"I've slept like a log, Jason!" he cried briskly, as he leaped out of bed."Anything new--anything happened?""No, sir; not a thing," Jason answered."Only, Master Jim, sir"--the old man twisted his hands nervously--"I--you'll excuse my saying so, sir--I do hope you'll be careful to-night, sir.I can't help being afraid that something'll happen to you, Master Jim.""Nonsense, Jason!" Jimmie Dale laughed cheerfully."There's nothing going to happen--to me! You go ahead now and stay with the servants, and get them out of the road at the proper time."He bathed, dressed, ate his dinner, and was slipping cartridges into the magazine of his automatic when, within a minute or two of eight o'clock, Jason's whisper came from the doorway.
"It's all clear now, Master Jim, sir."
"Right!" Jimmie Dale responded--and followed Jason down the stairway, and to the head of the cellar stairs.
Here Jason halted.
"God keep you, Master Jim!" said the old man huskily."Good-night, Jason," Jimmie Dale answered softly; and, with a reassuring squeeze on the other's arm, went on down to the cellar.
Here he moved quickly, noiselessly across to the window--not the window of the night before, but another of the same description, almost directly beneath the one in his den above, that faced the garage and lay in the line of that black shadow path between the two buildings.Deftly, cautiously without sound, a half inch, an inch at a time he opened it.He stood listening, then.A minute passed.
Then he heard Benson open and shut the back door; then Benson in the yard; and then Benson's voice in a muttered and irritable growl, talking to himself, as he stamped around on the ground.
With a lithe, agile movement, Jimmie Dale pulled himself up and through the window--and began to creep rapidly on hands and knees toward the garage.It was dark, intensely dark.He could barely distinguish Benson's form, though, as he passed the other, the slight sounds he made drowned out by the chauffeur's angry mumblings, he could have reached out and touched Benson easily.
He gained the interior of the garage, and, as Benson, came on again, stepped lightly into the car, lifted the seat, and wriggled his way inside.
It was close, stuffy, abominably cramped, but Jimmie Dale was smiling grimly now.Thanks to Benson, there wasn't a possibility that he had been seen.He both felt and heard Benson start the car.
Then the car moved forward, ran the length of the driveway, bumped slightly as it made the street--and stopped.He heard Benson jump out and run back--and then he listened intently, and the grim smile flickered on his lips again.Came the sound of a footstep on the sidewalk close beside the car--then silence--the car shook a little as though some one's weight was on the step--then the footsteps receded--Benson returned on the run--and the car started forward once more.
Perhaps ten minutes passed.Three times the car had swerved sharply, making a corner turn.Then Jimmie Dale pushed up the seat, and, protected from observation from behind by the back of the car itself, crawled out and crouched down on the floor of the tonneau.
"Don't look around, Benson," he said calmly."Are we followed?""Yes, sir." Benson answered."At least, there's always been a car behind us, though not the same one.They're pretty clever.There must be three or four, each following the other.Every time I turn a corner it's a different car that turns it behind me.""How far behind?" Jimmie Dale asked.
"Half a block."
"Slow down a little," instructed Jimmie Dale; "and don't turn another corner until they've had a chance to accomodate themselves to your new speed.You are going too fast for me to jump, and Idon't want them to notice any change in speed, except what is made in plain sight.Yes; that's better.Where are we, Benson?""That's Amsterdam Avenue ahead," replied Benson.
"All right," said Jimmie Dale quietly."Turn into it.The more people the better.Tell me just as you are about to turn.""Yes, sir," said Benson; then, almost on the instant, "All ready, sir!"Jimmie Dale's hand reached out for the door catch, edged the door ajar, the car swerved, took the corner--and Jimmie Dale stepped out on the running board, hung there negligently for a moment as though chatting with Benson, and then with an airy "good-night" dropped nonchalantly to the ground, and the next instant had mingled with the throng of pedestrians on the sidewalk.
A half minute later, a large gray automobile turned the corner and followed Benson--and Jimmie Dale, stepping out into the street again, swung on a downtown car.The road to the Sanctuary was open!
In his impatience, now, the street car seemed to drag along every foot of the way; but a glance at his watch, as he finally reached the Bowery, and, walking then, rapidly approached the cross street a few steps ahead that led to the Sanctuary, told him that it was still but a quarter to nine.But even at that he quickened his steps a little.He was free now! There was a sort of savage, elemental uplift upon him.He was free! He could strike now in his own defense--and hers! In a few moments he would be at the Sanctuary; in a few more he would be Larry the Bat, and by to-morrow at the latest he would see--The Tocsin.After all, that "hour" was not to be taken from him! It was not, perhaps, the hour that she had meant it should be, thought and prayed, perhaps, that it might be! It was not the hour of victory.But it was the hour that meant to him the realisation of the years of longing, the hour when he should see her, see her for the first time face to face, when there should be no more barriers between them, when--""Fer Gawd's sake, mister, buy a pencil!"
A hand was plucking at his sleeve, the thin voice was whining in his ear.He halted mechanically.A woman, old, bedraggled, ragged, was thrusting a bunch of cheap pencils imploringly toward him--and then, with a stifled cry, Jimmie Dale leaned forward.The eyes that lifted to his for an instant were bright and clear with the vigor of youth, great eyes of brown they were, and trouble, hope, fear, wistfulness, ay, and a glorious shyness were in their depths.And then the voice he knew so well, the Tocsin's was whispering hurriedly:
"I will be waiting here, Jimmie--for Larry the Bat."