Marie, the French maid, turned.
"She"s perfectly well, M"sieu, only she"s had a fainting fit and I"ve given her something to keep her quiet."
She spoke in French.
"Then how do you come here, what"s happened?"
"At some time in the night, M"sieu, I think it must have been between two and three, the warning bell, which is always attached to my bed, began to ring. I knew exactly what to do. It was part of Mr. Morse"s precautions, in which he had drilled us. When that bell rang, at whatever time of day or night, I was to wake M"selle instantly, dress her without a second"s delay, and bring her out of the Palace by a secret way.
"I did so, and arrived in this room, where M"selle fainted. The door was locked from the outside, and as I have strict orders never to exceed my instructions by a hair"s breadth, I have been waiting.
"Not very long ago M"sieu here"--she pointed to Rolston--"hearing some noise, unlocked the door and came in. To him I told what had happened."
"Thank G.o.d," I said aloud, "that she"s safe," and in my heart I paid a tribute to the minutely detailed genius of Gideon Morse, who had at least foiled the panthers on his track in one, and the greatest particular.
"Very well then. Now we must leave you here while we hurry to the Palace to try and learn what has happened, and do what we can. You will not be afraid?"
"No, M"sieu," she replied simply. "There"s an angel with us," and she crossed herself devoutly. "And, moreover," from somewhere about her waist she withdrew a long, keen knife, "I know what to do with this, M"sieu, in the last resort."
I went to the bed, I looked down at Juanita and kissed her gently on the forehead.
"Now then, Bill, come along," I said.
Bill grinned.
"By the private way," he said, pointing to the French woman, who was removing a heavy Turkish rug which lay in front of the fireplace. There was a click, and a portion of the floor fell down, disclosing some steps, padded with felt.
"This way, M"sieu," she whispered, "the pa.s.sage is lit, but here"s a torch if you should need it, and here is the book."
She handed me a little leather-bound book about the size of a railway ticket.
"What"s this?"
"Instructions in English and Chinese in regard to the secret room at the other end. They are few and simple, but Mr. Morse had them printed so that there could be no mistake if ever it became necessary to use the place and its machinery."
"He thinks of everything," said Bill, as we crept down into a fairly wide pa.s.sage, and the trap-door above rose once more into its place.
The pa.s.sage was fully a hundred and thirty or forty yards long and straight as an arrow. As we approached the end, which I saw to be hidden by a heavy curtain, I thought of the little leather covered book.
Motioning Rolston to stop I opened it and read the English portion.
There were about five or six pages, with one or two simple diagrams, and I blessed the journalistic training that enabled me to see the purport of the whole thing in a minute, though I gasped once more at the fertile ingenuity of Gideon Morse. Gently putting aside the heavy curtain, we entered a room of some size. The floor was heavily carpeted. Around two of the walls were couches piled with blankets. Upon shelves above were piles of stores--I saw boxes of biscuits, tins of condensed milk and many bottles of wine. The place was quite fourteen feet high and at one end four posts came down from the ceiling to the floor. They were grooved and the grooves were lined with steel which was cogged to receive a toothed wheel. Between the four posts, dropping some two feet from the ceiling, was what looked like the lower part of a large cistern or tank. This apparatus extended along the whole far end of the room, which was not square but square-oblong in shape. Immediately opposite to where we entered was an arrangement of levers, like the levers in a railway signal-box, though smaller; above these, sprouting out of the wall, were half a dozen vulcanite mouthpieces like black trumpets. Above each one was a little ivory label.
"What does it all mean?" Bill whispered.
I held up my hand for silence, looking round the place, referring once or twice to the little book, and making absolutely sure. As I was doing so there was a sudden "pop," followed by the unmistakable gurgle of champagne into a gla.s.s.
It was the most uncanny thing I have ever heard, for it might have happened at my elbow. Had it not been that a tiny electric signal-bulb no bigger than a sixpence glowed out over one of the mouthpieces, I should have been utterly unnerved. This mouthpiece was labeled "Mr.
Morse"s study."
"The dictograph," I whispered to Rolston, and he pressed my arm to show he understood.
I think I would have given a thousand pounds myself for some champagne just then. We stood holding each other, frozen into an ecstasy of listening. I almost thought that one of Bill"s remarkable ears was elongating itself until it coiled sinuously towards the wall, but this, no doubt, was illusion.
There came a voice, an urbane, and cultured voice, well modulated and serene.
It was all that, but as I heard it my blood seemed to turn to red currant jelly and to circulate no more in my veins. If there was ever a voice which was informed by some unnamable quality which came straight from the red pit of h.e.l.l, we heard that voice then. Hearing it, I knew for the first time the meaning of those words: _The worm that dies not and the fire that is not quenched_.
"Whoever thought, Gideon Morse, that I should be breakfasting with you to-day! To tell the truth I didn"t myself. But as you know, I have always been a great gambler and now, at the end of all the games of chance that we have played together, I have turned up the final ace."
Another voice--Heaven! it was Morse himself who answered. His voice seemed almost amused. It was like coming out of a pitch dark room into summer sunlight to hear it after that other.
"Mark Antony Midwinter, you speak of triumph, but you were never nearer your ultimate end than you are at this moment"--I could have sworn I heard his dry chuckle and I moved nearer to the wall.
"This cold pheasant is quite excellent. What is the use of trying to bluff me? Your end has come and you know it. It isn"t going to be a pleasant end, I expect you guess that. We have tossed the dice for many years, you and I. You"ve won over and over again. I had become an outcast on the face of the earth, until Fate made me the agent of a great vengeance."
This time Morse laughed outright.
"You offal-eating jackal!" he said. "Finish your stolen meal and get to work. You, the agent of a great vengeance! when not long ago you slunk into my London hotel and offered to sell your employers. I understand,"
he went on in a curiously impersonal voice, "that you really are supposed to be descended from a high English family. Even when I had you tarred and feathered--do you remember that, Antony?--many years ago, I still believed in your descent, though I own I didn"t give it much of a thought. Tell me, where exactly did the kitchen-maid come in?"
Following upon Morse"s words we heard the sound of footsteps and the sc.r.a.ping of a chair.
A new person had come into the room and Midwinter had risen to meet him.
"Well?"
The reply came in a deep ba.s.s voice.
"Nothing is changed. There was one Chinaman, it must have been the librarian of whom that guy we put through it, spoke--he came sliding along and tried to get down by the cat"s cradle outside the tower. I was leaning out of that balcony window above, commanding every approach, and I got him with my second shot."
"Did he fall all the way down? That might startle them below."
"No. He just crumpled up on the stairs, and after looking round, I"ve come back here. There"s a little wind beginning to get up and I shouldn"t wonder if in an hour or so this mist-blanket is all blown away."
"Half an hour is enough for what we have to do, Zorilla. Just go over to Mr. Morse there and see if his lashings are secure--and then we must think about getting off ourselves."
It was as though Bill and I could see exactly what was happening in the library--the heavy tread, an affirmative grunt, and then the smooth h.e.l.lish voice resuming:
"You know you"ve got to die, Morse, and die painfully. Nothing can alter that, but I"ll let you off part of your agonies if you tell me at once where your daughter is. It will only precipitate matters. We can easily find her as you must know."
"I don"t like talking with you at all. You are both of you doomed beyond power of redemption. You have overcome some of my precautions, by what means I cannot tell. You"ve captured my person. You are about to wreak your disgusting vengeance on it. For Heaven"s sake do so. You know nothing of this place you are in, or very little. Fools!" The voice rang out like a trumpet.
There was a murmured conference, the words of which we could not catch, then Midwinter said:
"We"ll put you to the test a little, before Zorilla really begins--operating. Adjoining this apartment I see there is your most luxurious bathroom--the walls of onyx, the bath of solid silver. Well, we"ll take you and put you in that bath and turn on the water. I"ll stand over you, and with my hands on your shoulders, I"ll plunge you an inch or two beneath the surface, till you are so nearly drowned that you taste all the bitterness of death. Then we"ll have you up again and ask you a few questions. Perhaps you may have to go back into the bath a second time before Zorilla gets to the real work."
No words of mine can describe the malignancy of that voice, no words of mine can describe the shout of resolute, sardonic laughter which answered it.
Bill wanted to shout in answer, but I clapped my hand over his mouth just in time, and I could almost see the frowning faces of the two fiends as they advanced upon the bound man.