CHAPTER VII.

THE BRAND OF FEAR.

It was not a lively party that approached the clubhouse half an hour later. Merriwell had turned his captive over to Roger Clingwood and Jack Niles, and was devoting his attention to the dumb boy, who had so far recovered as to be able to walk with very little assistance.

Brose Stovebridge looked like another man. With dragging feet and eyes fixed on the ground, he was the picture of guilt as he slouched along between the two other clubmen. Roger Clingwood’s eyes, wearing a mingled expression of anger and humiliation, were set straight ahead, as though he could not bring himself to look at the fellow who had so disgraced his club. The homely, honest features of the other man, showed only a fierce contempt. Behind them straggled the curious party of golfers who had witnessed that extraordinary race.

As they approached the veranda, a tall, well-built fellow with bronzed face and pleasant gray eyes, stepped forward from the group assembled by the door.

“Hello, Niles,” he said, holding out his hand. “Awfully sorry I disappointed you yesterday, but it couldn’t be helped. I’m ready to run your champion to-day, though.”

“Glad to see you, Layton,” Niles said warmly. “I don’t know----”

Roger Clingwood’s cold, cutting voice interrupted him:

“We have no champion, Mr. Layton. Mr. Stovebridge will soon be no longer a member of the club.”

A gasp of astonishment went up from the listening members, and a feeling of utter desolation and despair swept over Stovebridge, who turned his back swiftly on the veranda.

“And if he were a member,” supplemented Niles, “he would no longer be champion. Dick Merriwell holds that honor at present. I have no doubt he will race you any time you wish.”

A look of pleased surprise flashed into Layton’s face as he caught sight of Dick for the first time, and, stepping forward quickly, he took the Yale man’s hand.

“Awfully glad to see you, old fellow,” he said warmly.

Then he turned to Niles.

“A race between us would be pretty much of a farce,” he smiled. “Apparently you don’t know him as well as I do. If there’s one fellow I’ll pull my colors to, it’s Merriwell of Yale.”

Roger Clingwood stepped forward and touched Niles’ arm.

“Take him upstairs and lock him in the end bedroom while I telephone the police,” he said in a low tone. “Much as I loathe the fellow, there’s no reason why he should be put to needless humiliation.”

With the disappearance of the two into the clubhouse, a perfect Bedlam of eager, breathless questions were flung at the other men of the party, and, as the story was briefly told, exclamations of amazement, contempt and scorn arose on every side. Some of the men were even incredulous. It did not seem possible that the dashing, debonair Stovebridge, one of the most popular of their number, and the best all-around athlete in the club, could have been guilty of such behavior; but they were at length convinced, and Roger Clingwood was urged to lose no time in summoning an officer to take him into custody.

As Brose Stovebridge crossed the threshold of the bedroom, his self-control snapped like a broken thread and he flung himself face downward on the bed, uttering a gasping cry of despair. Lying there, shaken with dry, racking sobs, he thought of the little child whose life had been the penalty of his recklessness. There was no doubt in his mind that she had died, and for the first time in his life the thought of his own troubles was swallowed up in the agony of that greater wrong he had done another.

Jack Niles gazed down at the man who had once been his friend, and his first feeling of infinite contempt gradually changed to pity. The man was suffering--suffering keenly; and Niles did not like to see any one suffer.

“Brace up, Stove,” he said roughly, but with kindly intent. “Take your medicine like a man. There’s no use crying over spilt milk.”

A shiver went through the other’s frame.

“It’s spilt--blood--I’m thinking about,” came in muffled gasps.

Suddenly he sprang to his feet and faced Niles. His eyes were full of unutterable despair; there were traces of tears on his cheeks, his hands clenched and unclenched ceaselessly.

“You won’t believe me, Jack,” he said in a strange, unnatural voice, “but I’m not thinking about myself, I don’t care what they do to me. It’s the idea of that little child, dead--killed by my own hand as surely as though I had shot her through the heart--that’s driving me mad.”

Niles opened his lips to speak and then closed them again. It was not up to him to tell Stovebridge that, so far as he knew, the child was not dead. She might have died that morning--they had been expecting it all night--and it would be cruel to raise any false hopes.

So he muttered a few rough words of sympathy and, closing the door, locked it on the outside.

His heart sank as he walked out on the veranda and saw the rugged face of little Amy’s father. The child must be dead, and he was telling Clingwood the sad news. He pressed up to the two.

“An’ so he says there ain’t any more fear of her dyin’,” the man was concluding. “She’ll be all right as soon as thet arm o’ hers gits well.”

“Splendid!” exclaimed Clingwood, his eyes brightening. “I can’t tell you how glad I am.”

Niles had heard enough. The child was not likely to die, and he hurried over to Dick Merriwell.

“Say, Dick,” he began hesitatingly, “Stove is pretty near crazy up there with the idea that he has killed the little girl. Now, Hanlon says she’s going to get well after all. Don’t you think you ought to tell Brose? He’s given up thinking about himself and says he don’t care what they do to him; but he’s just about wild with remorse. I hate to think of a fellow suffering the way he is.”

The Yale man hesitated for an instant, and then his face cleared.

“Why, yes, I’ll tell him,” he said readily. “If he were only thinking of the consequences to himself, it would serve him right to be kept guessing; but, as it is, that would only be needless cruelty.”

He turned quickly and disappeared into the house.

Upstairs, Brose Stovebridge was pacing up and down the room in a frenzied manner. His eyes were wild and his brown hands trembled as he lifted them now and then in an aimless fashion to his ghastly, set face.

“A murderer!” he muttered, in a strained voice. “Twice a murderer! I never thought of it in that light the other time.”

He stopped in front of the mirror and gazed fixedly at the reflection of his strangely altered face.

“What are you made of?” he whispered hoarsely--“what can you be made of to do the things you’ve done and not to care? Is there no soul, no conscience--nothing to make you care?”

He turned away from the glass, laughing harshly.

“Nothing there--nothing but a horrible face!”

Then fear seemed to grip him and drive remorse away.

“They’ve sent for the police!” he gasped wildly. “They’ll be here soon and drag me away. The jail, a barred cell, the courtroom full of scornful, grinning faces that were once my friends! And then--and then--perhaps, the electric chair!”

His voice sank to a vibrant whisper, and at the last words he caught at his collar like one choking.

“I can’t stand it!” he muttered. “I’m--afraid!”

Suddenly he stood erect and listened. Some one was coming upstairs. He crouched by the window, his white face turned breathlessly toward the door. Now they were coming down the hall. Another moment the key would turn, the door would open, and they would drag him away to prison. He shuddered.

“I can’t stand it,” he muttered--“I won’t stand it!”

Summoning all his resolution, he slipped through the window and hung by both hands. As the key clicked in the lock, he dropped to the ground, staggered, regained his footing with an effort, and then ran across the drive toward the automobile sheds.

He did not see Dick Merriwell’s head appear at the window and then quickly disappear. He did not know that he was flying from his own salvation. His one desperate thought was to get away.

He reached his car and, cranking the engine with feverish haste, sprang into the seat and swiftly backed her out. With a sharp turn, he went through the gears with a rush and started the car out of the club grounds at top speed.

As he dashed by the end of the veranda a yell arose:

“Stop him! Stop him!”

Several men ran out, waving their arms, but it was of no avail. He disappeared down the drive like a streak of light.

Merriwell, Niles and several others ran back for their cars to give chase; and as the fellow with the homely face and honest eyes bent to crank his engine, he shook his head seriously.

“He’s crazy,” he muttered to himself--“clean daffy. If something don’t happen pretty quick, I miss my guess.”

It was a long, long time before the jolly, happy-go-lucky Niles could thrust out of his mind the picture of that face--set, strained, and ghastly white, the eyes wide open and glittering with a strange light, the colorless lips parted over the clenched teeth. It was a face which bore the brand of fear; the face of one going to destruction.

Stovebridge whirled out of the club gates into the highroad, skidding, barely missing the ditch; but he did not pull down the speed a hair. Down the road he went, a blurred streak of red. He must get away. He would not be caught.

Presently he turned onto a narrower road which led over the hills into the more unsettled country. He knew they would follow him, and he meant to give them a long chase.

The road wound up hill and down dale, through farming country and wheat fields, with now and then a stretch of woods or meadow land. Once he flashed past a farmhouse where a woman stood drawing water from an old well, and as she caught a fleeting glimpse of his face, she gave a cry of horror and gazed after the thick cloud of dust, her hand lifted to her heart. The brand of fear was very plain.

On went the car like a flying monster. The man was pushing her to the utmost, and she responded nobly. They were nearing the river which he meant to cross by an old, unfrequented bridge close beside a deserted