CHAPTER XVIII

The Underground Railway

This is the story which I heard later from Mary....

She was at Milan with the new Anglo-American hospital when she got

Blenkiron’s letter. Santa Chiara had always been the place agreed upon,

and this message mentioned specifically Santa Chiara, and fixed a date

for her presence there. She was a little puzzled by it, for she had not

yet had a word from Ivery, to whom she had written twice by the

roundabout address in France which Bommaerts had given her. She did not

believe that he would come to Italy in the ordinary course of things,

and she wondered at Blenkiron’s certainty about the date.

The following morning came a letter from Ivery in which he ardently

pressed for a meeting. It was the first of several, full of strange

talk about some approaching crisis, in which the forebodings of the

prophet were mingled with the solicitude of a lover.

“The storm is about to break,” he wrote, “and I cannot think only of my

own fate. I have something to tell you which vitally concerns yourself.

You say you are in Lombardy. The Chiavagno valley is within easy reach,

and at its head is the inn of Santa Chiara, to which I come on the

morning of March 19th. Meet me there even if only for half an hour, I

implore you. We have already shared hopes and confidences, and I would

now share with you a knowledge which I alone in Europe possess. You

have the heart of a lion, my lady, worthy of what I can bring you.”

Wake was summoned from the _Croce Rossa_ unit with which he was working

at Vicenza, and the plan arranged by Blenkiron was faithfully carried

out. Four officers of the Alpini, in the rough dress of peasants of the

hills, met them in Chiavagno on the morning of the 18th. It was

arranged that the hostess of Santa Chiara should go on a visit to her

sister’s son, leaving the inn, now in the shuttered quiet of

wintertime, under the charge of two ancient servants. The hour of

Ivery’s coming on the 19th had been fixed by him for noon, and that

morning Mary would drive up the valley, while Wake and the Alpini went

inconspicuously by other routes so as to be in station around the place

before midday.

But on the evening of the 18th at the Hotel of the Four Kings in

Chiavagno Mary received another message. It was from me and told her

that I was crossing the Staub at midnight and would be at the inn

before dawn. It begged her to meet me there, to meet me alone without

the others, because I had that to say to her which must be said before

Ivery’s coming. I have seen the letter. It was written in a hand which

I could not have distinguished from my own scrawl. It was not exactly

what I would myself have written, but there were phrases in it which to

Mary’s mind could have come only from me. Oh, I admit it was cunningly

done, especially the love-making, which was just the kind of stammering

thing which I would have achieved if I had tried to put my feelings on

paper. Anyhow, Mary had no doubt of its genuineness. She slipped off

after dinner, hired a carriage with two broken-winded screws and set

off up the valley. She left a line for Wake telling him to follow

according to the plan—a line which he never got, for his anxiety when

he found she had gone drove him to immediate pursuit.

At about two in the morning of the 19th after a slow and icy journey

she arrived at the inn, knocked up the aged servants, made herself a

cup of chocolate out of her tea-basket and sat down to wait on my

coming.

She has described to me that time of waiting. A home-made candle in a

tall earthenware candlestick lit up the little _salle-à-manger_, which

was the one room in use. The world was very quiet, the snow muffled the

roads, and it was cold with the penetrating chill of the small hours of

a March night. Always, she has told me, will the taste of chocolate and

the smell of burning tallow bring back to her that strange place and

the flutter of the heart with which she waited. For she was on the eve

of the crisis of all our labours, she was very young, and youth has a

quick fancy which will not be checked. Moreover, it was I who was

coming, and save for the scrawl of the night before, we had had no

communication for many weeks.... She tried to distract her mind by

repeating poetry, and the thing that came into her head was Keats’s

“Nightingale”, an odd poem for the time and place.

There was a long wicker chair among the furnishings of the room, and

she lay down on it with her fur cloak muffled around her. There were

sounds of movement in the inn. The old woman who had let her in, with

the scent of intrigue of her kind, had brightened when she heard that

another guest was coming. Beautiful women do not travel at midnight for

nothing. She also was awake and expectant.

Then quite suddenly came the sound of a car slowing down outside. She

sprang to her feet in a tremor of excitement. It was like the Picardy

château again—the dim room and a friend coming out of the night. She

heard the front door open and a step in the little hall....

She was looking at Ivery.... He slipped his driving-coat off as he

entered, and bowed gravely. He was wearing a green hunting suit which

in the dusk seemed like khaki, and, as he was about my own height, for

a second she was misled. Then she saw his face and her heart stopped.

“You!” she cried. She had sunk back again on the wicker chair.

“I have come as I promised,” he said, “but a little earlier. You will

forgive me my eagerness to be with you.”

She did not heed his words, for her mind was feverishly busy. My letter

had been a fraud and this man had discovered our plans. She was alone

with him, for it would be hours before her friends came from Chiavagno.

He had the game in his hands, and of all our confederacy she alone

remained to confront him. Mary’s courage was pretty near perfect, and

for the moment she did not think of herself or her own fate. That came

later. She was possessed with poignant disappointment at our failure.

All our efforts had gone to the winds, and the enemy had won with

contemptuous ease. Her nervousness disappeared before the intense

regret, and her brain set coolly and busily to work.

It was a new Ivery who confronted her, a man with vigour and purpose in

every line of him and the quiet confidence of power. He spoke with a

serious courtesy.

“The time for make-believe is past,” he was saying. “We have fenced

with each other. I have told you only half the truth, and you have

always kept me at arm’s length. But you knew in your heart, my dearest

lady, that there must be the full truth between us some day, and that

day has come. I have often told you that I love you. I do not come now

to repeat that declaration. I come to ask you to entrust yourself to

me, to join your fate to mine, for I can promise you the happiness

which you deserve.”

He pulled up a chair and sat beside her. I cannot put down all that he

said, for Mary, once she grasped the drift of it, was busy with her own

thoughts and did not listen. But I gather from her that he was very

candid and seemed to grow as he spoke in mental and moral stature. He

told her who he was and what his work had been. He claimed the same

purpose as hers, a hatred of war and a passion to rebuild the world

into decency. But now he drew a different moral. He was a German: it

was through Germany alone that peace and regeneration could come. His

country was purged from her faults, and the marvellous German

discipline was about to prove itself in the eye of gods and men. He

told her what he had told me in the room at the Pink Chalet, but with

another colouring. Germany was not vengeful or vainglorious, only

patient and merciful. God was about to give her the power to decide the

world’s fate, and it was for him and his kind to see that the decision

was beneficent. The greater task of his people was only now beginning.

That was the gist of his talk. She appeared to listen, but her mind was

far away. She must delay him for two hours, three hours, four hours. If

not, she must keep beside him. She was the only one of our company left

in touch with the enemy....

“I go to Germany now,” he was saying. “I want you to come with me—to be

my wife.”

He waited for an answer, and got it in the form of a startled question.

“To Germany? How?”

“It is easy,” he said, smiling. “The car which is waiting outside is

the first stage of a system of travel which we have perfected.” Then he

told her about the Underground Railway—not as he had told it to me, to

scare, but as a proof of power and forethought.

His manner was perfect. He was respectful, devoted, thoughtful of all

things. He was the suppliant, not the master. He offered her power and

pride, a dazzling career, for he had deserved well of his country, the

devotion of the faithful lover. He would take her to his mother’s

house, where she would be welcomed like a princess. I have no doubt he

was sincere, for he had many moods, and the libertine whom he had

revealed to me at the Pink Chalet had given place to the honourable

gentleman. He could play all parts well because he could believe in

himself in them all.

Then he spoke of danger, not so as to slight her courage, but to

emphasise his own thoughtfulness. The world in which she had lived was

crumbling, and he alone could offer a refuge. She felt the steel

gauntlet through the texture of the velvet glove.

All the while she had been furiously thinking, with her chin in her

hand in the old way.... She might refuse to go. He could compel her, no

doubt, for there was no help to be got from the old servants. But it

might be difficult to carry an unwilling woman over the first stages of

the Underground Railway. There might be chances.... Supposing he

accepted her refusal and left her. Then indeed he would be gone for

ever and our game would have closed with a fiasco. The great antagonist

of England would go home rejoicing, taking his sheaves with him.

At this time she had no personal fear of him. So curious a thing is the

human heart that her main preoccupation was with our mission, not with

her own fate. To fail utterly seemed too bitter. Supposing she went

with him. They had still to get out of Italy and cross Switzerland. If

she were with him she would be an emissary of the Allies in the enemy’s

camp. She asked herself what could she do, and told herself “Nothing.”

She felt like a small bird in a very large trap, and her chief

sensation was that of her own powerlessness. But she had learned

Blenkiron’s gospel and knew that Heaven sends amazing chances to the

bold. And, even as she made her decision, she was aware of a dark

shadow lurking at the back of her mind, the shadow of the fear which

she knew was awaiting her. For she was going into the unknown with a

man whom she hated, a man who claimed to be her lover.

It was the bravest thing I have ever heard of, and I have lived my life

among brave men.

“I will come with you,” she said. “But you mustn’t speak to me, please.

I am tired and troubled and I want peace to think.”

As she rose weakness came over her and she swayed till his arm caught

her. “I wish I could let you rest for a little,” he said tenderly, “but

time presses. The car runs smoothly and you can sleep there.”

He summoned one of the servants to whom he handed Mary. “We leave in

ten minutes,” he said, and he went out to see to the car.

Mary’s first act in the bedroom to which she was taken was to bathe her

eyes and brush her hair. She felt dimly that she must keep her head

clear. Her second was to scribble a note to Wake, telling him what had

happened, and to give it to the servant with a tip.

“The gentleman will come in the morning,” she said. “You must give it

him at once, for it concerns the fate of your country.” The woman

grinned and promised. It was not the first time she had done errands

for pretty ladies.

Ivery settled her in the great closed car with much solicitude, and

made her comfortable with rugs. Then he went back to the inn for a

second, and she saw a light move in the _salle-à-manger_. He returned

and spoke to the driver in German, taking his seat beside him.

But first he handed Mary her note to Wake. “I think you left this

behind you,” he said. He had not opened it.

Alone in the car Mary slept. She saw the figures of Ivery and the

chauffeur in the front seat dark against the headlights, and then they

dislimned into dreams. She had undergone a greater strain than she

knew, and was sunk in the heavy sleep of weary nerves.

When she woke it was daylight. They were still in Italy, as her first

glance told her, so they could not have taken the Staub route. They

seemed to be among the foothills, for there was little snow, but now

and then up tributary valleys she had glimpses of the high peaks. She

tried hard to think what it could mean, and then remembered the

Marjolana. Wake had laboured to instruct her in the topography of the

Alps, and she had grasped the fact of the two open passes. But the

Marjolana meant a big circuit, and they would not be in Switzerland

till the evening. They would arrive in the dark, and pass out of it in

the dark, and there would be no chance of succour. She felt very lonely

and very weak.

Throughout the morning her fear grew. The more hopeless her chance of

defeating Ivery became the more insistently the dark shadow crept over

her mind. She tried to steady herself by watching the show from the

windows. The car swung through little villages, past vineyards and

pine-woods and the blue of lakes, and over the gorges of mountain

streams. There seemed to be no trouble about passports. The sentries at

the controls waved a reassuring hand when they were shown some card

which the chauffeur held between his teeth. In one place there was a

longish halt, and she could hear Ivery talking Italian with two

officers of Bersaglieri, to whom he gave cigars. They were fresh-faced,

upstanding boys, and for a second she had an idea of flinging open the

door and appealing to them to save her. But that would have been

futile, for Ivery was clearly amply certificated. She wondered what

part he was now playing.

The Marjolana route had been chosen for a purpose. In one town Ivery

met and talked to a civilian official, and more than once the car

slowed down and someone appeared from the wayside to speak a word and

vanish. She was assisting at the last gathering up of the threads of a

great plan, before the Wild Birds returned to their nest. Mostly these

conferences seemed to be in Italian, but once or twice she gathered

from the movement of the lips that German was spoken and that this

rough peasant or that black-hatted bourgeois was not of Italian blood.

Early in the morning, soon after she awoke, Ivery had stopped the car

and offered her a well-provided luncheon basket. She could eat nothing,

and watched him breakfast off sandwiches beside the driver. In the

afternoon he asked her permission to sit with her. The car drew up in a

lonely place, and a tea-basket was produced by the chauffeur. Ivery

made tea, for she seemed too listless to move, and she drank a cup with

him. After that he remained beside her.

“In half an hour we shall be out of Italy,” he said. The car was

running up a long valley to the curious hollow between snowy saddles

which is the crest of the Marjolana. He showed her the place on a road

map. As the altitude increased and the air grew colder he wrapped the

rugs closer around her and apologised for the absence of a foot-warmer.

“In a little,” he said, “we shall be in the land where your slightest

wish will be law.”

She dozed again and so missed the frontier post. When she woke the car

was slipping down the long curves of the Weiss valley, before it

narrows to the gorge through which it debouches on Grünewald.

“We are in Switzerland now,” she heard his voice say. It may have been

fancy, but it seemed to her that there was a new note in it. He spoke

to her with the assurance of possession. They were outside the country

of the Allies, and in a land where his web was thickly spread.

“Where do we stop tonight?” she asked timidly.

“I fear we cannot stop. Tonight also you must put up with the car. I

have a little errand to do on the way, which will delay us a few

minutes, and then we press on. Tomorrow, my fairest one, fatigue will

be ended.”

There was no mistake now about the note of possession in his voice.

Mary’s heart began to beat fast and wild. The trap had closed down on

her and she saw the folly of her courage. It had delivered her bound

and gagged into the hands of one whom she loathed more deeply every

moment, whose proximity was less welcome than a snake’s. She had to

bite hard on her lip to keep from screaming.

The weather had changed and it was snowing hard, the same storm that

had greeted us on the Col of the Swallows. The pace was slower now, and

Ivery grew restless. He looked frequently at his watch, and snatched

the speaking-tube to talk to the driver. Mary caught the word “St

Anton”.

“Do we go by St Anton?” she found voice to ask.

“Yes,” he said shortly.

The word gave her the faintest glimmering of hope, for she knew that

Peter and I had lived at St Anton. She tried to look out of the blurred

window, but could see nothing except that the twilight was falling. She

begged for the road-map, and saw that so far as she could make out they

were still in the broad Grünewald valley and that to reach St Anton

they had to cross the low pass from the Staubthal. The snow was still

drifting thick and the car crawled.

Then she felt the rise as they mounted to the pass. Here the going was

bad, very different from the dry frost in which I had covered the same

road the night before. Moreover, there seemed to be curious obstacles.

Some careless wood-cart had dropped logs on the highway, and more than

once both Ivery and the chauffeur had to get out to shift them. In one

place there had been a small landslide which left little room to pass,

and Mary had to descend and cross on foot while the driver took the car

over alone. Ivery’s temper seemed to be souring. To the girl’s relief

he resumed the outside seat, where he was engaged in constant argument

with the chauffeur.

At the head of the pass stands an inn, the comfortable hostelry of Herr

Kronig, well known to all who clamber among the lesser peaks of the

Staubthal. There in the middle of the way stood a man with a lantern.

“The road is blocked by a snowfall,” he cried. “They are clearing it

now. It will be ready in half an hour’s time.”

Ivery sprang from his seat and darted into the hotel. His business was

to speed up the clearing party, and Herr Kronig himself accompanied him

to the scene of the catastrophe. Mary sat still, for she had suddenly

become possessed of an idea. She drove it from her as foolishness, but

it kept returning. Why had those tree-trunks been spilt on the road?

Why had an easy pass after a moderate snowfall been suddenly closed?

A man came out of the inn-yard and spoke to the chauffeur. It seemed to

be an offer of refreshment, for the latter left his seat and

disappeared inside. He was away for some time and returned shivering

and grumbling at the weather, with the collar of his greatcoat turned

up around his ears. A lantern had been hung in the porch and as he

passed Mary saw the man. She had been watching the back of his head

idly during the long drive, and had observed that it was of the round

bullet type, with no nape to the neck, which is common in the

Fatherland. Now she could not see his neck for the coat collar, but she

could have sworn that the head was a different shape. The man seemed to

suffer acutely from the cold, for he buttoned the collar round his chin

and pulled his cap far over his brows.

Ivery came back, followed by a dragging line of men with spades and

lanterns. He flung himself into the front seat and nodded to the driver

to start. The man had his engine going already so as to lose no time.

He bumped over the rough debris of the snowfall and then fairly let the

car hum. Ivery was anxious for speed, but he did not want his neck

broken and he yelled out to take care. The driver nodded and slowed

down, but presently he had got up speed again.

If Ivery was restless, Mary was worse. She seemed suddenly to have come

on the traces of her friends. In the St Anton valley the snow had

stopped and she let down the window for air, for she was choking with

suspense. The car rushed past the station, down the hill by Peter’s

cottage, through the village, and along the lake shore to the Pink

Chalet.

Ivery halted it at the gate. “See that you fill up with petrol,” he

told the man. “Bid Gustav get the Daimler and be ready to follow in

half in hour.”

He spoke to Mary through the open window.

“I will keep you only a very little time. I think you had better wait

in the car, for it will be more comfortable than a dismantled house. A

servant will bring you food and more rugs for the night journey.”

Then he vanished up the dark avenue.

Mary’s first thought was to slip out and get back to the village and

there to find someone who knew me or could take her where Peter lived.

But the driver would prevent her, for he had been left behind on guard.

She looked anxiously at his back, for he alone stood between her and

liberty.

That gentleman seemed to be intent on his own business. As soon as

Ivery’s footsteps had grown faint, he had backed the car into the

entrance, and turned it so that it faced towards St Anton. Then very

slowly it began to move.

At the same moment a whistle was blown shrilly three times. The door on

the right had opened and someone who had been waiting in the shadows

climbed painfully in. Mary saw that it was a little man and that he was

a cripple. She reached a hand to help him, and he fell on to the

cushions beside her. The car was gathering speed.

Before she realised what was happening the new-comer had taken her hand

and was patting it.

About two minutes later I was entering the gate of the Pink Chalet.