Till the Clock Stops Part 45

Monsieur Guidet almost fell in, crying--

"Quick! Look after Mr. Caw! He was hurt--on the stair!"

As he spoke, Lancaster, Doris, Mr. Harvie and the doctor appeared from the pa.s.sage.

"Doctor, will you go to Caw?" said Alan rapidly. "He's hurt--downstairs."

Handyside ran out, and Guidet banged the door after him. "Guard it!" he shouted to Teddy. "Let not the pig-hog escape!"

The little Frenchman was beside himself. "So I suspect you right!" he almost screamed. "You think I was greater fool than you look when you ask me to make clock the same for five hundred pounds! Bah! What idiot you was! For I think a little after you go, and I take not many chances. How to get here most quick, I ask myself. The train to Greenock, the ferry to cross the water, and the legs to run three miles. I do so! I arrive!--behold, I arrive in time!" He laughed wildly. "And so you would try to kill him--my clock!" he yelled, and with that, like a furious bantam, ignoring the pistol, he flew at Bullard, tore away the mask and tossed it against the wall.

"Monsieur Guidet!" cried Alan, running forward and catching his arm.

"Leave him to us."

Guidet shook off the clasp. "Pig-hog," he went on, "behold, I pull your nose! There! Also, I flap your face! One! two! I do not waste a good clean card on you, but I will give you satisfaction when you like--after you come out of the jail!"

Alan had grabbed Bullard's right wrist. "Teddy, take the madman away," he cried, and Teddy removed Guidet, who went obediently, but blowing like a porpoise, to a seat by the wall.

Lancaster, looking ill, had sunk into an easy-chair by the fire. His daughter, pale but composed, stood beside him, her hand on his shoulder.

She still feared Bullard: even now she was ready for sacrifice. Mr.

Harvie, lost in amazement, had not got beyond the threshold.

As for Bullard, he had gone white to the lips at the Frenchman's affront; his expression was diabolical. Wrenching his wrist from Alan's grasp, he stepped back until he stood framed in the curtains. His black eyes stared straight in front of him, at the clock, perhaps; perhaps into the future.

Alan went back to the door, and whispered to Marjorie: "Go beside Doris, please." Then he turned to Bullard.

"I may as well tell you," he said, "that unless my servant Caw is another of your victims, like Flitch, we shall neither attempt to injure you nor give you in charge; the reason for that is our affair."

At this Teddy found it necessary to restrain Monsieur Guidet.

"But, on the other hand," Alan continued, "you are not going to walk out of this house as easily as you seem to have entered. In fact, you are not going to leave this house until many things have been settled."

Bullard gave him a glance. "Indeed!" he said quietly. "And what does Mr.

Lancaster say to that?"

"Mr. Lancaster is not going to be troubled over this matter," Alan replied calmly, "and you will have no opportunities for troubling him on any other matter. We happen to have a nice, dry cellar, and--well, in short, you are our prisoner, Mr. Bullard--"

Mr. Harvie took a step forward. This was too much for his legal mind. "My dear Mr. Craig," he began, "pray consider carefully--"

"Oh, please, for goodness' sake, keep quiet, Mr. Harvie," Marjorie impulsively interposed, and he collapsed, partly, it may have been, from astonishment.

"For how long, may I ask," sneered Bullard, "am I to have the felicity of your hospitality?"

"Till the clock stops."

A short silence was broken by Monsieur Guidet's clapping his hands and exclaiming: "How you like that, pig-hog? Bravo, Mr. Craik! That was a good bean to give him!"

Marjorie and Teddy laughed, and the others, excepting Lancaster, smiled.

And just then the doctor entered supporting Caw, who looked dazed and wretched. Alan shook his limp hand and helped him to a seat beside Guidet--which was an error of judgment, for the Frenchman's eloquence was loosened afresh.

"Ah, poor Mr. Caw," he cried, patting the sufferer affectionately. "But never mind, for now you have the enemy on the toast! Cheer up, for I will tell you a good choke! Figure it to yourself, the pig-hog comes here with a gla.s.s dish over his bad face--he was so fearful of my clock that it would hurt him--he had so great terror of the green fluid--ha! ha!--I must laugh, it was so very droll." Then he flashed round on Bullard. "But listen, pig-hog, and I tell you the secret of the dreadful, fearful, terrible, awful green fluid! I know the secret, for I make it myself. It is a kind of fish--what you call a cod--understand? And I make it with the oil of castor and some nice colourings! _Voila_! I could laugh for weeks and fortnights, and--"

"Look out!" shouted Teddy, and sprang forward--too late.

"Till the clock stops," said Bullard in a thick voice, and fired at it.

Then he flung the pistol behind him and grinned.

Teddy secured Guidet just in time, and a silence fell that seemed to last for minutes.

The bullet, having made a starry hole in the gla.s.s, had pierced the face an inch below its centre, and as the company stared, the pendulum shuddered and fell with a little plash into the green liquid.

A wild cry came from the Frenchman--"Miracle!"--and he fell to hugging poor Caw.

As though the others had ceased to exist, Bullard strode forward. Now his countenance was congested, his eyes glazed. "The diamonds!" he muttered.

"Where are the--"

He stopped short, as did Alan and Teddy, who had started to intercept him,--stopped short, as did every other human movement in that room at the sound of a voice--a voice emanating from no person present.

Far and faint it sounded, but distinct enough for the hearing of all.

"Do not be alarmed," it said, and paused.

And Bullard was ghastly again, and Lancaster gasped and s.h.i.+vered and put his hands to his face. Marjorie caught Doris's hand, and Caw tried to rise. The others stared at the clock.

The voice slowly proceeded--

"These are my instructions to my nephew, Alan Craig, respecting the diamonds once mine, now his; and if Alan has not returned, to my servant Caw, and failing him, to my lawyer, Mr. George Harvie, who shall then open the letter marked 'last resort,' which I leave in his care. But I make this record in the full belief that my nephew lives and will hear my words." A pause.

Bullard threw himself on the couch. "'His master's voice, Caw,'" he sneered most bitterly.

No one answered save the impulsive Marjorie.

"Cad!" she said clearly.

The voice resumed:

"Alan, you will have the diamonds divided expertly and without delay into three portions of equal value, and you will hand one portion to Miss Marjorie Handyside, the second to Miss Doris Lancaster, yourself retaining the third. I make no restrictions of any sort. I also desire you to present the pendulum intact to Monsieur Guidet, the maker of the clock, provided he has proved faithful. Finally, I ask you to present to my one-time friend, Francis Bullard, the Green Box left in the deep drawer of my writing-table, unless he has already obtained possession of the same, along with the key which Mr. Harvie will provide. And may G.o.d bless and deal gently with us all!--even with the traitor in our midst.

Farewell."

There was another silence. Doris was kneeling, her arms round her father, as though to protect him, and Bullard had risen; the others had scarcely changed their positions.

Mr. Harvie cleared his throat. "Really, my dear Mr. Craig," he said, "all this is most interesting, but, I beg leave to say, extremely irregular.

And--and where are the--"

"I almost forgot to say," replied the voice--and you might have fancied a repressed chuckle--"that the diamonds are deposited, in my nephew's name, with the Bank of Scotland, Glasgow. Once more, farewell."

And with that the clock, having performed its duty, though so long before its time, disintegrated, the works falling piecemeal into the green fluid, there forming a melancholy little heap of submerged wreckage.

No one seemed to know what to say, until Mr. Harvie came to the rescue.