“Here we have Austro-Hungarian Supreme Headquarters’ reply to my inquiry there. You were appointed to the Operations branch of the Commander-in-Chief’s staff on August 16th, and served in that capacity until being entrusted with a special mission to this Headquarters on the evening of the 18th. Both there and here, you must have learned military secrets of the first importance. That is your death warrant. Have you anything to say?”
“Not much,” replied the Duke. Standing there with his back against the door, he now looked the very picture of dejection, as he added miserably, “But I find your conclusions a little shattering to the nerves. If you permit, I will smoke a cigarette.”
Without waiting for a reply, he undid the top button of his tunic and slipped his hand inside it. Next moment he drew out, not a cigarette case, but the miniature automatic that he had been carrying under his armpit ever since he had joined von Hötzendorf’s staff.
“Achtung!” he snapped, instantly straightening himself and taking a pace forward. “One move from either of you and I shoot to kill. This little toy is as deadly at eight feet as a rifle. You know that I can’t afford to take any chances now my own neck is in the noose. You’ll do exactly what I tell you, unless you wish to die here in this room. Put your hands up!”
The two Germans had been taken entirely by surprise. Neither of them had even had time to thrust out a hand for the pistol lying only two feet in front of them on the table. The eyes of both flickered towards it for a second, then met the Duke’s steely glance again. Glaring with hate and fury at having been caught napping, they raised their hands shoulder high.
“Higher!” snarled the Duke. “As high as you can stretch. And quick about it! I’ve no time to waste! Our friends on the train must be wondering what the devil has become of me. Or do they know about this?”
Colonel Nicolai’s face relaxed for a moment into a malicious smile. “No. But you needn’t think you’re going to get away on it. I didn’t want that old Austrian Baron coming back to find you, and have to waste time giving him an explanation. I told the engine driver that he would have only two officers travelling, with their servants, and that as soon as they were aboard he was to move off. The train has gone without you.”
Those sneering words were a nasty blow for the Duke. He had felt certain that old Lanzi would have given the show away if he had known that anything of this sort was in the wind, and there was no reason why Nicolai should have informed Major Tauber of the trap he intended to spring. So he had counted on getting away on the train, anyhow as far as Berlin. That was now out of the question, but, all the same, he intended to ensure himself a good start.
“About turn, both of you!” he said abruptly. “Go on! Keep your hands up and walk over to the wall. Press your noses to it. Quick now! Remember I am desperate and we are at war. If you move a muscle without my orders, I shall treat you as I would prisoners on a battlefield who attempted to attack me—I’ll blow your brains out!”
Cowed by the menacing light in his steely grey eyes, they did as he had ordered. When their backs were turned, he transferred the little automatic to his left hand. Then he stepped after them. As he passed the table, he picked up his pistol by the barrel. Slipping on the safety catch of the bigger weapon, he lifted it and brought its butt crashing down on the back of Nicolai’s skull.
The Colonel gave a long, agonized groan, buckled at the knees, and fell senseless to the floor.
At the sound, Steinhauer started back from the wall, half lowering his hands and turning a little, a look of petrified horror on his now ashen face. But the Duke had him covered with the little automatic.
“Get back,” he snapped. “It’s a bullet or a rap on the head. You won’t live after the one, but you will after the other. Take your choice.”
With shoulders hunched and head bent, Steinhauer turned his terrified face away. A sob broke from him just before the blow fell; then he too doubled up and dropped senseless at De Richleau’s feet.
Returning his weapons to their holsters, the Duke stooped down and dragged his two victims into a position where they were lying on their sides back to back. Undoing the Colonel’s belt, he used it to strap their legs together. Wrenching away the cord of the window blind, he tied their wrists with it. Pulling off Steinhauer’s gaudy necktie, he knotted it round both throats, so that the backs of their bleeding heads were held firmly to one another. Then he took a few sheets of foolscap from the table, crumpled them up, and forced them into the unconscious men’s mouths, to prevent their crying out when they regained consciousness.
Turning back to the table, he lit a match and burnt the thin file of papers from which Nicolai had been reading. Having made certain that there were no other documents there which incriminated him, he walked to the door, unlocked it, and put out the light.
Opening the door cautiously, he peered out, and listened intently for a moment. All was quiet, so he removed the key from the lock, stepped out into the passage, re-locked the door from the outside and put the key in his pocket.
Like some great grey cat, he tiptoed down the short length of corridor to the hall. No one was about, so he slipped unobserved out of the back door. There, he paused for a moment, considering his next move. Nicolai had been telling the truth about the train leaving without him. There was a stationary train some distance down the line, but that must be the C. in C.’s special: the siding to the west of the house stood empty. The choice now lay between making off on foot or attempting to steal a vehicle. The latter project meant a risk of being spotted and questioned, which ultimately might lead to the most dire consequences. On the other hand, the greater distance he could put between Wartenburg and himself during the night, the better his chance of getting away altogether. He decided to risk it.
Walking as quietly as possible, but naturally now in case he should be noticed from one of the windows of the house, he went round its east end and paused on the corner of its south front. Eight or ten cars and a dozen motor-cycles were garaged in a long tin-roofed shed, which had recently been erected for that purpose on the opposite side of the drive. During the day they were constantly coming and going, but at night there were much longer intervals unbroken by their roar and clatter, and the hour was past when the drivers washed down their vehicles. There was no special guard on the long shed, as it stood in full view of the sentry who was posted on the front door of the Headquarters. Wartenburg was still fifty miles from the nearest battle zone and not even within sound of its guns, so the sentry was there only as a usual appurtenance to the presence of a senior Commander. He would challenge any civilian who approached either the house or the shed, but De Richleau thought it very unlikely that he would halt anyone in uniform, as soldiers of all ranks were moving about in the vicinity of the house at all hours of the day and night.
Nevertheless, as he stood there, he found himself trembling. If he slipped up in the next few moments, the matter might be referred to some senior officer who would want to know, not only what he had been up to, trying to make off with Headquarters’ transport, but why he had not caught the train. To provide a plausible explanation would be extremely difficult, and once he fell under suspicion copies of the telegrams that had come in about him from von Hötzendorf’s Headquarters and Major Ronge might be produced. Once again, he had nightmare visions of a shooting party at dawn, with himself as the target.
He knew that his shivering fit was caused by reaction from the bad ten minutes through which he had just been. Lighting a cigarette to steady his nerves, he debated whether he should take a car or a motorcycle. Whichever he took, as soon as its loss was discovered the military police would be notified. As a car would be more easily identifiable, he decided on a bicycle.
It was a darkish night. The moon had not yet risen. Only a few stars glimmered overhead. But the area of the drive was lit both by the windows of the house and a few electric bulbs that had been left burning in the long shed. He could not possibly cross the sweep of gravel without the sentry seeing h
im. Checking an impulse to throw away the cigarette, he walked forward still puffing at it. His heart was hammering heavily.
When he had covered a dozen yards the sentry caught sight of him. Recognizing his uniform as that of an officer, he banged and slapped his rifle, bringing it to the salute. With a guilty start, De Richleau acknowledged the gesture. He thanked his stars that the light was insufficient for the man to have seen the expression on his face. Hoping the sentry would think that he was borrowing a motor-bike simply to run in to the town, he approached the shed with all the nonchalance he could muster.
The motor-cycles were all of the same make, so he grasped the nearest by its handlebars and pushed it off its stand. Now was the critical instant. Switching on the controls, he kicked the stand up and ran the bike forward. The engine banged twice, then began to roar. He jumped into the saddle and was off.
He knew that half a mile away, at the gate of the manor grounds, there was another sentry post. But the object of the guard there was to check up on people coming in, not stop those going out. He passed it unchallenged and a second later was out on the open road. To the left, it led north towards Königsberg and the Baltic: to the right, south towards Wartenburg. But in the town there was a cross-roads that would take him to the west. Turning right, he let out the engine, and four minutes later he was entering the little town.
It seemed hours since he had said good-bye to General Hoffmann and the other officers in the mess, so he was surprised to see many lights still on in the windows of the houses, and, here and there, little groups of soldiers flirting with the local girls in the streets. As he purred past a small café he caught sight of its clock. The hands stood at twenty minutes to eleven.
Thinking back, he realized that, hectic as every moment of his encounter with Nicolai and Steinhauer had been, it could not have occupied more than seven or eight minutes, and after leaving them he had wasted only half a minute or so standing at the corner of the house before stealing the bike, so the whole nerve-racking episode had taken place in less than a quarter of an hour.
Turning west at the cross-roads, he ran on for a further quarter of a mile, then he came to a small hump-backed bridge over a canal, which had a red light showing above and beyond it. Slowing down on the crest of the bridge, he saw the reason for the warning signal. On the far side of the bridge lay a level crossing, and its gates were closed.
Pulling up, he peered from side to side in the semi-darkness. To his left front he could make out the outline of a building that was obviously the railway station. To his right front was what appeared to be a goods yard, as several trains were standing there, and two of them were shunting.
Cursing the delay, he remained there on the crest of the bridge, waiting for the gates to open. A train coming from the direction of the station puffed slowly over the level crossing. It was a short one of only three coaches. The first and third coaches were almost in darkness. The centre one was brightly lit. It was a pullman car, and empty but for two people. At a table framed in one window sat Major Tauber and Lanzi smoking one of his big torpedo-shaped cigars.
With fury in his heart, the Duke watched it glide by. He was greatly surprised that it had got no farther. However, Wartenburg was a small junction: its station was now busier than it had ever been in all its history, with trains going to and from the front. And Nicolai had ordered the special to leave some ten minutes before it was due out, so probably it had been held up on the other side of the station until a line could be cleared for it. Or perhaps Lanzi had pulled the communication cord and insisted on waiting for him for a quarter of an hour or so. In any case, the sight of the train, and the thought that although he had caught up with it there was no hope of getting on it, was positively maddening.
When the special had passed the level crossing, the gates swung open, but it halted some sixty yards beyond them. It stood there, hissing steam, its driver evidently waiting for a further signal to proceed.
Suddenly De Richleau decided to take a wild gamble. Jumping from his motor-cycle, he gave a quick look round. There was nobody in sight. Seizing the machine, he upended it, so that its front wheel rested on the low parapet of the bridge. Grasping the saddle, he gave a terrific heave. For a moment the bike balanced on the stone coping, sideways on, both its wheels in the air. With another mighty thrust, he pushed it over. There followed a resounding splash as it struck the water in the middle of the canal. But he caught it only faintly. He was running like a madman for the train.
By his act he knew that he had burnt his boats. If he failed to get on the train there was now no hope of recovering the motor-cycle. But he had been impelled to sacrifice the bird in the hand by the thought that it would be weeks before the machine was discovered on the canal bottom. It was certain to be missed within a few hours. The sentry would report having seen him take it. But nobody would now learn where he had abandoned the stolen vehicle. Therefore, no link would be left connecting him with the special train—if he could catch it.
With flying feet he pelted down the far slope of the bridge. Swerving to the right, he turned away from the level crossing. Beside the road there was a deep ditch, but owing to the summer drought there was no water in it. The ditch was too wide to jump, so he scrambled down and up the lower bank on its far side into a field of turnips. There was now a steep embankment to his left, above which lay the railway line. The rear of the train was still forty yards farther on. His eyes were riveted on it. Every moment he expected it to move and leave him stranded. He tripped on a turnip, swore, regained his balance, and ran on. Another spurt and he was level with the end of the train. Turning, he charged the bank, but it was almost perpendicular. His initial impetus gave out when he was half-way up it. He nearly fell backwards. For a moment he hovered, his hands wildly outstretched and clutching in mid-air.
With a terrific effort he saved himself, pitched forward, and seized two tufts of coarse grass.
The train’s whistle blew. In frantic haste he scrambled up the last few feet of the embankment. Hardly two minutes had elapsed since he had left the bridge, but he was panting as though his lungs would burst.
The train began to move. He hurled himself forward at the last door in it. In one spring he was on the moving foot-board, but his clutching fingers missed the handle of the door. He lost his balance and fell heavily. Lying there on the track, he saw the rear light receding. Picking himself up, he ran after it. The speed of the train increased. He knew now that he would never catch it, but he still ran on. Suddenly he tripped on a sleeper and measured his length on the ground.
Sprawled there with the remaining wind dashed from his body, he watched the light steadily moving away from him. Only now that he had failed to get on the train did he fully realize how much it would have meant for him to do so. No one at Wartenburg could possibly suspect his presence on it. Within an hour or so it would have carried him beyond all danger of pursuit. To have caught it would have meant safety and life. Having lost it meant that, long before he could reach the Dutch border, he would be hunted like a hare—and he had thrown away his only chance of getting clear of the district while darkness lasted.
Scrambling to his feet, he rubbed his bruised knees. As he looked up from doing so he could still see the rear light of the train. It was no longer moving. The train had halted again about two hundred yards down the line.
In a second he was racing after it. Gasping, panting, he leapt from sleeper to sleeper along the track. His mouth wide, his eyes staring, he forced himself forward at the utmost speed of which he was capable. His heart leaping with exaltation, he flashed past the rear buffers of the train, sprang again upon the foot-board of the last coach and, this time, seized the handle of the door. Frantically he wrenched it, first one way, then the other. It was locked.
Jumping down, he dashed along the side of the unlit rear coach, leapt on to the foot-board of the next, and seized the handle of the door there. It turned under his pressure, and swung open. Levering himself up, he lurched insi
de, slamming the door shut behind him. Opposite him, as he stood fighting for breath, was the door of a lavatory. Pushing it open, he staggered inside, thrust back the bolt and collapsed on the seat.
For every second of the time since he had heaved the motor-bike over the parapet of the bridge, his exertions had been of the utmost violence, but the whole episode had occupied less than two minutes, so his exhaustion was purely temporary. The moment he got his wind back he was ready for anything. His brain began to race again, exploring the possibilities of this entirely unexpected situation.
As he washed the dirt off his hands in the lavatory basin, he smiled at his reflection in the mirror. There was a good chance that Messrs. Nicolai and Steinhauer would not be found till the following morning and, even if they were, he considered it improbable that they would be in any state to tell what had happened to them for many hours to come. The sentry had seen him take the motor-cycle, but he had passed him at well over fifty yards’ distance, and in the uncertain light it was unlikely that the man would have seen his features, or even noticed that he was wearing an Austrian uniform. The bike had been sunk without trace, so inquiries about it would lead nowhere. When the doctors did succeed in getting some sense out of his concussed victims the hue and cry would start with a vengeance; but even then the very last place that anyone would look for him was on the train. He recalled the saying that ‘God helps those who help themselves’, and, while his escape from immediate peril was due to his own wits and resolution, he gratefully acknowledged that he owed to Providence this splendid chance of getting clean away.
He began to consider if it would be better to remain hidden for the night, then drop off the train when it had carried him several hundred miles to the west, which offered the prospect of being able to disappear entirely; or face his fellow travellers and give them some plausible explanation for his sudden appearance on it.
Dennis Wheatley - Duke de Richleau 07 Page 53
