Dennis Wheatley - Duke de Richleau 07 (44 page)

The faint light filtering
down the ventilating shaft had now almost entirely disappeared, and he could
not even see the outline of his hand, when he held it up in front of him. He
supposed that the three men upstairs were now having dinner, but did not think
it likely that they would bring him any, so he was glad now that he had not
turned up his nose at the prison stew. However, he hoped that, before they went
to bed, they would throw him down some cushions and rugs to sleep on, as
otherwise he was in for an extremely uncomfortable night. It then occurred to
him that, even if they were so ungracious as to forget that he might not have
dined, they could not prevent his consoling himself with a good bottle of wine.

Going over to a row of
bins he felt about among them till he found one containing champagne. As he
opened a bottle, he wondered if it would be the sort of muck the French sent to
the Balkans, of which during the past week he had had to drink far more than
was good for his head or his stomach at
Le Can-Can.
At first, drinking out of the bottle,
it was difficult to get the flavour, but after a moment he knew that it was a
premiere cuv
é
e
that had been prepared either for England or Russia.

As the dry, yet full
bodied, wine tickled his palate, he was reminded of the last time he had drunk
champagne of that quality. It had been at Ilona’s birthday ball. That had been
thirteen nights ago, but it now seemed so remote that it might have been
thirteen months. In fact, seen in retrospect and by contrast with the present,
it might have been in a different lifetime.

In his mental vision he
saw again the constant quiet movement and blending of the innumerable colours
that had made up that living kaleidoscope. No one dress or uniform stood out
from the others, but in a shimmering, iridescent sea, sable and yellow satin,
black lace and pastel coloured silks, patent leather and paradise plumes, blue,
green and scarlet cloth, gold braid and silver trimmings—the whole twinkling
and winking with a hundred thousand gems—mingled like the million water
globules of some vast fountain seen against the summer sun. Yet it had been
composed of human beings; the flower of an ancient Empire gathered at the most
brilliant court in Europe—gathered there to do honour to the woman he loved,
and who loved him.

Seated there, a prisoner
in that now pitch-black cellar, while three assassins, who held his fate in
their hands, dined in the room above, it seemed utterly impossible that he
could be the same man who, less than a fortnight before, had worn that dashing
sky-blue uniform trimmed with silver braid and grey astrakhan, and had seen an
Archduchess fight back her tears because he must leave her.

Slowly, he finished the
bottle of champagne. He had only just drained it of the last mouthful, when he
heard a car drive up outside. He wondered, vaguely at first, what that
portended. Judging by the total disappearance of the light from the ventilating
shaft, he knew that it must be after ten o’clock. But perhaps some of the other
conspirators had driven out from Belgrade for an after-dinner conference with
their Chief.

A few minutes later the
noise of the engine reached him again, and he heard the car drive off. That
seemed to invalidate his first explanation of its arrival. The odds were, then,
that it had brought a dispatch out to Dimitriyevitch. If so, it must contain
news of some urgency, to have been sent out so late at night. Uneasily, he
began to wonder whether it had been a messenger who had brought some fresh
information about himself.

Again, he swiftly
reviewed his position, but could think of nothing that might have given him
away. All the same, his sixth sense gave him an uneasy feeling that the arrival
of the car spelt danger for him. Instinctively, he began to visualize being
called up to the room above, re-questioned, found guilty: then being taken out
into the woods and shot. He did not mean to die tamely. He would seize the
first chance to break away if he possibly could, or, in the worst case, fight
to the last gasp. But he knew that he would stand little chance without a
weapon.

The champagne bottle he
was holding would make an excellent club; but it was too big to hide under his
jacket, and the moment they saw it they would take it away from him at the
pistol point. Perhaps, though, if he pretended to be drunk—

Quickly, he shuffled
through the darkness, found the bin again, opened another bottle, and poured
about a third of its contents into the back of the bin. Returning with it to
the scantling, he sat down once more, holding the bottle upright on his knee.

It was less than five
minutes since the car had driven off, but it seemed longer. He was just
beginning to think that his nerves had panicked him into a false alarm, when
the door at the top of the steps opened and Tankosić called to him to come
up.

He caught his breath and
his heart began to hammer. His instinct had been right, then. Unless they had
received some fresh information, why should they wish to question him again
that night? Dimitriyevitch had said that his police were working on the case.
They must have unearthed something and sent it out to him. Tankosić’s
voice had been harsh. His bulky form loomed threateningly against the lighted
doorway at the top of the steps. This was it! The summons was that of the Angel
of Death. In all probability he now had no more than a few minutes to live.

Instead of getting to his
feet, he lurched round and called back drunkenly: “Don’t wanna come up. Very
happy here. You come down and have a drink.”

“Come up, damn you!”
shouted Tankosić.

“Don’t wanna come up,” the
Duke repeated. “Darn good wine—’ an’ lots of it. Very happy here.”

“Come up, you bastard,” bawled
the Serbian. “Come up, or I’ll shoot that bottle out of your hands.”

The unsavoury epithet,
and the threat to shoot, were ample confirmation of the Duke’s fears. They did
not want him up there to question him again on some minor matter. Somehow, they
had found him out, and now meant to exact vengeance on him for attempting to
betray them. But still he did not get to his feet. Now that he was up against
it, his nerve was back. His mind was clear as a bell, his brain assessing
chances as quickly as an actuary working with a life insurance table spread
before him. He had gambled with death before, and now he did so again.

“Oh, go to hell!” he
called thickly. “Can’t you see—see I’m enjoyin’ myself?” And, raising the
bottle to his lips, he took a pull at it.

With an oath, Tankosić
came stumping down the stairs. Marching over to De Richleau, he seized him by
the arm and jerked him to his feet.

“Wait a minute! Wait a
minute!” mumbled the Duke. “Wanna finish the bottle. Why you so impatient?”

“Get up those bloody
stairs,” snarled Tankosić, and gave him a rough push towards them with his
left hand. In his right he held his pistol. He waved it with a threatening
gesture.

Clutching his bottle
under his left arm, De Richleau stumbled forward, muttering, “Oh, all right!
All right!” On the first stair he tripped intentionally, recovered himself, and
began to stagger up the flight.

Tankosić followed a
yard behind him, impatiently urging him on. The Duke could no longer see the
Serbian’s pistol and, for all he knew, it might be pointed at his back. If so,
he did know that within another moment his number would be up. But once again
he gambled with death. When they were two thirds of the way up the stairs, he
grasped the neck of the bottle in his right hand. He dared not give his enemy
an instant’s warning by turning to aim the blow. Only the Timeless Ones could
help him now, by directing the arm that he must use blindly. Pretending to
stumble again, he suddenly swung the bottle round in a terrific back-hander at
the spot where he judged Tankosić’s head to be.

It swished through the
air and landed with a dull thud, nearly dislocating De Richleau’s wrist. The
bottle caught the Major flat on the side of the head, smashing his right ear to
pulp, and cracking his skull low down. Without a moan, he twisted sideways,
fell, and rolled bumping down the stairs. The pistol he had been holding
clattered noisily beside him.

De Richleau would have
given ten years of his life to have been able to get that pistol. But he dared
not attempt to. Down there in the heavy shadow it might be two, three, five,
minutes before he could find it. Even one would be too big a price to pay. In
less, Ciganović and Dimitriyevitch, having heard Tankosić fall, would
be coming through the door with drawn weapons, to find out what had happened.
If they caught their prisoner groping there at the bottom of the steps, they
would have him completely at their mercy.

Without losing an
instant, De Richleau thrust the now nearly empty bottle under his left arm
again, took the remaining three stairs at a bound, and lurched into the room.
Swaying drunkenly, he fell against the door-post and leaned there blocking the
doorway for Ciganović, who had been just about to go through it. Thrusting
out his free hand sideways, so that it pointed to the cellar, he roared with
laughter, and stuttered hilariously:

“Ole Tankosić—ole Tankosić’s
fallen down the stairs.”

Ciganović took a
pace forward, seized him by the collar and tie, and gave him a violent shake.
He let his eyes goggle, and his head roll from side to side on his shoulders,
as though he was hopelessly drunk. But the shaking was brief. As Ciganović
swung him round, away from the door, Dimitriyevitch’s voice came sharply from
behind him.

“Leave that drunken
swine, and see what’s happened to Tankosić.”

Flinging him hard against
the wall, Ciganović loosed his grip, turned, and stepped through the
doorway. It was the very thing that De Richleau had been praying for. It should
now be the work of only a second to slip through after him and, as he started
down the stairs, brain him with the bottle by one mighty blow from behind.

But, for that manœvre the
Duke had counted on Dimitriyevitch still being off his guard, and he was not.
His prisoner might or might not be drunk; but he was not taking any chances.
Whipping out his pistol, he aimed it at De Richleau’s stomach and snapped:

“Stay where you are, you
perjured traitor!”

Dimitriyevitch was eight
feet away, and standing on the far side of the small dinner table. It would
have been suicide to attempt to rush him. De Richleau’s hopes had been high a
moment before. If he could have brained Ciganović, he could have got his
gun, and having settled two of them, shot it out man for man with the Colonel.
Now, terror gripped him for a second. He was still one against two, and both of
them were armed, while he had only a bottle with which to attack them or defend
himself.

Hatred blazing from his
fanatical eyes, Dimitriyevitch pointed at the table and went on, almost
spitting with venom:

“Here’s the evidence of
your treachery. You didn’t know, did you. that my postal police open all
letters to or from the Embassies and Legations? But for a hitch, for which
someone is going to pay, these should have reached me by mid-day, and you would
be dead now. There’s enough here for the Brotherhood to condemn you ten times
over. But I need no court to confirm my actions. Your attempt to get a warning
to the Archduke has failed. Despite your perfidy, we’ll blow that Austrian pig
to bits on Sunday. And I mean to send you to hell two nights and a day ahead of
him.”

The Duke’s glance fell to
the table. But he knew what he would see before his look confirmed his thought.
Among the half-empty glasses upon it, lay two open letters. The writing on them
was his own. They were the all-important details of the plot that he had posted
the previous night to the British Chargé d’affaires in Belgrade and Sir Maurice
de Bunsen in Vienna. It was beyond Dimitriyevitch’s powers to interfere with
the Diplomatic Bags, but, as De Richleau stared at the damning letters, he felt
he ought to have foreseen that such an adept at espionage would be certain to
have the ordinary mails watched, and any letters which might appear of interest
submitted to him before being carefully re-sealed for delivery.

Appalled at the thought
that two out of the three channels he had used to warn Franz Ferdinand had been
blocked, De Richleau stood slouched against the wall, where Ciganović had
flung him. One ray of comfort flashed into his agonized mind. His telegram to
Sir Pellinore was not with the letters and, its message having been disguised,
it might yet get through. But in a second he forced the Archduke from his mind.
He had done his utmost to save him, and could do no more. In this instant of
time, no further fraction of thought could be spared for past or future. He was
standing on the razor edge of life and death. Another moment, and Ciganović
would come running up the stairs, back into the room. No man could hope to
dodge the shots from two automatics, so with his reappearance the last faint
chance would be gone. De Richleau knew that he must act
now
, or admit defeat and face eternity.