‘Joan! My little Joan!’ he cried.
He kissed her, held her from him to gaze hungrily at her, and whisper her name, then kissed her again.
Hugh and Cousins shook hands for a whole minute, but neither could utter a word. They could not even make a sound, but Hugh’s eyes were unnaturally bright and down Cousins’ cheeks the tears of joy were streaming without restraint.
Presently Joan gently released herself from her lover’s grasp, and flew to Hugh, who took her into a great bear-like hug. Then came Cousins turn and this time she went to him without shyness as though she realised that he had suffered as much as her lover and her brother. The little man put his arms round her with infinite tenderness, like a mother taking into her arms an only child. He was about to kiss her on the forehead, but she raised her lips to his, and he touched them almost reverently.
‘I can’t say “my Joan”,’ he said chokingly, ‘but I can say, “our Joan”! Thank God you are back safely!’
‘Let us go and bring in my rescuer!’ she said. ‘I want to thank him.’
‘Sure,’ said Miles. ‘We all do!’
‘God knows how we’re going to do it,’ said Hugh. ‘But come along!’
They hurried out of the house. Miles, having noticed that Joan wore no shoes, lifted her up and carried her as though she were a baby. Outside nothing but darkness met their searching gaze.
‘Oh!’ cried Joan, a great disappointment in her voice. ‘He has gone!’
The others were almost as disappointed as she, and they stood there sorrowfully until Hugh spoke.
‘Never mind,’ he said; ‘we’ll find him, and make him face our gratitude! Rainer will know where to get hold of him.’
They turned and re-entered the house.
‘He was wonderful,’ sighed Joan, ‘just wonderful!’
Twenty minutes after Abdul Rahim had taken Joan away from The Retreat, Hudson sat up and looked round him. There was a fixed intensity in his gaze which was unnatural, and when he noticed the chaotic state of the room he began to chuckle in a low cunning manner. He rose to his feet, crossed over to the bed, and looked at it.
‘Where are you, Joan?’ he called. ‘You’re playing a trick on me. Come out of your hiding place!’
He looked under the bed, then straightening himself laughed aloud.
‘She’s gone! My little bird has flown! I’ll find her and I’ll kill anyone who has taken her away!’
He staggered to the door and out into the passage. He pushed open another door a little way along and looked in. Kamper was lying on the floor face downwards and Hudson contemplated him for some moments in silence.
‘You must be dead, I think,’ he said in the tone of one who was entirely unconcerned. ‘She killed you I suppose, and she will kill the others, too; I must go and help her.’
He went straight along the passage, passing the hall on his way, and eventually reached the other end where his own rooms were situated. He entered a tiny little sitting room and, closing the door, sat down by a small table on which was a decanter of whisky and two glasses. He stared at the whisky as though he had never seen such a liquor before and, pouring some into a glass smelt it, and drank it. He repeated this process several times until the decanter was almost empty and the more he drank, the more cunning became the look in his eyes. Presently he rose and went into the bedroom. He stood for several minutes in the centre of the room with his hands to his head as though trying to recollect something, but apparently it eluded him, for he sat aimlessly at a writing-table, and picking up a fountain pen played with it in the manner of a child. On the desk in front of him was lying a large writing pad, and he began to write on it as though with no very clear idea of what he was doing. The sight of ink upon paper appeared to please him, for he settled down and wrote at great length covering several sheets with words scrawled in a bewildering jumble. He tired of this at length, and threw his efforts and the writing-pad into a waste-paper basket which stood at his feet. One after another he opened the drawers of the desk and presently picked up a revolver. He looked at it and then memory appeared to return to him, for he stood up and made his way back into the passage.
‘Must help little Joan,’ he muttered.
He reached the hall and wandered along towards the front door. The sound of voices reached him from a room on his right and he paused and listened. Then with a chuckle of satisfaction he turned and entered the room. It was the same apartment in which Joan had faced the three men in the morning. Rahtz and Novar were sitting there smoking, and apparently holding a serious conversation. They looked up as Hudson entered. Rahtz laughed.
‘So you have tamed the little Shannon,’ he said. ‘My word! It must have taken some doing to judge from the state you’re in.’
Hudson laughed, a silly, cackling sort of laugh and Novar frowned.
‘What’s the matter with you, man?’ he asked.
‘Looking for Joan!’ chuckled the ex-civil servant.
Suddenly he stopped laughing and leant towards the other two, his lips curling away from his teeth in a snarl, his eyes bloodshot and staring.
‘What have you done with her?’ he cried. ‘Where have you put her? Why didn’t she kill you like the other?’
The two Russians looked at him in amazement.
‘What are you talking about?’ demanded Rahtz angrily.
‘Joan! I want her and you’ve taken her away.’
Rahtz sprang to his feet.
‘Do you mean to say that she has escaped?’ he thundered.
Hudson nodded his head.
‘You took her away,’ he reiterated, ‘otherwise she would have killed you, too.’
‘Why do you say she would have killed us too?’ asked Novar in a shaky voice. ‘Has she killed anyone else?’
He rose from his chair and clutched Rahtz by the arm apprehensively. Again Hudson nodded.
‘She killed the little man – Kamper. He is dead!’ he added in a tone of horrible satisfaction.
Suddenly he gave a scream of maniacal laughter. Peal upon peal rose to the high ceiling and was echoed throughout the room until the place seemed full of laughing, gloating fiends.
‘Oh, my God!’ cried Novar, and violently. ‘He has gone mad!’
Even Rahtz was unnerved for some seconds. Hudson continued to laugh, then as suddenly as he had started he stopped.
‘You’re devils,’ he snarled, ‘both of you. You made me give you information from the office, copies of secret letters, and private documents, and now you’ve taken away Joan from me. But you shan’t have her and I won’t bring you any more Government secrets, because I’m going to kill you. You won’t want anything then.’ He laughed again. ‘Will you like being dead?’ he asked, as though he were asking them if they would like a holiday.
Rahtz pulled himself together and strode forward, but Hudson raised the revolver and pointed it at him.
‘Don’t move!’ he said querulously. ‘I’m going to kill you I tell you!’
‘We’ll talk of that later on,’ said Rahtz soothingly. ‘At present we’ve got to find Joan, you know.’
Hudson stared at him doubtfully, then nodded.
‘Yes – find Joan,’ he said.
‘Come along then,’ said Rahtz, and took his arm.
But the touch of the arm roused the devil in Hudson. His eyes almost seemed to start from their sockets and he suddenly caught the Russian by the throat with his left arm, with a grip that paralysed his movements. He struggled desperately but it was useless. Hudson was ordinarily a strong man, but now the strength of madness was on him as well and the Russian, in his weak, sickly state, was like a child to him. He swung him backwards and forwards, watching with gloating eyes the while, and uttering insane chuckles of glee. In vain Rahtz croaked out for mercy; the more he tried to speak the harder the madman squeezed his throat. Novar stood helpless, trembling with fear and with beads of perspiration standing out on his forehead. At last, with a desperate effort, he staggered forward and caug
ht Hudson by the right arm. The latter stopped swinging Rahtz about and stared at him.
‘Go away!’ he said. ‘I’ll kill you presently.’
‘You’re acting like a child,’ cried Novar in a high-pitched trembling voice. ‘We can’t find Joan if you do these silly things.’
‘Oh,’ said the maniac, ‘I forgot little Joan!’
He let go of Rahtz, who sank to the floor and crouched there gasping for breath. Novar was more terror-stricken than ever now as he saw that Hudson’s left hand was free. He clung hard to the right arm, however, and spoke rapidly, soothingly, in the hope of quieting the man who was looking at him with the burning gaze of the homicidal maniac. His object was to get the revolver from the latter’s hand, for he felt certain that sooner or later Hudson would start shooting. He would have been wiser had he let go and spoken to the other from a distance, for the madman presently resented the hold on his arm and tried to shake it off. With a sob of apprehension, Novar clung with all his strength and then Hudson was on him. The two swayed backwards. and forwards and the fat, flabby, out-of-condition Russian soon knew that unless something happened to save him, and that at once, his days were numbered. The lunatic tore his arm from the other’s grip – in doing so he dropped the revolver – and his two hands were round Novar’s throat. Gradually he forced the latter’s head back; the Russian fought desperately, kicking, scratching, trying to bite, but Hudson only laughed horribly, fiendishly. Novar’s strength began to go, his lips were turning blue, drops of blood began to ooze from the corners of his eyes.
By this time Rahtz had nearly recovered, and seeing the desperate condition of his friend he picked up Hudson’s revolver and got somehow to his feet. He staggered towards the struggling men, and waiting a second until the madman’s body was in a line with him, he fired. Hudson let go of Novar – who dropped groaning to the floor – and slowly turned round. His face wore a look of intense surprise. He uttered no sound, but for a second stood there swaying, then crashed to the floor – dead. Rahtz sank on to a divan and it was nearly ten minutes before either he or Novar moved.
At last Novar raised his head.
‘Get me a drink!’ he said in a hoarse whisper.
Rahtz poured out a stiff peg of whisky, took it to him, and helped him to drink, after which he returned to the table and gave himself a similar dose. Novar made several attempts to rise, but it was a long time before he eventually got to his feet and then only with the aid of the other. He looked down at the body of their former companion, and shuddered.
‘Is he dead?’ he asked shakily.
Rahtz nodded.
They sat for some time without moving, gradually recovering from the effects of their ordeal. At length Rahtz drew himself up with a long deep breath.
‘We must go and see what has happened,’ he muttered. ‘If, as he said, the girl has escaped, we are in danger. She is bound to tell where we are hiding.’
‘She couldn’t get out unless she climbed over the gate,’ said Novar.
‘That’s true,’ replied the other, ‘and I don’t suppose she could do that. You go and organise a search through the grounds, while I look in her room, and see if Kamper really has been killed. If he has somebody else has done it, not she. That girl could never kill anyone.’
Novar took another drink and departed slowly to give orders for a search to be made. Rahtz went along to the room in which Joan had been imprisoned. Of course he found no one there and after glancing round he looked into Kamper’s room. The Jew was just beginning to recover. Rahtz helped him up and gave him some water.
‘What happened to you?’ he asked, when the other was able to rise from the floor and sat on a chair resting his head on his hands.
Kamper looked at him and swore vilely.
‘How do I know?’ he replied in Russian. ‘I was standing in the corridor listening to the noise that was going on in the girl’s room, when something hit me on the head.’
‘It couldn’t have been the girl, I suppose?’ queried Rahtz.
‘Of course not. She was struggling vith Hudson at the time.’
Rahtz stood biting his lips for a few moments.
‘Then somebody must have got in and rescued her,’ he said. ‘We’ve been discovered and the sooner we hide the safer for us.’
He told Kamper about Hudson’s madness and death, then left him to find Novar. The latter was coming towards him excitedly, followed by three men, when he reached the front door.
‘We found the gate open,’ cried Novar, ‘so obviously she has got away. The keys were in their place and Babu Lai said that the gate was locked.’
‘He lied!’ growled Rahtz.
‘I don’t think so,’ replied Novar. ‘I kicked him until he groaned for mercy, but he still maintained that he had locked and bolted the gate as usual. Yet it was open.’
‘Then whoever got in and rescued the girl had duplicate keys,’ said Rahtz. ‘She has escaped and someone has rescued her.’
‘How do you know that?’ asked Novar quickly.
‘Because Kamper was standing in the passage listening to the struggle going on between Hudson and the Shannon girl, when he was knocked on the head by someone behind him and lost consciousness. I rather incline to the belief that the same person treated Hudson in a similar manner and the blow helped to bring on his madness. That person is either someone in our employment, who stole the keys of the gate and replaced them, or someone from outside with duplicates.’
‘But even if he unlocked the gates from the outside the bolts would have prevented him from opening them.’
‘True! He probably climbed over and unlocked and unbolted the gates from the inside. But we can’t waste time trying to find out what happened. We are in real danger and the sooner we escape below the better. Luckily only Jai Singh and his brother know of our hiding place so we can’t be betrayed.’
The two Russians entered the house – Novar first calling Jai Singh and telling him to gather everyone into the porch as he wanted to speak to them. Kamper was standing in the hall, a rough bandage – which he had fixed himself – on his head.
‘What are you going to do?’ he asked.
‘Gather as few things as possible and get below,’ replied Novar tersely, and hurried away to his apartments.
The others followed his example. Ten minutes later Novar came rushing into Rahtz’s room, his lips white, and in his eyes a deadly fear.
‘Those letters from Bukharin—’ he screamed. ‘They’ve gone!’
Rahtz was no less affected and for once in a way even he showed terror.
‘My God!’ he cried. ‘Are you sure?’
‘Absolutely! I’ve searched among all my papers – everywhere – but there is no sign of them.’
‘Perhaps you left them behind?’
Novar shook his head.
‘No,’ he said; ‘they were fastened to those drafts you and I made out. The drafts are here, but the letters are gone! I did not examine them before I left the house, but I must have had them then, because they were locked in my safe. They have been stolen from here.’
Rahtz was too overcome to speak for some moments. Then he wiped the perspiration from his forehead.
‘One of them was about Germany and the airships, wasn’t it?’ he asked.
‘Yes; and the other telling us to do all we could to damage British prestige in India.’
The Principal of Mozang College glared at his companion.
‘You damn fool!’ he snapped. ‘Oh, you damn fool! This is the end of things. We’ll have to urge immediate measures at the meeting on Tuesday night, or we’re beaten.’
‘Perhaps they even know of the meeting,’ said Novar in a voice of abject terror.
‘Pull yourself together!’ said the other grimly. ‘We are on the verge of a catastrophe. Everything now depends upon rapid action and we shall have to see that it is taken.’
Novar returned to his room a broken man. Left alone Rahtz buried his face in his hands for some minut
es.
‘To be checkmated,’ he groaned, ‘by a schoolmaster is too bitter a pill to swallow.’ He stood up and a glint of resolution came into his eyes. ‘But we’re not beaten yet!’ he added aloud, ‘not by a very long way.’
Rahtz was a scoundrel, but he was a born fighter and he had the courage of half a dozen Novars.
Ten minutes later the latter stood at the door of the house and spoke to the motley collection of men gathered in front of him. He told them that they must disperse immediately; that the police might raid the premises at any moment and that he suspected one among their number to be a traitor whom he would be certain to discover later on and punish thoroughly. He added that Jai Singh would see that they were all provided with money to keep them for some time and that he would take their addresses so that they could be recalled when they were wanted. He then called Jai Singh to him, took him into his room, and gave him a bundle of notes.
‘Distribute those!’ he said. ‘After that take my car away and hide it for the present, and instruct Mr Rahtz’s chauffeur to do the same with his master’s car. Leave the other where it is. Mr Hudson has killed himself unfortunately – which reminds me you had better get some men to dig a grave and bury him before they go.’
Jai Singh showed no emotion nor concern of any sort on hearing of Hudson’s death. He merely bent his head to show that he understood and hurried from the room.
In less than half an hour there was no one left anywhere on the premises but the three Russians, Jai Singh and his brother. The Sikh had carried out Novar’s instructions to the letter, and the five were now preparing to disappear literally into the bowels of the earth.
Devil's Cocktail (Wallace of the Secret Service Series) Page 33