Three-Cornered Halo (13 page)

The guards placed the coffin. Tipped up on end, it stood in the centre of the gallows beneath the one empty noose: to each side of it, hung four dead or dying men. The crowd held its breath. In one moment, El Gerente de Politio, cloaked, sabred and masked, would step forward, throw upon the coffin and tear the hood aside, so that all might see who it was that had escaped from the very embraces of death.

El Gerente stepped forward. The coffin lid was flung open, the robed and hooded figure was visible, propped up, leaning back against the floor of the coffin. El Gerente put out his hand to strip away the hood: and into the absolute silence, a voice said, almost in a whisper and yet carrying to the furthermost corner of the arena: “Wait!”

The secretary, Tabaqui, moved quietly forward; with soft, unhurried gestures of his grey hands, he pushed aside the startled guards and made a lane for his master. El Exaltida strode up to the coffin, his head brushing the feet of the hanging men. With one great hand, he caught the robed figure by the front of its gown, half lifted it out of the coffin and dropped it to its knees at his feet. The secretary intoned in his soft, carrying voice: “The message of El Exaltida, Juan Lorenzo, Hereditary Grand Duke of San Juan el Pirata to the people of this island—
'Next time there will be no resurrection!'
” The Grand Duke, as though at a given signal, tore aside the hood: and, grey-white, half fainting, hideously scarred, the piteous, ruined old face of El Arcivescovo stared out across the heads of the people. The Grand Duke jerked him to his feet again and said in a voice of thunder and lightning, “Very well. Dance!”

Down in the heart of the arena, surrounded by all the gay holiday-makers in their bright clothes, stricken silent, staring up with horrified eyes—Mr Cecil stood appalled. A drop scene! A Cecil B. de Mille epic in Glorious Tech., the ring of oleander under the blue sky, broken only by the marble minarets of the little pavilion; the barren bowl of the arena packed full with supers at so many dollars a day, all ready to raise stained brown arms and cry, Rhubarb! Rhubarb! at a sign from the cheer-leader outside camera-range. And, centre stage, the built-up platform of cardboard rock with its formal pattern of swinging dummies on opposed octagonals of post and cross-beams, black against blue, blue sky: the dark hump of the coffin centring an arrangement in black and grey, the black of the Grand Duke's costume, brightly embroidered, the grey of the grey secretary, the black-and-grey of the tottering old man, black robed and ashen faced. But—it was not a drop-scene. It was real. A real sun smiled down upon real flowers, ringing in real people with real hearts, real tears of pity: and on the rock, a real man, old and dying, tottered and trembled and a real man stood and cried, ‘Dance!' with uplifted hand. “
Good
ness,” said Mr Cecil's high voice, piping across the heads of the people, standing all white-faced, silently looking on. “
Not
quite Winchester, would one say?”

The Grand Duke paused, for a long, long moment his hand still held in the air. Nor did he lower it. He clicked his fingers as though he had raised his hand for no other reason, and, without change of expression, said to El Gerente: “Take him aside,” and to the secretary, “Read.” He folded his arms beneath the black cloak and stood looking out over the people's heads, as Tabaqui read.

“El Exaltida, Juan Lorenzo, Hereditary Grand Duke of San Juan el Pirata—to be read in sight and hearing of the people of San Juan el Pirata: to His Serenity, the Most Reverend, Most Venerable, Most Excellent, Most Noble, the Archbishop of San Juan.… Whereas it pleased His Serenity to preach this day a sermon, in sight and hearing of the people of San Juan el Pirata, publicly questioning the decisions and actions of the Grand Duke himself: the Grand Duke decrees as follows—His Serenity the Archbishop demands first an heir to the Dukedom of San Juan, and secondly that application be made to Rome for beatification and canonisation of Juanita di Perli, called El Margherita; declaring that Juanita di Perli lived the life of a saint and in life and after death has shown miraculous powers. Let El Margherita, then, show her powers now; and let His Serenity the Archbishop rest his faith in this alone. On the feast of San Juan, in three days' time from now, El Exaltida will go publicly to the cathedral and there with the Grand Duchess, pray for an heir. At that hour, let El Margherita give some sign, let her give some miraculous sign that the gift will be granted. Let her do this and the Grand Duke will apply forthwith to Rome for recognition of her sanctity. Let her fail and, for his presumption and as a warning to each and every person here who dares even in his heart to question the Grand Duke's authority—the Archbishop dies. Within one hour of the Grand Duke's leaving the Duomo, if Juanita fails to uphold the Archbishop's faith in her, his body will be shown to the people, coffined as it has been shown just now: and the Grand Duke repeats that this time
there will be no resurrection.
” The secretary took a step backward, folded the paper neatly between nimble fingers and waited with bowed head. The Grand Duke stood in absolute silence for a moment; and then strode back to the pavilion and disappeared. The Archbishop presumably taking this as permission to give way to demands of nature only less pressing than those of the Grand Duke's dignity, duly gave way and tumbled in a dead faint on the ground. Miss Cockrill, looking on from the safe circle of the touristi, thought of the old, grey wolf, Akela, on the council rock and of Shere Khan, the tiger; and watched where one jackal slunk off after its master—and another crept up to the fallen leader whose leadership was done. Tomaso di Goya, thrusting aside other offers of assistance, knelt down and gathered the old man into his merciless arms.

To do Tomaso justice, it had never till this moment occurred to him to murder the Grand Duke Lorenzo. That his powers should be curbed—yes: some share in the lesser authority falling, naturally, in his, Tomaso's, way. That his wealth should be broken up and distributed—yes: some of this also accruing to the distributor. But by political revolution, peaceful or otherwise, and by this alone; that Juan Lorenzo should die, let alone that Tomaso should reign in his place—in this Innocenta's imagination had far outstripped Tomaso's ambition. Now, however … Lorenna had hastily imparted her secret, before the ceremonies began, and for the first time a personal hate for the tyrant sprang up where only hatred for tyranny had been. His affection for Lorenna, always quite genuine, took on new attributes of tenderness, of jealousy, of a physical possessiveness: the fact that, though fearful of his reactions, she could not conceal an inward elation at promise of her coming promotion, did nothing to endear the Grand Duke to her lover's heart. And now—now, through a coincidence almost miraculous in itself, at the very moment when his political hatred took on a personal tone, an instrument of vengeance was thrust into his hand. The Grand Duke demanded a sign from heaven; and he, Tomaso, had, locked away in the secrecy of his brain alone, a blueprint of a ‘sign from heaven,' and planned for the selfsame day. A swinging thurible, a tiny trapdoor cunningly concealed—a cloud of rosy incense rising, sweet-scented, up to the glittering shadows of mosaic domes.… He could have laughed aloud at the innocence of that pretty conception that an hour ago had seemed daring in the extreme. It should be no perfumed pellet that lay concealed beneath the gold trapdoor. The Grand Duke had asked Juanita for a sign: Juanita should send him a sign indeed.

Belly to the ground, the jackal crept up to the council rock; and gathered the fallen old wolf into the toils of a plan so new and so terrible that his own mind rocked at the thought of it.

CHAPTER NINE

T
O
say that the touristi were having a lovely time would be to exaggerate. The Juanese, to whom such scenes were merely the highlights of everyday life, soon bounced back to jollity again, the eight hanged bodies were cut down, somewhat stiff from prolonged suspension in their harnesses; everyone fell to eating and drinking once more. For the Archbishop's fate, little lasting concern was aroused. If he died, why, he was old and one had to die one day—people died for smaller crimes than flouting the Grand Duke's authority. But anyway, he would not die.…

For Juanita, of course, would give the sign: and what form the sign would take, whether the Grand Duchess would be granted her prayer, how soon Rome would arrange for the canonisation, and who among themselves might most delightfully benefit when all these wonders came about—these formed the only animating topics in a conversation that centred, naturally, on the events of the day. The limonado bottles disappeared, the bottles of arguadiente came out, upon the gallows-rock the band struck up a more lively tune and in the cool of the evening the real dancing began. Only the unsmiling touristi seemed heavy at heart; and the Juanese watched in astonishment as, still sick and shaken, in twos and threes they wandered about and tried to recapture the fiesta spirit of the day.

Major Bull and Miss Cockrill walked westward through the olive groves. She moved as though she were weary and when they came to a rocky niche carpeted with dry leaves and looking out over the sea, was glad to sit down and be quiet for a little while in the comfort of familiar companionship. “You're tired, old girl?”

“Yes,” said Miss Cockrill, unwontedly subdued.

“Fretting about that poor girl a bit, eh?”

“After what we've just seen …”

“By Jove, yes; and she's sensitive, y'know, soulful, y'know, not like you and me, tough.”

Miss Cockrill was on the whole reasonably tough; but she did not care to be reminded of it by her pretendu nor, indeed, to be bracketed in a comparision with him. Besides … “I don't know what you're talking about, Dick. Who's sensitive? I'm talking about the Grand Duchess.”

Major Bull had been talking about Winsome Foley. Miss Cockrill had claimed him as, over the long years of his fidelity she had established a right to do, and he had perforce gallantly walked off with her; and poor Winne had wandered away, looking soulful, in the opposite direction. He could not help wondering … Last evening, as they had strolled through the town—by Jove, poor girl, how close she had stuck to him! And there had been a tremble, he swore, in the hand that lay on his coat-sleeve. A little taller than himself, and more bony than in the choosey days, he had cared for 'em: but a fine girl all the same, little income of her own—and half the age of poor Hat. He fell into a reverie. There had been a hen pheasant, long, long ago, when he was a boy, down on his father's little bit of rough shootin' in Suffolk: injured wing, reckernise the bird any day from her irregular flight. Taken a good few pot shots at her; missed her every time. She had survived three seasons, it had become a point of honour to bag her. And so he had at last, and his dear old cocker, Queenie, had retrieved her; and, in triumph, between them they had carried her home. He remembered to this day his pride as, judiciously hung, she had been borne in, done to a turn, with her breadcrumbs and watercress disposed all about her; and, by Jove, poor old girl, how tough she had turned out to be! It made a feller think. Could there be such a thing, after all, as caring too much about the old hen pheasant, while the gay young birds flew by? “Grand Duchess?” he said. “I was talking about poor Winnie.”

“Winsome? What's poor about
her?
”

“Thought she looked a bit lonely, wandering off on her own.”

“She's with the others, I expect. They were going up to look at the gallows. Goya's supposed to have done the painting on them; quite worn offnow, of course …”

“Goyer?”

“My dear Dick—you must know that the painter, Goya, is supposed to have spent two years here, after he ran away from Spain?”

“No, I didn't,” said the Major rather sulkily. Hat was so damn sharp.

“Well, you'd better then. Call yourself a courier! What about the paintings on the walls of the cathedral? They're obviously Goya: and anyway, where
was
he, between the time he escaped from Madrid in 1765 and turned up in Italy in '67 or '8?”

“Why ask me?” said the Major.
“I
don't know.”

“I know you don't, and I'm telling you. He was here in San Juan. Just the person to get mixed up with pirates. It was probably he who inspired the original Juan to build the cathedral; in those days Goya was doing big murals of religious subjects—it wasn't till he arrived in Rome that …”

“All right, Hat, all right. I'll mug it all up tomorrow in the guide book. Feller can't be suckin' in culture every hour of the day.” 'Nother thing about poor Winnie—she could pour out this kind of drivel by the hour, but she didn't expect a feller to know it for himself. A lot of stuff about painters—very interesting, no doubt, but it wasn't a man's subject. If Hat had a fault, it was that she was a darn sight too critical. Old soldier, grown white in the service of his country and all that—couldn't be expected to shine in academic circles as well. Royal Academy, Sandhurst—not Royal Academy, Burlington House, by Jove! Not unreasonably pleased by his own wit, he repeated this gem to Hat, suitably led up to, i.e. without reference to Winsome. Miss Cockrill paid it the tribute of only a very wintry smile.