It has now become requisite to return to Captain Ducie, whose proceedings have been neglected for some time past.
When we left him last he had just found on the floor of his host's private library one of the tiny paper pellets which he had dropped purposely from his pocket when blindfolded the previous night. The finding of this pellet he looked on as proof-positive that the entrance to the hiding-place of the Diamond must be in that room. His discovery was an important one. It was his first step towards that goal whither all his hopes and wishes now tended. It placed him at once on a certain vantage ground. Still he was puzzled by the consideration of what his second step ought to be. For some time he could not see his way at all.
On the pretence of wanting some particular volume from its shelves he contrived once and again to visit the private library while Platzoff was engaged elsewhere. But he could not visit it without first asking permission, owing to the simple fact of its door being always kept locked. The required permission was grudgingly granted by Platzoff--he could see that, also that it would not be wise to court the privilege too often. Indeed, it was a privilege that proved of little or no service, either Cleon or Jasmin being sent with him to unlock and relock the door, and evidently having secret instructions not to leave the library so long as he was in it. While looking for the required volume he could merely take a few careless glances around, and such glances merely served to show him that the line of book-shelves was unbroken except by the two doorways and the fireplace. He had not, indeed, been sanguine enough to expect that such a casual examination would reveal to him the secret entrance that led to the cavern. But he had half hoped that by some faint sign, by some insignificant token, which to those not in the secret would seem utterly meaningless, he might be able to seize on the first hint of the wished-for clue. But in so far he was doomed to disappointment. No sign nor token of the faintest kind was visible to his quick-searching eyes.
So day after day came and went till but two days remained before the time fixed for his departure, and it seemed to him that he might just as well have never heard of the existence of the Great Mogul Diamond, much less have been favoured with the sight of it, for any use that he could make of his knowledge. Turn the subject in his mind which way he would, in this light and in that, there seemed no egress from the difficulty in which he now found himself. But however much Captain Ducie might be inwardly chagrined he betrayed no traces of it on the surface. On the contrary, he had never striven more assiduously to make himself agreeable to his host than he did during this period of his deepest mortification. In every way that he could possibly think of he tried to make himself indispensable to Platzoff--or, if not indispensable, such a pleasant element, such a piquant seasoning to the course of everyday life at Bon Repos, that the Russian should part from him with regret, and nothing be wanting to secure another invitation to the same roof in time to come. These exertions were not without their reward--a more immediate reward than he had ventured to hope for. On the morning of the day but one before that of his departure, as he and Platzoff were sitting together in a summerhouse that overlooked the lake, said the captain, after a pause in the conversation:--"Three days hence, instead of having this pleasant scene to gaze upon at will, I shall have nothing but London's dusty streets with which to solace my eyes. But, in any case, I shall have a store of pleasant recollections to take back with me."
"Is the time of your leaving me so near?" said the Russian. "In the pleasure of your society I had almost forgotten that such a time must necessarily come. But why go, cher ami? Why not extend your visit till--till you are tired of us and our quiet life, if, indeed, you are not that already?"
Captain Ducie shook his head. "My sojourn at Bon Repos has been a very pleasant one," he said, "and I am by no means tired of it. But other engagements claim my attention, and I am afraid that I dare not make any longer stay here."
"See, then. You can do this to oblige an old man," said Platzoff. "Of late I have not been well--in fact, I have never quite got over that accident on the railway. My doctor down here does not seem to understand what ails me, and I have had some thought of going up to London for the sake of better advice. I cannot, however, go for three weeks: there are certain matters that must be attended to before I can leave Bon Repos even for a few days. See, now. You shall put off your journey for three weeks, and then we will go up to town together. Que dites vous?"
Of course Captain Ducie could do nothing but accede as gracefully as possible to his host's request. He was, in truth, very well pleased to accede to it, even although the three weeks in question might do nothing towards the accomplishment of his secret hopes. Bon Repos was decidedly preferable to two stuffy rooms in a London back street, especially at a season of the year when the hegira of the fashionable world was just setting in. He would stay where he was as long as it was possible to do so.
There had been no conversation between Ducie and Platzoff respecting the Diamond since the night they two had visited the cavern together. Ducie had tried to broach the subject once or twice, but Platzoff had fought so shy of it that the captain had not ventured to proceed, but had turned the conversation into other channels. It seemed to Ducie as if Platzoff half repented having taken him so fully into his confidence. It was evidently not his intention to enlighten him any further in the matter.
The first week of the three had come to an end. According to custom, Ducie and Platzoff were sitting together on a certain evening in the smoke-room. It was one of the Russian's drashkil nights. He had been smoking hard and fast, and was already in a state of coma, lost to all outward influences. Ducie looked at his watch, debating within himself whether it would not be wiser on his part to go off to bed than to sit there any longer with his unconscious host. And yet it was only half-past ten--rather early for bed. He sat staring at his host, and toying absently with his watch-guard, when, clear and vivid as a shaft of lightning, there flashed across his brain a thought that struck him breathless for one moment, and the next startled him into the most intense life. He rose noiselessly to his feet, and stood for a full minute with his fingers pressed to his eyes, thinking, so it seemed to him, as he had never thought before.
That one minute sufficed to elaborate the scheme that had come to him as suddenly and as startlingly as a veritable inspiration of genius. Had his thoughts clothed themselves in words, they would have expressed themselves somewhat after this fashion:--
"It is only half-past ten o'clock, and Platzoff has smoked himself into a state of unconsciousness. On no account is he ever disturbed by his valet till the clock strikes twelve: ergo, I have an hour and a half before me safe from interruption. Platzoff always carries about with him a silver pass-key that will open every door in the house, unless it be those of the bedrooms of his guests and his servants. Suppose I possess myself of that pass-key for the time being, and penetrate by its assistance into the library. Once in the library with a clear hour and a half to call my own, it will be strange if I cannot succeed in making some discovery that will prove of service to me."
The first thing to be done was to satisfy himself that Platzoff was really and truly unconscious. Taking him by the arm, he shook him, gently at first, and then with greater violence. But the Russian only uttered a low, inarticulate moan of protest. Then Ducie ventured to lift up one of his eyelids. The glazed, fishy look of the eye below it was sufficient to convince him that from Platzoff himself he had nothing to fear. Then with a light-fingered dexterity that would not have discredited a professional pickpocket he began to search for the silver key. He was not long in finding it. There it was, in a small inner pocket of Platzoff's vest. He drew it out with a heart that beat a little faster than common. So far all was well. He stood for a few moments with the key in his fingers, listening intently. Not a sound of any kind inside the house or out. As he stood thus, he bethought himself of a little brass bolt on the inside of the door that, opened into the corridor. By means of this bolt Platzoff could at will secure himself even against the intrusion of Cleon. This bolt Ducie now shot noiselessly into its socket. If Cleon--or rather Jasmin, now that Cleon was ill--were inadvertently to come before his proper hour, he would have to wait till the door was opened for him from within. Having thus secured himself against any possible interruption, Ducie, after taking a last glance at his host, walked boldly across the room, and applying the key, opened the inner door and passed forward into the dressing-room. From the dressing-room he gained access to the bedroom, and from thence into the library. The latter room being in entire darkness, he had to go back into the bedroom for a candle, two of which were always lighted there at dusk and kept burning till M. Platzoff went to bed.
As already stated, the library had two doors opening into it, one that gave from the bedroom, and another that faced you as you went in. A brown curtain fixed by means of rings on a brass rod hung before this second door. Ducie never remembered having seen this curtain more than three parts drawn, leaving visible a small portion of the door. In fact, it appeared to him, considering the matter, as though the curtain were never touched, its exact position seemed so unaltered from time to time. His first idea on his first visit to the library after his sight of the Diamond, had been that through this second door lay the secret entrance to the cavern. But it was an idea that found no resting place in his mind. The Russian was not the sort of man to adopt such a palpable expedient as an ordinary door to mark the entrance to the secret staircase. Ducie had felt convinced at the time that behind those ponderous bookshelves lay the hidden entrance, and he was equally convinced of it to-night. Therefore, instead of taking any notice of the second door, he at once proceeded, candle in hand, to make an examination of the shelves.
They were made of mahogany, substantial and old-fashioned, with elaborate flutings between each compartment, and were crowned with carved bosses of fruit and flowers intermixed. Every shelf was completely filled with books, none of which were dummies, as Captain Ducie took care to verify. Beginning at the right-hand corner, he went completely round the room. The fireplace, too, came in for an amount of critical examination such as had probably never been bestowed on it before. The window that gave light to the library was in the outer wall of the house, and looked on to the lawn. Like all the windows in M. Platzoff's private suite it was crossed and recrossed by some half-dozen iron bars artfully let into the woodwork so as not to be visible from without. The outside walls of Bon Repos were of an antique thickness, as though they had been built to last a thousand years. They were, in fact, quite thick enough to allow of a narrow staircase being hollowed out of their substance. It seemed, therefore, to Ducie just as necessary to examine carefully that side of the room as it did to examine the inner side.
He examined both the sides and the ends, carefully, thoroughly; but the result of his examination was that he was exactly as wise when he left off as when he began. Not a crevice, not a cranny, not a discoloration of the wood, not the faintest trace of a secret spring was anywhere to be found. He tapped each panel and compartment separately with his knuckles, but he was unable to trace any difference in the dull dead sound given out by each and all. Then he went down on his knees to examine the carpet. It was a sombre velvet pile, and was nailed down at the edges with a number of small tin-tacks driven through it into the floor. The corners of the carpet had not been carefully swept, and the tiny indentations in it where it was pressed down by the heads of the tacks were full of dust. "Now," argued Captain Ducie with himself, "if the entrance to the cavern where the Diamond is hidden is through an opening in the floor of this room, then, in order to reach that opening this carpet or a portion of it must be taken up. Is it likely that M. Platzoff, who by his own account visits his Diamond at least once a week, would take up and nail down his carpet every time he wishes to look on his wonderful gem? Further: if the carpet had been lately taken up, the indentations caused by the heads of the nails would not be full of dust as they are now. The nails now in have not been touched for a month at the least."
Captain Ducie rose from his unwonted position, and put down his candle on the table with a muttered oath. He was baffled at every turn. He felt ready to knock his head against the wall, so eaten up was he with inward rage and mortification. But it was the cunning of the serpent and not the rage of the lion that was needed in his case. He flung himself into a chair, and in a few minutes had cooled down sufficiently to consider what his next step ought to be. Was any other step possible to him? he asked himself.
And then he answered himself with a lugubrious shake of the head. Only one thing remained to be tried, and that was the second door. It might be just as well to ascertain, if it were possible to do so, on what part of the house it opened. He had no recollection of having seen such a door in his perambulations about the interior of Bon Repos.
The brown curtain that hung before the second door was only half drawn. Captain Ducie drew it impatiently on one side and inserted his pass-key into the lock. It turned without difficulty, but on trying to push open the door, he found that it stuck and did not readily give way. This fact, slight as it seemed, proved to the captain that the road to the hiding-place of the Diamond did not lie through that door. The door when opened revealed a narrow and gloomy corridor thickly carpeted with dust. One side of this corridor was formed by a bare unbroken wall. On the opposite side, at intervals of a few feet, were four doors, all now locked. There was yet another door at the end of the corridor opposite to that by which Ducie had entered. This last door was not merely locked but was further secured by some half-dozen large screws drawn through the inner side and wormed deep into the massive posts.
When he had so far completed his examination, Captain Ducie turned to the four side doors. In the case of these also he found his pass-key available. Still carrying the light in his hand, he opened the first door and found himself in a gloomy and shuttered bedroom which had evidently not been occupied for a very long time. From this an inside door opened into a dressing-room, also shuttered and thick with dust. The second door in the corridor led also into this dressing-room. The third door in the corridor opened into another bedroom, and the fourth into its adjoining dressing-room. These two latter rooms, like the first two, had apparently not been entered for years.
To Captain Ducie it seemed plain enough why these rooms were kept untenanted, and the door at the extreme end of the corridor nailed up. M. Platzoff evidently did not choose that any one should come into too close proximity to the room within which lay the secret of the hidden door. For that the hidden door was in the library everything he had discovered that night went indisputably to prove. He relocked the four rooms, and went back to the library musing upon all he had seen. He was just about to shut and fasten the curtained door when a sudden thought struck him and caused him to pause. He stood musing for a few moments, his face gradually brightening the while, and then taking up his candle, he retraced his way to the fourth room in the corridor. He went in, put down his light, and succeeded after some difficulty in unfastening the shutters, which were strongly barred with iron. This done, he shut up his candle for a while in an empty wardrobe, and then proceeded to fold back the shutters. The night was a fine one, and the stars afforded him sufficient light for what he wanted to do next. Between the shutters and the window was a faded green blind, at present drawn up about three parts of the way to the top. From this blind depended a green cord that ended in a tassel. In this cord Captain Ducie tied a simple slip knot. When this was done, he unhasped the window, and tried whether the lower sash would work up and down readily and without too much noise. Finding that the window worked satisfactorily, he left it unfastened, and then proceeded to put back the shutters, which also he left unbolted. Then he took his candle out of its hiding-place and went back to the library, closing behind him both the door that led into the corridor and the curtained door, but leaving them both unlocked.
Midnight was now close at hand, and it was necessary that he should get back to the smoke-room. But even with more time at his command, he could have done nothing more to-night. When he got back to the smoke-room, he found Platzoff to all appearance precisely as he had left him. He put back the pass-key into the pocket from which he had taken it, and unbolted the outer door. Ten minutes later Jasmin, the new valet, acting temporarily in place of Cleon, coming into the room, found Captain Ducie quietly smoking beside the comatose body of his master.
At an early hour next morning, in fact long before M. Platzoff was out of bed, Captain Ducie, cigar in hand, took a ramble round the exterior of Bon Repos. While exploring the four rooms on the preceding evening he was struck with the recollection of having on one occasion seen their shuttered windows from the outside. A day or two after his arrival at Bon Repos he had gone on an exploring expedition about the grounds, and it was on that occasion that he had seen them. He had taken them as ordinary unused chambers, and had had no further curiosity respecting them. He remembered now that they looked--or would have looked if their shutters had been open--into a very thick bit of shrubbery, so dense, in fact, as to be all but impenetrable, and looking as if it had not been pruned for years. And yet this very bit of shrubbery was within a few feet of the delicious little flower-studded lawn on to which the windows of Platzoff's private rooms opened; indeed, the four shut-up rooms were merely a continuation of the same wing in which the private rooms were situate. It was evident that since the four rooms had been disused the shrubbery outside them had been allowed to grow as thick and wild as it chose, as though it were Platzoff's wish to screen them as much as possible from observation.
Captain Ducie having pierced this shrubbery, found himself within sight of the four windows, and saw that he had not been mistaken as to their position. Through the dusty panes of the last window of the four he could just make out the knotted cord as he had left it over night. He took a few quiet observations, unseen by any one, and then went back indoors.
That night, as usual, Captain Ducie accompanied his host to the smoke-room. Drashkil was not introduced, and the two friends passed a pleasant evening, smoking and conversing. As midnight struck, Jasmin entered. Ducie rose, shook hands with Platzoff, bade him good night, and retired. Having reached his own room, he locked the door. Then he proceeded to dress himself in a suit of dark gray tweed. On his feet he put a pair of Indian moccasins. His next proceeding was to produce a coil of strong rope from one of his trunks, one end of which he tied firmly to the top bar of the fire-grate. This done, he blew out the candle, drew up the blind, and opened the window. The night was fine, but overcast, and rather cold for the time of year. Having waited till he heard the clock strike one, he lowered the other end of the rope out of the open window. After listening intently for full two minutes he let himself quietly down, sailor fashion, and landed safely on the turf below. Then he paused again to listen. That part of the grounds in which he now found himself was very quiet and secluded even by day, but neither there nor in any other part of the little demesne was there any likelihood that his proceedings would be observed at that uncanny hour. The rule at Bon Repos was that all the servants, except Cleon, should go to bed, and the house be finally closed, at half-past eleven, and the time was now ten minutes past one. Still, Captain Ducie was not a man to neglect any precaution that presented itself to his mind. Keeping well under the deeper shadow of the trees, and walking lightly on the soft turf, he was not long before he found himself close under the window with the knotted cord. He had scanned Platzoff's windows anxiously in passing, but they were so closely shuttered and curtained that it was impossible to tell whether or no the Russian had yet retired to rest.
As previously stated, the whole of Platzoff's private rooms were on the ground floor: equally as a matter of course, the four rooms that opened out of the corridor were on the same level. A slight spring sufficed to place Captain Ducie on the window-sill of the room he wished to enter. Despite all his care, he could not prevent the creaking of the window as he pushed up the sash; but he trusted to the remoteness of Platzoff's bedroom not to be overheard. Then he pushed open the shutters and stepped lightly down into the dark room. He had noted the position of the furniture when there the previous night, and he knew that there was a clear course to the door. Another pause, to listen; then noiselessly across the floor; out by way of the door left unlocked last night, and so into the corridor; then forward, silent as a shadow, to the curtained door that opened into Platzoff's room.
Captain Ducie was far from being a nervous man, yet it is quite certain that his pulses beat by no means so equably as on ordinary occasions as he stood in the dark corridor, all his senses on the alert, his fingers on the handle of the door; dreading to take the next step, which must yet be taken or all that he had hitherto done be rendered nugatory; and stubbornly determined in his inmost heart that it should be taken, happen what might. An indrawing of the breath, a moment's pause, a turn of the handle, and almost before he knew that he was there he found himself standing behind the curtain and on the threshold of M. Platzoff's private rooms.
Not the faintest sound of any kind. Ducie stretched forth a hand, and little by little drew back the curtain sufficiently to enable him to peer into the room. It was dark and empty; but he could see that a faint light was burning in the bedroom beyond. Now that the curtain was partly drawn aside he could hear the low, regular breathing of M. Platzoff as that gentleman lay asleep in bed. Ducie knew what a light sleeper Platzoff was when not under the influence of his favourite drug, and he durst not venture a step beyond the spot where he was now standing. Indeed, there was no reason why he should so venture. There was nothing whatever to be gained by such a rash proceeding. It was Platzoff's habit (so the Russian himself had given Ducie to understand) to visit the Diamond once, sometimes twice a week. These visits generally took place during the small hours of the morning when Platzoff awoke, restless and uneasy, from his first sleep. All, therefore, that Ducie had now to do was to wait quietly for one of these occasions, and take advantage of it when it should come, in such a way as might seem advisable to him at the time.
This was the reason why Captain Ducie did not stir from his hiding-place behind the curtain. This was the reason why he stood there for two full hours to-night as patiently as if he had been cast in bronze. But on this occasion his waiting was in vain. When he had been there about an hour and a half, M. Platzoff woke up, took a pinch of snuff, sneezed, spoke a few words aloud in some language which Ducie did not understand, and then addressed himself to sleep again. Ducie waited a full half-hour longer without stirring. Then he went quietly back by the way he had come, shutting behind him the two doors, the shutters, and the window, but leaving them all unfastened--indeed, he had no means of fastening them, even had he been so minded. He got back unseen to his own room.
The same hour next night saw Captain Ducie behind the curtained door. He knew that several nights might elapse before Platzoff should visit the Diamond, and he was quite prepared to wait there night after night till his perseverance should be crowned with success. It was just as well, perhaps, that he had made up his mind to play a waiting game, seeing that five nights passed one after another, on no one of which did he fail in his watch at the curtained door, before Platzoff, taking counsel with himself, made up his mind to again visit the cavern.
It was on a certain night--or rather morning, being about three a.m.--after one of his drashkil debauches, that the Russian so made up his mind. Ducie was in patient waiting. From his hiding-place behind the curtain he heard Platzoff get out of bed. When he saw him put on his dressing-gown and light a small lamp--the same that the Russian had made use of on the night that Ducie accompanied him--then the latter knew that his patience was about to be rewarded.
As Platzoff advanced into the library, Ducie shrank back, and noiselessly closed the door that led into the corridor. He thought it just possible that Platzoff might lift the curtain to make sure that there was no one in hiding. Standing with his hand on the door, and listening intently, Ducie could hear Platzoff moving about the library. Then he heard the click of a spring or bolt, and a sound like the rolling back of a door or panel. Then all was still.
After waiting for a couple of minutes, during which the silence remained unbroken, Ducie slowly opened the door, and moved forward till his face nearly touched the curtain. He could hear nothing save the beating of his own heart. Drawing the curtain an inch or two on one side, he peeped. The library was empty, and the secret door was open.
For a few seconds he felt like a man in a dream; he could hardly believe in the reality of what he saw before him. But the thought that in ten or twelve minutes at the farthest M. Platzoff would be back again, and that now or never was his opportunity, quickened him into action. His object tonight was to take such accurate note of the position of the secret door, and the means by which it was opened and shut, as would enable him in time to come to find it again without much difficulty. Platzoff was in the cavern below, and till the sound of his returning footsteps could be heard Ducie knew that he was safe.
Moving noiselessly forward into the room, he went down on one knee, and proceeded to make a careful examination of the secret door. Then he took a measuring-tape out of his pocket, and proceeded to measure the exact distance of the opening from the upper end of the room. Then he took his penknife and cut away a couple of threads out of the carpet close to the book-case, at those points precisely where the secret door fitted into it when shut. Not less carefully did he examine the spring, and the mode by which it was acted on when the door was closed. There was nothing very complicated about it now that its mechanism was laid bare. A very slight examination sufficed to show Ducie its method of working, and where and how it was opened from without.
A faint noise from below warned him that his time was up. He glided back as noiselessly as he had come, and disappeared behind the curtain just as M. Platzoff began to ascend the steps that led from the cavern.
Captain Ducie stood with his hand on the door of the corridor for a full hour before he ventured to take another step in retreat. Then judging that Platzoff, who had gone to bed again, could not fail to be asleep, he went quietly back by the way he had come.
Next morning, immediately after breakfast, Captain Ducie shut himself up in his own room on the plea of having several important letters to write. The letters resolved themselves into one note, of no great length, addressed to a friend in London--to the same friend, in fact, to whom he had applied for a translation of the stolen cryptogram. Although the note did not contain more than a dozen lines, Captain Ducie was unusually particular as to its composition. He corrected and re-wrote it several times before he was satisfied. Then he sealed and directed it, and went down into the village and posted it himself. Then he set himself to wait patiently for a reply.
A reply came on the fifth day by post, in the shape of a tiny square packet. Captain Ducie received the packet from Jasmin with apparent indifference, but he did not open it till he was alone. The contents consisted of a brief note from his friend, inside which was a small square box made of very thin wood, which proved to be filled with some dark, fatty-looking substance, from which exhaled a faint, sickly odour that was far from pleasant. The following is a copy of the note:--
"My dear Ducie,--I send you a small quantity of the drug you ask for. I daresay there will be enough to serve your purpose. It is an exceedingly powerful narcotic, and very little of it must be used at one time. I greatly question the advisability of using it at all in the case of neuralgic pains such as you describe, but I presume you are acting under advice.
"Glad to hear that you are enjoying yourself so thoroughly. Town is anything but pleasant at this time of the year, and to be strolling on the banks of Windermere would suit much better the idiosyncrasy of
"Your perspiring but devoted friend,
"Geo. Bexell."
Captain Ducie, after taking one whiff at the contents of the box, put it carefully away under lock and key. Nothing further could be done till the next evening that his host might devote to drashkil-smoking. For that occasion he had not long to wait.
Ducie was now so far familiar with the process of drashkil-smoking and its results, that from the first evening of Cleon's absence he had taken upon himself the office of preparing M. Platzoff's pipe. This he did in that easy good-natured way which sat so gracefully on him, and made his simplest acts seem better than greater things done by another. On the first "big smoke night" after his receipt of the tiny packet from London, Ducie did not fail to proffer his services as usual, and Platzoff was glad to accept them. This evening as he charged the pipe out of the little silver box in which the preparation was always kept, he turned his back on the Russian, who was lazily reclining on the low cushioned seat that ran round the room, and seemed longer than usual in filling it to his mind. Platzoff was not heeding him at all, but was gazing with half-shut eyes on the lamp, of Oriental workmanship, by which the room was lighted.
"What strange patterns or weavings of life we often get," he said, speaking more to himself than to Ducie, "when we are asleep, or in a fever, or in any other state in which the vagaries of the brain are no longer controlled by the force of reason, or no longer restrained by what you would call the trammels of common sense. It is like looking at life through a kaleidoscope--a strange jumble of many-coloured differently shaped fragments, which yet shake themselves into curious and unlooked for patterns that have oftentimes a beauty and coherence of their own such as we seldom see in real life. Singular, too, that behind many of these brain-weavings which at first sight seem so purposeless and absurd there lurks an idea, sometimes a very subtle one, and wholly dissociated from any waking thought that we can remember. It is as if such an idea had found its way by chance into one's brain, and was determined to make its presence known by scratching a few quaint characters on the walls of its new domicile."
"You fly too high for me to follow you," said Ducie, with a laugh. "It is time you were ballasted with a pipe of your favourite drug. You have a lot of cobweb fancies in your brain that want clearing away. To-morrow you will be as practical and business-like as any Englishman of us all."
"I hope not. That is a level to which I do not aspire," answered Platzoff. "There is not sufficient far niente in the character of you English. You lack repose, and the grace of inaction. You are the world's plough-horses. It is your place to do the hard work of the universe. Beyond that you are good for little. Mais donnez-moi ma pipe, monsieur, s'il vous plait. Voilà ma consolation pour tons les defauts du monde."
He took the amber mouthpiece between his lips, and Ducie applied an allumette to the bowl. Spirals of thick white smoke, emitted from the Russian's mouth, began to ascend slowly in languid viperous wreaths towards the roof. Soon a dull drowsy film began to thicken in his eyes and to quench their light. Soon the muscles of his face began to relax, and all expression save one of vacuous self-enjoyment, to fade out of his features as daylight dies slowly out of a landscape at set of sun. Ducie had filled for himself a pipe of cavendish, and now sat down a yard or two removed from his host.
"Ducie, mon petit," said Platzoff, speaking already in tones that were strangely unlike his own, "there is a peculiar flavour about my pipe to-night, such as I never remember to have experienced before. I cannot understand it."
"Is it a flavour that you like, or one that you dislike?"
"I don't altogether dislike it," answered Platzoff. "But why is it there at all?"
"Can't say, I am sure," replied Ducie in his quiet way. "I filled your pipe this evening out of a fresh lot of drashkil that Cleon mixed for you this morning. Perhaps your taste is out of order."
"Perhaps so. Anyway, the pipe is delicious, but terribly strong. I can talk no more. Bon soir, ami, and pleasant dreams."
"In another ten minutes he will be as firm as a rock," murmured Ducie to himself. He looked at his watch. It was just eleven o'clock.
Ducie sat smoking his cavendish and watching his host stealthily from under his thick eyebrows. He had put a very small portion of the contents of the little packet from London into Platzoff's pipe, and he was curious to see how it would act. His intention was simply to send Platzoff into a sounder sleep than usual, and so make sure that he would not be disturbed by the unexpected waking of the Russian later in the night. For he had made up his mind that this night of all others he would steal the Great Mogul Diamond. In his own thoughts he did not use such an ugly word as steal in connexion with the affair. He merely remarked as it were casually to himself, that to-night he must appropriate the Diamond. He would retire at twelve o'clock as usual. Later on, when the last sitter-up could hardly fail to be asleep, he would come back as he had come so many times of late, letting himself down by means of the rope from his own window; and so, by way of No. 4 room and the corridor, reach M. Platzoff's private rooms. Once there, he could easily deprive the unconscious Russian of his pass-key, and now that he knew the secret of the hidden door, he would have no difficulty in making his way direct into the cavern; after which, to appropriate the Diamond would be the most natural thing in the world. Returning by the way he had come, he would carefully re-lock the cavern doors and shut the secret door. He would replace the pass-key in Platzoff's pocket, and retire unseen to his own room. Not improbably days would elapse before Platzoff again went to look at his Diamond, and when he should find that it was gone--what then? Why should he, Ducie, be suspected of stealing it any more than any one else who might happen to be in the house? And even granting the worst--that Platzoff suspected him of stealing the Diamond, even charged him with stealing it? For the suspicion he did not care one groat, and the charge was one that could not be proved. The only result would be a quarrel between himself and M. Platzoff, and a premature departure from Bon Repos. All this would not be difficult to bear. The fact of the Diamond being his at last would act as a salve for all the minor ills of life.
So ran Captain Ducie's thoughts as he sat smoking and watching M. Platzoff's faculties fade gradually out, like those of a very old man who has outlived his proper age. To-night the process was swifter than usual, thanks to the narcotic which he had put unseen into the Russian's pipe. He looked on with a complacent smile, caressing his moustache now and again.
Platzoff passed quickly from stage to stage of the process, till, in no long time, complete coma supervened, and he lived no longer save in the opium-smoker's fantastic world. The light in his pipe died out, the amber mouthpiece slipped from between his lips, his fingers relaxed their hold on the stem, his head drooped, his jaw fell slightly, a thin dark line marked the space between his imperfectly closed eyelids. He sighed gently twice, and was gone.
To all these signs Captain Ducie was now well accustomed, and he regarded them entirely as a matter of course. He refilled his pipe, and lay back, with his hands clasped under his head, gazing up at the gaudy ceiling, and building pleasant castles in the air. As the clock struck twelve, Cleon or Jasmin would enter, and he himself would go to roost for a couple of hours. Then would come the time for his great enterprise.
He had been thus quietly engaged with his second pipe, for a space of five or six minutes, when, finding that it did not draw to his mind, he sat up with the view of ascertaining what was the matter with it. In the act of opening his knife, he turned his eyes unthinkingly on M. Platzoff. In the face of the silent man sitting opposite to him there was something that caused his own face to blanch in a moment, as though he had seen some unmentionable horror. He rose to his feet as though moved by some invisible agency. Great beads of sweat burst out on his brow; his lips turned blue; in his eyes was a terror unspeakable. He staggered forward with a groan, and lifted the cold hand that would never grasp his again.
"My God! I have killed him!"
He sank on his knees, and buried his face in his hands. He knew as well as if twenty doctors had told him so, that M. Paul Platzoff, of Bon Repos, was dead. On his forehead was stamped the Great Angel's ineffaceable seal. Death had whispered in his ears, and he was deaf for ever.
That one minute which Ducie spent on his knees was, perhaps, the bitterest of his life. What his feelings were he himself could not have told. "As heaven is my witness, I did not intend to do this thing!" he exclaimed aloud, as he rose to his feet.
Then, in spite of the certainty which possessed him that Platzoff was beyond all earthly aid, he bared one of the Russian's arms, and pricked a vein with his penknife. But no blood followed, and with another groan Ducie let go the fingers that were already growing cold and stiff.
His next impulse was to ring for assistance. But in the very act of pulling the bell-rope he paused. For a minute or two the very existence of such a bauble as the Great Mogul Diamond had passed entirely out of his thoughts. But as his fingers touched the rope, there came a whisper in his ear, "Now or never the Diamond must become yours!" He paused, and sat down for a moment to think.
Platzoff was gone past recovery. Of all men living he, Ducie, was probably the only one to whom the existence of the Diamond was known; or, at least, the place where it was hidden. Dead men tell no tales. If he were to make the Diamond his,--and had he not a right to do so, having paid such a tremendous price for it--who in all the wide world would be one bit the wiser? If, on the contrary, he were to leave it untouched, it might remain undiscovered in its dark home for centuries, perhaps even till the end of time. Or if Platzoff's friend, Signor Lampini, were sufficiently instructed where to find it, of what use would it be to him except as a means for the propagation of red-hot revolutionary ideas, among which, for aught he knew to the contrary, assassination might be looked upon as a cardinal virtue? He would be worse than a fool not to seize the last chance that would ever be offered him of making the precious gem his own for ever.
Once more he looked at his watch. It wanted exactly a quarter to twelve. He had fifteen clear minutes that he could call his own, and not one minute more. No suspicion would attach to him with regard to the death of Platzoff; he felt no uneasiness on that score. But after that event should be discovered, the pass-key would be claimed by Cleon, and all access to the rooms denied him. Now or never was his time.
He hesitated no longer. With a shudder he put his hand into the dead man's pocket, and drew forth the silver key. It was the work of a moment to light the little hand-lamp, and pass forward into the library. Then he went down on his knees to look for the marks he had made on the carpet which were to point out to him the exact position of the secret door. Having found them, together with an almost invisible scratch which he had made on a particular part of the polished panelling of the bookcase, he was guided at once to the spring by which the secret door was acted upon, and in another moment the narrow stone staircase opened darkly at his feet. Down the stairs he went without pause or hesitation, carrying the lighted lamp in one hand and the pass-key in the other. The door at the bottom of the staircase opened without difficulty, and he found himself in the low vaulted chamber at the further end of which was the door that opened into the rock. The second door was passed as readily as the first, and before him appeared the narrow passage that led to the cavern. To-night the cold moist atmosphere of the place struck upon him with a chill that made him shudder. He had trodden that passage but once before, and then it was in company with the man who now lay cold and dead in the room above. He gave a backward glance over his shoulder half expecting to see the shade of Platzoff following silently in his footsteps. But there was nothing save his own distorted shadow dogging him like some monster at once ugly and grotesque. With a sneer at his own timidity he entered the passage in the rock. In three minutes more the great prize would be his.
Slowly and cautiously he threaded the tortuous pathway that led to the heart of the hill. He reached the end of it in safety, and the cavern loomed dim and vast before him. He paused for a moment, and held the lamp high above his head. There, fixed in the middle of the sandy floor he could just make out the vague outlines of the Indian idol. The great gem that flashed in its forehead caught a ray from the feeble lamp held by Ducie, and flung it back intensified a thousandfold. Dude saw the flash; and his breath came thick and fast.
He advanced one step--a second. Then, before he knew what had happened, he found himself stretched on the floor of the cave and in utter darkness. He had stumbled over some inequality in the floor, and had dropped his lamp in falling. Bruised and bleeding, and with a curse on his lips, he rose to his feet.
The predicament in which he now found himself was anything but a pleasant one. That he could find the idol even in the dark, and make himself master of the Diamond, he did not doubt. But the question was, whether if he wandered so far away from the narrow passage by which access was had to the cavern, he could find it again, and so get back to the library before the clock struck twelve. If that could be done all might yet be well. If it could not be done--but he would not stop to argue the point. He would make a bold dash for the Diamond. He would risk everything in one final throw, and trust that the good fortune which had so far befriended his enterprise would not desert him in this great crisis of his fate.
A few seconds sufficed for him to weave these thoughts in his brain, and almost before he had decided on what he would do he was advancing deeper into the cavern; advancing slowly, step by step, with outstretched arms, in the direction of the idol. By the light of his lamp he had noted its position, and now that he was in the dark he went to it nearly in a straight line. Suddenly it seemed as though the idol had risen noiselessly from the ground. The palm of his left hand smote its flat cold forehead. He lost not an instant in feeling for the Diamond. The moment his fingers touched it he thrilled from head to foot.
The Diamond was held in its place in the forehead of the idol by a small gold clasp which worked in the hollow of the skull. It occupied Ducie some three or four minutes, first to find the clasp, and afterwards to unfasten it. At length he succeeded in opening it, and the Diamond dropped into his palm. His own at last!
With a great sigh of relief and thankfulness he drew back his arm, and having first kissed the gem, he put it carefully away into a safe pocket, and then turned to retrace his steps. Taking the nose of the idol as his starting-point, he calculated that a straight line from it to the wall of the cavern would not land him very wide of the entrance. But the difficulty was to keep a straight line in the dark, and the darkness of the cavern was something that might almost be felt. But there was no time for hesitation. If midnight had not struck already it must be close on the point of doing so. The delay of a single minute might be the cause of his discovery either by Cleon or Jasmin. What the result would be in such a case he did not pause to ask himself. Instead, he set himself with his back to the face of the idol and stepped out slow and steady for the side of the cave.
He had got about half way across the intervening space when a sound fell on his ear that brought him on the instant to a dead stand. It was the noise made by some one descending the stone stairs that led into the vaulted room. All had been discovered, then! The death of Platzoff, the secret door standing wide open, and his, Ducie's, disappearance. The intruder must be either Cleon or Jasmin. Was either of them aware of the existence of the Diamond, and that it had been hidden in the cave? If not, then his presence there could be easily excused on the score of simple curiosity to see so strange a place. If they knew of the existence of the Diamond, they would suspect at once that he had taken it, and would doubtless try to dispossess him of it by force. Well: they should not take it from him without taking his life also: on that point he was fully determined. Presently a thin ray of light which cut the darkness like a sword, shone through the narrow entrance to the cave. It broadened and brightened quickly. As it drew nearer, Captain Ducie advanced to meet it. His face was pale, but very set and determined. His eyes shone from under his heavy brows with a light that boded no good to the intruder whoever he might be. He was not left long in doubt. Another half-minute brought into view the gaunt figure of Cleon, newly-risen from his sick bed. With haggard face and bloodshot eyes, and with a snarl of the lips that showed his long narrow teeth, the mulatto advanced slowly and warily. In one hand he carried a lamp, held high above his head; in the other a gleaming dagger. Ducie advanced towards him haughtily, with folded arms. As Cleon emerged from the into the cave his eyes fell on the captain's tall figure. He smiled a ghastly smile, and slowly nodded his head twice.
"Thief and villain! I have found you at last," he said. "Your heart's blood shall dye the floor of this cave."
He set down his lamp on a projection of the rock, and deliberately turned back the cuffs of his coat. Captain Ducie said never a word in reply, but kept his eyes fixed unswervingly on Cleon, as he would have done on a tiger or other beast of prey. He was without a defensive weapon of any kind, and was obliged to trust to the quickness of his eye and the strength of his muscles for safety in the coming attack.
Cleon's onslaught was exactly like that of a wild beast. It was a yell and a spring, and it would in all probability have been fatal to Ducie had not the latter been fully prepared for something of the kind. But the very instant Cleon sprang at his throat, out went Ducie's right arm, straight and true, like a sledge hammer, full in the mulatto's face. Cleon dropped before it as though he had been shot through the brain. But next instant he was on his feet again, his face streaked with blood, and now looking more ghastly than before. He said something Ducie could not understand, but if murder ever lurked in a man's eyes, it peeped out of the mulatto's at that moment. He was not at all daunted by his mishap: only rendered more wary. He made several feints and false moves before he ventured on a second dash at the captain. At last he thought he saw his chance, and in the twinkling of an eye he had struck his dagger into the captain's shoulder. He had aimed at the heart, but his enemy had proved too quick for him. His dagger pricked into Ducie's shoulder, and Ducie's arms went round him like a vice. The mulatto was active and sinewy, but in a close struggle he was no match for the great strength of his opponent. His arms were pinned to his sides, but his head was at liberty, and with his long sharp teeth he fastened on Ducie's cheek and bit it through. This roused Ducie's blood as half a dozen pricks with the dagger could not have done. Lifting Cleon bodily up, he swung him once round, and then dashed him with all his might against the side of the cave. The mulatto rebounded from the rock, and came to the floor with a dull heavy thud. He groaned twice, and then all was still except the heavy beating of Ducie's heart.
Ducie bent over the body for a moment. "His fate be on his own head!" he muttered. Then, having made sure that the Diamond was still safe in his possession, he took up the lamp and passed out of the cave. He shut and locked the two doors behind him, and when he got back to the library he also closed the secret door through the bookcase. As he passed through the smoke-room he gave one hasty shuddering glance at the dead body of Platzoff. The half-open eyes seemed to fix him with a look of terrible reproach. He fancied that he saw the pallid lips move. "Ingrate!" they seemed to say, "was it for this I took thee to my bosom and called thee friend?"
Ducie put his hand to his eyes and strode on. He found the door that led into the corridor half open as it had probably been left by Cleon in the horror of the sudden discovery he had made on entering the smoke-room. Ducie closed it carefully behind him. That door locked up a double secret, and it behoved him to get clear away from Bon Repos before it could be brought to light. He carried his treasure with him, and that would compensate for everything.
The moment he turned into the corridor to go towards his own rooms he began to feel faint from loss of blood. The first great excitement was over, and now his wounds began to make themselves felt. Great heavens! if he were to lose his senses at such a critical moment and be found by the servants! They would perceive that he was wounded, and would probably strip him, and then how would it fare with the Diamond? Just as this thought was in his mind Jasmin came suddenly round a corner and started back in alarm at sight of his pale face all streaked with blood.
"Sir--Captain Ducie--what is the matter? Are you wounded?" he cried.
"A slight accident--a mere scratch," gasped the captain. "Lend me your arm as far as my room, and--and don't leave me yet awhile."