CHAPTER XIII
THE WOODEN HORSE OF TROY
The question struck Dalroy as so bizarre--in the conditions so ludicrous--that, despite the cold fury evoked by Von Halwig"s innuendoes with regard to Irene, he nearly laughed.
"I am in no mood to discuss international politics," he answered curtly.
The other, who seemed to have his temper well under control, merely nodded. Indeed, he was obviously, if unconsciously, modelling his behaviour on that of his prisoner.
"I only imagined that you might be interested in hearing what"s going to happen to your d.a.m.ned country," he said.
"I know already. She will emerge from this struggle greater, more renowned, more invincible than ever."
"_Dummes zeug!_ All rubbish! That"s your House of Commons and music-hall patter, meant to tickle the ears of the British working-man. England is going to be wiped off the map. We"re obliterating her now. You"ve been in Belgium a month, and must have seen things which your stupid John Bulls at home can"t even comprehend, which they never will comprehend till too late."
He paused, awaiting a reply perhaps. None came.
"It"s rough luck that you, a soldier like myself, may not share in the game, even on the losing side," went on Von Halwig. "But you would be a particularly dangerous sort of spy if you contrived to reach England, especially with the information I"m now going to give you. You can"t possibly escape, of course. You will be executed, not as a spy, but as a murderer. You left a rather heavy mark on us. Two soldiers in a hut near Vise, three officers and a private in the mill, five soldiers in the wood at Argenteau----"
"You flatter me," put in Dalroy. "I may have shot one fellow in the wood, a real spy, named Schwartz. But that is all. Your men killed one another there."
"The credit was given to you," was the dry retort. "But--_es ist mir ganz einerlei_--what does it matter? You"re an intelligent Englishman, and that is why I am taking the trouble to tell you exactly why Great Britain will soon be Little Britain. Understand, I"m supplying facts, not war bulletins. On land you"re beaten already. Our armies are near Paris. German cavalry entered Chantilly to-day. Your men made a great stand, and fought a four days" rearguard action which will figure in the text-books for the next fifty years. But the French are broken, the English Expeditionary Force nearly destroyed. The French Government has deserted Paris for Bordeaux. And, excuse me if I laugh, Lord Kitchener has asked for a hundred thousand more men!"
"He will get five millions if he needs them."
Von Halwig swept the retort aside with an impatient flourish.
"Too late! Too late! I"ll prove it to you. Turkey is joining us.
Bulgaria will come in when wanted. Greece won"t lift a finger in the Balkans, and a great army of Turks led by Germans will march on Egypt.
South Africa will rise in rebellion. Ireland is quiet for the time, but who knows what will happen when she sees England on her knees? Italy is sitting on the fence. The United States are snivelling, but German influence is too strong out there to permit of active interference. And, in any event, what can America do except look on, shivering at the prospect of her own turn coming next? Russia is making a stir in East Prussia and along the Austrian frontier, so poor Old England is chortling because the Slav is fighting her battles. It is to laugh.
We"ll pen the Bear long before he becomes dangerous. I am not boasting, my friend. Why should _I_, Captain von Halwig of the Imperial Guard, be messing about in a wretched Flemish village when our men are about to storm Paris in the west and tackle Russia in the east? I"ll explain. I"m here because I know England so well. My job is to help in organising the invading force which will gather at Calais. Ah! that amuses you, does it? The British fleet is the obstacle, eh? Not it. Seriously now, do you regard us Germans as idiots? No; I"m sure you don"t. You _know_. These fellows in Parliament _don"t_ know. I a.s.sure you, on my honour, our general staff is confident that a German army will land on British soil--in Britain itself I mean--before Christmas."
The speaker interrupted this flood of dire prophecy in order to light a fresh cigarette. Then clasping his hands behind his back, and strutting with feet well apart, he said quite affably, "Why don"t you put a question or two? If you believe I"m reciting a fairy tale, say so, and point out the stupidities."
Now, Dalroy had not been "amused" by the statement that the Germans might occupy Calais. He had already discounted even worse reverses as lying well within the bounds of possibility. He was certain, too, that the Prussian was saying that which he really believed. But his nerves of steel were undoubtedly tried almost beyond endurance at the instant Von Halwig noticed the involuntary movement which elicited that uninvited comment on the British fleet.
As the word "Calais" quitted the Guardsman"s lips, a rope, with a noose at the end, dropped with swift stealth through the open trap-door. Its descent was checked when the noose dangled slightly higher than his head, and whoever was manipulating it began at once to swing it slowly forward and backward. Von Halwig stood some six or seven feet nearer the wall than the point which the rope would have touched if lowered to the floor, so the objective aimed at by that pendulum action was not difficult to grasp, being nothing else than his speedy and noiseless extinction by hanging.
It is an oft-repeated though far-fetched a.s.sertion that a drowning man reviews the whole of his life during the few seconds which separate the last conscious struggle from complete anaesthesia. That may or may not be true, but Dalroy now experienced a brain-storm not lacking many of the essentials of some such mental kinema.
Think what that swinging rope, with its unseen human agency, meant to a captive in his hapless position! It was simply incredible that one man alone would attempt so daring an expedient. Not only, then, were a number of plucky and resourceful allies concealed in the loft, but they must have been hidden there before the detachment of Death"s-Head Hussars occupied the barn beneath. Therefore, they knew the enemy"s strength, yet were not afraid. That they were ready-witted was shown by the method evolved for the suppression of that blatant Teuton, Von Halwig. It was evident, too, that they had intended to lie _perdu_ till the cavalry were gone, but had been moved to action by a desire to rescue the bound Englishman who was being twitted so outrageously on his own and his country"s supposed misfortunes. Who could they be? Were they armed, and sufficiently numerous to rout the Germans? In any event, how could they deliver an effective attack? He, Dalroy, took it for granted that the imminent strangulation of the Guardsman, if successful, was but the prelude to a sharp fight, since Von Halwig"s death, though supremely dramatic as an isolated incident, would neither benefit the prisoners nor conduce to the well-being of the people in the loft. How, then, did they purpose dealing with a score of trained soldiers, who must already be fidgeting in the rain, and whose leader, the corporal, might look in at any moment to ascertain what was delaying the young staff captain. Discipline was all very well, but these hussars belonged to a crack regiment, and their colonel would resent strongly the needless exposure of his men and horses to inclement weather. Moreover, how easy it was for the corporal to convey a polite hint to Von Halwig by asking if the chauffeur should not turn the car in readiness for his departure!
All this, and more, cascaded through Dalroy"s brain while his enemy was lighting the second cigarette. He was in the plight of a shipwrecked sailor clinging to a sinking craft, who saw a lifeboat approaching, yet dared neither look at nor signal to it. He must bend all his energies now to the task of keeping Von Halwig occupied. What would happen when the noose coiled around the orator"s neck? Would it tighten with sufficient rapidity to choke a cry for help? Would it fall awkwardly, and warn him? Were any of the troopers so placed that they could see into that section of the barn, and thus witness their officer"s extraordinary predicament? Who could tell? How might a man form any sort of opinion as to the yea or nay of a juggler"s feat which savoured of black magic?
Dalroy gave up the effort to guess what the next half-minute might bring forth. Those mysterious beings up there needed the best help he could offer, and his powers in that respect were strictly limited to two channels--he must egg on the talker--he must not watch that rope.
"I am ready to admit Germany"s strength on land," he said, resolutely fixing his eyes on an iron cross attached to the Prussian"s tunic above the top b.u.t.ton. "That is a reasonable claim. How futile otherwise would have been your twenty years of preparation for this very war! But my mind is far too dense to understand how you can disregard the English Channel."
"The _English_ Channel!" scoffed Von Halwig. "The impudence of you _verdammt_----No, it"s foolish to lose one"s temper. Well, I"ll explain.
The really important part of the _English_ Channel is about to become German. For a little time we leave you the surface, but Germany will own the rest. Your navy is about to receive a horrible surprise. We"ve caught you napping. While Britain was ruling the sea we Germans have been experimenting with it. Our visible fleet is good, but not good enough, so we allowed your naval superiority to keep you quiet until we had perfected our invisible fleet. We are ready now. We possess three submarines to your one; and can build more, and bigger, and better under-sea boats than you. Do you realise what that means? Already we have sunk four of your best cruisers, and they never saw the vessel that destroyed them. We are playing havoc with your mercantile marine.
Britain is girdled with mines and torpedoes. No ship can enter or leave any of your ports without incurring the almost unavoidable risk of----"
A rat scampered across one of the speaker"s feet, and startled him.
He swore, dropped the cigarette, and lighted another, the third. Like every junior officer of the German _corps d"elite_, he had sedulously copied the manners and bearing of the commissioned ranks in the British army. But your true German is neurotic; the rat had scratched the veneer. Meanwhile the rope rose quickly half-way to the trap-door; it fell again when Von Halwig donned the prophet"s mantle once more.
"We can not only ruin and starve you," he said exultantly, "but we have guns which will beat a way for our troops from Calais to Dover against all the ships you dare ma.s.s in those waters. We have you bested in every way. Each German company takes the field with more machine-guns than a British regiment. We have high explosives you never heard of. While you were playing polo and golf our chemists were busy in their laboratories."
His voice rose as he reeled off this litany of war. His perfect command of English was not proof against the guttural clank and crash of German. He became a veritable German talking English, rather than an accomplished linguist using a foreign tongue. Oddly enough, his next tirade showed that he was half-aware of the change. "Old England is done, Captain Dalroy," he chanted. "Young Germany is about to take her place. The world must learn to speak German, not English. Six months from now I"ll begin to forget your makeshift language. Six months from now the German Eagle will flaunt in the breeze as securely in London as it flies to-day in Berlin and Brussels, and, it may be, in Paris. If I"m lucky, and get through the war----_Gott in Himm_----"
With a sudden vicious swoop the noose settled on Von Halwig"s shoulders, and was jerked taut. A master-hand made that cast. No American cowboy ever placed la.s.so more neatly on the horns of unruly steer. At one instant the rope was swinging back and forth noiselessly; at the next, rising under the impetus of a gentle flick, it whirled over the Prussian"s head and tightened around his neck. He tore madly at it with both hands, but was already lifted off his feet, and in process of being hauled upward with an almost incredible rapidity. There was a momentary delay when his head reached the level of the trap-door; but Dalroy distinctly saw two hands grasp the struggling arms and heave the Guardsman"s long body out of sight.
An astounding feature of this tragic episode was the absence of any outcry on the victim"s part. He uttered no sound other than a stifled gurgle after that half-completed exclamation was stilled. Possibly, his dazed wits concentrated on the one frantic endeavour--to get rid of that horrible choking thing which had clutched at him from out of the surrounding obscurity.
And now a thick knotted rope plumped down until its end lay on the floor, and a rough-looking fellow, clothed like Maertz or Dalroy himself, descended with the ease and agility of a monkey. He was just the kind of s.h.a.ggy goblin one might expect to emerge from any such hiding-place; but he carried a slung rifle, and the bewildered prisoner, taking a few steps forward to greet his rescuer, realised that the weapon was a Lee-Enfield of the latest British army pattern.
""Arf a mo", sir," gurgled the new-comer in a husky and cheerful whisper. "I"ll "old the rope till the next of ahr little knot "as shinned dahn. Then I"ll cut yer loose, an" we"ll get the wind up ahtside. Didjever "ear such a gas-bag as that bloomin" Jarman? Lord luv"
a duck, "e couldn"t "arf tork! But Shiney Black, one of ahrs, "as just shoved a bynit through "is gizzard, so _that_ c.o.c.k won"t crow agine!"
Dalroy owned only a reader"s knowledge of colloquial c.o.c.kney. He inferred, rather than actually understood, that several British soldiers were secreted in the loft, and that one of them, named "Shiney Black,"
had closed Von Halwig"s career in the twinkling of an eye.
By this time another man had reached the ground. He seized the rope and steadied it, and a third appeared. The first gnome whipped out a knife, freed Dalroy, unslung his rifle, and picked up the electric torch, which he held so that its beam filled the doorway. Man after man came down.
Each was armed with a regulation rifle; Dalroy, for once thrown completely off his balance, became dimly aware that in every instance the equipment included bayonet, bandolier, and haversack.
The cohort formed up, too, as though they had rehea.r.s.ed the procedure in the gymnasium at Aldershot. There was no muttered order, no uncertainty.
Rifles were unslung, bayonets fixed, and safety catches turned over soundlessly.
Conquering his blank amazement as best he could, Dalroy inquired of the first sprite how many the party consisted of, all told.
"Twelve an" the corp"ral, sir," came the prompt answer. "The lucky thirteen we calls ahrselves. An" we wanted a bit o" luck ter leg it all the w"y from Monze to this "ole. Not that we "adn"t ter kill any Gord"s quant.i.ty o" Yewlans when they troied ter be funny, an" stop us----Here"s the corp"ral, sir."
Dalroy was confronted by a clear-eyed man, whose square-shouldered erectness was not concealed by the unkempt clothes of a Belgian peasant.
Carrying the rifle at "the slope," and bringing his right hand smartly across to the small of the b.u.t.t, the leader of this lost legion announced himself.
"Corporal Bates, sir, A Company, 2nd Battalion of the Buffs. That German officer made out, sir, that you were in our army."
"Yes, I am Captain Dalroy, of the 2nd Bengal Lancers."
Corporal Bates became, if possible, even more clear-eyed.
"Stationed where last year, sir?"
"At Lucknow, with your own battalion."