The Adventure of Anna the Great

Chapter XII - After the Fox!

  The marquis sent me ahead to the stable, to see if Tybalt’s horse was still there. Regis was there, and there was no sign yet of Tybalt. I then went to saddle the marquis’ horse, as I had been instructed to do. That done, I went, as I had not been instructed, to get my own bridle.

  Before I could get it, Tybalt entered the stable, and I had to hide. He was very quiet. I could not hear him at all, but I could see him move in and out of the shadows. He had his horse saddled quickly, and soon led him out. Regis himself made little noise, for a miracle.

  The instant Tybalt was gone I saw another shadow move. The marquis. He went to his own horse, pulling the animal quietly from its stall. I slipped into the tack room and got my bridle, hoping I would not be too late to follow them. I knew I did not have time to get my saddle, so I slipped onto Jupiter’s back right there in the stall.

  I paused in the yard, listening to hear which way they went. There were many more sounds than I had noticed before at night, but presently I picked out the clip clop of a horse at a trot. I rode in that direction, south, and saw a grey horse and rider, Tybalt, heading east down the park road. He was at quite a distance already, but I could hear the hoof beats ring out on the hard road surface.

  I did not see the marquis right away. He was much closer, and rode at a walk on the dirt to the side of the road. He was sitting tall, watching the man on the grey, and waiting. He then must have judged that Tybalt had enough distance, for he suddenly urged his mount to a good road trot. It was only then that I could hear his faint hoof beats, for the softness of the earth had made the slower pace inaudible.

  They were going along the park. I realized that I could cut across it without being seen, and the sod would muffle my sounds.

  I waited until Tybalt was at a very dim distance, and cantered onto the park. The trees and bushes broke up my view of the road but they also made me hard to see. I chose a path relatively far from the road so they could not hear me, and broke into a gallop. After a fair distance I slowed and quietly returned to the road. I hid myself in the bushes and looked out. Tybalt was not far ahead. He crested a hill just then, pausing at the top, and disappeared behind it. I looked back and saw the marquis had picked up his pace.

  I did not like the way Tybalt had stopped at the top of that hill. It was almost as if he were listening for the marquis’ hoof beats. I pulled back from the bushes and ran ahead to just beyond the crest. On the other side Tybalt had stopped and waited at the side of the road, watching patiently. Checking to see if he was being followed. I slipped back to warn the marquis.

  I came out of the woods with the hill between me and Tybalt to shield any sound. I waved frantically and the marquis pulled his big bay to a halt.

  “Albert!” he said quietly. “What are you doing here?”

  “Tybalt’s waiting for you on the other side of that hill,” I said.

  “Oh, he is, is he?” He looked askance at me.

  “I thought you might need help, so I came up the park,” I explained.

  “Would it do any good to send you home?” he asked.

  “No,” I said.

  “Then you’ll keep well behind me,” he replied. “As far as I keep from him. When I want you to come up I’ll signal you with my arm over my head, and to stay back, I’ll wave out to the side. Got that?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “And mind you, you listen when I tell you to stay back.”

  “I will.” I only wanted to see what was happening.

  The marquis went with me back to the park. We watched until Tybalt had given up his watch, no doubt still somewhat wary. The marquis liked my idea of galloping up the park. He used it himself, having me stay behind to see that Tybalt did not turn off while the marquis was running ahead.

  Tybalt seemed to be dallying a while, still trying to catch anyone following him. Then he apparently gave that up. At the end of the park he took up a faster pace, raising out of his saddle and heading across country. I ran to Jupiter and watched him shoot across the field. The gray flank of Regis was easy to see in the darkness. The marquis appeared only as Tybalt vanished in the distance, a small black figure setting a furious pace.

  I did as he bid me, and only just kept him in sight. That was hard enough, for Tybalt was running hard. Unlike Regis, the marquis’ horse was bay and hard to see in the dark. Tybalt was up to no tricks anymore, however. He made a bee line across the back of the park and northwest. It was a good thing for me. Had he not gone in a straight line I would have lost them altogether. As it was I lost sight of the marquis’ tail only to come up on the main road north and see him ahead, riding slower and entering a small village.

  By the time I reached the village he had come to a stop. He put out a hand for me to stop, and looked about, as if bewildered. He had lost the scent. He gestured for me to come and pointed down a street. I rode down it cautiously, while he took another. I saw no sign of our quarry. After searching a short while we met again in the square in front of the village church. The marquis bit his lip and shook his head.

  “He disappeared somewhere in here,” he said. We sat a moment casting about for a way we had not checked.

  “Do you think this was another trick to lose us?” I said.

  “Could be.”

  Something moved by the church. I tugged the marquis’ sleeve and pointed. Slowly he moved around to see better.

  “His horse,” he whispered, dismounting. I dismounted and took his reins. From beside him I could see Regis tied near the back of the church, by the north transept, but there was no other sign of Tybalt.

  “Take the horses to the other side and keep to the shadows,” he said, taking a pistol from his saddlebag. “And wait for me.”

  I did as I was told, though I was itching to follow him inside. Horses need to be held, and I held them. He, in the meantime, crept soundlessly to the main doors and disappeared inside.

  The church itself was not much, an old village church which aspired to cathedraldom, at least in architecture. I waited by the south transept for five minutes, which seemed interminable. There was a ring and post right in front of me. It was made for tying horses, and me not being one to resist temptation very hard, I tied the horses there and left.

  The door to the transept was locked, but the front door was still ajar. I slipped into the darkness, covering my eyes for a moment to help them get accustomed more quickly. I still could see little. I crept up the center, hugging the pews. There was more light up near the altar, with the candles.

  There was no one to be seen. Still I kept low and crept further. I came at last to the end of the pews where I could look down the transept at each side.

  The marquis was there, pressed back against a pillar and looking down the south transept. A door was ajar beyond him and a light could be seen behind it. There were faint sounds coming from that room. The marquis began to walk cautiously toward it.

  From my position behind the first pew I could not see very clearly, but just across the transept hall, in front and to one side of the altar, was an octagonal pulpit. It was raised some eight feet above the floor, and offered an excellent view of the entire church, including the door with the light behind it. I crept as quietly as I could and climbed its small stair.

  The door below me moved, and the marquis slipped back into the shadow. Tybalt emerged, closing the door behind him. As he came forward I could see him smile. He walked right by my pulpit. I cold have reached down and grabbed his curly hair. That would certainly have surprised him, but it would have surprised the marquis too, and in the long run I could not see that it would do any good.

  “Hold still, Stenbau,” the marquis called just then. His voice boomed across the hall. It was a small church and not all stone, but the effect was still rather good.

  Tybalt twisted and jumped back. He crouched like a cat and looked for where the voice was coming from. The marquis
stepped into the light, his gun leveled at Tybalt’s heart.

  “Drop that pistol, please,” he said. “Slowly.”

  Tybalt hesitated, then he carefully obeyed.

  “That’s right,” said the marquis. “Now kick it over here.”

  The pistol skittered across the stone and disappeared into the darkness. The marquis relaxed, slightly.

  “Now,” he said. “What are you doing here?”

  “What else?” answered Tybalt. “Worshipping.

  “Worshipping the Devil.”

  “To each his own.”

  “Let’s take a look in that room.”

  “Be my guest,” said Tybalt, chuckling.

  “You lead the way.”

  Tybalt bowed and moved out broadly, rather carelessly. The marquis followed and as the two figures came together Tybalt lurched. There was a struggle and then a bang and a flash. The bang was so loud it filled the church and the two figures came apart.

  Neither was apparently hurt by the shot, but the marquis had lost his gun. Now he had his sword in hand. Tybalt drew his own instantly, and for a moment the two faced one another. Then Tybalt made a wild attack. It was only to clear the ground for an escape, but the marquis stood his ground and Tybalt could only flee up the stair to the choir. The marquis quickly followed.

  Soon I heard them struggling in the choir above me. I could see nothing, though, except I thought once there was a glint of steel.

  Suddenly something dark flew out over my head. A human figure, I could not tell who it was, dropped to the pulpit and flattened me.

  “Ow!” I said as I hit the stone parapet. A sabre blade flashed by my ear and now rested on my shoulder.

  “Damn!” It was Tybalt whom I tangled with. “Ah, Pipsqueak!” He was sitting on my right knee, with one boot very nearly in my face, and the other somehow tucked under my knee, the same knee he was sitting on. I pushed his foot away from my face and tried to get up, and could not. Then he tried to get up and could not.

  “Albert? Where are you?” The marquis was directly above us, leaning over. Tybalt finally struggled to his feet and vaulted down the stairs. I grabbed a hold of his foot as he went. I heard him curse as he fell and his sword clattered to the floor. Then I had to throw myself on top of him, for the marquis was now leaping to the pulpit and I did not want to be flattened by his bulk as well.

  Tybalt was already up and moving by the time I jumped. I only bumped past him and rolled to the foot of the stair. He jumped over me and ran to retrieve his sword. He was limping, I noted with satisfaction. The marquis leapt over me, nearly stepping on me in the darkness. I began to see what it was like to fall off the front runner in a horse race.

  Tybalt had disappeared when I got up and the marquis was halfway down the aisle looking for him among the pews. I rubbed the back of my head, which had received a sharp crack in my tumble, and sat on the steps.

  The marquis started to turn back toward me, and Tybalt suddenly rose up just behind him, sword raised to strike.

  “Look out!” I yelled, and the marquis turned in time to parry. Then they fought. I still could not see them well in the darkness, but I saw well enough. Tybalt was a bit of slapdash motion, harder to see, but easier to identify. The marquis was steady and determined. He was winning, too. Tybalt was hampered by his limp. They seemed to get dimmer, their forms obscured more yet by a blur of darkness. I rubbed my head again. A haze was building between myself and them, and I wondered how bad a knock I had got. I was not dizzy, but the haze got worse. Then I noticed the smell.

  “Fire!” I shouted, jumping up. “Fire!”

  My shout broke up the fight. The marquis paused and turned, and Tybalt fled.

  The haze was heavy in the south transept, but through it I could see a glowing line. The fire was behind the door Tybalt had come from. The marquis ran to it but was driven back by the smoke. I ran down the aisle to the bell tower near the front door.

  In the darkness I could make out three large ropes. I took a running leap at the nearest one. The deep clang shook the room, and the weight of the bell pulled me up in the air. I swung back and forth, clanging it some more. The marquis joined me in a moment and rang another bell, but after that he grabbed me by the waist and dragged me out into the open.

  People were already coming. The town was awake and I could see windows lighting faintly in all directions. Lanterns were swinging toward us like drunken lightning bugs.

  Among the first to arrive was Tybalt. He had the pastor and the town constable with him, and they were backed up already by a brigade of sturdy, bucket equipped citizens. Tybalt was talking while the others listened.

  “. . . I smelled the smoke and I . . . Oh! I forgot to tell you about the thief!” he said as he spotted us. “When I went in to put the fire out I was attacked by a thief. He may have started it.”

  “A thief?” asked the constable.

  “Oh dear,” said the priest.

  “There may have been two of them,” Tybalt continued.

  “That was no thief,” said the marquis, stepping up to them. “And you weren’t trying to put out the fire.”

  “Why! The Marquis von Furlenhaur!” said Tybalt, turning in surprise. “Was it you? I took you for a thief.”

  “You knew very well who it was.”

  “I’m sorry but I didn’t.” He acted as if he were astonished. “I beg your pardon. The light was so bad. This is the Marquis von Furlenhaur, Father,” he turned to the priest, “He’s certainly no thief.”

  “Certainly not,” said the constable quickly, “but my lord....”

  “I’m not,” agreed the marquis, “but this man is. I just now caught him at mischief in there.”

  “Come now, Furlenhaur,” said Tybalt. “Just because I mistook you for a thief, there’s no need to be a bad sport.”

  “You didn’t mistake me.”

  “I did, sir. Honestly I did.”

  “My Lords!” said the constable. “There’s time for quarrelling later. Let’s save the church first?”

  That could not be argued with. The fire was not yet so big that most of the church could not be saved. The marquis and the constable set to organizing the bucket brigade. I was put at the tail end, at the fountain filling buckets with two village boys. Tybalt, not to be outdone, flew by with a troop of housewives, equipped with wet brooms and sacks to beat out the flames. The flames, though, were burning upward, beyond their reach, and the smoke inside was too thick for the bucket brigade.

  Then another brigade arrived, men carrying great hooks, twenty feet long. They lifted these hooks to the flaming timbers and pulled the wreckage down. On the ground the women descended to slap out the embers and the bucket brigade was soon able to throw water into the building through the holes made in the walls.

  Filling the buckets was hard work, especially after the wild day I had had. After a while I could no longer lift them out of the fountain by myself. Neither could the other boys. We had to team up.

  The fire was finally out. Smoke hung all through the town like stinking fog. Our clothes and hair were soaked with it and our eyes and noses stung. Superficial damage extended throughout the church, but the only structural damage was confined to the transept itself.

  While the townspeople milled about to inspect the ruins, I went to find the marquis. I saw Tybalt huddled with the town constable and the priest. They were deep in conversation and the constable was nodding and writing things down.

  “Albert!” The marquis was behind me. “There you are. Have you seen that constable?”

  I pointed across to Tybalt’s group.

  “Ah,” said the marquis. “Getting his story in quick, isn’t he?”

  The marquis went to the constable and drew him aside. I followed.

  “Terrible accident, my lord,” said the constable, turning a page in his notebook and waiting for the marquis to speak.

  “That was no
accident, I’m certain,” said the marquis.

  “I thought you might say that,” said the constable with a sigh. “All right. What is your story? My lord.”

  “Tybalt Stenbau started it, probably purposefully,” he replied, ignoring the sigh. “I followed him here, knowing he was up to some mischief.”

  “You followed him, you say?” There was something a bit sarcastic in the constable’s voice. “So you heard beforehand he was going to set fire our church?”

  “No,” said the marquis. “I did not actually know what he was going to do.”

  “But you saw him start it?”

  “I saw him come out of the room where it started.”

  “But you didn’t actually see him set the fire.”

  “No.”

  “I see,” said the constable, and he began to put away his notebook.

  “He was in that room just before it started,” said the marquis, a bit flustered.

  “Or just after,” said the constable. “My lord, Father Teller himself started the fire. He’s done it before. He’s too thrifty to throw out that bad lantern, and too forgetful to remember to blow it out.”

  “Constable, I was there,” insisted the marquis.

  “I know you were there,” said the constable, suddenly impatient. “And I know he was there too. But begging your pardon, my lord, I do wish you people would keep your aristocrat feuds at the palace where they belong. Don’t bring them out here.”

  “I didn’t bring it out here,” said the marquis. “He did.”

  “Perhaps so,” answered the constable. “And I’ll admit to you that I thought he was a liar from the first, but can you promise the funds to rebuild the church?”

  “Can I?”

  “He has. Through his uncle, Prince Hugo.”

  “So that’s it.”

  “Yes, that’s it,” said the constable. “I would arrest him for you, if you insisted, but he’s gone, and it would not do this town any good, and that’s what I’m pledged to protect.”

  “Gone?” said the marquis. Tybalt had been talking with the priest, but now the priest stood alone, contemplating his church. “But you can’t be sure that he’ll carry through on such a promise, or even if Hugo will agree.”

  “Hugo has been good to this town,” said the constable stubbornly. He rubbed the soot off his forehead and knitted his brow. “What would that young man want with our church, anyway?”

  “That’s what I want to know,” said the marquis. “I’d like to speak with Father Teller, if I may.”

  “Certainly,” said the constable.

  Father Teller stood among the charred timbers and smoke half smiling. He saddened when he saw us.

  “An old man’s folly,” he said, shaking his head. “I have such a poor memory any more, and it was so careless of me to leave that lamp burning.”

  “If you have such a poor memory, Father,” said the marquis, “how can you be sure you did leave it burning.”

  “This didn’t start itself,” he said, gesturing at the ruins.

  “No, I’m sure it didn’t,” said the marquis. “That’s why I want to talk to you.”

  “Oh, dear,” said the priest apprehensively.

  “I’d like to know what was lost. What was in that room where it started?”

  “My office? Well, quite a few things. My desk, for instance. It was rather valuable. Sentimentally too, you know. It belonged to Bishop Rank many years ago. Oh!” The priest suddenly put his hand to his head. “His memoirs! I’d forgotten. He was pastor here long ago—twenty years? Perhaps twenty-five. He left us all his papers recently. They were kept in that room.”

  “What sort of things were in them?” asked the marquis. “Anything of importance?”

  “Anything of importance? They dealt with just about everything that’s happened in Lifbau, and elsewhere, for the past twenty years or more. He was a friend of Prince Hugo, you know. Perhaps that’s why he will help us now. A saintly man, the prince. Very pious.”

  “Very pious indeed,” said the marquis with a sigh. “What else was lost?”

  “The parish records, of course, or at least some of them. The very oldest records were stored away in the archive, but the last ten or fifteen years. Let’s see, they covered our finances, and births, deaths and weddings. And baptisms, of course. Oh, and my papers were in there too. The were only important to me, though. I need them to refresh my memory.”

  We could discover little else of what was lost. The priest promised to write if he thought of anything, but he doubted he would. Soon we found ourselves going back to the palace.

  “I have failed, Albert,” said the marquis as we rode along. “That man runs rampant, and I sit as if my hands were tied.”

  “You didn’t know he was going to set fire to the church.”

  “You see how destructive he is?” continued the marquis. “You see what I mean?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “It’s not just in this sort of thing, either. It’s in this whole business of flaunting the rules. That’s partly your problem too, Albert. Not all rules may seem fair, or important, but break one of them and you damage them all. Now, that man is bent on breaking them all. He’s a danger to the whole of society.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “I should have had him arrested. I should have the whole countryside looking for him.”

  “But what about the lady?” I asked.

  “Yes, her.”

  “Now we know she’s alive. We can’t risk that they’ll kill her.”

  “You’re right, of course. I wonder what he was after?”

  “The church records?”

  “Or the bishop’s records. You know, Albert,” he said, turning to look at me. “Do you remember when Bishop Rank died?”

  I shook my head.

  “It was about a year ago. He was fond of shellfish, the bishop was. He used to have it brought in from Italy, fresh. Some of it went bad on him. How easy do you think it would be to make sure the shellfish went bad?”

  “Very easy?”

  “I would think so. I was suspicious of that at the time.”

  “So the bishop may have been murdered. And the lady may know about it!”

  “It’s possible,” said the marquis. “Albert, he wasn’t just fond of shellfish, he was fond of opera. That’s how he came to be friends with Hugo, and Duke Sigmond.”

  “They were talking about having taken care of the only witness, they must have been talking about the lady,” I said. “The bishop’s papers may have some clue to the murder.”

  “Not have, had. They don’t have any clues to anything now. But it does give us some new possibilities to consider.”