The Secret Mark

by Roy J. Snell

  CHAPTER XXII MANY MYSTERIES

  One might have supposed that, considering she was now late into the nightof the most exacting and exciting day of her whole life, Lucile, once shewas safely stowed away in her berth on the train, would immediately fallasleep. This, however, was not the case. Her active brain was still atwork, still struggling to untangle the many mysteries that, during thepast weeks, had woven themselves into what seemed an inseparable tangle.So, after a half hour of vain attempt to sleep, she sat bolt upright inher berth and snapped on the light, prepared if need be to spend the fewremaining hours of that night satisfying the demands of thatirreconcilable mind of hers.

  The train had already started. The heavy green curtains which hid herfrom the little outside world about her waved gently to and fro. Herwhite arms and shoulders gleamed in the light. Her hair hung tumbled in amass about her. As the train took a curve, she was swung against thehammock in which her heavy coat rested. Her bare shoulder touchedsomething hard.

  "The books," she said. "Wonder what my new acquirement is like?"

  She drew the new book from her pocket and, brushing her hair out of hereyes, scanned it curiously.

  "French," she whispered. "Very old French and hard to read." As shethumbed the pages she saw quaint woodcuts of soldiers and officers. Herewas a single officer seated impressively upon a horse; here a group ofsoldiers scanning the horizon; and there a whole battalion charging avery ancient fieldpiece.

  "Something about war," she told herself. "That's about all I can makeout." She was ready to close the book when her eye was caught by aninscription written upon the fly leaf.

  "Looks sort of distinguished," she told herself. "Shouldn't wonder if thebook were valuable because of that writing if for nothing else." In thissurmise she was more right than she knew.

  She put the book carefully away but was unable to banish the questionswhich the sight of it had brought up. Automatically her mind went overthe incidents which had led up to this precise moment. She saw the childin the university library, saw her take down the book and flee, saw herlater in the mystery cottage on Tyler street. She fought again the battlewith the hardened foster mother of the child and again endured thetorturing moments in that evil woman's abode. She thought of themysterious person who had followed her and had saved her from unknownterrors by notifying the police. Had that person been the same as he whohad followed her this very night in an attempt to regain possession ofthe two books? No, surely not. She could not conceive of his doing her anact of kindness. She thought of the person who had followed them to thewall of the summer cottage out at the dunes and wondered vaguely if hecould have been the same person who had followed them on Tyler street atone time and at that other saved her from the clutches of the child'sfoster parents. She wondered who he could be. Was he a detective who hadbeen set to dog her trail or was he some friend? The latter seemedimpossible. If he was a detective, how had she escaped him on this trip?Or, after all, had she? It gave her a little thrill to think that perhapsin the excitement of the day his presence near her had not been noticedand that he might at this very moment be traveling with her in this car.Involuntarily she seized the green curtains and tried to button them moretightly, then she threw back her head and laughed at herself.

  "But how," she asked herself, "is all this tangle to be straightened out?Take that one little book, 'The Compleat Angler.' The child apparentlystole it from Frank Morrow; I have it from her by a mere accident; FrankMorrow has it from one New York book shop; that shop from another; theother from a theologian; he from a third book shop; and that shop morethan likely from a thief, for if he would attempt to steal it from meto-night, he more than likely stole it in the first place and wasattempting to get it from me to destroy my evidence against him. Now ifthe book was stolen in the first place and all of us have had stolenproperty in our possession, in the form of this book, what's going tohappen to the bunch of us and how are we ever to square ourselves? Lastof all," she smiled, "where does our friend, the aged Frenchman, thegodfather of that precious child, come in on it? And what is the meaningof the secret mark?"

  With all these problems stated and none of them solved, she at last founda drowsy sensation about to overcome her, so settling back upon herpillow and drawing the blankets about her, she allowed herself to driftoff into slumber.

  The train she had taken was not as speedy as the one which had taken herto New York. Darkness of another day had fallen when at last sherecognized the welcome sound of the train rumbling over hollow spaces atregular intervals and knew that she was passing over the streets of herown city. Florence would be there to meet her. Lucile had wired her thetime of her arrival. It certainly would seem good to meet someone sheknew once more.

  As the train at last rattled into the heart of the city, she caught anunusual red glow against the sky.

  "Fire somewhere," she told herself without giving it much thought, for ina city of millions one thinks little of a single blaze.

  It was only after she and Florence had left the depot that she notedagain that red glow with a start.

  The first indication that something unusual was happening in that sectionof the city was the large amount of traffic which passed the street carthey had taken. Automobiles, trucks and delivery cars rattled rapidlypast them.

  "That's strange!" she told herself. "The street is usually deserted atthis time of night. I wonder if the fire could be over this way; butsurely it would be out by now."

  At last the traffic became so crowded that their car, like a bit ofdebris in a clogged stream, was caught and held in the middle of it all.

  "What's the trouble?" she asked the conductor.

  "Bad fire up ahead, just across the river."

  "Across the river? Why--that's where Tyler street is."

  "Yes'm, in that direction."

  "Come on," she said, seizing Florence by the arm; "the fire's down towardTyler street. I think we ought to try to get to the cottage if we can.What could that child and the old Frenchman do if the fire reached theircottage? He'd burn rather than leave his books and the child wouldn'tleave him; besides there are the books that belong to other people andthat I'm partly responsible for. C'm'on."

  For fifteen minutes they struggled down a street that was thronged withexcited people.

  "One wouldn't believe that there could be such a crowd on the streets atthis hour of the night," panted Florence, as she elbowed her way forward."Lucile, you hang to my waist. We must not be separated."

  They came to a dead stop at last. At the end of the river bridge a ropehad been thrown across the street. At paces of ten feet this rope wasguarded by policemen. None could pass save the firemen.

  The fire was across the river but sent forth a red glare that wasstartling. By dint of ten minutes of crawling Florence succeeded insecuring for them a position against the rope.

  A large fire in a city at night is a grand and terrible spectacle. Thisfire was no exception. Indeed, it was destined to become the worst firethe city had experienced in more than forty years.

  Starting in some low, ancient structures that lay along the river, itsoon climbed to a series of brick buildings occupied by garment makers.The flames, like red dragons' tongues, darted in and out of windows. Witha great burst they leaped through a tar-covered roof to mount hundreds offeet in air. Burning fragments, all ablaze, leaped to soar away in thehot currents of air.

  The firemen, all but powerless, fought bravely. Here a fire tower reareditself to dizzy heights in air. Here and there fire hose, like a thousandentwined serpents, writhed and twisted. Here a whole battery of fireengines smoked and there two powerful gasoline driven engines kept up aconstant heavy throbbing. Roofs and walls crumbled, water tanks totteredand fell, steel pillars writhed and twisted in the intense heat, chimneyscame crashing in heaps.

  The fire had all but consumed the row of four-story buildings. Then witha fresh dash of air from the lake it burst forth in earnest, a real a
ndterrible conflagration.

  Lucile, as she stood there watching it, felt a thousand hithertounexperienced emotions sweep over her. But at last she came to rest withone terrible fact bearing down upon her very soul. Tyler street was justbeyond this conflagration. Who could tell when the fire would reach themysterious tumble-down cottage with its aged occupant? She thought ofsomething else, of the books she might long since have returned to theirrightful owners and had not.

  "Now they will burn and I will never be able to explain," she toldherself. "Somehow I must get through!"

  In her excitement she lifted the rope and started forward. A heavy handwas instantly laid on her shoulders.

  "Y' can't go over there."

  "I must."

  "Y' can't."

  The policeman thrust her gently back behind the rope and drew it downbefore her.

  "I must go," she told herself. "Oh, I must! I must!"