The tall figure of Fräulein Volkmann came into the lavatory. With utter incredulity in my soul I put a hand over her mouth and my knee behind her knees, and pulled her back against the wall.…
In my romantic, sheltered life I had, I suppose, come to look on women as frailer, gentler creatures than men … This was my disillusioning.
Fräulein Volkmann reacted with the violence of a wrestler, thumping her head against my jaw, biting at my hand, jabbing with her elbows. I almost lost her.
Jane had squeezed in, bolted the door after her.
“Right pocket!” I snapped.
The German girl fought her mouth half free, gave a scream which was stifled as Jane thrust a glove in her mouth. In the tiny space there was no room. Volkmann twisted, pulling Jane with her, thrust her knees against the wall and kicked. At that moment in self defence I forgot she was a woman, and hit her hard somewhere about the kidneys, at the same time throwing my whole weight on her so that she gave at the knees. My shins were scarified with her high heels. Twice I hit her again, while Jane dragged from my pockets the bandages that had been round my hands, and began to tie her ankles, then a tough gag with her gloves.
Somebody was sobbing for breath: it took time for me to realise I was making the noise myself. It was as if my civilised, logical brain was sobbing for something lost. A skin of reason shed.
I watched her and held her while Jane tied her hands and elbows and knees. She went on struggling, her green eyes like daggers while she fought.
“You go on,” Jane said breathlessly. “I can do the rest.”
“She may get free. She’s—very strong.”
“She won’t! Hurry! Every second …”
I straggled upright painfully in die confined space. My hands were bleeding again, but this time where they had been bittern. Jane would have to stay here all the time. It was the only solutions, for the lavatory door could no: be locked from the outside. At least she would be out of what was to happen next.
I listened, carefully opened the door, slipped out. The door clicked behind me. There was no one near. A man was moving away up the corridor.
The train whistled and we rushed into the St. Gotthard tunnel.
Chapter Nineteen
There were two people in the first-class corridor. One was the S.S. guard, standing legs apart and hands in pockets, swaying with the train. The other, at the far end, was Andrews, beared in his ski clothes, a haversack still belted across his shoulders. The S.S. guard turned suspiciously as he saw me come into the corridor but was just too late to catch the nod I gave Andrews. I stared out of the window; a lantern now and then flashed past in the tunnel.
How long was the tunnel: ten minutes?
When I looked again Dwight was there too. They spoke to each other and Andrews laughed. They started moving down the corridor towards the Black Guard, Dwight some way behind Andres.
The corridor was not wide, and as Andrews reached the German he excused himself and evidently made some joke about his bulk. The German did not smile but drew back against the door of the compartment, his hand on the pistol holster at his side. Then Andrews hit him, with a knuckleduster, so quickly that I could not follow the blow. With one hand the S.S. man took out his revolver and with the other flung up an arm in a reflex action to fend off the blow that had already landed. He gave at the knees, blood spurting from his mouth.
Andrews caught him. As he did so Dwight slid past, thrust aside the door of the compartment and went in. There were two thuds, half smothered by the entombed rattle of the train, then quite distinctly the report of another revolver.
Andrews swung round and into the compartment. I was about to follow, intending to drag with me the body of the S.S. man slumped on the floor, when the door of the next compartment slid open and a middle-aged grey-bearded Swiss looked out.
“Was that—I thought I——” He stopped at sight of the unconscious man.
We stared at each other. He retreated into his compartment. I followed and was just in time to pull him out of reach of the communication cord. Losing all restraint and half blind with fear, I twisted at his collar until his face went purple, then relaxed the grip and felt in his pocket for something to gag him. He shouted, but I lifted my hands in such a manner that the cry died in his throat. In my memory now was the sound of a dry cracking noise—it might have been another pistol shot.
Someone was standing in the door. Andrews: a revolver with a silencer tube in his hand: perhaps that sort of expression was in my eyes too.
“Who is the man?”
“He heard the shot.”
“Bring him next door. Wait. The S.S. man first.”
I waited. In a minute he was back, sweat dewing round his nose and beard.
“Now!”
I half dragged the Swiss to his feet and thrust him out into the corridor. At the sight of Andrews’s revolver he had gone paper-white as if he was going to faint.
I should have feared what I would see in the next compartment but now I had no ordinary feelings left.
The S.S. guard was lying bunched up on one seat. Sitting almost across his feet was the little secretary, glasses broken, a bleeding purple bruise on one cheek. Opposite him and covering him with a revolver sat Dwight.
The big off-side window was right down, and cold air was rushing in like a vacuum from the screaming darkness outside. There was no sign of Dr von Riehl. His hat lay trodden under the seat, and on the seat were his wallet, his pocket book, same papers, a dispatch case. A smear of blood streaked the cushion of the seat; there was a wet stain on the floor. But Dr von Riehl had gone. He was gone.
Dwight’s mouth was twitching and twitching.
“Shut the door behind you,” said Andrews, “ and help me off with this!” In German he added: “I’ll kill the first one who moves!”
I shut the door and helped him with his knaspack. Inside were fine strong cord, ready-made gags, little wedges.
These he used at once, slipping them under the door so that it could not be opened from outside. Then he snatched up the cord and began to bind the three prisoners. He seemed to put an extra viciousness into tying up the secretary, so that the meek little man flinched with every pull. While they were being trussed up, Dwight was going through von Riehl’s wallet, pocket book and dispatch case, sifting through the contents of each, tearing documents and papers into tiny pieces and letting them fly out of the window. The revolver lay on the seat beside him.
When two had been bound and gagged Andrews said: “ Now. Tell Jane and bring the woman here.”
“We need your help for that,” I said. “Or Dwight’s. We need look-outs.”
He paused and stared at me. “ I’ll come. Found anything, Dwight?”
“Yes.” said Dwight. I could see him struggling not to cough.
We tied up the Black Guard. The man was still bleeding from the mouth, and I think his jaw was broken. It is difficult gagging a man in that condition but we had to do it, hoping he would not suffocate.
Andrews looked at his watch. “ Four minutes of the tunnel left. Gome on. We must leave at the next station: it’ll be in about eight minutes.”
We moved the wedges and left the compartment, went down the corridor, squeezed back to allow a couple of well-dressed ladies to pass, keeping our eyes down. I went ahead and came to the next carriage and the lavatory door behind which Jane and Fräulein Volkmann were hidden.
A man was waiting outside.
I stopped in utter dismay. It was an effort to keep my breath even, the muscles of my face still. The man glanced at me, went on with his cigarette. Andrews squeezed past us both, stopped a couple of yards away looking out of the window, leaving it to me.
I swallowed a lump of something and said to the stranger in German: “ I hope you will pardon me, but I think you will find a lavatory vacant in the next carriage.”
He took the cigarette from his mouth and stared again, a fussy, well-dressed man.
“Oh? But I have been waiting
here several minutes.” He spoke Swiss-German and clearly thought I was trying to cheat him of his turn.
“I’m indeed sorry.” I tried to smile, but only my lips turned, like a smile on a death-mask. “ You see … it is my wife who is inside. She is a very poor traveller and suffers from train sickness. She may be there half an hour.”
“Oh.” He was still non-committal, but after looking me up and down again he evidently thought I was not the sort of man to stoop to deception over so small a matter. “In that case … thank you … I will take your advice.”
“Thank you,” I said, with a rush of gratitude.
He drew at his cigarette and leaned against the window rail in a friendly way.
“My mother,” he said, “ was always a very bad traveller. Sea, rail or even carriage—any movement would upset her. It was a great disadvantage until, quite late in life, she went to a specialist in Zürich. He advised her to wear a belt.”
We came out of the St. Gotthard tunnel. The wild countryside showed up under the first glimmer of the rising moon.
“The specialist said—and I pass it on to you, mein Herr, for what it is worth—he said that ninety per cent of all travel sickness is dbe to insufficient support of the stomach and diaphragm. Any slight disturbance of the equilibrium, in susceptible persons …”
I looked at Andrews, who was looking at his watch. He had over-estimated the length of time we had left. And there was a smear of blood drying on his sleeve.
“On application of the belt … you get the support that is lacking. It binds the stomach and diaphragm. My mother …”
“I’m afraid,” I said, “I must ask you——”
He moved a step, then came back. “ My mother, I know, recommended this treatment in at least five different cases, and in only one do I know of a definite failure. And in that case …”
‘I must go and see my wife,” I interrupted, and tapped twice on the door. “I … know you will excuse me.”
“Of course. Naturally. I can see you are worried. But do not forget to recommend this expedient to her. Urge her to try it, for I assure you——”
There was a click as the door was unbolted.
“Sometimes it takes effect immediately; sometimes——”
“Thank you. I’ll remember.”
“And you will be saved the needless worry——”
I squeezed into the lavatory and bolted the door again. In here nothing had changed. The German girl was still on her knees, the gag in her mouth. She looked up sharply when I came in. Jane was standing behind the door. The sweat was dripping off my forehead on to my hands.
“Well?”
I nodded, not trusting my voice.
“Has everything—happened as it should?”
I nodded again. “ But there is a man outside, I couldn’t get rid of him. He may not have gone yet.” I was taking deep breaths, trying to control myself.
The train went into another tunnel. You could feel the carriage banking to the sweeping curve. Some of these tunnels made a complete spiral in the rock. I forced myself to wait half a minute. Urgency had left a taste like cold copper in my mouth.
“Now,” I said to Jane.
I unbolted the door and slipped out. Thank God the man had gone. Andrews had not moved. But coming down the corridor towards him was a Swiss railway official.
I wondered if he was examining tickets …
He squeezed past Andrews and as he did so said something. Andrews courteously replied.
He passed me. “ Please to remember that black-out regulations are still in force.”
“Thank you,” I said.
Was he going into all the carriages? As he went on through the connecting door and down the first-class corridor I waited for a shout of discovery.
None came. I went after him and peered down the first-class corridor. He had passed on and the corridor was empty. I came back and gestured to Andrews, who nodded back. I pushed open the lavatory door.
“Now,” I said. “ Take her legs. I’ll take her shoulders.”
In the cramped space it was horribly difficult to lift a dead weight. Then as soon as we got Fräulein Volkmann upright she began to jerk and struggle like a corpse suddenly galvanised with electric shocks.
Jane grabbed her feet and we tried to get her out The German woman hooked her elbows round the door so that the door swung with us and jammed us half out I kicked the door with my foot, but she twisted herself to hang on to it. She was rubbing her face against the wall to get her gag away.
“Quickly!” said Andrews behind me.
The train was beginning to slow down.
Andrews grabbed the woman’s legs and tugged, and we came out through the door with a jerk that must almost have dislocated her shoulder.
We had to navigate past two closed compartments whose occupants I had not seen. We did this somehow. At the third, which had been occupied by the Swiss gentleman, Fräulein Volkmann bent her knees suddenly and kicked with her bound feet at the glass. A second kick would have shattered it, but Andrews hit her—only once—and she suddenly went limp.
We were almost in the station.
Andrews slid back the door of the reserved compartment and we straggled in. Dwight still sat with his revolver on the seat beside him, methodically destroying the last of the papers. Somehow he had got some fresh blood on his hand. The three prisoners were where we had left them, except that the S.S. guard was recovering consciousness and groaning.
Andrews jumped across the carriage and thrust up the window; the blind fell back into place as we came to a stop.
I wedged the corridor door from the inside. “Well? …”
There was a brief silence as if we were all trying separately to estimate our chances of getting off here. The S.S. guard recovering, the woman not too securely tied.…
“Too late,” said Andrews. “We’ve got to wait till the next.”
“Go on, old boy,” Dwight said. “ You can manage it. I’ll attend to the filly.”
“Don’t talk foolish,” said Andrews. “Have you finished the papers?”
Fräulein Volkmann was stirring again. He had hit her somewhere on the neck.
After all the noise the station was strangely silent. The air was rarefied, quiet. Dwight wiped the back of his hand across his mouth and beard, and when it came away there was more blood on it.
“Go on!” said Dwight. “Don’t be a cow. Next one may be too late.”
“Jane,” said Andrews, “tie up that woman, or she’ll make trouble.”
Jane went instantly to his rucksack and took out fresh cord. Her own hair was over her face as if she had been out in a gale.
“Mencken,” said Andrews, and gestured.
I went at once to Dwight. “You have been wounded?”
Dwight sneered. “ Get out, you fool, while the going’s good! This luck won’t last much longer.”
“Where are you hit?”
“In the back if it satisfies you. Where else would that little runt of a secretary shoot you? I didn’t reckon he would be carrying a gun …”
The secretary cringed back against the seat, short-sighted eyes staring. Andrews had gone to help Jane with Volkmann. As she recovered, the German girl’s eyes went round the carriage, looking for someone who was not there, and for a second her eyes met mine. I do not know if she guessed what had happened, but they were cold with hate.
I pulled Dwight’s coat off, and dragged up his blue polo sweater and shirt, both of which were stained but not sodden.
The train began to move.
“Well?” said Andrews.
I pursed my lips.
“Go on, don’t you know the difference between a doctor of
chemistry and a doctor of medicine?” Dwight jeered at his friend.
“I can tell yon—without his advice. I’ve wasted my damned money
on a return ticket.”
Andrews looked at me. I shrugged. I thought most of the bleeding
was inte
rnal. Yet if there had been much loss of colour in his face,
the sunburn and the beard concealed it.
“Could do with a drop of brandy,” Dwight said to me.
“No, it’s the worst thing.”
“The worst thing’s happened, old man. Be your age.”
I looked at Andrews, who shrugged.
Dwight said: “You ought to have bloody got out then. False
heroics—in this game. Lot of ninnies. Good God—thought you’d
more sense, Andrews!”
The bullet looked as if it had gone into the left lung just under
the shoulder-blade. It had probably lodged in one of the ribs in
the front of the cage.
“That haversack,” Dwight said. “Take it or—destroy it. Nothing
else here matters. Anyway, it’s been a good gallop.”
“What about von Riehl’s papers?” Andrews asked.
Dwight shifted and wiped his mouth again with the back of his
hand. “All gone. Gone with the wind. Confetti-size pieces. Thought
it better—in case we didn’t get away with them.”
Andrews said to me: “Give him the brandy.”
Jane handed me a flask and I passed it to Dwight who only just
got it to his lips.
Andrews said to me: “How long d’you think?”
I shook my head. “I don’t know.”
“Your job’s done, Dr Mencken.”
I stared round the vibrating carriage, at the four captive figures, and at the empty belongings of the man who was no longer there. Every time, I seemed to meet Fräulein Volkmann’s hate-ridden, accusing eyes.
“And yours,” I said to Andrews.
“Mine is never done. What passport are you carrying?”
“Both.”
I was about to add more, but he glanced warningly at the three Germans. These were the witnesses to our deed. These two men and a woman—not to mention the innocent Swiss—would spread our description and wat we had done all over Europe. If we had only been sufficiently ruthless to destroy them all our chances of escape would be enormously greater.
The same idea must have been in Andrews’s mind for some time. He was watching me with a cynical, bitter glint in his eyes.