“Who are you? What’s this place? How did I get here? I was in a taxi talking to an old lady with a cough. I told her she oughtn’t to be out. What happened? Where is she?”
“I don’t know,” said Peter in his natural voice.
Terry sat up, pushed away her coat, and swung her feet down on to the floor. One hand went up to her tumbled hair.
“Will you please tell me what happened. I didn’t faint—I’ve never fainted in my life.”
“No, you didn’t faint.”
“How did I get here? Can’t you tell me what happened?”
“You were brought here. Does your arm hurt you? She bruised it, didn’t she?”
She looked at him. She was neither dazed nor confused. The look was steady and clear. She put her hand to her left elbow and felt it. Then she said,
“She caught hold of me. Why?”
“To run a hypodermic syringe into your arm.”
The colour came into Terry’s face. Her chin lifted.
“Why?”
“To bring you here, Miss Clive.”
Something flickered in her eyes. She sprang up.
“Who are you? I’ve seen you before. You were in the garden at Heathacres. You had the pearls. I knew I’d heard your voice.”
“Well, that makes it all quite easy—doesn’t it?” said Peter.
She opened her lips to speak, and was suddenly giddy. The floor tilted and sent her stumbling against Peter—stumbling, and catching at him for safety. His arm held her, and she heard him say from a long way off, “You’d better sit down. It’s all right, you know—nothing to worry about.”
She found herself on the bed again, sitting with the pillows propping her, and an arm behind the pillows. The voice of the young man who had tried to steal Emily’s pearls assured her again that there was nothing to worry about. Anger dispelled the last remnants of her dizziness. She sat right up and said in an indignant voice,
“I’m not in the least worried, thank you. I was just giddy. Anyone might be giddy if they’d been hypodermicked and—and kidnapped.”
Peter withdrew his arm and got up. Behind the sparkle in her eyes he thought he could discern a faint expectation. He thought, “She hopes I’ll say she hasn’t been kidnapped.” And what was the use? If he was to get her clear and run Maud Millicent Simpson down, he must play the gaoler and the bravo. He said,
“Well, that’s reasonable enough.”
Terry looked at him. She couldn’t believe her eyes, and yet she had to believe them. He didn’t look like the sort of person who would drug you and kidnap you, but he did look like the man at Heathacres—the man who had had Emily’s pearls. She wouldn’t have been sure if it wasn’t for his voice. And it was quite a nice voice too. What business had a drugging kidnapper to have a voice like that?
She rose to her feet, picked up her hat, and pulled it on. There was a cheap looking-glass on the rather battered chest of drawers beneath the shuttered window. Terry went over to it and stood there patting her hair into place and adjusting the brim of the hat. Her bag was lying in front of the glass. She opened it, took out powder-puff and compact, and tidied up her face, all with her back to Peter, and with the greatest appearance of unconcern. She might have been any girl who was getting ready to go out.
Peter watched her, and wondered what next. He thought he would hold his fire. But in the end she turned round, swooped up her coat from the bed, and said,
“And now I think I’ll go home.”
He admired the assurance with which she said it, but he did not stand away from the door.
“I’m ready to go home,” said Terry Clive.
“Well, I’m afraid—”
“Please stand away from that door.”
Peter remained where he was, his hands in his pockets, a shoulder against the jamb. He saw her colour flame into brilliance.
“Did you hear what I said?”
He nodded.
“I’m afraid you don’t understand the situation, Miss Clive. You were brought here for a purpose. I’m afraid you will have to stay here until my employers consider it safe to let you go.”
Terry went back a step, and said,
“What purpose?”
“Well, I rather gather you were thinking of having a heart-to-heart talk with the police. The idea is to prevent you having it. It’s a pity you looked out of your window, and it’s a pity you didn’t hold your tongue about it. As it is—well, there you have it.”
Terry went back as far as the bed and let her coat fall.
“You mean to keep me here?”
He could admire the way she took it, head up and colour bright. He nodded and said,
“You’d better get this straight. It’s no use your thinking you can get round me, because you can’t. And it’s no use your thinking you can get away, because you can’t do that either. If I wanted to let you out I couldn’t. There’s another man on guard with me, and he has the key of the outer door. He’s a very rough customer, and you’d better keep clear of him. I’ve got the key of your room, and I’ll see that he doesn’t bother you. You’ll be well treated. I don’t want to lock you in except at night. There’s a wash-place next door you can use. I’ll go along now and get you something to eat.”
CHAPTER XXVIII
Peter Talbot was not given to having sleepless nights, but that night he lay awake and watched the dying glow from the range and wondered whether a bigger fool than he had ever walked into a more obvious trap, and wondered how he was going to get out of it, and how he was going to get Terry Clive out of it. Here he was, bedded down for the night on a mattress against the kitchen wall, his feet half across the door which gave upon the passage. This was Terry dive’s security. The Bruiser couldn’t open that door without waking him—he could bank on that. But the door was locked, and the key was in the Bruiser’s pocket together with the key of the outside door and the key that locked the shutters front and back.
The keys were in the Bruiser’s pocket, and the Bruiser was sleeping noisily on a twin mattress to Peter’s on the farther side of the kitchen. His snores mingled with those of a fine bull-terrier which he had brought in from the yard before he went to bed. This and the removal of his boots were the only preparations he made. Now the blankets covered him and the bull-terrier snuffled at his feet. But whereas the man might not have waked to the touch of a very careful hand feeling for his keys, the dog certainly would. Every time Peter turned, the snuffle dropped to a whisper. When a coal fell in the fire the white head came up, an eye gleamed from the pink skin which surrounded it. When Peter rose and crossed the floor the lips drew back to show white teeth and firm pink gums, and a warning thrum came from the muscular throat. If he was any judge of dogs, he had about as much chance of getting those keys as he had of mounting the kitchen poker and flying up the chimney. Whoever had organized this show—and he supposed it was Maud Millicent Simpson—deserved full marks for ingenuity. He was a check on the Bruiser, and the Bruiser was a check on him. The unpleasant word check-mate peeped from the shadows of his mind and was sworn at for an intruder. Maud Millicent undoubtedly knew her job. She wouldn’t have lasted all these years at it if she hadn’t.
Peter went over the whole lay-out, and found it discouraging. There was the kitchen with its two windows on to the area, shuttered now and barred behind the shutters. Beyond the kitchen a large scullery, a coal-cellar, the larder, and a door leading into the yard. The scullery had a window over the sink, the larder had a small square window high in the wall, and the coal-cellar had nothing but a grating about eight inches square. The scullery window was barred and had a shutter which locked. The back door, like the area door, had a heavy lock, and was further secured by a chain and padlock. All the bars were sound and good, and all the locks were strong. He judged it quite impossible to open them by force, to pick the locks or file the bars, without rousing the bull terrier. His name was Alf, and Peter would have liked him a good deal if they had met in less difficult circumstances. But
for the moment they were in opposite camps.
Not for the first time, Peter felt the handicap of not being a criminal. He had a pistol in his pocket. He could shoot Alf and the Bruiser as they slept and get away at his leisure. As far as possibilities go he could, but when it came to actualities, he couldn’t. It needs practice and a considerable induration of the heart and mind to be able to kill in cold blood. Peter lacked these qualifications. It would have given him a good deal of pleasure to knock the Bruiser out—his conversation, though sparse, had been disgusting. He would have liked to make friends with Alf. But, friend or enemy, he didn’t see his way to doing murder.
He thought how much more comfortable things would be if Frank Garrett knew where he was, or even if he had any idea of his own whereabouts. He might be almost anywhere on the tape-map. They had driven for the best part of half an hour. You can get a long way in half an hour, or you can drive round and round and come back to very much where you started.
He turned on his mattress and faced the wall. On the other side of that wall, on the other side of the locked door by his feet, was the passage with the area door at one end of it and Terry Clive’s door at the other. But halfway along there was another door which, he felt sure, concealed the stairs. Maud Millicent had spoken of these stairs. She had said that they had a door at the top as well as at the bottom, and that the doors were locked, and that she herself had the keys. Peter’s fancy played about those doors and the stair which led to the upper part of the house. No interior door would have so strong a lock as an outside door, and no upstairs window would have bars. Give him ten minutes alone in the house and he would back himself to smash those locks, and, once upstairs, he could take Terry Clive out through the nearest window into that safest of all safe places, a street commanded by a thousand other windows. Daylight and the King’s highway—he asked no more.
He fell asleep on that, and plunged into a vivid dream. He was on safari in a taxi driven by the Bruiser. Jake and he were shooting bull-terriers with machine-guns at about eighty miles an hour. The bull-terriers ran like the wind, and presently they put up Terry Clive out of a patch of spiny cactus, and she ran like the wind too. She was barefoot and in her nightgown, just as he had seen her at Heathacres, but she had dropped her coat and left it lying on the yellow sand. One of the bull-terriers was Alf, and he ran with her step for step. And just as he was beginning to gain on them Peter suddenly felt that he couldn’t bear it. He tumbled his machine-gun out of the taxi and jumped after it. Then he and Terry and the dog were all running together, whilst Jake sprayed them with bullets. They ran all across the Sahara and down the Nile. And then he caught an aeroplane by the wings and pulled it down and they flew away, with Jake and the Bruiser coming after them in another plane. It was a very exciting flight. Peter sang at the top of his voice, and the wind sang in his ears, and Alf twined himself affectionately about Terry’s feet and was sick. And Terry said, “I want the pearls. Give them back to me at once,” and the bullets began to fall all round them again, so they jumped for it, he and Terry and Alf, and came down by the Marble Arch. They had to run for their lives, because Jake and the Bruiser were after them on motor-bicycles. And all at once they had turned a corner and were sprinting down Sunderland Terrace where his Aunt Fanny lived, and, quite without any intermission, they were in her drawing-room, where she sat drinking tea with her friend Miss Hollinger. The odd thing was that neither Aunt Fanny nor Miss Hollinger seemed to know that they were there. Alf snuffed at the furniture, and Peter and Terry stood there holding hands like ghosts come back to visit the glimpses of the past. But Terry’s hand was warm in his—Aunt Fanny said, “O dear—I never thought he would be taken first.” And she put her handkerchief to her eyes and said, “I haven’t bought my mourning yet. I wouldn’t like not to wear mourning for Peter.” But Miss Hollinger passed up her cup for some more tea and said primly, “We must look on the bright side, dear Miss Talbot. It’s an ill wind that blows nobody any good.”
He woke up. The kitchen was dark, the fire dead in the range. Alf and the Bruiser snored. The dream was gone.
Peter turned over and went to sleep again.
CHAPTER XXIX
Terry Clive ate her breakfast—a boiled egg, bread and butter, and a hot, strong cup of tea. Then she looked in the glass, thought how pale she was, and took steps to remedy this. No one was going to think she was afraid, or that she hadn’t slept, or anything of that sort. Especially not the young man who had boiled her egg and who had tried to steal Emily’s pearls.
He knocked presently on the door, and stood just inside it when she said, “Come in.”
“I hope the egg was all right.”
“Yes, thank you.”
Peter looked pleased.
“I hope you like eggs, because I can see that cooking is going to be the difficulty. Jake has just got back, and the Bruiser is going off. I left them arguing about how to cook a steak. None of it sounded right to me.”
“There are always eggs,” said Terry. “But, actually, I thought about going home.”
“To the fatted calf? I’m afraid you’re expected to stay to lunch.”
“Look here,” she said, “I want to go home. What are you going to get out of keeping me here? Whatever it is, I’ll double it. If you’re afraid I’ll talk, I won’t. You’re not like those other two men—you don’t want to hurt me. Let me go.”
Peter gazed at her with as much sarcasm as he could muster and said,
“There’s nothing doing. Here you are, and here you stay, with Jake and Alf and me to see that you do. And Alf’s about the only one of the three you might be able to bribe.”
“And who is Alf?” There was a hopeful note in Terry’s voice.
As if he had heard the repetition of his name, the bull-terrier came padding down the passage, ears at half-cock, nose wrinkled, and hackles ready to rise. He came snuffing into the room, and straight into Terry’s heart. Peter saw how she could look when she was friendly.
She said, “Angel!” and went down on her knees to put her arms round Alf’s neck. There was a moment of suspense. Most dogs like you or they don’t. Bull-terriers are very quick off the mark. They love you—or they hate you, and Terry’s face and her unguarded throat were horribly near those very sharp, strong teeth. Peter’s heart gave a jerk, but before he had time to move he saw Alf’s expression change. The hackles lay down, the eyes goggled, the lips stretched with an idiotic grin, a large pink tongue came flopping out in an attempt to lick as much of Terry’s face as possible. She fended him off, laughing, and with joyous woofs he launched a playful attack which nearly bowled her over.
A growl from the Bruiser and a piercing whistle from Jake restored order. With a final lick and a regretful eye, Alf slunk back to the kitchen. Terry, still laughing, said,
“Oh, what a lamb!”
“Eminently bribable. But you’d better be careful. He belongs to Jake, and Jake—”
A little cold shiver ran down Terry’s spine. She said, “What about Jake?” and did not know that she had stopped laughing.
“The less the better, I should say.”
Terry looked at him.
“What do you mean by that?”
Peter did not answer her directly. He frowned, came nearer, and suddenly said in a quite, non-carrying voice,
“You’ve got a bruise on your arm.”
Terry’s hand went to her elbow. She said,
“Why—yes. It isn’t anything. It’ll be gone in a day or two.”
Peter shook his head.
“I don’t think so—not if you’ve any gumption.”
She felt the shiver again.
“What do you mean?”
Peter dropped his voice lower still.
“Your arm is very badly hurt. You are all black and blue. Say so in front of the others if you get the chance. Make the most of it.”
He turned and went away past the door which led to the stairs and on into the kitchen. The shutters had been opened. A grey l
ight came in through the upper part of the windows. The Bruiser was making preparations to depart.
“You’ve got a lot to say to that girl,” said Jake suspiciously.
Peter put on a swaggering air.
“You’ve got your orders, and I’ve got mine. I’m to soft-sawder her, jolly her along, keep her from worrying—or trying to get away. She got bruised bringing her here. My orders are to keep her quiet till the bruises are gone. You get on with your job, and I’ll get on with mine.”
“Oh, you’re doing fine,” said Jake with a sneer, and went out to lock up after the Bruiser.
Terry slipped into the kitchen as soon as he was out of it. He found her there looking at the rusty range with disfavour. He opened his mouth to speak, but Peter got in first.
“She says she can cook.”
Jake stared.
“Who does?”
“She does. Why not let her?”
“I cook very well,” said Terry. “I got a diploma. You might as well let me do something. It’s frightfully cold in my room. After all, I’d be earning my keep.”
Jake looked from her to the windows as if he were measuring the distance.
“You can’t see in,” said Peter. “And if you could, what would you see? A girl cooking—the most ordinary, natural, every-day thing in the world.”
Jake lit a cigarette. Then he went over to the Bruiser’s mattress and lay down. All his movements were quick and jerky. He called Alf to him and made the dog lie down at his feet. Then he said,
“Cook away if you want to—I’ve no orders against it. But no nearer the windows than what you are now, or I’ll set the dog on you.”
“On me?” said Peter.
Jake used language.
“No, on her.” He used more language.
Terry stuck her chin in the air and asked where the larder was. It was heaven to have something to put her hand to. If she had had to stay in that cold room with nothing to do but sit on the edge of her bed and think, she might have found horrible things to think about. But you can’t think about horrible things when you are cooking, especially when every solitary thing you’ve got to use has been put away dirty and has to be scraped and boiled and scrubbed before you can do anything with it.
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