The Hosts of the Air by Joseph A. Altsheler (books to read in your 20s .TXT) 📖

was dazed, and, after all a princess of the house of Auersperg had a right to her whims. It was not for him to question the minds of the great, and the heavy gold piece that John dropped into his hands was potent to allay undue curiosity.

The automobile properly equipped was before the main door of the inn within ten minutes. John helped into it the hooded and cloaked figure of the great lady, and her maid, also hooded and cloaked, followed. Then he sprang into his own seat, turned the wheel, and the huge machine shot down the road. But at the first curve it slackened speed, then stopped for an instant beside a dark figure, and when it went on again four instead of three rode.

Picard sat beside his daughter and in those two faithful hearts was no doubt of their escape.

"Antoine," said Julie, "I know that we owe our lives to you."

She offered him a small gloved hand. It rested in his giant grasp a moment, then he raised it to his lips and kissed it.

"I'd have followed you across the world, my lady," he said.

"I know it, Antoine."

John, watching intently, sent the machine forward at fair speed. The road again stretched before him lone and white in the moonlight, which fell in a heavy silver shower. He did not know where they were going, but there was the road, and the hussars could not ride hard enough to overtake them. Now and then he stole a glance at Julie, and the same indomitable courage was always shining in her eyes. She was not weary and she was as wide awake as he. By and by both Antoine and Suzanne slept, sitting upright, but Julie, wrapped almost to the eyes in cloak and hood, was still quiet, watching everything with wide fearless eyes. John brought the machine down to a slow pace and guided it for the moment with one hand.

"Julie," he said softly, "I don't know where we're going, but I know that we'll escape, and knowing it I now have something to ask you."

"What is it, John?"

"When we reach Paris, you'll marry me, Julie?"

"Yes, John, I'll marry you."

The other hand came from the wheel and as he leaned back, they kissed in the moonlight. The great machine ran on, unguided but true. They kissed again in the moonlight, and for a splendid moment or two her arms were about his neck.

"Julie," whispered John, "will your mother consent?"

"Yes, when I tell her to do so."

"And Philip?"

"Yes, without telling."

The automobile, still unguided, ran on straight and true as if it were alive, and knew that it carried the precious freight of two young and faithful hearts, and that nothing else in all the world was so tender and true as young love.

Far in the night, when the road had climbed up the hills, John saw a light flashing and winking in the valley, and from a more distant point another light winked and flashed in reply. He read the fiery signals and he knew that the alarm was abroad. The hussars had come to Obenstein, only to find that the birds had flown, and doubtless, too, to find among the bushes the dead body of Weber, Prince Karl's most trusted and unscrupulous agent. Julie had gone to sleep at last and Antoine and Suzanne slumbered on.

He alone watched and worked, and for a few moments he felt a chill of dread. The hussars would spread the alarm and the whole country would now be seeking them. He saw a road turning from the main one, and leading deeper into the mountains. Instinctively he followed it, like an animal seeking hiding in the wilderness, and now the machine rose fast on the slopes, dense forest lining the way on either side. Far below in the valley the lights and the wireless signals talked incessantly to one another and the hounds were hot on the chase.

It was about halfway between midnight and morning when John stopped the machine among dense pines on the very crest of a mountain, where the road, without any reason, seemed to end. Antoine awoke with a start and, springing out, began to curse himself under his breath for having gone to sleep.

"Take no blame, Antoine," said John. "You could have done nothing then, and it was much better for you to have slept. You now have back all your strength and we may need it."

Julie awoke with a start and after a moment or two of bewilderment understood. Then she gave John that old brilliant, flashing look, softened now by the memory of a kiss when no hand was at the wheel.

"Julie," said John, trusting as ever in her courage, "we seem to have come to the end of things. Our enemies are in the valley following us, and it's not hard to trace the path of our automobile. I don't know how many will come, but Antoine and I can make a stand with the rifles."

"All hope is not yet lost!" said Suzanne, in a voice as deep as that of a man. "Remember that when the earth cannot hide us the air may open to receive us. Remember, too, Mademoiselle Julie, that your brother seeks you, and when the time comes we are to look aloft."

Driven again by that extraordinary impulse, John and Julie gazed up. But they saw only the dancing stars in the blue velvet of the sky.

"He may come! He may come in time!" said Suzanne, speaking like an inspired prophet of old, and her manner carried conviction. John, clinging to the last desperate hope, recalled how Lannes and he had summoned Castelneau and Méry from the sky to save them, and though it was a wild hope he resolved to send up the same signal.

It was a quick task to gather dry wood and build a little heap, Julie and Suzanne helping with energy and enthusiasm. There were plenty of matches in the car, and presently John lighted the heap, which crackled and sent up leaping tongues of flame.

"It may serve also as a signal to those who follow us," he said, "but we must take the chance. Cavalry can't reach us except by the road that we came and with our rifles we can hold it a long time."

The mention of the word "rifle," put a thought in the head of Antoine Picard, in whose veins the blood of Vikings flowed, and who that night was a veritable Viking of the land. Leaving John and the two women to feed the signal fire, he secured one of the powerful breech-loading rifles from the automobile, and quietly stole down the path.

Antoine, although he held a modern weapon in his hand, had shed centuries of civilization. As still as death as he trod lightly in the dark road, he was, nevertheless, consumed with the wild Berserk rage against those who followed him. He knew that hussars would soon appear on the slope, but he intended that a lion should be in their path and he stroked lovingly the barrel of the powerful breech-loader. Behind him the flames were shooting higher and higher, pouring red streaks against the velvet blue of the sky. But all of Picard's attention was concentrated now on what lay before him.

He heard soon the distant beat of hoofs and he drew a little to the side of the road, down which he could see a long distance, as it stretched straight before him, narrow and steep. He made out clearly a half dozen figures, hussars struggling forward on tired horses, and he chuckled a little to himself. It was a splendid weapon that he held in his hand, and he was a great marksman. Armed as he was, he felt that he had little to fear on that lone mountain road from six or seven horsemen.

He pushed the rifle forward a little and waited in the shadow of the pines. The hoofbeats rang louder, and the shadows became the distinct figures of horses and men. Picard uttered a deep "Ah!" because he recognized the one who led them, a powerful, erect man, the Prussian Rudolf von Boehlen, now in the very center of the moonlight.

When they were yet two hundred yards away, Picard stepped into the middle of the road and called to them in a loud voice to halt. He saw von Boehlen throw up his head, say something to his troop, and then try to urge his horse to a faster gait.

Picard sighed. He knew that von Boehlen was a brave man and he respected brave men. A disagreeable task lay before him, one that must be done, but he would give him another chance. He called again and louder than before for them to halt, but von Boehlen came on steadily. Then Picard promptly raised his rifle and shot him through the heart.

When von Boehlen fell dead in the road his hussars halted and while they were hesitating Picard shot the horses of two under them, while a third received a bullet in the shoulder. Then all of them fled on horse or on foot into the valley while Picard went calmly back to the fire which was now sending its signal across the whole heavens. He told John in a whisper of what had befallen, and soon he returned to his place in the road to watch.

John and Julie by and by left Suzanne to feed the fire and they stood hand in hand gazing now at the heavens and now at the dark pine forests. The velvet blue of the sky faded into the dark hour and then the dawn came, edged with silver, turning to pink and then to gold, like a robe of many colors, drawn slowly out of the infinite. Suzanne suddenly uttered a great cry.

"Look up! Look up, my children!" she cried.

Coming out of the west which was yet in dusk was a black dot and then three others—behind it in Indian file.

"We're saved," cried Suzanne. "It's Monsieur Philip and his friends'"

"How do you know? You can't see yet," said John, almost afraid to hope.

"I don't need to see it! I feel it, and I know!" replied Suzanne. "Look, how they come!"

John trembled and the hand of Julie in his own trembled too, but it was not fear, it was the feeling that a miracle, a miracle to save them, was coming to pass.

The four black dots moved on out of the west and John knew that they were aeroplanes coming swiftly and directly toward their mountain. The dawn reaching the zenith spread also to the west and the flying machines were outlined clearly in the luminous golden haze. Then John, too, uttered a great cry.

He knew the slender sinuous shape that led. As far as eye could reach he would recognize the Arrow. The miracle was done. They had called to Philip in their desperate need and he had come.

"Philip and the Arrow!" he exclaimed. "We're saved!"

"I knew that he would come!" Julie said, as she stared wide-eyed into the blue and gold of the heavens.

Now the aeroplanes flew at almost incredible speed, the Arrow always at their head, poised for a few moments directly over their heads, and then came down in a dazzling series of spirals, landing almost at their feet.

"Philip, my brother!" exclaimed Julie, as the slender compact figure that they knew so well stepped gracefully from the Arrow.

He took off his heavy glasses and gazed at them as they stood, forgetting that they were still hand in hand. Then he smiled and lifting his cap in his old dramatic way he said:

"It seems that for several reasons I didn't come too soon."

"No," replied John, calmly, and holding firmly the little hand in his, "you have arrived just in time to give your consent to my marriage with your sister."

"And what does Mademoiselle Julie Lannes say?"

The rising sun clothed Julie in a shower of gold. Never before had the wonderful golden hair seemed more wonderful. Never before had she seemed to the youthful eyes of her lover more nearly divine.

"Julie Lannes says," she replied bravely, "that if John Scott wishes her to be his wife and her mother and brother consent she will gladly marry him."

"Now the aeroplanes flew at almost incredible speed, the Arrow always at their head"

"Then we must hurry away, or it will be a wedding; without either a bride or a bridegroom. Are not those Austrian hussars at the bottom of the slope, Picard?"

"Yes, monsieur."

"Then it's up and away with us. Here are Caumartin, Méry and Castelneau, old friends of yours, John, but it was Delaunois who brought