"They're coming faster this time," remarked Stoddard.

"Certainly. Their general has been cursing them

right heartily for retreating without the loot. He wants

his three-hundred-thousand-dollar autograph collection,"

observed Larry.

"Why doesn't he come for it himself, like a man?" I

demanded.

"Like a man, do you say!" ejaculated Larry. "Faith

and you flatter that fat-head!"

It was nearly eleven o'clock when the attacking party

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returned after a parley on the ice beyond the boat-house.

The four of us were on the terrace ready for them.

They came smartly through the wood, the sheriff and

Morgan slightly in advance of the others. I expected

them to slacken their pace when they came to the open

meadow, but they broke into a quick trot at the water-tower

and came toward the house as steady as veteran

campaigners.

"Shall we try gunpowder?" asked Larry.

"We'll let them fire the first volley," I said.

"They've already tried to murder you and Stoddard,

-I'm in for letting loose with the elephant guns," protested

the Irishman.

"Stand to your clubs," admonished Stoddard, whose

own weapon was comparable to the Scriptural weaver's

beam. "Possession is nine points of the fight, and we've

got the house."

"Also a prisoner of war," said Larry, grinning.

The English detective had smashed the glass in the

barred window of the potato cellar and we could hear

him howling and cursing below.

"Looks like business this time!" exclaimed Larry.

"Spread out now and the first head that sticks over the

balustrade gets a dose of hickory."

When twenty-five yards from the terrace the advancing

party divided, half halting between us and the

water-tower and the remainder swinging around the

house toward the front entrance.

"Ah, look at that!" yelled Larry. "It's a battering-ram

they have. O man of peace! have I your Majesty's

consent to try the elephant guns now?"

Morgan and the sheriff carried between them a stick

of timber from which the branches had been cut, and,

with a third man to help, they ran it up the steps and

against the door with a crash that came booming back

through the house.

Bates was already bounding up the front stairway, a

revolver in his hand and a look of supreme rage on his

face. Leaving Stoddard and Larry to watch the library

windows, I was after him, and we clattered over the loose

boards in the upper hall and into a great unfinished

chamber immediately over the entrance. Bates had the

window up when I reached him and was well out upon

the coping, yelling a warning to the men below.

He had his revolver up to shoot, and when I caught

his arm he turned to me with a look of anger and indignation

I had never expected to see on his colorless, mask-like

face.

"My God, sir! That door was his pride, sir,-it came

from a famous house in England, and they're wrecking

it, sir, as though it were common pine."




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