Featuring the Saint (16 page)

The telegraph line, for most of its length, followed the roads, but at that point, for some inexplicable reason, it took a short cut across country. They had decided to attack it at that point on grounds of prudence; for, although the road between Esperanza and the Maduro frontier was not much used, there was always the risk of someone passing and commenting on their presence when he reached his destination.

The afternoon before, they had cut the line and sent through to Esperanza, to be relayed to Santa Miranda, the ultimatum purporting to come from the President of Maduro. Since then, night and day, one of them had sat with the receivers upon his ears, waiting for a reply. The arrangement was complicated, for Kelly could not read Morse, while Sheridan’s Spanish was very haphazard; but they managed somehow. Several times when Archie had been resting Kelly had roused him to take down a message; but the translation had had no bearing on the threat of war, except occasionally from a purely private and commercial aspect. There had been no official answer.

Sheridan looked at his watch again.

“Their time’s up in half an hour,” he said. “What do you say to sending a final demand?-the ‘D’ being loud and explosive, as in ‘Income Tax.’”

“Shure-if there’s no chance of ‘em surrenderin’,” agreed Kelly. “But we can’t let anything stop the war.”

The message they sent was worded with this in view:
Understand you refuse to release Quijote. Our armies will accordingly advance into Pasala at noon.

While they waited for zero hour, Kelly completed the task of breaking camp, strapping their tent and equipment into a workmanlike bundle. He finished this job just before twelve, and returned to his prostrate position on the ground sheet.

“I wonder what that blayguard Shannet is doin’?” he said. “I only hope he hasn’t missed the news by takin’ a thrip to the concession. It’d be unlucky for us if he had.”

“I think he’ll be there,” said Sheridan. “He was in Santa Miranda when we left, and he’s likely to stay there and supervise the hunt for the Saint.”

“He’s a good man, that,” said Kelly. “It’s a pity he’s not an Irishman.”

Sheridan fanned himself with a handkerchief.

“He’s one of the finest men that ever stepped,” he said. “If the Saint said he was going to make war on Hell, I’d pack a fire extinguisher and go with him.”

Kelly sucked his pipe and spat thoughtfully at an ant.

“That’s not what I call your duty,” he remarked. “In fact, I’m not sure that yez should have been in this at all, with a girl like Lilla watchin’ for yez to come back, and worryin’ her pretty head. And with a crawlin’ sarpint like Shannet about.”

“He’s tried to bother her once or twice. But if I thought—”

“I’ve been thinkin’ a lot out here,” said Kelly. “I’m not savin’ what I’ve thought. But it means that as soon as we’ve done what we’re here to do we’re going’ to hurry back to Santa Miranda as fast as Tin Lizzie‘11 take us. There’s my missus an’ Lilla without a man to look afther them; an’ the Saint—”

Sheridan suddenly held up a hand for silence. He wrote rapidly on his little pad, and Kelly leaned over to read.

“What’s it mean?”

“The war’s on!” yelled Kelly ecstatically. “Don Manuel ain’t the quitter I thought he was-or maybe he didn’t see how he could get out of it. But the war’s on! Hooroosh! There’s goin’ to be fightin’! Archie, me bhoy, the war’s on!”

He seized Sheridan in a bear hug of an embrace, swung him off the ground, dropped him, and went prancing round the clearing uttering wild Celtic cries. It was some minutes before he could be sobered sufficiently to give a translation of the message.

It was short and to the point:
. The armies of Pasala will resist aggression to the death.

Manuel Concepcion de Villega, being a civilian official, had thought this a particularly valiant and noble sentiment. In fact, he was so pleased with it that he used it to conclude his address to the army when, with the President, he reviewed it before it rode out of Santa Miranda to meet the invaders. Of course the speech should have been made by the President, but his excellency had no views on the subject.

At lunchtime the news came through from Esperanza that the enemy were attacking the town.

Although there had been ample warning, few of the inhabitants had left. The bulk of the population preferred to stay, secure in the belief that wars were the exclusive concern of the professional soldiers and had nothing to do with the general public, except for the inconvenience they might cause.

There was a small garrison stationed in the town, and they had barricaded the streets and settled down to await the attack. It came at about one o’clock.

The “invading armies” which Kelly had prepared had been designed by Archie Sheridan, who was something of a mechanical genius.

In the woods on the east, three hundred yards from the front line of improvised fortifications, had been established a line of ten braziers of glowing charcoal, about twenty yards apart. Above each brazier was suspended a string of cartridges knotted at intervals of a few inches into a length of cord. The cord passed over the branch of a tree into which nails had been driven as guides. All these cords were gathered together in two batches of five each at a point some distance away, in such a way that one man, using both hands, could slowly lower the strings of cartridges simultaneously into all ten braziers, and so give the impression that there was firing over a front of two hundred yards. If they had had fireworks they could have saved themselves much trouble; but they had no fireworks, and Archie Sheridan was justly proud of his ingenious substitute.

Sheridan worked the “invading armies,” while Kelly lay down behind a tree some distance away, sheltered from any stray bullets, and loaded his rifle. To complete the illusion it was necessary that the firing should seem to have some direction.

Sheridan, with a low whistle, signalled that he was ready, and the battle began.

The cartridges, lowered one by one into the braziers and there exploded by the heat, provided a realistic rattle up and down the line; while Kelly, firing and reloading like one possessed, sent bullets smacking into the walls of the houses and kicking up spurts of dust around the barricades. He took care not to aim anywhere where anyone might be hit.

The defense replied vigorously, though no one will ever know what they thought they were shooting at, and there were some spirited exchanges. When another whistle from Sheridan announced that the strings of cartridges were exhausted, Kelly rejoined him, and they crawled down to the road and the waiting Ford, and drove boldly towards the town, Kelly waving a nearly white flag.

The car was stopped but Kelly was well known.

“They let me through their lines,” he explained to the officer of the garrison. “That is why the firing has ceased. I was in Ondia when war was declared, and I came back at once.”

He told them that he was on his way to Santa Miranda.

“Then travel quickly, and urge them to not delay sending help,” said the officer, “for it is clear that we are attacked by a tremendous number. I have sent telegraphs, but you can do more by telling them what you have seen.”

“I will do that,” promised Kelly, and they let him drive on.

As soon as the car was clear of the town he stopped and assisted Sheridan to unearth himself from under the pile of luggage; for, being now an outlaw, Sheridan had had to hide when they passed through the towns on the journey up, and it was advisable for him to do the same for most of the return.

A little farther down the road they stopped again, and Sheridan climbed a tree and cut the telegraph wires, so that the news of the fizzling out of the attack should not reach Santa Miranda in time for the troops that had been sent out to be recalled. Instead of organizing the “invasion” they might have tapped the wire there and sent on messages from the commander of the garrison describing the progress of the battle, and so saved themselves much labour and thought; but the short road between Esperanza and Las Flores (the next town) was too well frequented for that to be practicable in broad daylight.

The Minister of the Interior was informed that it was no longer possible to communicate with Esperanza, and he could see only one explanation.

“Esperanza is surrounded,” he said. “The garrison is less than a hundred. The town will fall in twenty-four hours, and the advancing armies of Maduro will meet our reinforcements at Las Flores. It will be a miracle if we can hold the invaders from Santa Miranda for five days.”

“You should have kept some troops here,” said Shannet. “You have sent every soldier in Santa Miranda. Once that army is defeated there will be nothing for the invaders to overcome.”

“Tomorrow I will recruit the peones,” said Don Manuel. “There must be conscription. Pasala requires the services of every able-bodied citizen. I will draft a proclamation tonight for the President to sign.”

It was then nearly five o’clock, but none of them had had a siesta that afternoon. They were holding another of many unprofitable conferences in a room in the palace, and it was significant that Shannet’s right to be present was undisputed. The President himself was also there, biting his nails and stabbing the carpet nervously with the rowels of his spurs, but the other two took no notice of him. The President and De Villega were both still wearing the magnificent uniforms which they had donned for the review of the troops that morning.

Shannet paced the room, the inevitable limp unlighted cigarette drooping from his loose lower lip. His once-white ducks were as spiled and sloppy as ever. (Since they never be came filthy, it is apparent that he must nave treated himself to a clean suit occasionally, but nobody was ever allowed to notice this fact.) His unbrushed hair, as always, flopped over his right eye.

Since the day before, Shannet had had much to think about. Campard’s amazing cable, attributing the war to a criminal gang, had arrived, and Shannet had replied with the required information. He had passed on the suggestion of his employer to the Minister of the Interior, pointing to the undoubtedly lawless behaviour of Sheridan and the Unknown; but that two common outlaws could organize a war was a theory which De Villega refused to swallow.

“It is absurd,” he said. “They are ordinary criminals. Two men cannot be a gang. In due time they will be caught, the man Sheridan will be imprisoned, and the man Mussolini will be hanged.”

Shannet, asked for the name of the man who had assaulted him, had replied indignantly: “He told me his name was Benito Mussolini!” Since then, he had been impelled to make several protests against the conviction of the officials that this ‘ statement was to be believed; but the idea had taken too firm a root, and Shannet had to give up the attempt.

But now he had an inspiration.

“There can be no harm in finding out,” he urged. “Send for the peón that all the trouble is about, and let us question him.”

“I have a better idea than that,” exclaimed De Villega, jumping up. “I will send the peón to the garrote to-morrow, for an encouragement to the people. They will enjoy the spectacle, and it will make them more ready to accept the proclamation of conscription. I will make a holiday—”

But Shannet’s brain had suddenly taken to itself an amazing brilliance. In a flash it had soared above the crude and elementary idea of sending for the peón and forcing him to speak. He had no interest in De Villega’s sadistic elaboration of the same idea. He had seen a much better solution than that.

9
Rapidly Shannet explained his inspiration to the others. It was as simple as all great inspirations.

He was now firmly convinced in his mind that Sheridan and the Unknown were at the bottom of all the trouble, and this belief was strengthened by the fact that no trace of them had been found since their escape, although both police and military had searched for them. Some of the things that the Unknown had said-before and after the interlude in which words were dispensed with-came back to Shannet with a dazzling clarity. It all fitted in.

And ready to his hand lay the key to the trap in which he found himself. He saw that what the Unknown had started the Unknown could stop. It was Campard’s own idea, but Shannet was more conveniently placed to apply it than his master had been. Also, he had the necessary lever within a few minutes’ reach.

Lilla McAndrew.

She was the master card. Sheridan, he knew, was infatuated. And Sheridan was an important accomplice of the Unknown. With Lilla McAndrew for a hostage Shannet could dictate his own terms.

“I know I have reason!” Shannet said vehemently, while he inwardly cursed the limitations of his Spanish, which prevented him driving his ideas home into the thick skulls of his audience more forcibly. “I know well the Seńor Campard, for whom I have worked for years. Perhaps it sounds fantastic to you, but I know that he is not an easy man to frighten. If I had suggested this to him myself, that these two men could have plotted a war, he would have laughed me to scorn. But he has said it of his own accord. Therefore I know that he must have some information.”

“I think everyone has gone mad,” said De Villega helplessly. “But you may proceed with your plan. At least it can do no harm. But I warn you that it is on your own responsibility. The Senorita McAndrew is a British subject, and questions may be asked. Then I shall say that I know nothing of it; and, if the authorities demand it, you will have to be handed over to them.”

It was significant of the way in which Shannet’s prestige had declined since the commencement of the war, for which De Villega was inclined to blame him; but Shannet did not care.

“I will take the risk,” he said, and was gone.

In the palace courtyard his horse was still being held by a patient soldier-one of the half-dozen left behind to guard the palace. Shannet clambered into the saddle and galloped out as the gates were opened for him by a sentry.

His first course took him to an unsavoury cafe at the end of the town, where he knew he would find the men he needed. He enrolled two. They were pleased to call themselves “guides,” but actually they were half-caste cutthroats available for anything from murder upwards. Shannet knew them, for he had used their services before.