“You disturb yourself without cause,” Baradi said. “She is buying herself a silver goat. Why not? It is a good omen.”
“Already she’s been away half-an-hour.”
“She had gone for a walk, no doubt.”
“With him.”
“Again, why not? The infatuation is entirely on one side. Let it alone.”
“I am unusually interested and therefore nervous,” said Mr. Oberon. “It means more to me, this time, than ever before and besides the whole circumstance is extraordinary. The mystic association. The blood-sacrifice and then, while the victim is still here, the other, the living sacrifice. It is unique.”
Baradi looked at him with curiosity. “Tell me,” he said, “how much of all this”—he made a comprehensive gesture —“means anything to you? I mean I can understand the, what shall I call it, the factual pleasure. That is a great deal. I envy you your flair. But the esoteric window-dressing — is it possible that for you—?” He paused. Mr. Oberon’s face was as empty as a mask. He touched his lips with the tip of his tongue.
He said: “Wherein, if not in my belief, do you suppose the secret of my flair is to be found? I am what I am and I go back to beyond the dawn. I was the King of the Wood.”
Baradi examined his own shapely hands. “Ah, yes?” he said politely. “A fascinating theory.”
“You think me a poseur?”
“No, no. On the contrary. It is only as a practical man I am concerned with the hazards of the situation. You, I gather, though you have every cause, are not at all anxious on that account? The Truebody situation, I mean?”
“I find it immeasurably stimulating.”
“Indeed,” said Baradi drily.
“Only the absence of the girl disturbs me. It is almost dark. Turn on the light.”
Baradi reached out his hand to the switch. There was a click.
“No lights, it seems,” he said and opened the door. “No lights anywhere. There must be a fuse.”
“How can she be walking in the dark? And with a cripple like Robin? It is preposterous.”
“The British do these things.”
“I am British. I have my passport. Telephone the bureau in Roqueville.”
“The telephone is still out of order.”
“We must have light.”
“It may be a fault in the house. The servants will attend to it. One moment.”
He lifted the receiver from Mr. Oberon’s telephone. A voice answered.
“What is the matter with the lights?” Baradi asked.
“We cannot make out. Monsieur. There is no fault here. Perhaps the storm has brought down the lines.”
“Nothing but trouble. And the telephone? Can one telephone yet to Roqueville?”
“No, Monsieur. The centrale sent up a man. The fault is not in the Château. They are investigating. They will ring through when the line is clear.”
“Since yesterday afternoon we have been without the telephone. Unparalleled incompetence!” Baradi ejaculated, “Have Mr. Herrington and Mlle. Taylor returned?”
“I will enquire, Monsieur.”
“Do so, and ring Mr. Oberon’s apartments if they are in.”
He clapped down the receiver. “I am uneasy,” he said. “It has happened at a most tiresome moment. We have only the girl Teresa’s account of the affair at the factory. No doubt she is speaking the truth. Having found the boy, they are satisfied. All the same it is not too amusing, having had the police in the factory.”
“Callard will have handled them with discretion.”
“No doubt. The driver, Georges Martel, however, will be examined by the police.”
“Can he be trusted?”
“He has too much at stake to be anything but dependable. We pay him very highly. Also he has his story. He was rung up by an unknown client purporting to be the boy’s father. He took the job in good faith and merely asked the girl Teresa to accompany him. They know nothing. The police will at once suspect the former kidnappers. Nevertheless, I wish we had not attempted the affair with the boy.”
“One wanted to rid oneself of the parents.”
“Exactly. Of the father. If circumstances were different,” Baradi said softly, “I should not be nearly so interested in ridding myself of Mama. Women!” he ejaculated sententiously.
“Woman!” Mr. Oberon echoed with an inexplicable laugh and added immediately: “All the same I am getting abominably anxious. I don’t trust him. And then, the light! Suppose it doesn’t come on again before the Rites. How shall we manage?”
“Something can be done with car batteries, I think, and a soldering iron. Mahomet is ingenious in such matters. I shall speak to him in a moment.”
Baradi walked over to the window and pulled back the silk blind. “It is quite dark.” The blind shot up with a whirr and click.
“It really is much too quick on the trigger,” he observed.
Mr. Oberon said loudly: “Don’t do that! You exacerbate my nerves. Pull it down. Tie it down.”
And while Baradi busied himself with the blind he added: “I shall send out. My temper is rising and that is dangerous. I must not become angry. If his car his gone I shall send after it.”
“I strongly suggest you do nothing of the sort. It would be an unnecessary and foolish move. She will return. Surely you have not lost your flair.”
Mr. Oberon, in the darkness, said: “You are right. She will return. She must.”
“As for your rising temper,” said Baradi, “you had better subdue it. It is dangerous.”
Chapter XI
P. E. Garbel
i
Raoul slowed down at a point above the entrance to the tunnel.
“Where should we leave the car, Monsieur?”
“There’s a recess off the road, on the far side, near the tunnel and well under the lee of the hill. Pull in there.”
The silhouette of the Chèvre d’Argent showed black above the hills against a clearing but still stormy sky. A wind had risen and cloud-rack scurried across a brilliant display of stars.
“Gothic in spirit,” Alleyn muttered, “if not in design.”
The road turned the headland. Raoul dropped to a crawl and switched off his lights. Alleyn used a pocket torch. When they came down to the level of the tunnel exit he got out and guided Raoul into a recess hard by the stone facing.
Raoul dragged out a marketing basket from which the intermingled smells of cabbage, garlic and flowers rose incongruously on the rain-sweetened air.
“Have you hidden the cloaks underneath?” Alleyn asked him.
“Yes, Monsieur. It was an excellent notion. It is not unusual for me to present myself with such gear. The aunt of Teresa is a market-gardener.”
“Good. We’ll smell like two helpings of a particularly exotic soup.”
“Monsieur?”
“No matter. Now, Raoul, to make certain we understand each other will you repeat the instructions?”
“Very well, Monsieur. We go together to the servants’ entrance. If, by mischance, we encounter anybody on the way who recognizes Monsieur, Monsieur will at once say he has come to enquire for the sick Mademoiselle. I will continue on and will wait for Monsieur at the servants’ entrance. If Monsieur, on arriving there, is recognized by one of the servants who may not yet have left, he will say he has been waiting for me and is angry. He will say he wishes to speak to Teresa about the stealing of Riki. If, on the other hand, all goes well and we reach the servants’ quarters together and unchallenged, we go at once to Teresa’s room. Monsieur is seen but not recognized, he is introduced as the intellectual cousin of Teresa who has been to England, working in a bank, and has greatly improved his social status, and again we retire quickly to Teresa’s room before the Egyptian valet or the butler can encounter Monsieur. In either case, Teresa is to give a message saying it has come by a peasant on a bicycle. It is to say that Mr. Herrington’s car has broken down but that Miss Taylor and he will arrive in time for the party. Finally, if Monsieur does not come at all, I wait an hour then go to seek for him.”