The Secret Witness by George Gibbs (book recommendations txt) 📕

Spivak, he was indeed in danger of detection and capture, and the fate of an Englishman taken armed in a region where Austrian troops were massing was unpleasant to contemplate. And yet Renwick decided that before he made the rash attempt to mount the cliff he must further investigate. And so he lay silent until nightfall when with drawn automatic he emerged from his hiding place and quietly made his way along the mountain side. He searched the undergrowth eagerly, as a man only can when his life depends upon the keenness of his senses, and without mishap reached a point opposite the castle where he commanded both the courtyard and the mass of buildings around the central tower. The distance across the narrow gorge at this side of the castle was perhaps two or three hundred yards, and Renwick from the shelter of a bush could see the windows quite distinctly. As the night grew dark two lights appeared—both, he noted, upon the side of the buildings toward where he sat—lights which could not be visible from the deeper, wider valley upon the other side or from the road below. He saw figures moving—the small bent figure of a woman in the building upon the left which seemed to be the kitchen, a man in the courtyard near the gate which Renwick had seen from the other side. The room upon the right near the keep, seemed to be the Hall, for the windows were longer than any others and denoted a high ceiling within. There was a light here too, and Renwick watched the windows, his heart beating high with hope. In his anxiety to see who was within the apartment he forgot the strangers upon the mountain side, the danger of his position, the hazardous feat before him—all but the hope that Marishka was here.

He had almost given up hope of seeing her when she appeared. He knew her instantly, though he could not easily distinguish her features. She sat in a chair at a table, conversing with some one whom he could not see. A pang of jealousy shot through him. Goritz—!

What if believing him dead Marishka had learned to tolerate the German agent, even to the point of friendship. There they were, sitting face to face at table, as they had done for two months or more. What were their relations? Prisoner and captive? And which was which? How could he have blamed Marishka,—Renwick, a dead man?

He knew that she had grieved, that she must have hated the man who had done him to death—perhaps still hated him as Renwick did. He peered at the fragment of Marishka's white dress, the only part of her that was visible to him, and upbraided himself for his unworthy thoughts of her.

And when the dead came to life what would she say to him?

Hedged about with difficulties and dangers as he was, the sight of the girl so near him and yet so inaccessible was maddening. Now that he had discovered her, every impulse urged him to the feat of scaling the wall. And yet, as though fascinated, he still sat, his gaze fixed on the bit of white drapery which was a part of Marishka. He tried to imagine what Goritz was saying to her, for he seemed to know that Goritz was her companion, seemed to hear the murmur of their voices. He waited long and then the white drapery vanished, reappeared, and Marishka's figure stood in the window, leaning with one hand upon the casement, in silhouette against the light. And now quite distinctly against the velvety soft background of the breathless night the sound of her voice, refined by the distance between them, but fearful in its tone and significance.

"I—I am not afraid to die, Herr Goritz," it said.

Renwick started to his feet as though suddenly awaking from a dreadful dream into a still more dreadful reality. Marishka still stood in the window motionless, but the words that she had spoken seemed to be ringing endlessly down the silent gorge and in his brain, which was suddenly empty of all but its echoes. He wanted to shout to her a cry of encouragement—and hope, but he remained silent, grimly watching and listening.

Marishka said something else and then turned into the room, while through another window he saw the dark figure of Goritz pass away from her toward the outward wall. Of Marishka he saw no more, but at intervals he saw Goritz pacing to and fro....

How much longer Renwick watched he did not know, but after a while he found himself stumbling along the face of the mountain, descending by the way that he had come, Marishka's words singing their message through and through him. It was as though the words had been meant for him instead of Goritz, that Renwick even in death should know of her danger and come to her aid. He was coming now, not as an avenging spirit, but in the flesh, armed with righteous wrath and a fearful lust for vengeance. He understood what the message meant. Hers was not a cry of despair but of defiance.... What had happened? He had not seen.

"I am not afraid to die." Nor was Renwick—but to live were better—to live at least for tonight. Fury gave him desperation, but for the task before him he needed coolness, too. And realizing that haste might send him hurtling to the bottom of the gorge, he moved more cautiously, stepping down with infinite pains until he reached the brook, which he crossed carefully, and then moved back up the declivity toward the castle.

The night was clear, starlit but moonless, and the cliff as he reached it looked down upon him with majestic and sullen disdain. The ages had passed over and left it scarred and seared but still defiant and inaccessible. Renwick paused a moment to be sure of his ground and then boldly crawled up over the chaos of tumbled bowlders and broken masonry, until he reached the wall of solid rock, where he stopped again to regain his breath and examine the fissure that he had studied earlier in the day. It was a cleft in the rock, the result of some subterranean upheaval which had caused the whole crag to settle into its base; a fissure, originally a mere crack which had been widened and deepened by the erosion of time. Upon closer inspection, it was larger than it had appeared from below, perhaps ten feet in width at the outside, and tapering gradually as it rose.

He entered and ran his fingers along its sides, penetrating to its full depth until there was just room enough in which to wedge his bent body. Then rising cautiously, seated, so to speak, upon the incline which seemed to be about thirty degrees from the vertical, he dug the iron-shod toes of his peasant's boots into the roughnesses of the wall before him and rose, pushing with elbows and arms where the wall was too smooth for a foothold. It was hard work, and at the end of ten minutes, perspiring profusely, and leg and arm weary, he stopped upon a projecting ledge, where he found a perfect balance for his entire body, and relaxed. But he had gained fifty feet.

Above him was the long streak of pallid light shimmering against the gloom of the rock like the blade of a naked sword, with its point far above him among the stars. For a full five minutes he rested, and then went upward again, feeling with his finger ends while he braced his body, taking advantage of every foothold before and behind. At one spot the fissure widened dangerously, but he struggled inward; at another it went almost straight upward, requiring sheer strength of fingers; but at last he found another ledge and braced himself with his feet for another rest. He did not dare to look downward now, for fear of dizziness, but he knew that he had already come high. The sword blade was shorter, curved now more like a scimitar at its tip, which showed that the angle was greater.

But what if before he reached the rocky platform, the cleft should grow too narrow to admit the passage of his body? It was too late now to think of any such impediment. He struggled upward again, slipping back at times, clawing like a cat, with toes and fingers, fighting for his breath, but always mounting higher, his gaze upward toward a star in the heavens near the point of the scimitar. Would he ever reach the top? Bits of the rock crumbled, broke off and flew out into space, and once he slipped and slid outward, only saving himself from destruction by the aid of a jutting piece of jagged rock which caught in his clothing. A desperate venture—but successful, for with one final effort, with fingers torn, and knees and elbows bruised and bleeding, he hauled himself up to the level of the flat projection of rock upon which he dragged himself, exhausted and breathless, but so far, safe.

He lay there for a long time, flat on his back, his eyes dimmed with effort, his gaze on the stars, which now seemed to blink in a friendly way upon his venture. To succeed so far—failure was now impossible. Fearfully he peered over the edge of the cliff upon the velvety tree-tops of the valley below. Three hundred feet, four perhaps, and beyond to the left where the crag fell down to the very bed of the Dukla itself, black void—vacancy.

Above him still was the hazardous climb up the broken face of the rocks, but he did not fear it. His nerves were iron now. There were roots growing here, and small bushes, stunted trees, growing in the interstices of the rocks, and he climbed steadily, always looking upward, toward the breach in the wall now so very near, fifty feet, forty—and then the wall seemed to hang over him smooth and bare. So he hung there by a sturdy branch, one foot clinging, and studied the surface, descending a few feet carefully and then rising again to the left in a fissure, swinging himself along a narrow ledge where the masonry of the bastion joined the rock. Over this he climbed, finding solid footing at last, and then rest and a breathing space within the broken walls.

He lay behind a pile of rocks which had fallen from the walls of the watchtower, recovering his breath again, and the strength of his fingers, every bone of which was crying out in protest. He peered over into the depths below, trying to measure the distance he had come—three hundred feet—perhaps more. Could he find a rope of that length within the castle—? After a while he straightened in the shadow of the wall and peered cautiously up at the dark bulk of the keep and the tower, beyond the ruined chapel, searching its roofs and window for a sign of life. Silence. The ruin was deserted. For half an hour he watched and waited, and then sure that there was no chance that he had been observed, rose to his feet and moved forward stealthily into the shadows of the chapel. The roof had long since fallen in and been removed, but Renwick stumbled over a dusty tomb, toward the fragment of altar with the reredos still showing traces of sculpture, partially protected by a fragment of roof over the apse which had been spared by the wind and storm. To the right of the altar was a Gothic door, which had at one time led into the building adjoining, but upon investigation he found that it had been built in with solid blocks of stone. The other arch of the vaulted structure outside which he had noted from the mountain side was also filled by a wall. So far as Renwick could see, the ruined part of Schloss Szolnok was isolated,