(1929) The Three Just Men (18 page)

“This is certainly a snake that’s got the cobra skinned to death and a rattlesnake’s bite ain’t worse than a dog nip,” he said. “Mamba nothing! I know the mamba; he is pretty fatal, but not so bad as this.”

Manfred looked across to Leon.

“Gurther?” he asked simply, and Gonsalez nodded.

“It was intended for me obviously, but, as I’ve said before, Gurther is nervous. And it didn’t help him any to be shot up.”

“Do you fellows mind not talking so loud?” He glanced at the heavy curtains that covered the windows. Behind these the shutters had been fastened, and Dr. Oberzohn was an ingenious man.

Leon took a swift survey of the visitor’s feet; they wore felt slippers.

“I don’t think I can improve upon the tactics of the admirable Miss Leicester,” he said, and went up to Mr. Lee’s bedroom, which was in the centre of the house and had a small balcony, the floor of which was formed by the top of the porch.

The long French windows were open and Leon crawled out into the darkness and took observation through the pillars of the balustrade. They were in the open now, making no attempt to conceal their presence. He counted seven, until he saw the cigarette of another near the end of the drive. What were they waiting for? he wondered. None of them moved; they were not even closing on the house. And this inactivity puzzled him. They were awaiting a signal. What was it to be? Whence would it come?

He saw a man come stealthily across the lawn…one or two? His eyes were playing tricks. If there were two, one was Gurther. There was no mistaking him. For a second he passed out of view behind a pillar of the balcony. Leon moved his head…Gurther had fallen! He saw him stumble to his knees and tumble flat upon the ground. What did that mean?

He was still wondering when he heard a soft scraping, and a deep-drawn breath, and tried to locate the noise. Suddenly, within a few inches of his face, a hand came up out of the darkness and gripped the lower edge of the balcony.

Swiftly, noiselessly, Gonsalez wriggled back to the room, drew erect in the cover of the curtains and waited. His hand touched something: it was a long silken cord by which the curtains were drawn. Leon grinned in the darkness and made a scientific loop.

The intruder drew himself up on to the parapet, stepped quietly across, then tiptoed to the open window. He was not even suspicious, for the French windows had been open all the evening. Without a sound, he stepped into the room and was momentarily silhouetted against the starlight reflected in the window.

“Hatless,” thought Leon. That made things easier. As the man took another stealthy step, the noose dropped over his neck, jerked tight and strangled the cry in his throat. In an instant he was lying flat on the ground with a knee in his back. He struggled to rise, but Leon’s fist came down with the precision of a piston-rod, and he went suddenly quiet.

Gonsalez loosened the slip-knot, and, flinging the man over his shoulder, carried him out of the room and down the stairs. He could only guess that this would be the only intruder, but left nothing to chance, and after he had handed his prisoner to the men who were waiting in the hall, he ran back to the room, to find, as he had expected, that no other adventurer had followed the lead. They were still standing at irregular intervals where he had seen them last. The signal was to come from the house. What was it to be? he wondered.

He left one of his men on guard in the room and went back to the study, to find that the startled burglar was an old friend. Lew Cuccini was looking from one of his captors to the other, a picture of dumbfounded chagrin. But the most extraordinary discovery that Leon made on his return to the study was that the American snake-charmer was his old cheerful self, and, except for his unsightly appearance, seemed to be none the worse for an ordeal which would have promptly ended the lives of ninety-nine men out of a hundred. “Snake-proof—that’s me. Is this the guy that did it?” He pointed to Cuccini.

“Where is Gurther?” asked Manfred,

Cuccini grinned up into his face.

“You’d better find out, boss,” he said. “He’ll fix you. As soon as I shout—”

“Cuccini—” Leon’s voice was gentle. The point of the long-bladed knife that he held to the man’s neck was indubitably sharp. Cuccini shrank back. “You will not shout. If you do, I shall cut your throat and spoil all these beautiful carpets—that is a genuine silken Bokhara, George. I haven’t seen one in ten years.” He nodded to the soft-hued rug on which George Manfred was standing. “What is the signal, Cuccini?” turning his attention again to the prisoner. “And what happens when you give the signal?”

“Listen,” said Cuccini, “that throat-cutting stuff don’t mean anything to me. There’s no third degree in this country, and don’t forget it.”

“You have never seen my ninety-ninth degree.” Leon smiled like a delighted boy. “Put something in his mouth, will you?”

One of the men tied a woollen scarf round Cuccini’s head.

“Lay him on the sofa.”

He was already bound hand and foot and helpless.

“Have you any wax matches? Yes, here are some.” Leon emptied a cut-glass container into the palm of his hand and looked round at the curious company. “Now, gentlemen, if you will leave me alone for exactly five minutes, I will give Mr. Cuccini an excellent imitation of the persuasive methods of Gian Visconti, an excellent countryman of his, and the inventor of the system I am about to apply.”

Cuccini was shaking his head furiously. A mumble of unintelligible sounds came from behind the scarf.

“Our friend is not unintelligent. Any of you who say that Signer Cuccini is unintelligent will incur my severest displeasure,” said Leon.

They sat the man up and he talked brokenly, hesitatingly. “Splendid,” said Leon, when he had finished. “Take him into the kitchen and give him a drink—you’ll find a tap above the kitchen sink.”

“I’ve often wondered, Leon,” said George, when they were alone together, “whether you would ever carry out those horrific threats of yours of torture and malignant savagery?”

“Half the torture of torture is anticipation,” said Leon easily, lighting a cigarette with one of the matches he had taken from the table, and carefully guiding the rest back into the glass bowl. “Any man versed in the art of suggestive descriptions can dispense with thumbscrews and branding irons, little maidens and all the ghastly apparatus of criminal justice ever employed by our ancestors. I, too, wonder,” he mused, blowing a ring of smoke to the ceiling, “whether I could carry my threats into execution—I must try one day.” He nodded pleasantly, as though he were promising himself a great treat.

Manfred looked at his watch.

“What do you intend doing—giving the signal?” Gonsalez nodded. “And then?”

“Letting them come in. We may take refuge in the kitchen. I think it would be wiser.”

George Manfred nodded. “You’re going to allow them to open the safe?”

“Exactly,” said Leon. “I particularly wish that safe to be opened, and since Mr. Lee demurs, I think this is the best method. I had that in my mind all the time. Have you seen the safe, George? I have. Nobody but an expert could smash it. I have no tools. I did not provide against such a contingency, and I have scruples. Our friends have tools—and no scruples!”

“And the snake—is there any danger?”

Leon snapped his fingers.

“The snake has struck for the night, and will strike no more! As for Gurther—”

“He owes you something.”

Leon sent another ring up and did not speak until it broke on the ceiling.

“Gurther is dead,” he said simply. “He has been lying on the lawn in front of the house for the past ten minutes.”

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN - WRITTEN IN BRAILLE

LEON briefly related the scene he had witnessed from the balcony.

“It was undoubtedly Gurther,” he said. “I could not mistake him. He passed out of view for a second behind one of the pillars, and when I looked round he was lying flat on the ground.”

He threw his cigarette into the fire-place.

“I think it is nearly time,” he said. He waited until Manfred had gone, and, going to the door, moved the bar and pulled it open wide.

Stooping down, he saw that the opening of the door had been observed, for one of the men was moving across the lawn in the direction of the house. From his pocket he took a small electric lamp and sent three flickering beams into the darkness. To his surprise, only two men walked forward to the house. Evidently Cuccini was expected to deal with any resistance before the raid occurred.

The house had been built in the fifteenth century, and the entrance hall was a broad, high barn of a place. Some Georgian architect, in the peculiar manner of his kind, had built a small minstrel gallery over the dining-room entrance and immediately facing the study. Leon had already explored the house and had found the tiny staircase that led to this architectural monstrosity. He had no sooner given the signal than he dived into the dining-room, through the tall door, and was behind the thick curtains at the back of the narrow gallery when the first two men came in. He saw them go straight into the study and push open the door. At the same time a third man appeared under the porch, though he made no attempt to enter the hall.

Presently one of those who had gone into the study came out and called Cuccini by name. When no answer came, he went grumbling back to his task. What that task was, Leon could guess, before the peculiarly acrid smell of hot steel was wafted to his sensitive nostrils.

By crouching down he could see the legs of the men who were working at the safe. They had turned on all the lights, and apparently expected no interruption. The man at the door was joined by another man.

“Where is Lew?”

In the stillness of the house the words, though spoken in a low tone, were audible.

“I don’t know—inside somewhere. He had to fix that dago.”

Leon grinned. This description of himself never failed to tickle him.

One of the workers in the library came out at this point.

“Have you seen Cuccini?”

“No,” said the man at the door.

“Go in and find him. He ought to be here.”

Cuccini’s absence evidently made him uneasy, for though he returned to the room he was out again in a minute, asking if the messenger had come back. Then, from the back of the passage, came the searcher’s voice: “The kitchen’s locked.”

The safe-cutter uttered an expression of amazement.

“Locked? What’s the idea?”

He came to the foot of the stairs and bellowed up: “Cuccini!”

Only the echo answered him.

“That’s queer.” He poked his head in the door of the study. “Rush that job, Mike. There’s some funny business here.” And over his shoulder, “Tell the boys to get ready to jump.”

The man went out into the night and was absent some minutes, to return with an alarming piece of news.

“They’ve gone, boss. I can’t see one of them.”

The “boss” cursed him, and himself went into the grounds on a visit of inspection. He came back in a hurry, ran into the study, and Leon heard his voice: “Stand ready to clear.”

“What about Cuccini?”

“Cuccini will have to look after himself…got it, Mike?”

The deep voice said something. There followed the sound of a crack, as though something of iron had broken. It was the psychological moment. Leon parted the curtains and dropped lightly to the floor.

The man at the door turned in a flash at the sound.

“Put ‘em up!” he said sharply.

“Don’t shoot.” Leon’s voice was almost conversational in its calmness. “The house is surrounded by police.”

With an oath the man darted out of the door, and at that instant came the sound of the first shot, followed by desultory firing from the direction of the road. The second guard had been the first to go. Leon ran to the door, slammed it tight and switched on the lights as the two men came from the study. Under the arm of one was a thick pad of square brown sheets. He dropped his load and put up his hands at the sight of the gun; but his companion was made of harder material, and, with a yell, he leapt at the man who stood between him and freedom. Leon twisted aside, advanced his shoulder to meet the furious drive of the man’s fist; then, dropping his pistol, he stooped swiftly and tackled him below the knees. The man swayed, sought to recover his balance and fell with a crash on the stone floor. All the time his companion stood dazed and staring, his hands waving in the air.

There was a knock at the outer door. Without turning his back upon his prisoners, Leon reached for the bar and pulled it up. Manfred came in.

“The gentleman who shouted ‘Cuccini’ scared them. I think they’ve got away. There were two cars parked on the road.”

His eyes fell upon the brown sheets scattered on the floor and he nodded.

“I think you have all you want, Leon,” he said.

The detectives came crowding in at that moment and secured their prisoners whilst Leon Gonsalez and his friend went out on to the lawn to search for Gurther.

The man lay as he had fallen, on his face, and as Leon flashed his lamp upon the figure, he saw that the snake had struck behind the ear.

“Gurther?” frowned Leon.