Dennis Wheatley - The Black Baroness

Gregory sat down and stared out over the placid blue waters of the lake below. It was very quiet there and cut off by the trees from the sight of any other house along the lake-shore. Not a thing was moving and the only evidence of the handiwork of man in the whole panorama was the lemon-yellow villas just discernible in the distance upon the further shore and the ancient moss-covered, stone balustrade immediately in front of him. It occurred to him that the scene must have been just the same nearly 2,000

years before when some Roman patrician had perhaps entertained his Caesar there.

The black-clad manservant had disappeared as Gregory sat down, but he returned with a large, flagon-shaped decanter which had a narrow spout rising out of one side of it like that of a teapot, and on the other a sausage-shaped hole which went right down into the centre of the flagon and was packed full of crushed ice so that the wine was cooled without the ice getting into and diluting it.

The man poured the golden wine into a cone-shaped crystal goblet and handed it on a salver to Gregory. With a nod of thanks he took the glass and drank. It was a light, dry Italian wine, deliciously cool and refreshing after his hot journey, but with a slight taste of sulphur about it which has prevented such Italian wines ever becoming popular in England.

He set the glass down and began to think again of the grim work before him. When the Baroness joined him where would she sit? Probably in that chair there, as it was beside his own and faced the view. How would he then be able to get behind her? How utterly revolting the whole business was, but it must be done—it must be done. The lives of thousands of soldiers, sailors and airmen, the happiness or misery of literally millions of families, the fate of two great nations perhaps hung upon it.

He drank some more of the refreshing wine and with a momentary flash of his old cynicism thought how fate had played into his hands in the matter of the Baroness's trunk-call. In this secluded spot which could not be seen from the house or observed from the roadway it would be infinitely easier for him to do the thing he had to do, without any risk of being caught in the act. No doubt there was a path leading round the house which would make it unnecessary for him to go back through it. With luck he would be able to slip away unobserved and the Baroness's body might not be discovered until he was well on his way back to Rome or perhaps hours later when with Collimard and Desaix he was in the plane heading for Paris once more.

He suddenly realised that he was feeling very tired; the strain of the last two months, and particularly of the past four weeks, had been appalling. It was not only his own work which had taken it out of him so much, but the frightful mental stress of watching the world-tragedy unfold, with victory after victory going to Hitler. Norway seized, Holland overrun, Belgium smashed to her knees and now France in dire peril—yet there had seemed so little that one could do to halt the onward sweep of the mighty German war-machine.

He was sitting in the shadow, but the strong sunshine on the waters of the lake tired his eyes and he closed them for a moment. It was very pleasant there—so utterly peaceful and far removed from all the turmoil and the killing that was going on under the same sun far away to the north. For a little he remained between sleeping and waking; he did not hear her come, but when he opened his eyes again the Baroness was standing in front of him.

She was now dressed for travelling, in a light tweed coat-and-skirt. Her old-young face expressed none of the easy social charm with which she had greeted him on his arrival. Her dead-black eyes were staring down at him with a queer expression of mixed amusement and contempt.

'Well, Englishman?' A harsh note had crept into her soft voice as she addressed him. 'Are you the best thing that the British Government could find to send against me? Did you think for one moment that stupid clerical collar would deceive such eyes as mine?'

Gregory sat staring at her, his mouth a little open, as she went on mockingly: 'Your name is Sallust, isn't it? I think that was what Grauber said when I described you to him after that night when you tried to dissuade Leopold from surrendering and I had to shoot your little girl-friend who turned out to be the traitoress Erika von Epp.'

The moment Gregory had opened his eyes he had attempted to spring to his feet, but although his brain was still working perfectly clearly it seemed that it no longer controlled his body. All that happened was that after a slight jerk forward his feet slithered a little on the stones; but even by exerting all his willpower he could not lever himself up out of the chair. The awful truth came home to him with blinding suddenness—the wine had been drugged.

The Baroness lit a cigarette and went on calmly: 'I only caught a glimpse of you when we were with Leopold and the things someone has done to your face are very effective; but Grauber told me, too, that it was you who was the masked man that broke into my suite at the Hotel Weimar, and we stood within a few feet of each other for the best part of ten minutes then. It is useless to cover or alter your face unless you also do something about your hands—and you have very nice hands, Mr. Sallust; the moment you came into the room this afternoon I knew you by them for the man of Rotterdam.'

In vain Gregory wriggled, making superhuman efforts to get up, but it needed every ounce of concentration he had to move one limb at a time. He could raise either his hands or feet a few inches, but then it flopped back again and he was as fast in his chair as though he had been bound to it.

'Stop squirming!' she admonished him suddenly. 'It will do you no good. What you came here to do I don't know, but you have been caught by quicker wits than your own. Into the wine you drank I put an old and subtle Italian poison which is almost tasteless and leaves no trace. Its first symptoms you already know, the later ones you will learn in due course; I should think, judging by the amount you have drunk, in about two hours. No one will disturb you here; I sent a message out to your chauffeur that you had changed your plans and would not require him until ten o'clock, so he has gone back to Rome, My work in Italy is done and I am leaving now to hear Mussolini speak, before flying home. Count Ciano is already on his way to inform the French and British Ambassadors that Italy will enter the war on the side of Germany at midnight. Good-bye, Mr. Sallust; you will die quite peacefully and in no great pain.'

CHAPTER 23

Poison

Having picked up the goblet and tossed its remaining contents into the bushes the Baroness had collected the decanter and gone; removing with her the only evidence as to the manner in which he might have met his death.

The partial paralysis which had Gregory in its grip had prevented his uttering a single word. He could move his lips and his tongue but only enough to mutter incoherently and, strive as he would, it was utterly impossible for him to emit a shout for help; yet he now knew that every moment that he remained there the poison would be working through his body, making less his chance of life.

If only he had not been so eager to make a quick get-away and had left the car out on the road a few hundred yards away from the Villa, Collimard would have become suspicious at his non-appearance after he had been in the house for over an hour, and when another hour had passed he would probably have made up his mind to come in and investigate; but by driving up to the front door in the car Gregory realised that he had made his own line of retreat extremely vulnerable.

Even had the Baroness sent out to tell Collimard that she was, herself, motoring her guest back to Rome, he would have smelt a rat; but on being told to return at ten o'clock he would assume that for some good reason, after having seen the layout for himself, Gregory had decided not to make his attempt upon her life until after dark. By squinting sideways Gregory could just see his watch. It was twelve minutes past four; the Baroness had given him two hours; by ten o'clock he would have been dead for over three hours.