Skylark (26 page)

The clerk, who was having a brief respite from hotel patrons, came over to us. "Are you
all right, ladies? Shall I have the porter bring you something from the bar?"

"Oh, mercy, yes," Ann said. "We're hungry as wolves."

He looked bewildered.

I interpreted. "I think he means a drink."

"You could go in to dinner," he offered. "The dining room closes in half an hour, but I'm
sure they can seat you."

Ann sighed. "We would just love two half-pints of bitter, honey. And we wouldn't say
no to a packet of crisps."

He smiled. That he could cope with.

When the porter came, the dear man brought two handsome plates of assorted cheeses,
hard rolls, and butter, nicely garnished with lettuce, pickled onions, and chutney. The beer was
wonderful. So was the ploughman's lunch.

We dispatched the food and drinks in short order and Ann carried the tray back to the
bar. While she was gone, my brain kicked in. It was all very well for Jay to tell us to sit on our
thumbs, but Faisel and Smith might be getting away with murder. We couldn't telephone
Hambly, but I could drive out there and try to warn the Henning staff. I could drive right up to
the main gate. If there was a guard I could warn him.

When Ann returned I was on my feet, car keys in my hand. I told her what I had
decided.

"I'm coming, too."

"No, absolutely not. Somebody has to wait here in case Jay and Dad arrive while I'm
gone. I won't be long."

"But..."

"You can't drive the car, and I can," I said brutally. "I go. You stay. I'll be back in
forty-five minutes."

I covered the distance to the car park at a half-trot. All the coaches had gone and only
half a dozen cars remained. A sign said there was no overnight parking. When I came back I
would have to move the car to the hotel lot, but first things first. The villains had a half-hour start
on me.

There was very little traffic, fortunately. I zipped along the road with my high beams on
most of the way. I narrowly avoided running over a cat as I approached the estate. I drove along
the wall and, after several miles, pulled over at the edge of the meadow that had served as a
parking lot.

The gate--which was tall and beautifully ornamented with gilt oak leaves and acorns
around a monogram H--was locked tight. I found a button and pushed it. Though I waited almost
ten minutes, no one responded. It was nine-thirty by then and the moon was out. I peered through
the gate and tried yelling, but I was wasting my time. I heard a dog barking far off but no
encouraging sounds. No one was coming.

I gave up, got into the car, and turned back toward Much Aston. I poked along trying to
think of an alternate course of action, but nothing came to mind. Then I spotted the sedan. They
had parked it on the right hand shoulder, almost in the hedge that bordered that side of the road.
It looked abandoned.

I drove about fifty yards farther along until I came to a gate that led into a field on the
right. On the left, the wall of the Henning estate stretched unbroken as far as I could see. I parked
the Escort beside the gate and sat for a moment, working up my courage. Then I locked the car
with my purse behind the front seat and walked back toward the sedan. Slowly. Making as little
noise as possible.

The sedan was empty but unlocked. I could see nothing on the seats or dash but an
ordinary road map, and I hesitated to get in. The boot was ajar. I opened it, wincing as the hinges
creaked, but I saw nothing out of the ordinary. I closed it again very slowly until it latched.

I looked across at the wall. Had Smith and Faisel gone over it? It was about six feet high
and, though it was surmounted by a course of jagged stones, I thought it was scalable. A car
zipped by going the way I had come. I watched its tail-lights recede and wished I had had the wit
to flag it down.

A wisp of cloud passed over the moon, altering the light, and something glinted on the
wall. I crossed the road for a closer look. At first I saw nothing at all, but I ran my hands over the
area from which the gleam had come and felt metal. Two large hooks. I lifted them, careful to
make no noise. They were attached to a rope ladder, or chain ladder, to be specific, of the kind
sometimes used in home fire escapes. The cables had been wrapped in tape so they wouldn't
clank.

I deduced that the men had used the ladder to climb the wall then repositioned it as an
escape route. They had been at their business, whatever it was, almost an hour. They could return
at any moment.

I pulled the ladder back over the wall as quietly as I could. At least I could slow their
exit a bit. Then I looked at the ladder and temptation overwhelmed me. I climbed to the top of
the wall before I could have second thoughts, teetered a moment on the jagged surface, then
jumped down inside.

The goons had chosen their spot with care--the edge of an evergreen copse. The ground
was covered with needles. I made very little noise landing, though my flats slipped, and I fell on
my tush. I got to my feet, wishing I had taken the time to put on sneakers. And a darker shirt. My
blouse was a ladylike print, pink and purple, and I was afraid it would show up white against my
dark blazer. I buttoned the jacket.

I stood for a long moment, listening to the silence, and then I began moving along the
edge of the plantation. I could see very little, and I was worried about bumping into one of the
men in the dark. One of them would surely be acting as a look-out.

Within ten groping yards I emerged at a "ride," a wide swath through the woodland cut
to permit ancient Hennings to exercise their horses. At the far end, a good half mile away, a light
in the house shone small as a star.

I saw no one on the ride. I supposed the goons had not expected trouble from my
direction. The look-out would be posted nearer the house. I began to run toward it. I am a good
runner. In spite of my flats and the uneven sod beneath them I covered most of the distance
quickly, stumbling but not falling. The third time I slipped, I stopped and took off my shoes.

I was breathing hard, more from fear than from the run. I quieted my breath and went on
at a quick walk. The turf felt cool and soft through my nylon footies. When I reached the end of
the ride I was still at some distance from Hambly and directly behind it. Ann and I had not
circled the place completely. I wished we had. I wished I knew exactly what Faisel and Smith
were up to. It gave me satisfaction to name them in my mind--even if the names were faked.

Lights showed in the new wing, in one corner of the second floor. Family apartments.
The ground floor showed only dim illumination and most of the drapes had been pulled. There
were no lights in the central portion at all, but the Institute wing was patchily lit on the second
and third floors. Milos was probably housed there.

I had taken a few steps in the direction of the older wing of the house when the heavier
man, the Libyan, emerged from that direction and began to walk up the long rolled lawn toward
me.

Faisel was walking straight toward me across the quarter mile expanse of lawn that
separated the house from the ride. I leapt into the shadow of the trees and froze in place. He was
carrying something in his right hand, a gun or a knife, that glinted in the moonlight.

I felt like a deer caught in the scope of a rifle. He kept coming. When he was about a
hundred yards away he glanced over his left shoulder toward Hambly. I was on his right. I took
two cat steps back and tried to look like one of the flowering shrubs at the edge of the ride. His
head whipped forward, and he kept coming, trotting now, gun-hand at his side, eyes scanning
ahead of him. If I had twitched an eyebrow he would have seen me.

He looked over his shoulder again, a long look, as if he were expecting to see or hear
something from the direction of the house. I took three desperate sideways steps and gained the
protection of a rhododendron. It had large, pale blossoms with velvety dark hearts. I held very
still. Then he was past me, and I could breathe.

I counted to twenty very slowly, one one thousand, two one thousand, three one
thousand... Then I turned my head with exquisite care in his direction. He was trotting along at a
good clip, almost running. I waited until he was a blob in the shadowy distance. Then I did what
I probably should have done as soon as I sighted the house. I ran to the new wing, found the
entrance, raced up to the door, and began pounding on it.

I was yelling nonsense--help, fire, murder. Open up, come on, you limey bastards. I
pounded on the stout door with both fists, bashed the iron knocker, leaned on the bell when I
spotted it, all the while shouting at the top of my lungs.

I kept glancing back toward the ride. Surely Faisel could hear me, even at that distance. I
didn't see him returning, though. I pounded and yelled.

Light illuminated the narrow windows on both sides of the door and the fan-shaped arch
above. I kept pounding.

When the door opened I almost fell into the arms of a stout man with glasses.

"Here, what is it? What's the matter?"

"You have intruders," I panted.

He raised both eyebrows. "I certainly see one intruder."

I gulped for air. "You have a man here, a Czech named Milos Vlaçek. Two men
are on the grounds. They're going to try to kill him."

He stared at me for a blank minute in which I came close to despair. Maybe the people
in the family wing didn't know about Milos. Maybe the man would think I was crazy. Then he
wheeled without a word, trotted to a small alcove down the hallway, picked up a telephone, and
punched a number.

"Yes. Williams here. Someone has broken into the grounds and is after your friend.
Move him to the family wing now. Hurry."

He slammed down the phone and turned back to me. "Stay where you are." He punched
out another number. After a pause that may have lasted three rings, he said, "Williams here.
There are apparently intruders near the house. Where's McHale? He what? Well, find him."

I listened to him and stayed where I was, but I was dancing with impatience. I stared off
into the dark, trying to see whether Faisel was returning, whether Smith had heard me yell.

The man who had identified himself as Williams turned back and advanced toward me.
His teeth bared in a smile, and his eyeglasses glinted. "Now, madam, whoever you are, I should
like an explanation..."

I squinted into the darkness. "Look out. There he goes." It was Smith, and he was
running hell-for-leather toward the ride. I had tensed to move when a tremendous explosion
knocked me off my feet. Glass shattered outward on both sides of me.

I scrambled up. I must have been yelling as I ran, something about not letting the
bastards get away with it, but I didn't hear myself because the noise of the blast had deafened me.
I ran desperately, flat out, in my ladylike nylon footies.

I ran up the long slope of lawn and onto the ride. Smith had probably been knocked
down, too, and he ran like an amateur, arms flailing, feet flopping. I caught up with him about a
third of the way along the ride. In the last couple of yards he may have sensed me coming,
though I think we were both still deaf, for he started to turn and stumbled to one knee. His face
was a white blur. He regained his feet and had turned to face me, knife in hand, when I slammed
into him. I knocked him flat.

A fire burned in my head, fueled by adrenaline and rage, so I suppose we were equally
matched. I was taller by a couple of inches, and he outweighed me. He was a street fighter, I was
an athlete. I had knocked the wind out of him, but he had the knife. We grappled.

At the edge of my consciousness, I was aware of the turmoil behind me. I paid no heed.
I was wrestling with Smith, still atop him. I clamped the wrist of his right hand in my left,
digging my fingernails in, but though I had a fistful of his hair and was smashing his head on the
ground, he kept his grip on the knife. He gasped for air. His body heaved and jerked. He pounded
and tore at me with his left hand, trying to overturn me.

I knew at some dim level that if he reversed our positions and pinned me I was dead
meat, so I kept low to the ground and dug my knees into the springy sod on either side of his
waist. My hearing returned, and there were noises. Shouts, dogs barking, a woman screaming,
rumbles and crashes from the damaged house. Somewhere an engine started and, very far away,
the klaxons of emergency vehicles from the direction of Ludlow and Much Aston ripped at the
night.

Lord Henning's beagles found us as Smith's heels finally dug in. He arched his back,
twisted viciously, and rolled me over.

He was screaming obscenities. The circling dogs ki-yied. He wrenched his knife hand
from my grip as I clawed at his eyes. The knife plunged downward, and I felt burning pain, but I
found his throat with both hands, and I kneed upward. He let out a squawk and raised the knife
again. As I blacked out I heard heavy masculine voices above the shrill yelping of the dogs.

I have been told that I came to in the ambulance and asked after Milos. What had fueled
my berserk rage was the instant conviction that he had been killed in the blast.

Nobody answered me. The paramedics, and the constable who rode along in the
ambulance, had not the faintest idea who I was, of course. They asked. Apparently I told them I
was Lark Dailey and that I had a room at the Greyhound in Much Aston. Then I passed out
again. They radioed that information to the county police, and a car was sent to the Greyhound
where Ann was raising holy hell with the village constable. She set them straight about my name
and what I was doing at Hambly. It was then about eleven, and Jay and my father had still not
arrived.

At the Ludlow hospital my injuries were assessed, I was given a transfusion, and the
knife wounds to my shoulder and arm were stitched. I was wheeled into a recovery ward as
ambulances began screaming in with other casualties from Hambly, including Mr. Smith. When
Lord Henning's gamekeeper and groundsman took him into custody, Smith was howling with
pain because my knee had found its target. He was also considerably bruised about the head and
body, his right wrist was torn and swollen, and he had lost a handful of hair. They patched him
up and hauled him off to the pokey under heavy police guard.