CHAPTER XII.

SEVEN BURGLARS IN A SCRAPE.

The scene that followed beggars description. Mark had leaped forward to seize the Texan’s hand, shouting aloud:

“Stop! stop! It’s Grace Fuller!”

Texas started back in surprise; at the same moment came the shot, which was from the girl’s revolver. It was accidental, as she afterward declared, though the plebes did not know it then. The result frightened Grace even more than it did them, the bullet buried itself in the wall, but the sound of the report was followed by a wail of agony from the terrified Indian, which echoed down the hall. And Grace heard shouts from various parts of the hotel, doors opening, people running about, and she knew that her friends were in deadly peril.

A much more hopeless situation it would be hard to imagine; the girl was horrified. But her first thought was had she wounded Indian, and she dashed wildly down the hallway to them.

One glance at the huddled group of figures sufficed to answer that question. Before she could make another sound there came a bounding step upon the stairway.

“We’ll be discovered!” cried Mark. “Quick!”

He turned to the window; but a single glance outside showed him two figures running across the lawn. There was no hope of escape there. They were gone!

An instant later Grace Fuller’s clear tones rang in his ear.

“Come! Come!”

Like a flash she turned and dashed down the hallway to her room. Mark followed at her heels, and the rest of them, too, dragging the half-paralyzed and terrified Indian along, while the shouts and footsteps swelled louder and louder to urge them on.

They were just in time. Grace Fuller had scarcely time to push the last one in and then slam the door before three men, one of them her father, dashed around a turn of the hall and confronted her white figure standing at the door, the revolver still in her hand.

The huddled plebes inside were too alarmed to think. They heard the quick-witted girl call to the men:

“Here! Hurry up. This way!”

And then they heard the footsteps die away again, as the men with her at their head dashed down the hall toward the rear stairs of the building. They knew that for the time they were safe.

They stood panting and breathless, listening for a moment. They heard the noise at the rear increase; it was evident that everybody was hurrying in that direction. Mark sprang to the window and looked out. He saw three men running toward the foot of the ladder.

“There’s where they went up!” he heard one of them say.

And then came a shout from the rear and the three dashed around the building in that direction, leaving the lawn clear and the place deserted. Mark turned and cried to the others:

“Come! Quick! Now’s our chance!”

It was a desperate chance, but they took it.

“One dash for the camp,” whispered Texas. “Git in an’ hide, no matter what!”

They leaped out of the window and made a dash for the ladder. A second or two might make all the difference now. They might get a start, or again they might find a man with a revolver to stop them at the foot. It was a critical situation, and the plebes were quick as lightning, even Indian.

Texas dropped to the ground, and Dewey after him. They could not wait for the others to get down the ladder. Mark slid down like a flash, holding to the side with one hand. Indian slipped halfway and tumbled the rest. Chauncey, Sleepy and the Parson came down one on each side, almost on top of them, and a second or two later the Seven were at the foot staring about them like so many hunted animals.

“Come on!” cried Mark, seeing no one. “For your lives!”

They sprang forward and dashed away toward the camp. They had not gone a dozen yards before there came a shout from the rear of the hotel, a shout that swelled to a roar.

“There they go! Quick! Stop ’em! Halt!”

Halt? Not much! Those plebes were running as never did man run before. Even Indian was breaking records, fear urging him to prodigies of speed. Fortunately there was no one of the pursuers who was armed, but they were in hot pursuit, and their shouts might have the camp awake any moment.

It was a very short distance to the camp, but to the burglars it seemed a league. They expected a pistol shot any moment, and yet they could not run any faster. They bounded across the path, through the bushes and on, until suddenly a high embankment loomed up before them. It was Fort Clinton, and they dashed around the corner and into the camp beyond.

They were not so quick but that the foremost of those in chase saw clearly where they went; and the cry swelled out upon the breeze:

“The camp! The camp! The burglars are hiding in the camp! Don’t let them get out!”

Fortunately the sentry of the post had been at the other end of the path. There was no danger of his recognizing them, but he saw them cross his beat and vanish among the white tents. He heard the cry of “Burglars!” and as he came dashing down the path toward the spot his shouts ran out above the others:

“Corporal of the guard! Post number three!”

Camp McPherson was in an uproar ten seconds after that. The shouting awoke every cadet in the place and brought them all to their tent doors at a bound. The young corporal dashed out of the guard tent and around to the sentry’s aid, the tactical officer in command right at his heels with a clank of sword. At the same moment up rushed the crowd of excited half-clad men from the hotel.

“Burglars! Burglars! They’re hiding in the camp!”

The lieutenant (the tac) took in the situation in an instant. He dashed down the path, warning the sentries as he ran. The officer at the guard tent turned out the members of the guard a moment later and hurried them away to double the watch about the camp. At the same time the “long roll” was being sounded by a drum orderly up by the color line, summoning the cadets to form at once on the company street.

Truly those burglars were to have a hard time getting out of that trap, into which they had gotten so easily.

Meanwhile, what as to the Banded Seven? The time between when they entered camp and rushed into their two tents and when the company battalion formed was perhaps one minute. In that brief space the plebes had flung off their clothes and hid them feverishly under their blankets, then leaped into their uniforms and fallen into line. And that was the end of their danger.

The battalion once formed there was a hasty roll call, showing all present. And then began a search of the place. The officers, and some of the men from the hotel searched every tent, every spot within the camp. And when they found no burglars they gathered together and stared at each other and wondered how that could be. The tacs interviewed the sentries, and each swore that no burglars or any one else had run across their beats. After which came another search, and another failure, and more mystery.

That those burglars had been cadets on a lark no one dreamed. For they had been desperate-looking burglars, masked and armed. But where were they now?

No one knew, and no one knows to this day. The cadets returned to their tents, discussing the curious situation, and in a few minutes more the camp had settled into its customary stillness.