“Got any alternative?” demanded Drummond.
“If we’re all going down,” said Darrell. “Why not stick together and rush the house in a gang?”
“No go, old bean,” said Hugh decisively. “Too many of ’em to hope to pull it off. No, low cunning is the only thing that’s got an earthly of succeeding.”
“There is one other possible suggestion,” remarked Toby slowly. “What about the police? From what you say, Hugh, there’s enough in that house to jug the whole bunch.”
“Toby!” gasped Hugh. “I thought better of you. You seriously suggest that we should call in the police! And then return to a life of toping and ease! Besides,” he continued, removing his eyes from the abashed author of this hideous suggestion, “there’s a very good reason for keeping the police out of it. You’d land the girl’s father in the cart, along with the rest of them. And it makes it so devilish awkward if one’s father-in-law, is in prison!”
“When are we going to see this fairy?” demanded Algy.
“You, personally, never. You’re far too immoral. I might let the others look at her from a distance in a year or two.” With a grin he rose, and then strolled towards the door. “Now go and rope in Ted and Jerry, and for the love of Heaven don’t ram the wrong gate.”
“What are you going to do yourself?” demanded Peter, suspiciously.
“I’m going to look at her from close to. Go away, all of you, and don’t listen outside the telephone box.”
III
Hugh stopped his car at Guildford station and, lighting a cigarette, strolled restlessly up and down. He looked at his watch a dozen times in two minutes; he threw away his smoke before it was half finished. In short he manifested every symptom usually displayed by the male of the species when awaiting the arrival of the opposite sex. Over the telephone he had arranged that she should come by train from Godalming to confer with him on a matter of great importance; she had said she would, but what was it? He, having no suitable answer ready, had made a loud buzzing noise indicative of a telephone exchange in pain, and then rung off. And now he was waiting in that peculiar condition of mind which reveals itself outwardly in hands that are rather too warm, and feet that are rather too cold.
“When is this bally train likely to arrive?” He accosted a phlegmatic official, who regarded him coldly, and doubted the likelihood of its being more than a quarter of an hour early.
At length it was signalled, and Hugh got back into his car. Feverishly he scanned the faces of the passengers as they came out into the street, until, with a sudden quick jump of his heart, he saw her, cool and fresh, coming towards him with a faint smile on her lips.
“What is this very important matter you want to talk to me about?” she demanded, as he adjusted the rug round her.
“I’ll tell you when we get out on the Hog’s Back,” he said, slipping in his clutch. “It’s absolutely vital.”
He stole a glance at her, but she was looking straight in front of her, and her face seemed expressionless.
“You must stand a long way off when you do,” she said demurely. “At least if it’s the same thing as you told me over the phone.”
Hugh grinned sheepishly.
“The Exchange went wrong,” he remarked at length. “Astonishing how rotten the telephones are in Town these days.”
“Quite remarkable,” she returned. “I thought you weren’t feeling very well or something. Of course, if it was the Exchange…”
“They sort of buzz and blow, don’t you know,” he explained helpfully.
“That must be most fearfully jolly for them,” she agreed. And there was silence for the next two miles…
Once or twice he looked at her out of the corner of his eye, taking in every detail of the sweet profile so near to him. Except for their first meeting at the Carlton, it was the only time he had ever had her completely to himself, and Hugh was determined to make the most of it. He felt as if he could go on driving for ever, just he and she alone. He had an overwhelming longing to put out his hand and touch a soft tendril of hair which was blowing loose just behind her ear; he had an overwhelming longing to take her in his arms, and… It was then that the girl turned and looked at him. The car swerved dangerously…
“Let’s stop,” she said, with the suspicion of a smile. “Then you can tell me.”
Hugh drew into the side of the road, and switched off the engine.
“You’re not fair,” he remarked, and if the girl saw his hand trembling a little as he opened the door, she gave no sign. Only her breath came a shade faster, but a mere man could hardly be expected to notice such a trifle as that…
He came and stood beside her, and his right arm lay along the seat just behind her shoulders.
“You’re not fair,” he repeated gravely. “I haven’t swerved like that since I first started to drive.”
“Tell me about this important thing,” she said a little nervously. He smiled; and no woman yet born could see Hugh Drummond smile without smiling too.
“You darling!” he whispered, under his breath—“you adorable darling!” His arm closed around her, and almost before she realised it, she felt his lips on hers. For a moment she sat motionless, while the wonder of it surged over her, and the sky seemed more gloriously blue, and the woods a richer green. Then, with a little gasp, she pushed him away.
“You mustn’t…oh! you mustn’t, Hugh,” she whispered.
“And why not, little girl?” he said exultingly. “Don’t you know I love you?”
“But look, there’s a man over there, and he’ll see.”
Hugh glanced at the stolid labourer in question, and smiled.
“Go an absolute mucker over the cabbages, what! Plant carrots by mistake.” His face was still very close to hers. “Well?”
“Well, what?” she murmured.
“It’s your turn,” he whispered. “I love you, Phyllis—just love you.”
“But it’s only two or three days since we met,” she said feebly.
“And phwat the divil has that got to do with it, at all?” he demanded. “Would I be wanting longer to decide such an obvious fact? Tell me,” he went on, and she felt his arm round her again forcing her to look at him—“tell me, don’t you care…a little?”
“What’s the use?” She still struggled, but, even to her, it wasn’t very convincing. “We’ve got other things to do… We can’t think of…”
And then this very determined young man settled matters in his usual straightforward fashion. She felt herself lifted bodily out of the car as if she had been a child: she found herself lying in his arms, with Hugh’s eyes looking very tenderly into her own and a whimsical grin round his mouth.
“Cars pass here,” he remarked, “with great regularity. I know you’d hate to be discovered in this position.”
“Would I?” she whispered. “I wonder…”
She felt his heart pound madly against her; and with a sudden quick movement she put both her arms round his neck and kissed him on the mouth.
“Is that good enough?” she asked, very low: and just for a few moments, Time stood still… Then, very gently, he put her back in the car.
“I suppose,” he remarked resignedly, “that we had better descend to trivialities. We’ve had lots of fun and games since I last saw you a year or two ago.”
“Idiot boy,” she said happily. “It was yesterday morning.”
“The interruption is considered trivial. Mere facts don’t count when it’s you and me.” There was a further interlude of uncertain duration, followed rapidly by another because the first was so nice.
“To resume,” continued Hugh. “I regret to state that they’ve got Potts.”
The girl sat up quickly and stared at him.
“Got him? Oh, Hugh! How did they manage it?”
“I’m damned if I know,” he answered grimly. “They found out that he was in my bungalow at Goring during the afternoon by sending round a man to see about the water. Somehow or other
he must have doped the drink or the food, because after dinner we all fell asleep. I can just remember seeing Lakington’s face outside in the garden, pressed against the window, and then everything went out. I don’t remember anything more till I woke this morning with the most appalling head. Of course, Potts had gone.”
“I heard the car drive up in the middle of the night,” said the girl thoughtfully. “Do you think he’s at The Elms now?”
“That is what I propose to find out tonight,” answered Hugh. “We have staged a little comedy for Peterson’s especial benefit, and we are hoping for the best.”
“Oh, boy, do be careful!” She looked at him anxiously. “I’d never forgive myself if anything happened to you. I’d feel it was all due to me, and I just couldn’t bear it.”
“Dear little girl,” he whispered tenderly, “you’re simply adorable when you look like that. But not even for you would I back out of this show now.” His mouth set in a grim line. “It’s gone altogether too far, and they’ve shown themselves to be so completely beyond the pale that it’s got to be fought out. And when it has been,” he caught both her hands in his… “and we’ve won…why, then girl o’ mine, we’ll get Peter Darrell to be best man.”
Which was the cue for the commencement of the last and longest interlude, terminated only by the sudden and unwelcome appearance of a motor-bus covered within and without by unromantic sightseers, and paper-bags containing bananas.
They drove slowly back to Guildford, and on the way he told her briefly of the murder of the American’s secretary in Belfast, and his interview the preceding afternoon with the impostor at the Carlton.
“It’s a tough proposition,” he remarked quietly. “They’re absolutely without scruple, and their power seems unlimited. I know they are after the Duchess of Lampshire’s pearls: I found the beautiful Irma consuming tea with young Laidley yesterday—you know, the Duke’s eldest son. But there’s something more in the wind than that, Phyllis—something which, unless I’m a mug of the first water, is an infinitely larger proposition than that.”
The car drew up at the station, and he strolled with her on to the platform. Trivialities were once more banished: vital questions concerning when it had first happened—by both; whether he was quite sure it would last for ever—by her; what she could possibly see in him—by him; and wasn’t everything just too wonderful for words—mutual and carried nem. con.
Then the train came in, and he put her into a carriage. And two minutes later, with the touch of her lips warm on his, and her anxious little cry, “Take care, my darling!—take care!” still ringing in his ears, he got, into his car and drove off to a hotel to get an early dinner. Love for the time was over; the next round of the other game was due. And it struck Drummond that it was going to be a round where a mistake would not be advisable.
IV
At a quarter to ten he backed his car into the shadow of some trees not far from the gate of The Elms. The sky was overcast, which suited his purpose, and through the gloom of the bushes he dodged rapidly towards the house. Save for a light in the sitting-room and one in a bedroom upstairs, the front of the house was in darkness, and, treading noiselessly on the turf, he explored all round it. From a downstairs room on one side came the hoarse sound of men’s voices, and he placed that as the smoking-room of the gang of ex-convicts and blackguards who formed Peterson’s staff. There was one bedroom light at the back of the house, and thrown on the blind he could see the shadow of a man. As he watched, the man got up and moved away, only to return in a moment or two and take up his old position.
“It’s one of those two bedrooms,” he muttered to himself, “if he’s here at all.”
Then he crouched in the shadow of some shrubs and waited. Through the trees to his right he could see The Larches, and once, with a sudden quickening of his heart, he thought he saw the outline of the girl show up in the light from the drawing-room. But it was only for a second, and then it was gone…
He peered at his watch: it was just ten o’clock. The trees were creaking gently in the faint wind; all around him the strange night noises—noises which play pranks with a man’s nerves—were whispering and muttering. Bushes seemed suddenly to come to life, and move; eerie shapes crawled over the ground towards him—figures which existed only in his imagination. And once again the thrill of the night stalker gripped him.
He remembered the German who had lain motionless for an hour in a little gully by Hebuterne, while he from behind a stunted bush had tried to locate him. And then that one creak as the Boche had moved his leg. And then…the end. On that night, too, the little hummocks had moved and taken themselves strange shapes: fifty times he had imagined he saw him; fifty times he knew he was wrong—in time. He was used to it; the night held no terrors for him, only a fierce excitement. And thus it was that as he crouched in the bushes, waiting for the game to start, his pulse was as normal, and his nerves as steady, as if he had been sitting down to supper. The only difference was that in his hand he held something tight-gripped.
At last faintly in the distance he heard the hum of a car. Rapidly it grew louder, and he smiled grimly to himself as the sound of five unmelodious voices singing lustily struck his ear. They passed along the road in front of the house. There was a sudden crash—then silence; but only for a moment.
Peter’s voice came first:
“You priceless old ass, you’ve rammed the blinking gate.”
It was Jerry Seymour who then took up the ball. His voice was intensely solemn—also extremely loud.
“Preposhterous. Perfectly preposhterous. We must go and apologise to the owner… I… I… I…absholutely…musht apologise… Quite unpardonable… You can’t go about country…knocking down gates… Out of queshtion…”
Half consciously Hugh listened, but, now that the moment for action had come, every faculty was concentrated on his own job. He saw half a dozen men go rushing out into the garden through a side door, and then two more ran out and came straight towards him. They crashed past him and went on into the darkness, and for an instant he wondered what they were doing. A little later he was destined to find out…
Then came a peal at the front-door bell, and he determined to wait no longer. He darted through the garden door, to find a flight of back stairs in front of him, and in another moment he was on the first floor. He walked rapidly along the landing, trying to find his bearings, and, turning a corner, he found himself at the top of the main staircase—the spot where he had fought Peterson two nights previously.
From below Jerry Seymour’s voice came clearly.
“Are you the pro-propri-tor, ole friend? Because there’s been…acchident…”
He waited to hear no more, but walked quickly on to the room which he calculated was the one where he had seen the shadow on the blind. Without a second’s hesitation he flung the door open and walked in. There, lying in the bed, was the American, while crouched beside him, with a revolver in his hand, was a man…
For a few seconds they watched one another in silence, and then the man straightened up.
“The soldier!” he snarled. “You young pup!”
Deliberately, almost casually, he raised his revolver, and then the unexpected happened. A jet of liquid ammonia struck him full in the face, and with a short laugh Hugh dropped his water-pistol in his pocket, and turned his attention to the bed. Wrapping the millionaire in a blanket, he picked him up, and, paying no more attention to the man gasping and choking in a corner, he raced for the back stairs.
Below he could still hear Jerry hiccoughing gently, and explaining to the pro…pro…pritor that he pershonally would repair…inshisted on repairing…any and every gateposht he posshessed… And then he reached the garden…
Everything had fallen out exactly as he had hoped, but had hardly dared to expect. He heard Peterson’s voice, calm and suave as usual, answering Jerry. From the garden in front came the dreadful sound of a duet by Algy and Peter. Not a soul was in sight; the back of the hous
e was clear. All that he had to do was to walk quietly through the wicket-gate to The Larches with his semiconscious burden, get to his car and drive off. It all seemed so easy that he laughed…
But there were one or two factors that he had forgotten, and the first and most important one was the man upstairs. The window was thrown up suddenly, and the man leaned out waving his arms. He was still gasping with the strength of the ammonia, but Hugh saw him clearly in the light from the room behind. And as he cursed himself for a fool in not having tied him up, from the trees close by there came the sharp clang of metal.
With a quick catch in his breath he began to run. The two men who had rushed past him before he had entered the house, and whom, save for a passing thought, he had disregarded, had become the principal danger. For he had heard that clang before; he remembered Jem Smith’s white horror-struck face, and then his sigh of relief as the thing—whatever it was—was shut in its cage. And now it was out, dodging through the trees, let loose by the two men.
Turning his head from side to side, peering into the gloom, he ran on. What an interminable distance it seemed to the gate…and even then… He heard something crash into a bush on his right, and give a snarl of anger. Like a flash he swerved into the undergrowth on the left.
Then began a dreadful game. He was still some way from the fence, and he was hampered at every step by the man slung over his back. He could hear the thing blundering about searching for him, and suddenly, with a cold feeling of fear, he realised that the animal was in front of him—that his way to the gate was barred. The next moment he saw it.
Shadowy, indistinct, in the darkness, he saw something glide between two bushes. Then it came out into the open and he knew it had seen him, though as yet he could not make out what it was. Grotesque and horrible it crouched on the ground, and he could hear its heavy breathing, as it waited for him to move.
Cautiously he lowered the millionaire to the ground, and took a step forward. It was enough; with a snarl of fury the crouching form rose and shambled towards him. Two hairy arms shot towards his throat, he smelt the brute’s fetid breath, hot and loathsome, and he realised what he was up against. It was a partially grown gorilla.
The Bulldog Drummond Megapack Page 13