Frontier Boys in Frisco

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First they must find some sort of shelter. The enclosed yard was a
large one, including about eight acres, with trees and shrubs set here
and there and a fountain in the center of the driveway. This latter they
would hardly use, unless they needed a bath. Where the two comrades had
got over the fence was on the north side of the house, and about one
hundred and fifty yards distant.

At half the distance to the house was a clump of bushes in the center of
which rose a tall tree. Back of the castle a short space was a stable
built of brick. At first Jim thought of making it his base of retreat
and observation but gave it up for the present as he was fearful that
one of the dogs might be there or chained near it. As a matter of fact,
one of the big hounds was lying with his nose to the ground not far from
the double door of the stable. It may as well be stated that this
building was at the foot of a sharp slope below the castle and its back
wall was built on a line with the bluff.

"Come on, John," said Jim finally; "we will make for that clump of
bushes with the tree in the center."

"Aye, aye, sir!" replied the engineer softly.

Jim threw himself on the ground and began to crawl imperceptibly towards
the bushes and the engineer followed in as close an imitation of his
leader as possible, and about six feet behind him. The grass was four or
five inches high and they looked to be only a couple of inconspicuous
and inoffensive logs. Jim did not make the mistake of cranching swiftly
through the darkness, for motion was the one thing that would attract
the attention of even an unwary eye. So much James had learned from his
old-time enemies, the crafty and patient Indians.

Once they got a bad scare when they had worked along for half the
distance undertaken. Jim and his comrade became aware of the hulking
yellow form of one of the huge hounds, as he stalked into the open about
fifty yards from where they lay in the short grass. Luckily what little
wind there was blew from the southwest, so that it could not aid to
betray them.

The beast evidently did not have them in mind, and was unsuspicious of
their nearness, as he was looking in the direction of the big gate, but
only a short turn about the grounds and he would pick up their trail and
then the two comrades might as well resign from their present position
and retire over the fence if possible. It would seem as if he were
looking for someone to come from the direction of the road. Then to the
relief of Jim and the engineer the hound hulked heavily towards the
gate.

When he reached it he placed his fore feet high upon a cross bar and
gazed through, evidently on the lookout in a friendly, not an inimical
way. Then he turned and loping near to the house disappeared in the
direction of the stable, and this gave Jim and the engineer their chance
to reach the coveted clump of bushes.

"He is surely looking for someone," said the engineer, as they
straightened up in their shelter of overhanging leaves.

"Lucky he wasn't hunting for us," remarked Jim. "It would have been all
off if he had."

"Or we would be off," put in the engineer frankly.

"Come on, John; let's crawl through this clump and see what is on the
other side," ordered Jim.

"Lead on, MacDuff," assented Berwick.

"My name is plain Duff, I'll have ye to know," replied Jim, catching his
friend playfully by the throat.

For some reason they both felt a thrill of high spirits go through them
and it showed in their speech and actions. If Jim had stopped to
consider he would have remembered that high spirits at a time like this
always indicated some unusual peril ahead. It had been so on many
previous occasions and this peculiar thrill of every fiber was the
distillation of the very wine of danger. They had reached the middle of
the clump of bushes; Jim leading, when our friend received the shock of
his young life, and it startled him through and through.

CHAPTER XIX

THE CASTLE

Jim's hand as he had crawled forward, clutched the foot of a man who was
in hiding in this selfsame clump of bushes. James acted instantly,
realizing instinctively the danger, the extreme danger of the situation.
He leaped forward for the man's throat and to his utter surprise the
body lay perfectly limp.

"Great Heavens!" he exclaimed, "this man is dead."

"It's the poor fellow from the gully, below," said the engineer, after
an examination; "there's no mistaking him."

"But how did he get here?" questioned Jim, with suppressed excitement
and alarm.

"That's simple," replied his friend. "These bandits who live here,
brought the body up at the first convenient chance and left it here for
the time being, but they may come for it any time so we had better be on
the lookout for trouble.

"We don't have to; it is always on the lookout for us," replied Jim
briefly and with truth.

"There's someone directly ahead," remarked the engineer, "or I miss my
guess."

"Just wait a minute, Chief," said Jim; "I want to size up this castle
before making the next move."

"You don't observe any anxiety on my part to go anywhere do you,
Captain?" questioned Berwick.

"Quiet as a kitten," replied Jim with a grin, and then without any
further remarks, he crawled past the form of the unfortunate man, until
he reached the edge of the copse, and gathering a low bush around his
shoulders so that he appeared to be a part of the natural scenery
himself, he observed the castle closely with the eye of a trained scout.

The fog was rifted by the wind so that he could see with sufficient
clearness the outlines and details of the high brick castle. As has been
said, they were on the north side, where there was the large stained
glass window that lit the grand staircase, and now shone with a faint
radiance.

There was also a line of broad mullioned windows, their round, thick
glass in circles of lead, gleaming like opals when the full light was
within, but now cold and ghostly in the dimness of the fog-laden night.
These windows were some twenty feet from the ground, and Jim's keen eyes
regarded them with special interest. Further along and somewhat lower
were the smaller windows, evidently of the kitchen, and near the ground
several more heavily barred.

After a few minutes of observation, Jim returned to his companion, his
mind fully made up.

"Well, James, what do you make of it?" queried his friend.

"I'll make more of it a little later," replied Jim; "I'm going to move
on the enemy, right away."

"Very well, I'm ready," remarked the engineer. "When you can't go back
with safety or stand still it is a good scheme to go forward."

"But I want you to wait here, John," explained Jim; "there's much less
chance with two than one. In case I need you I'll yell."

"If you don't happen to be gagged," replied his friend cheerfully.

"Never you fear about that," returned Jim confidently; "there's none of
that gang that is going to get me so quick but that there will be
something doing on my part first."

"Nothing surer than that," replied the engineer heartily. "Luck to you,
Jim," gripping his hand, "and I'll be in reserve here when you want
me."

"Good old Chief," said Jim, returning his friend's grip; "now I'm off."

Without any further words Jim crawled to the edge of the thicket,
leaving John Berwick in the grewsome company of the dead man, but
Berwick took up a position where he could see the tall, shadowy figure
of James Darlington as he advanced straight toward the stronghold of
this gang of unmerciful pirates.

"That boy has them all beaten when it comes to unqualified nerve,"
muttered the engineer to himself; "the best fellow in an emergency I
ever saw, and that's something."

James would have felt proud to have heard his friend's eulogy, but his
mind was fully taken up with the problem he was facing. He must get into
that house without delay; to stand long where he was meant sure
detection in a short time. If he had only possessed his revolver, he
would have felt more comfortable.

"Have to get or borrow a gun from one of those chaps inside there," he
mused with shrewd humor.

He was now directly below the long mullioned window, but as he was not a
little birdie with wings, he could not fly, and had to climb.

"Here's luck," he said; "this vine is bigger than I thought it could
be. Takes California to grow a vine like a tree and that's a fact."

Indeed, the vine that spread its dark green splendor over the whole
north side of the great structure and wrapped itself around the giant
chimney had a stem that was more like the trunk of a small tree and very
tough and fibrous. Jim did not hesitate, but quickly removed his shoes,
and with both free hands, noiselessly climbed up towards the window,
sustaining his weight partially on the rough jutting bricks until he
finally reached in safety the broad sill of the mullioned window.

"So far so good," he murmured, "now to get inside."

Very slowly and cautiously he pushed on the lower part of the center
window and it gave easily enough, the gang in foolhardy security never
dreaming that an enemy would dare approach their stronghold, much less
come into their very castle. Indeed, their confidence was in some
measure justified, for their head and chief, old Captain Broome, was
very powerful through this section, had strong friends among the
officials in the city and was safe from being bothered by the
authorities. As for private enemies, he could very well take care of
them himself.

So without any trouble at this point Jim slipped through the window and
was within the castle of his bitterest enemy. He let himself down from
the window, to a settee, and thence to the floor. By the dim light from
the windows he saw that he was in a long, rectangular-shaped room,
evidently lined with bookcases, and in the dimness at one end loomed the
outline of a huge fireplace. For the moment Jim felt a thrill of
excitement go through him. There was something in the fact that he was
alone and unarmed in the house of his foes, quite enough to give him
this sensation.

Suppose that you were standing in the darkness in a cage where some
lions were stretched out asleep but liable to awake at any moment, you
might be excused if you had a few shivery thrills, and so it was with
Jim.

It was evident that this room was not in general use and our adventurer
could not have chosen a better place to land as it were.

He stopped only long enough for his eyes to become accustomed to the
lack of light and then he made sure that there was nothing in the room
that would serve him for a weapon.

"Might take a dictionary and throw some of the hard words at 'em," he
remarked with his usual humorous twist of imagination when in a tight
place.

Then he cautiously opened a door which led into a long, wide corridor
that was decidedly dark, except at the further end, where shone a faint
light. Keeping close to the wall, he went softly along until he came to
the main staircase, which surprised Jim with the winding sweep of its
magnificence and the beautiful stained glass window above it. But there
was that in the large hall below that made him draw back.

There was stretched out on an immense rug, the other hound, his nose
between his paws and his watchful, red-rimmed eyes upon the great door
leading from the hall to the out-of-doors. No wonder that the sight of
him made Jim pause and draw back into the darkness of the upper
corridor. One suspicion, and the huge beast would take the staircase in
three leaps, and neither quickness, strength nor prowess could have
saved Jim if once the hound had caught his trail.

"Gosh, I've got to find a weapon somewhere!" Jim mumbled to himself;
"this won't do at all."

By this time his eyes had become thoroughly accustomed to the dim light
and as he turned back he stopped and his heart beat with something
almost akin to fright. Now our friend James Darlington was not
superstitious by nature, but if that dim, silvery white figure was not a
ghost, what in Sam Hill could it be?

It stood perfectly quiet to one side and about half way down the hall,
evidently looking straight at Jim, but making no move to attack him.
What was Jim to do? He could not retreat down the staircase to the main
door, for that was to fall into the jaws of the hound. Neither could he
reach the library in safety.

CHAPTER XX

THE BANQUET HALL

Then Jim looked up at the wall which was paneled in some light wood and
there his eyes saw something that gave him the clue. He straightened up
and moved quickly towards the ghostly figure.

"How are you, Brian de Bois Guilbert?" he said as he came up. "I should
like to borrow your suit of armor if you don't mind."

The audacity of James. It was a gigantic suit of armor, and for the
moment Jim thought of trying to get into it, but he gave it up. Perhaps
as a last resort he might use it, to strike terror into the
superstitious greasers and cutthroats who were making their foul nest in
this once beautiful home.

It would be perfectly useless for him to try and put it on in the hall,
for it would make clangor enough to arouse the deaf or the dead. So Jim
very gently wheedled the image of the late Sir Brian inch by inch
towards the library and finally got it inside. Luckily there was only a
few feet to go, but it took Jim the better half of an hour. This
incident of the armor goes to show how carefully Jim was looking to a
possible chance in the future. Our old college chum, Jim, was certainly
strong on strategy.

"Now, you stay here, Brian, old Boy," he said, "until I come back; if
you don't I'll Ivanhoe your old block for you."

Then Jim slipped out in the passageway once more, and went immediately
to the place in the hall from whence he had sighted the armor man. There
on the wall were medieval weapons--battle-axes, swords and poniards.
These were what had given Jim his clue as to what the ghostly figure
really represented.

"I reckon that I will have to appropriate some of this hardware, before
I explore any further."

He finally selected a small and exceedingly keen poniard, also a short,
heavy sword, and thus equipped he was ready for what might come, which
as he well knew was apt to be the unexpected. As he stood motionless in
the dark hall, with its dimmed radiance at one end, he was sure that he
heard the faint sound of voices, which is not saying that the voices
were faint by any means.

As he went cautiously along, the sound of the voices came no nearer, but
they did not grow less distinct. This puzzled Jim exceedingly.

"I'd give my hat to be able to locate this serenade," he remarked to
himself; "it sounds most peculiar."

James went slowly along, feeling the wall as he went, and all at once
his fingers came to a slight break in the smooth wood, and the voices
became slightly clearer and Jim was positive that he heard the thrum,
thrum of a guitar. He ran his fingers up and down near the minute break,
until they touched a small wooden button. He hesitated a moment before
pressing it, not knowing what might happen nor what might possibly be on
the other side.

"Nothing venture, nothing have," he said, and standing to one side he
pressed the button and the door came quietly back.

"Well-oiled piece of machinery that," thought Jim; "I wonder who uses
this stage entrance anyhow."

Then there came distinctly and clear the voices of several men singing a
Mexican song and Jim saw several steps leading to a lower level under a
low-arched passageway. He also heard besides the singing the low voices
of men speaking and the occasional moving of a chair. He was soon to
solve this particular mystery.

Moving cautiously along he reached the end of the short passageway and
there he saw that it opened on a balcony that ran across one end of a
high vaulted room, embellished with a beautifully carved ceiling of oak.
As the balcony was quite high up and shut in by big panels of wood about
four feet in height, he could not see the floor below.

Jim dared not raise his head to see who were in the room, which was
evidently intended originally for a banquet hall and not a den of
thieves. However, he was not long in doubt as to what to do, for he
slipped the poniard from its sheath, and began to cut a hole through the
wood in front of him and it did not take him long to have a place large
enough to see perfectly what was going on below. He took one long
earnest look.

"Gosh," he muttered to himself, "what a chance, what a chance; if I only
had my revolver with me, I'd corner that gang in short order." And so he
would.

Now this is what he saw, by the light of a mammoth fireplace filled with
great logs that sent a weird, but beautiful light glowing and then
wavering in shadows across the high arched ceiling. A few feet back from
the wide high fireplace with its roaring flame were four men playing
cards. They sat around a table, and three in appearance were villainous
cutthroats, probably Mexicans by their dark visages, swaggeringly armed
with knives and revolvers, with gaudy handkerchiefs knotted at their
throats.

The firelight showed the flash of their cruel eyes and teeth at some
stroke of fortune in the play, and Jim, who was not unaccustomed to see
and deal with dubious citizens, felt that right below him was the
hardest bunch that ill fortune had ever brought across his path. He was
not forgetting either the Apaches with whom he and his brothers had
enjoyed more than one fracas in the great Southwest.

But what the observer regarded with greatest interest was a group of
three well back in the shadow, and he needed none to tell him who that
short, squat figure was. He held a guitar, and was accompanying his own
songs while the other two joined in the refrain. It was his _bete noir_,
the Mexican dwarf who had recently robbed him, and out-maneuvered him on
two occasions at least.

Strange to say that if you did not see him, and only heard his voice you
would be certain that he was a lithe, Spanish cavalier, of the "oh
Juanita" type of lover, for his tone was neither guttural nor harsh but
smooth and melodious, and to-night for some reason he was inclined to
sentimental songs of the serenade kind, but this reason was soon to
appear.

"Who gets the Senorita Manuel, the one who came in the carriage this
evening, as though to a ball?" queried one of the players at the card
table. The words were spoken at an interval between games.

Jim almost stood up in his sudden enlightenment and wrath but he
bethought himself in time and with whitened knuckles he drove the
poniard held in his hand deep into the wood of the floor. This, in a
mild way served to express his feelings. At the question the dwarf
swaggered into the full light of the fire.

"I, Manuel de Gorzaga, will have the senorita, my voice will charm her,
and my money please her."

Jim could hardly restrain a scornful laugh at the audacity of the dwarf,
but he noticed that though the others regarded him askance they did not
ridicule him, but seemed to have a certain fear of his malignity, and
his cunning craft. Jim saw that he was clean shaven now and that he
moved his head back and forth in front of his hump, like an ugly hooded
bird, and his shadow was distorted on the high vaulted ceiling into
something horrible and of ill omen. To complete the picture, it is
necessary to say that he was dressed in gorgeous fashion in a suit of
slashed velvet, and a resplendent sash around his waist.

There was a marvelous celerity in his every movement, so that he was
like nothing so much as a richly colored spider, that darts from shadow
to pounce upon its victim. Jim vowed that he would not leave the castle
that night until the Senorita da Cordova, if a prisoner, was freed from
the power of this contemptible creature. But he was to find the
adventure which he had planned more difficult than was expected and that
was saying a good deal.

"How about the senorita's nice little nurse, Senor Manuel da Gorzaga?"
questioned one of the card players, with a sneer. "Perchance that person
may have something to say to your pretensions."

The dwarf regarded his questioner with a venomous look and then spat
emphatically on the floor, but he gave no reply except by an expressive
drawing of his fingers across his throat.

"The Duenna's throat is iron," replied the other speaker to this
pantomime; "she guards the captain's treasures like the dragon the
golden apples."

"I, too, am valuable to that old shark of the seas," replied the
Mexican, in most uncomplimentary terms to his master captain, William
Broome. "I know his many secrets, and it was I, Manuel, who got the
treasure from that long-legged, white-headed gringo" (Jim grinned at
this description of himself), "who would make one meal of the brave
captain if it were not for me, who am too wise for his thick head."

"Good for you, Humpty Dumpty," said Jim, under his breath, "you won't
have to hire anybody to blow your trumpet for you. Sorry I can't stay,
old chap, to hear the rest of your interesting and eloquent speech."

CHAPTER XXI

THE APPARITION

Jim now had one purpose in mind when he gracefully withdrew, and closed
the door behind him and stood in the upper hall once more and that was
to find where in the castle the Senorita da Cordova was. James waited
for a minute in the broad hall, not only to get accustomed to the
darkness, but to make sure that there was no one coming, or waiting for
him.

Our friend had not been taught by harsh experience to no purpose. Nor
had he fought the crafty Indian, and failed to learn something of their
strategy. So he closed the door as tenderly as a mother, who fears to
waken her sleeping babe, and then stood as still as stone waiting,
watching, listening. Well it was that he did so. What was that gray
bundle across the hall and lying in front of the door opening into the
library?

At first glance Jim thought that it might be the hound, but it was not
that. It looked more like a shapeless bundle of old clothes. Then under
the directness of his gaze the thing stirred, a head was slowly lifted,
and like the gradual resurrection from the cerements of death a figure
half rose, and a gaze from the gray hood that seemed to burn was fixed
upon him.

Next the figure half raised, moved straight and steadily in his
direction, noiselessly, but with terrible intentness, direct towards
him. Jim did not move. What was the use? It was his purpose to avoid all
disturbance or fracas, which would surely wreck his plan now for the
rescue of the senorita. He would see what this creature meant and he
merely moved his hands lightly, one to grasp, the other to defend a
possible thrust at his heart or throat.

To say that he was cool and unmoved would not be true; his heart thumped
and he could feel the blood beat in his ears, but he was not trembling
or unmanned, though curious chills crept all over his body. This person
had advanced now half the way toward him, moving with the same half bent
posture, and the left hand gripping the gray cloth at the throat,
forming a hood. Then the woman, within three feet of him, raised her
face, and looked at him with the wildest eyes ever set in a human
visage. They were shot with horror, terror and an insane desperation. By
the half light from the end of the hall Jim could not tell whether she
were young or old.

Her face seemed to be lighted by her terrible eyes, and from her robe
one lean hand crept, half curved as though to claw. It seemed as if at
any instant she might scream and clutch him and something must be done
forthwith. Jim returned her gaze soberly, but not defiantly, and there
was no fear in his eyes. For a moment she paused, a curious questioning
showing in her glance.

"I wish to see and speak to a young girl who has been brought to this
place," he said quietly. "I am her friend, and would do neither one of
you any harm. You see many things and you believe me and know that I
speak the truth."

That was a simple speech, but there was more wisdom in it than appears
on the surface. It was spoken directly and was phrased to grip with
confidence the woman's poor broken mind; and notice also, that there was
nothing to unduly excite her by a show of sympathy or to arouse her by
denouncing her oppressors, for she was no doubt another victim who had
been held for a ransom that had not been forthcoming.

She made no direct reply to Jim, but only threw her head back and
laughed noiselessly with wide opened mouth. Then leaving the spot she
glided to the staircase and bent down listening intently. As if
satisfied she returned in a moment and beckoned Jim to follow her, which
he was only too willing to do.

She was a strange guide and might lead him to his destruction, but he
was determined to follow her at all hazards for he must find the
senorita and that quickly. So he kept only a short distance behind the
gray crouching figure.

Going through the main hall they came to a fairly broad staircase,
leading to the third floor, thence along a hall dimly lighted to a
narrow winding stair, that brought the two of them to a round platform
of stone with rooms on three sides. This place was badly lit by a tallow
candle, held by a miner's holder, stuck into the wall.

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