There was a locked gate to prevent intrusion, but the Arrow was quickly hoisted over the fence, and Jack and his crew were in the saddle again.
It was evident that the road had not been used for a long time, for it was overgrown with grass, and the old wheel-tracks were hardly discernible. But it was fair riding, for the turf was thick and firm, and as it was early in the spring, it had only just begun to grow. Half a mile in and the Arrow was running swiftly and noiselessly through the thickest part of the college wood. The university buildings were but a quarter of a mile or so away, but it was only occasionally that they showed through the leafless trunks of the great oaks and chestnuts. Here and there a chipmunk scuttled away through the dry rustling leaves, and once an early robin piped up with an original spring poem. The silence and stillness seemed almost primeval; it might have been the first Sunday morning after the creation of the world; a laugh or an idle word would have broken the spell. And then—
"Hold hard!" came in a tense whisper from Jack, and his crew mechanically bore back on their pedals. The Arrow had stopped at the brow of a gentle declivity that widened out at the bottom into a little glade, which was now the scene of a drama that looked perilously like a tragedy to the startled eyes of the new-comers. In the middle of the open space stood a rude structure of rough stones some three feet high and six long, and upon it was stretched the figure of a man bound and gagged. At a little distance were grouped a dozen masked forms armed with odd-looking axes, and listening attentively to an incomprehensible harangue on the part of the one who appeared to be their leader.
The boys looked at each other with white faces. Ku-Klux? White Caps? It was possible. Whatever it was, it looked ugly enough in all conscience.
Jack Howard began to unstrap his carbine from the framework of the Arrow.
"Our cartridges are all blanks," whispered Dick Long, hurriedly.
"I know it," returned Jack, fumbling with nervous haste at the mechanism of the breech-block, "but I'm not going to stand here and see murder done."
"But what can we do?"
"See that your magazines are full, be ready to ride the Arrow so as to get that stone pile between us and the crowd, and, above all, let nobody fire until I give the word. It's twelve to four, and the only chance is to bluff them."
It seemed like a dream to stand there waiting for the moment of action, the motionless figure stretched upon the stones, the sunlight flickering upon the grim-looking axes of the twelve masked men, the monotonous, unintelligible drone of the speaker. And yet there was a something in the picture that made it terribly alive, for all that this was the year of Our Lord 1896, and the bells in the college chapel were even now ringing the call for evening prayers.