The letter contained the following lines:
“Daubrecq has spent the week at the Hotel Central. This morning
he had his luggage taken to the Gare de — and telephoned to
reserve a berth in the sleeping-car — for —
“I do not know when the train starts. But I shall be at the
station all the afternoon. Come as soon as you can, all three
of you. We will arrange to kidnap him.”
“What next?” said the Masher. “At which station? And where’s the sleeping-car for? She has cut out just the words we wanted!”
“Yes,” said the Growler. “Two snips with the scissors in each place; and the words which we most want are gone. Who ever saw such a thing? Has Mme. Mergy lost her head?”
Lupin did not move. A rush of blood was beating at his temples with such violence that he glued his fists to them and pressed with all his might. His fever returned, burning and riotous, and his will, incensed to the verge of physical suffering, concentrated itself upon that stealthy enemy, which must be controlled then and there, if he himself did not wish to be irretrievably beaten.
He muttered, very calmly:
“Daubrecq has been here.”
“Daubrecq!”
“We can’t suppose that Mme. Mergy has been amusing herself by cutting out those two words. Daubrecq has been here. Mme. Mergy thought that she was watching him. He was watching her instead.”
“How?”
“Doubtless through that hall-porter who did not tell us that Mme. Mergy had been to the hotel, but who must have told Daubrecq. He came. He read the letter. And, by way of getting at us, he contented himself with cutting out the essential words.”
“We can find out... we can ask...”
“What’s the good? What’s the use of finding out how he came, when we know that he did come?”
He examined the letter for some time, turned it over and over, then stood up and said:
“Come along.”
“Where to?”
“Gare de Lyon.”
“Are you sure?”
“I am sure of nothing with Daubrecq. But, as we have to choose, according to the contents of the letter, between the Gare de l’Est and the Gare de Lyon, [*] I am presuming that his business, his pleasure and his health are more likely to take Daubrecq in the direction of Marseilles and the Riviera than to the Gare de l’Est.”
* These are the only two main-line stations in Paris with the
word de in their name. The others have du, as the Gare du
Nord or the Gare du Luxembourg, d’ as the Gare d’Orleans, or
no participle at all, as the Gare Saint-Lazare or the Gare
Montparnasse. — Translator’s Note.
It was past seven when Lupin and his companions left the Hotel Franklin. A motor-car took them across Paris at full speed, but they soon saw that Clarisse Mergy was not outside the station, nor in the waiting-rooms, nor on any of the platforms.
“Still,” muttered Lupin, whose agitation grew as the obstacles increased, “still, if Daubrecq booked a berth in a sleeping-car, it can only have been in an evening train. And it is barely half-past seven!”
A train was starting, the night express. They had time to rush along the corridor. Nobody... neither Mme. Mergy nor Daubrecq...
But, as they were all three going, a porter accosted them near the refreshment-room:
“Is one of you gentlemen looking for a lady?”
“Yes, yes,... I am,” said Lupin. “Quick, what is it?”
“Oh, it’s you, sir! The lady told me there might be three of you or two of you.... And I didn’t know...”
“But, in heaven’s name, speak, man! What lady?”
“The lady who spent the whole day on the pavement, with the luggage, waiting.”
“Well, out with it! Has she taken a train?”
“Yes, the train-de-luxe, at six-thirty: she made up her mind at the last moment, she told me to say. And I was also to say that the gentleman was in the same train and that they were going to Monte Carlo.”
“Damn it!” muttered Lupin. “We ought to have taken the express just now! There’s nothing left but the evening trains, and they crawl! We’ve lost over three hours.”
The wait seemed interminable. They booked their seats. They telephoned to the proprietor of the Hotel Franklin to send on their letters to Monte Carlo. They dined. They read the papers. At last, at half-past nine, the train started.
And so, by a really tragic series of circumstances, at the most critical moment of the contest, Lupin was turning his back on the battlefield and going away, at haphazard, to seek, he knew not where, and beat, he knew not how, the most formidable and elusive enemy that he had ever fought.
And this was happening four days, five days at most, before the inevitable execution of Gilbert and Vaucheray.
It was a bad and painful night for Lupin. The more he studied the situation the more terrible it appeared to him. On every side he was faced with uncertainty, darkness, confusion, helplessness.
True, he knew the secret of the crystal stopper. But how was he to know that Daubrecq would not change or had not already changed his tactics? How was he to know that the list of the Twenty-seven was still inside that crystal stopper or that the crystal stopper was still inside the object where Daubrecq had first hidden it?
And there was a further serious reason for alarm in the fact that Clarisse Mergy thought that she was shadowing and watching Daubrecq at a time when, on the contrary, Daubrecq was watching her, having her shadowed and dragging her, with diabolical cleverness, toward the places selected by himself, far from all help or hope of help.
Oh, Daubrecq’s game was clear as daylight! Did not Lupin know the unhappy woman’s hesitations? Did he not know — and the Growler and the Masher confirmed it most positively — that Clarisse looked upon the infamous bargain planned by Daubrecq in the light of a possible, an acceptable thing? In that case, how could he, Lupin, succeed? The logic of events, so powerfully moulded by Daubrecq, led to a fatal result: the mother must sacrifice herself and, to save her son, throw her scruples, her repugnance, her very honour, to the winds!
“Oh, you scoundrel!” snarled Lupin, in a fit of rage. “If I get hold of you, I’ll make you dance to a pretty tune! I wouldn’t be in your shoes for a great deal, when that happens.”
They reached Monte Carlo at three o’clock in the afternoon. Lupin was at once disappointed not to see Clarisse on the platform at the station.
He waited. No messenger came up to him.
He asked the porters and ticket-collectors if they had noticed, among the crowd, two travellers answering to the description of Daubrecq and Clarisse. They had not.
He had, therefore, to set to work and hunt through all the hotels and lodging-houses in the principality. Oh, the time wasted!
By the following evening, Lupin knew, beyond a doubt, that Daubrecq and Clarisse were not at Monte Carlo, nor at Monaco, nor at the Cap d’Ail, nor at La Turbie, nor at Cap Martin.
“Where can they be then?” he wondered, trembling with rage.
At last, on the Saturday, he received, at the poste restante, a telegram which had been readdressed from the Hotel Franklin and which said:
“He got out at Cannes and is going on to San Remo, Hotel Palace
des Ambassadeurs.
“CLARISSE.”
The telegram was dated the day before.
“Hang it!” exclaimed Lupin. “They passed through Monte Carlo. One of us ought to have remained at the station. I did think of it; but, in the midst of all that bustle...”
Lupin and his friends took the first train for Italy.
They crossed the frontier at twelve o’clock. The train entered the station at San Remo at twelve-forty.
They at once saw an hotel-porter, with “Ambassadeurs-Palace” on his braided cap, who seemed to be looking for some one among the arrivals.
Lupin went up to him:
“Are you looking for M. Nic
ole?”
“Yes, M. Nicole and two gentlemen.”
“From a lady?”
“Yes, Mme. Mergy.”
“Is she staying at your hotel?”
“No. She did not get out. She beckoned to me, described you three gentlemen and told me to say that she was going on to Genoa, to the Hotel Continental.”
“Was she by herself?”
“Yes.”
Lupin tipped the man, dismissed him and turned to his friends:
“This is Saturday. If the execution takes place on Monday, there’s nothing to be done. But Monday is not a likely day... What I have to do is to lay hands on Daubrecq to-night and to be in Paris on Monday, with the document. It’s our last chance. Let’s take it.”
The Growler went to the booking-office and returned with three tickets for Genoa.
The engine whistled.
Lupin had a last hesitation:
“No, really, it’s too childish! What are we doing? We ought to be in Paris, not here!... Just think!...”
He was on the point of opening the door and jumping out on the permanent way. But his companions held him back. The train started. He sat down again.
And they continued their mad pursuit, travelling at random, toward the unknown...
And this happened two days before the inevitable execution of Gilbert and Vaucheray.
CHAPTER X. EXTRA-DRY?
ON ONE OF the hills that girdle Nice with the finest scenery in the world, between the Vallon de Saint-Silvestre and the Vallon de La Mantega, stands a huge hotel which overlooks the town and the wonderful Baie des Anges. A crowd flocks to it from all parts, forming a medley of every class and nation.
On the evening of the same Saturday when Lupin, the Growler and the Masher were plunging into Italy, Clarisse Mergy entered this hotel, asked for a bedroom facing south and selected No. 130, on the second floor, a room which had been vacant since that morning.
The room was separated from No. 129 by two partition-doors. As soon as she was alone, Clarisse pulled back the curtain that concealed the first door, noiselessly drew the bolt and put her ear to the second door:
“He is here,” she thought. “He is dressing to go to the club... as he did yesterday.”
When her neighbour had gone, she went into the passage and, availing herself of a moment when there was no one in sight, walked up to the door of No. 129. The door was locked.
She waited all the evening for her neighbour’s return and did not go to bed until two o’clock. On Sunday morning, she resumed her watch.
The neighbour went out at eleven. This time he left the key in the door.
Hurriedly turning the key, Clarisse entered boldly, went to the partition-door, raised the curtain, drew the bolt and found herself in her own room.
In a few minutes, she heard two chambermaids doing the room in No. 129.
She waited until they were gone. Then, feeling sure that she would not be disturbed, she once more slipped into the other room.
Her excitement made her lean against a chair. After days and nights of stubborn pursuit, after alternate hopes and disappointments, she had at last succeeded in entering a room occupied by Daubrecq. She could look about at her ease; and, if she did not discover the crystal stopper, she could at least hide in the space between the partition-doors, behind the hanging, see Daubrecq, spy upon his movements and surprise his secret.
She looked around her. A travelling-bag at once caught her attention. She managed to open it; but her search was useless.
She ransacked the trays of a trunk and the compartments of a portmanteau. She searched the wardrobe, the writing-table, the chest of drawers, the bathroom, all the tables, all the furniture. She found nothing.
She gave a start when she saw a scrap of paper on the balcony, lying as though flung there by accident:
“Can it be a trick of Daubrecq’s?” she thought, out loud. “Can that scrap of paper contain...”
“No,” said a voice behind her, as she put her hand on the latch.
She turned and saw Daubrecq.
She felt neither astonishment nor alarm, nor even any embarrassment at finding herself face to face with him. She had suffered too deeply for months to trouble about what Daubrecq could think of her or say, at catching her in the act of spying.
She sat down wearily.
He grinned:
“No, you’re out of it, dear friend. As the children say, you’re not ‘burning’ at all. Oh, not a bit of it! And it’s so easy! Shall I help you? It’s next to you, dear friend, on that little table... And yet, by Jove, there’s not much on that little table! Something to read, something to write with, something to smoke, something to eat... and that’s all... Will you have one of these candied fruits?... Or perhaps you would rather wait for the more substantial meal which I have ordered?”
Clarisse made no reply. She did not even seem to listen to what he was saying, as though she expected other words, more serious words, which he could not fail to utter.
He cleared the table of all the things that lay upon it and put them on the mantel-piece. Then he rang the bell.
A head-waiter appeared. Daubrecq asked:
“Is the lunch which I ordered ready?”
“Yes, sir.”
“It’s for two, isn’t it?”
“Yes, sir.”
“And the champagne?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Extra-dry?”
“Yes, sir.”
Another waiter brought a tray and laid two covers on the table: a cold lunch, some fruit and a bottle of champagne in an ice-pail.
Then the two waiters withdrew.
“Sit down, dear lady. As you see, I was thinking of you and your cover is laid.”
And, without seeming to observe that Clarisse was not at all prepared to do honour to his invitation, he sat down, began to eat and continued:
“Yes, upon my word, I hoped that you would end by consenting to this little private meeting. During the past week, while you were keeping so assiduous a watch upon me, I did nothing but say to myself, ‘I wonder which she prefers: sweet champagne, dry champagne, or extra-dry?’ I was really puzzled. Especially after our departure from Paris. I had lost your tracks, that is to say, I feared that you had lost mine and abandoned the pursuit which was so gratifying to me. When I went for a walk, I missed your beautiful dark eyes, gleaming with hatred under your hair just touched with gray. But, this morning, I understood: the room next to mine was empty at last; and my friend Clarisse was able to take up her quarters, so to speak, by my bedside. From that moment I was reassured. I felt certain that, on coming back — instead of lunching in the restaurant as usual — I should find you arranging my things to your convenience and suiting your own taste. That was why I ordered two covers: one for your humble servant, the other for his fair friend.”
She was listening to him now and in the greatest terror. So Daubrecq knew that he was spied upon! For a whole week he had seen through her and all her schemes!
In a low voice, anxious-eyed, she asked:
“You did it on purpose, did you not? You only went away to drag me with you?”
“Yes,” he said.
“But why? Why?”
“Do you mean to say that you don’t know?” retorted Daubrecq, laughing with a little cluck of delight.
She half-rose from her chair and, bending toward him, thought, as she thought each time, of the murder which she could commit, of the murder which she would commit. One revolver-shot and the odious brute was done for.
Slowly her hand glided to the weapon concealed in her bodice.
Daubrecq said:
“One second, dear friend... You can shoot presently; but I beg you first to read this wire which I have just received.”
She hesitated, not knowing what trap he was laying for her; but he went on, as he produced a telegram:
“It’s about your son.”
“Gilbert?” she asked, greatly concerned.
“Yes, Gilbert.
.. Here, read it.”
She gave a yell of dismay. She had read:
“Execution on Tuesday morning.”
And she at once flung herself on Daubrecq, crying:
“It’s not true!... It’s a lie... to madden me... Oh, I know you: you are capable of anything! Confess! It won’t be on Tuesday, will it? In two days! No, no... I tell you, we have four days yet, five days, in which to save him... Confess it, confess it!”
She had no strength left, exhausted by this fit of rebellion; and her voice uttered none but inarticulate sounds.
He looked at her for a moment, then poured himself out a glass of champagne and drank it down at a gulp. He took a few steps up and down the room, came back to her and said:
“Listen to me, darling...”
The insult made her quiver with an unexpected energy. She drew herself up and, panting with indignation, said:
“I forbid you... I forbid you to speak to me like that. I will not accept such an outrage. You wretch!...”
He shrugged his shoulders and resumed:
“Pah, I see you’re not quite alive to the position. That comes, of course, because you still hope for assistance in some quarter. Prasville, perhaps? The excellent Prasville, whose right hand you are... My dear friend, a forlorn hope... You must know that Prasville is mixed up in the Canal affair! Not directly: that is to say, his name is not on the list of the Twenty-seven; but it is there under the name of one of his friends, an ex-deputy called Vorenglade, Stanislas Vorenglade, his man of straw, apparently: a penniless individual whom I left alone and rightly. I knew nothing of all that until this morning, when, lo and behold, I received a letter informing me of the existence of a bundle of documents which prove the complicity of our one and only Prasville! And who is my informant? Vorenglade himself! Vorenglade, who, tired of living in poverty, wants to extort money from Prasville, at the risk of being arrested, and who will be delighted to come to terms with me. And Prasville will get the sack. Oh, what a lark! I swear to you that he will get the sack, the villain! By Jove, but he’s annoyed me long enough! Prasville, old boy, you’ve deserved it...”
He rubbed his hands together, revelling in his coming revenge. And he continued:
Delphi Collected Works of Maurice Leblanc (Illustrated) (Delphi Series Nine Book 17) Page 135