them, but I've got a hunch that we are barking up the wrong
tree, and that this is a case for what Greyeyes calls his
masterly policy of inactivity. The old game of giving the enemy
enough rope so he'll hang himself in the end.
'Any sort of compromise is all against my nature, but I reckon
it's the only policy that offers now. If we stay put here and-
carry out Mocata's instructions to the letter, we'll at least be
satisfied in our minds that we are not bringing any fresh danger
on Fleur. But let's go that far and no farther. We all know
Simon is willing enough to cash in his checks, but I don't think
we ought to let him. Instead, we'll keep him here. That is going
to force Mocata to scratch his head a whole heap. He'll not do
Fleur in before he's had another cut at getting hold of Simon,
so it will be up to him to make the next move in the game, and
that may give us a fresh opening. The situation can't be worse
than it is at present, and when he shows his hand again, given a
spot of luck, we might be able to ring the changes on him yet.'
De Richleau smiled, for the first time in days, it seemed. 'My
friend, I salute you,' he said, with real feeling in his voice.
'I am growing old, I think, or I should have thought of that
myself. It is by far and away the most sensible thing that any
of us have suggested yet.'
With a sigh of relief, Marie Lou moved over and, stooping
down, kissed Rex on the cheek. 'Rex, darling, bless you. In our
trouble we've been forgetting yours, and it is very wonderful
that you should have thought of a real way out for us in the
midst of your sorrow. I dreaded having to make that decision
just now more than anything that I have had to do in my whole
life.'
He smiled rather wanly. "That's all right, darling. There's
nothing so mighty clever about it, but it gives us time, and you
must try and comfort yourself with the thought that time and the
angels are on our side.'
Even Richard's frantic anxiety to set out immediately in
search of his Fleur d'amour was overcome for the time being by
Rex's so obviously sensible suggestion. In his agitation he had
eaten nothing yet, but now he sat down to cut some sandwiches,
and set about persuading Marie Lou that she must eat the first
of them in order to keep up her strength. Then he looked over at
the Duke.
'I left that note for Malin where he's bound to see it-
slipped it under his bedroom door, so we shan't be disturbed
here. Is there anything at all that we can do?'
'Nothing, I fear, only possess ourselves with such patience as
we can, but we're all at about the end of our tether, so we
ought to try and get some sleep. If Mocata makes some fresh move
this evening it's on the cards that we shall be up again all
night.'
'I'll get some cushions,' Simon volunteered. 'I suppose
there's no harm in bringing used articles into this room now?'
'None. You had better collect all the stuff you can and we'll
make up some temporary beds on the floor.'
Simon, Richard and Rex left the room and returned a few
moments later with piles of cushions and all the rugs that they
could find. They placed some fresh logs on the smouldering ashes
of the fire and then set about laying out five makeshift resting-
places.
When they had finished, Marie Leu allowed Richard to lead her
over to one of them and tuck her up, although she protested
that, exhausted though she was, she would never be able to
sleep. The rest lay down, and then Richard switched out the
light.
Full day had come at last, but it was of little use, for the
range of vision was limited to about fifteen yards. The mist
outside the windows seemed, if anything, denser than before, and
it swirled and eddied in curling wreaths above the damp stones
of the terrace, muffling the noises of the countryside and
shutting out the light.
None of them felt that they would be able to sleep. Rex's
gnawing sorrow for Tanith preyed upon his mind. The others,
racked with anxiety for Fleur, turned restlessly upon their
cushions. Every now and then they heard Marie Lou give way to
fits of sobbing as though her heart would break. But the stress
of those terrible night hours and the emotions they had passed
through since had exhausted them completely. Marie Lou's bursts
of sobbing became quieter and then ceased. Richard fell into an
uneasy doze. De Richleau and Rex breathed evenly, sunk at last
in a heavy sleep.
Hours later Marie Lou was dreaming that she was seated in an
ancient library reading a big, old-fashioned book, the cover of
which was soft and hairy like a wolf's skin, and that as she
read it a circle of iron was bound about her head. Then the
scene changed. She was in the pentacle again, and that loathsome
sack-like Thing was attacking Fleur. She awoke -started up with
a sudden scream of fear.
Her waking was little better than the nightmare when memory
flooded back into her mind. Yet that too and the present only
seemed other phases of the frightful dream; the comfortable
library denuded of its furniture; Tanith's dead body lying in
the centre of the floor and the dimness of the room from those
horrible fog banks shutting out the sunshine. They could not
possibly be anything but figments of the imagination.
The men had roused at once, and crowded round her, shadowy
figures in the uncertain light. De Richleau pressed the electric
switch. They blinked a little, and looked at each other
sleepily, then their eyes turned to the place where Simon had
lain. With one thought their glances shifted to the window and
they knew that while they slept their friend had gone out,
into that ghostly unnatural night, to keep his grim appointment.
30
Out Into the Fog
It was Rex who noticed the chalk marks on the floor. He
stepped over and saw that Simon, lacking pencil and paper, had
used these means to leave them a short message. Slowly he
deciphered the scribbled words and read them out:
'Please don't fuss or try to come after me. This is my
muddle, so am keeping appointment. Do as Mocata has
ordered. Am certain that is only chance of saving
Fleur.
Love to all. Simon.'
'Aw, Hell!' exclaimed Rex as he finished. 'The dear heroic
little sap has gone and put paid to my big idea. Mocata has got
him and Fleur now on top of having killed Tanith. If you ask me
we're properly sunk.'
De Richleau groaned. 'It is just like him. We ought to have
guessed that he would do this.'
'You're right there,' Richard agreed sadly. 'I've known him
longer than any of you, and I did my damnedest to prevent him
sacrificing himself for nothing, but it seems to me he's only
done the very thing you said he should.'
'That's not quite fair,' the Duke protested mildly. 'I only
said I thought it right that he should with certain
modifications. I had it in my mind that we might follow him at a
distance. We should have arrived at the rendezvous before Mocata
could have known that we had left this place, and we might have
pulled something off. As it was, I thought Rex's idea so much
better that I abandoned mine.'
'I'm sorry,' Richard apologised huskily. 'But Simon's my
oldest friend you know, and this on top of all the rest '
'Do you-do you think the poor sweet is right, and that his
having given himself up will be of any use?' whispered Marie
Lou.
Richard shrugged despondently. 'Not the least, dearest. I hate
to seem ungracious, and you all know how devoted I am to Simon
but in his anxiety to do the right thing he's handed Mocata our
only decent card. We can sit here till Doomsday, but there's no
chance now of making any fresh move which might give us a new
opening. We've wasted the Lord knows how many precious hours,
and we're in a worse hole than we were before. I'm going to
carry out my original intention and get on to the police.'
'I wouldn't do that,' Rex caught him by the arm. 'It'll only
mean our wasting further time in spilling long dispositions to a
bunch of cops, and you're all wrong about our not having made
anything on the new deal. We've had a sleep which we needed
mighty badly, and we've lulled Mocata into a false sense of
security. Just because we've remained put here all morning like
he said and Simon's come over with the goods, he'll think he's
sitting pretty now and maybe let up on his supervision stunt.
Let's cut out bothering with the police and get after him
ourselves this minute.'
Marie Lou shivered slightly and then nodded. 'Rex is right,
you know. Mocata has got what he wants now, so it is very
unlikely that he is troubling to keep us under observation any
more, but how do you propose to try to find him?'
'We will go straight to Paris,' De Richleau announced, with a
display of his old form. 'You remember Tanith told us that by
tonight he would be there holding a conversation with a man who
had lost the upper portion of his left ear. That is Castelnau,
the banker, I am certain, so the thing for us to do is to make
for Paris and hunt him out.'
'How do you figure on getting there?' asked the practical Rex.
'By plane, of course. Mocata is obviously travelling that way
or he could never get there by tonight. Richard must take us in
his four-seater, and if Mocata has to motor all the way to
Croydon before he can make a start, we'll be there before him.
Is your plane hi commission, Richard?'
'Yes, the plane's all right. It's in the hangar at the bottom
of the meadow, and when I took her out three days ago she was
running perfectly. I don't much like the look of this fog,
though, although, of course, it's probably only a ground mist.'
They all glanced out of the window again. The grey murk still
hung over the terrace, shutting out the view of the Botticelli
garden where, on this early May morning, the polyanthus and
forget-me-nots and daffodils, shedding their green cocoons, were
bursting into colourful life.
'Let's go,' said Rex, impatiently. 'De Richleau's right.
'You'd best get some clothes on, then we'll beat it for Paris
the second you're fit.'
The rest followed him out into the hall and upstairs to the
rooms above. The house was silent and seemingly deserted. The
servants were obviously taking Richard's orders in their most
literal sense and, released for once from their daily tasks,
enjoying an unexpected holiday in their own quarters.
Marie Lou looked into the nursery and almost broke down again
for a moment as she once more saw the empty cot, but she hurried
past it to the nurse's bedroom and found the woman still
sleeping soundly.
In Richard's dressing-room the men made hasty preparations,
Rex was clad in the easy lounge suit which he had put on in De
Richleau's flat, but Richard and the Duke were still in pyjamas.
When they were dressed Richard fitted the others out as well as
he could with top clothes for their journey. The Duke was easy,
being only a little taller than himself, and a big double
overcoat was found for Rex, into which he managed to scramble
despite the breadth of his enormous shoulders. Marie Lou joined
them a few moments later, clad in her breeches and leather
flying coat, which she always used whenever she went up with
Richard.
Downstairs again, they paused in the library to make another
hurried meal. Then the door was locked, and after casting a last
unhappy glance at Tanith's body, which remained unaltered in
appearance, Rex led the way out on the terrace.
They walked quickly down the gravel path beside the Botticelli
border, the sound of their footsteps muffled by the all-
pervading mist-through Marie Lou's own garden, with its long
herbaceous borders, and past the old sundial-round the
quadrangles of tessellated pavement which fell in a succession
of little terraces to the pond garden, with its water lilies,
and so to the meadow beyond.
When they reached the hangar Richard and Rex ran out the plane
and got it in order for the flight. De Richleau stood watching
their operations with Marie Lou beside him, both of them
fretting a little at the necessary delay, since now that the
vital decision had been taken every member of the party was
impatient to set out,
They settled themselves in the comfortable four-seater. Rex
swung the propeller, well accustomed to the ways of aeroplanes,
and the engine purred upon a low steady note. He watched it for
a second, and then, as he scrambled aboard, there came the long
conventional cry: 'All set.'
The plane moved slowly forward into the dank mist. The hedges
and trees on either side were shut out by banks of fog, but
Richard knew the ground so well that he felt confident of
judging his distance and direction. He taxied over the even
grass of the long field, and turned to rise. The plane lifted,
touched ground again gently twice, and they were off.
As they left the earth a new feeling came over Richard. He was
passionately fond of flying, and it always filled him with
exhilaration, but this was different. It was as though he had
suddenly come out into the daylight after having been walking
down a long, dark, smoky tunnel for many hours. At long
intervals there had been brightly lit recesses in the sides of
it where figures stood like tableaux at a waxworks show. The
slug-like Thing and Fleur; Rex standing at the window with
Tanith in his arms; Simon whispering something to the Duke;
Marie Lou's face as she stood with her hand resting on the rail
of Fleur's empty cot, and a dozen others. The rest of that
strange journey he seemed to have made, consisted of long
periods of blankness only punctuated by little cries of fear and
scraps of reiterated argument, the purpose of which he could no
longer remember. Now-his brain was clear again, and he settled
himself with new purpose to handle the plane with all his skill.
In those few moments they had risen clear of the ground mist
and were soaring upwards into the blue above. As De Richleau
looked down he saw a very curious thing. Not only was the fog
that had hemmed them in local, but it seemed to be concentrated
entirely upon Cardinals Folly. He could just make out the
chimneys of the house rising in its centre, as from a grey sea,
and from the buildings it spread out in a circular formation for
half a mile or so on every side, hiding the gardens from his
view and obscuring the meadows between the house and the
village, but beyond, all was clear in the brilliant sunshine of
the earfy summer afternoon.
Rex was beside Richard in the cockpit. Automatically he had
taken on the job of navigator, and, like Richard, his brain
numbed before with misery, had started to function properly
again directly he set to busying himself with the maps and
scales.
The Duke, sitting in the body of the machine with Marie Lou,
felt that there was nothing he could say to comfort her, but he
took her hand in his and held it between his own. From his quick
gesture she felt again his intense distress that he should ever
have been the means of bringing her this terrible unhappiness,
so, to distract his thoughts, she put her mouth right up against
his ear and told him of the odd dream she had had; about reading
the old book. He gave her a curious glance and began to shout
back at her.
She could not catch all he said owing to the noise of the
engine, but enough to tell that he was intensely interested. He
seemed to think that she had been dreaming of the famous Red
Book of Appin, a wonderful treatise on Magic owned by the
Stewards of Invernahyle, who were now extinct. The book had been
lost and not heard of for more than a hundred years, but her
description of it, and the legend that it might only be read
with understanding by those who wore a circlet of iron above
their brow made him insistent that it must be this which she had
seen in her dream. He pressed her to try and remember if she had
understood any portion of it.
After some trouble she managed to convey to him that she had
read one sentence on a faded vellum page, and that although the
lettering was quite different from anything which she had ever
seen before, she understood it at the time, but could not recall
the meaning now. Then, as talking was so difficult, they fell
silent.
At a hundred miles an hour the plane soared above the English
counties, but they took little heed of the fields and hedges,
woods and hills, which fled so swiftly from beneath them.
Somehow they seemed to have stepped out of their old life
altogether. Time no longer existed for them, only the will to
arrive at their destination in order to be active once again.
All their thoughts were concentrated now upon Paris and the man
who had lost half his ear. Would he be there? Could they find
him if he was? And would they arrive before Mocata?
They passed over the Northern end of the English Channel
almost without noticing it; Marie Lou felt a little shock when
the plane banked steeply and Richard brought it circling down.
The sun was sinking behind great banks of cloud and, as the
plane tilted, she saw that a thick mist lay below them in which
glowed dull patches of half-obscured light. Richard and Rex knew
them, however, to be fog flares of the Le Bourget lauding
ground.
A few seconds more and they had seen the last of the sunset. A
thin greyness closed about them. One of the flares showed
bright, and the plane bounded along the earth until Richard
brought it to a standstill.
Almost in a daze they answered the questions of the officers
at the airport and passed the Customs, secured a fast-looking
taxi and, packed inside it, were heading for the centre of
Paris.
As they ran through the streets, with the familiar high-
pitched note of the taxi's horn continually sounding and the
subtle smell of the epiceries in their nostrils-the very scent
of Paris-they noticed half-unconsciously that night had fallen
once more.
Here and there the electric sky-signs on the tall buildings,
advertising Savan Cadum or Byrrh, glowed dully through the murk,
and the lights of the cafes illuminated little spaces of the
boulevards through which they passed, throwing up the figures
that sat sipping their aperitifs at the marble-topped tables and
dappling the young green of the stunted trees that lined the
pavements.
None of them spoke as the taxi swerved and rushed, seeking
every opportunity to nose its way through the traffic. Only Rex
leant forward once, soon after they left the aerodrome, and
murmured: 'I told him the Ritz. We'll be able to hunt up this
bird's address when we get there.'
They ran past the Opera, down the Boulevard de la Madeleine,
and turned left into the Place Vendome. The cab pulled up with a
jerk. A liveried porter hurried forward to fling open the door,
and they scrambled out.
'Pay him off, with a good tip,' Rex ordered the hotel servant.
'I' see-yer-later, inside.' Then he led the way into the hotel.
One of the under-managers at the bureau recognised him and
came forward with a welcoming smile.
'Monsieur Van Ryn, what a pleasure! You require accomo-dation
for your party? How many rooms do you desire? I hope that you
will stay with us some time.'
Two single rooms and one double, with bathrooms, and we'd best
have a sitting-room on the same floor,' replied Rex curtly. 'How
long we'll be staying I can't say. I've got urgent business to
attend to this trip. Do you happen to know a banker named
Castelnau-elderly man, grey-haired, with a hatchet face, who's
had a slice taken out of his left ear?'
'Mais oui, monsieur. He lunches here frequently.'
'Good. D'you know where he lives?'
"For the moment, no, but I will ascertain. You permit?' The
manager moved briskly away and disappeared into the office. A
few moments later he returned with a Paris telephone directory
open in his hand.
'This will be it, monsieur, I think. Monsieur Laurent Castel
nau, 72, Maison Rambouillet, Pare Monceau. That is a block of
flats. Do you wish to telephone his apartment?'
'Sure,' Rex nodded, 'Call him right away, please.' Then, as
the Frenchman hurried off, he nodded quietly to the Duke: 'Best
leave this to me. I've got a hunch how to fix him.'
'Go ahead,' the Duke acquiesced. He had been keeping well in
the background, and now he smiled a little unhappily as he went
on in a low voice:
'How I love Paris. The smell and the sight and the sound of
it. I have not been back here for fifteen years. The Government
have never forgiven me for the part that I played in the
Royalist rising which took place in the 90's. I was young then.
How long ago it all seems now. But never since have I dared to
venture back to France, except a few times, secretly on the most
urgent business. I believe the authorities would, still put me
into some miserable fortress if they discovered me on French
soil.'
'Oh, Greyeyes, dear! You ought never to have come.' Marie Lou
turned to him impulsively. 'With all these awful things
happening I had forgotten. Somehow I always think of.you really
as an Englishman, not as a French exile who lives in England as
the next best thing. It would be terrible if you were arrested
and tried as a political offender after all these years.'
He shrugged and smiled again. 'Don't worry, Princess. The
authorities have almost forgotten my existence, I expect, and
the only risk I run is in knowing so many people who constantly
travel through France. If someone recognised me and spoke my
name too loud it is just possible that it might strike a chord
in some police spy's memory, but beyond that there is very
little danger.
They sat down at a little table in the lounge while Rex was
telephoning. When he rejoined them he nodded cheerfully.
'We're in luck, and Lord knows we need it. I spoke to
Castelnau himself, used the name of my old man's firm-The
Chesapeake Banking and Trust Corporation-and spun a yarn that he
had sent me over on a special mission to Europe connected with
the franc. Told him the whole thing was far too hush-hush for me
to make a date to see him at his office tomorrow morning, where
his clerks might recognise me as the representative of an
American banking house, and that I must see him tonight
privately. He hedged a bit until I put it to him that I had
power to deal in real big figures, and he fell for that like a
sucker. He couldn't see me yet though, because he's busy putting
on his party frock for some official banquet, but he figures
he'll be back at the apartment round about ten o'clock, so I
said I'd be along to state my business then.'
To fill in time we might go upstairs and have a bath, remarked
Richard, feeling his bristly chin. 'Then we'd better go out and
dine somewhere, though God knows, I've never felt less like food
in my life.'
'All right,' De Richleau agreed, 'only let us go somewhere
quiet for dinner. If we go to one of the smart places it will
add to the chance of my running into somebody that I know.'
'What about Le Vert Galant?' Richard suggested. 'It's on the
right bank down by La Cite, old-fashioned, quiet, but excellent
food, and you're unlikely to see the sort of people that we know
there in the evening.'
'Is that still running?' De Richleau smiled. 'Then let us go
there by all means. It's just the place.' And they moved over
towards the lift.
Upstairs they bathed and tidied themselves, but almost auto
matically, for their uneasy sleep that morning seemed to have
done little to recruit their lowered energy. As though still in
a bad dream, Marie Lou undressed,' and dressed again, while
Richard moved about the room, for once apparently unconscious of
her presence, silently and mechanically eliminating the traces
of the journey. Then he submitted to the ministrations of the
hotel barber with one curt order, that the man was to shave him
and not to talk.
Rex finished first and wandered into their room, where he sat
uncomfortably perched upon a corner of the bed, but he stared at
his large feet the whole time that he sat there and did not make
any effort whatever at conversation.
De Richleau joined them shortly afterwards, and Marie Lou,
rousing for a moment from her abject misery, noted with a little
start how spick and span he had become again, after the
attentions of the barber and his bath. He had produced one of
his long Hoyos, and appeared to be smoking it with quiet
enjoyment. Richard and Rex, despite the removal of their
incipient beards, still looked woebegone and haggard, as though
they had not slept for days, and were almost contemplating
suicide, but the Duke still maintained his air of the great
gentleman for whose pleasure and satisfaction this whole
existence is ordered.
Actually his appearance was no more than a mask with which
long habit had accustomed him to disguise his emotions, and at
heart he was racked by an anxiety equal to that of any of the
others. He was suppressing his impatience to get hold of
Castelnau only by a supreme effort; his feet itched to be on the
move, and his fingers to be on the throat of the adversary; but
as he came into the room he smiled round at them, kissed Marie
Lou's hand with his usual gallantry, and presented a huge bunch
of white violets to her.
'A few flowers, Princess, for your room.'
Marie Lou took them without a word; the tears brimming in her
eyes spoke her thanks that he should have thought of such a
thing at such a time, and his perfect naturalness served to
steady them all a little as they went down afterwards in the
lift. Rex changed some money at the caisse, and they went out
into the night again.
'Queer-isn't it,' remarked Richard as he looked out of the
taxi window at the fog-bound streets. 'I've always said what fun
it is to make a surprise visit for a couple of nights to Paris
-in May. It's like stealing in on summer in advance-tea in the
open at Arrnenonville-a drive to Fontamebleau, with the forest
at its very best-and all that. 'I never thought I might come to
Paris one May like this.'
'I've a feeling there's something wrong about it-or us,' said
Rex slowly. 'Those servants in the hotel back there didn't seem
any more natural than the weather to me. It was as though I was
watching them act in some kind of play.'
De Richleau nodded. 'Yes, I felt the same, and I believe
Mocata is responsible. Perhaps he surrounded Cardinals Folly
with a strong atmospheric force, and we have brought the
vibrations of it with us, or he may be interfering with our
auras in some way. I'm only guessing, of course, and can't
possibly explain it.'
At the Vert Galant De Richleau ordered dinner without
reference to any of them. He was a great gourmet, and knew from
past experience the dishes that pleased them best, but as a meal
it was one of the most dismal failures which it had ever been
his misfortune to witness.
He knew and they knew that his apparent preoccupation with
food and wine was nothing but a bluff; an attempt to smother
their anxiety and occupy their thoughts until the time to go to
Castelnau's apartment should arrive, The cooking was excellent,
the service everything that one could desire, and the cellar of
Le Vert Galant provided wines to which even De Richleau's
critical taste gave full approval, but their hearts were not in
the business.
They toyed with the Lobster Cardinal, sent away the Paujllac
Lamb untasted, and drank the wines as a beverage to steady their
nerves rather than with the consideration and pleasure which
they deserved.
The fat maiire d'hotel supervised the service of each course
himself, and it passed his understanding how these three men and
the beautiful little lady could show so little appreciation.
With hands clasped upon a large stomach, he stood before the
Duke and murmured his distress that the dishes they had ordered
should not appear to please them, but the Duke waved him away,
even summoning up a little smile to assure him that it was no
fault of the restaurant and only their unfortunate lack of
appetite.
Throughout the meal De Richleau talked unceasingly. He was a
born raconteur, and ordinarily, with his charm and wit, could
hold any audience enthralled. Tonight, despite his own anxiety,
he made a supreme attempt to lift the burden from the shoulders
of his friends by exploiting every venue of memory and
conversation, but never in his life had his efforts met with
such a cold reception. In vain he attempted to divert their
thoughts, laughing a little to himself, as he reached the
denouement in each of his stories, and hoping against hope that
he might raise a smile in those three anxious faces that faced
him across the table.
For Marie Lou the meal was just another phase of that horrible
nightmare through which she had been passing since the early
hours of the morning. Mechanically she sampled the dishes which
were put before her, but each one seemed to taste the same, and
after a few mouthfuls she laid down her fork, submitting
miserably to the frantic, gnawing thoughts which pervaded her
whole being.
Richard said nothing, ate little, and drank heavily. He was in
that state when he knew quite well that it was impossible for
him to drink too much. Great happiness or great distress has
that effect upon certain men, and he was one of them. Every
other minute he glanced at the clock on the wall, as it slowly
registered the passage of time until they could set forth once
more on their attempt to save his daughter.
There was still half an hour to go when the fruit and brandy
were placed upon the table, and then at last De Richleau
surrendered.
'I've been talking utter nonsense all through dinner,' he
confessed gravely; 'only to keep my thoughts off this wretched
business, you understand. But now the time has come when we can
speak of it again with some advantage. What do you intend to do,
Rex, when you see this man?'
Marie Lou lifted her eyes from the untasted grapes which lay
upon her plate. 'You've been splendid, Greyeyes, dear. I haven't
been listening to you really, but a sentence here and there has
been just enough to take my mind off a picture of the worst that
may happen, which keeps on haunting me.'
He smiled across at her gratefully. 'I'm glad of that. It's
the least that I could try to do. But come now, Rex, let's hear
your plan.'
'I've hardly got one,' Rex confessed, shrugging his great
shoulders. 'We know he'll see me, and that's as far as I have
figured it out. I presume it'll boil down to my jumping on him
after a pretty short discussion and threatening to gouge out his
eyeballs with my hands unless he's prepared to come clean with
everything he knows about Mocata.'
De Richleau shook his head. That is roughly the idea, of
course, but there are certain to be servants in the flat, and we
must arrange it that you have a free field for your party.'
'Can't you take us along with you?' Richard suggested. 'Say
that we're privately interested in this deal you're putting up.
If only the three of us can get inside that flat God help
anybody who tries to stop us forcing him to talk.'
'Sure,' Rex agreed. 'I see no sort of objection to that. We
can park Marie Lou at the Ritz again, on our way, before we beat
this fellow up.'
'No!' Marie Lou gave a sudden dogged shake of her head. 'I am
coming with you. I'm quite capable of taking care of myself, and
I will keep out of the way if there is any trouble. You cannot
ask me to go back to the hotel and sit there on my own while you
are trying to obtain news of Fleur. I should go mad and fling
myself out of the window. I've got to come, so please don't
argue about it.'
Richard took her hand and caressed it softly. 'Of course you
shall, my sweet. It would be better, perhaps, for you not to be
with us when we see Castelnau, but there's no reason why you
shouldn't wait for us in his hall.'
De Richleau nodded. "Yes, in the circumstances it is im
possible to leave Marie Lou behind, but about these servants
-did you bring that gun that you had last night with you?'
'Yes, I brought it through the Customs in my hip pocket, and
it's fully loaded.'
'Right. Then if necessary you can use it to intimidate the
servants while Rex and I tackle Castelnau. It is a quarter to.
Shall we go?'
Rex sent for the bill and paid it, leaving a liberal tip which
soothed the dignity of the injured maitre d'hotel, then they
filed out of the restaurant.
'Maison Rambouillet, Pare Monceau,' De Richleau told the
driver sharply as they climbed into the taxi, and not a word was
spoken until the cab drew up before a palatial block of modern
flats, facing on to the little green park where the children of
the rich in Paris take their morning airing.
'Monsieur Castelnau?' the Duke inquired of the concierge.
This way, monsieur'; the man led them through a spacious stone
faced hall to the lift.
It shot up to the fifth floor and as he opened the gates, the
concierge pointed to a door upon the right.
'Number Seventy-two,' he said quietly. 'I think Monsieur
Castelnau has just come in.'
The gates clanged behind them, and the lift flashed silently
down again to the ground floor. De Richleau gave Rex a swift
glance and, stepping towards the door of Number Seventy-two,
pressed the bell.
31
The Man With the Jagged Ear
The tall, elaborately carved door was opened by a bald,
elderly man-servant in a black alpaca coat. Rex gave his name,
and the servant looked past him with dark, inquiring eyes at the
others.
'These are friends of mine who're seeing Monsieur Castelnau on
the same business,' Rex said abruptly, stepping into the long,
narrow hall. 'Is he in?'
'Yes, monsieur, and he is expecting you. This way, if you
please.'
Marie Lou perched herself on a high couch of Cordova leather,
while the other three followed the back of the alpaca jacket
down the corridor. Another tall, carved door was thrown open,
and they entered a wide, dimly-lit salon, furnished in the old
style of French elegance: gilt ormolu, tapestries, bric-a-brac,
and a painted ceiling where cupids disported themselves among
roseate flowers.
Castelnau stood, cold, thin, angular and hatchet-faced, with
his back to a large porcelain stove. He was dressed in the
clothes which he had worn at the banquet. The wide, watered silk
ribbon with the garish colours of some foreign order cut across
his shirt front and a number of decorations were pinned to the
lapel of his evening coat.
'Monsieur Van Ryn.' He barely touched Rex's hand with his cold
fingers and went on in his own language. 'It is a pleasure to
receive you. I know your house well by reputation, and from time
to time in the past my own firm has had some dealings with
yours.' Then he glanced at the others sharply. These gentlemen
are, I assume, associated with you in this business?
'They are.' Rex introduced them briefly. 'The Duke de
Richleau-Mr. Richard Eaton.'
Castelnau's eyebrows lifted a fraction as he studied the
Duke's face with new interest. 'Of course,' he murmured.
'Monsieur le Due must pardon me if I did not recognise him at
first. It is many years since we have met, and I was under the
impression that he had never found the air of Paris good for
him; but perhaps I am indiscreet to make any reference to that
old trouble.'
'The business which has brought me is urgent, monsieur,' De
Richleau replied suavely. "Therefore I elected to ignore the ban
which a Government of bourgeois and socialists placed upon me.'
'A grave step, monsieur, since the police of France have a
notoriously long memory. Particularly at the present time when
the Government has cause to regard all politicals who are not of
its party with suspicion. However,' the banker bowed slightly,
'that, of course, is your own affair entirely. Be seated,
gentlemen. I am at your service.'
None of the three accepted the proffered invitation, and Rex
said abruptly: 'The bullion deal I spoke of when I called you on
the telephone was only an excuse to secure this interview. The
three of us have come here tonight because we know that you are
associated with Mocata.'
The Frenchman stared at him in blank surprise and was just
about to burst into angry protest when Rex hurried on. 'It'll
cut no ice to deny it. We know too much. The night before last
we saw you at that joint in Chilbury, and afterwards with the
rest of those filthy swine doing the devil's business on
Salisbury Plain. You're a Satanist, and you're going to tell us
all you know about your leader.'
Castelnau's dark eyes glittered dangerously in his long, white
face. They shifted with a sudden furtive glance towards an open
escritoire.
Before he could move, Richard's voice came quiet but steely.
'Stay where you are. I've got you covered, and I'll shoot you
like a dog if you flicker an eyelid.'
De Richleau caught the banker's glance, and with his quick,
cat-like step had reached the ornate desk. He pulled out a few
drawers, and then found the weapon that he felt certain must be
there. It was a tiny .2 pistol, but deadly enough. Having
assured himself that it was loaded, he pointed it at the
Satanist. 'Now,' he said, icily, 'are you prepared to talk, or
must I make you?
Castelnau shrugged, then looked down at his feet. 'You cannot
make me,' he replied with a quiet confidence, 'but if you tell
me what you wish to know, I may possibly give you the
information you require in order to get rid of you.'
'First, what do you know of Mocata's history?'
'Very little, but sufficient to assure you that you are ex
ceedingly ill-advised if, as it appears, you intend to pit
yourself against him.'
To hell with that!' Rex snapped angrily; 'get on with the
story.'
'Just as you wish. It is the Canon Darnien Mocata to whom you
refer, of course. When he was younger he was an officiating
priest at some church in Lyons, I believe. He was always a
difficult person, and his intellectual gifts made a thorn in the
sides of his superiors. Then there was some scandal and he left
the Church; but long before that he had become an occulist of
exceptional powers. I met him some years ago and became
interested in his operations. Your apparent disapproval of them
does not distress me in the least. I find their theory an
exceptionally interesting study, and their practice of the
greatest assistance in governing my business transactions.
Mocata lives in Paris for a good portion of the year, and I see
him from time to time socially in addition to our meetings for
esoteric purposes. I think that is all that I can tell you.'
'When did you see him last?' asked the Duke.
'At Chilbury two nights ago, when we gathered again after the
break-up of our meeting, I suppose you were responsible for
that?' Castelnau's thin lips broke into a ghost of a smile, 'If
so, believe me, you will pay for it.'
'You have not seen him then today-this evening?'
'No, I did not even know that he had returned to Paris.' There
was a ring in the banker's voice which made it difficult for his
questioners to doubt that he was telling them the truth.
'Where does he live when he is in Paris?' the Duke enquired.
'I do not know. I have visited him at many places. Often he
stays with various friends, who are also interested in his
practices, but he has no permanent address. The people with whom
he was staying last left Paris some months ago for the
Argentine, so I have no idea where you are likely to find him
now.'
'Where do you meet him when these Satanic gatherings take
place?'
'I am sorry but I can't tell you.' The Frenchman's voice was
firm.
De Richleau padded softly forward and thrust the little Mstol
into Castefnau's ribs, just under his heart. 'I am afraid 'ou've
got to,' he purred silkily. 'The matter that we are engaged upon
is urgent.'
, The banker held his ground, and to outward appearances
remained unruffled at the threat. 'It is no good,' he said
quietly, I cannot do it, even if you intend to murder me. Each
one of us goes into a self-induced hypnotic trance before
proceeding to these meetings, and wakes upon his arrival. In my
conscious state I have no idea how I get there; so this apache
attitude of yours is completely useless.'
'I see.' De Richleau nodded slowly and withdrew the automatic.
'However, you are going to tell me just the same, because it
happens that I am something of a hypnotist. I shall put you
under now, and we shall proceed to follow all the stages of your
unconscious journey.'
For the first time Castelnau's face showed a trace of fear.
'You can't,' he muttered quickly. 'I won't let you.'
De Richleau shrugged. 'Your opposition will make it slightly
more difficult, but I shall do it, nevertheless. However, as it
may take some time, we will make fresh arrangements in order to
ensure that we are not disturbed. Press the bell, and when your
servant comes, give him definite instructions that as we shall
be engaged in a long conference, upon no pretext whatsoever are
you to be disturbed.'
'And if I refuse?' Castelnau's dark eyes suddenly flashed
rebellion.
'Then you will never live to give another order. The affair we
are engaged upon is desperate, and whatever the consequences may
be, I shall shoot you like the rat you are. Now ring.' De
Richleau put the pistol in his pocket but still held the banker
covered, and after a moment's hesitation Castelnau pressed the
bell.
'You, Richard,' the Duke said in a sharp whisper, 'will leave
us when the servant has taken his instructions. Wait for us with
Marie Lou in the entrance hall. You have your gun. Prevent
anyone leaving the apartment until we have finished. Open the
door to anyone who rings yourself, and if Mocata arrives, as he
may at any moment, don't argue-shoot. I take all
responsibility.'
'I am only waiting for the chance,' said Richard grimly, just
as the servant entered.
Castelnau gave his orders in an even voice, with one eye upon
the Duke's pocket, then Richard, in his normal voice, remarked
casually:
'Well, since the matter is confidential, I had better wait
outside with rny wife until you are through,' and followed the
elderly alpaca-coated man out into the hall.
'Rex,' De Richleau lost not an instant once the door was
closed. Take that telephone receiver off its stand so that we
are not interrupted by any calls. And you,' he turned to the
banker, 'sit down in that chair.'
'I won't!' exclaimed Castelnau furiously. 'This is abominable.
You invade my apartment like brigands. I give you such
information as I can, but what you are about to do will bring me
into danger, and I refuse-I refuse, I tell you.'
'I shall neither argue with you nor kill you,' De Richleau
answered frigidly, 'You are too valuable to me alive. Rex, knock
him out!'
Castelnau swung round and threw up his arms in a gesture of
defence, but Rex broke through his guard. The young American's
mighty fist caught him on the side of the jaw and he crumpled
up, a still heap on his own hearth-rug.
When the banker came to he found himself sitting in a straight
chair; his hands were lashed to the back and his ankles to the
legs with the curtain cords. His head ached abominably and he
saw De Richleau standing opposite to him, smiling relentlessly
down into his face.
'Now,' said the Duke, 'look into my eyes. The sooner we get
this business over the sooner you will be able to get to bed and
nurse your sore head. I am about to place you under, and you are
going to tell us what you do when you go to these satanic
meetings.'
For answer Castelnau quickly closed his eyes and lowered his
head on to his chest, resisting De Richleau's powerful
suggestion with all the force of his will.
This doesn't look to me as though it's going to be any too
easy,' Rex muttered dubiously. 'I've always thought that it was
impossible to hypnotise people if they were unwilling. You'd
better let me put the half-Nelson on him until he becomes more
amenable and sees reason.'
'That might make him agree verbally,' De Richleau replied,
'but it won't stop him lying to us afterwards, and it is quite
possible to hypnotise people against their will. It is often
done to lunatics in asylums. Get behind him now, hold back his
head and lift his eyelids with your fingers so that he cannot
close them. We've got to find out about this place. It is our
only hope of geting on to Mocata.'
Rex did as he was bid. The Duke stood before the chair, his
tree, and that this is a case for what Greyeyes calls his
masterly policy of inactivity. The old game of giving the enemy
enough rope so he'll hang himself in the end.
'Any sort of compromise is all against my nature, but I reckon
it's the only policy that offers now. If we stay put here and-
carry out Mocata's instructions to the letter, we'll at least be
satisfied in our minds that we are not bringing any fresh danger
on Fleur. But let's go that far and no farther. We all know
Simon is willing enough to cash in his checks, but I don't think
we ought to let him. Instead, we'll keep him here. That is going
to force Mocata to scratch his head a whole heap. He'll not do
Fleur in before he's had another cut at getting hold of Simon,
so it will be up to him to make the next move in the game, and
that may give us a fresh opening. The situation can't be worse
than it is at present, and when he shows his hand again, given a
spot of luck, we might be able to ring the changes on him yet.'
De Richleau smiled, for the first time in days, it seemed. 'My
friend, I salute you,' he said, with real feeling in his voice.
'I am growing old, I think, or I should have thought of that
myself. It is by far and away the most sensible thing that any
of us have suggested yet.'
With a sigh of relief, Marie Lou moved over and, stooping
down, kissed Rex on the cheek. 'Rex, darling, bless you. In our
trouble we've been forgetting yours, and it is very wonderful
that you should have thought of a real way out for us in the
midst of your sorrow. I dreaded having to make that decision
just now more than anything that I have had to do in my whole
life.'
He smiled rather wanly. "That's all right, darling. There's
nothing so mighty clever about it, but it gives us time, and you
must try and comfort yourself with the thought that time and the
angels are on our side.'
Even Richard's frantic anxiety to set out immediately in
search of his Fleur d'amour was overcome for the time being by
Rex's so obviously sensible suggestion. In his agitation he had
eaten nothing yet, but now he sat down to cut some sandwiches,
and set about persuading Marie Lou that she must eat the first
of them in order to keep up her strength. Then he looked over at
the Duke.
'I left that note for Malin where he's bound to see it-
slipped it under his bedroom door, so we shan't be disturbed
here. Is there anything at all that we can do?'
'Nothing, I fear, only possess ourselves with such patience as
we can, but we're all at about the end of our tether, so we
ought to try and get some sleep. If Mocata makes some fresh move
this evening it's on the cards that we shall be up again all
night.'
'I'll get some cushions,' Simon volunteered. 'I suppose
there's no harm in bringing used articles into this room now?'
'None. You had better collect all the stuff you can and we'll
make up some temporary beds on the floor.'
Simon, Richard and Rex left the room and returned a few
moments later with piles of cushions and all the rugs that they
could find. They placed some fresh logs on the smouldering ashes
of the fire and then set about laying out five makeshift resting-
places.
When they had finished, Marie Leu allowed Richard to lead her
over to one of them and tuck her up, although she protested
that, exhausted though she was, she would never be able to
sleep. The rest lay down, and then Richard switched out the
light.
Full day had come at last, but it was of little use, for the
range of vision was limited to about fifteen yards. The mist
outside the windows seemed, if anything, denser than before, and
it swirled and eddied in curling wreaths above the damp stones
of the terrace, muffling the noises of the countryside and
shutting out the light.
None of them felt that they would be able to sleep. Rex's
gnawing sorrow for Tanith preyed upon his mind. The others,
racked with anxiety for Fleur, turned restlessly upon their
cushions. Every now and then they heard Marie Lou give way to
fits of sobbing as though her heart would break. But the stress
of those terrible night hours and the emotions they had passed
through since had exhausted them completely. Marie Lou's bursts
of sobbing became quieter and then ceased. Richard fell into an
uneasy doze. De Richleau and Rex breathed evenly, sunk at last
in a heavy sleep.
Hours later Marie Lou was dreaming that she was seated in an
ancient library reading a big, old-fashioned book, the cover of
which was soft and hairy like a wolf's skin, and that as she
read it a circle of iron was bound about her head. Then the
scene changed. She was in the pentacle again, and that loathsome
sack-like Thing was attacking Fleur. She awoke -started up with
a sudden scream of fear.
Her waking was little better than the nightmare when memory
flooded back into her mind. Yet that too and the present only
seemed other phases of the frightful dream; the comfortable
library denuded of its furniture; Tanith's dead body lying in
the centre of the floor and the dimness of the room from those
horrible fog banks shutting out the sunshine. They could not
possibly be anything but figments of the imagination.
The men had roused at once, and crowded round her, shadowy
figures in the uncertain light. De Richleau pressed the electric
switch. They blinked a little, and looked at each other
sleepily, then their eyes turned to the place where Simon had
lain. With one thought their glances shifted to the window and
they knew that while they slept their friend had gone out,
into that ghostly unnatural night, to keep his grim appointment.
30
Out Into the Fog
It was Rex who noticed the chalk marks on the floor. He
stepped over and saw that Simon, lacking pencil and paper, had
used these means to leave them a short message. Slowly he
deciphered the scribbled words and read them out:
'Please don't fuss or try to come after me. This is my
muddle, so am keeping appointment. Do as Mocata has
ordered. Am certain that is only chance of saving
Fleur.
Love to all. Simon.'
'Aw, Hell!' exclaimed Rex as he finished. 'The dear heroic
little sap has gone and put paid to my big idea. Mocata has got
him and Fleur now on top of having killed Tanith. If you ask me
we're properly sunk.'
De Richleau groaned. 'It is just like him. We ought to have
guessed that he would do this.'
'You're right there,' Richard agreed sadly. 'I've known him
longer than any of you, and I did my damnedest to prevent him
sacrificing himself for nothing, but it seems to me he's only
done the very thing you said he should.'
'That's not quite fair,' the Duke protested mildly. 'I only
said I thought it right that he should with certain
modifications. I had it in my mind that we might follow him at a
distance. We should have arrived at the rendezvous before Mocata
could have known that we had left this place, and we might have
pulled something off. As it was, I thought Rex's idea so much
better that I abandoned mine.'
'I'm sorry,' Richard apologised huskily. 'But Simon's my
oldest friend you know, and this on top of all the rest '
'Do you-do you think the poor sweet is right, and that his
having given himself up will be of any use?' whispered Marie
Lou.
Richard shrugged despondently. 'Not the least, dearest. I hate
to seem ungracious, and you all know how devoted I am to Simon
but in his anxiety to do the right thing he's handed Mocata our
only decent card. We can sit here till Doomsday, but there's no
chance now of making any fresh move which might give us a new
opening. We've wasted the Lord knows how many precious hours,
and we're in a worse hole than we were before. I'm going to
carry out my original intention and get on to the police.'
'I wouldn't do that,' Rex caught him by the arm. 'It'll only
mean our wasting further time in spilling long dispositions to a
bunch of cops, and you're all wrong about our not having made
anything on the new deal. We've had a sleep which we needed
mighty badly, and we've lulled Mocata into a false sense of
security. Just because we've remained put here all morning like
he said and Simon's come over with the goods, he'll think he's
sitting pretty now and maybe let up on his supervision stunt.
Let's cut out bothering with the police and get after him
ourselves this minute.'
Marie Lou shivered slightly and then nodded. 'Rex is right,
you know. Mocata has got what he wants now, so it is very
unlikely that he is troubling to keep us under observation any
more, but how do you propose to try to find him?'
'We will go straight to Paris,' De Richleau announced, with a
display of his old form. 'You remember Tanith told us that by
tonight he would be there holding a conversation with a man who
had lost the upper portion of his left ear. That is Castelnau,
the banker, I am certain, so the thing for us to do is to make
for Paris and hunt him out.'
'How do you figure on getting there?' asked the practical Rex.
'By plane, of course. Mocata is obviously travelling that way
or he could never get there by tonight. Richard must take us in
his four-seater, and if Mocata has to motor all the way to
Croydon before he can make a start, we'll be there before him.
Is your plane hi commission, Richard?'
'Yes, the plane's all right. It's in the hangar at the bottom
of the meadow, and when I took her out three days ago she was
running perfectly. I don't much like the look of this fog,
though, although, of course, it's probably only a ground mist.'
They all glanced out of the window again. The grey murk still
hung over the terrace, shutting out the view of the Botticelli
garden where, on this early May morning, the polyanthus and
forget-me-nots and daffodils, shedding their green cocoons, were
bursting into colourful life.
'Let's go,' said Rex, impatiently. 'De Richleau's right.
'You'd best get some clothes on, then we'll beat it for Paris
the second you're fit.'
The rest followed him out into the hall and upstairs to the
rooms above. The house was silent and seemingly deserted. The
servants were obviously taking Richard's orders in their most
literal sense and, released for once from their daily tasks,
enjoying an unexpected holiday in their own quarters.
Marie Lou looked into the nursery and almost broke down again
for a moment as she once more saw the empty cot, but she hurried
past it to the nurse's bedroom and found the woman still
sleeping soundly.
In Richard's dressing-room the men made hasty preparations,
Rex was clad in the easy lounge suit which he had put on in De
Richleau's flat, but Richard and the Duke were still in pyjamas.
When they were dressed Richard fitted the others out as well as
he could with top clothes for their journey. The Duke was easy,
being only a little taller than himself, and a big double
overcoat was found for Rex, into which he managed to scramble
despite the breadth of his enormous shoulders. Marie Lou joined
them a few moments later, clad in her breeches and leather
flying coat, which she always used whenever she went up with
Richard.
Downstairs again, they paused in the library to make another
hurried meal. Then the door was locked, and after casting a last
unhappy glance at Tanith's body, which remained unaltered in
appearance, Rex led the way out on the terrace.
They walked quickly down the gravel path beside the Botticelli
border, the sound of their footsteps muffled by the all-
pervading mist-through Marie Lou's own garden, with its long
herbaceous borders, and past the old sundial-round the
quadrangles of tessellated pavement which fell in a succession
of little terraces to the pond garden, with its water lilies,
and so to the meadow beyond.
When they reached the hangar Richard and Rex ran out the plane
and got it in order for the flight. De Richleau stood watching
their operations with Marie Lou beside him, both of them
fretting a little at the necessary delay, since now that the
vital decision had been taken every member of the party was
impatient to set out,
They settled themselves in the comfortable four-seater. Rex
swung the propeller, well accustomed to the ways of aeroplanes,
and the engine purred upon a low steady note. He watched it for
a second, and then, as he scrambled aboard, there came the long
conventional cry: 'All set.'
The plane moved slowly forward into the dank mist. The hedges
and trees on either side were shut out by banks of fog, but
Richard knew the ground so well that he felt confident of
judging his distance and direction. He taxied over the even
grass of the long field, and turned to rise. The plane lifted,
touched ground again gently twice, and they were off.
As they left the earth a new feeling came over Richard. He was
passionately fond of flying, and it always filled him with
exhilaration, but this was different. It was as though he had
suddenly come out into the daylight after having been walking
down a long, dark, smoky tunnel for many hours. At long
intervals there had been brightly lit recesses in the sides of
it where figures stood like tableaux at a waxworks show. The
slug-like Thing and Fleur; Rex standing at the window with
Tanith in his arms; Simon whispering something to the Duke;
Marie Lou's face as she stood with her hand resting on the rail
of Fleur's empty cot, and a dozen others. The rest of that
strange journey he seemed to have made, consisted of long
periods of blankness only punctuated by little cries of fear and
scraps of reiterated argument, the purpose of which he could no
longer remember. Now-his brain was clear again, and he settled
himself with new purpose to handle the plane with all his skill.
In those few moments they had risen clear of the ground mist
and were soaring upwards into the blue above. As De Richleau
looked down he saw a very curious thing. Not only was the fog
that had hemmed them in local, but it seemed to be concentrated
entirely upon Cardinals Folly. He could just make out the
chimneys of the house rising in its centre, as from a grey sea,
and from the buildings it spread out in a circular formation for
half a mile or so on every side, hiding the gardens from his
view and obscuring the meadows between the house and the
village, but beyond, all was clear in the brilliant sunshine of
the earfy summer afternoon.
Rex was beside Richard in the cockpit. Automatically he had
taken on the job of navigator, and, like Richard, his brain
numbed before with misery, had started to function properly
again directly he set to busying himself with the maps and
scales.
The Duke, sitting in the body of the machine with Marie Lou,
felt that there was nothing he could say to comfort her, but he
took her hand in his and held it between his own. From his quick
gesture she felt again his intense distress that he should ever
have been the means of bringing her this terrible unhappiness,
so, to distract his thoughts, she put her mouth right up against
his ear and told him of the odd dream she had had; about reading
the old book. He gave her a curious glance and began to shout
back at her.
She could not catch all he said owing to the noise of the
engine, but enough to tell that he was intensely interested. He
seemed to think that she had been dreaming of the famous Red
Book of Appin, a wonderful treatise on Magic owned by the
Stewards of Invernahyle, who were now extinct. The book had been
lost and not heard of for more than a hundred years, but her
description of it, and the legend that it might only be read
with understanding by those who wore a circlet of iron above
their brow made him insistent that it must be this which she had
seen in her dream. He pressed her to try and remember if she had
understood any portion of it.
After some trouble she managed to convey to him that she had
read one sentence on a faded vellum page, and that although the
lettering was quite different from anything which she had ever
seen before, she understood it at the time, but could not recall
the meaning now. Then, as talking was so difficult, they fell
silent.
At a hundred miles an hour the plane soared above the English
counties, but they took little heed of the fields and hedges,
woods and hills, which fled so swiftly from beneath them.
Somehow they seemed to have stepped out of their old life
altogether. Time no longer existed for them, only the will to
arrive at their destination in order to be active once again.
All their thoughts were concentrated now upon Paris and the man
who had lost half his ear. Would he be there? Could they find
him if he was? And would they arrive before Mocata?
They passed over the Northern end of the English Channel
almost without noticing it; Marie Lou felt a little shock when
the plane banked steeply and Richard brought it circling down.
The sun was sinking behind great banks of cloud and, as the
plane tilted, she saw that a thick mist lay below them in which
glowed dull patches of half-obscured light. Richard and Rex knew
them, however, to be fog flares of the Le Bourget lauding
ground.
A few seconds more and they had seen the last of the sunset. A
thin greyness closed about them. One of the flares showed
bright, and the plane bounded along the earth until Richard
brought it to a standstill.
Almost in a daze they answered the questions of the officers
at the airport and passed the Customs, secured a fast-looking
taxi and, packed inside it, were heading for the centre of
Paris.
As they ran through the streets, with the familiar high-
pitched note of the taxi's horn continually sounding and the
subtle smell of the epiceries in their nostrils-the very scent
of Paris-they noticed half-unconsciously that night had fallen
once more.
Here and there the electric sky-signs on the tall buildings,
advertising Savan Cadum or Byrrh, glowed dully through the murk,
and the lights of the cafes illuminated little spaces of the
boulevards through which they passed, throwing up the figures
that sat sipping their aperitifs at the marble-topped tables and
dappling the young green of the stunted trees that lined the
pavements.
None of them spoke as the taxi swerved and rushed, seeking
every opportunity to nose its way through the traffic. Only Rex
leant forward once, soon after they left the aerodrome, and
murmured: 'I told him the Ritz. We'll be able to hunt up this
bird's address when we get there.'
They ran past the Opera, down the Boulevard de la Madeleine,
and turned left into the Place Vendome. The cab pulled up with a
jerk. A liveried porter hurried forward to fling open the door,
and they scrambled out.
'Pay him off, with a good tip,' Rex ordered the hotel servant.
'I' see-yer-later, inside.' Then he led the way into the hotel.
One of the under-managers at the bureau recognised him and
came forward with a welcoming smile.
'Monsieur Van Ryn, what a pleasure! You require accomo-dation
for your party? How many rooms do you desire? I hope that you
will stay with us some time.'
Two single rooms and one double, with bathrooms, and we'd best
have a sitting-room on the same floor,' replied Rex curtly. 'How
long we'll be staying I can't say. I've got urgent business to
attend to this trip. Do you happen to know a banker named
Castelnau-elderly man, grey-haired, with a hatchet face, who's
had a slice taken out of his left ear?'
'Mais oui, monsieur. He lunches here frequently.'
'Good. D'you know where he lives?'
"For the moment, no, but I will ascertain. You permit?' The
manager moved briskly away and disappeared into the office. A
few moments later he returned with a Paris telephone directory
open in his hand.
'This will be it, monsieur, I think. Monsieur Laurent Castel
nau, 72, Maison Rambouillet, Pare Monceau. That is a block of
flats. Do you wish to telephone his apartment?'
'Sure,' Rex nodded, 'Call him right away, please.' Then, as
the Frenchman hurried off, he nodded quietly to the Duke: 'Best
leave this to me. I've got a hunch how to fix him.'
'Go ahead,' the Duke acquiesced. He had been keeping well in
the background, and now he smiled a little unhappily as he went
on in a low voice:
'How I love Paris. The smell and the sight and the sound of
it. I have not been back here for fifteen years. The Government
have never forgiven me for the part that I played in the
Royalist rising which took place in the 90's. I was young then.
How long ago it all seems now. But never since have I dared to
venture back to France, except a few times, secretly on the most
urgent business. I believe the authorities would, still put me
into some miserable fortress if they discovered me on French
soil.'
'Oh, Greyeyes, dear! You ought never to have come.' Marie Lou
turned to him impulsively. 'With all these awful things
happening I had forgotten. Somehow I always think of.you really
as an Englishman, not as a French exile who lives in England as
the next best thing. It would be terrible if you were arrested
and tried as a political offender after all these years.'
He shrugged and smiled again. 'Don't worry, Princess. The
authorities have almost forgotten my existence, I expect, and
the only risk I run is in knowing so many people who constantly
travel through France. If someone recognised me and spoke my
name too loud it is just possible that it might strike a chord
in some police spy's memory, but beyond that there is very
little danger.
They sat down at a little table in the lounge while Rex was
telephoning. When he rejoined them he nodded cheerfully.
'We're in luck, and Lord knows we need it. I spoke to
Castelnau himself, used the name of my old man's firm-The
Chesapeake Banking and Trust Corporation-and spun a yarn that he
had sent me over on a special mission to Europe connected with
the franc. Told him the whole thing was far too hush-hush for me
to make a date to see him at his office tomorrow morning, where
his clerks might recognise me as the representative of an
American banking house, and that I must see him tonight
privately. He hedged a bit until I put it to him that I had
power to deal in real big figures, and he fell for that like a
sucker. He couldn't see me yet though, because he's busy putting
on his party frock for some official banquet, but he figures
he'll be back at the apartment round about ten o'clock, so I
said I'd be along to state my business then.'
To fill in time we might go upstairs and have a bath, remarked
Richard, feeling his bristly chin. 'Then we'd better go out and
dine somewhere, though God knows, I've never felt less like food
in my life.'
'All right,' De Richleau agreed, 'only let us go somewhere
quiet for dinner. If we go to one of the smart places it will
add to the chance of my running into somebody that I know.'
'What about Le Vert Galant?' Richard suggested. 'It's on the
right bank down by La Cite, old-fashioned, quiet, but excellent
food, and you're unlikely to see the sort of people that we know
there in the evening.'
'Is that still running?' De Richleau smiled. 'Then let us go
there by all means. It's just the place.' And they moved over
towards the lift.
Upstairs they bathed and tidied themselves, but almost auto
matically, for their uneasy sleep that morning seemed to have
done little to recruit their lowered energy. As though still in
a bad dream, Marie Lou undressed,' and dressed again, while
Richard moved about the room, for once apparently unconscious of
her presence, silently and mechanically eliminating the traces
of the journey. Then he submitted to the ministrations of the
hotel barber with one curt order, that the man was to shave him
and not to talk.
Rex finished first and wandered into their room, where he sat
uncomfortably perched upon a corner of the bed, but he stared at
his large feet the whole time that he sat there and did not make
any effort whatever at conversation.
De Richleau joined them shortly afterwards, and Marie Lou,
rousing for a moment from her abject misery, noted with a little
start how spick and span he had become again, after the
attentions of the barber and his bath. He had produced one of
his long Hoyos, and appeared to be smoking it with quiet
enjoyment. Richard and Rex, despite the removal of their
incipient beards, still looked woebegone and haggard, as though
they had not slept for days, and were almost contemplating
suicide, but the Duke still maintained his air of the great
gentleman for whose pleasure and satisfaction this whole
existence is ordered.
Actually his appearance was no more than a mask with which
long habit had accustomed him to disguise his emotions, and at
heart he was racked by an anxiety equal to that of any of the
others. He was suppressing his impatience to get hold of
Castelnau only by a supreme effort; his feet itched to be on the
move, and his fingers to be on the throat of the adversary; but
as he came into the room he smiled round at them, kissed Marie
Lou's hand with his usual gallantry, and presented a huge bunch
of white violets to her.
'A few flowers, Princess, for your room.'
Marie Lou took them without a word; the tears brimming in her
eyes spoke her thanks that he should have thought of such a
thing at such a time, and his perfect naturalness served to
steady them all a little as they went down afterwards in the
lift. Rex changed some money at the caisse, and they went out
into the night again.
'Queer-isn't it,' remarked Richard as he looked out of the
taxi window at the fog-bound streets. 'I've always said what fun
it is to make a surprise visit for a couple of nights to Paris
-in May. It's like stealing in on summer in advance-tea in the
open at Arrnenonville-a drive to Fontamebleau, with the forest
at its very best-and all that. 'I never thought I might come to
Paris one May like this.'
'I've a feeling there's something wrong about it-or us,' said
Rex slowly. 'Those servants in the hotel back there didn't seem
any more natural than the weather to me. It was as though I was
watching them act in some kind of play.'
De Richleau nodded. 'Yes, I felt the same, and I believe
Mocata is responsible. Perhaps he surrounded Cardinals Folly
with a strong atmospheric force, and we have brought the
vibrations of it with us, or he may be interfering with our
auras in some way. I'm only guessing, of course, and can't
possibly explain it.'
At the Vert Galant De Richleau ordered dinner without
reference to any of them. He was a great gourmet, and knew from
past experience the dishes that pleased them best, but as a meal
it was one of the most dismal failures which it had ever been
his misfortune to witness.
He knew and they knew that his apparent preoccupation with
food and wine was nothing but a bluff; an attempt to smother
their anxiety and occupy their thoughts until the time to go to
Castelnau's apartment should arrive, The cooking was excellent,
the service everything that one could desire, and the cellar of
Le Vert Galant provided wines to which even De Richleau's
critical taste gave full approval, but their hearts were not in
the business.
They toyed with the Lobster Cardinal, sent away the Paujllac
Lamb untasted, and drank the wines as a beverage to steady their
nerves rather than with the consideration and pleasure which
they deserved.
The fat maiire d'hotel supervised the service of each course
himself, and it passed his understanding how these three men and
the beautiful little lady could show so little appreciation.
With hands clasped upon a large stomach, he stood before the
Duke and murmured his distress that the dishes they had ordered
should not appear to please them, but the Duke waved him away,
even summoning up a little smile to assure him that it was no
fault of the restaurant and only their unfortunate lack of
appetite.
Throughout the meal De Richleau talked unceasingly. He was a
born raconteur, and ordinarily, with his charm and wit, could
hold any audience enthralled. Tonight, despite his own anxiety,
he made a supreme attempt to lift the burden from the shoulders
of his friends by exploiting every venue of memory and
conversation, but never in his life had his efforts met with
such a cold reception. In vain he attempted to divert their
thoughts, laughing a little to himself, as he reached the
denouement in each of his stories, and hoping against hope that
he might raise a smile in those three anxious faces that faced
him across the table.
For Marie Lou the meal was just another phase of that horrible
nightmare through which she had been passing since the early
hours of the morning. Mechanically she sampled the dishes which
were put before her, but each one seemed to taste the same, and
after a few mouthfuls she laid down her fork, submitting
miserably to the frantic, gnawing thoughts which pervaded her
whole being.
Richard said nothing, ate little, and drank heavily. He was in
that state when he knew quite well that it was impossible for
him to drink too much. Great happiness or great distress has
that effect upon certain men, and he was one of them. Every
other minute he glanced at the clock on the wall, as it slowly
registered the passage of time until they could set forth once
more on their attempt to save his daughter.
There was still half an hour to go when the fruit and brandy
were placed upon the table, and then at last De Richleau
surrendered.
'I've been talking utter nonsense all through dinner,' he
confessed gravely; 'only to keep my thoughts off this wretched
business, you understand. But now the time has come when we can
speak of it again with some advantage. What do you intend to do,
Rex, when you see this man?'
Marie Lou lifted her eyes from the untasted grapes which lay
upon her plate. 'You've been splendid, Greyeyes, dear. I haven't
been listening to you really, but a sentence here and there has
been just enough to take my mind off a picture of the worst that
may happen, which keeps on haunting me.'
He smiled across at her gratefully. 'I'm glad of that. It's
the least that I could try to do. But come now, Rex, let's hear
your plan.'
'I've hardly got one,' Rex confessed, shrugging his great
shoulders. 'We know he'll see me, and that's as far as I have
figured it out. I presume it'll boil down to my jumping on him
after a pretty short discussion and threatening to gouge out his
eyeballs with my hands unless he's prepared to come clean with
everything he knows about Mocata.'
De Richleau shook his head. That is roughly the idea, of
course, but there are certain to be servants in the flat, and we
must arrange it that you have a free field for your party.'
'Can't you take us along with you?' Richard suggested. 'Say
that we're privately interested in this deal you're putting up.
If only the three of us can get inside that flat God help
anybody who tries to stop us forcing him to talk.'
'Sure,' Rex agreed. 'I see no sort of objection to that. We
can park Marie Lou at the Ritz again, on our way, before we beat
this fellow up.'
'No!' Marie Lou gave a sudden dogged shake of her head. 'I am
coming with you. I'm quite capable of taking care of myself, and
I will keep out of the way if there is any trouble. You cannot
ask me to go back to the hotel and sit there on my own while you
are trying to obtain news of Fleur. I should go mad and fling
myself out of the window. I've got to come, so please don't
argue about it.'
Richard took her hand and caressed it softly. 'Of course you
shall, my sweet. It would be better, perhaps, for you not to be
with us when we see Castelnau, but there's no reason why you
shouldn't wait for us in his hall.'
De Richleau nodded. "Yes, in the circumstances it is im
possible to leave Marie Lou behind, but about these servants
-did you bring that gun that you had last night with you?'
'Yes, I brought it through the Customs in my hip pocket, and
it's fully loaded.'
'Right. Then if necessary you can use it to intimidate the
servants while Rex and I tackle Castelnau. It is a quarter to.
Shall we go?'
Rex sent for the bill and paid it, leaving a liberal tip which
soothed the dignity of the injured maitre d'hotel, then they
filed out of the restaurant.
'Maison Rambouillet, Pare Monceau,' De Richleau told the
driver sharply as they climbed into the taxi, and not a word was
spoken until the cab drew up before a palatial block of modern
flats, facing on to the little green park where the children of
the rich in Paris take their morning airing.
'Monsieur Castelnau?' the Duke inquired of the concierge.
This way, monsieur'; the man led them through a spacious stone
faced hall to the lift.
It shot up to the fifth floor and as he opened the gates, the
concierge pointed to a door upon the right.
'Number Seventy-two,' he said quietly. 'I think Monsieur
Castelnau has just come in.'
The gates clanged behind them, and the lift flashed silently
down again to the ground floor. De Richleau gave Rex a swift
glance and, stepping towards the door of Number Seventy-two,
pressed the bell.
31
The Man With the Jagged Ear
The tall, elaborately carved door was opened by a bald,
elderly man-servant in a black alpaca coat. Rex gave his name,
and the servant looked past him with dark, inquiring eyes at the
others.
'These are friends of mine who're seeing Monsieur Castelnau on
the same business,' Rex said abruptly, stepping into the long,
narrow hall. 'Is he in?'
'Yes, monsieur, and he is expecting you. This way, if you
please.'
Marie Lou perched herself on a high couch of Cordova leather,
while the other three followed the back of the alpaca jacket
down the corridor. Another tall, carved door was thrown open,
and they entered a wide, dimly-lit salon, furnished in the old
style of French elegance: gilt ormolu, tapestries, bric-a-brac,
and a painted ceiling where cupids disported themselves among
roseate flowers.
Castelnau stood, cold, thin, angular and hatchet-faced, with
his back to a large porcelain stove. He was dressed in the
clothes which he had worn at the banquet. The wide, watered silk
ribbon with the garish colours of some foreign order cut across
his shirt front and a number of decorations were pinned to the
lapel of his evening coat.
'Monsieur Van Ryn.' He barely touched Rex's hand with his cold
fingers and went on in his own language. 'It is a pleasure to
receive you. I know your house well by reputation, and from time
to time in the past my own firm has had some dealings with
yours.' Then he glanced at the others sharply. These gentlemen
are, I assume, associated with you in this business?
'They are.' Rex introduced them briefly. 'The Duke de
Richleau-Mr. Richard Eaton.'
Castelnau's eyebrows lifted a fraction as he studied the
Duke's face with new interest. 'Of course,' he murmured.
'Monsieur le Due must pardon me if I did not recognise him at
first. It is many years since we have met, and I was under the
impression that he had never found the air of Paris good for
him; but perhaps I am indiscreet to make any reference to that
old trouble.'
'The business which has brought me is urgent, monsieur,' De
Richleau replied suavely. "Therefore I elected to ignore the ban
which a Government of bourgeois and socialists placed upon me.'
'A grave step, monsieur, since the police of France have a
notoriously long memory. Particularly at the present time when
the Government has cause to regard all politicals who are not of
its party with suspicion. However,' the banker bowed slightly,
'that, of course, is your own affair entirely. Be seated,
gentlemen. I am at your service.'
None of the three accepted the proffered invitation, and Rex
said abruptly: 'The bullion deal I spoke of when I called you on
the telephone was only an excuse to secure this interview. The
three of us have come here tonight because we know that you are
associated with Mocata.'
The Frenchman stared at him in blank surprise and was just
about to burst into angry protest when Rex hurried on. 'It'll
cut no ice to deny it. We know too much. The night before last
we saw you at that joint in Chilbury, and afterwards with the
rest of those filthy swine doing the devil's business on
Salisbury Plain. You're a Satanist, and you're going to tell us
all you know about your leader.'
Castelnau's dark eyes glittered dangerously in his long, white
face. They shifted with a sudden furtive glance towards an open
escritoire.
Before he could move, Richard's voice came quiet but steely.
'Stay where you are. I've got you covered, and I'll shoot you
like a dog if you flicker an eyelid.'
De Richleau caught the banker's glance, and with his quick,
cat-like step had reached the ornate desk. He pulled out a few
drawers, and then found the weapon that he felt certain must be
there. It was a tiny .2 pistol, but deadly enough. Having
assured himself that it was loaded, he pointed it at the
Satanist. 'Now,' he said, icily, 'are you prepared to talk, or
must I make you?
Castelnau shrugged, then looked down at his feet. 'You cannot
make me,' he replied with a quiet confidence, 'but if you tell
me what you wish to know, I may possibly give you the
information you require in order to get rid of you.'
'First, what do you know of Mocata's history?'
'Very little, but sufficient to assure you that you are ex
ceedingly ill-advised if, as it appears, you intend to pit
yourself against him.'
To hell with that!' Rex snapped angrily; 'get on with the
story.'
'Just as you wish. It is the Canon Darnien Mocata to whom you
refer, of course. When he was younger he was an officiating
priest at some church in Lyons, I believe. He was always a
difficult person, and his intellectual gifts made a thorn in the
sides of his superiors. Then there was some scandal and he left
the Church; but long before that he had become an occulist of
exceptional powers. I met him some years ago and became
interested in his operations. Your apparent disapproval of them
does not distress me in the least. I find their theory an
exceptionally interesting study, and their practice of the
greatest assistance in governing my business transactions.
Mocata lives in Paris for a good portion of the year, and I see
him from time to time socially in addition to our meetings for
esoteric purposes. I think that is all that I can tell you.'
'When did you see him last?' asked the Duke.
'At Chilbury two nights ago, when we gathered again after the
break-up of our meeting, I suppose you were responsible for
that?' Castelnau's thin lips broke into a ghost of a smile, 'If
so, believe me, you will pay for it.'
'You have not seen him then today-this evening?'
'No, I did not even know that he had returned to Paris.' There
was a ring in the banker's voice which made it difficult for his
questioners to doubt that he was telling them the truth.
'Where does he live when he is in Paris?' the Duke enquired.
'I do not know. I have visited him at many places. Often he
stays with various friends, who are also interested in his
practices, but he has no permanent address. The people with whom
he was staying last left Paris some months ago for the
Argentine, so I have no idea where you are likely to find him
now.'
'Where do you meet him when these Satanic gatherings take
place?'
'I am sorry but I can't tell you.' The Frenchman's voice was
firm.
De Richleau padded softly forward and thrust the little Mstol
into Castefnau's ribs, just under his heart. 'I am afraid 'ou've
got to,' he purred silkily. 'The matter that we are engaged upon
is urgent.'
, The banker held his ground, and to outward appearances
remained unruffled at the threat. 'It is no good,' he said
quietly, I cannot do it, even if you intend to murder me. Each
one of us goes into a self-induced hypnotic trance before
proceeding to these meetings, and wakes upon his arrival. In my
conscious state I have no idea how I get there; so this apache
attitude of yours is completely useless.'
'I see.' De Richleau nodded slowly and withdrew the automatic.
'However, you are going to tell me just the same, because it
happens that I am something of a hypnotist. I shall put you
under now, and we shall proceed to follow all the stages of your
unconscious journey.'
For the first time Castelnau's face showed a trace of fear.
'You can't,' he muttered quickly. 'I won't let you.'
De Richleau shrugged. 'Your opposition will make it slightly
more difficult, but I shall do it, nevertheless. However, as it
may take some time, we will make fresh arrangements in order to
ensure that we are not disturbed. Press the bell, and when your
servant comes, give him definite instructions that as we shall
be engaged in a long conference, upon no pretext whatsoever are
you to be disturbed.'
'And if I refuse?' Castelnau's dark eyes suddenly flashed
rebellion.
'Then you will never live to give another order. The affair we
are engaged upon is desperate, and whatever the consequences may
be, I shall shoot you like the rat you are. Now ring.' De
Richleau put the pistol in his pocket but still held the banker
covered, and after a moment's hesitation Castelnau pressed the
bell.
'You, Richard,' the Duke said in a sharp whisper, 'will leave
us when the servant has taken his instructions. Wait for us with
Marie Lou in the entrance hall. You have your gun. Prevent
anyone leaving the apartment until we have finished. Open the
door to anyone who rings yourself, and if Mocata arrives, as he
may at any moment, don't argue-shoot. I take all
responsibility.'
'I am only waiting for the chance,' said Richard grimly, just
as the servant entered.
Castelnau gave his orders in an even voice, with one eye upon
the Duke's pocket, then Richard, in his normal voice, remarked
casually:
'Well, since the matter is confidential, I had better wait
outside with rny wife until you are through,' and followed the
elderly alpaca-coated man out into the hall.
'Rex,' De Richleau lost not an instant once the door was
closed. Take that telephone receiver off its stand so that we
are not interrupted by any calls. And you,' he turned to the
banker, 'sit down in that chair.'
'I won't!' exclaimed Castelnau furiously. 'This is abominable.
You invade my apartment like brigands. I give you such
information as I can, but what you are about to do will bring me
into danger, and I refuse-I refuse, I tell you.'
'I shall neither argue with you nor kill you,' De Richleau
answered frigidly, 'You are too valuable to me alive. Rex, knock
him out!'
Castelnau swung round and threw up his arms in a gesture of
defence, but Rex broke through his guard. The young American's
mighty fist caught him on the side of the jaw and he crumpled
up, a still heap on his own hearth-rug.
When the banker came to he found himself sitting in a straight
chair; his hands were lashed to the back and his ankles to the
legs with the curtain cords. His head ached abominably and he
saw De Richleau standing opposite to him, smiling relentlessly
down into his face.
'Now,' said the Duke, 'look into my eyes. The sooner we get
this business over the sooner you will be able to get to bed and
nurse your sore head. I am about to place you under, and you are
going to tell us what you do when you go to these satanic
meetings.'
For answer Castelnau quickly closed his eyes and lowered his
head on to his chest, resisting De Richleau's powerful
suggestion with all the force of his will.
This doesn't look to me as though it's going to be any too
easy,' Rex muttered dubiously. 'I've always thought that it was
impossible to hypnotise people if they were unwilling. You'd
better let me put the half-Nelson on him until he becomes more
amenable and sees reason.'
'That might make him agree verbally,' De Richleau replied,
'but it won't stop him lying to us afterwards, and it is quite
possible to hypnotise people against their will. It is often
done to lunatics in asylums. Get behind him now, hold back his
head and lift his eyelids with your fingers so that he cannot
close them. We've got to find out about this place. It is our
only hope of geting on to Mocata.'
Rex did as he was bid. The Duke stood before the chair, his