Читать книгу The Green Archer - Edgar Wallace - Страница 12

Table of Contents

AS Abe Bellamy fired the figure disappeared from view. It seemed to melt into the black shadow instantly. Abe ran forward, his pistol arm extended stiffly, but when he came to the spot where the figure had been there was no sign of archer, no other evidence of his presence than two bullet holes in the panelling of the wall.

The old man made a quick search. There was a door near where the figure had disappeared, which led to a circular staircase and down to the servants' quarters. He tried the door; it was locked. And then a thought struck him, and he went quickly back along the corridor, past the open door of his own room, and came at last to where Julius Savini was sleeping.

The door was fastened, and he rapped sharply.

"Savini!" he called.

There was no answer. By this time the servants had been aroused, and he caught a glimpse of a man in shirt and trousers coming toward him and called him by name.

"What is wrong, Mr. Bellamy?"

"Don't ask fool questions," snarled the old man. "Get dressed, rouse all the servants, and search the castle. 'Phone down to the lodge and wake the keeper. Hurry."

At that moment Savini's door opened, and he stood, a startled figure in his pyjamas, holding a lighted candle in his hand.

"What——" he began.

Bellamy pushed past him into the room and glanced round suspiciously. One of the long windows was open, and he strode across and looked out. A narrow parapet ran immediately beneath the window. It was broad enough for a man to walk upon, given the requisite nerve.

"Didn't you hear the shot?"

"I heard something. I think it must have been you pounding on the door. What has happened?"

"Dress and come down to the library."

Suddenly he lurched forward without warning and jerked open the jacket of Savini's pyjamas. A square foot of bare chest was his reward, and he grunted his disappointment. He had expected to see a skin-tight green vest.

Savini dressed quickly and went down, to find the old man in the library, pacing up and down like a caged lion.

"Who locked the door of the servants' stairway?" he asked.

"I did," was the reply. "You gave me instructions to see that the door was locked every night."

The old man eyed him keenly.

"And you've got the key, of course?"

"As a matter of fact, the butler has it. I give it to him because he's up earlier than I. He has to open the door to let in the cleaners."

"Where is the key now?" snarled Bellamy, his red face inflamed still further. The great jaw was out-thrust and his eyes were the merest slits. "I tell you this, Savini, if you're not in this Green Archer fake, I've made one of the few mistakes that I've ever made. Find Wilks."

Savini went out into the grounds to discover the butler, accompanied by the two keepers that Bellamy maintained.

"I've got the key in my pocket," said Wilks, when the other had explained his errand. "It couldn't have gone that way, Mr. Savini."

He was carrying a bright vapour lamp, and this, when he came to the library, the old man requisitioned. They went upstairs again to the bedroom floor, and the butler turned the key of the little door and swung it open.

"Give me that lamp," said Bellamy. He pulled his pistol from his pocket and went cautiously down the circular staircase, followed by the two men. At the foot was another door, which was unlocked, and this led into an annex of the castle kitchen—a vaulted chamber used as a storehouse for provisions. Both doors which led from this apartment were bolted from the inside. Mr. Bellamy cast the light of his lantern up the broad chimney, but saw nothing.

He pulled his pistol from his pocket.

"He couldn't have gone this way," he grumbled, and then irritably: "There was no other way he could have gone!"

The light of dawn was in the eastern sky when the search was finally finished. Mr. Bellamy sat before the newly kindled fire in the library drinking a cup of scalding hot coffee with savage, noisy gulps, whilst his secretary sat silently, and a little wearily, watching him. He stifled a yawn, not so furtively but the old man noticed it.

"There's something behind this Green Archer business, Savini," he said, breaking a silence that had lasted the greater part of an hour. "A ghost! Pah! I believe neither in ghosts nor devils. There is nothing on God Almighty's earth, under or over it, that can scare me! I am devil-proof and ghost-proof, Savini, and that fellow has got to be bullet-proof to get away with it if I ever find him! Well?" He swung his head round sharply toward the door.

It was the butler, a stately man despite the scantiness of his attire.

"I took the liberty of going down into the store-room again, Mr. Bellamy," he said, "for another search, and I found this."

Bellamy jumped up and snatched the thing from Wilks' outstretched hand. At first he could not see what it was; it looked like a small red ball, but when he took it in his hand he saw it was a handkerchief. It was wet with blood, and Bellamy's brows met.

"So I got the swine after all!" he said exultantly. "Do ghosts bleed?" he snarled round at Savini. "Tell me that, my friend. Does a ghost bleed?"

He opened the handkerchief to its full extent.

"A woman's," he said.

It was a delicate thing, of fine fabric and lace, and in one corner was a monogram. He carried the handkerchief to the table and held it under the light.

"V.H.," he said and frowned again. "V.H. Who in hell is V.H.?"

He did not glimpse Savini's face nor see him start.

V.H.! Valerie Howett!