Sprague’s warning had not been baseless. The stair-head guard had doubtless seen Sprague shoulder the locked door open, and had sprung a still alarm. There was a hurrying of many feet in the hall, marking the gathering of the gambling-house fighting force. While Calmaine was asking for a weapon, the crowd in the hall began to batter at the door, against which Sprague had once more put his huge bulk, and were calling to Murtrie to open to them.
Sprague gave his directions snappily, as if he were signalling his foot-ball squad. “Draw that cot a little this way—that’s right. Now then, Archer, stand here against the wall with your two jail-birds, and when I give the word, rush ’em for the yard by the stairway entrance. If they don’t obey, plug ’em, and plug ’em quick. Maxwell, you and the boy get over on this side. When you’re ready, turn off that light. Quick! They’re going to charge us!”
The simple programme was carried out precisely and to the letter. When the rush came the room was in darkness, and Sprague stepped lightly aside. Thereupon a dozen charging men, finding no resistance in the suddenly released door, piled themselves in cursing confusion over the barricading cot.
“Now!” shouted Sprague, and the dash for liberty was made, with the big man in the lead clearing the hall of its stragglers, brushing them aside with his mighty weight or driving them before him like chaff in the fury of his onset. At the stair-head there were more coming up from below: Sprague caught the bullet-headed ring-fighter around the waist, and using him as a missile, cleared the stairway at a single throw. “Come on!” he yelled to those who were behind; and a moment later the unlocked door at the stair-foot gave them egress to the open air and to the yard where the automobiles were parked.
Quite naturally, the din of the battle had precipitated a panic in the unlicensed road-house, and the building was disgorging, through doors and windows, and even over the roofs of the shelter sheds. Tarbell drove his two prisoners into the tonneau of the hired car, while Maxwell promptly cranked the motor and Sprague lifted Calmaine bodily to the front seat. Ten seconds beyond this, while the panic was still at its height, the hired car, leading all others in the townward rush, was leaving a dense dust trail to befog its followers, and the capture and rescue were facts accomplished.
With Tarbell at the steering-wheel, the car sped silently through the western suburb and came into the deserted, echoing streets of the city. Without asking any questions, the ex-cowboy drove straight to the county jail and pulled up at the curb in front of the grim building, with its heavily grilled windows showing their steel barrings in the street light. Sprague passed the two prisoners out to him, jerking even the bigger of the two clear of the auto step as if he had been a feather-weight. But when Tarbell would have marched the pair across the sidewalk, Sprague called out.
Brushing them aside with his mighty weight or driving them
before him like chaff in the fury of his onset.
“Just one question, Givens,” he said brusquely. “You know what you’re in for; you know that you are still wanted in Cleveland on that charge of counterfeiting. But if you’ll answer one question straight, we’ll forget the Ohio indictment for the present. What did you do with the swag that you lifted a few hours ago?”
For five full seconds the black-haired man kept silence. Then he spoke as the spirit moved him.