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The Confessions of Arsène Lupin

by Maurice Leblanc · English · Gutenberg #28093 · 400,530 chars · public domain (US)

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Title: The Confessions of Arsène Lupin

Author: Maurice Leblanc


        
Release date: February 15, 2009 [eBook #28093]
                Most recently updated: April 10, 2015

Language: English

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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE CONFESSIONS OF ARSÈNE LUPIN ***




Produced by Robert Cicconetti, Meredith Bach, and the
Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net







[Illustration: "_Suddenly he rushed at her and caught her by the arm_"]




    THE INTERNATIONAL
    ADVENTURE LIBRARY


    THREE OWLS EDITION

     THE CONFESSIONS
     OF ARSENE LUPIN

    An Adventure Story

           BY
     MAURICE LEBLANC
 Author of "Arsene Lupin"

   W. R. CALDWELL & CO.
         NEW YORK




 _Copyright, 1912, 1913, by_
 Maurice Leblanc

 _All rights reserved, including that of
 translation into foreign languages,
 including the Scandinavian_




CONTENTS


CHAPTER                                               PAGE

    I. TWO HUNDRED THOUSAND FRANCS REWARD!               1

    II. THE WEDDING-RING                                36

    III. THE SIGN OF THE SHADOW                         66

    IV. THE INFERNAL TRAP                              101

    V. THE RED SILK SCARF                              138

    VI. SHADOWED BY DEATH                              177

    VII. A TRAGEDY IN THE FOREST OF MORGUES            210

    VIII. LUPIN'S MARRIAGE                             228

    IX. THE INVISIBLE PRISONER                         266

    X. EDITH SWAN-NECK                                 291




THE CONFESSIONS OF ARSENE LUPIN




THE CONFESSIONS OF ARSENE LUPIN




I

TWO HUNDRED THOUSAND FRANCS REWARD!...


"Lupin," I said, "tell me something about yourself."

"Why, what would you have me tell you? Everybody knows my life!" replied
Lupin, who lay drowsing on the sofa in my study.

"Nobody knows it!" I protested. "People know from your letters in the
newspapers that you were mixed up in this case, that you started that
case. But the part which you played in it all, the plain facts of the
story, the upshot of the mystery: these are things of which they know
nothing."

"Pooh! A heap of uninteresting twaddle!"

"What! Your present of fifty thousand francs to Nicolas Dugrival's wife!
Do you call that uninteresting? And what about the way in which you
solved the puzzle of the three pictures?"

Lupin laughed:

"Yes, that was a queer puzzle, certainly. I can suggest a title for you
if you like: what do you say to _The Sign of the Shadow_?"

"And your successes in society and with the fair sex?" I continued. "The
dashing Arsene's love-affairs!... And the clue to your good actions?
Those chapters in your life to which you have so often alluded under the
names of _The Wedding-ring_, _Shadowed by Death_, and so on!... Why
delay these confidences and confessions, my dear Lupin?... Come, do what
I ask you!..."

It was at the time when Lupin, though already famous, had not yet fought
his biggest battles; the time that preceded the great adventures of _The
Hollow Needle_ and _813_. He had not yet dreamt of annexing the
accumulated treasures of the French Royal House[A] nor of changing the
map of Europe under the Kaiser's nose[B]: he contented himself with
milder surprises and humbler profits, making his daily effort, doing
evil from day to day and doing a little good as well, naturally and for
the love of the thing, like a whimsical and compassionate Don Quixote.


  [A] _The Hollow Needle._ By Maurice Leblanc. Translated by Alexander
  Teixeira de Mattos (Eveleigh Nash).

  [B] _813._ By Maurice Leblanc. Translated by Alexander Teixeira de
  Mattos (Mills & Boon).


He was silent; and I insisted:

"Lupin, I wish you would!"

To my astonishment, he replied:

"Take a sheet of paper, old fellow, and a pencil."

I obeyed with alacrity, delighted at the thought that he at last meant
to dictate to me some of those pages which he knows how to clothe with
such vigour and fancy, pages which I, unfortunately, am obliged to spoil
with tedious explanations and boring developments.

"Are you ready?" he asked.

"Quite."

"Write down, 20, 1, 11, 5, 14, 15."

"What?"

"Write it down, I tell you."

He was now sitting up, with his eyes turned to the open window and his
fingers rolling a Turkish cigarette. He continued:

"Write down, 21, 14, 14, 5...."

He stopped. Then he went on:

"3, 5, 19, 19 ..."

And, after a pause:

"5, 18, 25 ..."

Was he mad? I looked at him hard and, presently, I saw that his eyes
were no longer listless, as they had been a little before, but keen and
attentive and that they seemed to be watching, somewhere, in space, a
sight that apparently captivated them.

Meanwhile, he dictated, with intervals between each number:

"18, 9, 19, 11, 19 ..."

There was hardly anything to be seen through the window but a patch of
blue sky on the right and the front of the building opposite, an old
private house, whose shutters were closed as usual. There was nothing
particular about all this, no detail that struck me as new among those
which I had had before my eyes for years....

"1, 2...."

And suddenly I understood ... or rather I thought I understood, for how
could I admit that Lupin, a man so essentially level-headed under his
mask of frivolity, could waste his time upon such childish nonsense?
What he was counting was the intermittent flashes of a ray of sunlight
playing on the dingy front of the opposite house, at the height of the
second floor!

"15, 22 ..." said Lupin.

The flash disappeared for a few seconds and then struck the house again,
successively, at regular intervals, and disappeared once more.

I had instinctively counted the flashes and I said, aloud:

"5...."

"Caught the idea? I congratulate you!" he replied, sarcastically.

He went to the window and leant out, as though to discover the exact
direction followed by the ray of light. Then he came and lay on the sofa
again, saying:

"It's your turn now. Count away!"

The fellow seemed so positive that I did as he told me. Besides, I could
not help confessing that there was something rather curious about the
ordered frequency of those gleams on the front of the house opposite,
those appearances and disappearances, turn and turn about, like so many
flash signals.

They obviously came from a house on our side of the street, for the sun
was entering my windows slantwise. It was as though some one were
alternately opening and shutting a casement, or, more likely, amusing
himself by making sunlight flashes with a pocket-mirror.

"It's a child having a game!" I cried, after a moment or two, feeling a
little irritated by the trivial occupation that had been thrust upon me.

"Never mind, go on!"

And I counted away.... And I put down rows of figures.... And the sun
continued to play in front of me, with mathematical precision.

"Well?" said Lupin, after a longer pause than usual.

"Why, it seems finished.... There has been nothing for some
minutes...."

We waited and, as no more light flashed through space, I said,
jestingly:

"My idea is that we have been wasting our time. A few figures on paper:
a poor result!"

Lupin, without stirring from his sofa, rejoined:

"Oblige me, old chap, by putting in the place of each of those numbers
the corresponding letter of the alphabet. Count A as 1, B as 2 and so
on. Do you follow me?"

"But it's idiotic!"

"Absolutely idiotic, but we do such a lot of idiotic things in this
life.... One more or less, you know!..."

I sat down to this silly work and wrote out the first letters:


    "_Take no...._"


I broke off in surprise:

"Words!" I exclaimed. "Two English words meaning...."

"Go on, old chap."

And I went on and the next letters formed two more words, which I
separated as they appeared. And, to my great amazement, a complete
English sentence lay before my eyes.

"Done?" asked Lupin, after a time.

"Done!... By the way, there are mistakes in the spelling...."

"Never mind those and read it out, please.... Read slowly."

Thereupon I read out the following unfinished communication, which I
will set down as it appeared on the paper in front of me:


    "_Take no unnecessery risks. Above all, avoid atacks, approach
    ennemy with great prudance and...._"


I began to laugh:

"And there you are! _Fiat lux!_ We're simply dazed with light! But,
after all, Lupin, confess that this advice, dribbled out by a
kitchen-maid, doesn't help you much!"

Lupin rose, without breaking his contemptuous silence, and took the
sheet of paper.

I remembered soon after that, at this moment, I happened to look at the
clock. It was eighteen minutes past five.

Lupin was standing with the paper in his hand; and I was able at my ease
to watch, on his youthful features, that extraordinary mobility of
expression which baffles all observers and constitutes his great
strength and his chief safeguard. By what signs can one hope to identify
a face which changes at pleasure, even without the help of make-up, and
whose every transient expression seems to be the final, definite
expression?... By what signs? There was one which I knew well, an
invariable sign: Two little crossed wrinkles that marked his forehead
whenever he made a powerful effort of concentration. And I saw it at
that moment, saw the tiny tell-tale cross, plainly and deeply scored.

He put down the sheet of paper and muttered:

"Child's play!"

The clock struck half-past five.

"What!" I cried. "Have you succeeded?... In twelve minutes?..."

He took a few steps up and down the room, lit a cigarette and said:

"You might ring up Baron Repstein, if you don't mind, and tell him I
shall be with him at ten o'clock this evening."

"Baron Repstein?" I asked. "The husband of the famous baroness?"

"Yes."

"Are you serious?"

"Quite serious."

Feeling absolutely at a loss, but incapable of resisting him, I opened
the telephone-directory and unhooked the receiver. But, at that moment,
Lupin stopped me with a peremptory gesture and said, with his eyes on
the paper, which he had taken up again:

"No, don't say anything.... It's no use letting him know.... There's
something more urgent ... a queer thing that puzzles me.... Why on
earth wasn't the last sentence finished? Why is the sentence...."

He snatched up his hat and stick:

"Let's be off. If I'm not mistaken, this is a business that requires
immediate solution; and I don't believe I _am_ mistaken."

He put his arm through mine, as we went down the stairs, and said:

"I know what everybody knows. Baron Repstein, the company-promoter and
racing-man, whose colt Etna won the Derby and the Grand Prix this year,
has been victimized by his wife. The wife, who was well known for her
fair hair, her dress and her extravagance, ran away a fortnight ago,
taking with her a sum of three million francs, stolen from her husband,
and quite a collection of diamonds, pearls and jewellery which the
Princesse de Berny had placed in her hands and which she was supposed to
buy. For two weeks the police have been pursuing the baroness across
France and the continent: an easy job, as she scatters gold and jewels
wherever she goes. They think they have her every moment. Two days ago,
our champion detective, the egregious Ganimard, arrested a visitor at a
big hotel in Belgium, a woman against whom the most positive evidence
seemed to be heaped up. On enquiry, the lady turned out to be a
notorious chorus-girl called Nelly Darbal. As for the baroness, she has
vanished. The baron, on his side, has offered a reward of two hundred
thousand francs to whosoever finds his wife. The money is in the hands
of a solicitor. Moreover, he has sold his racing-stud, his house on the
Boulevard Haussmann and his country-seat of Roquencourt in one lump, so
that he may indemnify the Princesse de Berny for her loss."

"And the proceeds of the sale," I added, "are to be paid over at once.
The papers say that the princess will have her money to-morrow. Only,
frankly, I fail to see the connection between this story, which you have
told very well, and the puzzling sentence...."

Lupin did not condescend to reply.

We had been walking down the street in which I live and had passed some
four or five houses, when he stepped off the pavement and began to
examine a block of flats, not of the latest construction, which looked
as if it contained a large number of tenants:

"According to my calculations," he said, "this is where the signals came
from, probably from that open window."

"On the third floor?"

"Yes."

He went to the portress and asked her:

"Does one of your tenants happen to be acquainted with Baron Repstein?"

"Why, of course!" replied the woman. "We have M. Lavernoux here, such a
nice gentleman; he is the baron's secretary and agent. I look after his
flat."

"And can we see him?"

"See him?... The poor gentleman is very ill."

"Ill?"

"He's been ill a fortnight ... ever since the trouble with the
baroness.... He came home the next day with a temperature and took to
his bed."

"But he gets up, surely?"

"Ah, that I can't say!"

"How do you mean, you can't say?"

"No, his doctor won't let any one into his room. He took my key from
me."

"Who did?"

"The doctor. He comes and sees to his wants, two or three times a day.
He left the house only twenty minutes ago ... an old gentleman with a
grey beard and spectacles.... Walks quite bent.... But where are you
going sir?"

"I'm going up, show me the way," said Lupin, with his foot on the
stairs. "It's the third floor, isn't it, on the left?"

"But I mustn't!" moaned the portress, running after him. "Besides, I
haven't the key ... the doctor...."

They climbed the three flights, one behind the other. On the landing,
Lupin took a tool from his pocket and, disregarding the woman's
protests, inserted it in the lock. The door yielded almost immediately.
We went in.

At the back of a small dark room we saw a streak of light filtering
through a door that had been left ajar. Lupin ran across the room and,
on reaching the threshold, gave a cry:

"Too late! Oh, hang it all!"

The portress fell on her knees, as though fainting.

I entered the bedroom, in my turn, and saw a man lying half-dressed on
the carpet, with his legs drawn up under him, his arms contorted and his
face quite white, an emaciated, fleshless face, with the eyes still
staring in terror and the mouth twisted into a hideous grin.

"He's dead," said Lupin, after a rapid examination.

"But why?" I exclaimed. "There's not a trace of blood!"

"Yes, yes, there is," replied Lupin, pointing to two or three drops that
showed on the chest, through the open shirt. "Look, they must have taken
him by the throat with one hand and pricked him to the heart with the
other. I say, 'pricked,' because really the wound can't be seen. It
suggests a hole made by a very long needle."


[Illustration: "_Lupin took a tool from his pocket ... and inserted it
in the lock_"]


He looked on the floor, all round the corpse. There was nothing to
attract his attention, except a little pocket-mirror, the little mirror
with which M. Lavernoux had amused himself by making the sunbeams dance
through space.

But, suddenly, as the portress was breaking into lamentations and
calling for help, Lupin flung himself on her and shook her:

"Stop that!... Listen to me ... you can call out later.... Listen to me
and answer me. It is most important. M. Lavernoux had a friend living in
this street, had he not? On the same side, to the right? An intimate
friend?"

"Yes."

"A friend whom he used to meet at the cafe in the evening and with whom
he exchanged the illustrated papers?"

"Yes."

"Was the friend an Englishman?"

"Yes."

"What's his name?"

"Mr. Hargrove."

"Where does he live?"

"At No. 92 in this street."

"One word more: had that old doctor been attending him long?"

"No. I did not know him. He came on the evening when M. Lavernoux was
taken ill."

Without another word, Lupin dragged me away once more, ran down the
stairs and, once in the street, turned to the right, which took us past
my flat again. Four doors further, he stopped at No. 92, a small,
low-storied house, of which the ground-floor was occupied by the
proprietor of a dram-shop, who stood smoking in his doorway, next to the
entrance-passage. Lupin asked if Mr. Hargrove was at home.

"Mr. Hargrove went out about half-an-hour ago," said the publican. "He
seemed very much excited and took a taxi-cab, a thing he doesn't often
do."

"And you don't know...."

"Where he was going? Well, there's no secret about it He shouted it loud
enough! 'Prefecture of Police' is what he said to the driver...."

Lupin was himself just hailing a taxi, when he changed his mind; and I
heard him mutter:

"What's the good? He's got too much start of us...."

He asked if any one called after Mr. Hargrove had gone.

"Yes, an old gentleman with a grey beard and spectacles. He went up to
Mr. Hargrove's, rang the bell, and went away again."

"I am much obliged," said Lupin, touching his hat.

He walked away slowly without speaking to me, wearing a thoughtful air.
There was no doubt that the problem struck him as very difficult, and
that he saw none too clearly in the darkness through which he seemed to
be moving with such certainty.

He himself, for that matter, confessed to me:

"These are cases that require much more intuition than reflection. But
this one, I may tell you, is well worth taking pains about."

We had now reached the boulevards. Lupin entered a public reading-room
and spent a long time consulting the last fortnight's newspapers. Now
and again, he mumbled:

"Yes ... yes ... of course ... it's only a guess, but it explains
everything.... Well, a guess that answers every question is not far from
being the truth...."

It was now dark. We dined at a little restaurant and I noticed that
Lupin's face became gradually more animated. His gestures were more
decided. He recovered his spirits, his liveliness. When we left, during
the walk which he made me take along the Boulevard Haussmann, towards
Baron Repstein's house, he was the real Lupin of the great occasions,
the Lupin who had made up his mind to go in and win.

We slackened our pace just short of the Rue de Courcelles. Baron
Repstein lived on the left-hand side, between this street and the
Faubourg Saint-Honore, in a three-storied private house of which we
could see the front, decorated with columns and caryatides.

"Stop!" said Lupin, suddenly.

"What is it?"

"Another proof to confirm my supposition...."

"What proof? I see nothing."

"I do.... That's enough...."

He turned up the collar of his coat, lowered the brim of his soft hat
and said:

"By Jove, it'll be a stiff fight! Go to bed, my friend. I'll tell you
about my expedition to-morrow ... if it doesn't cost me my life."

"What are you talking about?"

"Oh, I know what I'm saying! I'm risking a lot. First of all, getting
arrested, which isn't much. Next, getting killed, which is worse.
But...." He gripped my shoulder. "But there's a third thing I'm risking,
which is getting hold of two millions.... And, once I possess a capital
of two millions, I'll show people what I can do! Good-night, old chap,
and, if you never see me again...." He spouted Musset's lines:


    "Plant a willow by my grave,
      The weeping willow that I love...."


I walked away. Three minutes later--I am continuing the narrative as he
told it to me next day--three minutes later, Lupin rang at the door of
the Hotel Repstein.

       *       *       *       *       *

"Is monsieur le baron at home?"

"Yes," replied the butler, examining the intruder with an air of
surprise, "but monsieur le baron does not see people as late as this."

"Does monsieur le baron know of the murder of M. Lavernoux, his
land-agent?"

"Certainly."

"Well, please tell monsieur le baron that I have come about the murder
and that there is not a moment to lose."

A voice called from above:

"Show the gentleman up, Antoine."

In obedience to this peremptory order, the butler led the way to the
first floor. In an open doorway stood a gentleman whom Lupin recognized
from his photograph in the papers as Baron Repstein, husband of the
famous baroness and owner of Etna, the horse of the year.

He was an exceedingly tall, square-shouldered man. His clean-shaven face
wore a pleasant, almost smiling expression, which was not affected by
the sadness of his eyes. He was dressed in a well-cut morning-coat, with
a tan waistcoat and a dark tie fastened with a pearl pin, the value of
which struck Lupin as considerable.

He took Lupin into his study, a large, three-windowed room, lined with
book-cases, sets of pigeonholes, an American desk and a safe. And he at
once asked, with ill-concealed eagerness:

"Do you know anything?"

"Yes, monsieur le baron."

"About the murder of that poor Lavernoux?"

"Yes, monsieur le baron, and about madame le baronne also."

"Do you really mean it? Quick, I entreat you...."

He pushed forward a chair. Lupin sat down and began:

"Monsieur le baron, the circumstances are very serious. I will be
brief."

"Yes, do, please."

"Well, monsieur le baron, in a few words, it amounts to this: five or
six hours ago, Lavernoux, who, for the last fortnight, had been kept in
a sort of enforced confinement by his doctor, Lavernoux--how shall I put
it?--telegraphed certain revelations by means of signals which were
partly taken down by me and which put me on the track of this case. He
himself was surprised in the act of making this communication and was
murdered."

"But by whom? By whom?"

"By his doctor."

"Who is this doctor?"

"I don't know. But one of M. Lavernoux's friends, an Englishman called
Hargrove, the friend, in fact, with whom he was communicating, is bound
to know and is also bound to know the exact and complete meaning of the
communication, because, without waiting for the end, he jumped into a
motor-cab and drove to the Prefecture of Police."

"Why? Why?... And what is the result of that step?"

"The result, monsieur le baron, is that your house is surrounded. There
are twelve detectives under your windows. The moment the sun rises, they
will enter in the name of the law and arrest the criminal."

"Then is Lavernoux's murderer concealed in my house? Who is he? One of
the servants? But no, for you were speaking of a doctor!..."

"I would remark, monsieur le baron, that when this Mr. Hargrove went to
the police to tell them of the revelations made by his friend Lavernoux,
he was not aware that his friend Lavernoux was going to be murdered. The
step taken by Mr Hargrove had to do with something else...."

"With what?"

"With the disappearance of madame la baronne, of which he knew the
secret, thanks to the communication made by Lavernoux."

"What! They know at last! They have found the baroness! Where is she?
And the jewels? And the money she robbed me of?"

Baron Repstein was talking in a great state of excitement. He rose and,
almost shouting at Lupin, cried:

"Finish your story, sir! I can't endure this suspense!"

Lupin continued, in a slow and hesitating voice:

"The fact is ... you see ... it is rather difficult to explain ... for
you and I are looking at the thing from a totally different point of
view."

"I don't understand."

"And yet you ought to understand, monsieur le baron.... We begin by
saying--I am quoting the newspapers--by saying, do we not, that Baroness
Repstein knew all the secrets of your business and that she was able to
open not only that safe over there, but also the one at the Credit
Lyonnais in which you kept your securities locked up?"

"Yes."

"Well, one evening, a fortnight ago, while you were at your club,
Baroness Repstein, who, unknown to yourself, had converted all those
securities into cash, left this house with a travelling-bag, containing
your money and all the Princesse de Berny's jewels?"

"Yes."

"And, since then, she has not been seen?"

"No."

"Well, there is an excellent reason why she has not been seen."

"What reason?"

"This, that Baroness Repstein has been murdered...."

"Murdered!... The baroness!... But you're mad!"

"Murdered ... and probably that same evening."

"I tell you again, you are mad! How can the baroness have been murdered,
when the police are following her tracks, so to speak, step by step?"

"They are following the tracks of another woman."

"What woman?"

"The murderer's accomplice."

"And who is the murderer?"

"The same man who, for the last fortnight, knowing that Lavernoux,
through the situation which he occupied in this house, had discovered
the truth, kept him imprisoned, forced him to silence, threatened him,
terrorized him; the same man who, finding Lavernoux in the act of
communicating with a friend, made away with him in cold blood by
stabbing him to the heart."

"The doctor, therefore?"

"Yes."

"But who is this doctor? Who is this malevolent genius, this infernal
being who appears and disappears, who slays in the dark and whom nobody
suspects?"

"Can't you guess?"

"No."

"And do you want to know?"

"Do I want to know?... Why, speak, man, speak!... You know where he is
hiding?"

"Yes."

"In this house?"

"Yes."

"And it is he whom the police are after?"

"Yes."

"And I know him?"

"Yes."

"Who is it?"

"You!"

"I!..."

Lupin had not been more than ten minutes with the baron; and the duel
was commencing. The accusation was hurled, definitely, violently,
implacably.

Lupin repeated:

"You yourself, got up in a false beard and a pair of spectacles, bent in
two, like an old man. In short, you, Baron Repstein; and it is you for
a very good reason, of which nobody has thought, which is that, if it
was not you who contrived the whole plot, the case becomes inexplicable.
Whereas, taking you as the criminal, you as murdering the baroness in
order to get rid of her and run through those millions with another
woman, you as murdering Lavernoux, your agent, in order to suppress an
unimpeachable witness, oh, then the whole case is explained! Well, is it
pretty clear? And are not you yourself convinced?"

The baron, who, throughout this conversation, had stood bending over his
visitor, waiting for each of his words with feverish avidity, now drew
himself up and looked at Lupin as though he undoubtedly had to do with a
madman. When Lupin had finished speaking, the baron stepped back two or
three paces, seemed on the point of uttering words which he ended by not
saying, and then, without taking his eyes from his strange visitor, went
to the fireplace and rang the bell.

Lupin did not make a movement. He waited smiling.

The butler entered. His master said:

"You can go to bed, Antoine. I will let this gentleman out."

"Shall I put out the lights, sir?"

"Leave a light in the hall."

Antoine left the room and the baron, after taking a revolver from his
desk, at once came back to Lupin, put the weapon in his pocket and said,
very calmly:

"You must excuse this little precaution, sir. I am obliged to take it in
case you should be mad, though that does not seem likely. No, you are
not mad. But you have come here with an object which I fail to grasp;
and you have sprung upon me an accusation of so astounding a character
that I am curious to know the reason. I have experienced so much
disappointment and undergone so much suffering that an outrage of this
kind leaves me indifferent. Continue, please."

His voice shook with emotion and his sad eyes seemed moist with tears.

Lupin shuddered. Had he made a mistake? Was the surmise which his
intuition had suggested to him and which was based upon a frail
groundwork of slight facts, was this surmise wrong?

His attention was caught by a detail: through the opening in the baron's
waistcoat he saw the point of the pin fixed in the tie and was thus able
to realize the unusual length of the pin. Moreover, the gold stem was
triangular and formed a sort of miniature dagger, very thin and very
delicate, yet formidable in an expert hand.

And Lupin had no doubt but that the pin attached to that magnificent
pearl was the weapon which had pierced the heart of the unfortunate M.
Lavernoux.

He muttered:

"You're jolly clever, monsieur le baron!"

The other, maintaining a rather scornful gravity, kept silence, as
though he did not understand and as though waiting for the explanation
to which he felt himself entitled. And, in spite of everything, this
impassive attitude worried Arsene Lupin. Nevertheless, his conviction
was so profound and, besides, he had staked so much on the adventure
that he repeated:

"Yes, jolly clever, for it is evident that the baroness only obeyed your
orders in realizing your securities and also in borrowing the princess's
jewels on the pretence of buying them. And it is evident that the person
who walked out of your house with a bag was not your wife, but an
accomplice, that chorus-girl probably, and that it is your chorus-girl
who is deliberately allowing herself to be chased across the continent
by our worthy Ganimard. And I look upon the trick as marvellous. What
does the woman risk, seeing that it is the baroness who is being looked
for? And how could they look for any other woman than the baroness,
seeing that you have promised a reward of two hundred thousand francs to
the person who finds the baroness?... Oh, that two hundred thousand
francs lodged with a solicitor: what a stroke of genius! It has dazzled
the police! It has thrown dust in the eyes of the most clear-sighted! A
gentleman who lodges two hundred thousand francs with a solicitor is a
gentleman who speaks the truth.... So they go on hunting the baroness!
And they leave you quietly to settle your affairs, to sell your stud and
your two houses to the highest bidder and to prepare your flight!
Heavens, what a joke!"

The baron did not wince. He walked up to Lupin and asked, without
abandoning his imperturbable coolness:

"Who are you?"

Lupin burst out laughing.

"What can it matter who I am? Take it that I am an emissary of fate,
looming out of the darkness for your destruction!"

He sprang from his chair, seized the baron by the shoulder and jerked
out:

"Yes, for your destruction, my bold baron! Listen to me! Your wife's
three millions, almost all the princess's jewels, the money you received
to-day from the sale of your stud and your real estate: it's all there,
in your pocket, or in that safe. Your flight is prepared. Look, I can
see the leather of your portmanteau behind that hanging. The papers on
your desk are in order. This very night, you would have done a guy.
This very night, disguised beyond recognition, after taking all your
precautions, you would have joined your chorus-girl, the creature for
whose sake you have committed murder, that same Nelly Darbal, no doubt,
whom Ganimard arrested in Belgium. But for one sudden, unforeseen
obstacle: the police, the twelve detectives who, thanks to Lavernoux's
revelations, have been posted under your windows. They've cooked your
goose, old chap!... Well, I'll save you. A word through the telephone;
and, by three or four o'clock in the morning, twenty of my friends will
have removed the obstacle, polished off the twelve detectives, and you
and I will slip away quietly. My conditions? Almost nothing; a trifle to
you: we share the millions and the jewels. Is it a bargain?"

He was leaning over the baron, thundering at him with irresistible
energy. The baron whispered:

"I'm beginning to understand. It's blackmail...."

"Blackmail or not, call it what you please, my boy, but you've got to go
through with it and do as I say. And don't imagine that I shall give way
at the last moment. Don't say to yourself, 'Here's a gentleman whom the
fear of the police will cause to think twice. If I run a big risk in
refusing, he also will be risking the handcuffs, the cells and the rest
of it, seeing that we are both being hunted down like wild beasts.' That
would be a mistake, monsieur le baron. I can always get out of it. It's
a question of yourself, of yourself alone.... Your money or your life,
my lord! Share and share alike ... if not, the scaffold! Is it a
bargain?"

A quick movement. The baron released himself, grasped his revolver and
fired.

But Lupin was prepared for the attack, the more so as the baron's face
had lost its assurance and gradually, under the slow impulse of rage and
fear, acquired an expression of almost bestial ferocity that heralded
the rebellion so long kept under control.

He fired twice. Lupin first flung himself to one side and then dived at
the baron's knees, seized him by both legs and brought him to the
ground. The baron freed himself with an effort. The two enemies rolled
over in each other's grip; and a stubborn, crafty, brutal, savage
struggle followed.

Suddenly, Lupin felt a pain at his chest:

"You villain!" he yelled. "That's your Lavernoux trick; the tie-pin!"

Stiffening his muscles with a desperate effort, he overpowered the baron
and clutched him by the throat victorious at last and omnipotent.

"You ass!" he cried. "If you hadn't shown your cards, I might have
thrown up the game! You have such a look of the honest man about you!
But what a biceps, my lord!... I thought for a moment.... But it's all
over, now!... Come, my friend, hand us the pin and look cheerful.... No,
that's what I call pulling a face.... I'm holding you too tight,
perhaps? My lord's at his last gasp?... Come, be good!... That's it,
just a wee bit of string round the wrists; do you allow me?... Why, you
and I are agreeing like two brothers! It's touching!... At heart, you
know, I'm rather fond of you.... And now, my bonnie lad, mind yourself!
And a thousand apologies!..."

Half raising himself, with all his strength he caught the other a
terrible blow in the pit of the stomach. The baron gave a gurgle and lay
stunned and unconscious.

"That comes of having a deficient sense of logic, my friend," said
Lupin. "I offered you half your money. Now I'll give you none at all ...
provided I know where to find any of it. For that's the main thing.
Where has the beggar hidden his dust? In the safe? By George, it'll be a
tough job! Luckily, I have all the night before me...."

He began to feel in the baron's pockets, came upon a bunch of keys,
first made sure that the portmanteau behind the curtain held no papers
or jewels, and then went to the safe.

But, at that moment, he stopped short: he heard a noise somewhere. The
servants? Impossible. Their attics were on the top floor. He listened.
The noise came from below. And, suddenly, he understood: the detectives,
who had heard the two shots, were banging at the front door, as was
their duty, without waiting for daybreak. Then an electric bell rang,
which Lupin recognized as that in the hall:

"By Jupiter!" he said. "Pretty work! Here are these jokers coming ...
and just as we were about to gather the fruits of our laborious efforts!
Tut, tut, Lupin, keep cool! What's expected of you? To open a safe, of
which you don't know the secret, in thirty seconds. That's a mere trifle
to lose your head about! Come, all you have to do is to discover the
secret! How many letters are there in the word? Four?"

He went on thinking, while talking and listening to the noise outside.
He double-locked the door of the outer room and then came back to the
safe:

"Four ciphers.... Four letters ... four letters.... Who can lend me a
hand?... Who can give me just a tiny hint?... Who? Why, Lavernoux, of
course! That good Lavernoux, seeing that he took the trouble to indulge
in optical telegraphy at the risk of his life.... Lord, what a fool I
am!... Why, of course, why, of course, that's it!... By Jove, this is
too exciting!... Lupin, you must count ten and suppress that distracted
beating of your heart. If not, it means bad work."

He counted ten and, now quite calm, knelt in front of the safe. He
turned the four knobs with careful attention. Next, he examined the
bunch of keys, selected one of them, then another, and attempted, in
vain, to insert them in the lock:

"There's luck in odd numbers," he muttered, trying a third key.
"Victory! This is the right one! Open Sesame, good old Sesame, open!"

The lock turned. The door moved on its hinges. Lupin pulled it to him,
after taking out the bunch of keys:

"The millions are ours," he said. "Baron, I forgive you!"

And then he gave a single bound backward, hiccoughing with fright. His
legs staggered beneath him. The keys jingled together in his fevered
hand with a sinister sound. And, for twenty, for thirty seconds, despite
the din that was being raised and the electric bells that kept ringing
through the house, he stood there, wild-eyed, gazing at the most
horrible, the most abominable sight: a woman's body, half-dressed, bent
in two in the safe, crammed in, like an over-large parcel ... and fair
hair hanging down ... and blood ... clots of blood ... and livid flesh,
blue in places, decomposing, flaccid.

"The baroness!" he gasped. "The baroness!... Oh, the monster!..."

He roused himself from his torpor, suddenly, to spit in the murderer's
face and pound him with his heels:

"Take that, you wretch!... Take that, you villain!... And, with it, the
scaffold, the bran-basket!..."

Meanwhile, shouts came from the upper floors in reply to the detectives'
ringing. Lupin heard footsteps scurrying down the stairs. It was time to
think of beating a retreat.

In reality, this did not trouble him greatly. During his conversation
with the baron, the enemy's extraordinary coolness had given him the
feeling that there must be a private outlet. Besides, how could the
baron have begun the fight, if he were not sure of escaping the police?

Lupin went into the next room. It looked out on the garden. At the
moment when the detectives were entering the house, he flung his legs
over the balcony and let himself down by a rain-pipe. He walked round
the building. On the opposite side was a wall lined with shrubs. He
slipped in between the shrubs and the wall and at once found a little
door which he easily opened with one of the keys on the bunch. All that
remained for him to do was to walk across a yard and pass through the
empty rooms of a lodge; and in a few moments he found himself in the Rue
du Faubourg Saint-Honore. Of course--and this he had reckoned on--the
police had not provided for this secret outlet.

       *       *       *       *       *

"Well, what do you think of Baron Repstein?" cried Lupin, after giving
me all the details of that tragic night. "What a dirty scoundrel! And
how it teaches one to distrust appearances! I swear to you, the fellow
looked a thoroughly honest man!"

"But what about the millions?" I asked. "The princess's jewels?"

"They were in the safe. I remember seeing the parcel."

"Well?"

"They are there still."

"Impossible!"

"They are, upon my word! I might tell you that I was afraid of the
detectives, or else plead a sudden attack of delicacy. But the truth is
simpler ... and more prosaic: the smell was too awful!..."

"What?"

"Yes, my dear fellow, the smell that came from that safe ... from that
coffin.... No, I couldn't do it ... my head swam.... Another second and
I should have been ill.... Isn't it silly?... Look, this is all I got
from my expedition: the tie-pin.... The bed-rock value of the pearl is
thirty thousand francs.... But all the same, I feel jolly well annoyed.
What a sell!"

"One more question," I said. "The word that opened the safe!"

"Well?"

"How did you guess it?"

"Oh, quite easily! In fact, I am surprised that I didn't think of it
sooner."

"Well, tell me."

"It was contained in the revelations telegraphed by that poor
Lavernoux."

"What?"

"Just think, my dear chap, the mistakes in spelling...."

"The mistakes in spelling?"

"Why, of course! They were deliberate. Surely, you don't imagine that
the agent, the private secretary of the baron--who was a
company-promoter, mind you, and a racing-man--did not know English
better than to spell 'necessery' with an 'e,' 'atack' with one 't,'
'ennemy' with two 'n's' and 'prudance' with an 'a'! The thing struck me
at once. I put the four letters together and got 'Etna,' the name of the
famous horse."

"And was that one word enough?"

"Of course! It was enough to start with, to put me on the scent of the
Repstein case, of which all the papers were full, and, next, to make me
guess that it was the key-word of the safe, because, on the one hand,
Lavernoux knew the gruesome contents of the safe and, on the other, he
was denouncing the baron. And it was in the same way that I was led to
suppose that Lavernoux had a friend in the street, that they both
frequented the same cafe, that they amused themselves by working out the
problems and cryptograms in the illustrated papers and that they had
contrived a way of exchanging telegrams from window to window."

"That makes it all quite simple!" I exclaimed.

"Very simple. And the incident once more shows that, in the discovery of
crimes, there is something much more valuable than the examination of
facts, than observations, deductions, inferences and all that stuff and
nonsense. What I mean is, as I said before, intuition ... intuition and
intelligence.... And Arsene Lupin, without boasting, is deficient in
neither one nor the other!..."




II

THE WEDDING-RING


Yvonne d'Origny kissed her son and told him to be good:

"You know your grandmother d'Origny is not very fond of children. Now
that she has sent for you to come and see her, you must show her what a
sensible little boy you are." And, turning to the governess, "Don't
forget, Fraeulein, to bring him home immediately after dinner.... Is
monsieur still in the house?"

"Yes, madame, monsieur le comte is in his study."

As soon as she was alone, Yvonne d'Origny walked to the window to catch
a glimpse of her son as he left the house. He was out in the street in a
moment, raised his head and blew her a kiss, as was his custom every
day. Then the governess took his hand with, as Yvonne remarked to her
surprise, a movement of unusual violence. Yvonne leant further out of
the window and, when the boy reached the corner of the boulevard, she
suddenly saw a man step out of a motor-car and go up to him. The man, in
whom she recognized Bernard, her husband's confidential servant, took
the child by the arm, made both him and the governess get into the car,
and ordered the chauffeur to drive off.

The whole incident did not take ten seconds.

Yvonne, in her trepidation, ran to her bedroom, seized a wrap and went
to the door. The door was locked; and there was no key in the lock.

She hurried back to the boudoir. The door of the boudoir also was
locked.

Then, suddenly, the image of her husband appeared before her, that
gloomy face which no smile ever lit up, those pitiless eyes in which,
for years, she had felt so much hatred and malice.

"It's he ... it's he!" she said to herself. "He has taken the child....
Oh, it's horrible!"

She beat against the door with her fists, with her feet, then flew to
the mantelpiece and pressed the bell fiercely.

The shrill sound rang through the house from top to bottom. The servants
would be sure to come. Perhaps a crowd would gather in the street. And,
impelled by a sort of despairing hope, she kept her finger on the
button.

A key turned in the lock.... The door was flung wide open. The count
appeared on the threshold of the boudoir. And the expression of his
face was so terrible that Yvonne began to tremble.

He entered the room. Five or six steps separated him from her. With a
supreme effort, she tried to stir, but all movement was impossible; and,
when she attempted to speak, she could only flutter her lips and emit
incoherent sounds. She felt herself lost. The thought of death unhinged
her. Her knees gave way beneath her and she sank into a huddled heap,
with a moan.

The count rushed at her and seized her by the throat:

"Hold your tongue ... don't call out!" he said, in a low voice. "That
will be best for you!..."

Seeing that she was not attempting to defend herself, he loosened his
hold of her and took from his pocket some strips of canvas ready rolled
and of different lengths. In a few minutes, Yvonne was lying on a sofa,
with her wrists and ankles bound and her arms fastened close to her
body.

It was now dark in the boudoir. The count switched on the electric light
and went to a little writing-desk where Yvonne was accustomed to keep
her letters. Not succeeding in opening it, he picked the lock with a
bent wire, emptied the drawers and collected all the contents into a
bundle, which he carried off in a cardboard file:

"Waste of time, eh?" he grinned. "Nothing but bills and letters of no
importance.... No proof against you.... Tah! I'll keep my son for all
that; and I swear before Heaven that I will not let him go!"

As he was leaving the room, he was joined, near the door, by his man
Bernard. The two stopped and talked, in a low voice; but Yvonne heard
these words spoken by the servant:

"I have had an answer from the working jeweller. He says he holds
himself at my disposal."

And the count replied:

"The thing is put off until twelve o'clock midday, to-morrow. My mother
has just telephoned to say that she could not come before."

Then Yvonne heard the key turn in the lock and the sound of steps going
down to the ground-floor, where her husband's study was.

She long lay inert, her brain reeling with vague, swift ideas that burnt
her in passing, like flames. She remembered her husband's infamous
behaviour, his humiliating conduct to her, his threats, his plans for a
divorce; and she gradually came to understand that she was the victim of
a regular conspiracy, that the servants had been sent away until the
following evening by their master's orders, that the governess had
carried off her son by the count's instructions and with Bernard's
assistance, that her son would not come back and that she would never
see him again.

"My son!" she cried. "My son!..."

Exasperated by her grief, she stiffened herself, with every nerve, with
every muscle tense, to make a violent effort. And she was astonished to
find that her right hand, which the count had fastened too hurriedly,
still retained a certain freedom.

Then a mad hope invaded her; and, slowly, patiently, she began the work
of self-deliverance.

It was long in the doing. She needed a deal of time to widen the knot
sufficiently and a deal of time afterward, when the hand was released,
to undo those other bonds which tied her arms to her body and those
which fastened her ankles.

Still, the thought of her son sustained her; and the last shackle fell
as the clock struck eight. She was free!

She was no sooner on her feet than she flew to the window and flung back
the latch, with the intention of calling the first passer-by. At that
moment a policeman came walking along the pavement. She leant out. But
the brisk evening air, striking her face, calmed her. She thought of the
scandal, of the judicial investigation, of the cross-examination, of her
son. O Heaven! What could she do to get him back? How could she escape?
The count might appear at the least sound. And who knew but that, in a
moment of fury ...?

She shivered from head to foot, seized with a sudden terror. The horror
of death mingled, in her poor brain, with the thought of her son; and
she stammered, with a choking throat:

"Help!... Help!..."

She stopped and said to herself, several times over, in a low voice,
"Help!... Help!..." as though the word awakened an idea, a memory within
her, and as though the hope of assistance no longer seemed to her
impossible. For some minutes she remained absorbed in deep meditation,
broken by fears and starts. Then, with an almost mechanical series of
movements, she put out her arm to a little set of shelves hanging over
the writing-desk, took down four books, one after the other, turned the
pages with a distraught air, replaced them and ended by finding, between
the pages of the fifth, a visiting-card on which her eyes spelt the
name:


                 HORACE VELMONT,


followed by an address written in pencil:


            CERCLE DE LA RUE ROYALE.


And her memory conjured up the strange thing which that man had said to
her, a few years before, in that same house, on a day when she was at
home to her friends:

"If ever a danger threatens you, if you need help, do not hesitate; post
this card, which you see me put into this book; and, whatever the hour,
whatever the obstacles, I will come."

With what a curious air he had spoken these words and how well he had
conveyed the impression of certainty, of strength, of unlimited power,
of indomitable daring!

Abruptly, unconsciously, acting under the impulse of an irresistible
determination, the consequences of which she refused to anticipate,
Yvonne, with the same automatic gestures, took a pneumatic-delivery
envelope, slipped in the card, sealed it, directed it to "Horace
Velmont, Cercle de la Rue Royale" and went to the open window. The
policeman was walking up and down outside. She flung out the envelope,
trusting to fate. Perhaps it would be picked up, treated as a lost
letter and posted.

She had hardly completed this act when she realized its absurdity. It
was mad to suppose that the message would reach the address and madder
still to hope that the man to whom she was sending could come to her
assistance, "whatever the hour, whatever the obstacles."

A reaction followed which was all the greater inasmuch as the effort had
been swift and violent. Yvonne staggered, leant against a chair and,
losing all energy, let herself fall.

The hours passed by, the dreary hours of winter evenings when nothing
but the sound of carriages interrupts the silence of the street. The
clock struck, pitilessly. In the half-sleep that numbed her limbs,
Yvonne counted the strokes. She also heard certain noises, on different
floors of the house, which told her that her husband had dined, that he
was going up to his room, that he was going down again to his study. But
all this seemed very shadowy to her; and her torpor was such that she
did not even think of lying down on the sofa, in case he should come
in....

The twelve strokes of midnight.... Then half-past twelve ... then
one.... Yvonne thought of nothing, awaiting the events which were
preparing and against which rebellion was useless. She pictured her son
and herself as one pictures those beings who have suffered much and who
suffer no more and who take each other in their loving arms. But a
nightmare shattered this dream. For now those two beings were to be torn
asunder; and she had the awful feeling, in her delirium, that she was
crying and choking....

She leapt from her seat. The key had turned in the lock. The count was
coming, attracted by her cries. Yvonne glanced round for a weapon with
which to defend herself. But the door was pushed back quickly and,
astounded, as though the sight that presented itself before her eyes
seemed to her the most inexplicable prodigy, she stammered:

"You!... You!..."

A man was walking up to her, in dress-clothes, with his opera-hat and
cape under his arm, and this man, young, slender and elegant, she had
recognized as Horace Velmont.

"You!" she repeated.

He said, with a bow:

"I beg your pardon, madame, but I did not receive your letter until very
late."

"Is it possible? Is it possible that this is you ... that you were able
to ...?"

He seemed greatly surprised:

"Did I not promise to come in answer to your call?"

"Yes ... but ..."

"Well, here I am," he said, with a smile.

He examined the strips of canvas from which Yvonne had succeeded in
freeing herself and nodded his head, while continuing his inspection:

"So those are the means employed? The Comte d'Origny, I presume?... I
also saw that he locked you in.... But then the pneumatic letter?... Ah,
through the window!... How careless of you not to close it!"

He pushed both sides to. Yvonne took fright:

"Suppose they hear!"

"There is no one in the house. I have been over it."

"Still ..."

"Your husband went out ten minutes ago."

"Where is he?"

"With his mother, the Comtesse d'Origny."

"How do you know?"

"Oh, it's very simple! He was rung up by telephone and I awaited the
result at the corner of this street and the boulevard. As I expected,
the count came out hurriedly, followed by his man. I at once entered,
with the aid of special keys."

He told this in the most natural way, just as one tells a meaningless
anecdote in a drawing-room. But Yvonne, suddenly seized with fresh
alarm, asked:

"Then it's not true?... His mother is not ill?... In that case, my
husband will be coming back...."

"Certainly, the count will see that a trick has been played on him and
in three quarters of an hour at the latest...."

"Let us go.... I don't want him to find me here.... I must go to my
son...."

"One moment...."

"One moment!... But don't you know that they have taken him from me?...
That they are hurting him, perhaps?..."

With set face and feverish gestures, she tried to push Velmont back. He,
with great gentleness, compelled her to sit down and, leaning over her
in a respectful attitude, said, in a serious voice:

"Listen, madame, and let us not waste time, when every minute is
valuable. First of all, remember this: we met four times, six years
ago.... And, on the fourth occasion, when I was speaking to you, in the
drawing-room of this house, with too much--what shall I say?--with too
much feeling, you gave me to understand that my visits were no longer
welcome. Since that day I have not seen you. And, nevertheless, in spite
of all, your faith in me was such that you kept the card which I put
between the pages of that book and, six years later, you send for me and
none other. That faith in me I ask you to continue. You must obey me
blindly. Just as I surmounted every obstacle to come to you, so I will
save you, whatever the position may be."

Horace Velmont's calmness, his masterful voice, with the friendly
intonation, gradually quieted the countess. Though still very weak, she
gained a fresh sense of ease and security in that man's presence.

"Have no fear," he went on. "The Comtesse d'Origny lives at the other
end of the Bois de Vincennes. Allowing that your husband finds a
motor-cab, it is impossible for him to be back before a quarter-past
three. Well, it is twenty-five to three now. I swear to take you away at
three o'clock exactly and to take you to your son. But I will not go
before I know everything."

"What am I to do?" she asked.

"Answer me and very plainly. We have twenty minutes. It is enough. But
it is not too much."

"Ask me what you want to know."

"Do you think that the count had any ... any murderous intentions?"

"No."

"Then it concerns your son?"

"Yes."

"He is taking him away, I suppose, because he wants to divorce you and
marry another woman, a former friend of yours, whom you have turned out
of your house. Is that it? Oh, I entreat you, answer me frankly! These
are facts of public notoriety; and your hesitation, your scruples, must
all cease, now that the matter concerns your son. So your husband wished
to marry another woman?

"Yes."

"The woman has no money. Your husband, on his side, has gambled away
all his property and has no means beyond the allowance which he receives
from his mother, the Comtesse d'Origny, and the income of a large
fortune which your son inherited from two of your uncles. It is this
fortune which your husband covets and which he would appropriate more
easily if the child were placed in his hands. There is only one way:
divorce. Am I right?"

"Yes."

"And what has prevented him until now is your refusal?"

"Yes, mine and that of my mother-in-law, whose religious feelings are
opposed to divorce. The Comtesse d'Origny would only yield in case ..."

"In case ...?"

"In case they could prove me guilty of shameful conduct."

Velmont shrugged his shoulders:

"Therefore he is powerless to do anything against you or against your
son. Both from the legal point of view and from that of his own
interests, he stumbles against an obstacle which is the most
insurmountable of all: the virtue of an honest woman. And yet, in spite
of everything, he suddenly shows fight."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean that, if a man like the count, after so many hesitations and
in the face of so many difficulties, risks so doubtful an adventure, it
must be because he thinks he has command of weapons ..."

"What weapons?"

"I don't know. But they exist ... or else he would not have begun by
taking away your son."

Yvonne gave way to her despair:

"Oh, this is horrible!... How do I know what he may have done, what he
may have invented?"

"Try and think.... Recall your memories.... Tell me, in this desk which
he has broken open, was there any sort of letter which he could possibly
turn against you?"

"No ... only bills and addresses...."

"And, in the words he used to you, in his threats, is there nothing that
allows you to guess?"

"Nothing."

"Still ... still," Velmont insisted, "there must be something." And he
continued, "Has the count a particularly intimate friend ... in whom he
confides?"

"No."

"Did anybody come to see him yesterday?"

"No, nobody."

"Was he alone when he bound you and locked you in?"

"At that moment, yes."

"But afterward?"

"His man, Bernard, joined him near the door and I heard them talking
about a working jeweller...."

"Is that all?"

"And about something that was to happen the next day, that is, to-day,
at twelve o'clock, because the Comtesse d'Origny could not come
earlier."

Velmont reflected:

"Has that conversation any meaning that throws a light upon your
husband's plans?"

"I don't see any."

"Where are your jewels?"

"My husband has sold them all."

"You have nothing at all left?"

"No."

"Not even a ring?"

"No," she said, showing her hands, "none except this."

"Which is your wedding-ring?"

"Which is my ... wedding--..."

She stopped, nonplussed. Velmont saw her flush as she stammered:

"Could it be possible?... But no ... no ... he doesn't know...."

Velmont at once pressed her with questions and Yvonne stood silent,
motionless, anxious-faced. At last, she replied, in a low voice:

"This is not my wedding-ring. One day, long ago, it dropped from the
mantelpiece in my bedroom, where I had put it a minute before and, hunt
for it as I might, I could not find it again. So I ordered another,
without saying anything about it ... and this is the one, on my
hand...."

"Did the real ring bear the date of your wedding?"

"Yes ... the 23rd of October."

"And the second?"

"This one has no date."

He perceived a slight hesitation in her and a confusion which, in point
of fact, she did not try to conceal.

"I implore you," he exclaimed, "don't hide anything from me.... You see
how far we have gone in a few minutes, with a little logic and
calmness.... Let us go on, I ask you as a favour."

"Are you sure," she said, "that it is necessary?"

"I am sure that the least detail is of importance and that we are nearly
attaining our object. But we must hurry. This is a crucial moment."

"I have nothing to conceal," she said, proudly raising her head. "It was
the most wretched and the most dangerous period of my life. While
suffering humiliation at home, outside I was surrounded with attentions,
with temptations, with pitfalls, like any woman who is seen to be
neglected by her husband. Then I remembered: before my marriage, a man
had been in love with me. I had guessed his unspoken love; and he has
died since. I had the name of that man engraved inside the ring; and I
wore it as a talisman. There was no love in me, because I was the wife
of another. But, in my secret heart, there was a memory, a sad dream,
something sweet and gentle that protected me...."

She had spoken slowly, without embarrassment, and Velmont did not doubt
for a second that she was telling the absolute truth. He kept silent;
and she, becoming anxious again, asked:

"Do you suppose ... that my husband ...?"

He took her hand and, while examining the plain gold ring, said:

"The puzzle lies here. Your husband, I don't know how, knows of the
substitution of one ring for the other. His mother will be here at
twelve o'clock. In the presence of witnesses, he will compel you to take
off your ring; and, in this way, he will obtain the approval of his
mother and, at the same time, will be able to obtain his divorce,
because he will have the proof for which he was seeking."

"I am lost!" she moaned. "I am lost!"

"On the contrary, you are saved! Give me that ring ... and presently he
will find another there, another which I will send you, to reach you
before twelve, and which will bear the date of the 23rd of October. So...."

He suddenly broke off. While he was speaking, Yvonne's hand had turned
ice-cold in his; and, raising his eyes, he saw that the young woman was
pale, terribly pale:

"What's the matter? I beseech you ..."

She yielded to a fit of mad despair:

"This is the matter, that I am lost!... This is the matter, that I can't
get the ring off! It has grown too small for me!... Do you
understand?... It made no difference and I did not give it a thought....
But to-day ... this proof ... this accusation.... Oh, what torture!...
Look ... it forms part of my finger ... it has grown into my flesh ...
and I can't ... I can't...."

She pulled at the ring, vainly, with all her might, at the risk of
injuring herself. But the flesh swelled up around the ring; and the ring
did not budge.

"Oh!" she cried, seized with an idea that terrified her. "I remember ...
the other night ... a nightmare I had.... It seemed to me that some one
entered my room and caught hold of my hand.... And I could not wake
up.... It was he! It was he! He had put me to sleep, I was sure of it
... and he was looking at the ring.... And presently he will pull it off
before his mother's eyes.... Ah, I understand everything: that working
jeweller!... He will cut it from my hand to-morrow.... You see, you
see.... I am lost!..."

She hid her face in her hands and began to weep. But, amid the silence,
the clock struck once ... and twice ... and yet once more. And Yvonne
drew herself up with a jerk:

"There he is!" she cried. "He is coming!... It is three o'clock!... Let
us go!..."

She grabbed at her cloak and ran to the door ... Velmont barred the way
and, in a masterful tone:

"You shall not go!"

"My son.... I want to see him, to take him back...."

"You don't even know where he is!"

"I want to go."

"You shall not go!... It would be madness...."

He took her by the wrists. She tried to release herself; and Velmont had
to employ a little force to overcome her resistance. In the end, he
succeeded in getting her back to the sofa, then in laying her at full
length and, at once, without heeding her lamentations, he took the
canvas strips and fastened her wrists and ankles:

"Yes," he said, "It would be madness! Who would have set you free? Who
would have opened that door for you? An accomplice? What an argument
against you and what a pretty use your husband would make of it with his
mother!... And, besides, what's the good? To run away means accepting
divorce ... and what might that not lead to?... You must stay here...."

She sobbed:

"I'm frightened.... I'm frightened ... this ring burns me.... Break
it.... Take it away.... Don't let him find it!"

"And if it is not found on your finger, who will have broken it? Again
an accomplice.... No, you must face the music ... and face it boldly,
for I answer for everything.... Believe me ... I answer for
everything.... If I have to tackle the Comtesse d'Origny bodily and thus
delay the interview.... If I had to come myself before noon ... it is
the real wedding-ring that shall be taken from your finger--that I
swear!--and your son shall be restored to you."

Swayed and subdued, Yvonne instinctively held out her hands to the
bonds. When he stood up, she was bound as she had been before.

He looked round the room to make sure that no trace of his visit
remained. Then he stooped over the countess again and whispered:

"Think of your son and, whatever happens, fear nothing.... I am watching
over you."

She heard him open and shut the door of the boudoir and, a few minutes
later, the hall-door.

At half-past three, a motor-cab drew up. The door downstairs was slammed
again; and, almost immediately after, Yvonne saw her husband hurry in,
with a furious look in his eyes. He ran up to her, felt to see if she
was still fastened and, snatching her hand, examined the ring. Yvonne
fainted....

       *       *       *       *       *

She could not tell, when she woke, how long she had slept. But the broad
light of day was filling the boudoir; and she perceived, at the first
movement which she made, that her bonds were cut. Then she turned her
head and saw her husband standing beside her, looking at her:

"My son ... my son ..." she moaned. "I want my son...."

He replied, in a voice of which she felt the jeering insolence:

"Our son is in a safe place. And, for the moment, it's a question not of
him, but of you. We are face to face with each other, probably for the
last time, and the explanation between us will be a very serious one. I
must warn you that it will take place before my mother. Have you any
objection?"

Yvonne tried to hide her agitation and answered:

"None at all."

"Can I send for her?"

"Yes. Leave me, in the meantime. I shall be ready when she comes."

"My mother is here."

"Your mother is here?" cried Yvonne, in dismay, remembering Horace
Velmont's promise.

"What is there to astonish you in that?"

"And is it now ... is it at once that you want to ...?

"Yes."

"Why?... Why not this evening?... Why not to-morrow?"

"To-day and now," declared the count. "A rather curious incident
happened in the course of last night, an incident which I cannot account
for and which decided me to hasten the explanation. Don't you want
something to eat first?"

"No ... no...."

"Then I will go and fetch my mother."

He turned to Yvonne's bedroom. Yvonne glanced at the clock. It marked
twenty-five minutes to eleven!

"Ah!" she said, with a shiver of fright.

Twenty-five minutes to eleven! Horace Velmont would not save her and
nobody in the world and nothing in the world would save her, for there
was no miracle that could place the wedding-ring upon her finger.

The count, returning with the Comtesse d'Origny, asked her to sit down.
She was a tall, lank, angular woman, who had always displayed a hostile
feeling to Yvonne. She did not even bid her daughter-in-law
good-morning, showing that her mind was made up as regards the
accusation:

"I don't think," she said, "that we need speak at length. In two words,
my son maintains...."

"I don't maintain, mother," said the count, "I declare. I declare on my
oath that, three months ago, during the holidays, the upholsterer, when
laying the carpet in this room and the boudoir, found the wedding-ring
which I gave my wife lying in a crack in the floor. Here is the ring.
The date of the 23rd of October is engraved inside."

"Then," said the countess, "the ring which your wife carries...."

"That is another ring, which she ordered in exchange for the real one.
Acting on my instructions, Bernard, my man, after long searching, ended
by discovering in the outskirts of Paris, where he now lives, the little
jeweller to whom she went. This man remembers perfectly and is willing
to bear witness that his customer did not tell him to engrave a date,
but a name. He has forgotten the name, but the man who used to work with
him in his shop may be able to remember it. This working jeweller has
been informed by letter that I required his services and he replied
yesterday, placing himself at my disposal. Bernard went to fetch him at
nine o'clock this morning. They are both waiting in my study."

He turned to his wife:

"Will you give me that ring of your own free will?"

"You know," she said, "from the other night, that it won't come off my
finger."

"In that case, can I have the man up? He has the necessary implements
with him."

"Yes," she said, in a voice faint as a whisper.

She was resigned. She conjured up the future as in a vision: the
scandal, the decree of divorce pronounced against herself, the custody
of the child awarded to the father; and she accepted this, thinking that
she would carry off her son, that she would go with him to the ends of
the earth and that the two of them would live alone together and
happy....

Her mother-in-law said:

"You have been very thoughtless, Yvonne."

Yvonne was on the point of confessing to her and asking for her
protection. But what was the good? How could the Comtesse d'Origny
possibly believe her innocent? She made no reply.

Besides, the count at once returned, followed by his servant and by a
man carrying a bag of tools under his arm.

And the count said to the man:

"You know what you have to do?"

"Yes," said the workman. "It's to cut a ring that's grown too
small.... That's easily done.... A touch of the nippers...."

"And then you will see," said the count, "if the inscription inside the
ring was the one you engraved."

Yvonne looked at the clock. It was ten minutes to eleven. She seemed to
hear, somewhere in the house, a sound of voices raised in argument; and,
in spite of herself, she felt a thrill of hope. Perhaps Velmont has
succeeded.... But the sound was renewed; and she perceived that it was
produced by some costermongers passing under her window and moving
farther on.

It was all over. Horace Velmont had been unable to assist her. And she
understood that, to recover her child, she must rely upon her own
strength, for the promises of others are vain.

She made a movement of recoil. She had felt the workman's heavy hand on
her hand; and that hateful touch revolted her.

The man apologized, awkwardly. The count said to his wife:

"You must make up your mind, you know."

Then she put out her slim and trembling hand to the workman, who took
it, turned it over and rested it on the table, with the palm upward.
Yvonne felt the cold steel. She longed to die, then and there; and, at
once attracted by that idea of death, she thought of the poisons which
she would buy and which would send her to sleep almost without her
knowing it.

The operation did not take long. Inserted on the slant, the little steel
pliers pushed back the flesh, made room for themselves and bit the ring.
A strong effort ... and the ring broke. The two ends had only to be
separated to remove the ring from the finger. The workman did so.

The count exclaimed, in triumph:

"At last! Now we shall see!... The proof is there! And we are all
witnesses...."

He snatched up the ring and looked at the inscription. A cry of
amazement escaped him. The ring bore the date of his marriage to Yvonne:
"23rd of October"!...

       *       *       *       *       *

We were sitting on the terrace at Monte Carlo. Lupin finished his story,
lit a cigarette and calmly puffed the smoke into the blue air.

I said:

"Well?"

"Well what?"

"Why, the end of the story...."

"The end of the story? But what other end could there be?"

"Come ... you're joking ..."

"Not at all. Isn't that enough for you? The countess is saved. The
count, not possessing the least proof against her, is compelled by his
mother to forego the divorce and to give up the child. That is all.
Since then, he has left his wife, who is living happily with her son, a
fine lad of sixteen."

"Yes ... yes ... but the way in which the countess was saved?"

Lupin burst out laughing:

"My dear old chap"--Lupin sometimes condescends to address me in this
affectionate manner--"my dear old chap, you may be rather smart at
relating my exploits, but, by Jove, you do want to have the i's dotted
for you! I assure you, the countess did not ask for explanations!"

"Very likely. But there's no pride about me," I added, laughing. "Dot
those i's for me, will you?"

He took out a five-franc piece and closed his hand over it.

"What's in my hand?"

"A five-franc piece."

He opened his hand. The five-franc piece was gone.

"You see how easy it is! A working jeweller, with his nippers, cuts a
ring with a date engraved upon it: 23rd of October. It's a simple little
trick of sleight-of-hand, one of many which I have in my bag. By Jove,
I didn't spend six months with Dickson, the conjurer,[C] for nothing!"


  [C] _The Exploits of Arsene Lupin._ By Maurice Leblanc. Translated by
  Alexander Teixeira de Mattos (Cassell). IV. _The Escape of Arsene
  Lupin._


"But then ...?"

"Out with it!"

"The working jeweller?"

"Was Horace Velmont! Was good old Lupin! Leaving the countess at three
o'clock in the morning, I employed the few remaining minutes before the
husband's return to have a look round his study. On the table I found
the letter from the working jeweller. The letter gave me the address. A
bribe of a few louis enabled me to take the workman's place; and I
arrived with a wedding-ring ready cut and engraved. Hocus-pocus!
Pass!... The count couldn't make head or tail of it."

"Splendid!" I cried. And I added, a little chaffingly, in my turn, "But
don't you think that you were humbugged a bit yourself, on this
occasion?"

"Oh! And by whom, pray?"

"By the countess?"

"In what way?"

"Hang it all, that name engraved as a talisman!... The mysterious Adonis
who loved her and suffered for her sake!... All that story seems very
unlikely; and I wonder whether, Lupin though you be, you did not just
drop upon a pretty love-story, absolutely genuine and ... none too
innocent."

Lupin looked at me out of the corner of his eye:

"No," he said.

"How do you know?"

"If the countess made a misstatement in telling me that she knew that
man before her marriage--and that he was dead--and if she really did
love him in her secret heart, I, at least, have a positive proof that it
was an ideal love and that he did not suspect it."

"And where is the proof?"

"It is inscribed inside the ring which I myself broke on the countess's
finger ... and which I carry on me. Here it is. You can read the name
she had engraved on it."

He handed me the ring. I read:

"Horace Velmont."

There was a moment of silence between Lupin and myself; and, noticing
it, I also observed on his face a certain emotion, a tinge of
melancholy.

I resumed:

"What made you tell me this story ... to which you have often alluded in
my presence?"

"What made me ...?"

He drew my attention to a woman, still exceedingly handsome, who was
passing on a young man's arm. She saw Lupin and bowed.

"It's she," he whispered. "She and her son."

"Then she recognized you?"

"She always recognizes me, whatever my disguise."

"But since the burglary at the Chateau de Thibermesnil,[D] the police
have identified the two names of Arsene Lupin and Horace Velmont."


  [D] _The Exploits of Arsene Lupin. IX. Holmlock Shears arrives too
  late._


"Yes."

"Therefore she knows who you are."

"Yes."

"And she bows to you?" I exclaimed, in spite of myself.

He caught me by the arm and, fiercely:

"Do you think that I am Lupin to her? Do you think that I am a burglar
in her eyes, a rogue, a cheat?... Why, I might be the lowest of
miscreants, I might be a murderer even ... and still she would bow to
me!"

"Why? Because she loved you once?"

"Rot! That would be an additional reason, on the contrary, why she
should now despise me."

"What then?"

"I am the man who gave her back her son!"




III

THE SIGN OF THE SHADOW


"I received your telegram and here I am," said a gentleman with a grey
moustache, who entered my study, dressed in a dark-brown frock-coat and
a wide-brimmed hat, with a red ribbon in his buttonhole. "What's the
matter?"

Had I not been expecting Arsene Lupin, I should certainly never have
recognized him in the person of this old half-pay officer:

"What's the matter?" I echoed. "Oh, nothing much: a rather curious
coincidence, that's all. And, as I know that you would just as soon
clear up a mystery as plan one...."

"Well?"

"You seem in a great hurry!"

"I am ... unless the mystery in question is worth putting myself out
for. So let us get to the point."

"Very well. Just begin by casting your eye on this little picture, which
I picked up, a week or two ago, in a grimy old shop on the other side
of the river. I bought it for the sake of its Empire frame, with the
palm-leaf ornaments on the mouldings ... for the painting is execrable."

"Execrable, as you say," said Lupin, after he had examined it, "but the
subject itself is rather nice. That corner of an old courtyard, with its
rotunda of Greek columns, its sun-dial and its fish-pond and that ruined
well with the Renascence roof and those stone steps and stone benches:
all very picturesque."

"And genuine," I added. "The picture, good or bad, has never been taken
out of its Empire frame. Besides, it is dated.... There, in the
left-hand bottom corner: those red figures, 15. 4. 2, which obviously
stand for 15 April, 1802."

"I dare say ... I dare say.... But you were speaking of a coincidence
and, so far, I fail to see...."

I went to a corner of my study, took a telescope, fixed it on its stand
and pointed it, through the open window, at the open window of a little
room facing my flat, on the other side of the street. And I asked Lupin
to look through it.

He stooped forward. The slanting rays of the morning sun lit up the room
opposite, revealing a set of mahogany furniture, all very simple, a
large bed and a child's bed hung with cretonne curtains.

"Ah!" cried Lupin, suddenly. "The same picture!"

"Exactly the same!" I said. "And the date: do you see the date, in red?
15. 4. 2."

"Yes, I see.... And who lives in that room?"

"A lady ... or, rather, a workwoman, for she has to work for her living
... needlework, hardly enough to keep herself and her child."

"What is her name?"

"Louise d'Ernemont.... From what I hear, she is the great-granddaughter
of a farmer-general who was guillotined during the Terror."

"Yes, on the same day as Andre Chenier," said Lupin. "According to the
memoirs of the time, this d'Ernemont was supposed to be a very rich
man." He raised his head and said, "It's an interesting story.... Why
did you wait before telling me?"

"Because this is the 15th of April."

"Well?"

"Well, I discovered yesterday--I heard them talking about it in the
porter's box--that the 15th of April plays an important part in the life
of Louise d'Ernemont."

"Nonsense!"

"Contrary to her usual habits, this woman who works every day of her
life, who keeps her two rooms tidy, who cooks the lunch which her
little girl eats when she comes home from the parish school ... this
woman, on the 15th of April, goes out with the child at ten o'clock in
the morning and does not return until nightfall. And this has happened
for years and in all weathers. You must admit that there is something
queer about this date which I find on an old picture, which is inscribed
on another, similar picture and which controls the annual movements of
the descendant of d'Ernemont the farmer-general."

"Yes, it's curious ... you're quite right," said Lupin, slowly. "And
don't you know where she goes to?"

"Nobody knows. She does not confide in a soul. As a matter of fact, she
talks very little."

"Are you sure of your information?"

"Absolutely. And the best proof of its accuracy is that here she comes."

A door had opened at the back of the room opposite, admitting a little
girl of seven or eight, who came and looked out of the window. A lady
appeared behind her, tall, good-looking still and wearing a sad and
gentle air. Both of them were ready and dressed, in clothes which were
simple in themselves, but which pointed to a love of neatness and a
certain elegance on the part of the mother.

"You see," I whispered, "they are going out."

And presently the mother took the child by the hand and they left the
room together.

Lupin caught up his hat:

"Are you coming?"

My curiosity was too great for me to raise the least objection. I went
downstairs with Lupin.

As we stepped into the street, we saw my neighbour enter a baker's shop.
She bought two rolls and placed them in a little basket which her
daughter was carrying and which seemed already to contain some other
provisions. Then they went in the direction of the outer boulevards and
followed them as far as the Place de l'Etoile, where they turned down
the Avenue Kleber to walk toward Passy.

Lupin strolled silently along, evidently obsessed by a train of thought
which I was glad to have provoked. From time to time, he uttered a
sentence which showed me the thread of his reflections; and I was able
to see that the riddle remained as much a mystery to him as to myself.

Louise d'Ernemont, meanwhile, had branched off to the left, along the
Rue Raynouard, a quiet old street in which Franklin and Balzac once
lived, one of those streets which, lined with old-fashioned houses and
walled gardens, give you the impression of being in a country-town. The
Seine flows at the foot of the slope which the street crowns; and a
number of lanes run down to the river.

My neighbour took one of these narrow, winding, deserted lanes. The
first building, on the right, was a house the front of which faced the
Rue Raynouard. Next came a moss-grown wall, of a height above the
ordinary, supported by buttresses and bristling with broken glass.

Half-way along the wall was a low, arched door. Louise d'Ernemont
stopped in front of this door and opened it with a key which seemed to
us enormous. Mother and child entered and closed the door.

"In any case," said Lupin, "she has nothing to conceal, for she has not
looked round once...."

He had hardly finished his sentence when we heard the sound of footsteps
behind us. It was two old beggars, a man and a woman, tattered, dirty,
squalid, covered in rags. They passed us without paying the least
attention to our presence. The man took from his wallet a key similar to
my neighbour's and put it into the lock. The door closed behind them.

And, suddenly, at the top of the lane, came the noise of a motor-car
stopping.... Lupin dragged me fifty yards lower down, to a corner in
which we were able to hide. And we saw coming down the lane, carrying a
little dog under her arm, a young and very much over-dressed woman,
wearing a quantity of jewellery, a young woman whose eyes were too dark,
her lips too red, her hair too fair. In front of the door, the same
performance, with the same key.... The lady and the dog disappeared from
view.

"This promises to be most amusing," said Lupin, chuckling. "What earthly
connection can there be between those different people?"

There hove in sight successively two elderly ladies, lean and rather
poverty-stricken in appearance, very much alike, evidently sisters; a
footman in livery; an infantry corporal; a fat gentleman in a soiled and
patched jacket-suit; and, lastly, a workman's family, father, mother,
and four children, all six of them pale and sickly, looking like people
who never eat their fill. And each of the newcomers carried a basket or
string-bag filled with provisions.

"It's a picnic!" I cried.

"It grows more and more surprising," said Lupin, "and I sha'n't be
satisfied till I know what is happening behind that wall."

To climb it was out of the question. We also saw that it finished, at
the lower as well as at the upper end, at a house none of whose windows
overlooked the enclosure which the wall contained.

During the next hour, no one else came along. We vainly cast about for
a stratagem; and Lupin, whose fertile brain had exhausted every possible
expedient, was about to go in search of a ladder, when, suddenly, the
little door opened and one of the workman's children came out.

The boy ran up the lane to the Rue Raynouard. A few minutes later he
returned, carrying two bottles of water, which he set down on the
pavement to take the big key from his pocket.

By that time Lupin had left me and was strolling slowly along the wall.
When the child, after entering the enclosure, pushed back the door Lupin
sprang forward and stuck the point of his knife into the staple of the
lock. The bolt failed to catch; and it became an easy matter to push the
door ajar.

"That's done the trick!" said Lupin.

He cautiously put his hand through the doorway and then, to my great
surprise, entered boldly. But, on following his example, I saw that, ten
yards behind the wall, a clump of laurels formed a sort of curtain which
allowed us to come up unobserved.

Lupin took his stand right in the middle of the clump. I joined him and,
like him, pushed aside the branches of one of the shrubs. And the sight
which presented itself to my eyes was so unexpected that I was unable to
suppress an exclamation, while Lupin, on his side, muttered, between
his teeth:

"By Jupiter! This is a funny job!"

We saw before us, within the confined space that lay between the two
windowless houses, the identical scene represented in the old picture
which I had bought at a second-hand dealer's!

The identical scene! At the back, against the opposite wall, the same
Greek rotunda displayed its slender columns. In the middle, the same
stone benches topped a circle of four steps that ran down to a fish-pond
with moss-grown flags. On the left, the same well raised its
wrought-iron roof; and, close at hand, the same sun-dial showed its
slanting gnomon and its marble face.

The identical scene! And what added to the strangeness of the sight was
the memory, obsessing Lupin and myself, of that date of the 15th of
April, inscribed in a corner of the picture, and the thought that this
very day was the 15th of April and that sixteen or seventeen people, so
different in age, condition and manners, had chosen the 15th of April to
come together in this forgotten corner of Paris!

All of them, at the moment when we caught sight of them, were sitting in
separate groups on the benches and steps; and all were eating. Not very
far from my neighbour and her daughter, the workman's family and the
beggar couple were sharing their provisions; while the footman, the
gentleman in the soiled suit, the infantry corporal and the two lean
sisters were making a common stock of their sliced ham, their tins of
sardines and their gruyere cheese.

The lady with the little dog alone, who had brought no food with her,
sat apart from the others, who made a show of turning their backs upon
her. But Louise d'Ernemont offered her a sandwich, whereupon her example
was followed by the two sisters; and the corporal at once began to make
himself as agreeable to the young person as he could.

It was now half-past one. The beggar-man took out his pipe, as did the
fat gentleman; and, when they found that one had no tobacco and the
other no matches, their needs soon brought them together. The men went
and smoked by the rotunda and the women joined them. For that matter,
all these people seemed to know one another quite well.

They were at some distance from where we were standing, so that we could
not hear what they said. However, we gradually perceived that the
conversation was becoming animated. The young person with the dog, in
particular, who by this time appeared to be in great request, indulged
in much voluble talk, accompanying her words with many gestures, which
set the little dog barking furiously.

But, suddenly, there was an outcry, promptly followed by shouts of rage;
and one and all, men and women alike, rushed in disorder toward the
well. One of the workman's brats was at that moment coming out of it,
fastened by his belt to the hook at the end of the rope; and the three
other urchins were drawing him up by turning the handle. More active
than the rest, the corporal flung himself upon him; and forthwith the
footman and the fat gentleman seized hold of him also, while the beggars
and the lean sisters came to blows with the workman and his family.

In a few seconds the little boy had not a stitch left on him beyond his
shirt. The footman, who had taken possession of the rest of the clothes,
ran away, pursued by the corporal, who snatched away the boy's breeches,
which were next torn from the corporal by one of the lean sisters.

"They are mad!" I muttered, feeling absolutely at sea.

"Not at all, not at all," said Lupin.

"What! Do you mean to say that you can make head or tail of what is
going on?"

He did not reply. The young lady with the little dog, tucking her pet
under her arm, had started running after the child in the shirt, who
uttered loud yells. The two of them raced round the laurel-clump in
which we stood hidden; and the brat flung himself into his mother's
arms.

At long last, Louise d'Ernemont, who had played a conciliatory part from
the beginning, succeeded in allaying the tumult. Everybody sat down
again; but there was a reaction in all those exasperated people and they
remained motionless and silent, as though worn out with their exertions.

And time went by. Losing patience and beginning to feel the pangs of
hunger, I went to the Rue Raynouard to fetch something to eat, which we
divided while watching the actors in the incomprehensible comedy that
was being performed before our eyes. They hardly stirred. Each minute
that passed seemed to load them with increasing melancholy; and they
sank into attitudes of discouragement, bent their backs more and more
and sat absorbed in their meditations.

The afternoon wore on in this way, under a grey sky that shed a dreary
light over the enclosure.

"Are they going to spend the night here?" I asked, in a bored voice.

But, at five o'clock or so, the fat gentleman in the soiled jacket-suit
took out his watch. The others did the same and all, watch in hand,
seemed to be anxiously awaiting an event of no little importance to
themselves. The event did not take place, for, in fifteen or twenty
minutes, the fat gentleman gave a gesture of despair, stood up and put
on his hat.

Then lamentations broke forth. The two lean sisters and the workman's
wife fell upon their knees and made the sign of the cross. The lady with
the little dog and the beggar-woman kissed each other and sobbed; and we
saw Louise d'Ernemont pressing her daughter sadly to her.

"Let's go," said Lupin.

"You think it's over?"

"Yes; and we have only just time to make ourselves scarce."

We went out unmolested. At the top of the lane, Lupin turned to the left
and, leaving me outside, entered the first house in the Rue Raynouard,
the one that backed on to the enclosure.

After talking for a few seconds to the porter, he joined me and we
stopped a passing taxi-cab:

"No. 34 Rue de Turin," he said to the driver.

The ground-floor of No. 34 was occupied by a notary's office; and we
were shown in, almost without waiting, to Maitre Valandier, a smiling,
pleasant-spoken man of a certain age.

Lupin introduced himself by the name of Captain Jeanniot, retired from
the army. He said that he wanted to build a house to his own liking
and that some one had suggested to him a plot of ground situated near
the Rue Raynouard.

"But that plot is not for sale," said Maitre Valandier.

"Oh, I was told...."

"You have been misinformed, I fear."

The lawyer rose, went to a cupboard and returned with a picture which he
showed us. I was petrified. It was the same picture which I had bought,
the same picture that hung in Louise d'Ernemont's room.

"This is a painting," he said, "of the plot of ground to which you
refer. It is known as the Clos d'Ernemont."

"Precisely."

"Well, this close," continued the notary, "once formed part of a large
garden belonging to d'Ernemont, the farmer-general, who was executed
during the Terror. All that could be sold has been sold, piecemeal, by
the heirs. But this last plot has remained and will remain in their
joint possession ... unless...."

The notary began to laugh.

"Unless what?" asked Lupin.

"Well, it's quite a romance, a rather curious romance, in fact. I often
amuse myself by looking through the voluminous documents of the case."

"Would it be indiscreet, if I asked ...?"

"Not at all, not at all," declared Maitre Valandier, who seemed
delighted, on the contrary, to have found a listener for his story. And,
without waiting to be pressed, he began: "At the outbreak of the
Revolution, Louis Agrippa d'Ernemont, on the pretence of joining his
wife, who was staying at Geneva with their daughter Pauline, shut up his
mansion in the Faubourg Saint-Germain, dismissed his servants and, with
his son Charles, came and took up his abode in his pleasure-house at
Passy, where he was known to nobody except an old and devoted
serving-woman. He remained there in hiding for three years and he had
every reason to hope that his retreat would not be discovered, when, one
day, after luncheon, as he was having a nap, the old servant burst into
his room. She had seen, at the end of the street, a patrol of armed men
who seemed to be making for the house. Louis d'Ernemont got ready
quickly and, at the moment when the men were knocking at the front door,
disappeared through the door that led to the garden, shouting to his
son, in a scared voice, to keep them talking, if only for five minutes.
He may have intended to escape and found the outlets through the garden
watched. In any case, he returned in six or seven minutes, replied very
calmly to the questions put to him and raised no difficulty about
accompanying the men. His son Charles, although only eighteen years of
age, was arrested also."

"When did this happen?" asked Lupin.

"It happened on the 26th day of Germinal, Year II, that is to say, on
the...."

Maitre Valandier stopped, with his eyes fixed on a calendar that hung on
the wall, and exclaimed:

"Why, it was on this very day! This is the 15th of April, the
anniversary of the farmer-general's arrest."

"What an odd coincidence!" said Lupin. "And considering the period at
which it took place, the arrest, no doubt, had serious consequences?"

"Oh, most serious!" said the notary, laughing. "Three months later, at
the beginning of Thermidor, the farmer-general mounted the scaffold. His
son Charles was forgotten in prison and their property was confiscated."

"The property was immense, I suppose?" said Lupin.

"Well, there you are! That's just where the thing becomes complicated.
The property, which was, in fact, immense, could never be traced. It was
discovered that the Faubourg Saint-Germain mansion had been sold, before
the Revolution, to an Englishman, together with all the country-seats
and estates and all the jewels, securities and collections belonging to
the farmer-general. The Convention instituted minute inquiries, as did
the Directory afterward. But the inquiries led to no result."

"There remained, at any rate, the Passy house," said Lupin.

"The house at Passy was bought, for a mere song, by a delegate of the
Commune, the very man who had arrested d'Ernemont, one Citizen Broquet.
Citizen Broquet shut himself up in the house, barricaded the doors,
fortified the walls and, when Charles d'Ernemont was at last set free
and appeared outside, received him by firing a musket at him. Charles
instituted one law-suit after another, lost them all and then proceeded
to offer large sums of money. But Citizen Broquet proved intractable. He
had bought the house and he stuck to the house; and he would have stuck
to it until his death, if Charles had not obtained the support of
Bonaparte. Citizen Broquet cleared out on the 12th of February, 1803;
but Charles d'Ernemont's joy was so great and his brain, no doubt, had
been so violently unhinged by all that he had gone through, that, on
reaching the threshold of the house of which he had at last recovered
the ownership, even before opening the door he began to dance and sing
in the street. He had gone clean off his head."

"By Jove!" said Lupin. "And what became of him?"

"His mother and his sister Pauline, who had ended by marrying a cousin
of the same name at Geneva, were both dead. The old servant-woman took
care of him and they lived together in the Passy house. Years passed
without any notable event; but, suddenly, in 1812, an unexpected
incident happened. The old servant made a series of strange revelations
on her death-bed, in the presence of two witnesses whom she sent for.
She declared that the farmer-general had carried to his house at Passy a
number of bags filled with gold and silver and that those bags had
disappeared a few days before the arrest. According to earlier
confidences made by Charles d'Ernemont, who had them from his father,
the treasures were hidden in the garden, between the rotunda, the
sun-dial and the well. In proof of her statement, she produced three
pictures, or rather, for they were not yet framed, three canvases, which
the farmer-general had painted during his captivity and which he had
succeeded in conveying to her, with instructions to hand them to his
wife, his son and his daughter. Tempted by the lure of wealth, Charles
and the old servant had kept silence. Then came the law-suits, the
recovery of the house, Charles's madness, the servant's own useless
searches; and the treasures were still there."

"And they are there now," chuckled Lupin.

"And they will be there always," exclaimed Maitre Valandier. "Unless ...
unless Citizen Broquet, who no doubt smelt a rat, succeeded in ferreting
them out. But this is an unlikely supposition, for Citizen Broquet died
in extreme poverty."

"So then ...?"

"So then everybody began to hunt. The children of Pauline, the sister,
hastened from Geneva. It was discovered that Charles had been secretly
married and that he had sons. All these heirs set to work."

"But Charles himself?"

"Charles lived in the most absolute retirement. He did not leave his
room."

"Never?"

"Well, that is the most extraordinary, the most astounding part of the
story. Once a year, Charles d'Ernemont, impelled by a sort of
subconscious will-power, came downstairs, took the exact road which his
father had taken, walked across the garden and sat down either on the
steps of the rotunda, which you see here, in the picture, or on the kerb
of the well. At twenty-seven minutes past five, he rose and went indoors
again; and until his death, which occurred in 1820, he never once failed
to perform this incomprehensible pilgrimage. Well, the day on which this
happened was invariably the 15th of April, the anniversary of the
arrest."

Maitre Valandier was no longer smiling and himself seemed impressed by
the amazing story which he was telling us.

"And, since Charles's death?" asked Lupin, after a moment's reflection.

"Since that time," replied the lawyer, with a certain solemnity of
manner, "for nearly a hundred years, the heirs of Charles and Pauline
d'Ernemont have kept up the pilgrimage of the 15th of April. During the
first few years they made the most thorough excavations. Every inch of
the garden was searched, every clod of ground dug up. All this is now
over. They take hardly any pains. All they do is, from time to time, for
no particular reason, to turn over a stone or explore the well. For the
most part, they are content to sit down on the steps of the rotunda,
like the poor madman; and, like him, they wait. And that, you see, is
the sad part of their destiny. In those hundred years, all these people
who have succeeded one another, from father to son, have lost--what
shall I say?--the energy of life. They have no courage left, no
initiative. They wait. They wait for the 15th of April; and, when the
15th of April comes, they wait for a miracle to take place. Poverty has
ended by overtaking every one of them. My predecessors and I have sold
first the house, in order to build another which yields a better rent,
followed by bits of the garden and further bits. But, as to that corner
over there," pointing to the picture, "they would rather die than sell
it. On this they are all agreed: Louise d'Ernemont, who is the direct
heiress of Pauline, as well as the beggars, the workman, the footman,
the circus-rider and so on, who represent the unfortunate Charles."

There was a fresh pause; and Lupin asked:

"What is your own opinion, Maitre Valandier?"

"My private opinion is that there's nothing in it. What credit can we
give to the statements of an old servant enfeebled by age? What
importance can we attach to the crotchets of a madman? Besides, if the
farmer-general had realized his fortune, don't you think that that
fortune would have been found? One could manage to hide a paper, a
document, in a confined space like that, but not treasures."

"Still, the pictures?..."

"Yes, of course. But, after all, are they a sufficient proof?"

Lupin bent over the copy which the solicitor had taken from the cupboard
and, after examining it at length, said:

"You spoke of three pictures."

"Yes, the one which you see was handed to my predecessor by the heirs of
Charles. Louise d'Ernemont possesses another. As for the third, no one
knows what became of it."

Lupin looked at me and continued:

"And do they all bear the same date?"

"Yes, the date inscribed by Charles d'Ernemont when he had them framed,
not long before his death.... The same date, that is to say the 15th of
April, Year II, according to the revolutionary calendar, as the arrest
took place in April, 1794."

"Oh, yes, of course," said Lupin. "The figure 2 means...."

He thought for a few moments and resumed:

"One more question, if I may. Did no one ever come forward to solve the
problem?"

Maitre Valandier threw up his arms:

"Goodness gracious me!" he cried. "Why, it was the plague of the office!
One of my predecessors, Maitre Turbon, was summoned to Passy no fewer
than eighteen times, between 1820 and 1843, by the groups of heirs, whom
fortune-tellers, clairvoyants, visionaries, impostors of all sorts had
promised that they would discover the farmer-general's treasures. At
last, we laid down a rule: any outsider applying to institute a search
was to begin by depositing a certain sum."

"What sum?"

"A thousand francs."

"And did this have the effect of frightening them off?"

"No. Four years ago, an Hungarian hypnotist tried the experiment and
made me waste a whole day. After that, we fixed the deposit at five
thousand francs. In case of success, a third of the treasure goes to the
finder. In case of failure, the deposit is forfeited to the heirs. Since
then, I have been left in peace."

"Here are your five thousand francs."

The lawyer gave a start:

"Eh? What do you say?"

"I say," repeated Lupin, taking five bank-notes from his pocket and
calmly spreading them on the table, "I say that here is the deposit of
five thousand francs. Please give me a receipt and invite all the
d'Ernemont heirs to meet me at Passy on the 15th of April next year."

The notary could not believe his senses. I myself, although Lupin had
accustomed me to these surprises, was utterly taken back.

"Are you serious?" asked Maitre Valandier.

"Perfectly serious."

"But, you know, I told you my opinion. All these improbable stories rest
upon no evidence of any kind."

"I don't agree with you," said Lupin.

The notary gave him the look which we give to a person who is not quite
right in his head. Then, accepting the situation, he took his pen and
drew up a contract on stamped paper, acknowledging the payment of the
deposit by Captain Jeanniot and promising him a third of such moneys as
he should discover:

"If you change your mind," he added, "you might let me know a week
before the time comes. I shall not inform the d'Ernemont family until
the last moment, so as not to give those poor people too long a spell of
hope."

"You can inform them this very day, Maitre Valandier. It will make them
spend a happier year."

We said good-bye. Outside, in the street, I cried:

"So you have hit upon something?"

"I?" replied Lupin. "Not a bit of it! And that's just what amuses me."

"But they have been searching for a hundred years!"

"It is not so much a matter of searching as of thinking. Now I have
three hundred and sixty-five days to think in. It is a great deal more
than I want; and I am afraid that I shall forget all about the business,
interesting though it may be. Oblige me by reminding me, will you?"

       *       *       *       *       *

I reminded him of it several times during the following months, though
he never seemed to attach much importance to the matter. Then came a
long period during which I had no opportunity of seeing him. It was the
period, as I afterward learnt, of his visit to Armenia and of the
terrible struggle on which he embarked against Abdul the Damned, a
struggle which ended in the tyrant's downfall.

I used to write to him, however, at the address which he gave me and I
was thus able to send him certain particulars which I had succeeded in
gathering, here and there, about my neighbour Louise d'Ernemont, such as
the love which she had conceived, a few years earlier, for a very rich
young man, who still loved her, but who had been compelled by his family
to throw her over; the young widow's despair, and the plucky life which
she led with her little daughter.

Lupin replied to none of my letters. I did not know whether they reached
him; and, meantime, the date was drawing near and I could not help
wondering whether his numerous undertakings would not prevent him from
keeping the appointment which he himself had fixed.

As a matter of fact, the morning of the 15th of April arrived and Lupin
was not with me by the time I had finished lunch. It was a quarter-past
twelve. I left my flat and took a cab to Passy.

I had no sooner entered the lane than I saw the workman's four brats
standing outside the door in the wall. Maitre Valandier, informed by
them of my arrival, hastened in my direction:

"Well?" he cried. "Where's Captain Jeanniot?"

"Hasn't he come?"

"No; and I can assure you that everybody is very impatient to see him."

The different groups began to crowd round the lawyer; and I noticed that
all those faces which I recognized had thrown off the gloomy and
despondent expression which they wore a year ago.

"They are full of hope," said Maitre Valandier, "and it is my fault. But
what could I do? Your friend made such an impression upon me that I
spoke to these good people with a confidence ... which I cannot say I
feel. However, he seems a queer sort of fellow, this Captain Jeanniot of
yours...."

He asked me many questions and I gave him a number of more or less
fanciful details about the captain, to which the heirs listened, nodding
their heads in appreciation of my remarks.

"Of course, the truth was bound to be discovered sooner or later," said
the fat gentleman, in a tone of conviction.

The infantry corporal, dazzled by the captain's rank, did not entertain
a doubt in his mind.

The lady with the little dog wanted to know if Captain Jeanniot was
young.

But Louise d'Ernemont said:

"And suppose he does not come?"

"We shall still have the five thousand francs to divide," said the
beggar-man.

For all that, Louise d'Ernemont's words had damped their enthusiasm.
Their faces began to look sullen and I felt an atmosphere as of anguish
weighing upon us.

At half-past one, the two lean sisters felt faint and sat down. Then the
fat gentleman in the soiled suit suddenly rounded on the notary:

"It's you, Maitre Valandier, who are to blame.... You ought to have
brought the captain here by main force.... He's a humbug, that's quite
clear."

He gave me a savage look, and the footman, in his turn, flung muttered
curses at me.

I confess that their reproaches seemed to me well-founded and that
Lupin's absence annoyed me greatly:

"He won't come now," I whispered to the lawyer.

And I was thinking of beating a retreat, when the eldest of the brats
appeared at the door, yelling:

"There's some one coming!... A motor-cycle!..."

A motor was throbbing on the other side of the wall. A man on a
motor-bicycle came tearing down the lane at the risk of breaking his
neck. Suddenly, he put on his brakes, outside the door, and sprang from
his machine.

Under the layer of dust which covered him from head to foot, we could
see that his navy-blue reefer-suit, his carefully creased trousers, his
black felt hat and patent-leather boots were not the clothes in which a
man usually goes cycling.

"But that's not Captain Jeanniot!" shouted the notary, who failed to
recognize him.

"Yes, it is," said Lupin, shaking hands with us. "I'm Captain Jeanniot
right enough ... only I've shaved off my moustache.... Besides, Maitre
Valandier, here's your receipt."

He caught one of the workman's children by the arm and said:

"Run to the cab-rank and fetch a taxi to the corner of the Rue
Raynouard. Look sharp! I have an urgent appointment to keep at two
o'clock, or a quarter-past at the latest."

There was a murmur of protest. Captain Jeanniot took out his watch:

"Well! It's only twelve minutes to two! I have a good quarter of an hour
before me. But, by Jingo, how tired I feel! And how hungry into the
bargain!"

The corporal thrust his ammunition-bread into Lupin's hand; and he
munched away at it as he sat down and said:

"You must forgive me. I was in the Marseilles express, which left the
rails between Dijon and Laroche. There were twelve people killed and any
number injured, whom I had to help. Then I found this motor-cycle in the
luggage-van.... Maitre Valandier, you must be good enough to restore it
to the owner. You will find the label fastened to the handle-bar. Ah,
you're back, my boy! Is the taxi there? At the corner of the Rue
Raynouard? Capital!"

He looked at his watch again:

"Hullo! No time to lose!"

I stared at him with eager curiosity. But how great must the excitement
of the d'Ernemont heirs have been! True, they had not the same faith in
Captain Jeanniot that I had in Lupin. Nevertheless, their faces were
pale and drawn. Captain Jeanniot turned slowly to the left and walked up
to the sun-dial. The pedestal represented the figure of a man with a
powerful torso, who bore on his shoulders a marble slab the surface of
which had been so much worn by time that we could hardly distinguish the
engraved lines that marked the hours. Above the slab, a Cupid, with
outspread wings, held an arrow that served as a gnomon.

The captain stood leaning forward for a minute, with attentive eyes.

Then he said:

"Somebody lend me a knife, please."

A clock in the neighbourhood struck two. At that exact moment, the
shadow of the arrow was thrown upon the sunlit dial along the line of a
crack in the marble which divided the slab very nearly in half.

The captain took the knife handed to him. And with the point, very
gently, he began to scratch the mixture of earth and moss that filled
the narrow cleft.

Almost immediately, at a couple of inches from the edge, he stopped, as
though his knife had encountered an obstacle, inserted his thumb and
forefinger and withdrew a small object which he rubbed between the palms
of his hands and gave to the lawyer:

"Here, Maitre Valandier. Something to go on with."

It was an enormous diamond, the size of a hazelnut and beautifully cut.

The captain resumed his work. The next moment, a fresh stop. A second
diamond, magnificent and brilliant as the first, appeared in sight.

And then came a third and a fourth.

In a minute's time, following the crack from one edge to the other and
certainly without digging deeper than half an inch, the captain had
taken out eighteen diamonds of the same size.

During this minute, there was not a cry, not a movement around the
sun-dial. The heirs seemed paralyzed with a sort of stupor. Then the fat
gentleman muttered:

"Geminy!"

And the corporal moaned:

"Oh, captain!... Oh, captain!..."

The two sisters fell in a dead faint. The lady with the little dog
dropped on her knees and prayed, while the footman, staggering like a
drunken man, held his head in his two hands, and Louise d'Ernemont wept.

When calm was restored and all became eager to thank Captain Jeanniot,
they saw that he was gone.

       *       *       *       *       *

Some years passed before I had an opportunity of talking to Lupin about
this business. He was in a confidential vein and answered:

"The business of the eighteen diamonds? By Jove, when I think that three
or four generations of my fellow-men had been hunting for the solution!
And the eighteen diamonds were there all the time, under a little mud
and dust!"

"But how did you guess?..."

"I did not guess. I reflected. I doubt if I need even have reflected.
I was struck, from the beginning, by the fact that the whole
circumstance was governed by one primary question: the question of time.
When Charles d'Ernemont was still in possession of his wits, he wrote a
date upon the three pictures. Later, in the gloom in which he was
struggling, a faint glimmer of intelligence led him every year to the
centre of the old garden; and the same faint glimmer led him away from
it every year at the same moment, that is to say, at twenty-seven
minutes past five. Something must have acted on the disordered machinery
of his brain in this way. What was the superior force that controlled
the poor madman's movements? Obviously, the instinctive notion of time
represented by the sun-dial in the farmer-general's pictures. It was the
annual revolution of the earth around the sun that brought Charles
d'Ernemont back to the garden at a fixed date. And it was the earth's
daily revolution upon its own axis that took him from it at a fixed
hour, that is to say, at the hour, most likely, when the sun, concealed
by objects different from those of to-day, ceased to light the Passy
garden. Now of all this the sun-dial was the symbol. And that is why I
at once knew where to look."

"But how did you settle the hour at which to begin looking?"

"Simply by the pictures. A man living at that time, such as Charles
d'Ernemont, would have written either 26 Germinal, Year II, or else 15
April, 1794, but not 15 April, Year II. I was astounded that no one had
thought of that."

"Then the figure 2 stood for two o'clock?"

"Evidently. And what must have happened was this: the farmer-general
began by turning his fortune into solid gold and silver money. Then, by
way of additional precaution, with this gold and silver he bought
eighteen wonderful diamonds. When he was surprised by the arrival of the
patrol, he fled into his garden. Which was the best place to hide the
diamonds? Chance caused his eyes to light upon the sun-dial. It was two
o'clock. The shadow of the arrow was then falling along the crack in the
marble. He obeyed this sign of the shadow, rammed his eighteen diamonds
into the dust and calmly went back and surrendered to the soldiers."

"But the shadow of the arrow coincides with the crack in the marble
every day of the year and not only on the 15th of April."

"You forget, my dear chap, that we are dealing with a lunatic and that
he remembered only this date of the 15th of April."

"Very well; but you, once you had solved the riddle, could easily have
made your way into the enclosure and taken the diamonds."

"Quite true; and I should not have hesitated, if I had had to do with
people of another description. But I really felt sorry for those poor
wretches. And then you know the sort of idiot that Lupin is. The idea of
appearing suddenly as a benevolent genius and amazing his kind would be
enough to make him commit any sort of folly."

"Tah!" I cried. "The folly was not so great as all that. Six magnificent
diamonds! How delighted the d'Ernemont heirs must have been to fulfil
their part of the contract!"

Lupin looked at me and burst into uncontrollable laughter:

"So you haven't heard? Oh, what a joke! The delight of the d'Ernemont
heirs!.... Why, my dear fellow, on the next day, that worthy Captain
Jeanniot had so many mortal enemies! On the very next day, the two lean
sisters and the fat gentleman organized an opposition. A contract? Not
worth the paper it was written on, because, as could easily be proved,
there was no such person as Captain Jeanniot. Where did that adventurer
spring from? Just let him sue them and they'd soon show him what was
what!"

"Louise d'Ernemont too?"

"No, Louise d'Ernemont protested against that piece of rascality. But
what could she do against so many? Besides, now that she was rich, she
got back her young man. I haven't heard of her since."

"So ...?"

"So, my dear fellow, I was caught in a trap, with not a leg to stand on,
and I had to compromise and accept one modest diamond as my share, the
smallest and the least handsome of the lot. That comes of doing one's
best to help people!"

And Lupin grumbled between his teeth:

"Oh, gratitude!... All humbug!... Where should we honest men be if we
had not our conscience and the satisfaction of duty performed to reward
us?"




IV

THE INFERNAL TRAP


When the race was over, a crowd of people, streaming toward the exit
from the grand stand, pushed against Nicolas Dugrival. He brought his
hand smartly to the inside pocket of his jacket.

"What's the matter?" asked his wife.

"I still feel nervous ... with that money on me! I'm afraid of some
nasty accident."

She muttered:

"And I can't understand you. How can you think of carrying such a sum
about with you? Every farthing we possess! Lord knows, it cost us
trouble enough to earn!"

"Pooh!" he said. "No one would guess that it is here, in my
pocket-book."

"Yes, yes," she grumbled. "That young man-servant whom we discharged
last week knew all about it, didn't he, Gabriel?"

"Yes, aunt," said a youth standing beside her.

Nicolas Dugrival, his wife and his nephew Gabriel were well-known
figures at the race-meetings, where the regular frequenters saw them
almost every day: Dugrival, a big, fat, red-faced man, who looked as if
he knew how to enjoy life; his wife, also built on heavy lines, with a
coarse, vulgar face, and always dressed in a plum-coloured silk much the
worse for wear; the nephew, quite young, slender, with pale features,
dark eyes and fair and rather curly hair.

As a rule, the couple remained seated throughout the afternoon. It was
Gabriel who betted for his uncle, watching the horses in the paddock,
picking up tips to right and left among the jockeys and stable-lads,
running backward and forward between the stands and the _pari-mutuel_.

Luck had favoured them that day, for, three times, Dugrival's neighbours
saw the young man come back and hand him money.

The fifth race was just finishing. Dugrival lit a cigar. At that moment,
a gentleman in a tight-fitting brown suit, with a face ending in a
peaked grey beard, came up to him and asked, in a confidential whisper:

"Does this happen to belong to you, sir?"

And he displayed a gold watch and chain.

Dugrival gave a start:

"Why, yes ... it's mine.... Look, here are my initials, N. G.: Nicolas
Dugrival!"

And he at once, with a movement of terror, clapped his hand to his
jacket-pocket. The note-case was still there.

"Ah," he said, greatly relieved, "that's a piece of luck!... But, all
the same, how on earth was it done?... Do you know the scoundrel?"

"Yes, we've got him locked up. Pray come with me and we'll soon look
into the matter."

"Whom have I the honour ...?"

"M. Delangle, detective-inspector. I have sent to let M. Marquenne, the
magistrate, know."

Nicolas Dugrival went out with the inspector; and the two of them
started for the commissary's office, some distance behind the grand
stand. They were within fifty yards of it, when the inspector was
accosted by a man who said to him, hurriedly:

"The fellow with the watch has blabbed; we are on the tracks of a whole
gang. M. Marquenne wants you to wait for him at the _pari-mutuel_ and to
keep a look-out near the fourth booth."

There was a crowd outside the betting-booths and Inspector Delangle
muttered:

"It's an absurd arrangement.... Whom am I to look out for?... That's
just like M. Marquenne!..."

He pushed aside a group of people who were crowding too close upon him:

"By Jove, one has to use one's elbows here and keep a tight hold on
one's purse. That's the way you got your watch pinched, M. Dugrival!"

"I can't understand...."

"Oh, if you knew how those gentry go to work! One never guesses what
they're up to next. One of them treads on your foot, another gives you a
poke in the eye with his stick and the third picks your pocket before
you know where you are.... I've been had that way myself." He stopped
and then continued, angrily. "But, bother it, what's the use of hanging
about here! What a mob! It's unbearable!... Ah, there's M. Marquenne
making signs to us!... One moment, please ... and be sure and wait for
me here."

He shouldered his way through the crowd. Nicolas Dugrival followed him
for a moment with his eyes. Once the inspector was out of sight, he
stood a little to one side, to avoid being hustled.

A few minutes passed. The sixth race was about to start, when Dugrival
saw his wife and nephew looking for him. He explained to them that
Inspector Delangle was arranging matters with the magistrate.

"Have you your money still?" asked his wife.

"Why, of course I have!" he replied. "The inspector and I took good
care, I assure you, not to let the crowd jostle us."

He felt his jacket, gave a stifled cry, thrust his hand into his pocket
and began to stammer inarticulate syllables, while Mme. Dugrival gasped,
in dismay:

"What is it? What's the matter?"

"Stolen!" he moaned. "The pocket-book ... the fifty notes!..."

"It's not true!" she screamed. "It's not true!"

"Yes, the inspector ... a common sharper ... he's the man...."

She uttered absolute yells:

"Thief! Thief! Stop thief!... My husband's been robbed!... Fifty
thousand francs!... We are ruined!... Thief! Thief ..."

In a moment they were surrounded by policemen and taken to the
commissary's office. Dugrival went like a lamb, absolutely bewildered.
His wife continued to shriek at the top of her voice, piling up
explanations, railing against the inspector:

"Have him looked for!... Have him found!... A brown suit.... A pointed
beard.... Oh, the villain, to think what he's robbed us of!... Fifty
thousand francs!... Why ... why, Dugrival, what are you doing?"

With one bound, she flung herself upon her husband. Too late! He had
pressed the barrel of a revolver against his temple. A shot rang out.
Dugrival fell. He was dead.

       *       *       *       *       *

The reader cannot have forgotten the commotion made by the newspapers in
connection with this case, nor how they jumped at the opportunity once
more to accuse the police of carelessness and blundering. Was it
conceivable that a pick-pocket could play the part of an inspector like
that, in broad daylight and in a public place, and rob a respectable man
with impunity?

Nicolas Dugrival's widow kept the controversy alive, thanks to her
jeremiads and to the interviews which she granted on every hand. A
reporter had secured a snapshot of her in front of her husband's body,
holding up her hand and swearing to revenge his death. Her nephew
Gabriel was standing beside her, with hatred pictured in his face. He,
too, it appeared, in a few words uttered in a whisper, but in a tone of
fierce determination, had taken an oath to pursue and catch the
murderer.

The accounts described the humble apartment which they occupied at the
Batignolles; and, as they had been robbed of all their means, a
sporting-paper opened a subscription on their behalf.

As for the mysterious Delangle, he remained undiscovered. Two men were
arrested, but had to be released forthwith. The police took up a number
of clues, which were at once abandoned; more than one name was
mentioned; and, lastly, they accused Arsene Lupin, an action which
provoked the famous burglar's celebrated cable, dispatched from New York
six days after the incident:


    "Protest indignantly against calumny invented by baffled police.
    Send my condolences to unhappy victims. Instructing my bankers to
    remit them fifty thousand francs.

                                                             "LUPIN."


True enough, on the day after the publication of the cable, a stranger
rang at Mme. Dugrival's door and handed her an envelope. The envelope
contained fifty thousand-franc notes.

This theatrical stroke was not at all calculated to allay the universal
comment. But an event soon occurred which provided any amount of
additional excitement. Two days later, the people living in the same
house as Mme. Dugrival and her nephew were awakened, at four o'clock in
the morning, by horrible cries and shrill calls for help. They rushed to
the flat. The porter succeeded in opening the door. By the light of a
lantern carried by one of the neighbours, he found Gabriel stretched at
full-length in his bedroom, with his wrists and ankles bound and a gag
forced into his mouth, while, in the next room, Mme. Dugrival lay with
her life's blood ebbing away through a great gash in her breast.

She whispered:

"The money.... I've been robbed.... All the notes gone...."

And she fainted away.

What had happened? Gabriel said--and, as soon as she was able to speak,
Mme. Dugrival completed her nephew's story--that he was startled from
his sleep by finding himself attacked by two men, one of whom gagged
him, while the other fastened him down. He was unable to see the men in
the dark, but he heard the noise of the struggle between them and his
aunt. It was a terrible struggle, Mme. Dugrival declared. The ruffians,
who obviously knew their way about, guided by some intuition, made
straight for the little cupboard containing the money and, in spite of
her resistance and outcries, laid hands upon the bundle of bank-notes.
As they left, one of them, whom she had bitten in the arm, stabbed her
with a knife, whereupon the men had both fled.

"Which way?" she was asked.

"Through the door of my bedroom and afterward, I suppose, through the
hall-door."

"Impossible! The porter would have noticed them."

For the whole mystery lay in this: how had the ruffians entered the
house and how did they manage to leave it? There was no outlet open to
them. Was it one of the tenants? A careful inquiry proved the absurdity
of such a supposition.

What then?

Chief-inspector Ganimard, who was placed in special charge of the case,
confessed that he had never known anything more bewildering:

"It's very like Lupin," he said, "and yet it's not Lupin.... No, there's
more in it than meets the eye, something very doubtful and
suspicious.... Besides, if it were Lupin, why should he take back the
fifty thousand francs which he sent? There's another question that
puzzles me: what is the connection between the second robbery and the
first, the one on the race-course? The whole thing is incomprehensible
and I have a sort of feeling--which is very rare with me--that it is no
use hunting. For my part, I give it up."

The examining-magistrate threw himself into the case with heart and
soul. The reporters united their efforts with those of the police. A
famous English sleuth-hound crossed the Channel. A wealthy American,
whose head had been turned by detective-stories, offered a big reward to
whosoever should supply the first information leading to the discovery
of the truth. Six weeks later, no one was any the wiser. The public
adopted Ganimard's view; and the examining-magistrate himself grew tired
of struggling in a darkness which only became denser as time went on.

And life continued as usual with Dugrival's widow. Nursed by her nephew,
she soon recovered from her wound. In the mornings, Gabriel settled her
in an easy-chair at the dining-room window, did the rooms and then went
out marketing. He cooked their lunch without even accepting the
proffered assistance of the porter's wife.

Worried by the police investigations and especially by the requests for
interviews, the aunt and nephew refused to see anybody. Not even the
portress, whose chatter disturbed and wearied Mme. Dugrival, was
admitted. She fell back upon Gabriel, whom she accosted each time that
he passed her room:

"Take care, M. Gabriel, you're both of you being spied upon. There are
men watching you. Why, only last night, my husband caught a fellow
staring up at your windows."

"Nonsense!" said Gabriel. "It's all right. That's the police, protecting
us."

One afternoon, at about four o'clock, there was a violent altercation
between two costermongers at the bottom of the street. The porter's wife
at once left her room to listen to the invectives which the adversaries
were hurling at each other's heads. Her back was no sooner turned than
a man, young, of medium height and dressed in a grey suit of
irreproachable cut, slipped into the house and ran up the staircase.

When he came to the third floor, he rang the bell. Receiving no answer,
he rang again. At the third summons, the door opened.

"Mme. Dugrival?" he asked, taking off his hat.

"Mme. Dugrival is still an invalid and unable to see any one," said
Gabriel, who stood in the hall.

"It's most important that I should speak to her."

"I am her nephew and perhaps I could take her a message...."

"Very well," said the man. "Please tell Mme. Dugrival that an accident
has supplied me with valuable information concerning the robbery from
which she has suffered and that I should like to go over the flat and
ascertain certain particulars for myself. I am accustomed to this sort
of inquiry; and my call is sure to be of use to her."

Gabriel examined the visitor for a moment, reflected and said:

"In that case, I suppose my aunt will consent ... Pray come in."

He opened the door of the dining-room and stepped back to allow the
other to pass. The stranger walked to the threshold, but, at the moment
when he was crossing it, Gabriel raised his arm and, with a swift
movement, struck him with a dagger over the right shoulder.

A burst of laughter rang through the room:

"Got him!" cried Mme. Dugrival, darting up from her chair. "Well done,
Gabriel! But, I say, you haven't killed the scoundrel, have you?"

"I don't think so, aunt. It's a small blade and I didn't strike him too
hard."

The man was staggering, with his hands stretched in front of him and his
face deathly pale.

"You fool!" sneered the widow. "So you've fallen into the trap ... and a
good job too! We've been looking out for you a long time. Come, my fine
fellow, down with you! You don't care about it, do you? But you can't
help yourself, you see. That's right: one knee on the ground, before the
missus ... now the other knee.... How well we've been brought up!...
Crash, there we go on the floor! Lord, if my poor Dugrival could only
see him like that!... And now, Gabriel, to work!"

She went to her bedroom and opened one of the doors of a hanging
wardrobe filled with dresses. Pulling these aside, she pushed open
another door which formed the back of the wardrobe and led to a room in
the next house:

"Help me carry him, Gabriel. And you'll nurse him as well as you can,
won't you? For the present, he's worth his weight in gold to us, the
artist!..."

       *       *       *       *       *

The hours succeeded one another. Days passed.

One morning, the wounded man regained a moment's consciousness. He
raised his eyelids and looked around him.

He was lying in a room larger than that in which he had been stabbed, a
room sparsely furnished, with thick curtains hanging before the windows
from top to bottom. There was light enough, however, to enable him to
see young Gabriel Dugrival seated on a chair beside him and watching
him.

"Ah, it's you, youngster!" he murmured. "I congratulate you, my lad. You
have a sure and pretty touch with the dagger."

And he fell asleep again.

That day and the following days, he woke up several times and, each
time, he saw the stripling's pale face, his thin lips and his dark eyes,
with the hard look in them:

"You frighten me," he said. "If you have sworn to do for me, don't stand
on ceremony. But cheer up, for goodness' sake. The thought of death has
always struck me as the most humorous thing in the world. Whereas, with
you, old chap, it simply becomes lugubrious. I prefer to go to sleep.
Good-night!"

Still, Gabriel, in obedience to Mme. Dugrival's orders, continued to
nurse him with the utmost care and attention. The patient was almost
free from fever and was beginning to take beef-tea and milk. He gained a
little strength and jested:

"When will the convalescent be allowed his first drive? Is the
bath-chair there? Why, cheer up, stupid! You look like a weeping-willow
contemplating a crime. Come, just one little smile for daddy!"

One day, on waking, he had a very unpleasant feeling of constraint.
After a few efforts, he perceived that, during his sleep, his legs,
chest and arms had been fastened to the bedstead with thin wire strands
that cut into his flesh at the least movements.

"Ah," he said to his keeper, "this time it's the great performance! The
chicken's going to be bled. Are you operating, Angel Gabriel? If so, see
that your razor's nice and clean, old chap! The antiseptic treatment,
_if_ you please!"

But he was interrupted by the sound of a key grating in the lock. The
door opposite opened and Mme. Dugrival appeared.

She approached slowly, took a chair and, producing a revolver from her
pocket, cocked it and laid it on the table by the bedside.

"Brrrrr!" said the prisoner. "We might be at the Ambigu!... Fourth act:
the Traitor's Doom. And the fair sex to do the deed.... The hand of the
Graces.... What an honour!... Mme. Dugrival, I rely on you not to
disfigure me."

"Hold your tongue, Lupin."

"Ah, so you know?... By Jove, how clever we are!"

"Hold your tongue, Lupin."

There was a solemn note in her voice that impressed the captive and
compelled him to silence. He watched his two gaolers in turns. The
bloated features and red complexion of Mme. Dugrival formed a striking
contrast with her nephew's refined face; but they both wore the same air
of implacable resolve.

The widow leant forward and said:

"Are you prepared to answer my questions?"

"Why not?"

"Then listen to me. How did you know that Dugrival carried all his money
in his pocket?"

"Servants' gossip...."

"A young man-servant whom we had in our employ: was that it?"

"Yes."

"And did you steal Dugrival's watch in order to give it back to him and
inspire him with confidence?"

"Yes."

She suppressed a movement of fury:

"You fool! You fool!... What! You rob my man, you drive him to kill
himself and, instead of making tracks to the uttermost ends of the earth
and hiding yourself, you go on playing Lupin in the heart of Paris!...
Did you forget that I swore, on my dead husband's head, to find his
murderer?"

"That's what staggers me," said Lupin. "How did you come to suspect me?"

"How? Why, you gave yourself away!"

"I did?..."

"Of course.... The fifty thousand francs...."

"Well, what about it? A present...."

"Yes, a present which you gave cabled instructions to have sent to me,
so as to make believe that you were in America on the day of the races.
A present, indeed! What humbug! The fact is, you didn't like to think of
the poor fellow whom you had murdered. So you restored the money to the
widow, publicly, of course, because you love playing to the gallery and
ranting and posing, like the mountebank that you are. That was all very
nicely thought out. Only, my fine fellow, you ought not to have sent me
the selfsame notes that were stolen from Dugrival! Yes, you silly fool,
the selfsame notes and no others! We knew the numbers, Dugrival and I
did. And you were stupid enough to send the bundle to me. Now do you
understand your folly?"

Lupin began to laugh:

"It was a pretty blunder, I confess. I'm not responsible; I gave
different orders. But, all the same I can't blame any one except
myself."

"Ah, so you admit it! You signed your theft and you signed your ruin at
the same time. There was nothing left to be done but to find you. Find
you? No, better than that. Sensible people don't find Lupin: they make
him come to them! That was a masterly notion. It belongs to my young
nephew, who loathes you as much as I do, if possible, and who knows you
thoroughly, through reading all the books that have been written about
you. He knows your prying nature, your need to be always plotting, your
mania for hunting in the dark and unravelling what others have failed to
unravel. He also knows that sort of sham kindness of yours, the
drivelling sentimentality that makes you shed crocodile tears over the
people you victimize; And he planned the whole farce! He invented the
story of the two burglars, the second theft of fifty thousand francs!
Oh, I swear to you, before Heaven, that the stab which I gave myself
with my own hands never hurt me! And I swear to you, before Heaven, that
we spent a glorious time waiting for you, the boy and I, peeping out at
your confederates who prowled under our windows, taking their bearings!
And there was no mistake about it: you were bound to come! Seeing that
you had restored the Widow Dugrival's fifty thousand francs, it was out
of the question that you should allow the Widow Dugrival to be robbed of
her fifty thousand francs! You were bound to come, attracted by the
scent of the mystery. You were bound to come, for swagger, out of
vanity! And you come!"

The widow gave a strident laugh:

"Well played, wasn't it? The Lupin of Lupins, the master of masters,
inaccessible and invisible, caught in a trap by a woman and a boy!...
Here he is in flesh and bone ... here he is with hands and feet tied, no
more dangerous than a sparrow ... here is he ... here he is!..."

She shook with joy and began to pace the room, throwing sidelong glances
at the bed, like a wild beast that does not for a moment take its eyes
from its victim. And never had Lupin beheld greater hatred and savagery
in any human being.

"Enough of this prattle," she said.

Suddenly restraining herself, she stalked back to him and, in a quite
different tone, in a hollow voice, laying stress on every syllable:

"Thanks to the papers in your pocket, Lupin, I have made good use of the
last twelve days. I know all your affairs, all your schemes, all your
assumed names, all the organization of your band, all the lodgings which
you possess in Paris and elsewhere. I have even visited one of them, the
most secret, the one where you hide your papers, your ledgers and the
whole story of your financial operations. The result of my
investigations is very satisfactory. Here are four cheques, taken from
four cheque-books and corresponding with four accounts which you keep at
four different banks under four different names. I have filled in each
of them for ten thousand francs. A larger figure would have been too
risky. And, now, sign."

"By Jove!" said Lupin, sarcastically. "This is blackmail, my worthy Mme.
Dugrival."

"That takes your breath away, what?"

"It takes my breath away, as you say."

"And you find an adversary who is a match for you?"

"The adversary is far beyond me. So the trap--let us call it
infernal--the infernal trap into which I have fallen was laid not merely
by a widow thirsting for revenge, but also by a first-rate business
woman anxious to increase her capital?"

"Just so."

"My congratulations. And, while I think of it, used M. Dugrival perhaps
to ...?"

"You have hit it, Lupin. After all, why conceal the fact? It will
relieve your conscience. Yes, Lupin, Dugrival used to work on the same
lines as yourself. Oh, not on the same scale!... We were modest people:
a louis here, a louis there ... a purse or two which we trained Gabriel
to pick up at the races.... And, in this way, we had made our little
pile ... just enough to buy a small place in the country."

"I prefer it that way," said Lupin.

"That's all right! I'm only telling you, so that you may know that I am
not a beginner and that you have nothing to hope for. A rescue? No. The
room in which we now are communicates with my bedroom. It has a private
outlet of which nobody knows. It was Dugrival's special apartment. He
used to see his friends here. He kept his implements and tools here, his
disguises ... his telephone even, as you perceive. So there's no hope,
you see. Your accomplices have given up looking for you here. I have
sent them off on another track. Your goose is cooked. Do you begin to
realize the position?"

"Yes."

"Then sign the cheques."

"And, when I have signed them, shall I be free?"

"I must cash them first."

"And after that?"

"After that, on my soul, as I hope to be saved, you will be free."

"I don't trust you."

"Have you any choice?"

"That's true. Hand me the cheques."

She unfastened Lupin's right hand, gave him a pen and said:

"Don't forget that the four cheques require four different signatures
and that the handwriting has to be altered in each case."

"Never fear."

He signed the cheques.

"Gabriel," said the widow, "it is ten o'clock. If I am not back by
twelve, it will mean that this scoundrel has played me one of his
tricks. At twelve o'clock, blow out his brains. I am leaving you the
revolver with which your uncle shot himself. There are five bullets left
out of the six. That will be ample."

She left the room, humming a tune as she went.

Lupin mumbled:

"I wouldn't give twopence for my life."

He shut his eyes for an instant and then, suddenly, said to Gabriel:

"How much?"

And, when the other did not appear to understand, he grew irritated:

"I mean what I say. How much? Answer me, can't you? We drive the same
trade, you and I. I steal, thou stealest, we steal. So we ought to come
to terms: that's what we are here for. Well? Is it a bargain? Shall we
clear out together. I will give you a post in my gang, an easy,
well-paid post. How much do you want for yourself? Ten thousand? Twenty
thousand? Fix your own price; don't be shy. There's plenty to be had for
the asking."

An angry shiver passed through his frame as he saw the impassive face of
his keeper:

"Oh, the beggar won't even answer! Why, you can't have been so fond of
old Dugrival as all that! Listen to me: if you consent to release
me...."

But he interrupted himself. The young man's eyes wore the cruel
expression which he knew so well. What was the use of trying to move
him?

"Hang it all!" he snarled. "I'm not going to croak here, like a dog! Oh,
if I could only...."

Stiffening all his muscles, he tried to burst his bonds, making a
violent effort that drew a cry of pain from him; and he fell back upon
his bed, exhausted.

"Well, well," he muttered, after a moment, "it's as the widow said: my
goose is cooked. Nothing to be done. _De profundis_, Lupin."

A quarter of an hour passed, half an hour....

Gabriel, moving closer to Lupin, saw that his eyes were shut and that
his breath came evenly, like that of a man sleeping. But Lupin said:

"Don't imagine that I'm asleep, youngster. No, people don't sleep at a
moment like this. Only I am consoling myself. Needs must, eh?... And
then I am thinking of what is to come after.... Exactly. I have a little
theory of my own about that. You wouldn't think it, to look at me, but I
believe in metempsychosis, in the transmigration of souls. It would take
too long to explain, however.... I say, boy ... suppose we shook hands
before we part? You won't? Then good-bye. Good health and a long life to
you, Gabriel!..."

He closed his eyelids and did not stir again before Mme. Dugrival's
return.

The widow entered with a lively step, at a few minutes before twelve.
She seemed greatly excited:

"I have the money," she said to her nephew. "Run away. I'll join you in
the motor down below."

"But...."

"I don't want your help to finish him off. I can do that alone. Still,
if you feel like seeing the sort of a face a rogue can pull.... Pass me
the weapon."

Gabriel handed her the revolver and the widow continued:

"Have you burnt our papers?"

"Yes."

"Then to work. And, as soon as he's done for, be off. The shots may
bring the neighbours. They must find both the flats empty."

She went up to the bed:

"Are you ready, Lupin?"

"Ready's not the word: I'm burning with impatience."

"Have you any request to make of me?"

"None."

"Then...."

"One word, though."

"What is it?"

"If I meet Dugrival in the next world, what message am I to give him
from you?"

She shrugged her shoulders and put the barrel of the revolver to Lupin's
temple.

"That's it," he said, "and be sure your hand doesn't shake, my dear
lady. It won't hurt you, I swear. Are you ready? At the word of command,
eh? One ... two ... three...."

The widow pulled the trigger. A shot rang out.

"Is this death?" said Lupin. "That's funny! I should have thought it was
something much more different from life!"

There was a second shot. Gabriel snatched the weapon from his aunt's
hands and examined it:

"Ah," he exclaimed, "the bullets have been removed!... There are only
the percussion-caps left!..."

His aunt and he stood motionless, for a moment, and confused:

"Impossible!" she blurted out. "Who could have done it?... An
inspector?... The examining-magistrate?..."

She stopped and, in a low voice:

"Hark.... I hear a noise...."

They listened and the widow went into the hall. She returned, furious,
exasperated by her failure and by the scare which she had received:

"There's nobody there.... It must have been the neighbours going out....
We have plenty of time.... Ah, Lupin, you were beginning to make
merry!... The knife, Gabriel."

"It's in my room."

"Go and fetch it."

Gabriel hurried away. The widow stamped with rage:

"I've sworn to do it!... You've got to suffer, my fine fellow!... I
swore to Dugrival that I would do it and I have repeated my oath every
morning and evening since.... I have taken it on my knees, yes, on my
knees, before Heaven that listens to me! It's my duty and my right to
revenge my dead husband!... By the way, Lupin, you don't look quite as
merry as you did!... Lord, one would almost think you were afraid!...
He's afraid! He's afraid! I can see it in his eyes!... Come along,
Gabriel, my boy!... Look at his eyes!... Look at his lips!... He's
trembling!... Give me the knife, so that I may dig it into his heart
while he's shivering.... Oh, you coward!... Quick, quick, Gabriel, the
knife!..."

"I can't find it anywhere," said the young man, running back in dismay.
"It has gone from my room! I can't make it out!"

"Never mind!" cried the Widow Dugrival, half demented. "All the better!
I will do the business myself."

She seized Lupin by the throat, clutched him with her ten fingers,
digging her nails into his flesh, and began to squeeze with all her
might. Lupin uttered a hoarse rattle and gave himself up for lost.

Suddenly, there was a crash at the window. One of the panes was smashed
to pieces.

"What's that? What is it?" stammered the widow, drawing herself erect,
in alarm.

Gabriel, who had turned even paler than usual, murmured:

"I don't know.... I can't think...."

"Who can have done it?" said the widow.

She dared not move, waiting for what would come next. And one thing
above all terrified her, the fact that there was no missile on the floor
around them, although the pane of glass, as was clearly visible, had
given way before the crash of a heavy and fairly large object, a stone,
probably.

After a while, she looked under the bed, under the chest of drawers:

"Nothing," she said.

"No," said her nephew, who was also looking. And, resuming her seat, she
said:

"I feel frightened ... my arms fail me ... you finish him off...."

Gabriel confessed:

"I'm frightened also."

"Still ... still," she stammered, "it's got to be done.... I swore
it...."

Making one last effort, she returned to Lupin and gasped his neck with
her stiff fingers. But Lupin, who was watching her pallid face, received
a very clear sensation that she would not have the courage to kill him.
To her he was becoming something sacred, invulnerable. A mysterious
power was protecting him against every attack, a power which had already
saved him three times by inexplicable means and which would find other
means to protect him against the wiles of death.

She said to him, in a hoarse voice:

"How you must be laughing at me!"

"Not at all, upon my word. I should feel frightened myself, in your
place."

"Nonsense, you scum of the earth! You imagine that you will be rescued
... that your friends are waiting outside? It's out of the question, my
fine fellow."

"I know. It's not they defending me ... nobody's defending me...."

"Well, then?..."

"Well, all the same, there's something strange at the bottom of it,
something fantastic and miraculous that makes your flesh creep, my fine
lady."

"You villain!... You'll be laughing on the other side of your mouth
before long."

"I doubt it."

"You wait and see."

She reflected once more and said to her nephew:

"What would you do?"

"Fasten his arm again and let's be off," he replied.

A hideous suggestion! It meant condemning Lupin to the most horrible of
all deaths, death by starvation.

"No," said the widow. "He might still find a means of escape. I know
something better than that."

She took down the receiver of the telephone, waited and asked:

"Number 82248, please."

And, after a second or two:

"Hullo!... Is that the Criminal Investigation Department?... Is
Chief-inspector Ganimard there?... In twenty minutes, you say?... I'm
sorry!... However!... When he comes, give him this message from Mme.
Dugrival.... Yes, Mme. Nicolas Dugrival.... Ask him to come to my flat.
Tell him to open the looking-glass door of my wardrobe; and, when he has
done so, he will see that the wardrobe hides an outlet which makes my
bedroom communicate with two other rooms. In one of these, he will find
a man bound hand and foot. It is the thief, Dugrival's murderer.... You
don't believe me?... Tell M. Ganimard; he'll believe me right enough....
Oh, I was almost forgetting to give you the man's name: Arsene Lupin!"

And, without another word, she replaced the receiver.

"There, Lupin, that's done. After all, I would just as soon have my
revenge this way. How I shall hold my sides when I read the reports of
the Lupin trial!... Are you coming, Gabriel?"

"Yes, aunt."

"Good-bye, Lupin. You and I sha'n't see each other again, I expect, for
we are going abroad. But I promise to send you some sweets while you're
in prison."

"Chocolates, mother! We'll eat them together!"

"Good-bye."

"_Au revoir._"

The widow went out with her nephew, leaving Lupin fastened down to the
bed.

He at once moved his free arm and tried to release himself; but he
realized, at the first attempt, that he would never have the strength to
break the wire strands that bound him. Exhausted with fever and pain,
what could he do in the twenty minutes or so that were left to him
before Ganimard's arrival?

Nor did he count upon his friends. True, he had been thrice saved from
death; but this was evidently due to an astounding series of accidents
and not to any interference on the part of his allies. Otherwise they
would not have contented themselves with these extraordinary
manifestations, but would have rescued him for good and all.

No, he must abandon all hope. Ganimard was coming. Ganimard would find
him there. It was inevitable. There was no getting away from the fact.

And the prospect of what was coming irritated him singularly. He already
heard his old enemy's gibes ringing in his ears. He foresaw the roars of
laughter with which the incredible news would be greeted on the morrow.
To be arrested in action, so to speak, on the battlefield, by an
imposing detachment of adversaries, was one thing: but to be arrested,
or rather picked up, scraped up, gathered up, in such condition, was
really too silly. And Lupin, who had so often scoffed at others, felt
all the ridicule that was falling to his share in this ending of the
Dugrival business, all the bathos of allowing himself to be caught in
the widow's infernal trap and finally of being "served up" to the police
like a dish of game, roasted to a turn and nicely seasoned.

"Blow the widow!" he growled. "I had rather she had cut my throat and
done with it."

He pricked up his ears. Some one was moving in the next room. Ganimard!
No. Great as his eagerness would be, he could not be there yet. Besides,
Ganimard would not have acted like that, would not have opened the door
as gently as that other person was doing. What other person? Lupin
remembered the three miraculous interventions to which he owed his life.
Was it possible that there was really somebody who had protected him
against the widow, and that that somebody was now attempting to rescue
him? But, if so, who?

Unseen by Lupin, the stranger stooped behind the bed. Lupin heard the
sound of the pliers attacking the wire strands and releasing him little
by little. First his chest was freed, then his arms, then his legs.

And a voice said to him:

"You must get up and dress."

Feeling very weak, he half-raised himself in bed at the moment when the
stranger rose from her stooping posture.

"Who are you?" he whispered. "Who are you?"

And a great surprise over came him.

By his side stood a woman, a woman dressed in black, with a lace shawl
over her head, covering part of her face. And the woman, as far as he
could judge, was young and of a graceful and slender stature.

"Who are you?" he repeated.

"You must come now," said the woman. "There's no time to lose."

"Can I?" asked Lupin, making a desperate effort. "I doubt if I have the
strength."

"Drink this."

She poured some milk into a cup; and, as she handed it to him, her lace
opened, leaving the face uncovered.

"You!" he stammered. "It's you!... It's you who ... it was you who
were...."

He stared in amazement at this woman whose features presented so
striking a resemblance to Gabriel's, whose delicate, regular face had
the same pallor, whose mouth wore the same hard and forbidding
expression. No sister could have borne so great a likeness to her
brother. There was not a doubt possible: it was the identical person.
And, without believing for a moment that Gabriel had concealed himself
in a woman's clothes, Lupin, on the contrary, received the distinct
impression that it was a woman standing beside him and that the
stripling who had pursued him with his hatred and struck him with the
dagger was in very deed a woman. In order to follow their trade with
greater ease, the Dugrival pair had accustomed her to disguise herself
as a boy.

"You ... you ...!" he repeated. "Who would have suspected ...?"

She emptied the contents of a phial into the cup:

"Drink this cordial," she said.

He hesitated, thinking of poison.

She added:

"It was I who saved you."

"Of course, of course," he said. "It was you who removed the bullets
from the revolver?"

"Yes."

"And you who hid the knife?"

"Here it is, in my pocket."

"And you who smashed the window-pane while your aunt was throttling me?"

"Yes, it was I, with the paper-weight on the table: I threw it into the
street."

"But why? Why?" he asked, in utter amazement.

"Drink the cordial."

"Didn't you want me to die? But then why did you stab me to begin with?"

"Drink the cordial."

He emptied the cup at a draught, without quite knowing the reason of his
sudden confidence.

"Dress yourself ... quickly," she commanded, retiring to the window.

He obeyed and she came back to him, for he had dropped into a chair,
exhausted.

"We must go now, we must, we have only just time.... Collect your
strength."

She bent forward a little, so that he might lean on her shoulder, and
turned toward the door and the staircase.

And Lupin walked as one walks in a dream, one of those queer dreams in
which the most inconsequent things occur, a dream that was the happy
sequel of the terrible nightmare in which he had lived for the past
fortnight.

A thought struck him, however. He began to laugh:

"Poor Ganimard! Upon my word, the fellow has no luck, I would give
twopence to see him coming to arrest me."

After descending the staircase with the aid of his companion, who
supported him with incredible vigour, he found himself in the street,
opposite a motor-car into which she helped him to mount.

"Right away," she said to the driver.

Lupin, dazed by the open air and the speed at which they were
travelling, hardly took stock of the drive and of the incidents on the
road. He recovered all his consciousness when he found himself at home
in one of the flats which he occupied, looked after by his servant, to
whom the girl gave a few rapid instructions.

"You can go," he said to the man.

But, when the girl turned to go as well, he held her back by a fold of
her dress.

"No ... no ... you must first explain.... Why did you save me? Did you
return unknown to your aunt? But why did you save me? Was it from pity?"

She did not answer. With her figure drawn up and her head flung back a
little, she retained her hard and impenetrable air. Nevertheless, he
thought he noticed that the lines of her mouth showed not so much
cruelty as bitterness. Her eyes, her beautiful dark eyes, revealed
melancholy. And Lupin, without as yet understanding, received a vague
intuition of what was passing within her. He seized her hand. She pushed
him away, with a start of revolt in which he felt hatred, almost
repulsion. And, when he insisted, she cried:

"Let me be, will you?... Let me be!... Can't you see that I detest you?"

They looked at each other for a moment, Lupin disconcerted, she
quivering and full of uneasiness, her pale face all flushed with
unwonted colour.

He said to her, gently:

"If you detested me, you should have let me die.... It was simple
enough.... Why didn't you?"

"Why?... Why?... How do I know?..."

Her face contracted. With a sudden movement, she hid it in her two
hands; and he saw tears trickle between her fingers.

Greatly touched, he thought of addressing her in fond words, such as one
would use to a little girl whom one wished to console, and of giving her
good advice and saving her, in his turn, and snatching her from the bad
life which she was leading, perhaps against her better nature.

But such words would have sounded ridiculous, coming from his lips, and
he did not know what to say, now that he understood the whole story and
was able to picture the young woman sitting beside his sick-bed,
nursing the man whom she had wounded, admiring his pluck and gaiety,
becoming attached to him, falling in love with him and thrice over,
probably in spite of herself, under a sort of instinctive impulse, amid
fits of spite and rage, saving him from death.

And all this was so strange, so unforeseen; Lupin was so much unmanned
by his astonishment, that, this time, he did not try to retain her when
she made for the door, backward, without taking her eyes from him.

She lowered her head, smiled for an instant and disappeared.

He rang the bell, quickly:

"Follow that woman," he said to his man. "Or no, stay where you are....
After all, it is better so...."

He sat brooding for a while, possessed by the girl's image. Then he
revolved in his mind all that curious, stirring and tragic adventure, in
which he had been so very near succumbing; and, taking a hand-glass from
the table, he gazed for a long time and with a certain self-complacency
at his features, which illness and pain had not succeeded in impairing
to any great extent:

"Good looks count for something, after all!" he muttered.




V

THE RED SILK SCARF


On leaving his house one morning, at his usual early hour for going to
the Law Courts, Chief-inspector Ganimard noticed the curious behaviour
of an individual who was walking along the Rue Pergolese in front of
him. Shabbily dressed and wearing a straw hat, though the day was the
first of December, the man stooped at every thirty or forty yards to
fasten his boot-lace, or pick up his stick, or for some other reason.
And, each time, he took a little piece of orange-peel from his pocket
and laid it stealthily on the kerb of the pavement. It was probably a
mere display of eccentricity, a childish amusement to which no one else
would have paid attention; but Ganimard was one of those shrewd
observers who are indifferent to nothing that strikes their eyes and who
are never satisfied until they know the secret cause of things. He
therefore began to follow the man.

Now, at the moment when the fellow was turning to the right, into the
Avenue de la Grande-Armee, the inspector caught him exchanging signals
with a boy of twelve or thirteen, who was walking along the houses on
the left-hand side. Twenty yards farther, the man stooped and turned up
the bottom of his trousers legs. A bit of orange-peel marked the place.
At the same moment, the boy stopped and, with a piece of chalk, drew a
white cross, surrounded by a circle, on the wall of the house next to
him.

The two continued on their way. A minute later, a fresh halt. The
strange individual picked up a pin and dropped a piece of orange-peel;
and the boy at once made a second cross on the wall and again drew a
white circle round it.

"By Jove!" thought the chief-inspector, with a grunt of satisfaction.
"This is rather promising.... What on earth can those two merchants be
plotting?"

The two "merchants" went down the Avenue Friedland and the Rue du
Faubourg-Saint-Honore, but nothing occurred that was worthy of special
mention. The double performance was repeated at almost regular intervals
and, so to speak, mechanically. Nevertheless, it was obvious, on the one
hand, that the man with the orange-peel did not do his part of the
business until after he had picked out with a glance the house that was
to be marked and, on the other hand, that the boy did not mark that
particular house until after he had observed his companion's signal. It
was certain, therefore, that there was an agreement between the two; and
the proceedings presented no small interest in the chief-inspector's
eyes.

At the Place Beauveau the man hesitated. Then, apparently making up his
mind, he twice turned up and twice turned down the bottom of his
trousers legs. Hereupon, the boy sat down on the kerb, opposite the
sentry who was mounting guard outside the Ministry of the Interior, and
marked the flagstone with two little crosses contained within two
circles. The same ceremony was gone through a little further on, when
they reached the Elysee. Only, on the pavement where the President's
sentry was marching up and down, there were three signs instead of two.

"Hang it all!" muttered Ganimard, pale with excitement and thinking, in
spite of himself, of his inveterate enemy, Lupin, whose name came to his
mind whenever a mysterious circumstance presented itself. "Hang it all,
what does it mean?"

He was nearly collaring and questioning the two "merchants." But he was
too clever to commit so gross a blunder. The man with the orange-peel
had now lit a cigarette; and the boy, also placing a cigarette-end
between his lips, had gone up to him, apparently with the object of
asking for a light.

They exchanged a few words. Quick as thought, the boy handed his
companion an object which looked--at least, so the inspector
believed--like a revolver. They both bent over this object; and the man,
standing with his face to the wall, put his hand six times in his pocket
and made a movement as though he were loading a weapon.

As soon as this was done, they walked briskly to the Rue de Surene; and
the inspector, who followed them as closely as he was able to do without
attracting their attention, saw them enter the gateway of an old house
of which all the shutters were closed, with the exception of those on
the third or top floor.

He hurried in after them. At the end of the carriage-entrance he saw a
large courtyard, with a house-painter's sign at the back and a staircase
on the left.

He went up the stairs and, as soon as he reached the first floor, ran
still faster, because he heard, right up at the top, a din as of a
free-fight.

When he came to the last landing he found the door open. He entered,
listened for a second, caught the sound of a struggle, rushed to the
room from which the sound appeared to proceed and remained standing on
the threshold, very much out of breath and greatly surprised to see
the man of the orange-peel and the boy banging the floor with chairs.

At that moment a third person walked out of an adjoining room. It was a
young man of twenty-eight or thirty, wearing a pair of short whiskers in
addition to his moustache, spectacles, and a smoking-jacket with an
astrakhan collar and looking like a foreigner, a Russian.

"Good morning, Ganimard," he said. And turning to the two companions,
"Thank you, my friends, and all my congratulations on the successful
result. Here's the reward I promised you."

He gave them a hundred-franc note, pushed them outside and shut both
doors.

"I am sorry, old chap," he said to Ganimard. "I wanted to talk to you
... wanted to talk to you badly."

He offered him his hand and, seeing that the inspector remained
flabbergasted and that his face was still distorted with anger, he
exclaimed:

"Why, you don't seem to understand!... And yet it's clear enough.... I
wanted to see you particularly.... So what could I do?" And, pretending
to reply to an objection, "No, no, old chap," he continued. "You're
quite wrong. If I had written or telephoned, you would not have come
... or else you would have come with a regiment. Now I wanted to see you
all alone; and I thought the best thing was to send those two decent
fellows to meet you, with orders to scatter bits of orange-peel and draw
crosses and circles, in short, to mark out your road to this place....
Why, you look quite bewildered! What is it? Perhaps you don't recognize
me? Lupin.... Arsene Lupin.... Ransack your memory.... Doesn't the name
remind you of anything?"

"You dirty scoundrel!" Ganimard snarled between his teeth.

Lupin seemed greatly distressed and, in an affectionate voice:

"Are you vexed? Yes, I can see it in your eyes.... The Dugrival
business, I suppose? I ought to have waited for you to come and take me
in charge?... There now, the thought never occurred to me! I promise
you, next time...."

"You scum of the earth!" growled Ganimard.

"And I thinking I was giving you a treat! Upon my word, I did. I said to
myself, 'That dear old Ganimard! We haven't met for an age. He'll simply
rush at me when he sees me!'"

Ganimard, who had not yet stirred a limb, seemed to be waking from his
stupor. He looked around him, looked at Lupin, visibly asked himself
whether he would not do well to rush at him in reality and then,
controlling himself, took hold of a chair and settled himself in it, as
though he had suddenly made up his mind to listen to his enemy:

"Speak," he said. "And don't waste my time with any nonsense. I'm in a
hurry."

"That's it," said Lupin, "let's talk. You can't imagine a quieter place
than this. It's an old manor-house, which once stood in the open
country, and it belongs to the Duc de Rochelaure. The duke, who has
never lived in it, lets this floor to me and the outhouses to a painter
and decorator. I always keep up a few establishments of this kind: it's
a sound, practical plan. Here, in spite of my looking like a Russian
nobleman, I am M. Daubreuil, an ex-cabinet-minister.... You understand,
I had to select a rather overstocked profession, so as not to attract
attention...."

"Do you think I care a hang about all this?" said Ganimard, interrupting
him.

"Quite right, I'm wasting words and you're in a hurry. Forgive me. I
sha'n't be long now.... Five minutes, that's all.... I'll start at
once.... Have a cigar? No? Very well, no more will I."

He sat down also, drummed his fingers on the table, while thinking, and
began in this fashion:

"On the 17th of October, 1599, on a warm and sunny autumn day ... Do
you follow me?... But, now that I come to think of it, is it really
necessary to go back to the reign of Henry IV, and tell you all about
the building of the Pont-Neuf? No, I don't suppose you are very well up
in French history; and I should only end by muddling you. Suffice it,
then, for you to know that, last night, at one o'clock in the morning, a
boatman passing under the last arch of the Pont-Neuf aforesaid, along
the left bank of the river, heard something drop into the front part of
his barge. The thing had been flung from the bridge and its evident
destination was the bottom of the Seine. The bargee's dog rushed
forward, barking, and, when the man reached the end of his craft, he saw
the animal worrying a piece of newspaper that had served to wrap up a
number of objects. He took from the dog such of the contents as had not
fallen into the water, went to his cabin and examined them carefully.
The result struck him as interesting; and, as the man is connected with
one of my friends, he sent to let me know. This morning I was waked up
and placed in possession of the facts and of the objects which the man
had collected. Here they are."

He pointed to them, spread out on a table. There were, first of all, the
torn pieces of a newspaper. Next came a large cut-glass inkstand, with a
long piece of string fastened to the lid. There was a bit of broken
glass and a sort of flexible cardboard, reduced to shreds. Lastly, there
was a piece of bright scarlet silk, ending in a tassel of the same
material and colour.

"You see our exhibits, friend of my youth," said Lupin. "No doubt, the
problem would be more easily solved if we had the other objects which
went overboard owing to the stupidity of the dog. But it seems to me,
all the same, that we ought to be able to manage, with a little
reflection and intelligence. And those are just your great qualities.
How does the business strike you?"

Ganimard did not move a muscle. He was willing to stand Lupin's chaff,
but his dignity commanded him not to speak a single word in answer nor
even to give a nod or shake of the head that might have been taken to
express approval or or criticism.

"I see that we are entirely of one mind," continued Lupin, without
appearing to remark the chief-inspector's silence. "And I can sum up the
matter briefly, as told us by these exhibits. Yesterday evening, between
nine and twelve o'clock, a showily dressed young woman was wounded with
a knife and then caught round the throat and choked to death by a
well-dressed gentleman, wearing a single eyeglass and interested in
racing, with whom the aforesaid showily dressed young lady had been
eating three meringues and a coffee eclair."

Lupin lit a cigarette and, taking Ganimard by the sleeve:

"Aha, that's up against you, chief-inspector! You thought that, in the
domain of police deductions, such feats as those were prohibited to
outsiders! Wrong, sir! Lupin juggles with inferences and deductions for
all the world like a detective in a novel. My proofs are dazzling and
absolutely simple."

And, pointing to the objects one by one, as he demonstrated his
statement, he resumed:

"I said, after nine o'clock yesterday evening. This scrap of newspaper
bears yesterday's date, with the words, 'Evening edition.' Also, you
will see here, pasted to the paper, a bit of one of those yellow
wrappers in which the subscribers' copies are sent out. These copies are
always delivered by the nine o'clock post. Therefore, it was after nine
o'clock. I said, a well-dressed man. Please observe that this tiny piece
of glass has the round hole of a single eyeglass at one of the edges and
that the single eyeglass is an essentially aristocratic article of wear.
This well-dressed man walked into a pastry-cook's shop. Here is the very
thin cardboard, shaped like a box, and still showing a little of the
cream of the meringues and eclairs which were packed in it in the usual
way. Having got his parcel, the gentleman with the eyeglass joined a
young person whose eccentricity in the matter of dress is pretty clearly
indicated by this bright-red silk scarf. Having joined her, for some
reason as yet unknown he first stabbed her with a knife and then
strangled her with the help of this same scarf. Take your magnifying
glass, chief-inspector, and you will see, on the silk, stains of a
darker red which are, here, the marks of a knife wiped on the scarf and,
there, the marks of a hand, covered with blood, clutching the material.
Having committed the murder, his next business is to leave no trace
behind him. So he takes from his pocket, first, the newspaper to which
he subscribes--a racing-paper, as you will see by glancing at the
contents of this scrap; and you will have no difficulty in discovering
the title--and, secondly, a cord, which, on inspection, turns out to be
a length of whip-cord. These two details prove--do they not?--that our
man is interested in racing and that he himself rides. Next, he picks up
the fragments of his eyeglass, the cord of which has been broken in the
struggle. He takes a pair of scissors--observe the hacking of the
scissors--and cuts off the stained part of the scarf, leaving the other
end, no doubt, in his victim's clenched hands. He makes a ball of the
confectioner's cardboard box. He also puts in certain things that would
have betrayed him, such as the knife, which must have slipped into the
Seine. He wraps everything in the newspaper, ties it with the cord and
fastens this cut-glass inkstand to it, as a make-weight. Then he makes
himself scarce. A little later, the parcel falls into the waterman's
barge. And there you are. Oof, it's hot work!... What do you say to the
story?"

He looked at Ganimard to see what impression his speech had produced on
the inspector. Ganimard did not depart from his attitude of silence.

Lupin began to laugh:

"As a matter of fact, you're annoyed and surprised. But you're
suspicious as well: 'Why should that confounded Lupin hand the business
over to me,' say you, 'instead of keeping it for himself, hunting down
the murderer and rifling his pockets, if there was a robbery?' The
question is quite logical, of course. But--there is a 'but'--I have no
time, you see. I am full up with work at the present moment: a burglary
in London, another at Lausanne, an exchange of children at Marseilles,
to say nothing of having to save a young girl who is at this moment
shadowed by death. That's always the way: it never rains but it pours.
So I said to myself, 'Suppose I handed the business over to my dear old
Ganimard? Now that it is half-solved for him, he is quite capable of
succeeding. And what a service I shall be doing him! How magnificently
he will be able to distinguish himself!' No sooner said than done. At
eight o'clock in the morning, I sent the joker with the orange-peel to
meet you. You swallowed the bait; and you were here by nine, all on edge
and eager for the fray."

Lupin rose from his chair. He went over to the inspector and, with his
eyes in Ganimard's, said:

"That's all. You now know the whole story. Presently, you will know the
victim: some ballet-dancer, probably, some singer at a music-hall. On
the other hand, the chances are that the criminal lives near the
Pont-Neuf, most likely on the left bank. Lastly, here are all the
exhibits. I make you a present of them. Set to work. I shall only keep
this end of the scarf. If ever you want to piece the scarf together,
bring me the other end, the one which the police will find round the
victim's neck. Bring it me in four weeks from now to the day, that is to
say, on the 29th of December, at ten o'clock in the morning. You can be
sure of finding me here. And don't be afraid: this is all perfectly
serious, friend of my youth; I swear it is. No humbug, honour bright.
You can go straight ahead. Oh, by the way, when you arrest the fellow
with the eyeglass, be a bit careful: he is left-handed! Good-bye, old
dear, and good luck to you!"

Lupin spun round on his heel, went to the door, opened it and
disappeared before Ganimard had even thought of taking a decision. The
inspector rushed after him, but at once found that the handle of the
door, by some trick of mechanism which he did not know, refused to turn.
It took him ten minutes to unscrew the lock and ten minutes more to
unscrew the lock of the hall-door. By the time that he had scrambled
down the three flights of stairs, Ganimard had given up all hope of
catching Arsene Lupin.

Besides, he was not thinking of it. Lupin inspired him with a queer,
complex feeling, made up of fear, hatred, involuntary admiration and
also the vague instinct that he, Ganimard, in spite of all his efforts,
in spite of the persistency of his endeavours, would never get the
better of this particular adversary. He pursued him from a sense of duty
and pride, but with the continual dread of being taken in by that
formidable hoaxer and scouted and fooled in the face of a public that
was always only too willing to laugh at the chief-inspector's mishaps.

This business of the red scarf, in particular, struck him as most
suspicious. It was interesting, certainly, in more ways than one, but
so very improbable! And Lupin's explanation, apparently so logical,
would never stand the test of a severe examination!

"No," said Ganimard, "this is all swank: a parcel of suppositions and
guesswork based upon nothing at all. I'm not to be caught with chaff."

       *       *       *       *       *

When he reached the headquarters of police, at 36 Quai des Orfevres, he
had quite made up his mind to treat the incident as though it had never
happened.

He went up to the Criminal Investigation Department. Here, one of his
fellow-inspectors said:

"Seen the chief?"

"No."

"He was asking for you just now."

"Oh, was he?"

"Yes, you had better go after him."

"Where?"

"To the Rue de Berne ... there was a murder there last night."

"Oh! Who's the victim?"

"I don't know exactly ... a music-hall singer, I believe."

Ganimard simply muttered:

"By Jove!"

Twenty minutes later he stepped out of the underground railway-station
and made for the Rue de Berne.

The victim, who was known in the theatrical world by her stage-name of
Jenny Saphir, occupied a small flat on the second floor of one of the
houses. A policeman took the chief-inspector upstairs and showed him the
way, through two sitting-rooms, to a bedroom, where he found the
magistrates in charge of the inquiry, together with the divisional
surgeon and M. Dudouis, the head of the detective-service.

Ganimard started at the first glance which he gave into the room. He
saw, lying on a sofa, the corpse of a young woman whose hands clutched a
strip of red silk! One of the shoulders, which appeared above the
low-cut bodice, bore the marks of two wounds surrounded with clotted
blood. The distorted and almost blackened features still bore an
expression of frenzied terror.

The divisional surgeon, who had just finished his examination, said:

"My first conclusions are very clear. The victim was twice stabbed with
a dagger and afterward strangled. The immediate cause of death was
asphyxia."

"By Jove!" thought Ganimard again, remembering Lupin's words and the
picture which he had drawn of the crime.

The examining-magistrate objected:

"But the neck shows no discoloration."

"She may have been strangled with a napkin or a handkerchief," said the
doctor.

"Most probably," said the chief detective, "with this silk scarf, which
the victim was wearing and a piece of which remains, as though she had
clung to it with her two hands to protect herself."

"But why does only that piece remain?" asked the magistrate. "What has
become of the other?"

"The other may have been stained with blood and carried off by the
murderer. You can plainly distinguish the hurried slashing of the
scissors."

"By Jove!" said Ganimard, between his teeth, for the third time. "That
brute of a Lupin saw everything without seeing a thing!"

"And what about the motive of the murder?" asked the magistrate. "The
locks have been forced, the cupboards turned upside down. Have you
anything to tell me, M. Dudouis?"

The chief of the detective-service replied:

"I can at least suggest a supposition, derived from the statements made
by the servant. The victim, who enjoyed a greater reputation on account
of her looks than through her talent as a singer, went to Russia, two
years ago, and brought back with her a magnificent sapphire, which she
appears to have received from some person of importance at the court.
Since then, she went by the name of Jenny Saphir and seems generally to
have been very proud of that present, although, for prudence sake, she
never wore it. I daresay that we shall not be far out if we presume the
theft of the sapphire to have been the cause of the crime."

"But did the maid know where the stone was?"

"No, nobody did. And the disorder of the room would tend to prove that
the murderer did not know either."

"We will question the maid," said the examining-magistrate.

M. Dudouis took the chief-inspector aside and said:

"You're looking very old-fashioned, Ganimard. What's the matter? Do you
suspect anything?"

"Nothing at all, chief."

"That's a pity. We could do with a bit of showy work in the department.
This is one of a number of crimes, all of the same class, of which we
have failed to discover the perpetrator. This time we want the criminal
... and quickly!"

"A difficult job, chief."

"It's got to be done. Listen to me, Ganimard. According to what the maid
says, Jenny Saphir led a very regular life. For a month past she was in
the habit of frequently receiving visits, on her return from the
music-hall, that is to say, at about half-past ten, from a man who would
stay until midnight or so. 'He's a society man,' Jenny Saphir used to
say, 'and he wants to marry me.' This society man took every precaution
to avoid being seen, such as turning up his coat-collar and lowering the
brim of his hat when he passed the porter's box. And Jenny Saphir always
made a point of sending away her maid, even before he came. This is the
man whom we have to find."

"Has he left no traces?"

"None at all. It is obvious that we have to deal with a very clever
scoundrel, who prepared his crime beforehand and committed it with every
possible chance of escaping unpunished. His arrest would be a great
feather in our cap. I rely on you, Ganimard."

"Ah, you rely on me, chief?" replied the inspector. "Well, we shall see
... we shall see.... I don't say no.... Only...."

He seemed in a very nervous condition, and his agitation struck M.
Dudouis.

"Only," continued Ganimard, "only I swear ... do you hear, chief? I
swear...."

"What do you swear?"

"Nothing.... We shall see, chief ... we shall see...."

Ganimard did not finish his sentence until he was outside, alone. And
he finished it aloud, stamping his foot, in a tone of the most violent
anger:

"Only, I swear to Heaven that the arrest shall be effected by my own
means, without my employing a single one of the clues with which that
villain has supplied me. Ah, no! Ah, no!..."

Railing against Lupin, furious at being mixed up in this business and
resolved, nevertheless, to get to the bottom of it, he wandered
aimlessly about the streets. His brain was seething with irritation; and
he tried to adjust his ideas a little and to discover, among the chaotic
facts, some trifling detail, unperceived by all, unsuspected by Lupin
himself, that might lead him to success.

He lunched hurriedly at a bar, resumed his stroll and suddenly stopped,
petrified, astounded and confused. He was walking under the gateway of
the very house in the Rue de Surene to which Lupin had enticed him a few
hours earlier! A force stronger than his own will was drawing him there
once more. The solution of the problem lay there. There and there alone
were all the elements of the truth. Do and say what he would, Lupin's
assertions were so precise, his calculations so accurate, that, worried
to the innermost recesses of his being by so prodigious a display of
perspicacity, he could not do other than take up the work at the point
where his enemy had left it.

Abandoning all further resistance, he climbed the three flights of
stairs. The door of the flat was open. No one had touched the exhibits.
He put them in his pocket and walked away.

From that moment, he reasoned and acted, so to speak, mechanically,
under the influence of the master whom he could not choose but obey.

Admitting that the unknown person whom he was seeking lived in the
neighbourhood of the Pont-Neuf, it became necessary to discover,
somewhere between that bridge and the Rue de Berne, the first-class
confectioner's shop, open in the evenings, at which the cakes were
bought. This did not take long to find. A pastry-cook near the Gare
Saint-Lazare showed him some little cardboard boxes, identical in
material and shape with the one in Ganimard's possession. Moreover, one
of the shop-girls remembered having served, on the previous evening, a
gentleman whose face was almost concealed in the collar of his fur coat,
but whose eyeglass she had happened to notice.

"That's one clue checked," thought the inspector. "Our man wears an
eyeglass."

He next collected the pieces of the racing-paper and showed them to a
newsvendor, who easily recognized the _Turf Illustre_. Ganimard at once
went to the offices of the _Turf_ and asked to see the list of
subscribers. Going through the list, he jotted down the names and
addresses of all those who lived anywhere near the Pont-Neuf and
principally--because Lupin had said so--those on the left bank of the
river.

He then went back to the Criminal Investigation Department, took half a
dozen men and packed them off with the necessary instructions.

At seven o'clock in the evening, the last of these men returned and
brought good news with him. A certain M. Prevailles, a subscriber to the
_Turf_, occupied an entresol flat on the Quai des Augustins. On the
previous evening, he left his place, wearing a fur coat, took his
letters and his paper, the _Turf Illustre_, from the porter's wife,
walked away and returned home at midnight. This M. Prevailles wore a
single eyeglass. He was a regular race-goer and himself owned several
hacks which he either rode himself or jobbed out.

The inquiry had taken so short a time and the results obtained were so
exactly in accordance with Lupin's predictions that Ganimard felt quite
overcome on hearing the detective's report. Once more he was measuring
the prodigious extent of the resources at Lupin's disposal. Never in the
course of his life--and Ganimard was already well-advanced in years--had
he come across such perspicacity, such a quick and far-seeing mind.

He went in search of M. Dudouis.

"Everything's ready, chief. Have you a warrant?"

"Eh?"

"I said, everything is ready for the arrest, chief."

"You know the name of Jenny Saphir's murderer?"

"Yes."

"But how? Explain yourself."

Ganimard had a sort of scruple of conscience, blushed a little and
nevertheless replied:

"An accident, chief. The murderer threw everything that was likely to
compromise him into the Seine. Part of the parcel was picked up and
handed to me."

"By whom?"

"A boatman who refused to give his name, for fear of getting into
trouble. But I had all the clues I wanted. It was not so difficult as I
expected."

And the inspector described how he had gone to work.

"And you call that an accident!" cried M. Dudouis. "And you say that it
was not difficult! Why, it's one of your finest performances! Finish it
yourself, Ganimard, and be prudent."

Ganimard was eager to get the business done. He went to the Quai des
Augustins with his men and distributed them around the house. He
questioned the portress, who said that her tenant took his meals out of
doors, but made a point of looking in after dinner.

A little before nine o'clock, in fact, leaning out of her window, she
warned Ganimard, who at once gave a low whistle. A gentleman in a tall
hat and a fur coat was coming along the pavement beside the Seine. He
crossed the road and walked up to the house.

Ganimard stepped forward:

"M. Prevailles, I believe?"

"Yes, but who are you?"

"I have a commission to...."

He had not time to finish his sentence. At the sight of the men
appearing out of the shadow, Prevailles quickly retreated to the wall
and faced his adversaries, with his back to the door of a shop on the
ground-floor, the shutters of which were closed.

"Stand back!" he cried. "I don't know you!"

His right hand brandished a heavy stick, while his left was slipped
behind him and seemed to be trying to open the door.

Ganimard had an impression that the man might escape through this way
and through some secret outlet:

"None of this nonsense," he said, moving closer to him. "You're
caught.... You had better come quietly."

But, just as he was laying hold of Prevailles' stick, Ganimard
remembered the warning which Lupin gave him: Prevailles was left-handed;
and it was his revolver for which he was feeling behind his back.

The inspector ducked his head. He had noticed the man's sudden movement.
Two reports rang out. No one was hit.

A second later, Prevailles received a blow under the chin from the
butt-end of a revolver, which brought him down where he stood. He was
entered at the Depot soon after nine o'clock.

       *       *       *       *       *

Ganimard enjoyed a great reputation even at that time. But this capture,
so quickly effected, by such very simple means, and at once made public
by the police, won him a sudden celebrity. Prevailles was forthwith
saddled with all the murders that had remained unpunished; and the
newspapers vied with one another in extolling Ganimard's prowess.

The case was conducted briskly at the start. It was first of all
ascertained that Prevailles, whose real name was Thomas Derocq, had
already been in trouble. Moreover, the search instituted in his rooms,
while not supplying any fresh proofs, at least led to the discovery of a
ball of whip-cord similar to the cord used for doing up the parcel and
also to the discovery of daggers which would have produced a wound
similar to the wounds on the victim.

But, on the eighth day, everything was changed. Until then Prevailles
had refused to reply to the questions put to him; but now, assisted by
his counsel, he pleaded a circumstantial alibi and maintained that he
was at the Folies-Bergere on the night of the murder.

As a matter of fact, the pockets of his dinner-jacket contained the
counterfoil of a stall-ticket and a programme of the performance, both
bearing the date of that evening.

"An alibi prepared in advance," objected the examining-magistrate.

"Prove it," said Prevailles.

The prisoner was confronted with the witnesses for the prosecution. The
young lady from the confectioner's "thought she knew" the gentleman with
the eyeglass. The hall-porter in the Rue de Berne "thought he knew" the
gentleman who used to come to see Jenny Saphir. But nobody dared to make
a more definite statement.

The examination, therefore, led to nothing of a precise character,
provided no solid basis whereon to found a serious accusation.

The judge sent for Ganimard and told him of his difficulty.

"I can't possibly persist, at this rate. There is no evidence to support
the charge."

"But surely you are convinced in your own mind, monsieur le juge
d'instruction! Prevailles would never have resisted his arrest unless he
was guilty."

"He says that he thought he was being assaulted. He also says that he
never set eyes on Jenny Saphir; and, as a matter of fact, we can find no
one to contradict his assertion. Then again, admitting that the sapphire
has been stolen, we have not been able to find it at his flat."

"Nor anywhere else," suggested Ganimard.

"Quite true, but that is no evidence against him. I'll tell you what we
shall want, M. Ganimard, and that very soon: the other end of this red
scarf."

"The other end?"

"Yes, for it is obvious that, if the murderer took it away with him, the
reason was that the stuff is stained with the marks of the blood on his
fingers."

Ganimard made no reply. For several days he had felt that the
whole business was tending to this conclusion. There was no
other proof possible. Given the silk scarf--and in no other
circumstances--Prevailles' guilt was certain. Now Ganimard's position
required that Prevailles' guilt should be established. He was
responsible for the arrest, it had cast a glamour around him, he had
been praised to the skies as the most formidable adversary of criminals;
and he would look absolutely ridiculous if Prevailles were released.

Unfortunately, the one and only indispensable proof was in Lupin's
pocket. How was he to get hold of it?

Ganimard cast about, exhausted himself with fresh investigations, went
over the inquiry from start to finish, spent sleepless nights in turning
over the mystery of the Rue de Berne, studied the records of Prevailles'
life, sent ten men hunting after the invisible sapphire. Everything was
useless.

On the 28th of December, the examining-magistrate stopped him in one of
the passages of the Law Courts:

"Well, M. Ganimard, any news?"

"No, monsieur le juge d'instruction."

"Then I shall dismiss the case."

"Wait one day longer."

"What's the use? We want the other end of the scarf; have you got it?"

"I shall have it to-morrow."

"To-morrow!"

"Yes, but please lend me the piece in your possession."

"What if I do?"

"If you do, I promise to let you have the whole scarf complete."

"Very well, that's understood."

Ganimard followed the examining-magistrate to his room and came out with
the piece of silk:

"Hang it all!" he growled. "Yes, I will go and fetch the proof and I
shall have it too ... always presuming that Master Lupin has the courage
to keep the appointment."

In point of fact, he did not doubt for a moment that Master Lupin would
have this courage, and that was just what exasperated him. Why had Lupin
insisted on this meeting? What was his object, in the circumstances?

Anxious, furious and full of hatred, he resolved to take every
precaution necessary not only to prevent his falling into a trap
himself, but to make his enemy fall into one, now that the opportunity
offered. And, on the next day, which was the 29th of December, the date
fixed by Lupin, after spending the night in studying the old manor-house
in the Rue de Surene and convincing himself that there was no other
outlet than the front door, he warned his men that he was going on a
dangerous expedition and arrived with them on the field of battle.

He posted them in a cafe and gave them formal instructions: if he showed
himself at one of the third-floor windows, or if he failed to return
within an hour, the detectives were to enter the house and arrest any
one who tried to leave it.

The chief-inspector made sure that his revolver was in working order and
that he could take it from his pocket easily. Then he went upstairs.

He was surprised to find things as he had left them, the doors open and
the locks broken. After ascertaining that the windows of the principal
room looked out on the street, he visited the three other rooms that
made up the flat. There was no one there.

"Master Lupin was afraid," he muttered, not without a certain
satisfaction.

"Don't be silly," said a voice behind him.

Turning round, he saw an old workman, wearing a house-painter's long
smock, standing in the doorway.

"You needn't bother your head," said the man. "It's I, Lupin. I have
been working in the painter's shop since early morning. This is when we
knock off for breakfast. So I came upstairs."

He looked at Ganimard with a quizzing smile and cried:

"'Pon my word, this is a gorgeous moment I owe you, old chap! I wouldn't
sell it for ten years of your life; and yet you know how I love you!
What do you think of it, artist? Wasn't it well thought out and well
foreseen? Foreseen from alpha to omega? Did I understand the business?
Did I penetrate the mystery of the scarf? I'm not saying that there were
no holes in my argument, no links missing in the chain.... But what a
masterpiece of intelligence! Ganimard, what a reconstruction of events!
What an intuition of everything that had taken place and of everything
that was going to take place, from the discovery of the crime to your
arrival here in search of a proof! What really marvellous divination!
Have you the scarf?"

"Yes, half of it. Have you the other?"

"Here it is. Let's compare."

They spread the two pieces of silk on the table. The cuts made by the
scissors corresponded exactly. Moreover, the colours were identical.

"But I presume," said Lupin, "that this was not the only thing you came
for. What you are interested in seeing is the marks of the blood. Come
with me, Ganimard: it's rather dark in here."

They moved into the next room, which, though it overlooked the
courtyard, was lighter; and Lupin held his piece of silk against the
window-pane:

"Look," he said, making room for Ganimard.

The inspector gave a start of delight. The marks of the five fingers and
the print of the palm were distinctly visible. The evidence was
undeniable. The murderer had seized the stuff in his bloodstained hand,
in the same hand that had stabbed Jenny Saphir, and tied the scarf round
her neck.

"And it is the print of a left hand," observed Lupin. "Hence my warning,
which had nothing miraculous about it, you see. For, though I admit,
friend of my youth, that you may look upon me as a superior
intelligence, I won't have you treat me as a wizard."

Ganimard had quickly pocketed the piece of silk. Lupin nodded his head
in approval:

"Quite right, old boy, it's for you. I'm so glad you're glad! And, you
see, there was no trap about all this ... only the wish to oblige ... a
service between friends, between pals.... And also, I confess, a little
curiosity.... Yes, I wanted to examine this other piece of silk, the one
the police had.... Don't be afraid: I'll give it back to you.... Just a
second...."

Lupin, with a careless movement, played with the tassel at the end of
this half of the scarf, while Ganimard listened to him in spite of
himself:

"How ingenious these little bits of women's work are! Did you notice one
detail in the maid's evidence? Jenny Saphir was very handy with her
needle and used to make all her own hats and frocks. It is obvious that
she made this scarf herself.... Besides, I noticed that from the first.
I am naturally curious, as I have already told you, and I made a
thorough examination of the piece of silk which you have just put in
your pocket. Inside the tassel, I found a little sacred medal, which the
poor girl had stitched into it to bring her luck. Touching, isn't it,
Ganimard? A little medal of Our Lady of Good Succour."

The inspector felt greatly puzzled and did not take his eyes off the
other. And Lupin continued:

"Then I said to myself, 'How interesting it would be to explore the
other half of the scarf, the one which the police will find round the
victim's neck!' For this other half, which I hold in my hands at last,
is finished off in the same way ... so I shall be able to see if it has
a hiding-place too and what's inside it.... But look, my friend, isn't
it cleverly made? And so simple! All you have to do is to take a skein
of red cord and braid it round a wooden cup, leaving a little recess, a
little empty space in the middle, very small, of course, but large
enough to hold a medal of a saint ... or anything.... A precious stone,
for instance.... Such as a sapphire...."

At that moment

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