The Dragon’s Teeth (11 page)

Kerrie noticed that the station-wagon was in its garage and wondered why the doors were not closed. But it was the wispiest kind of thought. She drove into her garage, raced her motor, turned off the ignition, withdrew the key, and reached over to switch off her headlights.

Her hand paused in midair. She thought she had heard the slam of a door.

Kerrie twisted in her seat and looked back. The doors of her garage were shut.

“There wasn't any wind,” she thought, puzzled. “I guess they just swung shut by themselves after I drove in.” And, without turning off her lights, she got out of the roadster and snapped the switch on the wall which operated the ceiling-light.

Then she went to the double-door, pressed down the latch, and pushed. And as she pushed, she heard the click of the lock which was attached to the hook-and-staple on the outside of the door.

Kerrie stood still.

The thought seeped into her mind that, while doors may swing shut of themselves, locks cannot. Her lock required a human hand to slip it through the ring. A human hand to slip the ring through the slit in the staple. A human hand to snap the lock shut.

“You out there!” she called. “You've locked me in! I was just about to—”

There was no answer.

And Kerrie did not finish. She knew it was useless to cry out, and why it was useless to cry out. And her heart catapulted into her throat.

But it was so stupid. To lock her in. Sooner or later some one would come to release her. Even if she had to stay all night.…

But another attack, a voice whispered. Vi's gone to bed. The butler won't remember. No one else knows you're here—no one that cares. Another attack.…

Kerrie laughed aloud, nervously. That was absurd. For whoever had locked her in had locked himself—of herself, she thought darkly—out at the same time. There was no opening in these walls large enough to admit a mouse. Not even a window. High in the right-hand wall of the compartment there was a radiator-grille; it ran through to the next garage, the one for the station-wagon. But the coils of the radiator were between the two garages, behind the grilles; only a fly or a bug could go from one garage to the other by that route.

“Let me out!” She pounded on the heavy doors. They did not even shake. “Let me out!”

She pounded until her hands were raw.

And then she became conscious of an undertone, a peculiar roaring hum, which seemed to come from the garage on the right … where the station-wagon stood.

She stopped pounding to listen.

It was the motor of the station-wagon. Some one had turned it on. And pulled out the throttle. It was roaring away. The penetrating stench of its exhaust came to her nose, floating through the grilles.

“Help!” cried Kerrie. “Whoever's in there!” She raced back and shouted up into the grille. “I'm locked in the next garage! Help!”

There was an answer, but it was not in human accents. The doors of the adjacent garage slammed shut. And over the roar of the racing motor Kerrie heard retreating footsteps.

And now she knew. Now she remembered death, when it was too late.

Some one had imprisoned her in the garage, turned on the motor of the car in the next compartment, locked the doors, and fled—leaving her to die slowly as the odorless fumes of the deadly carbon monoxide gas being generated next door seeped through the radiator-grilles.

NOW that death showed its face again, openly, Kerrie stopped shouting, stopped pounding the door, collected her thoughts with a cold deliberation that astonished the vague, fluttering, helpless part of her that was wilting and crumpling inside.

The garage was far from the house, from the servants' quarters. The sole building within hailing distance was the stable, and only the horses would be there at this time of night. It was useless, then, to scream.

As a matter of fact, she thought, sitting down suddenly on the running-board of the roadster, she had better save her breath. She had better conserve the air in the garage. Mustn't exert herself in the slightest. It would probably help to remain as close to the floor as possible. Didn't gas rise? Or maybe carbon monoxide was heavier than air. If it was, it would sink to the ground.… Well, there was only one way to find out.…

Kerrie lay down and turned over, pressing her cheek and nose to the cold cement floor.

That wasn't any good. She'd merely live a little longer. Sooner or later the garage would fill with the gas, sooner or later her lungs would exhaust the oxygen supply, and then she would die.

Die!

She sat up, thinking furiously. What could she do? There must be something she could do!

Theoretically, there were two ways to save herself: to stop the flow of the gas, or to get out of the garage. Could she prevent the carbon monoxide from entering her compartment?

She glanced up and discarded that possibility at once. It was conceivable that by stuffing the openings in the grille up there with material torn from her clothing, she might prevent most of the gas from seeping through. But to do that she had to reach the grille. And the wall was so high, and the grille was so high in the high wall, that even if she put up the roadster's top and stood on it, she would still be unable to reach the grille.

Could she get out of the garage?

She couldn't break through the walls. She might scrape through the plaster, but inside there was a core of brick. No windows. The door.… She couldn't break through. It was too thick. If she had an ax, she might; but she had no ax.

Kerrie became aware suddenly of a tightness across her forehead, as if the skin were trying to stretch; of a throbbing at the temples, like the beginning of a bad headache.

So soon!

Think. Think!

She examined the door desperately. And then she laughed aloud. What a fool she'd been! The hinges!

All she had to do was get some tools from the roadster's kit—why, just a screw-driver would do it! Even if she couldn't reach the upper hinges, she could remove the lower ones, push the whole door outward from below, and crawl to the safety of the air outside!

She sprang to her feet and stumbled around the car. She lifted the front seat joyously.…

The tools were gone.

SOBBING, Kerrie hurled things out of the seat-compartment—match-packets, slips of paper, scraps of lint, things, things, useless things … searching like a madwoman, getting splinters under her fingernails, scratching one finger so that the blood ran in a brilliant stream. Anything would do. A wrench. Anything.…

No tools.

Stolen.

She ran back and hurled herself against the door. Again. Again. No. Don't do that. That's silly. Think. Think.…

She sank back against the door, exhausted, a severe headache pounding at her temples, the beginning of a dizziness, the beginning of a nausea.…

Like a beacon in a foggy sea—the revolver. The revolver! She had slipped it into the side-pocket of the roadster very early this morning. Of course, she had left it for a short time.… No. It was there. It was there. She could shoot the hinges off—the lock, the hasp, shoot, shoot.…

Crying and laughing, she staggered back to the car, weakly opening the door, weakly thrusting her hand into the pocket on the inside of the door, ready to rejoice at the cold sensation of the metal on her palm, that blessed, loaded revolver.…

Every drop of blood in her body stopped flowing.

The little pearl-handled revolver had been stolen, too.

Her last chance, her last hope.

PART THREE

IX.
Beau's Gesture

Last chance. Last chance. Last chance.

The two words synchronized with the throb of her temples. A senseless hammering that gradually took meaning, digging through the muck of horror and panic.

Was it? Was it really? The very last?

Kerrie crawled over to the double-doors again, lay down on the floor, pressed her nose as close as she could to the thin line where floor and door met. And she lay still, simulating death in her stillness, struggling to breathe slowly, evenly, quietly, to conserve each precious bubble of oxygen in the garage, in her lungs … grudging each breath, doling breath out to her body like a man doling out his last drops of water as he lies dying of thirst in the burning desert.

The cement floor was cold, but she did not feel its cold. Only the taste of death in her mouth and the giant pulse at her temples. Last chance. Last chance.

Was it?

She went over in her mind each physical detail of the, garage, taking inventory, a ghastly job of accountancy, before her vision, which already was blurring, should become a jumble of swimming, tumbling, senseless objects, before her head should vibrate like a huge drum, before the nausea should make her so sick that sickness would drive away even the desire to keep living, before she should succumb to unconsciousness and, unconscious, gasp the last bubbles of her life away.

Garage. Three walls—blank, solid. Only that sieve of an opening, the radiator-grille, which she could not reach. The fourth wall—the doors. No tools. Useless to hurl herself against the doors. She would give, her soft tissues, her slight weight, her small muscles. She would give, not the doors.

What else?

Herself. No. She had only her hands, her fingers, her nails. What use were they against brick, concrete, hard wood?

If only the butler hadn't removed the hamper from the car. There were knives, forks in the hamper. Tools. But he had. Hamper from the car.

Hamper from the car.

Car.

Car!

The car!

KERRIE clung to that conception with desperation, turning it over in her mind, searching the flaws in the thought, probing, exploring, testing.

The car. Tool. It was. It could be. Not a puny tool like a screw-driver. A ram. A battering-ram!

She sat up quickly, reckless now of the exertion, her accelerated breathing, staring wildly at the roadster, at the space between her body and the roadster. About four feet. Not much. But it might be enough. And the rear bumper. It was a fairly heavy span of steel.… But starting the car. That meant releasing more fumes. More carbon monoxide. It would cut short what remained of her life.

The drums in her head banged louder. She blinked, trying to bring the rear bumper into focus. Her eyes were giving way. Was that what happened? Oh, to die! Here. Don't. Think. Chance. Your last, last chance.

Take it!

She rolled feebly over, managed to steady herself on her hands and knees, crept the four long feet to the car. Around the car. Now. Up. Up into the car.
Up into the car.

She bit her lower lip with the effort. The pain was remote. She tasted her own blood. Up.… The blood dripped from her lip, stained her dress. Up.…

How loud the drums were. What was she going to do? Car. Ram. Start the car.

Oh, yes. Key. Where was the key? Key. She had turned off the ignition. What had she done with the key?

Groggily Kerrie looked down at her left hand, felt for it with her right. Both hands swam in a sort of warm and swarming sea of shadow. Key. There it was. In her left hand. She had never let go of it.

She fell forward against the wheel, groping for the ignition keyhole with the point of the key, scratching, scraping, sliding, key in hole, key in hole.… She bit her lip again, deliberately, on the bleeding wound. The pain was sharp this time. Sharper. Bite. Again. She cried out. But her eyes cleared for an instant.

It was in. Now. Turn it. Turn it.

Slowly, slowly. There. It turned.

Now. The starter. Right foot. Bring it up. Drag it, push it up. Oh, it won't move. Damn you.… Kerrie took both hands and lifted her right leg from under the knee, carried it forward until the sole of her shoe lay on the starter.

Lean. Press.

The urgent rattle of the starter awakened her a little. She gulped, jerking in an abdominal spasm. The mutter of the motor filled her head. Quickly. Before it's too late.…

Left foot, clutch. Right foot, gas. Hand, shift. Shift. Shift!

Now!

The roadster leaped backward. Thud!

Forward. Backward. Thud!

Not hard enough. Stalled. Start again. Harder. Harder.

“Oh, the drums!” Thud! Forward. Crash! Forward. Crash! Stall.… Start. Forward.
Crash!

Better. There had been a crackly, splintery sound on that last one. Don't look around. Hang on to yourself. Keep your stomach down. Hold your head up. Right foot, left foot, one going down as the other goes up.
Crash!
Now shift into first, forward, stop, reverse, right foot and left foot, one going down as the other goes up!
Crash!

It's going. Oh, it's going. Think of that. Never stop thinking of that. Maybe just once more. Maybe just. Forward. Reverse.
Crash!

Her left and right feet were frozen to the clutch and gas pedals as the roadster burst through the double-door, as she lay across the wheel fighting the world of falling shadows, the sickness in her body, the roaring in her head … burst through into the black night, rode over the door's defeated, splintered body, careened as the weight of her body shifted the wheel, crashed into a broad and ancient beech yards to the side of the low garage building … crashed, snarled, was silent.

As silent as Kerrie who, even as the roadster struck the tree and the shock of the impact jerked her from the driver's seat and threw her out of the car to lie crumpled on the cold grass, even as unconsciousness embraced her fluidly like the arms of the sea, was sucking the sweet clean breath of the world—sucking, frowning, her bleeding lips and throat and smudged nostrils greedy … sucking, gulping, savoring, breathing the blessed air.

WHEN Beau drove into the grounds of the Cole estate, it was already dark.

He stopped at the servants' quarters first. His operative, a large stout woman with eyes like steel nailheads, was rocking on the back porch.

“Well?”

“All okay.” The woman squinted at him. “You're past due, Mr. Rummell. I was getting worried.”