The Saint Meets the Tiger (22 page)

Orace had halted just before he came to the open door.

“We better lookaht ‘ere,” he said.

She was looking round his shoulder as he turned the ray of the torch into the room, and they both saw the emptiness of it and the yawning square hole in the floor just inside the threshold.

Orace heard the girl give a strangled cry that choked in her throat. She would have rushed past him, but he caught and held her, though she fought him like a fury.

“Wyte—in a minnit!” he urged hoarsely.

He kept her back and edged toward the trapdoor, testing the soundness of the floor inch by inch as he advanced. It was not until he had thus satisfied himself about the safety of the footing right up to the edge of the opening that he would allow her to approach it.

They knelt down and turned the light of the torch into the gap. It shot down far into the blackness till it lost itself in space. Higher up they could see that the shaft was circular and lined with green, slimy brick. Evidently they were looking down the remains of a well over which the Old House had been built: Patricia thought she could detect a faint glimmer of reflection of the torch’s light from the surface of the water. Orace fetched one of the empty beer bottles from across the room, and they dropped it down the pit. It seemed an eternity before the hollow sound of the splash returned to their ears.

“Bouter nundred feet,” Orace guessed, and in this he was approximately right, being no more than sixty feet out.

The girl leaned over and cupped her hands.

“Simon!” she called. “Simon!”

Only the echo answered her.

“Mr. Templar, sir—Orace speakin’,” bellowed the man, but it was only his own voice that boomed back out of the darkness in reply,

Patricia’s face was bowed in her hands.

“Saint, Saint… . Oh, God. … My darling. …” The words came brokenly, dazedly. “Dear God, if you can save him now, give me his life!”

Presently she looked at Orace.

“Are you sure he went that way? The other trap didn’t catch him.

Orace had been examining the pitfall, and now, by the light of the torch, he pointed to the evidence. A square of the flooring had been cut out with a keyhole saw, leaving only the flimsiest connections at the corners which the weight of a man would destroy at once. The jagged ends of broken wood could be seen at once, and from one of these Orace plucked a shred of tweed and brought it close to the light.

“That there’s ‘is,” he said huskily. “Looks like ‘e weren’t expectin’ if. …“But don’ chew lose ‘art, miss—‘e always wuz the luckiest man wot ever stepped. P’raps ‘e’s as right as ryne, lyin’ aht cumfittible somewhere jus’ lettin’ the Tiger think ‘e’s a goner an’ get keerless, an’ orl set ready ter pop up an”ave the larf on’im lyter.”

It was not Orace’s fault if he did not sound very convincing. His arm went clumsily about her, and drew her gently away and outside the room.

“One thing,” he observed in an exaggeratedly commonplace tone, “ther carn’t be no Tiger Cubs ‘angin’ arahnd ‘ere naow—the noise we’ve myde, they’d uv bin buzzin’ in like ‘ornets be this time, if ther ‘ad bin.”

“Could we get a rope and go down?” she asked, striving to master her voice.

“I’ll git sum men from the village to “avea look,” he promised. “Ain’t nothink we can do fer ‘im fee is dahn there—‘e’d uv gorn howers ago….”

She leaned weakly against the wall, eyes closed and the tears starring on her cheeks, while Orace tried in his rough but kindly manner to console her. She hardly heard a word he said.

The Saint gone? A terrifying emptiness ached her heart. It was horrible to think of. Could a man like him be meant for such an end—to die alone in the unanswering darkness, drowned like a rat? He would have kept afloat for a long time, but if he had been alive and down there then he would have shouted back to them. Perhaps he had struck his head in the fall….

And then, slowly, a change came over her.

There was still that hurtful lump in her throat, and the dead numbness of her heart, but she was no longer trembling. Instead, she found herself cold and quiet. The darkness was speckled with dancing, dizzy splashes of red,…

This was the Tiger’s doing—he was the man who had sent Simon Templar to his death. And, with a bitter, dead, icy certainty, Patricia Holm knew that she would never-rest until she had found the Tiger….

“Come along. Miss Patricia,” pleaded Orace. “It ain’t so bad–we don’t know ‘e ever went dahn. Lemme tyke yer back, anjer can lie on the bed while I go explorin’; an’ as soon’s ever I ‘ears any-think I’ll come an’ tell ya.”

.“No.”:

She snapped out the word in a voice that was as clear and strong as a tocsin.

“There ain’t nothink—”

“There is,” said Patricia. Her hands closed fiercely on Grace’s shoulders. “There is. We’ve got to go on with the job. It’s up to us. It’s what he’d have wished— he wouldn’t have had any patience with our going to weep in our corner and chuck in the towel and let the Tiger get away. If the Saint gave his life to get the Tiger, we can’t waste the sacrifice. Orace,” she said, “will you carry on with me?”

He only hesitated a moment; then she heard him suck in his breath.

“Yes, Miss Patricia,” said Orace. “I guess yer right—we carn’t let the Tiger get aw’y wiv it, an’ we carn’t let Mr. Templar ‘ave gorn under fer nuffin. An’ fee’s gorn, I guess yer must in’erit Orace, miss. I’m on.” He paused. “But ‘adn’t we better get ‘old uv Dr. Carn, miss? ‘E’s a detective, really, Mr. Templar tole me, and ‘e’s after the Tiger,”

“I suppose so. … We must hurry!”

They passed through the village, and Patricia set off up the hill at a raking pace, with Orace toiling gamely along just behind.

Carn’s cottage was in darkness, and the girl fairly flew to the front door and tugged at the bell furiously. She kept it up for a full minute, but no one answered, though they could hear the metallic clamour reverberating through the house.

“He’s away,” she said flatly.

The man could see her white face and compressed lips. .

“I remember,” he said. ” ‘E kyme up this afternoon ter warn me an’ Mr. Templar that the Tiger was meanin’ ter do us in to-night. An’ I sore ‘im drivin’ orf along the Ilfracombe road in the farmer’s trap, me eyes bein’ rather good…. Carn’s fahndart somefing. Wod did ‘e wanter go ter Ilfracombe for?”

“If he has found out anything,” said the girl swiftly, “he probably went off to call in some reenforcements. Perhaps he found out about the ship coming in tonight. And in that case he’ll be back soon.”

“Mos’ likely,” agreed Orace cautiously. “But yer carn’t bet on it, yer know.”

She bit her lip.

“That’s true. We’ve got to make our arrangements and leave him out. If he arrives, so much the better, I don’t know,” said Patricia slowly, “that I wouldn’t rather find the Tiger before Carn does.”

Orace, that simple soul, was amazed at the concentrated savageness of her low, even voice. Women, in his philosophy, did not behave like this. But Patricia had the gift of leadership, and he had ceased to question her authority. He made no comment.

“We must watt till they come in for the gold,” she said. “We might as well go back to the Pill Box and have dinner. We shall want all our strength.”

Of a sudden the girl had become a remorseless fighting machine. She had fallen into her part as if she had been born and trained for no other purpose. It was not so much that the role fitted her as that she was able to adapt herself to the role. She ruthlessly suppressed her grief, finding that the rush of action took her mind off the awful thought of Simon’s fate. She allowed place in her brain for no other thought than that of trapping the Tiger and squaring up the account, and she concentrated on the task with every atom of force she could muster.

A sense of the unreality of the whole affair possessed her, drying up tears and crushing out sentiment. Her world was reeling and racing about her—the landmarks were hopelessly lost–but she felt herself poised above the chaos, remote and stable. The sword in her hand wielded her. She was going on with the job. The fight was going to be battled out to the last second, with the last ounce of vital energy in her body; for the time, she seemed to be beyond human limitations. When it was all over and settled one way or the other, the tension would snap and she would hurtle down into black abysses of terror and despair; but while the war was still to be waged she knew that hers was a strength greater than herself—knew that she could stand on the brink of the chasm in the blinding light and fight tirelessly on to the death.

She said, in that new, cotd, dispassionate voice:

“We shall want help—the odds are too great against two of us. I’ll get Mr. Lomas-Coper. He’s the only man here I could trust.”

” ‘Im?” spat the disgusted Orace. “That thunderin’ jelly bag?”

“I know he’s not such an ass as he pretends to be,” said Patricia. “He’ll weigh in all right.”

They were nearing Bloem’s house at that moment, and a lean dark figure loomed startlingly out of the shadow of the hedge. A pencil of luminance leaped from Orace’s torch and picked up the pleasantly vacuous face of Algy himself.

“Is that you, Pat?” he said. “I thought I recognized your voice.”

He was surprised at the firmness with which she grasped the limp paw he extended.

“I was just looking for you,” she said crisply. “Come over to the Pill Box. We’re going to have some dinner and hold a council of war.”

“W-w-what?” stammered Algy.

“Don’t waste time. I’ll tell you when we get there.”

There was so much crisp command in her tone that he fell in beside them obediently.

“But, dear old peach,” he protested weakly. “There’s no comic old war on, don’t you know! Is it a joke? I’ll buy it. Never say Algy isn’t a sportsman, old darling.”

“There’s nothing very funny about it,” she said, and something deadly about her obvious seriousness made him hold his peace for the rest of the journey.

In the Pill Box, she sat down at once to the food Orace provided, though Algy excused himself. He had already dined, and as a matter of fact, he explained, he had been on his way to visit her at the Manor.

While she ate she talked—in curt, cold sentences which held even the fatuous Algy intent. She told him the whole story from beginning to end, and his jaw sagged lower and lower as the recital proceeded. And when it was finished she looked anxiously at him, wondering whether he would say something foolish and soothing about the heat of the day and the probability that she would feel better in the morning—or, if he believed her, whether he would show up yellow.

She was satisfied to find that her estimate had been correct. While she looked, he closed his mouth with a snap, and the tightening of his mouth lent a new strength to his face. His eyes were gazing steadily back at her, and there was a steady soberness in them which transformed him.

“Just like a shilling shocker—what?” Said Algy quietly, but there was not much flippancy in his voice.

She outlined their plan, and he was staggered.

“You’ve a nerve!” he remarked. “But isn’t that old Carn’s job?” ^

“It was the Saint’s idea,” she told him; “and it’s such a desperate gamble that it might as easily succeed as not. As for Carn—we daren’t bank on him. He mightn’t know as much as we think, and he mayn’t have gone into Ilfracombe for the reason we suppose—we can only hope for the best. But we’ve got to be prepared to take the field without him. And, besides, as you’ll understand, I’ve rather a special desire to meet the Tiger and talk to him alone…”

For an amazing moment Algy saw death in her eyes; then, with the clenching of a small fist, the ferocity passed, and she was once again the cold, calculating general planning an attack.

“I know you swim pretty well,” she said, “Can you do the distance?”

He nodded.

“I think so.”

“Will you?”

No more than two seconds ticked away into eternity before he held out his hand.

Chapter XV

SPURS FOR ALGY

It was then ten o’clock.

“The boat should be coming in now,” said Patricia, and she and Algy went outside to look round.

They lay on the grass at the edge of the cliff, gazing out to sea. It was a cloudless night, and although there was as yet no moon, the stars shone brightly and covered the world with a dim silvery radiance. Starlight is the most deceptive and baffling of lights, but water is the easiest thing on earth to see over in the dark. The starlight etched in the tiny ripples over the sea, making it a wide, smooth expanse of glistening black and luminous gray; the island called the Old House sheered up from the calm flatness like some fabulous swarthy beast rising from the depths of the ocean.

“I can see the jolly old tub,” breathed Algy excitedly.

The girl’s hand closed over his arm like a vise.

“The Saint was right,” she said.

But it was not so much seeing the ship as detecting a shadowy mast silhouetted against the sleek darkness of the waters. The hull could be picked out in a profile of blurred outline, where there showed no flicker of reflected luminosity from the facets of the wrinkled sea. The Tiger’s bark must still have been six miles out from the coast, if not more.

Patricia watched it till her eyes ached.

“They must be coming in very slowly,” she said. “They hardly seem to have moved in the last five minutes. Right under the Saint’s bedroom window, they’d have to be careful.”

“Smugglers and pirates all up to date—what?” remarked Algy. “Yo-ho-ho and a bottle of Bass….”

He was as eager as a schoolboy.

They returned to the Pill Box, and Patricia consulted her watch and made a rough calculation.

“They should be in about eleven, at this rate,” she reckoned. “You’d better go home and slip on a bathing costume. And do you happen to have any firearms about the place?”

“I believe Uncle Hans stocks one.”

She smiled, and took the automatic from her pocket.

“He doesn’t now—Simon relieved him of it last night.”

“Perhaps he’s got another. I’ve an idea there used to be quite an armoury. I’ll do my best.”

“How long will it take you?”

He thought.