The Secret War (21 page)

“Dear soul, she knew me, once I gave my name, in spite of my ragged beard and tattered, mud-soiled clothing. I can see her now as she wept over me and sought to comfort me. When I had told her my story I collapsed from strain and weakness. She had me bathed and put to bed, then sent for my friends. For some days I was delirious and for weeks I hovered between life and death. At last I was fit to be moved, but she would not allow me to talk about my bill. Before the war she had amassed a great fortune; afterwards she gave it all away in credit to old clients like myself whom the war had ruined. She was a great woman whom I am very proud to have known.

“When I was fit to go about again, I found that everything was changed. It was a new world that I did not
understand. Little by little my exhausted brain began to take in all that had happened in my long absence and some aspects of the almost unbelievable situation. I was still Baron Foldvar, but I had no money, no estates. My family had believed me dead; a cousin had succeeded to my properties for a time. Later, when the Exchange collapsed, he had sold them all for the price of a ticket to America. He was living there in the most desperate poverty, so rumour said, barely supporting life by giving German lessons.

There was nothing to be done. Old friends that I met were in a similarly unhappy situation. Some had become professional dancing partners, others guides. They were glad to take any job which would secure them one square meal a day. Their women—I shudder to think of it, but more than half of those delicately nurtured girls I had known as a young man were living as
cocottes
; often to keep destitute parents or husbands and brothers disabled in the war who could not find employment at any price. That was what the war did for my beloved Austria.

“Naturally, even during my illness, the thought uppermost in my mind had been my wife. Nobody had seen or heard of her for years. My friends either would not or could not tell me what had become of her. At last I traced her. She was in the paupers' ward of a public asylum.

“I went at once to see her. It was very terrible. She did not know me. I did not know her. She was about twenty-six then, but she had the appearance of a woman of sixty. Her head was covered with bedraggled wisps of grey-white hair; her face was lined and shrunken like that of an old crone. She spat at me. They told me that she spat all the time at any man who came near her. That little, old, shrunken thing who, only a few years before, had been a lovely girl in the first flush of her beauty, reviled me in the most foul and abominable language. Her mind was utterly gone. She was dead;
as dead as any living creature could ever be. Only the ill-kept shrivelled husk of her remained, and that was quite unrecognizable.

Later, they told me her history. In the Russian break-through during the first winter of the war, when a large section of our front gave way, she, and the inmates of the hospital to which she was attached, had been captured. She fell into the hands of the Cossacks. They looted the stores and got drunk on the brandy. Their officers could not restrain them. She was only twenty, more beautiful than words can say, and our marriage six months before had brought her beauty to its zenith.

“How many of them there were I, mercifully, shall never know. She lived through it; but when our troops advanced again and drove the Russians back they found her stark naked on the floor of the hospital canteen, unconscious. Her hair had gone white in a single night and her brain had given way. When she came round she was a raving lunatic.”

As the Baron ceased speaking, Valerie shuddered. “It just doesn't bear thinking about,” she said softly, “that such things are possible in our vaunted civilisation. Poor dear—and you. I just can't say any more. It's too utterly terrible.”

The Baron shrugged. “Please do not distress yourself. It all happened so long ago and mine was only one of a hundred thousand tragedies which occurred when you were a little, laughing child playing with your dolls.”

“Good God!” exclaimed Christopher. “But don't you see that the same horrors may engulf us again at any time.”

“Of course,” the Austrian laughed and finished up his beer. “Life goes on much as it always did. The dictators and the politicians of every country continue to make fresh promises which do not mean a thing. The nonsense talked at the League has caused this
miserable population of blacks to defy the power of modern Italy. Mussolini was quite willing to leave the Emperor on his throne providing he would accept Italian advisers and allow the country to be properly policed and civilised. The Abyssinians would never have fought unless they had believed that Britain was coming to their aid. She won't, of course, and in consequence countless hideous tragedies which could have been avoided are being enacted as we sit here. But the politicians will dine no less well to-night in London, Paris and Geneva.”

“You're a cynic,” remarked Christopher. “In view of what you've been through one can't blame you, but it seems strange that you should be able to laugh about the wickedness and stupidity which initiate such ghastliness.”

“Why? Laughter, even though it be hollow, is the only thing left for people like myself. When I go up to Addis Ababa to-morow …” The Baron broke off as Lovelace suddenly appeared beside their table.

The two men were introduced. The elderly Austrian bowed courteously and pressed the Englishman to name any drink he would care to take with them.

“Sorry,” Lovelace replied rather curtly. “Another time perhaps. I'm afraid, too, that I have to break up the party. Valerie, my dear, I overslept a little and it's a quarter to nine already. We must be off.”

They said good-bye to the sad-faced Baron and, directly they were out of earshot, Lovelace snapped at Christopher: “Did that fellow tell you anything about himself?”

“Yes, the history of his war days. He was a prisoner in Russia and had the most ghastly time. I wish all the people we're up against could be forced to go through those six years of his life.”

“The poor dear,” Valerie added. “I could hardly keep from crying openly when he told us about his wife.”

Lovelace laughed angrily. “Lies, all of it, I'll bet a monkey. He was telling the tale to gain your sympathy and get in with you so that he could learn our plans. You couldn't know it, but we've been run to earth again. The last time I saw that chap he was talking to the porter at the gate of a house you've good cause to remember just outside Athens. He's one of Zarrif's men.”

In the narrow hallway beyond the bar Lovelace pulled up the others and spoke in a low voice. “Now Zarrif's friend, the Baron, knows where we are, it's too big a risk to stay here any longer. We'd best collect our things, pay the bill, and get out while the going's good; otherwise we may be dead before the morning.”

“But where are we going to sleep?” asked Christopher.

“Lord knows! If we can't get rooms anywhere else we'll have to shake down in the plane again. I'm sorry, Valerie, but, honestly, after what happened in Alex we should be mad to take any chances.”

She squeezed his arm. “Don't worry about me. I'd rather spend the night in an open field than have any more marksmen taking pot shots at Christopher through a window. I'll slip up and get my oddments packed. It won't take me five minutes. I'll pack for both of you, too.”

Leaving the two men to wrangle with the Levantine hotel proprietor and compensate him for their sudden departure, she ran swiftly upstairs. She had only just finished ramming the few belongings with which they travelled into their respective bags when Christopher joined her.

Two minutes later they were scrambling into one of the smart modern taxis that are Jibuti's pride, which Lovelace had secured in the meantime. He told the man to drive to Menelik Square the centre of the town, and jumped in after them.

“Where do we go from there? We must find somewhere to park our bags before we visit old Ben Ibrim.”

He spoke more to himself than to the others, but Christopher answered: “Why not the police station? It's open all night and our things'll be safe there. I expect we can find a friendly policeman who'll keep an eye on them if we make it worth his while.”

“Good for you,” Lovelace agreed, and gave fresh instructions to the driver.

The town had now stirred to movement, and the main boulevard swarmed with a motley throng. Turbaned, befezzed, topee'd, felt-hatted representatives of fifty different nations jostled each other on the sidewalks. Taxis bearing Europeans, half-breeds, and Japanese honked their way through the mob; skinny natives, clad only in coarse white cotton nightgowns, led strings of camels and heavily-laden donkeys were being pushed, cursed and bludgeoned upon their slow-footed ways by small, foul-mouthed black boys.

At the police-station a French sergeant with a little waxed moustache and a strong provincial accent, who breathed dense clouds of garlic at them, proved amenable to their request. When Christopher began to rustle a useful-looking note between his fingers the man became as suave as a born hotel-keeper, and one might have assumed that his principal function was the reception and care of strangers' luggage. At any hour they returned they would find it waiting, he said; more, for such distinguished visitors something must be done about accommodation for the night. True, the hotels were full, but the honour of France was impeached. He lived with his aunt, a widowed lady. She had one spare room and, as he was on duty all night, his own would also be vacant. If
Messieurs
could make do in a double bed the affair would arrange itself. He would telephone instantly.

The proposal suited them far better than the sergeant knew. The fact that they had temporarily escaped the attentions of the doubtless spurious Baron did not exclude the possibility that every hotel in Jibuti would be
scoured for them that night; but the chances were all against their being traced to the abode of the policeman's aunt, and, if they were, Zarrif's associates would doubtless think twice before risking an attempt upon them if it was believed that they were more or less under police protection.

The offer was accepted. The sergeant would send one of his native police with them when they returned to collect their luggage so that they should have no difficulty in finding his aunt's house. In the meantime he would take steps at once to inform his aunt of their coming.

“That fellow's missed his vocation,” Christopher said when they got outside.

“He'll find it yet,” Lovelace laughed. “Most French Colonial officials live only for the day when they can return to France. You can always find a dozen of them sitting outside the principal café in any provincial town. When this chap's saved a bit he'll retire and, like as not, run a pub of his own. But I think it unwise, Christopher, to bribe quite so heavily. I know it's not necessary for you to save your pennies, but those big notes that you keep handing out might make some people too inquisitive about us.”

Lovelace gave the taxi-man Abu Ben Ibrim's name, and he drove them to the old part of the town where he drew up before a barred gateway in a high, windowless wall. They got out and paid him off.

“I suppose it's all right to take Valerie into a place like this,” Christopher inquired a little doubtfully as he surveyed the ancient fortress-like building which rose high above the others in the mean twisting street. “I take it the old rogue's a Mohammedan and their views differ from ours a good bit on the question of women.”

“It's rather unusual,” Lovelace admitted. “They would never bring a woman if they came to call on us, of course, and I shouldn't have dreamed of bringing
Valerie if we were just ordinary tourists in Jibuti and this was a social visit. The trouble is that ever since that attack on you in Alex. I've felt the three of us should stick together as far as we possibly can. He may think it a little strange that Valerie should be with us, but he'll probably take it as a great compliment and mark of friendliness. I don't think there's the least likelihood of her being subjected to any unpleasantness, and, in any case, all three of us are armed.”

“I wouldn't miss seeing the inside of this place for worlds,” Valerie declared.

Lovelace's plan was a simple one. When they saw Ben Ibrim he meant to pretend that they were friends of Zarrif's and hoped to find him in Jibuti. It would be sheer bluff. Zarrif might be in Cairo or Khartoum for all they knew, but if Ben Ibrim were hand in glove with him, as was reported to be the case, they might be fortunate enough to trick the Arab into giving them some useful information.

“We're a bit late for our appointment owing to having to collect our baggage and our chat with the sergeant,” Lovelace remarked, “but fortunately time is the last thing that matters in the East. The old boy will probably keep us waiting, anyhow.” He knocked loudly upon the great double gates with his clenched fist, and a strapping negro opened a small door set in them.

Lovelace spoke to him in French and they were led through to an open courtyard where an Arab, whose teeth displayed more gold fillings than ivory, received them. His master, he said, welcomed their coming and would be happy to see them in one moment. In the meantime—would they be seated?

A few moments later the Arab returned. As they had honoured his master's house, he said, by bringing a pearl of beauty, who was doubtless the wife of one of them, would not the lady deign to follow him to the women's apartments where his master's wives would derive great pleasure from entertaining her?

“They want you to go to the harem. The women there are all agog to see a white girl, I expect,” Lovelace said rapidly to Valerie in English. “There's nothing behind the invitation—it's only a courtesy—but I'd rather you remained with us.”

He turned back to the Arab. “The lady thanks your master and His Excellency's wives, but as she has never travelled in the East before, she begs permission to meet so powerful a Sheik. Later, she would be honoured to wait upon his ladies.”