De Quesnoy wasted no time waiting to see the results of his bombshell. Having thrown it, he stepped back to the window, threw one leg over its low sill, then the other, squirmed over on to his stomach, ducked his head and wriggled out. For a moment he hung from the sill by his hands, then he let himself drop.
As his feet hit the cobbles he tried to flex his knees, but one of his ankles turned over and he pitched sideways to measure his length on the ground. Picking himself up, he darted in the direction of the archway, but as he put his right foot to the ground he gave an 'ouch!' of pain. He had twisted his ankle badly. All the same, he knew that unless he ran for it, and ran hard, he might yet be caught.
Ignoring the pain that shot through his ankle with every stride he took, he gained the archway at a loping run and dived into it. As he did so two men entered its far end from the street. They turned towards the door to the bar, then noticed him and stopped. For him there could be no turning back, and it was too late to pretend, by dropping into a walk, that he was not trying to get away from the place quickly. Running on, he made a sudden swerve and attempted to dart past the two men. But the nearer grabbed him by the arm, swung him round to a halt, and demanded:
'Hi, mate! Where are you off to in such a hurry?'
Tt's none of your business! Let me go!' he cried angrily, and strove to drag his arm free. The man had a firm grip on his coat sleeve and refused to be shaken off. For half a minute their tug-of-war continued, then de Quesnoy's heart sank. Faint but clear, coming through the archway there were shouts of:
'Stop thief! Murder! Murder! Stop thief!'
Both the men heard them. The first shot out his free hand and grasped the Count's wrist. The other cried, 'Hang on to him, Emile!' and closed in on de Quesnoy's other side. Able now to bear his own weight only on one foot, he was no match for them. Within a minute they had him fast with one of his arms twisted up behind his back.
They had hardly done so when the burly landlord came crashing down the stairs and out of the door opposite the bar. Taking in the situation at a glance, he cried:
'So you've caught the swine! Well done, lads! Bring him in here.'
Another man had followed the landlord out. With him leading, the other three lugged de Quesnoy up the stairs and back along the corridor to the scene of the affray. Someone had fetched another lamp from one of the other rooms, and during the past five minutes several newcomers had arrived on the scene. As there had been a number of people present when the fire started it had soon been beaten out; so the only signs remaining of it were some oily smoke and the stench of burnt clothing.
At the sight of the prisoner Inez, now freed from her bonds, let out a yell of vindictive delight, and the others shouted their congratulations to his captors.
By the time he had been pushed and pulled into the bedroom it was packed to suffocation. Sanchez's body had been lifted on to the bed and a towel laid over its face, but the bed was shared by the Spaniard over whose head the Count had broken the mirror. He lay moaning beside the corpse while another man mopped at the blood that seeped from cuts on his forehead, nose and ears. The square-head had regained consciousness and was sitting on a chair nursing his injured chin. In addition there were at least ten other people, including Beatriz who had appeared from somewhere in a dressing-gown; and the noise of their excited voices now made a positive babble.
The landlord took charge and shouted loudly for silence; then when their voices fell to a mutter, he said to Inez:
'Now tell us, girl. What happened? How did this start?'
'He's a thief!' she cried. 'The dirty low-down blackguard. We'd only been up here a few minutes when he came round behind me and gave me a wallop on the head. It knocked me right out for about ten minutes. When I came round he had tied me hand and foot and to the bed; and he was in here rummaging through our things to see what he could pilfer. A long time later Sanchez came in and took him by surprise. Then they fought, and I wriggled off the bed to try to get help.'
As she ceased speaking her glance fell on Sanchez. It seemed that in the general excitement it was not until that moment that she realized that he was really dead. With a heartrending wail she cast herself upon his body. Beatriz pushed through the crowd, put her arms about her shoulders and sought to comfort her. Inez's wails continued and it was only after some minutes, during which everyone burst into speech again, that they were reduced to a passionate sobbing.
Her outburst of grief had given de Quesnoy time to recover a little from the rough handling he had received. A glance round the room was enough to show him that his position was desperate. He had killed an inmate of the house, injured two other men and inflicted nasty burns on several more. His best hope lay in the fact that most of the frequenters of the Silver Galleon, although a little rough, looked fairly respectable; so there was a fair hope that they might hand him over to the police. If they did, he felt that he had nothing worse to fear than a few nights in the cells, for he could counter a charge of murder by stating that Sanchez had been a wanted criminal and he had killed him in self-defence while endeavouring to secure him so that justice might take its course; and de Cordoba's influence would then get him a quick release. But, as he glanced round the crowded room he saw that everyone who was looking in his direction was glaring at him, and he realized that it needed only a spark to their anger for the whole lot of them to set about lynching him.
Again the landlord called for silence, then swung round on de Quesnoy and snarled at him, 'She's given us the truth, hasn't she? You can't deny it.'
'I do,' retorted the Count hotly. Having had a few minutes to think up a line of defence, he went on in a firm voice. 'The senorita is lying to cover up for her dead fancy-man. I was with her in the little room and I heard movements in here, so I came through. I found him about to take a photograph of us through a big slit in the door. I saw at once that blackmail was his game, and went for him. We fought, he went over backwards, hit his head on the chest of drawers and broke his neck. You can't blame me for that. Meanwhile she had followed me in and was about to rouse the house. Seeing what had happened I knew that if I was caught here I'd be for the lockup, and perhaps held there for months while the police went into the question of the fellow's death. Who would want that, if there was a chance of avoiding it, eh? I stopped the hussy's cries and tied her up. But my luck was out. She broke free and her yells brought some of you on the scene before I could get away. That's the truth.'
It was a good story, but Inez raised her tousled red head from
Beatriz's shoulder and screamed. 'He's lying! He's lying! He's a thief and a murderer. By the Holy Virgin I swear he's lying.'
'It's the truth, you bitch,' cried the Count, using this term as suitable to the occasion, and the indignation he was feigning as his best hope of convincing his audience so that he might get out of the place alive.
At the foot of the bed lay the leather satchel with the negatives and prints he had taken from it in a little pile near by. Pointing at them, he went on indignantly. 'There's the proof of what I've told you. Just look at them. That's the sort of photograph her pimp was about to take of her and me when I caught him at it.'
Taking a quick step forward the landlord swept the pile into the satchel, tucked it under his arm and said gruffly, 'I'll take charge of those. They're just a lot of old snaps and I've seen them before.'
At his action de Quesnoy's hopes sank. It was a clear indication that the landlord knew about the blackmail racket that Sanchez and Inez had been running, and had been taking a cut from the results of their activities. It swept from beneath his feet the ground of his best line of defence.
Meanwhile Inez had begun to shout again. 'He murdered Sanchez! He murdered him after he'd tied me up. He came here as a thief, I tell you. Look at all my things scattered over the floor.'
Her cry distracted the others from the landlord, preventing any of them looking at the photographs; and she had made a point for which the Count could offer no explanation.
> As they glanced round at the junk on the floor and two still open drawers, a tall man with a grey moustache said, 'He's a thief all right. You can see that from the way the room's been searched. He killed her fellow, too. No doubt about that. We must get the police.'
'All right,' de Quesnoy volunteered. 'I'm sticking to my story and quite prepared to tell it to them.'
'No you won't,' the landlord cut in quickly. 'I'm not having the police here.' Glancing round, he added truculently, 'You can't be such a lot of fools as to want the police called in. Those of you who are off ships won't be allowed to sail in them. You'll be held as witnesses. We'd all land ourselves in for weeks of trouble.'
'He's right. That's sense.' 'Yes, we must keep the police out of this,' murmured several of the others.
The Scandinavian stopped massaging his jaw, looked up and said in broken Spanish. 'Then what will we do with him? He has killed a man, hasn't he? That he should go free is wrong.'
'Kill him !' shouted Inez. 'Stick a knife in his belly.'
Her shout was ignored, so she went on. 'Go to it, one of you. A life for a life. That's fair, isn't it? We don't need the police to settle his account. We can do it ourselves.'
Still they ignored her; so she cried, 'You lousy lot of cowards! Give me a knife, one of you, and I'll do it myself.'
The Spaniard whose face had been so badly cut about by the mirror sat up on the bed. With feverish eyes he stared at de Quesnoy, then his features broke into a cruel grin, and he rasped, 'You may spare yourself, senorita. The privilege shall be mine.'
'Shut your trap, Filipo,' snapped the landlord. 'There's been one murder here tonight. I'll not have another done before my eyes.'
A chorus of voices supported him. 'No!' 'Not that! Not that!'
'No! The police might trace him.' 'No, no; we'd all be held responsible.'
'But what will we do with him?' the square-head persisted. 'He has killed a man. That he should be let go free is not just.'
A tubby little man wearing a good reefer jacket and a brand new peaked cap, who had been one of the last to arrive on the scene, replied contemptuously, 'What is there so frightful about a killing? We all know that they happen from time to time in fo'c'sle fights; and in port, like this, when there is trouble over a woman.'
The landlord nodded. 'True enough, Captain Robles. But it's not right that we should let him get away with it altogether. What do you suggest?'
With new hope surging in his breast de Quesnoy stared at the Captain. He had lank black hair, tiny little eyes and an enormously developed jaw. After a moment he said, 'My ship is sailing for Rio in two hours' time. He looks like a seafaring type. I'm short of hands and could do with an extra man in the fo'c'sle. If he doesn't behave we'll soon teach him manners. Slug him under the jaw, one of you, and we'll escort him aboard as though he were a drunk.'
De Quesnoy listened appalled. But with the exception of Inez everyone else accepted Captain Robles's idea as an excellent solution to the problem. The Scandinavian lumbered to his feet, delighted at the chance to avenge himself for the kick under the jaw he had received. The two men who were holding the Count's arms tightened their grip on him. The sailor clenched his big fist and struck him a violent blow on the side of the chin. A black curtain descended in front of his eyes, red stars and circles flashed upon it; then he passed out.
fate stalks by night
When de Quesnoy came to he found himself in irons. He was lying on a thin straw-filled palliasse in a dark noisome hole. A rocking motion and the noise of a churning propeller told him that he was in a ship at sea. His head was aching abominably, but into his still bemused brain there drifted a picture of redheaded Inez, then of himself smashing the mirror. That had brought him ill-luck indeed.
Then another thought came to him. It was of Count Soltikoff saying 'Vengeance is Mine, saith The Lord'. Sanchez was dead, and his father and the others would shortly be on trial for their lives. But that was little consolation now. By taking the law into his own hands this was where he had landed himself. And there was no escape. He was faced with having to work his way to South America under a brutal captain as a seaman before the mast.
16
Fate Stalks by Night
It was two and a half years before de Quesnoy returned to Europe. He would not have done so then had he not learnt early in March, 1909, that his father had died. In consequence, when he did return it was as the tenth Due de Richleau.
One of the blessings granted to mankind is that while it is often possible to recall and, years later, enjoy again in retrospect the most delightful hours of one's life, the emotion of terror, the sensation of pain, the gnawings of hunger, anxiety and jealousy rarely leave a permanent impression on the mind; and even the memories of long periods of distress become blunted by the balm of time.
So, when de Richleau entered the first-class deck cabin of the de luxe liner that was to carry him from New Orleans to Hamburg, he did not even give a thought to the very different circumstances in which he had arrived in South America one hundred and thirty-one weeks earlier. By then his mind had telescoped his outward voyage into a few scenes:
His first interview with Captain Robles. The morning after the tramp had sailed from Cadiz he had been taken up, still in irons, from the lazaret to the Captain's cabin. He had told Robles his proper name and offered him five hundred pounds to put back and land him in Cadiz or any other European port. The squat, baboon-jawed Captain had laughed in his face, and flatly refused to believe that he was a Count or could lay his hand on one-tenth of that sum. To threaten him, on arrival in South America, with prosecution for kidnapping was obviously futile and, de Quesnoy realized, might even have led to his not being allowed to land when they got to Rio. The only course left to him had been to put as cheerful a face as possible on matters and agree to sign on for the voyage as a deck-hand under his assumed name of Jaime Avila.
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Then of a fight in the fo'c'sle. The rough seamen who were to be his shipmates were used to minding their own business, so did not inquire into his. An extra hand meant lightening their work so most of them gave him a surly welcome and, between them, fitted him up with spare oddments of kit, such as sea-boots, oilskins and a razor. But they soon began to put upon the landlubber who had arrived in their midst, and he saw that unless he took a stand his life, from being grim, would become intolerable. On the third night out he had refused to dubbin the boots of a brawny half-caste named Vecho. As Vecho was the fo'c'sle bully the other men did not, as de Quesnoy had feared they might, gang up against him, but stood by while the two of them fought it out. It had been a tough encounter with no holds barred; but after five gruelling minutes de Quesnoy had succeeded in getting a judo hold on Vecho and made him scream for mercy. From then on there were no further attempts to make the slim but formidable new hand do more than his share of the fo'c'sle chores.
Lastly, on the ship's arrival at Rio after three weeks at sea. During them the Count's lifelong assumption of leadership had soon made itself felt. Most of his tasks as a deck-hand required brawn rather than brains; so he swiftly mastered them and within a few days had, almost unconsciously, assumed the role of leading hand in his watch; then he had been singled out by the bosun for any special jobs needing a little ingenuity or skill. That had not been lost on Captain Robles, who had already realized that he was an educated man; yet de Quesnoy's surprise can be imagined when, on paying him off in Rio, the Captain had offered to sign him on for his next voyage as fourth mate. It had then been the Count's turn to laugh. But he was conscious that had Robles not shanghaied him he might well have been lynched and suffered some fatal injury before getting away from the Silver Galleon; so in spite of the hard time, wretched food and filthy quarters that he had since been forced to endure, he had taken leave of the tough little tramp skipper without any ill will.
In 1904, when a guest on the yacht of the American banker Channock Van Ryn, de Quesnoy had made a number of acquaintances in Rio, so he had had no di
fficulty in establishing his real identity there. The Rio branch of Van Ryn's bank had made him a substantial loan, which had enabled him to re-equip himself decently and live in a good hotel while arranging for funds to be sent to him from Europe, and he had at once cabled his father and de Vendome to let them know his whereabouts and that he was safe and well.
He had also written at length to de Cordoba relating all that had happened in Granada and Cadiz, and saying that it was not his intention to return to Spain. As he pointed out, the trial of the anarchists in Barcelona, having been fixed for October 11th, would by then be over. That he had been rendered incapable of appearing in court to substantiate his personal charges against Francisco Ferrer, his remaining son Benigno, and the others, was unfortunate; but Don Alfonso had been of the opinion that, even without those charges, on the evidence of their anarchist activities found in the Escuela Moderna, they would be lucky if they escaped the death penalty and, at the least, would receive long sentences of imprisonment; therefore no useful purpose could be served by his returning and having them brought to trial again.
He added that, had there been the least chance of their being set free, he would have taken the first ship back, but it had always been his intention to go to South America after the trial for the purpose of obtaining a commission in the army of one of the Republics; so, Fate having deposited him there - however uncomfortable the means she had chosen - he now took that as a good omen of better luck in Latin America than he had met with in Europe during the past year, and meant to remain there at all events for some time to come.
In due course he received a reply from the Conde telling him that, owing to his disappearance, the trial of the anarchists had been postponed. The police had traced his movements and learned from La Torcera, who had returned to Granada, that when in Cadiz he had gone out after Sanchez Ferrer. They had found out about Sanchez's death, but failed to discover what had become of de Quesnoy; so assumed that he had been made away with that same night. In consequence they had written him off as a witness for the prosecution in the Ferrer trial, and were now concentrating their efforts on ferreting out further evidence against the owner and staff of the Escuela Moderna. But there was no likelihood whatever of the prisoners being released or, in due course, not receiving long sentences; so de Quesnoy might rest content with the big contribution he had already made to breaking up the nest of vipers which, until August, had flourished in Barcelona.
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