The Eight Strokes of the Clock Part 21

Hortense gave a shudder:

"We shall be too late. Besides, you don't suppose that he's keeping her a prisoner?"

"Certainly not. The place I have in mind is at a cross-roads and is not a safe retreat. But we may discover some clue or other."

The shades of night were falling from the tall trees when they entered the ancient forest of Brotonne, full of Roman remains and mediaeval relics.

Renine knew the forest well and remembered that near a famous oak, known as the Wine-cask, there was a cave which must be the cave of the Happy Princess. He found it easily, switched on his electric torch, rummaged in the dark corners and brought Hortense back to the entrance:

"There's nothing inside," he said, "but here is the evidence which I was looking for. Dalbreque was obsessed by the recollection of the film, but so was Rose Andree. The Happy Princess had broken off the tips of the branches on the way through the forest. Rose Andree has managed to break off some to the right of this opening, in the hope that she would be discovered as on the first occasion."

"Yes," said Hortense, "it's a proof that she has been here; but the proof is three weeks old. Since that time...."

"Since that time, she is either dead and buried under a heap of leaves or else alive in some hole even lonelier than this."

"If so, where is he?"

Renine p.r.i.c.ked up his ears. Repeated blows of the axe were sounding from some distance, no doubt coming from a part of the forest that was being cleared.

"He?" said Renine, "I wonder whether he may not have continued to behave under the influence of the film and whether the man of the woods in _The Happy Princess_ has not quite naturally resumed his calling. For how is the man to live, to obtain his food, without attracting attention? He will have found a job."

"We can't make sure of that."

"We might, by questioning the woodcutters whom we can hear."

The car took them by a forest-road to another cross-roads where they entered on foot a track which was deeply rutted by waggon-wheels. The sound of axes ceased. After walking for a quarter of an hour, they met a dozen men who, having finished work for the day, were returning to the villages near by.

"Will this path take us to Routot?" ask Renine, in order to open a conversation with them.

"No, you're turning your backs on it," said one of the men, gruffly.

And he went on, accompanied by his mates.

Hortense and Renine stood rooted to the spot. They had recognized the butler. His cheeks and chin were shaved, but his upper lip was covered by a black moustache, evidently dyed. The eyebrows no longer met and were reduced to normal dimensions.

Thus, in less than twenty hours, acting on the vague hints supplied by the bearing of a film-actor, Serge Renine had touched the very heart of the tragedy by means of purely psychological arguments.

"Rose Andree is alive," he said. "Otherwise Dalbreque would have left the country. The poor thing must be imprisoned and bound up; and he takes her some food at night."

"We will save her, won't we?"

"Certainly, by keeping a watch on him and, if necessary, but in the last resort, compelling him by force to give up his secret."

They followed the woodcutter at a distance and, on the pretext that the car needed overhauling, engaged rooms in the princ.i.p.al inn at Routot.

Attached to the inn was a small cafe from which they were separated by the entrance to the yard and above which were two rooms, reached by a wooden outer staircase, at one side. Dalbreque occupied one of these rooms and Renine took the other for his chauffeur.

Next morning he learnt from Adolphe that Dalbreque, on the previous evening, after all the lights were out, had carried down a bicycle from his room and mounted it and had not returned until shortly before sunrise.

The bicycle tracks led Renine to the uninhabited Chateau des Landes, five miles from the village. They disappeared in a rocky path which ran beside the park down to the Seine, opposite the Jumieges peninsula.

Next night, he took up his position there. At eleven o'clock, Dalbreque climbed a bank, scrambled over a wire fence, hid his bicycle under the branches and moved away. It seemed impossible to follow him in the pitchy darkness, on a mossy soil that m.u.f.fled the sound of footsteps. Renine did not make the attempt; but, at daybreak, he came with his chauffeur and hunted through the park all the morning. Though the park, which covered the side of a hill and was bounded below by the river, was not very large, he found no clue which gave him any reason to suppose that Rose Andree was imprisoned there.

He therefore went back to the village, with the firm intention of taking action that evening and employing force:

"This state of things cannot go on," he said to Hortense. "I must rescue Rose Andree at all costs and save her from that ruffian's clutches. He must be made to speak. He must. Otherwise there's a danger that we may be too late."

That day was Sunday; and Dalbreque did not go to work. He did not leave his room except for lunch and went upstairs again immediately afterwards. But at three o'clock Renine and Hortense, who were keeping a watch on him from the inn, saw him come down the wooden staircase, with his bicycle on his shoulder. Leaning it against the bottom step, he inflated the tires and fastened to the handle-bar a rather bulky object wrapped in a newspaper.

"By Jove!" muttered Renine.

"What's the matter?"

In front of the cafe was a small terrace bordered on the right and left by spindle-trees planted in boxes, which were connected by a paling. Behind the shrubs, sitting on a bank but stooping forward so that they could see Dalbreque through the branches, were four men.

"Police!" said Renine. "What bad luck! If those fellows take a hand, they will spoil everything."

"Why? On the contrary, I should have thought...."

"Yes, they will. They will put Dalbreque out of the way ... and then? Will that give us Rose Andree?"

Dalbreque had finished his preparations. Just as he was mounting his bicycle, the detectives rose in a body, ready to make a dash for him. But Dalbreque, though quite unconscious of their presence, changed his mind and went back to his room as though he had forgotten something.

"Now's the time!" said Renine. "I'm going to risk it. But it's a difficult situation and I've no great hopes."

He went out into the yard and, at a moment when the detectives were not looking, ran up the staircase, as was only natural if he wished to give an order to his chauffeur. But he had no sooner reached the rustic balcony at the back of the house, which gave admission to the two bedrooms than he stopped. Dalbreque's door was open. Renine walked in.

Dalbreque stepped back, at once a.s.suming the defensive:

"What do you want? Who said you could...."

"Silence!" whispered Renine, with an imperious gesture. "It's all up with you!"

"What are you talking about?" growled the man, angrily.

"Lean out of your window. There are four men below on the watch for you to leave, four detectives."

Dalbreque leant over the terrace and muttered an oath:

"On the watch for me?" he said, turning round. "What do I care?"

"They have a warrant."

He folded his arms:

"Shut up with your piffle! A warrant! What's that to me?"

"Listen," said Renine, "and let us waste no time. It's urgent. Your name's Dalbreque, or, at least, that's the name under which you acted in _The Happy Princess_ and under which the police are looking for you as being the murderer of Bourguet the jeweller, the man who stole a motor-car and forty thousand francs from the World's Cinema Company and the man who abducted a woman at Le Havre. All this is known and proved ... and here's the upshot. Four men downstairs. Myself here, my chauffeur in the next room. You're done for. Do you want me to save you?"