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- Author: Sax Rohmer
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Val Beverley was watching Madame de Stämer anxiously, and the fact that she was unfit to undergo further examination was so obvious that any other than an Inspector Aylesbury would have withdrawn. The latter, however, seemed now to be glued to his chair, and:
“Oh, I see,” he said; “and now there’s another point: Have you any idea what took Colonel Menendez out into the grounds last night?”
Madame de Stämer lowered her hands and gazed across at the speaker.
“What is that, Monsieur l’inspecteur?”
“Well, you don’t think he might have gone out to talk to someone?”
“To someone? To what one?” demanded Madame, scornfully.
“Well, it isn’t natural for a man to go walking about the garden at midnight, when he’s unwell, is it? Not alone. But if there was a lady in the case he might go.”
“A lady?” said Madame, softly. “Yes—continue.”
“Well,” resumed the Inspector, deceived by the soft voice, “the young lady sitting beside you was still wearing her evening dress when I arrived here last night. I found that out, although she didn’t give me a chance to see her.”
His words had an effect more dramatic than he could have foreseen.
Madame de Stämer threw her arm around Val Beverley, and hugged her so closely to her side that the girl’s curly brown head was pressed against Madame’s shoulder. Thus holding her, she sat rigidly upright, her strange, still eyes glaring across the room at Inspector Aylesbury. Her whole pose was instinct with challenge, with defiance, and in that moment I identified the illusive memory which the eyes of Madame so often had conjured up in my mind.
Once, years before, I had seen a wounded tigress standing over her cubs, a beautiful, fearless creature, blazing defiance with dying eyes upon those who had destroyed her, the mother-instinct supreme to the last; for as she fell to rise no more she had thrown her paw around the cowering cubs. It was not in shape, nor in colour, but in expression and in their stillness, that the eyes of Madame de Stämer resembled the eyes of the tigress.
“Oh, Madame, Madame,” moaned the girl, “how dare he!”
“Ah!” Madame de Stämer raised her head yet higher, a royal gesture, that unmoving stare set upon the face of the discomfited Inspector Aylesbury. “Leave my apartment.” Her left hand shot out dramatically in the direction of the door, but even yet the fingers remained curled. “Stupid, gross fool!”
Inspector Aylesbury stood up, his face very flushed.
“I am only doing my duty, Madame,” he said.
“Go, go!” commanded Madame, “I insist that you go!”
Convulsively she held Val Beverley to her side, and although I could not see the girl’s face, I knew that she was weeping.
Those implacable flaming eyes followed with their stare the figure of the Inspector right to the doorway, for he essayed no further speech, but retired.
I, also, rose, and:
“Madame de Stämer,” I said, speaking, I fear, very unnaturally, “I love your spirit.”
She threw back her head, smiling up at me. I shall never forget that look, nor shall I attempt to portray all which it conveyed—for I know I should fail.
“My friend!” she said, and extended her hand to be kissed.
CHAPTER XXVII. AN INSPIRATION
Inspector Aylesbury had disappeared when I came out of the hall, but Pedro was standing there to remind me of the fact that I had not breakfasted. I realized that despite all tragic happenings, I was ravenously hungry, and accordingly I agreed to his proposal that I should take breakfast on the south veranda, as on the previous morning.
To the south veranda accordingly I made my way, rather despising myself because I was capable of hunger at such a time and amidst such horrors. The daily papers were on my table, for Carter drove into Market Hilton every morning to meet the London train which brought them down; but I did not open any of them.
Pedro waited upon me in person. I could see that the man was pathetically anxious to talk. Accordingly, when he presently brought me a fresh supply of hot rolls:
“This has been a dreadful blow to you, Pedro?” I said.
“Dreadful, sir,” he returned; “fearful. I lose a splendid master, I lose my place, and I am far, far from home.”
“You are from Cuba?”
“Yes, yes. I was with Señor the Colonel Don Juan in Cuba.”
“And do you know anything of the previous attempts which had been made upon his life, Pedro?”
“Nothing, sir. Nothing at all.”
“But the bat wing, Pedro?”
He looked at me in a startled way.
“Yes, sir,” he replied. “I found it pinned to the door here.”
“And what did you think it meant?”
“I thought it was a joke, sir—not a nice joke—by someone who knew Cuba.”
“You know the meaning of Bat Wing, then?”
“It is Obeah. I have never seen it before, but I have heard of it.”
“And what did you think?” said I, proceeding with my breakfast.
“I thought it was meant to frighten.”
“But who did you think had done it?”
“I had heard Señor Don Juan say that Mr. Camber hated him, so I thought perhaps he had sent someone to do it.”
“But why should Mr. Camber have hated the Colonel?”
“I cannot say, sir. I wish I could tell.”
“Was your master popular in the West Indies?” I asked.
“Well, sir—” Pedro hesitated—“perhaps not so well liked.”
“No,” I said. “I had gathered as much.”
The man withdrew, and I continued my solitary meal, listening to the song of the skylarks, and thinking how complex was human existence, compared with any other form of life beneath the sun.
How to employ my time until Harley should return I
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