Borrower of the Night

Chapter Eleven

I HAD NOT EXPECTED to find an open door with an EXIT sign beside it; but I hadn’t anticipated anything quite as bad as this. My hands were shaking as I wedged my torch into a crack in the wall and started digging. It didn’t take long to verify my pessimistic suspicions. The dirt and rubble continued for some distance. For all I knew, the rest of the tunnel might be filled. And I was here, in a neat airless trap, with two injured men.

I gave vent to my emotions briefly, but I did it without noise. Then I wiped my face on the sleeve of my coat and went back to the wounded.

Tony, squatting with his back up against the tunnel wall, looked a little better. I had put on a cheery smile, but it didn’t deceive him.

‘No way out?’

‘It doesn’t look good.’ I handed him the torch and knelt down by Blankenhagen, whose eyes were closed. ‘Doctor. If you can tell me what to do as I go along, I’ll try to fix your arm.’

‘I will tell you first,’ said Blankenhagen, without opening his eyes. ‘I am about to lose consciousness.’

And he did, too, as soon as I put my clumsy paws on his arm. Tony offered to take over, but I clamped my lower lip between my teeth and elbowed him away. Like mine, his knowledge was purely theoretical, derived from far-off memories of Scout manuals and Red Cross training. I did the job, with strips torn from my blouse and pieces of wood from the stairs; but I was covered with perspiration by the time I was through.

After a while, Blankenhagen opened one eye.

‘Finished?’ he inquired warily.

‘Finished is right.’ I was sitting on the floor next to Tony.

‘Then speak,’ ordered Blankenhagen, prone but positive. ‘What is our position?’

I told them. Neither of them liked it very much.

‘Seems to me,’ I concluded, ‘that our best bet is to try to dig through the earth fall. Even if I could climb the shaft – which I can’t – we can be sure that trapdoor is closed for good. The stone is a foot thick, and it’s down in the cellars, where no one ever comes. But if the dirt is just a localized fall, we can dig through it. Maybe.’

‘I can climb the shaft,’ said Tony, squinting up at it. ‘It’s a simple chimney job. But I agree with your other conclusions. I could hang up there yelling till I sprouted mushrooms before anyone would hear me.’

‘I didn’t know you could climb,’ I said, distracted.

‘I have many talents you don’t know about.’ Tony tried to leer, but didn’t do a very good job of it. ‘How far underground do you suppose we are?’

‘You mean we might try to dig out through the ceiling of the tunnel? We must be twenty or thirty feet down; the land rises behind the Schloss. What would we do with the dirt? There’s enough of it out there in the tunnel right now.’

‘But,’ said Blankenhagen, ‘if you dig through, and find the exit at the other end is also blocked?’

‘Let’s not cross bridges till we come to them,’ I said. ‘However, I don’t think our friend would have created a landslide if the exit at the other end were easy to close.’

‘It was deliberate, you believe?’

‘The dirt hasn’t been there long. And the rest of this is deliberate. I can assure you I didn’t dive feet first down that shaft on purpose. I’ll bet the stairs were partially sawed through, too.’

‘Someone flung you down?’ exclaimed Blankenhagen, as if the idea had just occurred to him. ‘You saw who it was?’

‘I saw nothing. I still don’t know who has been behind all the skulduggery. I suspect two people – ’

‘One of whom,’ said Tony, ‘could be you, Blankenhagen.’

Blankenhagen surveyed his battered form in meaningful silence. Tony shook his head.

‘That part could have been an accident – the stairs, I mean. You could have rapped me on the head and left me here if the stairs hadn’t collapsed.’

‘That’s silly,’ I said impatiently. ‘My money is still on the countess and Miss Burton. Good Lord, they are the only two left. And this argument isn’t getting us out of here.’

‘And,’ said Blankenhagen, ‘we may not have so much time.’

He didn’t have that much time. My surgery had been crude, and we had no antiseptic. A couple of days down here in his condition and he wouldn’t care about getting out. But that was not what he meant. The air in the tunnel had always been close and dry. Now, it seemed to me, it was already perceptibly warmer.

With Tony’s help, Blankenhagen managed to drag himself along the tunnel to where the dirt blocked the way, but when he tried to dig he collapsed.

‘I told you so,’ I said, helping Tony drag him out of the way. ‘I’ll start digging. I am, if you will pardon the expression, in better shape than either of you. And put out that torch, it’s just using air. This is going to be mostly by touch anyhow.’

Then began a period of time which is the worst memory of a not wholly pleasant summer. I started with great energy, sending out a spray of dirt like a burrowing puppy. Despite my boast I wasn’t feeling all that hot; I hadn’t had any sleep and my bruises ached. But there is no incentive quite as persuasive as the fear of dying of asphyxiation.

It was slow, heartbreaking work. The dirt slid down from above almost as fast as I dug it out. Finally Iwent back and got some boards from the fallen staircase to shore up my miniature tunnel. It helped some.

When Tony tugged at my ankles, I let him pull me out and take my place. Utterly exhausted, I curled up on the stone floor and, incredibly, fell asleep.

I slept uneasily, dreaming there was a steel band around my chest. I awoke with a gasp to find Tony shaking me.

‘The air is pretty bad, Vicky. We’ve got to get through soon, or we’ll never make it. If you clear away the dirt I push out . . .’

‘Blankenhagen?’ I croaked, rubbing eyes that felt as if they were glued shut.

‘He’s still breathing, but he won’t be for long. if we don’t get out of here soon, none of us will be.’

I insisted on taking his place in the hole. The air was foul in that narrow space, even worse than it was in the tunnel, and he had been breathing it for some time.

I felt as if I were working under water. Each movement had the languid deliberation of a swimmer’s arm-stroke. I could see nothing. Eyes can adjust to a tiny amount of light, but there was no light at all in that stinking hole. My senses were foggy; I couldn’t hear anything except the echo of my own hoarse breathing. After a time the only sense remaining to me was that of touch, the only reality the gritty yielding substance under my bleeding fingers. Occasionally I backed out of the hole to breathe the slightly less noxious mixture that passed for air out in the tunnel. I found Tony flat on the floor the second time I did this, and dragged him out of the way so the dirt wouldn’t cover his face. Then I crawled back in, and worked till I started to see flames dance against the darkness.

Finally I waited too long. When I tried to back out, I couldn’t move.

My hands went to my throat, as if to tear away the thing that was blocking my lungs. No use . . . Blankenhagen and Tony were dying, maybe dead. And I was dying too. I would fall down in this awful dirty hole and never wake up. It was almost a relief to feel the pain of my labouring lungs fade as I fell forward into blackness no more absolute than that which already surrounded me.

When I came to, I was breathing. The shock of this discovery woke me completely.

I had been on the verge of breaking through the earth fall when my last convulsion threw me against the thin shell of soil remaining. I was lying with my head and shoulders on a downhill slope of dirt. The rest of my body was still in the hole. By a miracle, it hadn’t caved in.

I went back through my little tunnel as fast as I dared. Tony was already stirring as the fresh air from beyond reached him. Ruthlessly I slapped him awake. We didn’t waste time feeling Blankenhagen’s pulse or handling him gently. I backed through the tunnel dragging him by the shoulder, with Tony pushing from the other end. Tony barely made it. The ceiling began to subside as his head came out of the hole, and he had to pull his legs through solid dirt.

The first thing I did was light a match. The feeble flame was a beautiful sight. I’ve had a slight phobia about darkness ever since that night.

To our surprise and relief, Blankenhagen was still breathing. That was all we bothered to find out. Tony was on his feet, swaying dizzily, but driven; I followed, lighting matches with reckless abandon.

The tunnel went straight on without bending. It ended in a flight of wooden stairs.

I let Tony go up. The stairs looked solid, but there was no point in risking a double weight. If only the stone I could see at the top was movable . . .

When Tony came down, his face was grey. He didn’t need to speak. He just shook his head.

The match went out. Holding hands, we stumbled back to where we had left Blankenhagen. He had not moved. We curled up, one on either side of him. Tony was mumbling about shock, and keeping the patient warm, and it all made very good sense to me at the time, but I didn’t really care. All I wanted to do was rest.

When I finally awoke I knew I had slept for hours. All my bruises had solidified, and I was as stiff as Blankenhagen’s splinted arm. Otherwise I didn’t feel too bad. The first thing I did was take a deep breath. The air was still fresh. No problem there.

With that vital matter settled, I started to take stock. I could hear Tony snoring; it was loud enough to wake the dead. So I knew he was okay. Blankenhagen . . .

At least he was warm. I was in a good position to know. Somehow his one usable arm had gotten around me and my head was on his shoulder. His heart sounded a little fast.

I extricated myself, sat up, and lit a match. Blankenhagen’s eyes were open.

The shreds of my blouse were wrapped around his left arm. I wasn’t embarrassed. I wear less on the beach, and anyhow I was covered by a coating of dirt

‘Sorry for leaning on you,’ I said. ‘Did I hurt you?’

‘Hurt me? You have saved my life – you and he.’ But he didn’t look at Tony. ‘You are an amazing woman.’

‘And you,’ I said, returning his du, ‘are quite a guy. How do you feel?’

‘Quite well.’ He smiled at me.

It was a silly question, and a ridiculous answer. He felt terrible. His face was flushed and his eyes had the glassy glitter of fever. The hand that reached for mine was dry and hot. But the smile was as attractive as ever. One thing you had to say about Blankenhagen: his emotions were wholehearted and consistent. When he disapproved of something, the very air turned icy. When he approved . . . Clearly he now approved of me. All of me.

The match went out. I felt sort of silly sitting there in the dark, so when he pulled at my hand, I lay down.

I’m not sure what would have happened next if Tony hadn’t woken up.

Every time I heard him go through this process I decided that, if I was ever weak-minded enough to marry the guy, I would insist on separate bedrooms. He snorted, choked, gargled, and flailed around. By the time he was fully awake, Blankenhagen was clucking with alarm and I was sitting detached, wrapped in my dirt and my dignity.

Since we were undistracted by details such as breakfast and baths, we got right to work. I don’t suppose Tony’s hopes were any higher than mine; but we had been too tired to examine the exit closely, and after all – what else could we do but try? Sitting in peaceful silence waiting to die of starvation wasn’t in keeping with any of our characters.

Blankenhagen could walk, but not much. Tony towed him to the foot of the stairs and propped him up, remarking, ‘Sit and watch. Criticize, complain, cheer politely now and then to encourage us – ’

‘And think,’ I interrupted. ‘We could use a few ideas.’

Tony went up the stairs. The first time he had banged and shoved and given up. This time he just looked. We were running low on matches, so he used pages from his notebook, twisted into tight little spills. Then he came down.

‘There’s a chance,’ he said. He was trying to sound matter-of-fact, but his voice shook slightly.

‘You can lift the stone?’

‘No.’ Tony dropped to the floor and took out his cigarettes. Those nice cancer-producing cigarettes . . . Without that vicious habit we wouldn’t have had any matches. ‘No, there’s something barring the trapdoor – metal, by the feel of it. I jabbed it with my pocketknife. But I’ve had an inspiration. Look at the way this place is built. We’re sitting at the bottom of a narrow shaft. This tunnel, and the shaft, are faced with stones bonded with mortar. They’re old. The mortar is crumbling.’

He dug at a section with his knife blade and dislodged an impressive chunk of plaster.

‘Gently,’ muttered Blankenhagen. ‘One landslide is enough.’

‘Okay, Okay. Now the stone that blocks the shaft is a monolith, must weigh hundreds of pounds, like the stones used to build the Wachtturm. I figure that’s where we are – under the floor of the keep. The stones here in the shaft are much smaller. Behind them is – plain dirt. If I can remove part of the wall of the shaft, and dig out enough dirt to expose the floor slab next to the trapdoor, I can remove it. Either it will push up, or I can chisel out the mortar and let it drop down.’

‘Can’t you let the trap drop down?’ I asked.

‘Stupid question. Trapdoors are designed not to drop down. This one is held up by a rim of stone and some solid metal hinges. We’d have seen it the other day, Vicky, if the floor of the keep weren’t so overgrown. No, the side stone is the only chance.’

The old mortar crumbled under Tony’s vigorous knife. When the first wall stone came out, it was followed by a shower of dirt that got into our eyes and made me wonder whether he was about to start another avalanche. It trickled out, however, and he went on working. When four stones had been removed, there was enough space to allow a man’s body to pass. Tony began to shovel out the dirt. He remarked, ‘I have a feeling I’m never going to want a garden.’

I didn’t answer. My eyes were glued on that gap on the wall, which I was illuminating by means of another homemade torch. By this time we could see the end of the floor slab, and there was a considerable pile of dirt on the stairs.

In less than an hour Tony had cleared the lower surface of the stone. He began to chip out the mortar. This was the trickiest part of the job; we ended up replacing some of the dirt Tony had laboriously removed, in order to support one end of the slab so it wouldn’t give way all at once and mash Tony. After a couple of heart-stopping scrapes, he finally managed to do what he had set out to do. There was an opening a couple of feet square in the wall of the shaft.

Tony turned.

‘I think we can make it now.’

But for several seconds none of us moved. We stared at one another with the white-faced incredulity of shipwrecked sailors who finally see a sail on the horizon.

‘Better let me go first,’ I said. ‘I’m the thinnest.’

At the expense of a few square inches of skin, I got through. A push from Tony and I was out, gooseflesh popping out on my bare arms as the heavenly coolness of the night air hit them. My coat was still down below, and so far as I was concerned, it could stay there. Nothing, not even the shrine, could have gotten me back into that hole.

At first I just lay there on the floor and admired the view through the open door. As Tony had predicted, I was on the ground floor of the keep, and the moonlight scene without was exquisite. A desert would have looked good to me just then if it had a sky over it.

The sight of the silvery moonlight reminded me of a minor discomfort that had been overridden by more pressing worries. Suddenly I was dying of thirst. Leaning over the hole I croaked out, ‘Put out the torch and come on.’

Getting Blankenhagen out wasn’t easy. Only fortitude and hope had kept him conscious; he was a dead weight, and even with Tony pushing from below and me pulling from above we had a hard time. When we finally extracted him, he collapsed at full length on the floor and lay there without moving.

Tony followed, breathing hard and looking as if he was going to be sick. We were both flat on the floor, just breathing, when the beautiful silver moonlight was blotted out by a shape in the doorway.

The figure crossed the room without a glance at the shadows where we were sprawled, and disappeared.

I applied grubby knuckles to my eyes. I knew the stairs leading up to the next floor had provided the means of exit for that incredible apparition, but I couldn’t believe I had really seen it – a tall figure, cloaked and hooded, wearing boots that rang metallically on the stone floor – and carrying in its arms the white-robed figure of a woman.

Tony stared speechlessly. Blankenhagen sat up. He had no voice left; but the air came out of his lungs in an explosive whisper that broke my paralysis like a dash of cold water.

‘Irma!’