XVII
The Independent Strategy of Señor Gregori
It is a fact worth remarking upon, that in all her career, though she had been associated with the most desperate of criminals, and though she had been surrounded on all sides by men who would stop at nothing to gain their ends, Kate had never witnessed an act of violence. Such arrests of members of the confederation as she had seen had been very humdrum affairs. The arrival of two strangers, a consultation carried on in a low tone by a pleasant detective officer, an urgent call to somebody to “get my hat” and the disappearance, very often for a long time, of the member affected. She had never seen a fellow creature manhandled nor did she believe that there was in her confederates the tigerish malignity which was now displayed. She looked from face to face in amazement and horror as they crowded round the handcuffed figure and flung him into a chair.
Michael had been choked to insensibility at the first attack. With the loosening of the rope, he had recovered consciousness and put up a fight, and had been hammered back to insensibility by the three men who had watched him from the moment he had crossed the open ground to the east of the railway, and had lain in wait for him. They had manacled him with his own handcuffs. This he realized, as he came back to consciousness, with his head throbbing and every bone in his body aching.
He leant his elbows on the table and buried his face in his hands, striving to collect his thoughts. It was the cold steel of the handcuff against his nose which was the starting point from whence he unravelled the situation. The blow which had felled him had fortunately been broken by his soft felt hat and he raised his hand and gingerly felt the bump which Dr. Garon’s loaded cane had raised.
“Now then, wake up,” said Gregori’s voice roughly, “let’s have a look at you.”
Michael raised his head and looked at the speaker.
“Hello, Gregori,” he said dully. He looked round the room and caught the girl’s eyes and for a moment held them.
“You seem to have tumbled into it, my young friend,” said Colonel Westhanger.
Michael slowly shifted his eyes to the speaker and smiled.
“We all seem to have tumbled into it, you worse than anybody. This means a life sentence for you, Colonel.”
The old man’s face went white.
“It is only bluff,” said Garon; “he is here by himself. I have been watching him for an hour. You tried to pull off the job on your lonely!”
“Alone,” said the Colonel and the girl watching him saw his face go hard. “Alone! Are you sure?”
“Absolutely sure,” said the doctor.
He sat straddle-legged on a chair leaning on the back and puffing the cigar he had just lighted.
“It would be rather a serious business if you had made a mistake, wouldn’t it?” drawled Michael. He was recovering his scattered senses and something of his good spirits. “You fellows had better make the best of a bad job.”
“What is your idea of the best of a bad job,” sneered Gregori—“to take the handcuffs off you and put them on me and the Colonel? If it means a ‘lifer’ for the Colonel! what does it mean for me? You don’t suppose I am going back to Dartmoor to build walls for the moor farmers, do you?”
“What is the alternative?” asked Michael.
“I’ll tell you what is the alternative,” hissed the other thrusting his face into the detective’s, “it is the only alternative that will give me any satisfaction—and it is to put you out.”
“Dot is id,” nodded Stockmar.
The girl’s heart almost stopped beating and for a moment she closed her eyes and gripped tight to the edge of the table. She felt physically sick and her knees were trembling under her. Fortunately their attention was fully occupied with Michael and nobody noticed that she had grown of a sudden peaked and grey. She bit her lips and by sheer effort of will regained control of herself. She looked at Michael: that little smile of his still played about the corners of his mouth and the eyes that were lifted to Colling Jacques were full of good humor.
“It is you or us, Pretherston,” the engineer was saying; “you don’t suppose we have been working for this stuff and taken all the risk, only to see ourselves standing in the dock of the Old Bailey?”
“Winchester,” corrected the detective, “it is a very pretty assize court—the vaulted ceiling will appeal to you, Jacques. It is in the Gothic style.”
“One moment,” said the Colonel suddenly.
With a nod he called the men to a corner of the room and for five minutes there was a whispered consultation. The girl and Michael were left alone and obeying some impulse which she could not define, she suddenly turned her back upon him and walked to the window, a proceeding which Gregori noticed out of the corner of his eye. Presently the little conference broke up and the Colonel came back with the others.
“Look here, Pretherston, I am going to make a proposition to you. You are not a rich man, I take it.”
“My private affairs don’t concern you,” said Michael calmly, “and I certainly am not prepared to discuss them with you.”
“This job is worth two and a half millions and there are ten of us in it. Help us to make a getaway and there is not far short of a quarter of a million for you.”
The girl swung round and looked at Michael. How would he take this offer? She knew how great was the appeal which money made to men, especially money easily earnt. She waited in breathless, almost painful, suspense.
“Two hundred and fifty thousand pounds,” said Michael—“that is a lot of money. But, why do you put such a proposition to me?”
“It is a lot of money,” repeated the Colonel significantly.
Michael laughed.
“I suppose there was a time in your life,” he drawled, “when if somebody had offered you money to do a dishonest act, you would have knocked him down? But perhaps there never was such a time,” he said, searching the other’s face.
“I no more want to discuss my affairs, than you want to discuss yours,” said the Colonel gruffly; “here is the proposition,” he thumped the table, “do you take it?”
Michael shook his head.
“I won’t be rude to you,” he said, “because you are an older man and because you are going to end your life rather miserably in a very short time.”
He saw the man wince.
“I am not saying that with the object of offending you,” Michael continued. “I am just telling you what is the truth. Suppose you get away from here, how are you going to make your escape from England? By this time every port is closed to you.”
“I will tell you how we are going to get out of England,” said Gregori, “we are going to leave by the only route possible, by ship from London.”
“By ship from London?” it was the surprised voice of the girl.
“We have done a little planning on our own, Kate,” said Gregori with a grin; “this is our last job. We didn’t tell you because we didn’t think it was worth while upsetting you. Everything was arranged last week.”
“Without my knowledge,” she said.
He nodded.
“What do you say, Pretherston? It is your last chance.”
“It isn’t my last chance,” said the other cheerfully.
“What do you mean?”
“That you will find out,” said Michael with a sudden sternness. “I warn you that your time is very short.”
“Your time will be shorter,” said Gregori with a sinister smile.
“We will give him half-an-hour to think over it,” suggested Jacques; “put him in the engine room.”
The engine room was the uncomfortable little shed which had been built on to the mixing shop to accommodate a dynamo. It was now empty save for a truckle bed on which one of the gang had slept. Padlocked iron doors led to the mixing room and to the outer world, but to make doubly sure, Garon volunteered to stand outside the building and keep guard. Michael was thrust into the little room and the door slammed upon him.
“Now,” said Gregori when they were back again in the office, “we have to decide and decide quickly. If we can be sure that this fellow is alone he has got to be killed.”
“Killed?” said Kate. “Oh, no, no!”
He turned on her with a snarl.
“This is our job. You keep out of this, Kate,” he said. “I tell you it must be done, for all our sakes.”
“The first thing,” said the Colonel, “is to get the gold away.”
“It will be loaded on to the trucks tomorrow morning,” said Gregori, “and we had better keep this fellow alive until it is gone.”
“Are we using our own trucks?”
Gregori shook his head.
“Oh, no,” he said, “that would be too dangerous. I have hired ten, from a man in Eastbourne who is used to handling machinery. He has no idea what sort of factory this is and I have told him it is a preparation of lead we are shipping to the docks. Young Stockmar will meet the convoy in London. Our own men are on board the ship and will load the stuff.”
“It is a bit risky,” said Colling Jacques shaking his head, “sending all that money through London without a guard.”
“It would be more risky to guard it,” said the other calmly, “our only chance lies in not rousing the suspicion of the contractor who has promised to come down himself to superintend the carriage to the docks. His people won’t be allowed to handle any of it and I have told him especially that it is dangerous to touch the packages—now, Kate, you must be sensible about this business of Pretherston.”
She shrugged her shoulders and leant back against the windowsill, her hands behind her.
“I suppose it is necessary,” she said in her cool even tone and the Colonel heaved a sigh of relief.
“Gad, that’s the way to look at it, my girl,” he said admiringly. “I knew you wouldn’t fail us.”
She said nothing.
“You said there were ten shares,” she asked presently, “do you count me—as one who is sharing?”
“You stand in with me, my dear,” said the Colonel, patting her on the shoulder, “don’t you be afraid. I have never denied you anything, have I?”
She shook her head.
“I have never been aware that you denied me anything,” she said absently.
“When is this—” she could not find words to complete the sentence.
“Pretherston,” said Gregori—“oh, we can’t do anything yet. I think you will agree, Colonel. We must make absolutely sure that he is not being followed and that he has not half the Metropolitan police force within call. I shall do nothing at all till tomorrow night.”
She inclined her head.
“I see,” she said simply and then, “I think I will go to my room.”
They had made her comfortable quarters in what had been once the foreman’s office. She passed through the great sheds slowly and stopped for a moment to look at the powerful engine which stood near the closed doors, a tiny feather of steam at its safety valve, then she went into her room.