CHAPTER XVIII.

THE ENEMY STRIKE.

In the sudden silence which fell on the group at Jack’s low-spoken cry, not a sound was to be heard.

Captain Murray shook off Jack’s grasp on his arm and mounted another step.

“You’re hearing things, my boy. I didn’t hear a sound. Ah!”

The exclamation was jerked from him as, distinct, yet faint, there came a distant thud. It might have been the slamming of a door, or the dropping of some heavy object. What it was, Captain Murray did not wait to hear, but with a cry of “Come, come on, fellows,” he started to bound up the cellar steps, the bullseye of light from his torch showing a closed door at their head.

After him leaped the others, crowding the narrow stairway. But as Captain Murray reached the door and grasped the handle, he came to an abrupt halt. The door was locked. And as the others piled up behind him, there came to their ears the sharp crack of revolver shots, muffled by distance and intervening walls and floors, from somewhere in the body of the house above them.

“Something funny here,” muttered Captain Murray. “We left this door open.”

But in the same breath he was thrust aside and against the stone wall on his left, while a bulky form brushed by him on the right, along the unrailed edge of the stairway, and went crashing, shoulder first, into the locked door ahead. The door reeled under the impact, but still held. However, it was made of flimsy material and once more the big fellow who had taken the initiative crashed into it. The door flew outward, and the human battering ram with it, landing on hands and knees.

It was Bob. He jumped to his feet as first Captain Murray and then the others started forward over the breach which he had made.

“Which way?” he cried.

The spatter of revolver shots, heard when they had been crowded together on the stairway, had ceased. The house was silent about them. They looked at each other, nonplussed. Then Jack raising his voice shouted:

“Dad, Dad, where are you?”

A moment. Then from overhead came Mr. Hampton’s voice in reply:

“Up here, Jack. In the front room.”

There was a faintness in the tone, however, which was far from re-assuring and Jack cried again:

“What’s all the shooting for, Dad? You all right?”

A hollow groan was his only answer. And at that Jack thrust aside Captain Murray, who stood between him and a door leading from the kitchen, into which they had emerged from the cellar stairway, into the body of the house, and darted ahead.

“After him, fellows,” said Captain Murray, setting the example. “That’s the way upstairs.”

Jack in the lead, the rout streamed through a large room bare of furnishings as had been the kitchen, and lighted only dimly by reason of the fact that latticed shutters barred the several windows. Out of this into a long hall leading to the front door, then a sharp turn to the left and up a boxed-in flight of stairs. Heavy boots beat a tattoo on the bare boards.

Filled with terrifying fears on account of his father, Jack was racing madly in the lead, with Captain Murray at his heels, followed by Bob and Frank, and the others streaming after. At the head of the stairway, they turned again to the left, entering a corridor which led toward the street front. On the left, above the dark stairway, was a hand rail; on the right a number of doors opened into rooms, into which those of the party who, unlike Jack and Captain Murray, had not before been over the ground, peered as they ran by. But the rooms were unfurnished, except for mattresses and crumpled coverlets seeming to cover every available inch of floor space; and they were unoccupied, too. The corridor ended at the open door of a larger room than the others which faced on the street, and into this dashed Jack, going straight, with a strangled cry, to the form of his father. Mr. Hampton lay on a greasy mattress, near the front wall, and beside an open window looking out upon the street. His face was white, and his eyes closed, and the left shoulder of his light-colored, summer coat was stained dark.

Jack had no eyes for anyone but his father, beside whom he knelt with a choking cry which caused the latter to open his eyes.

“They got away, Jack,” said Mr. Hampton, painfully. “But you’re safe, aren’t you? I was afraid—”

His voice dropped to an unintelligible murmur, and his eyelids fluttered shut again.

Jack looked up, staring around wildly, as if for help. But the others had deserted him. And then for the first time he saw the other occupants of the big front room. In the far corner they lay—the two aviators who had accompanied the Hamptons and Captain Murray into the house, and Captain Cornell. All three were bound. Jack half rose to his feet in astonishment. Captain Cornell had been found bound and gagged when they first had gained entrance to the house. But how came these others so? When he and Captain Murray had descended to the cellar in search of the tunnel entrance, they had left his father on the lower floor, and the two aviators upstairs cutting Captain Cornell’s bonds. He passed a hand across his eyes.

Well, that mystery must be left to solution by the men loosing the bonds of the trio. His part was to get aid for his father. He called, and Bob and Frank broke away from the little group on the opposite side of the room and hurried to him. An ordinary emergency might have found Jack the coolest of the three. But in a case such as this, involving his father, positions were reversed. The poor fellow was half frantic. And Bob and Frank, with an exchange of understanding glances, elbowed him aside and went to their knees beside Mr. Hampton.

The latter again opened his eyes, and as his glance fell on them he spoke in a stronger voice.

“The bullet took me in the shoulder, boys,” he said. “Don’t think it smashed the bone, although it was a close shave. Wasn’t that knocked me out, but when I fell I struck the wall with my head. Cut off my coat, so you can see what to do. Then bind my shoulder up with something, and I’ll manage to survive, I reckon.”

His voice gained in strength as he proceeded, and on concluding he struggled to sit up. Jack with a gulp of relief got on his other side and thrust an arm beneath him. Bob, opposite, did likewise; and Mr. Hampton was raised to a sitting position against the wall.

“Stripping for action, Frank?” asked Mr. Hampton with an attempt to smile that ended in a grimace of pain. “No use. It’s all over. They, got away out of the window.”

Frank had torn off his light-weight summer coat and now ruthlessly stripping off his white linen shirt with a great popping of buttons ripped it in half from collar to neckband and began tearing the halves thus created into quarters.

“Making bandages,” he said. “Peel off his coat, fellows. Don’t stand there like ninnies.”

Jack and Bob hastened to comply, easing the wounded shoulder as much as possible, and, having removed the coat, stripped off the shirt sleeve, revealing a hole through the shoulder muscles, from which the blood was slowly pumping.

“Hurry, now, one of you, get some water,” commanded Frank. “Must be water somewhere. Jack, you’ve been through here. Maybe, there’s a bathroom. If not, there must be water in the kitchen. If you can’t find anything to put it in, take this cloth and wet it well.” And thrusting one of the long strips into Jack’s hands he sent him scurrying away with a peremptory gesture.

With another of the linen strips, Frank wiped the blood away from the wound in Mr. Hampton’s shoulder, discovering that the bullet had entered from the rear, where there was only a bluish mark that already had stopped bleeding, and had come out in front. “No sir, didn’t smash the bone,” he said, thankfully, as with deft fingers he felt of the wounded man’s shoulder. “You were in luck, Mr. Hampton.”

“I was that,” the other answered. “Came on them just as they were leaving. But here’s Captain Murray, wanting to hear my story,” he added glancing up at the aviator, who, striding across the room, was now bending anxiously above him. “I don’t know all that happened, Captain,” he said. “But between our friends over there and myself, I guess we can piece the yarn together.”