Part 85 (1/2)

”I did not before understand Mahmud's delay. Now, I understand. He has been warned. Breslau and Kestner will not come. Otherwise, you now would be barricaded behind that breastwork of rubbish, fighting for your lives.”

”But you say there are men on the stairs below who are ready to kill us if we try to leave the house.”

”They, too, are trapped without knowing it. War will come with sunrise. This house has been under surveillance since yesterday afternoon. They have not closed in on us yet, because they are leaving the trap open in hopes of catching us all. They are waiting for Breslau and Kestner and Mahmud Damat.... But they'll never come, now.... They are out of the city by this time.... I know them. They are running for their lives at this hour.... And we--we lesser ones--caught here--trapped--reserved for a French court martial and a firing squad in a barrack square!”

She shuddered and pressed her hands over her temples.

Neeland said:

”I am going to stand by you. Captain Sengoun will do the same.”

She shook her head:

”No use,” she said with a s.h.i.+ver. ”I am too well known. They have my _dossier_ almost complete. My _proces_ will be a brief one.”

”Can't you get away by the roof? There are two of your men up there.”

”They themselves are caught, and do not even know it. They too will face a squad of execution before the sun rises tomorrow. And they never dream of it up there----”

She made a hopeless gesture:

”What is the use! When I came here from the Turkish Emba.s.sy, hearing that you were here but believing the information false, I discovered you conversing with a Russian spy--overheard her warn you to leave this house.

”And there, all the while, unknown to me, in the _salle de jeu_ were Curfoot and that unspeakable scoundrel Brandes! Why, the place was swarming with enemies--and I never dreamed it!... Yet--I might have feared some such thing--I might have feared that the man, Brandes, who had betrayed me once, would do it again if he ever had the chance....

And he's done it.”

There was a long silence. Ilse stood staring at the melancholy greyish light on the window panes.

She said as though to herself:

”I shall never see another daybreak.”... After a moment she turned and began to pace the attic, a strange, terrible figure of haggard youth in the shadowy light. ”How horribly still it is at daybreak!” she breathed, halting before Neeland. ”How deathly quiet----”

The dry crack of a pistol cut her short. Then, instantly, in the dim depths of the house, shot followed shot in bewildering succession, faster, faster, filling the place with a distracting tumult.

Neeland jerked up his pistol as a nearer volley rattled out on the landing directly underneath.

Sengoun, exasperated, shouted:

”Well, what the devil is all this!” and ran toward the head of the stairs, his pistol lifted for action.

Then, in the garret doorway, Weishelm appeared, his handsome face streaming blood. He staggered, turned mechanically toward the stairs again with wavering revolver; but a shot drove him blindly backward and another hurled him full length across the floor, where he lay with both arms spread out, and the last tremors, running from his feet to his twitching face.

CHAPTER x.x.xIII

A RAT HUNT

The interior of the entire house was now in an uproar; shots came fast from every landing; the semi-dusk of stair-well and corridor was lighted by incessant pistol flashes and the whole building echoed the deafening racket.