The City of Fire - Page 67/221

After Billy had listened a long time he took a single step to relieve

his cramped toes, which were numb with the tensity of his strained

position. Stealthily as he could he moved his shoe, but it seemed to

grind loudly upon the cement floor of the cellar, and he stopped frozen

in tensity again to listen. After a second he heard a low growl as if

someone outside the house were speaking. Then all was still. After a

time he heard the steps again, cautiously, walking over his head, and

his spine seemed to rise right up and lift him, as he stood trembling.

He wasn't a bit superstitious, Billy wasn't. He knew there was no such

thing as a ghost, and he wasn't going to be fooled by any noises

whatsoever, but anybody would admit it was an unpleasant position to be

in, pinned in a dark unfamiliar cellar without a flash light, and steps

coming overhead, where only a dead man or a doped man was supposed to

be.

He cast one swift glance back at the cobwebby window through which

he had so recently arrived, and longed to be back again, out in the

open with the bells, the good bells sounding a call in his ears. If he

were out wouldn't he run? Wouldn't he even leave his old bicycle to any

fate and run? But no! He couldn't! He would have to come back

inevitably. Whoever was upstairs in that house alone and in peril he

must save. Suppose--!--His heart gave a great dry sob within him and he

turned away from the dusty exit that looked so little now and so

inadequate for sudden flight.

The steps went on overhead shuffling a little louder, as they seemed

further off. They were climbing the stair he believed. They wore rubber

heels! Link had worn rubber heels! And Shorty's shoes were

covered with old overshoes! Had they come back, perhaps to hide from

their pursuers? His heart sank. If that were so he must get out somehow

and go after the police, but that should be his last resort. He didn't

want to get any one else in this scrape until he knew exactly what sort

of a scrape it was. It wasn't square to anybody--not square to the

doped man, not square to himself, not even square to Pat and the other

two, and--yes, he must own it,--not square to Cart. That was his

first consideration, Cart! He must find Cart. But first he must find

out somehow who that man was that had been kidnapped.

It seemed an age that he waited there in the cellar and everything so

still. Once he heard a door far up open, and little shuffling noises,

and by and by he could not stand it any longer. Getting down softly on

all fours, he crept slowly, noiselessly over to the cellar stairs, and

began climbing, stopping at every step to listen. His efforts were much

hampered by the milk bottle which kept dragging down to one side and

threatening to hit against the steps. But he felt that milk was

essential to his mission. He dared not go without it. The tools were in

his other pocket. They too kept catching in his sleeve as he moved

cautiously. At last he drew himself to the top step. There was a crack

of light under the door. Suppose it should be locked? He could saw out

a panel, but that would make a noise, and he still had the feeling that

someone was in that house. A cellar was not a nice place in which to be

trapped. One bottle of milk wouldn't keep him alive very long. The

haunted house was a great way from anywhere. Even the bells couldn't

call him from there, once anybody chose to fasten him in the cellar,

and find the loose window and fasten it up--!