CHAPTER XVI
THE STRUGGLE IN THE LONELY COTTAGE
"YOU'RE a bright sort of friend, Entwistle," was Peter's greeting. "Pushing off with young Farrar and leaving me in solitary contemplation of our host's library. Well, did you get any very important information?"
Entwistle groaned in mock dismay.
"Another of them!" he exclaimed dismally. "Bless my soul, Barcroft, have I to let you into the know, too?"
"You came a cropper once when you didn't take me into your confidence——"
"Don't rub it in," protested the Secret Service man. "I'll cry peccavi. But to return to our original subject. To be brief, young Farrar knocked over my bird. The fellow he shot is von Gobendorff. I've arranged for the man to be moved to Trebalda to-night. Meanwhile—and this is where you come in handy, Peter—Farrar and I are off to complete the coup, and I want you to cover our tracks."
The promise given, Entwistle's spirits rose, when at length, at about four in the afternoon, he bade his host farewell, Barcroft casually suggested that perhaps Farrar would like to walk part of the way with him.
"I'd go myself," added Peter, "only this confounded ankle of mine—an old injury, you know. Besides, Greenwood, we've got a lot to talk about old times."
Farrar and his companion kept along the Trebalda road until they were quite half a mile from the village of Penkestle, then making a considerable detour, they found themselves on the open moor, and roughly three miles N.W. of Broad Tor.
"Here's the spot," said Entwistle, unfolding a large-scale Ordnance map, during a halt made in order to charge and light pipes. "The cottage is shown—about fifty yards from the shaft of a disused copper mine. Whether the two suspects are deliberate traitors to their country, or whether they are unwillingly the tools of the unscrupulous von Gobendorff, remains to be proved; but they are tough characters, so we must be prepared for strong action."
Keeping to the low-lying ground as far as possible, the two men stealthily approached the stone cottage, until it lay revealed at a distance of about a hundred yards. That it was not deserted was evident by a wreath of pale-grey smoke rising into the still air, while tethered to a ring in its stonework was a small, sturdily-built Cornish pony, with a pair of panniers slung across its back.
"Looks like a flit, Farrar," remarked his companion. "I'll go first. You remain here. If I whistle, one blast will mean that things are progressing favourably, and you can help me round them up. Two blasts mean that there is trouble, so don't forget to keep your pistol handy."
Entwistle deliberately knocked out the ashes from his pipe and placed it in a stout leather case.
"Don't want to have an old pal broken in the scrap," he observed, as he put the case into an inner breast-pocket. "Well, au revoir."
Concealed behind a suitably situated clump of gorse Farrar watched the retreating form of his late companion until the latter gained the blank wall of the cottage, and then edged towards the window.
For some moments Entwistle listened, crouching under the sill of the window, then he boldly tried the door. It was locked. The sound of a peremptory knock wafted to the sub's ears. A little interval and the door was thrown open, and the Secret Service man disappeared from Farrar's view.
Five long-drawn minutes passed, but neither by sight nor sound did Entwistle give indication of the progress of his efforts. The sub was becoming anxious when two shrill blasts rent the air. Entwistle was in difficulty and called for aid.
Pistol in hand, Farrar cleared the intervening stretch of rough ground and dashed through the open doorway to his companion's assistance.
In his impetuosity the sub forgot to exercise due caution. A stick was thrust betwixt his legs, and, tripping, Farrar measured his length upon the ground. Slightly dazed by his fall, the sub was hiked up in the clutches of two burly men—a prisoner—and his automatic weapon taken from him.
Vainly he attempted to break away, but an excruciating pain warned him that his captors were applying a most efficacious arm-lock. To struggle more would mean a broken limb.
"Are you sure that there are no more of these prying Englanders, Schranz?" inquired one of the men, speaking in German.
The person addressed—he was the man who had bungled with the signals on the occasion of the attempt to blow up Poldene Bridge—went out, to return presently with the information that everything appeared quiet.
"It is well," rejoined the leader of the gang. "Now to settle with these meddlesome interlopers."
"It is easier said than done," remarked another.
The sub was taking stock of his surroundings. In a corner, and protected to a certain extent by an overthrown table, stood Entwistle, seemingly unperturbed at the danger that confronted him. Instead of two suspects there were four powerfully built men to be reckoned with.
"We'll wait till it's quite dark," resumed the last speaker, "and then these Englanders will be able to test the depth of the shaft. It is better than having recourse to pistol shots; and if their bodies are ever found, well, it will be concluded that they have met with a regrettable accident."
"Why wait?" grumbled Schranz. "Everything is clear outside. Every moment is precious, if we are to get away with whole skins."
"All right," assented the leader. "Two of us will be sufficient to keep the old one in order; you others can remove the young one. Don't be long about it."
With pistols in their hands the two Huns detailed to guard Entwistle covered their prisoner, while the others, seizing Farrar, began to haul him out of the cottage, despite a strenuous resistance on the part of the sub.
So fierce was the struggle that Entwistle's guards turned their heads to watch the fracas. It was exactly what the Secret Service man was waiting for. Without removing his right hand from his hip pocket he fired two shots in rapid succession.
With a yell one of his captors leapt a couple of feet into the air and fell in a huddled mass upon the earth floor.
{Illustration: "SEIZING FARRAR, BEGAN TO HAUL HIM OUT OF THE COTTAGE." [p. 172.}
The other spun round, made a futile attempt to raise his pistol and subsided heavily across the body of his companion.
Intent upon their particular task, Schranz and the fourth man had not realised the turn of events before Entwistle, watching his opportunity, placed a bullet through the former's right arm. Without a great risk of hitting the sub, Entwistle could not fire at the remaining miscreant.
Farrar was now quite equal to the occasion. Finding, although unaccountably to him, that he was engaged against only one man he let drive with a powerful left-hander. His fist struck the Hun fairly and squarely on the chin, and the man dropped like a log.
"Rather warm while it lasted," remarked Entwistle nonchalantly. "'Fraid I've spoilt a good pair of trousers. Any damage?"
"Not to me," replied Farrar. "By Jove! I made a most unholy bungle."
"And so did I," admitted his companion. "So you've nothing to brag about. I was quite under the impression that there were only two of the fellows here, and it gave me a bit of a shock to find four. It's a handy trick, Farrar, to know how to use a pistol without removing it from your hip pocket."
"You might as well extinguish the embers," remarked Farrar.
Entwistle clapped his hand to his smouldering garment.
"Thought I could sniff something burning," he said. "There are advantages and disadvantages to most things, and a pistol fired from one's pocket is no exception. Sorry I landed you in a bit of a mess."
"Not at all," protested the sub. "You saved me from—well—a long and decidedly unpleasant fall. What's the depth of a mine shaft?"
"Anything from two hundred to four hundred feet," was the reply. "As a matter of fact I had no doubts on that score. I knew that one against four was long odds, and reckoned on a division of work when you were collared. It was then an easy matter to dispose of a couple of the bounders, and that equalised things.... No, you don't, Fritz; hands up and behave yourself!"
This was to the man Schranz, who was furtively eyeing the open door, the while nursing his bullet-punctured arm. The fellow whom Farrar had floored was still in a dazed condition, muttering incoherently. Of the others, the leader of the gang was stone dead, Entwistle's shot having penetrated the brain; the other was fast shuffling off this mortal coil.
Deftly the sub dressed the arm of his late antagonist, for the small-calibre bullet had ripped an artery.
"Now what's to be done?" he inquired.
"Go without dinner, I'm afraid," replied Entwistle. He glanced at his watch.
"In another thirty-five minutes," he announced, "we will hand over our prisoners to the local police. I took the precaution this afternoon of telephoning to the superintendent at Trebalda. The cottage will be locked up and seals attached to the doors. To-morrow I can investigate its contents at my leisure. Now, our immediate business completed, I think we'll have a pipe—try this tobacco."