The Viking's Skull

by John R. Carling

Idris, his curiosity getting the better of his fear, slipped from his mother's embrace, and, stealing to a second casement, looked through its latticed panes.

On the water was the boat he had noticed earlier in the evening, the boat that had been put out from the yacht. If its occupants had gone ashore for the purpose of taking some one aboard they had failed in their object, since the boat contained the same seven sailors. They were evidently in a state of perplexity: for, without any apparent motive, they were rowing backwards and forwards in a line parallel with the shore, the steersman now and then standing up and sweeping the coast with a night-glass.

Turning his eyes upon the yacht Idris saw jets of black smoke issuing from the funnel. The engineer was evidently getting up steam.

Here, thought Idris, was the explanation of the booming sound. The yacht was about to weigh anchor, and had fired a gun as a signal of departure.

The masked man, however, did not seem to think that the sound came from the yacht. With his body half out of the window he was staring at the plateau of brown moorland with its faint silvery crown—staring as if behind that white mist some exciting event were happening that he would fain witness.

Once more came the dull, rolling reverberation, and at that sound the man reeled from the window as if buffeted by a giant hand.

"Damnation! he has escaped," he hissed between his set teeth. "Is this their vigilance, after being warned of the plot? But my enemy shall not escape. I'll join in the chase myself. That gun invites pursuit. It is lawful," and here a sinister smile appeared beneath the fringe of his mask, "it is lawful to shoot a fugitive convict."

With that he darted from the room and dashed down the staircase: the slamming of a door followed, and the next moment his tread could be heard going up the street in the direction of the moorland prison.

The indignation felt by Mrs. Breakspear at the theft of the ring became lost in a new emotion. A convict had escaped, and the stranger's words seemed almost to imply that the fugitive was—her husband! She strove to banish this idea as a wild fancy, as a too daring hope on her part, but it would persist in forcing itself upon her. With her hand pressed to her side she sat, powerless to speak, trembling at the thought that at that very moment Eric Marville might be fleeing over the misty moorland with armed warders in close pursuit eager to bring him down with a carbine shot.

"Hark! there goes another gun," cried Idris. "Who is it that is firing, and why are they doing it?"