by Sapper
“And until we start?” said Blackton quietly.
“We remain in this room,” answered Drummond. “At least – you and I do. Mademoiselle must please herself.”
The girl looked at him languidly.
“You don’t mind if I leave you?” she remarked. “To tell you the truth, mon ami, you’re being a little tedious this evening. And since I am going to Evian-les-Bains for the waters tomorrow, I think I’ll retire to bed. Do you know Evian?”
“Never heard of it, I’m afraid,” said Drummond. “My geography was always rotten.”
He was lighting a cigarette, more to conceal his thoughts than for any desire to smoke. That she was a perfect actress he knew, and yet it seemed impossible to believe that her composure was anything but natural. He glanced at Peterson, who was still sitting motionless, his chin sunk on his chest. He glanced at the girl, and she was patting a stray tendril of hair in front of a mirror. He even glanced at Sir Raymond, but there was nothing to be learned from that gentleman. He still resembled a man only partially recovered from a drugged sleep. Was it conceivable that he had left a loophole in his scheme? Or could it be that she had ceased to care for Peterson?
She had turned and was regarding him with a faint smile.
“I fear I shan’t be up before you go tomorrow,” she murmured. “But whoever does not go into cold storage must come and tell me about it. And there are a lot of other things, too, I want to hear about. Why Carl, for instance, ought to have looked in the motor-boat, and how you got concussion.”
Drummond looked at her steadily.
“I find you a little difficult to understand, Mademoiselle. I trust you are under no delusions as to whether I am bluffing or not. You can, at any rate, settle one point in your mind by glancing outside the door.”
“To see the two large policemen,” laughed the girl. “La, la, my dear man – they would give me what you call a nightmare. I will take your word for it.”
“And any appeal for help will result somewhat unfortunately for Carl.”
She shrugged her shoulders irritably.
“I know when the game is up,” she remarked. Then abruptly she turned on the man who had been her companion for years. “Bah! you damned fool!” she stormed. “Every time this great idiot here does you down. Not once, but half a dozen times have you told me ‘Drummond is dead’, and every time he bobs up again like a jack-in-the-box. And now – this time – when you had everything – everything – everything, you go and let him beat you again. You tire me. It is good that we end our partnership. You are imbecile.”
She raged out of the room, and Carl Peterson raised his haggard eyes as the door closed. His lips had set in a twisted smile, and after a while his head sank forward again, and he sat motionless, staring at the table in front of him. His cigar had long gone out; he seemed to have aged suddenly. And into Drummond’s mind there stole a faint feeling of pity.
“I’m sorry about that, Peterson,” he said quietly. “She might at least have seen the game out to the end.”
The other made no reply – only by a slight shake of his shoulders did he show that he had heard. And Drummond’s feeling of pity increased. Scoundrel, murderer, unmitigated blackguard though he knew this man to be, yet when all was said and done he was no weakling. And it wasn’t difficult to read his thoughts at the moment – to realise the bitterness and the fury that must be possessing him. Half an hour ago he had believed himself successful beyond his wildest dreams; now – And then for the girl to go back on him at the finish.
Drummond pulled himself together; such thoughts were dangerous. He forced himself to remember that night when it had been the question of seconds between life and death for Phyllis; he recalled to his mind the words he had listened to as he lay on the floor in the house to which Freyder had brought him while still unconscious.
“I think if it was a question between getting away with the process and killing Drummond – it would be the latter.”
If the positions were reversed, would one thought of mercy have softened the man he now held in his power? No one knew better than Drummond himself that it would not. He was a fool even to think about it. The man who hated him so bitterly was in his power. He deserved, no man more so, to die; he was going to die. Moreover he was going to have a sporting chance for his life into the bargain. And that was a thing he had never given Drummond. And yet he could have wished the girl had not proved herself so rotten.
The lights went out on the long terrace fronting the lake, and he glanced at his watch. It was twelve o’clock: in another three hours it would be light enough to start. Through Chateau d’Oex to Interlaken – he knew the way quite well. And then up either by train or car to Grindelwald. It would depend on what time they arrived as to the rest of the programme. And as he saw in his mind’s eye the grim struggle that would be the finish one way or the other – for Peterson was no mean antagonist physically – Drummond’s fists tightened instinctively and his breathing came a little quicker. Up above the snow line they would fight, in the dusk when the light was bad, and there would be no wandering peasant to spread awkward stories.
Peterson’s voice cut in on his thoughts.
“You are quite determined to go through with this?”
“Quite,” answered Drummond. “As I told you, I have definitely come to the conclusion that the world is not big enough for both of us.”
Peterson said no more, but after a while he rose and walked into the glassed-in balcony. The windows were open, and with his hands in his pockets he stood staring out over the lake.
“I advise you to try nothing foolish,” said Drummond, joining him. “The Swiss police are remarkably efficient, and communication with the frontiers by telephone is rapid.”
“You think of everything,” murmured Peterson. “But there are no trains, and it takes time to order a car at midnight. And since it is beyond my powers to swim the lake, there doesn’t seem much more to be said.” He turned and faced Drummond thoughtfully. “How on earth do you do it, my young friend? Are you aware that you are the only man in the world who has ever succeeded in doing me down? And you have done it not once – but three times. I wonder what your secret is.” He gave a short laugh, then once again stared intently out of the window. “Yes, I wonder very much. In fact I shall really have to find out. Good God! look at that fool Blantyre.”
Drummond swung round, and even as he did so Peterson hit him with all his force under the jaw. The blow caught him off his balance, and he crashed backwards, striking the back of his head against the side of the balcony as he fell. For a moment or two he lay there half-stunned. Dimly he saw that Peterson had disappeared, then, dazed and sick, he scrambled to his feet and tottered to the window. And all he saw was the figure of a man which showed up for a second in the light of a street-lamp and then disappeared amongst the trees which led to the edge of the lake.
Desperately he pulled himself together. The police outside; the telephone; there was still time. He could hear the engine of a motor-boat now, but even so there was time. He rushed across the room to the door; outside in the passage were the two gendarmes.
They listened as he poured out the story, and then one of them shook his head a little doubtfully.
“It is perfectly true, Monsieur,” he remarked, “that we can communicate with the gendarmes of all the Swiss towns au bord du lac – and at once. But with the French towns it is different.”
“French?” said Drummond, staring at him. “Isn’t this bally lake Swiss?”
“Mais non, monsieur. Most of it is. But the southern shore from St. Gingolph to Hermance is French. Evian-les-Bains is a well-known French watering-place.”
“Evian-les-Bains!” shouted Drummond – “Evian-les-Bains! Stung! – utterly, absolutely, completely stung! And to think that that girl fixed the whole thing under my very nose.”
For a moment he stood undecided; then at a run he started along the corridor.
“After ’em, mes braves. Another motor-boat is the only chance.”
There was another moored close in-shore, and into it they all tumbled, followed by Ted Jerningham and Algy Longworth, whom they had roused from their slumbers in the lounge. Ted, as the authority, took charge of the engine – only to peer at it once and start laughing.
“What’s the matter?” snapped Drummond.
“Nothing much, old man,” said his pal. “Only that there are difficulties in the way of making a petrol engine go when both sparking-plugs have long been removed.”
And it seemed to Drummond that, at that moment, there came a faint, mocking shout from far out on the darkness of the lake.
“Mind you wear hob-nailed boots on the glacier.”
Chapter 13
In which Drummond receives an addition to his library
It was four days later. During that four days Drummond’s usual bright conversational powers had been limited to one word – “Stung.” And now as he drew his second pint from the cask in the corner of his room in Brook Street, he elaborated it.
“Stung in the centre and on both flanks,” he remarked morosely. “And biffed in the jaw into the bargain.”
“Still, old dear,” murmured Algy brightly – Algy’s world was bright again, now that there was no further need to postpone his marriage – “you may meet him again. You’d never really have forgiven yourself if you’d watched him passaging down a glacier. So near and yet so far, and all that sort of thing. I mean, what’s the good of a glacier, anyway? You can’t use the ice even to make a cocktail with. At least, not if old man Peterson was embalmed in it. It wouldn’t be decent.”
“Stung,” reiterated Drummond. “And not only stung, my dear boy, but very nearly bitten. Are you aware that only by the most uncompromising firmness on my part did I avoid paying his bill at the Palace Hotel? The manager appeared to think that I was responsible for his abrupt departure. A truly hideous affair.”
He relapsed into moody silence, which remained unbroken till the sudden entrance of Professor Goodman. He was holding in his hand an early edition of an evening paper, and his face was agitated.
“What’s up, Professor?” asked Drummond.
“Read that,” said the other.
Drummond glanced at the paper.
“Death of well-known English financier in Paris.” Thus ran the headline. He read on:
“This morning Sir Raymond Blantyre, who was stopping at the Savoy Hotel, was found dead in his bed. Beside the deceased man an empty bottle of veronal was discovered. No further details are at present to hand.”
The paragraph concluded with a brief description of the dead man’s career, but Drummond read no farther. So Blantyre had failed to face the music. As usual, the lesser man paid, while Peterson got off.
“Suicide, I assume,” said the Professor.
“Undoubtedly,” answered Drummond. “It saves trouble. And I may say I put the fear of God into him. Well, Denny – what is it?”
“This letter and parcel have just come for you, sir,” said his servant.
Drummond turned them both over in his hand, and a faint smile showed on his face. The postmark was Rome; the writing he knew. It was the letter he opened first:
“I have threatened often: I shall not always fail. You have threatened once: you could hardly hope to succeed. I shall treasure some edelweiss. Au revoir.”
Still smiling, he looked at the parcel. After all, perhaps it was as well. Life without Peterson would indeed be tame. He cut the string; he undid the paper. And then a strange look spread over his face – a look which caused the faithful Denny to step forward in alarm.
“Beer, fool – beer!” cried his master hoarsely.
On the table in front of him lay a book. It was entitled “Our Tiny Tots’ Primer of Geography.”
Series Information
Dates given are for year of first publication.
'Bulldog Drummond' Series
These Titles can be read as a series, or randomly as standalone novels
1. Bulldog Drummond 1920
2. The Black Gang 1922
3. The Third Round 1924
4. The Final Count 1926
5. The Female of the Species 1928
6. Temple Tower 1929
7. The Return of Bulldog Drummond 1932
8. Knock Out 1933
9. Bulldog Drummond At Bay 1935
10. Challenge 1937
'Ronald Standish' Series
These Titles can be read as a series, or randomly as standalone novels
1. Knock Out 1933
2. Ask For Ronald Standish 1936
3. Challenge 1937
'Jim Maitland'
These Titles can be read as a series, or randomly as standalone novels
1. Jim Maitland 1933
2. The Island of Terror 1937
Synopses - All Titles
Published by House of Stratus
Ask for Ronald Standish
Introducing debonair detective, Ronald Standish – good-looking, refined, and wealthy enough to be selective in taking cases that are of special interest to him. There are twelve tales in this compelling collection, written by the creator of Bulldog Drummond, who once more proves his mastery with the cream of detection.
The Black Gang
Although the First World War is over, it seems that the hostilities are not, and when Captain Hugh ‘Bulldog’ Drummond discovers that a stint of bribery and blackmail is undermining England’s democratic tradition, he forms the Black Gang, bent on tracking down the perpetrators of such plots. They set a trap to lure the criminal mastermind behind these subversive attacks to England, and all is going to plan until Bulldog Drummond accepts an invitation to tea at the Ritz with a charming American clergyman and his dowdy daughter.
Bulldog Drummond
‘Demobilised officer, finding peace incredibly tedious, would welcome diversion. Legitimate, if possible; but crime, if of a comparatively humorous description, no objection. Excitement essential... Reply at once Box X10.’
Hungry for adventure following the First World War, Captain Hugh ‘Bulldog’ Drummond begins a career as the invincible protectorate of his country. His first reply comes from a beautiful young woman, who sends him racing off to investigate what at first looks like blackmail but turns out to be far more complicated and dangerous. The rescue of a kidnapped millionaire, found with his thumbs horribly mangled, leads Drummond to the discovery of a political conspiracy of awesome scope and villainy, masterminded by the ruthless Carl Peterson.
Bulldog Drummond At Bay
While Hugh ‘Bulldog’ Drummond is staying in an old cottage for a peaceful few days duck-shooting, he is disturbed one night by the sound of men shouting, followed by a large stone that comes crashing through the window. When he goes outside to investigate, he finds a patch of blood in the road, and is questioned by two men who tell him that they are chasing a lunatic who has escaped from the nearby asylum. Drummond plays dumb, but is determined to investigate in his inimitable style when he discovers a cryptic message.
Challenge
When Colonel Henry Talbot summons Bulldog Drummond and Ronald Standish, it is to inform them of the mysterious death of one of their colleagues – Jimmy Latimer. At the time of his death, he was on a big job, and was travelling on a boat to Newhaven when he died. But there was no sign of any wound, no trace of any weapon when they found him in his cabin. What strikes Drummond and Standish is why millionaire, Charles Burton, would have been travelling on the same boat – arguably the most uncomfortable crossing he could choose and very out-of-character.
The Dinner Club
A fascinating collection of tales, including stories related by members of a select club consisting of an actor, a barrister, a doctor, a soldier, a writer and an ‘ordinary
man’. Each member of this club is obliged to entertain his fellows to dinner from time to time, after which he relates a story connected with his profession or trade – the only penalty is a donation to a worthy charity should he fail to keep his audience awake. Readers of these excellent stories may rest assured that there is no such danger.
The Female of the Species
Bulldog Drummond has slain his archenemy, Carl Peterson, but Peterson’s mistress lives on and is intent on revenge. Drummond’s wife vanishes, followed by a series of vicious traps set by a malicious adversary, which lead to a hair-raising chase across England, to a sinister house and a fantastic torture-chamber modelled on Stonehenge, with its legend of human sacrifice.
The Final Count
When Robin Gaunt, inventor of a terrifyingly powerful weapon of chemical warfare, goes missing, the police suspect that he has ‘sold out’ to the other side. But Bulldog Drummond is convinced of his innocence, and can think of only one man brutal enough to use the weapon to hold the world to ransom. Drummond receives an invitation to a sumptuous dinner-dance aboard an airship that is to mark the beginning of his final battle for triumph.