Enter the Nyctalope

by Jean de La Hire

  Then Saint-Clair made a sharp right turn into a small by-road, passed under a narrow bridge over which the railway ran, accelerated, climbed a steep slope, turned left, and rapidly went into a paved courtyard surrounded by high walls and bordered at the back by a large, high and square building reminiscent of a barracks—but a barracks whose windows had all been fitted with orange canopies and decorated with flowers.

  Behind the automobile, the double-battened gate of iron-reinforced wood was closed by a man in a green uniform trimmed with red.

  The grey roadster rolled swiftly to the left of the house, and went around it to stop, beyond a lawn garnished with thick shrubbery, in front of a little chalet in the Swiss style. There, on descending from the car, Leo Saint-Clair was met be a white-haired gentleman with gold-rimmed spectacles, who shook his hand and said:

  “Welcome, Monsieur. At the request of Monsieur de Villiers-Pagan and General Le Breuil, I’m putting this chalet at the disposal of the four of you. You’ll find everything that the general listed on the telephone inside. There’s a garage in rear deep enough and broad enough for your car. I’ll leave you, gentlemen, for I have a lot to do. I’ll come to see you again in an hour’s time.”

  “Thank you, Monsieur!” said Saint-Clair.

  The hospitable old man in the gold-rimmed spectacles and white hair was the famous professor of psychology Ambroise Dorsang, the proprietor and director of a private hospital known as the Sanatorium du Bouchet, where the mental illnesses of rich individuals of both sexes from all over the world were treated.

  It was in one of the most comfortable chalets of the Sanatorium du Bouchet that Leo Saint-Clair took refuge at seven fifteen in the evening of Monday the eleventh of March—a refuge which, according to every appearance and by virtue of a sound logic, was doubtless intended to remain absolutely secret.

  At the clinic in Lausanne, however, Mademoiselle Aurora Malianova—called Katia or, more intimately, Katyushka in other milieux—had not given up trying to discover the key to the enigmatic departure of Leo Saint-Clair and his companions. Being very intuitive, like so many Russian women when they are intelligent, amorous, passionate and fanatical, she did not believe that the four young men had returned to Paris.

  Throughout the afternoon, as usual, she fulfilled her duties as a nurse-assistant and secretary to the Director to perfection, but her brain was nevertheless active, and she came to a decision.

  When she finished work in the directorial office at 6 p.m., before bidding her usual “Good night” to Monsieur de Villiers-Pagan, she said, with considerable skillfully-feigned timidity and well-simulated anxiety: “Monsieur… Monsieur Medical Director…”

  “What is it, Mademoiselle?” asked the doctor, slightly surprised but with his usual benevolence.

  “My sister in Geneva isn’t well. She’s suffering a bout of cardiac trouble that’s worrying me greatly. I’m not on duty tonight. I ask your permission to go watch over my sister until tomorrow morning.”

  Monsieur de Villiers-Pagan was a genuinely good man. He immediately became interested. “Has she a doctor?”

  “Yes, a cousin by marriage, from the Russian colony. It’s him, in fact, who prescribed that—at least for tonight, when the crisis will each its height—that someone attentive and experienced…he can’t do it himself; he’s not free. An unfamiliar nurse? Pooh! Especially when I…”

  “Very well, Mademoiselle, very well!” There and then, the Medical Director filled in and signed a blank form giving permission for an overnight leave for Mademoiselle Malianova.

  Less than two hours later, having taken the 6:30 train from Lausanne to Geneva, the young woman opened the door under the dark porch and went upstairs to knock on the door of the only apartment contained in the house hidden amid a crowd of disparate buildings in the Rive neighborhood.

  As on the previous day, the tall broad-shouldered man came to open it.

  “You, Katyushka!”

  “Me, darling!”

  She embraced him quickly, but only allowed herself to be half-embraced, so preoccupied was she. “Close the door again. Good! Come, listen to me!” And she recounted what she had learned regarding the departure of Leo Saint-Clair and his companions. That was little enough, in quantity, but how weightily it was charged with deception, perhaps with threat!

  Grigoryi swore, thumped the table with both fists and said, rudely: “We need to know where they’ve gone and where he is—the inventor’s son, assistant and collaborator. We need him. I’ve been working all day again, and I’m firmly convinced that we won’t get anywhere, in spite of the plans, instructions and models. Something essential is missing, and I don’t know what it is!” After a brief pause he added: “Do you, Katia, who have seen them, who have talked to Saint-Clair, and who know Villiers-Pagan well—the nuances of truth, lies or merely the restriction and dissimulation of his speech—believe that the four Frenchmen have crossed the border?”

  “No!”

  The young woman made that response without hesitation, in a tone of the firmest conviction.

  “Then we must search for them without losing a minute,” Grigoryi said. “Is it cold outside?”

  “Yes.”

  “I’ll take my cloak, then. Let’s go out. We’ll go to dinner, since there’s nothing for the two of us to eat here, and then we’ll go to Serge Ivanov’s. There’s a meeting tonight. We’ll find comrades there who’ll be able to start searching immediately. Four young Frenchmen equipped with an automobile like theirs have no chance of passing unnoticed—especially in Switzerland, where there are so few of them.8

  The Caucasian Serge Ivanov, condemned to death three times over in his absence in St. Petersburg, was the secret leader of the active Central European organization of Russian nihilists known as the “flying squads.” In Geneva, he was believed to be exercising the profession of medicine, in which he had a diploma from the University of Lyon. That explained the numerous visits he made in his neighborhood and the even more numerous ones he received. He was scrupulously submissive to all the laws and regulations that regulated the profession of physician by a foreigner in Switzerland. He paid his rent, his suppliers and his taxes very dutifully, and was never seen at any kind of political meeting. He was thus protected by the very laws of the country, and within the shelter of that safety he simultaneously carried out espionage of behalf of Germany and disseminated anarcho-terrorist propaganda against Russian Tsarism, world Capitalism and the Imperialism of bourgeois States.

  He lived in an old house in the middle of the Rive quarter, between a courtyard and a garden, each of which was on a different street. It was a very comfortable dwelling in every respect. He lived alone, with an old German cook and a young Chinese valet. He was a man of middle age, quite ordinary in his general appearance, but with one particular distinction that was fairly rare in Europe and gave him an original physiognomy: he wore a beard in the old Yankee mode—which is to say, thickly covering the entire chin, while the lips and the upper parts of the cheeks were clean-shaven. It should be noted that such a beard can be removed within a minute with four strikes of a razor, and that the appearance of the face is then so radically modified as to be unrecognizable.

  Every Tuesday, from nine p.m. until midnight, Doctor Serge Ivanov received his friends. In reality he held a council of espionage and anarchism. Admission to these Tuesday meetings was, in fact, restricted to comrades who combined the two functions of spy and revolutionary. The others, who did not know about the meetings, were only received or visited individually. Like a Talleyrand or a Lenin—to take examples from the opposite poles of political action—Serge Ivanov knew how to move men like pawns on a chessboard, without ever being captured himself, his own game only ending in a natural death after its conclusive success.

  When the beautiful Katia and the colossal Grigoryi, having given the password, were admitted by the Chinese valet into the large drawing-room on the ground floor of Doctor Serge Ivanov’s comfortable dwelling, the master of the ho
use still had only three men and one old lady with him, for the hour was not advanced. Ordinarily, the meeting comprised 15 individuals, including Ivanov himself.

  There was the usual exchange of cordialities between the “comrades” and, once the newcomers were sitting down and had each taken a cigarette from a large box open on a sideboard, Serge Ivanov said in the calmest imaginable high-pitched voice: “We were just talking about the bomb thrown yesterday in the Grand Theater. None of us knows any more than the newspapers have reported. Do either of you know anything else?”

  “Nothing,” said Grigoryi. “The action of a loner, an independent individual, probably simple-minded—according to the press, the bomb, although it would have been terribly destructive if it had exploded, seems to have been put together by an inexperienced child.”

  “That didn’t prevent the child, simple-minded as he may be, from running away, escaping and going into hiding…and the police having no suspicion of where he might be. No one knows whether he’s tall or short, young or old. He’s certainly an individual, and a loner—but to have been able to remain unknown before, during and after his exploit, the brother can’t be simple-minded!” These words had been spoken, not without irony, by the old lady, who was utterly bourgeois in appearance, wore ordinary spectacles and had her fine white hair gathered into two bandeaux.

  With a hint of respect, Grigoryi said: “My dear Helena, I’m only speaking as a chemist.”

  “Yes, yes,” said the old lady, smiling. “And I wanted to tease you a little, Grigoryi—but I’d really be quite astonished if, even though he’s a mediocre student of elementary chemistry, the author of yesterday’s exploit were devoid of intelligence, or at least cunning.”

  Grigoryi also smiled broadly. Then he made a gesture that commanded attention, and said in a grave tone: “Comrades, there’s something other than this inexpert and anonymous gesture that Katia and I have to bring to your attention today. It concerns the matter of Radiant Z, and I…”

  Once again, however, the proverb that says “When you mention the wolf, look out—he’ll be there!” was abruptly verified. They had been talking about the “author of yesterday’s exploit” for an hour—and, in fact, talking about nothing else. At the very moment when Grigoryi directed their thoughts toward another subject, although they had not yet turned to it, he was interrupted by the opening of the door and the entrance of an individual at the sight of whom the entire company rose to its feet, including the respectable old lady.

  And Doctor Ivanov hurried forward, both arms extended. “Oh, what a nice surprise, my dear Maître! I certainly don’t intend any reproach, but we see you so rarely because of your work, which is so admirable and so useful to the great and sacred cause of world emancipation…”

  It was in such terms, even in congratulating one another, that the leaders of international espionage and universal Anarchism, hid their formidable and pitiless desire, their egotistical thirst for power and domination, their monstrous pride, and their furious humiliation at not already being among the masters of the world. In reality, they wanted, not the world’s emancipation—for thus employed, the word signifies nothing—but rather its submission to their own ideas and their personal tyranny.

  The man to whom Doctor Serge Ivanov had spoken with such admiring respect and such “bourgeois” reverence was the illustrious professor Alexis Roudine—who said, after shaking everyone’s hand: “But I’m not alone, and I assure you that a humble scientist like me isn’t much by comparison with a child who will be the purest and most magnificent hero of our holy Cause!”

  He stepped to one side, turned round, and made a gesture of introduction. Only then did they notice that he had, indeed, not come in alone, and they saw a young man with large yellow-tinted spectacles and a sickly face, but of considerable stature, to whom the Professor pointed, saying: “My dear Helena Gruss, my dear Ivanov, and you, beautiful Katia, Comrades, take a bow, for by virtue of the potential that he has, even more than what he has already tried to do, this young man is worthy of your respect.

  “Adrien Fortis, who threw a bomb yesterday at the Grand Theater capable of killing or wounding two hundred people…”

  Part Three: The Artificial Heart

  Chapter I: In the Bear’s Jaws

  Eight hours later, Adrien Fortis was no longer ignorant regarding the organization of Espionage and Anarchism, and the preparations for war and nihilist action of which Serge Ivanov was the secret executive leader and of which Alexis Roudine constituted the sole archivist-historian, the supreme counselor, the inspirer, the financial backer and the frequent publisher of journals, tracts, pamphlets and books of propaganda—brutal, primitive and immediate propaganda, or savant, disguised and long-range, according to the case in point.

  In fact, Adrien Fortis had played his part admirably.

  Yes, played his part, for—haven’t you guessed?—Adrien Fortis was, in reality, Leo Saint-Clair, the Nyctalope!

  Eventually—and in what terribly tragic, tortuous and abominably mortal circumstances!—he would record the story of the rapid stages of his transformation and the prodigiously intelligent, courageous and self-confident deeds that he conceived and accomplished during this brief period of his life.9 On Wednesday March 20, 1912, however, at exactly 3:20 a.m., Leo Saint-Clair related nothing, because he had no time. The moment of the supreme action was very close at hand, and he had wanted to see—merely to see—and embrace his friends before hurling himself, coolly but recklessly, into that “supreme action,” which would, in his opinion either give him victory or precipitate him into torture followed by death.

  Every night during that long, interminable and exceedingly painful week, Robert Champeau, René Croqui and Jean Degains had waited for Leo Saint-Clair behind a little iron door, normally unused, which cut out a hollow rectangle in the least visible section of the high wall encircling the private Sanatorium du Bouchet.

  That door opened into an alley that was always deserted by night, along which no one passed even by day but occasional servants from the neighboring villas desirous of taking a short cut.

  Every night, from three until 3:30 a.m., all three of them grimly undertook that duty, although they would have been able to take turns. Since the morning of Wednesday March 13, Champeau, Croqui and Degains had been there, motionless and silent, behind that gate, waiting for their leader, whom they admired more every day, and who was now beloved with an increasingly-painful disquiet. Seven times the 30 minutes of waiting, initially vibrant with hope, then tremulous with anxiety, had run by without the cry of recognition that would bid them to open the door as quickly as possible resounding in the nocturnal silence.

  Seven nights! What anguish!

  A week without the slightest news, without a single telephone call, telegram, letter or note—which Monsieur Ambroise Dorsang would have been able to receive discreetly and would have immediately passed on.

  Finally, at 3:17 a.m. on March 20, the cry had rent the air. The door was opened; the Nyctalope came in; the door was closed again. They ran into the garden.

  “No, no, I won’t explain anything!” said the Nyctalope to Champeau, Croqui and Degains—who, shivering with emotion, stood elbow-to-elbow in front of him in the vestibule of the private chalet put at the disposal of the “French forwards” in the Sanatorium grounds. With a fraternal ardor he embraced them forcefully one after another, and continued rapidly and incisively: “In an hour, I’ll have won or lost! I’ve come to tell you and embrace you. And I’m leaving again!”

  Champeau seized him violently by the shoulders. “Give us something to do!” he cried. “There’s mortal danger, isn’t there?—I sense it. Tell me.”

  “Yes,” said Leo, subjugated momentarily by the force of that anguished affection.

  “Then we’re going with you.”

  “Yes, yes, all together!” cried Degains and Croqui, excitedly.

  But the Chief got hold of himself again. “No! I’m going alone. I have to be alone. The action
is such that I can’t pull it off unless I’m alone.”

  “But why?” they exclaimed, taking his hands and squeezing them.

  “Come on, let me go—I don’t have the time to explain.”

  It was true. He did not have the time, for the explanations would have been very difficult and quite long.

  Could he actually have given them an explanation of his conduct, though? Rather than following the directives of a coolly-formulated plan, was he not following the lures of passion—of the first passion, the first love of his life—through a dark forest, within which his mind was fortunately tracing a logical path? Could he have confided to his three friends that he loved Aurora Malianova? Could he have explained to them that he had very quickly discovered that she was playing a dual role, that she was “the beautiful nihilist Katia,” and that she was the lover, more by virtue of docility than amorousness, of the formidable Grigoryi, subject to his command and his will? Could he have confessed to them that, in spite of all of that, and perhaps because of it, he, Leo Saint-Clair, felt his love for Aurora-Katia growing to the point of irresistibility. And finally, could he have said to them:

  “Yes, I love her, but I haven’t forgotten my mission and my duty. On the contrary, I shall render my mission even more triumphant by extracting Aurora Malianova from the criminal milieu into which some unknown misfortune has hurled her. I shall get back the documents and the models, and I shall also save a young woman, the young woman I love…”

  Ah, like all the young people of his era. Leo Saint-Clair had read the overly generous and Utopian Resurrection by Tolstoy, and he was sincere—just as sincere as the young men long before his time who had committed suicide after reading Werther!10

  “Come on! Come on!” he repeated, detaching himself forcefully and skillfully from his friends’ clenched hands. “Calm down, damn it!” And he burst out laughing. He had the strength to laugh.