Читать книгу The Vultures of Desolate Island - George E. Rochester - Страница 5
ОглавлениеI MEET ERKUNSTELT
I cannot say that I enjoyed the subsequent walk back to Four Gables with Henri. The sun was setting with a wondrous golden beauty behind the Berwickshire hills, and mists of evening were creeping up from pleasant vales.
But such things are not viewed to best advantage through puffed and swollen eyes. Moreover, to attune the mind to a proper appreciation one must walk alone in that strange, sweet, tranquil hush which comes with the eventide.
I did not walk alone; and any hush there might have been was rudely and most jarringly shattered by Henri’s unmusical chattering.
Question after question he put to me as he ambled along by my side, whilst I carried the laden basket. My name, my occupation, from whence I hailed, what I was doing in Berwickshire—all these things he sought to be enlightened upon. I think I answered easily enough, for I had my plans well laid beforehand.
My name was John Smith—a good, honest English name with which none could quarrel. I was a gardener by profession, but could turn my hand to most things. I hailed from Godstone, in Surrey, and was tramping the country in search of permanent work.
“You’ll not get permanent work with me,” cried Henri with a certain triumphant maliciousness.
“But if I give satisfaction——” I temporised.
“It doesn’t matter what you give,” he rapped. “We leave England in a few days’ time and Four Gables will be shut up.”
I pricked up my ears at that.
“Going abroad?” I ventured.
“Mind your own business,” he snapped.
I did as I was bid. But as we walked along I found myself wondering as to the nature of the work which would be found for me, in view of the fact that the house was being so soon shut up. And, somewhat humbly, I put this question to my companion.
“You will tidy the garden and help with the covering of the furniture,” he replied. “There’s a lot of small jobs to be done. Mr. Erkunstelt wishes the place to be left in order because he hates it to stand empty, and he is trying to let it to anybody who will pay the price he wants.”
“Yes, and has been these fifteen years.”
“He might not like me about the place?” I commented.
Henri stopped abruptly.
“Why?” he shot at me, his head thrust forward, a world of sudden suspicion in his voice.
“Well, I’m a—a bit funny looking, you see, after that fight,” I replied weakly. “Gentlemen don’t like servants who fight. At least, I’ve never found a gentleman who did.”
Henri’s brow cleared.
“That’s all right,” he replied in a mollified tone. “Don’t let that worry you. Fifteen years I’ve been with master, and he won’t interfere with my taking on a bit of help to aid me in cleaning up.”
And thus we came to Four Gables and, passing in through the iron gates, walked up the drive and round to the rear of the house. Henri led the way into a large stone-floored kitchen. I placed my basket on the table, and doffing my cap, stood shuffling my feet in awkward expectation.
“You will come with me to Mr. Erkunstelt,” said Henri, hanging his seedy overcoat on a peg behind the door.
I followed him along a corridor and across a large entrance hall to a closed door, upon which he knocked.
“Come in,” called a voice harshly.
Opening the door, Henri ushered me across the threshold into a large room, comfortably furnished as a sort of library-cum-study.
A big, broad-shouldered man was seated writing at a desk littered with papers. He raised his head to stare at me as I entered.
His swarthy face was almost covered by a black, shaggy beard, which failed to hide, however, the cruel, thin-lipped mouth. A big hooked nose jutted out prominently, belligerently.
But it was his eyes which held me—cold, cruel, merciless eyes of vivid blue, surmounted by thick, bushy eyebrows. They seemed to bore right into me, and in spite of myself I could not suppress a shudder of repulsion.
This then was Erkunstelt.
I dropped my eyes beneath his gaze, for it did not seem fitting to me that a battered applicant for a humble post should have the temerity to stare back at the master of the household.
“Who is this fellow, Henri?” he demanded harshly.
“His name is Smith, master—John Smith,” replied the old man-servant whiningly. “He came here this morning seeking a job, but I turned him away. This evening, in the village, I was attacked by a hooligan and he came to my assistance. I took the——”
“You were attacked?” cut in Erkunstelt sharply.
“Yes, master.”
“Your own vile temper to blame, of course.”
“Master!” protested Henri.
“Continue,” rapped Erkunstelt. “You say this man came to your assistance?”
“Yes. He thrashed the man who attacked me, so I took the liberty of engaging him to help me for the next few days. We want someone, master, for there is much to do.”
“Yes, and you grow older every day,” remarked Erkunstelt brutally. “I wonder sometimes why I keep you on.”
From the corner of my eyes I saw a crafty grin wrinkle Henri’s face for an instant. And Erkunstelt saw it also.
“Yes, smile, you weevil!” he said, and, curiously enough, there was little of anger in his voice. “But some day I think you will die quite suddenly.”
Now to a casual listener there was nothing in that remark save a callous prophecy as to Henri’s natural demise. But, to my hypersensitive ears, it contained a cold and deadly threat. And why not? For if Henri had been with Erkunstelt fifteen years, as he had said, then he probably knew enough about Erkunstelt to embarrass that gentleman painfully should he let his tongue wag. Always provided, of course, that Erkunstelt was a rogue. That fact had yet to be proved.
Erkunstelt stretched out a hand and pulled a writing tablet towards him.
“You,” he said harshly, turning to me and picking up a pencil. “What is your name?”
Then followed a cross-examination dealing with my utmost intimate domestic affairs. Erkunstelt jotted down all my replies.
“Very good,” he said at length, “you can go. You will assist Henri and will sleep above the stables.”
The old man-servant took me in tow and piloted me back to the kitchen.
“There,” he said triumphantly, “what did I tell you? Master leaves all these things to me.”
But I would have wagered that, in the privacy of his study, Erkunstelt was setting the telephone in motion to ascertain the truth of my answers to his questions. But my story was absolutely watertight. Sir Douglas Malcolm had seen to that. I was John Smith, of Godstone, and I was prepared to defy any inquiries by Erkunstelt to prove otherwise. Nothing is left to chance in the Secret Service.
After a meagre supper of bread and cold meat, Henri piloted me across a stable yard and up a wooden staircase, to what had obviously been intended as quarters for the grooms. He had supplied me with a stable lantern and, by its sickly illumination I glanced round the room which had been allotted to me.
I will not attempt to describe it, because there is little to describe, save that it had four distempered walls, bare wooden flooring, a rickety and rusted iron bedstead, and a lattice window which looked out across the sea.
“There, John Smith,” grunted Henri, “quarters fit for a duke. I’ll have you up at five in the morning, or maybe before. Don’t get prowling around in the night because the silver is locked up and the hound will be loose in the yard. Good-night.”
With that he ambled away, leaving me with the stable lantern and my thoughts. Here I was, then, established in Four Gables. And I had discovered that Erkunstelt was leaving the country in a few days.
Where was he going? Was he going to some secret pirate’s lair set in a cold and desolate sea within the Arctic Circle? Or was he merely going across to the Continent to direct the activities of the pirates from there by means of wireless or agents?
On the other hand, were the Flying Beetle’s suspicions false? What if Erkunstelt was not involved in this piracy and knew nothing of it? Where, also, was the Flying Beetle?
I crossed to the window and, leaning out, drank in the beauty of the night. A full moon had swung up over the sea, tracing a path of pure, shimmering gold to the far horizon. Nothing disturbed the stillness save the eerie, plaintive cry of some wheeling gull.
I do not know how long I remained there, but suddenly I stiffened and caught my breath. The slim, helmeted, black-clad figure of a man was standing directly below my window, looking up at me. I had not seen his advent, so silent had it been. He had seemingly sprung out of nothingness unless, indeed, it were out of the shadows of a nearby clump of gorse. But I knew him.
It was the Flying Beetle!
Softly I called his name. He stood motionless, staring up at my window without reply. Then sudden doubt assailed me. What if it was not the Flying Beetle? Fool that I was to have thus shown my hand.
Turning, I ran across the room to the door which opened onto the wooden staircase leading down to the stable yard. But, as I wrenched it open there came from the yard a deep-throated growl. From the shadows stalked a great hound.
It stood looking up at me, its eyes glinting blood-red in the moonlight. Cautiously, tentatively I set foot on the topmost stair. Again came that growl, full-throated and menacing.
I retreated then, closing the door, and sped back to the window. But, when I looked out the silent, black-clad figure had vanished.
Fully an hour I waited, but it did not reappear. I turned in at length and I think my last coherent thought, before I fell asleep, was that I must make friends with that hound. Unless I did so I was virtually a prisoner at nights.
But I was certain that the figure I had seen below my window was that of the Flying Beetle.
