Look to the Lady (29 page)

He had no illusions about what he was doing. To ride a Gypsy-doctored horse over a tract of unfamiliar land in the half-darkness was more than ordinarily foolhardy. Trusting devoutly that they would not come up against any insurmountable object, and praying against wire – the recollection that this was a hunting district relieved him considerably on that score – he kept the mare's head in the direction of Sanctuary and urged her on to further efforts.

She had her moments of difficulty. A nesting partridge disturbed under her feet sent her rearing dangerously, and once when a sheep lumbered out of their path she plunged continuously for some seconds and all but unseated him.

Luck and his unerring sense of direction brought them safely over the meadows to the brow of Saddlehill, and as they galloped up the steep grassland Campion suddenly saw the end of his quest, the gaunt east wing of the Tower at Sanctuary standing up against the sky on the other side of the valley.

In the Tower, high in the topmost storey, was a lighted window. It stood out quite clearly, a little circular spot of red light in the blackness.

Although he had expected it, it startled him. It was higher than he had supposed the windows would come, and he identified it suddenly in his mind with the curious circular decoration over the centre window of the wing, an orifice which had looked like a plaque of deeply indented stone work from the ground.

As he stared at the Tower, something in the grounds attracted his attention, and he looked down to see a car's headlights turn in to the trees at the far end of the drive. Even as he looked they vanished. A panic seized him. He drove his heels gently into the mare's sides and she leapt forward quivering.

For a moment he thought he had lost control, but she quietened as the long gallop down the slope exerted her. He took her over a ditch into the lane at the foot of the hill, and they continued down the narrow road, her hoofs striking sparks from the ragged flints. The little white gate at the end of the home meadow she took almost in her stride and the steep incline hardly affected her pace: the effect of Joey's treatment was wearing off and she jerked her head angrily from time to time as though she were irritated by the reins.

Campion barely noticed her changing mood. He flung himself off her back at the end of the flower garden, and she kicked out at him as he disappeared through the gate and ran up the grass path towards the house.

There were beads of sweat on his forehead, and the expression on his pale face was no longer inane. A car had turned into the drive and had instantly switched off its lights; that was fifteen minutes ago at least, he reckoned. Even allowing for reckless driving, Mrs Dick could hardly have traversed the twelve miles of winding lane in less time than that would account for.

Therefore she was in the grounds now. He was prepared for anything. Mrs Dick's possibilities were numberless.

He glanced up at the Tower across the wide lawn. The single red eye, a significant and silent witness to the thousand rumours concerning the Gyrths' secret, glared down upon him. Behind that eye lay the Chalice, protected by something unknown, the intangible and perhaps terrible guardian upon which probably only three men living had ever looked. He had heard dozens of ‘genuine explanations'; men referred to it guardedly in famous clubs, well-known books of reminiscence hinted darkly at unprintable horrors. Val himself had seemed a little afraid to consider what it might be.

He wondered how many anxious eyes were fixed on the Tower that evening. Mrs Dick's band of experts had been put out of action, certainly. But there would surely be others waiting to bear the treasure to safety. The lady herself, he fancied, would keep out of it for fear of being recognized, but would general the attack from somewhere outside.

At present all was peaceful. There were only two other lights in the whole building, both in the west wing, in the drawing-room and in the library. The servants' quarters were dark; the staff had been sent to bed early, no doubt. Campion imagined Penny alone in the drawing-room, and Val seated with his father and the old Rector in the study. And somewhere in the darkness a group of watchers, utterly without fear or scruple, eyeing, even as he, the single glaring window in the Tower.

He advanced across the lawn, keeping carefully to the deep shadow.

The uncanny silence of the garden around him filled him with apprehension. He could have sworn that there was no one moving amid the belts of trees and shrubs which surrounded the lawn. Once again he paused and stood rigid. Somewhere there had been a movement. Instinctively he glanced up. The old house stood out black against the night sky. His eyes were drawn irresistibly to the circular window. Then he started. Just above it, standing out clearly over the battlements of the east wing, there was a figure.

He waited, silent, hoping against hope that it was Val or his father, but, even as he watched, something slender, snake-like, slid down across the circle of crimson light. As he strained his eyes to make it out, the truth came slowly home to him. It was a fine flexible rope, knotted at intervals.

Instantly the question which had been rankling at the back of his mind was made blindingly clear to him. The raiders were going to make sure of the exact whereabouts of their prize before they risked an open attack. The half-caste cat burglar's part in Sanderson's scheme became obvious. He was to have been the spy, possibly even their thief, if the window were negotiable. The simplicity of it appalled him. It would be so easy. Although the Tower was about a hundred and twenty feet high, a man with nerve could make a descent to the window once its whereabouts was made clear to him. It would be dangerous, but by no means impossible, to a man of Moggie's experience.

Then he remembered that Moggie was lying in the garage with Sanderson on Heronhoe Heath. Who, then, was the climber who was about to take his place? There was an answer to this question, but his mind shrank from considering it.

He raced for the house. His first impulse was to alarm the Colonel, but as he reached the base of the east wing the intruder's means of entry was instantly apparent. One of the narrow latticed windows stood open. He climbed through it without hesitation and crept across the flagged state dining-room within to the centre hall, where a huge wooden spiral staircase, one of the show-pieces of the county, reared its way up into the darkness.

He crept up the steps, the wood creaking terrifyingly beneath his weight. It was a long climb in the darkness. The stairs wound up the whole height of the Tower. At last they began to narrow and presently he felt the cool night air upon his face.

Suddenly the faint light from the open doorway above his head warned him that he was reaching the roof. He paused to listen. There was no sound in the house. All was quiet and ghostly in the gloom. He moved silently up the last half-dozen stairs, and emerged at last from the little central turret on the flat stone roof of the Tower.

For a moment he looked about him, prepared for instant attack. As far as he could see the place was deserted. Keeping his back to the wall he worked his way round the turret. Then a chill feeling of horror crept over him. He was quite alone.

A movement almost like the passing of a shadow just in front of him made him start forward, and in doing so his thigh brushed against something stretched tightly from the central flagstaff and disappearing over the edge of the battlements. He touched it with his hand. It was a rope with knots in it. In that moment he realized that the one eventuality which he had never foreseen had taken place. Whoever was undertaking the theft of the Chalice was doing it alone.

Beads of sweat stood out on his forehead. There was only one person living who would have the nerve to make such an attempt, only one person who would consider the prize worth the risk. He moved to the edge of the Tower and drew out his torch, which he had been careful not to use until now.

‘Hold on,' he said firmly, ‘you'd better come back.'

His voice sounded strained and theatrical to him after the silence, the words inadequate and ridiculous. He listened intently, but the reply was loud, almost as if the speaker had been standing beside him.

‘I'll see you in hell first,' said Mrs Dick.

Following the rope, he bent over the parapet and switched his torch downwards. Although he had expected it, the sight sickened him. She lay against the side of the Tower like a fly on a wall, her steel hands gripping the rope which supported her as she picked her way down with easy precision. Not more than two feet below her the round window gleamed dully on to the cord as it squirmed and flopped against the stone work. In the day-time the height was sickening; at night it was impossible to see the ground, and Campion was glad of it.

He leant on the parapet looking down at her. He could see her distinctly, still in the riding costume in which she had interviewed him only that afternoon. As he stared, a thought forced itself into his mind. Mrs Dick was the employee of the society; the responsibility lay upon her shoulders alone. Should she meet with her death the danger to the Chalice would end automatically.

The rope, which alone supported her from a hundred foot drop on to the flags beneath, lay under his hand. If the cord should slip its mooring round the flagstaff …

He leant on the parapet and kept his eyes fixed upon her. He could find plenty of moral justification in his own mind for this execution, and he did not flinch from the fact that it would be an execution. There were passages in Mrs Dick's past that no English jury would have excused in spite of their notorious leniency towards women. He gripped the stones, his knuckles showing white in the faint light.

‘Come back,' he said distinctly, turning the light full on her bent head. ‘Come back before you look in that room, or I swear I'll cut this rope.'

As soon as he had spoken the meaning of his own words startled him. Once Mrs Dick, the agent for the most influential syndicate in the world, saw the prize she sought, no power on earth could save it from her. She must be prevented from reaching the window.

‘I'll cut the rope,' he repeated.

She looked up at him unflinchingly, and the merciless light revealed the twisted smile on her small, hideous mouth.

‘You wouldn't dare,' she said. ‘You haven't the courage. Get back; I'll deal with you later.'

She descended another step deliberately.

‘Come back!' Campion's voice was menacing. ‘Hold tight. I'm going to draw you up.' He gripped the rope and took the strain, but she was a heavy woman, and he knew instinctively that in spite of the knots the task would be beyond him.

Mrs Dick, who had remained motionless on the rope, steadying herself for any such attempt, jeered at him openly.

‘Mind your own business,' she said. ‘If you must interfere, go downstairs and call a servant to help you.'

Her voice sounded a little farther away, and he knew that she was climbing down. Again he bent over the parapet. He caught sight of her feet reflecting the red glare from the window.

‘Come back!' he called hoarsely. ‘Come back, for God's sake!'

‘Just a moment.' The words came softly to him as she deliberately lowered herself another foot, and adjusting her position, peered into the window.

There was a pause which seemed like an age. The man bending forward with his torch directed upon the hunched figure on the rope received some of the tremor which shot through her body. The red light was on her face, and he saw her shoulders twitch as she hung there, apparently fascinated by what she saw. In that moment the world seemed to have paused. It was as if the Tower and garden had held their breath.

Then from somewhere beneath him he fancied he heard a faint, almost indetectable sound. It was a sound so intangible that it did not convey anything concrete to his mind, so soft that he questioned it immediately afterwards. The effect upon Mrs Dick, however, was instantaneous.

‘No!' she said distinctly, ‘no!'

The last word was smothered by a shuddering intake of breath, and she swung round on the rope, hanging to the full length of her arms. Her face was turned up to the man on the Tower for an instant. He saw her lips drawn back over her teeth, her eyes wide and expressionless with fear, while a thin trickle of saliva escaped at one corner of her mouth. He bent forward.

‘Hold on,' he said, not realizing that he was whispering. ‘Hold on!'

But even as he looked, her limp fingers relinquished their grip, he heard the sickening hiss of the rope as it raced through her hands, and she receded with horrible slowness down, down, out of the range of his torch into the darkness below.

The body crunched as it hit the flags, and then silence. The guardian of the Gyrth Chalice had protected its treasure.

Mr Campion, sick and trembling uncontrollably in the cold wind, reeled unsteadily to the turret and went quietly downstairs.

—

The East Suffolk Courier and Hadleigh Argus
for

July 7th

SAD FATALITY AT SANCTUARY

Coroner Comments on Curiosity

A
N INQUEST
was held on Saturday last at the Three Drummers Inn, Sanctuary-by-Tower, before Doctor J. Cobden, Coroner for the district, on Daisy Adela Shannon (44) of Heronhoe Stables, Heronhoe, who fell from the tower in the east wing of the mansion of Colonel Sir Percival Gyrth, Bt, on the night of July 2nd while a birthday party was in progress.

The body was discovered by Mr Alfred Campion, a guest at the Tower. Mr Campion, 17 Battle Street, London, W1, said that on Thursday evening he was walking across the lawn at about 11.25 p.m. when he noticed someone moving on the top of the east wing tower. He thought that it was a member of the household, and hailed them. Receiving no reply he became alarmed, a state of mind which increased when he perceived that one of the dining-room windows stood open. He ran into the house and climbed the staircase to the top landing, coming out at last upon the roof. The jury subsequently viewed the staircase, which is one of the show-pieces of Suffolk.