The Last Shot Part 54

Waiting on the path of the second terrace for Westerling to come, Marta realized the full meaning of her task. Day in and day out she was to have suspense at her elbow and the horror of hypocrisy on her conscience, the while keeping her wits nicely balanced. She must feel her part and at the same time she must be sufficiently conscious that she was placing a part not to let any impulse of aversion betray her.

The tea-table scene had been a rehearsal; coming was a _premiere_ before the ghostly, still faces across the bent glare of the footlights. No ready-made lines, hers She must create them. Every word must be the right word and spoken in the right way, all for the deception of one man.

When she saw Westerling appear on the veranda and start over the lawn she felt dizzy and uncertain of her capabilities. In the gathering dusk he seemed of giant stature, too masterful to be outwitted by any trickery she might devise. She wondered if she would be able to articulate a word; if she would not turn and flee.

"I have considered all that you said for my guidance and I have decided," she began.

Marta heard her own voice with the relief of a singer in a debut who, with knees shaking, finds that her notes are true. She was looking directly at Westerling in profound seriousness. Though knees shook, lips and chin could aid eyes in revealing the painful fatigue of a battle that had raged in the mind of a woman who went away for half an hour to think for herself.

"I have concluded," she went on, "that it is an occasion for the sacrifice of private ethics to a great purpose, the sooner to end the slaughter."

"All true!" whispered an inner voice. Its tone was Lanny's, in the old days of their comradeship. It gave her strength. All true!

"Yes, an end--a speedy end!" said Westerling with a fine, inflexible emphasis. "That is your prayer and mine and the prayer of all lovers of humanity."

"He is not thinking of humanity, but of individual victory!" whispered another voice, which had the mellow tone of Hugo Mallin's deliberate wisdom.

"It is little that I know, but such as it is you shall have it," she began, conscious of his guarded scrutiny. When she told him of Bordir, the weak point in the first line of the Browns' defence, she noted no change in his steady look; but with the mention of Engadir in the main line she detected a gleam in his eyes that had the merciless delight of a cutting edge of steel. "I have made my sacrifice to some purpose? The information is worth something to you?" she asked wistfully.

"Yes, yes! Yes, it promises that way," he replied thoughtfully.

Quietly he began a considerate catechism. Soon she was subtly understanding that her answers lacked the convincing details that he sought. She longed to avert her eyes from his for an instant, but she knew that this would be fatal. She felt the force of him directed in professional channels, free of all personal relations, beating as a strong light on her bare statements. How could a woman ever have learned two such vital secrets? How could it happen that two such critical points as Bordir and Engadir should go undefended? No tactician, no engineer but would have realized their strategic importance. Did she know what she was saying? How did she get her knowledge? These, she understood, were the real questions that underlay Westerling's polite indirection.

"Invention! Quick, quick! How did you find out? Quick and naturally and obviously--pure invention; no half-way business!" whispered still another voice, the voice of that most facile of story-builders, Feller, this time.

"But I have not told you the sources of my information! Isn't that like a woman!" she exclaimed. "You see, it did not concern me at all at the time I heard it. I didn't even realize its importance and I didn't hear much," she proceeded, her introduction giving time for improvisation.

"You see, Partow was inspecting the premises with Colonel Lanstron. My mother had known Partow in her younger days when my grandfather was premier. We had them both to luncheon."

"Yes?" put in Westerling, betraying his eagerness. Partow and Lanstron!

Then her source was one of authority, not the gossip of subalterns!

"And it occurs to me now that, even while he was our guest," she interjected in sudden indignation--"that even while he was our guest Partow was planning to make our grounds a redoubt!"

"Bully! Very feminine and convincing!" whispered the voice of Feller.

"After luncheon I remember Partow saying, 'We are going to have a look at the crops,' and they went for a walk out to the knoll where the fighting began."

"Yes! When was this?" Westerling asked keenly.

"Only about six weeks ago," answered Marta.

"That's it! That's splendid! If you'd said a year ago there would have been time enough in the meanwhile to fortify!" whispered the voice of Feller encouragingly. "You're going fine! Keep it up!"

"Later, I came upon them unexpectedly after they had returned," Marta went on. "They were sitting there on that seat concealed by the shrubbery. I was on the terrace steps un.o.bserved and I couldn't help overhearing them. Their voices grew louder with the interest of their discussion. I caught something about appropriations and aeroplanes and Bordir and Engadir, and saw that Lanstron was pleading with his chief.

He wanted a sum appropriated for fortifications to be applied to building planes and dirigibles. Finally, Partow consented, and I recall his exact words: 'They're shockingly archaically defended, especially Engadir,' he said, 'but they can wait until we get further appropriations in the fall.'" She was so far under the spell of her own invention that she believed the reality of her words, reflected in her wide-open eyes which seemed to have nothing to hide.

"That is all," she exclaimed with a shudder--"all my eavesdropping, all my breach of confidence! If--if it--" and her voice trembled with the intensity of the one purpose that was shining with the light of truth through the murk of her deception--"it will only help to end the slaughter!" She held out her hand convulsively in parting as if she would leave the rest with him.

"I think it will," he said soberly. "I think it will prove that you have done a great service," he repeated as he caught both her hands, which were cold from her ordeal. His own were warm with the strong beating of his heart stirred by the promise of what he had just heard. But he did not prolong the grasp. He was as eager to be away to his work as she to be alone. "I think it will. You will know in the morning," he added.

His steps were st.u.r.dier than ever in the power of five against three as he started back to the house. When he reached the veranda, Bouchard, the saturnine chief of intelligence, appeared in the doorway of the dining-room: or, rather, reappeared, for he had been standing there throughout the interview of Westerling and Marta, whose heads were just visible, above the terrace wall, to his hawk eyes.

"A little promenade in the open and my mind made up," said Westerling, clapping Bouchard on the shoulder.

"Something about an attack to-night?" asked Bouchard.

"You guess right. Call the others."

Five minutes later he was seated at the head of the dining-room table with his chiefs around him waiting for their chairman to speak. He asked some categorical questions almost perfunctorily, and the answer to each was, "Ready!" with, in some instances, a qualification--the qualification made by regimental and brigade commanders that, though they could take the position in front of them, the cost would be heavy.

Yes, all were willing and ready for the first general a.s.sault of the war, but they wanted to state the costs as a matter of professional self-defence.

Westerling could pose when it served his purpose. Now he rose and, going to one of the wall maps, indicated a point with his forefinger.

"If we get that we have the most vital position, haven't we?"

Some uttered a word of a.s.sent; some only nodded. A glance or two of curiosity was exchanged. Why should the chief of staff ask so elementary a question? Westerling was not unconscious of the glances or of their meaning. They gave dramatic value to his next remark.

"We are going to ma.s.s for our main attack in front at Bordir!"

"But," exclaimed four or five officers at once, "that is the heart of the position! That is--"

"I believe it is weak--that it will fall, and to-night!"

"You have information, then, information that I have not?" asked Bouchard.

"No more than you," replied Westerling. "Not as much if you have anything new."

"Nothing!" admitted Bouchard wryly. He lowered his head under Westerling's penetrating look in the consciousness of failure.

"I am going on a conviction--on putting two and two together!"

Westerling announced. "I am going on my experience as a soldier, as a chief of staff. If I am wrong, I take the responsibility. If I am right, Bordir will be ours before morning. It is settled!"

"If you are right, then," exclaimed Turcas--"well, then it's genius or--" He did not finish the sentence. He had been about to say coincidence; while Westerling knew that if he were right all the rising scepticism in certain quarters, owing to the delay in his programme, would be silenced. His prestige would be una.s.sailable.

x.x.xV

MRS. GALLAND INSISTS

"You have been in the tunnel again!" said Mrs. Galland with an emphasis on "again," when Marta came up the stairs, lantern in hand, after telling Lanstron of her interview with Westerling.

"Again--yes!" Marta replied mechanically. Her mind was empty, burned out. She had thought herself through with deceit for the day.

"What interests you so much down there?" Mrs. Galland pursued softly.

Marta realized that she had to deal with a fresh dilemma. She could not be making frequent visits to the telephone without her mother's knowledge; and, as yet, Mrs. Galland knew nothing of the part originally planned for Feller, let alone any inkling of her daughter's part.