A Woman at Bay; Or, A Fiend in Skirts
"Right you are, my man! It is a wonder. For example, what did you think
of the operation that was performed last night?"
"I thought it was carried out very perfectly. The men must have been a
long time in laying their plans."
She laughed again.
"Not one of those men--not even Handsome--had ever seen that place
before. They only obeyed my orders; nothing more. I made the plans
myself. I told them exactly what to do, and when, and how to do it. It
is all a question of mathematics, and of obeying orders."
"It was perfectly done, madam."
"There you go again. By the way, Handsome gives me an excellent report
of you."
"I had supposed as much, else I would not be here breakfasting with
you."
"That is not why I sent for you; that has nothing to do with last
night."
"No?"
"I want you to tell me where I have seen you before--and where you have
met me before," she said swiftly, and with a sudden and dangerous
narrowing of her eyes.
If Nick had not had himself perfectly in hand he must have given a start
then that would have betrayed him; as it was, he answered instantly, and
as if the subject had also occurred to him:
"For the life of me, madam, I cannot remember. I have tried to recall
the time and place ever since I saw you last night; but it eludes me. I
cannot tell."
"It is well that you have answered as you have," she said, with a
threatening cadence in her voice.
"Why so, madam?"
"Because I saw plainly in your eyes last night that you remembered to
have seen me somewhere before that time. Had you denied it, you would
have lied to me; and it is not healthy for people to tell me lies."
"I can imagine that, madam. But since I have no reason to do so----"
"Tell me what there is about me that is familiar to you, Dago."
"It must be your great beauty that I remem----"
"That will be about enough of that, thank you," she interrupted him
coldly. "I know all about my beauty, and don't in the least need to be
told about it."
"One could not very well remember you at all without remembering your
beauty," insisted Nick boldly. "It is the first thing about you that
strikes one; and the second is----"
"Well--what? Possibly I will be more interested in that."
"The fear you inspire, I think. You have what the French call a 'way'
about you."
She started perceptibly.
"What do you know about the French?" she demanded; and Nick saw
instantly that he had made a mistake in reminding her of her career in
Paris. Now it was possible that she might recall where she had seen him.
But he dismissed the idea as soon as it came to him, for he remembered
again how perfectly he was disguised, and how impossible it should be
for her to remember him after all these years, through the disguise.
But now she was looking steadily at him, and for the moment she had
forgotten to eat.
"Who are you, Dago?" she demanded suddenly. "You are not what you seem."
"Few of us are," returned the detective evasively.
"Who are you?"
"I have told you, madam, as much as it is possible to tell. You do not
demand the past records of your followers. All that you insist upon is
that they shall be faithful in the future."
"Who are you?" she repeated again.
"I am Dago John, madam, at your service."
"But you have another name than Dago John."
"I had another--once."
"What was it?"
"Madam does not suppose, when she asks the question, that it will be
answered, does she?" Nick inquired boldly.
"By Heaven, sir, do you dare to defy me?"
"Not at all. I merely feel sure that madam asked the question as a joke,
knowing that it could not be answered."
For a moment it seemed as if she did not know whether to be angry at him
for his cool effrontery, or to laugh the matter off entirely, in
admiration of his bravery. She decided upon the latter course evidently,
for she did laugh--in a way that was not quite pleasant to hear,
however; and she said:
"Try to think where you have seen me before. Help me to remember. I want
to recall it."
"It is impossible, madam. I have already tried."
"Is the memory that is associated with me pleasant or otherwise?"
"It could not be but pleasant, since it was--you," he ventured; and she
frowned. It was plain that she did not relish such compliments.
And now she sat with her eyes fixed upon him, idly stirring her second
cup of coffee, and seeming to look him through and through, while she
cast her memory back over the storms of her life, not yet more than
twenty-three years, all told, and attempted with all her strength of
will to call up for recognition the ghost which his appearance had
conjured.
After a little she leaned forward, nearer to him, and her eyes, coal
black, and blazing, fairly burned into his own; but he held his gaze
steadily upon her, never once flinching from the scrutiny.
And then, so suddenly that it startled him, she leaped to her feet,
knocking her coffee to the floor, and she stood over him--but whether in
anger or only in astonishment that she had remembered, he could not have
told.
"By all the gods!" she cried out. "I remember you now. It is your eyes
that have haunted me, and now I remember where I have seen them. I
remember. It was in Paris. It was at the prefecture of police. I was
there. I was only a girl. I had just finished with the chief when you
entered the room. I did not notice your name when it was announced, but
now I remember you--at the prefecture of police in Paris! Tell me--tell
me, I say, what you were doing there!"
The detective knew that it would be folly to deny the charge that she
made. He knew that she remembered now, perfectly well, and that nothing
could disabuse her mind of the determination it had reached.
Acting upon the impulse of the instant, therefore, and determined now to
play out his role as it should appear, Nick pretended instantly to be as
greatly astonished as she was at the recollection, and the strangeness
of it.
He, too, leaped to his feet, imitating an astonishment as great as her
own. He did not tip over his coffee, but he did manage to upset his
chair, so that it fell backward on the floor; and then for the space of
a moment they stood staring into each other's eyes, both--from all
appearances--speechless with astonishment.
And then, very slowly, she subsided into her chair again, still keeping
her eyes upon him, and still evidently taxing her memory to the utmost
to recall all the incidents of that meeting at the prefecture in Paris.
"I remember now," she murmured at last, more to herself than to him. "It
all comes back to me, bit by bit. Monsieur Goron was chief at the
time--no? Yes. I remember. There had been a sudden death in the house
where I lived--it was on the floor just beneath me--and Goron sent for
me to question me about it. It was thought at first that Lucie had been
murdered, and Goron thought that perhaps I would know about it. He had
just finished questioning me when you entered the room--ah!"
Her eyes blazed with a sudden fire of anger, and her lips tightened over
her teeth.
"When you entered the room Goron rose and shook hands with you. Why did
he do that? Goron did not shake hands with criminals!"
"Nor with his police spies, did he?" asked Nick, smiling and shrugging
his shoulders.
"But why did he shake hands with you?"
"Because we were old acquaintances, madam."
"And he called you by name. What was that name?"
"Madam, for some time past I have deemed it best to forget it."
"Nevertheless you shall remember it now."
Nick shrugged his shoulders, and did not reply.
"What was that name?" she demanded again.
"I have told madam that I----"
She started from her chair, and ran across the room so suddenly that
Nick was interrupted in what he was about to say; and she seized a rope
that hung from the ceiling and stood with her hand upon it, grasping it.
"If I pull this rope," she said coldly, "as many of my followers as hear
it will rush to this place. You know what is likely to happen then if I
loose them upon you. They are all like wild beasts, or like dogs, ready
to tear each other at the slightest provocation. If I should point my
finger at you--so--and say to them, 'Take him; he is yours,' your life
would not be worth as much as the dregs in your coffee cup. Tell me,
what that name was, or I will summon the men."
The detective shrugged his shoulders, and leaned back in his chair,
smiling.
"It would be a foolish and a useless proceeding," he said calmly. "I
should not tell them that name any more than I tell it to you. I will
not tell it. It is of no moment here. It could do you no good to hear
it, and to mention it might do me harm; therefore, I shall not mention
it, no matter how often you order me to do so. It pains me to disobey
you, madam, but you force me into the alternative, and I have no choice.
Pull the rope if you will."
Instead of pulling it, she released it, still staring at him, and she
returned slowly to her chair.
"You are a strange man," she murmured, "and a brave one. There is not
another who would dare to defy me as you have done."
"Perhaps there is not another who has so much at stake," he replied
quietly, but with perfect truth, as the reader knows.
Again she knit her brows in perplexity; again the detective knew that
she was concentrating her mind upon that incident at the prefecture,
trying with all her power to recall the merest detail of it.
Nick remembered that his name had been mentioned aloud at that time; he
recalled the fact that Goron, in rising to shake hands with him, had
called him by name plainly enough. It was evident that she also
remembered that much of the facts, and was now straining every energy
she possessed to recall what that name was.
And while she thought so deeply, her face gradually assumed an
expressionless cast. She closed her lips firmly together. Her eyes
became sombre. She seemed oblivious of his presence, and of her
surroundings. For the moment she was back again in Paris, at the
prefecture, in the presence of Goron, five years ago.
After a little, without another change of expression, she shrugged her
shoulders, and rose from her chair, and then, with an assumption of
carelessness, she passed from the room upon the piazza, saying as she
went:
"Come. We will not bother any more about this for the present. We will
take up the subject again another time, after we have both had
opportunity to think it over. If you care for a cigar, Dago, there are
some in that cupboard yonder. Help yourself."
Now, it happened that Nick did care for a cigar. He had not had one in
many a day, but had forced himself to be content with an old pipe. The
prospect of a cigar was enticing, and so he took her at her word, and
helped himself--turning his back to her as he did so, and so he did not
see the strange smile which crossed her face as she passed through the
door upon the piazza.
He was a bit puzzled by this sudden change in her attitude and manner.
He could not exactly account for it. Had she remembered? He could not
tell.
He realized, however, that he was in a predicament--that his position
was precarious; for if she should remember--if she should recall the
name of Nick Carter as connected with that incident, he knew that his
own life would not be worth the snap of a finger, no matter how bravely
he might fight, or how many of the foe he should overcome in the contest
that would inevitably follow.
For, scattered about in that stronghold in the swamp, there were no less
than a hundred of her followers, and there was not one among them who
would not kill at her bidding.
She was standing upon the piazza, looking away through the woods, when
he came out, and, without turning her head, she said to him: