Collected Works of Gaston Leroux

by Gaston Leroux

  Theophrastus said, “My head is worth twenty thousand francs; and well you know it!”

  He accompanied the “And well you know it!” with a bang of his fist on the table which made the glasses ring and Signor Petito jump.

  “Don’t be frightened, Signor Petito: your beer isn’t spilt,” Theophrastus went on in a jeering tone. “You know then, my good sir, that my head is worth twenty thousand francs; but you’d better act as if you didn’t, or some unpleasantness will befall you. I promised you a story. Well, here it is:

  “Just about two hundred years ago I was walking along Vaugirard Street, with my hands in my pockets and without a weapon of any kind on me, not even a sword, when a man accosted me at the corner of the street, greeted me with all the politeness imaginable and declared that my face had taken his fancy — just as you said and did, Signor Petito! — that his name was Bidel, and all his friends called him Good Old Bidel, and he had a secret to confide to me. I encouraged him with a friendly tap on the shoulder.” At this point Theophrastus fetched Signor Petito such a thump on the shoulder that it drew a short howl from him; and he pulled out his money under the constraining desire to go out and see if the mist had dispersed. “Put away your money, Signor Petito, I’m paying for the drinks!” said Theophrastus sharply; and he went on in his easy, conversational tone. “Well, Good Old Bidel, encouraged by my friendly tap,” Signor Petito slipped along the bench, “told me his secret. He whispered in my ear that the Regent had offered twenty thousand francs to anyone who would arrest the Child; that he, Good Old Bidel, knew where the Child was hiding; that I looked to him to be a man of courage, and that with my help he ought to go pretty near getting that twenty thousand francs. We would share it.” Theophrastus paused to laugh a laugh which froze Signor Petito’s blood. “Good Old Bidel was not in luck’s way, Signor Petito, for I too knew where the Child was hiding, since the Child was me!” Signor Petito did not believe a word of it. It was his firm opinion that M. Longuet had ceased to be a child months ago. But he dared not say so. “I answered Good Old Bidel that it was a regular windfall, and that I was thankful indeed that he had chanced on me; and I begged him to take me straight to the place where the Child was hiding. He said:

  “‘To-night the Child will sleep at the Capucins, at the inn of The Golden Cross.’

  “It was true, Signor Petito. Good Old Bidel’s information was O.K.; and I congratulated him on it. We were passing a cutler’s shop; and I went in, and under the astonished eyes of Good Old Bidel bought a little penny knife.” The eyes of Theophrastus blazed; and the eyes of Signor Petito blinked. “When we came out into the street, Good Old Bidel asked me what on earth I was going to do with a little penny knife. I replied, ‘With a little penny knife’” — M. Longuet moved nearer to Signor Petito; Signor Petito moved further from M. Longuet—”’one can always kill a coppers’ nark!’ And I jammed it into his ribs! He waved his arms round like a windmill and fell down dead!”

  He laughed his blood-freezing laugh again; but Signor Petito was not attending to it: he had slipped along the bench and under it. He crawled swiftly under bench after bench, to the astonishment of the staff of the café, gained the door, plunged through it, and bolted down the street.

  M. Theophrastus Longuet drained his glass and rose. He went to the desk, where Mlle. Bertha was counting the brass disks, and said to her:

  “Madame Taconet,” — Mlle. Bertha asked herself with some surprise why M. Longuet called her Madame Taconet; but the question met with no response,— “if that little Petito comes here again, tell him from me that the next time I come across him, I’ll clip his ears for him.”

  So saying, Theophrastus stroked the handle of his green umbrella as one strokes the hilt of a dagger, and went out without paying.

  There can be no reasonable doubt that Theophrastus had his Black Feather.

  The fog was still thick. He forgot all about lunching. He walked through the sulphurous mist as in a dream. He crossed the old Quartier d’Antin and what was formerly called Bishop’s Town. When he saw dimly the towers of the Trinité, he muttered, “Ah, the towers of Cock Castle!” He was at St. Lazare station when he fancied that he was in “Little Poland.” But little by little, as the mist cleared, his dream vanished with it. He had a more accurate idea of things. When he crossed the Seine at Pont-Royal, he had once more become honest Theophrastus, and when he set foot on the left bank of the river he had but a vague memory of what had happened on the other side.

  But he had that memory. In fact, when he examined himself closely, he found that he was beginning to experience three different mental states: first, that which arose from his actual existence as an honest manufacturer of rubber stamps; second, that which arose from the sudden and passing resurrection of the Other; third, that which arose from memory. While the resurrection of the Other was, while it lasted, a terrible business, the memory was a pleasant and melancholy frame of mind, calculated to induce in a sorrowful heart a feeling of gentle sadness and philosophic pity.

  As he turned his steps towards Guénégaud Street, he asked himself idly why Adolphe had fixed the corner of Guénégaud and Mazarine Streets as their meeting-place.

  He took a round-about way to that corner, for he could not bring himself to walk along the strip of Mazarine Street where it runs along the palace of the Institute, formerly the Four Nations. He did not know the reason of this reluctance. He went round by De la Monnaie house, and so came into Guénégaud Street.

  Adolphe was awaiting him, with a very gloomy face, at the corner, and slipped his arm into his.

  “Have you ever heard anyone speak of someone called the Child, Adolphe?” said Theophrastus, after they had greeted one another.

  “I have indeed,” said Adolphe in a tone as gloomy as his face. “And I know his name, his family name.”

  “Ah, what is it?” said Theophrastus anxiously.

  For all reply Adolphe pushed him along a little passage leading to an old house in Guénégaud Street, a few doors off De la Monnaie house. They went into the house, up a shaky staircase, and into a room in which the window curtains were drawn. It had been darkened purposely. But on a little table in a corner a flickering candle threw its light on a portrait.

  It was the portrait of a man of thirty, of a powerful face, with “flashing” eyes. The brow was high, the nose big, the strong, square chin shaven; the large mouth was surmounted by a bristly moustache. On the bushy hair was a cap of wool or rough leather; and the dress appeared to be that of a convict. A coarse linen shirt was half open across the hairy chest.

  “Goodness!” said Theophrastus without raising his voice. “How did my portrait get into this house?”

  “Your portrait?” cried Adolphe. “Are you sure?”

  “Who could be surer than I?” said Theophrastus calmly.

  “Well — well—” said Adolphe Lecamus in a choking voice, his face contorted by an expression of the most painful emotion. “This portrait, which is your portrait, is the portrait of that great eighteenth-century king of thieves, Cartouche!”

  Theophrastus stared at the portrait with eyes that opened and opened as a sickly pallor overspread his anguished face; a little grunt broke from his parted lips, and he dropped to the ground in a dead faint.

  Adolphe dropped on his knees beside him, unfastened his collar, and slapped his hands vigorously. Then he blew out the candle, turned the portrait with its face to the wall, and opened the window.

  Theophrastus was a long time recovering his senses. When he did, his first words were:

  “On no account tell my wife, Adolphe!”

  CHAPTER VII

  THE YOUNG CARTOUCHE

  ON THE MORROW of this terrible discovery Theophrastus and Marceline sought once more the calm joys of Azure Waves Villa. Theophrastus had not said a word of the shocking business; and Marceline had not dared question him about it so that she was still ignorant of their dreadful misfortune. A blank consternation reigned perpetually on his gentle face; and eve
ry now and then tears filled his kind eyes.

  Adolphe, who had remained in Paris to make researches into the life of the famous King Of Thieves, was to join them in a couple of days; and the hours till his coming passed gloomily indeed: Marceline pottered about the house, busy with her household tasks; Theophrastus silently prepared his fishing-tackle, and on the afternoon of the second day fished with very little luck.

  But the third day dawned bright and sunny; and Theophrastus, who had passed a good night, showed an easier face of less dismayed expression; about his lips hovered a shadow of a smile. Adolphe Lecamus came to Esbly station by the 11.46 train, and was welcomed with transports of joy. They went straight to déjeuner, and did not rise from the table till two o’clock. Marceline once more breathed peacefully in the presence of their faithful friend; and Theophrastus regaled him with a detailed account of his afternoon’s impassioned, but unsuccessful, fishing. M. Lecamus said little; but after his coffee he helped himself to a third glass of a curaçoa which he appreciated far more highly than it deserved.

  After lunch Theophrastus loaded himself with rods, lines, and bait; Adolphe took the landing-net; they bade Marceline good-bye; and walked down to the Marne with the quiet gait of men who have lunched well.

  “I have got everything ready for your afternoon’s sport,” said Theophrastus, when they reached its banks. “While you fish I will listen to your news and amuse myself by trolling. It’s all I’m fit for. I’ve a can full of minnows under the willows. I am prepared for the worst.”

  Adolphe said nothing; and when he was baiting his hook, Theophrastus said, with a touch of impatience in his tone, “Well?”

  “Well, my news is good and bad,” said Adolphe. “But I must warn you that it’s more bad than good: no doubt they have invented a good many stories about you; but the truth is bad enough for anything.”

  “Your information is correct?” said Theophrastus with a sigh.

  “I went to the source, the original documents,” said Adolphe. “I’ll tell you what I learned; and you can set me right if I go wrong.”

  “Go on,” said Theophrastus in a tone of patient resignation. “I must make the best of it.”

  “In the first place you were born in the month of October, 1693, and you are named Louis-Dominique Cartouche—”

  “There’s no point in calling me Cartouche,” interrupted Theophrastus, pulling a minnow out of the bait-can. “There’s no reason anyone should know it. You know what these country people are: they’d laugh at the idea. Call me the Child: I prefer it.”

  “You agree that Cartouche is your real name and not a nickname?” persisted Adolphe.

  “Cut it out! Cut it out! It’s a vile name!” said Theophrastus impatiently.

  “They relate that you were well educated at Clermont College and were a pupil there at the same time as Voltaire. But that’s a mere legend: unless you learnt to read from the gipsies, you never learnt to read at all.”

  “I like that!” cried Theophrastus. “How could I have learnt to write unless I knew how to read? And if I didn’t know how to write, how could I have written the document I hid in the cellars of the Conciergerie?”

  “That’s reasonable enough. But at your trial—”

  “Did I have a trial?” interrupted Theophrastus eagerly.

  “I should think you did — a very famous trial!” said Adolphe. “And at your trial you declared that you did not know how to write. You signed all your depositions with a cross, and you never wrote a line to a single soul.”

  “Because one never should put anything in writing,” said Theophrastus firmly. “I was doubtless afraid to compromise myself. None the less the document exists.”

  “That’s true. But let us go back to your eleventh year. One day you went with some of your school-fellows to Saint-Laurent fair—”

  “Look here, Adolphe: couldn’t you put it differently? You keep saying, ‘You went with your school-fellows to Saint-Laurent fair’ ... ‘You were born in 1693’ ... ‘You were a school-fellow of Voltaire.’ After all, though I admit I was Car—” he stopped short— “the Child, I am also Theophrastus Longuet; and I can assure you that Theophrastus Longuet is not at all flattered at having been Car — the Child. Give everyone his due. I should be much obliged if you’d put it that ‘The Child went with his school-fellows.’”

  “Certainly — certainly. At Saint-Laurent fair little Cartouche—”

  “The Child!”

  “But you weren’t yet called the Child — you weren’t called the Child till you were a man—”

  “Well, say, ‘Little Louis-Dominique.’”

  “Louis-Dominique fell among a troop of gipsies—”

  “That shows you that parents ought never to let their children go to fairs alone,” said Theophrastus solemnly.

  “The gipsies carried him off; they stole him—”

  “Poor little Louis-Dominique: he deserves our pity,” said Theophrastus in a tone of warm compassion. “Do they express pity for him in the books?”

  “They say that he made no difficulties about being stolen.”

  “And what do they know about it!” cried Theophrastus indignantly.

  “Well, the gipsies taught him cudgel-play, fencing, pistol-shooting, the art of springing from roof to roof, juggling, tumbling—”

  “All very useful things,” said Theophrastus in a tone of approval.

  “They taught him to empty the pockets of tradesmen and gentlemen without their perceiving it. Oh, he was a nice boy! No one could touch him at collaring handkerchiefs, snuff-boxes, watches, sword-knots—”

  “That was not at all nice!” cried Theophrastus in scandalised tones.

  “Oh! If that were all!” said Adolphe gloomily. “The troop of gipsies was at Rouen, when Louis-Dominique fell ill.”

  “Poor little boy! He was never meant for such a life,” cried Theophrastus compassionately.

  “He was sent to the Rouen hospital; and there a brother of his father found him. He recognised him, embraced him with tears of joy, and swore to restore him to his parents.”

  “A fine fellow that uncle! Louis-Dominique was saved!” cried Theophrastus joyfully.

  M. Lecamus lost patience, turned sharply on Theophrastus and begged him to cease his continual interruptions, declaring that it would take him a good ten years to tell the story of Cartouche, if he could not bring himself to listen without these comments.

  “It’s all very well for you to say that!” said Theophrastus with some heat. “But I should like to see you in my place! However, I’ll do as you want; but just tell me first if Cartouche was as redoubtable as they say: was he a brigand chief?”

  “He was indeed.”

  “Of many brigands?”

  “At Paris alone he commanded about three thousand men.”

  “Three thousand? Goodness! That’s a lot!”

  “You had more than fifty lieutenants; and there were always about a city twenty men dressed exactly like you — in a reddish brown coat, lined with amaranthine silk, and wearing a patch of black cloth over the left eye — to put the police off your track.”

  “Oh, ho! it was a household of some size!” said Theophrastus, in a tone of irrepressible pride.

  “They attribute to you more than a hundred and fifty murders by your own hand.”

  All this while Theophrastus had been trolling with a minnow without having had the slightest reason to suspect the existence of any fish in the waters of the Marne with the slightest appetite for his living bait. Of a sudden, the float which the minnow was drawing gently along among the green hearts of the water-lilies seemed smitten with frenzy. It leapt out of the water and plunged into it again, with such an unexpected swiftness and in such a resolute haste that it disappeared in the depths, carrying with it all the line which united it to the rod which united it to the hand of Theophrastus. The unfortunate thing was that after having taken after it all the line, it also took with it all the rod — with the result that nothing whatever unit
ed it any longer to the empty hand of Theophrastus.

  “The blackguard!” cried Theophrastus, with a gesture of despair, in such a manner that it is impossible to say whether he used that strong expression, so rare in his mouth, about the murderer of the past or the fish of the present.

  He added however: “It must have weighed a good four pounds!”

  Taking everything into account, Theophrastus appeared to regret the loss of his fish more bitterly than his hundred and fifty murders.

  Adolphe condoled with him and went on with his story.

  “This good uncle,” he said, “rescued little Cartouche from his wretched condition, took him from the Rouen hospital, and restored him to his parents. There was joy in Cabbage-Bridge Street — it was at number nine Cabbage-Bridge Street that little Cartouche was born and his father followed the trade of cooper. Louis-Dominique, warned by his early misfortunes, swore that for the future there should not be a more obedient son or steadier apprentice than he in all Paris. He helped his good father make casks; and it was a pleasure to see him ply the hammer and adze from early dawn to dewy eve. He seemed to be making it his first business to forget his disastrous truancy. The few months he had passed in the company of the gipsies had however been of some service to him in that they had taught him some of the arts of pleasing; and in the dinner hour he would amuse his fellow workmen by conjuring tricks, and on holidays there was a rush to invite his family to dinner in order that the company might be amused by his dexterity and humour. He was a great success in the neighbourhood; and his growing renown filled him with pride.

  “In these occupations he reached that happy age at which the least sensible of human beings feels his beating heart awake the tenderest sentiments in him; and Louis-Dominique fell in love. The object of his affections was charming. She was a little milliner of Portefoin Street, with blue eyes, golden hair, a slender figure, and coquettish in the extreme—”