The Silent Barrier

“Why not? We are alone.”

“You must come with me, Herr Baron.”

“That is not my title.”

“It used to be. It will serve as well as any other.”

“I refuse to stir a yard farther.”

“Then,” said Stampa, “I will kill you where you stand!”

Neither in voice nor feature did he exhibit any emotion. He merely put forward an all-sufficing reason, and left it at that.

Bower was no coward. Though the curiously repressed manner of the threat sent a wave of blood from his face to his heart, he strode suddenly nearer. Ready and eager to grapple with his adversary before a weapon could be drawn, he peered into the peasant’s care lined face.

“So that is your plan, is it?” he said thickly. “You would entice me to some lonely place, where you can shoot or stab me at your own good pleasure. Fool! I can overpower you instantly, and have you sent to a jail or a lunatic asylum for the rest of your life.”

“I carry no knife, nor can I use a pistol, Herr Baron,” was the unruffled answer. “I do not need them. My hands are enough. You are a man, a big, strong man, with all a man’s worst passions. Have you never felt that you could tear your enemy with your nails, choke him till the bones of his neck crackled, and his tongue lolled out like a panting dog’s? That is how I too may feel if you deny my request. And I will kill you, Marcus Bauer! As sure as God is in Heaven, I will kill you!”

Fear now lent its blind fury to the instinct of self preservation. Bower leaped at Stampa, determined to master him at the first onslaught. But he was heavy and slow, inert after long years of physical indolence. The older man, awkward only because of his crippled leg, swung himself clear of Bower’s grip, and sprang out of reach.

“If there be any who look, ’tis you who risk imprisonment,” he said calmly, with a touch of humor that assuredly he did not intend.

Bower knew then how greatly he had erred. It was a mistake ever to have agreed to meet Stampa alone – a much greater one not to have waited to be attacked. As Stampa said truly, if anyone in the village had seen his mad action, there would be testimony that he was the aggressor. He frowned at Stampa in a bull-like rage, glowering at him in a frenzy of impotence. This dour old man opposed a grim barrier to his hopes. It was intolerable that he, Mark Bower the millionaire, a man who held within his grasp all that the material world has to give, should be standing there at the mercy of a Swiss peasant. Throughout the dreary vigil of the night he had pondered this thing, and could find no loophole of escape. The record of that accursed summer sixteen years ago was long since obliterated in the history of Marcus Bauer, the emotional youth who made love to a village belle in Zermatt, and posed as an Austrian baron among the English and Italians who at that time formed the select band of climbers in the Valais. But the short-lived romance was dead and buried, and its memory brought the taste of Dead Sea ashes to the mouth.

Marcus Bauer had become a naturalized Englishman. The mock barony was replaced by a wealth that might buy real titles. But the crime still lived, and woe to Mark Bower, the financial magnate, if it was brought home to him! He had not risen above his fellows without making enemies. He well knew the weakness and the strength of the British social system, with its strange complacency, its “allowances,” its hysterical prudery, its queer amalgam of Puritanism and light hearted forbearance. He might gamble with loaded dice in the City, and people would applaud him as cleverer and shrewder than his opponents. His name might be coupled with that of a pretty actress, and people would only smile knowingly. But let a hint of his betrayal of Etta Stampa and its attendant circumstances reach the ears of those who hated him, and he would sink forthwith into the slough of rich parvenus who eke out their lives in vain efforts to enter the closely guarded circle from which he had been expelled.

If that was the only danger, he might meet and vanquish it. The unscrupulous use of money, backed up by the law of libel, can do a great deal to still the public conscience. There was another, more subtle and heart searching.

He was genuinely in love with Helen Wynton. He had reached an age when position and power were more gratifying than mere gilded Bohemianism. He could enter Parliament either by way of Palace Yard or through the portals of the Upper House. He owned estates in Scotland and the home counties, and his Park Lane mansion figured already in the address books of half the peerage. It pleased him to think that in placing a charming and gracious woman like Helen at the head of his household, she would look to him as the lodestar of her existence, and not tolerate him with the well-bred hauteur of one of the many aristocratic young women who were ready enough to marry him, but who, in their heart of hearts, despised him. He had deliberately avoided that sort of matrimonial blunder. It promised more than it fulfilled. He refused to wed a woman who deemed her social rank dearly bartered for his money.

Yet, before ever the question arose, he knew quite well that this girl whom he had chosen – the poorly paid secretary of some harmless enthusiast, the strangely selected correspondent of an insignificant journal – would spurn him with scorn if she heard the story Stampa might tell of his lost daughter. That was the wildest absurdity in the mad jumble of events which brought him here face to face with a broken and frayed old man, – one whom he had never seen before the previous day. It was of a piece with this fantasy that he should be standing ankle deep in snow under the brilliant sun of August, and in risk, if not in fear, of his life within two hundred yards of a crowded hotel and a placid Swiss village.

His usually well ordered brain rebelled against these manifest incongruities. His passion subsided almost as quickly as it had arisen. He moistened his cold lips with his tongue, and the action seemed to restore his power of speech.

“I suppose you have some motive in bringing me here. What is it?” he said.

“You must come to the cemetery. It is not far.”

This unlooked for reply struck a new note. It had such a bizarre effect that Bower actually laughed. “Then you really are mad?” he guffawed harshly.

“No, not at all. I was on the verge of madness the other day; but I was pulled back in time, thanks to the Madonna, else I might never have met you.”

“Do you expect me to walk quietly to the burial ground in order that I may be slaughtered conveniently?”

“I am not going to kill you, Marcus Bauer,” said Stampa. “I trust the good God will enable me to keep my hands off you. He will punish you in His own good time. You are safe from me.”

“A moment ago you spoke differently.”

“Ah, that was because you refused to come with me. Assuredly I shall bring either you or your lying tongue to Etta’s grave this morning. But you will come now. You are afraid, Herr Baron. I see it in your eyes, and you value that well-fed body of yours too highly not to do as I demand. Believe me, within the next few minutes you shall either kneel by my little girl’s grave or tumble into your own.”

“I am not afraid, Stampa. I warn you again that I am more than a match for you. Yet I would willingly make any reparation within my power for the wrong I have done you.”

“Yes, yes – that is all I ask – reparation, such as it is. Not to me – to Etta. Come then. I have no weapon, I repeat. You trust to your size and strength; so, by your own showing, you are safe. But you must come!”

A gleam of confidence crept into Bower’s eyes. Was it not wise to humor this old madman? Perhaps, by displaying a remorse that was not all acting, he might arrange a truce, secure a breathing space. He would be free to deal with Millicent Jaques. He might so contrive matters that Helen should be far removed from Stampa’s dangerous presence before the threatened disclosure was made. Yes, a wary prudence in speech and action might accomplish much. Surely he dared match his brain against a peasant’s.

“Very well,” he said, “I shall accompany you. But remember, at the least sign of violence, I shall not only defend myself, but drag you off to the communal guardhouse.”

Without any answer, Stampa resumed his steady plodding through the snow. Bower followed, somewhat in the rear. He glanced sharply back toward the hotel. So far as he could judge, no one had witnessed that frantic spring at his tormentor. At that hour, nearly every resident would be on the sunlit veranda. He wondered whether or not Helen and Millicent had met again. He wished now he had interviewed Millicent last night. Her problem was simple enough, – a mere question of terms. Spite had carried her boldly through the scene in the foyer; but she was far too sensible a young woman to persist in a hopeless quarrel.

It was one of the fatalities that dogged his footsteps ever since he came to Maloja that the only person watching him at the moment should happen to be Millicent herself. Her room was situated at the back of the hotel, and she had fallen asleep after many hours of restless thought. When the clang of a bell woke her with a start she found that the morning was far advanced. She dressed hurriedly, rather in a panic lest her quarry might have evaded her by an early flight. The fine panorama of the Italian Alps naturally attracted her eyes. She was staring at it idly, when she saw Bower and Stampa crossing the open space in front of her bed room window.

Stampa, of course, was unknown to her. In some indefinable way his presence chimed with her fear that Bower would leave Maloja forthwith. Did he intend to post through the Vale of Bregaglia to Chiavenna? Then, indeed, she might be called on to overcome unforeseen difficulties. She appreciated his character to the point of believing that Helen was his dupe. She regretted now that she was so foolish as to attack her one-time friend openly. Far better have asked Helen to visit her privately, and endeavor to find out exactly how the land lay before she encountered Bower. At any rate, she ought to learn without delay whether or not he was hiring post horses in the village. If so, he was unwilling to meet her, and the battle royal must take place in London.

A maid entered with coffee and rolls.

“Who is that man with the English monsieur?” inquired Millicent, pointing to the two.

The servant was a St. Moritz girl, and a glance sufficed. “That? He is Christian Stampa, madam. He used to drive one of Joos’s carriages; but he had a misfortune. He nearly killed a lady whom he was bringing to the hotel, and was dismissed in consequence. Now he is guide to an American gentleman. My God! but they are droll, the Americans!”

The maid laughed, and created a clatter with basin and hot water can. Millicent, forcing herself to eat quickly, continued to gaze after the pair. The description of Stampa’s employer interested her. His drollery evidently consisted in hiring a cripple as guide.

“Is the American monsieur named Charles K. Spencer?” she said, speaking very clearly.

“I do not know, madam. But Marie, who is on the second, can tell me. Shall I ask?”

“Do, please.”

Léontine bustled out. Just then Millicent was amazed by Bower’s extraordinary leap at Stampa and the guide’s agile avoidance of his would-be assailant. The men faced each other as though a fight was imminent; but the upshot was that they walked on together quietly. Be sure that two keen blue eyes watched their every motion thenceforth, never leaving them till they entered the village street and disappeared behind a large chalet.

“And what did it all mean? Mark Bower – scuffling with a villager!”

Millicent’s smooth forehead wrinkled in earnest thought. How queer it would be if Bower was trying to force Spencer’s guide into the commission of a crime! He would stop at nothing. He believed he could bend all men, and all women too, to his will. Was he angered by unexpected resistance? She hoped the maid would hurry with her news. Though she meant to go at once to the village, it would be a point gained if she was certain of Stampa’s identity.

She was already veiled and befurred when Léontine returned. Yes, Marie had given her full information. Madam had heard, perhaps, how Herr Bower and the pretty English mademoiselle were in danger of being snowed up in the Forno hut yesterday. Well, Stampa had gone with his voyageur, Monsieur Spensare, to their rescue. And the young lady was the one whom Stampa had endangered during his career as a cab driver. Again, it was droll.

Millicent agreed. For the second time, she resolved to postpone her journey to St. Moritz.

Bower was surprised when Stampa led him into the main road. Having never seen any sign of a cemetery at Maloja, he guessed vaguely that it must be situated close to the church. Therein, in a sense, he was right. It will be remembered how Helen’s solitary ramble on the morning after her arrival in Maloja brought her to the secluded graveyard. She first visited the little Swiss tabernacle which had attracted her curiosity, and thence took the priest’s path to the last resting place of his flock. But Stampa had a purpose in following a circuitous route. He turned sharply round the base of a huge pile of logs, stacked there in readiness for the fires of a long winter.

“Look!” he said, throwing open the half door of a cattle shed behind the timber. “They found her here on the second of August, a Sunday morning, just before the people went to early mass. By her side was a bottle labeled ‘Poison.’ She bought it in Zermatt on the sixth of July. So, you see, my little girl had been thinking a whole month of killing herself. Poor child! What a month! They tell me, Herr Baron, you left Zermatt on the sixth of July?”

Bower’s face had grown cold and gray while the old man was speaking. He began to understand. Stampa would spare him none of the horror of the tragedy from which he fled like a lost soul when the news of it reached the hotel. Well, he would not draw back now. If Stampa and he were destined to have a settlement, why defer it? This was his day of reckoning, – of atonement, he hoped, – and he would not shirk the ordeal, though his flesh quivered and his humbled pride lashed him like a whip.

The squalid stable was peculiarly offensive. Owing to the gale, the cattle that ought to be pasturing in the high alp were crowded there in reeking filth. Yesterday, not long before this hour, he was humming verses of cow songs to Helen, and beguiling the way to the Forno with a recital of the customs and idyls of the hills. What a spiteful thing was Fate! Why had this doting peasant risen from the dead to drag him through the mire of a past transgression? If Stampa betrayed anger, if his eyes and voice showed the scorn and hatred of a man justly incensed because of his daughter’s untimely death, the situation would be more tolerable. But his words were mild, biting only by reason of their simple pathos. He spoke in a detached manner. He might be relating the unhappy story of some village maid of whom he had no personal knowledge. This complete self effacement grated on Bower’s nerves. It almost spurred him again to ungovernable rage. But he realized the paramount need of self control. He clenched his teeth in the effort to bear his punishment without protest.

And Stampa seemed to have the gift of divination. He read Bower’s heart. By some means he became aware that the unsavory shed was loathsome to the fine gentleman standing beside him.