Major Bauer’s face turned scarlet, and jumping to his feet he bellowed: ‘You insult the Fuehrer! You shall die for that!’
‘You’ll be dead yourself if you don’t sit down,’ snapped Simon with unusual venom, thrusting his pistol towards the German. ‘Don’t like shooting people, myself, but I’d get quite a kick out of killing you.’
Bauer shot one look at Simon’s long, curved Semitic nose, and knew that he meant what he said. With a shrug which was meant to convey contempt, he subsided in his chair again.
Ten minutes later the new dispositions were completed. Richard led Marie Lou out on to the terrace to tell her of the plan that had been agreed on. They took a swift farewell of each other, and he set off with Simon. Then, at the Duke’s suggestion, she went upstairs to pack for him and Lucretia, as well as for herself and Richard.
Rex collected a couple of cushions and made himself comfortable in his old position halfway up the stairs. De Richleau covered Anna Lubieszow’s face with an antimacassar, drew a chair into the centre of the terrace doorway, and settling himself in it addressed the company.
‘I fear it will be necessary for us to remain here until the morning. Please make yourselves as comfortable as you can. You may read, if you wish, and I am sure the Baron will have no objection to your helping yourselves to the drinks and other refreshments which are already on the sidetables; but if you talk it must be in your normal voices and in English or French, so that both my friend and I can understand you. I will tolerate no whispering, and not more than one of you is to leave your seat at one time.’
At the idea of spending the night where they were there was some sporadic grumbling, but the tension eased, and, in relays, under the Duke’s watchful eye, the party sorted itself out. The Baroness lay down on a sofa, the men servants, who all this while had remained fascinated spectators, now congregated in one corner of the big room on a row of upright chairs which they collected there, and the others arranged themselves in the armchairs and sofas.
There was little talking, and the vigil soon became monotonous. Some of the party began to doze as well as they could in the brightly lighted room, others settled down to read; occasionally one of them got up to get a drink or a sandwich. Von Geisenheim had drawn a chair up to the refectory table, and taking a sheaf of papers from his pocket began to work upon them.
After about twenty minutes, finding that de Richleau did not attempt to interfere with his writing, he wrote the following note on a small piece of paper:
Presently I shall ask to be allowed to go to the lavatory. As the door to the hall is now locked the chances are that the American will be detailed to take me to the one on the landing at the top of the stairs. If so, there may be a chance for you to rush the Duke while he is alone.
Concealing this note in his hand, he got up, walked over to one of the console tables and poured himself a glass of champagne, asking casually over his shoulder as he did so:
‘Want a drink, Bauer?’
‘Bitte, Herr General,’ replied the Nazi.
Pouring out a second glass, von Geisenheim took it over to his adjutant and as he handed it to him, skilfully passed him the slip of paper without being observed by either Rex or the Duke. He then returned to the table and continued making his notes.
After working away diligently for a further twenty minutes, he collected his papers, put them in his pocket and moved over to a more comfortable chair; but after a little he began to show signs of restlessness and eventually, standing up, addressed the Duke in English.
‘My apologies. It is necessary that I should leave the room. It is for circumstances over which I have no control. I have your permission, yes?’
‘Very well,’ agreed the Duke, who had foreseen that among such a numerous company a request of this kind was almost certain to be made by someone during the night. ‘You had better go upstairs. Rex, will you escort the General across the landing? If he attempts anything, or you hear the least sound of a commotion down here, shoot him. If he has locked himself in put three or four bullets through the door and hurry back here immediately.’
Von Geisenheim bowed stiffly and walked across the room with a firm tread; but as he mounted the stairs he realised that for him they might prove the equivalent of the steps of a scaffold. It struck him as grimly humorous that by his own action he had quite possibly condemned himself to death. If Bauer did start anything in his absence, the confined space of a lavatory would give him little chance of escaping a spate of bullets sent crashing through the panels of the door, and he noted with additional concern the heavy calibre of Rex’s weapon. But the German Junker, once having initiated a plan, was not the man to abandon it through any thought of his own safety, and with unhurried gait he preceded Rex across the rug-strewn polished floor at the head of the stairs.
For two minutes everything remained still in the lounge below, then Bauer slowly got to his feet.
‘Sit down!’ snapped the Duke.
Bauer held up his empty glass. ‘I have finished my wine. I would the glass on the tray put back.’
‘Sit down!’ repeated the Duke, still more sharply.
The two men were about twelve feet apart; Bauer standing and de Richleau still seated. Suddenly, with a flick of his wrist, the German hurled the cut-glass goblet at the Duke’s head.
De Richleau ducked, and an instant later fired from his waist. With amazing agility, considering his lameness and weight, Bauer sprang aside. At the same time he thrust out his left hand to grasp the back of the chair in front of which he had been standing. As he regained his balance he heaved with all his might upon the chair, half-jerking and half-throwing it towards the Duke.
The goblet landed with a crash out on the terrace. The Duke’s bullet missed Bauer by inches and thudded into the wall. The chair came hurtling across the floor. The Baroness screamed. Everyone else in the room had now sprung to their feet, and while the Nazi was occupying the Duke’s attention they were grabbing up missiles and weapons with which to join in the attack on him.
He alone was still seated, and had deliberately remained so from the knowledge that every second was precious and that to fire again while in the act of coming to his feet would interfere with the certainty of his aim.
Putting out his foot to stop the chair from crashing into his knees, he raised his pistol to send a bullet through Bauer’s head. As he did so two of the lights went out. Two more followed almost instantly.
The Duke felt confident that once he had killed the Nazi Major he would be able to cow the rest, provided that he could still see. But if one of them succeeded in playing his own trick and plunging the room in darkness, he would be at the mercy of the pack.
With instant decision he switched his aim and fired at Jaljusz—who was now snapping off the electric light switches as hard as he could go.
Two more lights went out, and now only one wall bracket was left burning at the far end of the room, half-hidded by the stairs. Almost simultaneously, the Duke’s pistol cracked, and with a loud cry the Pole collapsed, falling across a table and sending the glasses upon it crashing to the floor.
Three more shots rang out in quick succession from upstairs, and de Richleau realised with grim satisfaction that von Geisenheim was paying a heavy price for this outbreak, which there were fair grounds for suspecting that he had somehow managed to engineer.
Seizing the brief respite gained him by Jaljusz, Bauer had flung himself at the Duke. Again de Richleau fired, but he had no time to take proper aim, and the shot tore through the shoulder of the German’s coat.
The chair that Bauer had himself flung forward now proved his temporary undoing. Tripping against it, he lost his footing and fell heavily; but in falling he managed to grab the Duke’s arm and drag him down.
The room was now in semi-darkness. Shouts, cries, the crashing of furniture, and the screams of the Baroness created a positive pandemonium. The Nazi and the Duke were struggling fiercely together in the terrace entrance. The German was far
the stronger of the two and had got his adversary by the throat with one hand, while he strove to seize his gun with the other. But de Richleau, despite his age, was still wiry and agile; moreover, his cool, calculating brain was an asset which did much to offset the brute force of the Nazi. Forcing down his chin, he ignored the agonising grip on his windpipe and concentrated on keeping his gun arm free.
Rex’s stentorian bellow from the staircase now added to the din. ‘Stand back all of you! Stand back, or I’ll blow the guts out of you!’
His shout checked the ugly rush of the crowd that was surging forward to aid Bauer, but it was of no immediate assistance to the Duke. He knew, too, that, if Rex left his position on the stairs to aid him, he would perforce expose himself to being attacked and overwhelmed from behind.
As de Richleau squirmed and struggled in the German’s grip the sounds in the room grew vague and blurred. There was a rushing noise like the sound of surf beating on a shore in his ears. His eyes were bulging in his head, and his sight grew dim. But he had managed to wriggle his gun hand down beneath the Nazi’s body. Thrusting up the barrel, he pulled the trigger.
Bauer jerked spasmodically, gave a sudden groan and relaxed his grip. De Richleau fired again and heaved himself upward; the German went limp, and with another heave the Duke rolled from beneath him.
Slowly, he picked himself up. Bauer now lay on his back; a little patch of blood that was rapidly increasing welled from his chest.
‘All right, Rex,’ the Duke shouted. ‘I’m not hurt. Keep the rest of them covered while I get the lights on.’ Still gasping for breath, he walked across the room and turned down the switches. Then he returned to his old position by the terrace door.
The big room now presented a grim spectacle. Anna Lubieszow dead in her chair; Jaljusz lying still in a pool of his own blood, his head shattered, the glasses he had knocked over in his fall and the spilt wine scattered about him; Bauer groaning and twisting as he lay in the terrace entrance.
As de Richleau’s glance swept the sullen, angry faces of the others he missed one. Count Ignac was no longer among them. Then the Duke saw that the curtain masking a small door that led to the library, where Mack had placed him under arrest four nights before, had been partly pulled back.
It was the curtain that had caused him to overlook this possible means of exit, and with grim foreboding it now flashed upon his mind that the Count must have slipped out unobserved that way during the recent confusion. It was no good giving chase. He would be well on his way to the village by this time, to raise the alarm. Their plan to hold the house until morning had been frustrated. They must act on fresh lines and act at once, or within half an hour at most Count Ignac would bring a hornets’ nest about their ears.
7
Night in the Quiet Forest
In vain de Richleau cursed himself for having neglected to secure the small library door. True, the portière, which, when drawn, concealed it, formed in itself a barrier that none of the captives could have got by quickly enough to escape a bullet in the back, so long as they were under the eye of their captors; but the Duke felt that he had been unforgivably remiss in not taking the precaution of locking the door against just such an eventuality as had occurred.
Ignac’s escape now jeopardised their whole plan. If the Duke and Rex had been able to hold the occupants of Lubieszow until morning, Richard and Simon would have reached Warsaw, collected Lucretia and got clear of the city unmolested; but, now that Ignacf was free, police headquarters in the capital would be fully informed of the situation as soon as he could reach a telephone. Police or troops would be rushed from the nearest post to Lubieszow, and a description of Richard and Simon issued. It was not yet midnight, and they had been gone barely an hour; so they might well be caught long before they reached Warsaw. As for Rex, Marie Lou and himself, if they remained where they were they would certainly be rounded up, and their margin of safety was now decreasing every minute.
One thing was clear: with a single bird gone from the nest no purpose could be served by continuing to hold up the rest of the flock. Richard and Simon could not now be helped by their friends remaining at Lubieszow to be captured; and, if they were captured themselves, they would stand a much better chance of regaining their freedom if their friends remained at liberty to plan their rescue.
Knowing that it was beyond his powers to warn the pair who were driving hell-for-leather through the night, de Richleau was not the man to waste further time crying over spilt milk.
The sound of the shooting had brought Marie Lou back from her packing to the head of the stairs, where she was now standing behind Rex.
Looking up at them, the Duke said: ‘While Bauer had me on the floor Count Ignac got away. He’ll be back shortly with the gendarmes. We must get out—and quickly.’
‘I’ve finished packing!’ exclaimed Marie Lou, a trifle breathlessly. ‘All but a few things. I can’t manage Lucretia’s wardrobe trunk on my own, but I could bring down the suitcases. I left my own trunk in Warsaw.’
‘Good! We’ll collect that when we get there.’
‘But—’ Rex began.
‘I’ve changed my plan,’ de Richleau interrupted. ‘The best thing we can do now is to make for Warsaw and place ourselves under the protection of the British Embassy. We must borrow a car. You go out to the garage, Rex, and bring the most powerful one you can find round to the front door, while Marie Lou brings down the luggage. We shall have to leave Lucretia’s trunk behind, but that can’t be helped.’
As he finished speaking, the Duke began to herd all the un-wounded members of the company into the far corner of the lounge where the men servants were standing. When they were bunched together there he said to them: ‘If any of you starts any more trouble I’ll shoot to kill first, then empty the remaining contents of my pistol into the rest of you indiscriminately. My friends and I will be leaving in a few moments, and you can do your best for the poor fellow whom I shot while he was putting out the lights directly we’ve gone. If Major Bauer dies I don’t think any of us will count that a great loss.’
Glancing at Baron Lubieszow, he went on: ‘I’m, terribly sorry, Baron, that our visit to you should have ended like this: but you must blame Count Ignac and these intriguers whom he introduced under your hospitable roof. That they do not represent the true spirit of Poland I am well aware. No doubt some of them are already heartily ashamed of the part they have been forced to play, but felt in duty bound to stand by their leader when my friends appeared so unexpectedly tonight and held you all up. That’s why I feel deep regret at having had to wound two of them—one perhaps fatally—when they might yet have fought gallantly for Poland in the struggle that now seems inevitable. But they, too, must blame Count Ignac and the treacherous Minister on whose staff they have the misfortune to find themselves.’
There were tears in the Baron’s eyes as he looked first at the Duke, then across at his dead cousin, Anna. ‘I cannot blame you,’ he said slowly. ‘You were to us all that a good guest should be and we detained you here against your will. It was not you who brought tragedy to my house; and, if I had gained knowledge of such a conspiracy in England as you have found here, I should have done all that lay in my power to defeat it; I thank God that you do not leave us with the belief that all Poles are like His Excellency. Jan, at least, has saved our honour; but he will be in grave danger for a time, and if opportunity offers I beg you to do what you can for him.’
Thank you, Baron.’ De Richleau bowed gravely. ‘As soon as I can communicate with the British Government I will ask them to interest themselves in Jan and, provided the Anglo-Polish alliance continues, I feel confident they will find means to ensure that he is not victimised on account of the gallantry he displayed tonight.’
While they had been talking little Marie Lou had been gamely dragging downstairs the Duke’s heavy pigskin suitcases and the other baggage. The engine of a powerful car could now be heard purring outside the house and a moment later Rex came hurryin
g in. Taking the bags, he carried them out. As he grabbed up the last and Marie Lou followed him to the door, de Richleau spoke again, this time to ‘General Mack’.
‘I must now request Your Excellency to come with me.’
Mack took an instinctive step backwards, treading on the foot of the man behind him.
‘I refuse!’ he exclaimed. ‘You and your friends have shown yourselves to be completely unscrupulous. You are saboteurs—brigands—you mean to murder me.’
The Duke shrugged. ‘If you maintain your refusal to come with me your blood will be on your own head—as I give you my word that I shall shoot you where you stand.’
‘You—you—’ Mack’s face had suddenly gone grey and old. ‘Do you promise that—that if I do as you wish no harm will come to me?’
‘I promise nothing. I simply propose to take you with us as a hostage. If these gentlemen remain quietly here, the odds are that you will still be alive tomorrow morning. On the other hand, should they make any attempt to follow us, I warn them now that at the first sign of pursuit I shall put a bullet into you. If you reject my proposal I shall put several bullets into you before I leave this room. And, with or without you, I intend to leave in sixty seconds’ time.’
‘I won’t go! I won’t!’ Mack almost whimpered.
De Richleau raised his gun. His steel-grey eyes, which at times could flash with such brilliance, were as hard as agate.
Mack threw out a protesting hand. ‘Stop!’ he cried. ‘Stop! I’ll come if I must.’ Dabbing at the beads of sweat that had suddenly started out of his forehead, he stepped out from the crowd.
As he reached the door the Duke gave a slight nod to the others, then turned to follow him with an inaudible sigh of relief. Ignac’s escape was an irreparable mishap, but the game was not yet entirely in his hands. By having secured Mack’s person the Duke felt that he had at least one trump still left to play.
Rex was already seated at the wheel of the car with Marie Lou beside him, and neither of them asked any questions as de Richleau motioned Mack into the back before getting in himself. Rex slid in the clutch, the headlights carved a gleaming arc across the larch trees that bordered the curving drive, and the big car gathered speed for its dash through the still August night.
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