Nick patted her thigh. “I was wondering how you found me.”

  “Quite easily. The weather’s too bad for flying. There are no regular flights out of the Highlands anyway. This seemed the only logical train. And of course our man in Oban saw you board it. So we had it flagged down at a little station. The train guard is one of us and the porter has been bribed. All very simple. If your compartment is empty when the train arrives at Euston nothing will ever be said. Ohhhhhhhhhh—don’t ever stop doing that!”

  Her last frenzied little moan was evoked by Nick’s hand reaching a vital target. Constant tremors were racking her slim body now. She lay back against the seat, her swan throat arched, her eyes slitted and staring up at the ceiling. Nick Carter had the odd illusion that she was a victim on the rack, and he the tormenter. He took his hand away. With a little gasp she seized it and drew it back. Nick grinned to himself. Lady Hardesty was in the toils, in sexual travail, and in his power. Later it might be different. But for now—

  “What did they do to the girl?” He kept his voice low, casual. He might have been inquiring about the weather.

  Her answer was in the same vein. She might have been predicting the weather. “The snake torture. Very effective. I watched. I expected to be sick, but I wasn’t. They staked her out naked and let a snake crawl over her. It was harmless, of course. They told her that. But she couldn’t stand it—especially when it got between her legs!”

  A crack AXE agent is many things. One of the things Nick was, at that moment, was a rock of composure. He did not let a muscle twitch. His lean saturnine face showed no emotion. “Pretty nasty,” he said calmly. While his hands itched for her throat.

  “Pretty nasty,” he repeated. “Burning Jim Stockes—that was nasty, too! Your people play rough.”

  But she shook her head. A trifling motion. Her half-closed eyes were still fixed on the ceiling. She was slowly moving now, wriggling, swinging her hips in a little circular motion to meet Nick’s stimulating hand.

  “That was bad,” she said. “A mistake. Crude. My husband is going to be furious about it. One of the Centurions had the idea—to drug him to make him look dead, and so he wouldn’t feel anything—and then to burn him as a sacrifice. The idea was to get the whole crowd involved— they would be guilty too, you see. Guilty of letting it happen. But they botched it. He woke up and screamed.” She shook her head slowly from side to side. “Pendragon is going to be in a perfect rage about it. It gives a bad impression. We’re not barbarians!”

  No? Nick had his own grim inner thoughts about that. Maybe they weren’t barbarians—but they would do until some came along!

  Lady Hardesty came over against him. Her eyes opened close to his and she stared at him. Her scarlet mouth whispered, “Kiss me now! No more talking for a time. Just kiss me now!”

  Her lips were sweet and hot. They ravaged his. Her tongue struck like a rapier at him, laving and caressing and thrusting. She bit his lip cruelly and he could taste blood. Hawk, he thought just before he was caught up in her frenzy, Hawk is never going to believe this! Even if I live to tell him!

  Lady Hardesty’s breathing was harsh now. Great gusty breaths. She stood up and pulled the black dress over her head in one fluid motion. He saw then why the black nylon legs seemed to go on forever, why there was no cream of flesh—she was wearing black tights! Tights and a fragile black brassiere.

  She pulled off the brassiere with a deft motion and flung it into a corner of the compartment. Her breasts were small and soft, the peaks a brownish pink. Rigid now. She stood close to him and put her firm little breasts to his lips and whispered. “Kiss me there! Oh, kiss me there!

  “I hope you are good,” whispered Lady Hardesty. “Oh, I hope you are good! Because that would solve everything. If you are good in this way you will be good in other ways, too. They say you are very good in all ways, Nick Carter! For years I have been hearing about you—and now here you are! Be good to me—be good for me! If you are the one—if only you are the one! First me—and then you must kill Pendragon for me! But first me!”

  Nick fought savagely to keep a clear head. Blood was pounding in his temples and the little compartment was fuzzing over. He leaned to kiss the little squiggle of umbilicus. She shuddered. Her flesh was like fire under velvet. She stroked his hair and touched his ears with her fingers. “Please,” she said. “Please, Nick. I never have, you know. Hundreds of men and I never have! Sometimes I think I’m going mad!”

  She fell to her knees before him. Her red mouth was twisted in torment. “Please make me, Nick! Please! I’ll be your slave if you do—I’ll do anything for you. Be anything! I’ll never leave you—only make me feel something!”

  With a little cry she dropped to the seat beside him, pulling and tugging at his body, wrapping her slim limbs about his big hard body. She wept quietly, “Only make me feel something!”

  N3 had had all he could take. He took her immediately and without tenderness or mercy or even thoughtfulness. He forgot about the mission and about Hawk and about Pendragon and about the world! Everything slipped away into a red haze of animal lust. She was a bitch in heat and he was a brute male! Beneath him she twitched and moaned and wriggled and muttered little obscenities and he scarcely heard her. He rode her hard, with a building rage to rip her into bloody shreds with his spur. Lady Hardesty responded with a like frenzy. She bit him and he slapped her hard, a ringing slap, and she laughed wildly and bit him again. He strove with bitter hatred to impale her farther. She alternated laughter with tears and sobs with gasps and moans with groans of pain and pleasure. And continued to bite him. Soon he was bleeding from a dozen spots.

  Still, for all his frenzy, he paced himself carefully. Expertly. All over the world, from Singapore to Moscow, were more than a hundred living testimonials to his prowess. He needed all that experience now. And had it. Nick could sense the exact moment when he knew he had won. When he had, at long last, achieved what no other man or woman had ever been able to do—make the Lady Hardesty feel something!

  It was his undoing! It smashed all his immediate plans. It plunged him instantly into deadly peril.

  The lady screamed. She went into a twisting convulsion and screamed! It was the damndest scream N3 had ever heard in his life. High and shrill and full of triumph and ecstasy. It went on and on, that scream, shaking and shuddering in the little compartment. Drowning out the hoot of the laboring diesel ahead. A scream of joyous fulfillment.

  EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee

  Frantically he tried to shut her off. He clapped a big hand over her mouth. She bit it and went on wailing her pleasure. My God, thought Nick in dismay, they’ll hear her up in the engine. But it was not the engineer he was worried about. It was—

  And it was too late! The door of the compartment was smashed open. The gillies who had been waiting so patiently in the corridor—Pendragon’s Centurions—surged into the little room. Nick fought to disentangle himself from the clinging white limbs. She would not let him go. He had only time for an absurd remembrance of the couple on the moor, and to think that irony was everywhere and that you sometimes got what you gave, when something hard crashed against his skull and he went spinning away into a dark universe. As the world exploded in while hot stars he had the curious thought that Pendragon would hate him even more for this. He would kill them both now, surely. Both himself and Lady Hardesty. But Pendragon had always had that in mind, hadn’t he?

  Nick Carter came back to consciousness abruptly. He knew immediately where he was and what had happened. He was alone, lying face down on the compartment floor. The Mail was still flogging along at a terrific pace, hooting and swaying and rattling. He was alone. The door had been closed and through the frosted glass Nick could see the familiar shadow still on guard. The lock was smashed, must be, but that did him no good.

  He sat up and rubbed his head. There was only one thing on the credit side—he was still alive! Slowly he got to his feet, his head still throbbing. They had racked him up but good. He explored and found his weapons gone. That figured. No Luger and no stiletto. It was a wonder they had let him keep them so long. Of course they had trusted Lady Hardesty to handle him in her own way.

  The Mail plunged on through the night. Nick lit a cigarette. At least he still had the special lighter. That was going to come in handy, as he had suspected it would. He tiptoed to the door and softly tried the knob. The lock was splintered, sure enough, but they had managed to fasten it somehow on the outside. It moved half an inch inward, then stopped.

  That half inch was too much. The door opened suddenly and Nick was looking into the dark eye of a heavy automatic. It was the same gillie who had been on guard from the beginning. He motioned with the mean looking Colt. “Back in wi’ ye, mon! Aye, and no tricks, mind it! Or I’ll have yer guts all over the fine carpeting, I will.”

  Nick backed away. “Sorry, old fellow. Just thought I’d wander into the diner and see what’s cooking.”

  The man’s hard red face cracked in a nasty smile. “Ye’ll know soon enough what’s cooking, lad. We’ll get to ye, never fear. Now back and shut yer gab!”

  He pulled the door shut. Nick saw that it was fastened on the outside with a strap of some sort. Probably one of the men’s belts.

  The only sign that Lady Hardesty had ever been in the compartment was her scent and a small overnighter on the luggage rack near the door. When they hauled her out they had forgotten it. Nick took it down and clicked it open. There just might be a weapon—

  There wasn’t any weapon. There was only a Devil’s costume and the black phallus. Nick sighed. He had been right about that, at least. Lady Hardesty was the Devil. Nick went to the single large window and let the blind zip up. Pendragon had better worry about him, he told the night rushing past outside. He wasn’t through yet, not by a long shot. They hadn’t killed him yet and that was a mistake. It was likely to be a fatal one for some of them. All—if he could arrange it.

  The Mail was still running through mountains. Nick stared out at the unfriendly dark. He could see little but his own image in the glass. He began to lay out his plans. They would more than likely come in to him—they would want the privacy of the compartment for what they had in mind, no matter how friendly the train guard or how bribed the porter. They would want to make it a very secret little murder!

  N3 sat down and smoked another cigarette and waited. He had it clear in his head now. Let them come. The sooner the better.

  Five minutes later they came. Three of them. All big and powerful men with raw outdoor faces and huge muscles. They surged into the little compartment and closed the door. One of them, evidently the spokesman and leader, stood with his back against the door and looked at Nick. He glanced at a watch on his wrist. When he spoke it was with the high growl of the Scottish uplands. Nick remained seated, unmoving. He did not want to provoke them into any premature moves. He did not want them to bind him. Or try to. It would upset his own schedule.

  “Five minutes the noo,” the leader said. He glanced back at Nick. “Sorry, lad. Nothing personal, ye’ll ken. In the line of duty. Yair a sore burden to the Laird, ye’ll ken. Ye have to go, lad, ye simply have to go!”

  Nick nodded calmly. “I’m sorry, too. Give the Laird my best regards and thank him for his hospitality. It’s been grand.”

  All three of them stared at him. One said: “It’s a cool one you are at that! Too bad you couldn’t be wi’ us and not agin us! We can always use a braw lad or two.”

  Nick smiled faintly. “Perhaps it isn’t too late even now? If you could take me to your leader?”

  They laughed in unison at the poor joke. The leader glanced at his watch again. “Three minutes now.”

  Nick feigned interest. “What happens in three minutes?” As if he didn’t know.

  The leader smiled broadly. “There’s a bonny trestle bridge coming up, ye’ll ken. Real bonny. Two hundred feet or more it is down to the river bed.”

  “Aye,” said another gilly. “A good two hundred ‘tis— and no verry much water in the bed at that. Not this time of the year, ye’ll ken.”

  The third man grinned at Nick. “Mostly stones, ye see. ‘Tis sharp jagged stones ye’ll be meeting wi’ yer thick head. I doubt you’ll relish the meeting, mon!”

  He regarded them calmly, his eyes slightly narrowed. “What if I don’t cooperate? There are three of you, yes, but I’m pretty rugged. And this is a little space—I might make it very rough for you.”

  The man at the door waggled the Colt at Nick. “I hope not, lad. Ye’ll ken that we want this to be neat like—no ropes on you and no bullet holes. The Laird likes neat work. But if we must—weel, we must and that’s all to it!”

  N3 nodded. “I see. Very sensible of you. Let me know when there’s only a minute left, eh? I’d like to smoke a last cigarette. It’s the custom, I believe.”

  They all nodded. “Aye. It’s a privilege you have, lad. It will not be long.”

  Nick stood up very slowly and cautiously. “Where’s the Lady Hardesty?”

  Silence. The three men exchanged glances. It was as though Nick had spoken a magic word turning them to stone.

  Then one of the gillies snickered. “She’ll be safe in the next car, ye ken. Out of mischief wi’ Robbie watching her. Aye—she’ll no get anyplace wi’ Robbie!”

  The leader shot Nick a glance of reluctant admiration. “Ye seem to have gi’ her what she was needing, mon! Too bad ye’ve got to die for it! ‘Twas more than any of the likes of us could do, eh, lads?”

  The other two men nodded at Nick. “Aye—she’s been the rounds, has m’lady. You’re the only lad could ever do her business ‘til now.”

  The leader glanced at his watch. “Aye, ‘tis all a peety. The lady has done hersel’ proper this time, I’m thinking. The Laird will have her throat cut wi’out a doot! But that’s no our worry—better light your last cigarette, lad. The bridge is coming up the noo—”

  So this was it. Nick took the lighter from his pocket and moved a step into the center of the tiny compartment. They were all three very much on the alert, watching him with hard eyes. Nick flicked the little knob on the lighter into the ON position. He prayed ferventiy that the thing would work. Without it he would lose the element of surprise on which he was counting so heavily.

  He put a cigarette in his mouth and pretended to try the lighter, masking the action with his palm. Nothing. He tried again, faking the action. Nothing. Nick swore and took another step toward the head gilly who was guarding the door.

  Nick smiled weakly. “Fine thing! My last cigarette and the damned lighter won’t work. May I have a match?”

  The man’s gesture was instinctive, unthinking. He took a step toward Nick and put one hand in his pocket. The Colt in his hand drooped minutely.

  One of the other men said sharply, “There’s no the time now, Tom! The bridge is coming up the noo—let’s be done wi’ it!”

  Two men moved swiftly in on Nick. They had pocketed their guns and were intent on seizing him and hurling him through the window. The leader, off balance for an instant, brought up the Colt and began to step back away from Nick. “I’m sorry, lad. There’ll be no—”

  Nick brought up the lighter. He leveled it at the man’s face as though it were a gun. “Then I’ll give you a light!”

  Nick Cartel said fiercely. He flicked the lighter.

  Napalm is a terrible weapon! Two feet of the greasy unextinguishable liquid hell leaped into the man’s face! A lance of terrifying flame under terrific pressure! Even as the leader screamed in agony his face was a charred mask, eaten to the bone by the fire!

  The man fell, screaming and clawing at his face which would burn itself away. Nick went backward as though shot out of a catapult. He had counted on the two of them rushing him, thus adding their own impetus to his tremendous bull’s rush. A form of rough judo.

  N3 brought his right elbow around in a stiff swinging arc. It clicked against the chin of one of the men like billiard balls striking. The big man slumped and Nick had gained a fraction of a second. He needed it. The third gilly was a fast thinker and knew how much trouble he was in. He was dragging out his pistol when Nick jumped him.

  Nick’s motions were a symphony in brutal overtones, a practiced surge of raw and unleashed power, the end result of months and years of rigorous training. He handled the huge, raw-boned Scot as though he were a new born babe!

  A leaping, back thrusting kick in the groin! A wicked downward chop on the wrist! A murderous karate blow across the back of the neck that was just a trifle harder than he had meant it to be. As the man slumped Nick saw that he was dead! Neck broken!

  He turned to meet the rush of the remaining gilly, now recovering his strength but not his wits. Had he used his gun he might have shot Nick. Instead he rushed N3 with a bellow of rage.

  They were squarely in front of the window. Nick ducked, turned, and took the man over his shoulder in a judo throw. There was a ringing crash of breaking glass and flying shards as the man went through the window into the night and the abyss. The diesel whistled at that precise moment, drowning out the screams of the falling man.

  Nick took one fast glance around. The man by the door had mercifully lost consciousness. His face was still smouldering, a blackened unrecognizable thing. The other man was dead of a broken neck.

  Nick went into the corridor and turned right, toward the engine. Immediate object to find Lady Hardesty and get her back to this car. If the remaining gilly, Robbie, put up a fight so much the worst for him. Probably he wouldn’t. There would be other passengers in the next car, no doubt, and they would all have to be careful.

  But Nick had to get the Lady Hardesty back! They must talk and plan. She was his ticket to Pendragon, the only one he had. She wanted her husband dead and N3 had every intention of obliging her—in his own time and by his own method. She, Lady Hardesty, could be taken care of later!