The Shadow of Tyburn Tree (75 page)

A moment later, above the cursing of the men up on the balcony, he caught the sound of hurried footsteps on the gravel some fifty paces to his right. He guessed at once that the shouting and the shooting had reached the ears of the outdoor servants and that they were running from the stables. In another minute his retreat would be cut off. If he was to save the letter he had not a second to lose.

As he straightened himself Natalia broke from his grasp, turned, spat in his face, and staggered away up the iron garden steps to the house. That she had survived her fall of fifteen feet on to a stone seat appeared a miracle, but as she had fallen on her stomach, it seemed that she had not sustained any permanent injury.

As she stumbled away from him, Roger swung round, jumped off the terrace and ran across the lawn. Shouts, curses and the sound of pounding feet followed him, but fear of capture lent speed to his long legs. Outpacing the stable-hands he reached the iron gate with a good lead, wrenched it open and staggered through the fringe of wood to the road. Flinging himself into the waiting carriage he shouted to Tomkins to drive like hell back to Bedford Square.

*     *     *     *     *

While the carriage bowled along Roger tried to examine his wound; but as it was at the back of his left shoulder it was almost impossible for him to do so. It was very painful and he thought that the bullet had smashed his shoulder blade. He had lost a lot of blood and felt faint and dizzy.

His physical distress was only dominated by his mental agitation. The all-important project which had inspired his clandestine visit to the Russian Embassy had, as yet, not even been broached. Natalia's unexpected appearance there had prevented him from saying a single word to Vorontzoff about Georgina. Still worse, the ensuing fracas had now entirely shattered any prospect of a calm, straightforward conversation
with the Russian, in which he might have been argued into assuming a share of the responsibility for Sir Humphrey Etheredge's death and coming to Georgina's rescue. And her only hope of escaping the rope lay in Vorontzoff being persuaded or forced into agreeing to do so before morning.

By the time the carriage had covered a mile Roger's brain had cleared a little, and he saw that the first thing he must do was to get his wound attended to; otherwise he would lose so much blood that he would be rendered
hors de combat
, and incapable of making any eleventh hour effort at all on Georgina's behalf.

When, some seventeen months earlier, he had fought his duel with George Gunston in St. John's Wood, they had had their hurts attended to by a Doctor Dillon. He was an Irishman and a drunkard, but he was a clever surgeon and knew how to hold his tongue; which was important in such matters, as duelling was strictly illegal. Roger remembered that Dillon lived in a cottage just off the Edgware Road, so he told Tomkins to drive there.

He had been in the precincts of the Russian Embassy for little more than half-an-hour, so it was still only a few minutes past nine when the carriage drew up outside Dillon's cottage. To his intense annoyance the Doctor was out, but his wife said that he was only round at the local tavern, and she would go and fetch him.

Roger made himself as comfortable as he could in the parlour and waited there with such patience as he could muster for a quarter of an hour. Then Mrs. Dillon returned to say that her husband had gone off with two friends to have a nightcap in some other haunt; but she felt sure that he would be back in an hour or so, and, in the meantime, if Roger would let her, she would dress his wound herself.

She was a hard-faced looking woman, and Roger recalled having heard it said that before her marriage she had first been a nurse, then a midwife who at times resorted to certain dubious practices; but if that was so it detracted nothing from her possible competence, so he agreed to submit himself to her ministrations.

After cutting away his coat and shirt she examined the wound by the light of a candle and said that she did not think that the bone was broken, but the ball might have lodged beneath it. Then she bathed the ugly gash, dressed it, and revived him after the ordeal by giving him a cup of hot, strong tea well laced with gin.

Roger knew that if there was a bullet in the wound he ought to have it removed as soon as possible, otherwise complications might set in; so, anxious as he was to be on his way, he
must stay where he was till the Doctor returned, as Dillon was the only surgeon he knew who would undertake such a job without asking awkward questions.

It was past eleven when the Irishman came in, and when he did he was three-parts drunk, but he set to work with cheerful unconcern on Roger. The probing for the bullet was excruciatingly painful, but it proved to be there, and, after Dillon had fished it out, the cauterising of the wound was equally agonising. For over half-an-hour Roger groaned and cursed while rivulets of sweat ran down his face, and several times he felt near to fainting. At last the gruelling business was over, his injured shoulder properly bandaged and his arm strapped firmly to his side; but, even then, the Doctor would not hear of his getting to his feet until he had had at least an hour to recover.

Having already been deprived of the opportunity of attempting anything further that evening, Roger did not feel that the loss of an extra hour round midnight would now make any material difference. While waiting for the doctor he had had ample time to review the situation, and he had come to the conclusion that it would be futile for him to try to see Vorontzoff again.

In the first place, after what had already occurred, the Ambassador would be extremely incensed against him and, in the second, he was now in no shape for further heroics. Therefore, he must get somebody else to go and talk to the Russian on the lines that he had meant to adopt himself; and the most suitable person for this delicate mission was clearly Droopy Ned.

Droopy had been at Stillwaters over the fatal weekend. He already knew most of the facts and could be told the rest, as he was entirely to be trusted. He was shrewd, diplomatic, and a person of sufficient prestige to secure an interview with Vorontzoff at any time, if he requested it on the plea of urgent business. The only possible alternative was Colonel Thursby; and Roger ruled him out as already so exhausted and overwrought, by his daughter's impending fate, as temporarily to be lacking in the agility of mind and force of will necessary to bring Vorontzoff to heel.

Dr. Dillon insisted on seeing Roger home, so at one o'clock in the morning, they walked down the garden-path, got into the waiting carriage and told the patient Tomkins to drive to Arlington Street.

The moon was up, and five minutes later, as the carriage turned out of the Edgware Road into Oxford Street, they could see on the west side of the corner the three stout posts and their cross-beams that formed the gallows, standing out clearly against the night sky.

‘Look at old Tyburn Tree,' remarked the jovial Irishman ‘I've seen many a good hanging yonder, and may the blessed St. Brigit preserve me to see many more.'

Roger shuddered, but did not reply. Already the very sight of the gibbet had conjured up an awful vision in his mind, He could see his dear, beautiful Georgina hanging there; her head lolling limply on one shoulder, her dark curls hanging in disorder over her purple face; her flashing eyes dull and lifeless as they protruded blindly from their sockets, and her laughter-loving lips horribly swollen about a gaping, sagging jaw.

He knew that unless he could do something within the next few hours that nightmare vision would become an actual fact, and that, even if he gave his own life uselessly, no course must be left untried which might avert that grim reality.

At Amesbury House he shook hands with old Tomkins, asked him to take Dr. Dillon home on his way back to Bedford Square, and gave him a handsome tip. Then, bidding good-night to the Doctor he pulled the bell beside the big carved door.

The night-footman let him in and told him that Lord Edward had come home an hour before and gone straight to bed. Roger went up to Droopy's room and found him in bed, lying on his back and snoring loudly. All attempts to rouse him failed, so, much perturbed, Roger went downstairs and sent the footman to rout out Droopy's valet.

When the valet appeared he said that his master had been much worried by the course that Lady Etheredge's trial had taken. He had been present at each session and given evidence himself on Tuesday. After the adjournment which had taken place on the previous afternoon, he had gone to Lincoln's Inn to consult the Counsel who were defending her ladyship, in the hope that a conversation with them would produce some hopeful aspect of the case. He had returned greatly depressed at half-past seven, and on learning that Roger had arrived in London, went out again to try to find him at White's Club, Colonel Thursby's, and various other places to which he might have gone. He had been back twice after that to see if Roger had come in, and on his final return at midnight, had told his man that ‘he meant to sleep this night if he died of it'; then he had taken a large dose of one of his Eastern drugs and allowed himself to be put to bed.

Droopy's deep concern for Georgina was, Roger realised, mainly inspired by his friend's knowledge of his own attachment to her. He had obviously felt himself to be
in loco parentis
, even to the point of interviewing Counsel; but, as matters stood at the moment, that made it all the more exasperating
that, only an hour before, he should have thrown his hand in and sought refuge from further anxiety in impenetrable oblivion.

Too late, Roger saw that if only he had not been in such a hurry to dash off to Mr. Pitt that afternoon the Marquess would have told him about Georgina's trial and Droopy's pre-occupation with it. Then, if he had waited until Droopy had come in they could have put their heads together, and things might have been in far better shape. As it was he could only ask the valet to come upstairs and help him to undress; then, when he had been propped up in bed, issue an imperative order that in no circumstances was he to be called later than six o'clock.

In spite of a distinct feverishness and the gnawing pain in his left shoulder, mental exhaustion carried him off to sleep quite quickly. Yet when Droopy's man came to rouse him he felt that barely ten minutes could have elapsed since he had closed his eyes.

On looking in the mirror he saw that he had a black eye where Natalia had struck him, and he wondered if, apart from a black, blue and aching tummy, she was by now well on the way to recovery from the effects of her nasty fall. Then his mind snapped back to Georgina, and the fact that this was the fateful day upon which it must be decided whether her generous youth and vital loveliness was to be preserved as a joy to all who knew her, or soon be transmuted into a lump of senseless, ugly clay.

*     *     *     *     *

It took three-quarters of an hour for Droopy's man to get Roger into his clothes, adjust the sling round his arm, and make him as presentable as possible. Immediately this painful process had been accomplished, they hurried downstairs. Droopy still lay like a log and, for over an hour, defied all efforts to wake him.

They shook and slapped him; put an ice-compress on his head and poured the most fiery liquor they could find down his throat. The valet tickled the soles of his master's feet and Roger stuck pins in his arms, but still he lay impervious to this violent treatment, except for an occasional jerk, or a snort through his fleshy nose.

It was not until eight o'clock, after Roger had ordered a hip-bath to be brought in and filled with cold water, and had Droopy's limp form plunged into it, that he at last showed signs of returning consciousness. Then it took them another quarter of an hour of slapping his face, holding smelling-salts
under his nose, and pouring black coffee into him to restore him to his full senses.

He took his arbitrary treatment with perfect good temper and only protested mildly that he was well-acquainted with the properties of the drug he had taken; and, that had he been left alone, he would in any case, have woken round about eight o'clock and been at the Old Bailey soon after nine to hear the judge's summing-up.

When he was stretched comfortably on his gilt day-bed with Roger seated beside him, the valet brought them up breakfast. Only then did Roger realise that he had not eaten since breakfasting with Natalia Andreovna in the sloop that had brought them home from Stockholm. Relays of food were sent for, Droopy cut the eggs, sausages, mushrooms and ham into mouthfuls, and between them, the now one-handed Roger spoke rapidly and forcefully of Georgina's frightful situation.

By a quarter to nine they had fully agreed on the only course of action which might still possibly save her, and leaving Droopy to complete his dressing as swiftly as he could, Roger hurried downstairs, got into a coach that he had already ordered, and drove to the Old Bailey.

The trial of a lady of fashion on a charge of murder had aroused great interest, so ghouls from the social world had vied with all the enthusiastic amateurs of crime in London to get places in the portion of the Court reserved for the public. As the Court was already sitting when Roger arrived he would have stood no chance at all of getting in, had it not been for his intimacy with Colonel Thursby. By bribery accompanied by alternate smiles and menaces he eventually succeeded in being conducted through the press to a seat beside the Colonel at the solicitors' table.

Georgina, dressed entirely in black and looking very pale but quite calm, and still strikingly lovely, was seated in the dock. The stir caused by Roger's entrance caused her to look round. The second her glance fell on him her eyebrows went up and her mouth opened as though she was about to emit a piercing scream. With an obvious effort she stifled it in her throat but made a swift gesture with her hands as if to say: ‘Go away! Please! Please! I beg you to go away from here.'

He gave her a reassuring smile, sat down and looked round the Court. It was packed to capacity with row upon row of hard, avid, gloating faces. Few but those of the lawyers, the court officials and the double row of 'twelve good men and true,' in their jury-box, showed any trace of solemn decency.