Loyal in All Read online

  “Oh, not seriously.” She simply dared not let herself start hoping along those lines again! “But I’m glad about Teresa Marne.”

  She was so glad—so rapturously, feverishly, hysterically glad that she thought she was going to start crying, right there in the restaurant, in front of her mother. But she managed to pull herself together, and to talk calmly of other things and other people. Anything so that even her mother should not possibly guess that the whole world was changed because Rodney was not going to marry Teresa Marne, after all.

  It was quite late when they went upstairs. And only when they had kissed good-night and gone to their separate rooms did Marika remember guiltily that she had done very little towards ensuring that her mother should leave Hungary as soon as possible.

  But she could not do anything about that now. Instead, she could lie in her great bed, in a room only a little smaller than her mother’s, and think how wonderful it was that Rodney was only a hundred—or perhaps it was two hundred—miles away.

  She slept almost immediately. But it seemed only a few minutes before some sound roused her again. A sound which she already associated with fear, so that it brought her bolt upright in bed, her heart thumping savagely.

  There it was again! The sound of gunfire in the street below her window. But curiously different in direction now. As though someone were firing upwards. And, even as she realized that, there was a different, nerve-shattering sound which twanged her stretched nerves unmercifully. The sound of breaking glass, so near that she thought for a moment that they must have shot in the window of her bathroom next door.

  “They’re after someone on the roof!” she thought suddenly, and a great shudder of pity and terror shook her. “Poor soul—poor soul! Perhaps it’s a real criminal. Oh, I wish it could be! But, even then, how awful—to be hunted—to know they are waiting below—”

  She sat there in the dark, still shaking. But everything was silent now.

  At least—Suddenly she became aware of another, very small sound. A sound which lifted the hairs at the nape of her neck, and made her want to scream. For someone was very quietly undoing the catch of the long window. Someone was outside on the balcony—and it was impossible to know if he were a criminal or a fugitive.

  It was her impulse to flash on the light. But, even as she put out her hand towards the lamp, she stopped. If the man at the window were really a fugitive from the secret police, any sudden lighting of the room would reveal him immediately to anyone below.

  She waited, counting the seconds by the thudding of her own heart. Then she saw one of the heavy curtains lifted aside for a moment. A figure was silhouetted against the lesser darkness of the night sky; then the curtain fell to again, and she knew that the intruder, whoever he was, was in the room.

  It was then that she put out her hand and flashed on the smaller light beside her bed. It was not a bright light, but, even so, it dazzled her for a moment.

  Then, as she looked towards the heavily curtained window, she gave a great gasp. For the man who stood motionless against the curtains, his left arm hanging limply and blood trickling down his hand, was Dr. von Raszay.

  CHAPTER II

  “DR. VON RASZAY—” Instinctively she spoke in a whisper. “What on earth—? Oh, you’re hurt!” Suddenly the limp arm and the trickle of blood impinged on her consciousness. And, jumping out of bed, she reached for her dressing-gown and flung it round her as she came across to him.

  “I didn’t know it was—your room.” He spoke rather jerkily and hoarsely, not at all like his usual authoritative utterance. “I took a change on the room being empty.”

  “It doesn’t matter.” She spoke soothingly now, almost as she might have spoken to the little Kolnagy boy. “Let me look at your hand and arm.”

  “No.” He turned sharply towards the window again. “I must go. I must not involve you—”

  “Don’t be stupid!” She caught him by his uninjured arm. “You can’t go out there. They’re probably still below, waiting for you.”

  “Yes, of course.” His voice was almost expressionless. “But if I stay, and they search the hotel—”

  He stopped, and Marika felt as though someone had slipped a piece of ice down her spine. All the evening, it seemed to her, she had been fighting off melodrama—pretending that this simply could not happen to her—and now it had caught up with her.

  “They will not search the hotel,” she began resolutely, with a conviction she was far from feeling. And, almost as though her presumption had loosed off some devilish activity, there was a sound of confused and angry voices from the far end of the corridor. A door opened and someone shrieked hysterically and was silent. Then someone else spoke in a rough tone of command, though the actual words were not audible.

  “You see—” For a moment his dark eyes looked into hers. And he was not the reserved and enigmatic doctor any more. He was a hunted man, with the hounds very close. “I must go.”

  “You will do nothing of the sort.” She hardly knew where the words came from or how it was that her mind was suddenly ice-clear and prompting her to the most incredible action. “Take off your coat and shoes—there isn’t time for more—” She was already stripping off his coat, with as much care for the injured arm as time would permit. “Get into the bed—”

  “But—”

  “Don’t you ever do just what you are told without question?” she flung at him. And, even at that moment, the recollection of their earlier dispute brought a faint smile to his pale face.

  “But it’s crazily dangerous—”

  “Yes. I’ve got that,’ she told him ironically. “But arguing will only increase the danger. They’ll be here any minute. Get into the bed—” She half pushed him on to it, pulled off his shoes, tossed them carelessly on the floor, flung his coat over a chair, and then pulled the bedclothes over him, so that only his dark heat showed.

  “Lie still—and snore occasionally if you can do it convincingly. You’re a bit drunk and almost impossible to wake,” she informed him. And, putting out her hand, she tousled his hair.

  Then with the voices of the searchers as close as the next room, she switched off the light and flung herself, trembling, on the bed beside the doctor.

  ‘Don’t try to interfere, whatever happens,” she was whispering, with her lips close to his ear. “Just breathe heavily and sound as drunk as you know how—”

  She thought, incredulously, that she heard a very faint laugh from him. Then there was a loud, peremptory knock on the door, and her heart leapt in a sickening way.

  “What is it?” she called out in English, trying desperately to make her voice sound husky and sleepy. “What’s the matter?”

  “Open! Open!” A voice called out in Hungarian, and someone rattled the door-handle peremptorily.

  “For heaven’s sake!” She was surprised to hear how petulant and natural her voice sounded. “Wait a minute—wait a minute, can’t you?”

  She fumbled for the side-light once more—really fumbled, for her fingers were shaking—and then she went to the door, apparently pulling on her dressing-gown again, and unlocked it.

  A man stood in the doorway. A young man in some uniform she did not know, with a curious, nightmare likeness to Dr. Anday, she thought briefly, even in that moment. Behind him were two other men not in uniform.

  “Security Police.” The young man saluted. “We are searching—”

  “How dare you!” she burst out in English. “How dare you come disturbing me and my husband at this hour! I’ll complain to the real police—polizei—or whatever the word is in your stupid language! I’ll complain to the British consul too. What do you mean by troubling foreign visitors? We’re British—do you understand?—British—and we expect to be treated properly—”

  She poured out a stream of English upon him, throwing in an occasional Hungarian or German word, as though she thought this might give the stupid foreigner some pointers. In all her life she had never supposed she could find su
ch a rapid, shrewish stream of words.

  He seemed rather stunned at first. Then he pushed her aside and, coming into the room, went over and looked in the big wardrobe and outside the window on the balcony. All the time, she followed him, giving an admirable imitation of someone who also had perhaps drunk a little too much and was furious and confused.

  Stooping, he glanced under the big bed, and then indicated the man who had contributed nothing to the conversation so far except a surprisingly natural grunt or snuffle when the noise became acute.

  “That? That’s my husband, you fool. Who else do you suppose it would be in my bed? We’ve been to a party—tarsasag—and there was too much wine—bor. Do you understand? Sok bor!”

  For a moment a slight smile flickered over the young man’s grim face.

  “But we don’t expect to be treated like criminals for that,” she ran on angrily, knowing that he was not understanding more than one word in ten, but the angry tirade served to produce the correct mood for her part. “We’re British, I tell you—” and, snatching up her dark blue passport from the dressing-table, she shook it under his nose menacingly, so that he should not direct too much attention to the man in the bed.

  Then, for a frightful moment, she thought she had over-reached herself, for if the young man took the passport and looked inside, he would see she was not married. Or would he? Her mind went blank as she tried to remember what particulars one’s passport contained.

  But, even as a fresh wave of terror assailed her, one of the other men said, in Hungarian.

  “It was the next floor anyway, Matray. I said so all along. No need to make trouble with these foreigners. Complaints at the consulate are not what we want at the moment.”

  The young man did not answer. He took Marika’s passport, at which she almost fainted, and tapped it rather portentously on his other hand. Then suddenly he flung the passport back at her, growled some sort of apology, saluted and walked out of the room, followed by the other two.

  She retained enough presence of mind to complete her role by calling an ironical “Good-night” after him. Then she shut the door, shot the bolt with apparently angry violence and leant against the door, feeling so faint that she thought she must fall.

  Don’t faint now. It’s over,” she heard the doctor say, from a long way off. And she pulled herself together enough to grope her way over to the bed and sit down on the side of it.

  “Thank you,” he said simply, and she felt him stroke her bent head with a curiously gentle hand. “Though God knows where we go from here.”

  “We’ll think of something.” The deadly sickness was passing now, but she felt a ridiculous desire to cry. “We only have to wait—”

  They were both speaking in the quietest of whispers, but suddenly they were silent, for the terrifying sound of light tapping on the door choked the words in their throats.

  Then Marika, who, until that moment, had forgotten her mother’s very existence, realized that the sound came from the door which connected their two rooms.

  “Marika!” Her mother’s voice, cautiously raised, sounded through the door. “Marika, are you all right?”

  “Yes—yes—wait a moment—” With suddenly renewed strength, she jumped up and ran to open the connecting door. For she knew, with complete certainty, that there was no possibility of keeping her mother out of this. Only one must make sure that she saw it from the right angle.

  She undid the bolt, which she had not even slipped back the previous evening before falling sleepily into bed, and her mother entered, still lovely, in a wrap which might have come straight out of a Viennese operetta.

  “I heard such a terrible lot of talking—I was afraid they might even be arresting—Oh!” She stood there aghast, staring across the room at the man on the bed.

  “Hush, Mother, hush!” Marika spoke urgently, but in a low vice. “I’ll explain. Is your door into the passage bolted?”

  “Yes, of course. I bolted it as soon as they had gone. But—”

  “This is Dr. von Raszay—” She might have been presenting him at a party, Marika thought. “He is my chief at the clinic. He—he’s the man they are after. He came in by the window. He had escaped over the roofs—at least, I think so. Is that right?” She too glanced at the doctor, who had sat up now and swung his legs to the ground.

  “Yes.” He nodded. “They tried to arrest me earlier this evening, but I got away and found a fire escape further down the street.”

  “We heard them shooting,” Mrs. Stevens murmured, her violet eyes wide.

  “Yes, yes, I daresay. I’ve been on the roofs for several hours. Then they spotted me again and started firing once more. I thought I’d risk one of these rooms being empty. Half of them are. It was just unlucky for you—” he smiled slightly at Marika—“that I chose your room.”

  “I’m glad you did. At least we’ve put them off for the moment.”

  “But it’s a frightful position!” cried Mrs. Stevens in incredulous dismay. “You’re both taking it so calmly, but—”

  “Oh, no, Mother!, Not calmly. Only one can’t help being a bit elated at having succeeded so far,” Marika explained.

  “But—” Mrs. Stevens looked at her child as though, in some way, she saw her for the first time—“how did you do it? How did you hide him?”

  “I didn’t, quite. I mean, I didn’t hide him right out of sight. I—I shoved him into bed and covered him over and—and said he was my husband.”

  “And they believed that?” Marika saw suddenly that her mother was half intrigued now, in spite of her dismay.

  “At least they went away,” Marika pointed out modestly. “I made myself very offensive, and stormed like an angry, outraged tourist. That was what all the noise was about. It worked for the moment. Particularly as one of the men really thought their—their quarry had got in by a window on another floor.”

  “I see.” From the little smile which came and went, Marika suspected that her mother was largely won over. “But now there is the question of getting him away.”

  “We must wait until morning,” Marika said firmly. “Until morning!”

  “Of course. Don’t you see? They’ll be watching all the exits until they are convinced he got away another way.”

  “But, Miss Stevens—” it was the doctor now who took a hand—“every minute I remain here adds to you danger, and to your complicity if I am eventually caught. If I make an attempt to get away by the window now—”

  “You will inevitably be caught,” Marika pointed out drily. “You cannot suppose they are not still watching in the street below. You must stay here until morning.”

  “And then? In broad daylight?” That was her mother, anxious to help by now but seeing the glaring flaws in the plan. “And what about when the maids come to do the rooms?”

  “I shall put this on the outside of the door—” Marika went over and took from the door-handle the regulation “Do Not Disturb” notice which hangs on every continental bedroom door-handle. “I’ll keep it there until the maid has done your room, Mother. Then we will switch Dr. von Raszay over to your room and lock the doors. With two rooms one can arrange these things. What a good thing you were here!”

  “I begin to think so too.” Her mother’s smile was a mixture of irony and a sort of irrepressible enjoyment which made her look strangely like Marika. “But we can’t keep that up indefinitely.”

  “It is quite unpractical—” von Raszay began.

  “No. Not as a temporary measure,” Marika retorted quickly. “But we must get you out of here tomorrow, of course. I’ll think of something.” She was astonished herself at her confidence in her own ingenuity. “And now let me look at your arm.”

  She pushed him gently on to the sofa and, kneeling beside him, began to peel the shirt-sleeve back from his injured arm.

  “It isn’t much, really.” He sounded almost indifferent. “Not more than a flesh wound, but I lost some blood, and it’s rather sore and stiff.”

&nb
sp; “I’m sure it is!” Expertly, she began to wash and bandage the nasty gash in his forearm. “Mother, do you happen to have any brandy with you? I imagine Dr. von Raszay can do with some, after those hours on the roof.”

  “It was cold and unpleasant,” he agreed, with masterly understatement.

  And Mrs. Stevens flashed him her lovely smile before she went into her own room, to return a few moments later with a travelling flask, a glass and a packet of biscuits.

  “I’m afraid this is the only solid thing I have.” She gave him the biscuits and poured out some brandy. “But we’ll have coffee and rolls sent up to one of the rooms as soon as we can in the morning.”

  “You are too kind, Madame. Both of you.” He glanced at Marika’s bright head, as she bent over her bandaging. “I have no way of thanking you, and can only apologize for having involved you in this unhappy affair.”

  “There’s no need to apologize,” Marika said, without looking up. And, after a moment, her mother added.

  “No. There’s no need to apologize. I suppose if we lived here we should be on your side. As it is, I’m glad we were here to help. Besides—” that irrepressible smile flashed out again—“once it is over, one will enjoy it so much. Though how we are to get you away, or where we are to send you—”

  “To Nagyanya,” exclaimed Marika, with sudden inspiration. “And we will take him there ourselves, just as though we were all going on a day’s visit.”

  “To Nagyanya?” Mrs. Stevens looked startled, but not actually resistant.

  “Yes, of course. We will travel together—”

  “By train?”

  “By car, if we can get one.”

  “That’s risky, with a hired driver,” von Raszay said. “But perhaps less risky than the train,” he added consideringly.

  “At any rate, we must take some risk to get you out of Budapest. Too many people know you here,” Marika pointed out.

  “But—in broad daylight—” Mrs. Stevens said again.