Chapter Twenty
_Trapped!_
"Get the money," said Ronicky to Jerry Smith.
"There it is!"
He pointed to the drawer, where McKeever, as banker, had kept the money.The wounded man in the meantime had disappeared.
"How much is ours?" asked Jerry Smith.
"All you find there," answered Ronicky calmly.
"But there's a big bunch--large bills, too. McKeever was loaded forbear."
"He loses--the house loses it. Out in my country, Jerry, that wouldn'tbe half of what the house would lose for a little trick like what's beenplayed on us tonight. Not the half of what the house would lose, I tellyou! He had us trimmed, Jerry, and out West we'd wreck this joint fromhead to heels."
The diffident Jerry fingered the money in the drawer of the tableuncertainly. Ronicky Doone swept it up and thrust it into his pocket."We'll split straws later," said Ronicky. "Main thing we need rightabout now is action. This coin will start us."
In the hall, as they took their hats, they found big Frederic Fernand inthe act of dissuading several of his clients from leaving. The incidentof the evening was regrettable, most regrettable, but such things wouldhappen when wild men appeared. Besides, the fault had been that ofMcKeever. He assured them that McKeever would never again be employed inhis house. And Fernand meant it. He had discarded all care for thewounded man.
Ronicky Doone stepped to him and drew him aside. "Mr. Fernand," he said,"I've got to have a couple of words with you."
"Come into my private room," said Fernand, eager to get the fighter outof view of the rest of the little crowd. He drew Ronicky and Jerry Smithinto a little apartment which opened off the hall. It was furnished withan almost feminine delicacy of style, with wide-seated, spindle-leggedLouis XV. chairs and a couch covered with rich brocade. The desk was awork of Boulle. A small tapestry of the Gobelins made a ragged glow ofcolor on the wall. Frederic Fernand had recreated an atmosphere twohundred years old.
He seated them at once. "And now, sir," he said sternly to RonickyDoone, "you are aware that I could have placed you in the hands of thepolice for what you've done tonight?"
Ronicky Doone made no answer. His only retort was a gradually spreadingsmile. "Partner," he said at length, while Fernand was flushing withanger at this nonchalance on the part of the Westerner, "they might ofgrabbed me, but they would have grabbed your house first."
"That fact," said Fernand hotly, "is the reason you have dared to actlike a wild man in my place? Mr. Doone, this is your last visit."
"It sure is," said Ronicky heartily. "D'you know what would havehappened out in my neck of the woods, if there had been a game like theone tonight? I wouldn't have waited to be polite, but just pulled a gatand started smashing things for luck."
"The incident is closed," Fernand said with gravity, and he leanedforward, as if to rise.
"Not by a long sight," said Ronicky Doone. "I got an idea, partner, thatyou worked the whole deal. This is a square house, Fernand. Why was Ipicked out for the dirty work?"
It required all of Fernand's long habits of self control to keep himfrom gasping. He managed to look Ronicky Doone fairly in the eyes. Whatdid the youngster know? What had he guessed?
"Suppose I get down to cases and name names? The gent that talked to youabout me was John Mark. Am I right?" asked Ronicky.
"Sir," said Fernand, thinking that the world was tumbling about hisears, "what infernal--"
"I'm right," said Ronicky. "I can tell when I've hurt a gent by the wayhis face wrinkles up. I sure hurt you that time, Fernand. John Mark itwas, eh?"
Fernand could merely stare. He began to have vague fears that this youngdevil might have hypnotic powers, or be in touch with he knew not whatunearthly source of information.
"Out with it," said Ronicky, leaving his chair.
Frederic Fernand bit his lip in thought. He was by no means a coward,and two alternatives presented themselves to him. One was to say nothingand pretend absolute ignorance; the other was to drop his hand into hiscoat pocket and fire the little automatic which nestled there.
"Listen," said Ronicky Doone, "suppose I was to go a little fartherstill in my guesses! Suppose I said I figured out that John Mark and hismen might be scattered around outside this house, waiting for me andSmith to come out: What would you say to that?"
"Nothing," said Fernand, but he blinked as he spoke. "For a feat ofimagination as great as that I have only a silent admiration. But, ifyou have some insane idea that John Mark, a gentleman I know and respectgreatly, is lurking like an assassin outside the doors of my house--"
"Or maybe inside 'em," said Ronicky, unabashed by this gravity.
"If you think that," went on the gambler heavily, "I can only keepsilence. But, to ease your own mind, I'll show you a simple way out ofthe house--a perfectly safe way which even you cannot doubt will leadyou out unharmed. Does that bring you what you want?"
"It sure does," said Ronicky. "Lead the way, captain, and you'll find usright at your heels." He fell in beside Jerry Smith, while the fat manled on as their guide.
"What does he mean by a safe exit?" asked Jerry Smith. "You'd think wewere in a smuggler's cave."
"Worse," said Ronicky, "a pile worse, son. And they'll sure have to havesome tunnels or something for get-aways. This ain't a lawful house,Jerry."
As they talked, they were being led down toward the cellar. They pausedat last in a cool, big room, paved with cement, and the unmistakablescent of the underground was in the air.
"Here we are," said the fat man, and, so saying, he turned a switchwhich illumined the room completely and then drew aside a curtain whichopened into a black cavity.
Ronicky Doone approached and peered into it. "How does it look to you,Jerry?" he asked.
"Dark, but good enough for me, if you're all set on leaving by somefunny way."
"I don't care how it looks," said Ronicky thoughtfully. "By the looksyou can't make out nothing most of the time--nothing important. Butthey's ways of smelling things, and the smell of this here tunnel ain'ttoo good to me. Look again and try to pry down that tunnel with yourflash light, Jerry."
Accordingly Jerry raised his little pocket electric torch and held itabove his head. They saw a tunnel opening, with raw dirt walls and floorand a rude framing of heavy timbers to support the roof. But it turnedan angle and went out of view in a very few paces.
"Go down there with your lantern and look for the exit," said RonickyDoone. "I'll stay back here and see that we get our farewell all fixedup."
The damp cellar air seemed to affect the throat of the fat man. Hecoughed heavily.
"Say, Ronicky," said Jerry Smith, "looks to me that you're carrying thispretty far. Let's take a chance on what we've got ahead of us?"
The fat man was chuckling: "You show a touching trust in me, Mr. Doone."
Ronicky turned on him with an ugly sneer. "I don't like you, Fernand,"he said. "They's nothing about you that looks good to me. If I knew halfas much as I guess about you I'd blow your head off, and go on withoutever thinking about you again. But I don't know. Here you've got me upagainst it. We're going to go down that tunnel; but, if it's blind,Fernand, and you trap us from this end, it will be the worst day of yourlife."
"Take this passage, Doone, or turn around and come back with me, andI'll show some other ways of getting out--ways that lie under the opensky, Doone. Would you like that better? Do you want starlight and JohnMark--or a little stretch of darkness, all by yourself?" asked Fernand.
Ronicky Doone studied the face of Fernand, almost wistfully. The more heknew about the fellow the more thoroughly convinced he was that Fernandwas bad in all possible ways. He might be telling the truth now,however--again he might be simply tempting him on to a danger. There wasonly one way to decide. Ronicky, a gambler himself, mentally flipped acoin and nodded to Jerry.
"We'll go in," he said, "but man, man, how my old scars are pricking!"
They walked into the moldy, damp air of the tunnel,
reached the corner,and there the passage turned and ended in a blank wall of raw dirt, witha little apron of fallen debris at the bottom of it. Ronicky Doonewalked first, and, when he saw the passage obstructed in this manner, hewhirled like a flash and fired at the mouth of the tunnel.
A snarl and a curse told him that he had at least come close to histarget, but he was too late. A great door was sliding rapidly across thewidth of the tunnel, and, before he could fire a second time, the tunnelwas closed.
Jerry Smith went temporarily mad. He ran at the door, which had justclosed, and struck the whole weight of his body against it. There wasnot so much as a quiver. The face of it was smooth steel, and there wasprobably a dense thickness of stonework on the other side, to match thecellar walls of the house.
"It was my fool fault," exclaimed Jerry, turning to his friend. "Myfault, Ronicky! Oh, what a fool I am!"
"I should have known by the feel of the scars," said Ronicky. "Put outthat flash light, Jerry. We may need that after a while, and thebatteries won't last forever."
He sat down, as he spoke, cross-legged, and the last thing Jerry saw, ashe snapped out the light, was the lean, intense face and the blazingeyes of Ronicky Doone. Decidedly this was not a fellow to trifle with.If he trembled for himself and Ronicky, he could also spare a shudderfor what would happen to Frederic Fernand, if Ronicky got away. In themeantime the light was out, and the darkness sat heavily beside andabout them, with that faint succession of inaudible breathing soundswhich are sensed rather than actually heard.
"Is there anything that we can do?" asked Jerry suddenly. "It's allright to sit down and argue and worry, but isn't it foolish, Ronicky?"
"How come?"
"I mean it in this way. Sometimes when you can't solve a problem it'svery easy to prove that it can't be solved by anyone. That's what I canprove now, but why waste time?"
"Have we got anything special to do with our time?" asked Ronicky dryly.
"Well, my proof is easy. Here we are in hard-pan dirt, without any sortof a tool for digging. So we sure can't tunnel out from the sides, canwe?"
"Looks most like we can't," said Ronicky sadly.
"And the only ways that are left are the ends."
"That's right."
"But one end is the unfinished part of the tunnel; and, if you think wecan do anything to the steel door--"
"Hush up," said Ronicky. "Besides, there ain't any use in you talking ina whisper, either. No, it sure don't look like we could do much to thatdoor. Besides, even if we could, I don't think I'd go. I'd rather take achance against starvation than another trip to fat Fernand's place. If Iever enter it again, son, you lay to it that he'll get me bumped off,mighty pronto."
Jerry Smith, after a groan, returned to his argument. "But that ties usup, Ronicky. The door won't work, and it's worse than solid rock. And wecan't tunnel out the side, without so much as a pin to help us dig, canwe? I think that just about settles things. Ronicky, we can't get out."
"Suppose we had some dynamite," said Ronicky cheerily.
"Sure, but we haven't."
"Suppose we find some?"
Jerry Smith groaned. "Are you trying to make a joke out of this?Besides, could we send off a blast of dynamite in a closed tunnel likethis?"
"We could try," said Ronicky. "Way I'm figuring is to show you it's badmedicine to sit down and figure out how you're beat. Even if you owe apile of money they's some satisfaction in sitting back and adding up thefigures so that you come out about a million dollars on top--in yourdreams. Before we can get out of here we got to begin to feel powerfulsure."
"But you take it straight, friend: Fernand ain't going to leave us inhere. Nope, he's going to find a way to get us out. That's easy tofigure out. But the way he'll get us out will be as dead ones, and thenhe can dump us, when he feels like it, in the river. Ain't that thesimplest way of working it out?"
The teeth of Jerry Smith came together with a snap. "Then the thing forus to do is to get set and wait for them to make an attack?"
"No use waiting. When they attack it'll be in a way that'll give us nochance."
"Then you figure the same as me--we're lost?"
"Unless we can get out before they make the attack. In other words,Jerry, there may be something behind the dirt wall at the end of thetunnel."
"Nonsense, Ronicky."
"There's got to be," said Ronicky very soberly, "because, if thereain't, you and me are dead ones, Jerry. Come along and help me look,anyway."
Jerry rose obediently and flashed on his precious pocket torch, and theywent down to pass the turn and come again to the ragged wall of earthwhich terminated the passage. Jerry held the torch and passed it closeto the dirt. All was solid. There was no sign of anything wrong. Thevery pick marks were clearly defined.
"Hold on," whispered Ronicky Doone. "Hold on, Jerry. I seen something."He snatched the electric torch, and together they peered at the patchfrom which the dried earth had fallen.
"Queer for hardpan to break up like that," muttered Ronicky, cuttinginto the surface beneath the patch, with the point of his hunting knife.Instantly there was the sharp gritting of steel against steel.
The shout of Ronicky was an indrawn breath. The shout of Jerry Smith wasa moan of relief.
Ronicky continued his observations. The thing was very clear. They haddug the tunnel to this point and excavated a place which they hadguarded with a steel door, but, in order to conceal the hiding place, orwhatever it might be, they cunningly worked the false wall of dirtagainst the face of it, using clay and a thin coating of plaster as abase.
"It's a place they don't use very often, maybe," said Ronicky, "andthat's why they can afford to put up this fake wall of plaster and mudafter every time they want to come down here. Pretty clever to leavethat little pile of dirt on the floor, just like it had been worked offby the picks, eh? But we've found 'em, Jerry, and now all we got to dois to get to the door and into whatever lies beyond."
"We'd better hurry, then," cried Jerry.
"How come?"
"Take a breath."
Ronicky obeyed; the air was beginning to fill with the pungent andunmistakable odor of burning wood!