is all.”
“All?” T.B.’s eyebrows rose. “All? But you have not explained the whereabouts of Lolo?”
The prisoner was frankly puzzled.
“Lolo?” he repeated. “M’sieur, I do not understand.”
It was T.B.’s turn to be astonished.
“But the rendezvous — there was to be some rendezvous where the ship would come to pick up any member of the Nine who might become detached.”
The man shook his head, and at that moment an idea occurred to T.B. He drew from his pocket a copy of Baggin’s little “cross with the nobs,” as it had been named at Scotland Yard.
“Do you know this?” he asked.
The man looked at it, and smiled.
“Yes — Poltavo drew that for me on the last occasion I met him in Paris.”
“What does it mean?”
Again the prisoner shook his head.
“I do not know,” he said simply. “Poltavo was telling me something of his plans. He drew the cross and was beginning to explain its meaning, and then for some reason he stopped, crumpled up the paper, and threw it into the fireplace. At the time I attached some importance to it, and, after he had gone, I rescued it, but—”
“You don’t understand it?”
“I don’t,” said the man, and T.B. knew that he spoke the truth.
31. The Flight
It must have been whilst Poltavo was in Paris that the ruling spirit of the Maria Braganza discovered that Count Poltavo was indispensable, and that strange reconciliation occurred. Through what agency Baggin and he came into touch is not known. It is generally supposed that the warship ventured close to the French or Spanish coast and sent a message of good will flickering through space, and that some receiving station, undiscovered and undemolished — there must have been a score of such stations — received it, and transmitted it to Poltavo.
News of him came to Smith from Van Ingen, who, following a faint clue of the Spanish dancer, had gone to Tangier. Work at the Embassy had become unendurable to him, since the disappearance of the Nine Men had marked also the disappearance of Doris, and despite the expostulations of the ambassador, who was sorely distressed by certain international complications of the situation — for both Baggin and Grayson were Americans — despite also the detective’s blunt advice to let the business alone and return to the Embassy, Van Ingen had set forth on his wild-goose chase.
The afternoon of his arrival, he climbed to the Marshan, the plateau that commands Tangier. Here are villas, in which Moorish, Spanish, and English styles of architecture, struggling for supremacy, have compromised in a conglomerate type. And here, idling along the promenade, scanning every figure as it passed, he had come face to face with Catherine Dominguez.
At his start of surprise, for he had not expected such good fortune, the lady paused, uncertainly. The young man uncovered with a sweeping bow.
“Pardon!” he exclaimed gallantly, in Spanish, “but so often have I seen the lovely face of the ‘Belle Espagnole’ in the newspapers that I recognised it before I was aware!”
Catherine nodded amiably, and, at a word of invitation, Van Ingen fell into step beside her.
That night he cabled to the detective:
POLTAVO IN TANGIER. C. DOMINGUEZ WILL SELL HIS WHEREABOUTS FOR £5,000. VAN INGEN.
To this he received the laconic reply, “Coming.”
The trap which the detective laid, as the Sud Express fled shrieking through the night, was simple. To capture Count Poltavo while the “Mad Terror” remained afloat would be imbecile. But to frighten him by a pseudo-attack out into the open, and then follow him to the Nine — Smith smiled over the commonsense of his little scheme, and fell asleep.
His interview, two mornings later, with Catherine Dominguez was most amiable — both ignored their last meeting — and satisfactory, save in one small particular. Upon reflection, the lady had raised her price. For £10,000 she would divulge her secret. And the detective, after a few protests, acceded to her demands. After all, she ran a certain risk in betraying a man like the count. He thought, grimly, of Hyatt and Moss.
At the conclusion of the conference, he wrote her a check.
She shook her head, smiling.
“I should prefer banknotes,” she said gently. Smith appeared to hesitate. “Very well,” he replied finally. “But, in that case, you must wait until tomorrow. If your information is good — the check will be also.”
She took it from his hand, and he rose.
“Ver’ good, Senor Smit’,” she replied, looking up at him with an engaging smile. “I will trust you.” She fingered the paper absently. Smith looked down at her. Something, he knew, she had left untold, and he waited.
“One small thing I had almost forgot,” she murmured pensively. “Count Poltavo leaves for — Lolo — tonight.”
Catherine Dominguez had not lied. Perhaps, she had some secret grudge against the Nine, whose faithful agent she had been, or perhaps she was tired of obscure flittings, and wished to buy indemnity by confession. The detective never knew. Nevertheless, he felt grateful to her.
*
That night, a slender man, wearing a felt hat and a cappa, descended the steps of one of the villas of the Marshan, and walked through the garden.
There was a man standing in the middle of the white road, his hands in his overcoat pocket, the red glow of his cigar a point of light in the gloom. Farther away, he saw the figures of three horsemen.
“Count Poltavo, I suppose,” drawled a voice — the voice of T.B. Smith. “Put up your hands or you’re a dead man.”
32. Poltavo Leaves Hurriedly
In an instant the road was filled with men; they must have been crouching in the shadow of the grassy plateau, but in that same instant Poltavo had leapt back to the cover of the garden. A revolver banged behind him; and, as he ran, he snatched his own revolver from his pocket, and sent two quick shots into the thick of the surrounding circle. There was another gate at the farther end of the garden; there would be men there, but he must risk it. He was slight and had some speed as a runner; he must depend upon these gifts.
He opened the gate swiftly and sprang out. There were three or four men standing in his path. He shot at one point-blank, dodged the others, and ran. He judged that his pursuers would not know the road as well as he. Shot after shot rang out behind him. He was an easy mark on the white road, and he turned aside and took to the grass.
