His mind, as though on a pendulum, swung between rage and fear.
If they came for him he would make them pay dearly!
But his anger was as nothing to his dread at the thought of capture. He had always promised himself he wouldn't be taken alive. He could never endure the shame of appearing in court, of hearing the charges against him read out in public. An even greater terror, barely acknowledged, lay beneath the surface of his thoughts.
What did they know of his past? Would he be called to account for it?
His first intimation of the net being spread for him had come the previous day at Folkestone station when he had gone there to collect Mrs Aylward. He saw his own face on a poster affixed to the noticeboard in the ticket hall.
Less than half an hour later, when driving his employer home, they had come on a police roadblock on the outskirts of town. A line of motorcycles was drawn up at the side of the road and the drivers were being questioned.
Pike, at the wheel of Mrs Aylward's Bentley, was waved through, but already he had felt the iron jaws of the trap closing on him.
He knew he had to leave the district. Once Mrs Troy's body was discovered the police would be going from door to door searching for Grail. Even if they didn't connect him with Pike, the face on the poster and in the artist's sketches published in the newspapers would be fresh in their minds.
But his motorcycle, hidden for the present in a field behind the stables, was useless to him now. Even the bus seemed fraught with peril. How did he know the police weren't stopping public vehicles as well?
He had lain awake most of the night, seeking a solution to his dilemma. It came to him the following morning, but by that time he was half-way to Dover.
The answer lay in the car he was driving! Dressed in his chauffeur's uniform he could go where he chose and not be stopped. They were looking for motorcyclists.
The idea struck him with such force he almost pulled off the road at once in order to deal with the lesser problem of Mrs Aylward's presence in the back seat. But he checked himself in time. He needed several hours' start before the alarm was raised, and that could only be achieved if he travelled by night.
He would leave when the household was asleep and his absence would not be noted until morning. Once he was well away, he could abandon the car, and then … and then…?
His mind clawed at the question. But this time he could find no answer.
The future was blank.
Henceforth he must live as an outlaw, his face displayed in police stations and public buildings throughout the land, while the beast within him grew stronger and more demanding.
The future was chaos.
Pike went through the stone-pillared gateway into the stableyard. The lights were on in the kitchen, where the maid was preparing Mrs Aylward's dinner. He understood from some remarks he'd overheard that Mrs Rowley, the cook, wouldn't be coming in that evening. She had telephoned to say she was unwell. It made no difference to him. He planned on leaving the house — and Mrs Aylward's employment — within the next few hours.
The Bentley was parked across the cobbled yard in the old stables. Pike shut the doors behind him and switched on the light. His room on the floor above was swept clean. Nearly everything he wanted to take with him was already packed in the car. His clothes and his military uniform, together with his rifle, were stowed in the boot. Earlier that day, while Mrs Aylward was lunching in Dover, he had purchased a five gallon can and filled it with petrol as a fuel reserve.
The can shared the back seat with a tarpaulin-wrapped bundle, which served to wedge it securely in place.
He was almost ready to leave. He needed only to retrieve his canvas bag, which was still in the sidecar of his motorcycle. He had had to make two trips from Rudd's Cross on Sunday night to clear the shed and remove all traces of his presence from the cottage. He hoped the police were still puzzling over what had occurred there. (How would they interpret the disappearance of Biggs?) His bag contained the silver ornaments he'd taken from Mrs Troy's cabinet. He wanted to get well away from Knowlton before he disposed of them. There was just a chance — the slimmest of possibilities — that Carver the chauffeur would not be linked in the minds of the police to either Pike or Grail. That his absconding with Mrs Aylward's Bentley would be marked down as straightforward theft. He meant to leave as few clues to his identity as possible. The longer he could keep them guessing the better.
Pike unbolted the rear door of the stables and stepped outside. Darkness was falling. A high brick wall only a few paces from where he stood marked the boundary of the property. Beyond it was a field, which also belonged to Mrs Aylward — it had come with the purchase of the house and had been used by the previous owner as a paddock for his horses. Now it served no purpose and was overgrown. Pike had parked his motorcycle at the bottom of it under the cover of overhanging bushes.
There was an iron gate in the wall, giving access to the field, but Pike walked past it to a smaller, wooden gate, which opened on to a path that ran alongside the field in the shadow of an untrimmed hedge. Just as it was natural for him to use the cover of the hedge, so he walked soft-footed, making hardly any sound as he padded through the darkness.
He had gone no more than twenty yards when he heard a cough, and stopped dead in his tracks.
The sound came from his left, where the field stretched. He crouched down at once, reaching for the bayonet that swung from his belt, motionless in the inky shadows. After a minute he heard a man's voice.
He was speaking softly and Pike couldn't hear what he was saying. He fixed his gaze on the direction from which the sound had come. Beyond the edge of the field, at the far limit of the horizon, the sky was the colour of pearl, glowing faintly with the last rays of the sun. Against this pale backdrop — and visible only for a second, as the man changed position on the ground — he presently glimpsed a familiar shape: the unmistakable outline of a policeman's helmet.
Pike dropped to his stomach and, without pausing, began to crawl back the way he had come. He was practised in the action — he had done it countless times — but the peril he faced now seemed far greater than the dangers he had risked among the mud choked shell-holes and barbed wire of no man's land.
In little more than a minute he was back at the wooden gate. He slid through it on his belly and only when he had regained the protection of the brick wall did he spring to his feet and run to the stable door.
The situation was clear to him. He had understood all in a flash. These were not officers coming to the house on routine inquiries. The presence of the police in the field meant there were others nearby. In all likelihood the house was already surrounded. They knew who he was and had come to arrest him.
His mind screamed a silent refusal.
They would never take him.
His first impulse was to seize his rifle and bayonet and charge the constables crouched in the grass. Shoot them! Bayonet them! Break through their flimsy cordon and run free into the night.
Madness bloomed like a red flower in his brain. But sanity still had a foothold there, and he paused, panting, beside the Bentley.
Where would they go first? To the house, or the stables?
The answer was obvious. They knew where to find him. Mrs Rowley would have seen to that. The cook who was unwell, who wouldn't be in that evening.
He went quickly to the main doors and opened them a crack. The stableyard was empty. So was the lighted kitchen. Either the maid was upstairs, busy in Mrs Aylward's bedroom, or the police were already inside, clearing the house of its occupants. He switched off the light in the stable and opened the doors wide. He needed to create a diversion. Luckily the means were at hand.