The light stood still. Whoever it was must have put it down somewhere, because the footsteps went on, growing fainter.
She was just beginning to breathe again when her blood froze. A groan had come from below. There was a muffled cry, as though of terror and surprise, and then, almost at once, the sound of two sets of feet, one running from the other. A crash like the clap of doom told of the collapse of some piece of furniture, evidently laden with bric-a-brac. A door slammed, and the noise of the pursuit dwindled rapidly. Marianne heard a second and much fainter cry followed by the faint but horrible sound of a death-rattle. Somewhere, in the house or garden, a person was dying… After that, nothing. Only an overpowering silence.
Striving to still the thudding of her heart which seemed to echo through the silence like a cathedral bell, Marianne left her hiding place and tiptoed nervously towards the stairs, since there appeared to be no other way out. She reached them, but the sight which met her eyes froze her where she stood.
The stairs ran down to a noble hall sombrely furnished and hung with long tapestries and paintings in the style of Tiepolo, but to Marianne the room looked like a battlefield. A tall candlestick stood on a long stone table and nearby lay the bodies of the two black servants whose living voices she had never even heard. One was on the floor beside an overturned chair, the other lay across the table. Both had died in the same way, stuck through the heart with merciless precision.
But there was a third body, lying right across the lowest steps. Matteo Damiani sprawled with eyes wide open on an eternity of horror and the blood from his severed throat spreading in slowly widening pools over the dripping steps.
'He is dead!' Marianne said aloud, half-unconsciously, and the sound of her own voice seemed to come from an immense distance. 'Someone has killed him – but who?'
The horror of it was mingled in her with a savage joy that was almost painful in its intensity, the instinctive joy of the torture victim who finds the dead body of the torturer stretched suddenly at her feet. Some unknown hand had simultaneously avenged both the murdered Prince Sant'Anna and the sufferings of Marianne herself.
Abruptly, the instinct of self-preservation reasserted itself. There would be time to rejoice later, when she was safely out of this nightmare, supposing she ever got out of it, for there were only three bodies in the room. Where was Ishtar? Was it the black witch who had slain her master? She was certainly capable of it but, if that were so, why had she also killed the other two women of her own race whom she called her sisters? Then, there had been that other cry, the sounds of pursuit and that dying groan… Was that Ishtar? And, if so, who was the author of this slaughter?
Since her arrival at this accursed palace, Marianne had learned nothing of its inhabitants save for Matteo himself and the three negresses and the oily Giuseppe. Yet Giuseppe did not possess the physical strength to overcome a man like Damiani, far less Ishtar. Yet there might be other servants and it was possible that one of them had done this, for reasons of his own.
It occurred to her at this point that the murderer might well return and would not necessarily make any distinction between herself and his earlier victims. She fought off her sense of paralysing horror. She must not stay here. She had to escape from this charnel hell, walk down the stairs, past the red stains at their foot and past the body in its bloodstained golden robe with its hideous gaping wound and its staring eyes.
Shuddering, she crept down, flattening her back against the marble baluster, towards the dark red pools which now gleamed with an oily sheen as they congealed.
She gathered her dress up in trembling hands to keep it from contact with the blood, but could do nothing to save her shoes.
As she went down, she could not drag her eyes away from Matteo's body. They were drawn by the fascination of horror which afflicts imaginative minds, when they have not fainted outright.
So it was that she became aware of the nature of a curious heap of metal lying on the dead man's chest: it was made up of chains, a prisoner's chains and shackles. They were old and fairly rusty but they were unlocked and evidently placed there deliberately.
However, Marianne wasted no time on this latest mystery. A rush of panic swept over her and as soon as her feet touched the ground she began to run down the hall, too much in the grip of fear to care how much noise she made. She plunged through the double doors which stood half-open, without a thought for the murderer who might be lurking outside, and found herself in the entrance hall.
As it happened, it was empty. The two ship's lanterns she remembered were alight and the garden door was also open.
Not checking in her stride, Marianne sped towards it and went down the steps leading to the shadowy garden at breakneck speed in her haste to reach the door to the canal. That, too, stood open, giving a glimpse of the sheen on dark water.
Freedom! Freedom was there, within reach…
She was swerving to avoid the vague shape of the wellhead which loomed clearer as her eyes became accustomed to the dark, when she stumbled and fell headlong over something warm and soft. This time she almost screamed aloud, for the thing which had tripped her was a human form. Her hands encountered damp, silken cloth, and by the exotic scent, mingled with the sweet, sickening smell of blood, Marianne knew that it was Ishtar. So, that death cry had been hers. The mysterious killer had not spared her, any more than her sisters.
Choking back a hysterical sob, she was about to rise when suddenly she felt the body move under her and heard a feeble groan. The dying woman muttered something Marianne could not understand and, instinctively, she bent closer to hear, lifting the head a little as she did so.
In the dimness, she was aware of the black woman's hands moving, groping like a blind person's at the supporting arms, but she felt no fear. The woman was dying: nothing now remained of her phenomenal strength. Then, suddenly, she heard words:
'The… the Master!… Forgive… oh, forgive…'
The head fell back. Ishtar was dead. Marianne laid her down on the ground and got up quickly, but stopped dead as she turned towards the door.
Framed in the opening, two figures had appeared on the small landing. There was no mistaking their military outline and they were followed by others, less clear.
'But, officer, I heard screams, I assure you, frightful screams,' came a woman's voice. 'And now this door open – and that other, up there, at the head of the stairs. It's not right. I always thought there was something funny going on here. If people had only listened to me…'
'Quiet everybody!' A rough voice broke in authoritatively. 'We'll search the house from top to bottom. If there's been a mistake made, then we'll apologize, of course. But it'll go hard with you, my good woman, if you've brought us on a wild-goose chase!'
'I'm quite sure I haven't, officer. You'll thank me, I daresay. I've always said that house was a wicked place.'
'Well, we'll soon see. Bring up some light, there!'
Slowly, holding her breath, Marianne backed away, half-crouching, into the shelter of the dark walled garden which lay beyond a stone arch. It seemed to run parallel with the canal. Her instinct told her that it would not do for her to be seen by the soldiers or by any of these people who, however well-intentioned, were a great deal too inquisitive. She could guess only too well what would happen if she were found, the only one alive in a house full of corpses. How could she expect them to believe her terrible but, on the face of it, improbable tale? At best they would take her for a madwoman and probably lock her up again, and in any case she would be detained by the police and questioned endlessly. Previous experience at Selton Hall, after her duel with Francis Cranmere, had taught her how easily the truth can be distorted. Her dress, her shoes, her hands were all stained with blood. She might very easily be accused of fourfold murder, and then what would become of her rendezvous with Jason?