Out into the storm Michael thrust the lady with his murderous hands;
and at once, with an ease his great strength gave him, he tossed her
on his horse, which was tied with others in the court-yard. Then he
swung himself into the saddle, and an instant later, when the rest of
the pack came tumbling out into the night, they were off.
One wanton villain--it was the French gutter-snipe, Virot--paused a
moment to ride up to a window of the hall and discharge his revolver
through the glass. Fortunately his aim was as evil as his intent.
Beyond shattering a priceless vase, the bullet did no damage.
The night was black as pitch, and Michael cursed his horse roundly as
the willing animal, jumping under the spur, grazed the great gate as
he sprang through it. Soon they were all out on the main road, where
the thoroughbred that carried a double burden settled down into a long
swinging stride that fairly devoured the distance, league after
league.
Looking out on the country in the flashes of lightning, Natalie's
heart gave a little jump, for she recognized the high hedges between
which they were running as those that lined the great highway to the
west, which led to the château her cousin maintained, a day's journey
distant from his shooting lodge near her own family estate. They were
taking her there, then! And her heart sank at the thought.
Nor was she wrong. For at last, after a cruel ride, in which they
covered the journey in half the usual time, the steaming, panting
horses were urged up a smooth road, which climbed in curves up the
face of a steep hill. Then they came to a small plateau and stopped
soon before a gate on which someone knocked loudly.
Several fierce dogs began baying. Light began to show in the east now,
and Natalie saw a man push open the massive gate. Then, in another
minute, she was in the château.
In a waiting-room, which projected over a vast cliff, Boris faced his
captive. As he stood there a woman entered--the red-haired creature
whom Boris had introduced to Paul as his sister.
He beckoned her to draw near.
"This," he said to Natalie, "is Madame Estelle. You see, I have
provided a chaperone," he remarked with something like a sneer.
Natalie looked coldly at the two, but said nothing.
Madame Estelle flushed slightly under Natalie's scornful scrutiny as
she led the way into an immense dining-room.
To reach this room they had traversed a long passage, and Natalie
appreciated the fact that the château was very curiously built. It
consisted, indeed, of two portions, which were linked together by a
long stone-flagged corridor.
Boris helped himself liberally to neat brandy, while Madame Estelle
sent for a servant and told him to order tea.
Natalie had been filled with an intense foreboding as she entered the
house, a foreboding which increased as she slowly recognized that she
and Madame Estelle were apparently the only women in the place.
For the tea was brought in by a man, not a farmhand or an honest
countryman, but a villainous-looking individual with a pock-marked
face and little gold earrings in the lobes of his frost-bitten ears.
He walked with his feet wide apart, and with a slightly rolling gait.
He had an immense bull neck, and the hands with which he grasped the
tray were large, grimy and hairy. Natalie set him down as a sailor;
nor was she wrong.
When tea was over, Boris lit a cigarette, and drawing Madame Estelle
on one side conversed with her for some time in whispers.
At the end of the conference between the two the woman left the room
without so much as a word to Natalie or even a glance in her
direction.
Boris turned round with a baleful light in his eyes.
"Now, my lady," he said, "we can have this matter out."
Natalie's afflictions had only increased her old habit of command and
her natural dignity. Though in reality she was the prisoner, she might
have been the captor.
"Before you speak, Boris," she said, "I also have something to say.
How long do you intend to keep me here? I ask this, not for my own
sake, but for my brother's."
"That," said Boris, with a malicious grin, "depends entirely on
yourself."
"By this time, of course," Natalie continued, "a great hue-and-cry
will have been raised after me. Again I ask this question for my
brother's sake. He should be informed of my whereabouts at once; for
you must remember that he will take this very much to heart."
"He will not be informed of your whereabouts at present," said Boris,
shortly. "Because," he continued, with a villainous leer, "I am only
cruel to be kind. I want to have all the details of our marriage
settled as soon as possible. A night of waiting will soften your dear
brother's heart, and he will probably listen to reason in the
morning."
Natalie shuddered and drew a little further away from Boris. "You
coward," she said, and looked at him with infinite contempt.
Again a dangerous light leapt into his eyes.
"Have a care," he cried, "what names you call me here. I do not wish
to be compelled to make you feel your position. But if necessary I
shall--"
Natalie did not take her scornful eyes from his face, and Boris at
last looked shiftily away.
As he apparently did not intend to speak again, she put to him another
question:
"Who is the woman," she asked, "you have here with you?"
"That is no business of yours," snarled Boris, "though you can, if you
wish to speak to or allude to her, call her Madame Estelle, as I
introduced her to you."
"I merely asked," said Natalie, "because I was curious to know how she
came to be associated with a rascal like you."
"Ah! my dear cousin, that is something you will understand better a
little later." He said this with an insinuating air which filled
Natalie with loathing.
"Boris," she said coldly, "I decline altogether to allow you to insult
me."
She turned her back on him, and Boris swore at her without disguise.
But she paid no heed.
Presently he walked round the room so that he could come face to face
with her.
"It is early," he said, "but early hours will do you good. If you will
be so kind as to accompany me I will show you to your room."
He led the way up three flights of stairs till they came to a small
landing. Out of this there opened only one door, and through this
Boris passed.
Natalie now found herself in a large, square room, simply and yet
fairly well furnished, partly as a bedroom and partly as a
sitting-room.
"It is here," said Boris, "that I am unfortunately compelled to ask
you to make your decision.
"You are at perfect liberty to scream to your heart's content. There
is no one here who will mind in the least. You are also at perfect
liberty to make what efforts at escape you choose. I fear that you
will only find them futile."
He went out quickly and closed the door after him. Natalie, listening
in the badly-lighted room, could hear a key grate in the lock and
bolts shot in both at the top and the bottom of the door.
Quickly and methodically she made an examination of her prison. She
looked into the cupboards and into the drawers and the massive bureau.
But there was nothing about the room of the remotest interest to her
which offered the faintest suggestion, sinister or otherwise.
It was, indeed, only when she looked out of the windows, of which
there were three, that she discovered to the full how utterly helpless
was her position.
The window on the south side was apparently over the window of the
dining-room, and, as she peeped over the sill, looked sheer down the
face of the precipice beneath her.
The west window, she found, looked down into a stone court-yard, while
the window on the east overhung the moat. Apparently she was
imprisoned in a tower.
When Boris had reached the ground floor he sought out Madame Estelle,
and drew a chair to the table at which Madame sat at breakfast.
"Estelle," he said, "the crisis in our fortunes has arrived to-day. I
want all the help you can give me, and you will want all your nerve."
Madame Estelle eyed him calmly.
"Indeed," she said. "But even though the crisis in our fortunes
arrived within the next ten minutes there are certain questions which
I must ask you first."
Boris fidgeted impatiently. He realized that he could no longer baulk
the question of Natalie, and the sooner he got himself out of the
difficulty the better for his day's work. He had all along concealed
from Estelle the fact that he meant to marry his cousin.
"Boris," said Madame, stretching out her right hand and brushing
Boris's lightly with her fingers, "are you playing me false?"
"Playing you false?" he cried, with a fine show of indignation. "What
do you mean?"
"I mean that either you have told me too much or too little. If I am
to believe you, this girl we hold is worth at least half a million
roubles to us. You say you are certain of the money, and that the
moment it is yours we are to be married and leave this miserable mode
of life. If this is so I am content. But now I suspect something else.
Is it not true that as part of the bargain you are to be permitted to
marry her?"
Boris jumped out of his chair.
"It's a lie!" he shouted, "and I'll take my oath that that
rattle-brained fool Verdayne is responsible for your stupid fancies."
"But are they fancies?" urged Madame.
"Fancies! Of course they are fancies. What good do you think it would
do me to be tied to a girl like that? Surely half a million should
content any man. I wish to be free to pursue my life with you. The
sooner indeed I am free from all this business the better."
Madame Estelle looked greatly troubled.
"Are you sure, Boris," she asked again, "that this is absolutely true?
Oh! be sure that I dislike to distress you in this way, but I cannot
help it."
"My dear Estelle," Boris cried, with a greater show of tenderness than
he had yet exhibited, "surely I have been true enough and faithful
enough all these years for you to believe me now. Indeed, you must
believe in me, because if you don't believe in me and give me your
support the cup of happiness which is so near our lips may be dashed
away from them.
"Wait!" he went on, "and see whether I am speaking the truth or not."
Nevertheless, Madame was restless and ill at ease.
"If I had seen that girl before to-day," she said, "I should never
have entered into this business with you."
"Then you would have been a fool," said Boris, rudely.
"Possibly, but still, even at the risk of your displeasure, there are
a few things which I do not care to do."
Boris glanced at her sharply.
"Of course," she continued, "it is too late now. I have made up my
mind, and we will go through with it, but frankly, I don't like this
business."
"Never mind," said Boris; "it will not last forever. To-morrow ought
to settle it."
As Madame at this point started to leave the room, Boris enjoined her
to silence; and though Madame promised that she would not discuss his
affairs with Natalie, she was, if the truth were told, not quite
decided whether she would keep her word.
Then Boris sent for Michael.
"Mark you, Michael," he said, "I will have no hanky-panky games in
this house. And, mark you, too, I have no desire to have Madame
Estelle and Mademoiselle Vseslavitch becoming too friendly. You never
can rely on women. They are funny creatures, and Madame is far too
sympathetic with the girl already. So I shall look to you to stop
anything of that sort.
"For the rest, you will know what to do if certain contingencies
should arise. I have not brought the dogs here for nothing." He broke
off and shuddered a little himself as at some short distance from the
house he could hear the baying of the great hounds.
"They are loose, I suppose?" he asked.
Michael nodded.
"Then Heaven help the stranger," he rejoined with a cruel laugh, and
pulling a rug over himself he lay down to sleep on the sofa.