The Secret of Sarek, Maurice Leblanc [the ebook reader .txt] 📗

was in Stéphane’s cell and who had barred the door?

Véronique therefore had precipitated events and given them a turn which she had so many reasons to dread; and François, up above, would be caught at the very moment when he was preparing to escape.

She was utterly overwhelmed:

“Why did I come here?” she muttered. “It would have been so simple to wait! The two of us would have saved you to a certainty.”

One idea flashed through the confusion of her mind: had she not sought to hasten Stéphane’s release because of what she knew of this man’s love for her? And was it not an unworthy curiosity that had prompted her to make the attempt? A horrible idea, which she at once rejected, saying:

“No, I had to come. It is fate which is persecuting us.”

“Don’t believe it,” said Stéphane. “Everything will come right.”

“Too late!” said she, shaking her head.

“Why? How do we know that François has not left his cell? You yourself thought so just now.⁠ ⁠…”

She did not reply. Her face became drawn and very pale. By virtue of her sufferings she had acquired a kind of intuition of the evil that threatened her. This evil now surrounded her on every hand. A second series of ordeals was before her, more terrible than the first.

“There’s death all about us,” she said.

He tried to smile:

“You are talking like the people of Sarek. You have the same fears⁠ ⁠…”

“They were right to be afraid. And you yourself feel the horror of it all.”

She rushed to the door, drew the bolt, tried to open it; but what could she do against that massive, ironclad door?

Stéphane seized her by the arm:

“One moment.⁠ ⁠… Listen.⁠ ⁠… It sounds as if⁠ ⁠…”

“Yes,” she said, “it’s up there that they are knocking⁠ ⁠… above our heads⁠ ⁠… in François’ cell.⁠ ⁠…”

“Not at all, not at all: listen.⁠ ⁠…”

There was a long silence; and then blows were heard in the thickness of the cliff. The sound came from below them.

“The same blows that I heard this morning,” said Stéphane, in dismay. “The same attempt of which I spoke to you.⁠ ⁠… Ah, I understand!⁠ ⁠…”

“What? What do you mean?”

The blows were repeated, at regular intervals, and then ceased, to be followed by a dull, continuous sound, pierced by shriller creakings and sudden cracks, like the straining of machinery newly started, or of one of those capstans which are used for hoisting boats up a beach.

Véronique listened, desperately expectant of what was coming, trying to guess, seeking to find some clue in Stéphane’s eyes. He stood in front of her, looking at her as a man, in the hour of danger, looks at the woman he loves.

And suddenly she staggered and had to press her hand against the wall. It was as though the cave and indeed the whole cliff were bodily moving from its place.

“Oh,” she murmured, “is it I who am trembling like this? Is it from fear that I am shaking from head to foot?”

Seizing Stéphane’s hands, she said:

“Tell me! I want to know!⁠ ⁠…”

He did not answer. There was no fear in his eyes bedewed with tears, there was nothing but immense love and unbounded despair. He was thinking only of her.

Besides, was it necessary for him to explain what was happening? Did not the reality itself become more and more apparent as the seconds passed? A strange reality indeed, having no connection with commonplace facts, a reality quite beyond anything that the imagination might invent in the domain of evil, a strange reality which Véronique, who was beginning to grasp its indication, still refused to believe.

Acting like a trap-door, but like a trap-door working the reverse way, the square of enormous joists which was set in the middle of the cave rose, pivoting on the fixed axis by which it was hinged parallel with the cliff. The almost imperceptible movement was that of an enormous lid opening; and the thing already formed a sort of springboard reaching from the edge to the back of the cave, a springboard with as yet a very slight slope, on which it was easy enough to keep one’s balance.

At the first moment, Véronique thought that the enemy’s object was to crush them between the implacable floor and the granite of the ceiling. But, almost immediately afterwards, she understood that the hateful mechanism, by standing erect like a drawbridge when hoisted up, was intended to hurl them over the precipice. And it would carry out that intention inexorably. The result was fatal and inevitable. Whatever they might try, whatever efforts they might make to hold on, a minute would come when the floor of that drawbridge would be absolutely vertical, forming an integral part of the perpendicular cliff.

“It’s horrible, it’s horrible,” she muttered.

Their hands were still clasped. Stéphane was weeping silent tears.

Presently she moaned:

“There’s nothing to be done, is there?”

“Nothing,” he replied.

“Still, there is room beyond that wooden floor. The cave is round. We might⁠ ⁠…”

“The space is too small. If we tried to stand between the sides of the square and the wall, we should be crushed to death. That has all been planned. I have often thought about it.”

“Then⁠ ⁠… ?”

“We must wait.”

“For what? For whom?”

“For François.”

“Oh, François!” she said, with a sob. “Perhaps he too is doomed.⁠ ⁠… Or perhaps he is looking for us and will fall into some trap. In any case, I shall not see him.⁠ ⁠… And he will know nothing.⁠ ⁠… And he will not even have seen his mother before dying.⁠ ⁠…”

She pressed Stéphane’s hands and said:

“Stéphane, if one of us escapes death⁠—and I hope it may be you⁠ ⁠…”

“It will be you,” he said, in a tone of conviction. “I am even surprised that the enemy should condemn you to the same torture as myself. But no doubt he doesn’t know that it’s you who are here with me.”

“It surprises me too!” said Véronique. “A different torture is set aside for me. But what does it matter, if I am not to see my son again!⁠ ⁠… Stéphane, I can safely leave him in your charge, can’t I? I know