On the platform, Froberval, the dockyard clerk who had given hospitality to M. Beautrelet, senior, was waiting for him, accompanied by his daughter Charlotte, an imp of twelve or thirteen.
“Well?” cried Isidore.
The worthy man beginning to moan and groan, he interrupted him, dragged him to a neighboring tavern, ordered coffee and began to put plain questions, without permitting the other the slightest digression:
“My father has not been carried off, has he? It was impossible.”
“Impossible. Still, he has disappeared.”
“Since when?”
“We don’t know.”
“What!”
“No. Yesterday morning, at six o’clock, as I had not seen him come down as usual, I opened his door. He was gone.”
“But was he there on the day before, two days ago?”
“Yes. On the day before yesterday, he did not leave his room. He was a little tired; and Charlotte took his lunch up to him at twelve and his dinner at seven in the evening.”
“So it was between seven o’clock in the evening, on the day before yesterday, and six o’clock on yesterday morning that he disappeared?”
“Yes, during the night before last. Only—”
“Only what?”
“Well, it’s like this: you can’t leave the arsenal at night.”
“Do you mean that he has not left it?”
“That’s impossible! My friends and I have searched the whole naval harbor.”
“Then he has left it!”
“Impossible, every outlet is guarded!”
Beautrelet reflected and then said:
“What next?”
“Next, I hurried to the commandant’s and informed the officer in charge.”
“Did he come to your house?”
“Yes; and a gentleman from the public prosecutor’s also. They searched all through the morning; and, when I saw that they were making no progress and that there was no hope left, I telegraphed to you.”
“Was the bed disarranged in his room?”
“No.”
“Nor the room disturbed in any way?”
“No. I found his pipe in its usual place, with his tobacco and the book which he was reading. There was even this little photograph of yourself in the middle of the book, marking the page.”
“Let me see it.”
Froberval passed him the photograph. Beautrelet gave a start of surprise. He had recognized himself in the snapshot, standing, with his two hands in his pockets, on a lawn from which rose trees and ruins.
Froberval added:
“It must be the last portrait of yourself which you sent him. Look, on the back, you will see the date, 3 April, the name of the photographer, R. de Val, and the name of the town, Lion—Lion-sur-Mer, perhaps.”
Isidore turned the photograph over and read this little note, in his own handwriting:
“R. de Val.—3.4—Lion.”
He was silent for a few minutes and resumed:
“My father hadn’t shown you that snapshot yet?”
“No—and that’s just what astonished me when I saw it yesterday—for your father used so often to talk to us about you.”
There was a fresh pause, greatly prolonged. Froberval muttered:
“I have business at the workshop. We might as well go in—”
He was silent. Isidore had not taken his eyes from the photograph, was examining it from every point of view. At last, the boy asked:
“Is there such a thing as an inn called the Lion d’Or at a short league outside the town?”
“Yes, about a league from here.”
“On the Route de Valognes, is it?”
“Yes, on the Route de Valognes.”
“Well, I have every reason to believe that this inn was the head-quarters of Lupin’s friends. It was from there that they entered into communication with my father.”
“What an idea! Your father spoke to nobody. He saw nobody.”
“He saw nobody, but they made use of an intermediary.”
“What proof have you?”
“This photograph.”
“But it’s your photograph!”
“It’s my photograph, but it was not sent by me. I was not even aware of its existence. It was taken, without my knowledge, in the ruins of Ambrumesy, doubtless by the examining-magistrate’s clerk, who, as you know, was an accomplice of Arsène Lupin’s.”
“And then?”
“Then this photograph became the passport, the talisman, by means of which they obtained my father’s confidence.”
“But who? Who was able to get into my house?”
“I don’t know, but my father fell into the trap. They told him and he believed that I was in the neighborhood, that I was asking to see him and that I was giving him an appointment at the Golden Lion.”
“But all this is nonsense! How can you assert—?”
“Very simply. They imitated my writing on the back of the photograph and specified the meeting-place: Valognes Road, 3 kilometres 400, Lion Inn. My father came and they seized him, that’s all.”
“Very well,” muttered Froberval, dumbfounded, “very well. I admit it—things happened as you say—but that does not explain how he was able to leave during the night.”
“He left in broad daylight, though he waited until dark to go to the meeting-place.”
“But, confound it, he didn’t leave his room the whole of the day before yesterday!”
“There is one way of making sure: run down to the dockyard, Froberval, and look for one of the men who were on guard in the afternoon, two days ago.—Only, be quick, if you wish to find me here.”
“Are you going?”
“Yes, I shall take the next train back.”
“What!—Why, you don’t know—your inquiry—”
“My inquiry is finished. I know pretty well all that I wanted to know. I shall have left Cherbourg in an hour.”
Froberval rose to go. He looked at Beautrelet with an air of absolute bewilderment, hesitated a moment and then took his cap:
“Are you coming, Charlotte?”
“No,” said Beautrelet, “I shall want a few more particulars. Leave her with me. Besides, I want to talk to her. I knew her when she was quite small.”
Froberval went away. Beautrelet and the little girl remained alone in the tavern smoking room. A few minutes passed, a waiter entered, cleared away some cups and left the room again. The eyes of the young man and the child met; and Beautrelet placed his hand very gently on the little girl’s hand. She looked at him for two or three seconds, distractedly, as though about to choke. Then, suddenly hiding her head between her folded arms, she burst into sobs.
He let her cry and, after a while, said:
“It was you, wasn’t it, who did all the mischief, who acted as go-between? It was you who took him the photograph? You admit it, don’t you? And, when you said that my father was in his room, two days ago, you knew that it was not true, did you not, because you yourself had helped him to leave it—?”
She made no reply. He asked:
“Why did you do it? They offered you money, I suppose—to buy ribbons with a frock—?”
He uncrossed Charlotte’s arms and lifted up her head. He saw a poor little face all streaked with tears, the attractive, disquieting, mobile face of one of those little girls who seem marked out for temptation and weakness.
“Come,” said Beautrelet, “it’s over, we’ll say no more about it. I will not even ask you how it happened. Only you must tell me everything that can be of use to me.—Did you catch anything—any remark made by those men? How did they carry him off?”
She replied at once:
“By motor car. I heard them talking about it—”
“And what road did they take?”
“Ah, I don’t know that!”
“Didn’t they say anything before you—something that might help us?”
“No—wait, though: there was one who said, ‘We shall have no time to lose—the governor is to telephone to us at eight o’clock in the morning—’”
“Where to?”
“I can’t say.—I’ve forgotten—”
“Try—try and remember. It was the name of a town, wasn’t it?”
“Yes—a name—like Chateau—”
“Chateaubriant?—Chateau-Thierry?—”
“No-no—”
“Chateauroux?”
“Yes, that was it—Chateauroux—”
Beautrelet did not wait for her to complete her sentence. Already he was on his feet and, without giving a thought to Froberval, without even troubling about the child, who stood gazing at him in stupefaction, he opened the door and ran to the station:
“Chateauroux, Madame—a ticket for Chateauroux—”
“Over Mans and Tours?” asked the booking-clerk.
“Of course—the shortest way. Shall I be there for lunch?”
“Oh, no!”
“For dinner? Bedtime—?”
“Oh, no! For that, you would have to go over Paris. The Paris express leaves at nine o’clock. You’re too late—”
It was not too late. Beautrelet was just able to catch the train.
“Well,” said Beautrelet, rubbing his hands, “I have spent only two hours or so at Cherbourg, but they were well employed.”
He did not for a moment think of accusing Charlotte of lying. Weak, unstable, capable of the worst treacheries, those petty natures also obey impulses of sincerity; and Beautrelet had read in her affrighted eyes her shame for the harm which she had done and her delight at repairing it in part. He had no doubt, therefore, that Chateauroux was the other town to which Lupin had referred and where his confederates were to telephone to him.
On his arrival in Paris, Beautrelet took every necessary precaution to avoid being followed. He felt that it was a serious moment. He was on the right road that was leading him to his father: one act of imprudence might ruin all.
He went to the flat of one of his schoolfellows and came out, an hour later, irrecognizable, rigged out as an Englishman of thirty, in a brown check suit, with knickerbockers, woolen stockings and a cap, a high-colored complexion and a red wig. He jumped on a bicycle laden with a complete painter’s outfit and rode off to the Gare d’Austerlitz.
He slept that night at Issoudun. The next morning, he mounted his machine at break of day. At seven o’clock, he walked into the Chateauroux post-office and asked to be put on to Paris. As he had to wait, he entered into conversation with the clerk and learnt that, two days before, at the same hour, a man dressed for motoring had also asked for Paris.
The proof was established. He waited no longer.
By the afternoon, he had ascertained, from undeniable evidence, that a limousine car, following the Tours road, had passed through the village of Buzancais and the town of Chateauroux and had stopped beyond the town, on the verge of the forest. At ten o’clock, a hired gig, driven by a man unknown, had stopped beside the car and then gone off south, through the valley of the Bouzanne. There was then another person seated beside the driver. As for the car, it had turned in the opposite direction and gone north, toward Issoudun.
Beautrelet easily discovered the owner of the gig, who, however, had no information to supply. He had hired out his horse and trap to a man who brought them back himself next day.
Lastly, that same evening, Isidore found out that the motor car had only passed through Issoudun, continuing its road toward Orleans, that is to say, toward Paris.
From all this, it resulted, in the most absolute fashion, that M. Beautrelet was somewhere in the neighborhood. If not, how was it conceivable that people should travel nearly three hundred miles across France in order to telephone from Chateauroux and next to return, at an acute angle, by the Paris road?
This immense circuit had a more definite object: to move M. Beautrelet to the place assigned to him.
“And this place is within reach of my hand,” said Isidore to himself, quivering with hope and expectation. “My father is waiting for me to rescue him at ten or fifteen leagues from here. He is close by. He is breathing the same air as I.”
He set to work at once. Taking a war-office map, he divided it into small squares, which he visited one after the other, entering the farmhouses making the peasants talk, calling on the schoolmasters, the mayors, the parish priests, chatting to the women. It seemed to him that he must attain his end without delay and his dreams grew until it was no longer his father alone whom he hoped to deliver, but all those whom Lupin was holding captive: Raymonde de Saint-Veran, Ganimard, Holmlock Shears, perhaps, and others, many others; and, in reaching them, he would, at the same time, reach Lupin’s stronghold, his lair, the impenetrable retreat where he was piling up the treasures of which he had robbed the wide world.
But, after a fortnight’s useless searching, his enthusiasm ended by slackening and he very soon lost confidence. Because success was slow in appearing, from one day to the next, almost, he ceased to believe in it; and, though he continued to pursue his plan of investigations, he would have felt a real surprise if his efforts had led to the smallest discovery.
More days still passed by, monotonous days of discouragement. He read in the newspapers that the Comte de Gesvres and his daughter had left Ambrumesy and gone to stay near Nice. He also learnt that Harlington had been released, that gentleman’s innocence having become self-obvious, in accordance with the indications supplied by Arsène Lupin.
Isidore changed his head-quarters, established himself for two days at the Chatre, for two days at Argenton. The result was the same.
Just then, he was nearly throwing up the game. Evidently, the gig in which his father had been carried off could only have furnished a stage, which had been followed by another stage, furnished by some other conveyance. And his father was far away.
He was thinking of leaving, when, one Monday morning, he saw, on the envelope of an unstamped letter, sent on to him from Paris, a handwriting that set him trembling with emotion. So great was his excitement that, for some minutes, he dared not open the letter, for fear of a disappointment. His hand shook. Was it possible? Was this not a trap laid for him by his infernal enemy?
He tore open the envelope. It was indeed a letter from his father, written by his father himself. The handwriting presented all the peculiarities, all the oddities of the hand which he knew so well.
He read:
Will these lines ever reach you, my dear son? I dare not believe it.
During the whole night of my abduction, we traveled by motor car; then, in the morning, by carriage. I could see nothing. My eyes were bandaged. The castle in which I am confined should be somewhere in the midlands, to judge by its construction and the vegetation in the park. The room which I occupy is on the second floor: it is a room with two windows, one of which is almost blocked by a screen of climbing glycines. In the afternoon, I am allowed to walk about the park, at certain hours, but I am kept under unrelaxing observation.
I am writing this letter, on the mere chance of its reaching you, and fastening it to a stone. Perhaps, one day, I shall be able to throw it over the wall and some peasant will pick it up.
But do not be distressed about me. I am treated with every consideration.
Your old father, who is very fond of you and very sad to think of the trouble he is giving you,
BEAUTRELET
Isidore at once looked at the postmarks. They read, “Cuzion, Indre.”
The Indre! The department which he had been stubbornly searching for weeks!
He consulted a little pocket-guide which he always carried. Cuzion, in the canton of Eguzon—he had been there too.
For prudence’s sake, he discarded his personality as an Englishman, which was becoming too well known in the district, disguised himself as a workman and made for Cuzion. It was an unimportant village. He would easily disco
ver the sender of the letter.
For that matter, chance served him without delay:
“A letter posted on Wednesday last?” exclaimed the mayor, a respectable tradesman in whom he confided and who placed himself at his disposal. “Listen, I think I can give you a valuable clue: on Saturday morning, Gaffer Charel, an old knife-grinder who visits all the fairs in the department, met me at the end of the village and asked, ‘Monsieur le maire, does a letter without a stamp on it go all the same?’ ‘Of course,’ said I. ‘And does it get there?’ ‘Certainly. Only there’s double postage to pay on it, that’s all the difference.’”
“And where does he live?”
“He lives over there, all alone—on the slope—the hovel that comes next after the churchyard.—Shall I go with you?”
It was a hovel standing by itself, in the middle of an orchard surrounded by tall trees. As they entered the orchard, three magpies flew away with a great splutter and they saw that the birds were flying out of the very hole in which the watch-dog was fastened. And the dog neither barked nor stirred as they approached.
Beautrelet went up in great surprise. The brute was lying on its side, with stiff paws, dead.
They ran quickly to the cottage. The door stood open. They entered. At the back of a low, damp room, on a wretched straw mattress, flung on the floor itself, lay a man fully dressed.
“Gaffer Charel!” cried the mayor. “Is he dead, too?”
The old man’s hands were cold, his face terribly pale, but his heart was still beating, with a faint, slow throb, and he seemed not to be wounded in any way.
They tried to resuscitate him and, as they failed in their efforts, Beautrelet went to fetch a doctor. The doctor succeeded no better than they had done. The old man did not seem to be suffering. He looked as if he were just asleep, but with an artificial slumber, as though he had been put to sleep by hypnotism or with the aid of a narcotic.
In the middle of the night that followed, however, Isidore, who was watching by his side, observed that the breathing became stronger and that his whole being appeared to be throwing off the invisible bonds that paralyzed it.
At daybreak, he woke up and resumed his normal functions: ate, drank and moved about. But, the whole day long, he was unable to reply to the young man’s questions and his brain seemed as though still numbed by an inexplicable torpor.
The Hollow Needle Page 11