The Dark Star

She smiled and continued on toward the stairs where the English agent

stood. Neeland and the Russian girl followed her.

The agent said: "There's 'ell to pay below, sir."

The depths of the house rang with the infernal din of blows falling on

iron shutters. A deeper, more sinister roar rose from the mob outside.

There was a struggle going on inside the building, too; Neeland could

hear the trampling and surging of men on every floor--voices calling

from room to room, shouts of anger, the terrible outcry of a man in

agony.

"Wot a rat's nest, then, there was in this here blessed 'ouse, sir!"

said the British agent, coolly. "If we get Breslau and the others on

the roof we've bagged 'em all."

The Russian girl was trembling so violently that Neeland took her by

the arm. But Ilse Dumont, giving her a glance of contempt, moved

calmly past the British agent to the head of the stairway.

"Come," she said to Neeland.

The agent, leaning over the banisters, shouted to a man on the next

floor: "Look sharp below there! I'm sendin' Miss Dumont down with Mr.

Neeland, the American! Take her in charge, Bill!"

"Send her along!" bawled the man, framing his face with both hands.

"Keep Breslau on the roof a bit and we'll 'ave the beggar in a few

moments!"

Somebody else shouted up from the tumult below: "It's war, 'Arry! 'Ave you 'eard? It's war this morning! Them 'Uns 'as

declared war! And the perlice is a-killin' of the Apaches all over

Paris!"

Ilse Dumont looked curiously at the agent, calmly at Neeland, then,

dropping one hand on the banisters, she went lightly down the stairs

toward the uproar below, followed by Neeland and the Russian girl

clinging to his arm with both desperate little hands.

The British agent hung far over the banisters until he saw his

colleague join them on the floor below; then, reassured, and on guard

again, he leaned back against the corridor wall, his pistol resting on

his thigh, and fixed his cold grey eyes on the attic stairs once

more.

The secret agent who now joined Neeland and Ilse Dumont on the fourth

floor had evidently been constructing a barricade across the hallway

as a precaution in case of a rush from the Germans on the roof.

Chairs and mattresses, piled shoulder high, obstructed the passageway,

blocking the stairs; and the secret agent--a very young man with red

hair and in the garb of a waiter--clambered over it, revolver in one

hand, a pair of handcuffs in the other. He lost his balance on top of

the shaky heap; strove desperately to recover it, scrambled like a cat

in a tub, stumbled, rolled over on a mattress.

And there Neeland pinned him, closing his mouth with one hand and his

throat with the other, while Ilse Dumont tore weapon and handcuffs

from his grasp, snapped the latter over his wrists, snatched the case

from a bedroom pillow lying among the mattresses, and, with Neeland's

aid, swathed the struggling man's head in it.