"Yes, m"sieur. We are to go to Cette with all speed. Is not that so?"
"Yes," was Hugh"s reply. "I will come up beside you. I prefer it. We shall have a long, dark ride to-night."
"Ah! but the roads are good," was the man"s reply. "I came from Cette yesterday," he added, as he mounted to his seat and the pa.s.senger got up beside him.
Hugh sat there very thoughtful as the car sped out of the city of noise and bustle. The man"s remark that he had come from Cette on the previous day gave colour to the idea that no net had been spread, but that the stranger was acting at the orders of the ubiquitous Sparrow. Indeed, were it not for the strange glance the undersized little man had given to the pa.s.ser-by, he would have been convinced that he was actually once again under the protection of the all-powerful ruler of the criminal underworld.
As it was, he remained suspicious. He did not like that woman who had watched so patiently his coming and going at the station.
With strong headlights glaring--for the night was extremely dark and a strong wind was blowing--they were soon out on the broad highway which leads first across the plain and then beside the sea, and again across the lowlands to old-world Arles.
It was midnight before they got to the village of Lancon, an obscure little place in total darkness.
But on the way the driver, who had told Hugh that his name was Henri Aramon, and who insinuated that he was one of The Sparrow"s a.s.sociates, became most affable and talkative. Over those miles of dark roads, unfamiliar to Hugh, they travelled at high speed, for Henri had from the first showed himself to be an expert driver, not only in the unceasing traffic of the main streets of Ma.r.s.eilles, but also on the dark, much-worn roads leading out of the city. The roads around Ma.r.s.eilles have never been outstanding for their excellence, and after the war they were indeed execrable.
"This is Lancon," the driver remarked, as they sped through the dark little town. "We now go on to Salon, where we have a direct road across the plain they call the Crau into Arles. From there the road to Cette is quite good and straight. The road we are now on is the worst," he added.
Hugh was undecided. Was the man who was driving him so rapidly out of the danger zone his friend--or his enemy?
He sat there for over an hour unable to decide.
"This is an outlandish part of France," he remarked to the driver presently.
"Yes. But after Salon it is more desolate."
"And is there no railway near?"
"After Salon, yes. It runs parallel with the road about two miles to the north--the railway between Arles and Aix-en-Provence."
"So if we get a breakdown, which I hope we shall not, we are not far from a railway?" Hugh remarked, as through the night the heavy car tore along that open desolate road.
As he sat there he thought of Dorise, wondering what had happened--and of Louise. If he had obeyed his father"s wishes and married the latter all the trouble would have been avoided, he thought. Yet he loved Dorise--loved her with his whole soul.
And she doubted him.
Poor fellow! Hustled from pillar to post, and compelled to resort to every ruse in order to avoid arrest for a crime which he did not commit, yet about which he could not establish his innocence, he very often despaired. At that moment he felt somehow--how he could not explain--that he was in a very tight corner. He felt confident after two hours of reflection that he was being driven over these roads that night in order that the police should gain time to execute some legal formality for his arrest.
Why had not the police of Ma.r.s.eilles arrested him? There was some subtle motive for sending him to Cette.
He had not had time to send a telegram to Mr. Peters in London, or to Monsieur Gautier, the name by which The Sparrow told him he was known at his flat in the Rue des Pet.i.ts Champs, in the centre of Paris. He longed to be able to communicate with his all-powerful friend, but there had been no opportunity.
Suddenly the car began to pa.s.s through banks of mist, which are usual at night over the low marshes around the mouths of the Rhone. It was about half-past two in the morning. They had pa.s.sed through the long dark streets of Salon, and were already five or six miles on the broad straight road which runs across the marshes through St. Martin-de-Crau into Arles.
Of a sudden Hugh declared that he must have a cigarette, and producing his case handed one to the driver and took one himself. Then he lit the man"s, and afterwards his own.
"It is cold here on the marshes, monsieur," remarked the driver, his cigarette between his lips. "This mist, too, is puzzling. But it is nearly always like this at night. That is why n.o.body lives about here."
"Is it quite deserted?"
"Yes, except for a few shepherds, and they live up north at the foot of the hills."
For some ten minutes or so they kept on, but Hugh had suddenly become very watchful of the driver.
Presently the man exclaimed in French:
"I do not feel very well!"
"What is the matter?" asked Hugh in alarm. "You must not be taken ill here--so far from anywhere!"
But the man was evidently unwell, for he pulled up the car.
"Oh! my head!" he cried, putting both hands to his brow as the cigarette dropped from his lips. "My head! It seems as if it will burst! And--and I can"t see! Everything is going round--round! Where--_where am I_?"
"You are all right, my friend. Get into the back of the car and rest.
You will be yourself very quickly."
And he half dragged the man from his seat and placed him in the back of the car, where he fell inert and unconscious.
The cigarette which The Sparrow had given to Hugh only to be used in case of urgent necessity had certainly done its work. The man, whether friend or enemy, would now remain unconscious for many hours.
Hugh, having settled him in the bottom of the car, placed a rug over him. Then, mounting to the driver"s place, he turned the car and drove as rapidly as he dared back over the roads to Salon.
Time after time, he wondered whether he had been misled; whether, after all, the man who had driven him was actually acting under The Sparrow"s orders. If so, then he had committed a fatal error!
However, the die was cast. He had acted upon his own initiative, and if a net had actually been spread to catch him he had successfully broken through it. He laughed as he thought of the police at Cette awaiting his arrival, and their consternation when hour after hour pa.s.sed without news of the car from Ma.r.s.eilles.
At Salon he pa.s.sed half way through the town to cross roads where he had noticed in pa.s.sing a sign-board which indicated the road to Avignon--the broad high road from Ma.r.s.eilles to Paris.
Already he had made up his mind how to act. He would get to Avignon, and thence by express to Paris. The _rapides_ from Ma.r.s.eilles and the Riviera all stopped at the ancient city of the Popes.
Therefore, being a good motor driver, Hugh started away down the long road which led through the valley to Orgon, and thence direct to Avignon, which came into sight about seven o"clock in the morning.
Before entering the old city of walls and castles Hugh turned into a side road about two miles distant, drove the car to the end, and opening a gate succeeded in getting it some little distance into a wood, where it was well concealed from anyone pa.s.sing along the road.
Then, descending and ascertaining that the driver was sleeping comfortably from the effects of the strong narcotic, he took his bag and walked into the town.
At the railway station he found the through express from Ventimiglia--the Italian frontier--to Paris would be due in twenty minutes, therefore he purchased a first-cla.s.s ticket for Paris, and in a short time was taking his morning coffee in the _wagon-restaurant_ on his way to the French capital.
TWENTY-FIFTH CHAPTER
THE MAN CATALDI
On the day that Hugh was travelling in hot haste to Paris, Charles Benton arrived in Nice early in the afternoon.
Leaving the station it was apparent he knew his way about the town, for pa.s.sing down the Avenue de la Gare, with its row of high eucalyptus trees, to the Place Ma.s.sena, he plunged into the narrow, rather evil-smelling streets of the old quarter.