The door fell open, and more men appeared. Hans Meyer, sweating with fear, dropped his gun and raised his hands. Nancy Adair was staring at Grieban with horror. Hitchcock couldn’t believe what he next saw. Grieban’s gun barked again and Nancy Adair’s look of horror changed to one of surprise. “Hitch!” she gasped, “dear Hitch.” With a beatific smile, she sank to the floor, blood appearing from a wound in her heart, and then her head hit the floor and soon she lay still.
Grieban had now advanced to Hitchcock’s side. “Did you have to kill her?” asked Hitchcock as Hans Meyer and Lady Miranda were taken into custody.
“A trial would have been too costly,” rasped Herbert. His eyes locked with Hitchcock’s. “She was marked to die by both sides. Believe me, I have been humane.”
Lady Miranda was struggling with her captor in an amazing display of strength for one who looked so frail. “My daughter! She needs me! I want to go to Violet!”
Violet Pack sat on a chair waiting for the poison to take effect.
Lady Miranda screamed. “In the bathroom! Hurry! In the medicine chest—the antidote!”
Violet’s eyes beseeched Hitchcock. He went to her while Herbert sent a man into the bathroom. He took her hand; it was cold and clammy. “Not Nigel,” she whispered. “It was not Nigel.” Hitchcock could hear the noise of the raid going on downstairs. He wondered if they would succeed in rounding up the Adolf Hitlers. The man in the bathroom found the antidote and hurried to Violet. Her face was contorted with agony as she gasped a name to Hitchcock. Then she said, “God forgive me!” Her eyes rolled up, and Hitchcock heard her ugly death rattle as she fell into his arms. Hitchcock lifted her and carried her to the settee. Lady Miranda ululated like a banshee in hell. Hitchcock looked at Grieban.
“Violet told me the name. Who’s Basil Cole?”
Eighteen
Basil Cole knew his cell well. He had held interrogations there on many occasions since joining British Intelligence. He was pleased that it had been freshly repainted. He liked the smell of fresh paint. It held the promise of a new beginning. He was almost glad he was under arrest. It tidied things up. There were no loose strings about, and if there were, Basil would weave them into their appropriate place for Sir Arthur Willing. He genuinely liked and admired Sir Arthur. After more than a decade with him, he respected the man for his fairness, his intelligence, the way he ran his department. True, Willing hadn’t suspected a traitor in residence right under his nose, but then, that’s how the game was frequently played. Basil Cole wasn’t the firm’s first traitor, nor would he be its last.
He was sorry he hadn’t punched Nigel Pack in the nose when Nigel spat in his face, but then, he had been cuckolding the man for years. Violet had been such a steady lover. Not terribly passionate, not terribly exciting, but very steady. He should have recognized she was reaching a breaking point in her unhappy marriage and the unpleasant course her mother and father had charted for themselves again. He should have recognized she could not face the inevitability of another deplorable family scandal. Her miserable marriage, which she didn’t dare abrogate, so often plunged her into the depths of despair that Basil should have recognized the symptoms of her undermined and crumbling sanity.
Oh, God, he began agonizing. They’ll make an example of me. They’ll hang me in the press and on the radio and in the media across the world before they hang me proper. They say it’s very quick. They say the penis erects and then you die. What a waste of life. What a waste of erected penis.
Hitchcock. What a peculiar man. The very idea of his insisting he owns exclusive rights to the story of my life. Here he’s had death staring him in the face and all he can think about is material for a film. Basil was strutting the narrow cell from side to side. Well, why not? Why not film the story of my life? Let me think. What’s a good title? The Martyr. Too simplistic. Oh, well, someone will come up with the proper title. Now who’s to play me? Herbert Marshall? All wrong, and besides, he’s got a wooden leg. James Cagney? Possibly, if they decide to cast against type. I’ve got it! Ronald Colman! Just as he was in A Tale of Two Cities.
“Tis a far far better thing…”
Perfect. Well, now, that’s all tidied up—now to think about my defense.
“Stroke? Oh, the poor dear! But when? This morning?” Miss Farquhar clucked her tongue, and at the other end of the wire, Miss Allerton wiped a tear from her eye. “Poor Madeleine. Which side’s paralyzed? The left or the right? Or a bit of each?”
“She’s dead!” wailed unhappy Miss Allerton. “She’s gone to the big music hall in the sky!”
“My, my, my,” said Miss Farquhar.
“Just as that gypsy woman predicted!”
“What gypsy woman?”
“The one at the Pechter Circus. Oh, dear, it’s the end of an era, farewell to a woman who was a legend in her own time.”
“Well, that’s what she thought,” snilfed Miss Farquhar. “So tell me, dear, who inherits?”
Lady Miranda was permitted to attend the double funeral of her husband and her daughter. She refused to stand near Nigel Pack, who was just as loath to stand next to her. He was in for a grim time with Sir Arthur Willing in the days ahead, and he hoped that he would be exonerated and restored to his position in the firm. It was the only job he knew. He couldn’t think of anything else. On the other hand, he knew Hitchcock was preparing another spy film. Perhaps the man could see Nigel as his technical director. Perhaps he’d drop Hitchcock a note suggesting it. One must be a bit more aggressive
