That could be put right, but how much was he really to blame for the miseries she had suffered after he had left Dublin?
Thrusting the question aside, he switched his mind back to Lothar. Evidently the Satanist did not suspect either Mary or himself, as he had offered to initiate them. What form would the initiation take? Something pretty vile without a doubt. Spitting on the Cross, oaths of fidelity to the Devil, and a sexual 'free for all' to finish up with, seemed the probable programme. At the last item his thoughts switched back to Mary.
Was she really as hardboiled as she now appeared? Apparently she had been thoroughly enjoying herself here for the past week with the great hulking American. Perhaps, then, she would not mind giving herself to several different men during the course of a midnight orgy. Mentally he groaned at the thought.
In his fury he had stormed at her, 'Once a whore always a whore!' but was that really true? Not necessarily; and certainly not in her case. He knew now that she had been forced into prostitution, and it was clear from her having married Teddy Morden that she had escaped from it as soon as she had the chance. The fact that she was now living with the American could not be held against her. It needed only a second thought to appreciate that she was doing so as a stage in her campaign to get evidence against Teddy's murderers. If that was so she was going to hate taking part in an orgy as much as he did the thought of her doing so.
Lothar had not addressed a word to him. With regal unconcern for the fact that he had a passenger the Great Ram remained deep in his own thoughts, driving the powerful car with ease and skill so that it maintained an almost unvarying distance of some fifty yards from the rear lights of the other car.
Barney shot Lothar a sidelong glance. He was wondering now if by some means he could prevent the Satanist from getting to the Esbbat, and so save Mary from the ordeal of initiation. The only possibility seemed to be to wait until the car slowed down, then turn and strike him senseless by a sudden blow behind the ear. But as long as they were moving at more than twenty miles an hour that would be much too dangerous. Barney realized that before he could grab the wheel the car would be off the road. If it turned over or crashed into a tree he might be seriously injured, and so have robbed himself of the chance to capture Lothar. Yet if he waited until the car slowed down on approaching their destination, it was certain that the car in front would already have pulled up. The big American would be getting out and would be bound to see the result of an attack on Lothar. He would come dashing to the rescue long before the stunned Satanist could be pulled out of the car and dragged off into the bushes. These considerations swiftly decided Barney against making such an attempt unless they lost touch with the car ahead or for some unforeseen reason Lothar had to reduce their pace to something near a crawl.
Again his thoughts went back to Mary. He now remembered her clearly as a lovely golden-haired slip of a girl who had been the pick of the dance-hostesses in the restaurant where she worked, but he had only vague memories of the single night they had spent together. He had had a big win that day on a horse called 'Cherry Pie' and, as usual when his luck was in, splashed a good part of the proceeds in standing champagne to all and sundry; so he had been pretty tight himself by the time he had persuaded her to let him take her to an hotel. He recalled his disappointment at finding her frigid and later his annoyance at her not having told him to begin with that she was a virgin, but apart from that his mind was a blank.
He knew himself well enough to be sure that he had not abused her or treated her unkindly, and no doubt on leaving he had promised to see her soon again. After all, it was usual to say something of that kind to a girl after having spent the night with her, whether one meant it or not. In this case he probably had meant it, and all the odds were that he would have, had not his whole life taken a different turn a few days later.
But if he had, it would not have been to assure himself that he had not put her in the family way. The idea that he might have had not even occurred to him. His light-hearted amours with other cabaret girls had led him to believe that they all knew how to look after themselves or, in the event of an accident, take early steps to remedy it. If Mary had let things slide that was her fault, and he could not be blamed.
Yet, on further thought, he had to admit to himself that fundamentally he was responsible, because he had tempted her with money. She had not been like the other girls who had cheerfully accepted his advances on a business basis. She had more than once refused him, declaring that she 'did not do that sort of thing'. Then, on the night of his big win she had been very depressed, and he had got out of her the reason. Her brother was in trouble and she was too hard up to help him out.
He had not supposed for one moment that she was a virgin, but a girl who normally would not give herself for money, as many of her companions did; so he had seized the opportunity of her needing money and bid her twenty pounds, reasoning that the offer of so large a sum might do the trick - and it had.
Only later, had he been more sober, could he have appreciated the mental struggle she must have been through before giving way to the temptation to have that fat wad of pound notes in her handbag next morning; and only now could he begin to appreciate something of the misery with which she had ultimately had to pay for them.
The thought of her at seventeen, or eighteen at the most, concealing her harrowing secret for many weeks, until only an illegal operation could free her from it, wrung his heart. And then the way she had had to earn the money to pay for it. What she must have been through did not bear thinking about. He might count himself innocent of intent to harm her, but he had, and the wonder was that she had survived it to become the charming and courageous woman he had met at Mrs. Wardeel's.
That, he realized, was the real Mary; and now that he knew the whole truth concerning her the doubts he had had during the past week about allowing himself to go on loving her were entirely dissipated. The dangerous and distasteful role she was playing at present was that of a Crusader against Evil, wielding a woman's weapons. The life of ill-fame she had led in Dublin had been forced upon her, and by his act as an irresponsible young rake. If she would let him he would do his utmost to make up to her for that. The moment they were free to be together again he would beg her forgiveness for the abuse he had heaped on her that night, and tell her how desperately he loved her.
But when would they be free to be together again? Once more he glanced at Lothar's aloof, hatchet-like profile and silently cursed him for having turned up at the Cedars. Had he not done so the present situation would never have arisen. Instead of Mary being on her way to play a part in some revolting ceremony she would still be at the Cedars; he could have left, driven into Cambridge, collected the police, bagged the American and then driven her back to London.
Suddenly he began to wonder why Lothar had turned up at the Cedars when he had. Surely the Great Ram had not come all the way from the Continent, or even from London, simply to preside at a meeting of a little local coven and, at that, a meeting that was only an Esbbat, not even a Sabbat, let alone one of the great Satanic feasts of the year to which the covens of several countries would have been summoned. What devilry was he up to, then, in a remote village like Fulgoham?
Perhaps the fact that his host was a Colonel in the United States Air Force gave the clue? Yes, something to do with the great American air base in the nearby valley must be the answer. Down in Wales he had succeeded in making off with a considerable quantity of the special rocket fuel. What could he be after here?
For some minutes Barney's mind roved over possibilities. Surely he was not planning to get away with one of
