Driftwood Spars Part 36

"No, thank you," said Malet-Marsac. "I would like to get as far away as possible and stay there."

Major Ra.n.a.ld laughed.

"Wouldn't like to visit the mortuary and see a post-mortem?"

"No, thank you."

"What about the Holy One?" put in the City Magistrate. "Did you 'autopsy' him? A pleasure to hang a chap like him."

"Yes, the brute. I'll show you his neck vertebrae presently if you like.

Kept 'em as a curiosity. An absolute break of the bone itself. People talk about pain, strangulation, suffocation and all that. Nothing of the sort. Literally breaks the neck. Not mere separation of the vertebrae you know. I'll show you the vertebra itself--clean broken...."

Captain Malet-Marsac swayed on his feet. What should he do? A blue mist floated before his eyes and a sound of rushing waters filled his ears.

Was he fainting? He must _not_ faint, and fail his friend. And then, the roar of the waters was pierced and dominated by the voice of that friend saying--

"Hul_lo_! old bird. Awf'ly good of you to turn out, such a beastly cold morning."

John Robin Ross-Ellison had come round an adjacent corner, a European warder on either side of him and another behind him, all three, to their credit, as white as their white uniforms and helmets. On his head was a curious bag-like cap.

Ross-Ellison appeared perfectly cheerful, absolutely natural, and without the slightest outward and visible sign of any form of perturbation.

"'Morning, Ra.n.a.ld," he continued. "Sorry to be the cause of turning you out in the cold. Gad! _isn't_ it parky. Hope you aren't going to keep me standing. If I might be allowed I'd quote unto you the words which a pretty American girl once used when I asked if I might kiss her--'_Wade right in, Bub!_'"

"'Fraid I can't 'wade in' till seven o'clock--er--Ross-Ellison,"

answered the horribly embarra.s.sed Major Ra.n.a.ld. "It won't be long."

"Right O, I was only thinking of your convenience. _I'm_ all right,"

said the remarkable criminal, about to suffer by the Mosaic law at the hands of Christians, to receive Old Testament mercy from the disciples of the New, to be done-by as he had done.

An Indian clerk, salaaming, joined the group, and prepared to read from an official-looking doc.u.ment.

"Read," said Major Ra.n.a.ld, and the clerk in a high sing-song voice, regardless of punctuation, read out the charge, conviction and death-warrant of the man formerly calling himself John Robin Ross-Ellison, and now professing and confessing himself to be a Baluchi.

Having finished, the clerk smiled as one well pleased with a duty well performed, salaamed and clacked away in his heelless slippers.

"It is my duty to inquire whether you have anything to say or any last request to make," said Major Ra.n.a.ld to the prisoner.

"Well, I've only to say that I'm sorry to cause all this fuss, y'

know--and, well, yes, I _would_ like a smoke," replied the condemned man, and added hastily: "Don't think I want to delay things for a moment though--but if there is time...."

"It is four minutes to seven," said Major Ra.n.a.ld, "and tobacco and matches are not supposed to be found in a Government Jail."

Ross-Ellison winked at the Major and glanced at a bulge on the right side of the breast of the Major's coat.

At this moment the warder standing behind the condemned man seized both his wrists, drew them behind him and fastened them with a broad, strong strap.

"H'm! That's done it, I suppose," said the murderer. "Can't smoke without my hands. Queer idea too--never thought of it before. Can't smoke without hands.... Rather late in life to realize it, what?"

"Oh, yes, you can," said the Major, drawing his big silver cheroot-case from his pocket and selecting a cheroot. Placing it between the prisoner's lips he struck a match and held it to the end of the cigar.

Ross-Ellison drew hard and the cigar was lit. He puffed luxuriously and sighed.

"Gad! That's good," he said, "May some one do as much for you, old chap, when _you_ come to be--er--no, I don't mean that, of course.... Haven't had a smoke for weeks. Yes--you can smoke without hands after all--but not for long without feeling the inconvenience. I used to know an American (wicked old gun-running millionaire he was, Cuba way, and down South too) who could change his cigar from one corner of his mouth right across to the other with his tongue. Fascinatin' sight to watch...."

Captain Malet-Marsac swallowed continuously, lest he lose the faculty of swallowing--and be choked.

Major Ra.n.a.ld looked at his watch.

"Two minutes to seven. Come on," he said, and took the cheroot from the prisoner's mouth.

"Good-bye, Mike," said that person to the swallowing fainting wretch.

"Don't try and say anything. I know exactly what you feel. Sorry we can't shake hands," and he stepped off in the wake of Major Ra.n.a.ld, closely guarded by three warders.

The City Magistrate and Captain Malet-Marsac followed. At Major Ra.n.a.ld's knock, the small inner door of the gate-house was opened and the procession filed through it into the strong room where the warders stood to attention. Having re-fastened the door, the jailer opened the outer one and the procession pa.s.sed out of the jail into the blessed free world, the world that might be such a place of wonder, beauty, delight, health and joy, were man not educated to materialism, false ideals, false standards, and blind strife for nothing worth.

The sepoy-guard stood in a semicircle from the gate-house to the entrance to a door-way in the jail-wall. Ross-Ellison took his last look at the sky, the distant hills, the trees, G.o.d's good world, and then turned into the doorless door-way with his jailers, and faced the scaffold in a square, roofless cell. The warder behind him drew the cap down over his face, and he was led up a flight of shallow stairs on to a platform on which was a roughly-chalked square where two hinged flaps met. As he stood on this spot the noose of the greased rope was placed round his neck by a warder who then looked to Major Ra.n.a.ld for a sign, received it, and pulled over a lever which withdrew the bolts supporting the hinged flaps. These fell apart, Ross-Ellison dropped through the platform, and Christian Society was avenged.

Without a word, Captain Malet-Marsac strode, as in a dream, to his horse, rode home, and, as in a dream, entered his sanctum, took his revolver from its holster and loaded it.

Laying it on the table beside him, he sat down to write a few words to the Colonel of his regiment, Colonel Wilberforce Wriothesley of the 99th Baluch Light Infantry, and to send his will to a brother-officer whom he wished to be his executor.

This done, he took up the revolver, placed the muzzle in his mouth, the barrel pointing upward, and--pulled the trigger.

_Click_!

And nothing more.

A tiny, nerve-shattering, world-shaking, little universe-rocking _click_--and nothing more.

A bad cartridge. He remembered complaints about the revolver ammunition from the Duri Small Arms Ammunition Factory. Too long in stock.

Should he try the same one again, or go on to the next? Probably get better results from the first, as the cap would be already dented by the concussion. He took the muzzle of the big revolver from his aching mouth and, releasing the chamber, spun it round.... He would place it to his temple this time. Holding one's mouth open was undignified. He raised the revolver--and John Bruce burst into the room. He had seen Malet-Marsac ride by, and knew where he had been.

"Half a second!" he shouted. "News! Do that afterwards."

"What is it?" asked Malet-Marsac, taken by surprise.

"Put that beastly thing in the drawer while I tell you, then. It might go off. I hate pistols," said Bruce.

Malet-Marsac obeyed. Bruce was a man to be listened to, and what had to be done could be done when he had gone. If it were some last piece of duty or service, it should be seen to.

"It is this," said Bruce. "You are a liar, a forger, a thief, a dirty pickpocket, a coward, a seller of secrets to Foreign Powers," and, ere the astounded soldier could speak, John Bruce sprang at him and tried to knock him out. "Take that you greasy cad--and fight me if you dare," he shouted as the other dodged his punch.

Malet-Marsac sprang to his feet, furious, and returned the blow. In a second the men were fighting fiercely, coolly, murderously.

Bruce was the bigger, stronger, more scientific, and there could be but one result, given ordinary luck. It was a long, severe, and punishing affair.

"Time," gasped Malet-Marsac at length, and dropped his hands.

"Get--breath--fight--decently--time--'nother round--after," and as he spoke Bruce knocked him down and out, proceeding instantly to tie his feet with the punkah-cord and his hands with two handkerchiefs and a pair of braces. This done, he carried him into his bedroom, and laid him on the bed, and sprinkled his face with water.