Sergeant Dick of the Royal Mounted Police A thrilling story of the Canadian woods
silent,” continued Inspector Medhurst. “If your uncle and cousins
_are_ innocent, Muriel Arnold, they will be afforded every chance of
clearing themselves by the law of the land, provided they submit
quietly. Haverty and Leclere, bring the Seymours aboard. Then we
will draw out and make for the ‘castle.’ Sergeant, will you take the
tiller, and steer?”
Gasping hard and staring wildly at each other, the two girls passed
inside the after-cabin, then stood embracing for mutual support,
while the police-troopers brought the Seymours aboard and hauled on
the anchor-rope, pulling the ark off-shore.
Amos and Abner had been thrown helplessly handcuffed and gagged into
two of the bunks in the fore-cabin. Bud Seymour was put in another
bunk and his wife was bound to the mast inside the cabin.
As the ark drew near “Water Castle,” Sergeant Dick and his
fellow-policemen saw that the gate in the “dockyard” palisading
stood wide, just as they expected it would be. The way in up to the
verandah or landing-stage was clear.
But standing half within, half without the door of the “castle,”
peering out anxiously, was old Alf, rifle in hand, while faces were
visible at two of the windows facing them. There were no lights
showing in the place; all had been extinguished, and most of the
windows in sight appeared to be shuttered.
“They heard the girls’ screams, and are on their guard, sergeant,”
Inspector Medhurst called in a low voice from the after-door of the
ark.
“I’m afraid so, sir. Sound travels far over water, and this lake is
famous for its remarkable echoes,” Sergeant Dick answered as
cautiously, turning the ark’s nose a degree so as to skirt the
palisading to the open gate.
“Ark, ahoy! Anything wrong? That you, Amos--Abner?” Old Man Alf
bawled to them.
Sergeant Dick was still wearing “Bud” Seymour’s hat and coat, and
again mimicking that old reprobate’s voice, shouted back:
“Of course, it’s Amos and Abner, and ‘Bud’ Seymour, too, a-comin’ to
see you, ole hoss! What do you think’s wrong?”
Old Alf evidently consulted with others of the garrison, but he
still seemed suspicious as he called out again:
“Amos, Abner, are you there? What did them there screams mean? We
heerd them right enough. Muriel--Jenny, is it all right wi’ you?”
“No, father, it isn’t,” shrilled Jenny on the instant, rushing to
the edge of the squared bow. “The police are here, and they are
after you and the boys. They’ve got Amos and Abner, and the two
Seymours, prisoners in the cabin. Those you see are police wearing
their hats.”
She shouted the words rapidly--all in one breath.
Muriel gasped in dismay and ran and clapped a hand over her mouth,
too late. She fought to free her mouth and shout something more, as
Inspector Medhurst and three of the troopers rushed forth from the
cabin and seized and dragged her and Muriel within it again.
“Oh, Jenny! Why were you so foolish? They will fight to the bitter
end now. I know they will--your father and brothers. You have sealed
their doom.”
“She has that, for, as I said, if they resist, we will show no
mercy--we cannot show any,” exclaimed Inspector Medhurst. Then he
stepped to the door again, and called out:
“Surrender, Arnold! Submit quietly, and you will all have the
benefit of a fair trial. Refuse, and resist us at your peril! You
know the penalty of defying us--the police.”
Old Alf had vanished within the door, which was now closed, and the
other faces were no longer visible at the windows. All the windows
in sight presented only their armored, loopholed screens.
Suddenly one of the screens was thrown open, and Aunt Kate’s voice
boomed forth, even as the bow of the ark scraped one of the gate
posts in the palisading, and the clumsy vessel swung slowly round to
enter the gate.
“Let my two sons and daughter whom you have prisoners come on to the
verandah and talk to us, and we’ll think about surrenderin’.”
Inspector Medhurst did not reply, but stepped back inside the
fore-cabin. He called through the after one for the two troopers
with Sergeant Dick to keep close behind the tiller-shield, with him.
“Stand on up to the house and lay us alongside the verandah,
sergeant,” he added.
“Do you hear me, you policemen?” roared the lion-like old woman
again. “Give my sons and daughter their liberty, let ’em join us,
and we’ll then talk about surrenderin’.”
“Your two sons aboard with us are prisoners, and as such they will
remain,” Medhurst answered, after another moment or two’s pause
during which Sergeant Dick ran the scow swiftly and deftly alongside
the verandah. “I will hold no further parley with you than to ask
you once more, ‘Do you surrender or do you not?’”
“Curse you, we will fight to the death!” roared out the voice of
Aaron.
An automatic pistol cracked rapidly from the open window, and bullet
after bullet from the weapon clanged against and ricocheted off the
steel tiller-shield, behind which Sergeant Dick and Troopers Bell
and Watts were standing huddled, showing not as much as an elbow,
fortunately for them.
“Hold your fire, troopers! Hold your fire!” bawled Inspector
Medhurst. “Within the ‘castle,’ there! Alf Arnold, listen to me. I
have no wish to fire on the house, as you have women with you. Let
them come out--your wife and two daughters-in-law--then, if you men
will not surrender, so much the worse for you. Send the women out,
anyhow, first of all.”
Abel, the other son in the house, had been quick to join in the
firing at the ark. But both desperadoes now ceased shooting, and a
silence intervened, broken at length by Aunt Kate’s voice, calling
out:
“No, no! Let Deb and Bella go, but my place is here. I will not
leave you, Alf, nor my brave lads.”
“They only want you to open the door so’s they can make a rush in.
Don’t be gulled, men,” shrilled the voice of Bella, Abel’s wife.
“We will take no such advantage of you,” the inspector bawled back,
“but, if you doubt my word, lower the women through your trapdoor
into a canoe.”
Another longish pause, broken only by murmuring voices within the
“castle”; and then old Alf Arnold called out:
“Very well, we will send the women out through the trapdoor.”
Aunt Kate and her daughters-in-law could be heard still fiercely
protesting against quitting their husband’s sides. But the men’s
arguments evidently prevailed, for presently the occupants of the
ark could hear noises under the “castle,” which told them the women
were being put into one of the canoes.
Sergeant Dick and Troopers Bell and Watts, by stooping and peeping
round the side of the tiller-screen, could see, through the piles
and cross-timbering under the verandah, the three women being
lowered in turn through the trap in the central passage of the
“castle” into a canoe drawn up under it. There were two other canoes
moored close by.
CHAPTER XXX--THE END OF THE WHITE HOODS, AND OF THE STORY
“Thank heaven for that mercy, Jenny. Your mother and sisters-in-law
will be out of the fighting,” panted Muriel.
As the words left her lips there came a loud “view-hallo!” from the
direction of the southern end of the lake, and, glancing
thitherwards, Sergeant Dick and Inspector Medhurst saw a dozen or
more canoes and rafts making for them.
For a moment the inmates of the ark believed that they were taken in
the rear by Indians, broken out on the warpath again. But the next
moment torches burst into flame in the leading canoes and revealed
that the new comers were cowboys and settlers from the surrounding
district. The red coat and Stetson hat of a police-trooper showed up
conspicuously in the foremost canoe under the bright torchlight.
Medhurst and Sergeant Dick recognized the man as the trooper who had
been dispatched for reënforcements immediately after Dick’s rescue
from the White Hoods.
Hails were exchanged between the troopers in the ark and the
would-be avengers in the canoes; explanations were called for, and
given freely.
“It means that we’ve rounded up and cornered the last of the White
Hoods, men,” Inspector Medhurst shouted to those in the canoes. “Old
Man Arnold and his sons, his wife and two daughters-in-law with the
two Seymours, ‘Bud’ and his wife, formed the entire gang, as we
discovered. They tried to blow us up in the hills, where they’ve got
a secret duffing-yard stocked full of cattle, sheep, and horses, all
awaiting identification now. But we escaped the diabolical plot,
thanks be, and here we are with Amos and Abner Arnold and the two
Seymours prisoners, and just waiting for Mrs. Arnold and the other
women to come out before falling on and capturing or wiping out the
last three male members of the band--Old Alf and his two eldest
sons.”
A yell of vengeful rage and fierce execration went up from the
canoes on the words; and the cowboys and settlers in the canoes were
all for attacking the “castle” from the other three sides in
conjunction with the police in the ark.
But Inspector Medhurst again called out:
“No, no, men, you must keep at a distance. This is our affair--for
us police to settle. And you wouldn’t rob us of any of the glory of
the capture of the place? We are strongly entrenched inside this
vessel, while you’d have no more chance in your canoes and on those
rafts than the redskins had in their late siege of the place. I
cannot allow you to throw away your lives in any such foolish
attack. You would all be wiped out and not be able to accomplish
anything.”
The canoe containing Aunt Kate and her two daughters-in-law, Bella
and Deborah, now came up to the little gate in the timbering under
the “castle.” Unlocking the padlock upon it, the women opened it and
paddled out.
“You had better come aboard the ark, Mrs. Arnold,” called the
Inspector.
The women were nothing loath to do so, dreading with reason the
reception they would get from their infuriated neighbors in the
canoes and on the rafts. Every man’s hand was against the White
Hoods, and all belonging to them; their atrocities had enraged every
one, English, French, and Indian.
As the three women stepped aboard and passed by Sergeant Dick behind
the tiller-screen, they each gave him a look of awful hate and
vengeful longing.
Barely had the cabin door closed upon them than from three of the
front windows of the “castle” three rifles rang out and as many
bullets clanged again against the tiller-screen covering Sergeant
Dick and Troopers Bell and Watts.
The police still held their fire, but Sergeant Dick saw the
after-door of the ark open cautiously a few inches again, and
Inspector Medhurst peep round it and beckon to him--indicate by
jerking a finger that he and the two troopers were to move the
tiller-screen close up against the door.
This the trio promptly proceeded to do. They contrived to do so
without exposing themselves in any way, but caused two of the
outlaws in the “castle” again to blaze away furiously at their
shield.
When it was alongside the after-door, Medhurst put into Dick’s hands
a small barrel or keg, with a candle thrust into the open bunghole.
“Sergeant,” he whispered, “here is a keg of gunpowder. Slip under
the verandah in the canoe and put it just beneath the door, then
light the candle and get back as smartly as you can. We shall have
to push off promptly to escape the force of the explosion. Will you
do it?”
“Certainly, inspector. Where did you find the keg?”
“Inside one of the store-cupboards. The sight of it suggested the
idea.”
“One moment, sir! Would it not be better to blow in the western or
eastern wall? You remember what I told you about the drop-floor in
the front room? The gap would want some getting over, if they let it
down, even if we got in the front as the Ogalcrees did, in the face
of their fire from the inner rooms.”