That knowledge has been judged by wise men to be unfitting for mortals who have not yet achieved a certain state of advancement, and so in every age had become the jealously-guarded secret of a few enlightened individuals who have mostly been members of an inner circle of some priestly caste. Yet such enlightened ones have always been willing to share that knowledge with those whom they recognize as sufficiently advanced not to abuse it. And de Quesnoy had been chosen as one of those fitted to receive instruction in these great mysteries.
He knew one of the fundamental laws to be that while a person can shorten his life by taking it, no one can add one second to the span of life on earth allotted to him on each incarnation. And he recognized that it might be that his time had come to leave his present body for good.
To do so would now be easy, and in many ways it held out a tempting prospect. While away from earth he would again be with numerous long-time friends who were also out of incarnation for the time being, and some of whom he could not have had the joy of seeing for many generations. He would also see others who had died before him in his present life - Angela among them.
But it would not be the same as living with her on earth. He knew too that never again would they be reincarnated in the same period with similar bodies. Sooner or later the bond between them, as with his other long-time friends, would ensure their coming together again on earth in some relationship, but until that happened they would be no more to one another than companions in the Fields of Asphodel, the Land of Sekhet-Aaru, the Gardens beneath which Rivers Flow - as various peoples had termed the enchanted country in which spirits out of incarnation awaited their return to earth. It was this knowledge which, after his first weeks of grief, had enabled him to put thoughts of Angela, all but occasionally, out of his mind. Since arriving in Barcelona he had accepted their love as a closed chapter in one of his many lives.
Each life on earth he knew to be like a term in school, during which one must learn the new lessons set for one and strive to overcome some weakness of character, whereas to be out of incarnation meant a long and joyous holiday with no tests to pass, no ailments or accidents and no cares of any kind; so the thought of that alone was a big inducement to make no further effort and allow his Silver Cord to disintegrate.
Yet there was also the thought that after that glorious holiday there was no escaping the law which would send him back to earth again in a new incarnation. What form would it take?
He knew the widely-spread Indian belief, that an ill-spent life on earth might result in one's being reincarnated as an animal, or even an insect, to be a heresy. No soul that had once achieved human status was ever sent back as a part of one of the group souls that animated the lower species of creation. Those, too, who had advanced as far as he had always returned with some part of the knowledge they had acquired in previous lives lying dormant within them; so, except in cases where they still had to learn some special lesson, such as humility, they were given an opportunity to become in some degree members of some governing class.
But in this incarnation he had been born the heir to a Duke, and given a fine body, a handsome face and plenty of money. He could hardly expect such good fortune and so easy a path next time. He was, too, still only in his early thirties; so he might yet do great things.
It was then it occurred to him that he might no longer have a fine body. Obviously it had received a most savage battering and, as a result of the fall of twenty feet, might have some internal injury that would make him a cripple for the rest of his life. His astral vision having an X-ray quality not granted with ordinary-human sight, he began to examine it thoroughly and assess the full amount of the damage it had sustained.
His scalp was cut at the back of his head and his skull slightly cracked at the side some way above the right ear; more serious, there were broken skin and a huge bruise across the centre of his forehead and it was this which had caused his temporary loss of memory. His left collar-bone was broken, two of his ribs were cracked, and his left leg was broken about six inches above the ankle; but it was a clean break, not a compound fracture, and he could see no sign of internal haemorrhage. His lungs, however, were severely inflamed, which might lead to pneumonia.
Summing matters up he decided that, once over the initial shock to the system caused by such multiple injuries, there was none among them that should prevent him within a few weeks, or at worst months, from riding, fighting and loving again. So it would still be a fine body, and a sad waste to leave it - and all the other good things that went with it - for an unknown future. But he greatly doubted now if he had any choice.
On that another thought came to him. Perhaps the choice had been left to him in order to test his will-power. If so, he must not shirk the test. It was the law that as long as one had the power to keep life in one's body one should do so. Even those who died under torture were expected to stick it out to the limit of their endurance. They were paying off a debt for some evil they had done to another in the past, and were not given more pain than with extreme fortitude they could bear; so to give up the ghost prematurely left part of the debt unpaid, and was a minor form of suicide. It was possible - no, certain - that if he lived on there were numerous debts that it had been decreed that he should pay during his incarnation as Armand de Quesnoy. The thought decided him. He must make an all-out attempt to get back.
He had hardly taken the decision when a doctor appeared with a lay sister behind him. Taking the wrist of the body, the doctor felt for a pulse, dropped the wrist, then turned up one of the eyelids, glanced at the eye, and shut it. Turning to the lay sister he said, 'He's gone. You can start washing the body and preparing it for burial whenever you like.'
Swiftly now de Quesnoy began to concentrate. No relaxation of muscles was first required, but the employment of a thought rhythm, then the creation of a mental image of the body breathing to that rhythm. Had his Silver Cord had its normal strength the lungs would have responded at once, but now they seemed impenetrable. Yet very slowly the outline of the bed and body on which he was looking down began to blur. For two more long minutes of concentration, so intense that his mind became an agony in the void, he could still see them faintly. Then they disappeared. At the same instant his Silver Cord thickened, he felt a pull upon it that carried him downwards as though borne by a wind of hurricane strength. Two great tunnels - his nostrils magnified a hundred times - opened in front of him and within a matter of seconds he became conscious again of the weight of his limbs.
For several minutes, utterly exhausted by his effort, he made attempt to move. The lay sister emerged from behind one of the screens wheeling a small table with a bowl of water and some bandages on it. She stripped down the bed-clothes but still he made no sign. He knew that his hold on life remained most precarious, and that even an effort to sit up might prove so great a strain that it would drive his spirit out of his body again, and this time once and for all.
It was not until she put her hands flat on his stomach to press it empty that he summoned what little strength he had to show that he was still alive. For one awful moment he feared it was too little even to make his vocal cords work; but as she threw her weight upon him he succeeded in letting out a deep groan.
Exclaiming 'Saints defend us; he's not yet gone after all!' she ran off and next minute returned with the doctor.
While he was making a quick examination, de Quesnoy succeeded in slightly fluttering his eyelashes to confirm that the woman had not raised a false alarm. The doctor sent for his hypodermic and hot-water bottles, other nuns came to busy themselves about the bedside, and a quarter of an hour later the Count, now carefully tucked up again, had responded satisfactorily to their treatment.
During the forty-eight hours that followed, it continued to be touch and go; but by the Friday night he felt himself to be out of danger, and after a good night's sleep he woke on Saturday morning feeling much stronger. The nun who had charge of him, seeing that for the first time since being brought in he
appeared sufficiently recovered to answer a few questions, asked him his name and the address of his nearest relative. But he shook his head as though he had lost his memory, because he wanted time to think matters over before giving an account of himself.
That day during his waking periods he considered his situation. Pedro Conesa could not possibly have escaped with only bruises. He must either have been killed or severely injured, and if he was alive the odds were that he was occupying a bed in the same ward. If that was so, de Quesnoy reasoned, and Pedro was in much the same state as himself, he had little cause to worry; but if within the next few days Pedro became capable of leaving his bed, he must not delay long in taking special precautions. The anarchist must know that as soon as his intended victim had sufficiently recovered he would bring a charge of attempted murder against him and, in view of his declared intention when on top of the ladder to break the Count's neck, it was highly probable that in a bid to save himself he would, one night when all was quiet, make a final attempt to murder him.
Next, what about Ferrer? Pedro's daughter would certainly have informed him of all that had occurred at the mill. He, too, his sons and all those who had played a part in Monday evening's events must fear that the Count's recovery would lead to their arrest. Perhaps, however, they believed that as it would be only his word against that of all of them they would be able to bluff the matter out. They might quite well succeed in that as they must have many fellow-anarchists who would certainly not stick at committing perjury to provide them with alibis for the night in question.
At first the Count thought the chances were that they would get away with it, but later in the day he revised his opinion. The bearded Luis and young Antoine could be called as independent witnesses that he had been trapped in the flour chamber. How could he have got there unless his account of what had happened was the truth? In Barcelona'midnight was not regarded as a late hour, so quite a number of passing people must have seen the Ferrer brothers and their companions loading the carpet and some pieces of furniture on to the covered cart. If they could be found that would be strong supporting evidence. Lastly, Zapatro had received a bullet in his shoulder and Dolores one in the calf of her leg. Even if the pellets had been abstracted by a trusted friend it would be several weeks before the marks of the wounds disappeared entirely; and the same applied to Gerault's broken nose. No, taken together all this should prove ample to convict them.
That meant then, de Quesnoy reasoned, that Ferrer and Co. must at the moment be exceedingly anxious that he should die. It could be taken for granted that among the medical students who came round the wards of the hospital they would have a spy who was keeping them informed of his condition. Once they learned that it looked as if he would soon be well enough to make a statement to the police the odds were that they would do their utmost to kill him off.
How, he wondered, would they make the attempt? In hospital an overdose of a drug offered the simplest means, and one in which there was a big possibility that no one would suspect that murder had been committed. At the thought, he thanked God that he was in the care of nuns, since their religion made anarchists anathema to them; so there was no likelihood of one of them being got at.
Perhaps, then, the anarchists would use their favourite weapon, the bomb. If there was a student of their persuasion spying for them, they might induce him to bring in a deadly little packet and secret it somewhere in or near the bed during the round of the ward that the students made each morning with the house surgeon. It would not be easy to do so unnoticed while a little crowd was standing round the bed; but he might, perhaps, drop his notebook and while stooping to recover it push the bomb under the bed.
Still under the influence of the secrecy about his real self which had become second nature to him during the past six weeks, the Count had at first intended to say 'Nicolai Chirikov' when the time came that he had to answer the question about his name. But on consideration he decided that it was pointless to do so. The mission on which he had come to Barcelona had been abruptly terminated by Gerault's having identified him as de Quesnoy. Even if he were in a state to do so he could carry it no further under the name of Chirikov, or any other.
Moreover, he realized now that if he wanted to get out of the hospital alive he must secure police protection. If he sent for the police he was still much too weak to give them a full account of himself, and they might not be inclined to pay very much attention to the fears of a Russian refugee; whereas the name de Quesnoy would ring a bell with them. Angela's having been assassinated during the wedding-day attempt on the King and Queen, and his having come to Barcelona with the idea of avenging her death on the anarchists made obvious sense: they provided an adequate reason for his now needing protection from them. He would, of course, maintain that it had been an entirely private venture, so Don Alfonso's interest in it would continue to remain secret.
That evening he spoke coherently for the first time and asked the nun in whose care he was what had happened to the man who had fallen off the ladder with him. Crossing herself, she said, 'He is dead; God rest his soul. He fell on his head, and they say that his great weight caused it to smash like an eggshell; so he could have known little about it.'
This news was a great relief to the Count, as it removed his most immediate danger. When she asked his name he gave it simply as de Quesnoy, then added weakly that in the morning he wished to make a statement to the police.
When morning came the house surgeon arrived early at his bedside, congratulated him on the improvement he had made, and said: 'I understand you wish to make a statement to the police about how the accident occurred, but I don't think it in the least necessary, particularly as the inquest on the man who fell with you is now over. In any case I couldn't possibly allow you to strain yourself by talking for any length of time. It will be some days yet before you are fit to do that.'
For a minute the Count considered this unexpected hitch in his plans. He was not strong enough to enter into a full explanation, or argue; yet if he failed to get police protection fairly soon now he might pay for it with his life. So also, if a bomb was used, might many other unfortunate people in the ward, as the anarchists were completely ruthless about killing the innocent if in a general massacre there was a fair chance of including the person they wished to assassinate.
At length he said, 'Send a telegram . . . please.'
Producing a pencil from the pocket of his jacket, the doctor lifted his note-pad and, expecting that his patient wanted to notify some relative of his whereabouts, smiled amiably.
'His Highness the Duke de Vendome,' the Count began slowly.
Lowering his note-pad the doctor frowned. 'When you were brought in they said you were a tramp. You cannot be serious in wishing to send a telegram to a member of the Royal Family.'
'I am a Knight of the Golden Fleece,' de Quesnoy said with a faint smile.
The doctor almost dropped his note-pad, then wondered if he was being made a fool of, but decided that his patient was too ill to play practical jokes. Meanwhile the Count went on. 'Banco de Coralles, Madrid . . . Am helpless . . . and in great danger . . . require police protection urgently . . . General Quiroga also in danger . . . Armand de Quesnoy.'
Having taken down the message the doctor looked up quickly and said, 'Are you . . . surely you must be the Conde de Quesnoy whose Condesa was among . . .'
De Quesnoy nodded; then, exhausted by his effort, he closed his eyes. He had no idea of Francois's present whereabouts and thought it unlikely that he was in Madrid, but the Bank would be certain to know where he was and forward the telegram to him immediately.
Late that evening his action took effect. The Captain-General of the City himself came striding into the ward followed by the Superintendent of the Hospital, the doctor who had been looking after de Quesnoy, and numerous other people.
General Quiroga had met the Count at a pre-wedding reception at the Royal Palace in Madrid. Halting at his bedside he peered for a moment at the
bandaged head, then turning to the others he said, 'Yes. It is no hoax. This is the Conde de Quesnoy.'
Turning back to the Count, he went on, 'I am indeed sorry to find you in such a bad way, Senor Conde. But be assured that from this moment you may set your mind at rest with regard to your safety. Can you tell me what danger it is that threatens you and, it seems, also myself?'
'Anarchists,' replied the Count. 'I got in among them . . . but was found out . . . They are plotting to kill you . . . Don't know any details . . . Mustn't talk much yet . . . either.'
The broad-shouldered General gave a grim smile. The attempt on me was made on Wednesday, by a young man named Alvaro Barbestro. We caught him, but I escaped, as I have several times before. I expect they'll get me one day, though; so thanks for the intended warning. Are there any particular precautions you would like me to take in your own case?'
'Ferrer,' de Quesnoy murmured. 'Whole staff of Escuela Moderna nest of murderers . . . Good thing if you could . . . could hold them on some pretext ... till I ... I .. . well enough to bring charge.'
'That's enough,' announced the doctor. 'He really must not talk any more for the present, Your Excellency.'
The General nodded. 'Of course; of course. Anyhow, that is all I want to know for the moment. Please see that he has every possible attention; and have him moved to a private ward - that is, if being moved would not be too great a strain on him.'
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