The Secret of Sarek Maurice Leblanc (best detective novels of all time .TXT) 📖

of destiny. There was no hesitation as to the road to be followed to the end; the beacon was lighted. I therefore followed the path marked out for me. Vorski has now only to gather the reward of his efforts. Vorski has only to put out his hand. Within reach of his hand fortune, glory, unlimited power. In a few hours, Vorski, son of a king, will be king of the world. It is this kingdom that he offers you.”

He was becoming more and more declamatory, more and more of the emphatic and pompous play-actor.

He bent towards Véronique:

“Will you be a queen, an empress, and soar above other women even as Vorski will dominate other men? Queen by right of gold and power even as you are already queen by right of beauty? Will you?⁠ ⁠… Vorski’s slave, but mistress of all those over whom Vorski holds sway? Will you?⁠ ⁠… Understand me clearly; it is not a question of your making a single decision; you have to choose between two. There is, mark you, the alternative to your refusal. Either the kingdom which I am offering, or else⁠ ⁠…”

He paused and then, in a grating tone, completed his sentence:

“Or else the cross!”

Véronique shuddered. The dreadful word, the dreadful thing appeared once more. And she now knew the name of the unknown executioner!

“The cross!” he repeated, with an atrocious smile of content. “It is for you to choose. On the one hand all the joys and honours of life. On the other hand, death by the most barbarous torture. Choose. There is nothing between the two alternatives. You must select one or the other. And observe that there is no unnecessary cruelty on my part, no vain ostentation of authority. I am only the instrument. The order comes from a higher power than mine, it comes from destiny. For the divine will to be accomplished, Véronique d’Hergemont must die and die on the cross. This is explicitly stated. There is no remedy against fate. There is no remedy unless one is Vorski and, like Vorski, is capable of every audacity, of every form of cunning. If Vorski was able, in the forest of Fontainebleau, to substitute a sham Vorski for the real one, if Vorski thus succeeded in escaping the fate which condemned him, from his childhood, to die by the knife of a friend, he can certainly discover some stratagem by which the divine will is accomplished, while the woman he loves is left alive. But in that case she will have to submit. I offer safety to my bride or death to my foe. Which are you, my foe or my bride? Which do you choose? Life by my side, with all the joys and honours of life⁠ ⁠… or death?”

“Death,” Véronique replied, simply.

He made a threatening gesture:

“It is more than death. It is torture. Which do you choose?”

“Torture.”

He insisted, malevolently:

“But you are not alone! Pause to reflect! There is your son. When you are gone, he will remain. In dying, you leave an orphan behind you. Worse than that; in dying, you bequeath him to me. I am his father. I possess full rights. Which do you choose?”

“Death,” she said, once more.

He became incensed:

“Death for you, very well. But suppose it means death for him? Suppose I bring him here, before you, your François, and put the knife to his throat and ask you for the last time, what will your answer be?”

Véronique closed her eyes. Never before had she suffered so intensely, and Vorski had certainly found the vulnerable spot. Nevertheless she murmured:

“I wish to die.”

Vorski flew into a rage, and, resorting straightway to insults, throwing politeness and courtesy to the winds, he shouted:

“Oh, the hussy, how she must hate me! Anything, anything, she accepts anything, even the death of her beloved son, rather than yield to me! A mother killing her son! For that’s what it is; you’re killing your son, so as not to belong to me. You are depriving him of his life, so as not to sacrifice yours to me. Oh, what hatred! No, no, it is impossible. I don’t believe in such hatred. Hatred has its limits. A mother like you! No, no, there’s something else⁠ ⁠… some love-affair, perhaps? No, no, Véronique’s not in love⁠ ⁠… What then? My pity, a weakness on my part? Oh, how little you know me! Vorski show pity! Vorski show weakness! Why, you’ve seen me at work! Did I flinch in the performance of my terrible mission? Was Sarek not devastated as it was written? Were the boats not sunk and the people not drowned? Were the sisters Archignat not nailed to the ancient oak-trees? I, I flinch! Listen, when I was a child, with these two hands of mine I wrung the necks of dogs and birds, with these two hands I flayed goats alive and plucked the live chickens in the poultry-yard. Pity indeed! Do you know what my mother called me? Attila! And, when she was mystically inspired and read the future in these hands of mine or on the tarot-cards, ‘Attila Vorski,’ that great seer would say, ‘you shall be the instrument of Providence. You shall be the sharp edge of the blade, the point of the dagger, the bullet in the rifle, the noose in the rope. Scourge of God! Scourge of God, your name is written at full length in the books of time! It blazes among the stars that shone at your birth. Scourge of God! Scourge of God!’ And you, you hope that my eyes will be wet with tears? Nonsense! Does the hangman weep? It is the weak who weep, those who fear lest they be punished, lest their crimes be turned against themselves. But I, I! Our ancestors feared but one thing, that the sky should fall upon their heads. What have I to fear? I am God’s accomplice! He has chosen me among all men. It is God that has inspired me, the God of the fatherland, the old