Red In The Morning (16 page)

My legs were giving out, but I shambled up to its jaws.

And then I heard the rasp of a curtain – the sound a steel curtain makes when it is moved up or down.

“
Mansel!
”, I roared. “
Mansel! For God’s sake stop!
”

“By God, it’s him,” shouted Mansel.

And a figure leapt out of the shadows to set a hand under my arm.

“Oh, thank God, sir. Thank God.”

Bell.

The honest fellow was trembling.

Then came a heavy explosion, and right on its heels a thunderous, rumbling crash.

Two hours had gone by.

Mona Lelong was asleep in John Bagot’s bed, and I was at ease in my own, with a quart of champagne inside me and brandy within my reach. Bell was standing by the window, Mansel was sitting beside me, and Bagot was leaning upon the end of my bed.

I had made my report, and Mansel was now to tell me the little I did not know.

“In the first place,” he said, “you must wonder why I left you alone with John Bagot and went for the car. That was because you were wearing the colour of death. I’ve known you a good many years, but never before have I seen you look so ill. I was going for a doctor, William. I meant to bring a doctor from Sarrat, as quickly as ever I could.

“Well, my luck was dead out. I had to cover three miles before I fell in with a lorry, and I never got to Sarrat till a quarter to nine. There are only two doctors there, and both were out. I tried in vain to run one or other to earth: but at last I threw in my hand and sought for a car. I meant to drive straight to the meadow and pick you up. If you will believe me, there wasn’t a car to be had; for everyone had been taken by so many idle fools as had an urge to visit the scene of the accident. Observe the unkindness of Fate. Every one of those cars had been driven to a spot ten minutes from where I wanted to go. But all were gone. The last had left two minutes before I arrived… I got a lift in the end – from another idle fool who had come from farther afield, but I never got to the farm till ten minutes to ten.

“It didn’t take me long to get back, with Carson and Bell. But I was just too late. When John Bagot ran into the road, and I saw his face…” He stopped there and covered his eyes. “I’ve had some bad moments, William, but I cannot remember when I’ve been hit so hard. Of course I knew they’d got you, before he opened his mouth. And I knew that you would receive no mercy at all. The only question was how soon they would put you to death.

“Well, something had to be done. But, for once in my life, I didn’t know what to do. One thing was most painfully clear – that we could do nothing by day.

“I naturally thought of the sinkhole, but that I dismissed at once. You see, I knew nothing at all of what you had found, and in view of the shocking condition in which you emerged, it seemed the height of folly to try to get in that way.

“I decided to survey the dingle – from where you saw it on Thursday. I did, before midday – to no purpose, of course. There’s no approach from the mountains. There must have been once, of course: my theory is that the landslide closed the gate.

“I then considered the château – to no avail. There was nothing for it but the quarry, as you and Gedge had perceived.

“Now there could, I knew, be no doubt that when we raised the first curtain, we should also raise the alarm: so that, when we raised the second, our friends would be ready and waiting to pick us off. I mean, that was elementary. Yet both curtains had to be raised, if we were to strike. And so I fell back on the Baron’s infernal machine.

“I never mentioned the fact, but, after you had retired, on Thursday night, Carson and I went out and retrieved the bomb. This, for two reasons. First, to leave it under the culvert was a most monstrous act. Some innocent being or beings might very well stumble upon it: and if and when they did, they would almost certainly stumble into another world. Secondly, it might come in useful – one never knows.

“And so I determined to use the infernal machine. It would certainly raise the second curtain much quicker than could our hands. What was more to the point, its effect would be disconcerting. Gedge and Brevet and Punter would hardly be at their best. And that would give us a chance.

“Well, there you are. After a fearful day, we left full strength for the quarry, complete with bomb.

“The first of the curtains took us an hour to raise. Then we entered the tunnel, and I placed the infernal machine. I wired it up and then withdrew with the leads. You heard us pull down the first curtain, to stop any flying stuff. And then you heard the explosion…

“I think that’s all.”

“Tell me again,” I said, “what Carson found.”

“He and Rowley could only raise the curtain a foot – the first curtain, of course, the one we had just pulled down. Then Carson crawled underneath – to find the tunnel gone, for its roof had collapsed. He says you would never have known there had been a tunnel there. That being so at our end, what is it like at theirs? Of course, quarries will be quarries: they’re chosen because their stone is easy to win.

“Had you not already escaped, I should have ruined our chances of getting you out. Of that there is no question. All I can say for myself is that it never entered my head that de Parol possessed an explosive so savage as that. But since you have saved yourself, William, it’s really turned out very well. The enemy’s transport is frozen; and only by way of the château can they themselves emerge. One or more may have been bent when the cracker went off. The strong probability is that Horace is out of his mind, and I’m sure that Gedge and Brevet are having their beastly being like men possessed. But that is more your fault than mine, for your escape, William, will bruise their cold, black hearts. My God, I give you best for getting out of that jam. I don’t believe I could have done it, and that’s the truth.”

“But for Mona Lelong,” said I, “I should still be there.”

“Perhaps. But, but for your spirit, you’d both be entombed alive.”

“We were very lucky,” I said. “I don’t have to tell you that. Next time I go down–”

“Next time?” cried Bagot, but Mansel only smiled.

I nodded.

“I’ve some scores to settle, John. And unless they’ve discovered my bar, within the week I shall see that kitchen again.”

At six o’clock that evening the three of us sat in a meadow and talked with Mona Lelong. The spot was that above and behind the farm, from which I had watched the Baron’s attempt on our flat. Carson and Bell were on guard, and Rowley was keeping the farm, a furlong away.

The Stoat and I had rested the whole of that day, and neither of us was the worse for what we had undergone. But my hands were still very sore. She was wearing clothes that Mansel had bought for her – a dark-blue shirt and slacks, which suited her very well.

“The thing,” said Mansel, “is this. You have broken with Arx and you cannot go back. That is the price you have paid for saving Chandos’ life. Now we can make no return, for no one can make return for valour like that. For his sake you staked your life – and you very nearly lost it, Miss Mona Lelong. But though you didn’t lose it, you have lost everything else. Well, of course we are at your service from this time on. Any help you wish, you shall have. That is understood. But there is another point. Chandos took you with him, to save your life – not at all with the idea that you should come in with us. If you like to come in with us, that is to say, to help us to bring Gedge and Brevet down, we shall be very glad. But that would mean giving us the layout – telling us all we ask about the Château of Arx. And if you don’t want to do that – well, there’s an end of the matter. We shall put no pressure upon you: we shall not question your decision in any way. Perhaps I ought to add this – that we know your uncle’s profession: and when we have dealt with Gedge, we shall destroy his plant. We shall not inform the police: we shall not hurt your uncle, except in self-defence: but we shall draw his teeth. That’s all I want to say, except to insist upon this – that there is no reason at all why you should come in with us. You have done enough, Miss Lelong. You have done far more than we had any right to ask: and, as a result, you have turned your life upside down.”

Mona Lelong raised her eyebrows.

“As a matter of fact,” she said, “I’ve put it the right side up. You’ve pulled me out of the slough. I’ve got a little money – ill-gotten gains, of course; and if I can get to England… Not yet, you know. I’m going to see this through. I told Richard yesterday that I didn’t do things by halves. Without me, my uncle’s finished: but, as I daresay you’ll believe, I owe him nothing at all. He made me what I am; and, though I’ve always played square, again and again I’ve had to stand up for myself. I’ve taken ten per cent of what he has made – and he’s never forgiven me. Yet he couldn’t get on without me, and mine was the dangerous job. So, you see, I’ve no compunction. As for Gedge and Brevet…” She drew in her breath. “And now let’s get down to things. Tell me in so many words what you want to know.”

“Can we enter Arx,” said Mansel, “except by the way you came out?”

Miss Lelong considered.

Then –

“No,” she said. “You might have done it by the quarry, but now you say the tunnel is blocked. The château itself is impregnable.”

“When you say ‘impregnable’…”

Miss Lelong frowned.

“It isn’t by day,” she said. “But–”

“We can’t try by day,” said Mansel.

“Well, at dusk, throughout the château the inside shutters are closed. These are of steel, and every one is wired to give the alarm. So, of course, are the gates. If you managed to force the wicket – well, they’d be waiting for you inside the
porte-cochère
.”

Mansel bit his lip.

“Electricity,” he said. “Any chance of cutting that off?”

The girl shook her head.

“We make our own. Turbines. They’re underground. The place is a natural fortress. Between the house and the château there’s a cavern as big as a church.”

“Servants?”

“All crooks. Most of them badly wanted – that’s why they stay. And they never squeak – why kill the golden goose?”

There was a little silence.

“Tell me,” said Bagot. “Have they got a car in the château?”

“No,” said Mona Lelong. “We kept the limousine there, but you did that in. Until they can clear the tunnel, they’ll have to hire.”

“Then they’ll hire for some time,” said Mansel. “To clear that tunnel would take a gang six weeks.”

“And now,” said I, “for the question that really counts. Will they guess which way we went – eighteen hours ago?”

“I don’t think they will. The rope would not be missed; nor would the bar. You say they were both out of sight. We didn’t light the kitchen, and so there was nothing to show that we had been there. They would assume that I’d taken you back to the château: and when they drew blank there, they’d start on the cavern’s depths. While they were searching those, Captain Mansel made his – demonstration. So they’d have to let the search go, and, when the tumult had died, begin all over again. And they’d do it half-heartedly this time and presently give it up. But, if they did think of the drain, they’d make sure we were dead. To be frank, I don’t know that I blame them.”

Mansel nodded.

“Such an assumption,” he said, “would be entirely warrantable. And now may we have the layout?”

“Give me pencil and paper,” said Mona. “I’ll draw a plan of the house.”

Long before we went to our dinner, we knew all there was to be known about Arx and Petit Arx. For reasons which will appear, I shall not set it all down, but they made the sort of retreat of which a malefactor must dream. In the neighbourhood the Baron was accepted as a rich, eccentric recluse: and until he had had the misfortune to be discovered by Gedge, the cloak which he wore was a cloak of darkness indeed. It seemed, even now, most unlikely that anyone dreamed that he was devoted to crime: but the comings and goings of Gedge and his confederates must have impaired the legend of the recluse. For this reason alone, the Baron was mad to be free of his beastly guests; while the thought that they might be followed to his abode – I mean, of course, by the police – was a continual torment. As I have already shown, Mansel’s arrival had set him beside himself; and I quite agreed with Mansel that Mona’s and my disappearance and then the tunnel’s collapse must have reduced him to that condition of mind which marches with Insanity.

Be that as it may, we decided that three full days must pass before we attacked. (This was simply because of the state of my hands. For one thing only, until these were healed, I could not have fired a pistol and hit my man.) We should then attack in force, entering Arx by the way by which Mona and I had escaped.

“And unless,” said Mansel, “they have a guard in the kitchen – well, that should be the end of Brevet and Gedge. But, before we change the subject, I think I should just say this. This three days’ delay is trying – we all know that. But let us be sure that it will be just as trying for Daniel Gedge.”

“That’s right,” said Mona Lelong. “I know he wants to be gone. He’s got some job in the offing – I don’t know where or what. But he had a wire about it the other day – and the way he spoke about you for ‘holding him up’! Brevet improved the occasion. ‘The priest abuses the goat which is late for the sacrifice.’”

Mansel made no reply, but I saw his brows contract.

We knew no peace the next day.

No doubt because it was Sunday, scores of strangers came to inspect the dell: and, because they had plenty of time, a great many brought their lunch. Cars were continually moving along our little-used lane, and families broke their fast in the curtilage of the farm. Since we wished to attract no attention, the doors of the barn were kept shut and we did not leave our rooms till seven o’clock that night: but the day was immensely hot, and the flat was like a furnace that afternoon.

I think this made Mansel insist that Mona and I should drive into the hills on Monday and pass the whole of the day in that majestic peace which only high places know.

“Take Bell and the Lowland,” he said. “Make for Cluny and eat your lunch above Jules. Then go to sleep in a beech wood. You won’t be worried up there.”

“And you?”

“John Bagot and Carson and I shall go to Toulouse. We must get some proper gear for the fun and games which will open on Wednesday next. I know just what we need, and it shouldn’t be hard to find. But I will not attack without it. Twice the bowels of the earth have nearly taken your life, and we’ve quite enough risks to run without treading on Nature’s toes.”

So it came about that at nine the following morning Mona and Bell and I drove into the topless hills.

Once we had passed Cluny, we met no traffic at all; and a mile and a half beyond Jules, we might have had the world to ourselves. And then at last the mountain road we had chosen came to an end.

I knew the spot though I had seen it but twice. Shepherds and fishermen know it; and I suppose that surveyors have passed that way. But if others know it, it does not reflect their acquaintance, but seems to have lain untrodden since Time was young.

That we had been seen and followed, I could not believe. Still, I felt it was prudent that Bell should stay with the car: so Mona and I took our lunch and made our way south.

A mile from the end of the road, you come to a hidden valley, of which the Pic de Merlin makes one stupendous side. At its foot a blue and white water tumbles and darts and flashes and sings its eternal song. From this rise up three lawns – three velvet, emerald lawns, the one above the other, in natural terraces. And this magic of lawns and water is sunk in hanging beech woods, jealously guarded by forest, as Sleeping Beauty’s castle was kept in the fairytales. The eye of the great sun sees it: birds and beasts are at ease there; and sheep, I think, must tend the terraces. But it is very private – a little powder closet of Nature’s own.

As we gained the middle terrace –

“And how do you like this?” I said.

After a long look round, Mona sat down on the turf.

“I have no words,” she said, “but those of the Queen of Sheba. Yes, I have. I think the gods must love it. I feel we’re trespassers.”

“It reduces Gedge and his works to their true proportion,” I said.

“Gedge is a myth,” said Mona. “This place denies his existence. But doesn’t it conjure up Jenny?”

I threw myself down beside her.

“To tell you the truth, it does. I don’t know how you know, but this is the kind of place to which my wife belongs.”

“I know from what Brevet said. He was – immensely impressed. He quoted Milton, comparing Jenny to Eve.”

“Brevet has eyes to see – as Satan had. Jenny is unusually natural. She wouldn’t marvel at this: she’d love it, of course – but her love would be familiar; she’d feel at home.”

“Tell me about her, please.”

I did my best. When I had done –

“And isn’t she worried about you?”

“I’m afraid she probably is. But she has a natural faith. It’s very hard to describe. But it was natural to her that, when Jonathan Mansel was menaced, I should stand fast by his side. What is natural, to her is right. And that God will defend the right, she has no doubt at all.”

“Her faith is impregnable?”

“I truly believe it is. And such a faith is powerful. I think it disconcerts the hounds of Death.”

We lunched and dozed and we talked of many things: and then we went down to the water, which seemed to be flowing for us.

As we strolled the lawn beside it –

“We’ve stolen a day,” said Mona. “At least, I have.” She threw out an arm. “This doesn’t belong to my portion. But no one shall take it from me. I’m not too bad at sticking to stolen goods.”

“You have robbed no one,” said I.

“Nor did Prometheus. The gods still had their fire. But all the same – he stole.”

“Mankind was the fence. I hardly think you will be punished.”

“I don’t care if I am. I’ve got it – and no one can take it away.”

“It’s only the first of many. You’re out of the slough.”

She shook her beautiful head.

“They won’t be like this. This will stand by itself – always. Will you do something for me?”

“Of course.”

“Go on strolling, then: as if you were all alone. Just for a minute or two. I’m going to leave the stage and sit in the stalls.”

She moved to the middle terrace and stood there, watching me, whilst I, feeling something foolish, pretended she was not there. And then she came running back, to set her arm within mine.

“I just wanted the picture,” she said. “Adam strolling in Eden – and thinking of Eve.”

“I decline to believe that Brevet compared me to Adam.”

“No. He was less complimentary. He doesn’t like you very much. He’s jealous of you, Richard. Gedge just hates you like poison: but Brevet is jealous, too.”

“I’m sorry for that.”

“It’s not your fault. It’s Brevet’s. Gedge may be a mad dog. But Brevet’s way is that of a cat with a mouse. But don’t let’s talk about him. He – hardly belongs.”

“You do, though,” said I. “Many a girl would be bored with five minutes of this.”

“I don’t agree,” said Mona. “I know quite a lot of women who’d want to scratch my eyes out, if they could see me now.”

“I won’t argue the point,” said I, “for I don’t know much about women, and that’s the truth.”

“That’s a very nice failing, Richard. Why do you say I belong?”

“Because you’re happy here, Mona. There’s nothing to do but sit in the lap of Nature, study her lovely lines and hear her speech. But that is enough for you, as it is for me.”

Mona nodded gravely.

“I am happy here. Very happy. But you contribute, you know. You’ve shown me how to read this beautiful book. You’ve held my hand. You’ve made it…live, Richard.”

“I’m used to high places,” I said.

“But not to giving lessons to good-looking girls.”

“You’re a damned good pupil, Mona.”

“Better than you think, Richard. I’ve learned much more than you’ve taught me – such lovely stuff. And I shall never forget it, as long as I live.”

“I’m out of my depth,” I said, “when you talk like that.”

Mona put up a hand and touched my hair.

“The squire of Nature,” she said. “I hope the dame won’t be jealous, because I am here with you.”

I find it hard to believe that a stranger operation was ever deliberately planned than that for which we made ready the following day. That men have entered strongholds by conduits, I have no doubt: and it is common knowledge that others explore, as a pastime, the caverns under the earth. But features of both such adventures distinguished our enterprise; for, while we must wrestle with Nature, to have our way, all we did had to be done in secret from first to last.