Part 12

I found him at Barcelona, engaged on some Government job. What the job was I don’t know, but it left him plenty of time—to take two people about in his great big car. They were French, these two, and pretty rich. The girl was young and handsome, with a dangerously short upper lip and masses of fine red hair. When Perowne took them out, she sat in front with him, her husband and the chauffeur sitting behind. . . . The husband stuck it until five days ago. Then they left for Valencia, they said, he and his wife . . . going by road.

That night I took the lady’s name in vain.

I wired from Pampeluna—I had a big car, too—suggesting Perowne should come. He came. I fancy his vanity was tickled. I may be wrong. But I think he liked the idea of the husband chuckling to think that he’d thrown him off the track, while the wife was giving him the tip that they’d taken another road.

A maid at Pampeluna did the rest. At least, she gave him a message, when all the rest of the staff denied the very existence of the lady with the short upper lip and the masses of fine red hair.

The message bade Perowne take the north-east road. This leads into the mountains and is but little travelled till April is old. He took the road the next day, and he took it alone. His chauffeur had supped with me the night before—holding a very short spoon. . . .

I saw him coming when he was miles away, driving like fury along the elegant road that swept and curled and thrust like some stately serpent up and up into bleak places, where, even beneath the sunshine, spring seemed very distant and the monstrous silence of the depths on either hand turned the trickle of running water into the rush of a sluice.

When he was two miles off, I knocked out my pipe. Then I adjusted my goggles and entered my car.

I drove slowly to meet him on one of the bends. The corner was blind, but he cut it—I knew he would. He found me full in his path on my proper side. He tried to get through, but I squeezed him and crammed him into the ditch. . . .

I let him talk for a minute, while I moved on and turned my wheels into a bank. Then I locked the switch and got out of the car.

As I came up he let out at me in French.

“How long have you been driving?”

I answered in English.

“Ten or twelve years,” I said.

“Had many accidents?”

“None. And you?”

He stared.

“Let me give you a tip,” he said. “When you’re driving a car, don’t stick too close to your rights. It’s not much good to be able to shout ‘You’re wrong’ when they’re pickin’ what’s left of the wind screen out of your brain.”

“That’s a true enough saying,” said I, “and here’s another. If you shout for trouble, don’t squeal when your prayer is heard,” and, with that, I took out tobacco and started to fill a pipe.

For a moment he looked like thunder. Then he flung out a laugh.

“I see you’re one of the Die-Hards. I confess I never drive with a Bible under my arm. But there you are.” He rose and peered at the ditch. “Another two inches of your precious slice of the way, and I should have been all right.”

“Four,” said I, and pointed to a scar in the road. “That was your safety crease. With a wheel on that, I knew you were bound to go.”

Perowne stared at the scar. It might have been cut with a punch. As a matter of fact, it had. Presently he looked at me. I pressed my tobacco home and stared at the sky.

Perowne got out of his car and looked at her tracks. Then he picked up a stick and did some measuring. . . .

“You’re right,” said he. “Right to an eighth of an inch.”

“I know,” said I. “I measured your car last night.”

For a moment he never moved. Then he took out cigarettes, lighted one carefully and leaned against the door with a foot on the step.

“So I was wrong,” he said softly. “You do know how to drive.”

I shrugged my shoulders.

“Maybe,” said I, watching his right arm move. “I took your pistol, too,” I added carelessly.

For a moment or two he almost lost control. Then he took a deep breath.

“Well,” he sighed, “you’re thorough. I’ll give you that. And my chauffeur? I suppose I owe his failure to the same virtue.”

“You do,” said I. “And the message.”

“Dear, dear,” said he. “Not the telegram, too?”

“The telegram, too,” said I.

“Well, I’m damned,” said he, crossing his legs. “You do work hard, don’t you?” With half-closed eyes, he let the smoke make its way out of his mouth. “Glorious view from here. . . . That why you brought me?”

“In a way,” said I. “It’s quite a good place to—to see the sun go down.”

Perowne shot me a glance.

“No doubt,” he said shortly. “But—I’m afraid I can’t wait so long. And now tell me your game, and I’ll see if I care to play. Which is it—blackmail or murder?”

“It’s not blackmail,” said I, and took off my goggles.

“Hullo,” said Perowne. “If it isn’t old What’s-his-name!”

The thrust was shrewd. Almost I lost my temper. To pretend that she’d meant so little that her name was out of his mind. . . .

Instead—

“Some names sting the tongue,” I said quietly.

He lifted his head and looked at the cold blue sky.

“True,” he said. “And the brush of some lips the mouth.”

“I’ll take your word for it,” said I.

“Tell me,” he said, frowning. “Did she go back to you?”

“She did,” said I: “to die.”

“I thought she would,” said Perowne.

“Forgive me,” said I. “You thought she wouldn’t dare.” He started. “You used her love for me to bind her feet. That’s how you held her, you rotten loose-lipped thief. . . trading on her devotion to another man. . . . And then at the last, poor lady, she called her bully’s bluff, stared Blackmail out of countenance, and came back.”

The fellow’s face was livid: his eyes like swords. For a moment he stood trembling, with fists clenched. Then he seemed to think better of his valour and, clapping his hands behind him, threw himself back with a jerk against the spare wheel.

“And now you’re out for blood?” he burst out presently.

I knocked out my pipe.

“Some years ago,” I said. “I was in Macedonia. Up in the mountains, I remember, there was an old churchyard, quite full of graves.” I looked about me. “The place was not unlike this. . . . And every grave had been opened—to release the spirits of the dead. It was a local superstition. Now, what do you think lived _and grew fat_. . . . in that churchyard?”

There was a long silence.

At length I leaned forward.

“Snakes, Perowne, snakes. Snakes that traded on devotion . . . turned piteous piety to their own ends . . . used women’s love for their husbands to fill their bellies . . . battened upon the dead . . . And you ask if I’m out for blood. What do you think?”

“Think?” said he. “Why, I think you’re very confident.”

“I confess it,” said I. “I’m a poacher to-day. But you should watch your preserves.”

He stared at the edge of the road and into the depths beyond. Then he tilted his chin and scanned the grandeur of Navarre—all mountains and sudden valleys and again mountains like footstools to mountains greater than they, so that the world seemed nothing but a black sea of breakers foam-crested, petrified.

“You’re sore, of course,” he mused. “It’s a way relicts have. . . . But why have you left it so long?”

“I thought she was happy,” I said. “It never occurred to me that the man was born who could treat such a lady ill. But it seems you struck her, Perowne.”

He cried out at that, but the blood was in my head and I shouted him down.

“More,” I raved, “more. You jeered at her grief . . . . . . mocked at her misery . . . twisted those delicate arms . . . cursed her for weeping because it spoiled your sleep . . . bullied my dying girl . . . My God! My God!” I bowed my head and covered my eyes with my hands. “Don’t think she told me,” I muttered. “She never gave you away. But——”

As I lifted my head, the spare wheel caught me full in the face.

I went down like a log, with the wheel on the top of me. I never remember feeling so shaken up. I wasn’t exactly unconscious but things were distorted—unreal.

I saw Perowne seize a kit-bag and drop it into the ditch. I saw him slip into the car and I heard her start. I saw her begin to move . . . lurch . . . pitch to and fro. I saw the pitches grow longer—more pronounced. I began to get quite interested, wondering at every failure whether he’ld get her out at the next attempt. All the time his engine kept storming like an angry fiend. . . .

Suddenly my brain cleared, and I realized that he was like to be gone and leave me sitting in the road with a wheel in my lap.

I heaved the wheel off my legs and leapt for the luggage-grid, as the car shot back. Its off hind wheel went over the spare with a couple of jerks that nearly threw me off. Then he clapped her into first, bumped over the spare wheel again and flung up the pass all out. . . .

Perhaps for the very first time in all his life Perowne had lost his nerve. I thought he had, and the moment I saw him I knew. And the knowledge did me more good than the wind in my face. The man was not sitting: he was crouched—with his shoulders up to his ears. His one idea was to get away from that spot. The silence, perhaps. . . .

He never saw me climb up over the hood or settle myself on the seat behind his back. But I did. As a matter of fact, I sat there a minute or two—to get my breath and recover—before I put him wise.

Strangely enough, my touch seemed to bring his confidence back.

He gave one whoop. . . . Then he threw back his head and laughed up into my eyes.

“You do work hard,” he said. “I thought you were done.”

The road was falling now for a long half-mile.

I stretched out a hand and switched his engine off.

He cursed me for that. Then he stamped on the clutch.

“I’ll take you to find her in hell,” he cried, and headed straight for the brink.

I clapped my hands on his and wrenched the wheel about.

For a second I thought we were over. . . . Then the car swung back to the crown of the road.

Again he swerved to the off, and I wrenched her back.

All the time the car was gathering speed.

I had the strength, but he had the position. We swayed and swung and swerved all over the road, fighting and raving like madmen to get the upper hand. Twice I went for the brake, but each time, before I could reach it, I had to catch at the wheel. I crushed his fingers, and he screamed and spat in my face.

We were doing fifty now, and a curve was coming. The man wasn’t born that could take it without brakes. Perowne saw it, too, and laughed.

“Behold our spring-board,” he said.

I seized his neck and jammed his face between the spokes of the wheel.

“Now turn it,” said I.

Then I applied the brakes. . . .

When the car came to rest, I let him lift his head.

Then I put my hands under his chin and looked into his eyes.

“You’ll never see her,” I said. “She’s up in heaven.”

He smiled.

“With the rest of the _demi-monde_!”

I began to bend him back.

“Where there aren’t any bullies,” I said. “She had her hell upon earth.”

“I devilish nearly won,” said he.

“You did,” said I. “But you made one bad mistake.”

“Why, what was that?” said he.

“You lost your nerve.”

He struggled at that, and I bent him back again.

“This won’t help her,” he blurted, panting.

“The more’s the pity,” said I. “But it’ll help me and it’ll make the world cleaner.”

Again I bent him back, till his eyes were starting and his back curved like a bow.

“For God’s sake, end it,” he whimpered.

“Ask in her name,” said I.

“For . . . her . . . sake.”

I broke his back.

Then I turned the wheels to the edge and started the engine up. . . .

The car came to rest finally about six hundred feet below the road—a battered blazing wreck.

For a moment I watched her burn, and, being human and very much in love with my dead wife, felt better than I had felt for many a month.

That was three days ago.

To-morrow morning I shall report for duty.

VI September 5th, 1929

I came up from Bristol to-day.

Just as the train was starting, the door of my carriage was opened, and a woman was hoisted in.

She stuck a glass in her eye and waved to her breathless squire.

“So long, Nosey,” she said. “’Fraid I’m out of bananas, but here’s an onion’s heart.”

She blew him a kiss and flung herself back in her seat.

I knew her at once: and I began to wonder if she’ld remember me. She did. After a little reflection she opened her mouth.

“Didn’t I meet you,” she said, “at the Meurices’?”

“That’s right,” said I. “You told my fortune from my hand.”

She looked at me sharply.

“I remember,” she said. “Did—did it ever come true?”

“Half of it did. You said I should meet a man who’ld have a terrific influence on my life—indirectly, through somebody else. Well, you were perfectly right.”

“That all?” she said, looking at me very hard.

“Yes,” I said. “That’s all that’s been fulfilled. So far as I know, I’ve had no influence on him. And I assume I should know. Mine was to be direct, if you remember.”

“And physical,” said Sarah Roach.

“And physical,” said I, “whatever that may mean. If it’s coming off, it’ll have to come off quick. He’s over seventy-four, and the papers say he’s ill.”

Miss Roach stared at me as if I was drunk.

“Seventy-four?” she snapped. “Who—what’s his name?”

“That I can’t tell you,” said I. “But he’s in Debrett. Why shouldn’t he be seventy-four?”

“Oh, I don’t know.”

She picked up her papers then, and we said no more.

As the train was running into Paddington—

“I don’t talk,” she said, “but I study women and men and put two and two together rather as you do yourself. And when I’ve done my addition I like turning up the answer to see if I’m right.”

“Well,” said I, wondering what was afoot.

“Well, I’ve done a sum,” she said, “and you’ve got the answer. If I tell you my result, will you tell me whether it’s right?”

“It depends on the sum,” said I. “I don’t talk either, you know.”

“It’s nothing to do with your job. It’s a purely personal matter.”

“In that case I’ll say ‘Yes’ or ‘No.’”

“Right,” said Sarah Roach, “and remember—I don’t talk. Did you kill Berwick Perowne?”

“I had that pleasure,” said I. “But how did you know?”

She laughed.

“Simple addition,” she said. “Besides, I’m half a prophet.”

Which is all she’ll ever be, so far as I’m concerned. For I see from this morning’s paper that Sir George —— is dead.

ATHALIA

ATHALIA

“I feel,” said Fairfax, “that I must marry you.”

His partner threw back her head and laughed delightedly.

“I warn you,” she flashed, “I’m very rich.”

“Oh, but why ‘warn’?” said Fairfax, swinging her off her feet and then subsiding abruptly into a step of which the progressive nature was almost imperceptible. “Besides, I knew it before. Besides, if you had been poor, I shouldn’t have spoken.”

“Are you seriously asking me to be your wife?”

“I am. So far as you’re concerned, the advantages of such a course may not be obvious. To be perfectly frank, I can hardly see them myself. Still, you might do worse. At least, I’m clean, honest and sober.”

“I’m not so sure about that,” said Athalia Choate.

The man raised his eyebrows. Then he laid hold of the lady and started to dance.

It was a superb performance.

The floor was crowded, but, for all the notice of others that Fairfax seemed to take, it might have been empty. The two passed as one through the press, whirling, side-stepping, poising, translating every whim of the capricious measure into a masterpiece of motion. Athalia found herself treading as she had never trod before, yet making no mistake. The firm pressure upon her back became a powerful government, urging her to right or left, turning her, keeping her clear of collision, lifting her into the very spirit of the dance. The pace of the music grew hotter; the fury of the band, madcap. All about them people were labouring hilariously in a feverish endeavour to keep abreast of the rhythm. Fairfax’s feet moved like quicksilver . . . the two swam the length of the ballroom with a clean rush . . . he was doing another step, and she was late . . . she was off her feet, and he was thrusting again into the very heart of the crowd . . . her head——

Then the music stopped, and she was released.

“Am I sober?” said Punch Fairfax.

Miss Choate took a deep breath.

“Indubitably,” she said.

They made their way downstairs to a dim library, and Fairfax drew two chairs to the slow wood fire. Then he gave her a cigarette, lighted it, and took one himself.

“Will you do me a favour?” he said.

“Try me,” said Miss Choate.

“Be perfectly honest with me for a quarter of an hour.”

The lady knitted her brows.

“What do you mean?”

“That will appear,” said Fairfax. “The best way to learn a game is to start playing it. Now then. Are you averse to wedlock?”

Miss Choate started.

“I—I never agreed to play,” she said uneasily.

Punch pulled his moustache.

“It’s a very good game,” he said. “I have to answer, too—any question you ask.”

Athalia subjected the toe of a ridiculously tiny slipper to a prolonged scrutiny. At length—

“The answer,” she said, “is in the negative.”

“Good,” said Fairfax, marking the excellence of her instep. “I’m seven years older than you. As a matter of fact, I think that’s just about right. Do you agree?”

“I don’t disagree,” said Miss Choate slowly. “Anything between five and ten years. . . . When do I start?”

“When you please,” said Fairfax, comfortably exhaling smoke. “What a sweet pretty leg you’ve got! Do you like my style?”

Miss Choate swallowed.

“You are quick,” she said. “Of course, I’ve never played this before, so——”

“Neither have I,” said Punch. “I give you my word. Er, do you?”

The lady stared into the fire.

“Yes,” she said, “I do. If I had been poor, you wouldn’t have spoken, would you?”

“I should not.”

“Why?”

“Because I haven’t enough to keep you—us as we should be kept.”

Athalia laughed.

“‘I could not love thee, dear, so much,’” she quoted, “‘loved I not _comfort_ more.’”

“My dear,” said Punch, “that was most admirably put. It exactly represents my point of view, your point of view and the point from which, furiously as they would deny the impeachment, every rational male and female in this edifice views the rich vale of matrimony.”

Miss Choate raised her sweet eyebrows.

“We are a topping lot of wash-outs, aren’t we?” she said.

Fairfax shook his head.

“Not at all. We’re just wise. We have the sagacity to avoid the steep and narrow path which leads to heroism, because we blinkin’ well know that we should never get there.”

“But——”

“One moment. If Fortune puts us upon that path, as she may, that’s another matter. We get to heroism then. But if we choose it of our own free will—never. Never. Because, sooner or later, we always regret our choice. And there ain’t no admittance to ’eroism for gents wot regrets their choice.”

“I seem to know that line,” said Miss Choate. “Isn’t it out of _His Sin against Her Love_?”

Fairfax appeared to wince.

“Tennyson, dear, Tennyson. Hiawatha’s address to the Boy Scouts.”

There was a pregnant silence.

As soon as she could trust her voice—

“Aren’t you leaving love out of the question?” ventured Athalia.

“I don’t think so. I know love jettisons fear, but I don’t think it sandbags the instinct of self-preservation. I don’t mean that if you tottered into a bear-pit I wouldn’t go in to get you out. But if you dropped your lip-stick in—well, the bears could have it.”

“Supposing it was the only lip-stick I had?”

“Nothing doing,” said Fairfax.

“Supposing I said that if you got it out I’ld marry you?”

“Love doesn’t——”

“Don’t evade,” said Miss Choate. “There’s another ten minutes to go.”

Fairfax looked at her.

Silhouetted against the black of an old bureau, the delicate features looked especially beautiful. The smooth brow, the straight clean-cut nose, the sweet droop of the mouth—from temples to pert chin my lady’s face was a picture for men to kneel to.

Her squire covered his eyes.

“Rot it,” he said shakily. “I—I believe I should have a dart.”

Athalia permitted herself to smile.

“But if I was poor you wouldn’t?”

“No. For both our sakes. . . . Yes—I’m honest. For both. We’re earthy, you know. It’ld mean that we’ld have to come down—come down in the world. Well, I shouldn’t like that—I’ld hate it. And so would you. And on the top of it all I should always know two things—first, that I’d brought you down, and then that you might have married a richer man.”

“How would you bring me down if I was poor?”

“My dear, your face is your fortune—your face and your pretty ways. You might be poor as blazes, but as long as you stayed single you could dine and dance and sleep in half the ancestral homes of England.”

“Sort of second Queen Elizabeth?” said Athalia. “I must be nice.”

“Oh, but you are,” said Punch. “Most—er—most nice.”

“D’you mind speaking the truth?”

Fairfax moistened his lips.

“You are probably the most adorable woman in London to-day. I have never heard anything said of you which you would not have liked to hear. Finally, you are frequently indicated as a future Duchess: in fact, if you married me, I believe sterling would drop two stitches—I mean, points.”

“I wish I was poor,” said Miss Choate.

“What would you do?”

Again the lady smiled.

“I should probably marry you,” she said.

“But I shouldn’t ’ve asked——”

“I should waive that preliminary,” said Miss Choate calmly.

So soon as he could speak—

“You forward girl,” said Fairfax. “You wicked——”

“And you,” continued Athalia, “not having had any say in the matter, would go up the steep and narrow path to heroism—touching the ground in spots. I should see to that,” she added darkly.

Fairfax wiped his brow.

“Oh, the vixen,” he said. “Listen at her.”

“As it is,” said his companion, “though my feet are of clay—‘earthy,’ I think, was your expression—the man who marries me must think them of fine gold.”

Fairfax looked down his nose.

“There are plenty of coves,” he said, “who’ll tell you the tale. Besides, when I said you were earthy, I only meant ‘human.’ Hang it, Athalia, if I told you your little feet were golden, you’ld tell me to go straight home and sleep it off.”

“Also,” continued Miss Choate, “he must prefer my smile to any comfort that he has ever dreamed of.”

“But I do,” protested her swain. “Infinitely. They’re not in the same street.”

“Rot,” said Athalia. “You love your comfort best every time. My smile doesn’t come off with my pearls. If I was poor, my smile’ld still be there. But you wouldn’t want it then.”

“Of course I should. And if I was rich, I’ld have it. It’s not your money I want, but it _is_ your money we need. I’ve been honest about it. ‘Live and let live,’ you know.”

“Have you anything,” said Athalia, “but what you earn?”

“Not a bean,” was the cheerful reply. “I had sixty thousand, you know. But I’ve been through the lot.”

“Good,” said my lady. “Look here. Jobs tend to cramp the style——”

“They’re a weariness of the flesh,” sighed Punch.

“—and my husband’s style must not be cramped. If you’ll give up your job, I’ll—I’ll marry you.”

Punch Fairfax sat up, open-mouthed.

“What an’ keep me?”

“I’ll settle two thousand a year on you. That’s twice what you earn.”

There was an electric silence.

Then Punch rose with a laugh.

“‘Clean, honest and sober,’” he said quietly. “I see that I should have added ‘respectable’: but, to tell you the truth, I——”

“Sit down, Punch, me lad,” said Athalia Choate. “Dismount and sit down. You’ve given the answer I wanted. Not that I really doubted, but—one likes to make sure.”

Fairfax regarded her thoughtfully. Then—

“Talk about edgywedged tools,” he said, resuming his seat. “Supposing I’d said ‘D-d-done!’—all quick like, with bulging eyes. . . .”

Athalia laughed.

“I should have found a way,” she murmured. “And now go on—ask me. There’s still five minutes to go.”

“As you please,” said Punch. “Why does one like to make sure?”

“Because, so far as I’m concerned, there are only two starters for the Athalia Stakes—and you’re one of them.”

“Athalia!”