In pity I let her be, and in truth I was so shaken myself that I could not speak. That the man whose murder she had witnessed was Perceval — Perceval, my friend — I could not doubt; nor that in this very building, under this very roof — the ill-omened roof under which we sat — he had been thus foully, thus miserably done to death. But mingled with the horror that I felt was another feeling scarcely less strong, and that was wonder — the wonder to which the great coincidences of life give rise.
For I knew that pity had deflected me from the straight course of my duty. Pity had led me away from the scent I should have pursued and that I had set myself to follow. And, lo! the divergence had but guided me under Providence and by a shorter route to the end of the chase.
“Did you see the men’s faces?” I asked as soon as she had a little recovered herself.
She shook her head.
It rose to my mind to ask her the fate of the despatches, for I had not a doubt that the parcel which poor Ellis, faithful to the last, had flung through her window, contained them. But I refrained. For the despatches seemed at this moment a small thing, a mere detail in happenings so tragic. I left her to tell the story, and by and by, in a lower whisper and with many pauses, she went on:
“The fall stunned me. When I came to myself I was on the floor, chilled to the bone, and the first light was stealing into the room. I raised myself and drank some water and crept back to bed, and for a few moments I fancied that the whole was a nightmare, and that I had fallen out of bed in the effort to escape from my dream.
“But I could not sleep, and when it grew lighter my eyes fell on a packet lying on the floor, and I was seized with sickness, for I knew then that it was no dream! And I might — I ought to have roused the house even then and told the story. But the thing had so terrified me, I had become such a coward, that I fancied that the men who had done it were at my elbow — were watching me. I feared even to open the door, and especially I shrank from keeping the packet — in sight or about me.
“I looked round for a hiding-place, and at length — I do not know what made me think of it — I went to the open window and peered out. I saw that the window opposite was shuttered, I could see no one watching me; the eaves were within reach of my hand, and, trembling, I thrust the packet under them, between the wall and the roof, and I rushed back to my bed.”
“And the packet is there now?” I exclaimed, unable to control my voice.
“Yes,” she answered dully. “I suppose so.”
“Then you never—”
“Removed it?” with a shudder. “Oh, I dared not! I dared not! And I had no chance, for more happened. I was dressing, feeling very sick and ill, but still intending to tell someone, when the — the woman came in, half-dressed, and she had not been with me a minute — not a minute — before I knew that she was — was one of them. She said that she had dropped an ear-ring and she would search my room. But I knew — I guessed in a moment that she was searching for the packet, and I believed that if I betrayed myself she would kill me.
“I do not know how I had the strength to play my part, but I pretended alarm, affecting to believe that she suspected me, and for the time I deceived her. I even had the courage to make my vexation a reason for parting from her, and she made no difficulty. But she took care not to let me out of her sight for one moment; she followed me everywhere while I remained, and, God forgive me for my cowardice — I had not the courage to speak.
“Instead, I resumed my journey, reproaching myself bitterly with every league. But arrived at Altona, I found my father very ill and in danger, and in my anxiety I put the horror out of my mind. Still, I did not mean” — her voice broken with sobs—” indeed, indeed, I did not mean to be silent.
“I intended to call at the Embassy on my return and tell all. And I travelled to Berlin with that in my mind. But at Spandau, when I got out of the chaise they — they met me.”
“What?” I cried, amazed. “Do you mean that they dared—”
“The three! Yes,” dully. “The three! They met me. They were there waiting for me. I was alone — it was dusk when I stepped out — and they surrounded me, pretended to be my friends, silenced me, hustled me away with them, and before I could resist they pushed me into a chaise which was in waiting, and drove me on to Berlin. There they took me, terrified and vainly protesting, to a house in the suburbs.
“I know now that they had searched and searched at Perleberg and made certain at last that I had the packet. It is possible that my manner had deceived the woman only for the moment. At any rate, they kept me three days in the house at Berlin, starving me, questioning me, above all, threatening me” — with a shudder—” with Karl. They would make him put his great hands round my throat, and then while he half-strangled me, gloating over my pain and my terror, they would cry: “Tell! Tell! Where is the packet? Tell, or—’”
“The devils!” I cried, leaping to my feet in irrepressible rage. “Oh, the devils! But they shall pay me for that! Let me only get my hand on them! Let me — But — but, why, Fraulein, did you not tell?”
“He trusted me,” she said, shaking from head to foot. “But it was not that. If it had been that — only that — I should have told. I am a coward. But I dared not. I dared not. Don’t you see? I knew that the moment they held the secret they would kill me. They would strangle me at once. They dared not let me go, for I knew all — they had boasted before me that they had killed him.
“So to give up my secret was to die — to die, do you see? But at last, seeing them grow desperate, and to win a day or two of life, I owned that I had hidden the packet — at Perleberg; and if they would take me there I would find it for them. It was a respite; it meant three or four days of life, and I thought that something might happen on the road, some means of escape offer, some chance of appealing to strangers.
“And at first I had hope. They took me for the night to a hotel in Berlin that they might make an early start, and there I — I all but” — she wrung her hands over the remembrance—” I all but got away from them. They left Karl to guard me, and he dozed. But when I had crept to the door and was all but outside, he awoke, and he missed me and caught me on the threshold — oh, it was a bitter moment. A most bitter moment!”
‘My God!” I cried. “If I had known! If I had only known! I saw your shadow, and if you had cried out — spoken, if you had—”
“He would have strangled me,” she whispered. “Oh, yes, he would, he would! After that, each night —
I suppose they wished to break me down — each night they made me think that they were going to kill me — that their patience was at an end, that they would wait no longer. Each night! They would talk before me, devising ways in which they might do it, and gloating over my terror.
“Once they told me that they would drop molten lead in my ear while I slept, and I think that they bought lead — I think they meant it. Another night they threatened to suffocate me with smoke and burn me with the room. They debated it before me — and the chances! And always to silence me there were Karl’s horrible hands! They were never a yard from my throat, and they told me that nothing could be done to him — he was not responsible, he was half-witted. Oh, it was horrible! Horrible!
“Oh, d — n them, d — n them!” I whispered, shaking with rage. “If I get my hands on them!”
But she paid no attention to me. “Then at last,” she said, twisting and untwisting her fingers, “we came here. They knew that you were following them then, and for the first time I think that they were afraid. They alighted at a village a league from the town and off the road, and we walked in after dark with my wrist tied to Karl’s.
“They brought me here, and last night I felt sure that I should die, for I knew that if I did not now show them where the packet was they would torture me; and if I told they would kill me — kill me and bury me in the cellar — where he is buried. But I suppose that they were still afraid of you, for nothing happened last night. But I knew that the end
would come to-night, and then—”
“And then?” I said, for she had paused.
“You came in.” She looked at the door.
CHAPTER XXIII
TRAPPED
“AY, I came in,” I rejoined grimly. “ And now we will go out!” I rose to my feet. The anger and indignation that I felt on her account overshadowed for the time the horrors that she had related. “We will go out! And woe to them if they try to stop us! Come! Be of good courage, Fraulein — it is over. But first — let me see if I cannot force this door without wasting a shot. If I cannot, I can still—”
She held up her hand. The flame of the candle wavered as if blown aside, and the girl’s shadow on the wall swayed and hovered, as my ear caught far away in the hollow depths of the empty building a faint creak. She gripped my arm — she had already risen to her feet. “Wait! Wait!” she breathed. “Listen!” With fear-stricken eyes she strove to probe the shadows of the outer closet.
But her fear — that fear on which those cowardly wretches had so foully and so brutally played — only brought my rage to a white heat. Under the polish of civil life, and even, thank God, under the veneer of the Service, the natural man still lives, and for the moment it was uppermost in me. I longed for nothing so much as to come to blows with the murderers. “Coming, are they?” I rejoined. “So much the better, Fraulein! Let them come! And they shall receive something more than they expect!” For since I had heard the girl’s story I had nothing less in my mind than to pay them the thousand crowns that I had offered — or one crown!
No, let them come, and Heaven help me if I did not turn the tables on them, and, if they withstood me, shoot them down like the dogs they were! “Let them come,” I repeated, to reassure the girl. “And do you have no fear, Fraulein. The game is in my hands; I am armed — and well armed — and they have no woman to deal with now!”
“Oh, but I am frightened! I am frightened!” she wailed, striving with all her little strength to detain me. “They are cunning! They are cunning as death! It was not without a purpose that they let us meet, that they have let us talk! I am sure — oh, I am sure of that.”
“Pooh!” I said. “It was to gain a thousand crowns, Fraulein. I know them, believe me. But they have overshot the mark. In a few minutes you will be free, and they none the richer!”
I suppose that it was the opening of some very distant door that had caused the flame of the candle to flicker, for it was not until this moment that we heard the tramp of footsteps crossing the loosely laid floor of the great room. With the sound there came a murmur of voices and a laugh — a low, cruel laugh. And if anything could have hardened me in my purpose, it was that laugh.
As the footsteps halted at the door, and I heard the key grate in the clumsy lock, I thrust the girl behind me, and at the same time set up between myself and the light a broken corn-measure that chance had left on the table. This placed me in shadow, and when the door opened and the three came in, the two men jumping down while the woman remained poised on the threshold, I was ready for them, a pistol balanced in my hand. And, thank heaven, some skill with the pistol was in those days a part of a gentleman’s education.
“Halt, there!” I cried. “Stand! If you come a foot nearer, you devils—”
“What will you do?” the man jeered. He seemed not a whit surprised.
“Shoot you down like dogs!” I retorted. “And murdering dogs you are!”
“Ho! Ho! You will, will you?”
“You’ve come for money, but you’ll get lead!” I said, casting concealment aside. And as the man took a step forward I covered him. “Steady, if you prize your life or—”
“You’ll shoot us, eh? Shoot us like dogs, will you?”
“Yes, I will,” I cried, “and with pleasure! All the pleasure in life.”
“You fool!” he snarled, swiftly changing his bantering tone. “Fool! I drew the charges of those pistols two hours back — in the hall at the inn where you left them! Booby! Idiot!” with savage scorn. “They are harmless! As harmless as you, silly rabbit, with your neck in a noose! We’ve trapped you, dummer Englander, trapped you. And your thousand crowns as well. Ay, fire away!” as in a rage I pulled the trigger and the flint fell futilely. “In ten minutes, if the stubborn little slut there does not speak, you will join your friend in the cellar! And moulder — moulder and rot there with him — both of you!”
Quick as light, but with despair in my heart, I flashed the second pistol at him — with the same result. I have since thought that I had done better then had I dashed out the light and taken my chance in the dark. But I had no time to think, and, thought apart, what else was there for me to do in that bitter moment of defeat, except what I did? I hurled the pistol at the man, and, clubbing the other, I flung myself upon him.
My aim was true, the weapon, short and heavy, struck him on his grinning mouth, and he went down as if I had hit him with a club. But my very success was fatal to me. Carried on by the impulse of my rush, I fell over him, and in a second the long powerful arms of the dwarf closed about me, his weight held me down, his horrible grasp sought my throat, clutched it, dug into it.
In vain, his hot breath on my neck, his wild-beast growl in my ears, I strove with all my strength to rise — strove desperately to cast him off. In vain. The pressure of his twining fingers, vice-like, strangling, grew tighter and tighter. My breast heaved, sparks shone and burst before my eyes, I was suffocating — suffocating! A last struggle, a blaze of light, and I lost consciousness.
When I came to myself, drawing deep and painful breaths, with tingling limbs and a bursting head, I did not for a while take in where I was, or even at the first know if I lived. I seemed to be in a vast cavern, stretching on every side to a dark horizon beyond the reach of dim eyes. I fancied myself alone, set solitary in the midst of this gloomy antre — which might, to my still reeling senses, have been Hades itself.
And for a space, holding but weakly to reality, I recalled no part of the things that had gone before, nor the circumstances which had brought me to this. I only knew that I was in great pain; but this very pain it was that by and by had the effect of sharpening my perceptions. I began to notice things — that my stock was gone, my coat and shirt were wet, my face and hair dripping. My throat, too, hurt me vilely, and my wrists and ankles burned.
I tried to move and could not; and by slow degrees enlightenment bitter as death penetrated to my mind. I was a prisoner. I remembered the struggle and its issue, I recognized that I was still alive, but bound hand and foot and helpless; set, my back against something that I could not see, in the middle of the floor of the great chamber of the brewery. A yellow light, as of a lanthorn burning behind me, disclosed so much of the place as I could see.
I had barely tasted the bitterness of this knowledge, I had no more than tried the strength of the bonds that held me, my senses were still giddy with the shock of the discovery, when a sound broke the silence. I heard footsteps coming across the loose floor towards me. I heard sentences exchanged, but as the speakers were behind me and my neck was so sore that I could not turn my head, I could not see the speakers.
It was only when the Waechters appeared before me and stood looking down at me, the man with cruel malignity as he gloated over my helplessness, the woman with sombre eyes — it was only then that I appreciated the hopelessness of my case, and recognized that I was in the hands of those from whom I could expect no grain of mercy.
Though their eyes rested on me they continued to talk as if I had not been there. The woman said something about a light, a better light.
“Oh, there’s light enough,” the man answered in a muffled tone, and I saw that his jaw was bound up. “I want only enough to see the bolt, and if it takes more than one stroke to find it — he’ll have the longer time to think where he’s going! That’s all! Do you see this?”
He spurred me brutally with his foot and pointed to his bandaged face. “You did it, you devil! And you are going to pay for it.” T
hen, to his companion, “Where’s the girl?” impatiently. “Why doesn’t he bring her along?”
“Oh, he’ll bring her,” the woman answered, her eyes fixed on me — and they had the same brooding look which had struck me so forcibly two nights before when I had watched her leaning over the sleeping girl. “He’s bringing her now. But he’ll want to do the work.”
“Well, he won’t!” the man snarled. “That’s my job, and I mean to do it.”
“It might be safer — to let him do it.”
“D — n safety!” he retorted. “If you’d lost your teeth and a piece of your jaw” — with another ugly look at me—” your hands would itch for the bar as much as mine do. Besides, we’re too deep in now to talk of safety.” Then abruptly, “Will she speak?”
“I think so.” The woman seemed to measure her words as she answered. “If anything will make her, I think this will.”
“It was your idea,” he rejoined. “And you’re a woman and may know. But one way or the other is no matter. He’ll go any way, and no loss and a thousand thalers gained. And if she hasn’t spoken, well, we can try my way with her. We’ll see if the lead won’t persuade her. Make it hot enough, and I’ll go bail she’ll squeak.”
“She may die first,” the woman answered with, I fancied, a shudder, quickly repressed. “But that’s your affair. Only I warn you, have a care that she does not follow him — and cheat you that way. Hold her fast, do you hear?”
“Karl will see to that,” he replied. “He’ll hold her, and fast enough, I’ll be bound, if I tell him. Oh — he’s bringing her. Then let’s get this part over. But” — with a devilish glance at me—” not too quickly, either. No, my Englishman, not too quickly, either. For each of these teeth I’ll have a price.”
Not a syllable of their talk had escaped me, and to this day and this hour I can recall not only the slightest word that passed between them, but — so far as they were to me — their looks and their bearing as they spoke. For though there was much said, and some said that I did not understand, though the more sinister points baffled me, I knew that it was the last, or a part of the last conversation that I should ever hear.
Complete Works of Stanley J Weyman Page 705
