The Burglar and the Blizzard: A Christmas Story | Page 5

He had the keys of the house in his pocket, and he moved quickly toward a side door which he remembered swung silently on its hinges. It was not so much that he believed that there was any one in the house--perhaps to the most apprehensive a burglar comes as a surprise--but he felt he had too good grounds for suspicion to fail to investigate.
He unlocked the door without a sound. As he stepped within, doubt was put an end to by the patch of white light that, streaming out of the library door, fell across the passageway before him. He stooped down and took off his boots, and then cautiously approached the open door and looked in, knowing that darkness and preparation were in his favour.
His caution was unnecessary, for his entrance had not been heard. The Hillsborough theory of the femininity of the burglar instantly fell to the ground. A man of medium size was standing before one of the bookcases with his elbow resting near the clock; he was holding a volume in his hands with the careful ease of a book fancier. The man's back was turned so that a sandy head and a strongly built figure were all Geoffrey could make out. Had it not been for a glimpse of a mask on his face, he might have been a student at work.
So intent did he appear that Geoffrey could not resist the temptation to make his entrance dramatic. Creeping almost to the other's elbow, revolver in hand, he said gently:
"Fond of reading?"
The man, naturally startled, made a surprisingly quick movement toward his own revolver, and had it knocked out of his hand with a benumbing blow. Geoffrey secured the weapon, and seeing the man's retreat, may be excused for supposing the struggle over.
He underestimated his adversary's resources, for the burglar, retreating with a look of surrender, came within reach of the electric light, turned it off, and fled in the total darkness that followed. Geoffrey sprang to the switch, but the few seconds that his fingers were fumbling for it told against him. When he turned it on the room was empty. The door by which the thief had gone opened on the main hall and not on the passageway, so that Geoffrey still had time to secure the outer door. Next he lit the chandelier in the hall, but its illumination told nothing. It was Geoffrey's own sharp ears that told him of light footsteps beyond the turn of the stairs. Here Holland recognised at once that the burglar had a great advantage. The flight of stairs from the hall reached the upper story at a point very near where the back stairs came up, while they descended to widely different places in the lower story, so that the burglar, looking down, could choose his flight of stairs as soon as he saw his pursuer committed to the other, and thus reach the lower hall with several seconds to spare. Fortunately, however, Geoffrey remembered that there was a door at the foot of the back stairs. With incredible quickness he turned off the light again, threw his boots upstairs in the ingenious hope that the sound would give the effect of his own ascent, dashed round and locked the door at the foot of the stairs and then at the top of his speed ran up the front stairs and down the back. The result was somewhat as he expected. The burglar had reached the door at the foot of the stairs, and finding it locked was half way up again when he and Geoffrey met. The impetus of Geoffrey's descent carried the man backward. They both landed against the locked door with a force that burst it open. Geoffrey, on top and armed, had little difficulty in securing his bruised foe, and marching him back to the library where he now took the precaution of locking all the doors.
Geoffrey, who had felt himself tingling with excitement and the natural love of the chase, now had time to wonder what he was going to do with his capture. He thought of the darkness, the storm, the absence of the two undermen, and the helplessness of the McFarlanes. Then he remembered the telephone, which, fortunately, stood in a closet off the library.
He turned to the burglar. "Stand with your face to the wall and your hands up," he said; "and if I see you move I'd just as lief shoot you as look at you," with which warning he approached the telephone and, still keeping an eye on the other, rang up central. There was no answer. He rang again,--six, seven times he repeated the process unavailingly. He tried the private wire to the McFarlane cottage with no better result.
At this point the burglar