The Golden Triangle Part 30

An unquestioning force of will supported her. Nothing now would have induced her to stop. She walked on.

Though large, the room gave an impression of coziness, owing to the way in which it was furnished. The sofas, armchairs, carpet and hangings all tended to add to its comfort; and its appearance might well have remained unchanged since the tragic death of the two who used to occupy it. This appearance was rather that of a studio, because of a skylight which filled the middle of the high ceiling, where the belvedere was.

The light came from here. There were two other windows, but these were hidden by curtains.

"Simeon is not here," said Patrice.

Coralie did not reply. She was examining the things around her with an emotion which was reflected in every feature. There were books, all of them going back to the last century. Some of them were signed "Coralie"

in pencil on their blue or yellow wrappers. There were pieces of unfinished needlework, an embroidery-frame, a piece of tapestry with a needle hanging to it by a thread of wool. And there were also books signed "Patrice" and a box of cigars and a blotting-pad and an inkstand and penholders. And there were two small framed photographs, those of two children, Patrice and Coralie. And thus the life of long ago went on, not only the life of two lovers who loved each other with a violent and fleeting pa.s.sion, but of two beings who dwell together in the calm a.s.surance of a long existence spent in common.

"Oh, my darling, darling mother!" Coralie whispered.

Her emotion increased with each new memory. She leant trembling on Patrice's shoulder.

"Let's go," he said.

"Yes, dear, yes, we had better. We will come back again. . . . We will come back to them. . . . We will revive the life of love that was cut short by their death. Let us go for to-day; I have no strength left."

But they had taken only a few steps when they stopped dismayed.

The door was closed.

Their eyes met, filled with uneasiness.

"We didn't close it, did we?" he asked.

"No," she said, "we didn't close it."

He went to open it and perceived that it had neither handle nor lock.

It was a single door, of ma.s.sive wood that looked hard and substantial.

It might well have been made of one piece, taken from the very heart of an oak. There was no paint or varnish on it. Here and there were scratches, as if some one had been rapping at it with a tool. And then . . . and then, on the right, were these few words in pencil:

_Patrice and Coralie, 14 April, 1895_ _G.o.d will avenge us_

Below this was a cross and, below the cross, another date, but in a different and more recent handwriting:

_14 April, 1915_

"This is terrible, this is terrible," said Patrice. "To-day's date! Who can have written that? It has only just been written. Oh, it's terrible!

. . . Come, come, after all, we can't . . ."

He rushed to one of the windows, tore back the curtain that veiled it and pulled upon the cas.e.m.e.nt. A cry escaped him. The window was walled up, walled up with building-stones that filled the s.p.a.ce between the gla.s.s and the shutters.

He ran to the other window and found the same obstacle.

There were two doors, leading probably to the bedroom on the right and to a room next to the kitchen on the left. He opened them quickly. Both doors were walled up.

He ran in every direction, during the first moment of terror, and then hurled himself against the first of the three doors and tried to break it down. It did not move. It might have been an immovable block.

Then, once again, they looked at each other with eyes of fear; and the same terrible thought came over them both. The thing that had happened before was being repeated! The tragedy was being played a second time.

After the mother and the father, it was the turn of the daughter and the son. Like the lovers of yesteryear, those of to-day were prisoners. The enemy held them in his powerful grip; and they would doubtless soon know how their parents had died by seeing how they themselves would die.

. . . 14 April, 1895. . . . 14 April, 1915. . . .

CHAPTER XII

IN THE ABYSS

"No, no, no!" cried Patrice. "I won't stand this!"

He flung himself against the windows and doors, took up an iron dog from the fender and banged it against the wooden doors and the stone walls.

Barren efforts! They were the same which his father had made before him; and they could only result in the same mockery of impotent scratches on the wood and the stone.

"Oh, Coralie, Coralie!" he cried in his despair. "It's I who have brought you to this! What an abyss I've dragged you into! It was madness to try to fight this out by myself! I ought to have called in those who understand, who are accustomed to it! . . . No, I was going to be so clever! . . . Forgive me, Coralie."

She had sunk into a chair. He, almost on his knees beside her, threw his arms around her, imploring her pardon.

She smiled, to calm him:

"Come, dear," she said, gently, "don't lose courage. Perhaps we are mistaken. . . . After all, there's nothing to show that it is not all an accident."

"The date!" he said. "The date of this year, of this day, written in another hand! It was your mother and my father who wrote the first . . .

but this one, Coralie, this one proves premeditation, and an implacable determination to do away with us."

She shuddered. Still she persisted in trying to comfort him:

"It may be. But yet it is not so bad as all that. We have enemies, but we have friends also. They will look for us."

"They will look for us, but how can they ever find us, Coralie? We took steps to prevent them from guessing where we were going; and not one of them knows this house."

"Old Simeon does."

"Simeon came and placed his wreath, but some one else came with him, some one who rules him and who has perhaps already got rid of him, now that Simeon has played his part."

"And what then, Patrice?"

He felt that she was overcome and began to be ashamed of his own weakness:

"Well," he said, mastering himself, "we must just wait. After all, the attack may not materialize. The fact of our being locked in does not mean that we are lost. And, even so, we shall make a fight for it, shall we not? You need not think that I am at the end of my strength or my resources. Let us wait, Coralie, and act."

The main thing was to find out whether there was any entrance to the house which could allow of an unforeseen attack. After an hour's search they took up the carpet and found tiles which showed nothing unusual.

There was certainly nothing except the door, and, as they could not prevent this from being opened, since it opened outwards, they heaped up most of the furniture in front of it, thus forming a barricade which would protect them against a surprise.

Then Patrice c.o.c.ked his two revolvers and placed them beside him, in full sight.

"This will make us easy in our minds," he said. "Any enemy who appears is a dead man."