Knight Without Armour

A.J.’s eyes were searching ahead for any sign of the railway as well as preparing for any lightning emergency in the rear. The silence and darkness of the forest were both uncanny, and though he listened acutely for any repetition of that distant engine-whistle, he heard nothing. After walking for some ten minutes, by which time he estimated that the railway ought to have come into view, the track narrowed and began to twist uphill. He whispered suddenly: “I’ve lost my way.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means we may have to spend the rest of the night in the forest with these ruffians.” A moment later he added: “They’re talking again—they’re guessing we’re lost, and I’m afraid it suits them only too well. I think I’d rather have it out with them than go on like this.”

He stopped abruptly, facing the guards so quickly that they had not time to conceal the revolvers in their hands. “Gentlemen,” he said calmly, “I think you must find it a burden to carry those weapons as well as our luggage. Suppose you hand them over to me—I can guard the party if we are attacked.”

The very unexpectedness of the request might have succeeded with one of the men, had not the other, with a snarl of rage, flung himself all at once upon A.J. The other then went to his companion’s assistance, and the three men were soon engaged in a desperate struggle in which darkness seemed an extra enemy of them all. One powerful pair of arms gripped A.J. round the neck, while another seized his right arm and sought to wrest away the revolver. Both assailants were exceedingly strong, and though A.J. was strong also, he could not have held out for long against such odds. Suddenly one of the guards managed to wrench his own revolver free and aimed it full in A.J.’s face; and simultaneously a second revolver swung on to the scene and glinted in a shaft of moonlight. The two triggers were pressed almost together, but there was only one report. The guard’s weapon misfired, and a second later its owner collapsed to the ground. A.J. turned to deal with the second guard, but with a sharp movement the latter drew back and plunged wildly into the undergrowth and away.

A.J. was left, revolver in hand, peering down at a huddled body. The woman stood close to him, also holding a weapon, but hers was smoking.

He stooped and said, after a pause: “He’s dead.”

“Is he? I did it.”

“Probably saving your own life as well as mine.”

“Yes, I daresay. But what has to be done now?”

“This—before anything else.”

He dragged the body to one side of the path and pushed it into the midst of thick undergrowth.

“Was the other fellow hurt?” she then asked.

“No—only terrified. He’ll soon find his way to the nearest village and tell everybody. There’ll be a pretty big fuss.”

“But we were being attacked—it was self-defence, surely?”

“In a way, yes, but he’s hardly likely to say so, and nobody’s likely to take our word for it against his. Probably he’ll say we’re counter-revolutionary spies and that we seized the chance of a train hold-up to lure our two guards into the forest and attack them.”

“But you have your papers to prove who you are?”

“You saw for yourself how doubtfully they were accepted in Ekaterinburg. After the stories that fellow will spread about us, they’ll count even less.”

“Then it looks as if we’d better move on.”

“Yes. Instantly.”

“Do you know which way to go?”

“Away from the nearest village. That means, almost certainly, uphill.”

Then they discovered that they were both quite breathless. All about them were the dark pillars of tree-trunks, with here and there a delicate pattern on the undergrowth where moonlight spilled through. He began to gather up the various bundles that the two guards had thrown down. Then they hurried away. They climbed in silence for some time, till at last she asked, in a very ordinary casual voice, what he was thinking about. He answered: “To be exact, about a packet of chocolate I left on the seat in the train.”

She laughed softly. “Never mind. I have some. Shall we share it?”

“Not yet. Better get on further.”

They went on climbing amongst the trees, stopping only now and then to listen for any distant sound. But none could be heard distinctly, though once, from the very edge of the world, it seemed, there came what might have been the wail of a train-whistle. As they climbed higher, the trees thinned out into the open, and suddenly they reached a high curving summit outlined against the moonlight like a knife-edge. The air, after the cool forest depths, was warm, and they themselves were again breathless. “Keep in shadow,” he ordered, and they took a few backward steps into a little hollow full of dead leaves. A squirrel scampered past them as they halted. “Now for your chocolate,” he said.