‘Oh God, you’re safe! I thought they’d murdered you. But you’re alive! Alive! Thank God! And I was about… about to shoot you. If I’d pressed the trigger I … I’d have killed you myself. Oh, thank God! Thank God!’
‘Simon, dear Simon,’ de Richleau put one arm round his friend’s shoulders and with the other stroked his dark hair. ‘Calm yourself, my son, calm yourself. Yes, I’ve had a very narrow escape. But why were you about to shoot me?’
‘We guessed you were here,’ Simon blurted out. ‘Rajapakse and I. We broke into the back room, saw a body on the floor. Thought it was you, then were driven off by a snake. I came round the front. Meant to get those bastards even if I swung for it. Only saw the back of your head and jumped to it that you were old d’Azavedo.’
The Duke gave a low laugh. ‘So you came in to avenge my death. And you are always telling people that you lack courage. What nonsense, dear Simon. But where is Douglas?’
‘Left him outside,’ Simon replied. ‘He’s still there, I expect. Must let him know you’re safe.’ Getting to his feet, he ran from the room and out to the front door.
Against the possibility that Simon might need to make a quick get-away, Douglas had collected his car from further along the road and was now sitting in it outside the house. On seeing Simon he pressed the self-starter and called, ‘Praise be you didn’t use that gun. Come on! Let’s get out of this.’
‘Had no need,’ Simon called back, halting on the verandah. ‘The d’Azavedos aren’t here. But de Richleau is and, believe it or not, I found him asleep. Come along in.’
Scrambling out of the car, Douglas hurried up the drive and asked, ‘If the Duke is safe, whose body did we see in the back room?’
‘Don’t know, but de Richleau may,’ Simon replied, as he led the way back into the sitting room.
When Douglas had expressed his delight at the Duke’s being safe and sound, he said, ‘Mr. Aron was convinced we would find you here; but as you had agreed to the d’Azavedos’ proposition about Olenevka I’ve been puzzling my wits in vain for a reason why they should have wished to get hold of you.’
De Richleau told them about the d’Azavedos’ plot to secure the mine without giving up their jewels, then how he had partially upset their plans by scaring Lalita but that had not saved him from being pushed by Ukwatte into the room with the cobra.
At that, Simon exclaimed, ‘Heavens! Even you can’t often have been nearer death. How in the world did you save yourself?’
‘Old soldiers never die,’ quoted de Richleau with a smile. ‘I owe my survival in this case to having once been a soldier; although the use of physical weapons did not enter into it. I must long ago have told you how, as a young officer in the French Army, owing to my having come upon proof that Dreyfus was innocent I attracted to myself the enmity of the Minister of War who would have been ruined had the truth come out. In consequence I was sent to do garrison duty on Madagascar and remained in exile there for over two years.’
Simon nodded. ‘I remember. And you found life in that primitive island so utterly boring that you made friends with the witch-doctors. Took up magic and made a serious study of it.’
‘Yes. The Malagesy, being largely of Polynesian extraction and partly negro, enjoy knowledge of the secret arts as practised both in the Pacific and in Africa; so they have a greater understanding of what we term the supernatural than any other occultists in the world. Among other attributes their medicine men have inherited the means of exerting power over snakes, and that was among the things I learned from them.’
‘So you managed to charm the snake?’
‘Hardly that. I had so little time that I really thought my end had come. But an angry snake can be calmed if one has the courage to extend one’s hand with two fingers pointing downward over its head. Why that gesture should have such an effect I have no idea. No doubt willing the snake not to strike is the real secret. But that is what I did, and it worked. For a few minutes the reptile continued to sway its head and hiss at me, then it relaxed, sank down and went to sleep.’
‘And then?’
‘I too lay down. Knowing that d’Azavedo would return to collect the jewels and dispose of my body, I shammed dead. In due course he came in, threw the cobra a chicken, then bent down over me. Having mustered all my strength, I reared up and struck him a single judo blow on the neck with the side of my hand. It was well aimed and got him right on the jugular vein. He collapsed on top of me. I heaved him off, succeeded in pulling him to his knees and gave him a shove that sent him backward right on top of the cobra just as it had begun to lick the chicken. Then I stumbled from the room and locked him in.’
‘So it was his body we saw.’
De Richleau chuckled. ‘Yes, and I’m glad to have your confirmation that the snake bit him. I felt pretty sure it had because if it hadn’t he would have come round after a few minutes and I’d have heard him trying to break out. By now he must be as near dead as makes no matter and it gives me considerable pleasure to know that he met with the terrible end he intended for me.’
‘But why,’ Douglas asked, ‘having outwitted them, did you remain here?’
‘Alas, I’m not the man I was, my friend. I’m no longer strong enough to walk the two or three miles it must be back to the Galle Face. And so late at night there would be very little chance of my getting a lift.’
Simon pointed to the telephone that stood nearby on a small, hardwood table. ‘You could have telephoned me. Why on earth didn’t you?’
The Duke shook his head. ‘No, my son. You would have come out here in a hired car. We would then have been faced with a most unpleasant dilemma. Either we would have had to go straight to the police and tell them the whole story, or risk d’Azavedo’s death being followed by an enquiry, and my being suspected in connection with it, owing to the driver reporting that he picked me up here in the middle of the night.’
‘As your lawyer I must advise you to go straight to the police anyhow,’ said Douglas firmly. ‘Ukwatte’s death has no relevance to the fact that the d’Azavedos lured you from your hotel on false pretences, then used threats of violence to force you to sign a document. Your proper course is to bring an action against Lalita, as the surviving partner in this criminal conspiracy.’
De Richleau shook his head. ‘No, thank you. The fact that you found me in this house is no proof that I was lured here. It is known by several people that I had already agreed to sign such a document and I have the jewels which were to be my consideration for so doing. As a Colonel in the Security Service Lalita must have considerable pull with all sorts of influential people. Such an action against him would get us nowhere. It would serve only as an admission that I was in this house at approximately the time Ukwatte met his death.’
‘Concerning that you have nothing to fear. The natural assumption will be that Ukwatte left you in this room and went to give his snake its meal, then it bit him.’
‘I would you were right,’ the Duke gave a tired sigh. ‘But if a full inquiry is started a very different picture will emerge. It will be seen at once that Ukwatte has a big bruise on his neck, owing to the congestion of blood in his jugular vein from the judo blow I struck him. No fall or accident could have caused that; only a human agency. Once we admit that I was here tonight, Lalita will declare, and quite truthfully, that he left me alone with his father. The odds are that on leaving here he went to some place where he has friends or acquaintances who will vouch for his presence with them for the remainder of the night. In any case there is no reason why he should not be believed. Who else then but myself could have struck Ukwatte unconscious and left him at the mercy of the cobra? It is true enough that he planned to kill me, but the fact is that I killed him; and I’ve no wish to be tried for murder.’
Simon’s head bobbed up and down like that of a nodding china Mandarin. ‘Um, I get you. Got to keep the police out of this. No way we could explain away that bruise on Ukwatte’s neck. We’d be in a muddle, a really nasty
muddle. But what did you intend to do?’
‘Doze here till daylight, when there would be people about. Then go out and walk as far as a main street where I could pick up some form of transport. No-one except Lalita would then ever have known that I had been near this place. And unless he was prepared to divulge that he had participated in a criminal conspiracy he would not dare say that I had. Even were he prepared to face that, it would be only his word against mine.’
Douglas still looked worried and he said, ‘These things have a nasty way of coming out unexpectedly. Honestly, I feel you would be wiser to let me ring up the police, tell them the whole truth, enter an action against Lalita and plead that while you were struggling with Ukwatte to save yourself from the cobra he tripped and fell on the snake.’
A gentle smile twitched the Duke’s lips. ‘I’m sure, Douglas, that you have my best interests at heart. But you must leave me to be the judge of how to protect myself against a charge of murder. I killed Ukwatte as surely as though I had put a bullet through his brain; and at my age I could not stand up to hours of grilling by detectives. To escape that I must get back to the Galle Face. If the question of my having gone out soon after ten o’clock ever arises, I could say that by arrangement I went to meet Simon, as I will be returning with him. But all the odds are that, unless Lalita is so ill-advised as to accuse me, no-one will even think of connecting me with his father’s death.’
‘You’re right,’ agreed Simon. ‘Sooner we get out of here the better. I wonder though that you didn’t make yourself scarce immediately you’d dealt with Ukwatte. If Lalita had come back and found you still here, you’d have been for the high jump.’
The Duke gave an abrupt laugh. ‘I had little fear of that. I had made him too scared of becoming involved in my murder. There is every reason to assume that he will allow ample time for his father to devise some means of disposing of my body; so it is most unlikely that he will return until tomorrow.’
They all stood up and, with de Richleau leading, walked out into the hall. The front door was still ajar, as Douglas had left it. He drew it open. With sudden shock it impinged on his mind that de Richleau’s statement a moment before might be counted among ‘famous last words’.
Outside on the verandah Lalita was standing. The moonlight glinted on the thick lenses of his spectacles and in his hand he held a heavy automatic.
13
Battle of Wits
As Douglas pulled the door open he had stepped aside for the Duke, and Simon was only a pace behind de Richleau, so the three of them were bunched together. Lalita stood pointing the gun at them from about six feet away; too far off for there to be any hope of rushing him. His slack mouth broke into a grin and he said:
‘I catch you nicely. Recognising Mr. Rajapakse’s car tell me that he, and perhaps others, come to rescue the old gentlemans. How lucky that I come back with new plan regarding him. I have only to wait here for you come out. Hands up, all of you, and inside. Be quick.’
As he spoke, he thrust forward his pistol. Under the threat they retreated to the middle of the hall. Following them he pushed-to the door behind him, then snapped, ‘Now, form line. Turn round. Backs towards me.’
When they had obeyed him he jabbed his weapon against de Richleau’s spine. ‘You move, or your friends, and I shoot.’ With his left hand he quickly frisked the Duke, and from the way he did so it was clear that since he had become a Security Officer he knew his business. While repeating the procedure with the other two, he removed Douglas’s revolver from Simon’s trouser top and thrust its barrel inside the belt of his uniform tunic.
His next orders were, ‘Advance now to curtains. Turn to face me. Hands you may put down.’ When they had obeyed him he walked forward until he was within two paces of them, so that he could look into the sitting room. Seeing that it was empty he said:
‘My father? You catch him off guard, eh? Then tie him up. Where you put him?’
It was de Richleau who replied, ‘You will recall that it was his intention to put me in the back room with the cobra.’
Lalita’s eyes narrowed. He was making no admission before witnesses, so he said cautiously, ‘This is strange statement you make.’
‘Well,’ said the Duke, ‘he did. But instead of biting me it bit him.’
‘Aiee!’ Lalita’s mouth dropped open and from it there issued a strange wail of mingled grief and shock. His muscles tautened as though he had been hit, then suddenly relaxed, causing the hand that held the heavy automatic to droop. Seeing that the pistol now pointed toward the floor both Douglas and Simon seized their chance. Before Lalita had time to recover they simultaneously threw themselves upon him.
The ensuing struggle was so brief that it was over in a matter of seconds. Douglas flung his arms about Lalita. Simon grabbed his gun hand, gave his wrist a sharp twist and tore the weapon from him. Thrusting him against the wall, Douglas then recovered his own revolver and, seeing that Simon had Lalita covered, stuck it back in his trouser band.
De Richleau had taken a few steps towards the door. Turning, he said to Lalita, ‘It is your turn now to listen while we talk to you. Get over there with your back to the curtain.’
‘My father!’ gasped Lalita, still panting from the recent scrimmage, as he moved over. ‘Oh, what have you do? Is he… is he dead?’
The Duke nodded. ‘As he was bitten at least half an hour ago he must certainly be beyond aid by now. But if you wish to make sure we will put you in there with him.’
‘No! Please! No; no!’ Lalita wailed. ‘I meant no harm. I do nothings against you. I refuse help my father. Leave house. You know it.’
‘Yes. You ratted on your charming parent. But only to save your own skin. It was you who lured me from the Galle Face.’
Lalita rallied suddenly. ‘You cannot prove. I make no admissions I was ever here.’
‘Naturally.’ A cynical smile twitched de Richleau’s lips. ‘And you were very wise to have backed out of assisting your father to murder me. Had you remained and done so, instead of him tripping up and falling on the cobra it might have been you who met with such a fatal accident. But you have been very foolish to return. Although it might be difficult to trace the telephone call you made to me and identify you with the Indian who picked me up, if I liked to charge you with having abducted me, both Mr. Aron and Mr. Rajapakse can now swear to it that they found me in this house, and that later you arrived and held the three of us up with your pistol.’
‘I should say it mus’ be my father who telephone. That I know nothings of it. That I come to see him, find you here and thought you was burglars.’
‘Very clever. But I still feel I could make a case that you would find difficult to answer. However, it is your good fortune that I am averse to involving myself in a criminal action which might lead to my being detained in Ceylon for some time as the principal witness. So we will draw a veil over this night’s work. It remains only for you to throw a hearty meal to the cobra then, when it is sleeping it off, remove your father’s body, tell your neighbours that his pet snake bit him and make arrangements for his funeral.’
Lalita nodded dully. ‘Yes, that I mus’ do. For he is dead, dead! To realise is hard yet.’ For a moment he remained silent. Then suddenly his dark eyes behind the heavy spectacles lit up and he gave a pale smile. ‘But he made you sign contract. I inherit. Olenevka is now mine.’
‘Don’t be too certain. Where is your copy of the contract?’
‘In safe place.’ Lalita’s smile deepened. ‘You see my father give me, to take away. I take to my office and put in safe. Contract already witness by two mens very reliable to me. All in order. No use you demanding back. I claim deeds; firm of Rajapakse have to give.’
‘To that I can see no objection,’ remarked Douglas tartly, ‘or what you have to look so pleased about. Your vile plot was aimed at getting both Olenevka and keeping the jewels. Instead you are having to give up the jewels and you have lost your father.’
‘Aiee!
’ The strange wail came again from Lalita. For a moment his features were contorted with hate and rage, then he cried, ‘My father! Yes! That he is dead, the shock drives all sense from my head. The contract was never meant to be fulfil both ways. The stones were bait only. Shown only so that later people believe we give them you as paying for Olenevka, but they worth more; much more.’
Simon tittered into his hand. ‘Case of the trickster tricked, isn’t it?’
‘You think very funny,’ snarled Lalita. ‘But I not sit down for this. Stones are property of d’Azavedos. Now myself. You leave house with them and I charge you with theft.’
De Richleau shook his head. ‘They are not the property of the d’Azavedos, and they never have been. They are the stones that should have been handed over to my representative after a verdict was given against your father in the Court of Appeal. The very fact of your father possessing such a hoard shows the story of their having been looted at the time your workshop was burned out to be a pack of lies. In fact he admitted that tonight and boasted to me of the clever trick he had played in order to retain them.’
‘And why not?’ Lalita sneered. ‘It pleased him, I guess, to have last laugh at you; although idea of using riots for purpose of keeping our fortune in stones was mine.’
Actually, Ukwatte had made no mention of the fire and the Duke’s saying he had was just a clever bluff by which he had hoped to secure an admission from Lalita. And it had come off. Glancing at his friends he said, ‘You see. He admits that the stones are my property.’
Lalita gave a quick shrug. ‘No matter. What has been said here makes nothings different. Word of you and your friends against mine; no proof. No proof whatevers. As for contract I not use now. I tear up. Olenevka I lose; but stones of much greater value I keep.’ The case showed as a large oblong bulge at the left side of the Duke’s overcoat. Pointing to it, Lalita added, ‘You have stones there. Give me back. Then you all go and much riddance’.
Dangerous Inheritance Page 18