Ashton-Kirk, Special Detective. John T. McIntyre

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СКАЧАТЬ detective dug carelessly at the hard-packed earth of the platform with the tip of the hickory stick.

      “The person who asked for my friend the last time he stopped off here was a stranger to you, I understand.”

      The ancient official took one of the thumbs from under a suspender and raked it thoughtfully through the wisp of beard.

      “Don’t remember ever seeing him before,” stated he.

      “I suppose you couldn’t recall what he looked like?”

      The ancient looked injured.

      “I’m sixty-seven year old,” said he, “but I got good eyesight, and a better memory than most That man I talked to that night was a stranger at the Furnace. If I’d ever set an eye on him before I’d remembered him. He was fat and white and soft looking. And he talked soft and walked soft. When he went away, I’d kind of a feeling that I’d been talking to a batter pudding.”

      “Have you seen him since?” asked the crime student.

      The old man shook his head.

      “No. And I don’t know how he got here, or went away—unless he drove or come in an automobile. He didn’t use the trains.”

      The road down toward the river was steep, and lined with trees upon each side; their interwoven branches overhead, as Scanlon had explained, were dense enough to keep out most of the light.

      “It’s pretty much the same kind of a night as the one I used when I first came here,” said Bat “Stars, but no moon.”

      The wooden bridge, with a peaked roof over it, crossed the river at the foot of the road; the square openings upon either side showed the dark water flowing sullenly along.

      “Look,” and Bat Scanlon pointed out at one of the windows of the bridge. “There are the lights of Schwartzberg.”

      Some distance away—perhaps a mile—and high above the west bank of the river, hung a cluster of lights. So lonely were these, and so pale and cold that they might well have marked the retreat of some necromancer, in which he pored over his dark books of magic.

      “It’s a peculiar thing,” said Ashton-Kirk, his eyes upon the far-off lights, “what various forms fear takes. Here is a man who, apparently, is in constant terror of some one, or something, and yet we find him lodged stubbornly in a place where a secret blow might be leveled at him with the greatest ease.”

      “That struck me more than once,” spoke Mr. Scanlon. “And I felt like putting it to him as a question shaped something like: ‘Why stay here when there’s places where there’s more folks? Why stick around a spot where there’s always some one cutting in with an unwelcome surprise, when you can get good house-room in places where there’s a-plenty of burglar alarms, and lots of night sticks? ’”

      Their feet sounded drearily upon the loose planks of the bridge; and when they emerged at the far end they found themselves upon a narrow road which ran off into the darkness.

      “On, over the hills, in and out, and up and down, until it lands you at Schwartzberg gate,” said Scanlon.

      They climbed to the top of a hill; the sky was thick with stars, and the light from them touched the high places with pale hands. But the hollows were black and deep looking; mystery followed the course of the slowly-running river.

      “What is there about Campe’s place?” asked the crime specialist. “Is this the only road that leads there? What are his neighbors like?”

      “To the first of those questions,"said Mr Scanlon, “I reply, fields—also hills—also woods. There are roads passing Schwartzberg upon either side. As to neighbors, there's a few farmers, and their help. And then there’s the man who flags the bad crossing down by the river, and the inn.”

      “Ah, yes, you mentioned the inn before,” said Ashton-Kirk.

      “A big, old-fashioned place—built away back in the old times.”

      “With a wide hearth and a hearty old landlord, whose father and grandfather owned the house before him.”

      “Well, I guess that’s how it ought to be, to be in the picture; but it happens that this landlord has been here for only about six months.”

      Scanlon heard the hickory stick slashing at a clump of dried brush; then the crime specialist spoke:

      “How far away is it?”

      “A couple of miles.”

      “Maybe it’d be as well if we went there and bespoke a bed, if they’ll take us in,” said Ashton-Kirk.

      Scanlon seemed surprised.

      “I guess they’ve got room,” said he. “But I had it in my mind you were going to Schwartzberg.”

      “I will pay it a visit, if I’m permitted, when I’ve had a chance to see something of its surroundings. Your story, you see, shows plainly that, whatever the nature of Campe’s danger, it comes from the outside.”

      Scanlon seemed struck by this; then he nodded and said:

      “I guess that’s right. But don’t you think a good chance to shake Campe down for some inside information would be better than anything else?”

      “In its proper place, perhaps. But I want to look over the outside, uninfluenced. Five minutes’ talk with a man in Campe’s state of mind might color one’s thoughts to such an extent that it would be difficult to see anything except with his eyes.”

      “That sounds like wise talk,” agreed Bat. “And if there’s anything in the world you don’t want to get doing, it’s seeing things as he sees them.”

      They followed the narrow road for some distance, and then the big man turned off into a path which led through a stretch of farm land.

      “This is a short cut,” said he. “I followed it frequently when I was out with the gun. It’ll bring us to a road a bit beyond this timber; and the road leads on to the inn.”

      A hundred yards further on they topped the crest of a hill; before them loomed a dense growth of trees which covered the slopes round about.

      “It’s a fine kind of a place in summer, I guess,” said Scanlon, as they halted. “But of an autumn night when the air gets thin, the stars look far away, and there’s a pretty well settled belief that some queer things are doing, it’s got its weak side. When I was located in Canyon City, I swore in as a deputy one night and started out into the hills with the sheriff to look for two lads who’d fussed up a whole train load of Easterners, and got away with a bag full of dough. That country was some wilder than this, and was further away from anywhere; but,” with a look at the gloomy wooded slopes, “believe me, it had nothing on it for that uncertain feeling.”

      As they stood gazing about, Ashton-Kirk’s head suddenly went up. He bent forward in the attitude of listening. .

      “What is it?” asked the big man.

      “Hark!”

      Far СКАЧАТЬ