The Secret of Sarek - Maurice Leblanc (easy to read books for adults list TXT) 📗

knee, to put her head through and to witness the tragedy that was being enacted in the room.

At that moment, M. d’Hergemont had once more retreated to the window and even a little beyond it, so that she almost saw him face to face. He stood without moving, haggard-eyed and with his arms hanging in an undecided posture, as though waiting for something terrible to happen. He stammered:

“Murderer! Murderer!⁠ ⁠… Is it really you? Oh, curse you! François! François!”

He was no doubt calling upon his grandson for help; and François no doubt was also exposed to some attack, was perhaps wounded, was possibly dead!

Véronique summoned up all her strength and succeeded in setting foot on the ledge.

“Here I am! Here I am!” she meant to cry.

But her voice died away in her throat. She had seen! She saw! Facing her father, at a distance of five paces, against the opposite wall of the room, stood someone pointing a revolver at M. d’Hergemont and deliberately taking aim. And that someone was⁠ ⁠… oh, horror! Véronique recognized the red cap of which Honorine had spoken, the flannel shirt with the gilt buttons. And above all she beheld, in that young face convulsed with hideous emotions, the very expression which Vorski used to wear at times when his instincts, hatred and ferocity, gained the upper hand.

The boy did not see her. His eyes were fixed on the mark which he proposed to hit; and he seemed to take a sort of savage joy in postponing the fatal act.

Véronique herself was silent. Words or cries could not possibly avert the peril. What she had to do was to fling herself between her father and her son. She clutched hold of the railings, clambered up and climbed through the window.

It was too late. The shot was fired. M. d’Hergemont fell with a groan of pain.

And, at the same time, at that very moment, while the boy still had his arm outstretched and the old man was sinking into a huddled heap, a door opened at the back. Honorine appeared; and the abominable sight struck her, so to speak, full in the face.

“François!” she screamed. “You! You!”

The boy sprang at her. The woman tried to bar his way. There was not even a struggle. The boy took a step back, quickly raised his weapon and fired.

Honorine’s knees gave way beneath her and she fell across the threshold. And, as he jumped over her body and fled, she kept on repeating:

“François.⁠ ⁠… François.⁠ ⁠… No, it’s not true!⁠ ⁠… Oh, can it be possible?⁠ ⁠… François.⁠ ⁠…”

There was a burst of laughter outside. Yes, the boy had laughed. Véronique heard that horrible, infernal laugh, so like Vorski’s laugh; and it all agonized her with the same anguish which used to sear her in Vorski’s days!

She did not run after the murderer. She did not call out.

A faint voice beside her was murmuring her name:

“Véronique.⁠ ⁠… Véronique.⁠ ⁠…”

M. d’Hergemont lay on the ground, staring at her with glassy eyes which were already filled with death.

She knelt down by his side; but, when she tried to unbutton his waistcoat and his bloodstained shirt, in order to dress the wound of which he was dying, he gently pushed her hand aside. She understood that all aid was useless and that he wished to speak to her. She stooped still lower.

“Véronique⁠ ⁠… forgive⁠ ⁠… Véronique.⁠ ⁠…”

It was the first utterance of his failing thoughts.

She kissed him on the forehead and wept:

“Hush, father.⁠ ⁠… Don’t tire yourself.⁠ ⁠…”

But he had something else to say; and his mouth vainly emitted syllables which did not form words and to which she listened in despair. His life was ebbing away. His mind was fading into the darkness. Véronique glued her ear to the lips which exhausted themselves in a supreme effort and she caught the words:

“Beware⁠ ⁠… beware⁠ ⁠… the God-Stone.⁠ ⁠…”

Suddenly he half raised himself. His eyes flashed as though lit by the last flicker of an expiring flame. Véronique received the impression that her father, as he looked at her, now understood nothing but the full significance of her presence and foresaw all the dangers that threatened her; and, speaking in a hoarse and terrified but quite distinct voice, he said:

“You mustn’t stay.⁠ ⁠… It means death if you stay.⁠ ⁠… Escape this island.⁠ ⁠… Go⁠ ⁠… Go.⁠ ⁠…”

His head fell back. He stammered a few more words which Véronique was just able to grasp:

“Oh, the cross!⁠ ⁠… The four crosses of Sarek!⁠ ⁠… My daughter⁠ ⁠… my daughter⁠ ⁠… crucified!⁠ ⁠…”

And that was all.

There was a great silence, a vast silence which Véronique felt weighing upon her like a burden that grows heavier second after second.

“You must escape from this island,” a voice repeated. “Go, quickly. Your father bade you, Madame Véronique.”

Honorine was beside her, livid in the face, with her two hands clasping a napkin, rolled into a plug and red with blood, which she held to her chest.

“But I must look after you first!” cried Véronique. “Wait a moment.⁠ ⁠… Let me see.⁠ ⁠…”

“Later on⁠ ⁠… they’ll attend to me presently,” spluttered Honorine. “Oh, the monster!⁠ ⁠… If I had only come in time! But the door below was barricaded.⁠ ⁠…”

“Do let me see to your wound,” Véronique implored. “Lie down.”

“Presently.⁠ ⁠… First Marie Le Goff, the cook, at the top of the staircase.⁠ ⁠… She’s wounded too⁠ ⁠… mortally perhaps.⁠ ⁠… Go and see.”

Véronique went out by the door at the back, the one through which her son had made his escape. There was a large landing here. On the top steps, curled into a heap, lay Marie Le Goff, with the death-rattle in her throat.

She died almost at once, without recovering consciousness, the third victim of the incomprehensible tragedy. As foretold by old Maguennoc, M. d’Hergemont had been the second victim.

IV The Poor People of Sarek

Honorine’s wound was deep but did not seem likely to prove fatal. When Véronique had dressed it and moved Marie Le Goff’s body to the room filled with books and furnished like a study in which her father was lying, she closed M. d’Hergemont’s eyes, covered him with a sheet and knelt down