do we still-hunt in Drowned Valley?"
"Not me, at night," remarked Blommers drily.
"Not amongst them sink-holes," added Hone.
Suddenly Clinch turned and stared at him. Then the deadly light from his little eyes shone on the others one by one.
"Boys," he said, "I gotta get Quintana. I can't never sleep another wink till I get that man. Come on. Act up like gents all. Let's go."
Nobody stirred.
"Come on," repeated Clinch softly. But his lips shrank back, twitching.
As they looked at him they saw his teeth.
"All right, all right," growled Hone, shouldering his rifle with a jerk.
The Hastings boys, young and rash, shuffled into the trail. Blommers hesitated, glanced askance at Clinch, and instantly made up his mind to take a chance with the sink-holes rather than with Clinch.
"God A'mighty, Mike, what be you aimin' to do?" faltered Harvey.
"I'm aimin' to stop the inlet and outlet to Drowned Valley, Harve," replied Clinch in his pleasant voice. "God is a-goin' to deliver Quintana into my hands."
"All right. What next?"
"Then," continued Clinch, "I cal'late to set down and wait."
"How long?"
"Ask God, boys. I don't know. All I know is that whatever is livin' in Drowned Valley at this hour has gotta live and die there. For it can't never live to come outen that there morass walkin' onto two legs like a real man."
He moved slowly along the file of sullen men, his rifle a-trail in one huge fist.
"Boys," he said, "I got first. There ain't no sink-hole deep enough to drowned me while Eve needs me.... And my little girlie needs me bad.... After she gits what's her'n, then I don't care no more...." He looked up into the sky, where the last ashes of sunset faded from the zenith.... "Then I don't care," he murmured. "Like's not I'll creep away like some shot-up critter, n'kinda find some lone, safe spot, n'kinda fix me f'r a long nap.... I guess that'll be the way ... when Eve's a lady down to Noo York 'r'som'ers——"he added vaguely.
Then, still looking up at the fading heavens, he moved forward, head lifted, silent, unhurried, with the soundless, stealthy, and certain tread of those who walk unseeing and asleep.
Clinch had not taken a dozen strides before Hal Smith loomed up ahead in the rosy dusk, driving in Leverett before him.
An exclamation of fierce exultation burst from Clinch's thin lips as he flung out one arm, indicating Smith and his clinking prisoner:
"Who was that gol-dinged catamount that suspicioned Hal? I wa'nt worried none, neither. Hal's a gent. Mebbe he sticks up folks, too, but he's a gent. And gents is honest or they ain't gents."
Smith came up at his easy, tireless gait, hustling Leverett along with prods from gun-butt or muzzle, as came handiest.
The prisoner turned a ghastly visage on Clinch, who ignored him.
"Got my packet, Hal?" he demanded.
Smith poked Leverett with his rifle: "Tune up," he said; "tell Clinch your story."
As a caged rat looks death in the face, his ratty wits working like lightning and every atom of cunning and ferocity alert for attack or escape, so the little, mean eyes of Earl Leverett became fixed on Clinch like two immobile and glassy beads of jet.
"G'wan," said Clinch softly, "spit it out."
"Jake done it," muttered Leverett, thickly.
"Done what?"
"Stole that there packet o' yourn—whatever there was into it."
"Who put him up to it?"
"A fella called Quintana."
"What was there in it for Jake?" inquired Clinch pleasantly.
"Ten thousand."
"How about you?"
"I told 'em I wouldn't touch it. Then they pulled their guns on me, and I was scared to squeal."
"So that was the way?" asked Clinch in his even, reassuring voice.
Leverett's eyes travelled stealthily around the circle of men, then reverted to Clinch.
"I dassn't touch it," he said, "but I dassn't squeal.... I was huntin' onto Drowned Valley when Jake meets up with me."
"'I got the packet,' he sez, 'and I'm a-going to double criss-cross Quintana, I am, and beat it. Don't you wish you was whacks with me?'
"'No,' sez I, 'honesty is my policy, no matter what they tell about me. S'help me God, I ain't never robbed no trap and I ain't no skin thief, whatever lies folks tell. All I ever done was run a little hootch, same's everybody.'"
He licked his lips furtively, his cold, bright eyes fastened on Clinch.
"G'wan, Earl," nodded the latter, "heave her up."
"That's all. I sez, 'Good-bye, Jake. An' if you heed my warnin', ill-gotten gains ain't a-going to prosper nobody.' That's what I said to Jake Kloon, the last solemn words I spoke to that there man now in his bloody grave——"
"Hey?" demanded Clinch.
"That's where Jake is," repeated Leverett. "Why, so help me, I wa'nt gone ten yards when, bang! goes a gun, and I see this here Quintana come outen the bush, I do, and walk up to Jake and frisk him, and Jake still a-kickin' the moss to slivers. Yessir, that's what I seen."
"G'wan."
"Yessir.... 'N'then Quintana he shoved Jake into a sink-hole. Thaswot I seen with my two eyes. Yessir. 'N'then Quintana he run off, 'n'I jest set down in the trail, I did; 'n'then Hal come up and acted like I had stole your packet, he did; 'n'then I told him what Quintana done. 'N'Hal, he takes after Quintana, but I don't guess he meets up with him, for he come back and ketched holt o' me, 'n'he druv me in like I was a caaf, he did. 'N'here I be."
The dusk in the forest had deepened so that the men's faces had become mere blotches of grey.
Smith said to Clinch: "That's his story, Mike. But I preferred he should tell it to you himself, so I brought him along.... Did you drive Star Peak?"
"There wa'nt nothin' onto it," said Clinch very softly. Then, of a sudden, his shadowy visage became contorted and he jerked up his rifle and threw a cartridge into the magazine.
"You dirty louse!" he roared at Leverett, "you was into this, too, a-robbin' my little Eve——"
"Run!" yelled somebody, giving Leverett a violent shove into the woods.
In the darkness and confusion, Clinch shouldered his way out of the circle and fired at the crackling noise that marked Leverett's course,—fired again, lower, and again as a distant crash revealed the frenzied flight of the trap-robber. After he had fired a fourth shot, somebody struck up his rifle.
"Aw," said Jim Hastings, "that ain't no good. You act up like a kid, Mike. 'Tain't so far to Ghost Lake, n'them Troopers might hear you."
After a silence, Clinch spoke, his voice heavy with reaction:
"Into that there packet is my little girl's dower. It's all I got to give her. It's all she's got to make her a lady. I'll kill any man that robs her or that helps rob her. 'N'that's that."
"Are you going on after Quintana?" asked Smith.
"I am. 'N'these fellas are a-going with me. N' I want you should go back to my Dump and look after my girlie while I'm gone."
"How long are you going to be away?"
"I dunno."
There was a silence. Then,
"All right," said Smith, briefly. He added: "Look out for sink-holes, Mike."
Clinch tossed his heavy rifle to his shoulder: "Let's go," he said in his pleasant, misleading way, "—and I'll shoot the guts outa any fella that don't show up at rollcall."
For its size there is no fiercer animal than a rat.
Rat-like rage possessed Leverett. In his headlong flight through the dusk, fear, instead of quenching, added to his rage; and he ran on and on, crashing through the undergrowth, made wilder by the pain of vicious blows from branches which flew back and struck him in the dark.
Thorns bled him; unseen logs tripped him; he heard Clinch's bullets whining around him; and he ran on, beginning to sob and curse in a frenzy of fury, fear, and shame.
Shots from Clinch's rifle ceased; the fugitive dropped into a heavy, shuffling walk, slavering, gasping, gesticulating with his weaponless fists in the darkness.
"Gol ram ye, I'll fix ye!" he kept stammering in his snarling, jangling voice, broken by sobs. "I'll learn ye, yeh poor danged thing, gol ram ye——"
An unseen limb struck him cruelly across the face, and a moose-bush tripped him flat. Almost crazed, he got up, yelling in his pain, one hand wet and sticky from blood welling up from his cheek-bone.
He stood listening, infuriated, vindictive, but heard nothing save the panting, animal sounds in his own throat.
He strove to see in the ghostly obscurity around him, but could make out little except the trees close by.
But wood-rats are never completely lost in their nativedarkness; and Leverett presently discovered the far stars shining faintly through rifts in the phantom foliage above.
These heavenly signals were sufficient to give him his directions. Then the question suddenly came,whichdirection?
To his own shack on Stinking Lake he dared not go. He tried to believe that it was fear of Clinch that made him shy of the home shanty; but, in his cowering soul, he knew it was fear of another kind—the deep, superstitious horror of Jake Kloon's empty bunk—the repugnant sight of Kloon's spare clothing hanging from its peg—the dead man's shoes——
No, he could not go to Stinking Lake and sleep.... And wake with the faint stench of sulphur in his throat.... And see the worm-like leeches unfolding in the shallows, and the big, reddish water-lizards, livid as skinned eels, wriggling convulsively toward their sunless lairs....
At the mere thought of his dead bunk-mate he sought relief in vindictive rage—stirred up the smouldering embers again, cursed Clinch and Hal Smith, violently searching in his inflamed brain some instant vengeance upon these men who had driven him out from the only place on earth where he knew how to exist—the wilderness.
All at once he thought of Clinch's step-daughter. The thought instantly scared him. Yet—what a revenge!—to strike Clinch through the only creature he cared for in all the world!... What a revenge!... Clinch was headed for Drowned Valley. Eve Strayer was alone at the Dump.... Another thought flashed like lightning across his turbid mind;—the packet!
Bribed by Quintana, Jake Kloon, lurking at Clinch's door, had heard him direct Eve to take a packet to Owl Marsh, and had notified Quintana.
Wittingly or unwittingly, the girl had taken a packet of sugar-milk chocolate instead of the priceless parcel expected.
Again, carried in, exhausted, by a State Trooper, Jake Kloon had been fooled; and it was the packet of sugar-milk chocolate that Jake had purloined from the veranda where Clinch kicked it. For two cakes of chocolate Kloon had died. For two cakes of chocolate he, Earl Leverett, had become a man-slayer, a homeless fugitive in peril of his life.
He stood licking his blood-dried lips there in the darkness, striving to hatch courage out of the dull fury eating at a coward's heart.
Somewhere in Clinch's Dump was the packet that would make him rich.... Here was his opportunity. He had only to dare; and pain and poverty and fear—above all elsefear—would end forever!...
When, at last, he came out to the edge of Clinch's clearing, the dark October heavens were but a vast wilderness of stars.
Star Pond, set to its limpid depths with the heavenly gems, glittered and darkled with its million diamond incrustations. The humped-up lump of Clinch's Dump crouched like some huge and feeding night-beast on the bank, ringed by the solemn forest.
There was a kerosene lamp burning in Eve Strayer's rooms. Another light—a candle—flickered in the kitchen.
Leverett, crouching, ran rat-like down to the barn, slid inbetween the ice house and corn-crib, crawled out among the wilderness of weeds and lay flat.
The light burned steadily from Eve's window.
From his form among frost-blackened rag-weeds, the trap-robber could see only the plastered ceiling of the bed chamber.
But the kerosene lamp cast two shadows on that—tall shadows of human shapes that stirred at times.
The trap-robber, scared, stiffened to immobility, but his little eyes remained fastened on the camera obscura above. All the cunning, patience, and murderous immobility of the rat were his.
Not a weed stirred under the stars where he lay with tiny, unwinking eyes intent upon the shadows on the ceiling.
The shadows on the ceiling were cast by Eve Strayer and her State Trooper.
Eve sat on her bed's edge, swathed in a lilac silk kimona—delicate relic of school days. Her bandaged feet, crossed, dangled above the rag-rug on the floor; her slim, tanned fingers were interlaced over the book on her lap.
Near the door stood State Trooper Stormont, spurred, booted, trig and trim, an undecided and flushed young man, fumbling irresolutely with the purple cord on his campaign-hat.
The book on Eve's knees—another relic of the past—wasSigurd the Volsung. Stormont had been reading to her—they having found, after the half shy tentatives of new friends, a point d'appui in literature. And the girl, admittinga passion for the poets, invited him to inspect the bookcase of unpainted pine which Clinch had built into her bedroom wall.
Here it was he discovered mutual friends among the nobler Victorians—surprised to discoverSigurdthere—and, carrying it to her bedside, looked leisurely through the half forgotten pages.
"Would you read a little?" she ventured.
He blushed but did his best. His was an agreeable, boyish voice, betraying taste and understanding. Time passed quickly—not so much in the reading but in the conversations intervening.
And now, made uneasy by chance consultation with his wrist-watch, and being rather a conscientious young man, he had risen and had informed Eve that she ought to go to sleep.
And she had denounced the idea, almost fretfully.
"Even if you go I shan't sleep till daddy comes," she said. "Of course," she added, smiling at him out of gentian-blue eyes, "ifyouare sleepy I shouldn't dream of asking you to stay."
"I'm not intending to sleep."
"What are you going to do?"
"Take a chair on the landing outside your door."
"What!"
"Certainly. What did you expect me to do, Eve?"
"Go to bed, of course. The beds in the guest rooms are all made up."
"Your father didn't expect me to do that," he said, smiling.
"I'm not afraid, as long as you're in the house," she said.
She looked up at him again, wistfully. Perhaps he was restless, bored, sitting there beside her half the day, and, already, half the night. Men of that kind—active, nervous young men accustomed to the open, can't stand caging.
"I want you to go out and get some fresh air," she said. "It's a wonderful night. Go and walk a while. And—if you feel like—coming back to me——"
"Will you sleep?"
"No, I'll wait for you."
Her words were natural and direct, but in their simplicity there seemed a delicate sweetness that stirred him.
"I'll come back to you," he said.
Then, in his response, the girl in her turn became aware of something beside the simple words—a vague charm about them that faintly haunted her after he had gone away down the stairs.
Thatwas the man she had once tried to kill! At the sudden and terrible recollection she shivered from curly head to bandaged feet. Then she trembled a little with the memory of his lips against her bruised hands—bruised by handcuffs which he had fastened upon her.
She sat very, very still now, huddled on the bed's edge, scarcely breathing.
For the girl was beginning to dare formulate the deepest of any thoughts that ever had stirred her virgin mind and body.
If it was love, then it had come suddenly, and strangely. It had come on that day—at the very moment when he flung her against the tree and handcuffed her—that terrible instant—if it were love.
Or—what was it that so delicately overwhelmed her withpleasure in his presence, in his voice, in the light, firm sound of his spurred tread on the veranda below?
Friendship? A lonely passion for young and decent companionship? The clean youth of him in contrast to the mangy, surly louts who haunted Clinch's Dump,—was that the appeal?
Listening there where she sat clasping the book, she heard his steady tread patrolling the veranda; caught the faint fragrance of his brier pipe in the still night air.
"I think—I think it's—love," she said under her breath.... "But he couldn't ever think of me——"always listening to his spurred tread below.
After a while she placed both bandaged feet on the rug. It hurt her, but she stood up, walked to the open window. She wanted to look at him—just a moment——
By chance he looked up at that instant, and saw her pale face, like a flower in the starlight.
"Why, Eve," he said, "you ought not to be on your feet."
"Once," she said, "you weren't so particular about my bruises."
Her breathless little voice coming down through the starlight thrilled him.
"Do you remember what I did?" he asked.
"Yes. You bruised my hands and made my mouth bleed."
"I did penance—for your hands."
"Yes, you kissedthem!"
What possessed her—what irresponsible exhilaration was inciting her to a daring utterly foreign to her nature? She heard herself laugh, knew that she was young, pretty, capable of provocation. And in a sudden, breathless sortof way an overwhelming desire seized her to please, to charm, to be noticed by such a man—whatever, on afterthought, he might think of the step-child of Mike Clinch.
Stormont had come directly under her window and stood looking up.
"I dared not offer further penance," he said.
The emotion in his voice stirred her—but she was still laughing down at him.
She said: "Youdidoffer further penance—you offered your handkerchief. So—as that wasallyou offered as reparation for—my lips——"
"Eve! I could have taken you into my arms——"
"Youdid! And threw me down among the spruces. You really did everything that a contrite heart could suggest——"
"Good heavens!" said that rather matter-of-fact young man, "I don't believe you have forgiven me after all."
"I have—everything except the handkerchief——"
"Then I'm coming up to complete my penance——"
"I'll lock my door!"
"Would you?"
"I ought to.... But if you are in great spiritual distress, and if you really and truly repent, and if you humbly desire to expiate your sin by doing—penance——"And hesitated: "Do you so desire?"
"Yes, I do."
"Humbly? Contritely?"
"Yes."
"Very well. Say 'Mea culpa, mea maxima culpa.'"
"Mea maxima culpa," he said so earnestly, looking up into her face that she bent lower over the sill to see him.
"Let me come up, Eve," he said.
She strove to laugh, gazing down into his shadowy face—but suddenly the desire had left her,—and all her gaiety left her, too, suddenly, leaving only a still excitement in her breast.
"You—you knew I was just laughing," she said unsteadily. "You understood, didn't you?"
"I don't know."
After a silence: "I didn't mean you to take me seriously," she said. She tried to laugh. It was no use. And, as she leaned there on the sill, her heart frightened her with its loud beating.
"Will you let me come up, Eve?"
No answer.
"Would you lock your door?"
"What do you think I'd do?" she asked tremulously.
"You know; I don't."
"Are you so sure I know what I'd do? I don't think either of us know our own minds.... I seem to have lost some of my wits.... Somehow...."
"If you are not going to sleep, let me come up."
"I want you to take a walk down by the pond. And while you're walking there all by yourself, I want you to think very clearly, very calmly, and make up your mind whether I should remain awake to-night, or whether, when you return, I ought to be asleep and—and my door bolted."
After a long pause: "All right," he said in a low voice.
She saw him walk away—saw his shadowy, well-built form fade into the starlit mist.
An almost uncontrollable impulse set her throat and lipsquivering with desire to call to him through the night, "I do love you! I do love you! Come back quickly, quickly!——"
Fog hung over Star Pond, edging the veranda, rising in frail shreds to her window. The lapping of the water sounded very near. An owl was very mournful in the hemlocks.
The girl turned from the window, looked at the door for a moment, then her face flushed and she walked toward a chair and seated herself, leaving the door unbolted.
For a little while she sat upright, alert, as though a little frightened. After a few moments she folded her hands and sat unstirring, with lowered head, awaiting Destiny.
It came, noiselessly. And so swiftly that the rush of air from her violently opened door was what first startled her.
For in the same second Earl Leverett was upon her in his stockinged feet, one bony hand gripping her mouth, the other flung around her, pinning both arms to her sides.
"The packet!" he panted, "—quick, yeh dirty little cat, 'r'I'll break yeh head off'n yeh damn neck!"
She bit at the hand that he held crushed against her mouth. He lifted her bodily, flung her onto the bed, and, twisting sheet and quilt around her, swathed her to the throat.
Still controlling her violently distorted lips with his left hand and holding her so, one knee upon her, he reached back, unsheathed his hunting knife, and pricked her throat till the blood spurted.
"Now, gol ram yeh!" he whispered fiercely, "where'sMike's packet? Yell, and I'll hog-stick yeh fur fair! Where is it, you dum thing!"
He took his left hand from her mouth. The distorted, scarlet lips writhed back, displaying her white teeth clenched.
"Where's Mike's bundle!" he repeated, hoarse with rage and fear.
"You rat!" she gasped.
At that he closed her mouth again, and again he pricked her with his knife, cruelly. The blood welled up onto the sheets.
"Now, by God!" he said in a ghastly voice, "answer or I'll hog-stick yeh next time! Where is it? Where! where!"
She only showed her teeth in answer. Her eyes flamed.
"Where! Quick! Gol ding yeh, I'll shove this knife in behind your ear if you don't tell! Go on. Where is it? It's in this Dump som'ers. I know it is—don't lie! You want that I should stick you good? That what you want—you dirty little dump-slut? Well, then, gol ram yeh—I'll fix yeh like Quintana was aimin' at——"
He slit the sheet downward from her imprisoned knees, seized one wounded foot and tried to slash the bandages.
"I'll cut a coupla toes off'n yeh," he snarled, "—I'll hamstring yeh fur keeps!"—struggling to mutilate her while she flung her helpless and entangled body from side to side and bit at the hand that was almost suffocating her.
Unable to hold her any longer, he seized a pillow, to bury the venomous little head that writhed, biting, under his clutch.
As he lifted it he saw a packet lying under it.
"By God!" he panted.
As he seized it she screamed for the first time: "Jack! Jack Stormont!"—and fairly hurled her helpless little body at Leverett, striking him full in the face with her head.
Half stunned, still clutching the packet, he tried to stab her in the stomach; but the armour of bed-clothes turned the knife, although his violence dashed all breath out of her.
Sick with the agony of it, speechless, she still made the effort; and, as he stumbled to his feet and turned to escape, she struggled upright, choking, blood running from the knife pricks in her neck.
With the remnant of her strength, and still writhing and gasping for breath, she tore herself from the sheets and blankets, reeled across the room to where Stormont's rifle stood, threw in a cartridge, dragged herself to the window.
Dimly she saw a running figure in the night mist, flung the rifle across the window sill and fired. Then she fired again—or thought she did. There were two shots.
"Eve!" came Stormont's sharp cry, "what the devil are you trying to do to me?"
His cry terrified her; the rifle clattered to the floor.
The next instant he came running up the stairs, bare headed, heavy pistol swinging, and halted, horrified at sight of her.
"Eve! My God!" he whispered, taking her blood-wet body into his arms.
"Go after Leverett," she gasped. "He's robbed daddy. He's running away—out there—somewhere——"
"Where did he hurt you, Eve—my little Eve——"
"Oh, go! go!" she wailed,—"I'm not hurt. He only pricked me with his knife. I'm not hurt, I tell you. Goafter him! Take your pistol and follow him and kill him!"
"Oh," she cried hysterically, twisting and sobbing in his arms, "don't lose time here with me! Don't stand here while he's running away with dad's money!" And, "Oh—oh—oh!!" she sobbed, collapsing in his arms and clinging to him convulsively as he carried her to her tumbled bed and laid her there.
He said: "I couldn't risk following anybody now, after what has happened to you. I can't leave you alone here! Don't cry, Eve. I'll get your man for you, I promise! Don't cry, dear. It was all my fault for leaving this room even for a minute——"
"No, no, no! It's my fault. I sent you away. Oh, I wish I hadn't. I wish I had let you come back when you wanted to.... I was waiting for you.... I left the door unbolted for you. When it opened I thought it was you. And it was Leverett!—it was Leverett!——"
Stormont's face grew very white: "What did he do to you, Eve? Tell me, darling. What did he do to you?"
"Dad's money was under my pillow," she wailed. "Leverett tried to make me tell where it was. I wouldn't, and he hurt me——"
"How?"
"He pricked me with his knife. When I screamed for you he tried to choke me with the pillow. Didn't you hear me scream?"
"Yes. I came on the jump."
"It was too late," she sobbed; "—too late! He saw the money packet under my pillow and he snatched it and ran. Somehow I found your rifle and fired. I fired twice."
Her only bullet had torn his campaign hat from his head. But he did not tell her.
"Let me see your neck," he said, bending closer.
She bared her throat, making a soft, vague complaint like a hurt bird,—lay there whimpering under her breath while he bathed the blood away with lint, sterilised the two cuts from his emergency packet, and bound them.
He was still bending low over her when her blue eyes unclosed on his.
"That is the second time I've tried to kill you," she whispered. "I thought it was Leverett.... I'd have died if I had killed you."
There was a silence.
"Lie very still," he said huskily. "I'll be back in a moment to rebandage your feet and make you comfortable for the night."
"I can't sleep," she repeated desolately. "Dad trusted his money to me and I've let Leverett rob me. How can I sleep?"
"I'll bring you something to make you sleep."
"I can't!"
"I promise you you will sleep. Lie still."
He rose, went away downstairs and out to the barn, where his campaign hat lay in the weed, drilled through by a bullet.
There was something else lying there in the weeds,—a flat, muddy, shoeless shape sprawling grotesquely in the foggy starlight.
One hand clutched a hunting knife; the other a packet.
Stormont drew the packet from the stiff fingers, then turned the body over, and, flashing his electric torch, examined the ratty visage—what remained of it—for his pistolbullet had crashed through from ear to cheek-bone, almost obliterating the trap-robber's features.
Stormont came slowly into Eve's room and laid the packet on the sheet beside her.
"Now," he said, "there is no reason for you to lie awake any longer. I'll fix you up for the night."
Deftly he unbandaged, bathed, dressed, and rebandaged her slim white feet—little wounded feet so lovely, so exquisite that his hand trembled as he touched them.
"They're doing fine," he said cheerily. "You've half a degree of fever and I'm going to give you something to drink before you go to sleep——"
He poured out a glass of water, dissolved two tablets, supported her shoulders while she drank in a dazed way, looking always at him over the glass.
"Now," he said, "go to sleep. I'll be on the job outside your door until your daddy arrives."
"How did you get back dad's money?" she asked in an odd, emotionless way as though too weary for further surprises.
"I'll tell you in the morning."
"Did you kill him? I didn't hear your pistol."
"I'll tell you all about it in the morning. Good night, Eve."
As he bent over her, she looked up into his eyes and put both arms around his neck.
It was her first kiss given to any man, except Mike Clinch.
After Stormont had gone out and closed the door, she lay very still for a long while.
Then, instinctively, she touched her lips with her fingers;and, at the contact, a blush clothed her from brow to ankle.
The Flaming Jewel in its morocco casket under her pillow burned with no purer fire than the enchanted flame glowing in the virgin heart of Eve Strayer of Clinch's Dump.
Thus they lay together, two lovely flaming jewels burning softly, steadily through the misty splendour of the night.
Under a million stars, Death sprawled in squalor among the trampled weeds. Under the same high stars dark mountains waited; and there was a silvery sound of waters stirring somewhere in the mist.
WHEN Mike Clinch bade Hal Smith return to the Dump and take care of Eve, Smith already had decided to go there.
Somewhere in Clinch's Dump was hidden the Flaming Jewel. Now was his time to search for it.
There were two other reasons why he should go back. One of them was that Leverett was loose. If anything had called Trooper Stormont away, Eve would be alone in the house. And nobody on earth could forecast what a coward like Leverett might attempt.
But there was another and more serious reason for returning to Clinch's. Clinch, blood-mad, was headed for Drowned Valley with his men, to stop both ends of that vast morass before Quintana and his gang could get out.
It was evident that neither Clinch nor any of his men—although their very lives depended upon familiarity with the wilderness—knew that a third exit from Drowned Valley existed.
But the nephew of the late Henry Harrod knew.
When Jake Kloon was a young man and Darragh was a boy, Kloon had shown him the rocky, submerged game trail into Drowned Valley. Doubtless Kloon had used it inhootch running since. If ever he had told anybody else about it, probably he had revealed the trail to Quintana.
And that was why Darragh, or Hal Smith, finally decided to return to Star Pond;—because if Quintana had been told or had discovered that circuitous way out of Drowned Valley, he might go straight to Clinch's Dump.... And, supposing Stormont was still there, how long could one State Trooper stand off Quintana's gang?
No sooner had Clinch and his motley followers disappeared in the dusk than Smith unslung his basket-pack, fished out a big electric torch, flashed it tentatively, and then, reslinging the pack and taking his rifle in his left hand, he set off at an easy swinging stride.
His course was not toward Star Pond; it was at right angles with that trail. For he was taking no chances. Quintana might already have left Drowned Valley by that third exit unknown to Clinch.
Smith's course would now cut this unmarked trail, trodden only by game that left no sign in the shallow mountain rivulet which was the path.
The trail lay a long way off through the night. But if Quintana had discovered and taken that trail, it would be longer still for him—twice as long as the regular trail out.
For a mile or two the forest was first growth pine, and sufficiently open so that Smith might economise on his torch.
He knew every foot of it. As a boy he had carried a jacob-staff in the Geological Survey. Who better than the forest-roaming nephew of Henry Harrod should know this blind wilderness?
The great pines towered on every side, lofty and smoothto the feathery canopy that crowned them under the high stars.
There was no game here, no water, nothing to attract anybody except the devastating lumberman. But this was a five thousand acre patch of State land. The ugly whine of the steam-saw would never be heard here.
On he walked at an easy, swinging stride, flashing his torch rarely, feeling no concern about discovery by Quintana's people.
It was only when he came into the hardwoods that the combined necessity for caution and torch perplexed and worried him.
Somewhere in here began an outcrop of rock running east for miles. Only stunted cedar and berry bushes found shallow nourishment on this ridge.
When at last he found it he travelled upon it, more slowly, constantly obliged to employ the torch.
After an hour, perhaps, his feet splashed in shallow water.Thatwas what he was expecting. The water was only an inch or two deep; it was ice cold and running north.
Now, he must advance with every caution. For here trickled the thin flow of that rocky rivulet which was the other entrance and exit penetrating that immense horror of marsh and bog and depthless sink-hole known as Drowned Valley.
For a long while he did not dare to use his torch; but now he was obliged to.
He shined the ground at his feet, elevated the torch with infinite precaution, throwing a fan-shaped light over the stretch of sink he had suspected and feared. It flanked theflat, wet path of rock on either side. Here Death spread its slimy trap at his very feet.
Then, as he stood taking his bearings with burning torch, far ahead in the darkness a light flashed, went out, flashed twice more, and was extinguished.
Quintana!
Smith's wits were working like lightning, but instinct guided him before his brain took command. He levelled his torch and repeated the three signal flashes. Then, in darkness, he came to swift conclusion.
There were no other signals from the unknown. The stony bottom of the rivulet was his only aid.
In his right hand the torch hung almost touching the water. At times he ventured sufficient pressure for a feeble glimmer, then again trusted to his sense of contact.
For three hundred yards, counting his strides, he continued on. Then, in total darkness, he pocketed the torch, slid a cartridge into the breech of his rifle, slung the weapon, pulled out a handkerchief, and tied it across his face under the eyes.
Now, he drew the torch from his pocket, levelled it, sent three quick flashes out into darkness.
Instantly, close ahead, three blinding flashes broke out.
For Hal Smith it all had become a question of seconds.
Death lay depthless on either hand; ahead Death blocked the trail in silence.
Out of the dark some unseen rifle might vomit death in his very face at any moment.
He continued to move forward. After a little while his ear caught a slight splash ahead. Suddenly a glare of light enveloped him.
"Is it you, Harry Beck?"
Instinct led again while wits worked madly: "Harry Beck is two miles back on guard. Where is Sard?"
The silence became terrible. Once the glaring light in front moved, then become fixed. There was a light splashing. Instantly Smith realised that the man in front had set his torch in a tree-crotch and was now cowering somewhere behind a levelled weapon. His voice came presently:
"Hé! Drap-a that-a gun damn quick!"
Smith bent, leisurely, and laid his rifle on a mossy rock.
"Now! You there! Why you want Sard! Eh?"
"I'll tell Sard, not you," retorted Smith coolly. "You listen to me, whoever you are. I'm from Sard's office in New York. I'm Abrams. The police are on their way here to find Quintana."
"How I know? Eh? Why shall I believe that? You tell-a me queeck or I blow-a your damn head off!"
"Quintana will blow-ayourhead off unless you take me to Sard," drawled Smith.
A movement might have meant death, but he calmly rummaged for a cigarette, lighted it, blew a cloud insolently toward the white glare ahead. Then he took another chance:
"I guess you're Nick Salzar, aren't you?"
"Si! I am Salzar. Who the dev' are you?"
"I'm Eddie Abrams, Sard's lawyer. My business is to find my client. If you stop me you'll go to prison—the whole gang of you—Sard, Quintana, Picquet, Sanchez, Georgiades and Harry Beck,—andyou!"
After a dead silence: "Maybeyou'llgo to the chair, too!"
It was the third chance he took.
There was a dreadful stillness in the woods. Finally came a slight series of splashes; the crunch of heavy boots on rock.
"For why you com-a here, eh?" demanded Salzar, in a less aggressive manner. "What-a da matt', eh?"
"Well," said Smith, "if you've got to know, there are people from Esthonia in New York.... If you understand that."
"Christi! When do they arrive?"
"A week ago. Sard's place is in the hands of the police. I couldn't stop them. They've got his safe and all his papers. City, State, and Federal officers are looking for him. The Constabulary rode into Ghost Lake yesterday. Now, don't you think you'd better lead me to Sard?"
"Cristi!" exclaimed Salzar. "Sard he is a mile ahead with the others. Damn! Damn! Me, how should I know what is to be done? Me, I have my orders from Quintana. What I do, eh? Cristi! What to do? What you say I should do, eh, Abrams?"
A new fear had succeeded the old one—that was evident—and Salzar came forward into the light of his own fixed torch—a well-knit figure in slouch hat, grey shirt, and grey breeches, and wearing a red bandanna over the lower part of his face. He carried a heavy rifle.
He came on, sturdily, splashing through the water, and walked up to Smith, his rifle resting on his right shoulder.
"For me," he said excitedly, "long time I have worry in this-a damn wood! Si! Where you say those carbinieri? Eh?"
"At Ghost Lake.Yoursignature is in the hotel ledger."
"Cristi! You know where Clinch is?"
"You know, too. He is on the way to Drowned Valley."
"Damn! I knew it. Quintana also. You know where is Quintana? And Sard? I tell-a you. They march ver' fast to the Dump of Clinch. Si! And there they would discover these-a beeg-a dimon'—these-a Flame-Jewel. Si!Now, you tell-a me what I do?"
Smith said slowly: "If Quintana is marching on Clinch's he's marching into a trap!"
Salzar blanched above his bandanna.
"The State Troopers are there," said Smith. "They'll get him sure."
"Cristi," faltered Salzar, "—then they are gobble—Quintana, Sard, everybody! Si?"
Smith considered the man: "You can saveyourskin anyway. You can go back and tell Harry Beck. Then both of you can beat it for Drowned Valley."
He picked up his rifle, stood a moment in troubled reflection:
"If I could overtake Quintana I'd do it," he said. "I think I'll try. If I can't, he's done for. You tell Harry Beck that Eddie Abrams advises him to beat it for Drowned Valley."
Suddenly Salzar tore the bandanna from his face, flung it down and stamped on it.
"What I tell Quintana!" he yelled, his features distorted with rage. "I don't-a like!—no, not me!—no, I tell-a heem, stay at those Ghost-a Lake and watch thees-a fellow Clinch. Si! Not for me thees-a wood. No! I spit upon it! I curse like hell! I tell Quintana I don't-a like. Now, eet is trouble that comes and we lose-a out! Damn!Damn!Me, I find me Beck. You shall say to José Quintana how he is adamfool. Me, I am finish—me, Nick Salzar! You hear me, Abrams! I am through! I go!"
He glared at Smith, started to move, came back and took his torch, made a violent gesture with it which drenched the woods with goblin light.
"You stop-a Quintana, maybe. You tell-a heem he is the bigg-a fool! You tell-a heem Nick Salzar is no damn fool. No! Adios, my frien' Abrams. I beat it. I save my skin!"
Once more Salzar turned and headed for Drowned Valley.... Where Clinch would not fail to kill him.... The man was going to his death.... And it was Smith who sent him.
Suddenly it came to Smith that he could not do this thing; that this man had no chance; that he was slaying a human being with perfect safety to himself and without giving him a chance.
"Salzar!" he called sharply.
The man halted and looked around.
"Come back!"
Salzar hesitated, turned finally, slouched toward him.
Smith laid aside his pack and rifle, and, as Salzar came up, he quietly took his weapon from him and laid it beside his own.
"What-a da matt'?" demanded Salzar, astonished. "Why you taka my gun?"
Smith measured him. They were well matched.
"Set your torch in that crotch," he said.
Salzar, puzzled and impatient, demanded to know why. Smith took both torches, set them opposite each other and drew Salzar into the white glare.
"Now," he said, "you dirty desperado, I am going to try to kill you clean. Look out for yourself!"
For a second Salzar stood rooted in blank astonishment.
"I'm one of Clinch's men," said Smith, "but I can't stick a knife in your back, at that! Now, take care of yourself if you can——"
His voice died in his throat; Salzar was on him, clawing, biting, kicking, striving to strangle him, to wrestle him off his feet. Smith reeled, staggering under the sheer rush of the man, almost blinded by blows, clutched, bewildered in Salzar's panther grip.
For a moment he writhed there, searching blindly for his enemy's wrist, striving to avoid the teeth that snapped at his throat, stifled by the hot stench of the man's breath in his face.
"I keel you! I keel you! Damn! Damn!" panted Salzar, in convulsive fury as Smith freed his left arm and struck him in the face.
Now, on the narrow, wet and slippery strip of rock they swayed to and fro, murderously interlocked, their heavy boots splashing, battling with limb and body.
Twice Salzar forced Smith outward over the sink, trying to end it, but could not free himself.
Once, too, he managed to get at a hidden knife, drag it out and stab at head and throat; but Smith caught the fist that wielded it, forced back the arm, held it while Salzar screamed at him, lunging at his face with bared teeth.
Suddenly the end came: Salzar's body heaved upward, sprawled for an instant in the dazzling glare, hurtled over Smith's head and fell into the sink with a crashing splash.
Frantically he thrashed there, spattering and flounderingin darkness. He made no outcry. Probably he had landed head first.
In a moment only a vague heaving came from the unseen ooze.
Smith, exhausted, drenched with sweat, leaned against a tamarack, sickened.
After all sound had ceased he straightened up with an effort. Presently he bent and recovered Salzar's red bandanna and his hat, lifted his own rifle and pack and struggled into the harness. Then, kicking Salzar's rifle overboard, he unfastened both torches, pocketed one, and started on in a flood of ghostly light.
He was shaking all over and the torch quivered in his hand. He had seen men die in the Great War. He had been near death himself. But never before had he been near death in so horrible a form. The sodden noises in the mud, the deadened flopping of the sinking body—mud-plastered hands beating frantically on mud, spattering, agonising in darkness—"My God," he breathed, "anything but that—anything but that!——"
Before midnight he struck the hard forest. Here there was no trail at all, only spreading outcrop of rock under dying leaves.
He could see a few stars. Cautiously he ventured to shine his compass close to the ground. He was still headed right. The ghastly sink country lay behind him.
Ahead of him, somewhere in darkness—but how far he did not know—Quintana and his people were moving swiftly on Clinch's Dump.
It may have been an hour later—two hours, perhaps—when from far ahead in the forest came a sound—the faint clink of a shod heel on rock.
Now, Smith unslung his pack, placed it between two rocks where laurel grew.
Salzar's red bandanna was still wet, but he tied it across his face, leaving his eyes exposed. The dead man's hat fitted him. His own hat and the extra torch he dropped into his basket-pack.
Ready, now, he moved swiftly forward, trailing his rifle. And very soon it became plain to him that the people ahead were moving without much caution, evidently fearing no unfriendly ear or eye in that section of the wilderness.
Smith could hear their tread on rock and root and rotten branch, or swishing through frosted fern and brake, or louder on newly fallen leaves.
At times he could even see the round white glare of a torch on the ground—see it shift ahead, lighting up tree trunks, spread out, fanlike, into a wide, misty glory, then vanish as darkness rushed in from the vast ocean of the night.
Once they halted at a brook. Their torches flashed it; he heard them sounding its depths with their gun-butts.
Smith knew that brook. It was the east branch of Star Brook, the inlet to Star Pond.
Far ahead above the trees the sky seemed luminous. It was star lustre over the pond, turning the mist to a silvery splendour.
Now the people ahead of him moved with more caution, crossing the brook without splashing, and their boots made less noise in the woods.
To keep in touch with them Smith hastened his pace until he drew near enough to hear the low murmur of their voices.
They were travelling in single file; he had a glimpse of them against the ghostly radiance ahead. Indeed, so near had he approached that he could hear the heavy, laboured breathing of the last man in the file—some laggard who dragged his feet, plodding on doggedly, panting, muttering. Probably the man was Sard.
Already the forest in front was invaded by the misty radiance from the clearing. Through the trees starlight glimmered on water. The perfume of the open land grew in the night air,—the scent of dew-wet grass, the smell of still water and of sedgy shores.
Lying flat behind a rotting log, Smith could see them all now,—spectral shapes against the light. There were five of them at the forest's edge.
They seemed to know what was to be done and how to do it. Two went down among the ferns and stunted willows toward the west shore of the pond; two sheered off to the southwest, shoulder deep in blackberry and sumac. The fifth man waited for a while, then ran down across the open pasture.
Scarcely had he started when Smith glided to the wood's edge, crouched, and looked down.
Below stood Clinch's Dump, plain in the starlight, every window dark. To the west the barn loomed, huge with its ramshackle outbuildings straggling toward the lake.
Straight down the slope toward the barn ran the fifth man of Quintana's gang, and disappeared among the out-buildings.
Smith crept after him through the sumacs; and, at the foot of the slope, squatted low in a clump of rag-weed.
So close to the house was he now that he could hear the dew rattling on the veranda roof. He saw shadowy figures appear, one after another, and take stations at the four corners of the house. The fifth man was somewhere near the out-buildings, very silent about whatever he had on hand.
The stillness was absolute save for the drumming dew and a faint ripple from the water's edge.
Smith crouched, listened, searched the starlight with intent eyes, and waited.
Until something happened he could not solve the problem before him. He could be of no use to Eve Strayer and to Stormont until he found out what Quintana was going to do.
He could be of little use anyway unless he got into the house, where two rifles might hold out against five.
There was no use in trying to get to Ghost Lake for assistance. He felt that whatever was about to happen would come with a rush. It would be all over before he had gone five minutes. No; the only thing to do was to stay where he was.
As for his pledge to the little Grand Duchess, that was always in his mind. Sooner or later, somehow, he was going to make good his pledge.
He knew that Quintana and his gang were here to find the Flaming Jewel.
Had he not encountered Quintana, his own errand had been the same. For Smith had started for Clinch's prepared to reveal himself to Stormont, and then, masked to the eyes—and to save Eve from a broken heart, and Clinch fromStates Prison—he had meant to rob the girl at pistol-point.
It was the only way to save Clinch; the only way to save the pride of this blindly loyal girl. For the arrest of Clinch meant ruin to both, and Smith realised it thoroughly.
A slight sound from one of the out-houses—a sort of wagon-shed—attracted his attention. Through the frost-blighted rag-weeds he peered intently, listening.
After a few moments a faint glow appeared in the shed. There was a crackling noise. The glow grew pinker.
Inside Clinch's house Eve awoke with a start. Her ears were filled with a strange, rushing, crackling noise. A rosy glare danced and shook outside her windows.
As she sprang to the floor on bandaged feet, a shrill scream burst out in the ruddy darkness—unearthly, horrible; and there came a thunderous battering from the barn.
The girl tore open her bedroom door. "Jack!" she cried in a terrified voice. "The barn's on fire!"
"Good God!" he said, "—my horse!"
He had already sprung from his chair outside her door. Now he ran downstairs, and she heard bolt and chain clash at the kitchen door and his spurred boots land on the porch.
"Oh," she whimpered, snatching a blanket wrapper from a peg and struggling into it. "Oh, the poor horse! Jack! Jack! I'm coming to help! Don't risk your life! I'm coming—I'm coming——"
Terror clutched her as she stumbled downstairs on bandaged feet.
As she reached the door a great flare of light almost blinded her.
"Jack!"
And at the same instant she saw him struggling with three masked men in the glare of the wagon-shed afire.
His rifle stood in the corridor outside her door. With one bound she was on the stairs again. There came the crash and splinter of wood and glass from the kitchen, and a man with a handkerchief over his face caught her on the landing.
Twice she wrenched herself loose and her fingers almost touched Stormont's rifle; she fought like a cornered lynx, tore the handkerchief from her assailant's face, recognised Quintana, hurled her very body at him, eyes flaming, small teeth bared.
Two other men laid hold. In another moment she had tripped Quintana, and all four fell, rolling over and over down the short flight of stairs, landing in the kitchen, still fighting.
Here, in darkness, she wriggled out, somehow, leaving her blanket wrapped in their clutches. In another instant she was up the stairs again, only to discover that the rifle was gone.
The red glare from the wagon-house lighted her bedroom; she sprang inside and bolted the door.
Her chamois jacket with its loops full of cartridges hung on a peg. She got into it, seized her rifle and ran to the window just as two masked men, pushing Stormont before them, entered the house by the kitchen way.
Her own door was resounding with kicks and blows, shaking, shivering under the furious impact of boot and rifle-butt.
She ran to the bed, thrust her hand under the pillow,pulled out the case containing the Flaming Jewel, and placed it in the breast pocket of her shooting jacket.
Again she crept to the window. Only the wagon-house was burning. Somebody, however, had led Stormont's horse from the barn, and had tied it to a tree at a safe distance. It stood there, trembling, its beautiful, nervous head turned toward the burning building.
The blows upon her bedroom door had ceased; there came a loud trampling, the sound of excited voices; Quintana's sarcastic tones, clear, dominant:
"Dios! The police! Why you bring me this gendarme? What am I to do with a gentleman of the Constabulary, eh? Do you think I am fool enough to cut his throat? Well, Señor Gendarme, what are you doing here in the Dump of Clinch?"
Then Stormont's voice, clear and quiet: "What areyoudoing here? If you've a quarrel with Clinch, he's not here. There's only a young girl in this house."
"So?" said Quintana. "Well, that is what I expec', my frien'. It is thees lady upon whom I do myse'f the honour to call!"
Eve, listening, heard Stormont's rejoinder, still, calm, and very grave:
"The man who lays a finger on that young girl had better be dead. He's as good as dead the moment he touches her. There won't be a chance for him.... Nor for any of you, if you harm her."
"Calm youse'f, my frien'," said Quintana. "I demand of thees young lady only that she return to me the property of which I have been rob by Monsieur Clinch."
"I knew nothing of any theft. Nor does she——"
"Pardon; Señor Clinch knows; and I know." His tone changed, offensively: "Señor Gendarme, am I permit to understan' that you are a frien' of thees young lady?—a heart-frien', per'aps——"