Bayard and his cousins squeezed themselves through the hole in the door, one after the other, all of them revolving in their minds some tantalizing remarks they intended to address to Chase and Wilson when they saw them; and the surprise and bewilderment they exhibited when they found the room empty, were quite equal to Pierre’s. The latter, after looking all about the apartment to make sure that the boys were not there, lighted a candle, threw open the trap-door, and dived into the cellar, where he spent some time in overturning the boxes and barrels that were stowed around the walls; and when he came out again the expression his face wore was a sufficient indication that his search had been fruitless. “Now, see here,” said he, looking savagely at Bayard; “what sort of a story is this you have been telling me?”
[231]
“I told you the truth,” replied the boy, retreating hastily toward the door as Pierre advanced upon him. “Wilson was certainly in this room, because we all saw him when he made an attempt to climb out of that hole in the loft. Look around a little. He’s here, I know he is.”
Pierre, who believed that Bayard was trying to mislead him for some purpose of his own, and who had been on the point of giving him a good shaking with a view of forcing the real facts of the case out of him, looked toward the other boys for a confirmation of this story. Seth and Will loudly protested that their cousin had told the truth, and nothing but the truth, and Pierre, being in some measure convinced by their earnestness, lifted the table from the floor, and after pushing it against the wall to enable it to retain an upright position, placed his candle upon it, and set to work to give the apartment a thorough overhauling.
“If they were in the room when I reached the house, they must be here now,” said he, “for there is no way for them to get out except through the door and that hole in the loft. Move everything, and we’ll find them.”
Suiting the action to the word, Pierre seized one[232] of the beds, and pulled it into the middle of the floor, and there, snugly hidden behind a pile of saddles, old blankets, boots, hats, boxes, and a variety of other articles that had been thrown under the couch for safekeeping, was Henry Chase. Pierre had looked under that same bed when he first came in; but as it was dark in the room—there being no windows in the house—and his examination had been hastily made, Chase had escaped his observation.
“Here’s one of them!” exclaimed Pierre, seizing the fugitive by the collar and lifting him to his feet.
“What did we tell you?” cried Bayard. “Are you satisfied now that we knew what we were talking about?”
“Where’s the other fellow—what’s his name?” demanded Pierre.
“Wilson,” suggested Seth.
“I’m sure I don’t know where he is,” answered Chase, and he told the truth. Just before he dived under the bed, he saw Wilson running frantically about the room as if he did not know which way to turn, but where he went, Chase had not the remotest[233] idea. “And if I did know I wouldn’t tell you,” he added, boldly.
“You do know,” exclaimed Bayard. “He was in this room with you not five minutes ago.”
“I don’t deny that, but still I don’t know where he is. O, you may strike me, if you feel so inclined,” added Chase, as Pierre drew back his clenched hand, “but I can’t tell you a thing I don’t know, can I?”
“Bring me something to tie him with,” said Pierre, turning to Bayard; “one of those bridles will do. We’ll make sure of him, now that we have got him, and then look for the other.”
Bayard brought the bridle with alacrity, and even assisted in confining Chase’s arms, the latter submitting to the operation without even a show of resistance. Pierre used more than usual care in making the straps fast, and when he had bound the boy so tightly that he could scarcely move a finger, he pulled a chair into the middle of the room and pushed him into it. His short experience with his prisoner had convinced him that he was a very slippery fellow, and he thought it best to have him where he could keep his eyes upon him.
As soon as Chase had been disposed of, the[234] search for Wilson was renewed, Bayard and his cousins lending willing aid. They began by examining every nook and corner of the cellar, and not finding him there, they returned to the room above and pulled the beds to pieces, explored the loft, and looked into all sorts of impossible places, even peering under chairs, and taking out the bureau drawers; and finally, one after another, they made a journey to the fire-place and looked up the chimney. But they could see nothing there. There was a fire on the hearth, and the smoke ascended in such volumes that it speedily filled their eyes and nostrils, and they were glad to draw back into the room for a breath of fresh air. Chase sat in his chair watching all their movements with the deepest interest. His friend’s sudden and mysterious disappearance astonished and perplexed him as much as it did anybody; but he exulted over it, while Pierre and his young assistants seemed to be very much dismayed, especially the former. After the house had been thoroughly searched (even the apartment across the hall was examined, although there was not the least probability that Wilson could have got into it), Pierre walked once or twice across the room, and then taking down a[235] hunting-horn from its nail over the fire-place, went to the door and blew it as if he meant that it should be heard by everybody for ten miles around. When he came back he addressed himself rather sternly to Bayard.
“Now, then, clear out,” said he. “Be off at once, and never let me see your face again.”
“What are you going to do with Chase, and what were you blowing that horn for?” asked Bayard, who thought it might be policy to learn something of Pierre’s plans before he left him.
“That’s my own business,” was the gruff reply. “Do you see that hole in the wall? It was left there for folks to go out of, and I advise you to make use of it.”
Pierre pointed toward the door, and Bayard, judging by the expression of his countenance that it would be a dangerous piece of business to irritate him by refusing to comply with his wishes, sprang out into the hall, followed by his cousins.
“That’s the return we get for doing him a favor,” said he, as he led the way toward the place where their horses were tied. “However, I don’t mind it much, for Chase is captured again, and if we can only secure Wilson we are all right.[236] As he is not in the house, it follows as a thing of course that he must be out of it; although how he got out is a mystery to me. He has taken to the woods, most likely, and if we start after him at once we can catch him.”
Bayard and his cousins mounted their horses and rode off at a gallop. Pierre watched them until they were out of sight, and then went into the house and renewed his search for Wilson, which he kept up until he was interrupted by a hasty step in the hall, and Coulte appeared and looked through the broken door. He had heard the sound of the hunting-horn, and knowing from the peculiar manner in which it was blown, that there was something unusual going on at the house, he had hurried back to see what was the matter. A single glance at the inside of the room and at his son’s face, was enough to tell him that the latter had some exciting news to communicate.
“Oh! Whew! Somedings is going wrong again!” he exclaimed, in a frightened tone.
Pierre replied that there were a good many things going wrong, and in a few hurried words made him acquainted with all that had happened in the house during the last fifteen minutes, adding a piece of[237] information and prediction that greatly alarmed Coulte, namely: that Wilson had again escaped, and that in less than an hour he would return to the clearing with an army of settlers at his heels. The old Frenchman listened eagerly to his son’s story, only interrupting him with long-drawn whistles, which were loud and frequent, and when it was finished declared that it was necessary to make a change in their plans—that, instead of waiting until night to begin the voyage to Lost Island, they must begin it at once. They would sail down the bayou into the swamp, conceal themselves there until dark, and then continue their journey. What they would do after they had disposed of their prisoner, Coulte said he did not know; but of one thing he was satisfied, and that was, that they could not return to the settlement to sell their property, as they had intended to do. They had worked hard for it, but they must give it up now, for it would probably be confiscated when the authorities learned that he and his sons belonged to the smugglers. This thought seemed to drive the old Frenchman to the verge of distraction. He paced up and down the floor with his beloved pipe tightly clenched between his teeth, swinging his arms wildly about his[238] head, talking loudly, sometimes in English and sometimes in French, and declaring, over and over again, that this was the most magnificent scrape he had ever got into.
“Well, I can’t help it,” grumbled Pierre. “You know that I didn’t want to have anything to do with it in the first place. I told you just how it would end, and now there is no use in wasting words over it. Let’s be moving, for as long as we stay here we’re in danger.”
Pierre bustled out of the room, and presently returned with an axe, a side of meat, a small bag of corn-meal, and a couple of old blankets, which he deposited in the hall. He then approached the prisoner and remarked, as he began untying his arms—
“As those things are intended for you, you can take them down to the boat yourself. Have you a flint and steel?”
“I have,” replied Chase. “Is that all you are going to give me for an outfit?”
“Of course, and you may be glad to get it, too. What more do you want? There’s grub enough to last you a week, blankets to keep you warm of[239] nights, and an axe to build your camp and cut fire-wood.”
“Why, I want a gun and some ammunition. How am I going to get anything to eat after that bread and meat are gone?”
“Trap it, that’s the way. Your own gun is on board the schooner; we’ve got none here to give you, and besides, you don’t need one, and shan’t have it. Shoulder those things and come along; and mind you, now, no tricks.”
Chase picked up his outfit and followed his captors, who, after loading themselves with various articles, which they thought they might need during the voyage, led the way across the clearing at a rapid walk, keeping a bright lookout on all sides to make sure that there was no one observing their movements.
About ten minutes after they left the house, an incident happened there that would have greatly astonished Pierre and his father, could they have witnessed it. At one side of the room in which happened the events that we have just attempted to describe, was an immense fire-place. The lower part of it was built of logs and lined with mud, which had been baked until it was as hard as a[240] rock. The upper part—that is, the chimney—was built of sticks, and was also plastered with mud, both inside and out. As the chimney had been standing nearly ten years it was in a very dilapidated state, and leaned away from the house as though it meant to fall over every moment. Near the top were several holes which had been made by the sticks burning out and falling into the fire-place; and had Coulte and his son thought to look up at the chimney when they left the house, they would have found that some of these holes were filled with objects they had never seen there before. One of them looked very much like the toe of a heavy boot; and at another opening, about five feet nearer the top, was something that might have been taken for a black hat with three holes cut in it. But it was not a black hat; it was something else.
Shortly after Chase and his captors had disappeared in the woods, this dilapidated structure began to rock and groan in the most alarming manner. Huge cakes of mud fell down into the fire, and had there been any one in the room at the time he would have said that there was some heavy body working its way down the chimney. Presently[241] a pair of boots appeared below the mouth of the fire-place, then a portion of a pair of trowsers, next the skirts of an overcoat, and at last a human figure dropped down among the smouldering coals, and with one jump reached the middle of the floor, where it stood stamping its feet to shake off the sparks of fire that clung to them, pounding its clothes, scattering a cloud of soot a............