She shrugged. “It is not pleasant, but it is necessary. What can I do to help?”
“My rucksack is in the loft — in it there is a little bottle of iodine — if you could fetch me that.” The Duke knelt down again as he spoke.
Rex leant on Simon’s chest, and pressed the cloth over his mouth. “You fit?” he asked.
“Yes.” De Richleau straddled Simon’s legs. “Now,” he said. “Hold him tight”
For a moment nothing happened, then Simon gave a sudden squeal — his eyes opened, and he wiggled his head wildly as he glared at Rex.
“Take a pull, Simon — all over in a minute,” Rex tried to soothe him.
“I’ve got it,” gasped the Duke, in triumph. “You can let him go.” Rex released his grasp on the unfortunate Simon.
“There,” said De Richleau, holding out the round lead bullet, much as a dentist might a first tooth that he had removed from a frightened child. “Look, you would have had all sorts of trouble from that later!”
Simon looked — and then looked away, groaning, the wound had begun to well blood rapidly again.
Marie Lou began to try and staunch it. “What have you done?” she cried, angrily. “The poor little one — see how you have made him bleed!”
“No matter, it will heal all the better now we have the bullet,” smiled the Duke, taking the iodine from her.
“Now, Simon, my son, this is going to hurt.”
“Like hell it is,” agreed Rex, feelingly.
“Listen,” the Duke went on. “The soldiers are perhaps searching for us in the woods at this very moment If you cry out you may bring them upon us. Can you bear it, do you think, or shall Rex gag you again?”
Simon groaned, and looked from side to side. “Give me the cloth,” he said, in a faint whisper.
They passed it to him, and he took it between his teeth, then nodded feebly. Marie Lou held one of his hands tightly in hers.
De Richleau applied the antiseptic — Simon gave a shudder and lay still.
“He’s done another faint,” said Rex.
“All the better,” murmured the Duke. “I can make a more thorough job of it.”
When Simon came to again his thigh was nearly bandaged.
“You’ll feel fine now.” Rex patted him on the shoulder. “We are going to pop you right between the blankets.”
Simon nodded, feebly.
“I killed him,” he said. “That’s two I killed, isn’t it?”
“Sure,” Rex laughed. “Al Capone won’t have anything on you when you come to see me in the States next fall!”
“We must get him up to the loft — can you manage, Rex?” De Richleau asked. “I’m almost useless with this shoulder of mine. It has begun to bleed again already.”
“I’ll make it — don’t worry,” Rex assured him. “I’ll go up backwards. You steady his game leg.” Very gently he took Simon under the armpits, and lifted him off the ground. He held him dangling in front of him as though he were a little child.
To negotiate the ladder of shelves was no easy task, but it was accomplished, and above Marie Lou had prepared a bed of rugs and skins. De Richleau delved into his knapsack again and produced a bottle of morphine tablets.
“It is fortunate,” he said, “that this is not my first campaign — I never travel without iodine and morphia.”
Simon was made as comfortable as possible, and given a couple of the tablets. The others went below to clear up the mess.
“How long do you figure it’ll be before he can be moved?” Rex asked.
“If he were in London I should say a fortnight at least,” the Duke replied. “Although it is only a flesh wound; here we must move when and how we can. After tonight’s affair the chances are, I suppose, about a thousand to one against our getting away from here alive.”
“I wish to God I’d never met old Shulimoff,” sighed Rex.
De Richleau smiled. “I fear we shall never see those famous jewels.”
“No, we’ll never sit round fingering those pretties now!”
Marie Lou had just finished ramming the last of the bloodstained cloths into the stove. “Did you say, Monsieur, that you had met Prince Shulimoff?” she asked.
At that moment there came a heavy knocking on the door.
XIX — Hidden Corn
De Richleau signalled Rex towards the cupboard with a wave of his hand. The American, with a lightness surprising in so large a man, tiptoed across the room.
The knocking came again, more persistently this time.
“What is it?” called Marie Lou, in an angry voice.
“Open!” cried a voice, in Russian. “Open in the name of the Soviets!”
De Richleau saw the iodine bottle, with its London label. He snatched it up quickly, and thrust it in his pocket.
“I am coming,” cried Marie Lou. “One moment, I must get some clothes. She began to undo the scarf at her neck, and at the same time held out her booted foot to the Duke. He understood, and quickly pulled off first one boot then the other.
“Open!” cried the voice again. “Do not delay.”
The Duke smiled at Marie Lou reassuringly, and held up his big automatic for her to see, then, like a shadow, he disappeared into the cupboard.
She arranged the curtain carefully, took a last look round, and ran to the door.
Two police officers, a civilian, and the kulak, Rakov, stood on the threshold. “What do you want?” she asked, angrily.
The civilian pushed her aside and walked into the cottage. One of the policemen answered her.
“We search, Comrade, for three politicals — foreigners. It is believed that you gave them shelter here, in your cottage.”
“Here?” she exclaimed, her blue eyes wide with astonishment. “I have seen no one.”
The civilian had been examining the inner room, which was her bedroom. He turned to her. “I am of the Ogpu, Comrade, what is your work?”
“She is a teacher in the school,” the policeman answered for her — he was a local man and knew her well.
“How long have you been in bed?” asked the member of the Ogpu.
“I have not been to bed,” she replied, promptly.
“You keep late hours,” he said, suspiciously, “here in the country — later than we do in Moscow.”
“If I am to teach, I must learn,” said Marie Lou. “I read late if I cannot sleep.”
“Till one o’clock in the morning?” said the man. He was tall and thin and menacing. “Come, these men were with you earlier tonight?”
She shook her head.
“You,” said the man, sharply, to Rakov. “This woman wished to buy horses of you tonight — is that not so?”
Rakov bowed obsequiously — his straggly beard almost touched the level of his hands, which were hidden, Chinese-fashion, in the sleeves of his kaften. “Yes, master, horses and a sleigh.”
“There are no masters now,” snapped the thin man, irritably. He turned on the girl. “What have you to say, Comrade?”
“He lies, the greedy kulak — he lies in hope of reward. He would kill his mother for an egg,” Marie Lou said hotly.
“Oh — ou — ou.” Rakov laughed a greasy laugh, his thin lips drew back and his long narrow nose almost met his chin. “To say that I lie — Rakov lies! It is well known that I give all that I have to the Soviets. I am an upright man!”
“You are a thief, and a hider of corn,” Marie Lou went on, accusingly. De Richleau, with his ear to a crack in the floor overhead, smiled as he heard her attack.