Poiccart nodded and looked up thoughtfully.
“Schmidt—Schmidt,” he puzzled. “Oh yes—there is something against him, a cold-blooded murder, was it not?”
“Yes,” said Leon very quietly, and they did not speak again of Herr Schmidt of Prague. Poiccart was dipping thin glass rods into the seething, bubbling contents of the crucible, and Leon watched idly.
“Did she speak?” Poiccart asked after a long interval of silence.
“Yes.”
Another silence, and then Leon resumed:
“She was not sure of me—but I made her the sign of the Red Hundred. I could not speak to her in the open street. Falmouth’s people were in all probability watching her day and night. You know the old glove trick for giving the hour of assignation. Drawing on the glove slowly and stopping to admire the fit of one, two, or three fingers … so I signalled to her to meet me in three hours’ time.”
“Where?”
“At Wivenhoe—that was fairly simple too … imagine me leaning over the side of the car to demand of the willing bystanders how long it would take me to reach Wivenhoe—the last word loudly—would it take me three hours? Whilst they volunteered their counsel, I saw her signal of assent.”
Poiccart hummed as he worked.
“Well—are you going?” he asked.
“I am,” said the other, and looked at his watch.
After midnight, Poiccart, dozing in his chair, heard the splutter and the Gatling-gun explosions of the car as it turned into the extemporized garage.
“Well?” he asked as Leon entered.
“She’s gone,” said Gonsalez with a sigh of relief. “It was a difficult business, and I had to lie to her—we cannot afford the risk of betrayal. Like the remainder of the Red Hundred, she clings to the idea that we have thousands of people in our organization; she accepted my story of storming the prison with sheer brute force. She wanted to stay, but I told her that she would spoil everything—she leaves for the continent tomorrow.”
“She has no money, of course,” said Poiccart with a yawn.
“None—the Red Hundred has stopped supplies—but I gave her—”
“Naturally,” said Poiccart.
“It was difficult to persuade her to take it; she was like a mad thing between her fear of George, her joy at the news I gave her—and remorse.
“I think,” he went on seriously, “that she had an affection for George.”
Poiccart looked at him.
“You surprise me,” he said ironically, and went to bed.
Day found them working. There was machinery to be dismantled, a heavy open door to be fixed, new tires to be fitted to the big car. An hour before the midday demonstration came a knock at the outer door. Leon answered it and found a polite chauffeur. In the roadway stood a car with a solitary occupant.
The chauffeur wanted petrol; he had run himself dry. His master descended from the car and came forward to conduct the simple negotiation. He dismissed the mechanic with a word.
“There are one or two questions I would like to ask about my car,” he said distinctly.
“Come inside, sir,” said Leon, and ushered the man into the sitting-room.
He closed the door and turned on the fur-clad visitor.
“Why did you come?” he asked quickly; “it is terribly dangerous—for you.”
“I know,” said the other easily, “but I thought there might be something I could do—what is the plan?”
In a few words Leon told him, and the young man shivered.
“A gruesome experience for George,” he said.
“It’s the only way,” replied Leon, “and George has nerves like ice.”
“And after—you’re leaving that to chance?”
“You mean where shall we make for—the sea, of course. There is a good road between here and Clacton, and the boat lies snug between there and Walton.”
“I see,” said the young man, and he made a suggestion.
“Excellent—but you?” said Leon.
“I shall be all right?” said the cheerful visitor.
“By the way, have you a telegraph map of this part of the world?”
Leon unlocked a drawer and took out a folded paper.
“If you would arrange that,” he said, “I should be grateful.”
The man who called himself Courtlander marked the plan with a pencil.
“I have men who may be trusted to the very end,” he said. “The wires shall be cut at eight o’clock, and Chelmsford shall be isolated from the world.”
Then, with a tin of petrol in his hand, he walked back to his car.
XVI
The Execution
If you pass through the little door that leads to the porter’s lodge (the door will be locked and bolted behind you) your conductor will pass you through yet another door into a yard that is guarded by the ponderous doors of the prison at the one end and by a big steel gate at the other. Through this gate you reach another courtyard, and bearing to the right, you come to a flight of stone steps that bring you to the governor’s tiny office. If you go straight along the narrow passage from which the office opens, descend a flight of stairs at the other end, through a well-guarded doorway, you come suddenly into the great hall of the prison. Here galleries run along both sides of the hall, and steel gangways and bridges span the width at intervals. Here, too, polished stairways crisscross, and the white face of the two long walls of the hall are pitted with little black doors.
On the ground floor, the first cell on the right as you enter the hall from the governor’s office is larger and more commodious than its fellows. There is, too, a suspicion of comfort in the strip of matting that covers the floor, in the naked gaslight which flares in its wire cage by day and night, in the table and chair, and the plain comfortable bed. This is the condemned cell. A dozen paces from its threshold is a door that leads to another part of the yard, and a dozen more paces along the flagged pathway brings you to a little unpretentious one-storeyed house without
