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

but he wanted it dagger in hand, with the implacable intention of using it. Slowly, with his eyes fixed on Don Luis and without concealing his purpose, he had freed his weapon and was rising to his feet.

“Take care,” said Don Luis. “Your knife is faked as your revolver was. It’s made of tinfoil.”

Useless pleasantry! Nothing could either hasten or delay the methodical impulse which urged Vorski to the supreme contest. He walked round the sacred table and took up his stand in front of Don Luis.

“You’re sure it’s you who have been thwarting all my plans these last few days?”

“The last twenty-four hours, no longer. I arrived at Sarek twenty-four hours ago.”

“And you’re determined to go on to the end?”

“Yes; and farther still, if possible.”

“Why? And in what capacity?”

“As a sportsman; and because you fill me with disgust.”

“So there’s no arrangement to be made?”

“No.”

“Would you refuse to go shares with me?”

“Ah, now you’re talking!”

“You can have half, if you like.”

“I’d rather have the lot.”

“Meaning that the God-Stone⁠ ⁠…”

“The God-Stone belongs to me.”

Further speech was idle. An adversary of that quality has to be made away with; if not, he makes away with you. Vorski had to choose between the two endings; there was not a third.

Don Luis remained impassive, leaning against the pillar. Vorski towered a head above him: and at the same time Vorski had the profound impression that he was equally Don Luis’ superior in every other respect, in strength, muscular power and weight. In these conditions, there was no need to hesitate. Moreover, it seemed out of the question that Don Luis could even attempt to defend himself or to evade the blow before the dagger fell. His parry was bound to come late unless he moved at once. And he did not move. Vorski therefore struck his blow with all certainty, as one strikes a quarry that is doomed beforehand.

And yet⁠—it all happened so quickly and so inexplicably that he could not tell what occurred to bring about his defeat⁠—and yet, three or four seconds later, he was lying on the ground, disarmed, defeated, with his two legs feeling as though they had been broken with a stick and his right arm hanging limp and paining him till he cried out.

Don Luis did not even trouble to bind him. With one foot on the big, helpless body, half-bending over his adversary, he said:

“For the moment, no speeches. I’m keeping one in reserve for you. It’ll strike you as a bit long, but it’ll show you that I understand the whole business from start to finish, that is to say, much better than you do. There’s one doubtful point: and you’re going to clear it up. Where’s your son François d’Hergemont?”

Receiving no reply, he repeated:

“Where’s François d’Hergemont?”

Vorski no doubt considered that chance had placed an unexpected trump in his hands and that the game was perhaps not absolutely lost, for he maintained an obstinate silence.

“You refuse to answer?” asked Don Luis. “One⁠ ⁠… two⁠ ⁠… three times: do you refuse?⁠ ⁠… Very well!”

He gave a low whistle.

Four men appeared from a corner of the hall, four men with swarthy faces, resembling Moors. Like Don Luis, they wore jackets and sailor’s caps with shiny peaks.

A fifth person arrived almost immediately afterwards, a wounded French officer, who had lost his right leg and wore a wooden leg in its place.

“Ah, is that you, Patrice?” said Don Luis.

He introduced him formally:

“Captain Patrice Belval, my greatest friend; Mr. Vorski, a Hun.”

Then he asked:

“No news, captain? You haven’t found François?”

“No.”

“We shall have found him in an hour and then we’ll be off. Are all our men on board?”

“Yes.”

“Everything all right there?”

“Quite.”

He turned to the three Moors:

“Pick up the Hun,” he ordered, “and carry him up to the dolmen outside. You needn’t bind him: he couldn’t move a limb if he tried. Oh, one minute!”

He leant over Vorski’s ear:

“Before you start, have a good look at the God-Stone, between the flags in the ceiling. The ancient Druid wasn’t lying to you. It is the miraculous stone which people have been seeking for centuries⁠ ⁠… and which I discovered from a distance⁠ ⁠… by correspondence. Say goodbye to it, Vorski! You will never see it again, if indeed you are ever to see anything in this world.”

He made a sign with his hand.

The four Moors briskly took up Vorski and carried him to the back of the hall, on the side opposite the communicating passage.

Turning to Otto, who had stood throughout this scene without moving:

“I see that you’re a reasonable fellow, Otto, and that you understand the position. You won’t get up to any tricks?”

“No.”

“Then we shan’t touch you. You can come along without fear.”

He slipped his arm through Belval’s and the two walked away, talking.

They left the hall of the God-Stone through a series of three crypts, each of which was on a higher level than the one before. The last of them also led to a vestibule. At the far side of the vestibule, a ladder stood against a lightly-built wall in which an opening had been newly made. Through this they emerged into the open air, in the middle of a steep path, cut into steps, which wound about as it climbed upwards in the rock and which brought them to that part of the cliff to which François had taken Véronique on the previous morning. It was the Postern path. From above they saw, hanging from two iron davits, the boat in which Véronique and her son had intended to take flight. Not far away, in a little bay, was the long, tapering outline of a submarine.

Turning their backs to the sea, Don Luis and Patrice Belval continued on their way towards the semicircle of oaks and stopped near the Fairies’ Dolmen, where the Moors were waiting for them. They had set Vorski down at the foot of the tree on which his last victim had died. Nothing remained on the tree to bear witness to the abominable torture except the inscription, “V. d’H.”

“Not