The Adventures of Jimmie Dale [62]
opening, voices were calling to one another--from the windows across the street he must stand out in sharp outline against the sky. Yes--he was seen now. A woman's voice, from a top-story window across the street, screamed out, high-pitched in excitement: "There he is! There he is! On the roof there!" Jimmie Dale started on the run along the roof. The houses, built wall to wall, flat-roofed, seemed to offer an open course ahead of him--until a lane or an intersecting street should bar his way! But they were not quite all on the same level, though--the wall of the next house rose suddenly breast high in front of him. He flung himself up, regained his feet--and ducked instantly behind a chimney. The crack of a revolver echoed through the night--a bullet drummed through the air--the Skeeter and his gang were on the roof now, dashing forward, firing as they ran. Two shots from Jimmie Dale's automatic, in quick succession cooled the ardour of their rush--and they broke, black, flitting forms, for the shelter of chimneys, too. And now the whole neighbourhood seemed awakened. A dull-toned roar, as from some great gulf below, rolled up from the street, a medley of slamming windows, the rush of feet as people poured from the houses, cries, shouts, and yells--and high over all the shrill call of the police-patrol whistle--and the CRACK, CRACK, CRACK of the Skeeter's revolver shots--the Skeeter and his hellhounds for once self-appointed allies of the law! Twice again Jimmie Dale fired--then crouching, running low, he zigzagged his way across the next roof. The bullets followed him-- once more his pursuers dashed forward. And again Jimmie Dale, his face set like stone now, his breath coming in hard gasps, dodged behind a chimney, and with his gun checked their rush for the third time. He glanced about him--and with a growing sense of disaster saw that two houses farther on the stretch of roof appeared to end. There would be a lane or a street there! And in another minute or two, if it were not already the case, others would be following the gunmen to the roof, and then he would be--he caught his breath suddenly in a queer little strangled cry of relief. Just back of him, a few yards away, his eyes made out what, in the darkness, seemed to be a glass skylight. A dark form sped like a deeper shadow across the black in front of him, making for a chimney nearer by, closing in the range. Jimmie Dale fired--wide. Tight as was the corner he was in, little as was the mercy deserved at his hands, he could not, after all, bring himself to shoot--to kill. A voice, the Skeeter's, bawled out raucously: "Rush him all together--from different sides at once!" A backward leap! Jimmie Dale's boot was crashing glass and frame, stamping at it desperately, making a hole for his body through the skylight. A yell, a chorus of them, answered this--then the crunch of racing feet on the gravel roof. He emptied his revolver, sweeping the darkness with a semicircle of vicious flashes. It seemed an hour--it was barely the fraction of a second, as he hung by his hands from the side of the skylight frame, his body swinging back and forth in the unknown blackness below. The skylight might be, probably was, directly over the stair well, and open clear to the basement of the house--but it was his only chance. He swung his body well out, let go--and dropped. With the impetus he smashed against a wall, was flung back from it in a sort of rebound, and his hands closed, gripping fiercely, on banisters. It had been the stair well beyond any question of doubt, but his swing had sent him clear of it. Above, they had not yet reached the skylight. Jimmie Dale snatched a precious moment to listen, as he rose, and found himself, apart from bruises, perhaps unhurt. There was commotion, too, in this house below, the alarm had extended and spread along the block--but the commotion was all in the FRONT of the house--the street was the lure. Jimmie Dale started down the stairs, and in an instant he had gained the landing. In another he had slipped to the rear