The Lone Wolf, Louis Joseph Vance [best historical fiction books of all time txt] 📗

in the air, but

after that I was terribly afraid. I could feel myself going—taking

leave of my senses—and I knew I must act if we were not to follow that

other… God! what a death!”

 

He paused, shuddered, and drew the back of his hand across his eyes

before continuing: “So I cut off the ignition and volplaned. Here—my

hand. So-o! All right, eh?”

 

“Oh, I’m all right,” Lanyard insisted confidently.

 

But his confidence was belied by a look of daze; for the earth was

billowing and reeling round him as though bewitched; and before he knew

what had happened he sat down hard and stared foolishly up at the aviator.

 

“Here!” said the latter courteously, his wind-mask hiding a smile—“my

hand again, monsieur. You’ve endured more than you know. And now for

mademoiselle.”

 

But when they approached the girl, she surprised both by shivering,

sitting up, and obviously pulling herself together.

 

“You feel better now, mademoiselle?” Vauquelin enquired, hastening to

loosen her fastenings.

 

“I’m better—yes, thank you,” she admitted in a small, broken

voice—“but not yet quite myself.”

 

She gave a hand to the aviator, the other to Lanyard, and as they

helped her to the ground, Lanyard, warned by his experience, stood by

with a ready arm.

 

She needed that support, and for a few minutes didn’t seem even

conscious of it. Then gently disengaging, she moved a foot or two away.

 

“Where are we—do you know?”

 

“On the South Downs, somewhere?” Lanyard suggested, consulting

Vauquelin.

 

“That is probable,” this last affirmed—“at all events, judging from

the course I steered. Somewhere well in from the coast, at a venture;

I don’t hear the sea.”

 

“Near Lewes, perhaps?”

 

“I have no reason to doubt that.”

 

A constrained pause ensued. The girl looked from the aviator to Lanyard,

then turned away from both and, trembling with fatigue and enforcing

self-control by clenching her hands, stared aimlessly off into the mist.

 

Painfully, Lanyard set himself to consider their position.

 

The Parrott had come to rest in what seemed to be a wide, shallow,

saucer-like depression, whose irregular bounds were cloaked in fog. In

this space no living thing stirred save themselves; and the waste was

crossed by not so much as a sheep track. In brief, they were lost.

There might be a road running past the saucer ten yards from its brim

in any quarter. There might not. Possibly there was a town or village

immediately adjacent. Quite as possibly the Downs billowed away for

desolate miles on either hand.

 

“Well—what do we do now?” the girl demanded suddenly, in a nervous

voice, sharp and jarring.

 

“Oh, we’ll find a way out of this somehow,” Vauquelin asserted

confidently. “England isn’t big enough for anybody to remain lost in

it—not for long, at all events. I’m sorry only on Miss Shannon’s

account.”

 

“We’ll manage, somehow,” Lanyard affirmed stoutly.

 

The aviator smiled curiously. “To begin with,” he advanced, “I daresay

we might as well get rid of these awkward costumes. They’ll hamper

walking—rather.”

 

In spite of his fatigue Lanyard was so struck by the circumstances that

he couldn’t help remarking it as he tore off his wind-veil.

 

“Your English is remarkably good, Captain Vauquelin,” he observed.

 

The other laughed shortly.

 

“Why not?” said he, removing his mask.

 

Lanyard looked up into his face, stared, and fell back a pace.

 

“Wertheimer!” he gasped.

XXVII DAYBREAK

The Englishman smiled cheerfully in response to Lanyard’s cry of

astonishment.

 

“In effect,” he observed, stripping off his gauntlets, “you’re right,

Mr. Lanyard. ‘Wertheimer’ isn’t my name, but it is so closely

identified with my—ah—insinuative personality as to warrant the

misapprehension. I shan’t demand an apology so long as you permit me to

preserve an incognito which may yet prove somewhat useful.”

 

“Incognito!” Lanyard stammered, utterly discountenanced. “Useful!”

 

“You have my meaning exactly; although my work in Paris is now ended,

there’s no saying when it may not be convenient to be able to go back

without establishing a new identity.”

 

Before Lanyard replied to this the look of wonder in his eyes had

yielded to one of understanding.

 

“Scotland Yard, eh?” he queried curtly.

 

Wertheimer bowed. “Special agent,” he added.

 

“I might have guessed, if I’d had the wit of a goose!” Lanyard affirmed

bitterly. “But I must admit…”

 

“Yes,” the Englishman assented pleasantly; “I did pull your leg—didn’t

I? But not more than our other friends. Of course, it’s taken some

time: I had to establish myself firmly as a shining light of the swell

mob over here before De Morbihan would take me to his hospitable bosom.”

 

“I presume I’m to consider myself under arrest?”

 

With a laugh, the Englishman shook his head vigorously.

 

“No, thank you!” he declared. “I’ve had too convincing proof of your

distaste for interference in your affairs. You fight too sincerely,

Mr. Lanyard—and I’m a tired sleuth this very morning as ever was! I

would need a week’s rest to fit me for the job of taking you into

custody—a week and some able-bodied assistance!… But,” he amended

with graver countenance, “I will say this: if you’re in England a week

hence, I’ll be tempted to undertake the job on general principles. I

don’t in the least question the sincerity of your intention to behave

yourself hereafter; but as a servant of the King, it’s my duty to

advise you that England would prefer you to start life anew—as they

say—in another country. Several steamers sail for the States before

the end of the week: further details I leave entirely to your

discretion. But go you must,” he concluded firmly.

 

“I understand…” said Lanyard; and would have said more, but couldn’t.

There was something suspiciously like a mist before his eyes.

 

Avoiding the faces of his sweetheart and the Englishman, he turned

aside, put forth a hand blindly to a wing of the biplane to steady

himself, and stood with head bowed and limbs trembling.

 

Moving quietly to his side, the girl took his other hand and held it

tight….

 

Presently Lanyard shook himself impatiently and lifted his head again.

 

“Sorry,” he said, apologetic—“but your generosity—when I looked for

nothing better than arrest—was a bit too much for my nerves!”

 

“Nonsense!” the Englishman commented with brusque good-humour. “We’re

all upset. A drop of brandy will do us no end of good.”

 

Unbuttoning his leather surtout, he produced a flask from an inner

pocket, filled its metal cup, and offered it to the girl.

 

“You first, if you please, Miss Shannon. No—I insist. You positively

need it.”

 

She allowed herself to be persuaded, drank, coughed, gasped, and

returned the cup, which Wertheimer promptly refilled and passed to

Lanyard.

 

The raw spirits stung like fire, but proved an instant aid to the badly

jangled nerves of the adventurer. In another moment he was much more

himself.

 

Drinking in turn, Wertheimer put away the flask. “That’s better!” he

commented. “Now I’ll be able to cut along with this blessed machine

without fretting over the fate of Ekstrom. But till now I haven’t been

able to forget–-”

 

He paused and drew a hand across his eyes.

 

“It was, then, Ekstrom—you think?” Lanyard demanded.

 

“Unquestionably! De Morbihan had learned—I know—of your bargain with

Ducroy; and I know, too, that he and Ekstrom spent each morning in the

hangars at St. Germain, after your sensational evasion. It never

entered my head, of course, that they had any such insane scheme

brewing as that—else I would never have so giddily arranged with

Ducroy—through the S�ret�, you understand—to take Vauquelin’s

place…. Besides, who else could it have been? Not De Morbihan, for

he’s crippled for life, thanks to that affair in the Bois; not

Popinot, who was on his way to the Sant�, last I saw of him; and never

Bannon—he was dead before I left Paris for Port Aviation.”

 

“Dead!”

 

“Oh, quite!” the Englishman affirmed nonchalantly, “When we arrested

him at three this morning—charged with complicity in the murder of

Roddy—he flew into a passion that brought on a fatal haemorrhage. He

died within ten minutes.”

 

There was a little silence….

 

“I may tell you, Mr. Lanyard,” the Englishman resumed, looking up from

the motor, to which he was paying attentions with monkey-wrench and

oil-can, “that you were quite off your bat when you ridiculed the idea

of the ‘International Underworld Unlimited.’ Of course, if you hadn’t

laughed, I shouldn’t feel quite as much respect for you as I do; in

fact, the chances are you’d be in handcuffs or in a cell of the Sant�,

this very minute…. But, absurd as it sounded—and was—the

‘Underworld’ project was a pet hobby of Bannon’s—who’d been the brains

of a gang of criminals in New York for many years. He was a bit touched

on the subject: a monomaniac, if you ask me. And his enthusiasm won De

Morbihan and Popinot over … and me! He took a wonderful fancy to me,

Bannon did; I really was appointed first-lieutenant in Greggs’

stead…. So you first won my sympathy by laughing at my offer,” said

Wertheimer, restoring the oil-can to its place in the tool-kit;

“wherein you were very wise…. In fact, my personal feeling for you is

one of growing esteem, if you’ll permit me to say so. You’ve most of

the makings of a man. Will you shake hands—with a copper’s nark?”

 

He gave Lanyard’s hand a firm and friendly grasp, and turned to the girl.

 

“Good-bye, Miss Shannon. I’m truly grateful for the assistance you gave

us. Without you, we’d have been sadly handicapped. I understand you have

sent in your resignation? It’s too bad: the Service will feel the loss

of you. But I think you were right to leave us, the circumstances

considered…. And now it’s good-bye and good luck! I hope you may be

happy…. I’m sure you can’t go far without coming across a highroad or

a village; but—for reasons not unconnected with my profession—I prefer

to remain in ignorance of the way you go.”

 

Releasing her hand, he stepped back, saluted the lovers with a smile

and gay gesture, and clambered briskly to the pilot’s seat of the

biplane.

 

When firmly established, he turned the switch of the starting mechanism.

 

The heavy, distinctive hum of the great motor filled that isolated

hollow in the Downs like the purring of a dynamo.

 

With a final wave of his hand, Wertheimer grasped the starting-lever.

 

Its brool deepening, the Parrott stirred, shot forward abruptly. In

two seconds it was fifty yards distant, its silhouette already blurred,

its wheels lifting from the rim of the hollow.

 

Then lightly it leaped, soared, parted the mists, vanished….

 

For some time Lanyard and Lucy Shannon remained motionless, clinging

together, hand-in-hand, listening to the drone that presently dwindled

to a mere thread of sound and died out altogether in the obscurity

above them.

 

Then, turning, they faced each other, smiling a trace uncertainly, a

smile that said: “So all that is finished! … Or, perhaps, we dreamed

it!”…

 

Suddenly, with a low cry, the girl gave herself to Lanyard’s arms; and

as this happened the mists parted and bright sunlight flooded the

hollow in the Downs.

THE END

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