Just then a knock came at the little secret door behind Sonia’s portrait. Jacques himself opened the door slightly, took a letter, reclosed the door, and opened the letter. It was unsigned and typewritten, but bore a number in the corner of the page, and Jacques at once said:
“It’s from Mabel!”
He read the letter and then burnt it.
“Excellent.... Mabel tells me he is absolutely confident that all the troops at Versailles will follow him. At quarter-past five Mabel will be in a car at the corner of the Place de l’Etoile and the Avenue du Bois. He will wait until six o’clock for the order signed by the President of the Senate entrusting him with the defence of the National Assembly. As soon as he receives it he will set out for Versailles.”
“Who’s going to take the order to him?” asked Héloni.
“I shall, and I shall go to Versailles with him,” returned Jacques.
“Who’s going to deliver the President’s order to you?”
“You will, Frederic. You will at once go to the Senate and place yourself from now onwards at Baruch’s disposal. When the moment comes you will telephone from the Senate to me at the Chamber telling me what has happened in the Upper House. Finally you will bring me Baruch’s order for Mabel as soon as it is in your hands. Do you follow me?”
“Yes.”
“Well, good-bye, Frederic.... For if you do not bring me that order we shall probably not see each other again until we meet before a firing party for our execution.”
The two men embraced, and Frederic left the boudoir. Lavobourg was smoking, stretched on a lounge chair.
“Now that we are alone I may as well tell you what I think of your proclamation,” he said. “I don’t see much good in it.”
“What do you mean?” asked Sonia, taken aback.
Jacques stopped and faced Lavobourg. He understood him no more than Sonia did.
“You were wrong, my dear, not to explain yourself before Frederic left,” she said, mastering a feeling of ill-temper. “Now it is too late. What is there in the proclamation to which you object?”
“Nothing — absolutely nothing. I consider it unnecessary — that’s all.”
“Why — speak out.”
“I consider it unnecessary because within five minutes you will have me assassinated as you had Carlier assassinated.”
Jacques and Sonia started up before him in the same gesture of surprise and denial.
“Let me finish,” said Lavobourg without condescending to notice the indescribable agitation into which he had thrown them. “You will have me assassinated or else...”
“He has lost his head!” exclaimed Jacques.
“Lucien, pull yourself together. Think of the gravity of the hour, the importance of every moment, and don’t talk nonsense,” entreated Sonia distractedly.
“Or else,” went on Lavobourg, calmly flickering off the ash of his cigarette, “I shall be called upon presently to preside over the Chamber, and as I have determined to do my duty, my whole duty, I swear to you that I will not open the proceedings nor close them until every Deputy has been summoned by me and is free to take part normally in the debates. You see, my dear,” he ended, “your proclamation in these circumstances has but a relatively small chance of serving any purpose.”
On hearing these words, so terrible in their simplicity, wherein was developed in the clearest language Lavobourg’s plan of treachery, a plan which would destroy and bring their efforts to naught when they were in sight of the goal, Jacques and Sonia, who could no longer believe in the madness of this man, looked at each other in anguish, for they realized before he made his meaning clear that his treachery was an act of revenge for their treachery towards him.
“Unless you are a coward, Lavobourg,” said Jacques in a hollow voice in which there was less menace than supplication, “and if you have retained some sense of your duty, I will not say towards me, but towards the country which expects its deliverance from you, you will come to the Chamber with me as was agreed and you will know how to silence your personal resentment, however intense and justified you may imagine it to be in this moment of madness, and help me to save the Republic.”
“No phrases,” exclaimed Lavobourg. “You dream merely of strangling the Republic. Well, you’ll get no assistance from me, and you must make up your mind that you will fail because of me. You may possibly do away with me, free me from a life which henceforward will be hateful because you have poisoned it for me. You know quite well what I mean....”
“But we know nothing,” cried Sonia. “I swear, Lucien, that your conduct is a mystery to me.”
He did not interrupt her nor look at her but waited quietly until her lying and hypocritical protest was over. Then he went on:
“I shall at least have the consolation of destroying your scheme and ruining you.” He gave a leer. “I shall rob you of victory. But we shall be quits — you robbed me of my mistress.”
“That is false,” burst out Sonia, standing erect before him. “And it’s a deadly crime of you to think so.... Who told you this disgraceful story?”
“Oh, at least be as ashamed of it as your accomplice. Has he offered any denial?”
“That will do! This scene has lasted long enough,” said Jacques, suddenly coming to an inflexible resolution. “I will kill you, monsieur.” Lucien sprang to his feet. He had spoken of his death but he had not believed in it....
Jacques had left the room for a moment and now stood before Lavobourg with two swords in his hands. He threw one of them down.
“My death or Lavobourg’s” — that was the determination to which he had come. “And if I kill him I will find another President, whatever he may say. But I haven’t a moment to lose.”
Thus he laid his plans.
Lavobourg was an expert swordsman. He made a rush on the weapon provided for him with all the more frenzy since he had feared for the moment that instead of a sword he would have had to fight with a dagger.
Sonia followed the shifting fortunes of the fight with such intense agony that she groaned with pain as though she herself was being run through by the blade whenever Lavobourg made a lunge at the Major. At one moment after a straight thrust by Lavobourg, who had the advantage of height and reach, she imagined that Jacques would be pinned to the wall, and fell on her knees crying:
“Don’t kill him!”
But Jacques parried the stroke, struck up his adversary’s sword, and, slipping under it, made a tremendous lunge at Lavobourg, which he avoided only by a quick leap in the rear.
Jacques, resuming the offensive, brought back the fight to the middle of the room, and the mortal struggle continued between the two men amid overturned furniture and Sonia on her knees, gasping for breath, watching with hope and terror the clash of the swords. But Jacques was too eager to make an end of it and Lavobourg grasped that fact. From that moment he changed his tactics. He knew only too well that every moment wasted deprived his adversary of his strength by lessening his self-possession, and he took advantage of the position to play a cautious game which would excite the Major’s impatience.
It was for this that he was waiting. Jacques committed a serious fault in recklessly uncovering his guard in order to entice Lavobourg, and Lavobourg, by a solid stop thrust after withdrawing his arm, wounded him in the chest, but fortunately the sword glided off the breast-bone. Jacque’s shirt was stained with blood, and Sonia threw herself between the two duellists with a heart-rending moan, but they roughly thrust her aside, and she fell half-fainting to the floor while they took up again their desperate encounter.
Jacques was wounded for the second and third time — in the forearm and face. Each of these blows diffused a rain of blood. His mind, as he fought, was obsessed by too many extraneous things. He was thinking of the Deputies now beginning to arrive at the Palais Bourbon, and feeling that unless he could finish the fight at once all was lost. The blood coursing down his forehead hampered him by obscuring his vision.
He utte
red a cry of rage against the injustice of fate in waiting until the last moment thus to turn the scales against him on the very brink of success, and he threw himself on Lavobourg, driven back against the door of Sonia’s room, with the fierce determination to risk a thrust in which there was danger of each running the other through. But suddenly the door opened and four huge arms seized and carried off Lavobourg as though he were a feather. Sonia had herself fetched them, and, breathing heavily, she closed the door on Jacques’s bodyguard and their prey — the door through which hitherto love alone had entered but which now, perhaps, had opened to assassination.
That was Jacques’s first thought when he grasped what had happened and the manner in which he was rid of an enemy whom he had succeeded in bringing down with his own hand.
“Don’t kill him,” he cried, shaking the door which the men had locked behind them.
“No, no.... They won’t hurt him — he is our prisoner. Let me dress your wounds and go...
“You don’t know them.” And he shouted: “Jean Jean, bind him hand and foot.... Gag him, but I shall hold you answerable for his life with your own...”
She pointed to the time by the Buhl clock on the mantelpiece. It was perhaps the only article in the room that had remained standing in the tumult of the battle.
Half-past four!
She drew him into the dressing-room and sought for the wound in his chest. The sword had grazed his ribs, and a great deal of blood had flowed from a hurt in no way serious. She quickly set to work to dress the wound, and he left it to her without uttering a word, for he was collecting his thoughts, laying once more the threads of his snare, loosened for a moment by a stupid interlude.
The cut on his forehead was merely a “muscle caught.” He put some sticking plaster on it, drew a lock of hair over it in battle array, gave no heed to the cut on his arm, put on his coat, and hurried to the secret door, followed by Sonia, who gave him, as Lydia had done before, a warm kiss, shouted “Victory!” — and he disappeared.
CHAPTER XII
BARON D’ASKOF’S THIRTEEN PEANUTS
THE READER HAS not yet made acquaintance with the home life of Baron and Baroness d’Askof in their charming flat opposite the Square Monceau.
The most conspicuous figure of the family was undoubtedly Marie Thérèse, Lydia’s friend. She was a brunette, with a golden rose complexion, a slightly aquiline profile, a youthful brow expressive of decision, and large, dark, singularly beautiful eyes, lacking, however, in softness.
Marie Thérèse’s mother was jealous of her daughter. The presence by her side of this beautiful child who diverted men’s adulation from her was beyond all bearing. It was the Baroness’s second marriage which, more especially, had broken every tie of affection between mother and daughter.
Marie Thérèse could never see d’Askof without saying something unpleasant to him. She considered him a coxcomb, conceited, disturbing, sly, formidable. She failed to understand why her mother allowed herself to be influenced by so inimical a character; and most of all she could not forgive the haste with which the new union had been contracted after her father’s tragic death. And when she thought of this incident she scarcely dared admit to herself that d’Askof was one of the hunting party and had no scruples. Nevertheless a kind of truce had been called between mother and daughter during the last few months. Marie Thérèse, indeed, was now absorbed solely in her own affairs, and these were summed up in her love for Frederic Héloni. The young people had met at the houses of mutual friends, and as Marie Thérèse attended the same classes as Lydia the two girls soon shared each other’s secrets....
That night Marie Thérèse was discovered by the Baroness answering Frederic’s letter. The altercation between them at once reached a high pitch.
“You tell me that Frederic hasn’t a sou, but d’Askof wasn’t a rich man either when you agreed to marry him. You say Frederic is after my money... d’Askof has taken yours and perhaps some of mine....”
“I have known for a long time that you are my worst enemy, and I will send you to a convent until you are of age.”
“Indeed, my dear mother, I would soon escape from it, I assure you, and let all the world know that your d’Askof murdered my father at a shoot.”
The blow struck home, and Vera was so stunned by it that she could not at first make any reply. She cast a bewildered look at her daughter, and a leaden hue overspread her features a moment before scarlet with fury. At last she recovered sufficient strength and breath to cry:
“Wretched girl! how dare you....”
But it was too late, and her daughter threw in her face:
“Too late, mother. You have by your demeanour admitted it. You knew it.... You knew it.... I simply suspected it, and you have just admitted it.”
“I swear...” stammered her mother distractedly.
“Don’t swear. Father will hear you. As you hope to be saved, don’t swear! You understand, mother, that I am not accusing you. No, no, anything but that. But it was he who killed him. You are as convinced of it now as I am.... And you — oh, I don’t want to see you again....”
“And I — I have done with you,” groaned the Baroness.... “I have a daughter who raves and makes imputations on her mother — accuses her stepfather — and hates me merely because I begged her to take time to think before marrying a schemer.”
“D’Askof is a murderer and Frederic is an honest man.”
“Let me tell you — let me tell you that you can marry him to-morrow if you wish. You can please yourself.”
Just then a knock came at the door and the Polish maid called her mistress. The Baron had come in and desired to see the Baroness at once. Vera gave a sigh, turned her distorted face to her daughter and shuffled slowly from the room. The door was slammed behind her, and she had the feeling of being thrown out like a dog.
D’Askof was waiting for her in his room. When their eyes met they scarcely recognized each other. Though she had become in five minutes ugly and repellent, her George wore such a look of terror, the piteous look of an animal hunted to the death, that it was she who exclaimed first:
“What’s the matter with you?”
“Look here — do you know what’s happened?”
“No — tell me quickly.”
“Well, my dear, I have received thirteen peanuts.” She stared at him as if at first she failed to understand him, and then repeated with a look of stupor on her face: “Thirteen? What do you say? Thirteen?”
“He himself counted them out to me,” returned d’Askof, sinking into a seat beside her on the sofa, both stricken by an unspeakable, extraordinary terror.
But this time she had forgotten the scene between her daughter and herself, and nothing mattered to her but the thirteen peanuts. She wound her trembling arms round her George’s neck.
“What have you done, my poor dear?” she asked, looking at him as a mother might look at a son condemned to death.
He shrugged his shoulders:
“How do I know? He will tell me, or get someone to tell me before it’s all up with me.”
“Hush! don’t talk like that. If you were certain of it you wouldn’t say it. You know very well he can’t do without you. You are too useful to him. Last time he forgave you, and he will forgive you again.”
D’Askof shook his head:
“Last time he warned me. He told me that it would be the ‘last time,’ and you know when he says a thing he means it. Besides, what can I do? There’s nothing for it but to wait.”
“My poor dear! My poor dear! Have you made no attempt to get away?”
He smiled grimly:
“Where? Had I not returned home direct I should have been done for. Have you forgotten what happened to Bastard? As soon as he received his thirteen he tried to decamp. Next day his widow identified his body in the mortuary. No, you see, I have come back here.”
“But shall we never get rid of this man?”
“Never.”
“But will he ne
ver die? Will no one ever make an end of him?”
“Kill him? Why, death is his servant. If you only knew! I haven’t told you one-half of what I know about this man, and I am ignorant of so many things that go to make up his power. You wish to be rid of him, but, unhappy woman, by that very fact you are wishing our ruin, for, take it from me, he has provided for every contingency, and he fears no treachery. One day he said to me: ‘The day after my death, even if I die a natural death, it will be all over with you and yours!’”
“Oh, the torture of it! Will you never tell me, George, what you did to place yourself in this monster’s power?”
“What I did.... He had but to open his hands and I fell into them. I wanted money and his hands were full of it.”
“But where does he get all his wealth?”
“When a man is in possession of the world’s secrets he is in possession of the world’s wealth.... With his money he bought me, and he has me in his power — always. I have sold my body, soul, mind, heart and hatred to this man — yes, I have sold even the sacred thing, my hatred.... Listen, Vera, I must tell you things because who knows if to-morrow I shall be here to talk to you?”
“Hush, George! — you don’t believe it, but if it were so I swear that I would know how to avenge you.”
He stood erect before her in intense excitement.
“Do you think you would, Vera?”
“I would kill him. I would strike him down in such a way that he would know I was avenging you.”
“Is that what you call avenging me — cause the death of a man in the ordinary way?”
“Then what would you have me do?”
“You must let him live.... What torture, what slow torture will be his if you go the right way to work!... I will tell you certain things, and others explaining part of this man’s secret you will find in a sealed letter that I will show you....”
Collected Works of Gaston Leroux Page 215