The Woman of Mystery Part 50

The prisoner sprang up, terrified:

"Eh? What's that?"

"I said, courage, sir. The hour has come."

Pale as death, the prince stammered:

"Courage? . . . Courage? . . . I don't understand. . . . Oh Lord, oh Lord, is it possible?"

"Everything is always possible," said Bernard, "and what has to happen always happens, especially calamities." And he suggested, "A gla.s.s of rum, sir, to pull you together? A cigarette?"

"Oh Lord, oh Lord!" the prince repeated, trembling like a leaf.

Mechanically he took the cigarette offered him. But it fell from his lips after the first few puffs.

"Oh Lord, oh Lord!" he never ceased stammering.

And his distress increased when he saw the twelve men waiting, with their rifles at rest. He wore the distraught look of the condemned man who beholds the outline of the guillotine in the pale light of the dawn.

They had to carry him to the terrace, in front of a strip of broken wall.

"Sit down, sir," said Bernard.

Even without this invitation, the wretched man would have been incapable of standing on his feet. He sank upon a stone.

The twelve soldiers took up their position facing him. He bent his head so as not to see; and his whole body jerked like that of a dancing doll when you pull its strings.

A moment pa.s.sed; and Bernard asked, in a kind and friendly tone:

"Would you rather have it front or back?"

The prince, utterly overwhelmed, did not reply; and Bernard exclaimed:

"I'm afraid you're not very well, sir. Come, your royal highness must pull yourself together. You have lots of time. Lieutenant Delroze won't be here for another ten minutes. He was very keen on being present at this--how shall I put it?--at this little ceremony. And really he will be disappointed in your appearance. You're green in the face, sir."

Still displaying the greatest interest and as though seeking to divert the prince's thoughts, he said:

"What can I tell you, sir, by way of news? You know that your friend the Comtesse Hermine is dead, I suppose? Ha, ha, that makes you p.r.i.c.k up your ears, I see! It's quite true: that good and great woman was executed the other day at Soissons. And, upon my word, she cut just as poor a figure as you are doing now, sir. They had to hold her up. And the way she yelled and screamed for mercy! There was no pose about her, no dignity. But I can see that your thoughts are straying. Bother! What can I do to cheer you up? Ah, I have an idea! . . ."

He took a little paper-bound book from his pocket:

"Look here, sir, I'll read to you. Of course, a Bible would be more appropriate; only I haven't one on me. And the great thing, after all, is to help you to forget; and I know nothing better for a German who prides himself on his country and his army than this little book. We'll dip into it together, shall we? It's called _German Crimes as Related by German Eye-witnesses_. It consists of extracts from the diaries of your fellow-countrymen. It is therefore one of those irrefutable doc.u.ments which earn the respect of German science. I'll open it at random. Here goes. 'The inhabitants fled from the village. It was a horrible sight.

All the houses were plastered with blood; and the faces of the dead were hideous to see. We buried them all at once; there were sixty of them, including a number of old women, some old men, a woman about to become a mother, and three children who had pressed themselves against one another and who died like that. All the survivors were turned out; and I saw four little boys carrying on two sticks a cradle with a child of five or six months in it. The whole village was sacked. And I also saw a mother with two babies and one of them had a great wound in the head and had lost an eye.'"

Bernard stopped to address the prince:

"Interesting reading, is it not, sir?"

And he went on:

"'_26 August._ The charming village of Gue d'Hossus, in the Ardennes, has been burnt to the ground, though quite innocent, as it seems to me.

They tell me that a cyclist fell from his machine and that the fall made his rifle go off of its own accord, so they fired in his direction.

After that, they simply threw the male inhabitants into the flames.'

Here's another bit: '_25 August._' This was in Belgium. 'We have shot three hundred of the inhabitants of the town. Those who survived the volleys were told off to bury the rest. You should have seen the women's faces!'"

And the reading continued, interrupted by judicious reflections which Bernard emitted in a placid voice, as though he were commenting on an historical work. Prince Conrad, meanwhile, seemed on the verge of fainting.

When Paul arrived at the Chateau d'Ornequin and, alighting from his car, went to the terrace, the sight of the prince and the careful stage-setting with the twelve soldiers told him of the rather uncanny little comedy which Bernard was playing. He uttered a reproachful protest:

"I say! Bernard!"

The young man exclaimed, in an innocent voice:

"Ah, Paul, so you've come? Quick! His royal highness and I were waiting for you. We shall be able to finish off this job at last!"

He went and stood in front of his men at ten paces from the prince:

"Are you ready, sir? Ah, I see you prefer it front way! . . . Very well, though I can't say that you're very attractive seen from the front.

However. . . . Oh, but look here, this will never do! Don't bend your legs like that, I beg of you. Hold yourself up, do! And please look pleasant. Now then; keep your eyes on my cap. . . . I'm counting: one . . . two . . . Look pleasant, can't you?"

He had lowered his head and was holding a pocket camera against his chest. Presently he squeezed the bulb, the camera clicked and Bernard exclaimed:

"There! I've got you! Sir, I don't know how to thank you. You have been _so_ kind, _so_ patient. The smile was a little forced perhaps, like the smile of a man on his way to the gallows, and the eyes were like the eyes of a corpse. Otherwise the expression was quite charming. A thousand thanks."

Paul could not help laughing. Prince Conrad had not fully grasped the joke. However, he felt that the danger was past and he was now trying to put a good face on things, like a gentleman accustomed to bear any sort of misfortune with dignified contempt.

Paul said:

"You are free, sir. I have an appointment with one of the Emperor's aides-de-camp on the frontier at three o'clock to-day. He is bringing twenty French prisoners and I am to hand your royal highness over to him in exchange. Pray, step into the car."

Prince Conrad obviously did not grasp a word of what Paul was saying.

The appointment on the frontier, the twenty prisoners and the rest were just so many phrases which failed to make any impression on his bewildered brain. But, when he had taken his seat and when the motor-car drove slowly round the lawn, he saw something that completed his discomfiture. elisabeth stood on the gra.s.s and made him a smiling curtsey.

It was an obvious hallucination. He rubbed his eyes with a flabbergasted air which so clearly indicated what was in his mind that Bernard said:

"Make no mistake, sir. It's my sister all right. Yes, Paul Delroze and I thought we had better go and fetch her in Germany. So we turned up our Baedeker, asked for an interview with the Emperor and it was His Majesty himself who, with his usual good grace. . . . Oh, by the way, sir, you must expect to receive a wigging from the governor! His Majesty is simply furious with you. Such a scandal, you know! Behaving like a rotter, you know! You're in for a bad time, sir!"

The exchange took place at the hour named. The twenty prisoners were handed over. Paul Delroze took the aide-de-camp aside:

"Sir," he said, "you will please tell the Emperor that the Comtesse Hermine von Hohenzollern made an attempt to a.s.sa.s.sinate the commander-in-chief. She was arrested by me, tried by court-martial and sentenced and has been shot by the commander-in-chief's orders. I am in possession of a certain number of her papers, especially private letters to which I have no doubt that the Emperor himself attaches the greatest importance. They will be returned to His Majesty on the day when the Chateau d'Ornequin recovers all its furniture, pictures and other valuables. I wish you good-day, sir."

It was over. Paul had won all along the line. He had delivered elisabeth and revenged his father's death. He had destroyed the head of the German secret service and, by insisting on the release of the twenty French prisoners, kept all the promises which he had made to the general commanding-in-chief. He had every right to be proud of his work.

On the way back, Bernard asked:

"So I shocked you just now?"

"You more than shocked me," said Paul, laughing. "You made me feel indignant."