CHAPTER XXXVII CUT DOWN

It must have been a little before six o'clock on the following morning, when I was suddenly aroused from sleep, and, opening my eyes, saw my father, half-dressed, bending over me with his hand on my shoulder.

"Wake up, Hugh!" he cried, "wake up!"

I sat up in bed, bewildered and amazed. My father, with an anxious face, was rapidly putting on his boots.

"What has happened?" I asked, springing out of bed. "Is there anything wrong?"

"Dress yourself quick, and follow me. I am going to José's. Pietro has just come, and says that there was some desperate fighting last night between the brigands and some travellers on their way to Palermo. Two of the brigands were killed, but they have captured the man who killed them. Pietro thinks he was an Englishman. They will hang him this morning unless we can prevent it. Hurry, Hugh, and come after me. You don't know what those fellows are if they can lay their hands on any one who has killed one of their band. Sure as fate they'll hang him. I fear that we may be too late now. I shall take the mountain road."

All the time my father had been talking he had been completing a hasty toilet, and, now he had finished, he hurried from the room, and directly afterwards I heard Jacko cantering down the avenue. In a very few minutes I too was dressed and following him on foot.

Our villa was about four miles and a half from the hill on which Monsieur José and his friends had pitched their habitation, and it was uphill all the way, and a very rough road. The path—it was a mere mountain track—was covered with loose stones, and in many places was but a few feet wide. Below sloped, with the abruptness of a precipice, the green hillside, dotted with olive-trees and aloe shrubs, and above the vegetation grew more and more stunted, and great masses of rock jutted out and lay about the barren brown summit. I was running towards the sea, and the soft invigorating breeze which blew steadily in my teeth seemed to lend me an added vigour, for when I caught my father up, close to our destination, I was as fresh as at the start. Side by side we reached the chasm-like gorge which separated the range of hills which we had been traversing from the solitary one behind which was the brigands' dwelling-place. Here we halted, and my father, dismounting, put two of his fingers in his mouth and whistled a peculiar screech-like whistle, which I had often vainly tried to imitate.

At first there was no answer, save the echoes which came mockingly back again and again. Again he gave the signal, and this time one of the band made a cautious appearance from behind a knoll of trees, and, seeing who we were, came forward and threw a rough bridge, formed from the trunk of a tree, across the chasm. We were on the other side in a moment, and I hurried up the steep hillside, whilst my father remained behind to exchange a few sentences with the man whose vile patois I could not pretend to understand. He caught me up at the summit, and, without stopping, ran down the green footpath, calling out to me—

"Quick, Hugh, we shall only be just in time. They are going to hang him!"

Below us stretched the deep blue waters of the Mediterranean, gleaming and sparkling in the morning's sun, and though we were within a couple of hundred yards of our destination, not a sound broke the dead silence, nor was there any sign of human life anywhere about. We reached the edge of the cliff and half-fearfully looked down below. Instantly the whole view burst upon us, and we saw that we were but barely in time. As we looked upon the little scene, with its picturesque grouping, it seemed hard to believe that it was not some elaborate tableau which met our horrified eyes, rather than a grim, ghastly reality. Standing about on the smooth, velvety little stretch of turf, which seemed to hang right over the sea like a suspended platform, were the brigands, most of them with folded arms, and all with eyes fixed upon the little grove of cypresses. Foremost amongst them stood José, with a long cigarette between his thin lips, and a fierce, satisfied look upon his dark face. Simultaneously our eyes followed theirs, and a sickening horror crept over me, for, dangling from the boughs of one of the trees, was the struggling, quivering body of a man, whose feet, only a few inches from the ground, were making spasmodic but vain efforts to reach it. It was a fearful sight.

With a cry which rang out like the angry roar of a lion, my father sprang forward. For a moment he balanced himself on the edge of the cliff, and then with a single bound, which turned my heart sick to see, he leaped on to the plateau below. With fascinated eyes I watched him rush to the tree with the gleaming blade of a knife in his hand, and in a second the rope was severed, and the man lay in a heap on the ground, and then with a wild cry and a look on his face which no mortal painter could have depicted and no words describe, my father threw his hands up towards the heavens, and staggered backwards.

I rushed down the narrow path and stood by his side. His whole frame was shaking as though with a great horror; but his face, white to the lips, was rigid as solid marble. As he felt my touch upon his arm, he pointed with quivering finger to the man who lay doubled up upon the ground, although no sound came from them. With a new horror my eyes followed his gesture, and the man was my Uncle Rupert.

The momentary torpor into which my father's sudden appearance and action had thrown the little company of brigands had passed away, and with an angry exclamation José sprung forward.

"Mille diable! what did the Monsieur Anglais mean by this interference! How dared he thus presume to interfere with a simple act of justice!"

"Carlo! Paulato! String the fellow up again at once," he added, turning rapidly round.

My father seemed to have recovered himself; but, to my surprise, he stood stock still.

"Father, they will hang him again," I cried; but he never moved.

I looked into his face, and shrunk back terrified. The passionate hatred of a lifetime was convulsing and blackening his features, and flashing fiercely from his blazing eyes.

"Let them," he muttered, "let them. A dog's death is fittest for him!"

One swift thought saved him. He was Maud's father. I hastened forward and wrenched the rope from the hands of the men who were binding it together.

"Monsieur José," I cried, "tell me for what you hang this man? What has he done?"

"Killed two of my best comrades," was the prompt reply, "and by heaven he shall swing for it."

The rope was wrenched from my hands and adjusted round Rupert Devereux's neck. He was conscious now, but half dazed, and unable to make any resistance. Seizing him by the collar, I released him from the men's grasp, and dragged him with me to the side of the hill, against which I set my back. They sprang after me, but started back with a quick exclamation, for they looked into the black muzzle of my father's revolver.

"You are right, Hugh," he cried, "I was mad! Monsieur José, listen to me," he added quickly. "This man is an Englishman, and you know very well what that means! To take his life would be to compass your own extermination. He is a man of great position, and if you killed him, sure as there is a heaven above us you would be hunted out and hanged, every man of you."

"Who is to tell of his death?" José answered.

"I shall," was the firm reply. "And if you kill us, your fate is all the surer, for we too are English, and it is known that we have come here. Be sensible, José. Why kill him? What good will that do you? Why not a ransom?"

The battle was won, but Monsieur José did not yield all at once.

"He has killed two of my best fellows," he said sullenly.

"What of that? It was done in fair fight, I suppose? He did not attack them."

Monsieur José retired and consulted with his men. Presently he reappeared, smiling.

"Monsieur Arbuthnot," he said, "we are anxious to oblige a friend whom we value so much as you, but, at the same time, we feel the loss of two such well-beloved comrades as Pintro and Salino deeply; so deeply, in fact, that we cannot see our way to fix the ransom at less than two thousand pounds English."

"They shall have it," groaned Rupert Devereux, lifting his head.

"Good! Where is the money to be got?" inquired José, with twinkling eyes.

"There is as much in Rothschild's bank at Rome. Send one of your men to Palermo with a telegram, and let him wait till the money is wired to my credit. If you will give me something to write with, I will give him authority to draw it."

It was done, and then, whilst José withdrew to consult with his followers as to who should be the messenger, my Uncle Rupert turned slowly round and looked into my father's face.