The Secret Witness

by George Gibbs

Though he had been able to learn little in Budapest of the military situation, even from Herr Koulos, the sight of Austrian soldiers marching toward the northern end of the Pass assured him that the Russians must have won important victories in Galicia, thus placing all the passes of the Carpathians in jeopardy. But whatever his interest in conjectures regarding the possibility of victory or defeat, his own business was too urgent to admit of other issues, and so he made his way forward cautiously through the underbrush, which in places was almost impenetrable. Four-footed things, startled by this unusual invasion of their hunting ground, started up almost beside him and fled—rabbits, squirrels, a wolf, and a brown bear, which rocked upon its four legs dubiously for a moment, and then lumbered comically away. These creatures and the pathless woods advised him that however frequented the mountain road below, the inhabitants hereabout were not in the habit of traversing the wooded mountain sides. Moving forward slowly he climbed the hills in the general direction of the castle, the sunlit bastions of which suddenly appeared through the foliage above him and to the right.

He moved more warily now, for if Goritz were in hiding within Schloss Szolnok, he would of course take pains that every avenue of approach should be watched. But a careful inspection of the crag upon which the castle was perched, and from this new angle, led Renwick to the conclusion that Goritz might be so sure of its inaccessibility from the north that no guard at the ruined end would be thought necessary. At first glance, indeed, Renwick was inclined to that opinion himself, for the rocks, though fissured and scarred as though by the blasts of winter, though not so high, were scarcely less precipitous than upon the southern side. At his very feet, perhaps already buried for years in the loam and moss, were the huge blocks of stone which had fallen from the northern towers and rolled down the steep slope of the natural counterscarp which the conformation of the mountain provided.

Renwick scrutinized the beetling wall of rock above the incline with a dubious eye, seeking a possible path or succession of footholds by means of which he might make his way to the breach in the stone rampart above. The task seemed hopeless, but he knew that the most formidable difficulties are often solved by the simplest devices, and so he studied the wall patiently, his gaze suddenly focusing upon a fissure in the cliff, a little to his right, which went upward at an angle, its apex passing a projection of the rock which extended for a hundred feet or more to the southward. Above that precarious platform, the cliff was splintered and torn as though the agencies which had devastated the wall above had wreaked their vengeance here too. But there were finger holds and footholds, a desperate climb even in the daylight to a member of an Alpine club. But Renwick from his ambush studied the face of that rock foot by foot, and at last decided that when night came, the possibilities of entrance having been denied him elsewhere, he would make the effort.

He did not know what he would find among the ruins above, their connection with the habitable part of the castle having probably been walled up by Baron Neudeck, and granting that Renwick succeeded in making his way to the top, his chances of reaching the main buildings might be slim indeed. And suppose after all this effort, that Marishka were not here—that Goritz had gone on—!

But how could he have gone on? Surely not by a road guarded by an army at its other end. And it was only last night that he had seen Goritz's fellow assassin and hireling. Marishka was within, and Renwick had not permitted a doubt of it to enter his mind since yesterday.

But to make certain of the matter he decided upon further investigation, retracing his steps for some hundred yards down the declivity, making sure of his landmarks as he went, until he reached the lower level of the valley, where crossing a brook he began climbing the steeper slope of the northern mountain. Here a greater degree of caution was required, for the rock upon which the Schloss was built was close to the northern slope and it was over the eastern reaches of the northern crags that the road passed which led to the causeway. To make his investigation more difficult of accomplishment, most of the mountain side was in bright sunlight while the castle was in shadow. And so, it being now the middle of the afternoon, he decided to move slowly at first, find a secluded spot and eat of the bread and cheese which was to be both his breakfast and supper.

From his position, well up among the rocks, he had a view of the tree-tops of the valley below with a glimpse of the road a short distance from the spot where he had crossed it in the morning. The ruined end of the castle he commanded, too, from a new angle. He was now above the level of the crag and made out among the twisted mass of stone the vestiges of what had once been a chapel, and a watchtower. There was an arch which seemed to lead into a vaulted structure, but from his position he could not see within it.

Renwick's eyes were good and they searched the valley below him ceaselessly. He thought he heard a rumble as of thunder in the distance, but as the sky was clear he knew that he must have been mistaken, but after a while along the road below him more soldiers passed, riding rapidly and silently—into the deeper shadows of the gorge. Their clattering wagons followed, and this, Renwick decided, was the cause of the distant sound that he had heard. Once or twice he thought that he saw motion among the undergrowth at some distance below him, but decided that he had been mistaken. Again—nearer and to his right. There was no doubt of it now. Renwick crawled deeper into his place of concealment and peered out.

Some one was climbing up over the rocks below him, mounting slowly a little farther up the gorge. He heard the crackling of twigs and the sound of voices in a subdued murmur. There were two of them. Venturing his head beyond the leaves he got a glimpse through the trunks of the pine-trees—a tall man and a shorter, stouter one. They were more than a hundred yards away and moving up the mountain side away from him, but to Renwick's mind, fixed only upon the men he sought and those who sought himself, the figures, though wearing rough clothing like his own, seemed strangely like those of Herr Windt and Spivak. Of course he might have been mistaken, for within two miles of this spot at least two hundred people lived, but the profusion of game in the valley confirmed the report of his host of last night that the peasants who lived in the vicinity of Dukla were not in the habit of venturing into the Pass. And if not peasants and not the men he had imagined them to be, who were they and what were they doing here? He lay quietly, listening for the sound of their footsteps which seemed to pass toward the castle above him and at last died away in the distance.

Windt here? It seemed incredible that he had traced Renwick so quickly. Or was it as Herr Koulos had said, that the same sources of information which had been open to Renwick had been open to Herr Windt also? Was he seeking Goritz or Renwick or both, trusting to the relations between Renwick and Marishka to bring all trails to this converging point? If the strangers among the rocks above him were Windt and Spivak, he was indeed in danger of detection and capture, and the fate of an Englishman taken armed in a region where Austrian troops were massing was unpleasant to contemplate. And yet Renwick decided that before he made the rash attempt to mount the cliff he must further investigate. And so he lay silent until nightfall when with drawn automatic he emerged from his hiding place and quietly made his way along the mountain side. He searched the undergrowth eagerly, as a man only can when his life depends upon the keenness of his senses, and without mishap reached a point opposite the castle where he commanded both the courtyard and the mass of buildings around the central tower. The distance across the narrow gorge at this side of the castle was perhaps two or three hundred yards, and Renwick from the shelter of a bush could see the windows quite distinctly. As the night grew dark two lights appeared—both, he noted, upon the side of the buildings toward where he sat—lights which could not be visible from the deeper, wider valley upon the other side or from the road below. He saw figures moving—the small bent figure of a woman in the building upon the left which seemed to be the kitchen, a man in the courtyard near the gate which Renwick had seen from the other side. The room upon the right near the keep, seemed to be the Hall, for the windows were longer than any others and denoted a high ceiling within. There was a light here too, and Renwick watched the windows, his heart beating high with hope. In his anxiety to see who was within the apartment he forgot the strangers upon the mountain side, the danger of his position, the hazardous feat before him—all but the hope that Marishka was here.