The Mad King [65]
Barney was about hopeless. He had been in the war zone long enough to know that it might prove a very disagreeable matter to be caught sneaking through back alleys at night. There was a single chance--a sort of forlorn hope--and that was to risk fate and make a dash beneath the sentry's nose for the opposite alley mouth.
"Well, here goes," thought Barney. He had heard that many of the Austrians were excellent shots. Visions of Bea- trice, Nebraska, swarmed his memory. They were pleasant visions, made doubly alluring by the thought that the reali- ties of them might never again be for him.
He turned once more toward the sounds of pursuit--the men upon his track could not be over a square away--there was not an instant to be lost. And then from above him, upon the opposite side of the alley, came a low: "S-s-t!"
Barney looked up. Very dimly he could see the dark out- line of a window some dozen feet from the pavement, and framed within it the lighter blotch that might have been a human face. Again came the challenging: "S-s-t!" Yes, there was someone above, signaling to him.
"S-s-t!" replied Barney. He knew that he had been dis- covered, and could think of no better plan for throwing the discoverer off his guard than to reply.
Then a soft voice floated down to him--a woman's voice!
"Is that you?" The tongue was Serbian. Barney could understand it, though he spoke it but indifferently.
"Yes," he replied truthfully.
"Thank Heaven!" came the voice from above. "I have been watching you, and thought you one of the Austrian pigs. Quick! They are coming--I can hear them;" and at the same instant Barney saw something drop from the win- dow to the ground. He crossed the alley quickly, and could have shouted in relief for what he found there--the end of a knotted rope dangling from above.
His pursuers were almost upon him when he seized the rude ladder to clamber upward. At the window's ledge a firm, young hand reached out and, seizing his own, almost dragged him through the window. He turned to look back into the alley. He had been just in time; the Austrian sentry, alarmed by the sound of approaching footsteps down the alley, had stepped into view. He stood there now with leveled rifle, a challenge upon his lips. From the advancing party came a satisfactory reply.
At the same instant the girl beside him in the Stygian blackness of the room threw her arms about Barney's neck and drew his face down to hers.
"Oh, Stefan," she whispered, "what a narrow escape! It makes me tremble to think of it. They would have shot you, my Stefan!"
The American put an arm about the girl's shoulders, and raised one hand to her cheek--it might have been in caress, but it wasn't. It was to smother the cry of alarm he antici- pated would follow the discovery that he was not "Stefan." He bent his lips close to her ear.
"Do not make an outcry," he whispered in very poor Serbian. "I am not Stefan; but I am a friend."
The exclamation of surprise or fright that he had expected was not forthcoming. The girl lowered her arms from about his neck.
"Who are you?" she asked in a low whisper.
"I am an American war correspondent," replied Barney, "but if the Austrians get hold of me now it will be mighty difficult to convince them that I am not a spy." And then a sudden determination came to him to trust his fate to this unknown girl, whose face, even, he had never seen. "I am entirely at your mercy," he said. "There are Austrian soldiers in the street below. You have but to call to them to send me before the firing squad--or, you can let me remain here until I can find an opportunity to get away in safety. I am trying to reach Serbia."
"Why do you wish to reach Serbia?" asked the girl sus- piciously.
"I have discovered too many enemies in Austria tonight to make it safe for me to remain," he replied, "and, further, my original intention was to report the war from the Serbian side."
The girl hesitated for a while, evidently in thought.
"They are moving on," suggested Barney.