Sons of the Wolf (28 page)

Wolf put the watch back into his pocket and leaned back in the chair. So little time as that gone by, I thought dazedly. \ It seemed like days since I had stood outside that door.

"Not that's it any of your business," he said placidly, "but I need Francis to-er-persuade Harriet. Your surmise seems to have been correct; she fancies she is in love, as she would say, with him. She also 'loves' that silly little cousin of hers, but at the moment I think she is more concerned with Francis than with Ada. She'll acquiesce in order to save him, but she is canny enough to insist on seeing him first. So she will see him-alive and breathing, but pathetic enough to stir up all her schoolgirl emotions. After that-"

Julian nodded. "All well enough. After I have taken care of her, I shall dispose of Francis."

"You won't need to. Just leave him here. Another day, perhaps two . . . He's got the constitution of an ox. Make it three days."

"All well enough," Julian repeated. "But why bother?"

"What?"

"Why bother with threats? You have a fondness for melodrama, Wolf. As you pointed out to me, forced marriages are made every day. I can take care of Harriet without using Francis."

Wolf turned his head almost lazily and regarded his son. His slow gaze moved from Julian's gleaming hair to the tips of his polished boots, and back.

"Go back to the manor," he said.

Julian's mouth dropped open. I had the advantage of him; I knew Wolfs real plans, and as the conversation proceeded, I had realized that Julian did not. Frightened as I was, I felt an echo of Wolfs sardonic amusement at the sight of Julian's bewilderment. He was due for a shock, and if any man deserved one, he did.

"Go back?" he repeated parrotlike.

"Go back to the manor. Now."

"But-Harriet-"

"You complacent idiot." Wolf lifted his great arms and stretched enjoyably. "I don't often agree with the judgments of my elder son, but in this case I must. I would have let you take Ada-I couldn't have endured her squeals and whey-face-but Harriet is too good for the likes of you."

"But-not-for you." Julian's voice was as high as a woman's. "You mean you-"

"I will marry her, yes. Now get out."

"The money-"

"Lucky we found that second will." Wolf yawned.

"An unusually felicitous combination of business and pleasure."

"Nothing for me?" said Julian in the same high voice. I "Nothing for me . . . ! First abduction, then murder. I carried the girl off, I pushed Francis from the wall. I've put my neck in a noose for you and your plans. You promised me half the money. I could live like a gentleman. I could-I won't let you do this."

"Let me?" Wolf laughed.

"Give me half." Julian came toward him, swaying unsteadily. "Give me my half. I can go to the authorities-"

"With a signed confession? You carried the girl off, you pushed him from the wall. I could not have done either of those wicked deeds, not in my helpless state."

Wolf's features were animated. He had always enjoyed taunting Julian, and this was the best joke of all, his son's ineptitude and futility and his own casual command. His eyes danced with amusement, and he looked twenty years I younger-younger than his son, whose hunched shoulders and drawn face might have belonged to a man of sixty.

"They might not hang you," he went on, relishing every word. "They freed one of those Edinburgh ghouls for turning King's evidence, after all-the lads who supplied corpses for the dissecting rooms, nice, fresh corpses, manufactured to order. But it's a risky business. Fratricide-that doesn't sound pretty. ..."

Julian launched himself at his father's throat.

I had feared, even when I thought him unjustly persecuted, that one day he would turn upon his tormentor. With this final betrayal, the end was inevitable. Wolf had not been able to predict it because he was blinded by twenty-three years of contempt.

For a moment I thought that blindness would cost him his life. Julian was, for an interval, mad as a Bedlamite; if he had had a weapon, he would have struck and struck to kill. Having no knife, he used his bare hands, but he used them like a woman, tearing and clawing. His weight overturned the chair, and momentarily Wolf was pinned under the slighter man's body. Then, overcoming his initial shock with a quickness I almost admired, he began to fight back. The two bodies twisted and rolled, in near silence; the only sounds were the gasps of breath that came from first one man, then the other.

I watched the struggle with a cold, despicable calculation. Whatever the outcome, it would lessen the odds against me. With one man unconscious and the other weakened, I might enter the fray myself. I had long since abandoned hope of help from Ada; the crisis was now, in the next ten minutes, and she could never return in time. What I contemplated doing was bold and shocking and unwomanly; it would have been more "ladylike" to let Wolf murder Francis and seduce me. Well, I thought, clutching the bars and grinding my teeth, if that is the conduct our society demands of a lady, then I am not one.

The two men had struggled to their knees-or rather Wolf had risen so far, dragging Julian with him. I could not see precisely what was happening, for Wolfs broad back was turned squarely toward the door and his bulk obscured Julian's slimmer form. But I saw the great muscles of Wolfs shoulders bulge and tighten. I sank my teeth into my torn lip. I did not want Wolf to win. Mad or sane, Julian did not frighten me. Wolf was the greater menace of the two, and I was not sure I had the courage to face him.

For hours I had been acting under the lash of terror and had been animated by that kind of nervous energy which wreaks a fearful toll. I was beginning to feel the strain of it now. The whole scene seemed somehow unreal-the coolness with which the two discussed their fantastic crimes, the sudden, abhorrent struggle between father and son.

Then Wolf moved in a violent half turn, and I saw both their faces.

It was not Julian's features, blackened and distorted out of all recognition, that sent my hands fumbling for the door handle. It was Wolfs face-vulpine and inhuman, set in a careful frown of concentration as he choked the life out of his younger son. Whatever else he had done, I could not stand by and watch him do that. Whatever Julian had done, I could never endure myself again if I let him be murdered without lifting a finger to save him.

Before I knew my own intentions, I was inside the room and at Wolfs side, tearing at his hands. I might have been plucking at iron wires. Then he looked up and saw me. His face never changed. He simply released Julian, who fell backward with the heavy lifelessness of a sack of meal, and reached for me.

He was normally very strong. Now he was as irresistible as a windstorm. I went down under the sheer weight of him, feeling his hands on my throat and awaiting the first pressure of those hard fingers. The pressure never came. The fingers hooked themselves under the collar of my frock and jerked downward.

He was not mad. That was almost the worst moment of all, when I realized that he was not mad. He was proceeding methodically with his original plans, dismissing the black-faced thing that huddled at his feet, accepting the change of scene simply as a saving of time and effort.

Any "lady" would have fainted. I am not proud of my stamina; I tried as hard as I could to faint, and I recall my weak fury at not being able to do so. I could only struggle-quite ineffectually-and scream words I never would have admitted knowing. The struggles were as useless as the bad language.

I went on screaming and struggling even after I was beating at empty air.

It seemed an impossible effort to open my eyes. After it was done, I had no strength left for any other movement. I lay prostrate on the cold dirty floor and stared.

What I saw could not be real. Francis was lying on the cot in the corner, he could not be standing, unsteady but erect, over Wolfs supine form. He could not be holding a heavy stone. He could notHe looked as I had seen him look before-flushed as though with too much wine, his eyes a bright, unfocused glitter. His feet were planted widely apart, and he needed that support, for his whole body swayed back and forth with the solemn gravity of a pendulum. It was not only his sickness which had reduced him to such a state; I realized that he was appalled by what he had just done. The Wolfson madness did not contaminate him. He had railed at his father, insulted him, disobeyed him-but he could not strike him down without feeling the shock.

He had, in fact, let his decent instinct ruin his aim. At the last moment, as he struck, he must have held back.

Wolfs arms moved like two quick black snakes. His hands caught Francis' ankles. One jerk was enough to topple the sick man. Francis went down with a crash that was enough in itself to knock the life out of him, but Wolf, now impatient with interruptions, was taking no further chances. He scooped up the stone that had fallen from Francis' hands, rocked to his feet, and threw it down with all his strength, straight down upon his son's upturned face.

I caught his arm with both hands-a split second after the stone fell.

That was when it happened. I have never described it to anyone-they would only smile and look uneasily at me-but something broke. I felt it, somewhere inside me, and I heard the snap of a stretched string giving way. I stood quite steadily, my hands resting lightly on Wolfs arm, and I felt nothing, neither sensation nor emotion.

At first I thought he was held in the same strange spell. He stood without moving, his face grave, his head turned slightly. He moved away from me and I stood still, watching him. He went to the window. He could see nothing, I knew that; even in daylight the window was screened by weeds. But he was not looking; he was listening. I heard the same sounds, when I bothered to concentrate. The dogs were barking. They were making a frightful din. I wondered why. He must have heard the other sounds. I did not hear them, not then. He turned abruptly and it seemed to me that he was looking disturbed. His dark scowl moved from the window to the floor (I would not look down; I did not look down) and then to me. I returned his look, feeling no alarm, no interest; feeling nothing. And as he studied my face, his own changed. "Harriet," he said.

I looked at him inquiringly. I knew whom he meant. I was Harriet. Harriet was I. But it was too much trouble to answer him. "Harriet-"

He lurched toward me. Poor thing, I thought; he is so badly deformed. He took me by the shoulders and shook me, gently. His hands felt cold. I looked down and saw that my dress was tom. I took his hand away from my shoulder and pulled my dress up.

"Harriet." He sounded as if he were choking. The meaningless reiteration of my name was annoying.

"Yes?" I said. He was staring at me, rather impertinently, I thought. Then his face broke up into little fragments of expression, unconnected, inchoate. I did not like that look, so I closed my eyes. After a time he went away. It was an odd sensation, standing with my eyes closed. It was pleasant. I could hear much better. The dogs were in a positive frenzy of excitement. They sounded like two men fighting, not like dogs at all. There were other sounds too. Horses coming, fast. Voices. Shouts and screams. Then one loud shout that rose from anger into pain into silence.

I thought I knew that voice, and briefly something inside me stirred-like hands groping for a broken thread, trying to knot it back together. I made the hands let go. Then I waited. The other sounds continued, the voices and the howling of the dogs. There were some loud crashing noises, and the baying of the hounds stopped too. It would have been quiet then. But feet began to pound up and down, outside. Several sets of footsteps came down the stone corridor. I heard them become louder. They were just outside the door.

He left it open, I thought with a weak irritation. Now they will find me. Now they will make me open my eyes.

When I opened them, I saw two people standing on the threshold. The one in front was a boy-dark, slender, brown-skinned. He had one arm out, barring the door to the girl whose face peeped in from behind him. He looked at me and after a moment his arm dropped. The girl came in. She was pretty, despite her pallor. Her fair hair would have been lovely if it had been properly brushed and pinned.

"Harriet," she whispered. There were tears on her cheeks. They caught the candlelight like little moons. "I came as fast as I could. Oh, Harriet, darling-"

"I am Harriet," I said courteously. "Who are you?"

April 21

He came just then and I had to stop and hide my diary. It was just as well. This is not as easy as I thought it would be. I am trying to put it down, not only events, but thoughts and feelings, just as they occurred. Now I see that I had to do it that way. I had to live it again, and arrive at the climactic moment which was, then, too much for me to bear. My body stood in the cold candlelit room, awake and physically unharmed except for minor cuts and bruises. But Harriet had gone away. She was hidden deep down inside in a self-made darkness, huddled with her knees drawn up and her arms over her face. They pulled her out, partway, but she doesn't want to come, she is still clinging with one hand to the doorframe of that inner cell. If she is ever to emerge, she must let go and come freely, by herself.

He saw that I was upset and made me go to bed. The maids watched me for two days. I could not get the diary. But today the sun is shining and spring is in the air. I said I felt better and he let me get up. He is going to take me for a ride later, when he has finished the morning's business affairs. So I must end this, now.