Роберт Чамберс - Who Goes There!

"No," she said.

"Have you any suspicion that your maid has been involved in any such risky business?"

"I have no knowledge of anything military at all. I don't believe my maid has, either."

"You can recall no incident which might lead you to believe that your maid is engaged in that sort of affair?"

The girl was silent. He repeated the question. She said: "Anna has complained of being followed. I have already told you that she and I have been annoyed by impertinent telephone calls and by strange men coming here. Do you suppose they were from Scotland Yard?"

"Possibly. Have you any suspicion why your maid has been arrested?" he persisted. She hesitated; her straight brows knitted slightly again as though in a perplexed effort to remember and to understand. Then she looked up at Guild out of troubled eyes and shook her head:

"I don't know—I don't know —whatever my suspicions may be―"

"Suspicions!"

"My personal suspicions could scarcely concern you, Mr. Guild."

The snub was direct; he reddened.

"Very well," he said. "What you say gives me a decent chance for life." He drew a quick breath of relief. "I'm mighty glad," he said; "I have—have seen men die. It isn't—an—agreeable sight. I think we'd better go."

"In a moment."

She took her satchel and went into another room with it, closing the intervening door. She was gone only a few seconds. When she returned she had locked the satchel; he closed and strapped her suit–case and took it in his hand. Together they descended the stairway and started through the lower hall.

And what occurred there happened like lightning.

For, as he passed the door of the darkened living room, a man jumped out behind him and threw one arm around his throat, and another man stepped in front of him and snapped a pair of handcuffs on his wrists.

It was not even a struggle; Guild was being held too tightly. The girl shrank back against the wall, flattening herself against it, staring dumbly at the proceeding as though stunned. She did not even cry out when the man who had handcuffed Guild turned on her and caught her by the elbow.

"Come along quietly, miss," he began, when suddenly his voice died out in a groan and he crumpled up on the floor as Bush, the chauffeur, sprang from the passage–way behind him and struck him with something short and heavy.

The man who had thrown his arm around Guild's throat from behind, flung his handcuffed victim aside and whipped out a revolver, but the chauffeur knocked it out of his fist and hit him in the face two heavy, merciless blows, hurling him senseless across the stairs. And all the while the blond young chauffeur was smiling his fixed and murderous smile. And he was like a tiger now in every movement as he knelt, rummaged in the fallen men's pockets, found the key to the handcuffs, leaned over and unlocked them as Guild held out his manacled hands.

"The chauffeur hit him … two heavy, merciless blows, hurling him senseless across the stairs"

"Please watch them, sir," he said cheerfully. "I must find a curtain or something―"

He ran into the living–room, ripped off a long blue curtain, tore it into strips with his powerful blond hands, grinning cheerfully all the while.

"Best to tie them up, sir—this way—allow me, sir—this is the better way—the surer―"

Guild, working hard, he scarcely knew why, felt a touch on his arm.

"Are they dead?" whispered Karen Girard unsteadily.

"No—stunned."

"Are they robbers?"

The blond chauffeur looked up, laughed, then rolled a strip of cloth into a ball for a gag.

"I'm not entirely sure what they are," said Guild. "I'll tell you what I think when we're in the car."

The chauffeur completed his business, looked over the results of his efforts critically, rose to his feet, still smiling.

"Now, sir, if you please—and madam—" And he possessed himself of the luggage.

"Take the door–key, if you please, sir. Lock it on the outside. Thank you. This way, if you please, sir. I took it upon myself to bring the car up to the kitchen entrance."

The car stood there; the bags were flung in; Karen Girard stepped into the tonneau; Guild followed. At the same moment a woman appeared, coming along the brick walk.

"My maid of all work," exclaimed Karen. "What shall I say to her?"

"Anything, madam, but send her home," whispered Bush.

The girl leaned from the car and called out: "I have locked the house and am going away for the day, Mrs. Bulger. Please come tomorrow, as usual."

The woman thanked her, turned and went away again down the brick walk. They watched her out of sight.

"Now!" said Guild to the chauffeur, "drive to the Holland steamship wharf at―"

"I know, sir," smiled the blond chauffeur.

Which reply troubled the young man exceedingly, for it was evident to him now that, if not herself a spy, this young girl in his charge was watched, surrounded and protected by German agents of a sinister sort—agents known to her father, in evident communication with him, and thoroughly informed of the fact that he wanted his daughter to leave England at once and under the particular escort of Guild.

Nor had Guild the slightest doubt that the two men who had followed and handcuffed him were British Government agents, and that if this young girl's maid had really been arrested for espionage, and if the Edmeston people, too, were suspected, then suspicion had been also directed toward Miss Girard and naturally also to him, who was her visitor.

Guild's troubled gaze rested once more upon the young girl beside him. At the same moment, as though he had spoken to her she turned and looked at him out of eyes so honest, so fearless that he had responded aloud before he realized it: "It's all right. I know you are not deceiving me."

"No," she said, "I am not. But could you tell me what all this means—all this that has happened so swiftly, so terribly―"

"I have a pretty clear idea what it means…. It's just as well that those detectives did not arrest me…. Tell me, did you ever before see this chauffeur, Bush?"

"Never, Mr. Guild."

He nodded; he was slowly coming to a definite conclusion concerning the episode but he kept his own counsel. She said in a low, embarrassed voice: "You think me cowardly. I know it. But I really didn't know what to do."

She was very much in earnest, very intent on his expression, and he did not dare smile.

"What could you have done, Miss Girard?" he asked, pleasantly.

"I don't know. I—I felt as though we—you and I—were allies—and that I ought to help you. But it all passed too quickly―"

"There was nothing you could have done for me," he smiled.

She said reflectively: "I myself don't quite see how I could have helped matters. But I didn't wish you to believe me afraid to help you."

He looked into her wistful eyes smilingly: "Somehow," he said, "I don't believe you are really very much afraid of anything."

A slight shudder passed over her. "Violence is new to me. I am not very experienced—not very old you know. And I never saw men fight. And when"—she lowered her voice—"when that chauffeur struck them so heavily—so dreadfully—I—I have never seen men fight like that—strike each other in the face as though they—they meant murder―"

"Don't think of it now, Miss Girard. You must keep your nerve." He forced a laugh; "you'll need all your composure, too, because I've got something to tell you which you won't like. Shall I tell you now?"

"Yes, please."

"Then—the man, Grätz, says that you must go aboard that steamer as my wife."

The girl looked at him bewildered. "Somebody," continued Guild, "has taken passage for us as Mr. and Mrs. Kervyn Guild. Grätz warned me. My name is Kervyn. Yours is Karen. Our initials are alike. If there is any suspicion directed toward us there are the initials on your satchel and suit–case—and presumably on your clothing. Do you understand?"