Knowing that it would be impossible for me to sleep until I had seen Forrest; knowing, too, how unlikely it was that he would now return to St. Albans before morning, I thought I might at least have one shot on my own account of bringing off the capture I so ardently desired. So, in case of an untoward accident happening, I scribbled a note to the detective, telling him briefly what I had heard from the servants, and my intentions; and making sure that my revolver was in working order, I bade my friends at the police-station good night, and departed.
I knew it would be useless to take the direct road to Bedford if I wished to meet the Pirate, and, as he had been reported going east, I took the route through Hertford, trusting that I might be able to cut him off upon his return. I gleaned nothing concerning him at either Hertford or Ware, and was so doubtful of proceeding further in that direction that I left it to the arbitrament of a coin to determine whether I should go on by a road with which I was unacquainted to Cambridge through Bishop's Stortford, or take a route I knew through Royston. The choice fell upon the Stortford road, and later I was glad I had taken it, for about a mile to the south of Stortford I discovered that I was upon the right track.
I was bowling along at about fifteen miles an hour when I came upon two horses grazing at the road-side. They galloped off at my approach, and, a few seconds later, I came upon a specimen of the Pirate's handiwork, which at first sight was irresistibly ludicrous. A brougham was drawn up at the side of the road, and, bound to the wheels, were a coachman and a footman, clad in gorgeous liveries. The coachman was fat and florid, the footman a particularly fine specimen of flunkeydom, and their faces, as the light of my lamps fell upon them—they could not speak, for they were both gagged as well as bound—were so convulsed with terror, that I could see they did not look upon me as a friend. As I dismounted from my car to go to their assistance, I heard a dismal wail from the roof of the vehicle and, looking up, I perceived a portly old lady perched upon the uncomfortable eminence.
I made an attempt to explain that my intentions were purely pacific, but as I could elicit nothing from the old lady but appeals to spare her life, I turned my attention to the two men, and speedily released them from their bonds. By the time they were loose they had realized that I was a friend; but it was some time before I managed to obtain from them an account of how they got into such a mess. Even when their powers of speech had returned they were unable to give a lucid account of the affair.
Of course it was the work of the Pirate. They had been returning with their mistress—the old lady on the roof of the brougham—from some local coming-of-age festivities, when they had met the rascal. He had bound the servants, set the horses free, and, after robbing the old lady of all the jewellery she wore, he had compelled her to climb to the position where I discovered her, threatening to return and kill her if she moved from her position for an hour. It needed much persuasion before she ventured to descend from her perch; but with the assistance of the coachman, I managed to get her inside the brougham, and further assisting in securing the two horses, I left them.
This incident delayed me for nearly half an hour, and it was a good deal past one before I again set out on my quest. The brougham had been stopped just near a bye-road, and as the footman had assured me that the Pirate had taken this path when he departed, I thought I would follow. I could see for myself that a motor-car had passed that way, for the thunderstorm of the previous day had left the roads heavy in places, and the marks of his tyres were plainly visible.
I had followed the road for about a couple of miles further when I came once more upon some of the Pirate's victims. These, too, were returning from the same function at which the old lady had been a guest, when they fell into the clutches of the Pirate. In this case my assistance was not required, for the two young ladies of the party had recovered sufficiently from their fright to have already set at liberty their male companion and the coachman. They told me of their experiences, and after I had heard them, I thought that Forrest's idea that the Pirate was a madman more likely than I had done previously.
When stopped by the Pirate, the husband of one of the ladies had shown fight until he had been felled by a blow from the butt end of a revolver. The coachman had discreetly made no resistance. Then, after securing the jewels the women wore, the Pirate had displayed a freakish humour quite new to his character. He had insisted upon the two women dancing for his amusement in the road, threatening to shoot the husband if they did not comply with his request. They assured me that he had sat chuckling with laughter, and urging them on with all sorts of wild threats, until they fell from exhaustion. They were splashed with mud from head to foot, and their dainty frocks presented a sorry sight. In addition they told me that they could barely stand, for their feet were cut to pieces, since, at the first steps of the weird dance, their slippers had stuck in the mud, and they were given no opportunity to stop and recover them.
I did not wait to hear more than the barest outline of the story, for I learned that he had left them not more than ten minutes before my arrival on the scene, and with the heavy roads, I thought there was at least a chance of some lucky accident bringing me face to face with my quarry.