CHAPTER XXIII
THE POLICE DOG
Dillon pulled a whistle from his pocket and blew a short blast sharply.Far down the road, we could hear faintly an answering bark. It camenearer.
"They're taught to obey a police whistle and nothing else," remarkedDillon, with satisfaction. "I wonder which one of the dogs that was. Bythe way, just keep out of sight as much as you can--get back up in ourcar. They are trained to worry anyone who hasn't a uniform. I'll takethis dog in charge. I hope it's Cherry. She ought to be around here, ifthe men obeyed my orders. The others aren't keen on a scent even whenit is fresh, but Cherry is a dandy and I had the man bring her uppurposely."
We got back into our car and waited impatiently. Across the hills nowand then we could catch the sounds of dogs scouting around here andthere. It seemed as if every dog in the valley had been aroused. On theother slope of the hill from the main road we could see lights in thescattered houses.
"I doubt whether they have gone that way," commented Garrick followingmy gaze. "It looks less settled over here to the right of the road, inthe direction of New York."
The low baying of the dog which had answered Dillon's call was growingnearer every moment. At last we could hear it quite close, at thedeserted car ahead.
Cherry seemed to have many of the characteristics of the wild,prehistoric animal, among them the full, upright ears of the wild dog,which are such a great help to it. She was a fine, alert, up-standingdog, hardy, fierce, and literally untiring, of a tawny light brown likea lioness, about the same size and somewhat of the type of thesmooth-coated collie, broad of chest and with a full brush of tail.
Untamed though she seemed, she was perfectly under Dillon's control,and rendered him absolute and unreasoning obedience.
"Now, Cherry, nice dog," we heard Dillon encouraging, "Here, up here.And here."
He was giving the dog the scent from the deserted car. His voice rangout sharply in the night air, "Come on Garrick and Marshall. She's gotit. I've got her on leash. Follow along, now, just a few feet behind."
Cherry was on the trail and it was a hot one. We could just see hermagnificent head, narrow and dome-like, between the keen ears. She wasworking like a regular sleuthhound, now, too, slowly, picking up thetrail and following it, baying as she went.
She was now going without a halt or falter. Nose to the ground, she hadleaped from the bandit's car and made straight across a field in thedirection that Garrick had suspected they would take, only a little tothe west.
"This is a regular, old-fashioned man hunt," called back Dillon, as wefollowed the dog and himself, as best we could.
It was pitch dark, but we plunged ahead over fields and through littleclumps of trees, around hedges, and over fences.
There was no stopping, no cessation of the deep baying of the dog.Cherry was one of the best and most versatile that the police had everacquired and trained.
We came to the next crossroad, and the dog started up in the directionof the main road, questing carefully.
We had gone not a hundred feet when a dark object darted out of thebushes at the side of the road, and I felt myself unceremoniouslytumbled off my feet.
Garrick leaped aside, with a laugh.
"Dillon," he shouted ahead at the top of his voice, "one of theAiredales has discovered Marshall. Come back here. Lie still, Tom. Thedog is trained to run between the legs and trip up anyone without apolice uniform. By Jupiter--here's another one--after me. Dillon--Isay--Dillon!"
The commissioner came back, laughing at our plight, and called off thedogs, who were now barking furiously. We let him get a little ahead,calling the Airedales to follow him. They were not much good on thescent, but keen and intelligent along the lines of their training, andperfectly willing to follow Dillon, who was trusting to the keen senseof Cherry.
A little further down, the fugitives had evidently left the road aftergetting their bearings.
"They must have heard the dogs," commented Garrick. "They are doublingon their tracks, now, and making for the Ramapo River in the hope ofthrowing the dogs off the scent. That's the game. It's an old trick."
We came, sure enough, in a few minutes to the river. That had indeedbeen their objective point. Cherry was baffled. We stuck close toDillon, after our previous experience, as we stopped to talk overhastily what to do.
Had they gone up or down, or had they crossed? There was not much timethat we could afford to lose here in speculation if we were going tocatch them.
Cherry was casting backward in an instinctive endeavour to pick up thetrail. Dillon had taken her across and she had not succeeded in findingthe scent on the opposite bank for several hundred yards on either side.
"They started off toward the southwest," reasoned Garrick quickly."Then they turned in this direction. The railroads are over there. Yes,that is what they would make for. Dillon," he called, "let us followthe right bank of the river down this way, and see if we can't pickthem up again."
The river was shallow at this point, but full of rocks, which made itextremely hard, if not dangerous, to walk even close to the bank in thedarkness. "I don't think they'd stand for much of this sort of going,"remarked Garrick. "A little of it would satisfy them, and they'd strikeout again."
He was right. Perhaps five minutes later, after wading in the coldwater, clinging as close to the bank as we could, we came to a sort ofrapids. Cherry, who had been urged on by Dillon, gave a jerk at herleash, as she sniffed along the bank.
"She has it," cried Garrick, springing up the bank after Dillon.
I followed and we three men and three dogs struck out again in earnestacross country.
We had come upon a long stretch of woods, and the brambles and thickgrowth made the going exceedingly difficult. Still, if it was hard forus now, it must have been equally hard for them as they broke throughin the first place.
At last we came to the end of the woods. The trail was now fresher thanever, and Dillon had difficulty in holding Cherry back so that the restof us could follow. As we emerged from the shadow of the trees into theopen field, it seemed as if guns were blazing on all sides of us.
We were almost up with them. They had separated and were not half amile away, firing at random in our direction, as they heard the dogs.Dillon drew up, Cherry tugging ahead. He turned to the Airedales. Theyhad already taken in the situation, and were now darting ahead at whatthey could see, if not scent.
I felt a "ping!" on my chest. I scarcely realized what it was until Iheard something drop the next instant in the stubble at my feet, andfelt a smarting sensation as if a sharp blow had struck me. I bent downand from the stubble picked up a distorted bullet.
"These bullet-proof coats are some good, anyhow, at a distance,"remarked Garrick, close beside me, as he took the bullet from myfingers. "Duck! Back among the trees--until we get our bearings!"
Another bullet had whizzed just past his arm as he spoke.
We dodged back among the trees, and slowly skirted the edge of thewood, where it bent around a little on the flank of the position fromwhich the continuous firing was coming.
At the edge we stopped again. We could go no further without coming outinto the open, and the moon, just rising, above the trees, made us anexcellent mark under such conditions. Garrick peered out to determinefrom just where they were firing.
"Lucky for us that we had these coats," he muttered, "or they wouldhave croaked us, before we knew it. These are our old friends, theanaesthetic bullets, too. Even a little scratch from one of them and weshould be hors de combat for an hour or two."
"Shall we take a chance?" urged Dillon.
"Just a minute," cautioned Garrick, listening.
The barking of the Airedales had ceased suddenly. Cherry was strainingat her leash to go.
"They have winged the two dogs," exclaimed Garrick. "Yes--we must tryit now--at any cost."
We broke from the cover, taking a chance, separating as much as wecould, and pushing ahead rapidly, Dillon under his breath keeping
Cherry from baying as much as possible.
I had expected a sharp fusillade to greet us as we advanced andwondered whether the coats would stand it at closer range. Instead, thefiring seemed to have ceased altogether.
A quick dash and we had crossed the stretch of open field thatseparated us from a dark object which now loomed up, and from behindwhich it seemed had come the firing. As we approached, I saw it was ashed beside the railroad, which was depressed at this point some twelveor fifteen feet.
"They kept us off just long enough," exclaimed Garrick, glancing up atthe lights of the block signals down the road. "They must be desperate,all right. Why, they must have jumped a freight as it slowed down forthe curve, or perhaps one of them flagged it and held it up. See? Thered signal shows that a train has just gone through toward New York.There is no chance to wire ahead, either, from this Ducktown siding.Here's where they stood--look!"
Garrick had picked up a handful of exploded cartridge shells, while hewas speaking. They told a mute story of the last desperate stand of thegunmen.
"I'll keep these," he said, shoving them into his pocket. "They may beof some use later on in connecting to-night's doings with what has gonebefore."
We looked at each other blankly. There was nothing more to do thatnight but to return to the now deserted house in the valley where wehad left Forbes in charge of Dillon's man.
Toilsomely and disgusted, we trudged back in silence.
Garrick, however, refused to be discouraged. Late as it was, heinsisted on making a thorough search of the captured house. It provedto be a veritable arsenal. Here it seemed that all the new and deadlyweapons of the scientific gunman had been made. The barn, turned intohalf garage and half workshop, was a mine of interest.
We found it unlocked and entered, Garrick flashing a light about.
"There's a sight that would do McBirney's eyes good," he exclaimed ashe bent the rays of the light before us.
Before us, in the back of the barn, stood Warrington's stolen car--atlast.
"They won't plot anything more--at least not up here," remarkedGarrick, bending over it.
In the house, we found Jim still with Forbes, who was now completelyrecovered. In the possession of his senses, Forbes' tongue which theanaesthetic gases seemed to have loosened, now became suddenly silentagain. But he stuck doggedly to his story of kidnapping, although hewould not or could not add anything to it. Who the kidnapper was heswore he did not know, except that he had known his face well, bysight, at the gambling joint.
I could make nothing of Forbes. But of one thing I was sure. Even if wehad not captured the scientific gunman, we had dealt him a severe andcrushing blow. Like Garrick, I had begun to look upon the escapephilosophically.