Ellis Peters - George Felse 08 - The House Of Green Turf (18 page)

She raised her voice, not out of panic, but to reach the ears stretched to receive it beyond the other door, where the lock-breaker had been working now for many minutes:

‘He’s coming back!’

Someone outside cursed terribly. The door shook. George Felse shouted: ‘For God’s sake try the gun…’

‘He’s come for me,’ she called clearly and calmly. It was there in his face. She watched Robin, and cradled Francis, gently retaining the blood in him, never moving.

Outside the door they were going mad. The solid wood shook and trembled and creaked, but held firm, the first burst of gunfire, from something surely larger than a pistol, splintered the woodwork and scarred the stone wall, but still the lock resisted. Inside the cellar it seemed inordinately still and quiet. They were two separate worlds. Maggie excised from her consciousness the one that was useless to her, and sat still, only following with her eyes the struggles of the creature in the doorway.

The gold eyes never left her. His free left hand reached up laboriously, with the patience, she realised now, that belongs not to angels but to devils, until it got a hold on the latch of the door, and held fast. The right hand that held the gun, so carefully, so tenderly because it was the only treasure he had left, prised him doggedly up to his knees. He shifted the hand then with slow, drunken concentration to the door-frame, where it clung by the side and heel of the palm, frozen to the wood by the icy coldness of his will. Nothing else was now alive in him, except the deep, secret nerve that reacted only to hatred.

With infinite effort he had got one foot flattened to the floor, and with clinging hands and sweating agony he was levering himself upright. It was impossible. But for the burning determination he had to kill her as she had killed him, he would have fallen down long ago and stayed down, and died where he fell. Instead, inch by inch he drove himself upright, and even as she watched him, he took one lurching step away from the wall.

Gently and regretfully she laid down Francis out of her arms, on his face, that the wound might bleed less. Rising, she stepped over his body, and stood between him and their enemy. In this last encounter she had to meet Robin on equal terms. This whole affair had begun with the two of them, and with them it must end.

Neither of them heard the renewed grating of metal at the lock, the shattering gunshot, the impact of massed bodies against the barrier. There was no one left in the world but Maggie, erect and motionless in the centre of the cellar, and Robin Aylwin, propelling himself in dogged agony almost to within touch of her. The levelled gun, as heavy as the world, wavered upwards by inches towards her heart, sank irresistibly twice, and twice was recovered and forced onwards towards her heart, level with her heart.

With abnormal clarity she saw the crooked finger on the trigger struggling to command the strength to contract, and put an end to her. For an age the muzzle quivered, leaned, sagged from her breast, reared again and shook again, straining and ravenous for her.

The flame went out abruptly. The gun and the hand that held it trembled and sank, in spite of all his almost disembodied fury, sank and reached for the flagstones, subsiding into the dark. He pitched forward at her feet, and lay still. The bright blood from his lips stained her white slipper. The hand with the gun was buried under him.

The lock gave, the police flooded into the room. They saw her standing like a statue in ice and blood, her face as white as the ground colour of her own housecoat, blood on her breast and sleeve, blood on her shoe, where her enemy lay prone as if in worship, his curled lips kissing her instep. George Felse put his arm round her, and she crumpled into it with a huge, hapless sigh, and he picked her up bodily and carried her away, out into the air and the clean night emptied of enemies.

Behind him others at least as expert as he converged upon Francis Killian, and took charge of him until the ambulance came to rush him into hospital at Bregenz, where they would pump into him pints of blood, and stop the loss of his own.

But it wasn’t a hospital this one needed. George thought, as he always thought when the world closed in, of Bunty. He made for the nearest car of the several that had somehow gathered, and commandeered it without scruple, police driver and all. On the journey back into Scheidenau he held Maggie in his arms like the daughter he and Bunty had never had, and promised her the world and Francis, too, and never stopped holding her until he gave her to Bunty at the Goldener Hirsch.

So it was not until half-way through the next day that he provisionally closed his own case. They had excavated the sitting tenant of the wine cellar by then, naked, almost a skeleton, young, male, the errand-boy who knew better how to run the business than did the managing director. Maggie would clear up the references later, but up to then Maggie was a limp, wondering convalescent just coming to life in Bunty’s charge, living on bulletins from the hospital in Bregenz, and not yet fit to be questioned. What mattered about the young man from under the flagstones was that his more durable parts, notably the teeth, bore certain unique characteristics which were ultimately to identify him beyond doubt as Peter Bromwich, the art student of Comerbourne.

And that, combined with the capture of four of the international gang which had been plaguing this corner of Europe for so long, made the nocturnal siege of Scheidenau Castle a highly profitable operation. All the more so as three of the four showed signs of being willing to talk for their own sakes, and possibly to bring in, indirectly, at least half a dozen others from the shattered brotherhood.

Not to mention, of course, their lord and master, Robin Aylwin, sometime ’cellist of Freddy’s Circus, listed by the hospital at Bregenz as ‘Dead on arrival.’

I quite understand,’ said Maggie, picking abstractedly at the keys on her piano and frowning at the music before her, ‘that he doesn’t want to see me, after all that’s happened. What did I ever do for him, except make use of him, involve him against his better judgment in… all that horror… and nearly kill him? I don’t blame him if he never wants to see me again. I haven’t any right to force myself on him. Are you
sure
he’s all right?’

‘Right as rain.’ Bunty stood by the window, looking out upon the placid surface of the lake, pale in a still midday, bright but sunless. It was the ninth day since Helmut’s night carnival, and the clear, chill peace of autumn lay over Scheidenau. ‘They wouldn’t be discharging him in two days’ time if they weren’t satisfied, especially after all the fuss and all the reporters. Six pints of blood they’ve got staked in Francis, they’re not going to waste that, you may be sure.’

‘Bunty, I owe you so much, you and George.
Bunty, help me
!’

‘Did I ever say,’ wondered Bunty, ‘that he didn’t want to see you? I said he
said
he didn’t want to see you. In fact, I rather gave him to believe that you were going home with George and me, to-morrow. So he’s due to come out of care the next day on his own, just the way he claims he wants it. He’s ordered a taxi already, to take him back to the Weisses Kreuz. Most of his things are still there. He’ll stay overnight, and then arrange his exit. He’ll think he’s clear of the lot of us.
You, too
!’

‘Bunty, couldn’t you find out for me what time?’

‘I know what time. The taxi’s ordered for ten in the morning.
Maggie, are you absolutely sure you know what you want
?’

‘Yes, quite sure.
Yes, quite sure
! Oh, Bunty, pray for me!’

‘Both of us will be doing that, naturally. For both of you!’

‘Your car is here,’ they told him, and made their good-byes with warmth and ceremony, for he had been their prize patient for ten days, and when were they likely to get such another sensation? He packed his few toilet things in the briefcase George Felse had brought in for him from Scheidenau, along with a newly-pressed suit and clean shirt and underclothes to replace the ruins they had stripped from him and burned on arrival. He went down the stairs beside a gay little chattering nurse, and picked up at the desk his wallet and papers, with a note left for him by George and Bunty, wishing him luck and hoping to see him at home in England. Yes, perhaps. Nice people! They had visited him several times in hospital, and kept him informed about Maggie. Nothing from Maggie herself, of course. Well, that had been his intention, hadn’t it?

So that was that. She had respected his wish to be left alone, maybe she’d even been grateful to him for taking the issue out of her hands. Back into your proper orbit, Miss Tressider, and I’ll skid back into mine. I’ll see you, he thought, from the back of the circle occasionally, I’ll hear you broadcast and be thankful for that, but that’s all the rights I shall ever have or ever expect in you.

He stepped out through the door into the cool, autumnal air, and shivered. He felt light, empty and aimless. The world was a big place, but without savour. He looked along the kerb for his taxi; there was little point in hurrying anywhere, but none in staying here.

There was only one car drawn up by the entrance, and that was not a taxi. It was an elderly Dodge of a creamy coffee-colour, with a girl sitting behind the wheel.

She didn’t get out when she saw him, but she leaned across and opened the passenger door, and waited for him to get in. Her hair was braided into two great plaits and coiled on top of her head, and all those subtle colours that met and married in it matched the leaves of the oak tree as well in autumn as in spring. She was pale but radiant; all the lines of her face were easier and more at peace than he had ever seen them before, and her gentian eyes were no longer straining to see something remote and ominous that would not stand still to be seen. On the contrary, they focused very sharply and resolutely upon him.

‘I paid your taximan and sent him away,’ she said. ‘You don’t mind, do you? I’ll drive you back to Scheidenau.’

There was nothing to be done but get in beside her. ‘I thought you’d gone back to England,’ he said, leaning rather gingerly to dispose of his briefcase on the back seat.

‘No, not yet.’ She started the car, carefully because she wasn’t yet used to it, and drove slowly out into traffic, winding her way towards the frontage of Lake Constance. ‘I waited for you.’

‘That was kind, but you shouldn’t have put off going on my account.’

‘To be honest,’ she said, ‘I put it off on my own account. Did you really think I could go away and leave you here alone, after all that’s happened?’

‘I don’t see why not. You’d already done more than enough for me. You knew I was being perfectly well looked after, and making a good recovery. And you must be longing to get back and start work again. I see,’ he said, veering resolutely away from the subject, ‘they found the Dodge in time.’

‘At that mason’s yard in Regenheim. And quite a lot of contraband and stolen property, too, that nobody had time to ditch. When they’d done with the car I asked if I could take it over. I thought you’d be relieved to see it.’

‘It certainly wouldn’t be much fun to have to replace it. It was good of you to think of putting my mind at rest.’

Everything was going to be deference, kindness and gratitude, she could see that, whatever stresses might be gnawing away underneath. She waited until they were out of the town, winding their way along the upland road, and then settled to a gentle forty kilometres, and cast a long, measuring look at him along her shoulder.

‘You drive very well,’ he said. ‘I’ve never seen you in action before.’

‘You’ll have plenty of chance, I’m driving you back to Zurich when we go.’

‘Maggie… now look…’

‘Well, naturally! With that shoulder
you
certainly shouldn’t be driving long distances yet. Though of course we could stay in Scheidenau for a week or two longer, if you like. It might be the best plan, actually.’

‘Maggie, look, you shouldn’t have done this. I can’t let you…’

‘You can’t stop me,’ she said gently, and turned and smiled at him. She would have to be very careful of him, she could see, he was still easily shaken. She felt his body tighten and brace itself beside her, and saw his brows draw painfully together over clouded eyes.

‘Oh, no!’ he said, shaking his head with decision. ‘None of that! I know you now. Once you passed by an overture of love, as you thought, without noticing it until it was too late, and spent years of your life paying your substance away in requital of what you took to be a debt. Now you’re so mortally afraid of repeating the error that you’ll fall over backwards to avoid it. But not with me! I’ve got too much sense to let that happen, if you haven’t. You don’t love me, you just feel responsible for me. You owe me nothing,and I’ll take nothing from you. Go home, girl, sing, be successful, be happy… you’ve got time even for that, now.’

‘That,’ she said patiently, ‘depends on you. That’s what I’m trying to tell you.’ They were high among the meadows, the hills folding and unfolding before them in bleached green of pasture and blue-black of conifers. She pulled in to the wide grass verge and stopped the car, turning on him a face pale to incandescence with solemnity.

‘Francis, I’m not making any mistake this time, and I won’t let you, either. I’ve never loved anyone before, perhaps I couldn’t because of him. But I love you now, and if you pass me by I shall have lost everything. Maybe you don’t want me, and that I could accept, but I daren’t let go of you until I know whether that’s really why you want me to go away. If you don’t love me, tell me so, and I’ll leave you alone. But for pity’s sake don’t tell me you don’t if you do, because that wouldn’t be noble, it would be damned ignoble, and I should spend the rest of my life paying for it, as well as you. And if you do love me, then start getting used to my being here, because I’m always going to be here.’

He opened his lips to answer her, and found she had left him nothing to say. Everything he could have produced by way of subterfuge she had anticipated, and now he could not lie to her, even if he’d thought for a moment he could have managed it successfully. How could he live with himself afterwards, if he ever began to suspect she had been right? To send her back to her own world and her own kind might have been almost bearable, as long as he could rest in the conviction that she would be happiest that way, which God knew any sane man would take for granted. But what if the unbelievable turned out to be true, and he was the one who was fooling himself, not she?

He had begun to shake and sweat, between crazy hope and craven fear; this sort of thing wasn’t for him yet, he wasn’t up to it. He dragged his gaze away from her face with an effort, pressing his fingers deep into his hollow cheeks to clamp the wrong words in until he could find the right ones and somehow get them out. There are hurdles not even love can take without a crashing fall; only the native obstinacy recent stresses had roused in her could make her attempt them, and when the stresses passed, and even the memory of them grew pale, she would regret ever assaying the leap. She was a reasonable being, she would listen. And this wouldn’t be lying to her.

‘Maggie,’ he began laboriously, ‘have you really thought what you’re suggesting? You know who you are, and what you are, nobody knows it better. A world figure, and going to be even greater…’

‘I could,’ she agreed very quietly, ‘given the right circumstances.’

‘And I’m the right circumstances? Wake up, girl, for God’s sake! I don’t have to go into details about myself, and I’m not going to. Don’t pretend you can’t evaluate well enough to get my number right.’

‘Better, perhaps,’ she said fiercely, ‘than you.’

‘All right, let it go. But you know very well what I mean. You belong in a world about which I know nothing, among people with whom I have nothing in common, except, perhaps, a liking for music, and that wouldn’t get me far. It’s a live, mobile, important world, with no room for hangers-on. You know what I’m talking about as well as I do. Do you think that would be an easy marriage?’

‘All right,’ she said after a long pause, her eyes wide and watchful on his face, ‘I do know what you’re talking about, and no, it won’t be easy. Did you ever hear of a marriage that was? But this one will be more difficult than most, I know it. And fathoms deeper! I’m not glossing over anything. I don’t know any of the answers, those we have to find as we go. I’m simply telling you that there isn’t any alternative! Marriage may be difficult, but separation is impossible. After what we’ve been through together, after what we know about each other, what do you suppose the ordinary pinpricks can do to us? Do you think two people ever drew as near as we have, and managed to pull themselves apart again without bleeding to death?’

He didn’t know whether she had reached that argument by a lucky inspiration or by serious thought, but as soon as she had said it he saw that it was irresistibly true, and thanked God for it, since resistance was becoming unendurable. For better or worse, they had grown together until separation would have been extreme mutilation, a death before death.

Whether she had convinced him, or whether he had surrendered only to his own awful longing to be convinced, however it happened, suddenly she was in his arms. They had, after all, no option but to make their own rules, having strayed so far out of range of any others. Maybe she could never have married anyone now for the ordinary, socially respected reasons. Maybe he would really turn out to be what she wanted, and what she would continue to want, life-long. Please God, he thought. And God help us both, because we’re going to need it! But when he kissed her all his lingering forebodings vanished like the mists dissolving over Lake Constance, and there was no room left in him for anything but incredulous gratitude and joy.

After a while they disentangled themselves silently and solemnly, and drove on mute and dazed with achievement into Scheidenau.