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Title: The Exploits of Juve - Being the Second of the Series of the "Fantômas" Detective Tales
Author: Souvestre, Pierre, 1874-1914, Allain, Marcel, 1885-1969
Language: English
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THE EXPLOITS OF JUVE
Being the Second of the Series of the "Fantômas" Detective Tales
by
EMILE SOUVESTRE and MARCEL ALLAIN
New York
Brentano's
1917
Copyright, 1917, by Brentano's
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I. THE COMRADES' TRYST 1
II. ON THE TRACK 14
III. BEHIND THE CURTAIN 22
IV. A WOMAN'S CORPSE 33
V. LOUPART'S ANGER 42
VI. THE LÂRIBOISIÈRE HOSPITAL 50
VII. A REVOLVER SHOT 58
VIII. THE SEARCH FOR THE CRIMINAL 64
IX. IN THE REFRIGERATORY 70
X. THE BLOODY SIGNATURE 75
XI. THE SHOWER OF SAND 81
XII. FOLLOWING JOSEPHINE 90
XIII. ROBBERY; AMERICAN FASHION 99
XIV. FLIGHT THROUGH THE NIGHT 107
XV. THE SIMPLON EXPRESS DISASTER 113
XVI. A DRAMA AT THE BERCY WAREHOUSE 118
XVII. ON THE SLABS OF THE MORGUE 131
XVIII. FANTÔMAS' VICTIM 142
XIX. THE ENGLISHWOMAN OF BOULEVARD INKERMANN 147
XX. THE ARREST OF JOSEPHINE 153
XXI. AT THE MONTMARTRE FÊTE 165
XXII. THE PUGILIST'S WHIM 176
XXIII. "STATE'S EVIDENCE" 185
XXIV. A MYSTERIOUS CLASP 192
XXV. THE TRAP 204
XXVI. AT THE HOUSE OF BONARDIN, THE ACTOR 212
XXVII. THE MOTHER SUPERIOR 222
XXVIII. AN OLD PARALYTIC 230
XXIX. THROUGH THE WINDOW 238
XXX. UNCLE AND NEPHEW 245
XXXI. LOVERS AND ACCOMPLICES 256
XXXII. THE SILENT EXECUTIONER 268
XXXIII. A SCANDAL IN THE CLOISTER 280
XXXIV. FANTÔMAS' REVENGE 291
EXPLOITS OF JUVE
I
THE COMRADES' TRYST
"A bowl of claret, Father Korn."
The raucous voice of big Ernestine rose above the hubbub in the
smoke-begrimed tavern.
"Some claret, and let it be good," repeated the drab, a big, fair damsel
with puckered eyes and features worn by dissipation.
Father Korn had heard the first time, but he was in no hurry to comply
with the order.
He was a bald, whiskered giant, and at the moment was busily engaged in
swilling dirty glasses in a sink filled with tepid water.
This tavern, "The Comrades' Tryst," had two rooms, each with its
separate exit. Mme. Korn presided over the first in which food and drink
were served. By passing through the door at the far end, and crossing
the inner courtyard of the large seven-story building, the second "den"
was reached--a low and ill-lit room facing the Rue de la Charbonnière,
a street famed in the district for its bad reputation.
At a third summons, Father Korn, who had sized up the girl and the crowd
she was with, growled:
"It'll be two moons; hand over the stuff first."
Big Ernestine rose, and pushing her way to him, began a long argument.
When she stopped to draw a breath, Korn interposed:
"It's no use trying that game. I said two francs and two francs it is."
"All right, I won't argue with a brute like you," replied the girl.
"Everyone knows that you and Mother Korn are Germans, dirty Prussians."
The innkeeper smiled quietly and went on washing his glasses.
Big Ernestine glanced around the room. She knew the crowd and quickly
decided that the cash would not be forthcoming.
For a moment she thought of tackling old Mother Toulouche, ensconced in
the doorway with her display of portugals and snails, but dame
Toulouche, snuggled in her old shawl, was fast asleep.
Suddenly from a corner of the tavern, a weary voice cried with
authority:
"Go ahead, Korn, I'll stand treat."
It was the Sapper who had spoken.
A man of fifty who owed his nickname to the current report that he had
spent twenty years in Africa, both as a soldier and a convict.
While Ernestine and her friends hastened to his table, the Sapper's
companion, a heavily built man, rose carelessly and slouched off to join
another group, muttering:
"I'm too near the window here."
"It's Nonet," explained the Sapper to Ernestine. "He's home from New
Caledonia, and he doesn't care to show himself much just now."
The girl nodded, and pointing to one of her companions, became
confidential. "Look at poor Mimile, here. He's just out of quod and has
to start right off to do his service. Pretty tough."
The Sapper became very interested in the conversation. Meanwhile Nonet,
as he crossed the tap-room, had stopped a few moments before a pretty
girl who was evidently expecting some one.
"Waiting again for the Square, eh, Josephine?" Nonet inquired.
The girl, whose big blue eyes contrasted strikingly with her jet black
hair, replied:
"Why not? Loupart doesn't think of quitting me that I know of."
"Well, when he does let me know," Nonet suggested smilingly.
Josephine shrugged her shoulders contemptuously, and, glancing at the
clock above the bar, rose suddenly and left the tap-room.
She went rapidly down the Rue Charbonnière and along the boulevard, in
the direction of the Barbès Metropolitan Station. On reaching the level
of the Boulevard Magenta, she slackened and walked along the right-hand
pavement toward the centre of Paris.
"My little Jojo!"
The girl who, after leaving the tavern, had assumed a quiet and modest
air, now came face to face with a stout gentleman with a jovial face and
one gleaming eye, the other eye being permanently closed. He wore a
beard turning grey and his derby hat and light cane placed him as
belonging to the middle class.
"How late you are, my adored Jojo," he murmured tenderly. "That accursed
workshop been keeping you again after hours?"
The mistress of Loupart checked a smile.
"That's it!" she replied, "the workshop, M. Martialle."
The man addressed made a warning gesture.
"Don't mention my name here; I'm almost home." He pulled out his watch.
"Too bad; I'll have to go in or my wife will kick up a row. Let's see,
this is Tuesday; well, Saturday I'm off to Burgundy on my usual
half-monthly trip. Meet me at the Lyons station, platform No. 2,
Marseilles express. We won't be back till Monday. A delightful week-end
of love-making with my darling who at last consents.... What's that!"
The stout man broke off his impassioned harangue. A beggar, emerging
from the darkness, importuned him:
"Have pity on me, kind sir."
"Give him something," urged Josephine.
The middle-aged lover complied and tenderly drew away the pretty girl,
repeating carefully the details of the assignation:
"Lyons Station; a quarter past eight. The train leaves at twenty to
nine."
Then suddenly dropping Josephine's arm:
"Now, sweetheart, you'd better hurry home to your good mother, and
remember Saturday."
The outline of the portly personage faded into the night. Loupart's
mistress shrugged her shoulders, turned, and made her way back to the
"Tryst," where her place had been kept for her.
At the back of the tavern, the group which Nonet had joined were
discussing strange doings. "The Bear," head of the band of the Cyphers,
had just returned from the courthouse. He brought the latest news.
Riboneau had been given ten years, but was going to try for a reduced
sentence.
The talk suddenly dropped. A hubbub arose outside, a dull roar which
waxed louder and louder. The sound of hurrying footsteps mingled with
shrill cries and oaths. Doors in the street slammed. A few shots were
fired, followed by a pause, and then the stampede began again.
Father Korn, deserting his bar, warily planted himself at the entry to
his establishment, his hand on the latch of the door. He stood ready to
bar entrance to any who might try to press in.
"The raid," he warned in a low tone.
His customers, glad to feel themselves in safety, followed the
vicissitudes of what to them was almost a daily occurrence.
First came the frenzied rush of the "street walkers," deserted by their
sinister protectors and fleeing madly in search of shelter in terror of
the lock-up. Behind the shrieking herd the constables, in close ranks,
swept and cleared the street, leaving no corner, no court, no door that
remained ajar unsearched. Then the whirl swept away, the noise died
down, and the street resumed its normal aspect: drab, weird and
alarming.
Father Korn laughed. "All they've bagged is Bonzville!" he cried, and
the customers responded to his merriment. The police had been fooled
again. Bonzville was a harmless old tramp, who got himself "jugged"
every winter on purpose to lay up for repairs.
The passage of the "driver" had caused enough stir in the tap-room to
distract attention from the entry at the back of a stoutly built man
with a bestial face, known by the title of "The Cooper."
Swiftly he passed to the Beard's table, and, taking the latter aside,
began:
"The big job is fixed for the end of the week. On my way back from the
station I saw Josephine palavering with the swell customer...."
Suddenly the Beard stopped him short.
The general attention had become fixed on the street entrance to the
tap-room. The door had opened with a bang and Loupart, alias "The
Square," the popular lover of the pretty Josephine, came on the scene,
his eyes gleaming, his lips smiling under his upturned moustache.
Then there broke out cries of stupefaction. Loupart was between two
policemen, who had stopped short in the doorway.
The Square turned to them: "Thank you, gentlemen," he said in his most
urbane tone. "I am very grateful to you for having seen me this far. I
am quite safe now. Let me offer you a drink to the health of authority!"
However, the two policemen did not dare to enter the tavern, so they
briefly declined and made off. Josephine had risen, and Loupart, after
pressing a tender kiss upon her lips, turned to the company.
"That feazes you, eh! I was just heading this way when I ran into the
drive. As I'm a peaceful citizen, I got hold of two cops and begged them
to see me safely home. They thought I was really scared."
There was a burst of general laughter. No one could bluff the police
like the Square.
Loupart turned to Josephine: "How are things going, ducky?"
The girl repeated in a low tone to her lover her recent talk with M.
Martialle.
Loupart nodded approvingly, but grumbled when he found the meeting was
fixed for Saturday.
"Hang the fellow! Must hustle with all the jobs on hand this week.
Anyway, we won't let this one slip by. Plenty of shiners, eh,
Josephine?"
"You bet. He carries the stuff to his partners every fortnight."
"That's first rate, but in the meantime there's something doing
to-night. Here, kiddy, take a pen and scratch off a letter for me."
The Square dictated in a low voice:
"Sir, I am only a poor girl, but I've some feeling and honesty and I
hate to see wrong done around me. Believe me, you'd better keep an eye
open on some one pretty close to me. Maybe the police have already told
you I am the mistress of Loupart, alias the Square. I'm not denying it;
in fact, I'm proud of it. Well, I swear to you that this Loupart is
going to try a dirty game."
Josephine stopped writing.
"Look here, what are you at?"
"Scribble, and don't bother yourself. This doesn't concern you," replied
Loupart drily.
Josephine waited, docile and ready, but the Square's attention was now
focussed upon Ernestine, her young man and the generous Sapper.
"Yes," Ernestine was explaining to Mimile while the Sapper nodded
approvingly, "the Beard is, as you might say, the head of the band of
Cyphers, next to Loupart, of course. To belong to the Beard's gang
you've got to have done up at least one guy. Then you get your Number 1.
Your figure increases according to the number of deaders you have to
your credit."
"So then," inquired Mimile, with eager curiosity, "Riboneau, who has
just been sentenced, is called number 'seven' because ..."
"Because," added the Sapper in his serious voice, "because he has killed
off seven."
In a few curt questions the Square posted himself as to young Mimile,
who had impressed him favourably.
Josephine turned to Loupart: "What else am I to put in the letter? Why
are you stopping?"
For answer, the Square suddenly sprang to his feet, seized a half-empty
bottle and flung it on the floor, where it broke. This act of violence
sent the company scattering, and Loupart roared out:
"It's on account of spies that I'm stopping! By God! When are we going
to see their finish? And besides," he added, staring hard at Ernestine,
"I've had enough of all this nonsense; better clear out of here or
there'll be trouble."
Cunningly, with bloodshot eyes, her fists clenched in fury, but humbly
submissive, the girl made ready to comply. She knew the Square was
master, and there was no use standing out against his will.
The Sapper himself, growling, picked up his change, little disposed to
have a row, and beckoning to his comrade, Nonet, effected a humble exit
under cover of the girl Ernestine.
Loupart's arm fell upon the shoulder of Mimile, who alone seemed to defy
Josephine's formidable lover.
"Hold on, young 'un," ordered Loupart. "You seem to have some nerve;
better join us."
Mimile's eyes lighted up with joy.
"Oh!" he stammered, "Loupart, you'll take me in the Cypher gang?"
"Maybe," was the enigmatic reply. Then with a shove he sent the young
man to the back of the den. "Must go and talk it over with the Beard."
Without paying heed to the thanks of his new recruit, Loupart continued
his dictation to Josephine.
As the Sapper and Nonet went quickly down the Rue Charbonnière, Nonet
inquired:
"Well, chief, what do you think of our evening?"
The individual that the hooligans of La Chapelle knew by the nickname of
the Sapper, and who was no other than Inspector Michel, slowly stroked
his long beard:
"Not much," he declared, "except that we've been bluffed by the Square."
"Why not round up the bunch?" suggested Nonet, who was known as
Inspector Léon.
"It's easy enough to talk, but what can two do against twenty? Who wants
to take such risks for sixty dollars a month?"
In the meantime Josephine was writing at the Square's dictation:
"I know, sir, that to-morrow Loupart will be at Garnet's wine-shop
at seven o'clock, which you know is to the right as you go up the
Faubourg Montmartre, before you reach the Rue Lamartine. From there
he will go to Doctor Chaleck's to tackle the safe, which is placed,
as I told you, at the far side of the study, facing the window,
with its balcony overlooking the garden. I wouldn't have meddled in
the matter except that there'll be something worse regarding a
woman. I can't tell you any more, for this is all I know. Make the
best of it, and for God's sake never let Loupart know the letter
was sent to you by the undersigned.
"Very respectfully,"
About to sign her name, Josephine looked up, trembling and anxious.
"What does it mean, Loupart? You've been drinking, I'm sure you have!"
"Sign, I tell you," calmly replied the Square, and the girl, hypnotised,
proceeded to trace in her large clumsy hand, her name, "Josephine
Ramot."
"Now put it in an envelope."
From the end of the saloon the Beard was signalling Loupart.
"What is it?" the latter cried, annoyed at the interruption.
The Beard came near and whispered:
"Important business. The dock man's scheme is going well--it'll be for
the end of the week, Saturday at latest."
"In four days, then?"
"In four days."
"All right," declared Josephine's lover, "we'll be on hand. It'll be a
big haul, I hear."
"Fifty thousand at least, the Cooper told me."
Loupart nodded, waved the Beard aside and resumed:
"Address it to
"Monsieur Juve,
"Commissioner of Safety,
"At the Prefecture, Paris."
II
ON THE TRACK
The daily paper, _The Capital_, was about to go to press. The editors
had handed over the last slips of copy with the latest news.
"Well, Fandor," asked the Secretary, "nothing more for me?"
"No, nothing."
"You won't spring a 'latest' on me?"
"Not unless the President of the Republic should be assassinated."
"Right enough. But don't joke. Lord, there's something else to be done
just now."
The "setter up" appeared in the editor's rooms:
"I want sharp type for 'one,' and eight lines for 'two.'"
Discreetly, as a man accustomed to the business, Fandor withdrew on
hearing the request of the "setter up," avoiding the searching glance of
the sub-editor, who forthwith to meet the demands of the paging, called
at random one of the reporters and passed on the order to him.
"Some lines of special type; eight lines. Take up the Cretan question on
the Havas telegrams. Be quick!"
Fandor picked up his hat and stick and left the office. His berth as
police-reporter meant a constantly active and unsettled existence. He
was never his own master, never knew ten minutes beforehand what he was
going to do, whether he might go home, start on a journey, interview a
minister or risk his life by an investigation in the world of thugs and
cut-throats.
"Deuce take it!" he cried as he passed the office door and saw what the
time was. "I simply must go to the courts, and it's already very
late...." He ran forward a few paces, then stopped short. "And that
porter murdered at Belleville!... If I don't cover that affair I shall
have nothing interesting to turn in...."
He retraced his steps, looking for a cab and swearing at the narrowness
of the Rue Montmartre, where the inadequate pavements forced the foot
passengers to overflow on to the roadway, which was choked with
costermongers' carts, heavy motor-buses, and all that swarm of vehicles
which gives a Paris street an air of bustle unequalled in any other
capital in the world. As he was about to pass the corner of the Rue
Bergère, a porter laden down with sample boxes, strung on a hook, ran
into him, almost knocking him down.
"Look where you're going!" cried the journalist.
"Look out yourself," replied the man insolently.
Fandor, with an angry shrug of his shoulders, was about to pursue his
way, when the man stopped him.
"Sir, can you direct me to the Rue du Croissant?"
"Follow the Rue Montmartre and take the second turning to the right."
"Thank you, sir; could you give me a light?"
Fandor could not repress a smile. He held out his cigarette. "Here; is
that all you want to-day?"
"Well, you might offer me a drink."
Fandor was about to answer sharply when something in the man's face
seemed vaguely familiar. He was about sixty. His clothes were threadbare
and green with age, his shoes down at the heels, his moustache and
shaggy beard a dirty yellow.
"Why the devil should I stand you a drink?"
"A good impulse, M. Fandor."
In a moment the man's features seemed to change. He appeared quite a
different person and Fandor recognised who was speaking to him.
Accustomed by long habit to conceal his impressions, the journalist
spoke nonchalantly:
"All right; let's go to the 'Grand Charlemagne.'"
They started off together, reached the Faubourg Montmartre and entered a
small wine-shop. Having taken their seats and ordered drinks, Fandor
turned to the porter.
"What's up?" he asked.
"It takes you a long time to recognise your friends."
Fandor scrutinised his companion.
"You are wonderfully made up, Juve."
On hearing his name mentioned, the man gave a start. "Don't utter my
name! They know me here as old Paul."
"But why the disguise? Who are you after? Is it anything to do with
Fantômas?"
Juve shrugged his shoulders. "Let's leave Fantômas out of it," he said.
"At least for the moment. No, my lad, it's a very commonplace affair
to-day, and I wouldn't have bumped into you except that I have an hour
to while away and wanted your company."
"This disguise for a commonplace affair?" cried Fandor. "Come, Juve,
don't keep me in the dark."
Juve laughed at his friend's eagerness.
"You'll always be the same. When it's a matter of detective work,
there's no keeping you out of it. Well, here's the information you're
after. Read that."
He passed Fandor a greasy, ill-written letter. Fandor took it in at a
glance.
"This refers to Loupart, alias the Square?"
"Yes."
"And you call it a commonplace affair? But, look here, can you trust
information given by a loose woman?"
"My dear Fandor, the police largely depend upon such tips, given through
revenge by women of that class."
"Well, I'm going with you."
"No, I won't have you mixed up in this business; it's too dangerous."
"All the more reason for my being in it! What is really known about this
Loupart?"
"Very little, unfortunately," rejoined Juve. "And it's the mystery
surrounding him which makes us uneasy. Although he has been involved in
some of the worst crimes, he has always managed to escape arrest. He is
supposed to be one of an organised gang. In any case, he's a resolute
scoundrel who wouldn't hesitate to draw his gun in case of need."
Fandor nodded.
"His arrest will make bully copy."
"And for the pleasure of writing a sensational story you want to put
your life in peril again!" Juve smiled sympathetically as he spoke. He
had known the young journalist, when, scarcely grown up, he had been
involved in the weird affairs of "Fantômas."
Fandor was an assumed name. Juve recalled the young Charles Rambert,
victim of the mysterious Fantômas, the most redoubtable ruffian of
modern times, whom Juve declared to be Gurn and still alive, although
Gurn had supposedly died on the scaffold. He recalled the sensational
trial and the terrible revelations that had appalled society. Gurn he
had then affirmed to be the lover of the Englishwoman, Lady Beltham.
Gurn it was who had killed her husband, and Gurn was no other than
Fantômas.
He recalled the tragical morning when Gurn, in the very shadow of the
scaffold, had found means to send in his stead an innocent victim,
Valgrand, the actor.
"When will you begin to draw in your net?" inquired Fandor.
Juve motioned to his companion to be silent and listen.
"Fandor, you hear what that man's singing; the one drinking at the
bar?"
"Yes, 'The Blue Danube.'"
"Well, that gives me the answer. We shall soon be on Loupart's tracks.
By the way, are you armed?"
"If you won't run me in for carrying concealed weapons I'll confess that
Baby Browning is in my pocket."
"Good. Now, then, listen to my directions. Loupart was seen at the
markets this morning by two of my watchers, and you may be sure he
hasn't been lost sight of since. Reports I have received indicate that
he will presumably go to the Chateaudun cross-roads and from there to
the Place Pigalle, in the direction of Doctor Chaleck's house. We shall
nab him at the cross-roads. Needless to say we are not going to keep
together. As soon as our man comes in sight you will pass on ahead,
walking at his pace on the same pavement and without turning round."
"And if Loupart doesn't appear?"
"Why then--" began Juve. "The deuce! There's another customer whistling
'The Blue Danube.' It's time to be off."
"Are those your agents whistling?" asked Fandor, as they left the shop.
"No."
"What! Isn't it a signal?"
"It is, and you'll be able to find your trail by the passers-by who
whistle that air."
While talking, the journalist and the detective arrived at the
Chateaudun cross-roads. Juve cast an eye over the ground.
"It's six o'clock. Be off and prowl around Notre Dame de Lorette.
Loupart will probably come out of that wine-shop you see to the right.
You can easily recognise him by his height and a scar on his left
cheek."
"Look here, Juve, why should these people whistle 'The Blue Danube' if
they are not detectives?"
Juve smiled. "It's quite simple. If you whistle a popular tune in a
crowd, some one is bound to take it up. Well, the two men I put to
watching Loupart this morning were whistling this same tune, and now we
are meeting persons who caught the air."
Fandor crossed the road and proceeded toward Notre Dame de Lorette to
the post the detective had allotted to him. The man hunt was about to
begin.
III
BEHIND THE CURTAIN
The Cité Frochot is shut in by low stone walls, topped by grating round
which creepers intertwine.
The entry to its main thoroughfare, shaded by trees and lined with small
private houses, is not supposed to be public, and a porter's lodge to
the right of the entrance is intended to enforce its private character.
It was about seven in the evening. As the fine spring day drew to a
close, Fandor reached the square of the Cité. For an hour past the
journalist had been wholly engaged in keeping track of the famous
Loupart, who, after leaving the saloon, had sauntered up the Rue des
Martyrs, his hands in his pockets and a cigarette in his mouth.
Fandor allowed him to pass at the corner of the Rue Claude, and from
there on kept him in view.
Juve had completely disappeared.
As Loupart, followed by Fandor, was about to enter the Cité Frochot, an
exclamation made them both turn.
Fandor perceived a poorly dressed man anxiously searching for something
in the gutter. A curious crowd had instantly collected, and word was
passed round that the lost object was a twenty-five-franc gold piece.
Fandor, joining the crowd, was pushed close to the man, who quickly
whispered:
"Idiot! Keep out of the Cité."
The owner of the gold piece was no other than the detective. Then, under
cover of loud complaint, Juve muttered to Fandor, "Let him go! Watch the
entrance to the Cité!"
"But," objected Fandor in the same key, "what if I lose sight of him?"
"No fear of that. The doctor's house is the second on the right." The
hooligan, who had for a moment drawn near the crowd, was now heading
straight for the Cité.
Juve went on: "In a quarter of an hour at the latest join me again, 27
Rue Victor Massé."
"And if Loupart should enter the Cité in the meantime?"
"Come straight back to me."
Fandor was moving off when Juve addressed him out loud: "Thank you, kind
gentlemen! But as you are so charitable, give me something more for
God's sake."
The other drew near the pretended beggar and Juve added:
"If anyone questions you as you pass through, say you are going to
Omareille, the decorator's; you'll find me on the stairs."
Some moments later the little crowd had melted away and a policeman,
arriving as usual too late, wondered what had been going on.
Fandor carried out Juve's instructions to the letter. Hiding behind a
sentry box he kept an eye on the doctor's house, but nothing out of the
way happened. Loupart had vanished, although he was probably not far
away. When the fifteen minutes were up Fandor left his post and entered
No. 27 Rue Victor Massé. As he reached the third floor he heard Juve's
voice:
"Is that you, lad?"
"Yes."
"The porter didn't question you?"
"I've seen no one."
"All right, come up here."
Juve was seated at a hall window examining Doctor Chaleck's house
through a field glass.
"You've not seen Loupart go in?" he inquired as Fandor joined him.
"Not while I was on watch."
"It's well to know one's Paris and have friends everywhere, isn't it?"
continued Juve. "It occurred to me quite suddenly that this might be an
excellent place from where to follow citizen Loupart's doings. You would
have spoiled everything if you had followed him into the Cité. That's
why I devised my little scheme to hold you back."
"You are right," admitted Fandor, who, the next moment, gave a jump as
Juve's hand gripped him hard.
"Look, Fandor! The bird is going into the cage!"
The journalist, excited, saw a figure already familiar to him in the act
of slipping into the little garden which separated Dr. Chaleck's house
from the main thoroughfare.
The detective went on: "There he goes, skirting the house until he
reaches the little door hidden in the wall. What's he up to now? Ah!
He's fumbling in his pocket. False keys, of course."
They saw Loupart open the door and make his way into the house.
"What comes next?" inquired Fandor.
"We are going to tighten the net which the silly bird has hopped into,"
rejoined Juve, as he bolted down the stairs, and added as a
precautionary measure: "While I question the porter, you slip by me
into the main street. I have every reason to believe that M. Chaleck has
been absent for two days, and as soon as I get this information, I shall
pretend to go away, and then--the rest is my concern."
Juve's program was carried out in all points.
To his questions, the porter replied:
"Why, sir, I can't really say. I saw Doctor Chaleck go off with his bag
and I haven't seen him come back. However, if you care to see for
yourself----"
"No, thanks," replied Juve, "I'll return in a few days. But look out,
your lamp's flaring!"
As the porter turned to remedy the trouble, Juve, instead of going off
to the right, quickly followed the direction Fandor had taken and caught
up with the latter just outside Doctor Chaleck's house.
"Now for our plan of campaign," he said. "It's darker now than it will
be later when the street lamps are lit and the moon rises. That
excellent Josephine sent me a rough plan of the house. You see there are
two windows on the ground floor on either side of the hall. Naturally
they belong to the dining-room and drawing-room. The window to the right
on the first floor is evidently that of the bedroom. On the left, this
window with a balcony belongs to the study of our dealer in death!
That's where we must plant ourselves. Understand, Fandor?"
The journalist nodded. "I understand."
The two men advanced carefully, holding their breath and halting at
every step. To catch the ruffian in the act they must reach the study
without giving the alarm.
The first story of Doctor Chaleck's house was only slightly raised above
the ground: by the aid of a drain-pipe, Juve and Fandor managed without
difficulty to hoist themselves on to the balcony.
"Here's luck," cried Juve. "The study window is wide open!"
After putting on a pair of rubbers and making Fandor remove his boots,
the two men entered the room. Juve's first precaution was to test the
two halves of the window. Finding that their hinges did not creak, he
fastened the latch and drew the curtains.
"We'll risk a light," he whispered, taking out a pocket-lamp, which lit
up the room sufficiently to allow him to take his bearings.
The study was elegantly furnished. In the middle was a huge desk piled
with papers, reports, and files. To the right of the desk in the corner
opposite the window and half hidden by a heavy velvet curtain was the
door leading to the landing. A large corner sofa occupied the space of
two wall panels. A set of book-shelves covered a whole wall. Here and
there cosy armchairs invited meditation.
"I don't see the famous safe," Murmured Fandor.
"That's because your eyes aren't trained," replied the detective. "Look
at that corner sofa, topped by that richly carved bracket. Observe the
thick appearance of the delicate mahogany panel. You may be quite sure
that it hides a solid steel casket which the best tools would have no
easy job to cut through. That little moulding you see to the right can
be easily pushed aside."
Here Juve, with the precision of an expert, set the woodwork in motion
and showed the astonished Fandor a scarcely visible key-hole.
"Now, let's put out the light and hide ourselves behind the curtains.
Luckily they are far enough from the window for our presence not to be
noticed."
For about an hour the men remained motionless, then, weary of standing,
they squatted on the floor. Each had his revolver ready to hand.
Ten had just struck from a distant clock when suddenly a slight sound
reached their attentive ears.
The two had whiled away the time of waiting by drilling the curtains
with a small penknife. These holes were invisible at a distance, but
enabled them to see what was going on in the room.
The noise continued, slow and measured; some one was walking about in
the adjacent rooms without any attempt to disguise the sound. Evidently
Loupart believed himself quite alone in the house of the absent doctor.
The steps drew nearer, and Fandor, in spite of his courage, felt the
rapid beating of his heart. The handle of the door leading from the hall
to the study was turned, and some person entered the room.
There was an instant of silence, and then the desk was suddenly lit up.
The new-comer had found the switch. But he was not Loupart.
He seemed a man of forty and wore a brown beard, brushed fan-shape; a
noticeable baldness heightened his forehead. On his strongly arched nose
a double eye-glass was balanced. Suddenly, having looked at the clock
which marked half-past eleven, he began to loosen his tie and unbutton
his waistcoat and then went out, leaving the study lit as if intending
to come back.
"It's Chaleck!" exclaimed Fandor.
"Just so," replied the detective. "And this complicates matters; we may
have to protect him as well as his safe."
Indeed, Juve's first impulse was to go straight to Doctor Chaleck,
apprise him of the situation, and, under his guidance, search the house
thoroughly. But that would have put Loupart on the alert. It would be
taking too great a chance. If Juve should lay hands on him outside of
Chaleck's house he would have no right to hold him. For the subtle power
of Loupart, that well-loved hooligan of the purlieus of Paris, lay in
his remaining constantly a source of fear, always a suspect without ever
being caught with the goods.
Coming back to his first idea of insuring Chaleck's safety, Juve said to
himself: "The doctor is coming back here, that's sure, and we must
protect him without his knowing it. That is the best plan for the
present."
Sure enough after an absence of ten minutes Chaleck returned to the
study and seated himself at his desk. He had now changed into his
pajamas.
Time passed.
When the little Empire time piece which decorated the mantel struck
three, Fandor, for all his anxiety, could not repress a yawn: the night
was long and thus far had been devoid of incidents. From their
hiding-place, he and Juve kept an eye on Doctor Chaleck. When did the
man sleep?
Nothing in the physician's countenance betrayed the slightest weariness.
He examined numerous documents spread out on the desk, and also wrote a
letter which he sealed by lighting a candle and melting some wax. He
lingered a good twenty minutes afterwards, then finally put out the
lights and left the room.
The room was now in total darkness. The journalist and the detective
listened a few moments longer as a precaution, but nothing happened to
break the hush of the waning night.
Half an hour more and the outlines of the two would be visible on the
thin curtains. It was high time to be off.
Fandor and Juve rose with difficulty to their feet, so cramped were
their legs from the enforced rigidity.
"What now?" asked Fandor.
"Listen!" Juve abruptly gripped the other's arm as a fresh noise came to
their ears. This time it was not the footsteps of a man walking
carelessly, but weird creakings, sly gropings. The noise stopped, began
again and again stopped. Where did it come from?
"This room is a mass of hangings," muttered Juve.
"It's impossible to locate those sounds or determine their origin."
"You would suppose," began Fandor----
But he stopped short. The door had opened, the light was switched on
and Doctor Chaleck appeared once more, probably disturbed in his sleep
by the mysterious noises.
Chaleck gave a quick glance round the room, and then, to the
consternation of the two men, he took a few steps toward the window,
revolver in hand. At this moment dull creakings were heard, apparently
coming from the landing. Chaleck turned quickly, and, leaving the door
open, went out. An increase of light indicated that the other rooms in
the house were being searched, and as the lights were gradually switched
off again, it was apparent that Chaleck was concluding his domiciliary
visit without having noticed anything abnormal.
The two remained still for an hour longer, although they had heard
Chaleck go back to his room and lock himself into it.
Meantime the daylight was growing brighter, and in a little while the
neighbourhood would be awake.
"We must slip out," decreed Juve, as he turned the hasp of the window
with infinite care and set it ajar to reach the balcony.
A few moments later Juve had shed his disguise and the two men drew
breath in the middle of the Place Pigalle, having fled ignominiously
like common criminals.
IV
A WOMAN'S CORPSE
"Well, Juve, I suppose you'll agree with me that Josephine's information
was a piece of pure fiction," said Fandor as they turned into the Rue
Pigalle.
"You are talking nonsense," replied Juve.
"But," protested the other, "we arrived punctually at the place
appointed, and most assuredly nothing happened there."
"We were punctual, it is true, but so was Loupart. Josephine's letter
gave us two items of information: That her lover would be at Doctor
Chaleck's house and that he would rob the safe. Events have proved her
correct in one case. As to the second, while he did not break open the
safe, nothing proves that he had not that intention. He may have been
frustrated by the unexpected appearance of Doctor Chaleck, or he may
have discovered that we were following him."
At this moment Fandor pointed out to Juve three men who were running
toward them, violently gesticulating.
"What does that mean?" he asked.
Before Juve could reply one of the men, much out of breath, inquired:
"Well, chief!"
"Why, it's Michel and Henri and Léon!" Then, turning to Fandor, he
explained: "Three inspectors."
Michel repeated the question: "Well, chief, what's up?"
"What do you mean?"
"You've just come from the Cité Frochot, chief?"
Juve was amazed. "Look here," he said, "where do you come from, Michel?
The Prefecture?"
"No, chief, from the head office of No. IX."
"Then how do you know we were at the Cité Frochot?"
Taken aback, Michel replied: "Why, from seeing you here, after the
affair."
"What affair?" insisted Juve.
"Well, chief, it's this way. The three of us were on duty this morning
at the Rue Rochefoucauld Station. About twenty minutes ago the telephone
rang and I heard a woman asking in a broken and choked voice if it was
the police station. On my answering it was, she begged me to come to
the rescue, crying, 'Murder! I'm dying!'"
"What then?" questioned Juve.
"Then I asked who was speaking, but unfortunately Central had cut me
off."
"You made inquiries?"
"Yes, chief, and after a quarter of an hour Central told me that only
one subscriber had called up the police station, the number being
928-12, name of Doctor Chaleck in the Cité Frochot."
"I suppose you asked for the number again?"
"I did, but I could get no reply."
After a pause, during which Juve was lost in thought, the officer added
timidly: "We'd better hurry if a crime has been committed."
Juve beckoned Michel to him.
"There are too many of us," he said. "You come along, Michel; the other
two must go back to the station and be ready to join us in case of
need."
The two officers and Fandor went hurriedly up the Rue Pigalle and came
to a halt by Doctor Chaleck's door.
A loud ringing brought no reply. It was repeated, and finally a voice
cried: "Who is there; what's the matter?"
"Open," ordered Juve.
"To whom do you wish to speak?"
"To Doctor Chaleck." And Juve added: "Open, it's the police."
"The police! What the deuce do they want with me?"
"You'll soon find out," answered Michel. "Do you suppose we'd be making
this row if we were criminals?"
Doubtless convinced by this reasoning, Doctor Chaleck decided at length
to open his door.
"What do you want with me?" he repeated.
Juve quickly explained matters.
"We've just had a telephone message to say that some ruffians, possibly
murderers, are in your house."
"Murderers!" cried Chaleck in amazement. "But whom could they murder?
I'm living here alone."
At this assertion, Juve, Fandor and Michel looked at each other,
mystified.
"Well, in any case we must search your house from top to bottom," said
Juve, and added as an afterthought: "I suppose you are thoroughly
satisfied that we come with honest intentions?"
Doctor Chaleck smiled:
"Oh! Inspector Juve's features are very well known to me, and I place
myself entirely at his disposition."
The three men, led by Chaleck, ransacked all the rooms on the ground
floor; finding nothing suspicious, they then went up to the floor above.
"I have only three more rooms to show you, gentlemen," said the doctor.
"My bathroom, my bedroom and my study."
The bathroom disclosed nothing of interest, and Chaleck, throwing open
the door of another room, announced, "My study."
Scarcely had Fandor set foot in the study, from which he and Juve had so
recently made their escape, when a cry burst from his lips:
"Good God! How horrible!"
The apartment was in the greatest disorder. Overturned chairs bore
witness to a violent struggle. One of the mahogany panels of the desk
had been partly smashed in. A window curtain was torn and hanging, and
the small gas stove was broken.
Fandor, at the first glance, saw what appeared to be a long trail of
blood, extending from the window to the desk. Stepping forward quickly,
he discovered the body of a woman frightfully crushed and covered with
blood.
"Dead some time," cried Fandor. "The body is cold and the blood already
congealed."
Juve tranquilly examined the room, and took in its tragic horror. "The
telephone apparatus is overturned," he muttered to himself. "There has
been a struggle between the victim and the murderer. Ah!--theft was the
object of the crime."
"Theft!" cried Doctor Chaleck, coming forward.
"Look, doctor, your safe has been overturned, broken in and ransacked,"
answered Juve, as he and Fandor cautiously lifted the woman. The body
was a mass of contusions and appeared to be one large wound.
Juve turned to the doctor, who, livid with consternation, was holding up
a small grey linen bag which had contained his bonds.
"Come, doctor, calm yourself and give us some information. Can you make
anything of it?"
"Nothing! nothing! I heard nothing. Who is this woman? I don't know
her!"
Fandor pointed to a small shoe lying in a corner.
"A fashionable woman," he said.
"Quite so," was Juve's reply, and putting his hands on Chaleck's
shoulders he inquired: "A friend of yours, a mistress, eh? Come now,
don't deny it."
"Deny!" protested the doctor, "deny what? You are not accusing me, are
you? I know nothing of what has taken place here, and, as you see, have
been robbed into the bargain."
"Is she a patient of yours?"
"I don't practise."
"A visitor, perhaps?"
"No one has been to see me to-day."
"It is not your maid?"
"No; I tell you. I am living here all by myself."
"Have you noticed this, sir?" put in Michel, as he gave Juve a
handkerchief on which some vicious, greyish substance was spread in
thick layers.
"Shoemakers' wax," Juve explained, after a brief glance at it. "That
explains the burns we noticed. The murderer covered his victim's face
with the handkerchief to prevent identification." Then, turning to
Fandor, he went on in a low tone:
"But it doesn't explain how and when the crime was committed. Less than
an hour ago we were in this very room, and the burgling of the safe
alone would take fully an hour."
Michel, ignorant of this fact, was for arresting the doctor.
"Look here," he said sharply to Chaleck, "we've had enough yarns from
you; now tell us the truth."
"But, good God! I have told you the truth!" cried Chaleck.
"And you heard nothing, although you were only a few yards away?"
"Nothing at all. I sat up working very late last night. When I went to
bed, nothing had happened in the least suspicious. Oh, by the way,
toward morning I did hear a slight noise. I rose and went over the
house, even coming into this room. I found everything in order."
"That's a likely tale!"
"Here's a proof of what I say! When I returned to this study I used that
candle and sealing wax to seal my letter, which, as you can see, is
still here. Your ring at the bell awoke me not more than twenty minutes
later, just as I was getting to sleep again."
"Lies!" cried Michel, turning to Juve. "Shall I arrest him?"
"The doctor is telling the truth," replied Juve, half regretfully.
Chaleck seemed very much relieved.
"Oh, you'll help me, won't you? Get me out of this abominable affair!"
As a matter of fact, Chaleck had accounted for his time with exact
truthfulness.
Juve crossed the room and drew aside the curtains; upon the floor he
pointed out to Fandor traces of mud. It was there that he and the
journalist had stood.
"Doctor," said Juve at length, "I must ask you not to go out this
morning. I am going to headquarters to ask them to send experts in
anthropometry. We must photograph in detail the appearance of your
study; then I will come back and make an extended inquiry and I shall
want you. Michel, remain here with the doctor."
Without further words, Juve, followed by Fandor, left the house of
mystery, jumped into the first cab that passed and, mopping his
forehead, cried:
"It's astounding! This murder presents mysteries worthy of Fantômas
himself!"
V
LOUPART'S ANGER
Loupart was taking a fruit cure. It was about ten in the morning, and
along the Rues Charbonnière, Chartres and Goutte d'Or the women hawkers,
driven from central Paris by the police, were making for the high ground
of the populous quarters.
Loupart strolled along the pavement, making grabs at the barrows,
picking a handful of strawberries or cherries as he went by. If by
chance the dealer complained, she was quickly silenced by a chaffing
speech or a stern glance.
The hooligan stopped at the "Comrades' Tryst," in front of which Mother
Toulouche had set out a table with a large basket of winkles.
"Want to try them?" suggested the old woman on catching sight of
Josephine's lover.
"Hand me a pin," he answered harshly, and in a few moments had emptied
half a dozen shells.
"Friend Square, I've something to say to you."
"Out with it, then."
But before the old woman could reply, a noise of roller skates coming
down the pavement made her turn.
Loupart looked round with a smile.
"Why here comes the auto-bus," he cried.
A cripple moving at a great pace came plump into the basket of
shell-fish. The speed with which he travelled had earned him the
nickname of the Motor. He was said to be an old railway mechanic, who
had lost both legs in an accident.
"Motor," cried Mother Toulouche, "I have to be away for ten minutes or
so; look after my basket, will you?"
Following the old dame to her den Loupart entered with difficulty, on
account of the great quantity of heterogeneous objects with which it was
crowded. The product of innumerable thefts lay heaped up pell-mell in
this illicit bazaar.
Dame Toulouche, having shut the door, plunged into her subject.
"Big Ernestine is furious with you, Loupart."
"If she's threatening me," the hooligan replied, "I'll soon fix her."
"No, big Ernestine didn't want to fight, but she was annoyed at the
public affront put upon her by Josephine's lover when he drove her from
'The Good Comrades' the evening before last without any reason."
"Without any reason!" growled Loupart. "Then what was her business with
those spies, the Sapper and Nonet?"
"That can't be! Not the Sapper!"
"Spies, I tell you; they belong to headquarters."
The old receiver of stolen goods cast up her eyes. "And they looked such
decent people, too! Who can one trust?"
Loupart, for reply, suddenly picked up a scarf pin set with a diamond,
and, tossing the old Woman a five-dollar piece, said as he left the
room: "You can tell Ernestine that I bear her no malice."
Loupart had hardly gone a few steps along the Rue Charbonnière, when, at
the corner of the Rue de Chartres, he bumped into a passer-by who was
coming down the street.
Loupart burst out laughing: "What! Can this be you, Beard? What's
happened to you?"
It certainly needed a practised eye to recognise the famous leader of
the Cypher gang. For the Beard, who owed his name to an abnormal hairy
development, was clean shaved; in addition, he wore a soft, greenish
hat and was clad in a suit with huge checks.
"You told me to make up as an American."
"I did, and you've made yourself look like a hayseed juggins. For
Heaven's sake, take it off. By the way, what about young Mimile?"
"He's with us."
"Well, get him the togs of a collegian for the job at the docks. What
night do we bring it off?"
"Saturday night, unless the Cooper changes the time."
Loupart bent close to the ear of his lieutenant.
"Is he--easy to recognise?"
"No chance of making an error. Lean, togged in dark clothes and with one
goggle eye."
Loupart touched the "Beard's" arm.
"First-class tickets for everybody."
"How many will there be?"
"Five or six."
"Women, too?"
"No, only my girl. But you can bet we shan't be bored!" With these
words, Loupart walked away. He stopped a little later at the second
house in the Rue Goutte d'Or, a decent-looking house with carpet on the
stairs.
On reaching the fifth floor, he knocked several times on the door facing
him, but without reply. This annoyed him; he didn't like Josephine to
sleep late, and he expected her to be always ready when he condescended
to come and fetch her.
Josephine was a pretty burnisher from Belleville, and Loupart, who had
met her at a ball in that quarter six months ago had made her his
favourite mistress.
Among the bullies and drabs that frequented the place, Josephine had
appeared to him seductive, charming, almost virginal, and the popular
hooligan had promptly chosen her from her sisters of the underworld.
Certainly Josephine had no reason to complain of her lover's conduct,
and if at times he demanded of her a blind submission, he never treated
her with that fierce brutality which characterised most of his fellows.
But if Josephine had felt any leaning toward a good life, or any
scruples of conscience, she must necessarily have thrown them overboard
as soon as her connection with Loupart began. With a different start in
life she might have become an honest little woman, but circumstances
made her the mistress of a hooligan ring-leader, and, everything
considered, she had a certain pride in being so, without imitating the
vulgar and brutal behaviour of her companions.
At the third summons, Loupart, none too patient, drove the door in with
a vigorous shove of his shoulders.
Josephine's apartment, a comfortable and spacious room, with a fine
bird's-eye view of Paris, was empty.
Fancying his mistress was at some neighbour's gossiping, he bawled:
"Josephine! Come here!"
Heads appeared, looking anxiously out of rooms on the same floor.
"Where is Josephine?" Loupart cried.
Mme. Guinon came forward.
"I don't know," she replied, stammering. "She complained of pains in her
stomach last evening, and I was told she's gone."
"Gone? Gone where?" stormed Loupart.
"Why, I don't know; it was Julie who told me."
A freckled face, half hidden by a matted shock of hair, appeared. Julie
was not reticent like her mother. She explained in a hoarse, alcoholic
voice:
"It's quite simple. When I came in last night about four I heard groans
in Josephine's room. I went to see and found Josephine writhing in pain
as if she had been--poisoned."
"What did you do then?"
"Oh, nothing," declared Julie. "I just trotted away again; it wasn't my
business, but the Flirt came and meddled in it."
"The Flirt! Where is she?"
The Flirt, a faded, wrinkled woman of fifty, appeared from a doorway
where she had been listening.
"Where is Josephine?" demanded Loupart.
"At Lâriboisière hospital, ward 22, since you want to know."
After a moment's amazement, Loupart broke out furiously:
"You sent off Josephine in the middle of the night! You took her to a
hospital for a little indigestion! Without asking my consent! Why she's
no more ill than I am!"
"Have to believe she is," replied the Flirt, "since the 'probes' have
kept her."
Loupart turned and tramped downstairs swearing.
"She'll come out of that a damned sight quicker than she went in!"
A few moments later Loupart entered Father Korn's saloon. Having set
forth his plans to that worthy, the latter proceeded to demolish them.
"You can't do anything to-day, so there's no use trying. You'll have to
wait till to-morrow at midday, the proper visiting hour."
Loupart recognised the truth of the publican's assertion and, calling
for writing paper, sat down and scrawled a letter to his mistress.
"Motor," he cried to the cripple who was still at Mother Toulouche's
basket, "tumble along with this note to Lâriboisière; look sharp, and
when you get back I'll stand you a glass."
As the cripple hurried away he was all but knocked down by a newsboy,
running and shouting:
"Extra! Extra! Get _The Capital_. Extraordinary and mysterious crime of
the Cité Frochot. Murder of a woman."
"Shall I get a copy?" asked the publican.
Loupart stalked out of the saloon without turning.
"Oh, I know all about that," he cried.
Father Korn stood rooted to the spot at Loupart's answer.
"What! He knows already!"
VI
THE LÂRIBOISIÈRE HOSPITAL
The clerk, who had admitted Juve, withdrew, and M. de Maufil, the
amiable director, gave the police officer his most gracious smile.
"When I applied this morning at headquarters for an officer to be sent
here, I scarcely expected to receive so celebrated a detective, upon a
matter which is really very commonplace."
"Your letter to M. Havard mentioned a person I have been looking for
with the greatest interest for the past two days. Loupart, alias 'The
Square,'" replied Juve, "that is why I came myself. What is it about,
sir?"
"Well, the day before yesterday, we took in at the instance of Doctor
Patel, a patient suffering from acute gastric trouble. The woman gave us
for identification the name of Josephine, no calling, residing in Paris,
Rue de Goutte d'Or, in furnished rooms. Some hours after her admission
to the hospital, she received a letter, brought by a messenger, which
threw her into a violent state of terror. The nurse on duty sent for me,
and I succeeded, after great difficulty, in quieting her; but she
insisted most emphatically on leaving the hospital at once. The poor
creature was in a high fever, and to grant her request would have been
sending her to her death. At length she intrusted me with the letter
which had excited her so. Here it is, kindly look it over."
Juve took the letter and read:
"Am just back from the doss. You ain't there, and I don't want any
more of these dodges. You are no more ill than I am. See here,
you'll either leave the hospital and slope back to the house right
off or to-morrow, Friday, at visiting time, as sure as my name's
what it is, you'll get two bullets in your hide to teach you to
hold your tongue."
Juve gave a grunt of satisfaction.
"You understand what is going on?" asked the director.
"Yes, but please go on with your story."
"Well, sir, you can guess that having read this letter, I easily got
from the girl some information as to the writer. According to what she
told me this Loupart is her lover, and he seems to have in a high degree
that inconceivable pride which causes folks of his class, when they
have sworn to kill some one, to carry out their threat, no matter what
risk they may run themselves. The girl, Josephine, is convinced that
to-morrow Loupart will come and kill her."
"You have told her that all precautions will be taken?"
"Of course. I pointed out to her that people do not come in here as they
do into a bar; that being warned, I should have all the visitors watched
who come here and asked to see her. I repeated to her that her lover
probably wanted to frighten her, but that he could not do anything to
injure her. I insisted that in the state she was in it was physically
impossible for her to obey that wretch's bidding."
"And what was her answer to that?"
"Nothing. Her attack of alarm having subsided she seemed to fall into a
condition of extreme prostration. I realised quite well that she
regarded herself as condemned, that she had a far higher opinion of
Loupart's daring than of my watchfulness, and, lastly, if she stayed it
was because she realised that it was out of the question for her, in her
weak state, to go back to her home."
While the director was speaking, Juve had retained a smiling and
satisfied expression, seeming but little affected by Josephine's
terrible plight.
"I should very much like to know," continued the director, "why you said
you knew the reasons for the threat being sent by this man to his
mistress?"
Juve hesitated some moments; then, without going into details, said: "It
would take too long to recount the motives which prompted Loupart to
write that letter. This Josephine whom you see to-day trembling at her
lover's threat not so long ago supplied the police with valuable hints
concerning him. Has he learned that? Does he know the woman has rounded
on him? Did he fear, above all, that she would tell tales again here at
the hospital? It is quite possible. You see he must have had very strong
reasons for giving her the order to come home----"
Juve here broke off, fingering Loupart's letter; then at length he
placed it in his pocketbook.
"I will keep this document, director; it is a tangible proof of
Loupart's criminal intentions. If he should put his threats into
practice it would be difficult after that to deny premeditation."
"You think that such a thing is possible?"
"Don't you?"
"Loupart declares he will come to the hospital before three and kill his
mistress, but surely it must be easy to render that impossible."
"You think the police are all-powerful, that we can arrest would-be
murderers and render them incapable of harm? That is an error. We are
prevented from taking effective action by a swarm of regulations. If I
met Loupart on the street I would not be able to arrest him. I have no
warrant. When a man holds his life cheap and is determined to risk
everything, he has a pretty good chance of succeeding. Of course I shall
take every measure to prevent Loupart killing his mistress, but I'm not
at all sure of success."
"But M. Juve, we must have this girl Josephine transferred to another
hospital if necessary."
Juve shook his head.
"And show Loupart we are aware of his purpose? Flatter the ruffian's
vanity? No, we must let Loupart come, and catch him as he is about to
commit the crime."
"What do you propose to do?"
"Study the hospital; arrange where to place my men," replied Juve.
"In that case, I will do everything I can to help you." M. de Maufil
rang for an attendant and bade him take Juve to Doctor Patel's
department.
Juve thanked the obliging director and took leave. The attendant
pointed to a row of windows under the roof.
"Doctor Patel's division begins at the corner window and runs to the
window near the cornice."
"What are the means of access to the female ward?"
"Oh, that's quite simple, sir; you get into the woman's ward either by
the door on the staircase or by the door at the back, which leads into
the laboratory of the head physician, the room of the house surgeon on
duty, and the departmental offices."
"And how do visitors pass in?"
"Visitors always go up the main staircase."
"Now," said Juve, "show me over Doctor Patel's division."
"Very good, sir. It will be all the more interesting to you, as it is
just the visiting hour."
When Juve made his way into the woman's ward, Doctor Patel was actually
in process of seeing his patients. He was passing from bed to bed,
questioning each of the women under treatment and listening to the
comments of the house staff who followed him.
"Gentlemen," the doctor was saying as Juve joined the group, "the
patient we have just seen affords a very excellent and typical instance
of intermittent fever. The serum tests have not given any appreciable
result; it is therefore impossible to arrive at----"
A hand was laid on Juve's shoulder.
"Why, the tests are always absolutely indicative! Palpable typhoid, eh?
What do you think?"
Juve turned his head and could not suppress a cry of surprise.
"Doctor Chaleck!"
"What! M. Juve!--You here! Were you looking for me?"
Juve was dumbfounded. He drew Chaleck aside.
"Then you're attached to this hospital?"
"Oh, I have only leave to attend the courses."
"And I came here out of curiosity."
"In any case, allow me to thank you for the service you rendered me the
other day. The officer who was with you seemed to take me for the guilty
man."
"Well, you see, appearances...."
"But if anyone was a victim it was I. Apart from the finding of the
murdered woman in my house, I have been robbed!"
Here the doctor broke off. A house surgeon was beckoning to him.
"Forgive me," he said to Juve. "I cannot keep my colleague waiting."
Leaving Chaleck, Juve went back to the attendant who had patiently
waited for him.
"Stranger than ever!" he murmured. "There is no making it all out.
Josephine writes that Loupart means to rob Chaleck. I track Loupart and
he gives me the slip. I spend a night in a room where I see nothing, and
where nevertheless a horrible amazing crime is committed. The murder
takes place scarce a yard from me, and the doctor, the tenant of the
house, sees nothing either, and does not even know the victim who is
found next morning on his premises! Thereupon our informant, Josephine,
goes into hospital; pain in the stomach, they say--hem! Poison, maybe?
Then she gets a threatening letter from Loupart. And when I come to the
hospital to protect her, whom do I meet but Doctor Chaleck!"
Juve, turning to the attendant who was escorting him, asked:
"You know the person I was speaking to just now?"
"Doctor Chaleck? Yes, sir."
"What is his business here?"
"He is a foreign doctor, I believe. I should fancy a Belgian. Anyhow, he
is allowed by the authorities to follow the clinical courses and make
researches in the laboratory."
VII
A REVOLVER SHOT
Doctor Patel's division presented an unusually animated appearance that
afternoon. Not only were the patients allowed to receive visitors, but
quite a number of strange doctors had spent the day going from bed to
bed, note-books in hand, studying the patients and their temperature
charts. The nurses hesitated to call these individuals doctors, and the
patients, too, seemed aware of their true status. Whispers were hushed,
and all eyes turned toward the far end of the ward.
There, in a bed set slightly apart and near the house staff's quarters,
lay Josephine, a prey to a racking fever and breathing with difficulty.
Exactly opposite her was the bed of an old woman who had been admitted
that morning. Her face had almost entirely disappeared under voluminous
bandages.
As the ward clock struck a quarter to three, an attendant appeared and
announced:
"In ten minutes visitors will be requested to leave."
Two of the staff who had paced the ward since early in the day exchanged
a smile.
"Here's the end of the farce," remarked one; "Loupart isn't coming."
"He said three; there are still thirteen minutes left," replied the
other.
"Well, every precaution is taken."
"Precautions are of no use with men like Loupart."
"Eleven minutes left."
"What the devil could happen? There is no longer admission to the
hospital; the visitors are leaving."
"Three minutes!"
"Look here, you'll end by making me think..."
"Two minutes."
"Well, own yourself beaten!"
"One minute."
Bang! Bang! Two shots from a revolver suddenly startled the silent ward.
There was a moment's consternation and uproar. The patients leaped from
their beds and sought refuge in the corners of the ward, while the two
house surgeons and the policemen, passing as doctors, rushed in a body
toward Josephine's bed. Doors slammed. People came hurrying from all
quarters.
Above the hubbub rose a calm voice.
"What the devil! Here I am drenched! What does that mean?"
The house surgeon reached the bed where the hopeless Josephine lay,
white as a corpse, motionless. A large red blood stain was spreading on
her sheet. Quickly the doctor uncovered the wounded woman and examined
her.
"Fainted, she has only fainted!" And, silencing all comments, he called:
"Monsieur Juve! Monsieur Juve!"
The old woman who, a few moments before, had been dozing, now quickly
sprang out of bed, and, tearing off her bandages, revealed the placid
features of detective Juve.
"I understand everything except that I'm drenched to the bones,"
declared Juve, as he crossed to Josephine's bed, oblivious to the
amazement his appearance caused.
"That's easily explained," said the house surgeon. "The girl was lying
on a rubber mattress filled with water. One of the bullets punctured
it."
"What damage did she receive?"
"A contusion on the shoulder. The murderer aimed badly owing to her
recumbent position."
Juve beckoned to the officers.
"Your report? You've seen nothing?"
"Nothing."
"That's strange," declared the detective. "I kept an eye on Josephine
myself, thinking that a movement on her part would betray the entrance
of Loupart. She made no sign; but, however Loupart may have got in, he
can't get out without falling into a trap. I have fifty men posted round
the building. Now, the first point to clear up is the exact place from
where the shot was fired."
"How can we get at that?"
"Very simply. By drawing an imaginary line between the spot where the
bullet struck the mattress and where it went into the floor--extend this
line and we find the quarter from where the shot was fired." A doctor
came forward.
"M. Juve," he said, "that would bring us to the door of the staff's
room."
"Ah, it's you, Doctor Chaleck! I'm glad to see you! You are quite right
in your surmise. Do you see any objection to my reasoning?"
"I do. I came into the ward barely two seconds before the firing. No one
was behind me and no one was walking before me."
Juve crossed to the door.
"It is from here that the shots were fired!"
And the detective added triumphantly as he stooped and picked up an
object from the floor:
"And this backs up my assertion!"
He held out a revolver, still loaded in four chambers. "A precious bit
of evidence!" He turned to the doctor:
"Can a stranger get into the wards by this door?"
"Utterly impossible, M. Juve! Only those thoroughly familiar with
Lâriboisière can get into the ward through the laboratory. You must pass
through the surgical divisions."
The detective seated himself at the foot of the sick woman's bed and
mechanically laid the revolver beside him. But scarcely had he done so
when he sprang up. Upon the sheet was a tiny red speck left by the
muzzle of the weapon.
"Ah!--that's very instructive!" he cried. And as the others crowded
round, puzzled, Juve added: "Don't you see? The murderer ran his finger
along the barrel to steady his aim, and as the barrel is very short, the
bullet grazed the tip of his finger which extended slightly beyond it.
If I find anyone in the hospital with a wounded finger, I've got the
murderer! Gentlemen, I am going to ask the director to issue orders for
everyone within the hospital gates to pass before me. I reckon that in
two hours at most the culprit will no longer be at large."
* * * * *
The attempted murder happened at three o'clock; about six o'clock, those
who had first been examined by Juve had received permission to leave the
hospital and were beginning to depart.
With a careless step Doctor Chaleck made for the exit by which he issued
every evening from Lâriboisière. As he was about to pass out, a police
inspector barred his way.
"Excuse me, sir. Have you a pass?"
"A pass?"
"Yes, sir; no one is allowed to leave to-day without a pass from M.
Juve."
The doctor looked at his watch.
"The deuce," he said. "I'm late as it is. Where am I to get this pass?"
"You must ask M. Juve himself for it. He is in the director's private
room."
"All right, I'll go there." And Doctor Chaleck retraced his steps.
VIII
THE SEARCH FOR THE CRIMINAL
"It's astounding!" declared M. de Maufil. "We have already examined
nearly two hundred persons and found nothing."
"That may be," replied Juve, "but we may discover the culprit by the two
hundred and first hand held out to us."
"There is one thing you forget, M. Juve."
"What is that?"
"If the culprit gets wind of our method of investigation, if he has any
notion that you are inspecting the hands of all those who desire to
leave the hospital, he won't be such a ninny as to come and submit to
your inspection."
Juve nodded approval of the comment.
"You are right; but I have taken means to obviate that difficulty."
Since he had begun his inquiry on the spot, from the very moment when
the revolver shots had rung out, the great detective was growing more
and more sure that the arrest of the mysterious offender would be a
matter of considerable time. The buildings of the establishment were
extensive, and it was easy for a man to move about them without
attracting attention. They offered really strange facilities for hiding.
"Mr. Director," said Juve, "I fancy we have inspected pretty well all
the persons who leave Lâriboisière as a rule, at this time?"
"That is so."
"Then we must now change our plan. Let us leave a nurse here to detain
those who come to ask for passes, and begin a search of the hospital
ourselves. I shall post my officers in line, each man keeping in sight
the one behind and the one before him. At the foot of every staircase I
shall leave a sentry. Then, beginning at the outer wall of the building
we will drive everyone on the ground floor toward the other end. If we
don't round up our man there, we will proceed to the floor above."
"A good idea," replied M. de Maufil. "We shall catch him in a trap."
When Doctor Chaleck found that the inspector watching the exit leading
to the main door in the Rue Ambroise Paré refused him leave to pass out
of the hospital without the sanction of the great detective, he had
perforce to retrace his steps. Skirting the bushes in the courtyard he
took his way toward the medical wards, turning his back on the
directoral offices, where he might have encountered our friend Juve. He
had taken off his white uniform and was dressed in his street clothes.
He halted at the entrance to the long glazed gallery which extends to
the operating rooms of the surgical department. Turning suddenly, he saw
in the distance and coming his way Inspector Juve, accompanied by the
director. He noticed at the same time the cordon of officers preparing
to sweep the hospital from end to end. Mechanically, and as if bent on
putting a certain distance between him and the new-comers, he turned
into the glazed gallery, and reached the far end of it. He was about to
go into the surgical ward when a nurse stopped him.
"Doctor, you can't go in just now; Professor Hugard is operating and has
given express orders that no one is to be admitted."
Chaleck turned up the gallery again, but abruptly swung round again as
he caught sight of Juve and the director just entering the gallery,
driving before them half a dozen patients and orderlies. Chaleck joined
this little group, which had pulled up at the end of the gallery and was
making laughing comments on the rigid inspection to which Juve was just
about to subject them.
"Now's the time to show clean hands," joked a non-resident, "eh, Miss
Victorine?" he added, smiling at a buxom nurse whom the chances of duty
had blockaded in the corridor.
"Depend upon it," growled one of the accountants of the administrative
department, shrugging his shoulders, "they are making a great fuss over
nothing. After all, no one is hurt. Just one more pistol shot; in this
neighbourhood we have ceased to count them."
An old man, who had his hand bandaged, suggested: "Perhaps they'll be
wanting to arrest me since the culprit is wounded in the fingers, they
say."
Dignified and calm, Juve did his best to restore liberty to each of the
persons brought together. They had only to show their two hands held up
in front of the face, the fingers apart. M. de Maufil, at a sign from
Juve, immediately bade the attendant hand the person in question a card
bearing his name and description. Armed with this "Sesame" he could come
and go unimpeded all over the hospital.
Pointing to a large door at the extreme end of the corridor, Juve asked:
"What exit is that?"
The other smiled. "You want to see everything, don't you?"
The director, opening the heavy door, made room for Juve, who entered a
very narrow passage, damp and quite dark. The passage, a short one,
opened on a vast apartment, much like a cellar, lighted by air-holes in
the ceiling and intensely cold. A noise of running water from open taps
broke with its monotonous splash the silence of this place, solely
furnished with a huge slab of wood running from one end to the other.
Upon the slab dim and lengthy white shapes were outstretched, and when
his eyes grew accustomed to the twilight, Juve recognised the vague
outline of these weird bundles. They were corpses swathed in shrouds.
The heads and shoulders alone were visible, and on the brows of the dead
trickled icy water, dispensed sparingly but regularly by duck-billed
taps that overhung the inclined plane.
The director explained: "This is the amphitheatre where we keep the
bodies for post-mortems. Do you want to stay any longer?"
"There is no access to the room except by the door we came in at?"
"None."
"In that case," rejoined Juve, "and as there is no furniture here for a
person to hide in, let us look elsewhere. It's a rather gruesome
place."
"You're not used to the sight, that's all," replied the director, as he
led the way back to his office.
Juve looked at his watch. "Well, I must leave you now and make a report
to M. Havard. I'm afraid the murderer has slipped through our fingers."
"But you'll come back?"
"Of course."
"What am I to do meanwhile?"
"Nothing, unless you care to go over the hospital again."
"And the passes? Are they to be in force still? We have no one in the
place but the staff."
"That is essential," replied Juve. "I must know with certainty who comes
in and goes out. However, anyone known to your doorkeeper who wishes to
leave need only sign in a register."
IX
IN THE REFRIGERATORY
It was light in the evening. One by one the rooms in Lâriboisière were
being lit up.
The one exception was the grim amphitheatre, whose occupants would never
need to see again.
Suddenly--and if anyone had been present, he would have experienced the
most frightful impression it is possible to conceive--a corpse stirred.
Having assured himself that the door between the amphitheatre and the
gallery was shut, the corpse, shivering with cold, threw off the shroud
which enveloped him, and set to work to move his legs and arms about to
start up his circulation. Then at the far end of the apartment this
living corpse discovered, under a zinc basin attached to the wall, a
bundle of linen and garments, which he seized upon.
His body shaking with cold, the man dressed himself in haste, and then
waited until he considered his clothes sufficiently dry not to attract
attention.
Carefully ascertaining that the gallery was deserted, he then entered it
and walked rapidly to the courtyard. To the right of the main gateway,
the smaller gate leading into the Rue Ambroise Paré was open.
The man passed under the archway, and in a moment would have been clear
of Lâriboisière, when the doorkeeper barred his way.
"Excuse me, who goes there?"
Then, having looked more closely:
"Why it's Doctor Chaleck! You're late in leaving us this evening,
doctor. I suppose you've been kept pretty busy in ward 22?"
"That's so," replied Chaleck, for it was he. "That's why I'm in a hurry,
Charles."
And Chaleck, with an impatient gesture, was about to slip out, but the
porter stopped him again.
"One moment, doctor; you must register first."
"Is this a new hospital regulation?"
"No, doctor, it's the police who have ordered everyone entering or
leaving the hospital to sign his name in this book."
The porter, having taken Doctor Chaleck into his lodge, opened a new
register, and pointing to half a dozen names already written on the
first page, he added:
"You'll not be in bad company; you're to sign just below Professor
Hugard."
Chaleck smiled. "Tell me the latest news, Charles. Do they suspect
anyone?"
"All I know is that fifty of them came here with dirty shoes, made a
hubbub round the patients, put the service out of gear, and in the end
caught nobody at all. But if the culprit is still here, he won't get out
without the bracelets on his wrists!"
An equivocal smile touched the pale lips of Chaleck. It might be the
weird inhabitant of the little house in Cité Frochot was not so sure as
the porter was of the astuteness of the police. Perhaps he was thinking
that a few hours before a certain Doctor Chaleck, hemmed in a passage
with no exits and about to be compelled to show, like everyone else, the
tips of his fingers, had, under the nose of the officers, and even of
the artful and astute Juve, suddenly vanished, gone out of the world of
the living and thought it necessary, for reasons he alone knew, to
assume the rigidity of a corpse, the stillness of death. But the smile
in a moment became frozen.
The doctor who had kept both hands in his pockets while talking to the
porter, suddenly felt a sharp twinge in the fingers of his right hand,
and it became moist and lukewarm. This happened as the porter held out
the register for him to sign.
"Charles," he cried, "I'm in a great hurry; while I'm signing, please go
out and stop the first taxi that passes."
"Certainly, sir," replied the man.
Scarcely had the doorkeeper turned his back when the doctor, with
infinite precautions drew out his right hand and with evident difficulty
began to write, holding the pen between the third and fourth fingers, as
though unable to use the fore and middle ones.
As he was finishing his entry, he made what was doubtless an unintended
movement, something unexpected happened, for he suddenly turned pale and
repressed a heavy oath. Charles was just coming back to the lodge.
"Your taxi is here, Doctor."
"Right. Thank you."
Chaleck closed the register abruptly, jumped into the motor, threw an
address to the driver, who got under way. On seeing the doctor shut the
register, Charles cried: "The devil--there's no blotting paper in it, it
will be sure to blot!"
And, though it was too late, the careful man rushed to the book and
opened it. His eyes became fixed on the page where the signatures were.
He stared, wide-eyed.
"Oh!--Oh!--" he murmured.
X
THE BLOODY SIGNATURE
M. de Maufil was exceedingly nervous.
"As soon as you went back to headquarters," he declared to Juve, some
moments after that officer had been shown into his private room, "I
continued the search with redoubled efforts. Neither the ward-nurses, in
whom I place complete confidence, nor the heads of my staff, whom I have
known for ever so long, passed the doors of the hospital. In fact, I
took every precaution and obeyed your instructions to the letter--yet
all in vain."
"You found nothing?"
"Nothing. Not only did we not discover the criminal, but we did not come
upon any trace of him."
"That's strange.".
"It is maddening. It would seem that from the instant the man fired
those two shots in the woman's ward in Patel's department he vanished,
unaccountably. Your notion of examining the hands of all those in the
hospital was an excellent one, but nothing came of it.
"He must have known the snare we were preparing for him and did not turn
up at the hospital exit, so we must naturally conclude he is still
inside the gates, hidden in some remote corner, or underground. However,
the first thing to do is to protect the girl, Josephine. By the by, she
saw nothing, I suppose?"
"She declares she did not see Loupart come in, but she asserts with a
sort of perverse pride that it was certainly Loupart who fired at her
because he had threatened to do so."
A knock at the door was followed by the timid entrance of the
doorkeeper.
"Is that you, Charles? Come in," cried the director. "What do you want?"
"It's about the signature, sir. There is blood on my book."
In a moment Juve leaped from his chair and tore the register out of the
porter's hands.
"Blood!"
Feverishly he turned the pages until he came to the writing. Without
waiting for de Maufil's permission, he dismissed the porter.
"Very good, I'll see you presently."
Scarcely had the door shut, when Juve pointed to the page. "Look! Doctor
Chaleck's signature! And just below it this mark of blood! What do you
say to that, sir?"
"But it's sheer madness. Chaleck cannot be guilty!"
"Why not?"
"Because he is known to me. He was recommended to me seven months ago by
an old comrade of mine. Chaleck is a man of brains, a foreign physician,
a Belgian. He comes here specially to study intermittent fevers. M.
Juve, I tell you he has nothing whatever to do with this affair." Juve
picked up his hat and stick. He was restless and uneasy; the directors'
outburst had not greatly impressed him.
"Doctor Chaleck could not explain how his finger came to be hurt and he
did not inform us of the fact."
"A mere coincidence."
"Possibly, but it is a terrible coincidence for that man," replied Juve.
On leaving the director's room, the distinguished detective could not
refrain from rubbing his hands. "This time I have him!" he muttered. He
went rapidly down the stairs, crossed the great courtyard of the
hospital, and proceeded to knock at the porter's lodge.
"Tell me, my friend, precisely how Doctor Chaleck's leaving the hospital
came about?"
The worthy man with much detail, for he now felt very proud of having
played a part in the affair, related how Doctor Chaleck came to the
gate, sent him after a cab while signing his name, then made off, after
having, no doubt by an oversight, closed the register.
"Very good! Thank you," was Juve's comment, bestowing a liberal tip on
the man.
This time he was leaving Lâriboisière for good.
"Very characteristic, that piece of impudence," he reflected; "very like
Doctor Chaleck that device of shutting the register he had just stained
with blood in order to give himself time to make off!" On reaching the
Boulevard Magenta he hailed a cab.
"Rue Montmartre. Stop at the _Capital_ office. You know it?"
A few minutes later Juve was shown into Fandor's office. But the
detective no longer wore a smiling face, and his air of abstraction did
not escape his friend.
"Anything fresh?" inquired Fandor.
"Much that is fresh! That's why I came here to see you."
The journalist smiled. "Thanks, Juve. It is, indeed, owing to you that
the _Capital_ is the best posted sheet in town."
Then the detective proceeded to tell the reporter the startling
discovery he had just made at Lâriboisière. He concluded:
"There, I suppose you can turn that into a thrilling story, eh?"
"I certainly can."
"The arrest is now scarcely more than a matter of time."
"And how are you going to set about it?"
"I don't quite know. Well, good-bye."
Fandor let the officer reach the door of the office, then called him
back.
"Juve!"
"Fandor!"
"You are hiding something from me."
"I? Nonsense."
"Yes," persisted Fandor. "You are concealing something. Don't deny it. I
know you too well, my friend, to be content with your reticences."
"My reticences?"
"You didn't come here merely to give me copy."
"Why----"
"No. You had some idea in coming to look me up and then you changed your
mind. Why?"
"I assure you you are mistaken."
Fandor rose.
"All right, if you won't tell me, I shall follow you." At the
journalist's announcement Juve shrugged his shoulders.
"That's what I feared. But it's absurd to be always dragging you into
risky affairs."
"Where are we going?" asked Fandor briefly, as he lit a cigarette.
"We are going to-night to Doctor Chaleck's. If he's there we will force
a confession from him; if he's not there, we will ransack his house for
clues," and Juve added, smiling, "like good burglars. I have a whole
bunch of false keys. We shall be able to get into Doctor Chaleck's
without ringing his bell. Here's a snapshot I took of Josephine at the
hospital." And throwing the proof on Fandor's desk, he said smilingly:
"The young woman's not bad looking, is she?"
XI
THE SHOWER OF SAND
"I'm afraid it's not quite the thing to enter people's houses in this
fashion," whispered Juve, as the two men found themselves in the hall of
Doctor Chaleck's little house in the Frochot district.
It was about midnight, and through the fan-light of the outer door a dim
twilight enabled the detective and the journalist to get an idea of the
place in which they stood.
It was a fairly large hall with double doors on either hand, leading
into the drawing-and dining-rooms. At the far end rose a winding
staircase, and under it a door to the cellar. A hanging lamp, unlit, was
suspended from the ceiling and the walls were covered with dark
tapestries.
Juve and Fandor remained silent and motionless for some moments. They
might well be perturbed, for they had just entered the house in the
most unwarrantable manner, and they knew the doctor to be at home. The
lodge-keeper of the Cité had seen him return about two hours ago. For
one moment Juve had asked himself whether he should not ring in the most
natural manner in the world, and afterwards contrive some explanation;
but the silence, the peace which prevailed and the conviction that
Doctor Chaleck, quite off his guard, must be enjoying deep slumber,
prompted him to try and get into the house unannounced. If the door was
only bolted, if it was not secured from within by a latch, the officer
might reckon on finding among his pass keys one that would allow him to
open it. Juve was, indeed, equipped like the prince of burglars.
Well, the attempt had succeeded. Without trouble or noise, journalist
and officer had made their way into the place.
Before imparting to Fandor his plan of operations, Juve handed him a
pair of rubbers, and then at a signal they both ascended to the first
floor.
The detective's plan was to make a sudden incursion into Chaleck's
bedroom, and in the surprise of a sudden awakening, question him and
inspect the fingers of his right hand, which, presumably, had left on
the register a tell-tale trace of blood.
Juve had scarcely entered the room when Fandor switched on the lights;
the two men started back in disgust; the room was empty!
Without pause, Juve cried: "To the study!"
A moment later they found themselves in the room they knew so well from
having spent a whole night there, behind the window curtains.
Chaleck was not there either. Fandor searched the bathroom near by,
careless of the noise he made, then hurried after Juve to the floor
below in the fear that the doctor might already have made his escape.
Juve quickly reassured him the windows and shutters of the rooms were
hermetically closed; the hall door had not been touched.
Suddenly slight sounds became audible from the floor above. A crackling
of the boards, the muffled sounds of hasty footsteps, faint rustlings.
"Chaleck knows we are here," whispered Juve. "We must play with our
cards on the table."
The two men cocked their pistols and made a rush upstairs. They had left
the electric light burning on the floor above, and at first their eyes
were dazzled by the sudden brightness, multiplied by the reflection from
the glass which lined the octagonal-shaped landing.
Again the noises were heard. Chaleck or some one else was in the study.
Juve disappeared. In half a minute he returned and bumped into Fandor.
"Where are you coming from?" he cried. "I thought you were behind me."
"So I was," replied Fandor, "but I left you to take a look in the
study."
"But it was I who was in the study!"
Fandor stared in amazement. "Are you losing your senses?"
"I've just come from there myself!"
"Well, we weren't there together, that's certain. Let's try again."
The two proceeded in the dark to the head of the staircase. With their
heels they verified the last step; then Juve said in a low voice:
"I will go forward four paces. I am now in the middle of the landing; I
lift the curtain, turn and go in."
The steady tick of the little Empire clock on the mantelpiece assured
Juve that he was indeed in the study.
"Well, here I am," and mechanically he flung his hat on the sofa. But
scarcely had he uttered these words when Fandor's voice, very clear, but
some way off answered
"I am in the study, too."
Juve now switched on the light. Fandor was not there. Rushing back to
the landing he ran full tilt into his friend and the two gripped each
other in amazement.
"Look here," exclaimed Fandor, "if I'm not mistaken, you turned to the
right past the curtain while I went to the left; there may be two
separate entrances to the study."
"Let us keep together this time," replied Juve; "I propose to get to the
bottom of this mystery."
As they came out of the darkness of the passage and plunged into the
full light of the room, Juve stopped short. His hat was no longer on the
sofa.
Fandor went to the mantelpiece, turned and confronted the detective.
"I stopped the clock some moments ago, and here it is going and keeping
exact time! How do you account for it?"
Juve was about to reply, when suddenly with a dry click the light went
out.
Fandor, at the same moment, gave a startled cry: "Juve! the door is
fastened; we are shut in!"
With one bound Juve leaped for the window; but after opening the
casement he perceived that thick iron shutters, padlocked, banished all
hope of escape in that quarter. Fandor was ashy pale; Juve staggered as
he moved toward him.
"Walled in!" he cried. "We are walled in!"
But a new terror suddenly confronted the two men. The floor appeared to
be giving way, and as the descent proceeded regularly, they realised
that they were in a strange form of elevator.
The study, however, did not drop very far. With a slight shock it
reached the end of the run and stopped short.
Juve cried with an air of relief, "Well, here we are, and it now remains
to find out where we are."
The existence of two studies identical in every particular, one of which
was housed in an elevator, explained not only the events of the evening,
but also the tragedy of two days before.
"Juve! did you feel anything?"
"Yes."
"What is it?"
"I don't know."
Both had just experienced a weird sensation, impossible to define. Upon
their hands and faces slight prickings irritated the skin. The air at
the same time seemed heavier and more difficult to breathe. There was,
besides, a soft, vague crackling. With some difficulty Juve lighted his
pocket-lamp. By its faint glimmer the two men made a discovery. A fine
rain of sand was falling from the ceiling.
"It's collapsed!" cried Fandor.
"We're done for!" replied Juve.
They passed through some awful moments. All around the sand gathered and
rose.
Juve tried to comfort his friend:
"It would need an enormous amount of sand to fill this room and bury us
alive. It will cease to fall presently."
But horrible to relate, as the level of the sand rose on the floor, they
observed by the flickering gleam of the lamp, that the ceiling was now
being lowered little by little.
Fandor raised his arm and touched it. They were about to be crushed.
"Juve, do not let me die this way. Kill me!"
His comrade made no reply. At first paralysed by the shock he now felt
an unspeakable fury rise up in him. He began beating the walls with his
fists, shaking the furniture. He seized a chair and drove it against the
door. The chair struck with a ring upon metal and broke.
Uttering a loud sigh, the detective drew out his revolver; he would, at
least, save his friend the torments of an awful death. Suddenly a
fearful crash resounded. The moving mass of sand was falling away from
them into some gaping hole below, while at the same time fresh, moist
air reached them and refreshed their lungs. Evidently some
communication with the outside world had been established.
Juve relit his lamp and was bending over to examine what had taken place
when the floor all at once gave way under his feet and he fell, dragging
Fandor with him.
They found themselves up to mid-leg in water, but unhurt.
Juve's voice rang out: "We are saved! I see now what happened! Our trap
had a thin flooring, and, when down, it rested on a fragile arch. That
arch gave way, and with the sand we have tumbled into the sewer of the
Place Pigalle, which, if I am not mistaken, connects with the main of
the Chaussée d'Autin. Come along, friend Fandor, we'll find means to get
out of this before long."
Floundering in the mud, they made their way along the drain until Juve
halted and uttered a cry of triumph. On the left wall of the vault his
hand encountered iron rings one above the other. It was a ladder leading
to one of the manholes in the pavement. He quickly climbed up and, with
a vigorous push, raised the heavy slab. In a few moments both men
emerged and fell exhausted in the roadway.
When Fandor recovered his senses he was lying in a large, ill-lighted
hall. The first sound he heard was Juve's voice arguing hotly and
volubly.
"Why, you're nothing but a pack of idiots! We burglars! It's utter rot.
I tell you I'm Juve, Inspector of Public Safety!"
XII
FOLLOWING JOSEPHINE
The captives had been recognised, and had been set at liberty. They had
scarcely got a few yards from the police station, when Juve took the
journalist's arm.
"Let's make haste!" he cried. "This foolish arrest has made us lose
precious hours."
"You have a plan, Juve? What is it?"
"We must now turn our attention to Josephine; we must use her as a bait
to catch the others. The girl won't be much longer at Lâriboisière. She
will be extremely anxious to leave that place and----"
"And go back to clear herself of treachery in Loupart's eyes? Is that
it?" added Fandor.
"Exactly. Accordingly here is our plan of action. I must go at once to
the Prefecture and advise M. Havard of our adventure. Meanwhile you go
to the hospital. Contrive to see Josephine, make sure she has not left,
watch her and then--wait for me; in two hours, at the latest, I shall be
with you."
"All right, Juve, you can reckon on me. Josephine shall not escape me."
Fandor was already moving off when Juve called him back.
"Wait! If ever for one reason or another you want an appointment with
me, telegraph to the Safety, room 44, in my name. I will see that the
messages always reach me."
A quarter of an hour later Fandor was turning into the Rue Ambroise
Paré, when all at once as he passed a woman he gave a start.
"Hullo!" he cried; "that's something we didn't bargain for!..."
The woman walked along the Boulevard Chapelle toward the Boulevard
Barbès. Fandor followed her.
When the great clock which adorns the main front of the Lâriboisière
buildings struck six, the nurses in the hospital were busy finishing
their preparations for the night.
The surgeon in Dr. Patel's division was just concluding his evening
visit to the patients. With a word of encouragement and cheer he passed
from bed to bed until he reached the one at the end of the ward. The
young woman occupying it was sitting up.
"So you want to be off," exclaimed the surgeon.
"Yes, doctor."
"Then you're not comfortable here?"
"Yes, doctor, but----"
"But, what? Are you still afraid?"
"No, no."
The patient spoke these last words so confidently that the surgeon could
not help smiling.
"Do you know," he observed, "that in your place I should be much less
confident. What are you going to do? Where do you think of going when
you leave here? Come, now, you are still very weak; you had much better
spend the night here. You could go to-morrow morning after the round at
eleven. It would be much more rational."
The young woman shook her head and replied curtly:
"I want to go now, sir, at once."
"Very good. They will give you your ticket."
The doctor gone, the young woman quickly jumped out of bed and began to
dress herself.
"You don't suppose I'm going to stay here a minute longer than I have
to," she grumbled with a laugh to her neighbour, who was watching her
preparations with an envious eye.
"Some one waiting for you?"
"Sure there is. Loupart won't be pleased that I'm not back yet."
"Are you going from here to his place?"
"You bet I am."
This she said in a tone that showed plainly she found the thing quite
natural. The other was not of her mind.
"Oh, well, I should be scared only at the thought of seeing that man.
You were jolly lucky not to have been killed by him. And when he has got
hold of you----"
But Josephine laughed merrily.
"My dear," she said, "you don't know what you're saying. Depend on it,
if Loupart didn't kill me it's because he didn't want to. He's a
splendid shot. I suppose he had his reasons for not wanting me to stay
here; I don't know his affairs, and besides, I came here without
consulting him."
A vigorous "hush" from the nurse on duty stopped the conversation.
Josephine meanwhile completed her toilet. A nurse had brought her back
the clothes she wore when she entered the hospital. She slipped on a
poor muslin skirt, laced her bodice, buttoned her boots and set her
curls straight; she was ready.
"I'm off," she cried gaily to the porter as she held out her pass to
him. "Thank the Lord, I'm going, and I have no fancy to come back to
your hotel!"
Once in the street, Josephine walked quickly. She cast a glance at the
clock at a cabstand, and found she was behind time.
She went along the Rue Ambroise Paré, then turned on to the outer
boulevards.
The dinner-hour being at hand, the populous streets of the Chapelle
quarter were at their lowest ebb of animation. The bookshops had long
since released their employees, the cafés were giving up their
customers. Fandor, having recognised Josephine, followed her closely as
she passed the outer boulevards, then by Boulevard Barbès.
"Beyond a doubt she is bound for the Goutte d'Or," he muttered.
Some minutes later, sure enough, she reached her home.
"Very good! The bird is back in the nest: My job is now to watch the
visitors who come to call on her."
Opposite Josephine's door there was a wine-shop. This Fandor entered.
"Writing materials, please," he ordered. "I must drop a line to Juve,"
he thought. "We must begin to set the trap."
He was busy drawing up a detailed plan of the neighbourhood when, on
raising his head, he gave a violent start, and, throwing a coin on the
table, rushed out of the shop.
"She is well disguised, but there's no mistaking her!"
Without losing sight of the woman he was watching, Fandor reached the
Metropolitan Station.
"Good Lord! What does this mean?" he muttered. "Where is she off to?
She's taking a first-class ticket. Can she have an appointment with
Chaleck?" He also took a ticket behind the young woman and reached the
platform.
"I'm going where she goes," he thought. "But where the devil are we
bound for?"
Loupart's mistress was the embodiment of a charming Parisian.
Her gown was tailor-made, of navy blue, plain but perfectly cut; she
wore little shoes with high heels, and no one would have recognised in
the well-dressed woman, who got out of the Metropolitan at the Lyons
Station, the burnisher, who, a little while ago, had left Lâriboisière.
Josephine had scarcely taken a few steps on the great Square which
divides Boulevard Diderot from the Lyons Station, when a young man,
quietly dressed, came toward her. He ogled her, then in a voice of
marked cordiality, said:
"Can I say a few words to you?"
"But, sir----"
"Two words, mademoiselle, I beg of you."
"Speak," she said at last, after seeming to hesitate, halting on the
edge of the pavement.
"Oh, not here; surely you will accept a glass?"
The young woman made up her mind:
"Very well, if you like."
The couple directed their steps toward a neighbouring "brasserie," and
neither the young man nor Josephine dreamed of noticing that a passer-by
entered the place in their wake.
Fandor did not take a seat at one of the little tables outside, but made
for the interior, cleverly finding means to watch the two in a glass.
"Is this the person Josephine was to meet?" he wondered. "Can he be a
messenger of Loupart's? Yet she did not seem to know him. Hullo!"
Just as the waiter was bringing two glasses of wine to the table where
Josephine and her partner had seated themselves, the young woman
suddenly arose, and, without taking leave, made for the door.
Fandor managed to pass close to the deserted man. He heard the waiter
jokingly say:
"Not very kind, the little lady, eh?"
"I should think not! Didn't take her long to give me the slip."
Then in a tone of regret the young man added: "Pity, she was a nice
little thing."
"That's all right," thought Fandor. "Now I know that Josephine accepted
the drink because she thought he was sent by Loupart or one of the gang.
Once enlightened as to his real object, she left him abruptly."
Tracking the young woman, Fandor now felt sure he was going to witness
an interesting meeting. Josephine, however, seemed in no hurry. She
inspected the illustrated papers in the kiosks, and presently reached
the box where platform tickets are distributed; having taken one, she
sat down near the foot of the staircase which leads to the refreshment
rooms. Behind her Fandor also took a ticket, and, going up the stairs,
leaned against the balustrade.
"I am waiting for some one," he said to the waiter who appeared. "You
may bring me a cup of coffee."
Scarcely five minutes had passed, when Fandor saw a shabby looking man
approach Josephine and begin an earnest conversation.
The man drew from his pocket a greasy note-book. From it he took a paper
which he handed to the young woman, who promptly put it away in her
handbag.
Fandor was puzzled.
"Where was she going? Why did this person hand her a ticket?"
The man pointed to a train where passengers were already taking their
seats.
"The Marseilles train! So Loupart has left Paris!"
Then he called a messenger.
"Go and get me a first-class ticket to Marseilles. Here is money. Is
there a telegraph office near at hand?"
"On the arrival platform, sir."
"Right. I will give you a message to take; go and hurry back."
Fandor took out his note-book and scrawled a message:
"Juve, Prefecture of Police, Room 44.
"Have met Josephine and followed her. She is off first class, by
Marseilles train. Don't know her destination. Will wire you as soon
as there's anything fresh.
"Fandor."
XIII
ROBBERY; AMERICAN FASHION
"Tickets, please."
The guard took the one offered by Fandor.
"Excuse me, sir, there's a mistake here," he said.
"This train doesn't go to Marseilles?"
"The train, yes, but not the last carriage in which you are, for it is
bound for Pontarlier, and will be slipped at Lyons from this express."
Fandor was nonplussed. The essential was to follow Josephine, ensconced
in the compartment next to his.
"Well, I'll get into another carriage when we are off; it's so easy with
the corridors."
"You can't do that, sir," insisted the guard. "While all the carriages
for Marseilles in the front of the train communicate, this one is
separated from them by a baggage car."
"Then I'll change later, during the night. I have till Dijon, haven't
I?"
"You have."
The guard went away. Fandor suddenly asked himself:
"Has Josephine made a mistake, too? Or has she a definite purpose in
being in a carriage which is to be slipped from the Southern Express at
Dijon to go on toward the Swiss frontier?"
The guard was looking at tickets in Josephine's compartment. Fandor went
near to listen; he heard the tail of a conversation between the fair
traveller, her companion and the guard. The latter declared as he
withdrew:
"Exactly so, you shall not be disturbed."
When Josephine had boarded the train, Fandor had not ventured to watch
her too closely, nor the companion she had met on the platform at the
last moment. He now decided to take advantage of the corridor to take a
look at the man.
He was quite stout, rather common in appearance, although with a
prosperous air. A man of middle age, whose jolly face was framed in a
beard, giving him the look of an old mariner. Moreover, he was one-eyed.
Josephine was playful, full of smiles and amiability, but also somewhat
absent-minded.
The pair had decidedly the appearance of being lovers.
Although it was quite early, passengers were arranging to pass the night
as comfortably as possible. The lamps had been shaded with their little
blue curtains, and the portières, facing the corridors, had been drawn.
Fandor returned to his compartment. Two corners of it were already
occupied--the two furthest away from the corridor. One was in possession
of a man about forty, with a waxed moustache, having the air of an
officer in mufti, the other was taken by a young collegian with a waxen
complexion.
The journalist determined to keep awake, but scarcely had he settled
himself when drowsiness crept over him. Rocked by the regular motion of
the train he sank into a slumber troubled by nightmares. Then suddenly
he sprang up. He had the clear impression of some one brushing by him
and opening the door to the corridor.
"Who is there?" he murmured in a voice thick with sleep and drowned by
the rush of the train. No one answered him. He staggered out into the
corridor. At the far end of the carriage a passenger, with a long black
beard, was standing smoking a cigar, and apparently studying the murky
country. Not a sound came from Josephine's apartment. With a shrug of
his shoulders and cursing his fears, Fandor returned to his own seat.
Why should he fancy, because he was following Josephine, that all the
passengers in the train were cut-throats and accomplices of Loupart's
mistress? Yet, five minutes after these sage reflections, Fandor started
again; he had distinctly seen, passing along the corridor, two fellows
with villainous faces and suspicious demeanour. One of them cast into
Fandor's compartment such a murderous glance that it made the
journalist's heart palpitate.
Fandor glanced at his companions. The officer was sleeping soundly, but
the young fellow, although keeping perfectly still, opened his eyes from
time to time and cast uneasy glances about him, then pretended to sleep
as soon as he caught Fandor watching him.
The train slackened speed; they were entering Laroche Station; there was
a stop to change engines. The officer suddenly awoke and got out. The
compartment holding Josephine and her companion was thrown open, and,
strange to say, his neighbour, the collegian, had moved into it, sitting
just opposite the stout gentleman.
Fandor, with a view to keeping awake, abandoned his comfortable seat and
settled himself in one of the hammocks in the corridor. He chose the
one just opposite Josephine's door. But so great was his weariness that
he quickly fell into a deep sleep. Suddenly a violent shock sent him
rolling to the cross-seat in Josephine's compartment. As he picked
himself up in a dazed condition, a cry of terror broke from his lips.
Three inches from his head was the muzzle of a revolver held by a big
ruffian wearing a mask, who cried:
"Hands up, all!"
Fandor and his companions were too amazed to immediately obey, and the
command came again, more forcible.
"Hands up, and don't stir or I'll blow out your brains."
And now a gnome-like individual appeared, also masked.
The first one turned to Josephine: "You, woman, out of here!"
Without betraying by her expression whether or no she was his
accomplice, Josephine hurriedly left her place and, slipping between the
gnome and the colossus, went and cowered down at the end of the
carriage.
"Go on!" suddenly commanded the big ruffian, who seemed to be the
leader. "Go on! rifle 'em!"
The gnome, with wonderful adroitness, ransacked the coat and waistcoat
pockets of the traveller. The stout man, shaking with alarm, made no
resistance. After relieving him of his watch and pocketbook, they forced
him to undo his shirt. Around his waist he wore a broad leather belt.
"Go it, Beaumôme, relieve him of his burden, the fat jackass!"
From the body of the traveller, the stolen belt passed to the big masked
robber, who weighed the prize complacently. The belt contained pockets
stuffed with gold and bank notes. The two robbers then moved away toward
the further end of the carriage.
Fandor, furious at being tricked like the simplest of greenhorns,
determined to seize the occasion to give the alarm.
The emergency bell was immediately above the pale-faced collegian. With
a bound the journalist sprang for it, but fell back with a loud cry as
he felt a sharp pain in his hand. The collegian had leaped up and
cruelly bitten his finger. So great was the pain that Fandor swooned for
a few seconds, and that gave his assailant time to cross the compartment
and reach the corridor. At this moment the express slackened its speed
and slowly came to a standstill.
"Is it too high to jump?"
Fandor knew the voice: it was Josephine's.
"No," answered some one. "Let yourself go. I'll catch you."
The sound of heavy shoes on the footboard told him that the robbers were
making off. Josephine went with them, so she was their accomplice. The
journalist sprang into the corridor to rush in pursuit. But he recoiled.
A shot rang out, the glass fell broken before him, and a bullet
flattened above his head in the woodwork.
It now seemed to him that the train was gradually gathering way again.
Fandor put his head through the broken glass and searched the darkness
outside.
"Ah!" he cried in amazement. There was no longer a train on the track,
or rather, the main body of the train was vanishing in the distance,
while the carriage in which he was and the rear baggage car had pulled
up. Apparently the robbers had broken the couplings.
At the moment, the stout man, having quite recovered, drew near Fandor
and observed the situation.
"Why, we're backing! We're backing!" he bellowed with alarm.
"Naturally, we're going down a slope," calmly replied Fandor. The other
groaned and wrung his hands.
"It's appalling! The Simplon express is only twelve minutes behind us!"
Fandor now realized the frightful danger. Without delay he made for the
carriage door, ready to jump and risk breaking his bones rather than
face the terrible crash which seemed inevitable. But before he could
make up his mind to the leap, a grinding noise became audible. The guard
in the baggage car had applied the Westinghouse brakes and in a few
minutes they came to a stop.
Fandor and the stout gentleman sprang frantically out of the carriage,
and two brakemen jumped from the baggage car, crying: "Get away! Save
yourselves!"
Clambering over the ties, they jumped a hedge, floundered in a hole full
of water, scratching their hands and tearing their clothes; they rolled
down a grassy slope, stuck in a ploughed field, then dropped to the
ground, motionless, as a fearful din burst like thunder on the hush of
the night. The Simplon express, racing at full speed, had crashed into
the two carriages left on the rails and smashed them to bits, while the
engine and forward carriages of the train were telescoped.
XIV
FLIGHT THROUGH THE NIGHT
Scarcely had Loupart received Josephine in his arms, as she jumped from
the carriage, than he strenuously urged his companions to make haste.
"Now, then, boys, off we go, and quickly, too! Josephine, pick up your
skirts and get a move on!"
It was a dark night, without moon, favourable to the robber's plans. For
a good fifteen minutes the ill-omened crew continued their retreat by
forced march. From time to time Loupart questioned the "Beard":
"This the way?"
The other nodded assent: "Keep on, we'll get there."
At length they descried the white ribbon of a road winding up the side
of the low hill and vanishing in the distance into a small wood.
"There's the track," declared the Beard.
"To Dijon?"
"No, to Verrez."
"That's a good thing; now, stop and listen to me."
Loupart sat down on the grass and addressed them.
"It's been a good stroke, friends, but unfortunately it's not finished
yet. They took precautions we couldn't foresee. We have only part of the
fat. We share up to-morrow evening."
He was answered by growls of disappointment.
"I said to-morrow evening," he repeated. "Those who aren't satisfied
with that can stay away. There'll be all the more for the others. Now,
we must separate. Josephine, you, the Beard and I will get back
together. There's work for us in Paris. The others scatter and take care
not to get pinched; be back in the nest by ten."
Loupart motioned to the Beard and Josephine to follow him.
"Show us the way, Beard."
"Where to?"
"The telegraph office."
"What's up?"
"Why, you idiot," replied Loupart, "we've been robbed! The wine-dealer's
notes are only halves! The swine insured himself for nothing."
The Beard broke out into recriminations.
"To have a hundred and fifty notes in your pocket, and they good for
nothing! There was no such thing as Providence! It was sickening."
"Come, don't get angry, two halves will make a whole."
"You know where to lay hands on the rest?"
"Yes, old man."
"That's our job to-morrow evening? That's why you're chasing to the
telegraph office?"
Loupart clenched his fists.
"That and something else; there's bigger game afoot."
"What?"
"Juve."
"Oh, the devil!" murmured the Beard, divided between pleasure and fear.
"You've got the beggar?"
"I have."
"Sure?"
"Sure."
The little group moved forward in silence. At length Josephine began to
tire.
"Say, have we much further to go?"
"No," replied the Beard. "Verrez village is behind that hill. The main
road runs by the row of poplars."
"All right. Go and wait there with Josephine. I'll catch you up in a
quarter of an hour," ordered Loupart. "I've a wire to send off."
His acolytes gone, Loupart resumed his way. As a measure of precaution,
he took off his jacket, turned it inside out and put it on again. The
jacket was a trick one: the lining was a different colour and the
pockets differently placed.
On reaching Verrez, Loupart turned round. From the top of the little
hill he could see, in the distance, the reddening flames.
"That's going all right," thought the wretch; "the Simplon express has
run into the cars. There must be a fine mix-up there."
Reaching the post-office at last, he seized a blank and wrote on it
hastily:
"Juve, Inspector of Safety, 142 Rue Bonaparte, Paris. All is well;
found gang complete, including Loupart. Robbery committed but
failed. Cannot give details. Be at Bercy Stores alone, but armed,
to-morrow at eleven at night, near the Kessler House cellars.
"Fandor."
The clerk held out her hand to take the message. The bandit was
extremely polite.
"Be so good as to pay special attention to this message. Read it over,
madam. You grasp the importance of it? You see it must be kept
absolutely secret. I rely on you."
Ten minutes' quick walking brought Loupart once more to Josephine and
the Beard.
"Hullo!" he cried. "Anything new?"
"Nothing."
"Josephine, go down the hill and the first motor that passes, set to and
howl; call 'help' and 'murder'; got to stop it. Be off! Look sharp!"
Some minutes passed. The two men watched Josephine go down the road and
hide in one of the ditches.
"Your barker is ready, Beard?"
"Six plugs, Loupart."
"Good! You go to the right, I to the left."
Loupart had scarcely given these orders, when, on the horizon, a bright
gleam became visible, growing larger every minute, while the noise of a
motor broke the silence of the open country.
Loupart laughed.
"Look, Beard. Acetylene lamps, eh? That car will do our job splendidly."
An automobile was fast nearing them. As it passed by Josephine, she
rushed into the road, uttering piercing cries.
"Help! Murder! Have pity! Stop!"
With a hasty movement the chauffeur, taken aback by the sight of a woman
rising unexpectedly on the lonely road, made a dash at his brakes.
Meanwhile from the inside of the car a traveller leaned out.
"What is it? What's the matter?"
As the car was about to stop, Loupart and the Beard rushed out.
"You take the passenger!" cried the former; "I'll attend to the
chauffeur."
The two brigands sprang on the footboards.
"No tricks, or I'll shoot! Josephine, truss these fowls for me!" cried
Loupart.
Josephine took a roll of cord from her lover's pocket and tied the two
victims firmly while Loupart gagged them.
"Now, Beard, take them into the field and give them a rap on the head to
keep them quiet."
Then he got into the car and skilfully turned it round. When Josephine
and the Beard were on board, he got under way at full speed with a grim
smile.
"And, now, Juve, it's between us two!"
XV
THE SIMPLON EXPRESS DISASTER
While Loupart and his mates were making off across country the disaster
occurred. At a curve in the track the Simplon Express coming at full
speed charged the cars and crushed them, then, lifted by the shock, the
engine reared backwards on its wheels and fell heavily, dragging down in
its fall a baggage car and the first two carriages coupled behind it.
Then rose in the night cries of terror and the frantic rush of the
passengers who fled from the luxurious train.
Fandor picked himself up and went forward. From the tender of the engine
a cloud of steam escaped with hoarse whistlings.
The driver held out his two broken arms.
"Give me a hand, for God's sake! Open the tap! There, that hoisted bar.
Lift it up. Quick, the boiler is going to burst."
Fandor was still engaged in carrying out this manoeuvre when succour
began to arrive.
The stoker, less seriously hurt than the driver, had managed to drag
himself clear of the wreckage, which was beginning to catch fire. The
head guard, and those passengers whose seats had been at the rear of the
train, hurried up and the combined effort at rescue began. They searched
for the injured and put out the incipient blazes.
Instinctively those who had fled from the train followed in a frantic
stampede the road at the foot of the embankment, reached Verrez village
out of breath and gave the alarm.
The countryside was soon in an uproar. Lights flashed, torches and lamps
of vehicles harnessed in haste: a quarter of an hour after the disaster
half the neighbourhood was afoot from all quarters.
"A bit of luck, sir," remarked the conductor, still pallid with horror,
to Fandor, "that the collision happened at the curve where our speed was
slackened. Ten minutes sooner and all the carriages would have been
telescoped."
"Yes, it was luck," replied the journalist, as he wiped his face,
covered with soot and coal dust. "The two carriages telescoped were
almost empty."
From a neighbouring way-station the railway officials had telephoned
news of the accident. The section of line was kept clear by telegraph.
Word came that a relief train was being made up, and would arrive in an
hour.
Fandor had quickly regained his coolness, and was one of the first to
lend a hand in the rescue, turning over the wreckage and setting free
the injured.
As he passed along the track, he was attracted by the appeals of a stout
man, who hurried toward him, wailing:
"Sir! Sir! What a terrible calamity!"
Fandor recognised his fellow-passenger, Josephine's lover.
"Yes, and we had a lucky escape. But what has become of your wife?"
In using the word "wife" Fandor was under no illusion; he merely wanted
to interview the other.
"My wife? Ah, sir, that's the terrible part of it. She's not my
wife--she's a little friend, and now it's all bound to come out. My
lawful wife will hear everything. As for the girl, I don't know what has
become of her."
"She knew that you were carrying money?"
"Yes, sir. I am an agent for wines at Bercy, and I was going to pay over
dividends to stock-holders, one hundred and fifty thousand francs. I
recognised one of my men among the robbers, a cooper. He knew that every
month I travel, carrying large sums of money. I am quite sure this
robbery was planned beforehand."
"And who are you, sir?"
"M. Martialle, of Kessler & Barriès. Fortunately the money is not lost."
"Not lost! You know where to find the robbers?"
"That I do not, but they have only the halves of the notes. These are
worth nothing to them unless they can lay their hands on the
corresponding halves. It's a way of cheap insurance."
"And where are the other halves of the notes?"
"Oh, in a safe place, in the office of the firm at Bercy."
Fandor abruptly left M. Martialle and approached an official.
"When will the line be cleared?"
"In an hour's time, sire."
"There'll be no train for Paris till then?"
"No, sir."
Fandor moved off along the track.
"That's all right, I can make it. I'll have time to send a wire to _The
Capital_."
The journalist sat down on the grass, took out his writing-pad and began
his article. But he had overrated his strength. He was worn out, body
and soul. He had not been writing ten minutes when he dropped into a
doze, the pencil slipped from his fingers and he was fast asleep.
* * * * *
When Fandor opened his eyes, the twilight was beginning to come down. It
was between five and six o'clock.
"What a fool I've been! I've made a mess of the whole business now," he
cried as he ran frantically to the nearest station.
"How soon the first train to Paris?"
"In two minutes, sir: it is signalled."
"When does it arrive?"
"At ten o'clock."
Fandor threw up his hands.
"I shall be too late. I haven't time to wire Juve and warn him. Oh! what
an idiot I was to sleep like that!"
XVI
A DRAMA AT THE BERCY WAREHOUSE
Juve passed the whole day at the Cité Frochot. Despite the precautions
taken to keep the failure two days back a secret, the papers had got
wind of the drama: _The Capital_ itself had spoken of it, though without
naming his fellow-worker. The staff of that paper was unaware that
Fandor was the other man who had so marvellously escaped from the sewer.
Blood-curdling tales were told about Doctor Chaleck, Juve, Loupart, the
house of the crime, the affair at the hospital; but to anyone familiar
with the actual happenings, the newspaper accounts were very far from
giving the truth.
And Juve, far from contradicting these misstatements, took a delight in
spreading them broadcast.
It is sometimes useful to set astray the powerful voice of the Press so
as to give a false security to the real culprits.
However, when masons, electricians and zinc-workers were seen to take
possession of Doctor Chaleck's house and begin to turn it upside down, a
crowd quickly assembled to witness the performance.
It was with great difficulty that Juve, who did not want too many
witnesses round the place, organised arrangements of a vigorous
character.
Installed in the drawing-room on the ground floor, he first had a long
interview with the owner of the house, M. Nathan, the well-known diamond
broker of the Rue de Provence. The poor man was in despair to think his
property had been the scene of the extraordinary events which were on
everybody's tongue. All he knew of Doctor Chaleck was that that
gentleman had been his tenant just four years, and had always paid his
rent regularly.
"You didn't suspect," asked Juve in conclusion, "the ingenious
contrivance of that electric lift in which the doctor placed a study
identically similar to the real one?"
"Certainly not, sir," replied the worthy man. "Eighteen months ago my
tenant asked permission to repair the house at his own expense; as you
may suppose, I granted his request at once. It must have been at that
time that the queer contrivance was built. Have I your permission to go
down to the cellars and ascertain their condition?"
"Not before to-morrow, sir, when I shall have finished my inspection,"
replied Juve, as he saw M. Nathan out.
The inspector was assisted in his investigation by detectives Michel and
Dupation. They interviewed the old couple in charge of the Cité and
various neighbours of Doctor Chaleck, but without lighting upon a clue.
Nobody had seen or heard anything whatever.
Toward noon he and Michel, who did not wish to leave the house, decided
to have a modest repast brought to them. M. Dupation, a fidgety
official, took this chance of getting away.
"Well, gentlemen," he declared, "you are much more up to this business
than I, and besides my wife expects me to luncheon. You don't need any
further help from me?"
Juve reassured the worthy superintendent and gave him permission to go.
He was only too glad to find himself alone with his lieutenant. The
workmen who were repairing the caved-in basement of the little house
were already gone, and there was no chance of their being back before
two o'clock. Thus Juve found himself alone with Michel.
"What I can't understand, sir," said Michel, "is the telephone call we
got toward morning from here asking for help at the office in the Rue
Rochefoucauld. Either the victim herself 'phoned, and in that case she
did not die, as we think, in the early part of the night, or it was not
she, and then----"
Juve smiled.
"You are right in putting the problem that way, but to my mind it is
easy to solve. The call was not given by the murdered woman for,
remember, when we raised the body at half-past six it was already cold.
Now the call was not given till six, when the woman had been dead some
little time. That I am sure of, and you will see the report of the
medical expert will uphold me."
"Then it was a third person who gave it?"
"Yes, and one who sought to have the crime discovered as soon as
possible, and who reckoned on the officers coming from the Central
Station, but did not expect Fandor or me to come back."
"Then according to you, sir, the murderer knew of your presence behind
the curtain in the study while the crime was being committed."
"I can't tell about the murderer, but Doctor Chaleck certainly knew we
were there. That man must have watched us all night, known the exact
instant we left the house, and immediately afterwards got some one to
telephone or must have done so himself."
Michel, becoming more and more convinced by Juve's reasoning, went on:
"At any rate, the existence of two studies, in all respects similar,
goes to show a carefully premeditated plan, but there is something I
can't account for. When you came back to the study where we found the
dead woman, you found traces of mud by the window brought in by your
shoes. You must therefore have been watching through the night the room
where the crime was committed."
Juve was about to put in a word, but Michel, launched on his train of
argument, continued:
"Allow me, sir; you are going, no doubt, to tell me that they might
during your short absence have carried the body of the victim into the
study in question, but I would point out to you, that on the loosened
hair of the poor creature blood had caked, that some was on the carpet
and had even gone through it to the flooring beneath. Now if they
carried in the body just a little while before we discovered it, that
would not have been the case."
Michel was delighted with his own argument. Juve smiled indulgently.
"My poor Michel," he cried, "you would be quite right if I put forward
such an explanation. It is certain that the room in which we found the
body was that in which the crime took place. It is therefore that in
which we were not! As for the marks of mud near the window, they are
ours, but transferred from the room in which we were into the room in
which we were not! Which again proves that our presence was known to the
culprits.
"Furthermore, the candle with which Doctor Chaleck melted the wax to
seal his letters was scarcely used, it only burned in fact a few
minutes. Now we found another candle in the same state. So you see that
the precautions were well taken and everything possible done to lead us
astray.
"We see the puppets moving--Loupart, Chaleck, Josephine, others maybe,
but we do not see the strings."
"The strings which move them perhaps may be no other than--Fantômas,"
ventured Michel.
Juve frowned and suddenly fell silent. Then abruptly changing the
conversation, he asked his lieutenant:
"You told me, did you not, that you could no longer appear in the
character of the Sapper?"
"Quite true, Inspector, I was spotted just the day before the crime by
Loupart, and so was my colleague, Nonet."
"Talking of that," answered Juve, "Nonet mentioned vaguely something
about an affair at the docks, supposed to have been planned by the Beard
and an individual known as the Cooper. Are you fully informed?"
"Unfortunately no, Inspector. I know no more about the matter than you
do."
"And what is Nonet about now?"
"He has left for Chartres."
Juve shrugged his shoulders. He was annoyed. Perhaps if Léon, nicknamed
Nonet, had not been transferred he would by now have obtained pertinent
clues to the dock's affair.
After having enjoined Michel to devise a new disguise which allowed him
to mix once more with the Band of Cyphers and going back to "The Good
Comrades," Juve went down to the basement to supervise the workmen, who
were now back; while Michel busied himself with the inventory of the
papers found in Doctor Chaleck's study.
* * * * *
On leaving the house toward half-past seven in the evening Juve went
slowly down to the Rue des Martyrs, pondering over the occurrences which
for several days had succeeded each other with such startling rapidity.
As he reached the boulevards the bawling of newsboys attracted his
attention. An ominous headline was displayed in the papers the crowd was
struggling for.
"ANOTHER RAILROAD ACCIDENT.
THE SIMPLON EXPRESS TELESCOPES
THE MARSEILLES LIMITED. MANY
VICTIMS."
Juve anxiously bought a paper and scanned the list of the injured,
fearful that Fandor would be found among the number. But as he read the
details and learned that those in the detached carriage had escaped, he
felt somewhat relieved. Hailing a taxi he drove off rapidly to the
Prefecture in search of more precise information.
"A message for you, M. Juve."
The detective, hurrying home, was passing the porter's lodge. He pulled
up short.
"For me?"
"Yes--it's certainly your name on the telegram."
Juve took the blue envelope with distrust and uneasiness. He had given
his home address to no one. He glanced over the message, and gave a sigh
of relief.
"The dear fellow," he muttered as he went upstairs. "He's had a narrow
escape; however, all's well than ends well."
After a hurried toilet and a bite of dinner, Juve set off again, jumped
into a train for the Boulevard St. Germain and got down at the Jardin
des Plantes. Then, sauntering casually along, he made for Bercy by the
docks, which were covered as far as the eye could see with rows and rows
of barrels.
* * * * *
About two hours later, Juve, who had been wandering about the vast
labyrinth of wine-docks, began to grow impatient.
It was already fifty minutes past the appointed hour, and the detective
began to feel uneasy. Why was Fandor so late? Something must surely have
happened to him! And then what a queer idea to choose such a meeting
place!
Suddenly, Juve started. He recalled his talk that afternoon with Michel;
the reference made to the affair of the docks in which the Beard and the
Cooper were implicated. What if he had been drawn into a trap!
The detective's reflections were suddenly cut short by unusual and
alarming sounds.
He fancied he heard the shrill blast of a whistle, followed by the rush
of footsteps and a collision of empty barrels.
Juve held his breath and crouched down under the shed in which he stood;
he thought he saw the outline of a shadow passing slowly in the
distance. Juve was stealthily following in its tracks when he caught a
significant click.
"Two can play at that," he growled between his teeth, as he cocked his
revolver. The shadow disappeared, but the footsteps went on.
Disguising his voice he called out: "Who goes there?"
A sharp summons answered him, "Halt!"
Juve was about to call upon his mysterious neighbour to do likewise,
when a report rang out, at once followed by another. Juve saw where the
shots came from. His assailant was scarcely fifteen paces from him, but
luckily the shots had gone wide.
"Use up your cartridges, my friend," muttered Juve; "when your get to
number six, it will be my turn."
The sixth shot rang out. This was the signal for Juve to spring forward.
Leaping over the barrels, he made for the shadow which he espied at
intervals. All at once he gave a cry of triumph. He was face to face
with a man.
His cry, however, changed into amazement.
"You, Fandor?"
"Juve!"
"You've begun shooting at me, now, have you?"
For answer, the journalist held out his revolver, which was fully
loaded.
"But what are you doing here, Juve?" he asked.
"You wired to me to come."
"That I never did."
Juve drew the telegram from his pocket and held it out to Fandor, but as
the two men drew close together, they were startled by a lightning
flash, and a report. A bullet whistled past their ears. Instinctively
they lay flat between two barrels, holding their breaths.
Juve whispered instructions: "When I give the signal, fire at anything
you see or toward the direction of the next report."
The two men slowly and noiselessly raised their heads.
"Ah," cried Juve.
And he fired at the rapidly fleeing figure.
"Did you see?" whispered Fandor, clutching Juve's arm. "It's Chaleck."
Juve was about to leap up and start in pursuit when a series of dull
thuds, the overturning of barrels, stifled oaths and cracking planks
smote his ear. These noises were followed by the measured footfall of a
body of men drawing near, words of command and shrill whistles.
"What's all that now?" questioned Fandor.
"The best thing that could happen for us," replied Juve. "The police are
coming. These quays are a refuge for all kinds of tramps and crooks who
from time to time are rounded up. We are probably going to see a
'drive.'"
Juve had scarcely finished speaking when several shots rang out; these
were followed by a general uproar and then a great blue flame suddenly
rose, died away and flared up again. A thick smoke permeated the
atmosphere.
"Fire," exclaimed Fandor.
"The kegs of alcohol are alight," added Juve.
The two had now to think of their own safety. Evidently bandits had been
tracking them for more than an hour, guided by Doctor Chaleck.
But they soon found that their retreat was cut off by a ring of flames.
"Let us head for the Seine," suggested Fandor, who had discovered a
break in the ring of fire at that point. A fresh explosion now took
place. From a burst cask a spurt of liquid fire shot up, closing the
circle. It had become impossible to pass through in any direction.
They heard the cries of the rabble, the whistles of the officers. In the
distance the horns of the fire engines moaned dolefully. The heat was
growing unbearable, and the ring enclosing Fandor and Juve narrowed
more and more. Suddenly Juve pointed to an enormous empty puncheon that
had just rolled beside them.
"Have you ever looped the loop?" he asked. "Hurry up now; in you go;
we'll let it roll down the slope of the quay into the river."
In a few moments the cask was rolling at top speed. Juve and Fandor
guessed by the crackling of the outer planks and by a sudden rise in the
temperature that they were passing through the fire. All at once the
great vat reached the level of the river. It plunged into the waves with
a dull thud.
XVII
ON THE SLABS OF THE MORGUE
As he turned at the far side of the Pont St. Louis, Doctor Ardel, the
celebrated medical jurist, caught sight of M. Fuselier, the magistrate,
chatting with Inspector Juve in front of the Morgue.
"I am behind-hand, gentlemen. So sorry to have made you wait."
M. Fuselier and Juve crossed the tiny court and entered the
semi-circular lecture-room, where daily lessons in medical jurisprudence
are given to the students and the head men of the detective police
force.
Doctor Ardel, piloting his guests, did the honours.
"The place is not exactly gay; in fact, it has an ill reputation; but
anyhow, gentlemen, it is at your disposition. M. Fuselier, you will be
able to investigate in peace: M. Juve, you will be at liberty to put any
questions you choose to your client."
The doctor spoke in a loud voice, emphasising each word with a jolly
laugh, good natured, devoid of malice, yet making an unpleasant
impression on his two visitors less at home than he in the gruesome
abode they had just entered.
"You will excuse me," he went on, "if I leave you for a couple of
minutes to put on an overall and my rubber gloves?"
The doctor gone, the two instinctively felt a vague need to talk to
counteract the doleful atmosphere the Morgue seemed to exhale, where so
many unclaimed corpses, so much human flotsam, had come to sleep under
the inquiring eyes of the crowd, before being given to the common ditch,
being no more than an entry in a register and a date: "Body found so and
so, buried so and so."
"Tell me, my dear Juve," asked M. Fuselier. "This morning directly I got
your message I at once acceded to your wish and asked Ardel to have us
both here this afternoon, but I hardly understand your object. What have
you come here for?"
Juve, with both hands in his pockets, was walking up and down before the
dissecting table. At the Magistrate's question he stopped short, and,
turning to M. Fuselier, replied:
"Why have I come here? I scarcely know myself. It's everything or
nothing. The key to the puzzle. I tell you, M. Fuselier, things are
becoming increasingly tragic and baffling."
"How's that?"
"The part played by Josephine is less and less clear. She is Loupart's
mistress; she informs against him, is fired at by him, then, according
to Fandor, becomes in some manner his accomplice in a robbery so daring
that you must search the annals of American criminality to find its
like."
"You refer to the train affair?"
"Yes. Now, leaving Josephine on one side, we are confronted with two
enigmas. Doctor Chaleck, a man of the world, a scholar, crops up as
leader of a band of criminals. What we know for certain about him is
that he fired at Josephine, that he was concerned in the affair of the
docks--no more. There remains Loupart; and about him being the real
culprit we know nothing. There is no proof that he killed the woman. In
order to prove that we should have to know who that woman is and why she
was killed, and also how. The how and why of the crime alone might
chance to give us the answer."
"What trail are you following?"
"That of the dead woman. The body we are about to examine will determine
me in which quarter to direct my search."
M. Fuselier, looking at the detective with a penetrating eye, asked:
"You surely haven't the notion of suspecting Fantômas?"
"You are right, M. Fuselier," he replied. "Behind Loupart, behind
Chaleck, everywhere and always it is Fantômas I am looking for."
Whatever information the detective was about to impart to the magistrate
was cut short by the return of Doctor Ardel. That gentleman, in donning
the uniform of the expert, had resumed an appearance of professional
gravity.
"We are going to work now, gentlemen," he announced. "I need not remind
you, of course, that the body you are about to see, that of the woman
found in the Cité Frochot, has already undergone certain changes due to
decomposition, which have modified its aspect."
So saying, Dr. Ardel pressed a button and gave an attendant the
necessary order. "Be so good as to bring the body from room No. 6."
Some minutes later a folding door in the wall opened and two men pushed
a truck into the middle of the hall upon which lay the corpse of the
unknown.
"I now give over the dead woman to you to identify," declared Doctor
Ardel. "My examination has been carried out and my part as expert is
over--I am ready to hand in my report."
Fuselier and Juve bent long over the slab upon which the body had been
placed.
"Alas!" cried Juve, "how recognise anything in this countenance
destroyed by pitch? What discover in these crushed limbs, this human
form, which is now a shapeless mass?" And, turning to Dr. Ardel, he
questioned:
"Professor, what did you learn from your autopsy?"
"Nothing, or very little," replied the doctor. "Death was not due to one
blow more than another. A general effusion of blood took place
everywhere at once."
"Everywhere at once? What do you mean by that?" questioned Juve.
"Gentlemen, that is the exact truth. In dissecting this body I was
surprised to find all the blood vessels burst, the heart, the veins, the
arteries, even the lung cells. More than this, the very bones are
broken, splintered into a vast number of little pieces. Lastly, both on
the limbs and over the whole body I find a general ecchymosis, reaching
from the top of the neck to the lower extremities."
"But," objected Juve, who feared the professor might linger over
technical details too complex for him, "what general notion does this
suggest to you as to the cause of death?"
"A strange idea, M. Juve, and one it is not easy for me to define. You
might say that the body of this woman had passed under the grinders of a
roller! The body is 'rolled,' that is just the word, crushed all over,
and there is no point where the pressure might be conjectured to have
been greatest."
M. Fuselier looked at Juve.
"What can we deduce from that?" he asked.
"Professor Ardel demonstrates scientifically the same doubts to which a
rough inspection led me. How did the murderer go to work? It becomes
more and more of a mystery."
"It is so much so," declared Professor Ardel, "that even by postulating
the worst complications I really cannot conceive of any machine capable
of thus crushing a human being."
"I do not believe," declared the magistrate, "that we have any more to
see here. It is plain, Juve, that this corpse cannot furnish any clues
to you and me for the inquest."
"The corpse, no," cried Juve, "but there is something else."
Then, turning to the professor, he asked:
"Could you have brought to us the clothes this woman wore?"
"Quite easily."
From a bag that an attendant handed him Juve drew out the garments of
the dead woman. The shoes were by a good maker, the silk stockings with
open-work embroidery, the chemise and the drawers were of fine linen and
the corset was well cut.
"Nothing," he cried, "not a mark on this linen nor even the name of the
shop where it was bought."
He examined her petticoat, her bodice, a sort of elegant blouse, trimmed
with lace, and the velvet collar which had several spots of blood upon
it. He then drew a small penknife from his pocket and, kneeling on the
floor, proceeded to probe the seams. Suddenly he uttered a muffled
exclamation:
"Ah! What's this?" From the lining of the bodice he drew out a thin roll
of paper, crumpled, stained with blood, torn unfortunately.
"Goodness of God in whom I trust--I do not wish to die with this
remorse--I do not wish to risk his killing me to destroy this
secret--I write this confession, I will tell him it is deposited in
a safe place--yes, I was the cause of the death of that hapless
actor! Yes, Valgrand paid for the crime which Gurn committed....
Yes, I sent Valgrand to the scaffold by making him pass for
Gurn--Gurn who killed Lord Beltham, Gurn, who I sometimes think
must be Fantômas!"
Juve read these lines in an agitated voice, and as he came to the
signature he turned pale and was obliged to stop.
"What is the matter?"
"It is signed--'Lady Beltham.'"
In order that Doctor Ardel, understanding nothing of Juve's agitation,
might grasp that import of the paper just discovered he would have had
to call to mind the appalling tragedy which three years before had
stirred the whole world with its bloody vicissitude and mystery, one not
solved to that hour.
"Lady Beltham!"
At that name Juve called up the whole blood-curdling past! He saw in
fancy the English lady[A] whose husband was murdered by the Canadian
Gurn, who perhaps was her lover.
And Juve, following his train of thought, pondered that he had accused
this same lady of having, to save her lover, the very day the guillotine
was erected on the boulevard, found means to send in his stead the
innocent actor, Valgrand.
And here in connection with this affair of the Cité Frochot he found
Lady Beltham involved in the puzzle of which he was so keenly seeking
the key.
Juve again read the momentous paper he had just unearthed.
"By Jove, it was plain," ran his thought, "the lady, criminal though she
might be, was first and foremost Fantômas' passionate inamorata. And
this paper he held in his hands was the tail end of her confession--the
remains of a document in which in a fit of moral distress she had avowed
her remorse and made known the truth."
And taking line by line the cryptic statement, Juve asked himself
further:
"What do these phrases signify? How extract the whole truth from these
few words? 'I do not want him to kill me in order to destroy that
secret'! When Lady Beltham wrote that she was angry with Gurn. Then
again what did this other doubtful expression mean?--'Gurn who I
sometimes fancy may be Fantômas.' She did not know then the precise
identity of her lover! Oh, the wretch! To what depths had she sunk?"
Then as he put this query to himself, Juve shook from head to foot. Like
a thunderclap he thought he grasped the truth he had followed so
eagerly. What had become of Lady Beltham? Must he not come to the
conclusion that this woman whose face had been crushed out of all
recognition by the murderer was none other than the lady? How else
explain the discovery in her bodice of the betraying document? Who but
she could have had it in her possession? Who else could have so
sedulously concealed it?
Juve read over another clause: "I will tell him it is deposited in a
safe place."
Feverishly Juve took up the garments trailing on the ground, carefully
explored the fabric, made a minute search.
"It is impossible," he thought, "that I should not find another
document. The beginning of this confession--I must have it!"
All at once he stopped short in his search. "Curse it all!" And he
pointed out to M. Fuselier, disguised in the lining of a loose pocket in
the petticoat--a fresh hiding place, but torn and alas! empty.
This woman had split up her confession into several portions. And if she
was killed it was certainly to strip her of these compromising papers.
Well, the murderer had attained his object.
"Look, Fuselier, this empty 'cache' is the proof of what I put forward,
and chance alone allowed the page concealed in the collar of this bodice
to fall into my hands."
Long did the detective still grope and ponder, heedless of the
questions the professor and the magistrate kept asking him. He rose at
last, and with a distracted gesture took the arm of M. Fuselier, and
dragged him before the stone slab on which the corpse, but recently
unknown, smiled a ghastly smile.
"M. Fuselier, the dead woman has spoken. She is Lady Beltham. This is
the body of Lady Beltham!"
The magistrate recoiled in horror. He murmured:
"But who then can Doctor Chaleck be? Who can Loupart be?"
Juve replied without hesitation.
"Ask Fantômas the names of his accomplices!"
And leaving him and Doctor Ardel without any farewell Juve rushed from
the Morgue, his features so distorted that as they passed him people
drew aside, amazed and murmuring:
"A madman or a murderer!"
XVIII
FANTÔMAS' VICTIM
"You understand my object, Fandor? Hitherto I have worked unaided. I
wanted to unearth Fantômas and bring him to Headquarters, saying to my
superiors, 'For three years you have maintained this man was dead; well,
here he is! I have put the darbies on the most terrible ruffian of
modern times.' Well, I must forego my little triumph. We must now work
in the open. Public opinion must come to our aid."
"Then you want me to write my article?"
"Yes, and tell all the details; wind up by putting the question
squarely. 'Is not Fantômas still alive?' Then sum up in the affirmative.
Now, be off. I want to read your article this evening in the _Capital_."
Fandor had just left his detective friend when old Jean, the only
servant that Juve tolerated in his private quarters, entered the room.
"Don't forget the person who is waiting in the parlour, sir."
"Ah, yes, to be sure. A person who comes to see me at home, when nobody
knows my address should be interesting. Show him in, Jean."
Juve placed his revolver in reach of his hand as Jean announced: "Maître
Gérin, notary."
Juve rose, motioned his visitor to a chair and inquired the object of
his visit.
Maître Gérin bowed respectfully to Juve.
"I must apologise," he said, "for coming to disturb you at home, sir,
but it concerns a matter of such importance and it involves names so
terrible that I could not utter them within the walls of the Sûreté.
What brings me here is a crime which must be laid to Fantômas or his
heirs in crime."
Juve was strangely moved.
"Speak, sir, I am all attention."
"M. Juve, I believe that one of my clients, a woman, has been killed. I
have had for some time a certain sympathy, and, I don't disguise it, an
immense curiosity concerning her because she was actually involved in
the mysterious affairs of Fantômas."
"The name of the woman, counsel, her name, I beg of you?"
"The name of the woman who, I fear, has been murdered is--Lady
Beltham!"
Juve gave a sigh of relief. It was the name he wished to hear.
Maître Gérin continued: "I have been Lady Beltham's lawyer for a long
period of time, but since the Fantômas case came to an end in the
sentencing to death of Gurn and the subsequent scandal attached to the
name of Lady Beltham, I have ceased to have any further tidings of that
unhappy woman.
"Indirectly, through the medium of the papers which at times gave out
some echo of her, I knew that she had been travelling, then, that she
was back in Paris, and had gone to live at Neuilly, Boulevard Inkermann.
But I did not see her again. It is true her family matters were settled,
her husband's estate entirely wound up. In short, she had no reason to
appeal to me professionally."
"To be sure."
"Well, some days ago, I was greatly surprised by her visiting my office.
Naturally I refrained from asking her any awkward questions."
Juve interrupted: "In Heaven's name, sir, how long ago is it since Lady
Beltham called on you?"
"Nineteen days, sir."
A sigh of relief escaped Juve. He had feared all his theories regarding
the body at the Morgue the day before were going to collapse. "Go on,
sir," he cried.
"Lady Beltham, on being shown into my private office, appeared to me
much the same physically as I had known her previously, but she was no
longer the great lady, cold, haughty, a trifle disdainful. She seemed
crushed under a terrible load, a prey to awful mental torture. She made
appeal to my discretion, both professionally and as a man of honour.
"She then spoke as follows: 'I am going to write a letter which, if it
fell into the hands of a third person, would bring about a great
calamity. This letter I shall intrust to you together with my Will which
will instruct you what to do with it at my death. I will send you a
visiting card with a line in my own handwriting every fortnight. If ever
this card fails to come, conclude that I am dead, that they have
murdered me, and carry that letter where I tell you--Avenge me!'"
"Well, what then?" cried Juve, anxiously.
"That is all, M. Juve. I have not seen Lady Beltham again, nor had any
news of her. When I called at her residence I was told she was away. I
have come to ask you whether you think she has been murdered."
Juve was pacing his room with great strides.
"Maître," he said at last, "your story confirms all I have suspected.
Yes, Lady Beltham is dead. She has been murdered. That letter contained
her confession and revealed not only her own crimes, but those of her
accomplices, of her master--of--Fantômas. Fantômas killed her to free
himself of a witness to his evil life."
"Fantômas! But Fantômas is dead."
"So they say."
"Have you proofs of his existence?"
"I am looking for them."
"What do you think of doing?"
"I am going to make an investigation. I am going to learn where and how
Lady Beltham was killed. I shall see you again, Maître. Read _The
Capital_ this evening. You will find in it many interesting surprises."
XIX
THE ENGLISHWOMAN OF BOULEVARD INKERMANN
"To sum up what I have just learned."
Juve was seated at his desk, and those who knew the private life of the
great detective would assuredly have guessed that he was gravely
preoccupied. He was trying to extract some useful information from the
notary's visit, some hints essential to the investigation he had taken
in hand, and that at all hazards he meant to pursue to a successful
termination. The task was fraught with difficulties and even peril. But
the triumph would be great if he should succeed in putting the
"bracelets" on the "genius of crime," as he had called him to his friend
Fandor.
"Lady Beltham had gone to visit Gérin. She was an astute woman after
all, and knew how to get her own way. There must have been powerful
motives which urged her to write that confession. What were those
motives?
"Remorse? No. A woman who loves has no remorse. Fear? Probably, but fear
of what?"
Juve, without being aware of it, had just written on the paper of his
note-book the ill-omened name which haunted him.
"Fantômas!"
"Why, of course, Fantômas killed Lady Beltham, and killed her in the
house of Doctor Chaleck, an accomplice. And Loupart, a third accomplice,
got his mistress to write to me, and I believed the denunciation.
Loupart got us to dog him, led me unawares behind the curtains in the
study, and made me witness that Chaleck was innocent. Oh, the ruse was a
clever one. Josephine herself, by the two shots she received some days
later at Lâriboisière, became a victim. In short, the scent was crossed
and broken."
The detective snatched up his hat, saw carefully to the charges of his
pocket revolver, then gravely and solemnly cried:
"It is you and I now, Fantômas!" with which he left his rooms.
* * * * *
Juve and Fandor were entering a taxi-cab.
"To Neuilly Church," cried Juve to the driver. "And, now, my dear
Fandor, you must be thinking me crazy, as less than two hours ago I
sent you off to write an article, and here I come taking you from your
paper and carrying you away in this headlong fashion. But just listen to
the tale of this morning's doings."
Juve then gave a full account of Maître Gérin's visit and wound up by
saying: "It is through Lady Beltham that we must unearth that monster,
Fantômas."
"That's all very well," replied Fandor, "but as the lady is dead, how
are we going to set about it?"
"By reconstructing the last hours of her life. We are now on our way to
Lady Beltham's residence, Boulevard Inkermann."
"And what are we to do when we arrive there?"
"I shall examine the house, which is probably empty, and you are to
'pump' the neighbours, to ask questions of the tradespeople. I should
attract too much attention if I were to do this myself, and that is why
I dragged you away from your work."
Some moments later the taxi pulled up at the corner of Boulevard
Inkermann.
"The house is number--" said Juve as he took Fandor by the arm. "Bless
me, you remember the house! It is the one in which I arrested Gurn
three years ago; that famous day he came to see Lady Beltham, disguised
as a beggar."
The two friends soon found themselves at their destination. Through the
garden railing, which was wholly covered with a dense growth of ivy, the
two saw the house, which now looked very dilapidated.
"It doesn't look as if it had been inhabited for a long while," said
Fandor.
"That's what we want to make sure of. Go and make your inquiries."
Fandor left his companion and made his way back to the commercial
section of Neuilly. He stopped opposite a sign which read:
"Gardening done."
"Anyone there?" he inquired.
An old woman, standing in the doorway, came forward. "What can I do for
you, sir?"
"If I am not mistaken, it was you who attended to Lady Beltham's
garden?"
"Yes, sir, we kept her garden in order. But my husband hasn't worked
there for several months, as Lady Beltham has been away."
"I heard she was coming back to Paris, and called to-day, but found the
house closed up."
"Oh, I am sorry. Lady Beltham's an excellent customer and Mme. Raymond
also bought flowers of us."
"Mme. Raymond. She is a friend of Lady Beltham?"
"Her companion. It is now close to a year that Mme. Raymond has been
living with her. Oh! a very pleasant lady; a pretty brunette, very
elegant and not at all proud."
Fandor thought it well not to seem astonished.
"Oh, yes, of course," he cried, "Mme. Raymond. I remember now. Lady
Beltham's life is so sad and lonely."
"True enough," the woman replied, and, lowering her voice: "And then,
what with all these tales of noises and ghosts, the house can't be too
pleasant to live in, eh?"
Fandor pretended to be well posted. "People still talk of these
incidents?"
"Oh, yes, sir."
Fandor did not venture to press the subject, and, taking leave of the
worthy woman, he made his way back to the Boulevard. As soon as Juve
caught sight of him in the distance he ran up eagerly.
"Well?"
"Well, Juve, what have you found out during my absence?"
"In the first place that it is exactly sixty-four days since Lady
Beltham left Neuilly. I discovered this by the dates on a lot of
circulars in the letter box. I also had a talk with a butcher's man and
learned that Lady Beltham had a companion."
"Oh! I was bringing you that same news!"
"This Mme. Raymond is young, dark, very pretty. Can't you guess who she
is?"
Fandor stared at Juve.
"You mean----"
"Josephine. It's perfectly clear. We know Lady Beltham wrote a
confession, that Fantômas suspected this and murdered her to get hold of
it, and further that in this murder Loupart was involved. Josephine was
introduced to Lady Beltham by Fantômas. A spy going there to betray the
great lady and possibly entice her later to the Cité Frochot. Let us
make haste, lad. We thought we had to follow the trail of Loupart and
Chaleck, but we mustn't lose sight of Josephine. She may be the means of
helping us to the truth."
XX
THE ARREST OF JOSEPHINE
The somewhat grim faces of Mme. Guinon, Julie and the Flirt lit up
suddenly. Bonzille, the tramp set free by the police the day after the
"drive" in the Rue Charbonnière, had opened the bottle of vermouth, and
Josephine bustled around to find glasses to put on the table.
Josephine had visitors in her little lodging. There was to be a quiet
lunch. On the sideboard attractive dishes were ready, a fine savour of
cooking onions came from the dark corner in which Loupart's pretty
mistress was doing hasty cookery over the gas.
"Neat or with water?" asked Bonzille, performing his office of cup
bearer with comical dignity.
Mme. Guinon asked for plenty of water. Julie shrugged her shoulders
indifferently; she didn't care so long as there was drink, while the
Flirt, in her cracked voice, breathed in the loafer's ear: "How about a
sip of brandy to put with it?"
The appetiser loosened tongues: they began to cackle. From a drawer
Josephine got out a pack of cards, which the Flirt promptly seized,
while Julie, leaning familiarly on her shoulder, counselled her:
"Cut with the left and watch what you are doing; we shall see if there's
any luck for us in the pack."
* * * * *
Josephine had now been back three days from her painful journey and had
not seen Loupart. The latter, after having abandoned the motor in some
waste ground among the fortifications, had vanished with the Beard, only
bidding his mistress go home as if nothing had happened and wait for
news of him.
The Simplon Express affair had made a great stir in the fashionable
world, and had produced considerable uneasiness among the criminal
class.
To be sure no name had been mentioned, and apparently the police were
not following any definite clue. Still, in the Chapelle quarter, and
especially in the den of the "Goutte d'Or" and the Rue de Chartres, it
was noticed that the absence of the chief members of the Band of
Cyphers coincided with the date of the tragedy.
At first there had been some slight stand-offishness shown to Josephine
on her return. She was greeted with doubtful allusions, equivocal
compliments, with a touch of coldness, and folks were also amazed at not
seeing Loupart reappear with her.
Josephine told herself that she must at all costs disabuse her
neighbours of this bad impression, and that is why she had decided to
give a luncheon party to her most intimate friends. These might also be
her most formidable opponents, for such damsels as the Flirt and Julie,
even big Ernestine, could not fail to be jealous of the mistress of a
distinguished leader; besides, she was the prettiest woman in the
quarter.
Joining the conversation from time to time, Josephine smiled and
regained confidence. Her manoeuvre bade fair to be crowned with
success.
As they sat down to table the door opened and Mother Toulouche came in,
carrying a capacious basket.
"Well," cried the old fence, "I got wind that something was going on
here, and I said to myself, 'Why shouldn't Mother Toulouche be in it as
well?' One more or less don't matter, eh, Josephine?"
Josephine assented and made room for her. Before sitting down the old
woman put her basket on the floor.
"If I invite myself, Fifine, I bring something to the feast. Here are
some portugals and two dozen snails which will help out."
All at once, Josephine, who, despite the general gaiety, was
absent-minded and preoccupied, rose and ran to the door, answering a
knock. She was at bottom horribly uneasy at hearing nothing of her
lover. She began to fear that the police for once might have got the
upper hand. It was little Paulot, the porter's son, who rushed in quite
out of breath.
"Mme. Josephine, mother told me to come up and warn you that two
gentlemen were asking for you in the lodge just now. Two gentlemen in
special 'rig.'"
"Do you know them, Paulot?"
"I don't, Mme. Josephine."
"What did they want of me?"
"They didn't say."
"What did your mother answer?"
"Don't know. Believe she told 'em you were in your den."
The occurrence cast a chill over the company. Little Paulot was given a
big glass of claret, and when he had left the Flirt observed gravely:
"It's the cops."
"Why should they come and inquire for me?"
Julie tried to console her.
"Anyhow they'll not come up to your place."
Josephine was greatly upset. Were they after her or Loupart? Why had
they withdrawn? Would they come back?
In a flash she burst out, beating her fist on the table:
"Bah! I've had enough of this, not knowing what is going to happen from
one moment to the next. Sooner than stay here, I'll go and find out."
The Flirt suggested, with a spiteful smile.
"Go ahead, my girl, they won't be far away; go and ask them what they
want."
"Very well," cried Josephine, "I will."
And the young girl emptied her glass to give her courage.
"And if you don't come back, we'll set your room to rights," cried the
Flirt after her. "Good luck, try and not sleep in the jug."
Josephine rushed downstairs, and then, after a moment's hesitation,
turned and went down the Rue de Chartres.
At first she noticed nothing unusual or suspicious. The faces of those
she met were mostly familiar to her. But suddenly her heart stopped
beating. Two men accosted her simultaneously, one on her right, the
other on her left.
Her neighbour on the right asked very softly:
"Are you Josephine Ramot?"
"Yes."
"You must come with us."
"Yes," said Josephine, resigned.
A few moments later, Josephine, seated in a cab between the two men, was
crossing Paris. The detectives had given the address: "Boulevard du
Palais."
Loupart's mistress, taken on her arrival to the ante-room adjoining the
private rooms of the examining magistrates, had not much time for
reflection.
To be sure, she was not guilty. Not guilty? Well, at bottom the affair
of the Marseilles train made Josephine uneasy. And the story of the
motor, too, the motor taken by force from unknown travellers. What
knowledge had the police of these events? When questioned, was she to
confess or deny?
A little old man, bald and fussy, appeared at the end of the passage and
called her.
"Josephine Ramot, the private room of Justice Fuselier."
Mechanically she went forward between her two captors, who pushed her
into a well-lit apartment, in the corner of which stood a big desk. A
well-dressed gentleman was sitting there, writing; opposite him, in the
shadow, some one stood motionless. The magistrate raised his head; his
face was cold and contained, but not spiteful.
"What is your name?"
"Josephine Ramot."
"Where were you born?"
"Rue de Belleville."
"What is your age?"
"Twenty-two."
"You live by prostitution?"
Josephine coloured and, with an angry voice, cried:
"No, your honour, I have a calling. I am a polisher."
"Are you working now?"
Josephine felt awkward.
"Well, to say the truth, at the moment I have no work, but they know me
at M. Monthier's, Rue de Malte; it was there I was apprenticed, and----"
"And since you became the mistress of the ruffian Loupart, known as 'The
Square,' you have ceased to practise an honest calling?"
"I won't deny being Loupart's mistress, but as for prostitution----"
The man Josephine had noticed standing in the shadow came forward and
murmured a few words in the magistrate's ear.
"M. Juve," cried Josephine, moving toward the inspector with her hand
out. She stopped short as the detective motioned to her that such a
familiarity was not allowable, and the examination was resumed.
The magistrate, after having by some curt questions brought to light the
salient points of Josephine's life, and clearly mapped out the speedy
development of the honest little work girl into a ruffian's mistress,
and in all probability, accomplice, began the interrogation on the main
point.
At some length he narrated without losing a single change of her
countenance, the various incidents of the evening begun in the railway
which ended with the disaster to the Simplon Express.
Fuselier made Josephine pass again through her headlong exit from
Lâriboisière, her quick passage through Paris when she was barely
convalescent, and still suffering from the effects of the fever, her
departure in the Marseilles Express, where she picked up half a score of
footpads headed by her redoubtable lover; then the waiting in the
silence of the night, the affray, the threats, and lastly, after
breaking the couplings to the train, the dangerous flight of the band,
the headlong rush through the country.
The magistrate wound up:
"You came to town afterwards, Josephine Ramot, in company with Loupart,
called 'The Square,' and his factotum, the ruffian 'Beard.'"
Josephine, embarrassed by the steady glance of the magistrate,
endeavoured to keep her face devoid of expression, but as in his recital
the points of the adventure she had shared grew more definite, she felt
she was constantly changing colour and at certain moments her eyelids
quivered over her downcast eyes.
Evidently he was well posted. That young man who got into the same
compartment as M. Martialle must certainly have belonged to the police.
But for that the judge would never have known precisely what took place.
Decidedly this was a bad beginning.
Josephine now dreaded to see the door open and Loupart appear, the
bracelets on his wrists, followed by the Beard, similarly fettered, for
beyond a doubt the two men had been nabbed.
Hunched up, her nerves tense, Josephine kept her mind fixed on one
point. She was waiting anxiously for the first chance to protest. At a
certain juncture the magistrate declared:
"You three, Loupart, 'The Beard' and yourself, shared between you the
proceeds of the robberies committed."
As soon as she could get a word in, Josephine shouted her innocence.
Oh, as to that, no! She had not touched a cent from the business. She
did not even know what was involved.
The exact truth was this. She was ill in the hospital when all of a
sudden she remembered that Loupart had some days before bidden her be at
all costs at the Lyons Station, on a certain Saturday evening at exactly
seven o'clock. Now that particular Saturday was the day after the
attempt on her life. As she was much better she set off in obedience to
her lover. She knew no more; she had done no more; she would not have
them accuse her of any more.
The young woman had gradually grown warm, her voice rose and vibrated.
The judge let her have her say, and when she had finished there was a
silence.
M. Fuselier slowly dipped a pen in the ink, and in his level voice
declared, casting a glance in Juve's direction:
"After all, what seems clearly established is complicity."
Josephine gave a start--she knew the terrible significance of the term.
Complicity meant joint guilt.
But Juve intervened:
"Excuse me, in place of 'complicity' perhaps we had better say
'compulsion.'"
"I don't follow you, Juve."
"We must bear in mind, your honour, that this girl is to be pardoned to
a certain extent for having obeyed her lover's order, more particularly
at a time when the latter had gained quite a victory over the police.
For in spite of the protection of our people, his attempt against her
partially succeeded."
Taken aback, M. Fuselier looked from the detective to the young woman
whom he regarded as guilty. Juve's outburst seemed to him out of place.
"Your pardon, Juve, but your reasoning seems to me somewhat specious;
however, I will not press this charge against the girl; we have
something better."
Turning to Loupart's mistress, the judge asked abruptly:
"What has become of Lady Beltham?"
Josephine was amazed by the question. She turned inquiring eyes toward
Juve, who quickly said:
"M. Fuselier, this is not the moment----"
The magistrate, dropping this line, again tackled Josephine on her
relations with Loupart.
In a flash Josephine made up her mind. She would simulate innocence at
all costs. With the craft of a consummate actress, she began in a low
voice, which gradually rose and became impressive, insinuating:
"How pitiful it is to think that everyone bears a grudge against a poor
girl who, some day in springtime, has given herself the pleasure of a
lover! Is there any harm in giving oneself to the man who loves you? Who
forbids it? No one but the priests, and they have been kicked out of
doors!"
The magistrate could not help smiling, and Juve showed signs of
amusement.
"But I am honest, and when I understand something of what was going on,
I wrote to M. Juve. And what thanks did I get? Two bullet holes in my
skin!"
M. Fuselier hesitated about turning his summons into a committal.
XXI
AT THE MONTMARTRE FÊTE
The fête of Montmartre was at its height. In the Place Blanche a joyous
crowd was pressing round a booth of huge dimensions, splendidly lighted.
On the stage a cheap Jack, decked out in many-coloured frippery, was
delivering his patter:
"Walk in, ladies and gentlemen; it's only ten cents, and you won't
regret your money! The management of the theatre will present to you,
without delay, the prettiest woman in the world and also the fattest,
who weighs a trifle over 600 pounds and possibly more; as no scale has
yet been found strong enough to weigh her without breaking into a
thousand pieces.
"You will also have the rare and weird sight of a black from Abyssinia
whose splendid ebony hide has been tattooed in white. Furthermore, a
young girl of scarcely fourteen summers will astound you by entering
the cage of the ferocious beasts, whose terrible roarings reach you
here! The programme is most interesting, and after these incomparable
attractions, you will applaud the cinema in colours--the last exploit of
modern science--showing the recent tour of the President of the
Republic, and himself in person delivering his speech to an audience as
numerous as it is select. You will also see, reproduced in the most
stirring and life-like manner, all the details of the mysterious murder
which at this moment engages public interest and keeps the police on
tenter-hooks. The crime at the Cité Frochot, with the murdered woman,
the Empire clock, and the extinguished candle: all the accessories in
full, including the collapse of the elevator into the sewer. The show is
beginning! It has begun!"
Among the throng surrounding the mountebank three persons seemed
especially amused by the peroration. They were two gentlemen, very
elegant and distinguished, in evening clothes, and with them a pretty
woman wearing a loose silk mantle over her low dress.
She put her lips to the ear of the older of her companions, who, with
his turned-up moustache and grey hair, looked like a cavalry officer.
She murmured to him these strange words:
"Squint at the guy on the left, the one passing before the
clock-seller's booth. That's one of the gang. He was in the Simplon
affair."
The pretty Parisian, so smartly dressed, was no other than Josephine.
The young man with the fair beard was Fandor and the cavalry officer was
Juve. The three now "worked" together. The partnership dated from the
afternoon that Josephine escaped arrest, thanks to the lucky
intervention of Juve.
The latter had little belief in the young woman's innocence, but by
getting her on his side, he hoped to secure information as to Loupart's
doings.
Juve was talking to a ragged Arab selling nougat to the passers-by.
"Ay, sir," explained the Arab. "I have been dogging little Mimile since
two this afternoon."
"Bravo, my dear Michel, your disguise is a perfect success."
Josephine came suddenly close and pulled Juve by the sleeve, and then
pointed to a group of persons who were crossing the Place Blanche.
Without troubling further about the Arab, Juve at once began to follow
this group, motioning to Josephine and Fandor to follow him closely. The
three threaded their way through the crowd with a thousand precautions,
seeking to avoid attention, yet not losing sight of their quarry. All
three had recognised Loupart!
The outlaw, dressed in a long blouse, with a tall cap, and armed with a
stout cudgel, was walking among half a dozen individuals similarly
attired. By their garb they would be taken for cattle-herders from La
Villette.
This group proceeded slowly in the direction of Place Pigalle, and Juve,
who was pressing hard on his quarry, slackened his pace in order to let
them forge ahead a little. The square, which was surrounded by
brilliantly illuminated restaurants, was a flood of light, and the
detective did not want people to notice him. Moreover, the
pseudo-cattle-drivers had stopped, too: gathering round Loupart they
listened attentively to his remarks, made in a low tone. Clearly they
were accomplices of the robber, who, perhaps, realised that they were
being followed.
Fandor, who had put his arm through Josephine's, felt the young woman's
heart beating as though it would burst. They were all playing for high
stakes. Josephine, especially, was in a compromising and dangerous
plight. Not only had she to fear the wrath of her lover, but she ran the
risk of being "spotted" by one of the many satellites of the gang of
Cyphers, in which case her condemnation would be certain.
Fandor encouraged her with a few kind words:
"You know, mademoiselle, you mustn't be frightened. If I am not greatly
mistaken, Loupart is about to be nabbed, and once in Juve's hands he
won't get out of them in a hurry."
Josephine's perturbation was scarcely quieter, and Fandor, a trifle
skeptical, asked himself whether in reality the girl was on their side
or if she were not playing the game of false information. Suddenly
something fresh happened.
Loupart, separating himself from his companions, entered a restaurant
upon which the words
"The Crocodile"
were inscribed in dazzling letters on its front. The Crocodile
comprised, like most night resorts, a large saloon on the ground floor
and a dining-room on the first floor which was reached by a little
stairway and guarded by a giant clad in magnificent livery. Above this
were apartments and private rooms.
Just then, as it was near midnight, a number of carriages were bringing
couples in evening dress, who mounted the staircase. To their great
surprise, Fandor and Josephine saw Loupart make for this staircase. The
long smock of the seeming cattle-driver would certainly make a queer
showing. What was the formidable robber's game? Juve gave hasty
directions:
"It's all right. I know the house. It has only one exit. You, Ramot," he
went on, addressing the young woman, "go up to the first floor and take
your place at a table; here are ten dollars, order champagne and don't
be too stiff with the company."
Josephine nodded and went upstairs.
Juve and Fandor followed a few minutes later and took up a strategic
position at a table near the doorway. Fandor had a view of the room and
Juve commanded the hall and stairway. From the room came a confused hum
of laughter, cries and doubtful jokes. A negro, clad in red and armed
with a gong, capered among the tables, dancing and singing.
Fandor caught sight of Josephine, who appeared to be carrying out Juve's
instructions. Beside her was a fair giant of red complexion and
clean-shaven face, whose Anglo-Saxon origin was beyond doubt. Fandor
knew the face; he had seen the man somewhere; he remembered his square
shoulders and bull-like neck, and the enormous biceps which stood out
under the cloth of his sleeves.
"By Jove!" he cried suddenly. "Why it's Dixon, the American heavyweight
champion!"
Juve signalled to the waiter to bring him the bill as he fitted a
monocle into his right eye.
Fandor stared at him, surprised.
"Well, Juve, when you get yourself up as a man of the world, you omit no
detail."
Juve made no reply for some moments, then turned to his companion.
"Who else do you see in the room?"
Fandor looked carefully, and then made a gesture of amazement.
"Chaleck! Chaleck is over there eating his supper!"
"Yes," said Juve simply, "and you are stupid not to have seen him
before."
The profile of the mysterious doctor was in fact outlined very sharply
at a table, amply served and covered with bottles and flowers, around
which half a score of persons, men and women, had taken their places.
Without turning his head, Juve remarked:
"Judging by the action of the person who is at this moment lighting a
cigar the supper is not far from coming to an end."
"Come, now, Juve, have you eyes in your back? How can you know what is
going on at Doctor Chaleck's table, while you are looking in the
opposite direction?"
Juve handed his eye-glass to the journalist.
"Ah! Now I see! A trick eye-glass, with a mirror in it--not a bad idea."
"It is quite simple," murmured Juve. "The main thing is to have thought
of it. Come, let us go down."
"What? And desert the doctor?"
"An arrest should never be made in a public place when it can be
avoided. Here, give me your card that I may send it up with mine."
Juve called M. Dominique, the manager, and, pointing out Chaleck to him,
said:
"M. Dominique, please give our cards to that gentleman and say that we
are waiting outside to speak to him."
In a few moments Chaleck came out of the saloon to the Place Pigalle.
His face was calm and his glance unmoved. Juve laid his hand upon the
doctor's shoulder, and, signalling to a subordinate in uniform, cried:
"Doctor Chaleck, I arrest you in the name of the law."
Chaleck quietly flicked off his cigar ash and smiled:
"Do you know, M. Juve, I am not pleased with you. I read in the papers,
during a recent holiday abroad, that you had pulled my house absolutely
to pieces! That was not nice of you, when we had been on such good
terms."
This speech was so startling, so unlooked for, that Juve, though not
easily surprised, had nothing to answer for the moment.
Meanwhile, Chaleck tamely let himself be dragged toward the station in
the Rue Rochefoucauld.
"The fine fellow," thought Juve, "must have got his whole case
prepared--he will give us a run for our money; still it must----"
The detective gave vent to a loud yell. They had just got to the point
where the Rue Rochefoucauld is intersected by the Rue Notre Dame de
Lorette: a cab drawn by a big horse was moving in one direction and a
motor-bus coming from another. It had already cleared the Rue Pigalle,
and in a second would cut across the Rue Rochefoucauld, when Chaleck,
literally coming out of the Inverness coat he wore, leaped ahead of
Juve, dodged under the cab horse and boarded the bus, which rapidly went
on its way. All this had been accomplished in an instant.
Left dumbfounded, face to face, Juve and Fandor, together with the
officer, contemplated the only token left them by Chaleck. An elegant
Inverness cloak with capes, which, oddly enough, had shoulders and
arms--arms of India-rubber, so well imitated that through the cloth they
distinctly gave the impression of human arms.
Juve let fly a tremendous oath, then turned to Fandor and cried:
"How about Loupart?"
The two men hastily reascended the Rue Pigalle. They counted on standing
sentry again before the "Crocodile." But as they reached the square Juve
and Fandor were faced by fresh surprises. A powerful motor-car was
slowly getting under way. In it was the American Dixon, with Josephine
beside him.
Was the girl playing them false? That was the most important thing to
ascertain.
The car made off at a good pace toward the Place Clichy. Half a moment
later Juve was bowling after them in a taxi, calling to Fandor as he
left:
"Look after the other."
Fandor understood "The other" referred to Loupart, and carefully pumped
M. Dominique, but could get no further news from him, so, after waiting
an hour for Juve to return, he went home to bed far from easy in his
mind.
* * * * *
Juve followed the American through Billancourt, past Sèvres Bridge, and
finally into the Bellevue District, when, opposite Brimboison Park,
Dixon, with the air of a proprietor, took his motor into a fine looking
estate. Then, having housed the car, the pugilist, with Loupart's
mistress, went into the house, which was lit up for half an hour, after
which all was plunged again into darkness.
Juve had left his taxi at the bottom of the hill, and, having cleared
the low wall of the grounds, hid himself in view of the house. He waited
until daybreak, but nothing occurred to trouble the peace and hush of
the night. And then, unwilling to be seen in his evening clothes by
chance passers-by, he regretfully returned to the Rue Bonaparte.
XXII
THE PUGILIST'S WHIM
An old servant had brought out the early coffee to the arbour in the
garden. It was about eight o'clock, and in the shady retreat the
freshness of springtime reigned. Soon down the gravel walk appeared the
well-built figure of Dixon, dressed in white flannels. He bent under the
arch of greenery that led to the arbour, and seemed vexed to find that
it was empty.
Clearly the pugilist was not going to breakfast alone and, to while away
the time until his companion should appear, he lighted a cigarette.
Suddenly the door of the house opened to give passage to a gracious
apparition--Josephine. Wrapped in a kimona of bright silk and smiling at
the fine morning, the young woman came slowly down the steps and then
stopped short, blushing. Some one came to meet her--it was Dixon.
The giant, too, seemed moved. Lowering his eyes he asked:
"How are you this morning, fair lady?"
"And you, M. Dixon?"
"Mlle. Finette, the coffee is served, won't you join me?"
The two young people broke their fast in silence, exchanging only
monosyllables, to ask for a napkin, a plate, the sugar. At last,
overcoming his bashfulness Dixon asked in a voice full of entreaty:
"Will you always be so hard-hearted?"
Josephine, embarrassed, evaded the question, and with a show of gaiety
to hide her confusion, remarked:
"This is an awfully nice place of yours."
The pugilist answered her by describing the calm and simple delights of
a country life in the springtime, and, slipping his arm round her supple
waist, asked her softly:
"As you consented to come this far with me, why did you repel me
afterwards? Why resist me so stubbornly?"
"I was a trifle tipsy yesterday," she replied. "I don't know what I did
or why I came here with you." And then, with a touch of sadness:
"Naturally, finding me in such a place you took me for a----"
"Sure enough," replied the American, "but I can see you are not like the
others."
"And what attracts me to you," continued Josephine, "is that you are not
a brute. Why, yesterday evening, if you had wanted, when we were alone
together, eh?"
And she gave Dixon such a queer look that he asked himself whether she
did not regard him as absurd for having respected her.
"I like you very much," he said, "more than any other woman. In a month
from now I shall be off to America. I have already a good deal of money
and I shall earn much more out there. If you will come with me, we won't
part any more. Do you agree?"
Josephine was at first amused by this downright declaration, but
gradually she took it more seriously. She would see the world, be
elegant, rich, well dressed. She would have her future secured and no
more bother with the police. But, on the other hand, it might become
terribly boring after the exciting life she had led. And there was
Loupart. Certainly he was often repellant to her, but he had only to
come back and speak to her to be again submissive, loving and tractable.
And, strange to say, there was also--just of late--at the bottom of
Josephine's heart, a feeling of friendship, almost affection, for the
stern and thorough-going detective, for Juve, to whom she owed her
escape from a very bad fix. Fandor, too, she liked pretty well. She
valued the daring journalist, quick, full of courage, and yet a good
sort, free from prejudice. The more she thought about it, the more
Josephine felt herself to be strikingly complex: she felt that she could
not analyse her feelings, she was incomprehensible even to herself.
"Let me think it over a little longer," she asked. Dixon rose
ceremoniously.
"Dear friend," he declared, "you are at home here, as long as you care
to stay, and I hope you will consent to lunch with me at one o'clock.
From now till then I shall leave you alone to think at your leisure."
The old servant, too, having gone off shopping, Josephine remained alone
in the place, and after visiting the charming villa from top to bottom
strolled delightedly amid the lovely scenery of the park. As she was
about to turn into a narrow path, she uttered a loud cry. Loupart was
before her. The leader of the Gang of Cyphers had his evil look and
savage smile.
"How goes it?" he cried, then queried, sardonically: "Which would madame
prefer, the pig-sticker or the barker?"
Josephine, in terror, stepped backwards till she rested against the
trunk of a great tree.
Loupart carelessly got out his revolver and his knife: he seemed to
hesitate which weapon to use.
"Loupart," stammered Josephine, in a choking voice, "don't kill me--what
have I done?"
The ruffian snarled.
"Not only do you peach to M. Juve, but you let yourself be carried off
by the first toff that comes along; you don't stick at making me a
cuckold! That's very well!"
Josephine fell on her knees in the thick grass. Sure enough she had
played Loupart false, and suddenly a wave of remorse rose in her heart.
She was overcome at the thought that she could have endangered her lover
even for a moment, that she could have informed the police. She was
honestly maddened by the thought that Loupart had all but been arrested
through her fault. Yes, he was right in reproaching her, she deserved to
be punished. As for having wronged him, that was not true. She protested
with all her might against his accusation of unfaithfulness.
"I was wrong in listening to the pugilist, in coming here, but in spite
of appearances--Loupart, believe me, I am still worthy of you."
Loupart shrugged his shoulders.
"Well, we'll leave that for the moment. Just now you are going to obey
me without a word or protest."
Josephine's heart stopped; she knew these preambles. She tried to turn
the conversation.
"And how did you get here?"
"How did you get here yourself?"
"M. Dixon's motor-car."
"And who tracked you?"
"Why--no one."
"No one?" jeered the ruffian. "Then what was Juve doing in the taxi
which was rolling after you?"
Josephine uttered an exclamation of surprise. Loupart went on, greatly
satisfied with himself:
"And what was Loupart up to? That crafty gentleman was cosily ensconced
on the springs behind the taxi in which the worthy inspector was
riding."
The ruffian was teasing, and that showed he was in good humour again.
Josephine put her arms round his neck and hugged him.
"It's you that I love and you alone--let's go, take me away, won't you?"
Loupart freed himself from the embrace.
"Since you are at home here--the American said as much--I must see to
profiting by it. You will stay here till this evening: at five you will
be at the markets, and so shall I. You won't recognise me, but I shall
speak to you, and then you will tell me exactly where this pugilist
locks up his swag. I want a full plan of the house, the print of the
keys, all the usual truck. This evening I shall have something new for
Juve and his crew, an affair in which you will serve me."
Josephine, panting, did not pay heed to this last sentence. She flushed
crimson, perspiration broke out on her forehead, a great agony tightened
her heart. She, so docile till then, so devoted, suddenly felt an
immense scruple, an awful shame at the thought of being guilty of what
her lover demanded. Against any other man, she would have obeyed, but to
act in that way toward Dixon, who had treated her so considerately, she
felt was beyond her powers. Here Josephine showed herself truly a woman.
While determined not to be false to Loupart, she would not leave the
pugilist with an evil memory of her. She hesitated to betray him and
unwittingly proved the truth of the philosopher's dictum: "The most
honest of women, though unwilling to give hope, is never sorry to leave
behind her a regret!"
But Loupart was not going to stay discussing such subtleties with his
mistress. He never gave his orders twice. To seal the reconciliation he
imprinted a hasty kiss on Josephine's cheek and vanished. A sound of
crackling marked his passage through the thickets. Josephine was once
more alone in the great park around the villa.
* * * * *
Fandor and Dixon were taking tea in the drawing-room. The journalist
came, he alleged, to interview Dixon about his fight with Joe Sans, the
negro champion of the Soudan, which was to come off next day. After
getting various details as to weight, diet and other trifles, Fandor
inquired with a smile:
"But to keep in good form, Dixon, you must be as sober as a camel, as
chaste as a monk, eh?"
The American smiled. Fandor had told him a few moments before that he
had seen him supping at the "Crocodile" with a pretty woman.
At Juve's instigation Fandor had alleged a sporting interview, in order
to get into the American's house and discover if Josephine was still
there. He meant to ascertain what the relations were between the
pugilist and the girl.
The allusion to that evening loosened the American's tongue. Absorbed by
the pleasing impression which his pretty partner had made on him, Dixon
began talking on the subject. He belonged to that class of men who, when
they are in love, want the whole world to know it.
The American set the young woman on such a pedestal of innocence and
purity--that Fandor wondered if the pugilist were not laughing at him.
But Dixon, quite unconscious, did not conceal his intention to elope
with Josephine and shortly take her to America. Suddenly he rose.
"Come," he said, "I will introduce you to her."
Fandor was about to protest, but the American was already scouring the
house and searching the park, calling:
"Finette, Mlle. Finette, Josephine!"
Presently he returned, his face distorted, unnerved, dejected, and in a
toneless voice he ejaculated painfully:
"The pretty little woman has made off without a word to me. I am very
much grieved!"
Five minutes later, Fandor jumped into a train which took him back to
Paris.
XXIII
"STATES EVIDENCE"
"Juve, I've been fooled." The journalist was resting on the great couch
in his friend's study, Rue Bonaparte, and wound up with this assertion
the long account of the fruitless inquiry he had made at Dixon's.
"I'm played out! For two days I haven't stopped a minute. After the
night at the "Crocodile," which I spent for the most part, as I told
you, in search of Loupart, yesterday my day went in fruitless trips; my
mind is made up; to-night I shall do no more!"
"A cigarette, Fandor?"
"Thanks."
From the crystal vase where Juve, an inveterate smoker, always kept an
ample stock of tobacco, he chose an Egyptian cigarette.
"My dear Juve, it is absolutely necessary to go again to Sèvres and draw
a close net round Dixon. He needs watching. Isn't that your opinion?"
"I'm not sure."
Juve thought for a few moments, then:
"After all, what grounds have you for thinking that Dixon should be
watched?"
"Why, any number of reasons."
"What are they?"
It was Fandor's turn to be surprised. He had given Juve the account of
his visit, supposing that would bring him to his way of thinking, and
now Juve doubted Dixon being a suspect.
"You ask me for particulars. I am going to reply with generalisations.
Taking it all in all, what do we know of Dixon? That he was in a certain
place and carried off Josephine under our very eyes. Hence he is a
friend of Josephine's, which in itself looks compromising."
"Oh!" protested Juve. "You arrive at your conclusions very quickly,
Fandor. Josephine is not an honest woman. She may know the type of
people that haunt the night resorts, yet who, for all that, need not be
murderers."
"Then, Juve, how do you account for it that during my visit Dixon
tricked me and kept me from meeting Josephine while making believe to
look for her? Is not that again a sign of complicity? Does not that show
clearly that Josephine, realising that she is suspected in our eyes,
has decided to evade us?"
Juve smiled.
"Fandor, my lad, you are endowed with a prodigious imagination. You
impute to Dixon the worst intentions without any proof. He got Josephine
away, you say? What makes you think so? If you did not see her it was
due to collusion between them both. Why? As far as I can see, Josephine
simply picked up an old lover of hers at the 'Crocodile' and went off
with him as naturally as possible, preferring not to see the arrest of
Loupart or of Chaleck. I admit that next day she simply took French
leave of the worthy American, and you may be sure he knew nothing about
her going."
Fandor was silent and Juve resumed:
"That being so, what can we bring against Dixon? Merely that he knows
Josephine."
"You are right, Juve; perhaps I went too far with my deductions, but to
speak frankly, I don't see clearly what we are to do now. All our trails
are crossed. Loupart is in flight, Chaleck vanished, and as for
Josephine, I doubt our finding her again for ever so long."
All the while the journalist was speaking, Juve had remained leaning
against the window, watching the passers-by.
"Fandor, come and see! By the omnibus, there. The person who is going to
cross."
The journalist burst out:
"Well, I'm damned!"
"You see, Fandor, you must never swear to anything."
"Well, ain't we going to catch and arrest her?"
"Why? Do you think her being in this street is due to chance? Look, she
is crossing; she is coming straight here. She is entering the house. I
tell you in a few moments Josephine will have climbed my stairs and will
be seated cosily in this armchair, which I get ready and set full in the
light."
Fandor could not get over his astonishment.
"Did you make an appointment with her?"
"Not at all."
Jean, the detective's servant, came into the room and announced:
"There is a lady waiting in the sitting-room. She would not give her
name."
"Show her in, Jean."
A few moments later Josephine entered.
"Good day, Mademoiselle," cried Juve in a cordial tone. "What fresh news
have you to tell us?"
Loupart's mistress stood in the middle of the room, somewhat taken
aback. But Juve set her at ease.
"Sit down, Josephine. You mustn't mind my friend Fandor. He has just
been telling me about your friend Dixon."
"You know him, sir?"
"A little," said Fandor. "And you, Mademoiselle, have been seeing
something of him lately?"
"I happened to meet him at the 'Crocodile.'"
"And took a liking to him?"
"We took a liking to each other." She turned to Juve. "I suppose you
distrust me for giving you the slip with another man?"
Juve smiled. "You found a good companion and forgot us. There is really
nothing to be angry about. Now, won't you tell us what brings you here?"
"Yes, but M. Juve, you must swear to me that you will never repeat what
I am going to tell you."
"It is very serious then?"
"M. Juve, I am going to put you in the way of arresting Loupart."
"You are very kind, my dear Josephine, but if the attempt is to succeed
no better than that we made at the 'Crocodile'----"
"No, no, this time you'll be sure to nab him. Day after to-morrow at 2
o'clock, Loupart is going with some of his gang to Nogent, 7 Rue des
Charmilles. He has a job there under way."
Juve laughed. "They've been fooling you, Josephine. Isn't that your
view, Fandor? Do you think that Loupart would try a stroke in broad
daylight?"
Josephine gave more details, eager to persuade him.
"There will be fifteen of them outside a little house whose tenants are
away. Some of them will make a crowd to help their mates in case of
danger. The Beard is to be in it, too."
"And Loupart?"
"Yes, Loupart, I tell you. He will wear a black mask by which you can
identify him."
"Very well, if we have nothing better to do we will take a trip to
Nogent day after to-morrow; eh, Fandor?"
"As you like, Juve."
"Only, remember this, my dear Josephine, if you are putting up a game on
us you'll be sorry for it. There is a way, to be sure, in which you can
prove your good faith. Be at Nogent Station at half-past one. If we find
Loupart where you say he will be, we shall arrest him; if we don't find
him----"
The detective paused, significantly.
"You will nab him. Only we mustn't look as if we met by appointment. No
one must suspect that I gave you the tip."
Hereupon, Josephine started to go. Her manoeuvre had succeeded, and
Loupart's business would go ahead safely. She turned at the door and
nodded, looking at Fandor.
"Another thing; Loupart doesn't love you; you had better be on your
guard."
Juve turned thoughtfully to Fandor:
"Strange! Is this woman playing with us, or is she in earnest, and how
she looked at you when telling us to be on our guard!"
XXIV
A MYSTERIOUS CLASP
"Hullo! Hullo!"
Waking with a start, Juve rushed to the telephone. It was already broad
daylight, but the detective had gone to bed very late and had been
sleeping profoundly.
"Yes, it's I, Juve. The Sûreté? It's you, M. Havard? Yes, I am free. Oh!
That's strange. No signs? I understand. Count on me. I'll go there and
keep you informed."
Juve dressed in haste, went down to the street and hailed a taxi.
"To Sèvres, the foot of the hill at Bellevue, and look sharp about it!"
* * * * *
Juve left his taxi-cab, and mounted the slope on foot to the elegant
villa inhabited by Dixon. All was quiet, and if he had not had word, the
detective would have doubted that he was close to the scene of a crime,
or at least of an attempted one.
Scarcely had he entered the grounds when a sergeant came toward him and
saluted. Juve inquired:
"What has happened?"
"M. Dixon is resting just now, and the doctor has forbidden the least
noise."
"Is his condition serious?"
"I think not from what Doctor Plassin says."
"Now, Sergeant, tell me everything from the beginning."
The sergeant drew Juve to the arbour, where a policeman was seated
making out a report. Juve took the paper and read:
"We, the undersigned, Dubois, Sergeant in the second squad of
foot-police, quartered at Sèvres, together with Constable Verdier,
received this morning, June 28th, at 6.35 from M. Olivetti, a
business man, living in Bellevue, the following declaration:
"'Having left my home at 6.15 and being on the way to the
State Railway to take the 6.42 train, by which I go every day
to my work, I was passing the slopes of Bellevue, when, being
level with Brimborion Park, a little short of the villa number
16, which I hear belongs to M. Dixon, an American pugilist, I
heard a revolver shot followed by the noise of breaking
glass, the pieces falling on to a hard ground, most likely
stone.
"'Having halted for a moment through caution, I looked to see
if anyone was hiding near by. I saw nothing but heard three
more revolver shots in quick succession, seeming to come from
Dixon's house. After some minutes I went near the house and
ascertained that the panes of the window on the right side of
the front were broken, and the pieces strewed the asphalt
terrace in front of the house.
"'I made up my mind to ring, but no one opened the door. I
then thought that some prowlers had amused themselves by
making a shindy, and I was about to continue to the train when
I thought I heard faint cries coming from the inside of the
house. Then, fearing there was a mishap or a crime, I ran to
the police station and made the above statement in presence of
the sergeant.'"
Juve turned to the sergeant, who gave further details.
"Constable Verdier and I immediately hastened here. We reached the
terrace of the house, but there we came to a closed door we could not
break in. Having shouted loudly we were answered by groans and cries for
help which came from the room on the first floor of which the windows
were broken. We then got a ladder and climbed up. I passed my hand
inside and worked the hasp of the window. We went in and found ourselves
in a bedroom in apple-pie order and in which nothing appeared to have
been disarranged."
"And on a second inspection?" queried Juve.
"I went to the far end of the room and found stretched on the bed a man
in undress, who seemed a prey to violent pains. I learned afterwards
that this was M. Dixon, the tenant of the house. He could scarcely utter
a word or move. His shoulders and arms were out of the clothes, and I
could discern that the skin of his chest and shoulders bore traces of
blood effusion. On a bracket to the right of the bed lay a revolver, the
six cartridges of which had been recently fired."
"Ah!" cried Juve. "And then?"
"I thought the first thing to do was to call in a doctor. M. Olivetti
consented to go and call Doctor Plassin, who lives near by. Five minutes
later the doctor came, and I took advantage of his presence to send my
man to the Station."
"Have you been over the house?"
"Not yet, Inspector, but nothing will be easier, for in turning out the
pockets of the victim's clothes we found his bunch of keys."
"To bring the doctor into the house, you must have opened the door to
him, and therefore had a glimpse of the other rooms in the house, the
lobby, the staircase?"
The sergeant shook his head.
"No, Inspector. We went up the ladder. I tried to get out of the door of
M. Dixon's room, but found it was locked. This seemed strange, for the
assailant presumably entered by the door."
"By the by, Sergeant, are there no servants here? The place seems
deserted."
Constable Verdier put in his word:
"The American lives here alone except for an old charwoman who comes in
before nine. She will probably be here in half an hour, for she can have
no idea of what has happened."
"Good," said Juve. "You will let me know as soon as she comes; wait for
her in the garden. As for us," and he turned to the sergeant, "let us
make our way inside."
The two, armed with Dixon's keys, opened without difficulty the main
entrance door to the ground floor. There they found nothing out of the
way, but on reaching the first floor, the marks of some one's passage
was clearly visible.
The door of a lumber room stood wide open, and on its floor sheets of
paper, letters and documents lay scattered about. Juve took a candle
and, after a brief investigation, exclaimed:
"They were after the strong box."
A large steel safe, built into the wall, had been burst open, and the
workman-like manner in which it had been done showed clearly the hand of
an expert. Juve carefully examined the floor, picked up two or three
papers that had evidently been trodden on, took some measurements which
he jotted down in his note-book, and, without telling the sergeant his
conclusions, went downstairs again, paying no heed to the next room in
which Dixon lay, watched over by Doctor Plassin.
Verdier, who was mounting guard before the house, came forward and said:
"Mr. Inspector, the doctor says M. Dixon is awake. Do you care to see
him?"
Juve at once had the ladder put to the first story window and made his
way into the pugilist's room. The men's description was correct. No
disorder reigned in the chamber, at the far end of which, on a great
brass bed, a sturdy individual, his face worn with suffering, lay
stretched.
In two words Juve introduced himself to the doctor; then expressed his
sorrow for Dixon's plight.
"These are only contusions, M. Juve. Serious enough, but nothing more.
By the by, M. Dixon may congratulate himself upon owning muscles of
exceptional vigour. Otherwise, from the grip he must have undergone,
his body would be no more than a shapeless pulp."
Juve pricked up his ears. He had heard before of bones snapped and
broken under a strain that neither flesh nor muscle could resist. The
mysterious death of Lady Beltham at once occurred to his memory.
"Mr. Dixon, you will tell me all the details of the tragic night you
have passed through. You probably dined in Paris last evening?"
The sick man replied in a fairly firm voice:
"No, sir, I dined at home alone."
"Is that your usual habit?"
"No, sir, but between five and seven I had been training hard for my
match which was to have come off to-morrow with Joe Sans."
"Do you think your opponent would have been capable of trying to injure
you to keep you out of the ring?"
"No, Joe Sans is a good sportsman; besides, he lives at Brussels, and
isn't due in Paris till to-morrow."
"And after dinner, what did you do?"
"I fastened the shutters and doors, came up here and undressed."
"Are you in the habit of bolting yourself into your room?"
"Yes, I lock my door every evening."
"What time was it when you went to bed?"
"Ten at latest."
"And then?"
"Then I went fast asleep, but in the middle of the night I was waked by
a strange noise. It sounded like a scratching at my door. I gave a shout
and banged my fist on the partition."
"Why?" asked Juve, surprised.
The American explained:
"I thought the scratching came from rats, and I simply made a noise to
frighten them away. Then, the sound having ceased, I fell asleep again."
"And afterwards?"
"I was waked again by the sound of stealthy footsteps on the landing of
the first floor."
"This time you went to see?"
"I meant to do so, I was about to get up. I had put out my arm to get my
matches and revolver, when suddenly I felt a weight on my bed and then I
was corded, bound like a sausage, my arms tight to my body! For ten
minutes I struggled with all the power of my muscles against a frightful
and mysterious grip which continually grew tighter."
"A lasso!" suggested Doctor Plassin in a low voice.
"Were you able to determine the nature of the thing that was gripping
you?" asked Juve.
"I don't know. I remember feeling at the touch of the thing a marked
sensation of dampness and cold."
"A wetted lasso, exactly. A rope dipped in water tautens of itself,"
remarked the doctor.
"You had to make a great effort to prevent being crushed or broken?"
"A more than human effort, Mr. Inspector, as the doctor has witnessed;
if I had not muscles of steel and exceptional strength I should have
been flattened."
"Good--good," applauded Juve. "That's exactly it!"
"Really! You think so?" queried the American with a touch of sarcasm.
Juve smilingly apologised. His approval meant no more than that the
statements of the victim coincided with the theories he had formed. And
indeed he saw clearly in the unsuccessful attempt on the American and
the achieved killing of Lady Beltham a common way of going to work, the
same process. Undoubtedly the American owed it to his robust physique
that he got off but slightly scathed, whereas the hapless woman had been
totally crushed.
The similarity of the two crimes allowed Juve to make further
inductions. He reckoned that it was not by chance that Dixon had met
Josephine at the "Crocodile" two nights before, while the presence of
both Chaleck and Loupart in that establishment was still less
accidental. And already he felt pleased at the thought that he knew
almost to a certainty the villains to whom this fresh crime must be
ascribed. They had wanted to get rid of Dixon, that was sure, and by a
process still unknown to Juve, but which he would soon discover. They
had rendered the pugilist helpless while they were robbing him.
"Had you a large sum of money in your safe?" he asked.
The American gave a violent start.
"They've burgled me! Tell me, sir, tell me quickly!"
Juve nodded in the affirmative. Dixon stammered feebly:
"Four thousand pounds! They've taken four thousand pounds from me! I
received the sum a few days ago!"
"Gently, gently!" observed the doctor. "You will make yourself feverish
and I shall have to stop the interview."
Juve put in:
"I only want a few moments more, doctor. It is important." Then, turning
to Dixon, he resumed: "How did your struggle with the mysterious
pressure end?"
"After about ten minutes I felt my bands relaxing. In a short while I
was free; I heard no more, but suffered such great pain that I fell back
in bed and either slept or fainted."
"Then you did not get up at all?"
"No."
"And the door of your room to the landing remained locked all night?"
"Yes, all night."
"How about this broken glass in your window? Those revolver shots at six
in the morning?"
"It was I, firing from my bed to make a noise and bring some one here."
"I thought as much," said Juve, as he went down on all fours and
proceeded to examine the carpeting of the room between the bed and the
door, a distance of some seven feet. The carpet, of very close fabric,
afforded no trace, but on a white bearskin rug the detective noted in
places tufts of hair glued together as if something moist and sticky had
passed over it. He cut off one of these tufts and shut it carefully in
his pocketbook. He then went to the door which was hidden by a velvet
curtain. He could not suppress a cry of amazement. In the lower panel of
the door a round hole had been made about six or eight inches in
diameter. It was four inches above the floor, and might have been made
for a cat.
"Did you have that hole made in the door?" asked Juve.
"No. I don't know what it is," replied the American.
"Neither do I," rejoined Juve, "but I have an idea." Doctor Plassin was
jubilant.
"There you are!" he cried. "A lasso! And it was thrust in by that hole."
Through the window, Verdier called:
"M. Inspector, the charwoman is coming."
Juve looked at his watch.
"Half-past nine. I will see her in a minute."
XXV
THE TRAP
"Twelve o'clock! Hang it! I've just time to get there to keep my
engagement with Josephine."
Juve was going down Belleville hill as fast as his legs could take him
by a short cut past the Sèvres school. He cast a mocking glance toward
the little police station which stands smart and trim at one side of the
high road.
"Pity," he murmured, "that I can't escort my friends to that delightful
country house."
Then he hastened his pace still more. He was growing angry.
"I told Fandor to be at Nogent Station exactly at 1.30. It is now five
past twelve and I am still at Sèvres. Matters are getting complicated.
Oh, I'll take the tramway to Versailles' gate. From there I'll drive to
Nogent Station in a taxi."
He put this plan into execution, and was lucky enough to find a place
in the Louvre-Versailles' tram.
"All things considered, I have not wasted my morning. Poor Dixon! He was
lucky to get off so cheaply. It would seem now that Josephine told the
truth in saying he is not an accomplice of the Gang."
Juve reflected a while, then added:
"Only it looks as if that accursed Josephine had put her friends up to
the job."
At the St. Cloud gate the tram came to a stop and Juve got down, hailed
a taxi, and told the driver:
"To Nogent Station and look sharp. I'm in a terrible hurry."
The driver nodded assent, Juve got in, and the vehicle started. The taxi
had hardly been going five minutes when Juve became impatient.
"Go quicker, my man! Don't you know how to drive?"
The man replied, nettled:
"I don't want to get run in for breaking the regulations."
Juve laughed.
"Never mind the regulations, I'm from Police Headquarters."
The magical word took effect. From that moment, heedless of the frantic
signals of policemen, the driver tore along at full speed and reached
the square in front of Nogent Station.
"It is only 1.45--Fandor should just have got here."
Juve, indeed, had only just settled with his driver when Fandor popped
up from the waiting-room.
"Well, Juve! Anything fresh this morning?"
The detective smiled.
"Any number of things. But I'll tell you later. Where is Josephine?"
"Not here yet."
"The deuce!"
"That confirms my suspicions; eh, Juve?"
"Somewhat. I should be astonished if we did see her."
The detective led the journalist away, and the two went for a turn
beside the railway-line on the deserted boulevard.
"Fandor, this is the time to draw up a plan of action. Do you remember
the directions Josephine gave us?"
"Vaguely."
"Well, we are now going to the neighbourhood of the Rue des Charmilles.
It is number 7 that Loupart and his gang are to loot, according to
Josephine. Yesterday afternoon I sent my men to look at the street; this
is how they described it to me. It is a sort of lane with no issue; the
house which we are concerned with is the last, standing on the right. It
is a lodge of humble aspect, the tenants of which are really away. There
are not many people living in this Charmilles Lane, and the place is
well chosen for such a job, at least that is Michel's opinion.
"Oh, I forgot one thing, round the house is a fairly large garden of
which the walls are luckily high. So it is likely that even if the
burglars should discover our presence they could not get off the back
way."
"And what is your plan of action, Juve?"
"A very simple one. We are going to the entry of the Rue Charmilles and
wait there. When our men come up with us I shall try to pick out Loupart
and fly at his throat. There will be a struggle, no doubt, but in the
meantime you must bellow with all your might: 'Murder' and 'Help.' I
trust that succour will reach us."
"Then you haven't any plain-clothes men here?"
"No. I don't want to let my superiors know about this expedition."
The two men went forward some paces in silence along an empty side
street, till Juve halted in a shady corner and drew out his Browning,
carefully seeing to the magazine.
"Do as I do, Fandor"; he prepared for a tussle. "I smell powder in the
air."
Juve was about to start forward again when suddenly a tremendous uproar
broke out: "Help! Help!"
Juve seized Fandor by the arm.
"Take the left-hand pavement!"
The two had just reached the corner of the street where the house spoken
of by Josephine should stand, when a jostling crowd of people came in
sight, rushing toward them, uttering shouts and yells. Juve and Fandor
recognised a man fleeing at full speed in front of them, whose face was
hidden by a black mask! Behind him two other men were running, also
masked, but with grey velvet. In the crowd following were grocers'
assistants, workmen of all kinds, even a Nogent policeman.
"Help! Murder! Arrest him!"
The fleeing man was threatening his pursuers with an enormous revolver.
"Look out!" shouted Juve. "Loupart is mine! You tackle the others!"
But suddenly catching sight of the detective Loupart slackened his pace.
"Get out of the way!" he cried, flourishing his revolver.
"Stop, or I fire!" returned Juve.
"Fire then! I, too, shall fire!" And, leaping toward the detective, the
outlaw pointed his revolver at him and fired twice.
With a quick movement Juve leaped aside. The bullets must have brushed
him, but luckily he was not touched. The plucky detective again flung
himself on Loupart, seized him by the collar and tried to throw him
down.
"Let me go! I'll do for you----"
For a moment Juve felt the cold muzzle of the weapon on his neck. Then,
with a supreme effort, he forced the outlaw's hands down and, aiming his
revolver, fired.
"Help! I--I----"
A gush of blood welled up from the ruffian's collar. He turned twice,
and then fell heavily on the ground.
In the meantime Fandor was struggling with the two men in the grey
masks. Juve was about to go to his assistance, when the crowd now made a
rush and the detective became the central point of a furious encounter:
blows and kicks rained on him. He succumbed to numbers.
It was now Fandor's turn to help his friend, and he was about to join
the fight when he stood rooted to the spot in utter amazement. A little
beyond the groups of struggling men he caught sight of an individual
standing beside a tripod on which was placed a contrivance he did not
at once identify. The man seemed greatly amused, and was watching the
scene laughing and showing no desire to intervene.
"Very good! Very good! That will make a splendid film!"
Fandor understood----
His head bandaged and his arm in a sling, Juve was replying in a shaky
voice to the Superintendent of Police of Nogent.
"No, Superintendent, I realised nothing. It is monstrous! I asked in the
most perfect good faith. I did not fire till I had been fired at three
times."
"You didn't notice the strange get-up of the burglars? And of the
policemen? Of that poor actor, Bonardin, you half killed?"
Juve shook his head.
"I hadn't time to notice details. I want you to understand,
Superintendent, how things came about, to realise how the trap was laid
for me.... I came to Nogent, assured that I was about to face dangerous
ruffians. I was to encounter them at such an hour, in such a street. I
was given their description: they would have their faces masked and come
out of a certain house. And it all happened as described. I hadn't gone
ten paces in the said street when sure enough I saw people rushing
toward me bawling 'Help.' I recognised men in masks: had I time to look
at the details of their costumes? Certainly not! I spring at the throat
of the fugitive. He has a revolver and fires. How could I know the
weapon was only loaded blank? He, an actor in a cinematograph scene,
takes me for another, acting the part of a policeman. He fires at me and
I retaliate."
"And you half kill him."
"For which I am exceedingly sorry. But nothing could lead me to suspect
a trap."
"It's lucky you didn't wound anyone else. How did matters end?"
"The actors, naturally enough, were furious with me, and I was being
roughly handled when the real policemen arrived and rescued me. All was
explained when I brought out my card of identity. While they were taking
me to the station, the actor Bonardin was being carried to the nearest
house, a convent, I believe."
"Yes, the Convent of the Ladies of St. Clotilde."
* * * * *
The trap had been well devised, and Juve was not wrong in saying that
anyone in his place would have been taken in by it. And so while the
detective was detained at the station, Fandor, after a long and minute
interrogation, returned to Paris in a state of deep dejection.
XXVI
AT THE HOUSE OF BONARDIN, THE ACTOR
In the Place d'Anvers, Fandor was passing Rokin College. He heard some
one calling him. "Monsieur Fandor! Monsieur Fandor!"
It was Josephine, breathless and panting, her bright eyes glowing with
joy.
Fandor turned, astonished.
"What is up?"
Josephine paused a second, then taking Fandor's hand familiarly drew him
into the square, which at this time of day was almost deserted.
"Oh, it's something out of the common, I can assure you. I am going to
astonish you!"
"You've done that already. The mere sight of you----"
"You thought I was arrested, didn't you?"
Fandor nodded.
"Well, it's your Juve who is jugged!"
Contrary to Josephine's expectation, Fandor did not appear very
astonished.
"Come now, Miss Josephine, that's a likely tale! Juve arrested? On what
grounds?"
Josephine began an incoherent story.
"I tell you they squabbled like rag-pickers! 'You make justice
ridiculous,' shouted Fuselier. 'No one has the right to commit such
blunders!' Well, they kept going on like that for a quarter of an hour.
And then Fuselier rang and two Municipal guards came and he said:
'Arrest that man there!' pointing to Juve. And your friend the detective
was obliged to let them do it. Only as he left the room he gave Fuselier
such a look! Believe me, between those two it is war to the death from
now."
When she had ended Fandor asked in a calm voice:
"And how did you get away, Josephine?"
"Oh, M. Fuselier was very nice. 'It's you again?' said he when he saw
me. 'To be sure it is,' answered I, 'and I'm glad to meet you again, M.
Magistrate.' Then he began to hold forth about the cinema business. I
told him what I knew about it, what I told you. Loupart stuffed me up
with his tale of a trap. As sure as my name's Josephine I believed what
my lover told me."
Fandor gave her a penetrating glance.
"And how about the Dixon business?"
Josephine coloured, and said in a low tone:
"Oh, the Dixon business, as to that--we are very good pals, Dixon and I.
Just fancy, I went to see him yesterday afternoon. He has taken a fancy
to me. He promised to keep me in luxury. Ah, if I dared," sighed the
girl.
"You would do well to leave Loupart."
"Leave Loupart? Especially now that Juve is in quod, Loupart will be the
King of Paris!"
"Do you think your lover will attach much weight to the arrest of Juve?
Won't he fancy it's a put-up job?"
"A put-up job! How could it be? Why, I saw with my two eyes Juve led
away with the bracelets on his wrists."
The growing hubbub of the newsboys crying the evening papers drew near
the Place d'Anvers. Instinctively Fandor, followed by Josephine, went
toward them. On the boulevard he bought a paper.
"There you see!" cried Josephine triumphantly. "Here it is in print, so
it is true!"
In scare headlines appeared this notice--"Amazing development in the
affair of the Outlaws of La Chapelle. Detective Juve under lock and
key."
Fandor, when he met Josephine in the Place d'Anvers, was on his way to
the Rue des Abesses where Bonardin occupied a nice little suite of three
rooms, tastefully decorated and comfortably furnished.
The actor had his shoulder in plaster--Juve's bullet had broken his
clavicle, but the doctor declared that with a few days' rest he would be
quite well again.
"M. Fandor, I am very sorry for what is happening to M. Juve. Do you
think if I were to declare my intention not to proceed against him----"
Fandor cut his companion short.
"Let justice take its course, M. Bonardin. There will always be time
later on."
Although M. Bonardin was only twenty-five, he was beginning to have some
reputation. By hard work he had come rapidly to the front, and was fast
gaining a position among the best interpreters of modern comedy.
"My dream," he exclaimed to Fandor, "is one day to attain to the fame of
my masters, of such men as Tazzide, Gémier, Valgrand and Dumény."
"You knew Valgrand?" asked Fandor.
Bonardin smiled.
"Why, we were great friends. When I first made my appearance at the
theatre, after the Conservatoire, Valgrand was my model, my master. You
certainly don't recollect it, M. Fandor, but I played the lover in the
famous play 'La Toche Sanglante,' for which Valgrand had made himself up
exactly like Gurn, the murderer of Lord Beltham. You must have heard of
the case?"
Fandor pretended to tax his memory.
"Why, to be sure I do recall certain incidents, but won't you refresh my
memory?"
Bonardin asked no better than to chatter.
"Valgrand, on the first night of his presentation of Gurn,[B] was quite
worn out and left the theatre very late. He did not come again! For the
second performance, his understudy took his part. The following day they
sent to Valgrand's rooms; he had not been there for two days. The third
day from the 'first night' Valgrand came among us again."
"Pray go on, you interest me immensely!"
"Valgrand came back, but he had gone mad. He managed to get to his
dressing-room after taking the wrong door. 'I don't know a single word
of my part,' he confessed to me. I comforted him as best I could, but he
flung himself down on his couch and shook his head helplessly at me. 'I
have been very ill, Bonardin,' then suddenly he demanded: 'Where is
Charlot?'
"Charlot was his dresser. I remembered now that Charlot had not returned
to the theatre since his master's disappearance. His body was found
later in the Rue Messier. He had been murdered. I did not want to
mention this to him for fear it might upset him still more, so I advised
my old friend to wait for me till the end of the play and let me keep
him company. I intended to take him home and fetch a doctor. Valgrand
assented readily. I was then obliged to leave him hurriedly: they were
calling me--it was my cue. When I returned Valgrand had vanished: he had
left the theatre. We were not to see him again!"
"A sad affair," commented Fandor.
Bonardin continued his narrative:
"Shortly afterwards in a deserted house in the Rue Messier, near
Boulevard Arago, the police found the body of a murdered man. The corpse
was easily identified; it was that of Charlot, Valgrand's dresser."
"How did he come there? The house had no porter: the owner, an old
peasant, knew nothing."
"Well, what do you conclude from this?" asked Fandor.
"My theory is that Valgrand murdered his dresser, for some reason
unknown to us. Then, overcome by his crime, he went mad and committed
suicide. Of that there is no doubt."
"Oh!" muttered Fandor, a little taken aback by this unexpected
assertion.
The journalist, though he had closely followed the actor's account, was
far from drawing the same conclusions. For in fact, Gurn, Lord Beltham's
murderer, whom Fandor believed to be Fantômas, had certainly got
Valgrand executed in his stead. The Valgrand who came back to the
theatre, three days after the execution, was not the real one, but the
man who had taken his place--Gurn, the criminal, Gurn--Fantômas. Ah!
that was a stroke of the true Fantômas sort! It was certain that if
Valgrand's disappearance had been simultaneous with Gurn's execution,
there might have been suspicions. Gurn--Fantômas then found it necessary
to show Valgrand living to witnesses, so that these could swear that the
real Valgrand had not died instead of Gurn.
But Valgrand was an actor, Gurn--Fantômas was not! Not enough of one at
least to venture to take the place on the boards of such a consummate
player, such a famous tragedian.
"And that was the end?" asked Fandor.
"The end, no!" declared the actor. "Valgrand was married and had a son.
As is often the case with artists, the Valgrand marriage was not a
success, and madame, a singer of talent, was separated from her husband,
and travelled much abroad.
"About a year after these sad occurrences I had a visit from her. On her
way through Paris, she had come to draw the allowance made her by her
husband, to supply not only her own wants, but also those of her son, of
whom she had the custody. Mme. Valgrand chatted with me for hours
together. I recounted to her at length what I have had the honour of
telling you, and it seemed to me that she gave no great credence to my
words.
"Not that she threw doubts on my statements, but she kept reiterating,
'That is not like him; I know Valgrand would never have behaved in such
a way!'
"But I never could get her to say exactly what she thought. Some weeks
after this first visit I saw her again. Matters were getting
complicated. There was no certificate of her husband's death. Her men of
business made his 'absence' a pretext: she no longer drew a cent of her
allowance, and yet people knew that Valgrand had left a pretty large
amount, and it was in the bank or with a lawyer, I forget which. You are
aware, M. Fandor, that when the settling of accounts, or questions of
inheritance or wills, come to the fore there is no end to them."
"That's a fact," replied Fandor.
"We must believe," went on Bonardin, "that the matter was important in
Mme. Valgrand's eyes, for she refused fine offers from abroad, and
planted herself in Paris, living on her savings. The good woman
evidently had a double object, to recover the inheritance for her son,
little René, and also to get at the truth touching her husband's fate.
"She evidently cherished the hope that her husband was not guilty of the
dresser's murder, that perhaps he was not even dead, that he would get
over his madness if ever they managed to find him. In short, M. Fandor,
some six or seven months ago, when I had quite ceased to think of these
events, I found myself face to face with Mme. Valgrand on the Boulevard.
I had some difficulty in recognising her, for my friend's widow was no
longer dressed like the Parisian smart woman. Her hair was plastered
down and drawn tightly back, her garments were plain and humble, her
dress almost neglected. No doubt the poor woman had experienced cruel
disappointments.
"'Good day, Mme. Valgrand,' I cried, moving toward her with
outstretched hands. She stopped me with a gesture.
"'Hush,' she breathed, 'there is no Mme. Valgrand now. I am a
companion.' And the unhappy woman explained that to earn her living she
had to accept an inferior position as reader and housekeeper to a rich
lady."
"And to whom did Mme. Valgrand go as companion?"
"To an Englishwoman, I believe, but the name escapes me."
"Mme. Valgrand wished, you say, that her identity should remain unknown?
Do you know what name she took?"
"Yes--Mme. Raymond."
Some moments later Fandor left the actor and was hastening down the Rue
Lepic as fast as his legs would take him.
XXVII
THE MOTHER SUPERIOR
"The Mother Superior, if you please?"
The door shut automatically upon Fandor. He was in the little inner
court of the small convent, face to face with a Sister, who gazed in
alarm at the unexpected guest. The journalist persisted:
"Can I see the Mother Superior?"
"Well, sir, yes--no, I think not."
The worthy nun evidently did not know what to say. Finally making up her
mind she pointed to a passage, and, drawing aside to let the journalist
pass, said:
"Be good enough to go in there and wait a few moments."
Fandor was ushered into a large, plain and austere room--doubtless the
parlour of the community. At the windows hung long, white curtains,
while before the half-dozen armchairs lay tiny rugs of matting; the
floor, very waxed, was slippery to the tread. The journalist regarded
curiously the walls upon which were hung here and there religious
figures or chromos of an edifying kind. Above the chimney hung a great
crucifix of ebony. But for the noise from without, the passing of the
trains and motors, and were it not also for the fine savour of cooking
and roast onions, one might have thought oneself a hundred leagues from
the world in the peaceful calm of this little convent.
Fandor, on leaving Bonardin, had decided to fulfill without delay a
pious mission given him by Juve's victim.
Taken in at the time of his accident by the Sisters of the Rue
Charmille, Bonardin had received from them the first aid his condition
required, and as he had left them without a word of thanks, he had
begged Fandor to return and hand them on his behalf a fifty-franc bill
for their poor.
After some minutes the door opened and a nun appeared. She greeted
Fandor with a slight movement of the head; while the journalist bowed
deferentially before her.
"Have I the honour of speaking to the Mother Superior?"
"Our Mother sends her excuses," murmured the nun, "for not being able
to receive you at this moment. However, I can take her place, sir. I am
in charge of the finances of the house."
"I bring you news, Sister."
The nun clasped her hands.
"Good news, I hope! How is the poor young man doing?"
"As well as can be expected; the ball was extracted without trouble by
the doctors."
"I shall thank St. Comus, the patron saint of surgeons. And his
assailant? Surely he will be well punished?"
Fandor smiled.
"His assailant was the victim of a terrible misconception. He is a most
upright man."
"Then I will pray to St. Yves, the patron saint of advocates, to get him
out of his difficulty."
"Well," cried Fandor, "since you have so many saints at command, Sister,
you would do well to point out to me one who might favour the efforts of
the police in their struggle with the ruffians."
The nun was a woman of sense who understood a joke. She rejoined: "You
might try St. George, sir, the patron saint of warriors." Then becoming
serious again, the Sister made an end of the interview. "Our Mother
Superior will be much touched, sir, when I report the kind step you have
taken in coming here to us."
"Allow me, Sister," broke in Fandor, "my mission is not over yet."
Here the journalist discreetly proffered the note.
"This is from M. Bonardin, for your poor."
The nun was profuse in her thanks, and looking at Fandor with a touch of
malice:
"You may perhaps smile, sir, if I say I shall thank St. Martin, the
patron saint of the charitable. In any case I shall do it with my whole
heart."
The soft sound of a bell came from the distance; the Sister
instinctively turned her head and looked through the windows at the
inner cloister of the convent.
"The bell calls you, no doubt, Sister?" he inquired.
"It is, indeed, the hour of Vespers."
Fandor, followed by the Sister, left the parlour and reached the outer
gate. Already the porter was about to open it for him when he pulled up
short. Moving at a measured pace, one behind the other, the ladies of
the community crossed the courtyard, going toward the chapel at the far
end of the garden.
"Sister," Fandor inquired anxiously, "who is that nun who walks at the
head?"
"That is our holy Mother Superior."
Fandor was lucky enough to find a taxi as he left the little convent,
into which he jumped: he was immersed in such deep reflections that when
the taxi stopped he was quite surprised to find himself in Rue
Bonaparte, when he had meant to go up to Bonardin's and expected to
reach Montmarte.
"Where did I tell you to go?" he asked the driver.
The man looked at his fare in amazement:
"To the address you gave me, I suppose."
Fandor did not reply, but paid his fare.
"Heaven inspires me," he thought. "To be sure I wanted to see Bonardin
to tell him I had done his commission, but it was to prove I should have
gone after what I found out at the convent."
The journalist remained motionless on the pavement without seeming to
feel the jostling of the passers-by. He stood there with his eyes fixed
on the ground, his mind lost in a dream. He had unconsciously gone back
several years, to his mysterious childhood, stormy and restless. He went
over again in thought, this last affair, which had once more brought him
so intimately into Juve's life: the abominable crime in the Cité
Frochot, in which Chaleck and Loupart were involved, and behind them
Fantômas--the crime of which the victim--as Juve had clearly
established--was no other than Lady----
He quickly entered the house and rushed up the stairs, but halted on the
landing.
"What have I come here for? If I am to believe the papers, Juve is under
lock and key: It must be instinct that guides me. I feel that I am going
to see Juve: besides, I must."
He did not ring, for he enjoyed the unique favour of a key which allowed
him to enter Juve's place at will. He entered and went straight to the
study: it was empty. He then cried out:
"Juve! Many things have happened since I had the pleasure of seeing you!
Be good enough to let me into your office. I have two words to say to
you."
But Fandor's words fell dead in the silence of the apartment. After this
summons he made his way into the office, and ensconced himself in an
armchair: clearly Fandor was assured his friend had heard him. And he
was not wrong! Two seconds later, lifting a curtain that hid a secret
entrance to the study, Juve appeared.
"You speak as if you knew I was here!"
The two men looked at each other and burst into shouts of laughter.
"So you understood it was all a put-up affair intended to make our
opponents believe that for a time I was powerless to hurt them. What do
you think of my notion?"
"First rate," replied Fandor. "The more so that the fair Josephine 'saw
with her own eyes' some of the force taking you off to prison."
"Everybody believe it, don't they?"
"Everybody."
"Look here. You spoke just now as though you knew I was here?"
Fandor smiled.
"The odour of hot smoke is easily distinguished from the dankness of
cold tobacco."
Juve approved.
"Well done, Fandor. Here, for your pains, roll a cigarette and let's
talk. Have you anything fresh?"
"Yes--and a lot, too!"
Fandor related the talk he had had with Bonardin touching Valgrand, the
actor, and Mme. Valgrand, alias--Mme. Raymond.
Juve uttered his reflections aloud.
"This is one riddle the more to solve. I still adhere to the theory that
Josephine, some months ago, was brought into intimate relations with
Lady Beltham, whose body I discovered at Cité Frochot and later
identified."
Fandor sprang up and placed both of his hands upon Juve's shoulders.
"Lady Beltham is not dead: She is alive! As surely as my name's Fandor,
the Superior of the Convent at Nogent is--Lady Beltham."
XXVIII
AN OLD PARALYTIC
At the far end of the Rue de Rome Fandor halted. "After all," he
thought, "maybe I am going straight into a trap. Who sent me the letter?
Who is this M. Mahon? I never heard of him. Why this menacing phrase,
'Come, if you take any interest in the affairs of Lady B---- and F----.'
Oh, if only I could take counsel of Juve!"
But for the last fortnight, since the ill-starred affair of Nogent and
the almost incredible discovery he had made that Lady Beltham was still
alive, Fandor had not seen Juve. He had been to the Sûreté a number of
times, but Juve had vanished.
Fandor stopped before a private house on the Boulevard Pereire North. He
passed in through the outer hall and reached the porter's lodge.
"Madame, have you a tenant here named Mahon?"
The porteress came forward.
"M. Mahon? To be sure--fifth floor on the right."
"Thank you. I should like to ask a few questions about him. I have
come--to negotiate an insurance policy for him and I should like to know
about the value of the furniture in his rooms. What sort of a man is
this M. Mahon? About how old is he?"
Fandor had, by pure professional instinct, found the best device in the
world. There is not a porteress who has not many times enlightened
insurance agents.
"Why, sir, M. Mahon has lived here only a month or six weeks. He can
scarcely be very well off, for when he moved in I did not see any fine
furniture go up. I believe for that matter he is an old cavalry officer,
and, in the army nowadays, folks scarcely make fortunes."
"That's true enough," assented Fandor.
"Anyhow he is a very charming man, an ideal lodger. To begin with, he is
infirm, almost paralysed in both legs. I believe he never goes out of an
evening. And then he never has any visitors except two young fellows who
are serving their time in the army."
"Are they with him now?"
"No, sir, they never come till three or four in the afternoon."
Fandor slipped a coin into the woman's hand and went upstairs. He rang
at the door and was surprised at a strange, soft rolling sound.
"Oh, I know," he thought; "the poor man must move about his rooms in a
rubber-tired wheel chair."
He was not mistaken. Scarcely was the door opened when he caught sight
of an old man of much distinction seated in a wheel chair. This invalid
greeted the journalist pleasantly.
"M. Fandor?"
"The same, sir."
M. Mahon pushed forward his chair and motioned to his visitor to come
in.
Fandor entered a room in which the curtains were closely drawn and which
was brilliantly illuminated with electric lights, although it was the
middle of the afternoon. Was it a trap? The journalist instinctively
hesitated in the doorway. But behind him a cordial voice called:
"Come in, you all kinds of an idiot!"
The door clicked behind him and the invalid, getting out of his chair,
burst into a fit of laughter.
"Juve! Juve!"
"As you see!"
"Bah, what farce are you playing here? Why this lit-up room?"
"All for very good reasons. If you will be kind enough to take a seat, I
will explain."
Fandor dropped into a chair staring at Juve, who continued:
"When you came back the other day and told me that unlikely yarn about
Lady Beltham being alive, I decided to try new methods. First of all, I
became a cavalry officer, then I got this wheel chair and moved into
this apartment."
As Juve paused, Fandor, more and more amazed, inquired:
"But your reason for all this!"
"Just wait! The day after the Dixon business, I put three of my best men
on the track of the American. I had a notion he would want to see
Josephine again, and I was not mistaken. She came back to justify
herself in his eyes. The story ended as might have been foreseen.
Michel, who brought me the news, said that Josephine had agreed to
become Dixon's mistress."
"The deuce!"
"Oh, there is nothing to be surprised at that. Michel made arrangements
to learn all the details. Josephine is to live at 33 C in Boulevard
Pereire South; that is, to the right of the railway line, fourth floor.
Here we are at 24 B Boulevard Pereire North, to left of the railway,
fifth floor, and just opposite."
"And what does this old M. Mahon do, Juve?"
Juve smiled.
"You are going to see, my lad."
He settled himself again in the wheel chair, drew a heavy rug over his
knees and became once more the old invalid.
"My dear friend, will you open the door for me?"
Fandor laughingly complied, and Juve wheeled himself into another room.
"You see I have plenty of air here thanks to this balcony upon which I
can wheel my chair. Would you be good enough to pass me that spy-glass?"
Juve pointed the glass toward the far end of Boulevard Pereire, in the
direction of Poste Maillot.
"Mlle. Josephine has lately had a craze for keeping her nails polished."
"But you are not looking toward the house opposite, you are looking in a
contrary direction!"
Juve laid his spy-glass on his knees and laughed.
"I expected you to make that remark. See, those glasses at the end are
only for show, inside is a whole system of prisms. With this perspective
you see not in front of you, but on one side. In other words, when I
point it at the far end of the boulevard, what I am really looking at is
the house opposite."
Fandor was about to congratulate his friend on this new specimen of his
ingenuity, but Juve did not give him time. He startled the journalist by
suddenly asking him:
"Tell me, do you love the army?"
"Why?"
"Because I think those two soldiers you see over there are coming."
"To see you," added Fandor.
"How do you know?"
"From your porteress."
"You pumped her?"
"I did. I got her to talk a bit about that excellent M. Mahon."
Juve laughed:
"Confound you!"
With a quick movement Fandor, at the detective's request, drew back the
wheel chair and shut the window.
"You understand," explained Juve, "there is nothing to surprise my
neighbours in my having two soldiers to visit me. But I don't care for
third persons to hear what they say to me." There was a ring at the
apartment door. "Go and open, Fandor. I don't leave my cripple's chair
for them; people can see through the curtains."
Shown in by Fandor, the soldiers shook hands with Juve and took seats
opposite him.
"Do you recognise Michel and Léon?"
"Oh, perfectly!" cried Fandor, "but why this disguise?"
"Because no heed is paid to uniforms, there are soldiers everywhere, and
also it is not easy to recognise a civilian suddenly appearing in
uniform. What is fresh, Michel?"
"Something pretty serious, sir. According to your instructions we have
been shadowing the Superior of the Nogent Convent."
"Well, what have you discovered?"
"Every Tuesday evening the Superior leaves Nogent and goes to Paris."
"Where?"
"To one of the branches of her religious house in the Boulevard
Jourdan."
"No. 180?"
Michel was dumbfounded.
"Yes, sir, you knew?"
"No," said Juve, coldly. "What does she do at this branch?"
"There are four or five old nuns there. The Superior spends Tuesday
night there and on Wednesday goes back to Nogent about one in the
afternoon."
"And you know no more than that?"
"No, sir. Must we go on with the shadowing?"
"No, it is not worth while. Return to the Prefecture and report to M.
Havard."
When the two men had left, Fandor turned to Juve.
"What do you make of it?"
Juve shrugged his shoulders.
"Michel is an idiot. That house has two exits; one to the Boulevard, the
other to waste ground that leads to the fortifications. The Superior, or
Lady Beltham, goes there to change her dress, and then hastens to some
prearranged meeting elsewhere. The house at Neuilly will bear
watching."
XXIX
THROUGH THE WINDOW
"What a splendid fellow! One can count on him at any time. A friendship
like his is rare and precious."
Fandor had just left Juve, and the detective could not help being
strangely moved as he thought of the devotion shown him by the
journalist.
The detective was still in his wheel chair; with a skilful turn he went
back to the balcony and his post of observation.
Evening was coming on. After a fine day the sky had become leaden and
overcast with great clouds: a storm was threatening. Juve swore.
"I shan't see much this evening; this confounded Josephine is so
sentimental that she loves dreaming in the gloaming at her window
without lighting up. Devil take her!"
Juve had armed himself with his spy-glass; he apparently levelled it at
Porte Maillot, and in that way he could see something of the movements
of Josephine in the rooms opposite him.
"Flowers on the chimney and on the piano! Expecting her lover probably!"
Suddenly he started up in his chair.
"Ah! some one has rung her bell. She is going toward the entrance door."
A minute passed; in the front rooms Juve no longer saw anyone. Josephine
must be receiving a visitor.
Some minutes more went by; a heavy shower of rain came down and Juve was
forced to leave his balcony.
When he resumed his watching he could not suppress an exclamation of
surprise.
"Ah, if he would only turn! This cursed rain prevents me from seeing
clearly what is afoot. The brute! Why won't he turn! There, he has laid
his bag on a chair, his initials must be on it, but I can't read them.
Yet the height of the man! His gestures! It's he, sure enough, it's
Chaleck!"
Juve suddenly abandoned his post of observation, propelled his chair to
the back room of the suite and seized the telephone apparatus.
"Hello! Give me the Prefecture. It is Juve speaking. Send at once
detectives Léon and Michel to No. 33 C Boulevard Pereire South. They
are to wait at the door of the house and arrest as they come out the
persons I marked as numbers 14 and 15. Let them make haste."
"Assuredly Chaleck won't leave at once if he has come to see Josephine;
no doubt he has important things to say. Léon and Michel will arrive in
time to nab him first and Josephine after. And to-morrow, when I have
them handcuffed before me, it's the deuce if I don't manage to get the
truth out of them."
Juve went back to his look-out.
"Oh, they seem very lively, both of them; the talk must be serious.
Josephine doesn't look pleased. She seems to disagree with what Chaleck
is saying. One would think he was giving her orders. No! she is down on
her knees. A declaration of love! After Loupart and Dixon it's that
infernal doctor's turn!"
Juve watched for a moment longer the young woman and the mysterious and
elusive Chaleck.
"Ah! that's what I feared! Chaleck is going and Léon and Michel haven't
come!"
Juve hesitated. Should he go down, rush to the Boulevard and try to
collar the ruffian? That wasn't possible. Juve lived on the fifth floor,
so that he had one more story to get down than Chaleck, then there was
the railway line between him and Josephine's house. Chaleck would have
ample time to disappear. But Juve reassured himself.
"Luckily he has left his hold-all, and if I mistake not, that is his
stick on the chair. Therefore he expects to come back."
Powerless to act, Juve witnessed the exit of Chaleck, who soon appeared
at the door of Josephine's house and went striding off. Juve followed
him with his eyes, intensely chagrined. Would he ever again find such a
good opportunity of laying hands on the ruffian?
Chaleck vanished round the corner of the street, and Juve again took to
watching Josephine! The young woman did not appear to be upset by her
late visitor. She sat, her elbows on the table, turning with a listless
finger the pages of a volume.
"Clearly he is coming back," thought Juve, "or he would not have left
his things there. I shall nab him in a few days at latest."
Juve was about to leave his post of observation when he saw Josephine
raise her head in an attitude of listening to an indefinable and
mysterious noise.
"What is going on?" Juve asked himself. "She cannot be already watching
for Chaleck's return."
Then Juve started.
"Oh! oh!"
He had just seen Josephine at a single bound spring toward the window.
The young woman gazed steadily in front of her, her arms outstretched in
a posture of horror. She seemed in a state of abject terror. There was
no mistaking her motions. She was panic-stricken, panting, trembling in
all her limbs. Juve, who lost no movement of the hapless woman, felt a
cold sweat break out on his forehead.
"What's the matter with her? There is nobody in the room, I see nothing!
What can frighten her to that extent? Oh, my God!"
Forgetting all precautions, all the comedy he was preparing so carefully
for the neighbour's benefit, he sprang to his feet, deserting his wheel
chair. His hands clenched on the rail of the balcony while spellbound by
the sight he beheld, he leaned over the rail as if in a frantic desire
to fling himself to the young woman's help. Josephine had bestridden the
sash of her window. She was now standing on the ledge, holding with one
hand to the rail of her balcony and her body flung backwards as if mad
with terror.
"What is happening? Oh, the poor soul!"
Josephine, uttering a desperate cry, had let go of the supporting rail
and had flung herself into space. Juve saw the young woman's body spin
in the air, heard the dull thud that it made as it crashed against the
ground.
"It is monstrous!"
Juve beside himself tore down the stairs full tilt, passed breathlessly
the porteress, who seemed likely to faint at the sight of the headlong
pace of the supposed paralytic.
He went round Boulevard Pereire, darted along the railway line, and,
panting, got to the side of the ill-starred Josephine. At the sound of
her fall and the cries she uttered people had flown to the windows,
passers-by had turned round: when Juve got there a ring of people had
already formed round the unfortunate woman. The detective roughly pushed
some of them aside, knelt down beside the body and put his ear to the
chest.
"Dead? No!"
A faint groan came from the lips of the poor sufferer. Juve realised
that by unheard-of luck, Josephine, in the course of her fall, had
struck the outer branches of one of the trees that fringed the
Boulevard. This had somewhat broken the shock, but her legs were
frightfully broken and one of her arms hung lifeless.
"Quick!" commanded Juve. "A cab; take her to the hospital."
As soon as help was forthcoming, Juve, recalled to the duties of his
profession, asked himself:
"What can have occurred? What was it she tried to escape by throwing
herself into space? I saw the whole room, there was no one with her. She
must have been the victim of a delusion."
XXX
UNCLE AND NEPHEW
"So, uncle, you have decided to live at Neuilly?"
"Oh, it's quite settled. Your aunt finds the place charming, and
besides, it would be so pleasant to have a garden. Also, the land is
sure to grow more valuable in this neighbourhood and the purchase of a
house here would be a good speculation!"
The stout man, as he uttered the word "speculation," beamed. The mere
sight of him suggested the small tradesman grown rich by dint of long
and arduous years of toil, retired from business and prone to fancy he
was a man of genius.
Compared with him the young man he styled nephew, slim, elaborately
elegant, his little moustache carefully curled, gave the impression of
coming out of a draper's shop and wanting to be taken for a swell.
Evidently the nephew courted the uncle and flattered him.
"You are right, land speculations are very sure and very profitable. So
you wrote to the caretaker of the house to let you view it?"
"I did, and he answered, 'Come to-day or to-morrow. I shall be at your
orders.' That is why I sent you word to go with me, for since you are
the sole heir of my fortune----"
"Oh, uncle, you may be sure----"
The Madeleine tramway where the two men were talking aloud, heeding
little the amused notice of the other passengers, pulled up a moment in
the Place de l'Eglise at Neuilly.
"Let us get down. Boulevard Inkermann begins here."
With the pantings and gaspings of a man whose stoutness made all
physical exercise irksome, the uncle lowered himself off the footboard
of the tram. The young man sprang to his side. After five minutes' walk
the two men were in front of Lady Beltham's house, the identical house
to which Juve and Fandor had previously come before to make exhaustive
inquiries.
"You see, my boy," declared the stout party, "it is not at all a bad
looking house. Evidently it has not been lived in for a long time, its
state of outside dilapidation shows how neglected it has been, but it
is possible that inside there may not be many repairs to be made."
"In any case, the garden is very fine."
"Yes, the grounds are large enough. And then what I like is its
wonderful seclusion: the wall surrounding it on all sides is very high,
and the entrance gate would be hard for robbers to tackle."
"Shall I ring?"
"Yes, ring."
The young man pressed the button, a peal rang out in the distance:
presently the porter appeared. He was a big fellow with long whiskers
and a distinguished air, the perfect type of the high-class servant.
"You gentlemen have come to see the house?"
"Exactly. I am M. Durant. It is I who wrote to you."
"To be sure, sir, I remember."
The porter showed the two visitors into the garden, and forthwith the
stout man drew his nephew along the paths. The sense of proprietorship
came over him at once; he spared his relative none of the points of the
property.
"You see, Emile, it isn't big, but still it is amply sufficient. No
trees before the house, which allows a view of the Boulevard from all
the windows. The servants' quarters being in the far part of the garden
can in no way annoy the people in the house: Notice, too, that the trees
are quite young and their foliage thin. I don't care for too luxuriant
gardens which are apt to block the view."
"That's right, Uncle."
The porter, who was following the two, broke in upon the ecstasy of the
prospective owner.
"Would you gentlemen like to see the house?"
"Why, certainly, certainly."
The stout man, however, before entering, was bent on going round it. He
noticed the smallest details, growing more and more enthusiastic.
"Look, Emile, it is very well built. The ground floor is sufficiently
raised so as not to be too damp. This big terrace, on which the three
French windows open, must be very cheerful in summer. Oh, there are
drain pipes at the four corners! And we mustn't fail to see the cellars.
I'm sure they are very fine. Bend down over the air-holes; what do you
think of the gratings that close them? And, now, shall we go in?"
The porter led them to the main entrance door.
"Here is the vestibule, gentlemen, to the left, the servants' hall and
kitchen; to the right, the dining-room; facing you a small drawing-room,
then the large drawing-room, and, lastly, the double staircase leading
to the first floor."
The stout man dropped into a chair.
"And to whom does this place belong?"
"Lady Beltham, sir."
"She does not live here?"
"Not now. At this moment she is travelling."
In the wake of the porter, uncle and nephew went through the rooms on
the ground floor. As happens in all untenanted houses, the damp had
wrought terrible havoc. The flooring, worm-eaten, creaked under their
feet, the carpets had large damp spots on them, the paper hung loose on
the walls, while the furniture was covered with a thick coat of dust.
"Don't pay any attention to the furniture, Emile, it matters little;
what we must first look at is the arrangement of the rooms. Why, there
are iron shutters--I like that."
"To be sure, Uncle, they are very practical."
"Yes, yes; to begin with, when those shutters are closed it would be
impossible from the outside to see anything in the rooms. Not even the
least light."
The porter proceeded to show them the first floor of the house.
"There is only one staircase?" asked the stout man.
"Yes, only one."
"And what is the cause of the unusual dampness? We are far from the
Seine; the garden is not very leafy."
"There is a leaky cistern in the cellars, sir. Here is the largest
bedroom. It was my Lady's."
"Yes, one sees it has been the last room to be lived in."
At this harmless remark the porter seemed very upset.
"What makes you think that, sir?"
"Why, the chairs are pushed about as though recently used. There is much
less dust on the furniture. And--there's a print--look at the desk,
there is a trace of dust on the diary. The blotting paper has been moved
lately, some one has been writing there--why, what's wrong with you?"
As he listened to the stout man's remarks the porter grew strangely
pale.
"Oh," he stammered, "it's nothing, nothing at all."
"One would say you were afraid."
"Afraid? No, sir. I am not afraid--only----"
"Only what?"
"Well, gentlemen, it is best not to stay here--Lady Beltham is selling
the house because it is--haunted!"
Neither of the visitors seemed impressed by the statement of their
guide. The elder laughed a jolly laugh.
"Are there ghosts?"
"Why, sir, 'spirits' come here."
"Have you seen them?"
"Oh! certainly not, sir. When they are there, I shut myself up in the
lodge, I can assure you----"
"When do they appear?"
"They come almost always on Tuesday nights."
And warming to his subject the porter gave details. He got the
impression first on one occasion when her Ladyship was absent. She had
left some days before for Italy. It was Sunday, and then during Tuesday
night while walking in the garden he heard movements inside the house.
"I went to fetch my keys and when I came back I found nobody! I thought
at first it was burglars, but I saw nothing had been taken away. Yet, I
was not mistaken, furniture had been moved. There were bread crumbs on
the floor."
The young man roared with laughter.
"Bread crumbs! Then your spirits come and sup here?"
The uncle, equally amused, asked:
"And what did Lady Beltham think when you told her that?"
"Lady Beltham laughed at me. But, sir, I had my own ideas. I watched in
the garden daily and I heard the same sounds and always on Tuesday
nights. At last I laid a trap; I put a chalk mark round the chairs in
Lady Beltham's room, she being still away. Well, sir, when I came to the
house again on Thursday the chairs had been moved. I told Lady Beltham,
and this time she seemed very much frightened. It is since then she made
up her mind to sell the house."
"For all that, what makes you say they are spirits?"
"What else could it be, sir. I also heard the sounds of chains jangling.
One night I even heard a strange and terrible hiss."
"Well!" cried the stout man, beginning to go down the staircase, "since
the house is haunted I shall have to pay less for it; eh, Emile?"
"You will buy, sir, in spite of that?"
"To be sure. Your phantoms alarm me less than the damp."
"Oh, the damp? That can be easily remedied. You will see that we have a
central heating stove installed."
The porter led his visitors down a narrow stair to the cellars.
"Take care, gentlemen, the stairs are slippery."
Then he observed: "You don't need a candle, the gratings are big enough
to give plenty of light."
"What is that?" asked the young man, pointing to a huge iron cylinder
embedded in the earth and rising some four-and-a-half feet above the
floor.
"The cistern of which I spoke, as you can see for yourselves, it is all
but full."
The porter hurried them on.
"That is the heating stove. There are conductors throughout the house.
When it is in full blast the house is even too warm."
"But your grate stove is in pieces!" objected the stout man, pointing
with his stick to iron plates torn out of one side of the central
furnace.
"Oh, sir, that happened at the time of the floods. But it won't cost
much to put it right. If you gentlemen will examine the inside of the
apparatus you will see that the pipes are in perfect order."
The uncle followed the porter's suggestion.
"Your pipes are as big as chimneys; a man could pass through them."
The inspection ended, uncle and nephew bestowed a liberal tip on their
guide. They would think it over and write or come again soon.
The two relatives retraced their steps to Boulevard Inkermann.
"Fandor?"
"Juve?"
"We have got them!"
Uncle and nephew--that is to say, Juve and Fandor--could talk quite
freely now.
"Juve, are you certain that we have got them?"
Juve pushed his friend into a wine-shop and ordered drinks. He then drew
from his pocket a piece of paper, quite blank.
"What is that?"
"A bit of paper I picked up on Lady Beltham's desk while the porter's
back was turned. It will serve for a little experiment. If it is not
long since a hand rested on it, we shall find the print."
"On this blank paper?"
"Yes, Fandor. Look!"
Juve drew a pencil from his pocket and scratched off a fine dust of
graphite which he shook over the paper. Gradually the outline of a hand
appeared, faint, but quite visible.
"That is how," resumed Juve, "with this very simple process, you can
decipher the finger prints of persons who have written or rested their
hands on anything--paper, glass, even wood. According to the clearness
of this outline which is thrown up by the coagulation of the
plumbago--thanks to the ordinary moisture of the hand--which was laid
on the paper, I can assure you that some one wrote on Lady Beltham's
desk about ten days ago."
"It is wonderful," said Fandor. "Here, then, is proof positive that her
Ladyship visits her house from time to time."
"Correct--or at least that some one goes there, for that is a man's
hand."
"Well, what are you going to do now, Juve?"
"Now? I'm off to the Prefecture to get rid of my false embonpoint, which
bothers me no end. I have never been so glad that I am not naturally
stout."
Fandor laughed.
"And I own to you that I shan't be sorry to get rid of my false
moustache. All the while I was inspecting that cursed house, this
moustache kept tickling my nose and making me want to sneeze."
"You should have done so."
"But suppose my moustache had come off?"
XXXI
LOVERS AND ACCOMPLICES
"Oh! who is that?"
From the shadow issued some one who calmly replied:
"It is I."
"Ah!--I know you now, but why this disguise?"
"Madame the Superior--I present myself--Doctor Chaleck. Isn't my
disguise as good as yours?"
"What do you want of me? Speak quickly, I am frightened."
"To begin with, I thank you for coming to the tryst at your house--at
ours. For five Tuesdays I have waited in vain. But first, madame,
explain your sudden conversion, the reason of your sudden entry into
Orders. That is a strange device for the mistress of Gurn."
Doctor Chaleck held under the lash of his irony the unhappy woman who
seemed overcome by anxiety. The two were facing each other in the large
room that formed the middle of the first floor of the house in Boulevard
Inkermann at Neuilly. It was, in fact, the only room fit to use: they
had left to neglect and inclement weather the other rooms in the elegant
mansion which some years before was considered in the Parisian world as
one of the most comfortable and luxurious in the foreign colony.
It was in truth here that in days gone by the tragic drama had been
played: death had laid its cold hand upon the gilded trappings of the
great apartment and laughter and joy had taken flight. However, time
passes so quickly and evil memories so soon grow dim that many had
forgotten the grim happenings which three years before had beset the
mansion on the Boulevard.
It was at first the deep mourning of Lady Beltham whose husband had been
mysteriously done to death at Belleville. Then, some weeks later,
occurred the awful scene of the arrest of Lord Beltham's murderer, just
as he was leaving the house, an arrest due to Juve, who, though he
succeeded in laying hands on the assassin, the infamous Gurn, was not
able to prove--sure though he might be of it--that the slayer of the
husband was the lover of the wife.
After these shocking events Lady Beltham left France, dismissing the
many attendants with whom she loved to surround herself like a true
queen of beauty, luxury and wealth.
At rare intervals the Lady, whose existence grew more and more
mysterious, went back for a few days to her house at Neuilly. She would
vanish, would reappear, living like a recluse, almost in entire
solitude, receiving none of her old acquaintances.
About a year ago she seemed to want to settle finally at Boulevard
Inkermann. Workmen began to put the house in order again, the lodge was
opened and a family of caretakers came; then suddenly the work had been
broken off; some weeks went by while Lady Beltham lived alone with her
companion; then both disappeared.
Lady Beltham shivered, and, gathering about her shoulders the cloak
which covered her religious habit, muttered: "I'm cold."
"Beastly weather, and to think this is July."
Chaleck crossed to a register in the corner of the room.
"No good to leave that open! An icy wind comes through the passage to
the cellar."
Lady Beltham turned in alarm toward her enigmatic companion.
"Why did you let it be supposed I was dead?"
"Why did you yourself leave here two days before the crime at the Cité
Frochot?"
Lady Beltham hung her head and with a sob in her voice:
"I was deserted and jealous. Besides, I was enduring frightful remorse.
The idea had come to me to write down the terrible secret which haunted
my spirit, to give the story to some one I could trust, an attorney, and
then----"
"Go on, pray!"
"And, then, what I had written suddenly vanished. It was after that I
lost my head and fled. I had long been meaning to withdraw from the
world. The Sisters of St. Clotilde offered to receive me in their house
at Nogent."
Chaleck added brutally:
"That isn't all. You forgot to say you were afraid. Come, be frank,
afraid of Gurn, of me!"
"Well, yes, I was afraid, not so much of you, but of our crimes. I am
also afraid of dying."
"That confession you wrote became known to some one who confided it to
me."
"Heavens," murmured the unhappy woman. "Who mentioned it?"
Chaleck had again crossed to the register, which, although closed by him
some moments before, was open again, letting into the room a blast of
icy air from the basement.
"This can't stay shut, it must be seen to," he muttered.
Lady Beltham, shaken by a nervous tremour, insisted:
"Who betrayed me? Who told?"
Chaleck seated himself by her side.
"You remember Valgrand, the actor? Well, Valgrand was married. His wife
sought to clear up the mystery of his disappearance and went--where, I
ask you? Why, to you, Lady Beltham! You took her as companion! It would
have been impossible to introduce a more redoubtable spy into the house
than the widow Valgrand, known by you under the false name of Mme.
Raymond."
Lady Beltham remained panic-stricken.
"We are lost!"
Chaleck squeezed her two hands in a genuine burst of affection.
"We are saved!" he shouted. "Mme. Raymond will talk no more!"
"The body at the Cité Frochot!"
Chaleck nodded. "Yes."
She looked at him in alarm, mingled with repulsion and horror.
"Now, understand that that death saved you, and if I saved you it is
because I loved you, love you still, will always love you!"
Lady Beltham, overcome, let herself fall into Chaleck's arms, her head
resting on her lover's shoulder as she wept hot tears.
Lady Beltham was once more enslaved, a captive! More than two years ago
she had broken with the mysterious and terrible being whom she had once
egged on to kill her husband, and with whom she then committed the most
appalling of crimes. During this separation the unhappy woman had tried
to pull herself together, to acquire a fresh honesty of mind and body, a
new soul; dreamed of finding again in religion some help, some
forgetfulness. She had later experienced the frightful tortures of
jealousy, knowing her late lover had mistresses! But she resisted the
craving to see him again, and pictured him to herself in such terrible
guise that she felt an overwhelming fear of finding herself face to face
with him. Now the season of calm and quiet she had evoked was suddenly
dispelled. First came the mysterious disappearance of her confession and
the weird crime of the Cité Frochot following on its loss. To be sure
she did not then know that Doctor Chaleck, of whom the papers spoke, was
none other than Gurn, but had they not in _La Capitale_ spoken of
Fantômas in that connection? And at this disquieting comparison Lady
Beltham had felt sinister forebodings. Other mysteries had then
supervened, unaccountable to the guilty lady who by that time was
already seeking her new birth in the bosom of Religion. Alas! her
miseries were to grow definite enough.
At the very gate of the convent an innocent man, Bonardin, the actor,
fell victim to the attack of Juve, also innocent, and in that affair she
felt the complicity of her late lover grow more and more certain. She
then received a letter from him, followed by a second. Gurn called her
to his place--their place--the mansion at Neuilly, every Tuesday night.
She held out several times despite threatened reprisals. At last she
yielded and went: she expected Gurn--it was Chaleck she found. The two
were one!
From henceforth she was faced with this accomplice, guilty of new
crimes, clothed in a new personality, already under suspicion, which
doubtless he would cast off only to assume another which would enable
him still further to extend the list of his crimes! But despite all the
horror her lover inspired her with she felt herself tamed again,
powerless to resist him, ready to do anything the moment he bade her!
She inquired feebly:
"Who was it killed Mme. Raymond? Was it that ruffian--whom they speak of
in the papers--Loupart?"
"Well, not exactly!"
"Then was it you? Speak, I would rather know."
"It was neither he nor I, and yet it was to some extent both."
"I do not understand."
"It is rather difficult to understand. Our 'executioner' does not lack
originality. I may say it is something which lives yet does not think."
"Who is it! Who is it!"
"Why not ask Detective Juve. Oh! Juve, too, would like to know who the
deuce all these people are. Gurn, Chaleck, Loupart, and, above
all--Fantômas!"
"Fantômas! Ah, I scarcely dare utter that name. And yet a doubt
oppresses my heart! Tell me, are you not, yourself--Fantômas?"
Chaleck freed himself gently, for Lady Beltham had wound her arms round
his neck.
"I know nothing, I am merely the lover who loves you."
"Then let us go far away. Let us begin a new existence together. Will
you? Come!" She stopped all at once--"I heard a noise." Chaleck, too,
listened. Some slight creakings had, indeed, disturbed the hush of the
room. But outside the wind and the rain whirled around the dilapidated,
lonely abode, and it was not surprising that unaccountable sounds should
be audible in the stillness. Once more Lady Beltham built up her plans,
catching a glimpse of a future all peace and happiness.
With a brief, harsh remark, Chaleck brought her back to reality.
"All that cannot be, at least for the moment, we must first----"
Lady Beltham laid her hand on his lips.
"Do not speak!" she begged. "A fresh crime--that's what you mean?"
"A vengeance, an execution! A man has set himself to run me down, has
determined my ruin: between us it is a struggle without quarter; my life
is not safe but at the cost of his, so he must perish. In four days they
will find Detective Juve dead in his own bed. And with him will finally
vanish the fiction he has evoked of Fantômas! Fantômas! Ah, if society
knew--if humanity, instead of being what it is--but it matters little!"
"And Fantômas? What will become of him--of you?"
"Have I told you that I was Fantômas?"
"No," stammered she, "but----"
* * * * *
The dim light of a pale dawn filtered through the closed shutters of the
big drawing-room in which lover and mistress had met again, after long
weeks of separation, to call up sinister memories. For all their hopes
the limit of the tribulations to which they were a prey seemed still far
off.
Chaleck blew out the lamp. He drew aside the curtains. Sharply he put an
end to the interview:
"I am off, Lady Beltham. Soon we shall meet again. Never let anyone
suspect what we have said to each other--Farewell."
The hapless woman, crushed and broken by emotion, remained nearly an
hour alone in the great room. Then the requirements of her official life
came to her mind. It was necessary to return to the convent at Nogent.
* * * * *
Extricating themselves painfully from the pipes of the great stove, Juve
and Fandor, covered with plaster, wreathed with cobwebs, and freely
sprinkled with dust, fell back suddenly into the middle of the cellar.
The two men, heedless of the disarray of their dress and their painful
cramped limbs, spoke both at once, dumbfounded but joyful:
"Well, Juve?"
"Well, Fandor, we got something for our money."
"Oh, what a lovely night, Juve; I wouldn't have given up my place for a
fortune."
"We had front seats, though to be sure the velvet armchairs were
lacking."
They were silent for a moment, their minds fully occupied with a crowd
of ideas. So Chaleck and Loupart were one and the same? And Lady Beltham
was indeed the accomplice of Gurn. An unhappy accomplice, repentant,
wretched, a criminal through love.
"Fandor, they are ours now. Let us act!"
The pair, not sorry to breathe a little more easily than they had done
for the past few hours, went upstairs, reached the ground floor and made
their way into the drawing-room, where during the night Doctor Chaleck
and Lady Beltham had had their memorable interview.
Juve, without a word, paced up and down the room, poking in all the
corners, then gave a cry:
"Here is the famous mouth of the heater which that brute Chaleck tried
to shut, and I persisted in opening so as not to lose a word of his
instructive conversation. No matter, if he felt cold, what did I feel
like?"
"The fact is," added Fandor, whose hoarse voice bore witness to the
difficulties he had just passed through, "these stove pipes have very
little comfort about them."
"What can you expect?" cried Juve. "The architect did not think of us
when he built the house. And now, Fandor, we have a hard task before us
and we need all the luck we can get. For certainly it is Fantômas we
have unearthed: Fantômas, the lover of Lady Beltham, the slayer of her
husband, the murderer of Valgrand, the master that got rid of Mme.
Raymond! Gurn, Chaleck, Loupart. The one being who can be all those and
himself too--Fantômas."
As the two friends left Lady Beltham's house without attracting notice,
the detective drew from his pocket a species of little scale which he
showed Fandor.
"What do you make of that?"
"I haven't the least idea."
"Well, I have, and it may put us in the way of a great discovery. Did
you notice that Chaleck did not say definitely who the 'executioner' of
Mme. Raymond was?"
"To be sure."
"Well, I believe that I have a morsel of this 'executioner' in my
pocket."
XXXII
THE SILENT EXECUTIONER
Juve was in his study smoking a cigarette. It was nine in the evening.
The door leading to the lobby opened and Fandor walked in.
"All right, this evening?"
"All right. What brings you here, Fandor?"
The journalist smiled and pointed to a calendar on the wall: "The fact
that--it's this evening, Juve."
"The date fixed by Chaleck or Fantômas for my demise. To-morrow morning
I am to be found in my bed, strangled, crushed, or something of the
sort. I suppose you've come to get a farewell interview for _La
Capitale_. To gather the minutest details of the frightful crime so that
you can publish a special edition. '_The tragedy in Rue Bonaparte! Juve
overcome by Fantômas!_'"
Fandor listened, amused at the detective's outburst.
"You'd be angry with me, Juve," he declared, in the same jocular strain,
"for passing by such a sensational piece of news, wouldn't you?"
"That is so. And then I own I expected my last evening to be a lonely
one, there was a feeling of sadness at the bottom of my heart. I thought
that before dying I should have liked to say farewell to young Fandor,
whose life I am continually putting in peril by my crazy ventures, but
whom I love as the surest of companions, the sagest of advisers, the
most discreet of confidants."
Fandor was touched. With a spontaneous movement he sprang to the
armchair in which Juve sat, seized and wrung the detective's hands.
"What?"
"I shall stay here. You don't suppose I'm going to leave you to pass
this night alone?"
Juve, touched beyond measure by Fandor's words, seemed uncertain what he
ought to decide.
"I can't pretend, Fandor, that your presence is not agreeable, and I'm
grateful to you for your sympathy; I knew I could count on you: but
after all, lad, we must look ahead and consider all contingencies.
Fantômas may succeed! Now you know what I have set out to do; if I
should fail, I should like to think that you would carry on the work as
my successor and put an end to Fantômas."
"But, Juve, you are threatened by Fantômas; that is why I am here to
help you."
"Well, I have no bed to put you in."
Fandor, taken aback, stared at the detective. The latter rose and began
walking about the room, then turned sharply and gazed at the young man:
"You are quite determined to stay with me?"
"Yes."
"And if I bade you go?"
"I should disobey you."
"Very well, then," concluded Juve, shrugging his shoulders, "come along
and light me."
The detective passed out of the apartment and made for the stairs.
"Where are we bound for?" asked Fandor.
"The garret," Juve replied.
A quarter of an hour later Juve and Fandor dragged into the bedroom a
huge open-work wicker-basket.
"Whew!" cried Juve, mopping his forehead, "no one would believe it was
so heavy."
Fandor smiled.
"It's full of rubbish. Really, Juve, you are not a tidy man!"
Juve, without reply, proceeded to empty the basket, pulling out books,
linen, pieces of wood, carpet, rolls of paper; in fact, the accumulated
refuse of fifteen years.
"What is your height?" he asked.
"If I remember right, five feet ten."
Juve got out his pocket measure and took the length of the crate.
"That's all right," he murmured. "You'll be quite snug and comfortable
in it."
Fandor burst out:
"You're a cheerful host, Juve. You bottle up your guests in cages now!"
Juve placed a mattress at the bottom of the basket and laid two blankets
over that, then he put a pillow on top. Patting the bedding to make it
smooth, he declared with a laugh:
"I fear nothing, but I have taken precautions. I have posted two men in
the porter's lodge. I have loaded my revolver, and dined comfortably.
About half-past eleven I shall go to bed as usual. However, instead of
going to sleep I shall endeavour to keep awake. At dinner I took three
cups of coffee, and when you go I shall drink a fourth."
"Excuse me," said Fandor, "but I am not going away."
"There! You'll sleep splendid inside that, Fandor."
The journalist, used to the devices of his friend, nodded his head. Juve
had already taken off his coat and waistcoat and now drew from a box
three belts half a yard in breadth and studded outside with sharp
points. "Look, Fandor! I shall be completely protected when I am swathed
in them. Oh," he added, "I was going to forget my leg guards!"
Juve went back to the box and took out two other rolls, also studded
with spikes. Fandor looked in amazement at this gear and Juve observed
laughingly:
"It will cost me a pair of sheets and maybe a mattress."
"What does it mean?"
"These defensive works have a double object. To protect me against
Fantômas, or the 'executioner' he will send, and also I shall be able to
determine the civil status of the 'executioner' in question."
Fandor, more and more puzzled, inspected the iron spikes, which were two
or more inches in length.
"This contrivance is not new," said Juve; "Liabeuf wore arm guards like
these under his jacket, and when the officers wanted to seize him they
tore their hands."
"I know, I know," replied Fandor, "but----"
The detective all at once laid a finger on his lips.
"It's now twenty past eleven, and I am in the habit of being in bed at
half past. Fantômas is bound to know it: when he comes or sends, he must
not notice anything out of the way. Get into your wicker case and shut
the lid down carefully. By the by, I shall leave the window slightly
open."
"Isn't that a bit risky?"
"It is one of my habits, and not to make Fantômas suspicious I alter my
ways in nothing."
Fandor settled himself in his case and Juve also got into bed. As he put
out the light he gave a warning.
"We mustn't close an eye or utter a word. Whatever happens, don't move.
But when I call, strike a light at once and come to me."
"All right," replied Fandor.
* * * * *
"Fandor!"
Juve's cry rent the stillness of the night, loud and compelling. The
journalist leaped from his wicker-basket so abruptly that he knocked
against the lamp stand and the lamp fell to the floor. Fandor searched
for his matches in vain.
"Light up, Fandor!" shouted Juve.
The noise of a struggle, the dull thud of a fall on the floor, maddened
the journalist. In the darkness he heard Juve groaning, scraping the
floor with his boots, making violent efforts to resist some mysterious
assailant.
"Be quick, in God's name," implored the pain-wrung voice of the
detective. Fandor trod on the glass of the lamp, which broke. He
tripped, knocked his head against a press, rebounded, then suddenly
uttered a terrible cry. His hands, outstretched apart, in the gloom, had
brushed a cold, shiny body which slid under his palms.
"Fandor! Help, Fandor!"
Desperate, Fandor plunged haphazard about the disordered chamber,
wrapped in darkness. Suddenly, he rushed into the study hard by, found
there another lamp which he lit in haste, and hurried back with it.
A fearful sight wrung a cry of terror from him. Juve, on his knees on
the floor, was covered with blood.
"Juve!"
"It's all right, Fandor. Some one has bled, but not I."
The detective rushed to the open window and leaned out into the dark
night.
"Listen!" he cried. "Do you hear that low hissing, that dull rustling?"
"Yes. I heard it just now."
"It was the 'executioner.'"
The detective drew back into the room, shut the window, pulled down the
blinds, and then took off his armour. Curiously he examined the stains
of blood, the tiny shreds of flesh that had remained on the points.
"We have no more to fear now," he said, "the stroke has been tried--and
has failed."
"Juve! tell me what has just happened? I may be an idiot, but I don't
understand at all!"
"You are no fool, Fandor; far from it, but if in many circumstances you
reason and argue with considerable aptness, I grant you far less
deductive faculty. That does not seem to be your forte."
Fandor seated himself before the detective, and the latter held forth.
"When we found ourselves faced with the first crime, that of the Cité
Frochot, and our notice was drawn to the elusive Fantômas, we were
unable to decide in what manner that hapless Mme. Raymond, whom we then
took for Lady Beltham, had been done to death. Now, remember, Fandor,
that during that night of mystery, hidden behind the curtains in
Chaleck's study we heard weird rustlings and faint sort of hissings,
didn't we?"
"We did," admitted Fandor, at a loss, "but go on, Juve."
"When we were called to investigate the attack on the American, Dixon,
it was easy for us to conclude that the attempt of which the pugilist
had been the object was the outcome of the same plan of battle as that
which cost the widow Valgrand her life. The mysterious 'executioner,'
which Chaleck did not disguise from Lady Beltham, was thus a being
endowed with vigour enough to completely crush a woman's body, and
likely do as much to that of an ordinary man. But the 'executioner' in
question was not strong enough to get the better of the grand physique
of the champion pugilist, since it failed in its attempt.
"This instrument 'of limited power,' if I may so describe it, must then
be, not a mechanism which nothing can resist, but a living being! It
must also be a creature striking panic, terrifying, formidable: you ask
why, Fandor?"
"Yes, to be sure."
"I am going to tell you. If our poor friend Josephine were not still in
a high fever she would certainly uphold me. You remember the business on
the Boulevard Pereire? Chaleck or Fantômas wants to be rid of the woman
he loved under the guise of Loupart, since he has gone back to Lady
Beltham. Moreover, Josephine chatters too much with Dixon, with the
police.
"Chaleck, Fantômas, therefore, goes up to Josephine's. After having told
the poor creature I know not what yarn, he departs, leaving behind in
his hold-all, the instrument. Now this last, when it shows itself, so
terrifies the poor girl that she throws herself out of the window."
"I begin to see what you mean," said the journalist.
"Listen," replied Juve. "The mysterious, nameless and terrible
accomplice of Fantômas, is no other than a snake! A snake trained to
crush bodies in its coils. After having long suspected its existence, I
began to be sure of it when I found that strange scale at Neuilly. This
accounts for the incomprehensible state of Mme. Valgrand's body, the
extraordinary attempt on Dixon, the murderous thing that terrified
Josephine! That is why, expecting to-night's visit, I barbed myself with
iron like a knight of old, feeling pretty sure that if the hands of the
officers were torn by the armlets of Liabeuf, the coils of Fantômas'
serpent would be flayed on touching my sharp spikes."
"Juve!" cried Fandor, "if I hadn't had the bad luck to upset the lamp,
we should have caught this frightful beast."
"Probably, but what should we have done with it? After all, it's better
that it should go back to Fantômas."
"But you haven't yet told me what happened!"
The young man's face displayed such curiosity that Juve burst out
laughing.
"Journalist! Incorrigible newsmonger! All right, take notes for your
article describing this appalling adventure. So, then, Fandor, the lamp
once out, the hours go by, a trifle more slowly in the darkness than in
the light. You are silent and still like a little Moses in your wicker
cradle. As for me, armoured as I was, I tried not to stir in my bed--to
spare the sheets--Juve is not wealthy. Midnight, one o'clock, two, the
quarter past. How long it is!--Then, an alarm! A cat that mews
strangely. Then comes that little hissing sound I begin to know.
Hiss--hiss! Oh, what a horrid feeling! I guess that the window is
opening wider. You heard, as I did, Fandor, the revolting scales grit on
the boards. But you didn't know what it was, whereas I did know it was
the snake! I swear to you it needed all my pluck not to flinch, for I
wanted at any cost to see it through to the end, and know whether,
behind this reptile, Fantômas was not going to show his vile snout.
"Ah, the brute, how quickly he went to work. As I was listening, my
muscles tense, my nerves on edge, I suddenly felt my sheet stir--the
foul beast is trained to attack beds, remember the attack on Dixon--and
suddenly it was the grip, furious, quick as a whip stroke, twining about
me. I was thrown down, tossed, shaken, torn like a feather, tied up like
a sausage!
"My arms glued to my body, my loins hampered. I intended not to say a
word, I had faith in my iron-work; but to be frank, I was scared,
awfully scared. And I yelled: 'Fandor! Help!'
"Oh, those accursed moments. He began to squeeze horribly when all at
once I felt a cold liquid flow over my skin--blood. The brute was
wounded. We still wrestled, and you tripped in the darkness and smashed
the glass of the lamp, and I was choking gradually. All my life I shall
remember it. And then, what relief, what joy when the grip slackened,
when he gives up and makes off. The beast glided over the floor, reached
the window, hissed frantically and vanished. There, M. Reporter, you
have impressions from life, and rough ones, too! Well, the luck is
turning, and I think it is veering to our quarter. Things are going from
bad to worse for Fantômas. I tell you, Fandor, we shall nab him before
long!"
XXXIII
A SCANDAL IN THE CLOISTER
Slight sounds, scarcely audible, disturbed the peace of the cloister. In
the absolute silence of the night, vague noises could be distinguished.
Furtive steps, whisperings, doors opened or shut cautiously. Then the
blinking light of a candle shone at a casement, two or three other
windows were illuminated and the hubbub grew general. Voices were heard,
frightened interjections, the stir increased in the long corridor on
which cells opened. Generally the curtains of these cells were
discreetly drawn; now they were being pulled aside. Drowsy faces looked
out of the gloom; the excitement increased.
"Sister Marguerite! Sister Vincent! Sister Clotilde! What is it? What is
happening? Listen!"
The alarmed nuns gathered at the far end of the passage. The worthy
women, roused from their rest, had hastily arranged their coifs, and
chastely wrapped themselves in their flowing robes. They turned their
frightened faces toward the chapel.
"Burglars!" murmured the Sister who was treasurer of the convent,
thinking of the cup of gold that the humble little sisterhood preserved
as a relic with jealous care.
Another Sister, recently come from the creuse, from which she had been
driven by the laws, did not conceal her fears.
"More emissaries of the government! They are going to turn us out!"
The Senior, Sister Vincent, quivering with alarm, stammered:
"It is a revolution--I saw that in '70."
A heap of chairs under the vaulting suddenly toppled down. Panic
stricken, the sisters crowded closed together, not daring to go to the
chapel, which was joined to the passage by a little staircase.
"And the Mother Superior, what did she think of it all--what would she
say?"
They drew near the cell, a little apart from the others, occupied by the
lady, who, on taking the headship of the "House," had brought with her
precious personal assistance and a good deal of money as well. Sister
Vincent, who had gone forward and was about to enter the little
chamber, drew back.
"Our Holy Mother," she informed the others, "is at her prayers."
At this very moment broken cries rang down the passage. Sister Frances,
the janitress, who everyone believed was calmly slumbering in her lodge,
suddenly appeared, her eyes wild, her garments in disarray.
The sisters gathered round her, but the helpless woman shrieked, quite
beside herself.
"Let me go! Let us flee! I have seen the devil! He is there! In the
church! It is frightful!"
Mad with terror, the Sister explained in disjointed phrases what had
alarmed her. She had heard a noise and fancied it might be the
gardener's dog shut by mistake in the chapel. Then behold! At the moment
she entered the choir the stained-glass window above the shrine of St.
Clotilde, their patroness, suddenly gave way, and through the opening
appeared a supernatural being who came toward her ejaculating words she
could not understand. Armed with a great cudgel, he struck right and
left, making a terrible uproar.
Thereupon the janitress made an effort to escape, but the demon barred
her path, and in a sepulchral voice commanded her to go for the Mother
Superior and bid her come at once, if she did not want the worst of
evils to fall upon the sisterhood.
She had scarcely finished when an echoing crash was heard. The sisters
suppressed a cry, and as they turned, pale with dread, before them stood
their Mother Superior. With a sweeping gesture, she vaguely gave a
blessing as if to endow them with courage, then turned to the janitress.
"My dear Sister Françoise, calm yourself! Be brave! God will not forsake
us! I intend to comply with the desire of the stranger. I will go
alone--with God alone!" Lady Beltham made a mighty effort to disguise
the emotion she felt. Slowly she went down the steps and entered the
sanctuary, where she halted in a state of terror.
The choir was lit up. The tapers were flaring on the high altar, and in
the middle of the chapel, wrapped in a large black cloak, his face
hidden by a black mask, stood a man, mysterious and alarming.
"Lady Beltham!"
At the sound of this voice, Lady Beltham fancied she recognised her
lover.
"What do you want? What are you doing? It is madness!"
"Nothing is madness in Fantômas!"
Lady Beltham pressed her hands to her heart, unable to speak.
The voice resumed: "Fantômas bids you leave here, Lady Beltham. In two
hours you will go from this convent; a closed motor will be waiting for
you at the back of the garden, at the little gate. The vehicle will take
you to a seaport, where you will board a vessel which the driver will
indicate; when the voyage is over you will be in England: there you will
receive fresh orders to make for Canada."
Lady Beltham wrung her hands in despair.
"Why do you wish to force me to leave my dear companions?"
"Were you not ready to leave everything, Lady Beltham, to make a new
life for yourself with--him you love?"
"Alas!"
"Remember last Tuesday night at the Neuilly mansion!"
"Ah! You should have carried me off then, not left me time to think it
over. Now I am no longer willing."
"You will go! Yes or no. Will you obey?"
"I will--for, after all, I love you!"
The two tragic beings were silent for a moment, listening; outside the
church the uproar grew in violence, brief orders were being shouted, a
blowing of whistles. Suddenly, uttering a hoarse cry, the ruffian
exclaimed:
"The police! The police are on the track of Fantômas! Juve's police.
Well, this time Fantômas will be too much for them. Lady Beltham--till
we meet again."
Beating a rapid retreat behind a pillar of the chapel he vanished. Lady
Beltham found herself alone in the chapel. Five minutes later the heavy
steps of the police sounded in the passages. They went through the
house, searching for clues, then disappeared in the darkness of the
night.
Lady Beltham addressed the nuns:
"A great peril threatens our sisters of the Boulevard Jourdan. They must
be warned at all costs and at once. And it is necessary that I, and I
only, should go to warn them. Have no fear. No harm will happen to me. I
know what I am doing."
Under the appalled eyes of the sisterhood the Mother Superior slowly
passed from the assembled community with a sweeping gesture of farewell.
The moment she was alone, she ran to the far end of the garden and
passed through the little gate in the wall behind the chapel. She was
gone!
While these strange occurrences were in progress at the peaceful convent
of Nogent, and the flight of Lady Beltham at the bidding of Fantômas was
effected under the eyes of the sisters, no little stir was manifest in
the environs of La Chapelle, in the dreaded region where the hooligans,
forming the celebrated gang of Cyphers, have their haunts.
A certain misrule reigned in the confederation, due to the fact that
Loupart had not been seen for some time. None of its members believed
for an instant the newspaper story that Loupart had turned out to be
Fantômas--the elusive, the superhuman, the improbable, the weird
Fantômas. This was beyond them. Good enough to stuff the numskull of the
law with such a tale, but there was no use for it among the gang of
Cyphers.
That same evening there was considerable excitement at the station in
the Rue Stephenson. Detectives, inspectors, real or sham hooligans, were
assembled there.
"Who is that gentleman?" asked M. Rouquelet, the Commissary of the
district, pointing to a young man seated in a corner of the room, taking
notes on a pad.
Juve, to whom the query was addressed, turned his head.
"Why, it's Fandor, Jerome Fandor, my friend."
Juve was seated at the magistrate's table, comparing papers, documents,
and material evidence; he had, standing round him men in uniform or
mufti. One might have thought it the office of a general staff during a
battle. The door opened to a man dressed like a market gardener.
"Well, Léon?" asked Juve.
"M. Inspector, it is done. We have nabbed the 'Cooper.'"
A sergeant of the 19th Arrondissement appeared and saluted.
"M. Inspector, my men are bringing in 'The Flirt.' Her throat is cut."
"Is her murderer taken?"
"Not yet--there are several of them--but we know them. The wounded woman
was able to tell us their names. They 'bled' her because they suspected
her of giving us information."
M. Rouquelet telephoned to Lâriboisière for an ambulance, and the
officers went to see the victim, who was lying on a stretcher in the
hall. At that moment, the sound of a struggle hurried Juve to the
entrance of the station. Some officers were hauling in a youth with a
pallid complexion and wicked eyes. Fandor recognised the captive.
"It's that little collegian who bit my finger the night of the
Marseilles Express!"
Léon, who had drawn near, likewise identified the youth.
"I know him, that's Mimile. His account is settled, he is jugged!"
The hall of the station filled once more: an old woman, dragged in
forcibly, was groaning and bawling at the top of her voice:
"Pack of swine! Isn't it shameful to treat a poor woman so!"
"M. Superintendent," explained one of the men, "we caught this woman,
Mother Toulouche--in the act of stowing away in her bodice a bundle of
bank notes just passed to her by a man. Here they are."
The constable handed the packet to the magistrate, and Fandor, who was
watching, could not repress an exclamation.
"Oh!--Notes in halves! Suppose they belong to M. Martialle! Allow me, M.
Rouquelet, to look at the numbers."
"In with Mother Toulouche!" cried the Superintendent, then rubbing his
hands he turned to Juve and cried:
"A fine haul, M. Inspector. What do you think?"
But Juve did not hear him; he had drawn Fandor into a corner of the
office and was explaining:
"I have done no more at present than have Lady Beltham shadowed, but I
do not mean to arrest her. You see, if I asked Fuselier for a warrant
against Lady Beltham, a person legally dead and buried more than two
months ago, that excellent functionary would swallow his clerk, stool
and all, in sheer amazement."
At that moment a cyclist constable, dripping with sweat and quite out of
breath, came in and hastening straight to Juve, cried:
"I come from Nogent!"
"Well?"
"Well, M. Inspector, they saw a masked man come out of the convent,
wrapped in a big cloak. They gave chase--he fired a revolver twice and
killed two officers."
"Good God! It was certainly----"
"We thought, too--that perhaps--after all--it was--it was Fantômas!"
"Juve!" called the Commissary. "You are wanted on the telephone. Neuilly
is asking for you."
The detective picked up the receiver.
"Hello! hello! Is that you, Michel? Yes. What is it? In a motor? Oh, you
have taken the driver. But he--curse it! Who the devil is this man who
always escapes us? What? He is in Lady Beltham's house! You have
surrounded the house? Good, keep your eyes open! Do nothing till I
come."
Juve hung up the receiver and turned to Fandor.
"Fantômas is at Lady Beltham's; shut up in the house. I am going there."
"I'll go with you."
As the two men left the station, they were met by Inspector Grolle.
"We have taken 'The Beard' at Daddy Korn's," he cried.
"Confound that!" shouted Juve, as he jumped into a taxi with Fandor.
"Neuilly! Boulevard Inkermann, and top speed!"
XXXIV
FANTÔMAS' REVENGE
"Phew! Here I am!"
Checking his headlong course at the top of the terrace steps, Fantômas
rapidly entered the house, then double-locked himself in. The ruffian at
once inspected the fastenings of the windows and doors on the ground
floor.
The monster cocked his ear. Three calls of the horn sounded dolefully in
the silence of the night. Fantômas counted them anxiously and then
exclaimed:
"There! That's my signal! My driver is taken."
A slight shudder shook the sturdy frame of the man. He went up to the
first floor and peered through the shutters. He caught the sound of
footsteps. In the light of a street lamp he suddenly descried the
outline of his driver. The latter, among half a score of policemen, was
walking, head bent, with his hands fettered.
"Poor fellow!" he murmured. "Another who has to pay! Ah! they have left
my 'sixty horse' for my use presently. But there is no time to lose,
I'll bet that Juve, flanked by his everlasting journalist, will not be
long in coming here. Very well! Juve, it is not as master that you will
enter this house, but as a doomed man!"
Fantômas now became absorbed in a strange task which claimed all his
attention. On the floor of the dark closet where all the electric gear
of the house terminated, the bandit laid a sort of oblong fusee that he
drew from his capacious cloak.
He fitted to the end of this fusee two electric wires previously freed
of their insulator; then having verified the tie of the pulls of the
distribution board, he hid the cartridge under a little lid of wood.
Then he left the closet, taking care to double-lock the door.
"These detectives," he growled, "are about to witness the finest
firework display imaginable and, I dare say, take part in it, too.
Dynamite can transform a respectable middle-class house into a sparkling
bouquet of loose stone!"
Such was, indeed, the fearful reception Fantômas held in reserve for his
opponents. He had made everything ready to blow up the house and escape
unhurt himself.
If Juve and Fandor had paid more attention to the piping of the wires,
they would have seen that some of them ran outside the house and
disappeared below ground, reappearing at the far end of the property in
an old deserted woodshed.
Fantômas was about to leave the house. He was already stepping onto the
terrace when, suppressing an oath, he wheeled about suddenly.
As Juve and Fandor were about to enter the grounds, Detective Michel
rose up out of the dusk.
"That you, sir?"
"Well," replied Juve, "is the bird in the nest?"
"Yes, sir, and the cage is well guarded, I assure you. Fifteen of my men
kept a strict guard round the house."
"Good. Here is the plan of action. You, Sergeant, will enter the house
with Inspector Michel, at my back. The men will continue to watch the
exit."
Juve broke off sharply. He saw the door of the house open a little way
and Fantômas appear, then vanish again inside the house.
"At last!" cried Juve, who sprang forward, followed by Fandor.
"Slowly, gentlemen! We have now victory in sight, we mustn't imperil it
by rashness. You remain on the ground floor. Each one in a room, and
don't stir without good reason. I am going up."
"I am going with you," exclaimed Fandor.
The two went cautiously up the stairs to the first floor.
"Fantômas!" challenged Juve, halting on the landing, "you are caught;
surrender!"
But the detective's voice only roused distant echoes; the big house was
silent.
"Now, this is what we must do," he cautioned Fandor. "Above us is a
loft--we will search it first; if it is empty, we will close it again.
Then we will come down again, taking each room in turn and locking it
after us. At the slightest sound fling yourself on the ground and let
Fantômas fire first; the flash of the shot will tell us where it comes
from."
The two man-hunters searched the loft without success. At the first
floor Juve repressed a slight tremor, for the handle of the door leading
into Lady Beltham's room creaked ominously. He opened it, springing
aside quickly, expecting to be fired at. The room was empty, no trace of
Fantômas. The two passed into another room, then as soon as their
visitation was completed locked up the apartment.
Suddenly, as they reached the foot of the stairs, Juve gave a violent
start. From the door of the drawing-room a shadow, black from head to
foot, came bounding out. Quick as lightning the form crossed the
ante-room, then plunged by a low entrance into the cellarage.
Two shots rang out!
Fantômas drew behind him a big bar and prided himself on the barrier he
thus put between his pursuers and himself. But despite his consummate
confidence, he was beginning to feel a certain uneasiness, an undeniable
anxiety. His black mask clung to his temples, dripping with sweat.
He crossed the basement to the little air-hole overlooking the garden.
"That is a way of escape," he thought, "unless----"
But, baffled, he ceased his inspection.
"Curse it! There are three policemen before that exit."
He scraped a match and reviewed the place in which he found
himself--which for that matter he knew better than any one.
Facing him stood the dilapidated stove and at his feet shimmered the
cistern.
All at once Fantômas clenched his fists. Under the increasing blows of
the detective and his men the door of the basement yielded. Above the
crash of the boards and iron-work Juve's voice rang out:
"Fantômas! Surrender!"
Fantômas groped in the darkness. His hand came on a bottle. A crackle of
shattered glass was heard, Fantômas had taken the bottle by the neck and
broken it against the wall.
* * * * *
Juve, revolver in hand, followed by Fandor, moved cautiously down the
stairs to the cellar: both men were brave, yet they felt their hearts
beating as though they would burst.
Juve reached the last step. He pressed the knob of his electric torch; a
rush of light lit up the little room. It was empty!
Juve went the round of the cellar, carefully inspecting the walls and
sounding them with the butt of his revolver. He went round the cistern.
Its surface was black and still. A broken bottle, floating head
downward, remained half immersed, absolutely motionless.
Fandor laid his hand on the detective's arm.
"Did you hear; some one breathed!"
Beyond doubt some one had breathed!
"Idiots that we are! He is in there," cried Juve, pointing to the pipe
of the great stove.
The detective caught sight in a corner of a number of bundles of straw.
"That is what we want, Fandor! We are going to make a bonfire."
When the opening of the furnace was fitted, Juve set a light to it and
the flames rose, crackling, while up the pipe of the heater rose a
pungent smoke, thick and black.
"And now to the openings of the stove! Sergeant! Michel! This way!"
Through the apertures in the ground-floor rooms the great stove was
beginning to smoke.
* * * * *
A broken bottle with the bottom gone was floating head downward on the
black water of the tank. Scarcely had Juve and Fandor gone than the
water was stirred, and slowly the mysterious bottle rose again to the
top. Behind it rose the head of Fantômas, still wrapped in the black
hood which now clung to his face like a mask moulded on the features.
Dripping, he issued from the tank and breathed hard for some moments.
Despite his ingenious contrivance for feeding his lungs he was not far
from suffocating.
"All the same," he growled, "if I hadn't remembered the plan of the
Tonkingese who lie stretched at the bottom of a river for hours at a
time, breathing through hollow reeds, I think that time we should have
exchanged shots to some purpose!"
Fantômas was wringing out his garments in haste when loud cries sounded
above his head, and two or three shots rang out. At the same time a
sudden stirring took place in and around the house. He turned it to
account by going at once to the air-hole. Now there was no one on guard,
so Fantômas put his head through, then his shoulders.
* * * * *
"That's all right; the brute is dead!"
Juve was examining curiously the creature which lay helpless on the
floor. Two trembling sergeants stood at the door of the room.
"We were expecting Fantômas to appear and a snake unrolls itself and
springs in our faces!" cried Fandor.
Half emerging from the mouth of the heater the monstrous body of a boa
constrictor lay on the floor. The men Juve had brought into the house
were resolute, ripe for anything, but never did they imagine that
Fantômas could assume such an unexpected shape. And terrified,
overwhelmed with dread, they recoiled in a frenzy of fear and fled,
calling on their mates outside, who at once ran to their assistance.
"Sir!" A terrified voice called from outside.
Juve rushed to the window. A dripping creature, clad in black from head
to foot, crossed the garden, running toward the servants' quarters. It
was Fantômas. Juve swore a great oath: "There he is! Getting away!"
The detective left his cry unfinished.
* * * * *
As he issued by the air-holes, Fantômas leaped forward. He was free!
"Juve scored the first game, the second is mine," he cried.
He reached the woodshed. With a practised hand he turned the electric
tap which ignited a spark in the dark closet behind the pantry.
"I win!" shouted Fantômas, as a terrible explosion made itself heard.
The earth shook, a huge column of black smoke rose skywards, explosion
followed explosion. The roar of falling walls was mingled with fearful
cries and dying groans.
Lady Beltham's villa had been blown up, burying under its ruins the
hapless men who in their pursuit of Fantômas had ventured too near.
Assuredly this arch-criminal had got away once more. But were Juve and
Fandor among the dead?
THE END
+-----------------------+
| FOOTNOTES: |
| |
| [A] See "Fantômas." |
| |
| [B] See "Fantômas." |
+-----------------------+
+---------------------------------------------------------------+
| |
| Transcriber's note: |
| |
| Italics are represented in this text version by underscores. |
| |
| The following printer's errors have been corrected. |
| |
| Page 48 'turnd' to 'turned' |
| 'Loupart turned and tramped' |
| |
| Page 83 'reasurred' to 'reassured' |
| 'Juve quickly reassured him' |
| |
| Page 96 'than' to 'then' |
| 'then in a voice' |
| |
| Page 158 'Mechancially' to 'mechanically' |
| 'mechanically she went forward' |
| |
| Page 176 'grenery' to greenery' |
| 'under the arch of greenery' |
| |
| Page 221 'unkown' to 'unknown' |
| 'identity should remain unknown' |
| |
| Page 252 'vistors' to 'visitors' |
| 'The porter led his visitors' |
| |
| Page 266 'acccomplice' to 'accomplice' |
| 'was indeed the accomplice of' |
| |
| Page 270 'later' to 'latter' |
| 'the latter rose and began' |
| |
| Page 295 'drpping' to 'dripping' |
| 'dripping with sweat' |
| |
| |
+---------------------------------------------------------------+
*** End of this LibraryBlog Digital Book "The Exploits of Juve - Being the Second of the Series of the "Fantômas" Detective Tales" ***
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