To the Devil, a Daughter

by Dennis Wheatley

  Gradually he began to take stock of his surroundings. He was lying on a hard bunk in a narrow, dimly-lit cabin. It had no porthole, so must be below the water-level. Such light as there was filtered in through an iron grille in the door, which suggested that this was not the first time the place had been used as a prison. That, he concluded, was why his captors had not bothered to tie his feet and hands.

  Getting painfully off the bunk, he verified the impression. The door was of steel and had no bolts, handle, or even a keyhole on its inner side; so even had he had some implement available he could not have attempted to pick the lock. The cabin had no furniture other than a single chair and a small, dirty wash-basin with a cracked mirror above it. There was no bulb in the solitary electric fitting in the ceiling, so he could not switch on a light. But his eyes were now getting accustomed to the little light there was, and peering at his face in the mirror he turned it first one way, then the other, in an endeavour to assess the damage it had suffered.

  His dark hair was rumpled and his face streaked with dirt. The left side of his chin was swollen and very tender, where the man with the moustache had hit him. It gave his face a slightly lop-sided appearance, which was accentuated by the fact that his left eye was half closed and colouring up, as evidence that Jules had had the best of their first encounter.

  Pressing the single button-tap, he ran some water into the basin and, as there was no towel, used his handkerchief to bathe his hurts. The cold water refreshed him and helped to clear his head a little; but there was nothing he could do about the injuries to his body. His forearm was scraped raw where he had slithered on it down the last few stairs of the companionway, and his side pained him every time he took anything approaching a deep breath, although on gingerly feeling his ribs he did not think that any of them were broken.

  While examining himself he found that his pockets had not been rifled and, rather belatedly, it occurred to him to look at his watch. On holding it up to the light from the grille he saw that its glass had not been broken and that it was still going. To his surprise it was only twenty-five minutes past eleven, and as a single blow on the chin could hardly have rendered him unconscious for over twelve hours it now seemed clear that he must have come round quite soon after the yacht had left harbour. Seeing that it was not yet midnight made him realise that, wherever she was bound, there was small likelihood of her reaching port for some hours to come; so he lay down again on the bunk.

  A little grimly he began to wonder what they would do with him when she did reach port. C.B. had warned him that if he went aboard without an authority to do so he would risk a beating-up, and he had been beaten-up; but he did not now think it very likely that they would hand him over to the police, as C.B. had forecast they would should he find himself in his present circumstances. Any police doctor would attest that injuries such as he had sustained could not normally have been received simply while being prevented from attacking someone. It would be clear that it was he who had been attacked, and handled much more brutally than even being caught while committing a theft could warrant. Moreover, he could now justify his having come on board to look for Christina. Whatever might have happened earlier, he could swear that when he, as her fiancé, had been escorting her ashore, he had been set on himself and had seen the Marquis forcibly prevent her from walking down the gangway. The de Grasses would surely not willingly give him the opportunity to make a sworn deposition of that kind.

  On the contrary, it was to their interest to keep him silent. He could not believe that the de Grasses would run the risk of committing murder in order to cover up the much lesser crime of kidnapping. It seemed far more probable that they would keep him a prisoner until they had got Christina safely to England and had had a chance to manufacture ample evidence that she had gone willingly. They would then have very little to fear if they released him, particularly if they first gave him a crack on the head, followed it when he came round with a shot of something to keep him muzzy, and then took him to a hospital with a story that they had found him wandering.

  Such a prospect was very far from pleasant; but he felt that Christina’s prospects were infinitely worse. He had good reason to suppose that she was still on board, but she was now in the clutches of these people and there was not a soul who could do anything to aid her.

  At the moment, under the strange influence that night had upon her, it was probable that she was not at all apprehensive about her future; but she would wake tomorrow a young and frightened girl, knowing herself to be at the mercy of men she knew to be her enemies. It seemed unlikely that the de Grasses would do her any injury; but what would happen to her when they had delivered her in England? If C.B. was to be believed—and his word must be accepted as authoritative on all criminal matters—she would be drugged, hypnotised, bedevilled and given over to the lusts of evil men, until such time as the evil had entered into her to the exclusion of all else and, debauched in mind and body, she willingly lent herself to every filthiness that imagination could suggest.

  The thought of what she would suffer during periods of lucidity, and the awful fate that must finally overtake her, made the perspiration break out on John’s forehead. For a long time he sought desperately for possible ways of saving her, but each grew more far-fetched and hopelessly impractical, until at last he drifted off to sleep.

  He was woken by the steel door of the cabin being swung back with a clang. Starting up, he saw two seamen standing in the doorway. Both were brawny, tough-looking fellows with hard eyes. The elder, whose hair showed grey at the sides under a rakishly-worn peaked cap, beckoned to him to come out, and said: ‘Get between us; and keep your hands at your sides, or it will be the worse for you.’

  The yacht’s diesels had been stopped and her only movement now was a gentle rise and fall; so it seemed that she must have entered a port or have anchored in some sheltered bay. John gave a quick glance at his watch. It was a quarter-past three. That told him that she might have run between forty to fifty miles along the coast, but in which direction he had no means of guessing. Obviously this was no time to argue; so he slid off the bunk, placed himself between the two sailors, so that the three of them formed an Indian file, and in this manner allowed himself to be escorted up on deck.

  He saw then that he had been right in believing the yacht might be anchored in a bay. The moon was almost down, but the stars were bright and there was sufficient light for him to make out a headland on either side, from which the land dropped away. Between them rose an outline of dark hillside, with low down on it several lighted windows which appeared to be in one large, solitary house.

  A rigged gangway, slung from davits on the yacht’s portside, had been lowered. John was marched on to it, and saw that a motor-launch was rocking gently beside the square grating which formed the lowest stage of the ladder. As he walked down to it he began to play with the thought of taking a swift dive; but he was not much good at swimming under water; so he was very doubtful of his ability to get out of sight before he could be spotted and recaptured. The idea was definitely rendered stillborn when they reached the launch by the grey-haired sailor producing an ugly sheath-knife, showing it to him and saying: ‘Should Monsieur show any desire to go for a swim, he will enter the water with this in his liver. Those are my orders.’

  Evidently the man felt that it was not for a member of the crew to enter the launch’s cabin, as he prodded John towards the bow and made him sit down on the fore-deck with his back against the cabin’s forward end, then sat down beside him. A moment later John heard voices, and among them Christina’s, confirming his belief that the Marquis had not taken her off in his car, but detained her on the yacht. The party scrambled on to the launch and, as soon as they had settled themselves in the cabin, it cast off.

  John’s spirits were now on the upgrade. Now it looked as if they were both to be taken to the house with the lights, and that the place was to be used as a staging point in the arrangements for getting her to England. If so,
it was at least conceivable that a chance might occur for him to rescue her, or to escape himself and let C.B. know where she was before she was moved on again.

  Two-thirds of the way to the shore these new hopes were sadly dashed. The launch passed close to a small seaplane that lay rocking gently at its moorings. Here were the means by which Christina was to be transported to England, and the odds were that they meant to fly her off at dawn. With so short a time to go, all chance of rescue, or bringing C.B. and Inspector Malouet on the scene, would be ruled out.

  John had barely assimilated this new cause for depression when the launch pulled in at the shoreward end of a long curved breakwater that formed a small private harbour. The party in the cabin landed first, and he could now see that it consisted of Christina, the Marquis, Jules, the moustached pilot-type, and the little man who looked like a valet. John’s escort again showed his knife, then signed to him to follow them.

  With the Marquis and Christina leading, they went through a gate in a low wall and entered a garden. The trees there made it darker than it had been on the water, but there was still enough light to see by.

  Unlike most large properties on the Riviera, it was a flat-faced, pedimented eighteenth-century château with tall windows. It had two floors only of residential accommodation and from the first jutted out a broad terrace. Below the terrace the façade was broken only by a low central door and on either side of it a row of small, square windows protected by iron grilles. It was usual for the ground floor of such buildings to be used solely as cellarage, store-rooms and offices; and as no lights showed from any of the small windows it seemed that this château was no exception.

  The central door opened on to a small, stone-flagged hall with a low vaulted ceiling, and a curved stairway with a wrought-iron balustrade, which led up to another much loftier hall on the main floor. When they reached it the Marquis opened one of a pair of tall, white, heavily-gilded double doors and bowed Christina through into a brightly lit salon. With its panelled walls, tapestries, Aubusson carpet and delicate furniture, it had all the elegance of a genuine Louis Seize apartment. The others followed, but as John stepped inside Jules said to the sailor who had brought up the rear of the party: ‘You may go now, Chopin. Monsieur Upson and I will take care of your prisoner.’

  The Marquis, meanwhile, was addressing the little man who on closer inspection was obviously a servant, and John heard him say: ‘Frederick, see that all is in order in the du Barry room. Mademoiselle may like to rest there for a while before she sets out on her journey. Then prepare our special accommodation downstairs for Monsieur Fountain. He will be our guest for some days.’

  These orders confirmed John’s belief that within a few hours they intended to fly Christina off in the seaplane. It was the first chance he had had to get a proper look at her since they had been separated on the yacht, and as Jules closed the door behind him he shot a glance at her.

  She was half-turned away from him, so he could not catch her eye; but he was given a swift indication of her mood. As the valet left the room by a further door, she asked the Marquis angrily: ‘Where are you sending me?’

  ‘To England, Mademoiselle.’ He waved a hand towards the pilot-type, who was now leaning negligently against a large marble-topped table. ‘I have already presented Mr Reg Upson to you. He was an ace airman in the last war, so you need have no fears for your safety while he flies you home.’

  Jules and John were still standing within a few feet of the door to the hall. Seeing that everyone’s attention was concentrated on Christina, this seemed to John as good an opportunity as he might ever get to make a bolt for it. Taking a swift step back, he seized the door handle.

  Quick as his movement had been, Upson’s was quicker. Out of the corner of his eye he had seen John brace himself and guessed his intention. Whipping a small automatic from a shoulder holster, he cried in English: ‘Halt; or I fire!’

  John had not even got the door open. Under the menace of the pointing pistol there was nothing he could do but let go of the handle and give a resigned shrug. Jules then grabbed him by the arm, pulled him into the middle of the room and pushed him into an armchair.

  The airman laid his automatic down on the top of the table and said in a lazy drawl, ‘It’s just as well you stopped when you did, or I’d have put one through the calf of your leg.’

  Riled by Jules’s rough handling of him, but knowing it to be no time to start another fight, John turned and snapped at Upson, ‘If you are an ex-R.A.F. officer you ought to be ashamed of yourself.’

  ‘Got to earn a living somehow,’ Upson replied indifferently. ‘And I’m paid darn well for taking care of troublesome types like you.’

  Christina was still staring at the Marquis, and she suddenly burst out, ‘I will not be sent home! I wish to remain out here!’

  ‘We are not concerned with your wishes, Mademoiselle; and you will do exactly as you are told,’ said the Marquis coldly.

  She was standing within a few feet of Upson. Turning towards her, he said, ‘And while you are with me, little lady, don’t try any funny business. Can’t afford to do gentle restraining acts in a small aircraft like mine. If you start anything, you’ll get a backhander, hard, right on your snub-nose. Understand?’

  With glaring eyes she spat at him, ‘I am not coming with you! I’ll scratch your eyes out if you try to make me.’

  Upson shrugged, and looking across at his employer broke into French. ‘Monsieur le Marquis will agree that it would be dangerous to take her up in her present state, as she might easily bring about an accident. May I suggest that she should be given a shot of dope?’

  The Marquis nodded, and Jules commented, ‘We thought that might be necessary. Obviously it is, and we’ll see about it in good time before you start.’

  Christina’s lips drew back in a snarl. ‘I will not let you! I will tear the face off the first one of you who touches me!’ Then, after a moment, she added in a different tone, ‘I will go only if you will let John Fountain come with me.’

  ‘That,’ said the Marquis firmly, ‘is impossible.’

  Jules turned to John and said, ‘I may as well tell you now what we intend to do with you. I warned you that you would get hurt if you tried to interfere with us, and you have. I got hurt, too, although not as much, and that’s all in the day’s work; so I bear no malice. But that is beside the point. By butting in you have seen enough to bring a case against us for kidnapping; therefore we cannot afford to let you go. In fact, you have made it necessary for us to keep you out of the way for a considerable time. You will remain here for a few days, then you will be picked up by one of our cargo steamers on its way from Marseilles to North Africa.’

  ‘Africa!’ John exclaimed, aghast.

  ‘Yes. You will be put ashore without money or papers in some small Libyan port, and by the time you have made your way home all this will be ancient history. Should you still bring a case, we shall be able to show that you went at your own wish, and had been suffering from mental trouble.’

  John had come to his feet, but he endeavoured to keep the anger and apprehension out of his voice as he asked, ‘How would you show that?’

  ‘Because you are going to write a letter to me, saying that, owing to overwork, you have recently caught yourself imagining things and fear a nervous breakdown; so feel that a long sea trip is just what you need to put you right, and are very glad to accept my offer to send you round the Mediterranean in one of our vessels. Incidentally, should it come to a case, our Captain will swear to it that you left the ship without warning him of your intention to do so; and to land without money or papers will be further evidence that you have been off your nut.’

  ‘And what if I refuse to write such a letter?’

  Jules sighed. ‘I fear that we shall be unable to provide you with food or drink until you do.’

  To everyone’s surprise Christina cried, ‘Send me to North Africa with him!’

  ‘You are going to England,’ dec
lared the Marquis, his lean face for the first time showing irritation.

  ‘I am not! I refuse!’ cried Christina furiously. Then she pulled off her left glove and, looking away from it herself, displayed the glistening ring on her swollen finger. ‘Do you not see! I am tied to him by this. I must go wherever he goes.’

  Jules stared at her in astonishment. ‘But … but you told me this evening that your engagement to him was only a phoney one.’

  She shuddered and violently shook her head. ‘That was before the two of you had a fight. When he overcame you I knew I was his. Now I am bound to him … bound to him.’

  Flecks of foam had appeared at the corners of her mouth, and they all thought that at any moment she was going to have a fit. The Marquis moved quickly over to a side-table on which there was an array of drinks. A siphon was among them, and squirting some soda-water into a glass he carried it over to her.

  ‘Mademoiselle, calm yourself, I beg,’ he said. ‘Drink this, and sit down for a moment.’

  Christina took the glass and drank most of its contents. She gasped and set it down on the marble-topped table, but she did not sit down. No one spoke for a moment, then Jules said to John: ‘There is another letter which it would be advisable for you to write. This one would be just as much in your interest as in ours. It would be to your mother, to allay her anxiety about your disappearance. You could simply say that you have accepted an invitation from me to go for a cruise round the Mediterranean and expect to be back in about six weeks.’

  ‘You want me to do that in the hope that it will stop her putting the police on to you?’

  ‘Exactly. She will realise, of course, that the “invitation” was one which you were not allowed to refuse; but if she knows what has happened to you and believes you to be safe, there will be no point in her asking the police to trace you.’