Borrower of the Night - Elizabeth Peters [84]
I looked at Irma. She had risen to one knee. Her arm was lifted in the gesture that had just sent a man to a messy death. Her black hair was whipped about her face by the wind, and her eyes were enormous.
‘Well,’ said Tony weakly, ‘well, well, well . . .’
He might have gone on like that indefinitely if Irma had not interrupted.
‘He would have killed you,’ she cried, gesturing from Tony to the prostrate form of the doctor. ‘Should I lie still and see him kill you?’
She didn’t mention me. I was in no position to complain; I don’t mind having my life saved as an afterthought.
I cleared my throat. Nobody looked at me. Irma had decided the doctor was the more pathetic of her two heroes, and had taken his bloody head onto her lap. She was crooning over him, and I thought I detected a slight smirk on his face. One of his eyes was open; when he saw me staring, it quickly closed. Tony was trying to look pitiful too, but he couldn’t match Blankenhagen’s performance.
‘Somebody should go for help,’ I said. ‘Hey, Tony – ’
‘Aber nicht!’ Irma gave me a cold look. ‘He cannot go, he is bleeding, in pain – near death, in saving our lives. Run! Go at once!’
‘Run?’ I said. ‘Me?’
Tony moaned and let his head fall back against the parapet.
‘You creep,’ I said to him. I looked at Blankenhagen. ‘The same to you,’ I said. With great dignity I crawled to the stairs and started down them.
I covered about half the distance to the Schloss before my legs gave out. Shivering with shock and reaction, I squatted in a patch of nettles and let my mind wander.
The outlines of the castle wall wavered like fog in front of my half-closed eyes. I was sick. I was thirsty. I was all covered with dirt, and nobody loved me.
After a while my head cleared a little, and I tried to think. Maybe I should go directly to the police. The idea made me giggle wildly. They would take one look at me and send for a doctor. Meanwhile the Gräfin would be on the loose. What if she took a notion to go out and see how George was coming along with his murder? Tony’s groans weren’t altogether phony, he wasn’t in shape to fight anybody, and the Gräfin had always scared the hell out of him. She wouldn’t have to shoot him; she would just stare at him. He would shrivel up and blow away. So would I, if I ran into the old lady now. She could demolish me with a breath.
‘What I need,’ I said aloud, ‘is an army. Right now.’
Then I remembered a fact out of a past that seemed years away. I hauled myself to my feet and headed for the front door of the castle.
My entrance was public, and as spectacular as any ham actress could have prayed for. In the hall I met one of the blond waitresses on her way to the lounge with a big tray of steins. I grimaced into her horrified face and went on my way, hearing the crash of glassware behind me. In the lounge was the group I had hoped to see – the university kids, brimming over with beer and song and youthful joie de vivre. I was incapable of counting them, but the general effect was just what I wanted.
‘Guten Abend,’ I said politely and saw four . . . eight . . . sixteen – good heavens, how many were there? – all those eyes focus in glazed stares. I’m sure they expected me to bend over and extract a knife from my stocking. Only I wasn’t wearing stockings.
‘There has been an accident,’ I said, in my best German. ‘We must have the police. And a doctor. And on the top of the keep, behind this place, you will find several people who need to be transported