The Prophet's Mantle. Эдит Несбит
itself, and came slowly to lay its great head on his knee.
'Well, old girl, I daresay you'd like a little hunting for a change. Upon my soul it's almost a pity we're so very clever in keeping our literary achievements dark. We should have something exciting then at anyrate, and I'd give anything for a little excitement.'
'You're likely to have as much as you care about, then,' said another voice, which made Percival leap to his feet as the purple curtains that hung across the arched entrance to the sleeping-room were flung back, and a tall figure, muffled in furs, strode forward. The dog sprang at it.
'Down, Olga! Quiet, quiet, old lady!'
The coat was thrown off, and fell with a flop to the ground; and Litvinoff held out his hand to his secretary, who had started back and caught up the manuscripts, and was holding them behind him.
'Good heavens!' said Percival. 'Litvinoff, what is it? Are they after you? How did you come in?'
'I came in the way we must go out before another half-hour. They've found out the distinguished author of the "Vision," and they're anxious to secure the wonder. Lock that door; we don't want the servants.'
'It is locked. I don't do work of this sort with unlocked doors.'
Litvinoff glanced at the manuscript on the oak writing-table.
'We must collect all this and burn it, though I don't think we could be deeper damned than we are, even if we left it alone.'
'But where have you come from?' asked Percival, laying his hand on the other's shoulder. 'You're wet through. Have a drink,' and he poured out a tumbler of the Burgundy.
Litvinoff took it, and as he set down the glass replied, 'I fell into some water. There was snow enough to hide the ice.'
'Well, then, the very first thing is to change your clothes. Shall I get you dry ones, or will you go?'
'No, no; neither of us must leave this room. There may be a traitor in the house for aught I know. No one saw me come in. I shall do well enough.'
'You may as well be executed at once as be frozen to death in the course of the night. You must make shift with some of my things. You change while I see to the papers. We can talk while you're changing.'
Each went deftly and swiftly about what he had to do, and neither seemed to be in the least thrown off his balance. There was much less fuss than there is in some families every morning when the 'City man' is hurrying to catch his train. Drawer after drawer was emptied out on the wide hearthstones, and as stern denunciations of tyranny and eloquent appeals to the spirit of freedom vanished in smoke and sparks up the great chimney, Percival, a little puffed by his exertions, asked, 'How soon must we go? What's the exact state of things?'
'Our friends at Odessa were warned. There's an order for my arrest. I was to have been taken at Odessa, and long before this they'll have found out that I'm not there, and will have started after me here.'
'But how are we to go? Are we to walk, and fall into a succession of pools? Can't we get some horses from the stable?'
'I have a sleigh not a quarter of a mile off. Zabrousky is with it, waiting. We can reach Kilsen to-night, and get horses for the frontier. There is a revolver in the desk. The one in my belt is full of water. I've got two passports that will carry us over. You are Monsieur Mericourt of Paris, and I am Herr Baum of Düsseldorf, friends travelling.'
It was lucky that this room, the ordinary work-room of the friends, contained all their secrets and most of their 'portable property.'
'How about money?' asked the secretary.
'There are three hundred Napoleons in the cash-box. Those will be best to take. By-the-way, stick a French novel into your portmanteau, and throw in anything you can to fill it up. We have the frontier to pass. You know I am all right at Paris or Vienna.'
'Oh, yes,' rejoined Percival. 'If we get there we're all right. But these clothes of yours; we must hide them, or they'll tell tales.'
'Oh, bring them with you, and leave the room in order.'
'Yes, and I must take a revolver myself. We'll give a good account of a few of those brutes if they come too close.'
'Are we ready? I'll take the portmanteau, you carry those clothes. Now then, lights out. Give me your hand.'
The candles were blown out, and Litvinoff led the way through the bedroom and through a tiny door in the panelled wall, of whose existence Percival had been up to this moment ignorant. They passed down a narrow staircase, in a niche of whose wall they left the wet garments, and, passing through a stone passage or two, suddenly came out into the ice-cold air at an angle of the house quite other than that at which Percival had expected to find himself.
Litvinoff shivered. 'I miss my cloak,' he said. 'However, there are plenty of skins in the sleigh.'
The snow fell lightly on them as they hurried quietly away; it did its best with its cold feathery veil to hide the footsteps of the fugitives.
'Is this exciting enough for you?' asked the Count as they strode along under cover of the trees.
'Quite, thanks—I think I should be able to submit to a little less excitement with equanimity. It won't be actually unpleasant to be out of the dominions of his sacred majesty.'
'This excitement is nothing to what we shall have in getting over the frontier,' said Litvinoff; 'that's where the tug of war will come. Percival,' he went on after a pause, 'I shall never forgive myself if you suffer in this business through me.'
'My dear fellow,' Percival answered cheerfully, 'if it had not been for you I should have been out of it all long ago, and if the worst comes to the worst, there's still a way out of it. As long as I have my trusty little friend here,' tapping the revolver in his breast pocket, 'I don't intend to see the inside of St Peter and St Paul.'
As he spoke they heard the sound of horses' restless hoofs.
'What's that?'
'All right!' returned Litvinoff. 'They're our horses.'
Behind a clump of fir trees the sleigh was waiting, and beside it a man on a horse.
The two friends entered the sleigh, and adjusted the furs about them, and Litvinoff took the reins.
'Good speed,' said Zabrousky; 'a safe journey, and a good deliverance.'
'Good-bye,' Litvinoff said. 'Don't stay here a moment. It may cost you your life.'
In another instant the horseman had turned and left them, and the jingling of the harness and the noise of the fleet hoofs were the only sounds that broke the dense night silence as the sleigh sped forward.
'Have you any idea what the time is?' said Litvinoff, when they had travelled smoothly over three or four miles of snow. 'It's too cold to get watches out, and too dark to see them if we did.'
'It must be past two,' said Percival. 'It must have been past midnight when you came in. I wonder what time those devils will reach the empty nest.'
'The later the better for us, and the servants will mix things a bit by telling them that I've not been home. At this rate we shall reach Eckovitch's place about four. We can stretch our legs there while he rubs the horses down a bit.'
'Will that be safe? Is he to be trusted?'
'My dear Percival, this line of retreat has been marked out a long time. Eckovitch has been ready for me any time these three years.'
Nothing more was said. The situation was too grave for mere chatter, and there was nothing of importance that needed saying just then. Percival leaned back among the furs, which were by this time covered with snow, and Litvinoff seemed to be concentrating all his attention on his driving, using the horses as gently as possible, and continually leaning forward and peering into the darkness to make out the track, which was becoming no easy task, as the steady falling snow was fast obliterating the landmarks.
The secretary, overcome by that drowsiness which results from swift movement through bitterly cold air, was almost asleep, when the horses slackened speed, and the change in the motion roused him.
'What's