The Dragon-Slayer

Front matter

BY ROGER POCOCK AUTHOR OF "TALKS OF WESTERN LIFE " J " THE RULES OF THE GAME " j "THE ARCTIC NIGHT " J ETC. LONDON : CHAPMAN AND HALL, Ld. TO MY SISTER MISS LENA ASHWELL THIS WORK IS GRATEFULLY DEDICATED Once upon a time the Earth was a Woman; And she was in great peril from a Storm-cloud, which was a Dragon ; But the Sun, who was a Man, slew the Dragon and saved the Woman. Such is the myth, known to all races and in all ages, which was brought home by the English Crusaders as the story of Saint George and the Dragon. Upon our pound sterling this national legend is depicted, as emblematical of our Imperial honour, our Imperial faith ; and this because we British peoples see in the " Woman in Peril " our poor humanity ; in the Dragon, a symbol of evil ; in the Dragon-slayer, the image of a saving mightier power.

It is the faith of our race that Right shall triumph; but nowhere in the English-speaking world does the war between Good and Evil rage more furiously than in the United States, and nowhere are the issues more momentous than in New York, which is perhaps the future Capital of this Planet. There THE DRAGON-SLAYER VIII has been laid the scene of this work, which is not a criticism of American Institutions, nor a political document, nor even a novel with a purpose ; but, in all humility, the telling again of an old myth in a new age. A KEY TO THIS PARABLE The Dragon is Selfishness The Dragon-slayer is Altruism The Princess is the Commonwealth CONTENTS CHAPTER PAGE I. Prologue . . . . . i II. Enter two Vagrants . . 9 III. Enter a Princess . . . . 20 IV. Enter the great Philanthropist . . 30 V. The Fighting Editorship . • • 39 VI.

Enter the late Fighting Editor . . 46 VII. AS REGARDS DYNAMITE . . . . 56 VIII. Enter the Priest . . 68 IX. A Firebug Woman . . 80 X. An Ancient Reprobate . . . . 98 XI. The Price of Admiralty . . . 108 XII. The King's Bequest . . . . 122 XIII. A Power behind the Throne . . .133 XIV. The Siege Perilous . . . . 150 XV. The Dragon Awakes . . . . 165 XVI. Treachery . . . . . 176 XVII. The Drawing of the Sword . . 188 XVIII. The Dragon's Shadow . . . . 199 XIX. First Blood . . . . . 212 XX. "The Blade of the Sword alone is no Longer Sufficient" . . . .218 CONTENTS XII CHAPTER PAGE XXI. The First Revelation . . . . 226 XXII. The Second Revelation . . . 241 XXIII. The Third Revelation . . . 253 XXIV. The Plan of Campaign . . . 263 XXV. The Horrors of War . . . . 274 XXVI. Mobilising . . . . . 291 XXVII.

Prologue

r I "HE pilot train wakened the night with its -*- clangour, swayed with many a rolling jolt and bump at the rail-joints, climbed the track with gigantic labour, vented quick gasps of exhaustion in triumph of conquest. Up above its raining steam-clouds, its flame - hued smoke, waved the dim branches of pine trees against vistas of starlit crags, that towered height upon height into the white solitude of the snow-fields. Echoes rang clear from awakening cliffs ; but even the train's uproarious challenge was drowned in the calling of many waters, that answered the gusts of the night wind far up among the glaciers. Sharp the cry of the rails as the torturing wheels rolled onward, mid roar of flame, outbursts of steam, the jangle, the clamour, the deafening pæan of victorious invasion ; for the black forests fled by in silence, the solemn cliffs opened, and hills rolled i; away past cutting and snow-shed, tunnel and culvert, even to the parting of the waters at the summit of the Continental Divide.

Down with the runnels that race for the Pacific, down with bright streamlets new-born of the pine woods, away by loud torrents milk-white from their glaciers, the train that had vanquished the sierra, that had awakened the secret places of the Rocky Mountains, rushed on westward to startle the gorges with the outcry of man, with the turbulence of man's engines, with the deafening clangorous wheels of his chariots. But the echoes were dying away in the canyons, the snows lay still, the tiny stars in the drifts looked up with glittering eyes at the greater stars above, at awful constellations blazoned in strange devices on the 'scutcheon of the heavens, on the shield of the Almighty, that guards God's peace beyond. Yet even while the blustering engine, which had climbed over the very topmost ridge of the con tinent, was winding its cautious way down the loops to the lower gorges, a second train was following this pilot over the high sierra, climbing the long steeps of the Atlantic slope like a serpent of glistering lights with a blazing eye.

That was the private train of the Railroad King following in safety — following in safety, while the pilot ventured headlong, lest a fallen tree, or burning forest, or

PROLOGUE.

3 broken culvert, or ambushed rockslide imperil the master of the line. So the pilot train, with its dazzling headlight, glittering lamps, and flamelit steam, awakened the slumbrous starlit canyons, shaking all the earth with its roaring wheels ; and the fireman fed the flames of the furnace, on his foothold of earthquake, breathing the cyclone, labouring heavily in a glory of light. Though it crashed past the cliffs, swayed on the curves, roared over bridges, the monster was reined by the driver's hand, held in the merciless vice of the brakes, while the headlight cleft the blackness, while the rails stretched down in its glare, the serpentine rails writhing white in their torment, winding onward and onward, without stay or Behold a bar of blackness athwart the quivering steel — rails riveted by murderers across the track !

"Jump!" screamed the driver. He flung himself from the footboard, and was dashed headlong against the precipice, while the conductor and his brakes man jumped from the caboose, both falling fearfully wounded. But the fireman stood at his post, and loosened the brakes — he might sweep the obstruction aside. He set his teeth, grasped hard at the levers. The engine leaped upward, the train was wrenched from the track, and launched with whirling wheels and confused noise into space— rolling over and over in the air. The stars were raining down their light into the silence, the breathless silence, that listened to the river crooning sleepily among the pebbles, while sprays of the cedars whispered furtively lest they should disturb the song birds in their sleep. The fireman felt the breath of the night on his forehead, opened his eyes, saw the white mists trailing along the forest, and felt that his feet were heavy as though they were of the hills.

But the hills seemed to be full of dull pain, his body was part of the pain, and when he stirred the pain became agony. Turning his head a little, he looked idly up the pass, where moved a glistering serpent of lights with a blazing eye, winding and writhing down the loops. Then he heard a steam whistle screaming three times, knew it for the signal of the master's train, full of people — driver, conductor, brakesman, a fireman, who did not know that the track was barred — who must be warned, or they would perish. " Is there anybody here ? " he screamed. " Help ! help ! " And the cliffs took up the cry : "Help! help!" The man was sick with horror, the sweat stood on his forehead, because the doomed train was coming nearer, nearer. He lifted himself up on one elbow, groaning ; with heavy eyes stared at the wreck piled up in front of him — at the beam that pinned his

PROLOGUE.

5 ankles to the earth, at the splintered planks above it, and the engine lying crushed just beyond. He found a handful of cotton waste in his pocket, hunted in his clothes, and laid his fingers on a bunch of matches ; then, racked with the pain, reached forward, thrust the waste among the splinters, struck a match, and set the wreck on fire. There were dry twigs and pine cones lying about, which, gathering up, he piled on the burning waste ; but his fire spluttered, almost dying out. He wished now that it would go out, for he was barely come to his heritage of manhood, and it was no easy thing to give his body to the flames ; but he looked up the pass, and went on piling the cones and brush wood until there were no more within the reach of his arms. Then he lay back enjoying the warmth, resting — for the dull throbbing of his pain was a relief after the torture of moving — and put up his hands to shield his face from the glare.

Now the canvas overalls were scorched against his legs, smouldering a little where the cinders fell ; the growing heat made him feel sick ; he lay back with arms stretched out, making the figure of the cross, as though his body rendered supplication. His eyes wandered listlessly from bush to bush, from tree to tree, within the radiant circle of the fire — his gaze fastened suddenly upon the face of a man, red in the glare, with gaping mouth, with eyes that seemed to burn : a strong, malignant face, branded with the brand of Cain — murder incarnate ! And now he could see a hand raised to shelter the eyes that gazed up the pass, a hand that seemed stained with blood ; he could see the body of the man crouched down among the bushes, stealing furtively among the branches, noiseless, coming nearer, nearer, trying to beat out the flames, to destroy the signal fire that alone could save the train.

The wounded man lifted himself upon his elbows ; before his eyes the whole world seemed reeling in monstrous circles like a wheel, with that awful face in the midst glaring upon him ; the red hands had seized a fragment of burning timber ; it swung threatening in the air, it was whirling down " Murderer ! " he screamed ; " murderer ! " Then his skull seemed to burst ; he was drifting down, down into darkness that had no end. ♦ Swinging dreamily along the smooth track, in the golden sunrise of a world where there seemed to be no pain, the fireman lay noting the rumble of cul verts, measuring with his mind the length of a tunnel, lapsing into half-sleep, or dreaming awake. " It 's the five-mile tangent," he thought ; " we 're nearing Revolversburg. We '11 turn her over to Jim at the roundhouse ; then to the Railroad Hotel for

PROLOGUE.

7 an all day sleep. Who 's that whispering ? What are they talking about ? " " You know him then ? " The voice was deep and gentle. " Know him ? Why of course I do. He was firing for poor Matt Fortescue on the pilot — that 's young Brand Haraldson. Mr. Gault, I think I ought to tell you the wreck wasn't set alight by accident." "What do you mean, conductor?" " I mean, sir, that when this youngster was lying pinned down by the brake-beam, he seen your train coming down the grade ; and he knew that if he didn't make some signal, you was going to be smashed." The wounded man opened his eyes, to find him self lying in a great bed, curtained with silken hangings. Beyond he could see the dimly-lighted room, the state bedroom of a palace car. By the door stood the conductor, cap in hand ; and beside the bed sat an old, old man, with silvery white hair, who looked up with wistful, troubled eyes, as the official continued silent.

" Well ? " said the deep, soft voice. " Brand knew, sir," the conductor went on, " that unless he made some sort of signal, you was going to be smashed. He made the only signal he could — set the wreck on fire, knowing that he must be burnt to death. He threw away his life to save yours." That," muttered Brand Haraldson feebly, "is a lie. The old man looked round, startled by the in terruption. " 'T ain't true," said Brand ; " take me out of this bed." Then, disdainfully : " Railroad Kings ain't nothing to me. I signalled to save the train men." The Railroad King leaned forward in his chair, grasping the boy's rough hand in both his own. " Rest, my dear lad," he whispered. " For the sake of the lives you saved to-night, I am your friend for ever, Brand Haraldson. Sleep, my dear lad, sleep."

Brand fell back exhausted among the pillows ; and, as though in a dream, he heard the deep voice speaking : " Hilda. Did you hear, child ? It 's only heroes who dare to tell all the truth ! " Then, in the dream, Brand felt something fluttering near him. He heard a little sob, so he looked up, and there was a woman bending over him. Her face was full of pity ; her eyes glittered as though with tears. For sometimes, very near the gates of death, men's eyes are opened, and they see angels ; then, if their time is come, the angels lead them by the hand. But Brand went back for a little into the world's darkness, and his eyes were sealed in sleep.

Chapter II. Enter Two Vagrants

" T T is four o'clock, I hear the faint rustling of the *- wings of dawn — and it 's deuced cold. The orb of day, sir, forsakes the Old World, leaving it to wallow in the gloom of monarchial tyranny, that it may shed its radiance upon this glorious hemisphere of freedom." So rhapsodized the seediest of all tramps as he crawled feebly on to an empty packing-box against the wall of a shed. He seemed the more an object of compassion because his was a frock coat that had become green with age, a fashionable top hat which was masquerading as a smashed accordion. His trousers were such as could never have foreseen the evil day when they would be belted with a yard or so of dirty lamp wick, his boots must have been invalided and put out to grass when he adopted them ; yet the man's bearing made a forlorn protest of respectability which even the foulest linen could not quite repudiate.

He was weak with prolonged starvation, his jaws were rough with grey bristles, his alert eyes sunken away in shadows of tragic depth ; yet the face was of lionlike strength, and a man has no small courage who can laugh when it would be a relief to die. "Sir," he continued, arranging himself the while on his perch ; " I have the pleasure of introducing you to New York, metropolis of a republican paradise, bounded on the east by Feudal Ruin, on the west by the Slough of the Orient, on the south by the Tropic of Cancer, on the north by the Aurora Borealis. Behold, Mr. Brand Haraldson, the zinc cornices of the future capital of this planet, the chosen home of the eagle Freedom, head-quarters of the Irish Liberators, of representative misgovernment, of the Tammany gang. Corrupt, you say? Rotten?

Sir, it is Amurrican." The tramp was shaken with prolonged coughing ; he shivered miserably in the bitter cold, but still must needs make valiant attempts to cheer his companion in disaster. "We are not welcomed with the customary brass bands, the procession of free-born citizens, the champagne lunch ; we are not pestered with inter viewers ; we have arrived from the far west without trespassing upon eastern hospitality ; we have made our entry incognito, riding on the humble insecurity of the brake-beam, and now you look as glum as a forecastle parrot in a den of deacons." " Shut up," said Brand, roughly. " Here, you 're shivering ; take this." He wrenched off his tattered pilot jacket, which he spread with womanly tenderness over the other's knees. " Now, Colonel, don't be a fool." " Sir," said the Colonel, " I am greatly obliged to you.

And now, Brand, since I 'm too cold to sleep, I will harrow up thy young soul with tales of im pecuniosity and abortive vengeance. Do you know why I went to Revolversburg?" Brand Haraldson paid not the slightest attention, for he had turned his back upon the broken man, to gaze at the towering roofs of the metropolis that rose up stark against the dawn. Down under the quay the ebb tide was murmuring among the piles, long lines of lamps reached away along the water front into the river mists, the wintry air was still with a great silence, broken only by the swirl of the river and the Colonel's maundering voice. "Ten years ago, a certain Railroad King was crossing the Rocky Mountains in his private car — now, I guess you ain't honouring me with your attention, but you shall presently, by thunder ! — and the name of that aforesaid plutocrat was Michael Gault."

"What's that?" said Brand, turning sharply. The Colonel chuckled. " Now, if that particular capitalist had been allowed his own way, he wouldn't have permitted a pilot train to be hauled out of bed to see his track clear, in which event the recording angel might have been called upon to ' write off' one plutocrat. It was the division superintendent who despatched the pilot engine, with a caboose for ballast, and orders to look out for the usual natural amenities of mountain travel, such as rockslides, washouts, and bush fires. There was a little unexpected impediment — rails spiked across the track by a train wrecker — the pilot went to kingdom come, and the plutocrat would have followed, but that a young fool of a fireman set the wreckage alight by way of a signal. Now the young fool aforesaid, who nearly burned himself to death to save Dives, was one Brand Ha " " That 's enough," said Brand Haraldson ; " it 's no business of yours."

" Young man, it 's so much my business that I have just been to the Rocky Mountains to make enquiries." " And that 's why you thrust yourself into my company?" "You air correct." What do you want to know? "Young man, that enterprising ego -maniac, who tried to murder Michael Gault, is now one of the leading men of New York City." " Well ? " " Sir, that man is the chief of a great private detective system — the ' Frailty.' " " What— Doctor Rex Clewston ? " " Yes, sir ; Doctor Rex Clewston is a man of whom the United States is real proud." "You say" — Brand's voice trembled with excite ment — " that Doctor Rex Clewston was the wrecker who tried to murder Gault ? Come, I '11 put you to the test. If he is the man, I shall know him. Show me this man ! " But the Colonel laughed until he was seized with a paroxysm of coughing.

" Show you — Rex Clew ston. ! " he choked, gasped, laughed, wiping tears from his eyes with the back of his gloved hand. " I tell you, young man, that nobody has ever met Rex Clewston face to face. He suffers from opthalmia — wears a green shade over his eyes; lives in darkened rooms ; never goes out ; doesn't admit one visitor in a week. Sir, I admire the modesty of your demands. Show you Rex Clew ston ! " " Then," said Brand, turning indifferently away, " what can you know about him ? " " Know ! know, sir ! I was, until a few months ago, one of his ten chief officers, head of the Frailty Record Department, inventor and controller of his famous Exchange. " ' What 's that ? ' Say, where were you brung up ? Were you raised on the moon, or some barbarian planet ? Sir, I should admire ! " I will expound.

All information received by an up-to-date detective office is filed away for reference ; because a bureau without records is like a ground ling ape without a tail, unable to gesticulate, to admonish, to pervade the branches of the knowledge tree. But no one bureau can produce the pedigrees of all known criminals, or trot out the skeleton from every family closet ; so that while the detective systems were busy making enquiries one of another, the alert malefactor usually skipped out for foreign parts. Consequently, while I was keeper of Clew ston's archives, I founded for him an exchange, connected by pneumatic tubes and telephone with every detective system in New York City. I was also connected by telegraph with all the police bureaus in the civilized world ; so that if London wished news of an American swindler, we got the information quicker than lightning, and charged accordingly ; or if the New York police must have facts which we couldn't supply, we enquired among the other private detective offices, and bought up what was wanted, before anyone else had time to think about it.

Our office never closed. If work had to be done in New York for other cities, we generally got the contract ; and if anything important passed through our exchange we kept a copy, while all the other systems were left in the dark. That 's how all the detective offices in the world became branches of Clewston's Bureau." " Why," said Brand innocently, " it was enough to abolish crime." " Sir, do you suppose we wanted to abolish crime ? Do you imagine that police and detectives are filled with a passionate longing to make themselves un necessary? A crime farm, young man, is the last development of agriculture. A fool cashier plunders a bank, the bank pays to have him pursued ; then he is captured by a detective, and milked like a cow ; or else, if he hasn't any plunder, delivered into the hands of justice ; for honesty is the best policy of all, besides being good advertising.

Yes, young man, the effete European enquiry office returns the plunder to the plundered ; an ordinary American detective gets the cash for himself; but Clewston alone is smart enough to send out its officers to rustle on commission. A Clewston detective knows that Clewston wants seventy per cent, of the spoil — and Clewston gets it. Profitable ? Oh, that 's only a drop in the Clewston bucket ; because an American doesn't run the detective business for his health. Blackmail, sir, is the tribute which Vice pays to Knowledge ; and yet they say that Vice doesn't pay ! My dear young friend, Vice pays rather than get itself talked about — Vice pays through the nose ; or who would believe in its kid gloves of virtue, its frock - coat of respectability, its silk hat of self righteousness ? Vice pays seventy per cent, of its plunder to stay out of gaol, twenty-five per cent, to keep up appearances.

Vice is a fool ! And I, sir — who gave Clewston his exchange, who organized his record office, who contributed more than any other man to his enormous power — I — look at what I am — an outcast, a tramp, a pariah ! " The wretched man threw aside Brand's coat, scrambled down off the packing-case, and waved his long bony arms in frantic gesticulation. " Give me proof!" he screamed. "You're the only man who saw him at his devilish work ! Give me proof of Clewston's identity as the wrecker of trains, the bungling assassin — give me the one proof, Brand Haraldson, that it was his face you saw in the flames that night, and I will tear him down ! I '11 crush his jaws under my heel ! I '11 grind him to powder ! Proof, I say! Proof! Proof!" " Meanwhile," said Brand, " that 's a coffee stand starting up at the dock gates, and I made five cents last night by holding a horse.

Stay here." Brand left his friend sunk in a sort of stupor, and groped his way among the railway sidings to the stall by the dock gates, where he bought some bread. On his return, after an absence of five minutes, he found a policeman hoisting the Colonel off his packing-case by the scruff of the neck. " Let go," said Brand. The constable turned about in surprise, but he let go- "Now," said Brand, "you'll find a coffee fakir trading by the dock gates, and you'll get more out of him than you will from us." The policeman looked at the loom of Brand's huge body against the dawn light ; he cast an uneasy glance at the river behind him. "Be jabers!" he blustered, "I've a mind to arrist the both of yez." Then he swaggered away to blackmail the coffee fakir. "Brand," quavered the Colonel, "our city police would puzzle any biologist, but you 've studied natural history some."

" Here 's your share of the bread." Brand handed his five-cent roll to the Colonel, then turned away, making dumb show as though he gnawed at some imaginary crust. He could hear his friend behind him eating ravenously. " You 're a slow feeder," he growled ; " I 've almost finished mine." "Bread must be cheap now," mumbled the Colonel. " You got good weight for your money." " That 's so," said Brand heartily, drawing his belt in an inch ; " I 've had to loosen my belt. Say," he continued, " I 'm going to leave you at sunrise. I have business to do in this place, work that will keep me all day, and by to-night I shall have money for both of us. Where shall I find you, Colonel?" But the Colonel reached out his hands, and plucked feebly at Brand's sleeve. " Don't leave me," he pleaded ; " don't desert me yet " For a moment he sat limp and helpless, his hands fallen at his sides, his eyes closed.

Presently he felt the crustier half of the roll, which he had set down as too hard for his teeth ; his fingers closed upon it; he lifted one eyelid, and saw Brand's back turned upon him ; he smuggled the crust into his own tail pocket, and allowed himself one little half grin of satisfaction. Then he rocked himself to and fro. " I can't bear it," he quavered. " Brand, I 'm c an old man now ; I 've no more fight left in me ; Clewston will find me; his spies will follow me; they '11 drag me before him ; he knows everything ; he has no mercy, and I 'm doomed. Doomed ! Don't you hear, man? Doomed!" "What have you done?" said Brand, harshly; "what makes you afraid of Clewston?" "Done? Done?" he moaned; "what haven't I done?" Then came a harsh laugh. "So you think I 'm going to give myself away ?"

" Keep your mouth shut," said Brand, " and you '11 do yourself no harm." " You 're right, young man ; you're right. Say," he whispered, seizing Brand again by the sleeve; " you 've been a true friend. Don't desert me now. Perhaps some day I may serve you. It's worth your while to stand by me. Don't be mad with me, Brand ; don't mind what an old fool says. I 'm no good to anybody now — I, Colonel Hiram W. Giggleswick, am played out." His head sank upon his breast, his jaw dropped, for a moment he sat rocking to and fro, then he threw himself at full length upon the packing-case and burst into tears. The day was breaking now, the city rose in dim confusion against a crimson sky, waggons were rumbling along the cobbled pavements, labourers were whistling as they went to their work, an engine came floundering among the sidings, the dock gates were open, the murmur of the ebb tide was no longer to be heard among the piers, for the great metropolis had awakened.

And Brand had forgotten the sobbing of the outcast beside him, for his eyes were fastened upon the towering city, with its foundations set in the violet mists ; with its heights, its spires and domes barring the heavens. Starvation had hardened Brand Haraldson, ruin strengthened him, disaster fired him with the courage of battle ; he had for gotten the cold, his hard, blue eyes were alight with triumph.

Chapter III. Enter

A PRINCESS THE sun was shining fair, the bright spring day was young, with considerable promise of being too hot, and Brand had just found his way into a funny old street that led to a vista of two barges, flapping their lazy sails as the tide carried them broadside up the Hudson. He had an envelope in his hand, containing a letter of introduction, and directed to Messrs. Vanslyperken & Schneidam, Solicitors, at number thirty-four. Here was number thirty -four — a squat, brick house, old-fashioned, decidedly plain. Brand glanced at his envelope, then at the big shining brass-plate of Messrs. Van slyperken & Schneidam ; but he waited before climbing the steps, because the inner doors swung open, and a lady client came out, who turned with a gracious good-day to the clerk, while she gathered up her skirts before descending into the dust of the streets.