For a short space Esther believed herself lost. If Holliday found her,
which seemed almost inevitable, she knew she would be powerless to put
up a defence. It would be a simple matter for him to gag her and drag
her back over the few yards of intervening side-walk before anyone
could know what was happening. It was not as though there were many
people about. She had never seen the street so deserted. An
occasional motor passed, but she could detect no footstep save that of
the man pursuing her.
She rolled over and lay prone on the damp mould, as close under the
hedge as she could squeeze. The hedge itself was barely four feet
high, but it presented a certain amount of cover now that it had gone
dark. Perhaps if she knew in time that she had been discovered she
might manage to dash to the door of the house and ring the bell
violently. She gathered her strength for the attempt, then for the
first time noticed a sign, "_À louer_," across the front windows. The
place was vacant.
Her one hope lay in remaining stock-still, trusting to the shadows to
hide her. This she did, and listening heard Holliday run around the
side of the doctor's villa to the spot where she had fallen, then back
again and once more out into the street. Here he paused, and she could
picture him reconnoitring in every direction. He would know that she
could not have gone far, that she must be concealed within a short
radius. Unless someone came along the street discovery was merely a
matter of minutes.
Her head still ringing from the bumps she had recently received, she
felt herself rapidly relaxing, in spite of her danger. The thought of
complete abandonment to repose stole over her like a powerful narcotic.
It would have been heavenly to let herself go, to fall asleep here or
lapse into a faint; she didn't know which it would be. For several
seconds she saw the dark garden through a veil of black gauze. Then a
voice inside her brain roused her; she braced herself and set her teeth
fiercely to dam back the treacherous tide that threatened to swamp her
senses. Whatever happened, she must hold on a little longer; she must,
she must! ... She heard Holliday go down the street in the opposite
direction, stop, then after another minute return, more slowly, towards
her hiding-place. Another two seconds and he would be on a line with
her. Now, through a rift in the hedge she could see his feet, moving
undecidedly. Oh, why did no one come? The feet came towards her more
and more slowly. Why was he hanging about in that way? At last, at a
distance of six feet away from her, he stopped altogether. She could
no longer see him, but she felt his presence. She almost knew that he
was silently peering through the wall of foliage, endeavouring to probe
into the shadows. The suspense grew unbearable, she felt she must
scream out, "Here I am! What are you going to do about me?"
Suddenly other steps approached, those of two or three people. She
listened eagerly: then she heard voices talking in quite unintelligible
French, interspersed with laughter. She visualised a group of
returning workmen. Just opposite her one of them spat on the pavement
and broke into a snatch of song. Hardly had they passed by when others
came--the desert was populated once more. She felt a merciful degree
of security. At any rate Holliday would not dare now to come and seize
her, or even if he did she had a better chance of creating an effectual
disturbance. But where was Holliday? Had he departed, or was he still
standing there, searching for her? She could not tell, and she was
afraid to move to see better. What seemed an infinitude of time went
by; then at last, realising how late it was growing and that she must
not waste the precious minutes, she raised her head and took a cautious
look through an open patch in the leaves towards the doctor's door. A
few minutes ago it had stood open, emitting a bar of yellow light. Now
the place was in complete darkness. That argued that Holliday had gone
back whence he had come. Dare she rise to her feet and hasten on her
way? She knew that she must dare; to stop here longer might easily be
fatal to her project.
Yes, he was nowhere in sight, had apparently relinquished the pursuit.
She did not stop to wonder why, or if he had anything up his sleeve.
Instead she turned out of the gate to the side-walk, her clothing damp
and clinging to her, her limbs trembling. She had passed one terror,
but she was faced with a second almost as bad. Had the doctor already
reached the Villa Firenze? Could she possibly contrive to forestall
him? She must at once get to a telephone; it was her one chance.
A telephone--there must be one in this next villa; she would ring the
bell and ask. With her knees giving under her at every step she
hurried up the walk of a gingerbread pseudo-chalet, vilely
prosperous-looking, and pressed her finger firmly on the electric
button. There was a shrill peal, echoing throughout the house, but no
one came. She rang again and yet again, holding her finger glued to
the bell at last and stamping her feet with impatience. At last, after
an endless interval, someone approached with a deliberate, shuffling
tread, the door was unbarred--there seemed several bolts--and opened
half-way to reveal a gim-crack interior in execrable taste and the
figure of an old woman with a hard wrinkled face and grey hair smoothly
banded under a black cap.
"_S'il vous plait, madame,_" began Esther, half crying with agitation,
"_Est-ce qu'on peut téléphoner? C'est très important, madame._"
The old face, unsmiling, critical, looked her over from head to foot.
Esther for the first time realised her dishevelled appearance, her
hatless head. She saw the hard eyes fix themselves in a suspicious
stare on a point upon her cheek under the left eye. Mechanically she
put up her hand and discovered a needle-like splinter of glass sticking
into her face. She had not felt it before: it must have come from the
electric-bulb which Holliday's revolver had shattered. There must be a
good deal of blood on her cheek....
"_Un accident,_" she murmured apologetically, trying to smile, then
repeated desperately, beseechingly: "_Le téléphone, madame----? Je
suis très pressé----_"
The old woman spoke at last:
"_On n'a pas de téléphone ici,_" she replied with a Belgian accent, and
pushed the door to in Esther's face.
Outraged and disappointed, the more so as she had caught sight of the
telephone-instrument in the hall, Esther stumbled down the steps and
out again to the street, sick at heart over the waste of time and
strength, both priceless now. The old witch, the iron-faced creature,
eyeing her as if she wanted to steal something! Never mind, she must
simply try the house next door.
This proved to be an imposing edifice where one would expect to find
several well-trained servants. Yet she rang the bell for three minutes
at least without eliciting any response. At length she was on the
point of departure, maddened by her fruitless efforts, when she was
rewarded by a sound above her head. Looking up she saw that a casement
had been thrown open and that a gentleman with his face covered in
lather was gazing down upon her--at first angrily, then archly. Quite
desperate now she framed her request in what French she could command,
scarcely able to wait for the reply. The result was disconcerting.
The shaving gentleman became excessively gallant, entreated his fair
visitor to remain where she was for a tiny instant until he could
descend and admit her, implored her with expansive gestures not on any
account to go away and blight his life. As the sweep of the arm and
the shrug of the shoulders betrayed only too plainly the fact that the
hospitable gentleman was very much in a state of nature, except for the
lather on his face, Esther took fright and bolted out of the gate,
inwardly execrating the Gallic race and their amorous propensities.
One more chance gone, she thought in a panic of dread, five minutes
more wasted. Oh! to think a simple matter like finding a telephone
should present so many difficulties!
Diagonally across the street loomed a large, modern apartment house of
familiar design. Without doubt there would be a telephone there, in
the loge of the concierge. Precipitately she darted across the street,
narrowly escaping a motor-cycle, and plunged into the court. She could
see the loge at the far end, up a flight of three shallow steps. Light
streamed out of the wide glass double doors so frequently seen in this
type of building; she aimed her faltering steps towards it as to a
beacon. Within the doors she saw a brightly lit, stuffy room
overcrowded with machine-carved furniture, the central table covered
with a red chenille cloth, on which lay a string-bag bursting with
vegetables and parcels. No soul was visible, but she spied the
telephone against the back wall. She opened the doors and went in, a
bell tinkling as she did so. From an inner room issued the sound of
voices laughing and gossiping. The door was shut, and no one troubled
at all to answer the summons.
She crossed hurriedly to the other door and opened it, disclosing a
domestic group, fit subject for one of the Dutch school paintings.
There was a neat, compact, black-clad woman with shining, immaculate
coiffure, an old, florid, bald-headed man sluggishly fat, and a youth,
long-limbed and pale, with the face of an apache and a dank lock of
black hair dipping into his eyes. The woman was peeling potatoes and
recounting a history, the old man smoked, and fondled a cat, the apache
lounged against the chimney with a cigarette dangling from his thin
lips. A dog slept on the hearth; there were two love-birds in a green
cage upon the wall.
"_S'il vous plait, madame----_"
The three turned instantly and regarded her, all merriment gone, their
eyes shrewd, alien, inquisitorial. She began to feel like a criminal,
and struggled stammering in the effort to make her desire known, urgent
though it was.
"_Bien, mademoiselle, qu'est-ce que vous désirez?_" the woman rapped
out in staccato accents.
"_Madame, s'il vous plait, je veux bien téléphoner. Je regrette de
vous déranger, mais c'est tellement important._"
She saw the woman's gaze, hard and curious, take in the details of her
appearance, from her muddy shoes up to her blood-stained cheek.
"I've had an accident--_je viens d'avoir un petit accident,_" she
explained hurriedly. "_Il faut que je téléphone immédiatement._"
The concierge's face cleared slightly.
"_Pour chercher un médecin, sans doute?_" she suggested. "_Bien--voici
le téléphone._"
Gratefully Esther thanked her and took down the receiver in her
trembling hand. The operator failed to understand her accent; she
repeated the number three or four times without success, and was on the
point of bursting into tears when the concierge possessed herself of
the receiver and delivered the number for her, crisply and precisely.
"_Voilà, mademoiselle,_" she announced in triumph, and returned to her
potatoes.
There followed a long wait. From the other room Esther could hear the
family group discussing her in subdued voices, her strange aspect, her
evident weakness. They hazarded guesses as to how she had received her
injuries. The old man was positive that the lady's lover had been
chasing her with a knife; the wound on her face was a proof of it, in
his opinion.
A series of buzzings, tappings and clinkings came over the wire, with
hints of far-distant unintelligible conversation. This continued while
with agonised eyes Esther watched the hands of the big clock on the
wall creep from five minutes past seven to eleven past. Still no
connection. At last the operator, remote and chill as the top of the
Tour Eiffel, informed her that there was no reply. With French born of
desperation Esther cried, "_Sonnez encore! Sonnez toujours! Je suis
sûre qu'il y a quelqu'un la!_" Then recommenced the mysterious
commotion on the line, which, before, led to nothing.
"Oh, God! oh, God!" she breathed hysterically. "It will be too late,
it may already be too late! Oh, God, help me, make them answer!"
She was dimly aware that the apache was lounging in the doorway, using
a toothpick and examining her with interest. The voices from the inner
room had ceased; everyone was listening, but she did not care. All at
once a click louder than those preceding told her she had been put
through at last. Hope leapt within her. Alas! It suffered an
immediate extinction, when she found herself _au courant_ of a
conversation between two people of opposite sexes, a dalliance
flirtatious in character, interspersed with laughter and snatches of
song. Three times she lowered the hook, three times she raised it to
find herself still listening to the idiotic babble--"_Tu ne m'aimes
pas? Hein? Pourquoi pas?_"--laughter--"_Quand j'ai regardé le couleur
de ton nes l'autre soir, j'étais complètement bouleversé, j'
t'assure!_"--"_Ah, formidable!_" then another shrill cackle. It was
beyond endurance.
There was no use trying further. The clock hands touched twenty
minutes past, she had thrown away over a quarter of an hour here while
at the villa death was closing in surely upon its unsuspecting victim.
She dropped the receiver with a groan, turning to the woman, who had
just come out.
"_Madame, c'est inutile. Je vous remercie._"
The woman looked her over again with a softened glance, touched,
perhaps, by the tremor that shook her visitor's voice.
"_Mademoiselle est souffrante?_"
"_Non, madame, pas trop, ce n'est pas ça--mais il y a quelqu'un qui est
en danger--quelqu'un qu'il faut prévenir. Si je peux trouver un
taxi----_"
"_Gaston! Vite! Cherche un taxi pour mademoiselle. Va!_"
With a warmed feeling that these were kindly people after all, Esther
watched the young man's long figure slink out of the door like an otter
around the bend of a stream.
"_Asseyez-vous, mademoiselle,_" the woman bade her, and pushed forward
a chair.
But she could not sit down. She was in a fever of excitement,
quivering all over. With one section of her mind she thanked the woman
again, with another she looked for the young man's return, with still
another she said to herself, "How long will it take me to get to La
Californie from here? Has Roger come back? Is the doctor getting the
bandage ready for his hand? Oh, if it should already be too late!"
A torturing interval ensued. She left the loge and wandered out to the
entrance. Rain had begun to fall, that would make it harder to find a
taxi. It would happen, now of all times! Ten minutes passed, then up
the street chug-chugged a somewhat battered motor-vehicle with the
apache hanging on the step. Yes, it was a taxi, an antediluvian one,
but she must not be critical. If a chariot offered one a lift out of
hell, one would not stop to inquire its horse-power. The apache helped
her in and closed the door. She turned grateful eyes on him through
the open window and with an expressive gesture showed him she had no
purse.
"_Pas de quoi, mademoiselle,_" he responded gruffly, and her opinion of
the French rose several points.
The chauffeur, a septuagenarian who smelled of wine, had a bulbous nose
and was so deaf that it took her several seconds to make him understand
where she wanted to go. When finally he grasped the address, he tapped
his most conspicuous feature with a horny finger, and, his engine
having by this time stopped, descended with creaks and groans to crank
it up. He was so long over the operation that she began to be alarmed.
However, he was not drunk, only senile. Of the two, his taxi was far
worse--rickety, spavined, with every evidence of decrepitude. It
started with a jerk which threw its occupant off her seat.
"At any rate I'm moving," she told herself with real relief. "I'm
getting there at last. That's something."
Any sort of motion might be better than none, yet when she realised the
pace at which she must crawl she suffered strong misgivings. To jog
along like this when speed was a prime essential! Moreover they did
not always jog, frequently they stopped dead still, while the ancient
driver fumbled with the gear and eventually hit upon something which
sent them forward again with a fresh spasm. It was so completely
maddening that after the fifth attack she could bear it no longer.
Thrusting her head out of the window she shouted shrilly:
"_Vite! Vite! Je suis très pressé! Vite!_"
She regretted her lack of expletives, but she need not have done so.
The sole result, amid mumblings and grumblings, was an abortive spurt
which ended in a breakdown more disastrous than any preceding. Minutes
were lost while the septuagenarian got down for another cranking up,
and then in the old fashion they chugged on again. At this rate it
would take them more than half an hour to reach the villa, during which
time anything might happen--would happen, in all probability. Still,
she resolved not to risk another exhortation to speed, but to trust to
luck to send another taxi in her way. She had no money to pay for this
one if she abandoned it, but she reflected that she could give the old
man her wrist-watch. It was a problem which need not have concerned
her. Many taxis whizzed by, but not one was disengaged.
When they mounted the steeper part of the incline the unhappy engine so
laboured that each revolution of the wheels threatened to be the last.
Still they moved onward with a sort of grim persistence, and it
occurred to Esther that if she did not go altogether mad in the
interval there might just possibly be a glimmer of hope. They had
passed many familiar landmarks; in a sort of fashion they were getting
there. She sat on the edge of the lumpy seat, alternately praying and
gibbering, her hands clenched, her head throbbing with the sharp pain
born of fear.
"Oh, God," she murmured for the twentieth time, "don't let it happen,
make him wait till I get there! Oh, God----"
The taxi slowed down with an ominous finality. Again the driver
climbed down, fiddled about for several seconds, then with immense
deliberation approached and opened the door. "What's the matter?
Can't you get on? _Qu'est-ce qu'il y a?_" she cried, ready to shake
him.
He shrugged his shoulders and blew his red nose on a huge filthy
handkerchief. Then with an air of great philosophy he replied:
"_Ça marche plus._"
"_Comment?_" she screamed at him, although she had heard only too well.
"_Plus d'essence,_" he explained briefly, spitting into a puddle.
"_C'est fini._"
There it was concisely; she could take it or leave it. No more petrol,
and still at least a mile away from the Villa Firenze. As well write
"finis" to her whole desperate attempt. How she had got this far
without fainting was almost a miracle; if she tried to walk the
remaining distance she was quite certain to fall by the wayside. At
the moment the one thing that would have brought her some slight relief
would have been to slay this old man--and she had no weapon.
Slowly she got out of the mouldy cab and began automatically to
unfasten the strap of her watch. At least she must pay her debts....
"_Plus dessence... C'est fini...._"
The words rang in her brain like a knell.