The road to Jajce was winding and pitted, crumbling in parts, but the solid Benz did not fuss. They turned off for the village of Kontic after an hour’s drive, and the road became little better than a loose-surfaced cart track. It got worse as they approached the village, so they left the car and walked the last hundred yards. There was a valley on their right, beyond which hard brown hills rose starkly, only to be dwarfed by distant mountains soaring to ravage the sky. On the hills gigantic boulders were cupped so precariously by hard ridges that it seemed a touch would topple them. In the valley a river wound its way over a rocky course, the banks and the waters strewn with fallen stone. At the foot of the hills trees had forced their way into the light and bushes had sprung from cracks. The sun poured down to give life to colours invisible at grey dawn.
The walk was uphill and the village itself climbed steeply. The stone and timber cottages looked warm but quiet, their overhanging roofs shading the upper windows. Doors stood open and interiors, defying the outside heat, seemed dim and cool. Somewhere a kid goat bleated for its mother. Two women, scarves around their heads, black hats over the scarves, emerged from a path leading up from the river. They were carrying baskets of wet washing. They cast quick, shy glances as James and the young baronesses entered the village. Anne and Sophie, parasols up, looked in their bright elegance as if they had just come from a garden party. James was bareheaded, the sun deepening his dark tan. His white cotton shirt was tucked in comfortable knickerbockers, his jacket and sketchbook under his arm.
The little tavern, with its whitewashed front and faded awning, stood at the lower end of the village. Outside were a few round, marble-topped tables, their wrought-iron pedestals pitted with rust marks. There were no customers.
‘So quiet, so lovely,’ said Anne, ‘now we can have coffee.’
They stopped. Sophie regarded the village, its hilly, rutted street, and then the harshness of the sunlit view on their right.
‘Is this God’s own end of the world? I always think so,’ she said.
‘I always think that in this part of Bosnia there must be brigands,’ said Anne.
‘Oh, Dragovich and his kind grow corn and keep goats now,’ said Sophie.
James wished he had a bold, imaginative talent with oils. It was colour, rasping and brazen, which these vistas demanded. The village, built on the hillside above the river, was a dream vantage point for any artist. Here, by the tavern, one might sit and commit the primitive grandeur to memory, while sketching outlines.
As he stood in absorbed contemplation of light and shade, Anne and Sophie delicately inspected the chairs around one of the tables. James put his sketchbook on the table, took out his handkerchief and dusted the chairs.
‘James, that is so nice of you,’ said Sophie, ‘and although there’s a certain masculine superiority about some men which I fail to understand, considering the invaluable contribution women make to the continuation of life, I do enjoy the little courtesies which most men accord us. I confess—’
‘Won’t you sit down?’ said James gravely.
‘Thank you, James,’ she smiled. She and Anne seated themselves. James joined them. The baronesses awaited the next move in sun-mellowed graciousness. The village seemed even quieter, as if the advent of strangers had made all life retreat behind curtains. No one came out of the café to serve the arrivals. James got up to see who was dead and who was only sleeping, and the proprietor emerged. He was white-aproned, bushily moustached and fatly amiable.
James asked for coffee in German. Croatian or Serbian was beyond him, but German was the second language in this Austrian province of Bosnia. The proprietor smiled, showing gleaming white teeth, and polished the tabletop with the hem of his apron. He beamed at the summery baronesses.
‘Beautiful,’ he said in German.
‘Yes, quite the loveliest day,’ smiled Anne.
He chuckled and waddled back into the tavern.
‘I don’t think he meant the day,’ said James.
‘Well, everything is beautiful,’ said Anne, ‘or at least impressive.’
‘Striking,’ said James.
‘What is?’ asked Sophie, willing to simply sit for the moment and wonder about the world in summer, and why her nerves were becoming so sensitively on edge at times.
‘Both of you,’ said James.
‘James, this is very sudden,’ said Anne and laughed. Sophie thought how the summer always made her sister look radiant.
‘Oh, after this last month or so,’ said James, ‘I count myself an old friend of the family. Or at least of the Benz.’
‘You are our very good friend,’ said Sophie, ‘and I should hope you will always be.’
If Anne was the kind the sun made radiant, Sophie in summer looked exquisitely impervious to its heat. Except that now, as James smiled at her, a faint flush invaded her coolness. Anne saw the flush. She smiled. She got up and wandered across the dusty street to stand on the dry grassy verge that dipped a little way beyond her to merge with the bracken-strewn slope leading down to the river. She stood there in the sun, the skirt of her dress fluttering.
At the table James said, ‘Another thing. Your poetry, Sophie. Loved it, I assure you. Well, as much as I could in German. You’re far better with words than I am with paints.’
‘You are serious? You really liked it?’ said Sophie.
‘Really,’ said James.
‘You are very kind,’ said Sophie. ‘Of course, people are kind to one about such things and sometimes they are too kind. Sometimes it’s better not to be kind at all but frank, so that one knows, as everybody else does, that there is always room for improvement. It does not do to be flattered into thinking that everything one does is perfect. I am very imperfect—’
‘The proprietor thinks you are beautiful,’ said James.
‘There, you see, he is the kind of flatterer who will make me think I am,’ said Sophie.
The proprietor re-emerged, bringing the coffee on a tray, the earthenware pot full, the cups rattling. He bowed the tray on to the table. He beamed at Sophie.
‘Beautiful,’ he said again, at which Sophie laughed and shook her head and James smiled. The proprietor chuckled happily as he disappeared. Anne returned to her chair. Sophie busied herself pouring coffee. James turned and eyed the view again as he stirred his coffee. The range of mountain heights was sharp under the light of the clarifying sun.
‘If you want to sketch,’ said Sophie, ‘we don’t mind.’
‘He’s dying to, aren’t you, James?’ said Anne. ‘So please do.’
He opened up his sketchbook. With his pencil he began to put down soft, sweeping impressions. The sisters watched him, Anne with interest, Sophie with a sensitive awareness that images were changing for her. He was still sketching when they had finished the coffee.
Anne said, ‘Do you think the proprietor will give us lunch? If not, we can drive up to Jajce and have it there. James?’
James allowed himself to be interrupted. He rattled his cup in the saucer. It brought the proprietor out after a moment or so. He blinked sleepy but amiable eyes.
‘Lunch?’ said James. ‘In an hour, perhaps?’
The proprietor reached for the coffee pot.
‘Good, yes?’ he said.
‘No, not more coffee,’ said James in his now not quite so erratic German, ‘food.’
‘Ah, so. I do you good food.’
‘In an hour,’ said James.
‘Good,’ said the genial fat one. He looked at Sophie and Anne, his beam plumply happy for them. ‘Beautiful,’ he said yet again, then returned to his chair in the shady comfort of his café.
‘Anne,’ said Sophie, ‘we have made a hit. Which is rather nice these days when it’s only motor cars that make a hit with most men. Perhaps our good proprietor will treat us to an excellent lunch. We shall pay for it, you and I, because we would like to treat James for once, wouldn’t we? Isn’t it intriguing to notice how people of rather stout proportions are nearly always much more affable than everyone else? Do you remember the story about the fat man of Salzburg? His smile was wider than his front door, and he was always smiling, and when he laughed the church bells shook, and the only thing that worried him were his extraordinarily large feet. He grew fatter each year and when at last he was so fat that he could no longer see his feet he laughed so much that the church bells chimed.’
James, for all his concentration, said, ‘Oh, good God, Sophie.’
Anne said, ‘But, Sophie, if he was always smiling and his smile was wider than his front door, how did he get through it?’
‘Oh, he took a deep breath,’ said Sophie coolly, ‘and edged out sideways.’
James laughed.
‘It’s difficult for a fat man to hold a deep breath,’ said Anne.
‘Naturally,’ said Sophie, ‘there were times when he got stuck.’
‘Then what happened?’
‘He laughed,’ said Sophie.
‘And brought the house down,’ said James.
Inside the café the sleepy proprietor chuckled. It was good to hear people laughing. They were all laughing, those three. They were nice people.
‘I think we’re interrupting James,’ said Anne.
‘Oh, I’m sorry, James,’ said Sophie. ‘Anne, let us leave him to it for a while. We can walk up to the top of the village and look around. There may be a shop. They sell braid and lace in some of these places.’
‘Watch out for the fleas,’ said James as the girls rose.
‘Fleas?’ said Anne a little uncertainly.
‘They don’t sell them, not in these places,’ said James, ‘they give them away.’
‘Well, whatever they give us we’ll share with you,’ said Sophie generously. She and Anne walked up through the village. People began to materialize in doorways. The women in embroidered blouses and braided skirts were silent but curious. Here and there a shy smile peeped.
James sketched on for a while, then sat back. The mountains which were so clear in this light cried out for colour. He mused on them. It was very quiet without Sophie and Anne. One missed their infectious animation. He got up. The small church of whitewashed stone and red tiles stood back from the street. It was a simple, four-cornered building with a small open belfry. He walked from the tavern and turned to meander along the church path. The grass on either side already looked parched. There was a wooden bench. He sat down and sketched an outline. He looked up, at the belfry and the red roof, studied his outline and began again on a new sheet. He heard the sudden murmur of voices. The tavern had new customers. He finished his drawing, it did not displease him. But he would never make money at it. Not the kind of money he was beginning to think about. He would have to go back home some time and talk to the guv’nor about things. Things would have to embrace car designing. He returned to the tavern. He heard men talking but did not understand the language. There were many different tongues in the Balkans. But as he came round to the little patio, sheltered by faded awning, he heard someone say in German, ‘Ah, so, an archduke is just as much an archduke in Ilidze as in Sarajevo.’
It startled him. He stopped. The voices stopped. In blank silence four men at a table looked at him. They were in dark suits, black hats and tieless shirts. They were swarthy, their faces impassive but their eyes flickering with suspicion. They knew him for a man who did not belong here.
‘Good day to you,’ said James. He moved and sat down. He had spoken in English, instinctively rejecting German. Three of the men were uncomprehending. The fourth responded.
‘Good day,’ he said gutturally.
James smiled and nodded. The proprietor came out and gabbled to the men. Then he turned to James and said in German, ‘Soon, food. Good.’
‘Good,’ said James in English. There was not much difference. He began to sketch again. After a while the four men resumed their conversation, arms on the table, heads leaning in. The man who had responded to James had a fine, expressive face and eyes of brilliant brown. His chin was dark with stubble and he had a pallor to his skin as if he had been too long out of the sun. James lit a cigarette and went on with his sketching, glancing occasionally at the pale man.
A shadow fell across the veined marble table and a hand placed itself on his sketch. He looked up. It was the pale man.
‘What is this you do?’ asked the man in German.
‘You are saying?’ said James in English.
‘What’s that? Come, you understand me. What is this drawing?’
James turned the pad and showed him. It was a likeness of the man himself.
‘Perhaps not very good,’ said James, resigning himself to German.
‘Why have you done this?’ The man was studying the drawing intently.
‘Oh, the impulse of my kind.’
‘What kind is that?’ The man was curt, suspicious.
‘I’m an artist of sorts.’
‘Where are you from?’
‘England. Oh, and Scotland.’ James smiled. ‘And where are you from?’
‘Here,’ said the man and waved an arm to expansively embrace all Bosnia, but his eyes were still on the sketch. ‘Have you done this to show to someone?’
‘Sometimes I show my work to friends. Would you like to have this?’
‘I will have it.’ The man ripped the stiff sheet from the pad, folded it and stuffed it into his pocket. He went into the tavern. Rickety chairs stood around wooden tables, the tables scrubbed and clean. Behind the polished black marble counter was an array of earthenware coffee pots and china, bottles and glasses. The man called, ‘Joja!’ The proprietor emerged from the kitchen. ‘Joja, who’s that stranger?’
The proprietor shrugged. ‘He came with two young women and asked for coffee and food. That’s all I know.’
‘So. The two women are up in the village, looking. What are they looking for?’
‘Who is a magician? I am not. So how should I know? Listen, Dobrovic,’ said Joja, ‘sometimes people come in the summer to look and to buy braid. Then they go away. No one ever comes to stay.’
‘He’s not here to buy braid,’ said the man Dobrovic. ‘He heard Lazar say something, then he made a drawing. Of me. Look at it.’ He took the sketch out and showed it to Joja.
‘Ah, it is good,’ said Joja with placating good humour. Dobrovic was a touchy fellow at times. ‘You see? He’s an artist. Sometimes artists come here too.’
Dobrovic spat on the floor.
‘Artist the devil, he’s a police agent more like. They come nosing too sometimes. This drawing, it’s me, isn’t it? A man with half an eye could see that. He’ll show it to the police if I give it back to him and the police will ask me what I was doing at Kontic when I’m not supposed to leave Mostar. Well, our number one comrade will be here soon and we’ll see what he has to say about artists and prying women.’
‘There’s to be no trouble,’ said Joja, ‘Avriarches won’t like it.’
‘Is that roaring thief still running this district?’ scowled Dobrovic.
‘What can we do?’ Joja spread his hands. ‘The police at Jajce are in his pocket as much as we are.’
‘You are, we aren’t,’ said Dobrovic, ‘but he has his uses sometimes.’
Sophie and Anne returned. They arrived like the bright graces of summer. They made the four men stare. James was relieved to have them back. There was an atmosphere he did not like. He felt the men had been carefully watching him, scrutinizing him. Now they turned their eyes on the girls. Joja brought the food out. Anne and Sophie were delighted. There were trout, swimming in sauce, and salad containing something of everything, green with lettuce, red with tomatoes, rich with juicy cucumber and laced with sliced beans and peppers.
‘Good?’ said Joja with a confident beam.
‘Lovely,’ said Anne.
‘Thank you,’ said Sophie.
‘Beautiful,’ said Joja and smiled happily under his bushy black moustache. It was as well Avriarches was high in the hills. He might have been tempted by these two. They looked aristocratic. Avriarches liked high-born women. ‘Ah, well, good appetite,’ he said and went away.
He returned with a bottle of wine from a southern vineyard, and persuaded them to have it. It was just right, light dry and delicate. They enjoyed their lunch.
‘Who’d have thought it?’ said Anne. ‘So out of the way, so small, yet such a good meal.’
‘I don’t think civilization stops beyond Vienna or is anything to do with the size of a place,’ said Sophie. She wondered why the four men sat so silently at their table near the café door. ‘I expect one could sit on the top of a hill and be just as cultured and civilized as a million people in a large city.’
‘One could point to Diogenes, who lived in a tub,’ said James.
‘Was that civilized?’ said Anne. ‘Or uncomfortable?’
‘That was mortification of the flesh for the purification of the soul,’ said Sophie.
‘Poor soul,’ said Anne.
‘This is hardly mortifying, is it?’ said Sophie, dissecting her trout.
‘It is for the trout,’ said James. He engaged in light conversation with the baronesses, but felt the silence of the four men was a heavy, brooding one. They were drinking endless cups of coffee and saying not a word. The man Dobrovic referred to his tin pocket watch from time to time. At the finish of the meal James rose.
‘I must pay,’ he said and went inside. Joja woke up and stood up. He brushed his moustache and smiled.
‘How much?’ asked James.
Joja totted it all up on his fingers. He named an amount which James thought incredibly cheap. It brought Joja a handsome tip. He was more than happy.
‘It was good?’ he said.
‘Very good,’ said James, ‘and thank you.’
‘You go to Jajce now? Yes, very nice there. You go now.’
‘We weren’t thinking of that, only of returning to Ilidze.’
‘Ilidze, that is nice too,’ said Joja, ‘you come back and see me another day, yes? Make you more good food. Ah, you are a fortunate young man.’
‘You think so?’ James liked the fat man.
‘Beautiful,’ smiled Joja and spread his hands. James knew what he meant and patted the proprietor on the shoulder. Joja bustled him out, anxious apparently to see him on his way with his young ladies. Outside a horse-drawn cart had pulled up and a man was dismounting. An earnest-looking man in a dark suit and wide-brimmed black hat. Dobrovic went to meet him. They shook hands. James received a little shock. The newcomer was Boris Ferenac. Ferenac saw him while his ears listened to Dobrovic. He said something to Dobrovic. Dobrovic rattled off a long sentence. Ferenac pushed him aside and strode to the tables. Sophie was finishing the last of her wine.
‘Lazar,’ said Ferenac, ignoring James. The man Lazar got up and Ferenac pushed him inside the café, then turned savagely on him. ‘You fool,’ he said, ‘with your mouth as loud as a donkey’s – a German donkey’s.’
‘German – that was for friend Shuckmeister’s benefit,’ said Lazar, ‘he fumbles about in our language. And how was I to know that man was behind me? But it was nothing he took any notice of.’
‘Idiot,’ hissed Ferenac, ‘he’s a man who’d take a lot of notice. He’s heard things before and asked a child about me. He’s supposed to be a teacher—’
‘He’s an artist,’ said Joja.
‘Oh, so now he’s an artist, is he?’ said Ferenac and sucked at his teeth. Life, it seemed, was no longer a matter of secretive smiles. It had become troublesome. ‘He knows the son of Count Lundt-Hausen, the police superintendent of Vienna. I saw them together. Do you like the sound of that? I don’t. He’s drawn a likeness of Dobrovic and can no doubt do the same with the rest of you. But not with me. He knows me. He and I have met. This is a coincidence which is perhaps not a coincidence. And those damn women with him, they’ve been nosing about, Dobrovic says.’
‘We weren’t going to let them go, not until you came,’ said Lazar.
‘Look,’ said Joja, ‘don’t make trouble, nobody keeps healthy on trouble, and they’re nice people.’
‘Shut up,’ said Ferenac. ‘If they’re informers there has to be trouble and we’re taking no chances with the day so close. I don’t want the police tapping me on the shoulder in Ilidze. Lazar, you go for Avriarches. He’ll take care of the women. I’ll look after the informer. We will make it seem as if Avriarches took all three of them.’
‘Informer, bah,’ said Joja, ‘he’s an artist, he’s been drawing everything. It’s madness to encourage Avriarches to take those young women, you’ll bring the whole Austrian army and police force down on us.’
‘Shut up,’ said Ferenac again. ‘A man who was a teacher with friends in high places, and who now says he’s an artist hasn’t come here at a time like this looking for things to paint. He’s looking for us, for me. Well, he has found me. He’ll wish he hadn’t. Off you go, Lazar.’
Lazar slipped out. Joja looked worried. Outside Anne and Sophie were ready to go. They were putting up their parasols and James was fidgeting to get them moving. Ferenac came out and interposed himself.
‘What are you doing here?’ he asked James.
‘I wondered if you’d recognized me,’ said James amiably. ‘It’s a small world sometimes. Are you living in Bosnia now?’
‘What is it to you where I live?’ said Ferenac. ‘But now we’ve met again, sit down and we’ll talk. Joja will bring us coffee.’
‘I’ve had coffee, thanks all the same,’ said James, ‘and we have to get back to Ilidze.’
‘Ilidze?’ Ferenac’s eyes narrowed. He gestured. There were three other men now that Lazar had gone. The village was quieter than ever as they moved to bar the way to James and the baronesses. ‘You,’ he said to the sisters, ‘go inside.’
Sophie drew herself up very coolly and said, ‘I am not in your charge, neither is my sister.’
‘Goodbye, Ferenac,’ said James. He gave Anne his sketch book, then took both girls by the arm and moved forward, turning to avoid the men. The men shifted their position, presenting a more solid barrier. ‘Don’t be damned silly,’ said James.
Anne trembled. Something very unpleasant seemed to be happening. James swore to himself. He felt he knew what it was all about now that Ferenac had arrived. It was all about assassination. The Archduke Franz Ferdinand was in Bosnia for the Austrian army manoeuvres. A good archduke is a dead one.
‘You’ll be wise to do as you’re told,’ said Ferenac. Joja came out and said something. ‘Shut up,’ said Ferenac and jabbed his elbow into the proprietor’s round stomach. Joja gasped. ‘You, my friend,’ said Ferenac, ‘get these women out of the way. Inside. Nothing will happen to them as long as they’re sensible.’
‘Let us pass, please,’ said Anne bravely, ‘then nothing will happen to you.’
James squeezed her arm. Sophie was becoming icy, looking at Ferenac as if his species could not be classified.
‘You’ll be carried inside if you don’t walk,’ said Ferenac.
Sophie felt James tensing with anger. She did not want him to do anything foolish. She said, ‘We’ll go inside for a moment, Anne. Come along.’ She turned and took Anne into the tavern with her. James followed in seething fury. Inside Joja stood pulling at his moustache, uneasily avoiding the eyes of the baronesses.
‘I am sorry,’ he said to James, ‘it is not—’
‘For the last time, will you shut up?’ said Ferenac, crowding in with his men.
‘For your own sake,’ said James, ‘let me tell you that various people in Ilidze know we’re here. They’ll expect us back this afternoon.’
‘Expectations, expectations, ah, they burn in every breast,’ said Ferenac. ‘Well, there’s time enough.’
‘For what?’ asked James.
‘For a solution.’ Ferenac gestured again. ‘Take them upstairs, all of them.’
‘You are the silliest man,’ said Anne.
Ferenac, stung, shouted at her, ‘You’ll be sorry you said that, I’ll show you who will feel the silliest in the end! Go upstairs, all of you! Do you hear?’
To Anne’s horror a revolver appeared. It glinted in the dim tavern, its barrel snouting from the hand of Dobrovic. He gestured with it and the girls, with James, went through a tiny kitchen, full of heat from a wood-burning stove, and along a narrow passage to a staircase. They climbed to a tiny landing, the stairs creaking. Dobrovic, following on, pushed them into a cluttered bedroom which smelt of old wool and feathers. The angled ceiling was low and there was one small and not very clean window.
Dobrovic said, ‘Stay here and keep quiet.’ He locked the door on them and departed. They heard the stairs creak as he descended.
Sophie, looking around the room, said, ‘This is not the better kind of hotel.’
‘Then James must complain to the management,’ said Anne.
James knew they were both shaken, although they could not have been cooler. He went to the window. It overlooked the rear of the tavern. Chickens scratched around on the hard brown earth. A well stood in the centre of what might have been a garden but looked more like a large, scruffy yard. It was bounded by a high stone wall against which peach trees clung. Beyond the wall were rows of the ubiquitous Bosnian plum trees.
‘Damnation,’ he said. He turned and inspected the room. A brass bedstead took up half the space. On it was an old feather mattress and odds and ends of junk. A table supported a bowl and pitcher and more junk.
‘Those men, they’re mad, aren’t they?’ said Anne.
‘Fanatics,’ said James, thinking of the Archduke Franz Ferdinand.
‘What are we going to do?’ asked Sophie.
‘Frankly, I don’t know,’ said James. He ran a hand through his hair. ‘Damnation,’ he said again.
‘Now, James,’ said Anne. She was alarmed, she was not yet scared. She believed in the goodness of people.
James regarded the view from the window again. Beyond the stone wall on the right he glimpsed a corner of the church. He tried the window. The catch was rusty, the frame dry, the paint peeling. But the window opened. It was just large enough to let them out, except that there was a drop to the ground of about fifteen feet. A man came out from the back of the tavern and threw scraps from a bowl. It was Joja. The chickens rushed and scurried and pecked. Joja did not look up and James did not call. He felt Joja was well aware of him.
‘What did that man Ferenac mean by a solution?’ asked Anne.
‘An answer to a problem. I think we’re the problem.’ James closed the window as Joja disappeared. ‘I suspect they’re going to keep us here until the Archduke Franz Ferdinand has left Bosnia.’
‘What is the archduke to do with it?’ asked Sophie. ‘And what are we to do with them?’
‘I think they’re after the archduke,’ said James. He could have said he also thought they intended for the archduke to leave Bosnia in a coffin, but the girls were worried enough. ‘No, I’m not serious, of course.’
‘Yes, you are,’ said Sophie quietly, ‘you know something.’
‘I only know we’ve got to get out of here.’
The stairs creaked. Someone was coming up. Anne swallowed and Sophie steeled herself.
‘It’s Joja,’ said James.
‘Joja?’ said Anne.
‘The proprietor. Ferenac called him that. He’s weighty on those stairs.’
The creaking stopped. The landing sighed.
‘Quick, please.’ It was a whisper outside the door. James pressed his ear to the panel.
‘We’re listening,’ he said.
‘They have gone,’ whispered Joja, ‘they have seen your car and mean to take it away. But one is still here. I will put a ladder to your window. But when you leave take it, hide it, it must not be seen or it will mean trouble for me. The wall, there is an opening to the church. Go, run, but do not cross the river and go up into the hills, go along the valley by the side of the river.’
‘Good, Joja,’ said James, ‘we love you.’
‘It is bad, bad.’
The landing squeaked, the stairs groaned. James continued to listen. He heard no voices downstairs. The man left behind was probably sitting outside. Joja would not have come up otherwise. If the man on guard was the pallid one, the one with the gun, he would be dangerous.
They could only wait. They stood by the window. In a little while they heard a small sound. They were too tense to speak, but Sophie managed a little nervous smile as James gave her an encouraging one. Beneath the window outside something scraped the wall. He opened the frame. The top of a ladder appeared. He looked down and glimpsed Joja disappearing. There was no time to waste.
‘Sophie?’
‘You go first, that is best,’ said Sophie calmly.
‘Yes,’ said James. He put a leg over the sill. Both legs. He turned and found a rung with his right foot. Anne held the top of the ladder. He went down. The ladder was smooth and he slid most of the way in his haste. He planted his foot on the bottom rung and looked up.
‘You, Anne,’ said Sophie.
Anne went, agile and quick in her urgency. Sophie was out and on the ladder before Anne was halfway down. They left hats and parasols behind but took their handbags. James had left his sketchbook. The girls reached the ground in a froth of white underskirts. Quickly he hauled the ladder down. It was heavy. He took it to the wall and the chickens scattered as the girls followed him. He found the gap in the wall amid the peach trees, a triangular opening where the stone had crumbled away. He pushed the ladder through. He had to do that for Joja. He climbed, went through the gap, pulled the ladder after him and placed it in the long grass against the wall. He reached into the gap, helping the sisters up and through.
Someone shouted. The man Dobrovic was running from the back door of the tavern.
They hared away, the girls picking up their skirts and flying. Over hard ground and around bushes to the church. There was a wall there too and an old green door. It opened as James pushed. He bundled the girls through. Dobrovic came on in pounding chase. James went through the doorway and nipped behind the door itself. He watched through the crack as Dobrovic came running. Sophie and Anne turned. James gestured to them to go on. Dobrovic saw their whipping dresses and legs through the open door. He shouted again, his expression furious. He rushed at the opening and as he reached it James crashed the door against him. The impact of solid wood against face and body was traumatic. The door shuddered and Dobrovic dropped as if poleaxed, blood pouring from his nose. It gave James a feeling of giddy elation. That was a blow struck for fair virginity if you like! He turned to run, checked, stooped and thrust his hand into the bulging side pocket of Dobrovic’s jacket. He brought out the shining blue revolver, thrust it inside his shirt and went after the girls. He caught them up, they flew over the church path and out into the street. The village was as silent as a graveyard. And every door was shut tight.
Nobody wanted trouble. James sensed the danger of knocking on those closed doors for help. Joja had said to escape up the valley. They crossed the street and took a worn, stony path winding down to the river. Sophie and Anne slipped and scuffled in their white, leather-soled shoes. James put his arms around their waists and took them downwards in a headlong flight in which six feet hopped, skipped and jumped.
‘James!’ It was Anne in heady exultation.
‘I beg you, don’t hang back, girls,’ panted James.
Sophie said nothing, saving her breath for sustained effort. Only a slow-witted person would have failed to recognize the latent menace of those men, and she sensed that what James had recognized was a menace that was frightening. He was intense in his urgency to get her and Anne out of harm’s way. But why? Why should those men want to harm them? James’s cryptic reference to Franz Ferdinand had puzzled her.
They were rushing downwards, the sloping, winding path bordered by bushes and long wispy grass taking them in headlong flight to where the river, littered with fallen rock, danced and sparkled. They reached the smooth stony bank.
‘Run!’ said James. He knew they could be seen from the village above. They had to reach a sheltered way. In the distance the bald bank of the river gave way to bush and tree. They needed the cover it would give them. They ran. He was sweating. Anne’s hair was tumbling loose, Sophie’s bobbing. They gasped for breath as he urged them on. Discarding modesty they picked up their skirts and ran more freely. Anne ran hard and fast, supple limbs flashing. Sophie ran with long strides. Good girls, thought James. God, he had to get them out of this. His was the responsibility, he the one who had wanted to come here. He wondered if he should pray, but since he couldn’t remember when he had last paid reverent devotions he decided that to call on divine help now might be construed as slightly impertinent.
Their chance of escaping close pursuit depended on how long it took Ferenac and the other two men to dispose of the car. It was the obvious thing for Ferenac to get it out of the way as quickly as possible. Its presence pointed positively to the fact that its occupants had been in Kontic, and the fact that Ferenac wanted to move it indicated intentions that were sinister.
There was quite a way to go along the hard, shelving bank of the river before they could reach the shelter of the straggling bush and pine. In places the ground was strewn with fallen boulders big and small, and their progress over these stretches was awkward and comparatively slow. The river sang cheerfully on their left, swirling around protruding stone and gurgling over submerged rocks. Farther to their left the hills rose barren, bleak and inhospitable, yet were tempting in the multitude of sheltering crevices they offered. But Joja had said not to go up into the hills.
They sped over a clear incline. The sun was hot, its heat brazenly trapped in the valley. Sophie’s dress and petticoat whipped around her slender calves. Anne, a little more uninhibited, had hers hitched to her knees. White silk stockings were brilliant in the sunlight. James, running protectively behind the girls, experienced a moment of detached admiration amid his worries. Anne and Sophie, undeniably, had shapely legs. He urged them on. He was certain of one thing now. Ferenac meant to assassinate the Archduke Franz Ferdinand, either in Ilidze or Sarajevo, and was not going to be foiled by having anyone inform on him. Hell, thought James, if the idiot would only go back to Vienna and play his violin he would save the situation for himself and everybody else. But no, he had to go on with it and to remove anyone who stood in his way.
And if he could murder the archduke, what were three lesser people?
‘I’m going to fall,’ panted Sophie.
‘No, you’re not,’ shouted James, ‘you’re not an old lady yet.’
Anne was sucking in great draughts of air. James came up with them, took Anne by the hand, patted Sophie on the back and ran with them. The pine trees drew them on. James saw they were sparser than they seemed at a distance and the girls would look like pale summer ghosts flitting through them. He glanced back. He saw no one in the bright valley. He glanced upwards. The village was well behind them now, away up on their far right. But they could still be seen from the place. There would be eyes watching them, for all those closed doors.
Sophie lost a pointed shoe. She stumbled and hopped on one foot. James retrieved the shoe and slipped it quickly back on to her slim stockinged foot.
‘Thank you, James.’ She was darkly flushed, her forehead damp, her hair spilling and her mouth open as she gulped in air.
‘We must go on,’ he said.
‘I know,’ she said and Anne, breathless, nodded. They picked up their skirts again and ran again. James followed. They reached bushes showing shiny leaf and plunged into the shelter of the foremost trees. The ground was softer, there was earth here which was saved from being washed by rain into the river by a ridge of stone that in the distance rose higher.
They ran between the trees until Anne gasped, ‘James, we must rest for just a moment.’ She stopped, sank to her knees and Sophie sank down beside her. James, affected by their physical distress, let them have their break. They were healthy girls but they were not international athletes. They were not trained for a long run.
After a short while he said, ‘We’ll walk for a spell now, we can’t run all the time, I know. So come on, my lovely ones, they haven’t spotted us yet.’
‘Lovely ones? Oh, James,’ said Sophie and laughed a little breathlessly. ‘Have you looked at me lately?’ Her loosened hair clung damply at her temples, her delicate make-up marked by perspiration. Anne was no better.
‘You’re both at your best,’ said James. He helped them to their feet.
‘You’re a great comfort, James,’ said Anne.
‘I don’t feel a comfort,’ he said, ‘I feel responsible. Come on.’
They went on, walking quickly through the sparse woodland, their feet crunching the dry needles, the air hot but finely scented. The hills rose high across the river, and on their right the slope covered with straggling bush ascended to the road.
‘If we could climb up somewhere,’ said Anne, ‘we could reach the road, couldn’t we?’
James shook his head.
‘We can’t show ourselves yet,’ he said, ‘we must keep to this valley for as long as possible. Ferenac and his men probably know every rock and blade of grass in this area, and they’ll realize we’ll need to get up to the road. Damn,’ he said as the filtering light changed a little way ahead to glaring brightness. They broke from the trees and found themselves on a stretch of hard, sloping bank. The ridge on their left had fallen away, they could see the river again, a swirling, running flow. But there were more pines two hundred yards away. All the same, thought James, they would be out in the open for that distance. ‘Damn,’ he said again.
‘Shall we run, James?’ asked Sophie.
‘Yes,’ he said, ‘and now, like the devil.’
They ran, the girls’ shoes clicking over the smooth shelf of stone, the afternoon sun burningly plucking at their heads. Slender legs gleamed. James kept behind the girls, constantly urging them on. Two hundred yards, that was all. But the sloping shelf and the feeling that there must be eyes on their backs made the distance seem so long. When they reached the trees Anne and Sophie were gasping again. James turned and looked back. He squinted through the bright light, over the wooded stretch they had left and taking in the rising line of their retreat beyond. He caught his breath. Well beyond the vegetation a humped ridge showed like a sharp, undulating black line. Movement was breaking the line. A tiny silhouette showed. Then another.
‘Oh, hellfire and brimstone,’ breathed James. He joined the waiting girls. ‘Good,’ he said cheerfully, ‘you look fine. We’ll need our second wind.’
‘I think I’m on my fifth,’ said Sophie.
‘Well, make good use of it,’ said James, ‘because we need to run again. Go on, pick your feet up.’
Sophie and Anne did their best but the trees were thicker and brush hampering. They skirted bushes and ducked under low branches. James took the lead, breaking or holding a way through for his companions. They ran where they could and where they could not they at least had a respite from lung torture. The heat closed in on them and twigs reached to pluck at frisking skirts. James knew they were going as fast as they could and did not ask for more. The river seemed to be farther from them, hidden by another rising bulwark, yet it came louder to their ears, rushing and tumbling. Its insistent noise pounded at the hammering heart of Anne. She saw James kicking and savaging his way through tangled undergrowth in front and she was sure he was making demands on his repertoire of international adjectives.
The pines increased in density. They were hidden from any pursuers now. But that did not mean they were safe.
The skirt of Sophie’s dress tore.
‘Now that is tragic,’ she gasped.
‘I’ll buy you another, Sophie, I promise,’ said James, ‘so come on.’
They went on, they struggled on and at times they ran on. The pines began to thin. He hoped they were not going to lose their cover again. No, the wooded area stretched on. Even so, there was a weakness in the course they were taking. Ferenac and his men would know this was the only way they could go unless they emerged and climbed the dizzy slope to the road. And if they did emerge they would be seen. And they could not count on stopping a passing vehicle. Not in this area. Two carts a day along that road would be a good average. One motor car a month a high average. In any case, Ferenac would ensure that that avenue of escape was watched. The hills on the other side of the river were a temptation again, the huge boulders, the dips and ledges, and the crevices, affording hiding places.
Sunlight dappled the pines and the earthy ground as they hurried on, Sophie and Anne breathless but unwavering. James felt proud of them. To their left the stone ridge petered out and there was the river once more. It was bright and foam-flecked, running fast. The earth became harder, the growth poorer. James stopped objectively, the girls thankfully. Perspiration soaked them all. James wiped his forehead with his hand.
‘I should rather like to sit in a heap of snow,’ said Anne.
‘Oh, sweet winter,’ said Sophie.
James looked at the river. It curved at this point. It spanned a wide course, fifty yards or so. The opposite bank rose to merge with the foothills. There was a profusion of jammed boulders and the foothills themselves were split by dark, triangular fissures. But the river, how deep was it? The flowing waters sucked around the shallows, rushed and foamed around central islands of boulders.
‘What do you think, shall we cross?’ he said.
‘In a boat?’ said Sophie, dabbing at her face with a tiny handkerchief.
‘James, are you sure they’re behind us?’ asked Anne.
‘I’m afraid so, dear girl. I saw them. And they won’t give up while they think we’re in this valley. They know we can’t turn back, only go forward. But they won’t expect us to have crossed the river here. Frankly, it looks too damned rough. We’re going to get very wet.’
‘James, I have immense faith in you,’ said Sophie, ‘but are you sure we’re only going to get wet?’
‘Look, my sweet things,’ said James, ‘if we can cross here they’ll not see us, the river bend is in our favour. Once across we’ll get under cover. They can’t turn over every boulder or poke their noses into every cave. Damned if I know for certain, though. But what do you say, shall we risk it?’
‘We can’t swim,’ said Anne, eyeing the rushing river uncertainly.
‘Well, there are other activities young ladies are far more graceful at,’ said James, ‘and in any case swimming isn’t going to be the best pastime in that current. We’ve got to go across by making use of the rocks. I’ll see what it’s like.’
He buttoned his jacket and walked down into the shallows. He went on. The water was soon up to his calves, then his knees. And it was bitingly cold. He moved from one river-sprayed rock to the next, the level gushing and pulling at his legs. It was up to his thighs before he reached the middle and around his waist a moment later. It staggered him with its buffeting surges, but the standing boulders provided solid help. He was able to move although the river roared and foamed around him. Seconds were precious. In the middle of the river the waters tugged violently at him, but the wet, glistening outcrops of fallen stone were bastions of protection. Sophie, watching the tide beating at him on his way back, paled under her perspiration. If he slipped—
‘Oh, be careful,’ she whispered, her heart thumping painfully. And Anne, thinking of men who could not be far away now, breathed, ‘Hurry, James, hurry.’
He splashed through the shallows, ran up the bank and back into the trees. He streamed water on the way, his face and hair wet from spray.
‘I think we can do it,’ he said, ‘but I suggest you take your dresses off. They’ll get soaked and heavy. I’m sorry, but I don’t want you sinking.’
They did not argue. Sophie went a little pink, that was all. He turned his back. Quickly they removed their dresses. He took them, folded them tightly and tucked them inside his jacket. The girls were brightly, lacily delicate in waist petticoats and snowy corsets. And they were both pink now.
‘Lead on, James,’ said Sophie, her smile a desperate effort, ‘and you hang on for dear life, Anne. I’ll come with my eyes closed. I shall also pray.’
James took them down to the edge of the river. They stared at the menacing flow, at the spray and the foam, at the glistening boulders.
‘There’s a lot of it, I know,’ said James, ‘but it’s only water.’ And he went in, the girls with him, each using a hand to grip the belt on the back of his tweed jacket. Sophie shuddered at the icy cold of the water and Anne drew a hissing breath. James splashed forward, intent on crossing by the simple but precarious expedient of plunging from each sheltering rock to the next. But not every boulder was as near to the next as he’d have liked, and it was this that made the crossing such a risk. To lose a footing could mean being swept away.
Anne stifled gasps as the rising level icily embraced her legs and knees. She clung to James’s belt and to Sophie’s hand. The cold, surging waters were taking Sophie’s breath. She felt the tidal pull at her feet. She hung on. James’s tweed belt was strongly sewn to the jacket. Sometimes such belts were secured by buttons. Buttons would have ripped off. She thanked someone for the strong stitches.
James was the anchor, they were the chains. He brought them into deeper water, steadying them all against each solid sentinel of rock before plunging towards the next. Anne staggered as the river rose, surging, pulling and battering. Her shoulder was squeezed against a shining boulder, the tide sucked her from it and she lost her footing on the uneven bed. And she lost her grip. James turned in the swirling waters, put one arm around Sophie’s waist and dragged Anne mercilessly up by her hair as her face plunged in. They fought for their footing, Sophie panting, spray flying at her, and Anne coughing up water. James thrust them both into the lee of a huge bulwark, which stood up from the river like a misshapen obelisk. It protected them from the direct onslaught of the hungry tide. Foam lashed around them, the girls immersed to their breasts.
‘James . . .’ It was a wet, despairing gasp from Anne.
‘Marvellous,’ said James, and Sophie, chilled to the bone and rocked by the water, thought the fixed grin on his wet, dark face was almost villainously determined. ‘But let’s save the conversation for later. Go on now, we must.’
He kept behind them now, driving them forward, thrusting them, and they gasped and shuddered, fighting for handholds that were out of reach. He took hold of their sopping hair and they clenched their teeth at the pain as he bullied them through the rushing water and flying spray. He was not going to lose either of them and by their hair he kept his hold on them. Together they floundered and plunged from rock to rock. Each time the tide took Anne’s footing he hauled her up and he thrust Sophie on, on. Splashing, desperate, the girls fought the river and James fought for them.
The level began to fall. It eased reluctantly away from soaked breasts and corsets, leaving round curves wetly outlined. It dropped to their waists as James, releasing their hair, bundled them forward. He grabbed their arms and rushed them on through thigh-high tide until they reached the shallows. Every second was now more precious than ever. From the shallows he rushed them upwards over ridged stone towards the boulder-strewn foothills.
He brought them up from the bank to the foothills and they began to clamber over masses of stone, James making for the nearest fissure. He looked back. The bend of the river hid that part of the valley they had traversed. He looked at the point from which they had made their crossing, at the trees from which they had emerged. There were neither sounds nor movements, except those of the river. But he stayed for a moment while the girls scrambled on. And suddenly, over the bright warm air, carrying above the noise of the river, came the muffled sound of a crack. That was the crack of snapping timber, by God it was. Someone was not far from the vital point.
‘Oh, hell,’ he muttered and leapt upwards after the girls. They reached a spot where the steep hillside began. James pointed the way to the fissure. They moved behind piles of rock which gave them cover. The fissure yawned. There was clear space in front of it and James brought the girls pell-mell over the ground and into the cave. Rushing from bright light into darkness made them stop. In front of them the blackness seemed impenetrable. Their breathing was strained and noisy. They blinked.
Sight came. The cave was high and deep. Distance darkened to invisibility. Exhausted, Anne dropped to her knees on the cool stone floor. Sophie leaned wearily against the wall, her undergarments plastered wetly to her body. She looked at James, his jacket distorted by the bundled dresses. He drew them out. They were wet.
‘Oh, James,’ gasped Anne.
‘I know other young ladies,’ said James, ‘but I don’t know any as brave and lovely as you two.’
‘Brave?’ sighed Sophie, her hair soaked into a lushly wet cap. ‘James, I was terrified.’ She slipped slowly down the wall until she came to rest. He went to her, took her hands and rubbed them. They were still chill from the icy river, despite her exertions. She smiled at him. ‘I am glad it is you we are with.’
‘I was rough with you in the river,’ he said.
‘Brutal,’ said Sophie.
‘Dear Sophie,’ said James, and left her looking emotionally at him as he went to Anne. ‘You, my sweet,’ he said, ‘seem very wet.’
‘Oh, I am only half-drowned,’ said Anne, ‘which is not so bad as being fully drowned, is it?’
Her sopping underclothes, so revealing as they wetly outlined her, could not, he thought, have been more uncomfortable. His own were coldly, soakingly unpleasant. He rubbed Anne’s hands.
‘Walk about,’ he said.
‘But, James, I am worn down to the bones,’ she said.
‘Walk about,’ he said, ‘and you too, Sophie.’
Sophie, sitting gratefully against the wall but aware of creeping chill and wet discomfort, laughed weakly.
‘When I was a small girl,’ she said, ‘I fell into a pond and when people had fished me out and someone had gone to fetch Mama, someone else told me to jump up and down. I was a very nice small girl and obedient, so I jumped up and down. It was to save me getting pneumonia, they said. But I squelched so much that I stopped and said I thought I would rather have pneumonia. I am not going to say I would rather have pneumonia now—’
‘Sophie, walk about,’ said James, ‘or you’ll freeze. Squelching is a minor consideration at your age.’
‘My age? Do I look forty when I am soaked to the skin, then?’
James could have said she looked very wet and very endearing, but he only smiled, shook his head and went to the opening. He dropped on his stomach and peered out. He watched the river, the far bank, the straggling pines. He was soaked from head to foot but did not feel too cold, not yet. Excitement, fear and a touch of exhilaration all combined to keep his body nervously heated for the moment. He wondered if Ferenac and his men would be moving inconspicuously through the trees or boldly along the water’s edge. He did not think they would all be together. One would be moving quickly ahead, others would be searching. He stiffened. The sound was not loud or angry, it was just perceptible enough to reach ears listening for it. It was the sound of someone moving through the pines. Someone moving slowly, searchingly. The crack of a snapping twig he had heard before had probably been made by the man in advance. This was a second man, a probing man. The hunt was being conducted quietly, thoroughly, by men sure of their quarry, sure that some time two young women would fall exhausted into their arms. And one man, James was sure, would have been sent by Ferenac along the road. He thought, as he strained his eyes, that he glimpsed movement among the trees but could not be sure. He stayed where he was without stirring a muscle. The faint sounds gradually receded.
By God, thought James, he and the girls had crossed the river just in time. Then he wondered about that. The moment would come, perhaps, when the hunters would sense the quarry had slipped them. If one man was on the road he would confirm he had seen nothing of the fugitives there. Ferenac would begin to look across the river and wonder.
James sighed. He looked around. The ground directly in front of the cave was clear, but there were rockfalls to the right, large enough to conceal someone crawling out on that side. The sun was beating down. He edged back into the cave. Sophie and Anne were walking briskly about. They had put their dresses on. They had combed their wet hair.
‘Well done,’ he said, ‘that’s the stuff of brave conquest.’
Sophie, pacing up and down arm in arm with Anne, said, ‘Oh, apart from feeling uncomfortably wet, James, we are in excessively high spirits. But I beg you not to look at us because we are also hideously bedraggled.’
‘I haven’t noticed,’ said James. The girls marched deeper into the cave. ‘Um – may I suggest you take everything off except your dresses? It’s too cold in here for you to dry out. You’ll perish. There’s a place outside where all your things will dry quickly in the sun without being seen.’
‘We are to undress?’ said Anne from the depths. She and Sophie had stopped walking about.
‘It’s not what I’d ask you to do in the Prater,’ said James.
‘Oh, I’m not disposed to endure uncomfortable modesty if there’s a better alternative,’ said Anne.
‘Indeed, your suggestion is thoughtful and meritorious, James,’ said Sophie, ‘but will you please retreat a little and turn your back?’
He retreated to the cave entrance, standing close to the wall in shadow and looking out. The river was in disaffected flow, the trees lining the far bank in peaceful quiet. He took off his jacket, shirt and vest. He remembered the revolver. It was as wet as his jacket. He massaged his chest, keeping his eye on the view across the river. There were no sounds, no hunters, no menace. He heard whispers in the cave behind him, then Sophie’s voice close by.
‘James? No, please don’t look, I am a terrible sight in just a damp dress. Here are our things.’ He felt a heap of wet garments pushed at him and he gathered them without turning round. ‘James, you will spread them very modestly in the sunshine, won’t you?’ Her voice was light, her only anxiety, seemingly, that which concerned the impropriety of a single and unattached young lady handing into his care delicate garments which no man should see unless he was married to her. ‘You will consider them in a gentlemanly detached way, we trust, for we are both extremely sensitive and Anne is blushing—’
‘I am not,’ said Anne from farther back.
‘Well, I am,’ said Sophie.
‘I promise every due respect and consideration, with my mind elsewhere,’ said James.
‘Thank you, James.’
She was delicious, thought James. They both were. They were making light of discomfort, embarrassment and the inescapable worry of the situation. He himself was beginning to feel frozen from the waist down. He crawled out, and the hot afternoon sunshine was a sudden touch of rapture. He slid along into the shelter of fallen rock. He laid the wet garments of the girls over the sunbaked lower rocks, spreading them out in the most practical way while trying to keep his mind on the promised level of detachment. All the same he smiled at frills, at lace. The four white silk stockings were a problem, their lightness and delicacy susceptible to breezes. He secured them by placing small stones on them. He laid out his shirt, jacket and vest. Keeping himself shielded he slipped off his shoes, long knitted socks and knickerbockers. He left them in the sun too. In his long woollen pants he crawled back into the cave. He lay close to the entrance, looking, observing, watching. He saw nothing. His wet pants were acutely chill. He heard the girls moving about, walking, pacing, keeping their circulations active.
‘James?’ That was Anne. ‘Do you think –’
‘We must stay here, you know,’ he said, ‘we can’t risk showing ourselves even when our clothes are dry.’
‘Yes, I see.’ She did not argue but he knew she was disturbed. She was eighteen and young, she loved life and found people fascinating. But she did not know how to deal with men of violence. She did not understand them, she was removed from the causes which made thieves of some people and assassins of others. She was happy, why couldn’t everybody else be? Sophie was more sophisticated, more inclined to coolly accept that there were indisputable reasons for some men becoming brigands, for some to be cynical about the wonders of life. Anne was life’s uncomplicated love, Sophie was its poetic interpreter. Anne would give a husband laughter and sweetness, Sophie amusement and stimulation. And they would both give themselves, which alone would be a gift from life’s warm treasury.
‘James, are you all right?’ That was Sophie.
‘Fine except for wet woollens. Are your dresses drying?’
‘Oh, we are almost whirling about,’ said Sophie, ‘and they are better all the time. They were not so wet as our other clothes. Have you seen anyone?’
‘Nobody,’ he said, but his ears pricked precisely at that moment. ‘Oh, hell,’ he said. Sophie and Anne froze into silence. He edged back a little as a man broke from the trees on the far side of the river. Not Ferenac. One of the others. The sun was dipping now and taking on the glow of late afternoon. The man came down to the river. He peered, scanning the waters, the banks, the boulders and the hills. He moved along the edge of the river. He took his hat off, wiped his forehead with the sleeve of his jacket and said something ferocious. Even at this distance the sound of his imprecation reached James’s ears. The lightest of breezes carried it. James flattened himself. The man put his hat back on and walked slowly, squinting in every direction. He was retracing the line of hunt, moving in the direction of the village.
That meant Ferenac suspected the quarry had gone to ground. He had sent the man scouting back. Ferenac must know they were somewhere about. He would search until the light gave out. And sooner or later he would decide the quarry had crossed the river.
James stayed very still. The coolness of the cave became a coldness. Anne’s teeth began to chatter. The moving man disappeared. James told the girls to skip. Sophie said they would do their best but could not guarantee she would not fall flat on her face. They did their best while James stayed close to the entrance, watching, listening. He was cold now, very cold. But he did not move. The sun began its descent and the clear blue sky took on its first faint tint of gold. The drying garments spread on the rocks stirred. That, at least, was a comforting sign! James crawled out, slowly, cautiously. The undergarments were warm, all dampness gone. His jacket was only very slightly damp in places. He brought everything in. Anne came to take things from him, pattering up behind him. He looked very lean and masculine, she thought, in nothing but his pants.
‘Thank you, James, you’re a dear,’ she whispered.
She retreated with the garments. Sophie received her things with sighs of bliss. She embraced them.
‘Oh, sweet doors to paradise,’ she said, ‘what more can life offer than this?’
‘A nice quiet journey back to Ilidze,’ said James, pulling his dry socks on.
‘What is that you say, James?’ said Sophie from the depths. ‘Oh, you are the most beneficent of men, all my clothes are beautifully warm and dry.’
James, a little smile on his face, said, ‘Well, they all looked very enchanting in the sunshine.’
Anne laughed. Even in the dimness of the cave one could not miss the fact that Sophie was blushing, actually blushing.
James dressed. He heard soft rustles and swishes as the girls slipped their clothes on. The cave became darker as the sun dipped behind the mountains. He massaged his cold body. Long shadows crept over the river, over the trees. He wondered about Ferenac, whether he would give up. If he gave up he would probably change his plans. But he was not a man, in his fanaticism, to give up or to change his plans. Darkness, when it came, would restrict him and frustrate him.
It was going to be cold in this cave. He turned. The girls were pale glimmers of movement, but there was still just enough light for his eyes as he began to explore the place. He told the girls to stay where they were and keep their ears open. The cave narrowed at a depth of thirty feet, then opened out again and he saw the glimmer of still, dark water and a rocky ledge along the left-hand wall. He stripped off his knickerbockers and his still damp pants and vigorously massaged his chilled limbs. He put his knickerbockers back on but left the pants off. He was not very happy. They were in a damnable fix, no mistake. They had no food, no fire. The cave gave shelter but no warmth. Not until it was dark could they move out, and even then they would not be able to travel over these rocky foothills or the shelving riverbank unless there was a moon. Was there a moon? He cast his mind back over the last few nights. Damned if he could remember anything about bright moonlight.
He stamped around, reluctant to confront the baronesses with cold cheer. He saw the opening of the cave, the light outside was russet. He heard Sophie’s voice, it sounded warm and reassuring.
‘We need not worry too much, someone is bound to be looking for us. Papa and Carl for certain.’
‘But they won’t look for us here,’ said Anne. ‘Never mind, I am much more comfortable now, and we still have James.’
‘And James still has us,’ said Sophie, ‘I’m afraid we’re an awful responsibility for him. We must bear up and carry our banners bravely. I will recite the clarion call of the Habsburgs defying the Turks as James rides into battle.’
‘Your imagination, darling, is sometimes stupefying,’ said Anne.
James came stamping. The girls, for all their cheerfulness, looked peaked.
‘What is that you have?’ asked Sophie.
‘My pants,’ said James, ‘they were trying to give me pneumonia. Shall we see if we can get away when it’s dark enough?’
‘Where you go, James, we shall follow,’ said Sophie. ‘My faith in you is tenfold. With any other man I should be afraid of breaking my neck. And some men, you know, exercise what I call such a distinctive carelessness when climbing hills in the dark that they are constantly breaking their own necks. I hope you will be very careful.’
‘Sophie, you’re a fund of sweet light,’ smiled James, ‘and I shall take care that nobody breaks a neck. Certainly not you or Anne. I’m too fond of you both.’
‘And we are extremely fond of you,’ said Anne, ‘I don’t know what we should do if you weren’t here with us.’
‘The fact that you’re here at all is my fault—’
‘You’re not to say that,’ said Sophie a little emotionally.
‘I met that idiot Ferenac in Vienna,’ said James, ‘and for some reason he thinks I’m on his tail. He’s a political creature.’
‘It doesn’t matter where you met him, what he is or what he thinks,’ said Sophie, ‘you are not to say this is your fault. You will upset me. I don’t like being upset. I cry.’
‘No, you don’t,’ said Anne.
‘Yes, I do, and I will.’
‘No, you won’t,’ said Anne.
‘Sometimes,’ said Sophie, ‘the temperamental weapon of tears is woman’s only effective one. James, what am I talking about?’
‘How to keep smiling, I think,’ said James. His nerves were on edge, his ears attuned more for the extraneous than this localized banter. But Sophie, he felt, was trying to induce cheer and avoid the dismal. ‘I’ll go and put my nose out for a while.’
He went to the entrance again. Outside the shadows were deeper, longer, the river a murmurous flow, the darkening pines quiet. He sat down just inside the opening, he looked and he listened. He stayed there until the sun had gone and twilight muted the colours. The temperature dropped. He stretched, rubbed his hands, blew on them and rubbed them again. The twilight deepened. Anne and Sophie walked and whispered. He listened for the extraneous sounds. The quietness outside carried an uneasiness with it. He stiffened as little noises suddenly carried too. They were the noises of moving men, from the foothills to his right. Damn, they had crossed the river themselves at some point. He retreated quickly and silently into the cave. Sophie and Anne came out of the darkness.
‘Say nothing, they’re not far away,’ he whispered. He took their arms and led them through the narrowing passage into the black vault beyond, so much darker as the light faded outside the cave. The damp eeriness made Anne shiver and Sophie felt cold goose pimples rise at the engulfing blackness. In this inner chamber the ground inclined slightly downwards. James could not see the silent water, not in this darkness, but he knew it was there, somewhere in front of them. He had to get the girls up on to that ledge, above the still, black pool, and into a recess, their only possible hiding place. The ground became slippery and he knew they were at the edge of the water. The ledge was to the left. He kept hold of the girls while he put one foot up. He found the ledge and brought his foot down.
‘There’s a shelf wide enough to stand on,’ he whispered, ‘and a recess a little way along. Hold still while I get you up.’
He mounted the ledge. He reached down. Anne was a faint glimmer. He took her by the hands and pulled her up. He pulled Sophie up. They glued themselves to the damp wall and shuddered at its clamminess. But they made no sound and James loved them for their courage. He edged along, feeling his way, the girls following crabwise. He reached a rough, shallow depression in the wall and brought the girls into it, the shelf wider here. Anne gritted her teeth and Sophie fought to control her nerves as they all fitted themselves into the recess, James between the sisters, his arms around their waists, faces to the wall.
Then they could only wait. Below them the icy pool waited too, hungry to receive warm bodies.
They heard nothing but their own breathing for long minutes. They heard nothing of the men who silently approached the cave entrance. Sophie’s heart hammered as the silence screamed at her and three bodies froze rigidly as with a rush and a clatter the outer cave was invaded. Boots pounded the stone floor. Ferenac, with two men, had burst in. Anne’s right hand was over her mouth, stifling her frightened breath, and Sophie was conscious of the warning communicated by the tightening of James’s embracing arm. No sound, stay still, stay still.
They stayed still, rigid bodies pressed to the wall. There was a light in the cave. The men had a torch. Oh, dear God, thought Sophie, they are men determined to get us. Why, why?
The light swept around the vacated area. Oh, by God, thought James, had they left anything there? Shoes? No. His pants? No. He had them folded and tucked inside his jacket, and the girls had left their hats and parasols in the tavern. But their handbags, which they had clung to with all the resolution of their sex? God, their handbags!
His urgent hands investigated. Sophie and Anne, in a nightmare of fear, frenziedly wondered what he was at. James discovered identifiable shapes and breathed with relief. The light moved, the beam fingering the blackness, finding the narrow passage.
‘Damn them. Where are they?’ It was Ferenac’s voice, speaking in German. It sounded livid. He was answered by a mutter. ‘The next, then,’ said Ferenac impatiently, ‘they’re in one of these holes.’
But the man with the torch was moving down the cave, sweeping the light from side to side. It chased over walls, it pierced the darkness of the passage. It reached into the black vault and slow footsteps followed it. The beam swung, steadied and played straight down into the area of refuge. There were other footsteps and Ferenac’s voice, echoing around the vault.
‘Water,’ he hissed furiously, ‘stinking water. But we’ll find them, they’ll be in some hole we’ll have to crawl into. They’ve got Dobrovic’s gun and that gives them an advantage in the right place.’ The light lingered on the black water, mesmerized by its menacing stillness. ‘Come on. What does it matter? If we don’t get them tonight, Avriarches will tomorrow. Wherever they are, they’re stuck. Come on.’
The beam retreated. The blackness descended. They heard the men moving out. The hardness of a revolver pressed consciously now against James’s ribs. Until Ferenac had mentioned it he had forgotten it. He wouldn’t even make a decent Boy Scout.
‘Wait,’ he whispered to the trembling girls, ‘wait just a little longer.’
‘Oh, James . . .’ It was a distraught, almost imperceptible gasp from Sophie.
But he would not be trapped into moving yet. Ferenac had spoken in German. Why? To lull his prey in a language they knew? To bring them out of hiding as soon as they thought it safe? He would be wary of that revolver. Or were his companions German-speaking? Whatever the reason, it made James keep the girls on that ledge for long, agonizing minutes before he at last moved. Then he brought them free of it and helped them down, everyone moving cautiously. They edged clear of the water and around the wall to the passage. James knocked his head against projecting rock, but that was an insignificance compared with other things. They went through the passage into the outer cave. Outside the twilight had turned to dusk and the cave had the atmosphere of night. But at least they could see each other. Sophie winced.
‘James, you’ve cut yourself,’ she said, her voice strained.
‘Just a knock,’ he said. She and Anne were trembling, but he could have forgiven them an attack of hysteria at this point. He wiped away a trickle of blood on his forehead and said, ‘Stay here a moment, I must take a look.’
Cautiously, warily, he put his head out. The dusk was bringing the night, dark night. He could see no moon. The river was almost invisible and the littered foothills seemed highly discouraging in the gloom. He could hear no sound except the murmur of the fast-flowing river. He listened intently for a while, then returned to the baronesses.
‘I think they’ve gone,’ he said. Anne, overwrought, leaned against him. He put one arm around her. Sophie essayed a shaky smile. James gave her an encouraging one. ‘I know,’ he said, ‘it was a near thing, wasn’t it?’
‘Near?’ said Sophie. ‘It was next door to doom for a moment.’
‘Oh, I was so scared,’ sighed Anne.
James took her face between his hands. Her cheeks were cold.
‘I’m proud of both of you,’ he said and lightly kissed her. Sophie bit her lip and turned away. It was childish, she knew, but she would rather have liked a little affection herself. It was that kind of a moment.
‘I heard that man mention a gun,’ she said.
‘Yes, I have one,’ said James, ‘I took it from the fellow who ran his face into that door. I ought to have thought about using it if they’d spotted us, but this is my first manhunt, and certainly the first on the wrong end, and I only remembered the revolver when Ferenac spoke about it. I also forgot to make sure until then that you hadn’t left your handbags lying around here.’
‘Oh, I see now,’ said Anne.
‘I must agree, I did think it the wrong time for you to be familiar, James.’ Sophie managed a weak laugh. Their narrow escape was inducing light-headedness now. ‘Do you think we shall be able to get away in a little while?’
‘Come and look,’ said James. At the entrance they peered into gathering darkness. In the west the sky was purple-black. Above them it was becoming inky. Without the aid of moonlight they would never be able to see their way over this terrain. Nor could they think about recrossing the river or climbing the slope to the road. And even allowing that they might make some progress along the foothills, every noise they made would carry. Which, if Ferenac and his men were still roaming about, would bring disaster. James felt the whole business was an absolute swine. How the devil was he going to get the girls out of it?
‘We need a moon,’ he murmured, bringing them back into the cave.
‘Yes, that would be lovely,’ said Sophie, ‘and instead of everything being rather frightening it would all look romantic.’
‘It would help us to see and save us breaking our necks,’ said James, ‘which is what I promised.’
‘Men think in very practical terms, you know, Anne,’ said Sophie.
‘I am thinking in terms of a warm fire and hot food,’ said Anne. ‘Oh, it is so cold in here, isn’t it?’
It was. And they were all hungry, thirsty and drained.
‘Supposing you two try to get some sleep?’ said James. ‘We’ll move as soon as it’s light. I’ll sit by the entrance for a while. Just in case.’
‘James, exactly why are they after us?’ asked Sophie. ‘I think you know. Please tell us.’
They had a right to know, he thought. They had the courage to know.
‘I believe Ferenac intends to assassinate the Archduke Franz Ferdinand,’ he said, ‘and I also believe he’s aware I suspect him. Which is why his solution was to put me out of the way. Unfortunately, this has involved you two.’
‘James, you aren’t serious?’ said Anne incredulously.
‘He once said a good archduke is a dead one. I think he’s very serious himself.’
‘It makes sense of his desperate desire to get hold of us, for he knows you would go to the police,’ said Sophie. ‘James, I think I’m getting very frightened.’
‘If he’s that kind of a man,’ said Anne, ‘I think I’m going to be scared out of my wits.’
‘I don’t feel too happy myself,’ said James, ‘but he’s got other things on his mind as well as us. We only have to worry about shaking him off. We’ll do that as soon as it’s light. It won’t be difficult. Don’t worry, we’ll manage. Get some sleep. You must.’
Sophie and Anne were too tired to argue. They became a huddled bundle on the floor close to the wall, their heads pillowed on their white handbags. Anne shivered for a while, despite the warmth of her sister’s body, but she dropped off, drawn into slumber by the compulsive inducement of exhaustion. Sophie lay awake, worried about James, surely colder by himself than she and Anne were together. The hardness of the ground made her hip bone ache but she did not move. Suddenly, surprisingly, she slept.
James, sitting close to the entrance, got up and walked about, warming his chilled blood. He blew into his hands. He glanced at the glimmering figures of the recumbent girls. They had given him brave companionship. The menace of Ferenac was an obscenity, but political fanatics were always the most pitiless. Who was the man Avriarches he had mentioned? Avriarches, felt James, carried further menace. What day was it when Franz Ferdinand arrived in Sarajevo? Tomorrow? The day after? Or was he to be killed by Ferenac in Ilidze? But Ferenac would not go to either Ilidze or Sarajevo if he thought the fugitives had escaped to inform on him. No, he would not go anywhere until the situation was clearly resolved for him.
Sophie and Anne moaned a little. They were restless on their cold, hard bed. They did not often come face to face with this kind of crisis, one that was such a frightening assault on mind and body. They moved in a rich, cultured and privileged society, remote from the rigours and hardships of the rest of the world. But it had not turned them into spoiled and bloodless caricatures. They had survived Ferenac and his hunters with courage this day, and without complaints or tears. James knew he must return them unharmed to their bright citadel of life, they deserved no less.
He heard a sigh, a rustle. They were finding the stone floor primitive, discomfort battling with exhaustion.
‘James?’ Sophie whispered his name.
‘Can’t you sleep?’ He went over to her. Anne was fitfully dozing beside her.
‘I’ve been asleep. It isn’t the softest of beds, though.’ Sophie kept to a whisper, not wanting to wake Anne. ‘James, they won’t come back here now, I’m sure they won’t. So you must get some sleep too.’ As naturally as she could she went on, ‘It’s not much good any of us being prim and proper, you know. You must lie down with us, we’ll all keep each other warm. Please?’
She was being entirely sensible. His bone-weary condition tempted him. So did the warmth she exuded. She reached, took his hand and made the decision for him. He came down between her and Anne as she made room for him. She felt the coldness of his clothes. He must be frozen. She put her body bravely to his and her warmth generated both comfort and pleasure. He relaxed, using his folded woollen pants as a pillow. They pressed close. It was as instinctive as practical. In the darkness Sophie blushed to her roots. James was so undeniably masculine, so firm against her. She had been worried about him, now she worried about herself. There was a desire to be held, a desire to be wanted. She could not resist responding to the moment. She put her arms around him and drew closer. Warmly she snuggled. Sweet heat surged into her. She hid her crimson face in his shoulder because of the delicious excitement the physical contact brought.
James’s chilled veins thawed and warm blood flowed.
Anne gave a restless moan, sought the comfort of another body. The three of them lay close. Sometimes they slept, sometimes they fitfully chased the elusive. The warmth was only partial, the hard ground inescapable. Aching hips awoke them, they turned, they twisted and they dozed in spasms.
Sophie turned for the hundredth time. There was coldness all down her front, warmth at her back. In turning she found warmth for her front. She cuddled, snuggled, found blissful comfort for one more short space and thought how good, how lovely.
James awoke. A dark head rested on his arm, a soft curving body slept warmly against his. Cold cramp made him curl his toes and stony ground tortured his hip. He moved. Sophie gave a dreamy whimper and clung. He stayed still. His hip went numb. Sophie murmured. He closed his eyes.
Sophie awoke. The fissure was grey with dawn light. Cold draughts besieged her back, but the warmth in her stomach and thighs was so good. Her open eyes vaguely surveyed a crumpled tweed jacket. It belonged to James. It was James. She was shamelessly, tightly aligned with him, her arms around him. A little tremor quivered through her and sensations of sweet pleasure disturbed her. His head lay on his folded woollens, his face was a little gaunt and his chin blue. The cut on his forehead was marked by dried blood. How hard his body was. Colour suffused her. So this was James. He was sleeping like the dead even on this uncharitable ground, with Anne cuddled up behind him. He was not an ordinary man. He was much more like the new image forming in her mind. And her images were never of ordinary men.
Slowly she withdrew her arms and sat up. She realized then how her body ached, how icy her feet were, how dry and wretched her mouth. And the hem of her petticoat felt coldly damp around her ankles. She stood up. Her knees were stiff. James moved and turned over. His head rested on her handbag. She picked up his woollens and went to the entrance. The light in the east was pale, the dawn still and silent. The sun would soon be up. She slipped off her petticoat and sidled into the open. She laid petticoat and pants out over flat rocks.
In the east the pale light strengthened and soft colour began to invade the neutral sky.