At the very hour when Elaine received the strange letter signed "Bernard
Treves," a letter which awoke all her defensive feminine instincts, John
occupied a chair in the little mess-room at Heatherpoint Fort. The
occasion was one of deep and portentous significance. At the head of
the table, where Mrs. Beecher Monmouth had so recently taken tea with
Lieutenant Parkson, General Whiston was seated in state. His big,
commanding figure bulked largely in the chair usually occupied by
Colonel Hobin. Beneath the General's eyes was a map of the South Coast
defences--an elaborate, minutely particularised map, which in a layman's
eyes would have been almost undecipherable.
The General held a blue pencil over a particular section of the Solent;
his eyes, however, were fixed upon the countenance of a naval captain
who sat at his left hand, a little farther down the table. Opposite the
naval captain was Colonel Hobin, and next to Hobin sat old Commander
Greaves.
John occupied an insignificant position next to Greaves, and near the
end of the table there was a vacant chair.
"Is there no possibility, Captain," inquired General Whiston, speaking
to the naval officer, "of altering the mine-field in the time at our
command?"
Before the naval officer lay a small Admiralty chart of the Solent
clustered with a multitude of red crosses.
"Well," he said, deliberating upon the situation, "this is a pretty
elaborate field, and it would take us quite two days to make an
effective new arrangement. Of course, we could mine the free channels,
but that prevents us coming in."
He went into technical details.
General Whiston cast a glance at John.
"You are quite sure your friends Voules and Company intend to strike on
the twenty-eighth?"
"All the evidence I have been able to get points to that, sir," answered
John promptly.
"The twenty-eighth is the day after to-morrow," put in Greaves.
"Mr. Dacent Smith," said John, "had an idea that the attack might be
postponed, but he has now come round to my view."
As a matter of fact, John had that day amply convinced his chief that
the German blow was to fall on the date originally prescribed. Since
leaving Colonel Treves's house, and since his embarrassing interview
with Elaine, John had made certain valuable discoveries, all of which
pointed to the imminence of the German attack on the South Coast
defences. With infinite subtlety von Kuhne had managed to institute
nefarious schemes in a dozen different directions. The night of the
twenty-eighth had been marked out in the German general's mind with the
clockwork precision which was a second nature to him. And John believed
that nothing would shake his resolution. Mrs. Beecher Monmouth's
particular work of the early part of that night was to see that
Lieutenant Parkson was not at his post. All her potent charms were to
be expended to that end. That she would succeed in her task was, in von
Kuhne's and the lady's own eyes, a foregone conclusion. As to Manwitz,
he was to be mysteriously occupied with certain men of his Majesty's
forces whose business it was to operate the boom between Ponsonby
Lighthouse and Windsor Fort. Cherriton's particular duty upon the
eventful night John had not been able to discover. The tall German
still occupied the isolated cottage he had recently taken on the Downs
near Freshwater. Since John's visit to the cottage he had not had
further meeting with this particular formidable enemy.
In thinking of his visit to the cottage, however, John was conscious
that the man's attitude upon that day had been singular in the extreme.
What had been in Cherriton's mind he did not know, and he was, of
course, totally unaware that sentence of extermination had been passed
upon him. It is no stretch of imagination to say that in visiting the
cottage he had, without knowing it, walked within the very shadow of the
grave.
"Friend Cherriton is no mean antagonist," thought John, pondering upon
the German's personality as he sat in the little mess-room.
Now that the great blow was so soon to fall, Dacent Smith--an unusual
circumstance with him--had left his post in London and come to the Isle
of Wight. General Whiston and Captain Throgmorton, who respectively
commanded the counter military and naval measures, found the pleasant,
keen-eyed Chief of Intelligence an invaluable ally. His intuitive
knowledge of the German character proved to be of the utmost assistance.
He had been studying Germany and the German secret service for twenty
years, and what he did not know about Teutonic psychology, chicanery and
guile, was not worth knowing.
Dacent Smith, however, never made the mistake of under-estimating his
enemy. Von Kuhne's blow would, he conceded, be a well-wrought and
scientifically delivered attack. There was one slight thing, however,
which von Kuhne had possibly overlooked--he had possibly overlooked the
important fact that the Isle of Wight is after all an island, and that
in gathering his forces upon this particular portion of His Majesty's
dominions he was isolating himself from chances of escape in case of
failure.
Dacent Smith thought a good deal upon this subject during his first day
at Heatherpoint Fort. But when he presently resumed his chair at the
end of the table in the little mess-room, opposite General Whiston, his
pleasantly good-humoured face showed nothing of the intense mental
activity within.
General Whiston lifted his eyes as Dacent Smith took his seat.
"Well, have you found out anything else for us?"
"Nothing," answered Dacent Smith, "except further confirmation that von
Kuhne will make his attempt the day after to-morrow. He has disposed
his forces with a good deal of ingenuity. This end of the Isle of Wight
is at present dotted with amiable Britishers who happen to be Germans!"
A curious smile flitted across the face of John's Chief.
"It must have been very gratifying," said he, "to Captain Cherriton,
Manners, and von Kuhne to say 'British subject' to our good-looking
policeman as they stepped on board the boat at Lymington. Manners, so I
hear, was the only one of a dozen who came that way who showed the
slightest trace of nervousness. I think we shall have to reckon,
General," he concluded, "upon von Kuhne providing something pretty
forceful and daring!"
The naval captain whose eyes were still occupied with the chart of the
Solent, lifted his keen gaze. "Something in the nature of our own
adventure at Zeebrugge and Ostend, do you think?"
Here he turned his red-starred chart face downwards. On its back were
twenty or thirty neatly-pencilled lines.
"That," he said, pushing the chart towards Dacent Smith, "is my forecast
of what is going to happen in this area during the next forty-eight
hours. If your date is correct, I think my forecast will be pretty well
right. What do you think, General?"
Throgmorton's incisive, clean-cut features turned towards Whiston.
"I think it's a devilish clever piece of work!" answered General
Whiston, generously.
Dacent Smith's eyes lifted from the pencilled forecast. His vivid gaze
rested for a minute in admiration on Throgmorton's handsome,
well-wrought features.
"Some day, young man," thought he, "you will be ruler of the King's
Navy."
He pushed back the chart towards the naval officer; then turned towards
John.
"You can go, Treves," he said, "with the General's permission."
Whiston nodded.
John saluted and withdrew from the room.
As Manton passed out into the asphalted courtyard he met Chief Gunner
Ewins.
"Well, Ewins," he said, "what about your wife's dangerous illness?"
"She wasn't ill at all, sir. I can't make it out--I've just got a
letter from her to-day, saying she's as well as ever she was."
"Of course, she never sent the wire," explained John.
"Who could have sent it?" said Ewins, looking at John with puzzled eyes;
"it's a silly sort of joke to play on anybody, sir."
"Very silly," John admitted. "It looked as if somebody wanted to get
you out of the fort for a day or two. That's why the Colonel wouldn't
grant you leave. He didn't think you were playing a trick on him. He
thought some one was playing a trick on you. How are your guns, Ewins?"
"Nicely, sir, thank you," answered the chief gunner. "But I'm sorry
we've missed our nine-inch practice this week."
"You won't miss much by that," John answered. "You'll shoot as well as
ever when the time comes."
He knew how soon the time would come, though Ewins did not.
John descended the steps of the fort, took his bicycle, and, with due
observance of ceremonies, passed through the great gate that had
recently all but intimidated Mrs. Beecher Monmouth.
An hour later, John, still pedalling steadily, descended the winding
road into Brooke. At the outskirts of the village he placed his bicycle
against a gate, climbed into a field, and, by a detour, made his way to
the back of Doctor Voules's house. In the darkness he walked softly
forward under the shadow of the doctor's garden wall He had made only a
few paces when a voice came to him out of the gloom.
"Who's that?" demanded the voice, in a guarded whisper.
"Treves," answered John. "Is that you, Watson?"
"Yes, sir," came the answer.
John drew himself to the top of the garden wall and looked down upon a
corporal in uniform.
"Anything happened?" John asked.
"Yes," answered Watson; "three men came to the house after dark, stayed
a little while, and went away again, sir."
As a matter of fact, half an hour earlier Doctor Voules and two tall
young men had stealthily mounted the wall and entered the house by the
back way. Corporal Watson had been concealed in the garden and
witnessed this visit, and Voules's and his friends' departure in the
same stealthy manner.
"They are evidently trying to give the impression that the house is
uninhabited, sir," the corporal amplified.
John, who had climbed into the garden and was standing by him, gave a
few further instructions as to Voules's abode, presently mounted his
bicycle and rode away. Three quarters of an hour later, in a small clump
of trees on the heather-clad cliff-top near Freshwater, he spoke to
another soldier. This man, with three others, had been detailed to
watch Cherriton's cottage.
"The captain's been in his cottage all the evening, sir," said the man
to John, "and the big, fat man's been with him."
Having satisfied himself as to the whereabouts of Cherriton and Manners,
John cycled on and entered the Freshwater Hotel. Here he put through a
trunk-call to Newport. When he had been connected with a particular
number he inquired into the telephone:
"Is that you, Gibb?"
"Yes, sir," came the answer.
"Do you know who is speaking?"
"It's Mr. Treves, isn't it?"
"Yes," John answered.
Having satisfied himself that he was in touch with the gloomy-looking
waiter at the Newport Hotel, he put a discreet inquiry. He had parted
with certain Treasury notes to the benefit of the gloomy waiter. The
waiter, thereafter feeling himself a small but important wheel in a
piece of vast machinery, made himself busy and active in John's service.
"Is anybody at home, Gibb?"
"She's not been out all day, sir, and went to bed immediately after
dinner. She told her maid that she had a lot to do to-morrow, and asked
to be called at eight."
These details were, for the moment, enough to satisfy John.
"You know where to ring me up, Gibb, if anything exceptional occurs."
John, having concluded his duties for that day, pedalled slowly back to
the fort. The night was overcast, the air close, and as he led his
bicycle up the long white road to the gates, he could hear the waves
softly falling at the foot of the cliffs in the bay below him. No other
sound broke the stillness, and when the outer sentinel suddenly barred
his path and a challenge rang out on the close air, John was startled
out of a mood of dreams.
He passed the second and the third sentries, a wicket in the great gate
of the fort opened and admitted him, and, having reported himself to the
Colonel, he went straight to his room. For the better part of that
night his mind occupied itself with the momentous doings of the morrow.
The cloud that had gathered itself about that end of the island was
about to break. What would happen to himself and others on the morrow
he could not forecast. But one thing he knew--the long, hidden contest
between Voules and Dacent Smith would reach its culmination. Each man,
with his pawns, had manoeuvred, moved, finessed and counter-moved. The
subtlety of Dacent Smith had been pitted against the precision and
military skill of von Kuhne. What was to be the end? John did not
know, and at that moment his mind was only secondarily occupied with the
point; he was thinking, not of to-morrow, but of yesterday, of his
interview with Elaine, of his abrupt separation from her, of his
apparent brutality and harshness.
He wondered at himself, that he, a capable, alert and non-sentimental
young man, an individual who had withstood the seductive blandishments
of Mrs. Beecher Monmouth, he wondered to find himself deeply and
passionately in love with a girl whose knowledge of artifice was of the
slightest. Elaine's genuine trust in him, her belief in his integrity,
her delight in the improvement in his character, all helped to enchain
John's deepest affections.
As he lay now in the quiet and darkness of his room, he felt he dared
not let his mind dwell upon the future. He had tricked and duped Elaine,
and some day she would be bound to find him out.
What would happen then? What would happen when she learned the truth?
"There is nothing for it," John pronounced suddenly and emphatically.
"I must tell her myself--I must confess the whole thing from the
beginning."
Having arrived at this decision, he saw himself making the confession,
though he could not see what her attitude would be. He could visualise,
always standing between them as an impassable and sinister barrier, the
man whose identity he had borne for so many months. Bernard Treves--his
_alter ego_, his _doppel-gaenger_--had become what he had probably been
from the first--his evil genius. From the very first he had disliked
Treves; he had later grown to despise him. The man was contemptible
beyond words.
At this point John took himself resolutely in hand--or, rather, he
thought he took himself resolutely in hand. What really happened was
that he put away thoughts of Elaine, hiding them courageously and
tenderly in the deeps of his mind, for the sole reason that to think of
her, to think of the hopeless situation between them, meant nothing but
misery and bitterness.
At eight o'clock, when John appeared in the little mess-room, Colonel
Hobin was alone at breakfast, at the head of the table.
"Well, Treves," he said, "if your predictions are right, this is going
to be the day of our lives!"
"I think I am right, sir," John answered.
"We shall see," answered the Colonel. "Pass the marmalade, please."
John passed the marmalade. He noticed the Colonel's hand was
steady--none of the nervous irritability that characterised him usually
was apparent--and the old soldier's eyes had taken on a new masterful
expression of command--the countenance of a good captain on the bridge
in face of a great oncoming storm.