by Dion Fortune
One by one he picked up his officers with question and answer, even the miserable billy-goat replying to his cue with a despairing bleat as the butler stuck a pin into him. Ursula lay motionless, staring at Murchison as he hung limply from the cross, his face ashen-grey, his hands nearly black.
Fortunately his faint did not last long, the blood supply speedily re-establishing itself as soon as the pressure of Astley’s thumbs was removed. He lifted his head, and stared dazedly about him, unable to realize where he was or what had been done to him. The intolerable strain on his arms made itself felt, and he struggled to get upright and relieve it. But his feet had slipped through their strap during his faint, and he could not get his balance. It was an ugly sight as he struggled on the cross, and the audience held its breath, spellbound, watching it, stirred to God knows what intensity of decadent emotion by the spectacle.
At length he got on to his feet and heaved a sigh of relief, met Ursula’s horrified eyes and half smiled at her. Then he turned his attention to the ritual, watching for anything that should give him a cue. Astley was chanting translations from some of the more recondite Greek poets — the passages that are not included in the versions prepared for the use of schools. Murchison glanced down, and saw that Ursula was still gazing at him with a fixed intensity.
The ritual went on, chant and response and intoning making an impressive ceremony. Monks marched round with a censer that smoked like a factory chimney and smelt worse than the billy-goat. Astley waved his arms and boomed at intervals. Murchison leant back against the cross and watched it all.
And as he stood extended on the black Cross of Sacrifice watching it all, a strange feeling began to steal over him. Everything became unreal on the physical plane and real in some other dimension, and he himself, stretched on that cross, willingly suffering for the sake of another who despised and rejected him, felt himself actually becoming a saviour by the power Of sacrifice and vicarious suffering, and for the first time he had a glimpse of the significance of the Christian doctrine. What his brother had been unable to accomplish in his comfortable and aesthetic church, Astley accomplished without meaning to in a rite intended to invoke all evil and stimulate every depraved emotion.
Then the alleged virgins began to dance in diaphanous draperies, and Murchison was devoutly thankful that Ursula had had her back to the performance.
Finally, Astley struck his pedestal a resounding crash, the organ went off full blast, all the lights went out, and Murchison knew they had got to business at last, and tensed himself for whatever might be forthcoming.
The thing that was immediately forthcoming startled him so that he nearly cried out, for it was a small cold hand on his bare chest, and a voice that whispered, ‘It’s me, it’s Ursula!’
The hand ran down his arm to the strap that held it, and after a moment’s struggle the buckle was cast loose and the arm dropped down, drawing a gasp of agony from him in the pain of the bending. In another second the other arm was also set free, and, bending down, she unstrapped his feet. He put a numbed arm round her shoulder, and half dragging her, half supported by her, got behind the draperies at the back of the platform and out into the workshop. She switched on the light, as could safely be done behind these draperies, and they stared at each other silently. Ursula had left her cloak behind her, and was clad only in a straight silver tunic held round the breast by a band, her feet bare.
‘Come on, quick!’ he said, seizing her by the wrist with one hand and picking up the cloak Astley had wrapped about him with the other. He threw the cloak over her shoulders, opened the door leading into the area, thrust her through it, switched off the light, and followed her, after pulling the lumber back into position so as to block the door and make it look as if nothing had been disturbed. Then, electric torch in hand, he guided her up the steps that led to the trapdoor.
‘Hold this, will you?’ he said, thrusting the torch into her hand; she took it, and he put his hands against the trapdoor and pushed. But nothing happened save a trickle of coal-dust through the cracks and a sound of crunching. The trapdoor would not budge. It was held down by a weight too great for his strength to move, strain as he would, and it dawned on him that a load of coal must have come into the empty cellar since his last visit, and that a ton weight probably rested upon that trapdoor.
At that moment they heard noises from the carpenter’s shop which sounded as if someone were pulling down piles of lumber in the search for them. They listened, holding their breath, till the sounds died away and the light disappeared from the cracks of the door.
‘What are we going to do?’ whispered Ursula.
‘Sit here and wait, and stick it as best we can till your brother comes. He goes for the police if I’m not back by three.’
‘What time is it now?’
‘Goodness knows. Getting on for eleven, I should think. We’d better sit down and make the best of it.’
They sat down in the angle of the area steps so as to have the wall to lean their backs against. Ursula, drawing the thick black velvet cloak around her for what warmth she could get, accidentally brushed Murchison’s bare back with her wrist.
‘Good gracious!’ she said, ‘you’ve got nothing on! You can’t sit like that for three or four hours. Here, have half my cape.’
He felt a fold of velvet come over his shoulder and Ursula snuggle up against him.
‘I want to say something,’ came the girl’s voice in the dark.
‘Yes?’
‘I’m sorry I was to nasty to you the other morning.’
‘Perhaps you realize now that I did not betray your brother?’
‘Yes, of course I do. But why didn’t you explain?’
‘I was afraid you might give me away.’
‘Will you forgive me?’
‘There’s nothing to forgive that I know of. I don’t bear any ill-will, and never did. I’m sorry I lost my temper that day in the car, and if you’ll accept my apologies for that, we’ll call it square.’
‘I believe I owe you a great deal more than my life tonight.’
At that moment rays of light burst through the cracks of the door leading into the lumber-room, and they knew that the search was not yet over. They heard a sound of lumber being shifted away from the door.
‘We have got to face this,’ said Murchison. ‘I will try to bluff him. He won’t dare murder two of us together.’
He rose, an electric torch in one hand and the iron bar in the other, went forward to the door, banged on it with the bar, and called in a loud voice:
‘Hullo, Astley, looking for us?’
‘Ah, there you are!’ returned Astley, with a most deceptive affability. ‘Having a Mass of the Bull on your own out there?’
‘What’s the next item on the programme’?’
‘I thought of inviting you to come in and finish the Mass.’
‘Supposing we won’t?’
‘You soon will when you get a sulphur candle lit under you.’
‘Suppose I show fight?’
‘You’ll get the worst of it.’
Murchison laughed. ‘Oh, will I! Believe me, Astley, the first person who comes through that door will get a tap on the head with an iron bar. And I shall hit to kill. I know three men have died in this house, and if you corner me I shall fight to a finish.’
‘We shan’t trouble to corner you, we shall leave you there. You won’t last long in this weather.’
‘I shall last till the police arrive. We have an arrangement with Scotland Yard.’
There was a dead silence in the lumber-room, and a muttered consultation could be heard.
‘I am not sure I believe you.’
‘Please yourself.’
‘We shall simply deny that you have ever been here, and I don’t suppose you have advertised your comings and goings.’
‘Brangwyn walked with me to the end of the road and saw me enter the door.’
‘Do you expect us to believe that?’
&nb
sp; ‘Please yourself once again.’
‘What do you suppose Brangwyn would say if he saw a certain letter I had from you?’
‘He wrote it.’
‘What?’
‘Well, I wrote it at his dictation.’
There was another dead silence from the other side of the door, not even enlivened by a whispered consultation.
‘Look here, Murchison, if we let you and the girl go, will you keep your mouth shut?’
‘Sure.’
‘All right. I don’t want the trouble of disposing of your corpses. It isn’t worth it. I’m not in love with Ursula.’
The door swung wide open and a flood of light poured into the draughty darkness of the area.
‘Come on,’ said Murchison, not daring to turn round. He felt Ursula’s hand clutch his, and advanced through the low doorway, iron bar at the ready, drawing her after him.
Before him were Astley, the butler, Monks and the two young men in black and white, complete with swords, and in the hands of the butler was an iron bar, the fellow to Murchison’s.
He pointed towards the door. ‘You go first, all of you,’ he said.
‘Anything to oblige,’ said Astley, who knew how to lose gracefully. And in any case he did not greatly care, not being, as he said, enamoured of Miss Brangwyn. Fouldes could kick up a row if be liked. He led the way towards the door, the others trooping after him.
‘I’ll lead, I think, in case of trouble,’ said Murchison, motioning to Ursula to follow him.
They came out into the now empty temple, and the first person they came face to face with was Fouldes. Involuntarily Ursula drew close to Murchison’s side. Fouldes saw the movement, and for a long moment be stared at the pair of them without speaking, and then, God knows what demons of drink or drugs possessing him, struck Murchison full in the face. Murchison sprang back, iron bar upraised. Luckily some streak of sanity prevailed, and he dropped the bar and came for Fouldes with his bare hands. They were much of a height, but Murchison was the heavier and the hardier man. The result was a foregone conclusion. Fouldes was exceedingly quick and active, Murchison slower because of his weight and type. It was not so much a fight as a chase. Fouldes made a dash for the door, but Murchison headed him off. They dodged round the altar on which Ursula had lain, and Murchison nearly had him. Murchison was fighting mad in one of his berserk rages; his eyes had that strange, shining, blue, insane look of the Norseman in a tantrum, and Fouldes sincerely believed that he would die if Murchison laid hands on him, and the fear lent wings to his feet. Ursula, watching the man she had once loved and feared being chased like a frightened hen, felt his influence over her break once and for all.
It was obvious that Fouldes was faster than Murchison, and could turn in a shorter space, and the clutter of furniture in the room was to his advantage. But it was equally evident that Fouldes was panting and straining, whereas the deep-chested, heavily-muscled Murchison was going like a steam-engine. It was only a matter of time till he ran the other man down; it was impossible for Fouldes to get out through the door, as Astley and his party blocked it, thoroughly enjoying the fun and showing no signs of assisting him.
Finally, the end came when Fouldes made a bolt across an open space, tried to turn, and ran smack into Murchison. In a second his head was in chancery under Murchison’s arm, and Murchison was pounding his face to pulp. Murchison gave a snarl of rage, picked him up, raised him at arm’s length above his head, and flung him from him with all his strength. He hit one of Astley’s pillars, and knocked it flying.
‘My God!’ said Astley, as Fouldes lay in a crumpled heap almost at his feet, blood pouring from a nasty scalp wound. ‘We don’t want any more corpses here. We’ve had too many already.’
Murchison blinked, and stared round him with the look of one suddenly wakened from sleep. Astley bent down and examined the unconscious man, who stirred and groaned.
‘Ribs gone, and badly concussed. I thought you’d broken his spine! Here, you, get out of this. We’ve had enough of you.’
Murchison wrapped about him the white velvet cloak Ursula had worn. He did not bother with his iron bar, nor to guard against possible attack from the rear. All the fight had gone out of everybody.
The drive home was silent. Ursula glanced up shyly at her companion once or twice, but he only presented to her a grim profile, and stared steadily out of the window.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Brangwyn, watching the clock anxiously as the hands crept towards two, heaved a sigh of relief as he heard a key inserted in the lock; the door opened, and in came Ursula and Murchison. Ursula went up to her brother without a word and put her arms round his neck and hid her face on his shoulder. He put his arm round her and patted her back, and then held out his hand to Murchison. They exchanged a grip in a silence that was more eloquent than many words. Then Murchison turned and went off to his own quarters, leaving Brangwyn alone with his sister.
Murchison arrived down at breakfast next morning looking rather subdued and white.
‘How’s Miss Brangwyn?’ he inquired, seeing that the table was only laid for two.
‘Pretty bad. I was up with her all night. At seven this morning I sent for a doctor, and he gave her an injection of morphia and took her off to a nursing-home.’
Murchison made no comment, but sat staring at the table in silence. Finally be said: ‘Perhaps it’s just as well.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘I’d like to get off without seeing her again.’
‘What do you mean? You are not going to leave us, are you?’
‘Yes, I think I’d better. I’ve had as much as I can stick!’
‘But, my dear fellow, I don’t want to lose you. Even if you and Ursula can’t hit it off, I should like you to remain on as my secretary.’
‘That’s asking a bit too much. This business has gone pretty deep with me, and I couldn’t stand it.’
‘Well, this is a bitter disappointment to me, but I won’t press you to stay if you don’t feel you can. What do you want to do?’
‘I’ll go round to an employment agency and put my name down, and see what turns up.’
It was with a heavy heart he climbed the stairs of a very superior employment agency in Piccadilly to which Brangwyn had sent him with a letter of introduction. The clerk was almost cordial. ‘I think we can fit you up with what you want, if you are willing to go abroad?’
‘Delighted! Nothing I should like better. Where to, and when?’
‘Egypt, in about a month’s time!’
‘Well, I should have liked to have gone sooner, but I can hang on till then if it’s worth it.’
‘Very good. You go round to the Savoy and see Mr Agassiz. He’s a Levantine from Alexandria. He is as rich as Croesus and wants someone as a kind of bodyguard-cum-secretary.’
‘Sounds all right.’
‘Very good. Take this card and go and see him, and let us know if you get the job.’
Murchison took a bus to the Savoy and interviewed a small, skinny, sallow-checked little man, with eyes like black currants. He jibbed at the salary Murchison boldly asked for, but finally accepted when he heard that Murchison was a good revolver shot.
Murchison returned to the flat, and told Brangwyn of his good fortune.
‘I am glad you are fixed up, my lad, though I shall be very sorry to lose you.’
They ate their lunch in silence. Murchison seemed depressed and dispirited in a way that Brangwyn had never seen him before. He had often seen Murchison sullen and brooding, or resentful and up against life, but he had never seen him with all the kick gone out of him like this.
Brangwyn had resigned himself to the disappointment of his hopes and accepted his magical experiment as a failure. But now he was not so sure. Murchison had frankly admitted he had come to care for Ursula, and at the present moment, brooding over his coffee, looked about as thoroughly broken-hearted as a man could look. But the one thing Ursula had wanted to know in her semi-del
irium was whether Murchison was all right, and, reassured, had become quiet and dropped off to sleep. Actions speak louder than words, thought Brangwyn, trained to watch the language of unconscious gesture.
As he watched Murchison staring into space with miserable eyes, oblivious of his companion, a deep-laid plot began to hatch in his mind.
‘Murchison,’ he said, ‘if you haven’t got to go to Egypt for a month, I wonder whether you would do a job for me?’
‘Yes, certainly. What is it?’
‘I shall have to give up the cottage in Wales. It is far better that Ursula should not go back there after all that has happened. It will be full of painful memories for her. I want to find another place as a retreat. I had thought of the East Coast, up Yorkshire way.’
‘That’s my native heath. I’ll soon hunt you up something.’
‘Splendid. Go ahead. I want to have somewhere to take Ursula when she comes out of the nursing-home. Can you catch the afternoon mail-train for Llandudno Junction and pick up the car? You will want it for this job.’
‘Yes, easy. I’ll slam a few things into a suitcase and get off. Give me some particulars of the sort of thing you want, and the price you are prepared to go to.’
It was a tremendous relief to have something to do, and especially something to do that should take him about the country in the open air.
Murchison enjoyed the amenities of a first-class compartment to Llandudno Junction and then revelled in driving a six-cylindered thoroughbred cross-country to the East Coast, even though much of the route lay through the Black Country.
Finally he crossed the Humber and came into his own land. It was late afternoon as he approached the sea. He was making for a little village that had been the scene of summer holidays during his childhood. There were people about there who might remember him as a small boy in a sailor-suit, getting into every imaginable kind of mischief. Moreover, his name was one to conjure with in that district, for his forbears had owned it for many square miles. His objective was a farmhouse, about a mile from the village, right down on the beach among sandy dunes, where a stream that came from the moors ran out to the sea. It was here that they had always stayed, his father and mother and himself and an old Nanny; for his brother was a young man at the University by then, and despised holidays at a fishing village.