第 十八 章 · The Forcing of the Trap

. The Forcing of the Trap

The position wherein I stood does not appear very favourable to thought;

yet for the next moment or two I thought profoundly. I had, I told

myself, scored one point. Be Rupert Hentzau’s errand what it might, and

the villainy he was engaged on what it would, I had scored one point. He

was on the other side of the moat from the King, and it would be by no

fault of mine if ever he set foot on the same side again. I had three

left to deal with: two on guard and De Gautet in his bed. Ah, if I

had the keys! I would have risked everything and attacked Detchard and

Bersonin before their friends could join them. But I was powerless. I

must wait till the coming of my friends enticed someone to cross the

bridge--someone with the keys. And I waited, as it seemed, for half an

hour, really for about five minutes, before the next act in the rapid

drama began.

All was still on the other side. The duke’s room remained inscrutable

behind its shutters. The light burnt steadily in Madame de Mauban’s

window. Then I heard the faintest, faintest sound: it came from behind

the door which led to the drawbridge on the other side of the moat. It

but just reached my ear, yet I could not be mistaken as to what it was.

It was made by a key being turned very carefully and slowly. Who was

turning it? And of what room was it the key? There leapt before my eyes

the picture of young Rupert, with the key in one hand, his sword in the

other, and an evil smile on his face. But I did not know what door it

was, nor on which of his favourite pursuits young Rupert was spending

the hours of that night.

I was soon to be enlightened, for the next moment--before my friends

could be near the chateau door--before Johann the keeper would have

thought to nerve himself for his task--there was a sudden crash from

the room with the lighted window. It sounded as though someone had flung

down a lamp; and the window went dark and black. At the same instant a

cry rang out, shrill in the night: “Help, help! Michael, help!” and was

followed by a shriek of utter terror.

I was tingling in every nerve. I stood on the topmost step, clinging to

the threshold of the gate with my right hand and holding my sword in my

left. Suddenly I perceived that the gateway was broader than the bridge;

there was a dark corner on the opposite side where a man could stand. I

darted across and stood there. Thus placed, I commanded the path, and no

man could pass between the chateau and the old Castle till he had tried

conclusions with me.

There was another shriek. Then a door was flung open and clanged against

the wall, and I heard the handle of a door savagely twisted.

“Open the door! In God’s name, what’s the matter?” cried a voice--the

voice of Black Michael himself.

He was answered by the very words I had written in my letter.

“Help, Michael--Hentzau!”

A fierce oath rang out from the duke, and with a loud thud he threw

himself against the door. At the same moment I heard a window above my

head open, and a voice cried: “What’s the matter?” and I heard a man’s

hasty footsteps. I grasped my sword. If De Gautet came my way, the Six

would be less by one more.

Then I heard the clash of crossed swords and a tramp of feet and--I

cannot tell the thing so quickly as it happened, for all seemed to come

at once. There was an angry cry from madame’s room, the cry of a wounded

man; the window was flung open; young Rupert stood there sword in hand.

He turned his back, and I saw his body go forward to the lunge.

“Ah, Johann, there’s one for you! Come on, Michael!”

Johann was there, then--come to the rescue of the duke! How would he

open the door for me? For I feared that Rupert had slain him.

“Help!” cried the duke’s voice, faint and husky.

I heard a step on the stairs above me; and I heard a stir down to my

left, in the direction of the King’s cell. But, before anything happened

on my side of the moat, I saw five or six men round young Rupert in

the embrasure of madame’s window. Three or four times he lunged with

incomparable dash and dexterity. For an instant they fell back, leaving

a ring round him. He leapt on the parapet of the window, laughing as he

leapt, and waving his sword in his hand. He was drunk with blood, and he

laughed again wildly as he flung himself headlong into the moat.

What became of him then? I did not see: for as he leapt, De Gautet’s

lean face looked out through the door by me, and, without a second’s

hesitation, I struck at him with all the strength God had given me, and

he fell dead in the doorway without a word or a groan. I dropped on my

knees by him. Where were the keys? I found myself muttering: “The keys,

man, the keys?” as though he had been yet alive and could listen; and

when I could not find them, I--God forgive me!--I believe I struck a

dead man’s face.

At last I had them. There were but three. Seizing the largest, I felt

the lock of the door that led to the cell. I fitted in the key. It was

right. The lock turned. I drew the door close behind me and locked it as

noiselessly as I could, putting the key in my pocket.

I found myself at the top of a flight of steep stone stairs. An oil lamp

burnt dimly in the bracket. I took it down and held it in my hand; and I

stood and listened.

“What in the devil can it be?” I heard a voice say.

It came from behind a door that faced me at the bottom of the stairs.

And another answered:

“Shall we kill him?”

I strained to hear the answer, and could have sobbed with relief when

Detchard’s voice came grating and cold:

“Wait a bit. There’ll be trouble if we strike too soon.”

There was a moment’s silence. Then I heard the bolt of the door

cautiously drawn back. Instantly I put out the light I held, replacing

the lamp in the bracket.

“It’s dark--the lamp’s out. Have you a light?” said the other

voice--Bersonin’s.

No doubt they had a light, but they should not use it. It was come to

the crisis now, and I rushed down the steps and flung myself against the

door. Bersonin had unbolted it and it gave way before me. The Belgian

stood there sword in hand, and Detchard was sitting on a couch at the

side of the room. In astonishment at seeing me, Bersonin recoiled;

Detchard jumped to his sword. I rushed madly at the Belgian: he gave

way before me, and I drove him up against the wall. He was no swordsman,

though he fought bravely, and in a moment he lay on the floor before

me. I turned--Detchard was not there. Faithful to his orders, he had

not risked a fight with me, but had rushed straight to the door of the

King’s room, opened it and slammed it behind him. Even now he was at his

work inside.

And surely he would have killed the King, and perhaps me also, had it

not been for one devoted man who gave his life for the King. For when I

forced the door, the sight I saw was this: the King stood in the corner

of the room: broken by his sickness, he could do nothing; his fettered

hands moved uselessly up and down, and he was laughing horribly in

half-mad delirium. Detchard and the doctor were together in the middle

of the room; and the doctor had flung himself on the murderer, pinning

his hands to his sides for an instant. Then Detchard wrenched himself

free from the feeble grip, and, as I entered, drove his sword through

the hapless man. Then he turned on me, crying:

“At last!”

We were sword to sword. By blessed chance, neither he nor Bersonin had

been wearing their revolvers. I found them afterwards, ready loaded,

on the mantelpiece of the outer room: it was hard by the door, ready to

their hands, but my sudden rush in had cut off access to them. Yes, we

were man to man: and we began to fight, silently, sternly, and hard.

Yet I remember little of it, save that the man was my match with the

sword--nay, and more, for he knew more tricks than I; and that he forced

me back against the bars that guarded the entrance to “Jacob’s Ladder.”

And I saw a smile on his face, and he wounded me in the left arm.

No glory do I take for that contest. I believe that the man would have

mastered me and slain me, and then done his butcher’s work, for he was

the most skilful swordsman I have ever met; but even as he pressed me

hard, the half-mad, wasted, wan creature in the corner leapt high in

lunatic mirth, shrieking:

“It’s cousin Rudolf! Cousin Rudolf! I’ll help you, cousin Rudolf!” and

catching up a chair in his hands (he could but just lift it from the

ground and hold it uselessly before him) he came towards us. Hope came

to me. “Come on!” I cried. “Come on! Drive it against his legs.”

Detchard replied with a savage thrust. He all but had me.

“Come on! Come on, man!” I cried. “Come and share the fun!”

And the King laughed gleefully, and came on, pushing his chair before

him.

With an oath Detchard skipped back, and, before I knew what he was

doing, had turned his sword against the King. He made one fierce cut at

the King, and the King, with a piteous cry, dropped where he stood. The

stout ruffian turned to face me again. But his own hand had prepared

his destruction: for in turning he trod in the pool of blood that flowed

from the dead physician. He slipped; he fell. Like a dart I was upon

him. I caught him by the throat, and before he could recover himself I

drove my point through his neck, and with a stifled curse he fell across

the body of his victim.

Was the King dead? It was my first thought. I rushed to where he lay.

Ay, it seemed as if he were dead, for he had a great gash across his

forehead, and he lay still in a huddled heap on the floor. I dropped on

my knees beside him, and leant my ear down to hear if he breathed. But

before I could there was a loud rattle from the outside. I knew the

sound: the drawbridge was being pushed out. A moment later it rang home

against the wall on my side of the moat. I should be caught in a trap

and the King with me, if he yet lived. He must take his chance, to

live or die. I took my sword, and passed into the outer room. Who were

pushing the drawbridge out--my men? If so, all was well. My eye fell on

the revolvers, and I seized one; and paused to listen in the doorway of

the outer room. To listen, say I? Yes, and to get my breath: and I tore

my shirt and twisted a strip of it round my bleeding arm; and stood

listening again. I would have given the world to hear Sapt’s voice. For

I was faint, spent, and weary. And that wild-cat Rupert Hentzau was yet

at large in the Castle. Yet, because I could better defend the narrow

door at the top of the stairs than the wider entrance to the room, I

dragged myself up the steps, and stood behind it listening.

What was the sound? Again a strange one for the place and time. An

easy, scornful, merry laugh--the laugh of young Rupert Hentzau! I could

scarcely believe that a sane man would laugh. Yet the laugh told me that

my men had not come; for they must have shot Rupert ere now, if they had

come. And the clock struck half-past two! My God! The door had not been

opened! They had gone to the bank! They had not found me! They had gone

by now back to Tarlenheim, with the news of the King’s death--and mine.

Well, it would be true before they got there. Was not Rupert laughing in

triumph?

For a moment, I sank, unnerved, against the door. Then I started up

alert again, for Rupert cried scornfully:

“Well, the bridge is there! Come over it! And in God’s name, let’s see

Black Michael. Keep back, you curs! Michael, come and fight for her!”

If it were a three-cornered fight, I might yet bear my part. I turned

the key in the door and looked out.