The Trail Of The Axe Part 47

The silence was ominous, it was fraught with a portend of disaster; disaster worse than death. How could they hope to withstand the attack of the men outside? They were waiting, waiting for what was to happen.

Every conceivable method had been adopted by the besiegers to dislodge their intended victims. They had tried to tear the roof off, but the heavy logs were well dovetailed, and the process would have taken too long, and exposed those attempting it to the fire of the rifles in the capable hands of the defenders. Chepstow had ill.u.s.trated his determination promptly by a half dozen shots fired at the first moving of one of the logs. Then had come an a.s.sault on the door, but, here again, the ready play of the rifle from one of the windows had driven these besiegers hurriedly to cover. Some man, more blinded with drink than the rest of his comrades, had suggested fire. But his suggestion was promptly vetoed. Had it been the parson only they would probably have had no scruples, but Betty was there, and they wanted Betty.

For some time there had been no further a.s.sault.

"I wish I knew how many there were," Chepstow said, in a low voice.

"Would that do any good?"

The man moved his shoulders in something like a despairing shrug.

"Would anything do any good?"

"Nothing I can think of," Betty murmured bitterly.

"I thought if there were say only a dozen I might open this door. We have the repeating-rifles."

The man's eyes as he spoke glittered with a fierce light. Betty saw it, and somehow it made her shiver.

It brought home to her their extremity even more poignantly than all that had gone before. When a brave churchman's thoughts concentrated in such a direction she felt that their hopes were small indeed.

She shook her head.

"No, uncle dear. We must wait for that until they force an entrance."

She was cool enough in her desperation, cooler far than he.

"Yes," he nodded reluctantly, "perhaps you're right, but the suspense is--killing. Hark! Listen, they are coming at us again. I wonder what it is to be this time."

The harsh voices of the drunken mob could be plainly heard. They were coming nearer. Brutal laughter a.s.sailed the straining ears inside, and set their nerves tingling afresh. Then came a hush. It lasted some seconds. Then a single laugh just outside the door broke upon the silence.

"Try again," a voice said. "Say, here's some more. 'Struth you're a heap of G---- d---- foolishness."

Another voice broke in angrily.

"G.o.d strike you!" it snarled, "do it your b---- self."

"Right ho!"

Then there came a shuffling of feet, and, a moment later, a sc.r.a.ping and scratching at the foot of the door. Chepstow glanced down at it, and Betty's eyes were irresistibly drawn in the same direction.

"What are they doing now?"

It was the voice of the wounded strike-leader on his bunk at the far end of the room. He was staring over at the door, his expression one of even greater fear than that of the defenders themselves. He felt that, in spite of the part he had played in bringing the strike about, his position was no better than these others. If anything happened to them all help for him was gone. Besides, he, too, understood that these men outside were no longer strikers, but wolves, whiskey-soaked savages beyond the control of any strike-leader.

He received no reply. The sc.r.a.ping went on. Something was being thrust into the gaping crack which stood an inch wide beneath the door.

Suddenly the noise ceased, followed by a long pause. Then, in the strong draught under the door, a puff of oil smoke belched into the room, and its nauseous reek set Chepstow coughing. His cough brought an answering peal of brutal laughter from beyond the door, and some one shouted to his comrades--

"Bully fer you, bo'! Draw 'em! Draw 'em like badgers. Smoke 'em out like gophers."

The pungent smoke belched into the room, and the man darted from the door.

"Quick!" he cried. "Wet rags! A blanket!"

Betty sprang to his a.s.sistance. The room was rapidly filling with smoke, which stung their eyes and set them choking. A blanket was s.n.a.t.c.hed off the wounded strike-leader, but the process of saturating it was slow. They had only one barrel of water, and dared not waste it by plunging the blanket into it. So they were forced to resort to the use of a dipper. At last it was ready and the man crushed it down at the foot of the door, and stamped it tight with his foot.

But it had taken too much time to set in place. The room was dense with a fog of smoke that set eyes streaming and throats gasping. In reckless despair the man sprang at one of the windows and began to tear down the carefully-built barricade.

But now the cunning of the besiegers was displayed. As the last of the barricade was removed Chepstow discovered that the cotton covering of the window was smouldering. He tore it out to let in the fresh air, but only to release a pile of smouldering oil rags, which had been placed on the thickness of the wall, and set it tumbling into the room. The window was barricaded on the outside!

The smoke became unbearable now, and the two prisoners set to work to trample the smouldering rags out. It was while they were thus occupied that a fresh disaster occurred. There was a terrific clatter at the stove, and a cloud of smoke and soot practically put the place in darkness. Nor did it need the sound of scrambling feet on the roof to tell those below what had happened. The strikers, by removing the topmost joint of the pipe, where it protruded through the roof, had been able, by the aid of a long stick, to dislodge the rest of the pipe and send it crashing to the floor. It was a master-stroke of diabolical cunning, for now, added to the smoke and soot, the sulphurous fumes of the blazing stove rendered the conditions of the room beyond further endurance.

Half blinded and gasping Chepstow sprang at the table and seized a rifle. Betty had dropped into a chair choking. The strike-leader lay moaning, trying to shut out the smoke with his one remaining blanket.

"Come on, Betty," shouted the man, in a frenzy of rage. "You've got your revolver. I'm going to open the door, and may G.o.d Almighty have mercy on the soul of the man who tries to stop us!"

CHAPTER XXVIII

DAVE--THE MAN

Dave's buckboard swept up the slope of the last valley. It reached the dead level of the old travoy trail, which pa.s.sed in front of Mason's dugout on its way to the lumber camp. He was looking ahead for signs which he feared to discover; he wanted the reason of the smoke he had seen from afar off. But now a perfect screen of towering pine forest lined the way, and all that lay beyond was hidden from his anxious eyes.

He flogged his horses faster. The perfect mountain calm was unbroken; even the speeding horses and the rattle of his buckboard were powerless to disturb that stupendous quiet. It was a mere circ.u.mstance in a world too vast to take color from a detail so insignificant. It was that wondrous peace, that thrilling silence that aggravated his fears. His apprehension grew with each pa.s.sing moment, and, though he made no display, his clutch upon the reins, the sharpness with which he plied his whip, the very immobility of his face, all told their tale of feelings strung to a high pitch.

Mason was standing directly behind him in the carryall. He steadied himself with a grip upon the back of the driving-seat. Beside him the wretched Truscott was sitting on the jolting slats of the body of the vehicle, mercilessly thrown about by the b.u.mping over the broken trail.

Mason, too, was staring out ahead.

"Seems quiet enough," he murmured, half to himself.

Dave caught at his words.

"That's how it seems," he said, in a tone of doubt.

"It's less than half a mile now," Mason went on a moment later. "We're coming to the big bend."

Dave nodded. His whip fell across his horses' quarters. "Best get ready," he said significantly. Then he laughed mirthlessly and tried to excuse himself. "I don't guess there'll be a heap of trouble, though."

"No."

Mason's reply carried no conviction. Both men were in doubt. Neither knew what to expect. Neither knew in what way to prepare for the meeting that was now so near.

Now the trail began to swing out to the right. It was the beginning of the big bend. The walls of forest about them receded slightly, opening out where logs had been felled beside the trail in years past. The middle of the curve was a small clearing. Then, further on, as it inclined again to the left, it narrowed down to the bare breadth of the trail.

"Just beyond this----"

Mason broke off. His words were cut short by a loud shout just ahead of them. It was a shout of triumph and gleeful enjoyment. Dave's whip fell again, and the horses laid on to their traces. From that moment to the moment when the horses were almost flung upon their haunches by the sudden jolt with which Dave pulled them up was a matter of seconds only. He was out of the buckboard, too, having flung the reins to Mason, and was standing facing a small group of a dozen men whom it was almost impossible to recognize as lumberjacks. In truth, there were only three of them who were, the others were some of those Mason had been forced to engage in his extremity.