The Lone Wolf Part 23

"What was written on the paper?" the girl demanded obliquely.

He made his eyes blank: "Written on the paper--?"

"I saw something in red ink at the head of the column. You tried to hide it from me, but I saw.... What was it?"

"Oh--that!" he laughed contemptuously: "just Popinot's impudence--an invitation to come out and be a good target."

She shook her head impatiently: "You're not telling me the truth. It was something else, or you wouldn't have been so anxious to hide it."

"Oh, but I a.s.sure you--!"

"You can't. Be honest with me, Mr. Lanyard. It was an offer to let you off if you'd give me up to Bannon--wasn't it?"

"Something like that," he a.s.sented sheepishly--"too absurd for consideration.... But now we're due to clear out of this before they find a way in. Not that they're likely to risk a raid until they've tried starving us out; but it would be as well to put a good distance between us before they find out we've decamped."

He shrugged into his borrowed raincoat, b.u.t.toned it to his chin, and turned down the brim of his felt hat; but when he looked up at the girl again, he found she hadn't moved; rather, she remained as one spellbound, staring less at than through him, her expression inscrutable.

"Well," he ventured--"if you're quite ready, Miss Shannon--?"

"Mr. Lanyard," she demanded almost sharply--"what was the full wording of that message?"

"If you must know--"

"I must!"

He lifted a depreciative shoulder. "If you like, I'll read it to you--or, rather, translate it from the thieves' argot Popinot complimented me by using."

"Not necessary," she said tersely. "I'll take your word for it.... But you must tell me the truth."

"As you will.... Popinot delicately suggested that if I leave you here, to be reunited to your alleged parent--if I'll trust to his word of honour, that is, and walk out of the house alone, he'll give me twenty-four hours in which to leave Paris."

"Then only I stand between you and--"

"My dear young woman!" he protested hastily. "Please don't run away with any absurd notion like that. Do you imagine I'd consent to treat with such canaille under any circ.u.mstances?"

"All the same," she continued stubbornly, "I'm the stumbling-block.

You're risking your life for me--"

"I'm not," he insisted almost angrily.

"You are," she returned with quiet conviction.

"Well!" he laughed--"have it your own way!..."

"But it's _my_ life, isn't it? I really don't see how you're going to prevent my risking it for anything that may seem to me worth the risk!"

But she wouldn't laugh; only her countenance, suddenly bereft of its mutinous expression, softened winningly--and her eyes grew very kind to him.

"As long as it's understood I understand--very well," she said quietly; "I'll do as you wish, Mr. Lanyard."

"Good!" he cried cheerfully. "I wish, by your leave, to take you out to dinner.... This way, please!"

Leading through the scullery, he unbarred a low, arched door in one of the walls, discovering the black mouth of a narrow and tunnel-like pa.s.sageway.

With a word of caution, flash-lamp in his left hand, pistol in right, Lanyard stepped out into the darkness.

In two minutes he was back, with a look of relief.

"All clear," he reported; "I felt pretty sure Popinot knew nothing of this way out--else we'd have entertained uninvited guests long since.

Now, half a minute...."

The electric meter occupied a place on the wall of the scullery not far from the door. Prying open its cover, he unscrewed and removed the fuse plug, plunging the entire house in complete darkness.

"That'll keep 'em guessing a while!" he explained with a chuckle.

"They'll hesitate a long time before rushing a dark house infested by a desperate armed man--if I know anything about that mongrel lot!...

Besides, when they do get their courage up, the lack of light will stave off discovery of this way of escape.... And now, one word more."

A flash of the lamp located her hand. Calmly he possessed himself of it, if without opposition.

"I've brought you into trouble enough, as it is, through my stupidity,"

he said; "but for that, this place should have been a refuge to us until we were quite ready to leave Paris. So now we mustn't forget, before we go out to run G.o.d-only-knows-what gauntlet, to fix a rendezvous in event of separation.... Popinot, for instance, may have drawn a cordon around the block; we can't tell until we're in the street; if he has, you must leave me to entertain them until you're safe beyond their reach.... Oh, don't worry: I'm perfectly well able to take care of myself....But afterwards, we must know where to find each other. Hotels, cafes and restaurants are out of the question: in the first place, we've barely money enough for our dinner; besides, they'll be watched closely; as for our emba.s.sies and consulates, they aren't open at all hours, and will likewise be watched. There remain--unless you can suggest something--only the churches; and I can think of none better suited to our purposes than the Sacre-Cour."

Her fingers tightened gently upon his.

"I understand," she said quietly; "if we're obliged to separate, I'm to go direct to the Sacre-Cour and await you there."

"Right! ...But let's hope there'll be no such necessity."

Hand-in-hand like frightened children, these two stole down the tunnel-like pa.s.sageway, through a forlorn little court cramped between two tall old tenements, and so came out into the gloomy, sinuous and silent rue d'a.s.sas.

Here they encountered few wayfarers; and to these, preoccupied with anxiety to gain shelter from the inclement night, they seemed, no doubt, some student of the Quarter with his sweetheart--Lanyard in his shabby raincoat, striding rapidly, head and shoulders bowed against the driving mist, the girl in her trim Burberry clinging to his arm....

Avoiding the nearer stations as dangerous, Lanyard steered a roundabout course through by-ways to the rue de Sevres station of the Nord-Sud subway; from which in due course they came to the surface again at the place de la Concorde, walked several blocks, took a taxicab, and in less than half an hour after leaving the impa.s.se Stanislas were comfortably ensconced in a cabinet particulier of a little restaurant of modest pretensions just north of Les Halles.

They feasted famously: the cuisine, if bourgeois, was admirable and, better still, well within the resources of Lanyard's emaciated purse.

Nor did he fret with consciousness that, when the bill had been paid and the essential tips bestowed, there would remain in his pocket hardly more than cab fare. Supremely self-confident, he harboured no doubts of a smiling future--now that the dark pages in his record had been turned and sealed by a resolution he held irrevocable.

His spirits had mounted to a high pitch, thanks to their successful evasion. He was young, he was in love, he was hungry, he was--in short--very much alive. And the consciousness of common peril knitted an enchanting intimacy into their communications. For the first time in his history Lanyard found himself in the company of a woman with whom he dared--and cared--to speak without reserve: a circ.u.mstance intrinsically intoxicating. And stimulated by her unquestionable interest and sympathy, he did talk without reserve of old Troyon's and its drudge, Marcel; of Bourke and his wanderings; of the education of the Lone Wolf and his career, less in pride than in relief that it was ended; of the future he must achieve for himself.

And sitting with chin cradled on the backs of her interlaced fingers, the girl listened with such indulgence as women find always for their lovers. Of herself she had little to say: Lanyard filled in to his taste the outlines of the simple history of a young woman of good family obliged to become self-supporting.

And if at times her grave eyes clouded and her attention wandered, it was less in ennui than because of occult trains of thought set astir by some chance word or phrase of Lanyard's.

"I'm boring you," he surmised once with quick contrition, waking up to the fact that he had monopolized the conversation for many minutes on end.

She shook a pensive head. "No, again.... But I wonder, do you appreciate the magnitude of the task you've undertaken?"

"Possibly not," he conceded arrogantly; "but it doesn't matter. The heavier the odds, the greater the incentive to win."