THE DOCTOR'S PROTÉGÉE.
(All Rights Reserved.)
By ALBERT LEE, Author of "The Baronet in Corduroy," "The Key of tho Holy House," King Stork of the Netherlands," " The Black Disc," &c.
Published By Special Arrangement,
CHAPTER Xlll.— (Continued)
"We shall be in the road when v.c get to the corner yonder," said ore, and I recognised Telamone's voice.
i was now compelled to consider my course. The men had come by a direct cut across the park, and hurrying on the shorter way, had cut off my flight. As far as I could recall "the road, they were making for a gate where they would just meet me if I went forward, and "while it is true that I was armed with a revolver, I did not care to encounter a party of probably three or foui men —or more —judging from the voices I heard. Clearly the better plan was to turn back, and when I' found a break in the hedges which lined the road, get through and make for the city across the fields-
judged that it would save me more than half-a-rhile of the weary journey, and likewise lessen the chances of being overtaken by my pursuers. But it proved to be a disastrous course, for before I had gone a hundred yards down the lane my feet slipped from under me, and I found myself plunging down a snowy slope- The rough career ended in a crash, and for a while — I know not for how long —I lay stunned!
When I returned to the spot where the coach lay embedded, I saw that the wind had so driven the' snow that it left a narrow path with snowy walls. Regardless of the gruesome occupant within, I concluded that here would be a hidingplace until day-break, if I could not get away before. Better a dead man for a companion than a compulsory return to the place from whence I had escaped, for that return would mean increased misery to me, and I knew not what peril for- x Teresina. Thinking this, I went down the snow-formed passage without hesitation. Turning the handle of the coach I wrenched the door open. It moved with difficulty,?'for the intense cold had apparently frozen it to the casementMy courage failed me for a few moments, for the interior of the carriage was in darkness, and fancy ran its disagreeable way with me. I seemed to see the still and silent body of the dead man in the corncr where I had last seen it, and to shut myself in with such a companion was too dreadful an alternative. I was half disposed to take the other ri.sk, and leave the dead man to himself while I faced my pursuers. I drew the revolver from my pocket, and by carefully feeling the chambers in the darkenss made sure that it was fully charged and in working order. Then I walked to the head of the passage, thinking to get back into the road again and take my course away from Bristol, in-order to elude the men who were on my track. At the entrance, however, I heard the voices, and so near were the men that I could even hear their hard breathing after their toilsome tramp over the snow.
When I came to myself my head was bleeding, and my right foot was racked with pain. I bound a handkerchief about the head, and sitting in the snow, my teeth chattering all the while, and my hands trembling with the shock of the fall and the intense cold, I felt my ankle. It was badly sprained, but I did all that my medical skill. could suggest under such conditions, and then, knowing that it would be death to stay there, I resolved to get away with what speed I could. To walk was impossible, for my foot was helpless, and after many futile attempts, the pain of which brought the sweat drops to my forehead, I had to do what I could in the way of getting forward by going on my hands and knees.
I had discovered presently that I had fallen into a disused quarry, which had not been protected in any way, and, crawling out of it laboriously and with infinite pain, I looked around. The house I wanted was yet a mile distant, but I saw a light not more thnn a hundred yards away. With what haste I could command I dragged myself along, no longer cold, but bathed in perspiration as much from pain as from exertion, rv.d after a time I reached the door of a cottage. With difficulty I rose '.o my feet, and vainly feeling about for a knocker beat on the door with mv knuckles.
A kind-looking woman opened the door, and stared at mc in amazement. I was hatbss, and about mv head was a blood-stained handkerchief, so that it was not to be wondered at that she should be started.
"Heaven bless us!" she cried. "Who are you, and what do you want here at this time o' night?"
"I have met with an accident —a fal! into the quarry —and sprained mv ankle," I answered, finding it painful to stand, and therefore leaning almost helplessly against the door-post.
It now seemed to me a far less trying ordeal to enter the coach than to face men who were probably as desperate as myself, and to whom my recapture was of such vital importance. It was true that I was armed, but the. chances were that they had weapons also, and rather than allow me to escape them they would shoot me down without compunction. I turned quickly, stepped into the coach, drew the -door after me, and sat waiting in" the solemn, awful stillness; and at the extremist tension, my revolver in readiness, I listened for what might transpire.
The minutes, or moments —I knew not which—seemed unending. The men had halted close by, and I could distinguish the voices, now a mere murmur, then loud words of anger. Presently the voices ceased altogether, and there was once more the intolerable stillness in that coop-ed-up chamber of death. So unwelcome was the companionship of the dead that I ran the risk of looking out of the window to see whether the way was clear. I could see no one, neither was there a soundOpening the coach door, I stepped down softly, and walking cautiously to the end of the passage looked about. There was no one near, but away in the distance, on the road leading to the city, were the black figures of four or five men, moving slowly and uncertainly. From time to time they loitered, as if looking for some sign of my presence or my flight. A little later the distant shadows swallowed them up, and I ventured into the open. To attempt the road they took would have been madness —like courting recapture; for although I could have followed them for a couple of miles or more, they might unexpectedly turn and find me dogging their steps. I recalled the fact that there was a house a couple of miles further down the road away from the city, where I was known, and I felt that if I could reach it I should be safe, seeing that several menservants were in the place. Standing there in the snow, I decided on going thither, and sturdily set out on the way. From time to time I halted to scan the road I had traversed, anxious to discover whether I was followed, but each glance on the backward way reassured me, and I went on afresh with a much easier mind. After a while I came to.a by-way, which offered a short cut. I had jMsuaattiaUw frfrirr tint T
The woman took in the situation at once, and her motherly heart responded to my need on the instant. "Come in," she exclaimed. But when she saw I was unab'c to move she bade me lean on her shoulder, and thus she hc'pe:! me to limp across the spotless kitchen floor. There she sat me down in an armchair which stood before a dancing fire. She left me then, so that she might close '-he door and shut out the cold. But when she turned to bj of further service she cried out in alarm. The floor seemed to lift as I gazed at it, and the room to swim round, and even as 'he woman cried she saw that I was falling, but by a quick movement she caught me in her arms and broke the fall. Then all was blank for a little while.
There was never a kinder Samaritan than she. She left me lying on the floor, within reach of the fire's welcome warmth, while she went upstairs to the room overhead, and tumbled bed and blankets down the stairs. I have since wondered where she got her strength from, for when she had made, the bed ready on the floor, she drew me to it, big man that I was, and laid me
on it, and did her best to bring me back to conscious-ness. She had her rule of thumb methods for dealing with a helpless man, but in my case they were singularly efficacious, for I presently revived, enough, at all events, to realise how kind she had been to me. She had bound up my head after washing away the bloodstains, and had done her best with my ankle, so that it was somewhat easier. I told her, when I had thanked her gratefully, that I was faint with hunger, as well as from fatigue, and she, having under my directions, bound up my ankle afresh, brought me hot food. When I had satisfied myself, she sat down to. watch while I fell into a deep and dreamless sleep.
When I awoke I saw the woman watching me with some concern, and beside her stood a big, broadshouldered, red-faced man, who was gazing down at me curiously. Who he was I could not say, but I imagined that he must be the woman's husband. She was telling him in whispers how I had come to the door, and how weak I was, and how she had tended me because I was so sorely hurt, and suffering pain, and looked exhausted. "Did he do thee no harm, wife?" the man asked in a low voice, every word of which I heard distinctly. "Harm, Seth? Why, he was ac mitet as a lamh. An' 'tis easy
to see as he is a gentleman born. Just you look at'n, at his hands, an' his clothes. There's a cut about 'no- one above our sort, Seth. He's not like thee—a big, rough, hulking fellow, who couldn't move through a grand room without breaking summat." "Don't bother about that, woman!" exclaimed the man, half petulantly, as if he did not love to hear her girding at him, although all she said was spoken kindly enough. "Tell us how he's gone on since he came here."
"Haven't I told thee, Seth? Thour't sometimes very thick in the head, man; addle-brained, I'd call thee, if thou weren't my husband. He Was as quiet as a lamb, and thanked me like a gentleman for every little thing I did, and said he was terrible sorry to give me trouble."
"Well that's strange—'pon my soul it is!" the man responded emphatically. He seemed perfectly oblivious to the scolding of the woman at his elbow, who was intent on securing the comfort of the injured man who had come to her door. I was in trouble, in real need of attention, in pain that was intense, and that was her womanly warrant for doing what she could for me.
" Strange ? " she exclaimed, sharply. "What's strange? Why should it be strange that a gentleman should act as a gentleman ought to act? Did'st think he'd go rampagin' round, smashin' the furniture, an' knockin' me about for being kind to him?"
"Well, wife, to tell the honest truth, I did."
The woman stared at her husband, open-mouthed. Her face was a note of interrogation, and the man, seeing the question there, and something f like resentment also, gave his answer afresh, and justified his words by an explanation. "To tell the honest truth, I did. I met Job Croft not five minutes before I came in, an' he told me a fine story, which makes me feel that the poor gentleman's stark, starin* mad. He says he went to the Bartens at ten or thereabouts, with a cab, to take them as lives there to the river, so as they might go aboard that beautiful steam yacht as is lyin' there, an' out they brings this gentleman, an' quiet enough he looked, to be sure. But suddenly, without a moment's warnin', he ups with his fists, an' sends 'em smashin' into the face o' him as they calls Mr. Berens. He went down, so Job says, like a stone. Then he snatched at a revolver as was in Mr. Beren's pocket, an' holds it up, threatenin' to shoot the fust as touched him. Job said he looked at 'em all as if he'd do for 'em there an' then; an' he didn't like it, he said, when the mad gentleman turned the revolver dead on him while he stood at the cab -door. He half expected to see a flash, an' feci a bullet in him. Next moment the gentleman swung round and bolted for all he was worth. "When Mr. Berens came to hisself he said they must all be after him, for he was stark, starin' mad — them's the words he used, an' I've just used 'em again. He said that if he didn't get caught, he'd be the death o' somebody. Then came a chase; but he got out o 'sight, an' they couldn't find him nohow, although they searched for him high an' low."
I heard all this, and essayed to speak, but the words would not come. The fall into the quarry had shaken me greatly, and I felt so ill that I seemed indifferent as to what was said or thought concerning myself. Still, when this host of mine retailed Job Cross's lying story, I felt that I ought to make an effort and contradict it. I rose with considerable trouble on my elbow, the man meanwhile putting himself into a posture of alertness, in readiness for any possible mad rush on my part. What I intended to <lo mainly was. to deny the cabman's story, and promise this good woman's husband a substantial sum of money if he would go into the city and tell my friends where I was.
But my weakness was such, and the pain caused by my movement so severe, that the room swam round again, and I fell back with a groan. And after that I knew no more.
CHAPTER XIV. ON BOARD THE VALLAURIS. When I came to myself again I began to suspect that what I had seen and heard during the night, when I attempted my flight, was a dream. I was no longer in the cottage near the'quarry, where I had been so kindly treated by the woman, neither was I in the room at the Bartons. There was, instead, the plunging movement which suggested that I was on board ship on a tossing sea. (To be Continued) 8.P.—11. —m——m ii —wwil ■ nn»«
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King Country Chronicle, Volume VI, Issue 505, 2 October 1912, Page 2
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2,591THE DOCTOR'S PROTÉGÉE. King Country Chronicle, Volume VI, Issue 505, 2 October 1912, Page 2
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