At Swords' Point (13 page)

“What is this?” Joris had been skirting the wall, and now he stopped and put his thumb under a mark. The guide swung his light across it — a triangle, point down, the two top angles surmounted with straight lines.

The guide laughed. “Modern foolishment. Some youngster tries to make a mystery with the old sign of the Goat Riders.”

“Goat Riders?” echoed Quinn.

“Satan worshipers and thieves who hid out in these caverns maybe two hundred years ago,” Joris explained.

“But, Mijnheeren, if you wish to see the real sign of Black Man now — ” Loo stopped short and looked about him as if to get his bearings, then was off along a side way before they could protest. They had to break into a trot to keep his bobbing light in sight.

“Wait!” Quinn seized Joris’ sleeve and brought the Netherlander to a sliding stop. “Listen!”

“What — ?” Joris twisted himself free impatiently.

“Thought I heard something — ”

“You can't tell about sounds in here,” his companion returned brusquely. “Echoes and the dust distort everything. Come on — ”

Quinn followed Maartens. But he was still stubbornly sure that he
had
heard something — a cry choked off in the middle.

Loo had turned another corner, but they could still see the reflection of his light. And they were too close to stop when that reflection suddenly vanished. Quinn tried to pull his own torch out, only to have it catch in the flap of his coat pocket. He was still tugging at it when he heard a surprised grunt and other sounds which he could only interpret as a threshing battle in process ahead of him. He gave a last wrench at the torch, brought it out, and snapped the light on. And he had time for only an instant's glimpse of rolling bodies before a heavy weight crashed against his skull behind his ear and he fell forward into a blackness broken by jagged bolts of flame.

Now he ran, ran through icy slush which entrapped him to his knees. And behind him rode the Black Man, an inky-faced menace mounted on a goat. But around his head was a band of fire, biting in and in and in —

Quinn could touch the ice — it lay under his outspread hands, grainy, soft — cold. And the pain pounded in a regular beat behind his eyes. His eyes! They were open,
he was staring straight ahead — ahead at nothing but blackness! He was blind! He mouthed a sort of choked whimper — cold, sick, waves of nausea in his middle — he was blind!

Painfully he tried to remember. With his hands he made slow exploration. He was lying on his back against some kind of stone wall. A stone wall — in a cave — the St. Pietersburg Caverns! Quinn sat up abruptly and fought for control over his giddy head.

Maybe he wasn't blind after all. If there was no light — Light! He had had his torch in his hand when he went down. Now he hunched forward and began to run his hands through the dust in a circle. His heart jumped as he touched metal. He grabbed for it — then he knew that what he had was Joris’ Luger, not the torch.

With an exclamation of disappointment and disgust he dropped it behind him and began again in that blind quest, fingers sweeping furrows through the gritty dust. He crept away from the wall on all fours — like a wounded animal — sweeping inch by inch ahead, returning again and again over the same section to be sure he had not missed it in his sightless search.

Eons later he found that metal tube. He got up on his knees and brought it close to his body, cupping both shaking hands about it. Then he snapped the button.

Light leaped dazzingly down on the floor where the dust had been churned and plowed. Quinn edged back to the wall and steadied himself with one hand against it while he swept that beam over bare walls, torn up marl — then the light caught and held on something else —

Quinn could not get to his feet. He tried twice and his whirling head nearly sent him flat. So he crawled on hands and knees over the figure that was Maartens, lying face downward, his wrists and ankles tied with rope. Surely they would not have tied up a dead man, Quinn thought dully.

He picked at the knots and it took a long time for him to unfasten them. But, when the loosened rope coils fell away from his wrists, the Netherlander rolled over. Quinn relaxed and held his throbbing head between his hands.

Maartens spat a wad of cloth out of his mouth.

“So you're alive after all!” he croaked.

The American did not try to answer as Joris untied his ankles and kicked away the rope. Maartens took the torch and got to his feet, switching the light up and down the corridor. As far as that beam could pierce the gloom they were alone. Then the light centered on Quinn, and he shaded his tormented eyes against its glare. He was aware that Joris was kneeling beside him and that the Netherlander's hand was on his neck pressing his head down.

“It broke the skin —”

Quinn fumbled for his first-aid packet. Then he gritted his teeth and fought nausea while the other tended his wound.

“They were waiting for us —” Maartens’ words came slowly.

“Was — was Loo one of them?” asked Quinn with long spaces between the words.

“Might have been. If he wasn't they took him along with them. I saw them go. They must have knocked Wasburg cold — they were carrying him.”

“Go — where?” Quinn summoned wits enough to ask.

“Across the border. We'll get you back to a doctor and then —”

“No!” Quinn braced his arm against the wall behind him and levered his body up. This time, he thought, he could make his feet — the walls had ceased their mad dance around and around. He swallowed twice and found the words he wanted.

“Can't lose the time. I can make it —”

But Maartens was shaking his head. “That was a bad blow you took —”

Quinn dropped his supporting arm and forced himself to stand away from the wall. “I can do it. But how are we going to get out of here?”

“We can —” Maartens answered almost absently. “Well, I can find a doctor in Belgium, and it may be easier now to go ahead than back. All right — we'll try it!”

13

ODOCAR'S TOWER

Without a guide, how are we going to get out of here?” Quinn tried to assemble thoughts beaten awry by the pain in his skull.

“From remarks they dropped while tying me up,” Joris returned, “I gathered that our friends are going to follow a smuggler's route. If it is the same one I know of I can find the guide marks. Our best plan is this —”

He had been recoiling the rope with which he had been tied.

“They did not cut this — luckily. I will be the pathfinder, but until we are reasonably sure of the road we must not get too far from this point. So” — he dropped one end of the rope on Quinn's knee —”take hold of this and keep it in your hand. I shall go on along the way which they took when they left. There should be some blaze not too far away. When I discover it I will tug this rope and you must come. It is most simple —”

“All right,” agreed Quinn dully. He watched the torch beam flash down the corridor and heard the shuffling of
Joris’ feet as the Netherlander moved away. Then light and man turned a corner, and the dark closed in again.

Quinn twisted the rope about his wrist and waited. He would like to have now, he decided, a drink and a chance to crawl into bed — or maybe the bed first and the drink later. He would also like to rid himself of his splitting headache. But none of that was possible. He closed his eyes and endured as patiently as he could.

His hand was jerked off his knee by a sharp tug on the rope, and he got to his feet, supporting himself against the wall. Around the corner where Joris had disappeared, into a much narrower passage, he staggered, sometimes reeling from wall to wall. But now that he was on his feet and moving Quinn found that he was not so dizzy. And by the time he caught up with Maartens he was able to walk almost steadily.

“Can you make it?” the other greeted him.

“Sure. Find your guide mark?”

The light swept away from the American and focused on a yellow circle on the far wall. There were three words written there.

“Kilroy was here.” And the ‘here’ was underlined.

“You mean that?” Quinn remembered seeing the same message elsewhere. “Kilroy got around to quite a few places some years ago —”

“Yes. But note this —” Joris’ hand appeared in the light, his forefinger moved along the mark under ‘here’.

“Certainly Kilroy is many places in the caverns. But only when he has this arrow — so — is he important. The line is thinnest on this side — so we turn right.”

With the light on their path and Joris within reach, Quinn found that he was able to manage a straighter stride. And if the ground rocked under him now and then he was confident that his companion did not suspect it.

They paused at intervals to rest, and twice Joris brought out the thick squares of ration chocolate and the
canteen. Quinn's watch read twenty minutes past eleven when the corridor they were following ended in a blank wall. But, before the American could question that, Joris beamed the torch to their right.

Sometime in the past, maybe five or maybe five hundred years before, some blocks had been cut away and left ready to be hauled out. Behind them the black shadows masked a very narrow opening. Joris pointed to furrows in the dust.

“Something was dragged along here.”

“Something — or somebody,” commented Quinn. “I don't see though how they could have carried anything through here —”

He wondered even more as they edged through the hole. His shoulders were less wide than Joris’, and yet they brushed the walls on either side. And the Netherlander had to turn slightly sideways to negotiate the narrowest sections of the passage.

There was a sound coming from somewhere before them, a continuous murmur — not speech unless some crowd was chanting. And that made Quinn think of the Black Man and the Riders of Goats. These were the perfect surroundings for the celebration of the Black Mass.

“Watch out!” warned Maartens.

But in spite of that cry Quinn's foot slipped off into space. His fingernails scraped and broke against stone, then he bumped into Joris. But the Netherlander had planted himself sturdily enough to break the fall for both of them.

“Steps,” Joris managed to get out with what breath that encounter had left him.

They were on a series of wide, shallow ledges which might well have been used as a rude staircase. Luckily they
were
shallow and wide or Quinn's tumble might have carried both explorers to the bottom.

They must have descended for about fifty feet before
they came out into a low arched room Joris sent the light traveling slowly around the walls, then across the ceiling.

“Look at that!”

Quinn did not need the other's exclamation to rivet his attention on the roof painting. It was a black drawing of a crude manlike figure, but curved horns sprouted from its bullet head.

“The Black Man!” He identified it. “Could this have once been the meeting place for a Coven — a withces’ Sabbath —”

“Yes. That is old — it was not made by boys playing. Ah —”

The circle of light moved over the Black Man and down the far wall. Even across the chamber Quinn could read the inscription. Kilroy still pointed the way. The hollowed-out room in which they stood was roughly wedge-shaped, and the line of the sign pointed to the narrow end. It was not until they were more than halfway across that Quinn saw the other entrance, a hole in the wall. And it was from this that the muted murmuring issued.

Joris thrust his torch hand into the mouth of the crypt. There was just enough room for Quinn to see, over his shoulder, another passage, the floor of which was a band of black, swiftly-flowing water.

“This I was told of,” the Netherlander withdrew the light again, “so we are on the right path. Now we shall have to wade with the current —” He hesitated.

“How far?” Quinn shed his coat.

“That I do not know.” Joris stooped to put a hand in the water and flipped it out again quickly. “It is liquid ice —”

“Waiting won't warm it up,” Quinn observed. He unlaced his shoes and took them and his socks off. The marl was chill under his bare feet, and he could well believe that the water would be worse. But he bundled together
his slacks, shoes and coat and fastened them with his belt.

The Netherlander made the same preparations and in addition unwound the rope he had looped about his waist.

“Now we tie ourselves together. We do not know where or what this water covers, and one may be swept away. I shall go very slowly. I have never heard of an underground lake in St. Pietersburg — but elsewhere in the Limburg Caverns there are such, and I have no wish to go swimming without warning. Give me a little start now —”

With the caution of one aobut to cross a mined field Joris lowered one foot through the hole. He grunted and shivered as the water closed about his flesh.

“Let us hope that there is not to be much of this. Now I will go forward a little and light you through. It is very cold — be prepared —”

All the preparations in the world would not have softened the shock Quinn felt when the ice of the flood clamped about him as high as his knees. Luckily the bottom was level and free of stones. They crept forward at a snail's pace, the current tearing at them with force enough to be felt.

The numb chill crept up their shivering bodies until Quinn came to think that he would never be warm again. There was no place to rest, or to climb out of the stream for a moment or two. His hands began to shake, and he clutched his bundle of clothing tight to his chest for fear of dropping it.

Then the beam of light flicked to their right, and Joris stopped.

“Here is a place to rest —” His voice floated back in a ghostly whisper, hardly to be heard above the sound of the water.

Quinn shuffled up, and the Netherlander handed him
the torch.

“Hold this while I explore it —”

The American steadied himself against the slimy wall and watched Maartens clamber through a slit.

“Come on — there is room —”

He drew himself out of the water and sank down, furtively rubbing his weak leg. The cold had settled in the muscles there, and for some time he had felt a warning cramp. If his leg was going to give out — Quinn caught his lower lip between his teeth in a savage pinch and rubbed frantically at the stiff, clammy flesh of his calf.

So intent was he upon his own problem that he paid no attention to Joris until an exclamation from the Netherlander made him look around. Maartens stood by the far wall of the pocket in which they found themselves, and he had the torchlight on a small white pile.

“What is it?” asked Quinn without particular interest.

“A good Nazi —”

To Quinn that answer did not make much sense, then the other amplified it.

“From all indications he was a Nazi. Apparently he spied where it was not healthy to wear a black coat and has remained to serve as a warning —”

He snapped off the light. Quinn went on rubbing his leg. He found that the thought of sharing this hole with a tangle of bones was not as revolting as he might once have expected. At least they were out of that water for a while. Then another hand touched his, and he started wildly.

“Muscle cramp?” asked Joris.

“Yes. It will straighten out,” Quinn replied hurriedly, hoping that he was speaking the truth. He tried to believe that it pained less now than it had when he climbed in here.

“We can't be too far from the exit now.” Maartens’ hands moved along with Quinn's, rubbing and attempting
to ease the knotted muscles.

“It's feeling better. I can keep going all right.”

And, Quinn discovered, when they went back into the stream, he could. It wasn't going to last forever he promised his shaking body and numb leg. There would be an end to the dark and the water —

It did come. Joris turned off the torch. The darkness ahead was broken by dull grayish light. But that gray did not grow much brighter. And when they at last splashed out to a muddy bank it was under a thickly clouded sky.

Quinn collapsed on an outcrop of stone and fumbled with his bundle. He sacrificed the scarf he found in his coat pocket to serve as a towel, then dressed. But Joris had already climbed to the top of a neighboring spur.

All Quinn could see below were fields at the extreme left and, for the rest, a tongue of thickly wooded land. A faint path led away from the stream to these woods. But there was no other indication that anyone had passed that way before.

He squinted up at the clouds. It was going to rain and rain hard.

Joris skidded down to join him.

“Over there,” the Netherlander waved his hand to the right, “there is some kind of a house. I saw a piece of roof through the bare trees. This may be part of a hunting preserve —”

Quinn jerked upright. “The hunting box of the Sterns-berg Dukes — We may have come straight to the right place! But the lodge was burnt down during the war.”

“There might be a forester or keeper still living here. But I think it wiser for us not to travel too openly from now on. In the first place,” a half smile quirked his lips, “we are now illegally in Belgium. And secondly, we are on the heels of those who do not care for witnesses. They have had training in the handling of too curious trailers — both customs men and Nazis —”

Quinn remembered the poor huddle of bones they had come upon in the caverns. He had no desire for a similar fate.

“So now we do not follow this very clear path.” Joris dug his toe into the trace leading away from the stream. “Rather shall we circle to the right, making use of the cover afforded by that clump of bushes and that spear of rock. That will take us to the edge of the wood. But within that we must also walk with care. Snares are sometimes set — there is a black market for meat — or so I have heard. You are not woods trained?”

“I am not.”

“Then you will step as lightly as possible, and I shall lead. I am no forester, but in the war days I learned woodscraft — I had to.”

They made use of the clump of bushes and the outcrop of rock Joris had indicated and reached the edge of the wood — a process which entailed crawling. The sky was growing darker, and a rising wind rattled the branches over their heads.

Within the forest there was a secondary defense of thorny briars which resented their intrusion vigorously. And since the American lacked the amazing skill which Maartens displayed in getting through, over, and around these, his hands smarted with pricks, and there were long scratches across cheek and chin by the time he reached a small glade and relaxed thankfully on a pile of season-old leaves behind a fallen tree trunk.

Joris stood in the center of the clearing balancing a small pocket compass on the palm of his hand.

“It is going to storm —”

“Now that,” panted Quinn, “is an understatement if I ever heard one.”

He began to rub his leg again.

“It is better that we do not blunder along in the dark. I want to have a closer look at that house —”
“And you could do that easier if I weren't tagging at your heels?” demanded Quinn snappishly. “All right. I agree to roost here.”

Joris glanced at him, but the American could read nothing in that quick flash of eyes across his face. Instead of answering Maartens began to strip himself of all extra equipment — the knapsack, his jacket, even his cap. He hunched down and ran his hands thrugh the mold under the leaves and smeared the muck across his face until it was almost as uniformly brown as his hair.

“You are well away from the path. I shall be gone” — Joris consulted his watch —”two hours at the most. If I do not return in that time —”

“I send for the marines and head a rescue party —”

But Joris shook his head. “You do nothing to find me. Instead you will take the compass and go south. That will bring you to the highway and the frontier post. You can tell a story of being lost in the caverns and return to Maastricht —”

“Okay, okay,” Quinn broke in. “I can fill in the rest. But you'd better get going before it is too dark to see anything.”

Joris appeared to agree to that, for, without disturbing a spike of the dead weeds, he disappeared. Quinn rested a moment more, then got stiffly to his feet. He collected the bag and clothing the Netherlander discarded. He might be too green at this game to help much, but he had an idea or two of his own, and he was
not
going to hunt any highway and beat it back across the border! What was the matter with him anyway? He must seem the type who would fluff out when the going got rough or Maartens wouldn't have made a suggestion like that. After all this was more his adventure than the Netherlander's.