by John Buchan
“Have you been fighting?” Janet asked, observing a long scratch on her husband’s sunburnt forehead.
“Oh, that scratch is nothing, only the flick of a branch. But I’ve been through considerable physical tribulation. Wait till I get my pipe lit and you’ll have the whole story. . . .
“I reached the hut between four and five o’clock in what John Bunyan calls a pelting heat. Ye gods, but it was stuffy in the pinewoods, and blistering hot on the open hillside! I made pretty good time, and arrived rather out of condition, for my right leg — my game leg as was — wasn’t quite functioning as it should. Well, there was the old woman, and in none too good a temper. Poor soul, she had been considerably chivvied since we last saw her. It seemed that we were just in time this morning, for Mastrovin and his merry men turned up about an hour after we left. It was a mercy we didn’t blunder into them in the wood, and a mercy that we had the sense to hide the car a goodish distance from where the track starts. Mastrovin must have spent yesterday in sleuthing, for he had the ground taped, and knew that McTavish had been in the hut at supper. He had three fellows with him, and they gave the old lady a stiff time. They didn’t believe her yarn about McTavish having started out for the Vossthal. They ransacked every corner of the place, and put in some fine detective work examining beds and cupboards and dirty dishes, besides raking the outhouses and beating the adjacent coverts. In the end they decided that their bird had flown and tried to terrorise the old lady into a confession. But she’s a tough ancient, and by her account returned them as good as they gave. She wanted to know what concern her great-nephew Franz was of theirs, poor Franz that had lost his health working in Innsbruck and had come up into the hills to recruit. All their bullying couldn’t shake her about great-nephew Franz, and in the end they took themselves off, leaving her with a very healthy dislike of the whole push.
“Then, very early this morning, Count Casimir turned up and got his letter. It put him in a great taking. She said he grew as white as a napkin, and he started to cross-examine her about the hour and the manner of the pinching of McTavish. That was where I had fallen down, for I had forgotten to tell her what was in the letter. So she gave a very confused tale, for she described him as going off with us, mentioning the women in the party, and she also described Mastrovin’s coming, and from what she said I gathered that he got the two visits mixed up. What specially worried him was that Mastrovin should have had women with him, and he was very keen to know what they were like. I don’t know how the old dame described you two — I should have liked to hear her — but anyway, it didn’t do much to satisfy the Count. She said that he kept walking about biting his lips, and repeating a word that sounded like ‘Mintha.’ After that he was in a hurry to be off, but before leaving he gave her an address — I’ve written it down — with which she was to communicate if she got any news.
“I was just straightening out the story for her — I thought it right to get her mind clear — and explaining that we had got McTavish safe and sound, but that it was imperative in his own interests that Count Casimir should believe there had been dirty work, when what do you think happened? Mastrovin turned up, accompanied by a fellow who looked like a Jew barber out of a job. He didn’t recognise me and looked at me very old-fashioned. I was sitting in a low chair, and got up politely to greet him, when I had an infernal piece of bad luck. I sprang every blessed muscle in my darned leg. You see, it hadn’t been accustomed to so much exercise for a long time, and the muscles were all flabby. Gad, I never knew such pain! It was the worst go of cramp I ever heard of. My toes stuck out like agonising claws — my calf was a solid lump of torment — the riding muscle above the knee was stiff as a poker and as hard as iron. I must have gone white with pain, and I was all in a cold sweat, and I’m dashed if I could do anything except wallow in the chair and howl.
“Well, Mastrovin wasn’t having any of that. He gave me some rough-tonguing in German, and demanded of the old woman what kind of mountebank I was. But she had taken her cue — pretty quick in the uptake she is — or else she thought I was having a paralytic stroke. I was all dithered with the pain and couldn’t notice much, but I saw that she had got off my shoes and stockings and had fetched hot water to bathe my feet. Then the barber-fellow took a hand, for he saw I wasn’t playing a game. I daresay he was some kind of medico and he knew his business. He started out to massage me, beginning with the lower thigh, and I recognised the professional touch. In a few minutes he had me easier, and you know the way the thing goes — suddenly all the corded muscles dropped back into their proper places, and I was out of pain, but limp as chewing-gum.
“Then Mastrovin began to ask me questions, first in German, and then in rather better English than my own. I gave him my name, and his face cleared a little, for he remembered me from Geneva. He was quite polite, but I preferred his rough-tonguing to his civility. A nasty piece of work that lad — his eyes are as cold as a fish’s, but they go through you like a gimlet. I was determined to outstay him, for I didn’t want him to be giving the old lady the third degree, which was pretty obviously what he had come for. So I pretended to be down and out, and lay back in her chair gasping, and drank water in a sad invalidish way. I would have stuck it out till midnight, but friend Mastrovin must have been pressed for time, for after about half an hour he got up to go. He offered to give me a hand down the hill, but I explained that I wasn’t yet ready to move, but should be all right in an hour or so. I consider I brought off rather a creditable piece of acting, for he believed me. I also told him that I had just popped in to Unnutz for a night and was hurrying back to Geneva. He knew that the Conference had been resumed, but said that he himself might be a little late. . . . That’s about all. I gave him twenty minutes’ law and then started home. D’you mind ringing the bell, Janet? I think I’ll have an omelet and some more beer. Where’s McTavish?”
“At his supper, I expect. What I want to know, Archie, is our next step. We can’t go on hiding royal princes in the butler’s pantry. McTavish will revolt out of sheer boredom.”
“I don’t think so.” Archie shook a sapient head. “McTavish is a patient fellow, and has had a pretty strict training these last years. Besides, life is gayer for him here than up at that hut, and the food must be miles better. We’ve got to play a waiting game, for the situation is obscure. I had a talk with him this morning, and by all accounts Evallonian politics are a considerable mix-up.”
“What did he tell you?” Alison asked sharply. She felt that to Archie and Janet it was all a game, but that she herself had some responsibility.
“Well, it seems that the revolution is ready to the last decimal — the press prepared, the National Guard won over, the people waiting, and the Ministers packing their portmanteaux. The Republican Government will go down like ninepins. But while the odds are all on the monarchy being restored, they are all against its lasting very long. It appears that in the last two years there has been a great movement in Evallonia of all the younger lot. They’re tired of having the old ‘uns call the tune and want to play a sprig themselves. I don’t blame ‘em, for the old ‘uns have made a pretty mess of it.”
“Is that the thing they call Juventus?” Alison asked. “I read about it in The Times.”
“Some name like that. Anyhow, McTavish tells me it’s the most formidable thing Evallonia has seen for many a day. They hate the Republicans, and still more Mastrovin and his Communists. But they won’t have anything to do with Prince John, for they distrust Count Casimir and all that lot. Call them the ‘old gang,’ the same bouquets as we hand to our elder statesmen, and want a fresh deal with new measures and new men. They’re said to be more than half a million strong, all likely lads in hard condition and jolly well trained — they’ve specialised in marksmanship, for which Evallonia was always famous. They have the arms and the money, and, being all bound together by a blood oath, their discipline is the stiffest thing on earth. Oh, and I forgot to tell you — they wear green shirts — foresters’ gre
en. They have a marching song about the green of their woodlands, and the green of their mountain lakes, and the green shirts of Evallonia’s liberators. It’s funny what a big part fancy haberdashery plays in the world to-day.”
“Have they a leader?” Alison asked.
“That’s what I can’t make out. There doesn’t seem to be any particular roi de chemises — that’s what Charles Lamancha used to call me in my dressy days. But apparently the thing leads itself. The fact we’ve got to face is that if Casimir puts McTavish on the throne, which apparently he can do with his left hand, Juventus will kick him out in a week, and McTavish naturally doesn’t want that booting. That’s why he has been so docile. He sees that the right policy for him is to lie low till things develop.”
“Then our next step must be to get in touch with Juventus,” said Alison.
Janet opened her eyes. “You’re taking this very seriously, Allie,” she said.
“I am,” was the answer. “You see, I was in it two years ago.”
“But how is it to be done?” Archie asked. “McTavish doesn’t know. He doesn’t know who the real leaders are — nor Casimir, and certainly not Mastrovin. You see, the thing is by way of being a secret society, sort of jumble-up of Boy Scouts, Freemasons and the Red Hand. They have their secret pass-words, and the brightest journalist never sticks his head into one of their conclaves. They can spot a Monarchist or Republican spy a mile off, and don’t stand on ceremony with ‘em. They have a badge like Hitler’s swastika — an open eye — but, apart from their songs and their green shirts, that’s their only public symbol.”
“My advice,” said Janet, “is that we keep out of it, and restore the Prince to the sorrowing Count Casimir as soon as we can get in touch with him. You go back to Scotland with your family, Allie, and Archie and I will pop down into Italy.”
There was a knock at the door and a waiter brought in the evening post. One letter was for Alison, which she tore open eagerly as soon as she saw the handwriting. She read it three times and then raised a flushed face.
“It’s from Jaikie,” she said, and there was that in her voice which made Archie and Janet look up from their own correspondence. “Jaikie, you know — my friend — Mr Galt that I told you about. He is somewhere in Evallonia.”
“My aunt!” exclaimed Archie. “Then there will be trouble for somebody.”
“There’s trouble for him. He seems to have got into deep waters. Listen to what he says.”
She read the following:
“I am in a queer business which I am bound to see through. But I can’t do it without your help. Can you manage to get away from your parents for a few days, and come to Tarta, just inside the Evallonian frontier? You take the train to a place called Zutpha, where you will be met. If you can come wire Odalchini, Tarta, the time of your arrival. I wouldn’t bother you if the thing wasn’t rather important, and, besides, I think you would like to be in it.”
“Short and to the point,” commented the girl. “Jaikie never wastes words. He has a genius for understatement, so if he says it is rather important it must be tremendously important. . . . Wait a minute. Odalchini! Prince Odalchini was one of the three at Knockraw two years ago. Jaikie has got mixed up with the Monarchists.”
Archie was hunting through his notebook. “What did you say was the name of the place? Tarta? That’s the address Casimir gave the old woman to write to if she had any news. Schloss Thingumybob — the second word has about eight consonants and no vowels — Tarta, by Zutpha. Your friend Jaikie has certainly got among the Monarchists.”
“Hold on!” Alison cried. “What’s this?” She passed round the letter for inspection. It was a sheet of very common note-paper with no address on it, but in the top left-hand corner there was stamped in green a neat little open eye with some hieroglyphic initials under it.
“Do you see what that means?” In her excitement her voice sank to a whisper. “Jaikie is in touch with the Juventus people. This letter was sent with their consent — or the consent of one of them, and franked by him.”
“Well, Allie?” Janet asked.
“Of course I’m going. I must go. But I can’t go alone, for Papa wouldn’t allow it. He and Mamma have decided to return to Scotland this week to Aunt Harriet at Castle Gay. You and Archie must go to Tarta and take me with you.”
“Isn’t that a large order? What about McTavish?”
“We must take him with us, for then we’ll have all the cards in our hands. It’s going to be terribly exciting, but I can promise you that Jaikie won’t fail us. You won’t fail me either?”
Janet turned smilingly to her husband. “What about it, Archie?”
“I’m on,” was the answer. “I’ve been in a mix-up with Master Jaikie before. Bobby Despenser can whistle for me. The difficulty will be McTavish, who’s a compromising piece of goods, but we’ll manage somehow. Lord, this is like old times, and I feel about ten years younger. ‘It little profits that an idle king, matched with an aged wife. . . .’ Don’t beat me, Janet. We’re both ageing. . . . I always thought that the Almighty didn’t get old Christoph to mend my leg for nothing.”
CHAPTER IV. DIFFICULTIES OF A REVOLUTIONARY
When Jaikie saw who his captor was, his wrath ebbed. Had it been Prince Odalchini it would have been an outrage, but since it was Ashie, it was only an undergraduate “rag” which could easily be repaid in kind. But his demeanour was severe.
“What’s the meaning of these monkey tricks?” he demanded.
“The meaning is,” Ashie had ceased to smile, “that you have deceived me. What about your business with your circus friend? I had you followed — I was bound to take every precaution — and instead of feeding in a pot-house you run in circles like a hunted hare and end up at the Schloss. I had my men inside the park, and when I heard what you were up to I gave orders that you should be brought before me. You went straight from me to the enemy. What have you to say to that?”
Ashie’s words were firm, but there was dubiety in his voice and a hint of uncertainty in his eye; this the other observed, and the sight wholly removed his irritation. Ashie was talking like a book, but he was horribly embarrassed.
“Well, I’m blowed!” said Jaikie. “Who the blazes made you my keeper? Let’s get this straightened out at once. First, what I said was strictly true. I was going to lunch with my friend from the circus. If your tripe-hounds had been worth their keep they would have seen me meet him — a fellow with the name of the circus blazoned on his cap. The choice of a luncheon place was his own and I had nothing to do with it. As a matter of fact, I happened to know the man he took me to, Prince Odalchini — I met him two years ago in Scotland. Have you got that into your fat head?”
“Will you please give me the gist of your conversation with Prince Odalchini?”
“Why on earth should I? What has it got to do with you? But I’ll tell you one thing. He was very hospitable and wanted me to stay a bit with him — same as you. I said no, that I wanted to go home, and I was on my way back when I fell in with your push and got my head in a bag. What do you mean by it? I’m sorry to tell you that you have taken a liberty — and I don’t allow liberties.”
“Prince Odalchini is the enemy, and we are in a state of war.”
“Get off it. He’s not my enemy, and I don’t know anything about your local scraps. I told you I would have nothing to do with them, and I told the Prince the same.”
“So you talked of Evallonian affairs?” said Ashie.
“Certainly. What else was there to talk about? Not that he told me much, except that there was likely to be trouble and that he wanted me to stay on and see the fun. I told him I wasn’t interested in his tin-pot politics and I tell you the same.”
This had the effect which Jaikie intended, and made Ashie angry.
“I do not permit such language,” he said haughtily. “I do not tolerate insults to my country. Understand that you are not in your sleek England, but in a place where gentlemen defend their hono
ur in the old way.”
“Oh, don’t be a melodramatic ass. I thought we had civilised you at Cambridge and given you a sense of humour, but you’ve relapsed into the noble savage. I’ve been in Evallonia less than one day and I know nothing about it. Your politics may be all the world to you, but they’re tin-pot to me. I refuse to be mixed up in them.”
“You’ve mixed yourself up in them by having intercourse with the enemy.”
“Enemy be blowed! I talked for an hour or two to a nice old man who gave me a dashed good luncheon, and now you come butting in with your detective-novel tricks. I demand to be deported at once. Otherwise I’ll raise the hairiest row about the kidnapping of a British subject. If you want international trouble, I promise you you’ll get it. I don’t know where we are, but here’s this car, and you’ve got to deliver me at Kremisch by bedtime. That’s the least you can do to make amends for your cheek.”
Jaikie looked out of the window and observed that they had halted on high ground, and that below them lights twinkled as if from an encampment. For a moment he thought that he had struck the Cirque Doré. And then a bugle sounded, an instrument not generally used in circuses. “Is that your crowd down there?” he asked.
Ashie’s face, even in the dim interior light of the car, showed perplexity. He seemed to be revolving some difficult question in his mind. When he spoke again there was both appeal and apology in his voice. Jaikie had an authority among his friends which was the stronger because he was wholly unconscious of it and in no way sought it. His personality was so clean-cut and his individuality so complete and secure that, while one or two gave him affection, all gave him respect.
“I’ll apologise if you like,” said Ashie. “I daresay what I did was an outrage. But the fact is, Jaikie, I badly want your help. Your advice, anyway. I’m in a difficult position, and I don’t see my road very clearly. You see, I’m an Evallonian, and this is Evallonian business, but I’ve got a little outside the atmosphere of my own country. That’s to the good, perhaps, for this thing is on the biggest scale and wants looking at all round it. That’s why I need your help. Give me one night, and I swear, if you still want me to, I’ll deliver you at Kremisch to-morrow morning and trouble you no more.”
