Part 4 (1/2)

The effect on Paddy's highly-strung audience was tremendous. Many of them yelled as if they had received an electric shock. All of them sprang up and turned round just in time to see their captive vanish, not unlike a ghost, into the thick darkness!

That glance, however, was sufficient to enlighten them. With shouts of rage many of them darted after the fugitive, and followed him up like bloodhounds. Others, who had never been very anxious for his capture or death, and had been turned somewhat in his favour by the bold stand he had made against the bear, returned to the fire after a short run.

If there had been even a glimmering of light Tom would certainly have been retaken at once, for not a few of his pursuers were quite as active and hardy as himself, but the intense darkness favoured him.

Fortunately the forest immediately behind him was not so dense as elsewhere, else in his first desperate rush, regardless of consequences, he would probably have dashed himself against a tree. As it was he went right through a thicket and plunged headlong into a deep hole. He scrambled out of this with the agility of a panther, just in time to escape Gashford, who chanced to plunge into the same hole, but not so lightly. Heavy though he was, however, his strength was equal to the shock, and he would have scrambled out quickly enough if Crossby had not run on the same course and tumbled on the top of him.

Amid the growling half-fight, half-scramble that ensued, Tom crept swiftly away to the left, but the pursuers had so scattered themselves that he heard them panting and stumbling about in every direction-- before, on either hand, and behind. Hurrying blindly on for a few paces, he almost ran into the arms of a man whom he could hear, though he could not see him, and stopped.

”Hallo! is that you, Bill Smith?” demanded the man.

”Ay, that's me,” replied Tom, promptly, mimicking Bill Smith's voice and gasping violently. ”I thought you were Brixton. He's just pa.s.sed this way. I saw him.”

”Did you?--where?”

”Away there--to the left!”

Off went the pursuer as fast as he dared, and Tom continued his flight with more caution.

”Hallo! hi! hooroo!” came at that moment from a long distance to the right, in unmistakable tones. ”Here he is, down this way. Stop, you big thief! Howld him. d.i.c.k! Have ye got him?”

There was a general rush and scramble towards the owner of the ba.s.s voice, and Tom, who at once perceived the ruse, went quietly off in the opposite direction.

Of course, the hunt came to an end in a very few minutes. Every one, having more or less damaged his head, knees, elbows, and s.h.i.+ns, came to the natural conclusion that a chase in the dark was absurd as well as hopeless, and in a short time all were rea.s.sembled round the fire, where Fred Westly still stood, for he had not joined in the pursuit. Gashford was the last to come up, with the exception of Paddy Flinders.

The bully came forward, fuming with rage, and strode up to Fred Westly with a threatening look.

”You were at the bottom of this!” he cried, doubling his huge fist. ”It was you who cut the rope, for no mortal man could have untied it!”

”Indeed I did not!” replied Fred, with a steady but not defiant look.

”Then it must have bin your little chum Flinders. Where is he?”

”How could Flinders ha' done it when he was tellin' a ghost story?” said Crossby.

Gashford turned with a furious look to the speaker, and seemed on the point of venting his ill-humour upon him, when he was arrested by the sound of the Irishman's voice shouting in the distance.

As he drew nearer the words became intelligible. ”Howld him tight, now!

d'ye hear? Och! whereiver have ye gone an' lost yersilf? Howld him tight till I come an' help ye! What! is it let him go ye have? Ah then it's wis.h.i.+n' I had the eyes of a cat this night for I can't rightly see the length of my nose. Sure ye've niver gone an' let him go? Don't say so, now!” wound up Paddy as, issuing from the wood, he advanced into the circle of light.

”Who's got hold of him, Flin?” asked one of the men as he came up.

”Sorrow wan o' me knows,” returned the Irishman, wiping the perspiration from his brow; ”d'ye suppose I can see in the dark like the moles? All I know is that half a dozen of ye have bin shoutin' `Here he is!' an'

another half-dozen, `No, he's here--this way!' an' sure I ran this way an' then I ran that way--havin' a nat'ral disposition to obey orders, acquired in the Louth Militia--an' then I ran my nose flat on a tree-- bad luck to it!--that putt more stars in me hid than you'll see in the sky this night. Ah! ye may laugh, but it's truth I'm tellin'. See, there's a blob on the ind of it as big as a chirry!”

”That blob's always there, Paddy,” cried one of the men; ”it's a grog-blossom.”

”There now, Peter, don't become personal. But tell me--ye've got him, av coorse?”

”No, we haven't got him,” growled Crossby.