Part 24 (1/2)

The torch was switched off. Dalroy's eyes were momentarily blinded by the glare, but he heard an ugly chuckle.

”Where is the female prisoner?” said Von Halwig, with a formality that was as perplexing as his subdued manner.

”Here, _Herr Hauptmann_.”

The two entered the barn. So far as Dalroy could judge, no word was spoken. The torch flared again, remained lighted a full half-minute, and was extinguished.

Von Halwig reappeared, seemed to ponder matters, and turned to the corporal.

”Put the woman in my car,” he said. ”Fall in your men, and be ready to escort me back to the village. You've done a good day's work, corporal.”

”Two men have gone in pursuit of Jan Maertz, sir.”

”Never mind. They'll have sense enough to come on to headquarters if they catch him. How is this Englishman secured?”

The jubilant Franz explained.

”Mount him on one of your horses. The trooper can squeeze in in front of the car. Has the female prisoner a dagger or a pistol?”

”I have not searched her, _Herr Hauptmann_.”

”Make sure, but offer no violence or discourtesy. No, leave this fellow here at present. I want a few words with him in private. a.s.semble your men around the car, and take the woman there now.”

Irene was led out. She paused in the doorway, and the corporal thought she did not know what she was wanted for.

”You are to be conveyed in the automobile, _Fraulein_,” he said.

But she was looking for Dalroy in the gloom. Before anyone could interfere, she ran and threw her arms around him, kissing him on the lips.

”Good-bye, my dear one!” she wailed in a heart-broken way. ”We may not meet again on this earth, but I am yours to all eternity.”

”With these words in my ears I shall die happy,” said Dalroy. Her embrace thrilled him with a strange ecstasy, yet the pain of that parting was worse than death. Were ever lovers' vows plighted in such conditions in the history of this gray old world?

Franz seized the girl's arm. She knew it would be undignified to resist.

Kissing Dalroy again, she whispered a last choking farewell, and suffered her guide to take her where he willed. She walked with stumbling feet. Her eyes were dimmed with tears; but, sustained by the pride of her race, she refused to sob, and bit her lower lip in dauntless resolve not to yield.

The rain was beating down now in heavy gusts. Von Halwig, if he had no concern for the comfort of the troopers, had a good deal for his own.

”d.a.m.n the weather!” he grunted. ”Come into the bar. You can walk, I suppose?”

He turned on the torch, which was controlled by a sliding b.u.t.ton, and saw how the prisoner was secured. Then he flashed the light into the interior of the barn. It was a ramshackle place at the best, and looked peculiarly forlorn after the rummaging it had undergone since the fight, a recent picket having evidently torn down stalls and mangers to provide materials for a fire. Part of a long sloping ladder had been consumed for that purpose, so that an open trap-door in the boarded floor of an upper storey was inaccessible. The barn itself was unusually lofty, running to a height of twenty feet or more. There were no windows. Some rats, tempted out already by the oats spilled from the horses'

nose-bags, scuttled away from the light. Through the trap-door the noise of the rain pounding on a s.h.i.+ngle roof came with a curious hollowness.

Von Halwig did not extinguish the lamp, but tucked it under his left arm. He lighted a cigarette. With each movement of his body the beam of light s.h.i.+fted. Now it played on the wall, against which Dalroy leaned, because the cramped state of his arms was already becoming irksome; now it shone through the doorway, forming a sort of luminous blur in the rain, now it dwelt on the Englishman, standing there in his worn blouse, baggy breeches, and sabots, an old flannel s.h.i.+rt open at the neck, and a month's growth of beard on cheeks and chin. The hat which Irene made fun of had been tilted at a rakish angle when the corporal removed the cloak. Certainly he was changed in essentials since he and the Guardsman last met face to face on the platform at Aix-la-Chapelle.

But the eyes were unalterable. They were still resolute, and strangely calm, because he had nerved himself not to flinch before this strutting popinjay.

”You wonder why I have brought you in here, eh?” began Von Halwig, in English.