“By awaiting the supreme moment. By lying perdus until they are ready to strike.”
“That may mean a long wait,” I grumbled.
“Always impatient, the good Hastings! But no, it will not be so long. The one man they were afraid of—myself—is out of the way. I give them two or three months at most.”
His speaking of someone being got out of the way reminded me of Ingles and his tragic death, and I remembered that I had never told Poirot about the dying Chinaman in St. Giles’s Hospital.
He listened with keen attention to my story.
“Ingles’s servant, eh? And the few words he uttered were in Italian? Curious.”
“That’s why I suspected it might have been a plant on the part of the Big Four.”
“Your reasoning is at fault, Hastings. Employ the little grey cells. If your enemies wished to deceive you they would assuredly have seen to it that the Chinaman spoke in intelligible pidgin English. No, the message was genuine. Tell me again all that you heard?”
“First of all he made a reference to Handel’s Largo, and then he said something that sounded like ‘carrozza’—that’s a carriage, isn’t it?”
“Nothing else?”
“Well, just at the end he murmured something like ‘Cara’ somebody or other—some woman’s name. Zia, I think. But I don’t suppose that that had any bearing on the rest of it.”
“You would not suppose so, Hastings. Cara Zia is very important, very important indeed.”
“I don’t see—”
“My dear friend, you never see—and anyway the English know no geography.”
“Geography?” I cried. “What has geography got to do with it?”
“I dare say M. Thomas Cook would be more to the point.”
As usual, Poirot refused to say anything more—a most irritating trick of his. But I noticed that his manner became extremely cheerful, as though he had scored some point or other.
The days went on, pleasant if a trifle monotonous. There were plenty of books in the villa, and delightful rambles all around, but I chafed sometimes at the forced inactivity of our life, and marvelled at Poirot’s state of placid content. Nothing occurred to ruffle our quiet existence, and it was not until the end of June, well within the limit that Poirot had given them, that we had our news of the Big Four.
A car drove up to the villa early one morning, such an unusual event in our peaceful life that I hurried down to satisfy my curiosity. I found Poirot talking to a pleasant-faced young fellow of about my own age.
He introduced me.
“This is Captain Harvey, Hastings, one of the most famous members of your Intelligence Service.”
“Not famous at all, I’m afraid,” said the young man, laughing pleasantly.
“Not famous except to those in the know, I should have said. Most of Captain Harvey’s friends and acquaintances consider him an amiable but brainless young man—devoted only to the trot of the fox or whatever the dance is called.”
We both laughed.
“Well, well, to business,” said Poirot. “You are of opinion the time has come, then?”
“We are sure of it, sir. China was isolated politically yesterday. What is going on out there, nobody knows. No news of any kind, wireless or otherwise, has come through—just a complete break—and silence!”
“Li Chang Yen has shown his hand. And the others?”
“Abe Ryland arrived in England a week ago, and left for the Continent yesterday.”
“And Madame Olivier?”
“Madame Olivier left Paris last night.”
“For Italy?”
“For Italy, sir. As far as we can judge, they are both making for the resort you indicated—though how you knew that—”
“Ah, that is not the cap with the feather for me! That was the work of Hastings here. He conceals his intelligence, you comprehend, but it is profound for all that.”
Harvey looked at me with due appreciation, and I felt rather uncomfortable.
“All is in train, then,” said Poirot. He was pale now, and completely serious. “The time has come. The arrangements are all made?”
“Everything you ordered has been carried out. The governments of Italy, France, and England are behind you, and are all working harmoniously together.”
“It is, in fact, a new Entente,” observed Poirot drily. “I am glad that Desjardeaux is convinced at last. Eh bien, then, we will start—or rather, I will start. You, Hastings, will remain here—yes, I pray of you. In verity, my friend, I am serious.”
I believe him, but it was not likely that I should consent to being left behind in that fashion. Our argument was short but decisive.
It was not until we were in the train, speeding towards Paris, that he admitted that he was secretly glad of my decision.
“For you have a part to play, Hastings. An important part! Without you, I might well fail. Nevertheless, I felt that it was my duty to urge you to remain behind—”
“There is danger, then?”
“Mon ami, where there is the Big Four there is always danger.”
On arrival in Paris, we drove across to the Gare de l’Est, and Poirot at last announced our destination. We were bound for Bolzano and the Italian Tyrol.
During Harvey’s absence from our carriage I took the opportunity of asking Poirot why he had said that the discovery of the rendezvous was my work.
“Because it was, my friend. How Ingles managed to get hold of the information I do not know, but he did, and he sent it to us by his servant. We are bound, mon ami, for Karersee, the new Italian name for which is Lago di Carrezza. You see now where your ‘Cara Zia’ comes in and also your ‘Carrozza’ and ‘Largo’—the Handel was supplied by your own imagination. Possibly some reference to the information coming from the ‘hand’ of Mr. Ingles started the train of association.”
“Karersee?” I queried. “I never heard of it.”
“I always tell you that the English know no geography. But as a matter of fact it is a well known and very beautiful summer resort, four thousand feet up, in the heart of the Dolomites.”
“And it is in this out of the way spot that the Big Four have their rendezvous?”
“Say rather their headquarters. The signal has been given, and it is their intention to disappear from the world and issue orders from their mountain fastness. I have made the enquiries—a lot of quarrying of stone and mineral deposits is done there, and the company, apparently a small Italian firm, is in reality controlled by Abe Ryland. I am prepared
to swear that a vast subterranean dwelling has been hollowed out in the very heart of the mountain, secret and inaccessible. From there the leaders of the organization will issue by wireless their orders to their followers who are numbered by thousands in every country. And from that crag in the Dolomites the dictators of the world will emerge. That is to say—they would emerge were it not for Hercule Poirot.”
“Do you seriously believe all this, Poirot?—What about the armies and general machinery of civilization?”
“What about it in Russia, Hastings? This will be Russia on an infinitely larger scale—and with this additional menace—that Madame Olivier’s experiments have proceeded further than she has ever given out. I believe that she has, to a certain extent, succeeded in liberating atomic energy and harnessing it to her purpose. Her experiments with the nitrogen of the air have been very remarkable, and she has also experimented in the concentration of wireless energy, so that a beam of great intensity can be focused upon some given spot. Exactly how far she has progressed, nobody knows, but it is certain that it is much farther than has ever been given out. She is a genius, that woman—the Curies were as nothing to her. Add to her genius the powers of Ryland’s almost unlimited wealth, and, with the brain of Li Chang Yen, the finest criminal brain ever known, to direct and plan—eh bien, it will not be, as you say, all jam for civilization.”
His words made me very thoughtful. Although Poirot was given at times to exaggeration of language, he was not really an alarmist. For the first time I realized what a desperate struggle it was upon which we were engaged.
Harvey soon rejoined us and the journey went on.
We arrived at Bolzano about midday. From there the journey on was by motor. Several big blue motor cars were waiting in the central square of the town, and we three got into one of them. Poirot, notwithstanding the heat of the day, was muffled to the eyes in greatcoat and scarf. His eyes and the tips of his ears were all that could be seen of him.