The bells chimed for one in the morning: all shops and cafés in the Plaza closed. The waiters came from within, dressed in their old coats, with turned-up collars; their feet passed away, some to the old town, some to the north, till the town was almost silent. A cat or two went stealthily or swiftly across the Plaza. A little brown owl flew across crying a note that was querulous and sad. Out in the harbour, some watchman whose clock was slow made two bells.
Sard stayed in his chair, wondering.
He had no wish to sleep: he only wanted a new direction for his life. He was going to strike at life until he found one. “I will stay here,” he thought, “till I can see what I can do.”
He had thought of many ways of life as desirable, after he had once held command at sea. Now his old desire of command was gone. He wanted no more of the sea, but to come ashore and begin anew, without any dreams to mislead him, nothing but the work to do and the honour to earn from it. Why should he not come ashore, to bear a hand under Don Manuel? Great things were being done there: a great state was rising.
Thinking over all this, he had the fancy that someone, or rather not someone, something, was watching him from the central House of Sorrow. It became more than fancy with him that something evil, like a vast black cat, was watching him there. He turned to the house, to face it, whatever it was, but could see nothing there, save the green verandah, the windows blank and sightless, the walls morphewed with scaling. Then the central door opened, a man came out, locked the door behind him and then stood surveying the Plaza. As Sard was the only person there, he stared at Sard, who stared back. He was a shortish, very strongly made man, with the rangey boss movement of a young bull on pasture.
There was something dangerous about him. He tossed his head back, which flashed his earrings and emphasised the raffish sideways cock of his hat. There was something familiar about him: he reminded Sard of that “flash townee,” Sumecta, who had sat with Mr. Wiskey at the boxing-match.
The man strode off the doorstep on to the pavement. He gave his hat a further cock, still staring at Sard, almost with challenge, then he pulled a coloured handkerchief from a side pocket and blew his nose at Sard. As he drew the handkerchief something glimmered out with it and fell into the dust of the gutter. The man was plainly Sumecta, and the blowing of the nose was as the range-bull’s bellow at a rival. Sard tilted back his chair to watch him. Sumecta advanced to Sard, who waited for him, humming.
“You’re out here kind of late,” Sumecta said.
“Am I?”
Sumecta sharpened his tone. “Have you got a match?”
“Yes.” There was a pause: the two men watched each other. Presently Sumecta said: “Can I have the match? I’d like it.”
“Would you?”
“Yes.”
Sard went on with his humming but kept an eye lifting lest some other waif of the night should come. Sumecta took a half-step nearer.
“For two pins,” he said, “I’d bash your face in.”
Sard went on humming, but drew two pins from the lapel of his coat and offered them.
“What d’you mean?” Sumecta said.
“Two pins. There was going to be bashing.”
“You’re a funny dog, aren’t you?” Sumecta said. He edged away from Sard but kept his eyes upon him. He had the flash cock to his hat, a mouth with a tooth gone and a swollen nose. He edged away with his eyes on Sard till he was off the Plaza and going down the stair. Sard edged his chair a little round so that he might follow Sumecta as he went. When Sumecta was out of sight Sard swiftly and silently stepped aside in case Sumecta should rush back for a sudden shot. But no shot came, Sumecta was gone: his steps were dying away. Sard was alone again.
Being alone, he stepped swiftly to where the glimmering thing had dropped into the gutter. As he had expected, it was a door key: he picked it up. “If he had been reasonably polite,” he said to himself, “he should have had it. As it is, he shall do without it. And now, if I’m to be at the palace at seven I had better be off to turn in.”
He had pocketed the key and turned to the head of the stair on his way to bed, when he heard someone hurrying to the stair-foot. For the moment, he judged that it was Sumecta come back to shoot him, but a glance showed that it was a much younger, slighter man. He came running up the stairs, looked about the Plaza for someone, and hailed Sard with: “Oh, your Excellency?” It was Hilary Kingsborough.
“His Excellency has gone, Mr. Kingsborough,” Sard said. “He has been gone about half an hour.”
“Curse,” the young man said. “But who are you who know my name? O, you are the Mr. What’s-his-name, who warned me that night. Where has His Excellency gone, do you know?”
“Back to the palace to bed.”
“Curse. They told me there that I should find him here. I’ve been hunting for him and just missing him ever since I landed at ten o’clock. I must find him.”
Sard was struck by the high, shrill, feverish excitement of the young man’s speech; his face was gaunt and burning: his body wasted.
“Let me come with you,” Sard said, “I’ll find you a cab, I’m afraid you’re ill.”
“Ill?” he said. “This thing is tearing me to pieces. Those devils shot me and took my sister. And I can’t find her, Mr., sir, no one can find her.”
“But she was found,” Sard said. “She was found at Tlotoatin. I read it in the paper here, only a few hours ago.”
“The paper was a damned lie,” the young man cried. “She isn’t found. We’ve no trace nor track of her. Good God, they are all in it, police, press, politicians, and I can’t get a word of truth, nor any clue of where she is. You said that they talked of Santa Barbara? For the love of God, now Mr. What’s-your-name (I can’t remember names), those devils whom you overheard, tell me the truth now, they said they were coming here.”
“Mr. Kingsborough,” Sard said, “they did. What is more, one of the men, whom I overheard, came out of that door not ten minutes ago.”
“What? You’ll swear that?”
“I don’t swear. He did. He went down those stairs, you must almost have met him.”
“Then Margarita may be in that house?”
“I don’t think that that can be,” Sard said. “It’s not very likely, is it?”
“Likely?” Hilary cried. “What is likely? She has disappeared and every power, here and in the Occidental, is behind the swine who took her. I’ve come here to see the Dictator, and I want you to see him, too, Mr., sir. Tell him that you know that they are a Santa Barbara gang and that he must find her.”
“All right I will,” Sard said. “I was to see him in a few hours’ time, but I will go to him at once instead. Only look here, Mr. Kingsborough, I have seen this Dictator. Since I have landed I have seen both himself and his police service. It is hardly credible or possible that Miss Kingsborough could have been brought here without the fact coming to his knowledge.”
“That is what I am saying,” Hilary said, “he is in it, with the gang, and so I’ll tell him to his face.”
“Mr. Kingsborough, he is not that kind of man. Be assured, he is one who will help you in every way.”
“He will,” Hilary said. “Why did his filthy press print that lie, that she is found? He is in this rum-smuggling business, as everybody knows. He is in the smugglers’ power; he has to let them do what they please. My sister may be in that house: very likely is! Well, I am going in, to see.”
“Wait just for one minute, Mr. Kingsborough,” Sard said. “You’ve been shot, you say; you are still ill. We have a Minister here who will have that house laid bare for us almost within the hour. We will find a cab and drive to the Embassy and have the house searched in the proper manner.”
“The proper manner,” Hilary said. “I don’t know of any proper manner with blackguards of this sort. Why should you try to keep me from saving my sister, you might be one of the gang yourself.”
Sard was about to answer soothingly, seeing the young man’s distress and nervous exhaustion, but as he opened his lips there came the cry of a woman from within the central house. It was the cry of one in despair. It rang out clearly and fully for an instant, then was stopped suddenly as by a blow or a gag.
“You heard that?” Hilary said. “That was my sister’s voice. She is inside there.”
“Listen a moment,” Sard said, “wait.”
“I’m not going to wait,” Hilary answered. “Wait for what? Till they’ve killed her?” He was half-way to the door, when Sard stopped him.
“Look here,” Sard said, “this may be the key of this door; the man dropped it. We’ll go in, if it is. Are you armed?”
“No; are you?”
“No,” Sard said, “but I’m used to rough houses. Are you?”
“No.”
“Well,” Sard said, “there’s only one rule in rough house fighting, and that is, be first. Come on.”
* * * * *
They crept to the door of the house. It looked more solid, close at hand. It had knopped iron plates across it: the fanlight was barred: the windows to each side were covered with old iron rejas. The house behind it was as silent as the grave. For a moment Sard thought of calling a civil guard, but put the thought from him, “I’m my own civil guard in a seaport town; besides, this gang is certain to have squared the police.” Both men listened: Sard tried the key.
The key fitted and turned. Very gently, lest the door should be upon a chain, Sard moved it ajar. He peered in. There was a smell of some gum or incense, like the smell of sweet leather. There was an ample hall, dark as old leather, with patches of light from the windows. He saw then what he had not suspected from without, that the windows were of an opaque glass. He edged into the hall, followed by Hilary. They stood together, inside the door, listening intently. Sard felt along the door to make sure how to open it. “It’s a latch door,” he whispered. “We’d better close it.”
“No, keep it open for our retreat,” Hilary whispered.
“Too risky,” he answered. “It might slam to, or be noticed from outside, or make a draught that would be noticed inside.”
“Better have a line of escape,” Hilary said.
“We’ll prop it, then,” Sard said. “Or will you stand guard while I explore?”
“No fear,” Hilary answered, “I’m going to find my sister.”
“Come on, then,” Sard said. “We’ll prop it.”
There was a mat just within the door. He lifted an edge of this so that it kept the door pressed to, but not shut. Hilary took a step into the room and stumbled on the well of the mat. He gasped out “God!” and then shook with a laugh which was noiseless but hysterical. His stumble crashed in that stillness like a shot. Sard squeezed his arm to steady him: then they both listened: then Hilary whispered:
“I hear a sort of scratching noise.”
Sard heard it too, and thought, at first, that it was the fidgeting of feet, then made sure that it was not that, nor yet the brushing of leaves upon a window, but some noise which he could not yet explain: it might be nothing but the breeze upon a ventilator. It was a constant flutter somewhere to their left; it came no nearer.
“It’s all right,” Hilary muttered.
“Seconds out of the ring,” Sard answered. “Come on, now. Time.” He could see almost nothing. He groped about the hall. It was soft to the feet with a closely-woven grass matting. He moved eight paces to his right and touched a wall or screen of wood: “wood panelling,” he decided. It ran from the front of the house into the house: it seemed to be the boundary wall of the hall on that side. He groped along it to the end, but found no door, nor any break in the panelling. A table stood near this wall; it bore a metal tray containing a visiting card nearly as big as a postcard.
Sard took the card and listened. He heard Hilary at a little distance breathing like a roaring horse. Sard wished that he would make less noise with his breathing. He crept across to him and told him so.
“You’re snorting like a horse yourself,” Hilary said.
“Have you found any door?”
“No. There’s no door on this side. Only a row of pegs for hats and a rack for whips, but the whips are gone.”
“Is it all panelling?”
“Yes, panelling; with two chairs.”
“The door will be at the back then,” Sard said. “Come to this wall at the back. What is that thing on the wall?”
“It looks like a painting,” Hilary said.
“It is a painting,” Sard said, “but the paint is running on it. And it doesn’t smell like paint.”
“Is there no door?”
“None. None that I can see,” Sard whispered.
“Let me see,” Hilary answered.
He peered close to the wall and groped along it with his fingers. There seemed to be no door there. It was panelling, as at the sides. High up in the centre of it was a trophy of a horned beast’s head: it looked like a giant goat’s head; something odd had been done to it. The smell of sweet leather was much stronger at that end of the hall. There were figures painted on the panels, at both sides of the trophy. The paint was trickling down the wall.
“Someone has been burning carib leaf,” Hilary whispered.
“There must be a door,” Sard whispered back. “Only it is let in flush with the panels. We must strike a light.”
“Go ahead then,” Hilary muttered.
At that instant there came a little suck of air, Sard’s propping gave way before it, the hall door shut to with a crash.
“I say, you are a pearl of a door-fastener,” Hilary said.
“Hush! Watch for a light.”
They watched; but no light showed and no sound came.
“Nobody stirring,” Sard said; “the breeze is rising. We must leave the door. Look there.”
“What?”
“A man looking in at the window at us.”
“Can he see us?”
“Not possibly.”
“Who is he?”
“I can’t see.”
“Is he a civil guard?”
“He’s not wearing a helmet.”
“Do you think he can be coming in here?”
“No. He would come in if he belonged here. There, he has gone. He was only some passer-by.”
“It’s an odd time of morning for a passer-by,” Hilary said. “There. It is striking two.”
“Look here,” Sard said, stooping down; “I’ve guessed the secret of this wall. It has no door; but it slides in grooves to and fro. They seem to have oiled the runners. I’m going to strike a light to see which way the thing runs. Hold this twine: it is tarry. I’ll light it. It will make a candle.”
He took a small hank of roping twine, lit it and held it to the wall. “Look here,” he said, “at what is on my hands: blood. This which I thought was oil is blood. There can be no doubt of that. They have spattered blood all over this wall here.”
“They have killed her, then!”
“Not they. This is not the blood of a murder,” Sard said. “Look, it is splashed high up on the wall. It has been flung from a cup at those images.”
It was undoubtedly so.
“This seems to be a pretty devilish place,” Hilary said.
“We will shame the devil before we leave it. Now come here, behind me, Mr. Kingsborough; dig your fingers into this panel; that’s you. Now, heave; heave and start her; oh, heave! handsomely, handsomely; she is moving.”
The heavy panel of the wall slowly slid away to their right. A waft of the smoke of burning carib leaf came into their faces, so that they tasted rather than smelled it. It was sickly to taste and dizzying to breathe. Sard stopped heaving at the panel and peered into the opening which they had made.
They were looking into a large room, which ran further back (that is, away from the Plaza front) than they had expected. There were some upright things, they could not see what, in the middle of the room; all very dim. To the right of these there was a brazier glowing faintly with charcoal on which carib leaf had been crumbled. Sard, who was nearest to the opening, felt at once that there was somebody there. His dream of the mountains came back to him with a shock. He called in a low voice:
“Miss Kingsborough!”
Her voice from the middle of the room answered faintly:
“Yes.”
“Margarita!” Hilary cried.
“She is tied to these uprights,” Sard said, as he pushed into the room. He could dimly see that she was there.
“All right, Miss Kingsborough,” he said, “we will soon have you out of here.”
“I’m here, Margarita,” Hilary said.
Sard reached back for his knife, which he had replaced at San Agostino. It was a small but very strong sheath-knife without a guard. Margarita spoke from her stake.
“Oh, be careful, Hilary! There are Indians here.”
“All right, dear,” Hilary said. “We’ve found you now. We won’t let the Indians hurt you.”
“Good Lord,” Sard said, “she is chained and padlocked as well as tied. Never mind, Miss Kingsborough, we will set you free.”
He took the chain, so as to bend the hasp of the padlock, but it was beyond his strength.
“Have you a hairpin, Miss Kingsborough; perhaps I can pick this lock.”
“No,” she said. As he felt along the stake, he found her hair all loose about her. He felt the foot of the stake. It was an unbarked bole of a tree dug deep into the earth and tamped well home. She was chained to it at waist and ankles.
“Catch hold of the stake, Mr. Kingsborough,” Sard said. “We may be able to heave it right out. Sway with us, Miss Kingsborough. We will give the word.”
He and Hilary got their arms about the stake and hove and hove again, with no more result than to make the stake tremble: it was like trying to pull down a growing tree.
“We’ll save you, Margarita,” Hilary kept saying. Sard could not clearly see how they could save her without a cold chisel and a mallet. He struck a match and lit another twist of twine, which burned for nearly forty seconds. He saw Margarita’s white face and great eyes, a strange room of a triangular shape, with a throne at the apex, another bole or tree, a few feet from them, but nothing which could serve as a weapon or a tool.
“Look here,” he said, “I must fetch in the police. Here’s my knife, Mr. Kingsborough. You stay here on guard while I run out and fetch some guardias.”
“They’ll all be bribed,” Hilary said.
“No police can be bribed to this point,” Sard answered. “I’ll have them here in three minutes. Cheer up, Miss Kingsborough.”
He listened: all was still in the house.
“It’s all right,” he said, “I’ll be back in five minutes.”
He hated leaving them, but there was nothing for it. A piece of carib leaf settled in the brazier with a little sigh.
“I’ll go then,” he said. “Look out.”
He crept out of the room and across the hall. When he was near the door, he stumbled on something which had not been there on his first journey.
As he stumbled forward over it, he heard Margarita call, “Look out, Hilary; the Indians!” He heard Hilary gasp, as though struck, and cry out, “Ah! would you?” At the same instant, as he himself rose from the floor of the hall, someone most active tackled him from behind, with a strangle-hold round the throat. He swung himself forward and hove the strangler off his feet, but did not make him loose his hold. He stumbled again on the thing on the floor and someone came at him from in front. He hit out and landed on a body, but somebody new caught him by the right arm and gave it a twist which nearly broke it. He hit one or two bodies and faces, but they were all Indians; it was like punching india-rubber; they hissed their breath in through their teeth and came on again. He reached the door; he got hold of the latch, but the door would not open. He got hold of the strangler’s arm and wrenched it against the iron of the door. Then somebody thrust him sideways; he stumbled on to somebody who was crouching; then, immediately, he was down, with three or four of these wild cats on top of him. In his rage at being brought down, he hit hard, but they were too many and seemed to see in the dark. He was mastered, bound, blindfolded and gagged. Then a couple of them picked him up like a sack and ran him along into the inner room. A man asked in good Spanish, “If the lad were dead?” An Indian replied, “That he still breathed.” They hove Sard against the upright bole. Though he writhed, he was helpless: he felt like a storm staysail made up for bending; they chained him there. He heard Margarita wail. Then an Indian—perhaps the man whom he had wrenched against the iron—hit him hard in body and face again and again and again.
Presently he stopped, and there was silence, save for a rustling, as though snakes were gliding away. Then a light appeared, someone laughed with satisfaction and twitched the bandage from Sard’s eyes.
Sard saw before him the Father Garsinton who had asked for a passage in thePathfinder. It was he, unmistakably, but changed indeed. He now wore a scarlet robe wrought with symbols, which gave him the appearance of a cardinal of the Middle Ages. He gave to Sard the impression of an overwhelming power devoted resolutely to the practice of evil. There was cruelty in every line, with enormous strength (and grace) to give the cruelty its part in the world.
The man snickered as he looked at his victims chained to the trees before him. He walked a few yards to and fro with his head up, smiling; he stretched his hands and a light came into his eyes. It was exactly as though he realised those gestures of freedom which would most hurt his prisoners. The face had been made hard and evil by the devil, but it had also been made tired. The flesh was puckered at the eyes; there was some loose flesh forming under the chin; the mouth was a shade out of condition. The scarlet skull-cap no doubt hid hair beginning to be grey or thin. The great want in the face was the want of horns sprouting from the brow; with those he would have been a complete devil.
“Well,” Sard said, “our friends know that we are here. You had better let us go before they come to fetch us.”
“You lie,” the man said. “Your friends do not know that you are here.”
“The Dictator of this Republic knows that we are here,” Sard ventured.
“The Dictator of this Republic is my good friend,” the man replied.
“My Consul is not; neither is my Minister,” Sard said. “You will find this kidnapping trade a poor one.”
“How?”
“By our friends.”
“You will find night burglary and knight-errantry poor trades, before your friends find you, young man. Who are you?”
“Undo these chains and I will show you.”
“You are a sailor; an English sailor, who missed his ship at Las Palomas,” the padre answered. “You are one of these ship’s dogs who run loose in foreign ports. A slave by day, a drunken criminal by night.”
“Less of a criminal than a dirty, foreign, woman-torturer.”
“I take you burgling; in the fact, sailor. What is your name?”
“A better name than yours.”
“Your name is Harker. My name is the Holy One.”
“I thought you looked lousy enough for a saint.”
“Do you know the laws about burgling in this land? We may kill burglars. We do kill them. Every day a corpse of a burglar is flung out. You have seen such. They are often sailors, unclaimed three days, then buried. I just tell you now, that your corpse will be flung out of here, in a little while, when I have finished with you. I shall not keep you long, but it will be before your friends come here, never fear.”
“You had better hurry up then,” Sard said, “for they will be here in ten minutes. And you had better not boast too much before witnesses of the crimes you plan.”
The man stepped swiftly up to Sard and slapped his cheek. When he tried to slap the other cheek, Sard, as a boxer, was too quick; he snapped at the hand and bit it; the man wrenched himself free.
“The trapped rat bites,” he said. “Very well.”
He did not seem to mind the bite, though it bled. He seemed to pass into a state of contemplation in which the body did not matter.
“Do you know what I am?” he asked. “I am the priest of evil. This triangle in which you stand is the temple of evil. These gallows posts to which you stand are the altars of evil. I am going to offer mass to evil, of bread and wine. Do you know what bread and what wine?”
“You drunken, dirty ass!” Sard said. “Mr. Kingsborough, who was here with me, has raised the town by this. You will be taken out, scrubbed with sand and canvas, and then jailed; so hold on all with your folly and let us go.”
“Mr. Kingsborough did not escape quite so easily, honest sailor,” the Holy One replied. “We are Dagoes, as you call them, here, not Englishmen; not Gringos; we are not sentimental in our earnest. Mr. Kingsborough paid the penalty of burglary. You, Madonna, lovely Margarita Kingsborough, will tell you. You saw what happened to your brother. Tell him.”
“I heard him groan from a blow, Mr. Harker,” Margarita said. “Then, when the lights went on, I saw him lying dead on the floor; the Indians dragged him out.”
“Correct,” the Holy One said. “He is dead. And you are helpless. Your fleet can’t help you, nor your Minister, nor your Consul, nor your State, nor any other of those things you believe in. You are in the hands of power. You are elements for power to sacrifice. You, man, are bread; you, woman, are wine; and I shall sacrifice your bread and wine, your blood and honour, your life and your chastity.”
“I knew a dirty talker like you once before,” Sard said. “He was a Portuguese babu on the mother’s side; his father was the port of Goa. He fell into the slime once at low tide; but even without that you could not tell him from filth.”
“I leave you to prepare yourselves,” the Holy One said. “I go to prepare myself for communion with my god, the god of evil, who will come down here, to eat of the bread and drink of the wine.” His head went back as he spoke, and his eyes lit up (they were light-brown rolling eyes) till they were like the eyes of a beast that sees in the dark. He began to pray as he stood; his head went even further back, till they could hardly see his lips moving; then he began to chant:
“I am a body and a hand that waitThy power, O Evil; use and make me greatWith lust and thirst for blood until I shineLike goat for rut, like wolf for murder, thine.”
“I am a body and a hand that waitThy power, O Evil; use and make me greatWith lust and thirst for blood until I shineLike goat for rut, like wolf for murder, thine.”
“I am a body and a hand that waitThy power, O Evil; use and make me greatWith lust and thirst for blood until I shineLike goat for rut, like wolf for murder, thine.”
“I am a body and a hand that wait
Thy power, O Evil; use and make me great
With lust and thirst for blood until I shine
Like goat for rut, like wolf for murder, thine.”
He moved off, swaying to the rhythm of his song, and possessed by his thought: he turned to look at his captives as he passed, but there seemed to be no speculation in his eyes, only a glare, such as the petroleuses have, in their eyes, in revolutions, in the days of frenzy. He passed out of that door through which the body of Hilary had been dragged. Sard reckoned that doors led out of the central house into the houses on each side. He made the note in his mind, “the man controls two houses; perhaps three; there may be twenty or thirty of them, living here.” The door clicked to behind the Holy One; Sard was alone with Margarita.
“Mr. Harker,” she said, “does anybody know that you are here?”
“No,” he answered. “It was false.”
“Or that my brother was here?”
“Nobody knows. And it is my fault. I ought not to have let your brother into this house without the police.”
“Why did you?”
“We heard you cry out.”
“I cried because I saw that I was near the street,” she said. “They were bringing me in here from inside there. I hoped that someone might hear.”
“We did hear. If we shout now, someone may hear.”
“At this time in the morning?”
“It is worth trying. Help! help! help!” he shouted. “Police! Murder! Help us here! Help! help! help!”
“It is useless,” she said. “When I cried, they drew the doors across; these doors are sound-proof.”
“Let us save our breath for the present,” he said. “The streets are deserted now. We will shout later, when there are more people stirring.”
She did not answer immediately; she thought and he knew that she thought, that there might not be a “later” for him. He put a strain upon his bonds to test them. His legs were tightly lashed, his arms were secure; his body was chained to the stake and that chain was racked.
“Mr. Harker,” Margarita said, “is there any chance of the men of your ship coming to look for you?”
“No,” he said, “next to none. My ship is lost. People may enquire for me presently.”
After a silence Margarita asked:
“Did my brother say if the police were searching for me?”
“Yes, indeed, Miss Kingsborough, you are being sought for everywhere, and the police have been warned.”
“Have you any faith in the police?”
“Yes,” he said, “indeed, yes.”
“But if the police are competent,” she said, “then how do you account for our being as we are?”
“The wicked have their day,” he said.
He was fearful lest this should be disheartening to her. He hastened to add: “They will get you out of this, Miss Kingsborough. I shall be asked and searched for at seven o’clock, only five hours from now, by the Dictator himself.”
“What Dictator is that?” she asked. “Where is this place?”
“In Santa Barbara,” he said. “The Dictator is Don Manuel. Did you not even know where you are?”
“I have known nothing of where I have been since they dragged me out of the house after you had warned us. They put me into a boat and then into a ship, where I was a prisoner for a fortnight. Sometimes we were at sea and sometimes in anchorages. I knew from the sun that we went south and west; nothing more than that. Then three nights ago they landed me and wheeled me here, bound, blindfolded and gagged, upon a stretcher in a sort of ambulance. I knew from the noises and smells that we were in a city. Someone stopped the people who were bringing me and asked what was the matter. The woman said, ‘She has had an accident, poor thing.’ ”
“You had women guards, then?”
“Oh, yes, two.”
“Surely there were some decent men among the smugglers who were willing to help you: for instance, a man called Douglas?”
“The only men whom I have met have been those who carried me away out of the house, and those who are here, the Indians and a terrible negro.”
“But about this man in red,” Sard said, “I know him only as Father Garsinton; he seems to be the head of the business; but what is his aim?”
“He worships evil,” she said.
“Yes, but what does he hope to gain by all this?”
“To increase the power of evil in the world.”
“But he is not young,” Sard objected. “He is grown up; he is even elderly.”
“He is a devil,” she said.
“I have heard of boys in cities thinking these thoughts,” Sard said, “but never grown men. And why does he single out you?”
“He has always wanted me,” she said. “He always said that he would have me. He told me years ago that to-night should be the night: now it is. And now he has killed my brother.”
He heard her weeping and saw tears running down her steady face.
“Oh, no, no,” he said, “do not weep; do not cry like that.”
“I cannot help it,” she said. “I loved my brother.”
“He loved you too, dearly.”
They were silent for some minutes, while Sard tried again to shift his bonds. When he spoke again he had good news.
“Miss Kingsborough,” he said, “I have to break this news to you. Your brother is not dead. He is alive. He has just crept into the room behind you.”
“Don’t make any noise,” Hilary said. “For heaven’s sake don’t make any noise. I’ve been knocked out. I’m dizzy and sick.”
He came up between them and sat down upon the floor.
“Oh, Hilary,” she said, “you are covered with blood.”
“Yes, I know, dear. O Lord, I do feel queer! They have all gone upstairs, the people here. Cheer up, Pearl, my darling, we’ll soon have you out of this. The only question is, how to open the padlocks.”
“Have you any keys?” Sard asked, “or anything like wire for a pick-lock?”
“No,” he said, “I’m afraid I have nothing; nothing at all.” He bowed himself forward where he sat and propped his head in his hands; a few drops of blood trickled over his fingers. Sard saw that he was on the brink of swooning.
“Mr. Kingsborough,” he said, “will you look about the room for a wire or a tool or something?”
“Wait a moment, will you,” Hilary answered. “It’s silly of me. I’m afraid I’m going to faint.” He fainted, then came to himself, then saw the blood on his hands and fainted again. Presently he hove himself up into a sitting posture and said that he had never felt so sick in his life.
“Shut your eyes,” Sard said.
“Yes, you say ‘shut your eyes,’ but my head’s all gone. I’m as sick as a cat. I say, would you mind bringing me some water?”
“I’ll bring you water,” Sard said. Margarita was crying. “I’ll bring you lovely water. Only, you see, your sister and I are locked up here, chained. We want you to unchain us.”
“So I would,” he said. “But I cannot stand this smell of incense. It takes all the strength clean out of me.”
“Hilary,” Margarita said sharply, “Hilary, turn round. Look at that shelf on the side of the wall there. Is not that water in a glass jug there?”
“It is water,” Sard said. “Look, Mr. Kingsborough. It is water. Get to the shelf and splash yourself.”
“It is water,” Hilary said. “I don’t know about getting to it.”
“You can get to it, Hilary dear,” Margarita said. “Crawl to it and then you will reach it. Oh, well done, Hilary; how splendid of you!”
The sick man crawled on hand and knees to the wall. He leaned for a moment there and said, “I can’t reach it.”
“Rest and gather strength,” Sard said.
“Hilary,” his sister said, “crawl to that little table in the middle of the room. You will be able to push that to the wall and then climb to the water.”
“Yes, I will,” Hilary said: “only I must wait for a moment, for this sickness to pass.”
He stayed there huddled against the wall, with his eyes shut, for two or three minutes. He looked liker a dead man than a living. At last he moved forward from the wall and slowly crawled to the table. The table was liker a large old English stool than a table. When he reached it, he drooped forward over it as though he would never have the strength to rise.
“Take your time,” Sard said. “Do not try to lift that stool, but push it before you while you lean on it. So. That is you. Not too big a push at a time: take it quietly.”
“Oh, I do feel so sick!” Hilary said.
“No wonder. You’ve had a bat on the head,” Sard said. “You are a marvel to be moving at all, but go handsomely; there’s always time; always lots of time; no rushing. Now wait; rest; gather your strength again.”
He waited, leaning on the stool, while the others watched him.
“You are nearly there,” Sard said. “One more little effort and you will be there. I think your brother’s a hero, Miss Kingsborough, to be doing this, in his state.”
“You are wonderful, Hilary,” she said. “Now forward again.”
The sick man thrust the stool before him almost to the wall.
“Stop there,” Sard said. “Do not push it further under the shelf. Now you are almost there: all that you have to do now is to heave yourself up and reach the jug. Steady yourself against the wall.”
Hilary with an effort hove himself to a kneeling posture on the stool. When there, he found that he had pushed it too far underneath the shelf. He could not see the jug, but saw instead that he would have to lean somewhat backward, clutching to the shelf with one hand while he groped for the jug with the other. The thought of doing this unnerved him, he made no attempt for a minute.
“It is just directly over your head,” Margarita told him.
“Yes, I know where it is,” he answered, “only getting it is the problem. However, it is water.”
“It is lovely water, which will take away all your faintness.”
“Yes, by George, it will! I can tell you I want it. I’m going to get it.”
“Good. Well done.”
He steadied himself as cautiously as a tightrope-walker. He placed one foot upon the stool, swayed, steadied, made an effort, caught the rim of the shelf and stood there.
“Splendid, Hilary! You’ve done it.”
“Good man.”
“It’s on a tray,” Hilary said. “I can’t reach the jug, it’s too far in. But I’ve got hold of the tray.”
“Pull the tray towards you. There; it is coming.”
“Now catch hold of the jug.”
“Oh, take care, take care; mind, Hilary!”
“You’ll have the whole thing down.”
“Oh, Lord!” Hilary said.
In his weakness, as the tray reached the edge of the shelf, Hilary slipped, failed or fell. He tipped the tray over as he dropped; there was a crash and a breaking of glass and a gurgling of liquid.
“I’m sorry, you people,” Hilary said; “I was afraid that that would happen. I’m too weak to do this kind of thing: now it is gone.”
“No, no, it is not,” Margarita said. “Wet your handkerchief in it, then drink that, or mop your forehead with it.”
“Well thought of,” Sard said.
“I say,” Hilary said, “this is not water: it is that what’s-its-name, the white brandy these fellows drink.”
“Drink some, drink some, then.”
“I’m drinking. I say. You may say what you like. It makes me feel a different being.”
“Splash your brows with it.”
“I will. And I will save this. There’s about a tumblerful. And, good Lord, I say, I say!”
“What? What have you found in the tray?”
“Bunches of keys. Look here. Two bunches of keys. I may be able to unlock your padlocks.”
“Try your sister’s padlocks first.”
“No, no,” Margarita said, “try Mr. Harker’s padlocks first. He is a man. He can help.”
“Your sister first,” Sard said. “I’ll not be set free first. And as for helping, I have not helped anyone, so far as I can see.”
Hilary tried the keys in the padlocks of his sister’s chains. He tried eleven without success; then, at the twelfth, the locks clicked back and the chains could be cast aside. She was still bound to the pillar by a thong of hide. “I cannot undo this knot,” Hilary said, “my fingers are too weak.”
“Gnaw it open with your teeth,” Sard said.
Hilary sat down and sipped some brandy.
“I wish you would not upset me,” he said. “I feel as sick as a dog, and the very thought of taking this stuff in my teeth is more than I can stand.”
“Sorry,” Sard said. “What you must do is, pick up a piece of broken glass with a sharp edge and saw it through with that.”
“Good,” Hilary said. “I can do that.”
As he bent to pick up the glass, it seemed to all three there that men were muttering just beyond the doors. They heard no words distinctly, but voices spoke, feet shuffled: the noise, whatever it was, died away almost at once: all was still again. Hilary sawed through the hide, so that Margarita was free. She took the keys and began to try them on the padlocks of Sard’s chains. She unlocked his hand-chains with the third key, but could not fit the leg-iron padlock until the last key of all. They cast loose the last of the chains, Sard was free. He picked up the chain, which was of a one-inch link, stopped a bight in it for a handfast, made an overhand knot in each end, and then swayed it to and fro. “Now we have some sort of a weapon,” he said. “Now we will see whether we cannot get out of here.”
“Pearl,” Hilary asked, “do you know whether we can get out from here into any yard at the back of the house?”
“There is a yard at the back of the house; I have seen it. There is a shed in it, with a great dog,” she said. “But even if we reached the yard, it would not help. There are houses beyond.”
“Let us keep to what we know,” Sard said. “We know the way to the Plaza, and in the Plaza we may meet people who will help us. We must slide these doors apart and make for the front door.”
“I agree,” Margarita said.
“Each have a sip of brandy,” Sard said.
They each took a sip, then took their bearings and moved to the sliding door.
“The light is going out,” Hilary said. The light suddenly dimmed to half its strength.
“All right,” Sard said. “That means that it is half an hour from dawn. They cut off the light at the power-house.”
“I was afraid that it meant that we were discovered,” Margarita said.
“Not a bit of it,” Sard said. “It’s the custom in the port. Now, Mr. Kingsborough, we’ll soon have you and your sister out into safety. Catch hold of the door here. Dig your nails into it. Quietly, now. Are you all ready?”
“Yes. Yes.”
“Then, when I give the word, heave back. All together, now. Heave!”
They hove: it trembled a little, but did not give.
They hove again and again, but there was nothing for them to catch hold of: they could only hold by the tips of their fingers: the door trembled, but did not give. While Sard searched for something that would give them a purchase, the light went out.
“We can’t shift this panel,” Sard said; “we must try this door at the side.”
He opened it and peered beyond it into a dimness in which there was a flight of stairs.
“Come on,” he whispered. “There’s no one here.”
They crept into the dimness. There was another door beyond the staircase. They went through it into a darkness in which they groped.
Suddenly Sard trod upon somebody, who caught him by the leg. “Look out! Get back,” he cried. Somebody grappled him as he spoke, so that he could not get back with the others. A light suddenly shone out to show him a big buck negro coming at him. An Indian, who had him round the hips, brought him to the ground.
Sard shook himself free, rose to his feet, hit somebody hard, and at once was clinched by the big negro. “You’ve not got me yet,” he said. He hit him on the ribs and kicked his shins; the negro got him by the throat.
“I got yuh, honey,” he said.
The Indian whom he had kicked aside, caught him by the leg again. By a violent effort he flung himself free, and hit the negro on the jaw. The negro grunted, ducked and came on: two or three Indians leaped in, like cats. Sard hit one over the heart, so that he fell, then the others got him down, and snarled and spat over him, and called him evil names. They trussed him up as before with strips of hide. The negro held him by the throat while they did it.
“I got yuh, honey,” he kept saying. “I sure got yuh.”
When he was lashed up like a hammock, the negro slung him over his shoulder. An Indian, the man whom he had knocked down, followed just behind, digging Sard in the legs at each step with the point of a knife. The negro carried Sard back to the temple and chained him to the pillar from which he had escaped. Two Indians came up to Sard and pricked him with their knives.
“Gringucho!”
“Hay que matarle.”
“Si, hay que.”
“Hijo de puta.”
Presently the negro carried Margarita into the room and chained her to her pillar. When he had done this, he lit a cigar and puffed the smoke into her face; then thrust his face into hers, and said, “Ah love de white woman,” and kissed her. Then he looked at Sard, blew some cigar-smoke into his face, and said, “Yuh hit me on de jaw. Bimeby I come back and buhn yo eyes out with my segah.”
After this he and the Indians disappeared, closing a door behind them. Father Garsinton entered from the angle of the room.
He was dressed in his scarlet robes and carried a lamp, which he placed upon the low stool from which Hilary had reached the jug. He then went to a small aumbry, drew out some dried carib leaves and flung a few upon the brazier. The stuff sputtered and threw out profuse smoke, the smell of which was both sickly and stupefying. He seemed to breathe it with pleasure. At last he turned to his victims, looked from one to the other, and spoke.
“So,” he said. “My mice. The cat has played with you. And did you taste the pleasures of hope? Did you feel safe at last? Know, my little mice, that I watched, while you hoped. So you would not try the back yard, because of the dog? Why, the dog is stuffed. And so the Dictator will search for Mr. Harker? That is to be expected, but he will not search here, where so much of his wealth is planned for. Still, you enjoyed your little hopes.”
He drew nearer and seemed in some strange way to grow bigger. It was as though the evil which he served had entered into him and taken possession.
“And now,” he said, “put by hope. Evil is stronger than hope; or faith; or charity; or strength, you; or honour, madam. What do you say, sailor?”
“I wish I had you with my hands free.”
“Oh! What would happen then?”
“A cleaner world.”
“Cleaner?” Sagrado said. “A cleaner world? My friend, I serve the purpose of this world, which is not cleanliness, but triumph. You, with your cleanliness, wasting the energy of men in being clean. Pah, you two sickening things; one clean, the other chaste. Which of you does the more harm, with your beastly ideals?”
“We had a man in the fo’c’sle once,” Sard said, “who spoke just the same kind of thing; only there was some excuse for him; he’d been brought up in a brothel. The men took him on deck and scrubbed his mouth out with sand and canvas.”
“I do not use those methods,” Sagrado said. “But I have my own methods of correcting false philosophers, as you shall see.”
He returned, almost immediately, with something tied in a native frail. He laid it upon the floor, then brought the small table or stool and placed it facing the two victims, between them and about one yard from each of them. They could see the carib leaves in the brazier glowing and unglowing and writhing like live things on the charcoal. Then Sagrado unlaced the native frail and drew from it a shell-shaped bomb, which he placed upon the table. He adjusted the fuse with great care and then turned to his victims.
“A fifth part of an hour,” he said, “is twelve minutes. In twelve minutes, precisely, this bomb will explode. It contains a quarter charge, which will suffice. What the bomb leaves, I and my ministrants will then take, to the utmost.”
He lit a twist of bijuco bast in the brazier, and then with the flame set fire to the fuse. It burned for one second, then changed to a glow, as Sagrado softly blew upon it. It glowed rather redly and the glow showed a black mark which at once began to creep, though very, very slowly, along the unburned fuse. Sagrado blew out his lamp and disappeared out of the room. The two victims saw nothing but the veins in the leaves in the brazier and the black mark charring along the fuse in front of the fire which charred it. Already a small piece of white ash, like a cigar-ash, fell from the burnt end of the fuse.
“Do not look at that fuse,” Sard said.
“I cannot help it,” she said.
“Yes, you can help it. Look at me. Can you move at all?”
“Hardly at all. Can you?”
“No.”
“Tell me the truth,” she said. “Do you think they killed my brother?”
“I could not see,” he said.
“I suppose they will kill him. And I suppose this bomb will kill us.”
“It must injure us,” he said.
“How long have we, before it bursts?”
“Ten and a half minutes.”
“Supposing one of us should escape?”
“We had better have no false hopes,” he said. “We’re not likely to leave this house alive.”
“I meant only this,” she said: “the survivor might take a message. Is there any message that you would care to trust me with?”
“You might explain to my aunt, old Lady Crowthorne, in England. Would you care to trust any message to me?”
“To my brother, if he be alive,” she said; “and to my father—he is really my stepfather—Hardy Kingsborough, of Passion Courtenay, in Berkshire. Can you remember that?”
“Passion Courtenay?”
“Yes. Why? Do you know it?” she asked.
“I should think I do,” he said. “I’ve gone there every year, when I have been in England, for the last fifteen years.”
“With whom do you stay, then? Oh, this is happy, to hear of home now, here.”
“I do not stay,” he answered. “As a rule I go over for the day, and then away in the evening. You see, I know nobody there, now: in a way I never did. I go to the inn near the river, the Hunt and Hounds; then I go on the river, and away by the evening train, the 7.13.”
“I expect we have passed each other,” she said.
“Very likely,” he said. “Whereabouts do you live there, Miss Kingsborough? Could you describe it?”
“Yes. For the last ten years we have lived at The Murreys, which you may not know, but must have seen, if you have been to the Hunt.”
“I know the outside of your home very well, then,” he said. “It’s called The Murreys from the mulberry trees. Whenever I go on the river there, I land in one of the fields below your house and walk from the river to your garden wall. The field is called Bridger’s Peace; do you know why?”
“It means the piece of ground where the bridgers camped when they built the bridge in the fourteenth century.”
“I thought it was the other kind of peace,” he said, “the ‘Peace which passeth all understanding’; which it has always been to me.”
“It is a beautiful place,” she said; “and the thought of it is peace now.”
“Yes,” he said.
“It is going on, now,” she said, “under this same night; the water is going on under the bridge.”
“Ah, to be tied,” he cried, “lashed foot and hand!”
“Why did you land in our field?” she asked.
“The field is mixed up with my life; I have to go there. In a way, that field and house have been all my life. The sea has only been something to wrestle with: that is not enough.”
“What have the house and field been to you, then?” she asked.
“It would be mean not to share with my companion,” Sard said; “you are linked with the place too. It is all strange, and your being here at the end is almost the strangest: you, the owner of that place, and I, just the trespasser and worshipper. Fifteen years ago I was taken to a picnic there. I don’t believe in chance. But it seemed just chance that I went there. We didn’t know the people, but they wanted a boy to fill up a side at cricket. Anyhow, I went. Some people called Penga took me.
“But I was quite out of it. I was the youngest there. They had two elevens without me, and I didn’t know a soul there, except Dick Penga, and he had had the swot of bringing me and thought me a child, besides.
“There was a Spanish lady, a widow, there with her daughter, who was of my own age. She was out of it too.
“I could always talk Spanish, so I talked to the girl. In a way, we were children; but it was not any childishness to me. That girl altered my life. She has been my life ever since, all the life that mattered: the rest was only ropes and weights.”
“You saw her again, then?” Margarita said.
“No,” he said. “I’ve never seen her since, nor heard from her. You see, she was only there by as strange a chance, almost, as I. She came from Santo Espirito, in Andaluz, in Spain. I wrote to her there, but I never had an answer: of course, she would never have written to me.
“I went to Santo Espirito as soon as I could; but that was eight years later. Nobody knew of them there. The place had all changed in the interval, for they had begun to work copper there: it was a mining town.”
“What was the girl’s name?”
“Juanita de la Torre.”
“Would you know her again, do you think?”
“I thought that you were she when I saw you at that window at Los Xicales.”
“I am she,” she said simply. “I am Juanita de la Torre. My mother married my stepfather the year of the picnic. He met her at the picnic for the first time. Four years later we went to live at The Murreys. We took the name Kingsborough when mother married: we’ve been brought up as English ever since. Margarita is my second name; I took to that, because the English cannot pronounce the other.”
“I can, Juanita. Ah! no, no! do not look at that fuse. I will tell you when to prepare. We still have four minutes.”
“How can you tell?”
“I’ve kept watches nearly every day and night for ten years. I can tell time within a minute or two. And to think that we met at Los Xicales and never knew! I was misled by your name. Why did you not speak? You heard my name.”
“Remember I did not know your name,” she said. “I have always thought that your name was Chisholm. I never once heard you called Harker. You were Chisholm to me.”
“Ah! I was afraid of that,” he said. “You never got my letter?”
“Never.”
They were silent for a few seconds; in the stillness some ash dropped from the fuse with a feathery fall: down in the town a cock crowed.
“Strange,” he said. “There is a cock crowing. I cannot hear a cock without knowing that I have an immortal soul.”
“It is a live cry,” she said.
“It is like a trumpeter trumpeting the graves open. It’s the cry the dead will rise with.
“Ah!” he cried, bitterly. “And the living are rising with it, and going out to their work, while we are lashed here like staysails. Oh, if I could only heave this pillar down!” He swayed from side to side, but was too tightly lashed: there was no stirring that tree bole tamped in four feet below the floor.
“It’s no good,” he said. “I am caught. And if I had not been a hasty fool, I could have come here with guardias and set you free.”
“Don’t think that for an instant,” she said. “They were going to cut my throat if there were any rescue. ‘We shall all die together,’ he told me. It’s death to him to be caught here, but he was determined that I should die first. Guardias would not have saved me.”
“I haven’t done much,” he said.
“You have done everything,” she said.
The red glow on the fuse suddenly changed to yellowish; a little flame sprang up out of the glow: it wavered like a candle-flame.
“The thing is going to explode,” she said.
“I think so, it is bad fuse: it is burning.”
“How long have we?”
“Perhaps less than a minute.”
“Could you sing something?”
The flame in the fuse suddenly brightened and lit up the room. He turned to Margarita and saw her great eyes fixed upon his.
“Here comes the burst,” he said. “Stand by.”
The flame steadied, then began to shoot higher with a steady sputtering hiss till it was a foot high and scattering sparks.
“Keep your eyes tight shut,” he said. “And remember it may just as easily cut our chains as us. Here she comes.”
The flame changed its colour to a dull red, which smoked; it sputtered more loudly, then lessened, sank down and went out.
“Wait,” Sard said, “wait: it may be a delayed fuse.” He counted up to seventy-three, slowly. “No,” he said. “The fuse has failed: it is not going to explode.”
The light appeared at the door at the apex of the room: Sagrado came in and looked at them.
“First the pleasures, then the miseries of hope,” he said, “to make the victims despair.”
“We do not despair,” Sard said.
“Do you not?” Sagrado answered. “No; perhaps not yet. But you will.”
“A butcher’s sponge, like you, won’t make me.”
“We shall see.”
“A man would be unclean,” Sard said, “even for spitting at you.”
“Unclean?” Sagrado answered. “There are various conceptions of cleanliness, but all have to do with consecrations and devotions. I am called unclean by you, who serve men, who are a servant in a ship. Other flunkeys serve the state. I am myself, unspotted from these flunkeydoms and slaveries. If I serve, I serve evil, the master of this world.”
“It is something,” Sard said, “to have a master as dirty as the servant.”
“It is much,” Sagrado answered, “to have a power commensurate with your philosophy.”
“I have not seen any power in you yet,” Sard said.
“No?” Sagrado said. “Yet I stand free, while you are bound, you and your romantic one. Which of us has the power, Margarita?”
“He has,” she answered. “And you know it.”
“I do not know it,” he said, “nor do events show it. I wanted you in my hands by a certain day: there was nothing that you wanted less. Yet you came to my hands, to the very moment planned. This sailor, or second mate, if I understand him, has wanted you for fifteen years: there was nothing that you wanted more, if I overheard correctly. Are you in his hands, or arms, or in mine? Which of us has the power over you?”
“He has,” she said. “And you know it.”
“If you will not see truth, you must learn truth; and you too, my sailor. . . .
“You, as I understand it,” he said, turning to Sard, “were for saving her from danger in Las Palomas. Did you save her? . . .
“Did you save your ship from danger? Why, do you suppose, did I go in your ship amid all that I most despise?Yourship, I say, but I mean your owner’s ship, which you were bought to keep afloat: you, a man, being slave to a thing.”