The Woman of Mystery Part 29

M. d'Andeville, restraining his feelings and consenting to adopt the hypothesis which Paul seemed to insist on, said:

"Is there any reason that allows you to presume that my wife is still alive?"

"There are very serious reasons, I might say, incontestable reasons."

M. d'Andeville shrugged his shoulders and said, in a firm voice:

"My wife died in my arms. My lips touched her icy hands, felt that chill of death which is so horrible in those we love. I myself dressed her, as she had asked, in her wedding gown; and I was there when they nailed down the coffin. Anything else?"

Paul listened to him and thought to himself:

"Has he spoken the truth? Yes, he has; and still how can I admit . . . ?"

Speaking more imperiously, M. d'Andeville repeated:

"Anything else?"

"Yes," said Paul, "one more question. There was a portrait in the Comtesse d'Andeville's boudoir: was that her portrait?"

"Certainly, her full length portrait."

"Showing her with a black lace scarf over her shoulders?"

"Yes, the kind of scarf she liked wearing."

"And the scarf was fastened in front by a cameo set in a gold snake?"

"Yes, it was an old cameo which belonged to my mother and which my wife always wore."

Paul yielded to thoughtless impulse. M. d'Andeville's a.s.sertions seemed to him so many admissions; and, trembling with rage, he rapped out:

"Monsieur, you have not forgotten, have you, that my father was murdered? We often spoke of it, you and I. He was your friend. Well, the woman who murdered him and whom I saw, the woman whose image has stamped itself on my brain wore a black lace scarf round her shoulders and a cameo set in a gold snake. And I found this woman's portrait in your wife's room. Yes, I saw her portrait on my wedding evening. Do you understand now? Do you understand or don't you?"

It was a tragic moment between the two men. M. d'Andeville stood trembling, with his hands clutching his rifle.

"Why is he trembling?" Paul asked himself; and his suspicions increased until they became an actual accusation. "Is it a feeling of protest or his rage at being unmasked that makes him shake like that? And am I to look upon him as his wife's accomplice? For, after all. . . ."

He felt a fierce grip twisting his arm. M. d'Andeville, gray in the face, blurted out:

"How dare you? How dare you suggest that my wife murdered your father?

Why, you must be drunk! My wife, a saint in the sight of G.o.d and man!

And you dare! Oh, I don't know what keeps me from smashing your face in!"

Paul released himself roughly. The two men, shaking with a rage which was increased by the din of the firing and the madness of their quarrel, were on the verge of coming to blows while the sh.e.l.ls and bullets whistled all around them.

Then a new strip of wall fell to pieces. Paul gave his orders and, at the same time, thought of Major Hermann lying in his corner, to whom he could have brought M. d'Andeville like a criminal who is confronted with his accomplice. But why then did he not do so?

Suddenly remembering the photograph of the Comtesse Hermine which he had found on Rosenthal's body, he took it from his pocket and thrust it in front of M. d'Andeville's eyes:

"And this?" he shouted. "Do you know what this is? . . . There's a date on it, 1902, and you pretend that the Comtesse Hermine is dead! . . .

Answer me, can't you? A photograph taken in Berlin and sent to you by your wife four years after her death!"

M. d'Andeville staggered. It was as though all his rage had evaporated and was changing into infinite stupefaction. Paul brandished before his face the overwhelming proof const.i.tuted by that bit of cardboard. And he heard M. d'Andeville mutter:

"Who can have stolen it from me? It was among my papers in Paris. . . .

Why didn't I tear it up? . . ." Then he added, in a very low whisper, "Oh, Hermine, Hermine, my adored one!"

Surely it was an avowal? But, if so, what was the meaning of an avowal expressed in those terms and with that declaration of love for a woman laden with crime and infamy?

The lieutenant shouted from the ground floor:

"Everybody into the trenches, except ten men. Delroze, keep the best shots and order independent firing."

The volunteers, headed by Bernard, hurried downstairs. The enemy was approaching the ca.n.a.l, in spite of the losses which he had sustained. In fact, on the right and left, knots of pioneers, constantly renewed, were already striving with might and main to collect the boats stranded on the bank. The lieutenant in command of the volunteers formed his men into a first line of defense against the imminent a.s.sault, while the sharpshooters in the house had orders to kill without ceasing under the storm of sh.e.l.ls.

One by one, five of these marksmen fell.

Paul and M. d'Andeville were here, there and everywhere, while consulting one another as to the commands to be given and the things to be done. There was not the least chance, in view of their great inferiority in numbers, that they would be able to resist. But there was some hope of their holding out until the arrival of the reinforcements, which would ensure the possession of the blockhouse.

The French artillery, finding it impossible to secure an effective aim amid the confusion of the combatants, had ceased fire, whereas the German guns were still bombarding the house; and sh.e.l.ls were bursting at every moment.

Yet another man was wounded. He was carried into the attic and laid beside Major Hermann, where he died almost immediately.

Outside, there was fighting on and even in the water of the ca.n.a.l, in the boats and around them. There were hand-to-hand contests amid general uproar, yells of execration and pain, cries of terror and shouts of victory. The confusion was so great that Paul and M. d'Andeville found it difficult to take aim.

Paul said to his father-in-law:

"I'm afraid we may be done for before a.s.sistance arrives. I am bound therefore to warn you that the lieutenant has made his arrangements to blow up the house. As you are here by accident, without any authorization that gives you the quality or duties of a combatant.

"I am here as a Frenchman," said M. d'Andeville, "and I shall stay on to the end."

"Then perhaps we shall have time to finish what we have to say, sir.

Listen to me. I will be as brief as I can. But if you should see the least glimmer of light, please do not hesitate to interrupt me."

He fully understood that there was a gulf of darkness between them and that, whether guilty or not, whether his wife's accomplice or her dupe, M. d'Andeville must know things which he, Paul, did not know and that these things could only be made plain by an adequate recital of what had happened.

He therefore began to speak. He spoke calmly and deliberately, while M.

d'Andeville listened in silence. And they never ceased firing, quietly loading, aiming and reloading, as though they were at practise. All around and above them death pursued its implacable work.

Paul had hardly described his arrival at Ornequin with elisabeth, their entrance into the locked room and his dismay at the sight of the portrait, when an enormous sh.e.l.l exploded over their heads, spattering them with shrapnel bullets.

The four volunteers were hit. Paul also fell, wounded in the neck; and, though he suffered no pain, he felt that all his ideas were gradually fading into a mist without his being able to retain them. He made an effort, however, and by some miracle of will was still able to exercise a remnant of energy that allowed him to keep his hold on certain reflections and impressions. Thus he saw his father-in-law kneeling beside him and succeeded in saying to him:

"elisabeth's diary. . . . You'll find it in my kit-bag in camp . . .

with a few pages written by myself . . . which will explain. . . . But first you must . . . Look, that German officer over there, bound up . . . he's a spy. . . . Keep an eye on him. . . . Kill him. . . . If not, on the tenth of January . . . but you will kill him, won't you?"

Paul could speak no more. Besides, he saw that M. d'Andeville was not kneeling down to listen to him or help him, but that, himself shot, with his face bathed in blood, he was bending double and finally fell in a huddled heap, uttering moans that grew fainter and fainter.