She Fell Among Thieves by Dornford Yates Page B

something like that…” And while she speaks, she’s mocking you with those eyes. Pure speculation, of course. But I think I’m right.
    ‘Anyway, you’ve done very well, and you’ll soon be free. Tomorrow night the Rolls will be ready for the road: and the day after that you’re going. She’ll try to keep you all right, but you mustn’t stay, for only your going away will convince her that you are no spy. Once you’re gone, she’ll miss you – Jezreel is dull – and she’ll do her very utmost to get you back. And back you will come, my lad, in the fullness of time. You’ll tell her you’re going to Biarritz, and thence to Spain.’
    ‘Where in fact am I going?’
    ‘I’m not quite sure,’ said Mansel, and got to his feet. ‘I’ll send you your orders in writing tomorrow night. And now you must go to bed. Time’s getting on, and I’ve got to be up at six.’
     
    My lights had been put out for nearly an hour and, though I was wide awake and straining my ears, I lay with my eyes close shut, as though I were fast asleep.
    Beside the curtains that graced the head of my bed Mansel, I knew, was standing as still as death.
    I never heard the man enter: I never heard him approach.
    The first thing I heard was the smack of Mansel’s fist, as he hit someone under the jaw.
    In a flash I was out of bed, to find Mansel down on his knees, with his hand on his victim’s heart.
    ‘I had to hit hard,’ he breathed, ‘but he seems all right. He won’t come round for some time.’
    (Here I should say that Mansel was a beautiful boxer, and, as such, had been famous before he had left his school.)
    ‘Where’s your torch?’ I whispered. ‘I don’t believe it’s my man.’
    ‘I know it isn’t,’ said Mansel. ‘It’s a colleague of mine, called Jean .’
    With that, he drew his torch and lighted the fellow’s face.
    There was no doubt about it. There were the bull-dog features of the chauffeur who, six hours before, had poured my beer.
    Mansel sat back on his heels and fingered his chin.
    ‘I might have known,’ he murmured. ‘William, my boy, we’ve done a good night’s work. This is going to be very awkward for Vanity Fair.’
    Twenty minutes later Mansel was gone and I was again in my bed, and Jean, who was still unconscious, was lying on the tiles of my bathroom, his ankles lashed with his belt and his wrists with mine. The weapon which he had been wearing was back in his sleeve.
    It was a curious weapon, carefully sheathed and plainly many years old. There is, I believe, one like it in a private collection in Rome. It was not a lethal weapon. The mark it would have made on the skin would scarce have been seen. It was, however, hollow.
    How much liquid this ‘syringe’ contained I do not know, but the drop which Mansel extracted and placed in a phial was found to be more than sufficient to cause immediate death.

3
The Path in the Mountains
     
    ‘It’s a matter for you, Mr Chandos.’
    ‘The Star Chamber’ was cool and dim, for its shutters were shut. Vanity Fair’s manner went with the room. Cool, reserved, entirely at my disposal, she might have been my banker – some very giant of finance that, because I was his client, was awaiting my puny instructions to sell or retain some shares.
    I crossed my legs and laughed.
    ‘I don’t care,’ I said. ‘So far as I am concerned, my score was settled last night. I’ll bet he’s got a headache just now that he’d sell for what it’d fetch.’
    ‘Headache?’ said Vanity Fair. She drew in her breath. ‘He’d have something more than a headache if I had my way.’
    Of this I was sure. Vanity Fair had no use for servants that failed.
    ‘What does Acorn think?’ said I.
    ‘I don’t think he knows what he thinks. As usual, he offers me bread, and gives me a stone. I said the man should be jailed, and he quite agreed. “Then have him jailed,” said I. “That’s all very well,” said Acorn, “but what’s he done?” Since I