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+The Project Gutenberg Etext of The Hollow Needle, by Maurice Leblanc
+#2 in our series by Maurice Leblanc
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+Title: The Hollow Needle
+
+Author: Maurice Leblanc
+
+Release Date: May, 2003  [Etext #4017]
+[Yes, we are about one year ahead of schedule]
+[The actual date this file first posted = 10/11/01]
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+Edition: 10
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+Language: English
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+The Project Gutenberg Etext of The Hollow Needle, by Maurice Leblanc
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+
+
+THE HOLLOW NEEDLE
+
+FURTHER ADVENTURES OF ARSENE LUPIN
+
+BY
+
+MAURICE LEBLANC
+
+AUTHOR OF
+
+"ARSENE LUPIN," "THE BLONDE LADY," ETC.
+
+
+TRANSLATED BY ALEXANDER TEIXEIRA DE MATTOS
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+    I. The Shot
+   II. Isidore Beautrelet, Sixth-form Schoolboy
+  III. The Corpse
+   IV. Face to Face
+    V. On the Track
+   VI. An Historic Secret
+  VII. The Treatise of the Needle
+ VIII. From Caesar to Lupin
+   IX. Open, Sesame!
+    X. The Treasures of the Kings of France
+
+
+
+
+ILLUSTRATIONS
+
+Valmeras loved Raymonde's melancholy charm
+
+She put the gun to her shoulder, calmly took aim and fired
+
+Two huge letters, each perhaps a foot long, appeared cut in relief
+in the granite of the floor
+
+"We're going now. What do you think of my cockle-shell, Beautrelet?"
+
+
+
+
+
+
+THE HOLLOW NEEDLE
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER ONE
+
+THE SHOT
+
+
+Raymonde listened. The noise was repeated twice over, clearly enough
+to be distinguished from the medley of vague sounds that formed the
+great silence of the night and yet too faintly to enable her to tell
+whether it was near or far, within the walls of the big country-
+house, or outside, among the murky recesses of the park.
+
+She rose softly. Her window was half open: she flung it back wide.
+The moonlight lay over a peaceful landscape of lawns and thickets,
+against which the straggling ruins of the old abbey stood out in
+tragic outlines, truncated columns, mutilated arches, fragments of
+porches and shreds of flying buttresses. A light breeze hovered over
+the face of things, gliding noiselessly through the bare motionless
+branches of the trees, but shaking the tiny budding leaves of the
+shrubs.
+
+And, suddenly, she heard the same sound again. It was on the left
+and on the floor below her, in the living rooms, therefore, that
+occupied the left wing of the house. Brave and plucky though she
+was, the girl felt afraid. She slipped on her dressing gown and took
+the matches.
+
+"Raymonde--Raymonde!"
+
+A voice as low as a breath was calling to her from the next room,
+the door of which had not been closed. She was feeling her way
+there, when Suzanne, her cousin, came out of the room and fell into
+her arms:
+
+"Raymonde--is that you? Did you hear--?"
+
+"Yes. So you're not asleep?"
+
+"I suppose the dog woke me--some time ago. But he's not barking now.
+What time is it?"
+
+"About four."
+
+"Listen! Surely, some one's walking in the drawing room!"
+
+"There's no danger, your father is down there, Suzanne."
+
+"But there is danger for him. His room is next to the boudoir."
+
+"M. Daval is there too--"
+
+"At the other end of the house. He could never hear."
+
+They hesitated, not knowing what course to decide upon. Should they
+call out? Cry for help? They dared not; they were frightened of the
+sound of their own voices. But Suzanne, who had gone to the window,
+suppressed a scream:
+
+"Look!--A man!--Near the fountain!"
+
+A man was walking away at a rapid pace. He carried under his arm a
+fairly large load, the nature of which they were unable to
+distinguish: it knocked against his leg and impeded his progress.
+They saw him pass near the old chapel and turn toward a little door
+in the wall. The door must have been open, for the man disappeared
+suddenly from view and they failed to hear the usual grating of the
+hinges.
+
+"He came from the drawing room," whispered Suzanne.
+
+"No, the stairs and the hall would have brought him out more to the
+left--Unless--"
+
+The same idea struck them both. They leant out. Below them, a ladder
+stood against the front of the house, resting on the first floor. A
+glimmer lit up the stone balcony. And another man, who was also
+carrying something, bestrode the baluster, slid down the ladder and
+ran away by the same road as the first.
+
+Suzanne, scared to the verge of swooning, fell on her knees,
+stammering:
+
+"Let us call out--let us call for help--"
+
+"Who would come? Your father--and if there are more of them left--
+and they throw themselves upon him--?"
+
+"Then--then--we might call the servants--Your bell rings on their
+floor."
+
+"Yes--yes--perhaps, that's better. If only they come in time!"
+
+Raymonde felt for the electric push near her bed and pressed it with
+her finger. They heard the bell ring upstairs and had an impression
+that its shrill sound must also reach any one below.
+
+They waited. The silence became terrifying and the very breeze no
+longer shook the leaves of the shrubs.
+
+"I'm frightened--frightened," said Suzanne.
+
+And, suddenly, from the profound darkness below them, came the sound
+of a struggle, a crash of furniture overturned, words, exclamations
+and then, horrible and ominous, a hoarse groan, the gurgle of a man
+who is being murdered--
+
+Raymonde leapt toward the door. Suzanne clung desperately to her
+arm:
+
+"No--no--don't leave me--I'm frightened--"
+
+Raymonde pushed her aside and darted down the corridor, followed by
+Suzanne, who staggered from wall to wall, screaming as she went.
+Raymonde reached the staircase, flew down the stairs, flung herself
+upon the door of the big drawing room and stopped short, rooted to
+the threshold, while Suzanne sank in a heap by her side. Facing
+them, at three steps' distance, stood a man, with a lantern in his
+hand. He turned it upon the two girls, blinding them with the light,
+stared long at their pale faces, and then, without hurrying, with
+the calmest movements in the world, took his cap, picked up a scrap
+of paper and two bits of straw, removed some footmarks from the
+carpet, went to the balcony, turned to the girls, made them a deep
+bow and disappeared.
+
+Suzanne was the first to run to the little boudoir which separated
+the big drawing-room from her father's bedroom. But, at the
+entrance, a hideous sight appalled her. By the slanting rays of the
+moon, she saw two apparently lifeless bodies lying close to each
+other on the floor. She leaned over one of them:
+
+"Father!--Father!--Is it you? What has happened to you?" she cried,
+distractedly.
+
+After a moment, the Comte de Gesvres moved. In a broken voice, he
+said:
+
+"Don't be afraid--I am not wounded--Daval?--Is he alive?--The
+knife?--The knife?--"
+
+Two men-servants now arrived with candles. Raymonde flung herself
+down before the other body and recognized Jean Daval, the count's
+private secretary. A little stream of blood trickled from his neck.
+His face already wore the pallor of death.
+
+Then she rose, returned to the drawing room, took a gun that hung in
+a trophy of arms on the wall and went out on the balcony. Not more
+than fifty or sixty seconds had elapsed since the man had set his
+foot on the top rung of the ladder. He could not, therefore, be very
+far away, the more so as he had taken the precaution to remove the
+ladder, in order to prevent the inmates of the house from using it.
+And soon she saw him skirting the remains of the old cloister. She
+put the gun to her shoulder, calmly took aim and fired. The man
+fell.
+
+"That's done it! That's done it!" said one of the servants. "We've
+got this one. I'll run down."
+
+"No, Victor, he's getting up.... You had better go down by the
+staircase and make straight for the little door in the wall. That's
+the only way he can escape."
+
+Victor hurried off, but, before he reached the park, the man fell
+down again. Raymonde called the other servant:
+
+"Albert, do you see him down there? Near the main cloister?--"
+
+"Yes, he's crawling in the grass. He's done for--"
+
+"Watch him from here."
+
+"There's no way of escape for him. On the right of the ruins is the
+open lawn--"
+
+"And, Victor, do you guard the door, on the left," she said, taking
+up her gun.
+
+"But, surely, you are not going down, miss?"
+
+"Yes, yes," she said, with a resolute accent and abrupt movements;
+"let me be--I have a cartridge left--If he stirs--"
+
+She went out. A moment later, Albert saw her going toward the ruins.
+He called to her from the window:
+
+"He's dragged himself behind the cloister. I can't see him. Be
+careful, miss--"
+
+Raymonde went round the old cloisters, to cut off the man's retreat,
+and Albert soon lost sight of her. After a few minutes, as he did
+not see her return, he became uneasy and, keeping his eye on the
+ruins, instead of going down by the stairs he made an effort to
+reach the ladder. When he had succeeded, he scrambled down and ran
+straight to the cloisters near which he had seen the man last.
+Thirty paces farther, he found Raymonde, who was searching with
+Victor.
+
+"Well?" he asked.
+
+"There's no laying one's hands on him," replied Victor.
+
+"The little door?"
+
+"I've been there; here's the key."
+
+"Still--he must--"
+
+"Oh, we've got him safe enough, the scoundrel--He'll be ours in ten
+minutes."
+
+The farmer and his son, awakened by the shot, now came from the farm
+buildings, which were at some distance on the right, but within the
+circuit of the walls. They had met no one.
+
+"Of course not," said Albert. "The ruffian can't have left the
+ruins--We'll dig him out of some hole or other."
+
+They organized a methodical search, beating every bush, pulling
+aside the heavy masses of ivy rolled round the shafts of the
+columns. They made sure that the chapel was properly locked and that
+none of the panes were broken. They went round the cloisters and
+examined every nook and corner. The search was fruitless.
+
+There was but one discovery: at the place where the man had fallen
+under Raymonde's gun, they picked up a chauffeur's cap, in very soft
+buff leather; besides that, nothing.
+
+        *       *       *       *       *
+
+The gendarmerie of Ouville-la-Riviere were informed at six o'clock
+in the morning and at once proceeded to the spot, after sending an
+express to the authorities at Dieppe with a note describing the
+circumstances of the crime, the imminent capture of the chief
+criminal and "the discovery of his headgear and of the dagger with
+which the crime had been committed."
+
+At ten o'clock, two hired conveyances came down the gentle slope
+that led to the house. One of them, an old-fashioned calash,
+contained the deputy public prosecutor and the examining magistrate,
+accompanied by his clerk. In the other, a humble fly, were seated
+two reporters, representing the Journal de Rouen and a great Paris
+paper.
+
+The old chateau came into view--once the abbey residence of the
+priors of Ambrumesy, mutilated under the Revolution, both restored
+by the Comte de Gesvres, who had now owned it for some twenty years.
+It consists of a main building, surmounted by a pinnacled clock-
+tower, and two wings, each of which is surrounded by a flight of
+steps with a stone balustrade. Looking across the walls of the park
+and beyond the upland supported by the high Norman cliffs, you catch
+a glimpse of the blue line of the Channel between the villages of
+Sainte-Marguerite and Varengeville.
+
+Here the Comte de Gesvres lived with his daughter Suzanne, a
+delicate, fair-haired, pretty creature, and his niece Raymonde de
+Saint-Veran, whom he had taken to live with him two years before,
+when the simultaneous death of her father and mother left Raymonde
+an orphan. Life at the chateau was peaceful and regular. A few
+neighbors paid an occasional visit. In the summer, the count took
+the two girls almost every day to Dieppe. He was a tall man, with a
+handsome, serious face and hair that was turning gray. He was very
+rich, managed his fortune himself and looked after his extensive
+estates with the assistance of his secretary, Jean Daval.
+
+Immediately upon his arrival, the examining magistrate took down the
+first observations of Sergeant Quevillon of the gendarmes. The
+capture of the criminal, imminent though it might be, had not yet
+been effected, but every outlet of the park was held. Escape was
+impossible.
+
+The little company next crossed the chapter-hall and the refectory,
+both of which are on the ground floor, and went up to the first
+story. They at once remarked the perfect order that prevailed in the
+drawing room. Not a piece of furniture, not an ornament but appeared
+to occupy its usual place; nor was there any gap among the ornaments
+or furniture. On the right and left walls hung magnificent Flemish
+tapestries with figures. On the panels of the wall facing the
+windows were four fine canvases, in contemporary frames,
+representing mythological scenes. These were the famous pictures by
+Rubens which had been left to the Comte de Gesvres, together with
+the Flemish tapestries, by his maternal uncle, the Marques de
+Bobadilla, a Spanish grandee.
+
+M. Filleul remarked:
+
+"If the motive of the crime was theft, this drawing room, at any
+rate, was not the object of it."
+
+"You can't tell!" said the deputy, who spoke little, but who, when
+he did, invariably opposed the magistrate's views.
+
+"Why, my dear sir, the first thought of a burglar would be to carry
+off those pictures and tapestries, which are universally renowned."
+
+"Perhaps there was no time."
+
+"We shall see."
+
+At that moment, the Comte de Gesvres entered, accompanied by the
+doctor. The count, who did not seem to feel the effects of the
+attack to which he had been subjected, welcomed the two officials.
+Then he opened the door of the boudoir.
+
+This room, which no one had been allowed to enter since the
+discovery of the crime, differed from the drawing room inasmuch as
+it presented a scene of the greatest disorder. Two chairs were
+overturned, one of the tables smashed to pieces and several objects
+--a traveling-clock, a portfolio, a box of stationery--lay on the
+floor. And there was blood on some of the scattered pieces of note-
+paper.
+
+The doctor turned back the sheet that covered the corpse. Jean
+Daval, dressed in his usual velvet suit, with a pair of nailed boots
+on his feet, lay stretched on his back, with one arm folded beneath
+him. His collar and tie had been removed and his shirt opened,
+revealing a large wound in the chest.
+
+"Death must have been instantaneous," declared the doctor. "One blow
+of the knife was enough."
+
+"It was, no doubt, the knife which I saw on the drawing-room
+mantelpiece, next to a leather cap?" said the examining magistrate.
+
+"Yes," said the Comte de Gesvres, "the knife was picked up here. It
+comes from the same trophy in the drawing room from which my niece,
+Mlle. de Saint-Veran, snatched the gun. As for the chauffeur's cap,
+that evidently belongs to the murderer."
+
+M. Filleul examined certain further details in the room, put a few
+questions to the doctor and then asked M. de Gesvres to tell him
+what he had seen and heard. The count worded his story as follows:
+
+"Jean Daval woke me up. I had been sleeping badly, for that matter,
+with gleams of consciousness in which I seemed to hear noises, when,
+suddenly opening my eyes, I saw Daval standing at the foot of my
+bed, with his candle in his hand and fully dressed--as he is now,
+for he often worked late into the night. He seemed greatly excited
+and said, in a low voice: 'There's some one in the drawing room.' I
+heard a noise myself. I got up and softly pushed the door leading to
+this boudoir. At the same moment, the door over there, which opens
+into the big drawing room, was thrown back and a man appeared who
+leaped at me and stunned me with a blow on the temple. I am telling
+you this without any details, Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction, for
+the simple reason that I remember only the principal facts, and that
+these facts followed upon one another with extraordinary swiftness."
+
+"And after that?--"
+
+"After that, I don't know--I fainted. When I came to, Daval lay
+stretched by my side, mortally wounded."
+
+"At first sight, do you suspect no one?"
+
+"No one."
+
+"You have no enemy?"
+
+"I know of none."
+
+"Nor M. Daval either?"
+
+"Daval! An enemy? He was the best creature that ever lived. M. Daval
+was my secretary for twenty years and, I may say, my confidant; and
+I have never seen him surrounded with anything but love and
+friendship."
+
+"Still, there has been a burglary and there has been a murder: there
+must be a motive for all that."
+
+"The motive? Why, it was robbery pure and simple."
+
+"Robbery? Have you been robbed of something, then?"
+
+"No, nothing."
+
+"In that case--?"
+
+"In that case, if they have stolen nothing and if nothing is
+missing, they at least took something away."
+
+"What?"
+
+"I don't know. But my daughter and my niece will tell you, with
+absolute certainty, that they saw two men in succession cross the
+park and that those two men were carrying fairly heavy loads."
+
+"The young ladies--"
+
+"The young ladies may have been dreaming, you think? I should be
+tempted to believe it, for I have been exhausting myself in
+inquiries and suppositions ever since this morning. However, it is
+easy enough to question them."
+
+The two cousins were sent for to the big drawing room. Suzanne,
+still quite pale and trembling, could hardly speak. Raymonde, who
+was more energetic, more of a man, better looking, too, with the
+golden glint in her brown eyes, described the events of the night
+and the part which she had played in them.
+
+"So I may take it, mademoiselle, that your evidence is positive?"
+
+"Absolutely. The men who went across the park were carrying things
+away with them."
+
+"And the third man?"
+
+"He went from here empty-handed."
+
+"Could you describe him to us?"
+
+"He kept on dazzling us with the light of his lantern. All that I
+could say is that he is tall and heavily built."
+
+"Is that how he appeared to you, mademoiselle?" asked the
+magistrate, turning to Suzanne de Gesvres.
+
+"Yes--or, rather, no," said Suzanne, reflecting. "I thought he was
+about the middle height and slender."
+
+M. Filleul smiled; he was accustomed to differences of opinion and
+sight in witnesses to one and the same fact:
+
+"So we have to do, on the one hand, with a man, the one in the
+drawing room, who is, at the same time, tall and short, stout and
+thin, and, on the other, with two men, those in the park, who are
+accused of removing from that drawing room objects--which are still
+here!"
+
+M. Filleul was a magistrate of the ironic school, as he himself
+would say. He was also a very ambitious magistrate and one who did
+not object to an audience nor to an occasion to display his tactful
+resource in public, as was shown by the increasing number of persons
+who now crowded into the room. The journalists had been joined by
+the farmer and his son, the gardener and his wife, the indoor
+servants of the chateau and the two cabmen who had driven the flies
+from Dieppe.
+
+M. Filleul continued:
+
+"There is also the question of agreeing upon the way in which the
+third person disappeared. Was this the gun you fired, mademoiselle,
+and from this window?"
+
+"Yes. The man reached the tombstone which is almost buried under the
+brambles, to the left of the cloisters."
+
+"But he got up again?"
+
+"Only half. Victor ran down at once to guard the little door and I
+followed him, leaving the second footman, Albert, to keep watch
+here."
+
+Albert now gave his evidence and the magistrate concluded:
+
+"So, according to you, the wounded man was not able to escape on the
+left, because your fellow-servant was watching the door, nor on the
+right, because you would have seen him cross the lawn. Logically,
+therefore, he is, at the present moment, in the comparatively
+restricted space that lies before our eyes."
+
+"I am sure of it."
+
+"And you, mademoiselle?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"And I, too," said Victor.
+
+The deputy prosecutor exclaimed, with a leer:
+
+"The field of inquiry is quite narrow. We have only to continue the
+search commenced four hours ago."
+
+"We may be more fortunate."
+
+M. Filleul took the leather cap from the mantel, examined it and,
+beckoning to the sergeant of gendarmes, whispered:
+
+"Sergeant, send one of your men to Dieppe at once. Tell him to go to
+Maigret, the hatter, in the Rue de la Barre, and ask M. Maigret to
+tell him, if possible, to whom this cap was sold."
+
+The "field of inquiry," in the deputy's phrase, was limited to the
+space contained between the house, the lawn on the right and the
+angle formed by the left wall and the wall opposite the house, that
+is to say, a quadrilateral of about a hundred yards each way, in
+which the ruins of Ambrumesy, the famous mediaeval monastery, stood
+out at intervals.
+
+They at once noticed the traces left by the fugitive in the trampled
+grass. In two places, marks of blackened blood, now almost dried up,
+were observed. After the turn at the end of the cloisters, there was
+nothing more to be seen, as the nature of the ground, here covered
+with pine-needles, did not lend itself to the imprint of a body.
+But, in that case, how had the wounded man succeeded in escaping the
+eyes of Raymonde, Victor and Albert? There was nothing but a few
+brakes, which the servants and the gendarmes had beaten over and
+over again, and a number of tombstones, under which they had
+explored. The examining magistrate made the gardener, who had the
+key, open the chapel, a real gem of carving, a shrine in stone which
+had been respected by time and the revolutionaries, and which, with
+the delicate sculpture work of its porch and its miniature
+population of statuettes, was always looked upon as a marvelous
+specimen of the Norman-Gothic style. The chapel, which was very
+simple in the interior, with no other ornament than its marble
+altar, offered no hiding-place. Besides, the fugitive would have had
+to obtain admission. And by what means?
+
+The inspection brought them to the little door in the wall that
+served as an entrance for the visitors to the ruins. It opened on a
+sunk road running between the park wall and a copsewood containing
+some abandoned quarries. M. Filleul stooped forward: the dust of the
+road bore marks of anti-skid pneumatic tires. Raymonde and Victor
+remembered that, after the shot, they had seemed to hear the throb
+of a motor-car.
+
+The magistrate suggested:
+
+"The man must have joined his confederates."
+
+"Impossible!" cried Victor. "I was here while mademoiselle and
+Albert still had him in view."
+
+"Nonsense, he must be somewhere! Outside or inside: we have no
+choice!"
+
+"He is here," the servants insisted, obstinately.
+
+The magistrate shrugged his shoulders and went back to the house in
+a more or less sullen mood. There was no doubt that it was an
+unpromising case. A theft in which nothing had been stolen; an
+invisible prisoner: what could be less satisfactory?
+
+It was late. M. de Gesvres asked the officials and the two
+journalists to stay to lunch. They ate in silence and then M.
+Filleul returned to the drawing room, where he questioned the
+servants. But the sound of a horse's hoofs came from the courtyard
+and, a moment after, the gendarme who had been sent to Dieppe
+entered.
+
+"Well, did you see the hatter?" exclaimed the magistrate, eager at
+last to obtain some positive information.
+
+"I saw M. Maigret. The cap was sold to a cab-driver."
+
+"A cab-driver!"
+
+"Yes, a driver who stopped his fly before the shop and asked to be
+supplied with a yellow-leather chauffeur's cap for one of his
+customers. This was the only one left. He paid for it, without
+troubling about the size, and drove off. He was in a great hurry."
+
+"What sort of fly was it?"
+
+"A calash."
+
+"And on what day did this happen?"
+
+"On what day? Why, to-day, at eight o'clock this morning."
+
+"This morning? What are you talking about?"
+
+"The cap was bought this morning."
+
+"But that's impossible, because it was found last night in the park.
+If it was found there, it must have been there; and, consequently,
+it must have been bought before."
+
+"The hatter told me it was bought this morning."
+
+There was a moment of general bewilderment. The nonplussed
+magistrate strove to understand. Suddenly, he started, as though
+struck with a gleam of light:
+
+"Fetch the cabman who brought us here this morning! The man who
+drove the calash! Fetch him at once!"
+
+The sergeant of gendarmes and his subordinate ran off to the
+stables. In a few minutes, the sergeant returned alone.
+
+"Where's the cabman?"
+
+"He asked for food in the kitchen, ate his lunch and then--"
+
+"And then--?"
+
+"He went off."
+
+"With his fly?"
+
+"No. Pretending that he wanted to go and see a relation at Ouville,
+he borrowed the groom's bicycle. Here are his hat and greatcoat."
+
+"But did he leave bare-headed?"
+
+"No, he took a cap from his pocket and put it on."
+
+"A cap?"
+
+"Yes, a yellow leather cap, it seems."
+
+"A yellow leather cap? Why, no, we've got it here!"
+
+"That's true, Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction, but his is just like
+it."
+
+The deputy sniggered:
+
+"Very funny! Most amusing! There are two caps--One, the real one,
+which constituted our only piece of evidence, has gone off on the
+head of the sham flyman! The other, the false one, is in your hands.
+Oh, the fellow has had us nicely!"
+
+"Catch him! Fetch him back!" cried M. Filleul. "Two of your men on
+horseback, Sergeant Quevillon, and at full speed!"
+
+"He is far away by this time," said the deputy.
+
+"He can be as far as he pleases, but still we must lay hold of him."
+
+"I hope so; but I think, Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction, that your
+efforts should be concentrated here above all. Would you mind
+reading this scrap of paper, which I have just found in the pocket
+of the coat?"
+
+"Which coat?"
+
+"The driver's."
+
+And the deputy prosecutor handed M. Filleul a piece of paper, folded
+in four, containing these few words written in pencil, in a more or
+less common hand:
+
+"Woe betide the young lady, if she has killed the governor!"
+
+The incident caused a certain stir.
+
+"A word to the wise!" muttered the deputy. "We are now forewarned."
+
+"Monsieur le Comte," said the examining magistrate, "I beg you not
+to be alarmed. Nor you either, mademoiselle. This threat is of no
+importance, as the police are on the spot. We shall take every
+precaution and I will answer for your safety. As for you, gentlemen.
+I rely on your discretion. You have been present at this inquiry,
+thanks to my excessive kindness toward the Press, and it would be
+making me an ill return--"
+
+He interrupted himself, as though an idea had struck him, looked at
+the two young men, one after the other, and, going up to the first,
+asked:
+
+"What paper do you represent, sir?"
+
+"The Journal de Rouen."
+
+"Have you your credentials?"
+
+"Here."
+
+The card was in order. There was no more to be said. M. Filleul
+turned to the other reporter:
+
+"And you, sir?"
+
+"I?"
+
+"Yes, you: what paper do you belong to?"
+
+"Why, Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction, I write for a number of
+papers--all over the place--"
+
+"Your credentials?"
+
+"I haven't any."
+
+"Oh! How is that?"
+
+"For a newspaper to give you a card, you have to be on its regular
+staff."
+
+"Well?"
+
+"Well, I am only an occasional contributor, a free-lance. I send
+articles to this newspaper and that. They are published or declined
+according to circumstances."
+
+"In that case, what is your name? Where are your papers?"
+
+"My name would tell you nothing. As for papers, I have none."
+
+"You have no paper of any kind to prove your profession!"
+
+"I have no profession."
+
+"But look here, sir," cried the magistrate, with a certain asperity,
+"you can't expect to preserve your incognito after introducing
+yourself here by a trick and surprising the secrets of the police!"
+
+"I beg to remark, Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction, that you asked me
+nothing when I came in, and that therefore I had nothing to say.
+Besides, it never struck me that your inquiry was secret, when
+everybody was admitted--including even one of the criminals!"
+
+He spoke softly, in a tone of infinite politeness. He was quite a
+young man, very tall, very slender and dressed without the least
+attempt at fashion, in a jacket and trousers both too small for him.
+He had a pink face like a girl's, a broad forehead topped with
+close-cropped hair, and a scrubby and ill-trimmed fair beard. His
+bright eyes gleamed with intelligence. He seemed not in the least
+embarrassed and wore a pleasant smile, free from any shade of
+banter.
+
+M. Filleul looked at him with an aggressive air of distrust. The two
+gendarmes came forward. The young man exclaimed, gaily:
+
+"Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction, you clearly suspect me of being an
+accomplice. But, if that were so, would I not have slipped away at
+the right moment, following the example of my fellow-criminal?"
+
+"You might have hoped--"
+
+"Any hope would have been absurd. A moment's reflection, Monsieur le
+Juge d'Instruction, will make you agree with me that, logically
+speaking--"
+
+M. Filleul looked him straight in the eyes and said, sharply:
+
+"No more jokes! Your name?"
+
+"Isidore Beautrelet."
+
+"Your occupation?"
+
+"Sixth-form pupil at the Lycee Janson-de-Sailly."
+
+M. Filleul opened a pair of startled eyes.
+
+"What are you talking about? Sixth-form pupil--"
+
+"At the Lycee Janson, Rue de la Pompe, number--"
+
+"Oh, look here," exclaimed M. Filleul, "you're trying to take me in!
+This won't do, you know; a joke can go too far!"
+
+"I must say, Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction, that your astonishment
+surprises me. What is there to prevent my being a sixth-form pupil
+at the Lycee Janson? My beard, perhaps? Set your mind at ease: my
+beard is false!"
+
+Isidore Beautrelet pulled off the few curls that adorned his chin,
+and his beardless face appeared still younger and pinker, a genuine
+schoolboy's face. And, with a laugh like a child's, revealing his
+white teeth:
+
+"Are you convinced now?" he asked. "Do you want more proofs? Here,
+you can read the address on these letters from my father: 'To
+Monsieur Isidore Beautrelet, Indoor Pupil, Lycee Janson-de-Sailly.'"
+
+Convinced or not, M. Filleul did not look as if he liked the story.
+He asked, gruffly:
+
+"What are you doing here?"
+
+"Why--I'm--I'm improving my mind."
+
+"There are schools for that: yours, for instance."
+
+"You forget, Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction, that this is the
+twenty-third of April and that we are in the middle of the Easter
+holidays."
+
+"Well?"
+
+"Well, I have every right to spend my holidays as I please."
+
+"Your father--"
+
+"My father lives at the other end of the country, in Savoy, and he
+himself advised me to take a little trip on the North Coast."
+
+"With a false beard?"
+
+"Oh, no! That's my own idea. At school, we talk a great deal about
+mysterious adventures; we read detective stories, in which people
+disguise themselves; we imagine any amount of terrible and intricate
+cases. So I thought I would amuse myself; and I put on this false
+beard. Besides, I enjoyed the advantage of being taken seriously and
+I pretended to be a Paris reporter. That is how, last night, after
+an uneventful period of more than a week, I had the pleasure of
+making the acquaintance of my Rouen colleague; and, this morning,
+when he heard of the Ambrumesy murder, he very kindly suggested that
+I should come with him and that we should share the cost of a fly."
+
+Isidore Beautrelet said all this with a frank and artless simplicity
+of which it was impossible not to feel the charm. M. Filleul
+himself, though maintaining a distrustful reserve, took a certain
+pleasure in listening to him. He asked him, in a less peevish tone:
+
+"And are you satisfied with your expedition?"
+
+"Delighted! All the more as I had never been present at a case of
+the sort and I find that this one is not lacking in interest."
+
+"Nor in that mysterious intricacy which you prize so highly--"
+
+"And which is so stimulating, Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction! I know
+nothing more exciting than to see all the facts coming up out of the
+shadow, clustering together, so to speak, and gradually forming the
+probable truth."
+
+"The probable truth! You go pretty fast, young man! Do you suggest
+that you have your little solution of the riddle ready?"
+
+"Oh, no!" replied Beautrelet, with a laugh.
+
+"Only--it seems to me that there are certain points on which it is
+not impossible to form an opinion; and others, even, are so precise
+as to warrant--a conclusion."
+
+"Oh, but this is becoming very curious and I shall get to know
+something at last! For I confess, to my great confusion, that I know
+nothing."
+
+"That is because you have not had time to reflect, Monsieur le Juge
+d'Instruction. The great thing is to reflect. Facts very seldom fail
+to carry their own explanation!"
+
+"And, according to you, the facts which we have just ascertained
+carry their own explanation?"
+
+"Don't you think so yourself? In any case, I have ascertained none
+besides those which are set down in the official report."
+
+"Good! So that, if I were to ask you which were the objects stolen
+from this room--"
+
+"I should answer that I know."
+
+"Bravo! My gentleman knows more about it than the owner himself. M.
+de Gesvres has everything accounted for: M. Isidore Beautrelet has
+not. He misses a bookcase in three sections and a life-size statue
+which nobody ever noticed. And, if I asked you the name of the
+murderer?"
+
+"I should again answer that I know it."
+
+All present gave a start. The deputy and the journalist drew nearer.
+M. de Gesvres and the two girls, impressed by Beautrelet's tranquil
+assurance, listened attentively.
+
+"You know the murderer's name?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"And the place where he is concealed, perhaps?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+M. Filleul rubbed his hands.
+
+"What a piece of luck! This capture will do honor to my career. And
+can you make me these startling revelations now?"
+
+"Yes, now--or rather, if you do not mind, in an hour or two, when I
+shall have assisted at your inquiry to the end."
+
+"No, no, young man, here and now, please." At that moment Raymonde
+de Saint-Veran, who had not taken her eyes from Isidore Beautrelet
+since the beginning of this scene, came up to M. Filleul:
+
+"Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction--"
+
+"Yes, mademoiselle?"
+
+She hesitated for two or three seconds, with her eyes fixed on
+Beautrelet, and then, addressing M. Filleul:
+
+"I should like you to ask monsieur the reason why he was walking
+yesterday in the sunk road which leads up to the little door."
+
+It was an unexpected and dramatic stroke. Isidore Beautrelet
+appeared nonplussed:
+
+"I, mademoiselle? I? You saw me yesterday?"
+
+Raymonde remained thoughtful, with her eyes upon Beautrelet, as
+though she were trying to settle her own conviction, and then said,
+in a steady voice:
+
+"At four o'clock in the afternoon, as I was crossing the wood, I met
+in the sunk road a young man of monsieur's height, dressed like him
+and wearing a beard cut in the same way--and I received a very clear
+impression that he was trying to hide."
+
+"And it was I?"
+
+"I could not say that as an absolute certainty, for my recollection
+is a little vague. Still--still, I think so--if not, it would be an
+unusual resemblance--"
+
+M. Filleul was perplexed. Already taken in by one of the
+confederates, was he now going to let himself be tricked by this
+self-styled schoolboy? Certainly, the young man's manner spoke in
+his favor; but one can never tell!
+
+"What have you to say, sir?"
+
+"That mademoiselle is mistaken, as I can easily show you with one
+word. Yesterday, at the time stated, I was at Veules."
+
+"You will have to prove it, you will have to. In any case, the
+position is not what it was. Sergeant, one of your men will keep
+monsieur company."
+
+Isidore Beautrelet's face denoted a keen vexation.
+
+"Will it be for long?"
+
+"Long enough to collect the necessary information."
+
+"Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction, I beseech you to collect it with
+all possible speed and discretion."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"My father is an old man. We are very much attached to each other--
+and I would not have him suffer on my account."
+
+The more or less pathetic note in his voice made a bad impression on
+M. Filleul. It suggested a scene in a melodrama. Nevertheless, he
+promised:
+
+"This evening--or to-morrow at latest, I shall know what to think."
+
+The afternoon was wearing on. The examining magistrate returned to
+the ruins of the cloisters, after giving orders that no unauthorized
+persons were to be admitted, and patiently, methodically, dividing
+the ground into lots which were successively explored, himself
+directed the search. But at the end of the day he was no farther
+than at the start; and he declared, before an army of reporters who,
+during that time, had invaded the chateau:
+
+"Gentlemen, everything leads us to suppose that the wounded man is
+here, within our reach; everything, that is, except the reality, the
+fact. Therefore, in our humble opinion, he must have escaped and we
+shall find him outside."
+
+By way of precaution, however, he arranged, with the sergeant of
+gendarmes, for a complete watch to be kept over the park and, after
+making a fresh examination of the two drawing rooms, visiting the
+whole of the chateau and surrounding himself with all the necessary
+information, he took the road back to Dieppe, accompanied by the
+deputy prosecutor.
+
+        *       *       *       *       *
+
+Night fell. As the boudoir was to remain locked, Jean Daval's body
+had been moved to another room. Two women from the neighborhood sat
+up with it, assisted by Suzanne and Raymonde. Downstairs, young
+Isidore Beautrelet slept on the bench in the old oratory, under the
+watchful eye of the village policeman, who had been attached to his
+person. Outside, the gendarmes, the farmer and a dozen peasants had
+taken up their position among the ruins and along the walls.
+
+All was still until eleven o'clock; but, at ten minutes past eleven,
+a shot echoed from the other side of the house.
+
+"Attention!" roared the sergeant. "Two men remain here: you,
+Fossier--and you, Lecanu--The others at the double!"
+
+They all rushed forward and ran round the house on the left. A
+figure was seen to make away in the dark. Then, suddenly, a second
+shot drew them farther on, almost to the borders of the farm. And,
+all at once, as they arrived, in a band, at the hedge which lines
+the orchard, a flame burst out, to the right of the farmhouse, and
+other names also rose in a thick column. It was a barn burning,
+stuffed to the ridge with straw.
+
+"The scoundrels!" shouted the sergeant. "They've set fire to it.
+Have at them, lads! They can't be far away!"
+
+But the wind was turning the flames toward the main building; and it
+became necessary, before all things, to ward off the danger. They
+all exerted themselves with the greater ardor inasmuch as M. de
+Gesvres, hurrying to the scene of the disaster, encouraged them with
+the promise of a reward. By the time that they had mastered the
+flames, it was two o'clock in the morning. All pursuit would have
+been vain.
+
+"We'll look into it by daylight," said the sergeant. "They are sure
+to have left traces: we shall find them."
+
+"And I shall not be sorry," added M. de Gesvres, "to learn the
+reason of this attack. To set fire to trusses of straw strikes me as
+a very useless proceeding."
+
+"Come with me, Monsieur le Comte: I may be able to tell you the
+reason."
+
+Together they reached the ruins of the cloisters. The sergeant
+called out:
+
+"Lecanu!--Fossier!"
+
+The other gendarmes were already hunting for their comrades whom
+they had left standing sentry. They ended by finding them at a few
+paces from the little door. The two men were lying full length on
+the ground, bound and gagged, with bandages over their eyes.
+
+"Monsieur le Comte," muttered the sergeant, while his men were being
+released; "Monsieur le Comte, we have been tricked like children."
+
+"How so?"
+
+"The shots--the attack on the barn--the fire--all so much humbug to
+get us down there--a diversion. During that time they were tying up
+our two men and the business was done."
+
+"What business?"
+
+"Carrying off the wounded man, of course!"
+
+"You don't mean to say you think--?"
+
+"Think? Why, it's as plain as a pikestaff! The idea came to me ten
+minutes ago--but I'm a fool not to have thought of it earlier. We
+should have nabbed them all." Quevillon stamped his foot on the
+ground, with a sudden attack of rage. "But where, confound it, where
+did they go through? Which way did they carry him off? For, dash it
+all, we beat the ground all day; and a man can't hide in a tuft of
+grass, especially when he's wounded! It's witchcraft, that's what it
+is!--"
+
+Nor was this the last surprise awaiting Sergeant Quevillon. At dawn,
+when they entered the oratory which had been used as a cell for
+young Isidore Beautrelet, they realized that young Isidore
+Beautrelet had vanished.
+
+On a chair slept the village policeman, bent in two. By his side
+stood a water-bottle and two tumblers. At the bottom of one of those
+tumblers a few grains of white powder.
+
+On examination, it was proved, first, that young Isidore Beautrelet
+had administered a sleeping draught to the village policeman;
+secondly, that he could only have escaped by a window situated at a
+height of seven or eight feet in the wall; and lastly--a charming
+detail, this--that he could only have reached this window by using
+the back of his warder as a footstool.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER TWO
+
+ISIDORE BEAUTRELET, SIXTH-FORM SCHOOLBOY
+
+
+From the Grand Journal.
+
+LATEST NEWS
+
+DOCTOR DELATTRE KIDNAPPED 
+A MAD PIECE OF CRIMINAL DARING
+
+At the moment of going to press, we have received an item of news
+which we dare not guarantee as authentic, because of its very
+improbable character. We print it, therefore, with all reserve.
+
+Yesterday evening, Dr. Delattre, the well-known surgeon, was
+present, with his wife and daughter, at the performance of Hernani
+at the Comedie Francaise. At the commencement of the third act, that
+is to say, at about ten o'clock, the door of his box opened and a
+gentleman, accompanied by two others, leaned over to the doctor and
+said to him, in a low voice, but loud enough for Mme. Delattre to
+hear:
+
+"Doctor, I have a very painful task to fulfil and I shall be very
+grateful to you if you will make it as easy for me as you can."
+
+"Who are you, sir?"
+
+"M. Thezard, commissary of police of the first district; and my
+instructions are to take you to M. Dudouis, at the prefecture."
+
+"But--"
+
+"Not a word, doctor, I entreat you, not a movement--There is some
+regrettable mistake; and that is why we must act in silence and not
+attract anybody's attention. You will be back, I have no doubt,
+before the end of the performance."
+
+The doctor rose and went with the commissary. At the end of the
+performance, he had not returned. Mme. Delattre, greatly alarmed,
+drove to the office of the commissary of police. There she found the
+real M. Thezard and discovered, to her great terror, that the
+individual who had carried off her husband was an impostor.
+
+Inquiries made so far have revealed the fact that the doctor stepped
+into a motor car and that the car drove off in the direction of the
+Concorde.
+
+Readers will find further details of this incredible adventure in
+our second edition.
+
+        *       *       *       *       *
+
+Incredible though it might be, the adventure was perfectly true.
+Besides, the issue was not long delayed and the Grand Journal, while
+confirming the story in its midday edition, described in a few lines
+the dramatic ending with which it concluded:
+
+THE STORY ENDS
+
+AND
+
+GUESS-WORK BEGINS
+
+Dr. Delattre was brought back to 78, Rue Duret, at nine o'clock this
+morning, in a motor car which drove away immediately at full speed.
+
+No. 78, Rue Duret, is the address of Dr. Delattre's clinical
+surgery, at which he arrives every morning at the same hour. When we
+sent in our card, the doctor, though closeted with the chief of the
+detective service, was good enough to consent to receive us.
+
+"All that I can tell you," he said, in reply to our questions, "is
+that I was treated with the greatest consideration. My three
+companions were the most charming people I have ever met,
+exquisitely well-mannered and bright and witty talkers: a quality
+not to be despised, in view of the length of the journey."
+
+"How long did it take?"
+
+"About four hours and as long returning."
+
+"And what was the object of the journey?"
+
+"I was taken to see a patient whose condition rendered an immediate
+operation necessary."
+
+"And was the operation successful?"
+
+"Yes, but the consequences may be dangerous. I would answer for the
+patient here. Down there--under his present conditions--"
+
+"Bad conditions?"
+
+"Execrable!--A room in an inn--and the practically absolute
+impossibility of being attended to."
+
+"Then what can save him?"
+
+"A miracle--and his constitution, which is an exceptionally strong
+one."
+
+"And can you say nothing more about this strange patient?"
+
+"No. In the first place, I have taken an oath; and, secondly, I have
+received a present of ten thousand francs for my free surgery. If I
+do not keep silence, this sum will be taken from me."
+
+"You are joking! Do you believe that?"
+
+"Indeed I do. The men all struck me as being very much in earnest."
+
+This is the statement made to us by Dr. Delattre. And we know, on
+the other hand, that the head of the detective service, in spite of
+all his insisting, has not yet succeeded in extracting any more
+precise particulars from him as to the operation which he performed,
+the patient whom he attended or the district traversed by the car.
+It is difficult, therefore, to arrive at the truth.
+
+        *       *       *       *       *
+
+This truth, which the writer of the interview confessed himself
+unable to discover, was guessed by the more or less clear-sighted
+minds that perceived a connection with the facts which had occurred
+the day before at the Chateau d'Ambrumesy, and which were reported,
+down to the smallest detail, in all the newspapers of that day.
+There was evidently a coincidence to be reckoned with in the
+disappearance of a wounded burglar and the kidnapping of a famous
+surgeon.
+
+The judicial inquiry, moreover, proved the correctness of the
+hypothesis. By following the track of the sham flyman, who had fled
+on a bicycle, they were able to show that he had reached the forest
+of Arques, at some ten miles' distance, and that from there, after
+throwing his bicycle into a ditch, he had gone to the village of
+Saint-Nicolas, whence he had dispatched the following telegram:
+
+
+  A. L. N., Post-office 45, Paris. 
+
+  Situation desperate. Operation urgently necessary. 
+  Send celebrity by national road fourteen.
+
+
+The evidence was undeniable. Once apprised the accomplices in Paris
+hastened to make their arrangements. At ten o'clock in the evening
+they sent their celebrity by National Road No. 14, which skirts the
+forest of Arques and ends at Dieppe. During this time, under cover
+of the fire which they themselves had caused, the gang of burglars
+carried off their leader and moved him to an inn, where the
+operation took place on the arrival of the surgeon, at two o'clock
+in the morning.
+
+About that there was no doubt. At Pontoise, at Gournay, at Forges,
+Chief-inspector Ganimard, who was sent specially from Paris, with
+Inspector Folenfant, as his assistant, ascertained that a motor car
+had passed in the course of the previous night. The same on the road
+from Dieppe to Ambrumesy. And, though the traces of the car were
+lost at about a mile and a half from the chateau, at least a number
+of footmarks were seen between the little door in the park wall and
+the abbey ruins. Besides, Ganimard remarked that the lock of the
+little door had been forced.
+
+So all was explained. It remained to decide which inn the doctor had
+spoken of: an easy piece of work for a Ganimard, a professional
+ferret, a patient old stager of the police. The number of inns is
+limited and this one, given the condition of the wounded man, could
+only be one quite close to Ambrumesy. Ganimard and Sergeant
+Quevillon set to work. Within a circle of five hundred yards, of a
+thousand yards, of fifteen hundred yards, they visited and ransacked
+everything that could pass for an inn. But, against all expectation,
+the dying man persisted in remaining invisible.
+
+Ganimard became more resolved than ever. He came back to sleep at
+the chateau, on the Saturday night, with the intention of making his
+personal inquiry on the Sunday. On Sunday morning, he learned that,
+during the night, a posse of gendarmes had seen a figure gliding
+along the sunk road, outside the wall. Was it an accomplice who had
+come back to investigate? Were they to suppose that the leader of
+the gang had not left the cloisters or the neighborhood of the
+cloisters?
+
+That night, Ganimard openly sent the squad of gendarmes to the farm
+and posted himself and Folenfant outside the walls, near the little
+door.
+
+A little before midnight, a person passed out of the wood, slipped
+between them, went through the door and entered the park. For three
+hours, they saw him wander from side to side across the ruins,
+stooping, climbing up the old pillars, sometimes remaining for long
+minutes without moving. Then he went back to the door and again
+passed between the two inspectors.
+
+Ganimard caught him by the collar, while Folenfant seized him round
+the body. He made no resistance of any kind and, with the greatest
+docility, allowed them to bind his wrists and take him to the house.
+But, when they attempted to question him, he replied simply that he
+owed them no account of his doings and that he would wait for the
+arrival of the examining magistrate. Thereupon, they fastened him
+firmly to the foot of a bed, in one of the two adjoining rooms which
+they occupied.
+
+At nine o'clock on Monday morning, as soon as M. Filleul had
+arrived, Ganimard announced the capture which he had made. The
+prisoner was brought downstairs. It was Isidore Beautrelet.
+
+"M. Isidore Beautrelet!" exclaimed M. Filleul with an air of
+rapture, holding out both his hands to the newcomer. "What a
+delightful surprise! Our excellent amateur detective here! And at
+our disposal too! Why, it's a windfall!--M. Chief-inspector, allow
+me to introduce to you M. Isidore Beautrelet, a sixth-form pupil at
+the Lycee Janson-de-Sailly."
+
+Ganimard seemed a little nonplussed. Isidore made him a very low
+bow, as though he were greeting a colleague whom he knew how to
+esteem at his true value, and, turning to M. Filleul:
+
+"It appears, Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction, that you have received
+a satisfactory account of me?"
+
+"Perfectly satisfactory! To begin with, you were really at Veules-
+les-Roses at the time when Mlle. de Saint-Veran thought she saw you
+in the sunk road. I dare say we shall discover the identity of your
+double. In the second place, you are in very deed Isidore
+Beautrelet, a sixth-form pupil and, what is more, an excellent
+pupil, industrious at your work and of exemplary behavior. As your
+father lives in the country, you go out once a month to his
+correspondent, M. Bernod, who is lavish in his praises of you."
+
+"So that--"
+
+"So that you are free, M. Isidore Beautrelet."
+
+"Absolutely free?"
+
+"Absolutely. Oh, I must make just one little condition, all the
+same. You can understand that I can't release a gentleman who
+administers sleeping-draughts, who escapes by the window and who is
+afterward caught in the act of trespassing upon private property. I
+can't release him without a compensation of some kind."
+
+"I await your pleasure."
+
+"Well, we will resume our interrupted conversation and you shall
+tell me how far you have advanced with your investigations. In two
+days of liberty, you must have carried them pretty far?" And, as
+Ganimard was preparing to go, with an affectation of contempt for
+that sort of practice, the magistrate cried, "Not at all, M.
+Inspector, your place is here--I assure you that M. Isidore
+Beautrelet is worth listening to. M. Isidore Beautrelet, according
+to my information, has made a great reputation at the Lycee Janson-
+de-Sailly as an observer whom nothing escapes; and his
+schoolfellows, I hear, look upon him as your competitor and a rival
+of Holmlock Shears!"
+
+"Indeed!" said Ganimard, ironically.
+
+"Just so. One of them wrote to me, 'If Beautrelet declares that he
+knows, you must believe him; and, whatever he says, you may be sure
+that it is the exact expression of the truth.' M. Isidore
+Beautrelet, now or never is the time to vindicate the confidence of
+your friends. I beseech you, give us the exact expression of the
+truth."
+
+Isidore listened with a smile and replied:
+
+"Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction, you are very cruel. You make fun of
+poor schoolboys who amuse themselves as best they can. You are quite
+right, however, and I will give you no further reason to laugh at
+me."
+
+"The fact is that you know nothing, M. Isidore Beautrelet."
+
+"Yes, I confess in all humility that I know nothing. For I do not
+call it 'knowing anything' that I happen to have hit upon two or
+three more precise points which, I am sure, cannot have escaped
+you."
+
+"For instance?"
+
+"For instance, the object of the theft."
+
+"Ah, of course, you know the object of the theft?"
+
+"As you do, I have no doubt. In fact, it was the first thing I
+studied, because the task struck me as easier."
+
+"Easier, really?"
+
+"Why, of course. At the most, it's a question of reasoning."
+
+"Nothing more than that?"
+
+"Nothing more."
+
+"And what is your reasoning?"
+
+"It is just this, stripped of all extraneous comment: on the one
+hand, THERE HAS BEEN A THEFT, because the two young ladies are
+agreed and because they really saw two men running away and carrying
+things with them."
+
+"There has been a theft."
+
+"On the other hand, NOTHING HAS DISAPPEARED, because M. de Gesvres
+says so and he is in a better position than anybody to know."
+
+"Nothing has disappeared."
+
+"From those two premises I arrive at this inevitable result: granted
+that there has been a theft and that nothing has disappeared, it is
+because the object carried off has been replaced by an exactly
+similar object. Let me hasten to add that possibly my argument may
+not be confirmed by the facts. But I maintain that it is the first
+argument that ought to occur to us and that we are not entitled to
+waive it until we have made a serious examination."
+
+"That's true--that's true," muttered the magistrate, who was
+obviously interested.
+
+"Now," continued Isidore, "what was there in this room that could
+arouse the covetousness of the burglars? Two things. The tapestry
+first. It can't have been that. Old tapestry cannot be imitated: the
+fraud would have been palpable at once. There remain the four Rubens
+pictures."
+
+"What's that you say?"
+
+"I say that the four Rubenses on that wall are false."
+
+"Impossible!"
+
+"They are false a priori, inevitably and without a doubt."
+
+"I tell you, it's impossible."
+
+"It is very nearly a year ago, Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction, since
+a young man, who gave his name as Charpenais, came to the Chateau
+d'Ambrumesy and asked permission to copy the Rubens pictures. M. de
+Gesvres gave him permission. Every day for five months Charpenais
+worked in this room from morning till dusk. The copies which he
+made, canvases and frames, have taken the place of the four original
+pictures bequeathed to M. de Gesvres by his uncle, the Marques de
+Bobadilla."
+
+"Prove it!"
+
+"I have no proof to give. A picture is false because it is false;
+and I consider that it is not even necessary to examine these four."
+
+M. Filleul and Ganimard exchanged glances of unconcealed
+astonishment. The inspector no longer thought of withdrawing. At
+last, the magistrate muttered:
+
+"We must have M. de Gesvres's opinion."
+
+And Ganimard agreed:
+
+"Yes, we must have his opinion."
+
+And they sent to beg the count to come to the drawing room.
+
+The young sixth-form pupil had won a real victory. To compel two
+experts, two professionals like M. Filleul and Ganimard to take
+account of his surmises implied a testimony of respect of which any
+other would have been proud. But Beautrelet seemed not to feel those
+little satisfactions of self-conceit and, still smiling without the
+least trace of irony, he placidly waited.
+
+M. de Gesvres entered the room.
+
+"Monsieur le Comte," said the magistrate, "the result of our inquiry
+has brought us face to face with an utterly unexpected contingency,
+which we submit to you with all reserve. It is possible--I say that
+it is possible--that the burglars, when breaking into the house, had
+it as their object to steal your four pictures by Rubens--or, at
+least, to replace them by four copies--copies which are said to have
+been made last year by a painter called Charpenais. Would you be so
+good as to examine the pictures and to tell us if you recognize them
+as genuine?"
+
+The count appeared to suppress a movement of annoyance, looked at
+Isidore Beautrelet and at M. Filleul and replied, without even
+troubling to go near the pictures:
+
+"I hoped, Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction, that the truth might have
+remained unknown. As this is not so, I have no hesitation in
+declaring that the four pictures are false."
+
+"You knew it, then?"
+
+"From the beginning."
+
+"Why didn't you say so?"
+
+"The owner of a work is never in a hurry to declare that that work
+is not--or, rather, is no longer genuine."
+
+"Still, it was the only means of recovering them."
+
+"I consider that there was another and a better."
+
+"Which was that?"
+
+"Not to make the secret known, not to frighten my burglars and to
+offer to buy back the pictures, which they must find more or less
+difficult to dispose of."
+
+"How would you communicate with them?"
+
+As the count did not reply, Isidore answered for him:
+
+"By means of an advertisement in the papers. The paragraph inserted
+in the agony column of the Journal, the Echo de Paris and the Matin
+runs, 'Am prepared to buy back the pictures.'"
+
+The count agreed with a nod. Once again, the young man was teaching
+his elders. M. Filleul showed himself a good sportsman.
+
+"There's no doubt about it, my dear sir," he exclaimed. "I'm
+beginning to think your school-fellows were not quite wrong. By
+Jove, what an eye! What intuition! If this goes on, there will be
+nothing left for M. Ganimard and me to do."
+
+"Oh, none of this part was so very complicated!"
+
+"You mean to say that the rest was more so I remember, in fact,
+that, when we first met you seemed to know all about it. Let me see,
+a far as I recollect, you said that you knew the name of the
+murderer."
+
+"So I do."
+
+"Well, then, who killed Jean Daval? Is the man alive? Where is he
+hiding?"
+
+"There is a misunderstanding between us, Monsieur le Juge
+d'Instruction, or, rather, you have misunderstood the facts from the
+beginning The murderer and the runaway are two distinct persons."
+
+"What's that?" exclaimed M. Filleul. "The man whom M. de Gesvres saw
+in the boudoir and struggled with, the man whom the young ladies saw
+in the drawing-room and whom Mlle. de Saint-Veran shot at, the man
+who fell in the park and whom we are looking for: do you suggest
+that he is not the man who killed Jean Daval?"
+
+"I do."
+
+"Have you discovered the traces of a third accomplice who
+disappeared before the arrival of the young ladies?"
+
+"I have not."
+
+"In that case, I don't understand.--Well, who is the murderer of
+Jean Daval?"
+
+"Jean Daval was killed by--"
+
+Beautrelet interrupted himself, thought for a moment and continued:
+
+"But I must first show you the road which I followed to arrive at
+the certainty and the very reasons of the murder--without which my
+accusation would seem monstrous to you.--And it is not--no, it is
+not monstrous at all.--There is one detail which has passed
+unobserved and which, nevertheless, is of the greatest importance;
+and that is that Jean Daval, at the moment when he was stabbed, had
+all his clothes on, including his walking boots, was dressed, in
+short, as a man is dressed in the middle of the day, with a
+waistcoat, collar, tie and braces. Now the crime was committed at
+four o'clock in the morning."
+
+"I reflected on that strange fact," said the magistrate, "and M. de
+Gesvres replied that Jean Daval spent a part of his nights in
+working."
+
+"The servants say, on the contrary, that he went to bed regularly at
+a very early hour. But, admitting that he was up, why did he
+disarrange his bedclothes, to make believe that he had gone to bed?
+And, if he was in bed, why, when he heard a noise, did he take the
+trouble to dress himself from head to foot, instead of slipping on
+anything that came to hand? I went to his room on the first day,
+while you were at lunch: his slippers were at the foot of the bed.
+What prevented him from putting them on rather than his heavy nailed
+boots?"
+
+"So far, I do not see--"
+
+"So far, in fact, you cannot see anything, except anomalies. They
+appeared much more suspicious to me, however, when I learned that
+Charpenais the painter, the man who copied the Rubens pictures, had
+been introduced and recommended to the Comte de Gesvres by Jean
+Daval himself."
+
+"Well?"
+
+"Well, from that to the conclusion that Jean Daval and Charpenais
+were accomplices required but a step. I took that step at the time
+of our conversation."
+
+"A little quickly, I think."
+
+"As a matter of fact, a material proof was wanted. Now I had
+discovered in Daval's room, on one of the sheets of the blotting-pad
+on which he used to write, this address: 'Monsieur A.L.N., Post-
+office 45, Paris.' You will find it there still, traced the reverse
+way on the blotting-paper. The next day, it was discovered that the
+telegram sent by the sham flyman from Saint-Nicolas bore the same
+address: 'A.L.N., Post-office 45.' The material proof existed: Jean
+Daval was in correspondence with the gang which arranged the robbery
+of the pictures."
+
+M. Filleul raised no objection.
+
+"Agreed. The complicity is established. And what conclusion do you
+draw?"
+
+"This, first of all, that it was not the runaway who killed Jean
+Daval, because Jean Daval was his accomplice."
+
+"And after that?"
+
+"Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction, I will ask you to remember the
+first sentence uttered by Monsieur le Comte when he recovered from
+fainting. The sentence forms part of Mlle. de Gesvres' evidence and
+is in the official report: 'I am not wounded.--Daval?--Is he alive?--
+The knife?' And I will ask you to compare it with that part of his
+story, also in the report, in which Monsieur le Comte describes the
+assault: 'The man leaped at me and felled me with a blow on the
+temple!' How could M. de Gesvres, who had fainted, know, on waking,
+that Daval had been stabbed with a knife?"
+
+Isidore Beautrelet did not wait for an answer to his question. It
+seemed as though he were in a hurry to give the answer himself and
+to avoid all comment. He continued straightway:
+
+"Therefore it was Jean Daval who brought the three burglars to the
+drawing room. While he was there with the one whom they call their
+chief, a noise was heard in the boudoir. Daval opened the door.
+Recognizing M. de Gesvres, he rushed at him, armed with the knife.
+M. de Gesvres succeeded in snatching the knife from him, struck him
+with it and himself fell, on receiving a blow from the man whom the
+two girls were to see a few minutes after."
+
+Once again, M. Filleul and the inspector exchanged glances. Ganimard
+tossed his head in a disconcerted way. The magistrate said:
+
+"Monsieur le Comte, am I to believe that this version is correct?"
+
+M. de Gesvres made no answer.
+
+"Come, Monsieur le Comte, your silence would us to suppose--I beg
+you to speak."
+
+Replying in a very clear voice, M. de Gesvres said:
+
+"The version is correct in every particular."
+
+The magistrate gave a start.
+
+"Then I cannot understand why you misled the police. Why conceal an
+act which you were lawfully entitled to commit in defense of your
+life?"
+
+"For twenty years," said M. de Gesvres, "Daval worked by my side. I
+trusted him. If he betrayed me, as the result of some temptation or
+other, I was, at least, unwilling, for the sake of the past, that
+his treachery should become known."
+
+"You were unwilling, I agree, but you had no right to be."
+
+"I am not of your opinion, Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction. As long
+as no innocent person was accused of the crime, I was absolutely
+entitled to refrain from accusing the man who was at the same time
+the culprit and the victim. He is dead. I consider death a
+sufficient punishment."
+
+"But now, Monsieur le Comte, now that the truth is known, you can
+speak."
+
+"Yes. Here are two rough drafts of letters written by him to his
+accomplices. I took them from his pocket-book, a few minutes after
+his death."
+
+"And the motive of his theft?"
+
+"Go to 18, Rue de la Barre, at Dieppe, which is the address of a
+certain Mme. Verdier. It was for this woman, whom he got to know two
+years ago, and to supply her constant need of money that Daval
+turned thief."
+
+So everything was cleared up. The tragedy rose out of the darkness
+and gradually appeared in its true light.
+
+"Let us go on," said M. Filluel after the count had withdrawn.
+
+"Upon my word," said Beautrelet, gaily, "I have said almost all that
+I had to say."
+
+"But the runaway, the wounded man?"
+
+"As to that, Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction, you know as much as I
+do. You have followed his tracks in the grass by the cloisters--you
+have--"
+
+"Yes, yes, I know. But, since then, his friends have removed him and
+what I want is a clue or two as regards that inn--"
+
+Isidore Beautrelet burst out laughing:
+
+"The inn! The inn does not exist! It's an invention, a trick to put
+the police on the wrong scent, an ingenious trick, too, for it seems
+to have succeeded."
+
+"But Dr. Delattre declares--"
+
+"Ah, that's just it!" cried Beautrelet, in a tone of conviction. "It
+is just because Dr. Delattre declares that we mustn't believe him.
+Why, Dr. Delattre refused to give any but the vaguest details
+concerning his adventure! He refused to say anything that might
+compromise his patient's safety!--And suddenly he calls attention to
+an inn!--You may be sure that he talked about that inn because he
+was told to. You may be sure that the whole story which he dished up
+to us was dictated to him under the threat of terrible reprisals.
+The doctor has a wife. The doctor has a daughter. He is too fond of
+them to disobey people of whose formidable power he has seen proofs.
+And that is why he has assisted your efforts by supplying the most
+precise clues."
+
+"So precise that the inn is nowhere to be found."
+
+"So precise that you have never ceased looking for it, in the face
+of all probability, and that your eyes have been turned away from
+the only spot where the man can be, the mysterious spot which he has
+not left, which he has been unable to leave ever since the moment
+when, wounded by Mlle. de Saint-Veran, he succeeded in dragging
+himself to it, like a beast to its lair."
+
+"But where, confound it all?--In what corner of Hades--?"
+
+"In the ruins of the old abbey."
+
+"But there are no ruins left!--A few bits of wall!--A few broken
+columns!"
+
+"That's where he's gone to earth. Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction!"
+shouted Beautrelet. "That's where you will have to look for him!
+It's there and nowhere else that you will find Arsene Lupin!"
+
+"Arsene Lupin!" yelled M. Filleul, springing to his feet.
+
+There was a rather solemn pause, amid which the syllables of the
+famous name seemed to prolong their sound. Was it possible that the
+vanquished and yet invisible adversary, whom they had been hunting
+in vain for several days, could really be Arsene Lupin? Arsene
+Lupin, caught in a trap, arrested, meant immediate promotion,
+fortune, glory to any examining magistrate!
+
+Ganimard had not moved a limb. Isidore said to him:
+
+"You agree with me, do you not, M. Inspector?"
+
+"Of course I do!"
+
+"You have not doubted either, for a moment have you, that he managed
+this business?"
+
+"Not for a second! The thing bears his signature. A move of Arsene
+Lupin's is as different from a move made by another man as one face
+is from another. You have only to open your eyes."
+
+"Do you think so? Do you think so?" said M. Filleul.
+
+"Think so!" cried the young man. "Look, here's one little fact: what
+are the initials under which those men correspond among themselves?
+'A. L. N.,' that is to say, the first letter of the name Arsene and
+the first and last letters of the name Lupin."
+
+"Ah," said Ganimard, "nothing escapes you! Upon my word, you're a
+fine fellow and old Ganimard lays down his arms before you!"
+
+Beautrelet flushed with pleasure and pressed the hand which the
+chief-inspector held out to him. The three men had drawn near the
+balcony and their eyes now took in the extent of the ruins. M.
+Filleul muttered:
+
+"So he ought to be there."
+
+"HE IS THERE," said Beautrelet, in a hollow voice. "He has been
+there ever since the moment when he fell. Logically and practically,
+he could not escape without being seen by Mlle. de Saint-Veran and
+the two servants."
+
+"What proof have you?"
+
+"His accomplices have furnished the proof. On the very morning, one
+of them disguised himself as a flyman and drove you here--"
+
+"To recover the cap, which would serve to identify him."
+
+"Very well, but also and more particularly to examine the spot, find
+out and see for himself what had become of the 'governor.'"
+
+"And did he find out?"
+
+"I presume so, as he knew the hiding-place. And I presume that he
+became aware of the desperate condition of his chief, because, under
+the impulse of his alarm, he committed the imprudence to write that
+threat: 'Woe betide the young lady, if she has killed the
+governor!'"
+
+"But his friends were able to take him away afterward?"
+
+"When? Your men have never left the ruins. And where could they have
+moved him to? At most, a few hundred yards away, for one doesn't let
+a dying man travel--and then you would have found him. No, I tell
+you, he is there. His friends would never have removed him from the
+safest of hiding-places. It was there that they brought the doctor,
+while the gendarmes were running to the fire like children."
+
+"But how is he living? How will he keep alive? To keep alive you
+need food and drink."
+
+"I can't say. I don't know. But he is there, I will swear it. He is
+there, because he can't help being there. I am as sure of it as if I
+saw as if I touched him. He is there."
+
+With his finger outstretched toward the ruins, he traced in the air
+a little circle which became smaller and smaller until it was only a
+point. And that point his two companions sought desperately, both
+leaning into space, both moved by the same faith in Beautrelet and
+quivering with the ardent conviction which he had forced upon them.
+Yes, Arsene Lupin was there. In theory and in fact, he was there:
+neither of them was now able to doubt it.
+
+And there was something impressive and tragic in knowing that the
+famous adventurer was lying in some dark shelter, below the ground,
+helpless, feverish and exhausted.
+
+"And if he dies?" asked M. Filleul, in a low voice.
+
+"If he dies," said Beautrelet, "and if his accomplices are sure of
+it, then see to the safety of Mlle. de Saint-Veran. Monsieur le Juge
+d'Instruction, for the vengeance will be terrible."
+
+        *       *       *       *       *
+
+A few minutes later and in spite of the entreaties of M. Filleul,
+who would gladly have made further use of this fascinating
+auxiliary, Isidore Beautrelet, whose holidays ended that day, went
+off by the Dieppe Road. He stepped from the train in Paris at five
+o'clock and, at eight o'clock, returned to the Lycee Janson together
+with his schoolfellows.
+
+Ganimard, after a minute, but utterly useless exploration of the
+ruins of Ambrumesy, returned to Paris by the fast night-train. On
+reaching his apartment in the Rue Pergolese, he found an express
+letter awaiting him:
+
+        *       *       *       *       *
+
+Monsieur l'Inspecteur Principal:
+
+Finding that I had a little time to spare at the end of the day, I
+have succeeded in collecting a few additional particulars which are
+sure to interest you.
+
+Arsene Lupin has been living in Paris for twelve months under the
+name of Etienne de Vaudreix. It is a name which you will often come
+across in the society notes or the sporting columns of the
+newspapers. He is a great traveler and is absent for long periods,
+during which, by his own account, he goes hunting tigers in Bengal
+or blue foxes in Siberia. He is supposed to be in business of some
+kind, although nobody is able to say for certain what his business
+is.
+
+His present address is 38, Rue Marbeuf; and I will call your
+attention to the fact that the Rue Marbeuf is close to Post-office
+Number 45. Since Thursday the twenty-third of April, the day before
+the burglary at Ambrumesy, there has been no news at all of Etienne
+de Vaudreix.
+
+With very many thanks for the kindness which you have shown me,
+believe me to be,
+   Monsieur l'Inspecteur Principal,
+       Yours sincerely,
+         ISIDORE BEAUTRELET.
+
+P.S.--Please on no account think that it cost me any great trouble
+to obtain this information. On the very morning of the crime, while
+M. Filleul was pursuing his examination before a few privileged
+persons, I had the fortunate inspiration to glance at the runaway's
+cap, before the sham flyman came to change it. The hatter's name was
+enough, as you may imagine, to enable me to find the clue that led
+to the identification of the purchaser and his address.
+
+        *       *       *       *       *
+
+The next morning, Ganimard called at 36, Rue Marbeuf. After
+questioning the concierge, he made him open the door of the ground-
+floor flat on the right, a very comfortable apartment, elegantly
+furnished, in which, however, he discovered nothing beyond some
+cinders in the fireplace. Two friends had come, four days earlier,
+to burn all compromising papers.
+
+But, just as he was leaving, Ganimard passed the postman, who was
+bringing a letter for M. de Vaudreix. That afternoon, the public
+prosecutor was informed of the case and ordered the letter to be
+given up. It bore an American postmark and contained the following
+lines, in English:
+
+        *       *       *       *       *
+
+DEAR SIR:
+
+I write to confirm the answer which I gave your representative. As
+soon as you have M. de Gesvres's four pictures in your possession,
+you can forward them as arranged.
+
+You may add the rest, if you are able to succeed, which I doubt.
+
+An unexpected business requires my presence in Europe and I shall
+reach Paris at the same time as this letter. You will find me at the
+Grand Hotel.
+
+Yours faithfully,
+
+EPHRAIM B. HARLINGTON.
+
+        *       *       *       *       *
+
+That same day, Ganimard applied for a warrant and took Mr. E. B.
+Harlington, an American citizen, to the police-station, on a charge
+of receiving and conspiracy.
+
+        *       *       *       *       *
+
+Thus, within the space of twenty-four hours, all the threads of the
+plot had been unraveled, thanks to the really unforeseen clues
+supplied by a schoolboy of seventeen. In twenty-four hours, what had
+seemed inexplicable became simple and clear. In twenty-four hours,
+the scheme devised by the accomplices to save their leader was
+baffled; the capture of Arsene Lupin, wounded and dying, was no
+longer in doubt, his gang was disorganized, the address of his
+establishment in Paris and the name which he assumed were known and,
+for the first time, one of his cleverest and most carefully
+elaborated feats was seen through before he had been able to ensure
+its complete execution.
+
+An immense clamor of astonishment, admiration and curiosity arose
+among the public. Already, the Rouen journalist, in a very able
+article, had described the first examination of the sixth-form
+pupil, laying stress upon his personal charm, his simplicity of
+manner and his quiet assurance. The indiscretions of Ganimard and M.
+Filleul, indiscretions to which they yielded in spite of themselves,
+under an impulse that proved stronger than their professional pride,
+suddenly enlightened the public as to the part played by Isidore
+Beautrelet in recent events. He alone had done everything. To him
+alone the merit of the victory was due.
+
+The excitement was intense. Isidore Beautrelet awoke to find himself
+a hero; and the crowd, suddenly infatuated, insisted upon the
+fullest information regarding its new favorite. The reporters were
+there to supply it. They rushed to the assault of the Lycee Janson-
+de-Sailly, waited for the day-boarders to come out after schoolhours
+and picked up all that related, however remotely, to Beautrelet. It
+was in this way that they learned the reputation which he enjoyed
+among his schoolfellows, who called him the rival of Holmlock
+Shears. Thanks to his powers of logical reasoning, with no further
+data than those which he was able to gather from the papers, he had,
+time after time, proclaimed the solution of very complicated cases
+long before they were cleared up by the police.
+
+It had become a game at the Lycee Janson to put difficult questions
+and intricate problems to Beautrelet; and it was astonishing to see
+with what unhesitating and analytical power and by means of what
+ingenious deductions he made his way through the thickest darkness.
+Ten days before the arrest of Jorisse, the grocer, he showed what
+could be done with the famous umbrella. In the same way, he declared
+from the beginning, in the matter of the Saint-Cloud mystery, that
+the concierge was the only possible murderer.
+
+But most curious of all was the pamphlet which was found circulating
+among the boys at the school, a typewritten pamphlet signed by
+Beautrelet and manifolded to the number of ten copies. It was
+entitled, ARSENE LUPIN AND HIS METHOD, SHOWING IN HOW FAR THE LATTER
+IS BASED UPON TRADITION AND IN HOW FAR ORIGINAL. FOLLOWED BY A
+COMPARISON BETWEEN ENGLISH HUMOR AND FRENCH IRONY.
+
+It contained a profound study of each of the exploits of Arsene
+Lupin, throwing the illustrious burglar's operations into
+extraordinary relief, showing the very mechanism of his way of
+setting to work, his special tactics, his letters to the press, his
+threats, the announcement of his thefts, in short, the whole bag of
+tricks which he employed to bamboozle his selected victim and throw
+him into such a state of mind that the victim almost offered himself
+to the plot contrived against him and that everything took place, as
+it were, with his own consent.
+
+And the work was so just, regarded as a piece of criticism, so
+penetrating, so lively and marked by a wit so clever and, at the
+same time, so cruel that the lawyers at once passed over to his
+side, that the sympathy of the crowd was summarily transferred from
+Lupin to Beautrelet and that, in the struggle engaged upon between
+the two, the schoolboy's victory was loudly proclaimed in advance.
+
+Be this as it may, both M. Filleul and the Paris public prosecutor
+seemed jealously to reserve the possibility of this victory for him.
+On the one hand, they failed to establish Mr. Harlington's identity
+or to furnish a definite proof of his connection with Lupin's gang.
+Confederate or not, he preserved an obstinate silence. Nay, more,
+after examining his handwriting, it was impossible to declare that
+he was the author of the intercepted letter. A Mr. Harlington,
+carrying a small portmanteau and a pocket-book stuffed with bank-
+notes, had taken up his abode at the Grand Hotel: that was all that
+could be stated with certainty.
+
+On the other hand, at Dieppe, M. Filleul lay down on the positions
+which Beautrelet had won for him. He did not move a step forward.
+Around the individual whom Mlle. de Saint-Veran had taken for
+Beautrelet, on the eve of the crime, the same mystery reigned as
+heretofore. The same obscurity also surrounded everything connected
+with the removal of the four Rubens pictures. What had become of
+them? And what road had been taken by the motor car in which they
+were carried off during the night?
+
+Evidence of its passing was obtained at Luneray at Yerville, at
+Yvetot and at Caudebec-en-Caux, where it must have crossed the Seine
+at daybreak in the steam-ferry. But, when the matter came to be
+inquired into more thoroughly, it was stated that the motor car was
+an uncovered one and that it would have been impossible to pack four
+large pictures into it unobserved by the ferryman.
+
+It was very probably the same car; but then the question cropped up
+again: what had become of the four Rubenses?
+
+These were so many problems which M. Filleul unanswered. Every day,
+his subordinates searched the quadrilateral of the ruins. Almost
+every day, he came to direct the explorations. But between that and
+discovering the refuge in which Lupin lay dying--if it were true
+that Beautrelet's opinion was correct--there was a gulf fixed which
+the worthy magistrate did not seem likely to cross.
+
+And so it was natural that they should turn once more to Isidore
+Beautrelet, as he alone had succeeded in dispelling shadows which,
+in his absence, gathered thicker and more impenetrable than ever.
+Why did he not go on with the case? Seeing how far he had carried
+it, he required but an effort to succeed.
+
+The question was put to him by a member of the staff of the Grand
+Journal, who had obtained admission to the Lycee Janson by assuming
+the name of Bernod, the friend of Beautrelet's father. And Isidore
+very sensibly replied:
+
+"My dear sir, there are other things besides Lupin in this world,
+other things besides stories about burglars and detectives. There
+is, for instance, the thing which is known as taking one's degree.
+Now I am going up for my examination in July. This is May. And I
+don't want to be plucked. What would my worthy parent say?"
+
+"But what would he say if you delivered Arsene Lupin into the hands
+of the police?"
+
+"Tut! There's a time for everything. In the next holidays--"
+
+"Whitsuntide?"
+
+"Yes--I shall go down on Saturday the sixth of June by the first
+train."
+
+"And, on the evening of that Saturday, Lupin will be taken."
+
+"Will you give me until the Sunday?" asked Beautrelet, laughing.
+
+"Why delay?" replied the journalist, quite seriously.
+
+This inexplicable confidence, born of yesterday and already so
+strong, was felt with regard to the young man by one and all, even
+though, in reality, events had justified it only up to a certain
+point. No matter, people believed in him! Nothing seemed difficult
+to him. They expected from him what they were entitled to expect at
+most from some phenomenon of penetration and intuition, of
+experience and skill. That day of the sixth of June was made to
+sprawl over all the papers. On the sixth of June, Isidore Beautrelet
+would take the fast train to Dieppe: and Lupin would be arrested on
+the same evening.
+
+"Unless he escapes between this and then," objected the last
+remaining partisans of the adventurer.
+
+"Impossible! Every outlet is watched."
+
+"Unless he has succumbed to his wounds, then," said the partisans,
+who would have preferred their hero's death to his capture.
+
+And the retort was immediate:
+
+"Nonsense! If Lupin were dead, his confederates would know it by
+now, and Lupin would be revenged. Beautrelet said so!"
+
+        *       *       *       *       *
+
+And the sixth of June came. Half a dozen journalists were looking
+out for Isidore at the Gare Saint-Lazare. Two of them wanted to
+accompany him on his journey. He begged them to refrain.
+
+He started alone, therefore, in a compartment to himself. He was
+tired, thanks to a series of nights devoted to study, and soon fell
+asleep. He slept heavily. In his dreams, he had an impression that
+the train stopped at different stations and that people got in and
+out. When he awoke, within sight of Rouen, he was still alone. But,
+on the back of the opposite seat, was a large sheet of paper,
+fastened with a pin to the gray cloth. It bore these words:
+
+  "Every man should mind his own business. Do you mind yours.
+  If not, you must take the consequences."
+
+"Capital!" he exclaimed, rubbing his hands with delight. "Things are
+going badly in the adversary's camp. That threat is as stupid and
+vulgar as the sham flyman's. What a style! One can see that it
+wasn't composed by Lupin."
+
+The train threaded the tunnel that precedes the old Norman city. On
+reaching the station, Isidore took a few turns on the platform to
+stretch his legs. He was about to re-enter his compartment, when a
+cry escaped him. As he passed the bookstall, he had read, in an
+absent-minded way, the following lines on the front page of a
+special edition of the Journal de Rouen; and their alarming sense
+suddenly burst upon him:
+
+        *       *       *       *       *
+
+STOP-PRESS NEWS
+
+We hear by telephone from Dieppe that the Chateau d'Ambrumesy was
+broken into last night by criminals, who bound and gagged Mlle. de
+Gesvres and carried off Mlle. de Saint-Veran. Traces of blood have
+been seen at a distance of five hundred yards from the house and a
+scarf has been found close by, which is also stained with blood.
+There is every reason to fear that the poor young girl has been
+murdered.
+
+        *       *       *       *       *
+
+Isidore Beautrelet completed his journey to Dieppe without moving a
+limb. Bent in two, with his elbows on his knees and his hands
+plastered against his face, he sat thinking.
+
+At Dieppe, he took a fly. At the door of Ambrumesy, he met the
+examining magistrate, who confirmed the horrible news.
+
+"You know nothing more?" asked Beautrelet.
+
+"Nothing. I have only just arrived."
+
+At that moment, the sergeant of gendarmes came up to M. Filleul and
+handed him a crumpled, torn and discolored piece of paper, which he
+had picked up not far from the place where the scarf was found. M.
+Filleul looked at it and gave it to Beautrelet, saying:
+
+"I don't suppose this will help us much in our investigations."
+
+Isidore turned the paper over and over. It was covered with figures,
+dots and signs and presented the exact appearance reproduced below:
+
+[Illustration: drawing of an outline of paper with writing and
+drawing on it--numbers, dots, some letters, signs and symbols,
+something like...
+
+   2.1.1..2..2.1..1..
+   1...2.2.   2.43.2..2.
+   .45..2.4...2..2.4..2
+   D DF square 19F+44triangle357triangle
+   13.53..2   ..25.2
+
+]
+
+
+
+CHAPTER THREE
+
+THE CORPSE
+
+
+At six o'clock in the evening, having finished all he had to do, M.
+Filluel, accompanied by M. Bredoux, his clerk, stood waiting for the
+carriage which was to take him back to Dieppe. He seemed restless,
+nervous. Twice over, he asked:
+
+"You haven't seen anything of young Beautrelet, I suppose?"
+
+"No, Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction, I can't say I have."
+
+"Where on earth can he be? I haven't set eyes on him all day!"
+
+Suddenly, he had an idea, handed his portfolio to Bredoux, ran round
+the chateau and made for the ruins. Isidore Beautrelet was lying
+near the cloisters, flat on his face, with one arm folded under his
+head, on the ground carpeted with pine-needles. He seemed drowsing.
+
+"Hullo, young man, what are you doing here? Are you asleep?"
+
+"I'm not asleep. I've been thinking."
+
+"Ever since this morning?"
+
+"Ever since this morning."
+
+"It's not a question of thinking! One must see into things first,
+study facts, look for clues, establish connecting links. The time
+for thinking comes after, when one pieces all that together and
+discovers the truth."
+
+"Yes, I know.--That's the usual way, the right one, I dare say.--
+Mine is different.--I think first, I try, above all, to get the
+general hang of the case, if I may so express myself. Then I imagine
+a reasonable and logical hypothesis, which fits in with the general
+idea. And then, and not before, I examine the facts to see if they
+agree with my hypothesis."
+
+"That's a funny method and a terribly complicated one!"
+
+"It's a sure method, M. Filleul, which is more than can be said of
+yours."
+
+"Come, come! Facts are facts."
+
+"With your ordinary sort of adversary, yes. But, given an enemy
+endowed with a certain amount of cunning, the facts are those which
+he happens to have selected. Take the famous clues upon which you
+base your inquiry: why, he was at liberty to arrange them as he
+liked. And you see where that can lead you, into what mistakes and
+absurdities, when you are dealing with a man like Arsene Lupin.
+Holmlock Shears himself fell into the trap."
+
+"Arsene Lupin is dead."
+
+"No matter. His gang remains and the pupils of such a master are
+masters themselves."
+
+M. Filleul took Isidore by the arm and, leading him away:
+
+"Words, young man, words. Here is something of more importance.
+Listen to me. Ganimard is otherwise engaged at this moment and will
+not be here for a few days. On the other hand, the Comte de Gesvres
+has telegraphed to Holmlock Shears, who has promised his assistance
+next week. Now don't you think, young man, that it would be a
+feather in our cap if we were able to say to those two celebrities,
+on the day of their arrival, 'Awfully sorry, gentlemen, but we
+couldn't wait. The business is done'?"
+
+It was impossible for M. Filleul to confess helplessness with
+greater candor. Beautrelet suppressed a smile and, pretending not to
+see through the worthy magistrate, replied:
+
+"I confess. Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction, that, if I was not
+present at your inquiry just now, it was because I hoped that you
+would consent to tell me the results. May I ask what you have
+learned?"
+
+"Well, last night, at eleven o'clock, the three gendarmes whom
+Sergeant Quevillon had left on guard at the chateau received a note
+from the sergeant telling them to hasten with all speed to Ouville,
+where they are stationed. They at once rode off, and when they
+arrived at Ouville--"
+
+"They discovered that they had been tricked, that the order was a
+forgery and that there was nothing for them to do but return to
+Ambrumesy."
+
+"This they did, accompanied by Sergeant Quevillon. But they were
+away for an hour and a half and, during this time, the crime was
+committed."
+
+"In what circumstances?"
+
+"Very simple circumstances, indeed. A ladder was removed from the
+farm buildings and placed against the second story of the chateau. A
+pane of glass was cut out and a window opened. Two men, carrying a
+dark lantern, entered Mlle. de Gesvres's room and gagged her before
+she could cry out. Then, after binding her with cords, they softly
+opened the door of the room in which Mlle. de Saint-Veran was
+sleeping. Mlle. de Gesvres heard a stifled moan, followed by the
+sound of a person struggling. A moment later, she saw two men
+carrying her cousin, who was also bound and gagged. They passed in
+front of her and went out through the window. Then Mlle. de Gesvres,
+terrified and exhausted, fainted."
+
+"But what about the dogs? I thought M. de Gesvres had bought two
+almost wild sheep-dogs, which were let loose at night?"
+
+"They were found dead, poisoned."
+
+"By whom? Nobody could get near them."
+
+"It's a mystery. The fact remains that the two men crossed the ruins
+without let or hindrance and went out by the little door which we
+have heard so much about. They passed through the copsewood,
+following the line of the disused quarries. It was not until they
+were nearly half a mile from the chateau, at the foot of the tree
+known as the Great Oak, that they stopped--and executed their
+purpose."
+
+"If they came with the intention of killing Mlle. de Saint-Veran,
+why didn't they murder her in her room?"
+
+"I don't know. Perhaps the incident that settled their determination
+only occurred after they had left the house. Perhaps the girl
+succeeded in releasing herself from her bonds. In my opinion, the
+scarf which was picked up was used to fasten her wrists. In any
+case, the blow was struck at the foot of the Great Oak. I have
+collected indisputable proofs--"
+
+"But the body?"
+
+"The body has not been found, but there is nothing excessively
+surprising in that. As a matter of fact, the trail which I followed
+brought me to the church at Varengeville and the old cemetery
+perched on the top of the cliff. From there it is a sheer precipice,
+a fall of over three hundred feet to the rocks and the sea below. In
+a day or two, a stronger tide than usual will cast up the body on
+the beach."
+
+"Obviously. This is all very simple."
+
+"Yes, it is all very simple and doesn't trouble me in the least.
+Lupin is dead, his accomplices heard of it and, to revenge
+themselves, have killed Mlle. de Saint-Veran. These are facts which
+did not even require checking. But Lupin?"
+
+"What about him?"
+
+"What has become of him? In all probability, his confederates
+removed his corpse at the same time that they carried away the girl;
+but what proof have we? None at all. Any more than of his staying in
+the ruins, or of his death, or of his life. And that is the real
+mystery, M. Beautrelet. The murder of Mlle. Raymonde solves nothing.
+On the contrary, it only complicates matters. What has been
+happening during the past two months at the Chateau d'Ambrumesy? If
+we don't clear up the riddle, young man, others will give us the go-
+by."
+
+"On what day are those others coming?"
+
+"Wednesday--Tuesday perhaps--"
+
+Beautrelet seemed to be making an inward calculation and then
+declared:
+
+"Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction, this is Saturday. I have to be back
+at school on Monday evening. Well, if you will have the goodness to
+be here at ten o'clock exactly on Monday morning, I will try to give
+you the key to the riddle."
+
+"Really, M. Beautrelet--do you think so? Are you sure?"
+
+"I hope so, at any rate."
+
+"And where are you going now?"
+
+"I am going to see if the facts consent to fit in with the general
+theory which I am beginning to perceive."
+
+"And if they don't fit in?"
+
+"Well, Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction," said Beautrelet, with a
+laugh, "then it will be their fault and I must look for others
+which, will prove more tractable. Till Monday, then?"
+
+"Till Monday."
+
+A few minutes later, M. Filleul was driving toward Dieppe, while
+Isidore mounted a bicycle which he had borrowed from the Comte de
+Gesvres and rode off along the road to Yerville and Caudebec-en-
+Caux.
+
+There was one point in particular on which the young man was anxious
+to form a clear opinion, because this just appeared to him to be the
+enemy's weakest point. Objects of the size of the four Rubens
+pictures cannot be juggled away. They were bound to be somewhere.
+Granting that it was impossible to find them for the moment, might
+one not discover the road by which they had disappeared?
+
+What Beautrelet surmised was that the four pictures had undoubtedly
+been carried off in the motor car, but that, before reaching
+Caudebec, they were transferred to another car, which had crossed
+the Seine either above Caudebec or below it. Now the first horse-
+boat down the stream was at Quillebeuf, a greatly frequented ferry
+and, consequently, dangerous. Up stream, there was the ferry-boat at
+La Mailleraie, a large, but lonely market-town, lying well off the
+main road.
+
+By midnight, Isidore had covered the thirty-five or forty miles to
+La Mailleraie and was knocking at the door of an inn by the
+waterside. He slept there and, in the morning, questioned the
+ferrymen.
+
+They consulted the counterfoils in the traffic-book. No motor-car
+had crossed on Thursday the 23rd of April.
+
+"A horse-drawn vehicle, then?" suggested Beautrelet. "A cart? A
+van?"
+
+"No, not either."
+
+Isidore continued his inquiries all through the morning. He was on
+the point of leaving for Quillebeuf, when the waiter of the inn at
+which he had spent the night said:
+
+"I came back from my thirteen days' training on the morning of which
+you are speaking and I saw a cart, but it did not go across."
+
+"Really?"
+
+"No, they unloaded it onto a flat boat, a barge of sorts, which was
+moored to the wharf."
+
+"And where did the cart come from?"
+
+"Oh, I knew it at once. It belonged to Master Vatinel, the carter."
+
+"And where does he live?"
+
+"At Louvetot."
+
+Beautrelet consulted his military map. The hamlet of Louvetot lay
+where the highroad between Yvetot and Caudebec was crossed by a
+little winding road that ran through the woods to La Mailleraie.
+
+Not until six o'clock in the evening did Isidore succeed in
+discovering Master Vatinel, in a pothouse. Master Vatinel was one of
+those artful old Normans who are always on their guard, who distrust
+strangers, but who are unable to resist the lure of a gold coin or
+the influence of a glass or two:
+
+"Well, yes, sir, the men in the motor car that morning had told me
+to meet them at five o'clock at the crossroads. They gave me four
+great, big things, as high as that. One of them went with me and we
+carted the things to the barge."
+
+"You speak of them as if you knew them before."
+
+"I should think I did know them! It was the sixth time they were
+employing me."
+
+Isidore gave a start:
+
+"The sixth time, you say? And since when?"
+
+"Why every day before that one, to be sure! But it was other things
+then--great blocks of stone--or else smaller, longish ones, wrapped
+up in newspapers, which they carried as if they were worth I don't
+know what. Oh, I mustn't touch those on any account!--But what's the
+matter? You've turned quite white."
+
+"Nothing--the heat of the room--"
+
+Beautrelet staggered out into the air. The joy, the surprise of the
+discovery made him feel giddy. He went back very quietly to
+Varengeville, slept in the village, spent an hour at the mayor's
+offices with the school-master and returned to the chateau. There he
+found a letter awaiting him "care of M. le Comte de Gesvres." It
+consisted of a single line:
+
+"Second warning. Hold your tongue. If not--"
+
+"Come," he muttered. "I shall have to make up my mind and take a few
+precautions for my personal safety. If not, as they say--"
+
+It was nine o'clock. He strolled about among the ruins and then lay
+down near the cloisters and closed his eyes.
+
+"Well, young man, are you satisfied with the results of your
+campaign?"
+
+It was M. Filleul.
+
+"Delighted, Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction."
+
+"By which you mean to say--?"
+
+"By which I mean to say that I am prepared to keep my promise--in
+spite of this very uninviting letter."
+
+He showed the letter to M. Filleul.
+
+"Pooh! Stuff and nonsense!" cried the magistrate. "I hope you won't
+let that prevent you--"
+
+"From telling you what I know? No, Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction. I
+have given my word and I shall keep it. In less than ten minutes,
+you shall know--a part of the truth."
+
+"A part?"
+
+"Yes, in my opinion, Lupin's hiding-place does not constitute the
+whole of the problem. Far from it. But we shall see later on."
+
+"M. Beautrelet, nothing that you do could astonish me now. But how
+were you able to discover--?"
+
+"Oh, in a very natural way! In the letter from old man Harlington to
+M. Etienne de Vaudreix, or rather to Lupin--"
+
+"The intercepted letter?"
+
+"Yes. There is a phrase which always puzzled me. After saying that
+the pictures are to be forwarded as arranged, he goes on to say,
+'You may add THE REST, if you are able to succeed, which I doubt.'"
+
+"Yes, I remember."
+
+"What was this 'rest'? A work of art, a curiosity? The chateau
+contains nothing of any value besides the Rubenses and the
+tapestries. Jewelry? There is very little and what there is of it is
+not worth much. In that case, what could it be?--On the other hand,
+was it conceivable that people so prodigiously clever as Lupin
+should not have succeeded in adding 'the rest,' which they
+themselves had evidently suggested? A difficult undertaking, very
+likely; exceptional, surprising, I dare say; but possible and
+therefore certain, since Lupin wished it."
+
+"And yet he failed: nothing has disappeared."
+
+"He did not fail: something has disappeared."
+
+"Yes, the Rubenses--but--"
+
+"The Rubenses and something besides--something which has been
+replaced by a similar thing, as in the case of the Rubenses;
+something much more uncommon, much rarer, much more valuable than
+the Rubenses."
+
+"Well, what? You're killing me with this procrastination!"
+
+While talking, the two men had crossed the ruins, turned toward the
+little door and were now walking beside the chapel. Beautrelet
+stopped:
+
+"Do you really want to know, Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction?"
+
+"Of course, I do."
+
+Beautrelet was carrying a walking-stick, a strong, knotted stick.
+Suddenly, with a back stroke of this stick, he smashed one of the
+little statues that adorned the front of the chapel.
+
+"Why, you're mad!" shouted M. Filleul, beside himself, rushing at
+the broken pieces of the statue. "You're mad! That old saint was an
+admirable bit of work--"
+
+"An admirable bit of work!" echoed Isidore, giving a whirl which
+brought down the Virgin Mary.
+
+M. Filleul took hold of him round the body:
+
+"Young man, I won't allow you to commit--"
+
+A wise man of the East came toppling to the ground, followed by a
+manger containing the Mother and Child. . . .
+
+"If you stir another limb, I fire!"
+
+The Comte de Gesvres had appeared upon the scene and was cocking his
+revolver. Beautrelet burst out laughing:
+
+"That's right, Monsieur le Comte, blaze away!--Take a shot at them,
+as if you were at a fair!--Wait a bit--this chap carrying his head
+in his hands--"
+
+St. John the Baptist fell, shattered to pieces.
+
+"Oh!" shouted the count, pointing his revolver. "You young vandal!--
+Those masterpieces!"
+
+"Sham, Monsieur le Comte!"
+
+"What? What's that?" roared M. Filleul, wresting the Comte de
+Gesvres's weapon from him.
+
+"Sham!" repeated Beautrelet. "Paper-pulp and plaster!"
+
+"Oh, nonsense! It can't be true!"
+
+"Hollow plaster, I tell you! Nothing at all!"
+
+The count stooped and picked up a sliver of a statuette.
+
+"Look at it, Monsieur le Comte, and see for yourself: it's plaster!
+Rusty, musty, mildewed plaster, made to look like old stone--but
+plaster for all that, plaster casts!--That's all that remains of
+your perfect masterpiece!--That's what they've done in just a few
+days!-That's what the Sieur Charpenais who copied the Rubenses,
+prepared a year ago." He seized M. Filleul's arm in his turn. "What
+do you think of it, Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction? Isn't it fine?
+Isn't it grand? Isn't it gorgeous? The chapel has been removed! A
+whole Gothic chapel collected stone by stone! A whole population of
+statues captured and replaced by these chaps in stucco! One of the
+most magnificent specimens of an incomparable artistic period
+confiscated! The chapel, in short, stolen! Isn't it immense? Ah,
+Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction, what a genius the man is!"
+
+"You're allowing yourself to be carried away, M. Beautrelet."
+
+"One can't be carried away too much, monsieur, when one has to do
+with people like that. Everything above the average deserves our
+admiration. And this man soars above everything. There is in his
+flight a wealth of imagination, a force and power, a skill and
+freedom that send a thrill through me!"
+
+"Pity he's dead," said M. Filleul, with a grin. "He'd have ended by
+stealing the towers of Notre-Dame."
+
+Isidore shrugged his shoulders:
+
+"Don't laugh, monsieur. He upsets you, dead though he may be."
+
+"I don't say not, I don't say not, M. Beautrelet, I confess that I
+feel a certain excitement now that I am about to set eyes on him--
+unless, indeed, his friends have taken away the body."
+
+"And always admitting," observed the Comte de Gesvres, "that it was
+really he who was wounded by my poor niece."
+
+"It was he, beyond a doubt, Monsieur le Comte," declared Beautrelet;
+"it was he, believe me, who fell in the ruins under the shot fired
+by Mlle. de Saint-Veran; it was he whom she saw rise and who fell
+again and dragged himself toward the cloisters to rise again for the
+last time--this by a miracle which I will explain to you presently--
+to rise again for the last time and reach this stone shelter--which
+was to be his tomb."
+
+And Beautrelet struck the threshold of the chapel with his stick.
+
+"Eh? What?" cried M. Filleul, taken aback. "His tomb?--Do you think
+that that impenetrable hiding-place--"
+
+"It was here--there," he repeated.
+
+"But we searched it."
+
+"Badly."
+
+"There is no hiding-place here," protested M. de Gesvres. "I know
+the chapel."
+
+"Yes, there is, Monsieur le Comte. Go to the mayor's office at
+Varengeville, where they have collected all the papers that used to
+be in the old parish of Ambrumesy, and you will learn from those
+papers, which belong to the eighteenth century, that there is a
+crypt below the chapel. This crypt doubtless dates back to the Roman
+chapel, upon the site of which the present one was built."
+
+"But how can Lupin have known this detail?" asked M. Filleul.
+
+"In a very simple manner: because of the works which he had to
+execute to take away the chapel."
+
+"Come, come, M. Beautrelet, you're exaggerating. He has not taken
+away the whole chapel. Look, not one of the stones of this top
+course has been touched."
+
+"Obviously, he cast and took away only what had a financial value:
+the wrought stones, the sculptures, the statuettes, the whole
+treasure of little columns and carved arches. He did not trouble
+about the groundwork of the building itself. The foundations
+remain."
+
+"Therefore, M. Beautrelet, Lupin was not able to make his way into
+the crypt."
+
+At that moment, M. de Gesvres, who had been to call a servant,
+returned with the key of the chapel. He opened the door. The three
+men entered. After a short examination Beautrelet said:
+
+"The flag-stones on the ground have been respected, as one might
+expect. But it is easy to perceive that the high altar is nothing
+more than a cast. Now, generally, the staircase leading to the crypt
+opens in front of the high altar and passes under it."
+
+"What do you conclude?"
+
+"I conclude that Lupin discovered the crypt when working at the
+altar."
+
+The count sent for a pickaxe and Beautrelet attacked the altar. The
+plaster flew to right and left. He pushed the pieces aside as he
+went on.
+
+"By Jove!" muttered M. Filleul, "I am eager to know--"
+
+"So am I," said Beautrelet, whose face was pale with anguish.
+
+He hurried his blows. And, suddenly, his pickaxe, which, until then,
+had encountered no resistance, struck against a harder material and
+rebounded. There was a sound of something falling in; and all that
+remained of the altar went tumbling into the gap after the block of
+stone which had been struck by the pickaxe. Beautrelet bent forward.
+A puff of cold air rose to his face. He lit a match and moved it
+from side to side over the gap:
+
+"The staircase begins farther forward than I expected, under the
+entrance-flags, almost. I can see the last steps, there, right at
+the bottom."
+
+"Is it deep?"
+
+"Three or four yards. The steps are very high--and there are some
+missing."
+
+"It is hardly likely," said M. Filleul, "that the accomplices can
+have had time to remove the body from the cellar, when they were
+engaged in carrying off Mlle. de Saint-Veran--during the short
+absence of the gendarmes. Besides, why should they?--No, in my
+opinion, the body is here."
+
+A servant brought them a ladder. Beautrelet let it down through the
+opening and fixed it, after groping among the fallen fragments.
+Holding the two uprights firmly:
+
+"Will you go down, M. Filleul?" he asked.
+
+The magistrate, holding a candle in his hand, ventured down the
+ladder. The Comte de Gesvres followed him and Beautrelet, in his
+turn, placed his foot on the first rung.
+
+Mechanically, he counted eighteen rungs, while his eyes examined the
+crypt, where the glimmer of the candle struggled against the heavy
+darkness. But, at the bottom, his nostrils were assailed by one of
+those foul and violent smells which linger in the memory for many a
+long day. And, suddenly, a trembling hand seized him by the
+shoulder.
+
+"Well, what is it?"
+
+"B-beautrelet," stammered M. Filleul. "B-beau-trelet--"
+
+He could not get a word out for terror.
+
+"Come, Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction, compose yourself!"
+
+"Beautrelet--he is there--"
+
+"Eh?"
+
+"Yes--there was something under the big stone that broke off the
+altar--I pushed the stone--and I touched--I shall never--shall never
+forget.--"
+
+"Where is it?"
+
+"On this side.--Don't you notice the smell?--And then look--see."
+
+He took the candle and held it towards a motionless form stretched
+upon the ground.
+
+"Oh!" exclaimed Beautrelet, in a horror-stricken tone.
+
+The three men bent down quickly. The corpse lay half-naked, lean,
+frightful. The flesh, which had the greenish hue of soft wax,
+appeared in places through the torn clothes. But the most hideous
+thing, the thing that had drawn a cry of terror from the young man's
+lips, was the head, the head which had just been crushed by the
+block of stone, the shapeless head, a repulsive mass in which not
+one feature could be distinguished.
+
+Beautrelet took four strides up the ladder and fled into the
+daylight and the open air.
+
+M. Filleul found him again lying flat on the around, with his hands
+glued to his face:
+
+"I congratulate you, Beautrelet," he said. "In addition to the
+discovery of the hiding-place, there are two points on which I have
+been able to verify the correctness of your assertions. First of
+all, the man on whom Mlle. de Saint-Veran fired was indeed Arsene
+Lupin, as you said from the start. Also, he lived in Paris under the
+name of Etienne de Vaudreix. His linen is marked with the initials
+E. V. That ought to be sufficient proof, I think: don't you?"
+
+Isidore did not stir.
+
+"Monsieur le Comte has gone to have a horse put to. They're sending
+for Dr. Jouet, who will make the usual examination. In my opinion,
+death must have taken place a week ago, at least. The state of
+decomposition of the corpse--but you don't seem to be listening--"
+
+"Yes, yes."
+
+"What I say is based upon absolute reasons. Thus, for instance--"
+
+M. Filleul continued his demonstrations, without, however,
+obtaining any more manifest marks of attention. But M. de Gesvres's
+return interrupted his monologue. The comte brought two letters. One
+was to tell him that Holmlock Shears would arrive next morning.
+
+"Capital!" cried M. Filleul, joyfully. "Inspector Ganimard will be
+here too. It will be delightful."
+
+"The other letter is for you, Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction," said
+the comte.
+
+"Better and better," said M. Filleul, after reading it. "There will
+certainly not be much for those two gentlemen to do. M. Beautrelet,
+I hear from Dieppe that the body of a young woman was found by some
+shrimpers, this morning, on the rocks."
+
+Beautrelet gave a start:
+
+"What's that? The body--"
+
+"Of a young woman.--The body is horribly mutilated, they say, and it
+would be impossible to establish the identity, but for a very narrow
+little gold curb-bracelet on the right arm which has become
+encrusted in the swollen skin. Now Mlle. de Saint-Veran used to wear
+a gold curb-bracelet on her right arm. Evidently, therefore,
+Monsieur le Comte, this is the body of your poor niece, which the
+sea must have washed to that distance. What do you think,
+Beautrelet?"
+
+"Nothing--nothing--or, rather, yes--everything is connected, as you
+see--and there is no link missing in my argument. All the facts, one
+after the other, however contradictory, however disconcerting they
+may appear, end by supporting the supposition which I imagined from
+the first."
+
+"I don't understand."
+
+"You soon will. Remember, I promised you the whole truth."
+
+"But it seems to me--"
+
+"A little patience, Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction. So far, you have
+had no cause to complain of me. It is a fine day. Go for a walk,
+lunch at the chateau, smoke your pipe. I shall be back by four
+o'clock. As for my school, well, I don't care: I shall take the
+night train."
+
+They had reached the out-houses at the back of the chateau.
+Beautrelet jumped on his bicycle and rode away.
+
+At Dieppe, he stopped at the office of the local paper, the Vigie,
+and examined the file for the last fortnight. Then he went on to the
+market-town of Envermeu, six or seven miles farther. At Envermeu, he
+talked to the mayor, the rector and the local policeman. The church-
+clock struck three. His inquiry was finished.
+
+He returned singing for joy. He pressed upon the two pedals turn by
+turn, with an equal and powerful rhythm; his chest opened wide to
+take in the keen air that blew from the sea. And, from time to time,
+he forgot himself to the extent of uttering shouts of triumph to the
+sky, when he thought of the aim which he was pursuing and of the
+success that was crowning his efforts.
+
+Ambrumesy appeared in sight. He coasted at full speed down the slope
+leading to the chateau. The top rows of venerable trees that line
+the road seemed to run to meet him and to vanish behind him
+forthwith. And, all at once, he uttered a cry. In a sudden vision,
+he had seen a rope stretched from one tree to another, across the
+road.
+
+His machine gave a jolt and stopped short. Beautrelet was flung
+three yards forward, with immense violence, and it seemed to him
+that only chance, a miraculous chance, caused him to escape a heap
+of pebbles on which, logically, he ought to have broken his head.
+
+He lay for a few seconds stunned. Then, all covered with bruises,
+with the skin flayed from his knees, he examined the spot. On the
+right lay a small wood, by which his aggressor had no doubt fled.
+Beautrelet untied the rope. To the tree on the left around which it
+was fastened a small piece of paper was fixed with string.
+Beautrelet unfolded it and read:
+
+"The third and last warning."
+
+He went on to the chateau, put a few questions to the servants and
+joined the examining magistrate in a room on the ground floor, at
+the end of the right wing, where M. Filleul used to sit in the
+course of his operations. M. Filleul was writing, with his clerk
+seated opposite to him. At a sign from him, the clerk left the room;
+and the magistrate exclaimed:
+
+"Why, what have you been doing to yourself, M. Beautrelet? Your
+hands are covered with blood."
+
+"It's nothing, it's nothing," said the young man. "Just a fall
+occasioned by this rope, which was stretched in front of my bicycle.
+I will only ask you to observe that the rope comes from the chateau.
+Not longer than twenty minutes ago, it was being used to dry linen
+on, outside the laundry."
+
+"You don't mean to say so!"
+
+"Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction, I am being watched here, by some
+one in the very heart of the place, who can see me, who can hear me
+and who, minute by minute, observes my actions and knows my
+intentions."
+
+"Do you think so?"
+
+"I am sure of it. It is for you to discover him and you will have no
+difficulty in that. As for myself, I want to have finished and to
+give you the promised explanations. I have made faster progress than
+our adversaries expected and I am convinced that they mean to take
+vigorous measures on their side. The circle is closing around me.
+The danger is approaching. I feel it."
+
+"Nonsense, Beautrelet--"
+
+"You wait and see! For the moment, let us lose no time. And, first,
+a question on a point which I want to have done with at once. Have
+you spoken to anybody of that document which Sergeant Quevillon
+picked up and handed you in my presence?"
+
+"No, indeed; not to a soul. But do you attach any value--?"
+
+"The greatest value. It's an idea of mine, an idea, I confess, which
+does not rest upon a proof of any kind--for, up to the present, I
+have not succeeded in deciphering the document. And therefore I am
+mentioning it--so that we need not come back to it."
+
+Beautrelet pressed his hand on M. Filleul's and whispered:
+
+"Don't speak--there's some one listening--outside--"
+
+The gravel creaked. Beautrelet ran to the window and leaned out:
+
+"There's no one there--but the border has been trodden down--we can
+easily identify the footprints--"
+
+He closed the window and sat down again:
+
+"You see, Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction, the enemy has even ceased
+to take the most ordinary precautions--he has not time left--he too
+feels that the hour is urgent. Let us be quick, therefore, and
+speak, since they do not wish us to speak."
+
+He laid the document on the table and held it in position, unfolded:
+
+"One observation, Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction, to begin with. The
+paper consists almost entirely of dots and figures. And in the first
+three lines and the fifth--the only ones with which we have to do at
+present, for the fourth seems to present an entirely different
+character--not one of those figures is higher than the figure 5.
+There is, therefore, a great chance that each of these figures
+represents one of the five vowels, taken in alphabetical order. Let
+us put down the result."
+
+He wrote on a separate piece of paper:
+
+E . A . A . . E . . E . A . . A . .
+ A . . . E . E .      . E OI . E . . E .
+ . OU . . E . O . . . E . . E . O . . E
+ AI . UI . . E           . . EU . E
+
+
+Then he continued:
+
+"As you see, this does not give us much to go upon. The key is, at
+the same time, very easy, because the inventor has contented himself
+with replacing the vowels by figures and the consonants by dots, and
+very difficult, if not impossible, because he has taken no further
+trouble to complicate the problem."
+
+"It is certainly pretty obscure."
+
+"Let us try to throw some light upon it. The second line is divided
+into two parts; and the second part appears in such a way that it
+probably forms one word. If we now seek to replace the intermediary
+dots by consonants, we arrive at the conclusion, after searching and
+casting about, that the only consonants which are logically able to
+support the vowels are also logically able to produce only one word,
+the word DEMOISELLES."
+
+"That would refer to Mlle. de Gesvres and Mlle. de Saint-Veran."
+
+"Undoubtedly."
+
+"And do you see nothing more?"
+
+"Yes. I also note an hiatus in the middle of the last line; and, if
+I apply a similar operation to the beginning of the line, I at once
+see that the only consonant able to take the place of the dot
+between the diphthongs FAI and UI is the letter G and that, when I
+have thus formed the first five letters of the word, AIGUI, it is
+natural and inevitable that, with the two next dots and the final E,
+I should arrive at the word AIGUILLE."
+
+"Yes, the word AIGUILLE forces itself upon us."
+
+"Finally, for the last word, I have three vowels and three
+consonants. I cast about again, I try all the letters, one after the
+other, and, starting with the principle that the two first letters
+are necessary consonants, I find that three words apply: F*EUVE,
+PREUVE and CREUSE. I eliminate the words F*EUVE and PREUVE, as
+possessing no possible relation to a needle, and I keep the word
+CREUSE."
+
+"Making 'hollow needle'! By jove! I admit that your solution is
+correct, because it needs must be; but how does it help us?"
+
+"Not at all," said Beautrelet, in a thoughtful tone. "Not at all,
+for the moment.--Later on, we shall see.--I have an idea that a
+number of things are included in the puzzling conjunction of those
+two words, AIGUILLE CREUSE. What is troubling me at present is
+rather the material on which the document is written, the paper
+employed.--Do they still manufacture this sort of rather coarse-
+grained parchment? And then this ivory color.--And those folds--the
+wear of those folds--and, lastly, look, those marks of red sealing-
+wax, on the back--"
+
+At that moment Beautrelet, was interrupted by Bredoux, the
+magistrate's clerk, who opened the door and announced the unexpected
+arrival of the chief public prosecutor. M. Filleul rose:
+
+"Anything new? Is Monsieur le Procureur General downstairs?"
+
+"No, Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction. Monsieur le Procureur General
+has not left his carriage. He is only passing through Ambrumesy and
+begs you to be good enough to go down to him at the gate. He only
+has a word to say to you."
+
+"That's curious," muttered M. Filleul. "However--we shall see.
+Excuse me, Beautrelet, I shan't be long."
+
+He went away. His footsteps sounded outside. Then the clerk closed
+the door, turned the key and put it in his pocket.
+
+"Hullo!" exclaimed Beautrelet, greatly surprised. "What are you
+locking us in for?"
+
+"We shall be able to talk so much better," retorted Bredoux.
+
+Beautrelet rushed toward another door, which led to the next room.
+He had understood: the accomplice was Bredoux, the clerk of the
+examining magistrate himself. Bredoux grinned:
+
+"Don't hurt your fingers, my young friend. I have the key of that
+door, too."
+
+"There's the window!" cried Beautrelet.
+
+"Too late," said Bredoux, planting himself in front of the casement,
+revolver in hand.
+
+Every chance of retreat was cut off. There was nothing more for
+Isidore to do, nothing except to defend himself against the enemy
+who was revealing himself with such brutal daring. He crossed his
+arms.
+
+"Good," mumbled the clerk. "And now let us waste no time." He took
+out his watch. "Our worthy M. Filleul will walk down to the gate. At
+the gate, he will find nobody, of course: no more public prosecutor
+than my eye. Then he will come back. That gives us about four
+minutes. It will take me one minute to escape by this window, clear
+through the little door by the ruins and jump on the motor cycle
+waiting for me. That leaves three minutes, which is just enough."
+
+Bredoux was a queer sort of misshapen creature, who balanced on a
+pair of very long spindle-legs a huge trunk, as round as the body of
+a spider and furnished with immense arms. A bony face and a low,
+small stubborn forehead pointed to the man's narrow obstinacy.
+
+Beautrelet felt a weakness in the legs and staggered. He had to sit
+down:
+
+"Speak," he said. "What do you want?"
+
+"The paper. I've been looking for it for three days."
+
+"I haven't got it."
+
+"You're lying. I saw you put it back in your pocket-book when I came
+in."
+
+"Next?"
+
+"Next, you must undertake to keep quite quiet. You're annoying us.
+Leave us alone and mind your own business. Our patience is at an
+end."
+
+He had come nearer, with the revolver still aimed at the young man's
+head, and spoke in a hollow voice, with a powerful stress on each
+syllable that he uttered. His eyes were hard, his smile cruel.
+
+Beautrelet gave a shudder. It was the first time that he was
+experiencing the sense of danger. And such danger! He felt himself
+in the presence of an implacable enemy, endowed with blind and
+irresistible strength.
+
+"And next?" he asked, with less assurance in his voice.
+
+"Next? Nothing.--You will be free.--We will forget--"
+
+There was a pause. Then Bredoux resumed:
+
+"There is only a minute left. You must make up your mind. Come, old
+chap, don't be a fool.--We are the stronger, you know, always and
+everywhere.--Quick, the paper--"
+
+Isidore did not flinch. With a livid and terrified face, he remained
+master of himself, nevertheless, and his brain remained clear amid
+the breakdown of his nerves. The little black hole of the revolver
+was pointing at six inches from his eyes. The finger was bent and
+obviously pressing on the trigger. It only wanted a moment--
+
+"The paper," repeated Bredoux. "If not--"
+
+"Here it is," said Beautrelet.
+
+He took out his pocket-book and handed it to the clerk, who seized
+it eagerly.
+
+"Capital! We've come to our senses. I've no doubt there's something
+to be done with you.--You're troublesome, but full of common sense.
+I'll talk about it to my pals. And now I'm off. Good-bye!"
+
+He pocketed his revolver and turned back the fastening of the
+window. There was a noise in the passage.
+
+"Good-bye," he said again. "I'm only just in time."
+
+But the idea stopped him. With a quick movement, he examined the
+pocket-book:
+
+"Damn and blast it!" He grated through his teeth. "The paper's not
+there.--You've done me--"
+
+He leaped into the room. Two shots rang out. Isidore, in his turn,
+had seized his pistol and fired.
+
+"Missed, old chap!" shouted Bredoux. "Your hand's shaking.--You're
+afraid--"
+
+They caught each other round the body and came down to the floor
+together. There was a violent and incessant knocking at the door.
+Isidore's strength gave way and he was at once over come by his
+adversary. It was the end. A hand was lifted over him, armed with a
+knife, and fell. A fierce pain burst into his shoulder. He let go.
+
+He had an impression of some one fumbling in the inside pocket of
+his jacket and taking the paper from it. Then, through the lowered
+veil of his eyelids, he half saw the man stepping over the window-
+sill.
+
+        *       *       *       *       *
+
+The same newspapers which, on the following morning, related the
+last episodes that had occurred at the Chateau d'Ambrumesy--the
+trickery at the chapel, the discovery of Arsene Lupin's body and of
+Raymonde's body and, lastly, the murderous attempt made upon
+Beautrelet by the clerk to the examining magistrate--also announced
+two further pieces of news: the disappearance of Ganimard, and the
+kidnapping of Holmlock Shears, in broad daylight, in the heart of
+London, at the moment when he was about to take the train for Dover.
+
+Lupin's gang, therefore, which had been disorganized for a moment by
+the extraordinary ingenuity of a seventeen-year-old schoolboy, was
+now resuming the offensive and was winning all along the line from
+the first. Lupin's two great adversaries, Shears and Ganimard, were
+put away. Isidore Beautrelet was disabled. The police were
+powerless. For the moment there was no one left capable of
+struggling against such enemies.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER FOUR
+
+FACE TO FACE
+
+
+One evening, five weeks later, I had given my man leave to go out.
+It was the day before the 14th of July. The night was hot, a storm
+threatened and I felt no inclination to leave the flat. I opened
+wide the glass doors leading to my balcony, lit my reading lamp and
+sat down in an easy-chair to look through the papers, which I had
+not yet seen.
+
+It goes without saying that there was something about Arsene Lupin
+in all of them. Since the attempt at murder of which poor Isidore
+Beautrelet had been the victim, not a day had passed without some
+mention of the Ambrumesy mystery. It had a permanent headline
+devoted to it. Never had public opinion been excited to that extent,
+thanks to the extraordinary series of hurried events, of unexpected
+and disconcerting surprises. M. Filleul, who was certainly accepting
+the secondary part allotted to him with a good faith worthy of all
+praise, had let the interviewers into the secret of his young
+advisor's exploits during the memorable three days, so that the
+public was able to indulge in the rashest suppositions. And the
+public gave itself free scope. Specialists and experts in crime,
+novelists and playwrights, retired magistrates and chief-detectives,
+erstwhile Lecocqs and budding Holmlock Shearses, each had his theory
+and expounded it in lengthy contributions to the press. Everybody
+corrected and supplemented the inquiry of the examining magistrate;
+and all on the word of a child, on the word of Isidore Beautrelet, a
+sixth-form schoolboy at the Lycee Janson-de-Sailly!
+
+For really, it had to be admitted, the complete elements of the
+truth were now in everybody's possession. What did the mystery
+consist of? They knew the hiding-place where Arsene Lupin had taken
+refuge and lain a-dying; there was no doubt about it: Dr. Delattre,
+who continued to plead professional secrecy and refused to give
+evidence, nevertheless confessed to his intimate friends--who lost
+no time in blabbing--that he really had been taken to a crypt to
+attend a wounded man whom his confederates introduced to him by the
+name of Arsene Lupin. And, as the corpse of Etienne de Vaudreix was
+found in that same crypt and as the said Etienne de Vaudreix was
+none other than Arsene Lupin--as the official examination went to
+show--all this provided an additional proof, if one were needed, of
+the identity of Arsene Lupin and the wounded man. Therefore, with
+Lupin dead and Mlle. de Saint-Veran's body recognized by the curb-
+bracelet on her wrist, the tragedy was finished.
+
+It was not. Nobody thought that it was, because Beautrelet had said
+the contrary. Nobody knew in what respect it was not finished, but,
+on the word of the young man, the mystery remained complete. The
+evidence of the senses did not prevail against the statement of a
+Beautrelet. There was something which people did not know, and of
+that something they were convinced that he was in position to supply
+a triumphant explanation.
+
+It is easy, therefore, to imagine the anxiety with which, at first,
+people awaited the bulletins issued by the two Dieppe doctors to
+whose care the Comte de Gesvres entrusted his patient; the distress
+that prevailed during the first few days, when his life was thought
+to be in danger; and the enthusiasm of the morning when the
+newspapers announced that there was no further cause for fear. The
+least details excited the crowd. People wept at the thought of
+Beautrelet nursed by his old father, who had been hurriedly summoned
+by telegram, and they also admired the devotion of Mlle. Suzanne de
+Gesvres, who spent night after night by the wounded lad's bedside.
+
+Next came a swift and glad convalescence. At last, the public were
+about to know! They would know what Beautrelet had promised to
+reveal to M. Filleul and the decisive words which the knife of the
+would-be assassin had prevented him from uttering! And they would
+also know everything, outside the tragedy itself, that remained
+impenetrable or inaccessible to the efforts of the police.
+
+With Beautrelet free and cured of his wound, one could hope for some
+certainty regarding Harlington, Arsene Lupin's mysterious
+accomplice, who was still detained at the Sante prison. One would
+learn what had become, after the crime, of Bredoux the clerk, that
+other accomplice, whose daring was really terrifying.
+
+With Beautrelet free, one could also form a precise idea concerning
+the disappearance of Ganimard and the kidnapping of Shears. How was
+it possible for two attempts of this kind to take place? Neither the
+English detectives nor their French colleagues possessed the
+slightest clue on the subject. On Whit-Sunday, Ganimard did not come
+home, nor on the Monday either, nor during the five weeks that
+followed. In London, on Whit-Monday, Holmlock Shears took a cab at
+eight o'clock in the evening to drive to the station. He had hardly
+stepped in, when he tried to alight, probably feeling a presentiment
+of danger. But two men jumped into the hansom, one on either side,
+flung him back on the seat and kept him there between them, or
+rather under them. All this happened in sight of nine or ten
+witnesses, who had no time to interfere. The cab drove off at a
+gallop. And, after that, nothing. Nobody knew anything.
+
+Perhaps, also, Beautrelet would be able to give the complete
+explanation of the document, the mysterious paper to which. Bredoux,
+the magistrate's clerk, attached enough importance to recover it,
+with blows of the knife, from the person in whose possession it was.
+The problem of the Hollow Needle it was called, by the countless
+solvers of riddles who, with their eyes bent upon the figures and
+dots, strove to read a meaning into them. The Hollow Needle! What a
+bewildering conjunction of two simple words! What an
+incomprehensible question was set by that scrap of paper, whose very
+origin and manufacture were unknown! The Hollow Needle! Was it a
+meaningless expression, the puzzle of a schoolboy scribbling with
+pen and ink on the corner of a page? Or were they two magic words
+which could compel the whole great adventure of Lupin the great
+adventurer to assume its true significance? Nobody knew.
+
+But the public soon would know. For some days, the papers had been
+announcing the approaching arrival of Beautrelet. The struggle was
+on the point of recommencing; and, this time, it would be implacable
+on the part of the young man, who was burning to take his revenge.
+And, as it happened, my attention, just then, was drawn to his name,
+printed in capitals. The Grand Journal headed its front page with
+the following paragraph:
+
+        *       *       *       *       *
+
+WE HAVE PERSUADED
+
+M. ISIDORE BEAUTRELET
+
+TO GIVE US THE FIRST RIGHT OF PRINTING HIS REVELATIONS. TO-MORROW,
+TUESDAY, BEFORE THE POLICE THEMSELVES ARE INFORMED, THE Grand
+Journal WILL PUBLISH THE WHOLE TRUTH OF THE AMBRUMESY MYSTERY.
+
+        *       *       *       *       *
+
+"That's interesting, eh? What do you think of it, my dear chap?"
+
+I started from my chair. There was some one sitting beside me, some
+one I did not know. I cast my eyes round for a weapon. But, as my
+visitor's attitude appeared quite inoffensive, I restrained myself
+and went up to him.
+
+He was a young man with strongly-marked features, long, fair hair
+and a short, tawny beard, divided into two points. His dress
+suggested the dark clothes of an English clergyman; and his whole
+person, for that matter, wore an air of austerity and gravity that
+inspired respect.
+
+"Who are you?" I asked. And, as he did not reply, I repeated, "Who
+are you? How did you get in? What are you here for?"
+
+He looked at me and said:
+
+"Don't you know me?"
+
+"No--no!"
+
+"Oh, that's really curious! Just search your memory--one of your
+friends--a friend of a rather special kind--however--"
+
+I caught him smartly by the arm:
+
+"You lie! You lie! No, you're not the man you say you are--it's not
+true."
+
+"Then why are you thinking of that man rather than another?" he
+asked, with a laugh.
+
+Oh, that laugh! That bright and clear young laugh, whose amusing
+irony had so often contributed to my diversion! I shivered. Could it
+be?
+
+"No, no," I protested, with a sort of terror. "It cannot be."
+
+"It can't be I, because I'm dead, eh?" he retorted. "And because you
+don't believe in ghosts." He laughed again. "Am I the sort of man
+who dies? Do you think I would die like that, shot in the back by a
+girl? Really, you misjudge me! As though I would ever consent to
+such a death as that!"
+
+"So it is you!" I stammered, still incredulous and yet greatly
+excited. "So it is you! I can't manage to recognize you."
+
+"In that case," he said, gaily, "I am quite easy. If the only man to
+whom I have shown myself in my real aspect fails to know me to-day,
+then everybody who will see me henceforth as I am to-day is bound
+not to know me either, when he sees me in my real aspect--if,
+indeed, I have a real aspect--"
+
+I recognized his voice, now that he was no longer changing its tone,
+and I recognized his eyes also and the expression of his face and
+his whole attitude and his very being, through the counterfeit
+appearance in which he had shrouded it:
+
+"Arsene Lupin!" I muttered.
+
+"Yes, Arsene Lupin!" he cried, rising from his chair. "The one and
+only Arsene Lupin, returned from the realms of darkness, since it
+appears that I expired and passed away in a crypt! Arsene Lupin,
+alive and kicking, in the full exercise of his will, happy and free
+and more than ever resolved to enjoy that happy freedom in a world
+where hitherto he has received nothing but favors and privileges!"
+
+It was my turn to laugh:
+
+"Well, it's certainly you, and livelier this time than on the day
+when I had the pleasure of seeing you, last year--I congratulate
+you."
+
+I was alluding to his last visit, the visit following on the famous
+adventure of the diadem, [Footnote: Arsene Lupin, play in three acts
+and four scenes, by Maurice Leblanc and Francis de Croisset.] his
+interrupted marriage, his flight with Sonia Kirchnoff and the
+Russian girl's horrible death. On that day, I had seen an Arsene
+Lupin whom I did not know, weak, down-hearted, with eyes tired with
+weeping, seeking for a little sympathy and affection.
+
+"Be quiet," he said. "The past is far away."
+
+"It was a year ago," I observed.
+
+"It was ten years ago," he declared. "Arsene Lupin's years count for
+ten times as much as another man's."
+
+I did not insist and, changing the conversation:
+
+"How did you get in?"
+
+"Why, how do you think? Through the door, of course. Then, as I saw
+nobody, I walked across the drawing room and out by the balcony, and
+here I am."
+
+"Yes, but the key of the door--?"
+
+"There are no doors for me, as you know. I wanted your flat and I
+came in."
+
+"It is at your disposal. Am I to leave you?"
+
+"Oh, not at all! You won't be in the way. In fact, I can promise you
+an interesting evening."
+
+"Are you expecting some one?"
+
+"Yes. I have given him an appointment here at ten o'clock." He took
+out his watch. "It is ten now. If the telegram reached him, he ought
+to be here soon."
+
+The front-door bell rang.
+
+"What did I tell you? No, don't trouble to get up: I'll go."
+
+With whom on earth could he have made an appointment? And what sort
+of scene was I about to assist at: dramatic or comic? For Lupin
+himself to consider it worthy of interest, the situation must be
+somewhat exceptional.
+
+He returned in a moment and stood back to make way for a young man,
+tall and thin and very pale in the face.
+
+Without a word and with a certain solemnity about his movements that
+made me feel ill at ease. Lupin switched on all the electric lamps,
+one after the other, till the room was flooded with light. Then the
+two men looked at each other, exchanged profound and penetrating
+glances, as if, with all the effort of their gleaming eyes, they
+were trying to pierce into each other's souls.
+
+It was an impressive sight to see them thus, grave and silent. But
+who could the newcomer be?
+
+I was on the point of guessing the truth, through his resemblance to
+a photograph which had recently appeared in the papers, when Lupin
+turned to me:
+
+"My dear chap, let me introduce M. Isidore Beautrelet." And,
+addressing the young man, he continued, "I have to thank you, M.
+Beautrelet, first, for being good enough, on receipt of a letter
+from me, to postpone your revelations until after this interview
+and, secondly, for granting me this interview with so good a grace."
+
+Beautrelet smiled:
+
+"Allow me to remark that my good grace consists, above all, in
+obeying your orders. The threat which you made to me in the letter
+in question was the more peremptory in being aimed not at me, but at
+my father."
+
+"My word," said Lupin laughing, "we must do the best we can and make
+use of the means of action vouchsafed to us. I knew by experience
+that your own safety was indifferent to you, seeing that you
+resisted the arguments of Master Bredoux. There remained your
+father--your father for whom you have a great affection--I played on
+that string."
+
+"And here I am," said Beautrelet, approvingly.
+
+I motioned them to be seated. They consented and Lupin resumed, in
+that tone of imperceptible banter which is all his own:
+
+"In any case, M. Beautrelet, if you will not accept my thanks, you
+will at least not refuse my apologies."
+
+"Apologies! Bless my soul, what for?"
+
+"For the brutality which Master Bredoux showed you."
+
+"I confess that the act surprised me. It was not Lupin's usual way
+of behaving. A stab--"
+
+"I assure you I had no hand in it. Bredoux is a new recruit. My
+friends, during the time that they had the management of our
+affairs, thought that it might be useful to win over to our cause
+the clerk of the magistrate himself who was conducting the inquiry."
+
+"Your friends were right."
+
+"Bredoux, who was specially attached to your person, was, in fact,
+most valuable to us. But, with the ardor peculiar to any neophyte
+who wishes to distinguish himself, he pushed his zeal too far and
+thwarted my plans by permitting himself, on his own initiative, to
+strike you a blow."
+
+"Oh, it was a little accident!"
+
+"Not at all, not at all! And I have reprimanded him severely! I am
+bound, however, to say in his favor that he was taken unawares by
+the really unexpected rapidity of your investigation. If you had
+only left us a few hours longer, you would have escaped that
+unpardonable attempt."
+
+"And I should doubtless have enjoyed the enormous advantage of
+undergoing the same fate as M. Ganimard and Mr. Holmlock Shears?"
+
+"Exactly," said Lupin, laughing heartily. "And I should not have
+known the cruel terrors which your wound caused me. I have had an
+atrocious time because of it, believe me, and, at this moment, your
+pallor fills me with all the stings of remorse. Can you ever forgive
+me?"
+
+"The proof of confidence which you have shown me in delivering
+yourself unconditionally into my hands--it would have been so easy
+for me to bring a few of Ganimard's friends with me--that proof of
+confidence wipes out everything."
+
+Was he speaking seriously? I confess frankly that I was greatly
+perplexed. The struggle between the two men was beginning in a
+manner which I was simply unable to understand. I had been present
+at the first meeting between Lupin and Holmlock Shears, in the cafe
+near the Gare Montparnesse, [Footnote: Arsene Lupin versus Holmlock
+Shears, by Maurice Leblanc.] and I could not help recalling the
+haughty carriage of the two combatants, the terrific clash of their
+pride under the politeness of their manners, the hard blows which
+they dealt each other, their feints, their arrogance.
+
+Here, it was quite different. Lupin, it is true, had not changed; he
+exhibited the same tactics, the same crafty affability. But what a
+strange adversary he had come upon! Was it even an adversary?
+Really, he had neither the tone of one nor the appearance. Very
+calm, but with a real calmness, not one assumed to cloak the passion
+of a man endeavoring to restrain himself; very polite, but without
+exaggeration; smiling, but without chaff, he presented the most
+perfect contrast to Arsene Lupin, a contrast so perfect even that,
+to my mind, Lupin appeared as much perplexed as myself.
+
+No, there was no doubt about it: in the presence of that frail
+stripling, with cheeks smooth as a girl's and candid and charming
+eyes, Lupin was losing his ordinary self-assurance. Several times
+over, I observed traces of embarrassment in him. He hesitated, did
+not attack frankly, wasted time in mawkish and affected phrases.
+
+It also looked as though he wanted something. He seemed to be
+seeking, waiting. What for? Some aid?
+
+There was a fresh ring of the bell. He himself ran and opened the
+door. He returned with a letter:
+
+"Will you allow me, gentlemen?" he asked.
+
+He opened the letter. It contained a telegram. He read it--and
+became as though transformed. His face lit up, his figure righted
+itself and I saw the veins on his forehead swell. It was the athlete
+who once more stood before me, the ruler, sure of himself, master of
+events and master of persons. He spread the telegram on the table
+and, striking it with his fist, exclaimed:
+
+"Now, M. Beautrelet, it's you and I!"
+
+Beautrelet adopted a listening attitude and Lupin began, in
+measured, but harsh and masterful tones:
+
+"Let us throw off the mask--what say you?--and have done with
+hypocritical compliments. We are two enemies, who know exactly what
+to think of each other; we act toward each other as enemies; and
+therefore we ought to treat with each other as enemies."
+
+"To treat?" echoed Beautrelet, in a voice of surprise.
+
+"Yes, to treat. I did not use that word at random and I repeat it,
+in spite of the effort, the great effort, which it costs me. This is
+the first time I have employed it to an adversary. But also, I may
+as well tell you at once, it is the last. Make the most of it. I
+shall not leave this flat without a promise from you. If I do, it
+means war."
+
+Beautrelet seemed more and more surprised. He said very prettily:
+
+"I was not prepared for this--you speak so funnily! It's so
+different from what I expected! Yes, I thought you were not a bit
+like that! Why this display of anger? Why use threats? Are we
+enemies because circumstances bring us into opposition? Enemies?
+Why?"
+
+Lupin appeared a little out of countenance, but he snarled and,
+leaning over the boy:
+
+"Listen to me, youngster," he said. "It's not a question of picking
+one's words. It's a question of a fact, a positive, indisputable
+fact; and that fact is this: in all the past ten years, I have not
+yet knocked up against an adversary of your capacity. With Ganimard
+and Holmlock Shears I played as if they were children. With you, I
+am obliged to defend myself, I will say more, to retreat. Yes, at
+this moment, you and I well know that I must look upon myself as
+worsted in the fight. Isidore Beautrelet has got the better of
+Arsene Lupin. My plans are upset. What I tried to leave in the dark
+you have brought into the full light of day. You annoy me, you stand
+in my way. Well, I've had enough of it--Bredoux told you so to no
+purpose. I now tell you so again; and I insist upon it, so that you
+may take it to heart: I've had enough of it!"
+
+Beautrelet nodded his head:
+
+"Yes, but what do you want?"
+
+"Peace! Each of us minding his own business, keeping to his own
+side!"
+
+"That is to say, you free to continue your burglaries undisturbed, I
+free to return to my studies."
+
+"Your studies--anything you please--I don't care. But you must leave
+me in peace--I want peace."
+
+"How can I trouble it now?"
+
+Lupin seized his hand violently:
+
+"You know quite well! Don't pretend not to know. You are at this
+moment in possession of a secret to which I attach the highest
+importance. This secret you were free to guess, but you have no
+right to give it to the public."
+
+"Are you sure that I know it?"
+
+"You know it, I am certain: day by day, hour by hour, I have
+followed your train of thought and the progress of your
+investigations. At the very moment when Bredoux struck you, you were
+about to tell all. Subsequently, you delayed your revelations, out
+of solicitude for your father. But they are now promised to this
+paper here. The article is written. It will be set up in an hour. It
+will appear to-morrow."
+
+"Quite right."
+
+Lupin rose, and slashing the air with his hand,
+
+"It shall not appear!" he cried.
+
+"It shall appear!" said Beautrelet, starting up in his turn.
+
+At last, the two men were standing up to each other. I received the
+impression of a shock, as if they had seized each other round the
+body. Beautrelet seemed to burn with a sudden energy. It was as
+though a spark had kindled within him a group of new emotions:
+pluck, self-respect, the passion of fighting, the intoxication of
+danger. As for Lupin, I read in the radiance of his glance the joy
+of the duellist who at length encounters the sword of his hated
+rival.
+
+"Is the article in the printer's hands?"
+
+"Not yet."
+
+"Have you it there--on you?"
+
+"No fear! I shouldn't have it by now, in that case!"
+
+"Then--"
+
+"One of the assistant editors has it, in a sealed envelope. If I am
+not at the office by midnight, he will have set it up."
+
+"Oh, the scoundrel!" muttered Lupin. "He has provided for
+everything!"
+
+His anger was increasing, visibly and frightfully. Beautrelet
+chuckled, jeering in his turn, carried away by his success.
+
+"Stop that, you brat!" roared Lupin. "You're forgetting who I am--
+and that, if I wished--upon my word, he's daring to laugh!"
+
+A great silence fell between them. Then Lupin stepped forward and,
+in muttered tones, with his eyes on Beautrelet's:
+
+"You shall go straight to the Grand Journal."
+
+"No."
+
+"Tear up your article."
+
+"No."
+
+"See the editor."
+
+"No."
+
+"Tell him you made a mistake."
+
+"No."
+
+"And write him another article, in which you will give the official
+version of the Ambrumesy mystery, the one which every one has
+accepted."
+
+"No."
+
+Lupin took up a steel ruler that lay on my desk and broke it in two
+without an effort. His pallor was terrible to see. He wiped away the
+beads of perspiration that stood on his forehead. He, who had never
+known his wishes resisted, was being maddened by the obstinacy of
+this child. He pressed his two hands on Beautrelet's shoulder and,
+emphasizing every syllable, continued:
+
+"You shall do as I tell you, Beautrelet. You shall say that your
+latest discoveries have convinced you of my death, that there is not
+the least doubt about it. You shall say so because I wish it,
+because it has to be believed that I am dead. You shall say so,
+above all, because, if you do not say so--"
+
+"Because, if I do not say so--?"
+
+"Your father will be kidnapped to-night, as Ganimard and Holmlock
+Shears were."
+
+Beautrelet gave a smile.
+
+"Don't laugh--answer!"
+
+"My answer is that I am very sorry to disappoint you, but I have
+promised to speak and I shall speak."
+
+"Speak in the sense which I have told you."
+
+"I shall speak the truth," cried Beautrelet, eagerly. "It is
+something which you can't understand, the pleasure, the need,
+rather, of saying the thing that is and saying it aloud. The truth
+is here, in this brain which has guessed it and discovered it; and
+it will come out, all naked and quivering. The article, therefore,
+will be printed as I wrote it. The world shall know that Lupin is
+alive and shall know the reason why he wished to be considered dead.
+The world shall know all." And he added, calmly, "And my father
+shall not be kidnapped."
+
+Once again, they were both silent, with their eyes still fixed upon
+each other. They watched each other. Their swords were engaged up to
+the hilt. And it was like the heavy silence that goes before the
+mortal blow. Which of the two was to strike it?
+
+Lupin said, between his teeth:
+
+"Failing my instructions to the contrary, two of my friends have
+orders to enter your father's room to-night, at three o'clock in the
+morning, to seize him and carry him off to join Ganimard and
+Holmlock Shears."
+
+A burst of shrill laughter interrupted him:
+
+"Why, you highwayman, don't you understand," cried Beautrelet, "that
+I have taken my precautions? So you think that I am innocent enough,
+ass enough, to have sent my father home to his lonely little house
+in the open country!" Oh, the gay, bantering laughter that lit up
+the boy's face! It was a new sort of laugh on his lips, a laugh that
+showed the influence of Lupin himself. And the familiar form of
+address which he adopted placed him at once on his adversary's
+level. He continued:
+
+"You see, Lupin, your great fault is to believe your schemes
+infallible. You proclaim yourself beaten, do you? What humbug! You
+are convinced that you will always win the day in the end--and you
+forget that others can have their little schemes, too. Mine is a
+very simple one, my friend."
+
+It was delightful to hear him talk. He walked up and down, with his
+hands in his pockets and with the easy swagger of a boy teasing a
+caged beast. Really, at this moment, he was revenging, with the most
+terrible revenges, all the victims of the great adventurer. And he
+concluded:
+
+"Lupin, my father is not in Savoy. He is at the other end of France,
+in the centre of a big town, guarded by twenty of our friends, who
+have orders not to lose sight of him until our battle is over. Would
+you like details? He is at Cherbourg, in the house of one of the
+keepers of the arsenal. And remember that the arsenal is closed at
+night and that no one is allowed to enter it by day, unless he
+carries an authorization and is accompanied by a guide."
+
+He stopped in front of Lupin and defied him, like a child making
+faces at his playmate:
+
+"What do you say to that, master?"
+
+For some minutes, Lupin had stood motionless. Not a muscle of his
+face had moved. What were his thoughts? Upon what action was he
+resolving? To any one knowing the fierce violence of his pride the
+only possible solution was the total, immediate, final collapse of
+his adversary. His fingers twitched. For a second, I had a feeling
+that he was about to throw himself upon the boy and wring his neck.
+
+"What do you say to that, master?" Beautrelet repeated.
+
+Lupin took up the telegram that lay on the table, held it out and
+said, very calmly:
+
+"Here, baby, read that."
+
+Beautrelet became serious, suddenly, impressed by the gentleness of
+the movement. He unfolded the paper and, at once, raising his eyes,
+murmured:
+
+"What does it mean? I don't understand."
+
+"At any rate, you understand the first word," said Lupin, "the first
+word of the telegram--that is to say, the name of the place from
+which it was sent--look--'Cherbourg.'"
+
+"Yes--yes," stammered Beautrelet. "Yes--I understand--'Cherbourg'-
+and then?"
+
+"And then?--I should think the rest is quite plain: 'Removal of
+luggage finished. Friends left with it and will wait instructions
+till eight morning. All well.' Is there anything there that seems
+obscure? The word 'luggage'? Pooh, you wouldn't have them write 'M.
+Beautrelet, senior'! What then? The way in which the operation was
+performed? The miracle by which your father was taken out of
+Cherbourg Arsenal, in spite of his twenty body-guards? Pooh, it's as
+easy as A B C! And the fact remains that the luggage has been
+dispatched. What do you say to that, baby?"
+
+With all his tense being, with all his exasperated energy, Isidore
+tried to preserve a good countenance. But I saw his lips quiver, his
+jaw shrink, his eyes vainly strive to fix upon a point. He lisped a
+few words, then was silent and, suddenly, gave way and, with his
+hands before his face, burst into loud sobs:
+
+"Oh, father! Father!"
+
+An unexpected result, which was certainly the collapse which Lupin's
+pride demanded, but also something more, something infinitely
+touching and infinitely artless. Lupin gave a movement of annoyance
+and took up his hat, as though this unaccustomed display of
+sentiment were too much for him. But, on reaching the door, he
+stopped, hesitated and then returned, slowly, step by step.
+
+The soft sound of the sobs rose like the sad wailing of a little
+child overcome with grief. The lad's shoulders marked the heart-
+rending rhythm. Tears appeared through the crossed fingers. Lupin
+leaned forward and, without touching Beautrelet, said, in a voice
+that had not the least tone of pleasantry, nor even of the offensive
+pity of the victor:
+
+"Don't cry, youngster. This is one of those blows which a man must
+expect when he rushes headlong into the fray, as you did. The worst
+disasters lie in wait for him. The destiny of fighters will have it
+so. We must suffer it as bravely as we can." Then, with a sort of
+gentleness, he continued, "You were right, you see: we are not
+enemies. I have known it for long. From the very first, I felt for
+you, for the intelligent creature that you are, an involuntary
+sympathy--and admiration. And that is why I wanted to say this to
+you--don't be offended, whatever you do: I should be extremely sorry
+to offend you--but I must say it: well, give up struggling against
+me. I am not saying this out of vanity--nor because I despise you--
+but, you see, the struggle is too unequal. You do not know--nobody
+knows all the resources which I have at my command. Look here, this
+secret of the Hollow Needle which you are trying so vainly to
+unravel: suppose, for a moment, that it is a formidable,
+inexhaustible treasure--or else an invisible, prodigious, fantastic
+refuge--or both perhaps. Think of the superhuman power which I must
+derive from it! And you do not know, either, all the resources which
+I have within myself--all that my will and my imagination enable me
+to undertake and to undertake successfully. Only think that my whole
+life--ever since I was born, I might almost say--has tended toward
+the same aim, that I worked like a convict before becoming what I am
+and to realize, in its perfection, the type which I wished to
+create--which I have succeeded in creating. That being so--what can
+you do? At that very moment when you think that victory lies within
+your grasp, it will escape you--there will be something of which you
+have not thought--a trifle--a grain of sand which I shall have put
+in the right place, unknown to you. I entreat you, give up--I should
+be obliged to hurt you; and the thought distresses me." And, placing
+his hand on the boy's forehead, he repeated, "Once more, youngster,
+give up. I should only hurt you. Who knows if the trap into which
+you will inevitably fall has not already opened under your
+footsteps?"
+
+Beautrelet uncovered his face. He was no longer crying. Had he heard
+Lupin's words? One might have doubted it, judging by his inattentive
+air.
+
+For two or three minutes, he was silent. He seemed to weigh the
+decision which he was about to take, to examine the reasons for and
+against, to count up the favorable and unfavorable chances. At last,
+he said to Lupin:
+
+"If I change the sense of the article, if I confirm the version of
+your death and if I undertake never to contradict the false version
+which I shall have sanctioned, do you swear that my father will be
+free?"
+
+"I swear it. My friends have taken your father by motor car to
+another provincial town. At seven o'clock to-morrow morning, if the
+article in the Grand Journal is what I want it to be, I shall
+telephone to them and they will restore your father to liberty."
+
+"Very well," said Beautrelet. "I submit to your conditions."
+
+Quickly, as though he saw no object in prolonging the conversation
+after accepting his defeat, he rose, took his hat, bowed to me,
+bowed to Lupin and went out. Lupin watched him go, listened to the
+sound of the door closing and muttered:
+
+"Poor little beggar!"
+
+        *       *       *       *       *
+
+At eight o'clock the next morning, I sent my man out to buy the
+Grand Journal. It was twenty minutes before he brought me a copy,
+most of the kiosks being already sold out.
+
+I unfolded the paper with feverish hands. Beautrelet's article
+appeared on the front page. I give it as it stood and as it was
+quoted in the press of the whole world:
+
+        *       *       *       *       *
+
+THE AMBRUMESY MYSTERY
+
+I do not intend in these few sentences to set out in detail the
+mental processes and the investigations that have enabled me to
+reconstruct the tragedy--I should say the twofold tragedy--of
+Ambrumesy. In my opinion, this sort of work and the judgments which
+it entails, deductions, inductions, analyses and so on, are only
+interesting in a minor degree and, in any case, are highly
+commonplace. No, I shall content myself with setting forth the two
+leading ideas which I followed; and, if I do that, it will be seen
+that, in so setting them forth and in solving the two problems which
+they raise, I shall have told the story just as it happened, in the
+exact order of the different incidents.
+
+It may be said that some of these incidents are not proved and that
+I leave too large a field to conjecture. That is quite true. But, in
+my view, my theory is founded upon a sufficiently large number of
+proved facts to be able to say that even those facts which are not
+proved must follow from the strict logic of events. The stream is so
+often lost under the pebbly bed: it is nevertheless the same stream
+that reappears at intervals and mirrors back the blue sky.
+
+The first riddle that confronted me, a riddle not in detail, but as
+a whole, was how came it that Lupin, mortally wounded, one might
+say, managed to live for five or six weeks without nursing, medicine
+or food, at the bottom of a dark hole?
+
+Let us start at the beginning. On Thursday the sixteenth of April,
+at four o'clock in the morning, Arsene Lupin, surprised in the
+middle of one of his most daring burglaries, runs away by the path
+leading to the ruins and drops down shot. He drags himself painfully
+along, falls again and picks himself up in the desperate hope of
+reaching the chapel. The chapel contains a crypt, the existence of
+which he has discovered by accident. If he can burrow there, he may
+be saved. By dint of an effort, he approaches it, he is but a few
+yards away, when a sound of footsteps approaches. Harassed and lost,
+he lets himself go. The enemy arrives. It is Mlle. Raymonde de
+Saint-Veran.
+
+This is the prologue or rather the first scene of the drama.
+
+What happened between them? This is the easier to guess inasmuch as
+the sequel of the adventure gives us all the necessary clues. At the
+girl's feet lies a wounded man, exhausted by suffering, who will be
+captured in two minutes. THIS MAN HAS BEEN WOUNDED BY HERSELF. Will
+she also give him up?
+
+If he is Jean Daval's murderer, yes, she will let destiny take its
+course. But, in quick sentences, he tells her the truth about this
+awful murder committed by her uncle, M. de Gesvres. She believes
+him. What will she do?
+
+Nobody can see them. The footman Victor is watching the little door.
+The other, Albert, posted at the drawing-room window, has lost sight
+of both of them. Will she give up the man she has wounded?
+
+The girl is carried away by a movement of irresistible pity, which
+any woman will understand. Instructed by Lupin, with a few movements
+she binds up the wound with his handkerchief, to avoid the marks
+which the blood would leave. Then, with the aid of the key which he
+gives her, she opens the door of the chapel. He enters, supported by
+the girl. She locks the door again and walks away. Albert arrives.
+
+If the chapel had been visited at that moment or at least during the
+next few minutes, before Lupin had had time to recover his strength,
+to raise the flagstone and disappear by the stairs leading to the
+crypt, he would have been taken. But this visit did not take place
+until six hours later and then only in the most superficial way. As
+it is, Lupin is saved; and saved by whom? By the girl who very
+nearly killed him.
+
+Thenceforth, whether she wishes it or no, Mlle. de Saint-Veran is
+his accomplice. Not only is she no longer able to give him up, but
+she is obliged to continue her work, else the wounded man will
+perish in the shelter in which she has helped to conceal him.
+Therefore she continues.
+
+For that matter, if her feminine instinct makes the task a
+compulsory one, it also makes it easy. She is full of artifice, she
+foresees and forestalls everything. It is she who gives the
+examining magistrate a false description of Arsene Lupin (the reader
+will remember the difference of opinion on this subject between the
+cousins). It is she, obviously, who, thanks to certain signs which I
+do not know of, suspects an accomplice of Lupin's in the driver of
+the fly. She warns him. She informs him of the urgent need of an
+operation. It is she, no doubt, who substitutes one cap for the
+other. It is she who causes the famous letter to be written in which
+she is personally threatened. How, after that, is it possible to
+suspect her?
+
+It is she, who at that moment when I was about to confide my first
+impressions to the examining magistrate, pretends to have seen me,
+the day before, in the copsewood, alarms M. Filleul on my score and
+reduces me to silence: a dangerous move, no doubt, because it
+arouses my attention and directs it against the person who assails
+me with an accusation which I know to be false; but an efficacious
+move, because the most important thing of all is to gain time and
+close my lips.
+
+Lastly, it is she who, during forty days, feeds Lupin, brings him
+his medicine (the chemist at Ouville will produce the prescriptions
+which he made up for Mlle. de Saint-Veran), nurses him, dresses his
+wound, watches over him AND CURES HIM.
+
+Here we have the first of our two problems solved, at the same time
+that the Ambrumesy mystery is set forth. Arsene Lupin found, close
+at hand, in the chateau itself, the assistance which was
+indispensable to him in order, first, not to be discovered and,
+secondly, to live.
+
+He now lives. And we come to the second problem, corresponding with
+the second Ambrumesy mystery, the study of which served me as a
+conducting medium. Why does Lupin, alive, free, at the head of his
+gang, omnipotent as before, why does Lupin make desperate efforts,
+efforts with which I am constantly coming into collision, to force
+the idea of his death upon the police and the public?
+
+We must remember that Mlle. de Saint-Veran was a very pretty girl.
+The photographs reproduced in the papers after her disappearance
+give but an imperfect notion of her beauty. That follows which was
+bound to follow. Lupin, seeing this lovely girl daily for five or
+six weeks, longing for her presence when she is not there, subjected
+to her charm and grace when she is there, inhaling the cool perfume
+of her breath when she bends over him, Lupin becomes enamored of his
+nurse. Gratitude turns to love, admiration to passion. She is his
+salvation, but she is also the joy of his eyes, the dream of his
+lonely hours, his light, his hope, his very life.
+
+He respects her sufficiently not to take advantage of the girl's
+devotion and not to make use of her to direct his confederates.
+There is, in fact, a certain lack of decision apparent in the acts
+of the gang. But he loves her also, his scruples weaken and, as
+Mlle. de Saint-Veran refuses to be touched by a love that offends
+her, as she relaxes her visits when they become less necessary, as
+she ceases them entirely on the day when he is cured--desperate,
+maddened by grief, he takes a terrible resolve. He leaves his lair,
+prepares his stroke and, on Saturday the sixth of June, assisted by
+his accomplices, he carries off the girl.
+
+This is not all. The abduction must not be known. All search, all
+surmises, all hope, even, must be cut short. Mlle. de Saint-Veran
+must pass for dead. There is a mock murder: proofs are supplied for
+the police inquiries. There is doubt about the crime, a crime, for
+that matter, not unexpected, a crime foretold by the accomplices, a
+crime perpetrated to revenge the chief's death. And, through this
+very fact--observe the marvelous ingenuity of the conception--
+through this very fact, the belief in this death is, so to speak,
+stimulated.
+
+It is not enough to suggest a belief; it is necessary to compel a
+certainty. Lupin foresees my interference. I am sure to guess the
+trickery of the chapel. I am sure to discover the crypt. And, as the
+crypt will be empty, the whole scaffolding will come to the ground.
+
+THE CRYPT SHALL NOT BE EMPTY.
+
+In the same way, the death of Mlle. de Saint-Veran will not be
+definite, unless the sea gives up her corpse.
+
+THE SEA SHALL GIVE UP THE CORPSE OF MLLE. DE SAINT-VERAN.
+
+The difficulty is tremendous. The double obstacle seems
+insurmountable. Yes, to any one but Lupin, but not to Lupin.
+
+As he had foreseen, I guess the trickery of the chapel, I discover
+the crypt and I go down into the lair where Lupin has taken refuge.
+His corpse is there!
+
+Any person who had admitted the death of Lupin as possible would
+have been baffled. But I had not admitted this eventuality for an
+instant (first, by intuition and, secondly, by reasoning). Pretense
+thereupon became useless and every scheme vain. I said to myself at
+once that the block of stone disturbed by the pickaxe had been
+placed there with a very curious exactness, that the least knock was
+bound to make it fall and that, in falling, it must inevitably
+reduce the head of the false Arsene Lupin to pulp, in such a way as
+to make it utterly irrecognizable.
+
+Another discovery: half an hour later, I hear that the body of Mlle.
+de Saint-Veran has been found on the rocks at Dieppe--or rather a
+body which is considered to be Mlle. de Saint-Veran's, for the
+reason that the arm has a bracelet similar to one of that young
+lady's bracelets. This, however, is the only mark of identity, for
+the corpse is irrecognizable.
+
+Thereupon I remember and I understand. A few days earlier, I
+happened to read in a number of the Vigie de Dieppe that a young
+American couple staying at Envermeu had committed suicide by taking
+poison and that their bodies had disappeared on the very night of
+the death. I hasten to Envermeu. The story is true, I am told,
+except in so far as concerns the disappearance, because the brothers
+of the victims came to claim the corpses and took them away after
+the usual formalities. The name of these brothers, no doubt, was
+Arsene Lupin & Co.
+
+Consequently, the thing is proved. We know why Lupin shammed the
+murder of the girl and spread the rumor of his own death. He is in
+love and does not wish it known. And, to reach his ends, he shrinks
+from nothing, he even undertakes that incredible theft of the two
+corpses which he needs in order to impersonate himself and Mlle. de
+Saint-Veran. In this way, he will be at ease. No one can disturb
+him. No one will ever suspect the truth which he wishes to suppress.
+
+No one? Yes--three adversaries, at the most, might conceive doubts:
+Ganimard, whose arrival is hourly expected; Holmlock Shears, who is
+about to cross the Channel; and I, who am on the spot. This
+constitutes a threefold danger. He removes it. He kidnaps Ganimard.
+He kidnaps Holmlock Shears. He has me stabbed by Bredoux.
+
+One point alone remains obscure. Why was Lupin so fiercely bent upon
+snatching the document about the Hollow Needle from me? He surely
+did not imagine that, by taking it away, he could wipe out from my
+memory the text of the five lines of which it consists! Then why?
+Did he fear that the character of the paper itself, or some other
+clue, could give me a hint?
+
+Be that as it may, this is the truth of the Ambrumesy mystery. I
+repeat that conjecture plays a certain part in the explanation which
+I offer, even as it played a great part in my personal
+investigation. But, if one waited for proofs and facts to fight
+Lupin, one would run a great risk either of waiting forever or else
+of discovering proofs and facts carefully prepared by Lupin, which
+would lead in a direction immediately opposite to the object in
+view. I feel confident that the facts, when they are known, will
+confirm my surmise in every respect.
+
+        *       *       *       *       *
+
+So Isidore Beautrelet, mastered for a moment by Arsene Lupin,
+distressed by the abduction of his father and resigned to defeat,
+Isidore Beautrelet, in the end, was unable to persuade himself to
+keep silence. The truth was too beautiful and too curious, the
+proofs which he was able to produce were too logical and too
+conclusive for him to consent to misrepresent it. The whole world
+was waiting for his revelations. He spoke.
+
+        *       *       *       *       *
+
+On the evening of the day on which his article appeared, the
+newspapers announced the kidnapping of M. Beautrelet, senior.
+Isidore was informed of it by a telegram from Cherbourg, which
+reached him at three o'clock.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER FIVE
+
+ON THE TRACK
+
+
+Young Beautrelet was stunned by the violence of the blow. As a
+matter of fact, although, in publishing his article, he had obeyed
+one of those irresistible impulses which make a man despise every
+consideration of prudence, he had never really believed in the
+possibility of an abduction. His precautions had been too thorough.
+The friends at Cherbourg not only had instructions to guard and
+protect Beautrelet the elder: they were also to watch his comings
+and goings, never to let him walk out alone and not even to hand him
+a single letter without first opening it. No, there was no danger.
+Lupin, wishing to gain time, was trying to intimidate his adversary.
+
+The blow, therefore, was almost unexpected; and Isidore, because he
+was powerless to act, felt the pain of the shock during the whole of
+the remainder of the day. One idea alone supported him: that of
+leaving Paris, going down there, seeing for himself what had
+happened and resuming the offensive.
+
+He telegraphed to Cherbourg. He was at Saint-Lazare a little before
+nine. A few minutes after, he was steaming out of the station in the
+Normandy express.
+
+It was not until an hour later, when he mechanically unfolded a
+newspaper which he had bought on the platform, that he became aware
+of the letter by which Lupin indirectly replied to his article of
+that morning:
+
+        *       *       *       *       *
+
+To the Editor of the Grand Journal.
+
+SIR: I cannot pretend but that my modest personality, which would
+certainly have passed unnoticed in more heroic times, has acquired a
+certain prominence in the dull and feeble period in which we live.
+But there is a limit beyond which the morbid curiosity of the crowd
+cannot go without becoming indecently indiscreet. If the walls that
+surround our private lives be not respected, what is to safeguard
+the rights of the citizen?
+
+Will those who differ plead the higher interest of truth? An empty
+pretext in so far as I am concerned, because the truth is known and
+I raise no difficulty about making an official confession of the
+truth in writing. Yes, Mlle. de Saint-Veran is alive. Yes, I love
+her. Yes, I have the mortification not to be loved by her. Yes, the
+results of the boy Beautrelet's inquiry are wonderful in their
+precision and accuracy. Yes, we agree on every point. There is no
+riddle left. There is no mystery. Well, then, what?
+
+Injured to the very depths of my soul, bleeding still from cruel
+wounds, I ask that my more intimate feelings and secret hopes may no
+longer be delivered to the malevolence of the public. I ask for
+peace, the peace which I need to conquer the affection of Mlle. de
+Saint-Veran and to wipe out from her memory the thousand little
+injuries which she has had to suffer at the hands of her uncle and
+cousin--this has not been told--because of her position as a poor
+relation. Mlle. de Saint-Veran will forget this hateful past. All
+that she can desire, were it the fairest jewel in the world, were it
+the most unattainable treasure, I shall lay at her feet. She will be
+happy. She will love me.
+
+But, if I am to succeed, once more, I require peace. That is why I
+lay down my arms and hold out the olive-branch to my enemies--while
+warning them, with every magnanimity on my part, that a refusal on
+theirs might bring down upon them the gravest consequences.
+
+One word more on the subject of Mr. Harlington. This name conceals
+the identity of an excellent fellow, who is secretary to Cooley, the
+American millionaire, and instructed by him to lay hands upon every
+object of ancient art in Europe which it is possible to discover.
+His evil star brought him into touch with my friend Etienne de
+Vaudreix, ALIAS Arsene Lupin, ALIAS myself. He learnt, in this way,
+that a certain M. de Gesvres was willing to part with four pictures
+by Rubens, ostensibly on the condition that they were replaced by
+copies and that the bargain to which he was consenting remained
+unknown. My friend Vaudreix also undertook to persuade M. de Gesvres
+to sell his chapel. The negotiations were conducted with entire good
+faith on the side of my friend Vaudreix and with charming
+ingenuousness on the side of Mr. Harlington, until the day when the
+Rubenses and the carvings from the chapel were in a safe place and
+Mr. Harlington in prison. There remains nothing, therefore, to be
+done but to release the unfortunate American, because he was content
+to play the modest part of a dupe; to brand the millionaire Cooley,
+because, for fear of possible unpleasantness, he did not protest
+against his secretary's arrest; and to congratulate my friend
+Etienne de Vaudreix, because he is revenging the outraged morality
+of the public by keeping the hundred thousand francs which he was
+paid on account by that singularly unattractive person, Cooley.
+
+Pray, pardon the length of this letter and permit me to be, Sir,
+
+Your obedient servant,
+
+ARSENE LUPIN.
+
+        *       *       *       *       *
+
+Isidore weighed the words of this communication as minutely,
+perhaps, as he had studied the document concerning the Hollow
+Needle. He went on the principle, the correctness of which was
+easily proved, that Lupin had never taken the trouble to send one of
+his amusing letters to the press without absolute necessity, without
+some motive which events were sure, sooner or later, to bring to
+light.
+
+What was the motive for this particular letter? For what hidden
+reason was Lupin confessing his love and the failure of that love?
+Was it there that Beautrelet had to seek, or in the explanations
+regarding Mr. Harlington, or further still, between the lines,
+behind all those words whose apparent meaning had perhaps no other
+object than to suggest some wicked, perfidious, misleading little
+idea?
+
+For hours, the young man, confined to his compartment, remained
+pensive and anxious. The letter filled him with mistrust, as though
+it had been written for his benefit and were destined to lead him,
+personally, into error. For the first time and because he found
+himself confronted not with a direct attack, but with an ambiguous,
+indefinable method of fighting, he underwent a distinct sensation of
+fear. And, when he thought of his good old, easy-going father,
+kidnapped through his fault, he asked himself, with a pang, whether
+he was not mad to continue so unequal a contest. Was the result not
+certain? Had Lupin not won the game in advance?
+
+It was but a short moment of weakness. When he alighted from his
+compartment, at six o'clock in the morning, refreshed by a few
+hours' sleep, he had recovered all his confidence.
+
+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 Arsene 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
+Arsene 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 discover 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 next day, he asked Beautrelet:
+
+"What are you doing here, eh?"
+
+It was the first time that he had shown surprise at the presence of
+a stranger beside him.
+
+Gradually, in this way, he recovered all his faculties. He talked.
+He made plans. But, when Beautrelet asked him about the events
+immediately preceding his sleep, he seemed not to understand.
+
+And Beautrelet felt that he really did not understand. He had lost
+the recollection of all that had happened since the Friday before.
+It was like a sudden gap in the ordinary flow of his life. He
+described his morning and afternoon on the Friday, the purchases he
+had made at the fair, the meals he had taken at the inn. Then--
+nothing--nothing more. He believed himself to be waking on the
+morrow of that day.
+
+It was horrible for Beautrelet. The truth lay there, in those eyes
+which had seen the walls of the park behind which his father was
+waiting for him, in those hands which had picked up the letter, in
+that muddled brain which had recorded the whereabouts of that scene,
+the setting, the little corner of the world in which the play had
+been enacted. And from those hands, from that brain he was unable to
+extract the faintest echo of the truth so near at hand!
+
+Oh, that impalpable and formidable obstacle, against which all his
+efforts hurled themselves in vain, that obstacle built up of silence
+and oblivion! How clearly it bore the mark of Arsene Lupin! He
+alone, informed, no doubt, that M. Beautrelet had attempted to give
+a signal, he alone could have struck with partial death the one man
+whose evidence could injure him. It was not that Beautrelet felt
+himself to be discovered or thought that Lupin, hearing of his
+stealthy attack and knowing that a letter had reached him, was
+defending himself against him personally. But what an amount of
+foresight and real intelligence it displayed to suppress any
+possible accusation on the part of that chance wayfarer! Nobody now
+knew that within the walls of a park there lay a prisoner asking for
+help.
+
+Nobody? Yes, Beautrelet. Gaffer Charel was unable to speak. Very
+well. But, at least, one could find out which fair the old man had
+visited and which was the logical road that he had taken to return
+by. And, along this road, perhaps it would at last be possible to
+find--
+
+Isidore, as it was, had been careful not to visit Gaffer Charel's
+hovel except with the greatest precautions and in such a way as not
+to give an alarm. He now decided not to go back to it. He made
+inquiries and learnt that Friday was market-day at Fresselines, a
+fair-sized town situated a few leagues off, which could be reached
+either by the rather winding highroad or by a series of short cuts.
+
+On the Friday, he chose the road and saw nothing that attracted his
+attention, no high walled enclosure, no semblance of an old castle.
+
+He lunched at an inn at Fresselines and was on the point of leaving
+when he saw Gaffer Charel arrive and cross the square, wheeling his
+little knife-grinding barrow before him. He at once followed him at
+a good distance.
+
+The old man made two interminable waits, during which he ground
+dozens of knives. Then, at last, he went away by a quite different
+road, which ran in the direction of Crozant and the market-town of
+Eguzon.
+
+Beautrelet followed him along this road. But he had not walked five
+minutes before he received the impression that he was not alone in
+shadowing the old fellow. A man was walking along between them,
+stopping at the same time as Charel and starting off again when he
+did, without, for that matter, taking any great precautions against
+being seen.
+
+"He is being watched," thought Beautrelet. "Perhaps they want to
+know if he stops in front of the walls--"
+
+His heart beat violently. The event was at hand.
+
+The three of them, one behind the other, climbed up and down the
+steep slopes of the country and arrived at Crozant, famed for the
+colossal ruins of its castle. There Charel made a halt of an hour's
+duration. Next he went down to the riverside and crossed the bridge.
+
+But then a thing happened that took Beautrelet by surprise. The
+other man did not cross the river. He watched the old fellow move
+away and, when he had lost sight of him, turned down a path that
+took him right across the fields.
+
+Beautrelet hesitated for a few seconds as to what course to take,
+and then quietly decided. He set off in pursuit of the man.
+
+"He has made sure," he thought, "that Gaffer Charel has gone
+straight ahead. That is all he wanted to know and so he is going--
+where? To the castle?"
+
+He was within touch of the goal. He felt it by a sort of agonizing
+gladness that uplifted his whole being.
+
+The man plunged into a dark wood overhanging the river and then
+appeared once more in the full light, where the path met the
+horizon.
+
+When Beautrelet, in his turn, emerged from the wood, he was greatly
+surprised no longer to see the man. He was seeking him with his eyes
+when, suddenly, he gave a stifled cry and, with a backward spring,
+made for the line of trees which he had just left. On his right, he
+had seen a rampart of high walls, flanked, at regular distances, by
+massive buttresses.
+
+It was there! It was there! Those walls held his father captive! He
+had found the secret place where Lupin confined his victim.
+
+He dared not quit the shelter which the thick foliage of the wood
+afforded him. Slowly, almost on all fours, he bore to the right and
+in this way reached the top of a hillock that rose to the level of
+the neighboring trees. The walls were taller still. Nevertheless, he
+perceived the roof of the castle which they surrounded, an old Louis
+XIII. roof, surmounted by very slender bell-turrets arranged corbel-
+wise around a higher steeple which ran to a point.
+
+Beautrelet did no more that day. He felt the need to reflect and to
+prepare his plan of attack without leaving anything to chance. He
+held Lupin safe; and it was for Beautrelet now to select the hour
+and the manner of the combat.
+
+He walked away.
+
+Near the bridge, he met two country-girls carrying pails of milk. He
+asked:
+
+"What is the name of the castle over there, behind the trees?"
+
+"That's the Chateau de l'Aiguille, sir."
+
+He had put his question without attaching any importance to it. The
+answer took away his breath:
+
+"The Chateau de l'Aiguille?--Oh!--But in what department are we? The
+Indre?"
+
+"Certainly not. The Indre is on the other side of the river. This
+side, it's the Creuse."
+
+Isidore saw it all in a flash. The Chateau de l'Aiguille! The
+department of the Creuse! L'AIGUILLE CREUSE! The Hollow Needle! The
+very key to the document! Certain, decisive, absolute victory!
+
+Without another word, he turned his back on the two girls and went
+his way, tottering like a drunken man.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER SIX
+
+AN HISTORIC SECRET
+
+
+Beautrelet's resolve was soon taken: he would act alone. To inform
+the police was too dangerous. Apart from the fact that he could only
+offer presumptions, he dreaded the slowness of the police, their
+inevitable indiscretions, the whole preliminary inquiry, during
+which Lupin, who was sure to be warned, would have time to effect a
+retreat in good order.
+
+At eight o'clock the next morning, with his bundle under his arm, he
+left the inn in which he was staying near Cuzion, made for the
+nearest thicket, took off his workman's clothes, became once more
+the young English painter that he had been and went to call on the
+notary at Eguzon, the largest place in the immediate neighborhood.
+
+He said that he liked the country and that he was thinking of taking
+up his residence there, with his relations, if he could find a
+suitable house.
+
+The notary mentioned a number of properties. Beautrelet took note of
+them and let fall that some one had spoken to him of the Chateau de
+l'Aiguille, on the bank of the Creuse.
+
+"Oh, yes, but the Chateau de l'Aiguille, which has belonged to one
+of my clients for the last five years, is not for sale."
+
+"He lives in it, then?"
+
+"He used to live in it, or rather his mother did. But she did not
+care for it; found the castle rather gloomy. So they left it last
+year."
+
+"And is no one living there at present?"
+
+"Yes, an Italian, to whom my client let it for the summer season:
+Baron Anfredi."
+
+"Oh, Baron Anfredi! A man still young, rather grave and solemn-
+looking--?"
+
+"I'm sure I can't say.--My client dealt with him direct. There was
+no regular agreement, just a letter--"
+
+"But you know the baron?"
+
+"No, he never leaves the castle.--Sometimes, in his motor, at night,
+so they say. The marketing is done by an old cook, who talks to
+nobody. They are queer people--"
+
+"Do you think your client would consent to sell his castle?"
+
+"I don't think so. It's an historic castle, built in the purest
+Louis XIII. style. My client was very fond of it; and, unless he has
+changed his mind--"
+
+"Can you give me his name and address?"
+
+"Louis Valmeras, 34, Rue du Mont-Thabor."
+
+Beautrelet took the train for Paris at the nearest station. On the
+next day but one, after three fruitless calls, he at last found
+Louis Valmeras at home. He was a man of about thirty, with a frank
+and pleasing face. Beautrelet saw no need to beat about the bush,
+stated who he was and described his efforts and the object of the
+step which he was now taking:
+
+"I have good reason to believe," he concluded, "that my father is
+imprisoned in the Chateau de l'Aiguille, doubtless in the company of
+other victims. And I have come to ask you what you know of your
+tenant, Baron Anfredi."
+
+"Not much. I met Baron Anfredi last winter at Monte Carlo. He had
+heard by accident that I was the owner of the Chateau de l'Aiguille
+and, as he wished to spend the summer in France, he made me an offer
+for it."
+
+"He is still a young man--"
+
+"Yes, with very expressive eyes, fair hair--"
+
+"And a beard?"
+
+"Yes, ending in two points, which fall over a collar fastened at the
+back, like a clergyman's. In fact, he looks a little like an English
+parson."
+
+"It's he," murmured Beautrelet, "it's he, as I have seen him: it's
+his exact description."
+
+"What! Do you think--?"
+
+"I think, I am sure that your tenant is none other than Arsene
+Lupin."
+
+The story amused Louis Valmeras. He knew all the adventures of
+Arsene Lupin and the varying fortunes of his struggle with
+Beautrelet. He rubbed his hands:
+
+"Ha, the Chateau de l'Aiguille will become famous!--I'm sure I don't
+mind, for, as a matter of fact, now that my mother no longer lives
+in it, I have always thought that I would get rid of it at the first
+opportunity. After this, I shall soon find a purchaser. Only--"
+
+"Only what?"
+
+"I will ask you to act with the most extreme prudence and not to
+inform the police until you are quite sure. Can you picture the
+situation, supposing my tenant were not Arsene Lupin?"
+
+Beautrelet set forth his plan. He would go alone at night; he would
+climb the walls; he would sleep in the park--
+
+Louis Valmeras stopped him at once:
+
+"You will not climb walls of that height so easily. If you do, you
+will be received by two huge sheep-dogs which belonged to my mother
+and which I left behind at the castle."
+
+"Pooh! A dose of poison--"
+
+"Much obliged. But suppose you escaped them. What then? How would
+you get into the castle? The doors are massive, the windows barred.
+And, even then, once you were inside, who would guide you? There are
+eighty rooms."
+
+"Yes, but that room with two windows, on the second story--"
+
+"I know it, we call it the glycine room. But how will you find it?
+There are three staircases and a labyrinth of passages. I can give
+you the clue and explain the way to you, but you would get lost just
+the same."
+
+"Come with me," said Beautrelet, laughing.
+
+"I can't. I have promised to go to my mother in the South."
+
+Beautrelet returned to the friend with whom he was staying and began
+to make his preparations. But, late in the day, as he was getting
+ready to go, he received a visit from Valmeras.
+
+"Do you still want me?"
+
+"Rather!"
+
+"Well, I'm coming with you. Yes, the expedition fascinates me. I
+think it will be very amusing and I like being mixed up in this sort
+of thing.--Besides, my help will be of use to you. Look, here's
+something to start with."
+
+He held up a big key, all covered with rust and looking very old.
+
+"What does the key open?" asked Beautrelet.
+
+"A little postern hidden between two buttresses and left unused
+since centuries ago. I did not even think of pointing it out to my
+tenant. It opens straight on the country, just at the verge of the
+wood."
+
+Beautrelet interrupted him quickly:
+
+"They know all about that outlet. It was obviously by this way that
+the man whom I followed entered the park. Come, it's fine game and
+we shall win it. But, by Jupiter, we must play our cards carefully!"
+
+        *       *       *       *       *
+
+Two days later, a half-famished horse dragged a gipsy caravan into
+Crozant. Its driver obtained leave to stable it at the end of the
+village, in an old deserted cart-shed. In addition to the driver,
+who was none other than Valmeras, there were three young men, who
+occupied themselves in the manufacture of wicker-work chairs:
+Beautrelet and two of his Janson friends.
+
+They stayed there for three days, waiting for a propitious, moonless
+night and roaming singly round the outskirts of the park. Once
+Beautrelet saw the postern. Contrived between two buttresses placed
+very close together, it was almost merged, behind the screen of
+brambles that concealed it, in the pattern formed by the stones of
+the wall.
+
+At last, on the fourth evening, the sky was covered with heavy black
+clouds and Valmeras decided that they should go reconnoitring, at
+the risk of having to return again, should circumstances prove
+unfavorable.
+
+All four crossed the little wood. Then Beautrelet crept through the
+heather, scratched his hands at the bramble-hedge and, half raising
+himself, slowly, with restrained movements, put the key into the
+lock. He turned it gently. Would the door open without an effort?
+Was there no bolt closing it on the other side? He pushed: the door
+opened, without a creak or jolt. He was in the park.
+
+"Are you there, Beautrelet?" asked Valmeras. "Wait for me. You two
+chaps, watch the door and keep our line of retreat open. At the
+least alarm, whistle."
+
+He took Beautrelet's hand and they plunged into the dense shadow of
+the thickets. A clearer space was revealed to them when they reached
+the edge of the central lawn. At the same moment a ray of moonlight
+pierced the clouds; and they saw the castle, with its pointed
+turrets arranged around the tapering spire to which, no doubt, it
+owed its name. There was no light in the windows; not a sound.
+
+Valmeras grasped his companion's arm:
+
+"Keep still!"
+
+"What is it?"
+
+"The dogs, over there--look--"
+
+There was a growl. Valmeras gave a low whistle. Two white forms
+leapt forward and, in four bounds, came and crouched at their
+master's feet.
+
+"Gently--lie down--that's it--good dogs--stay there."
+
+And he said to Beautrelet:
+
+"And now let us push on. I feel more comfortable."
+
+"Are you sure of the way?"
+
+"Yes. We are near the terrace."
+
+"And then?"
+
+"I remember that, on the left, at a place where the river terrace
+rises to the level of the ground-floor windows, there is a shutter
+which closes badly and which can be opened from the outside."
+
+They found, when they came to it, that the shutter yielded to
+pressure. Valmeras removed a pane with a diamond which he carried.
+He turned the window-latch. First one and then the other stepped
+over the balcony. They were now in the castle, at the end of a
+passage which divided the left wing into two.
+
+"This room," said Valmeras, "opens at the end of a passage. Then
+comes an immense hall, lined with statues, and at the end of the
+hall a staircase which ends near the room occupied by your father."
+
+He took a step forward.
+
+"Are you coming, Beautrelet?"
+
+"Yes, yes."
+
+"But no, you're not coming--What's the matter with you?"
+
+He seized him by the hand. It was icy cold and he perceived that the
+young man was cowering on the floor.
+
+"What's the matter with you?" he repeated.
+
+"Nothing--it'll pass off--"
+
+"But what is it?"
+
+"I'm afraid--"
+
+"You're afraid?"
+
+"Yes," Beautrelet confessed, frankly, "it's my nerves giving way--I
+generally manage to control them--but, to-day, the silence--the
+excitement--And then, since I was stabbed by that magistrate's
+clerk--But it will pass off--There, it's passing now--"
+
+He succeeded in rising to his feet and Valmeras dragged him out of
+the room. They groped their way along the passage, so softly that
+neither could hear a sound made by the other.
+
+A faint glimmer, however, seemed to light the hall for which they
+were making. Valmeras put his head round the corner. It was a night-
+light placed at the foot of the stairs, on a little table which
+showed through the frail branches of a palm tree.
+
+"Halt!" whispered Valmeras.
+
+Near the night-light, a man stood sentry, carrying a gun.
+
+Had he seen them? Perhaps. At least, something must have alarmed
+him, for he brought the gun to his shoulder.
+
+Beautrelet had fallen on his knees, against a tub containing a
+plant, and he remained quite still, with his heart thumping against
+his chest.
+
+Meanwhile, the silence and the absence of all movement reassured the
+man. He lowered his weapon. But his head was still turned in the
+direction of the tub.
+
+Terrible minutes passed: ten minutes, fifteen. A moonbeam had glided
+through a window on the staircase. And, suddenly, Beautrelet became
+aware that the moonbeam was shifting imperceptibly, and that, before
+fifteen, before ten more minutes had elapsed, it would be shining
+full in his face.
+
+Great drops of perspiration fell from his forehead on his trembling
+hands. His anguish was such that he was on the point of getting up
+and running away--But, remembering that Valmeras was there, he
+sought him with his eyes and was astounded to see him, or rather to
+imagine him, creeping in the dark, under cover of the statues and
+plants. He was already at the foot of the stairs, within a few steps
+of the man.
+
+What was he going to do? To pass in spite of all? To go upstairs
+alone and release the prisoner? But could he pass?
+
+Beautrelet no longer saw him and he had an impression that something
+was about to take place, something that seemed foreboded also by the
+silence, which hung heavier, more awful than before.
+
+And, suddenly, a shadow springing upon the man, the night-light
+extinguished, the sound of a struggle--Beautrelet ran up. The two
+bodies had rolled over on the flagstones. He tried to stoop and see.
+But he heard a hoarse moan, a sigh; and one of the adversaries rose
+to his feet and seized him by the arm:
+
+"Quick!--Come along!"
+
+It was Valmeras.
+
+They went up two storys and came out at the entrance to a corridor,
+covered by a hanging.
+
+"To the right," whispered Valmeras. "The fourth room on the left."
+
+They soon found the door of the room. As they expected, the captive
+was locked in. It took them half an hour, half an hour of stifled
+efforts, of muffled attempts, to force open the lock. The door
+yielded at last.
+
+Beautrelet groped his way to the bed. His father was asleep.
+
+He woke him gently:
+
+"It's I--Isidore--and a friend--don't be afraid--get up--not a
+word."
+
+The father dressed himself, but, as they were leaving the room, he
+whispered:
+
+"I am not alone in the castle--"
+
+"Ah? Who else? Ganimard? Shears?"
+
+"No--at least, I have not seen them."
+
+"Who then?"
+
+"A young girl."
+
+"Mlle. de Saint-Veran, no doubt."
+
+"I don't know--I saw her several times at a distance, in the park--
+and, when I lean out of my window, I can see hers. She has made
+signals to me."
+
+"Do you know which is her room?"
+
+"Yes, in this passage, the third on the right."
+
+"The blue room," murmured Valmeras. "It has folding doors: they
+won't give us so much trouble."
+
+One of the two leaves very soon gave way. Old Beautrelet undertook
+to tell the girl.
+
+Ten minutes later, he left the room with her and said to his son:
+
+"You were right--Mlle. de Saint-Veran--;"
+
+They all four went down the stairs. When they reached the bottom,
+Valmeras stopped and bent over the man. Then, leading them to the
+terrace-room:
+
+"He is not dead," he said. "He will live."
+
+"Ah!" said Beautrelet, with a sigh of relief.
+
+"No, fortunately, the blade of my knife bent: the blow is not fatal.
+Besides, in any case, those rascals deserve no pity."
+
+Outside, they were met by the dogs, which accompanied them to the
+postern. Here, Beautrelet found his two friends and the little band
+left the park. It was three o'clock in the morning.
+
+        *       *       *       *       *
+
+This first victory was not enough to satisfy Beautrelet. As soon as
+he had comfortably settled his father and Mlle. de Saint-Veran, he
+asked them about the people who lived at the castle, and,
+particularly, about the habits of Arsene Lupin. He thus learnt that
+Lupin came only every three or four days, arriving at night in his
+motor car and leaving again in the morning. At each of his visits,
+he called separately upon his two prisoners, both of whom agreed in
+praising his courtesy and his extreme civility. For the moment, he
+was not at the castle.
+
+Apart from him, they had seen no one except an old woman, who ruled
+over the kitchen and the house, and two men, who kept watch over
+them by turns and never spoke to them: subordinates, obviously, to
+judge by their manners and appearance.
+
+"Two accomplices, for all that," said Beautrelet, in conclusion, "or
+rather three, with the old woman. It is a bag worth having. And, if
+we lose no time--"
+
+He jumped on his bicycle, rode to Eguzon, woke up the gendarmerie,
+set them all going, made them sound the boot and saddle and returned
+to Crozant at eight o'clock, accompanied by the sergeant and eight
+gendarmes. Two of the men were posted beside the gipsy-van. Two
+others took up their positions outside the postern-door. The last
+four, commanded by their chief and accompanied by Beautrelet and
+Valmeras, marched to the main entrance of the castle.
+
+Too late. The door was wide open. A peasant told them that he had
+seen a motor car drive out of the castle an hour before.
+
+Indeed, the search led to no result. In all probability, the gang
+had installed themselves there picnic fashion. A few clothes were
+found, a little linen, some household implements; and that was all.
+
+What astonished Beautrelet and Valmeras more was the disappearance
+of the wounded man. They could not see the faintest trace of a
+struggle, not even a drop of blood on the flagstones of the hall.
+
+All said, there was no material evidence to prove the fleeting
+presence of Lupin at the Chateau de l'Aiguille; and the authorities
+would have been entitled to challenge the statements of Beautrelet
+and his father, of Valmeras and Mlle. de Saint-Veran, had they not
+ended by discovering, in a room next to that occupied by the young
+girl, some half-dozen exquisite bouquets with Arsene Lupin's card
+pinned to them, bouquets scorned by her, faded and forgotten--One of
+them, in addition to the card, contained a letter which Raymonde had
+not seen. That afternoon, when opened by the examining magistrate,
+it was found to contain page upon page of prayers, entreaties,
+promises, threats, despair, all the madness of a love that has
+encountered nothing but contempt and repulsion.
+
+And the letter ended:
+
+I shall come on Tuesday evening, Raymonde. Reflect between now and
+then. As for me, I will wait no longer. I am resolved on all.
+
+        *       *       *       *       *
+
+Tuesday evening was the evening of the very day on which Beautrelet
+had released Mlle. de Saint-Veran from her captivity.
+
+The reader will remember the extraordinary explosion of surprise and
+enthusiasm that resounded throughout the world at the news of that
+unexpected issue: Mlle. de Saint-Veran free! The pretty girl whom
+Lupin coveted, to secure whom he had contrived his most
+Machiavellian schemes, snatched from his claws! Free also
+Beautrelet's father, whom Lupin had chosen as a hostage in his
+extravagant longing for the armistice demanded by the needs of his
+passion! They were both free, the two prisoners! And the secret of
+the Hollow Needle was known, published, flung to the four corners of
+the world!
+
+The crowd amused itself with a will. Ballads were sold and sung
+about the defeated adventurer: Lupin's Little Love-Affairs!--
+Arsene's Piteous Sobs!--The Lovesick Burglar! The Pickpocket's
+Lament!--They were cried on the boulevards and hummed in the
+artists' studios.
+
+Raymonde, pressed with questions and pursued by interviewers,
+replied with the most extreme reserve. But there was no denying the
+letter, or the bouquets of flowers, or any part of the pitiful
+story! Then and there, Lupin, scoffed and jeered at, toppled from
+his pedestal.
+
+And Beautrelet became the popular idol. He had foretold everything,
+thrown light on everything. The evidence which Mlle. de Saint-Veran
+gave before the examining magistrate confirmed, down to the smallest
+detail, the hypothesis imagined by Isidore. Reality seemed to
+submit, in every point, to what he had decreed beforehand. Lupin had
+found his master.--
+
+        *       *       *       *       *
+
+Beautrelet insisted that his father, before returning to his
+mountains in Savoy, should take a few months' rest in the sunshine,
+and himself escorted him and Mlle. de Saint-Veran to the outskirts
+of Nice, where the Comte de Gesvres and his daughter Suzanne were
+already settled for the winter. Two days later, Valmeras brought his
+mother to see his new friends and they thus composed a little colony
+grouped around the Villa de Gesvres and watched over day and night
+by half a dozen men engaged by the comte.
+
+Early in October, Beautrelet, once more the sixth-form pupil,
+returned to Paris to resume the interrupted course of his studies
+and to prepare for his examinations. And life began again, calmer,
+this time, and free from incident. What could happen, for that
+matter. Was the war not over?
+
+Lupin, on his side, must have felt this very clearly, must have felt
+that there was nothing left for him but to resign himself to the
+accomplished fact; for, one fine day, his two other victims,
+Ganimard and Holmlock Shears, made their reappearance. Their return
+to the life of this planet, however, was devoid of any sort of
+glamor or fascination. An itinerant rag-man picked them up on the
+Quai des Orfevres, opposite the headquarters of police. Both of them
+were gagged, bound and fast asleep.
+
+After a week of complete bewilderment, they succeeded in recovering
+the control of their thought and told--or rather Ganimard told, for
+Shears wrapped himself in a fierce and stubborn silence--how they
+had made a voyage of circumnavigation round the coast of Africa on
+board the yacht Hirondelle, a voyage combining amusement with
+instruction, during which they could look upon themselves as free,
+save for a few hours which they spent at the bottom of the hold,
+while the crew went on shore at outlandish ports.
+
+As for their landing on the Quai des Orfevres, they remembered
+nothing about it and had probably been asleep for many days before.
+
+This liberation of the prisoners was the final confession of defeat.
+By ceasing to fight, Lupin admitted it without reserve.
+
+One incident, moreover, made it still more glaring, which was the
+engagement of Louis Valmeras and Mlle. de Saint-Veran. In the
+intimacy created between them by the new conditions under which they
+lived, the two young people fell in love with each other. Valmeras
+loved Raymonde's melancholy charm; and she, wounded by life, greedy
+for protection, yielded before the strength and energy of the man
+who had contributed so gallantly to her preservation.
+
+The wedding day was awaited with a certain amount of anxiety. Would
+Lupin not try to resume the offensive? Would he accept with a good
+grace the irretrievable loss of the woman he loved? Twice or three
+times, suspicious-looking people were seen prowling round the villa;
+and Valmeras even had to defend himself one evening against a so-
+called drunken man, who fired a pistol at him and sent a bullet
+through his hat. But, in the end, the ceremony was performed at the
+appointed hour and day and Raymonde de Saint-Veran became Mme. Louis
+Valmeras.
+
+It was as though Fate herself had taken sides with Beautrelet and
+countersigned the news of victory. This was so apparent to the crowd
+that his admirers now conceived the notion of entertaining him at a
+banquet to celebrate his triumph and Lupin's overthrow. It was a
+great idea and aroused general enthusiasm. Three hundred tickets
+were sold in less than a fortnight. Invitations were issued to the
+public schools of Paris, to send two sixth-form pupils apiece. The
+press sang paeans. The banquet was what it could not fail to be, an
+apotheosis.
+
+But it was a charming and simple apotheosis, because Beautrelet was
+its hero. His presence was enough to bring things back to their due
+proportion. He showed himself modest, as usual, a little surprised
+at the excessive cheering, a little embarrassed by the extravagant
+panegyrics in which he was pronounced greater than the most
+illustrious detectives--a little embarrassed, but also not a little
+touched.
+
+He said as much in a few words that pleased all his hearers and with
+the shyness of a child that blushes when you look at it. He spoke of
+his delight, of his pride. And really, reasonable and self-
+controlled as he was, this was for him a moment of never-to-be-
+forgotten exultation. He smiled to his friends, to his fellow-
+Jansonians, to Valmeras, who had come specially to give him a cheer,
+to M. de Gesvres, to his father.
+
+When he had finished speaking; and while he still held his glass in
+his hand, a sound of voices came from the other end of the room and
+some one was gesticulating and waving a newspaper. Silence was
+restored and the importunate person sat down again: but a thrill of
+curiosity ran round the table, the newspaper was passed from hand to
+hand and, each time that one of the guests cast his eyes upon the
+page at which it was opened, exclamations followed:
+
+"Read it! Read it!" they cried from the opposite side.
+
+The people were leaving their seats at the principal table. M.
+Beautrelet went and took the paper and handed it to his son.
+
+"Read it out! Read it out!" they cried, louder.
+
+And others said:
+
+"Listen! He's going to read it! Listen!"
+
+Beautrelet stood facing his audience, looked in the evening paper
+which his father had given him for the article that was causing all
+this uproar and, suddenly, his eyes encountering a heading
+underlined in blue pencil, he raised his hand to call for silence
+and began in a loud voice to read a letter addressed to the editor
+by M. Massiban, of the Academy of Inscriptions and Belles-Lettres.
+His voice broke and fell, little by little, as he read those
+stupefying revelations, which reduced all his efforts to nothing,
+upset his notions concerning the Hollow Needle and proved the vanity
+of his struggle with Arsene Lupin:
+
+        *       *       *       *       *
+
+Sir:
+
+On the 17th of March, 1679, there appeared a little book with the
+following title: The Mystery of the Hollow Needle. The Whole Truth
+now first exhibited. One hundred copies printed by myself for the
+instruction of the Court.
+
+At nine o'clock on the morning of that day, the author, a very young
+man, well-dressed, whose name has remained unknown, began to leave
+his book on the principal persons at court. At ten o'clock, when he
+had fulfilled four of these errands, he was arrested by a captain in
+the guards, who took him to the king's closet and forthwith set off
+in search of the four copies distributed.
+
+When the hundred copies were got together, counted, carefully looked
+through and verified, the king himself threw them into the fire and
+burnt them, all but one, which he kept for his own purposes.
+
+Then he ordered the captain of the guards to take the author of the
+book to M. de Saint-Mars, who confined his prisoner first at
+Pignerol and then in the fortress of the Ile Sainte-Marguerite. This
+man was obviously no other than the famous Man with the Iron Mask.
+
+The truth would never have been known, or at least a part of the
+truth, if the captain in the guards had not been present at the
+interview and if, when the king's back was turned, he had not been
+tempted to withdraw another of the copies from the chimney, before
+the fire got to it.
+
+Six months later, the captain was found dead on the highroad between
+Gaillon and Mantes. His murderers had stripped him of all his
+apparel, forgetting, however, in his right boot a jewel which was
+discovered there afterward, a diamond of the first water and of
+considerable value.
+
+Among his papers was found a sheet in his handwriting, in which he
+did not speak of the book snatched from the flames, but gave a
+summary of the earlier chapters. It referred to a secret which was
+known to the Kings of England, which was lost by them when the crown
+passed from the poor fool, Henry VI., to the Duke of York, which was
+revealed to Charles VII., King of France, by Joan of Arc and which,
+becoming a State secret, was handed down from sovereign to sovereign
+by means of a letter, sealed anew on each occasion, which was found
+in the deceased monarch's death-bed with this superscription: "For
+the King of France."
+
+This secret concerned the existence and described the whereabouts of
+a tremendous treasure, belonging to the kings, which increased in
+dimensions from century to century.
+
+One hundred and fourteen years later, Louis XVI., then a prisoner in
+the Temple, took aside one of the officers whose duty it was to
+guard the royal family, and asked:
+
+"Monsieur, had you not an ancestor who served as a captain under my
+predecessor, the Great King?"
+
+"Yes, sire."
+
+"Well, could you be relied upon--could you be relied upon--"
+
+He hesitated. The officer completed the sentence:
+
+"Not to betray your Majesty! Oh, sire!--"
+
+"Then listen to me."
+
+He took from his pocket a little book of which he tore out one of
+the last pages. But, altering his mind:
+
+"No, I had better copy it--"
+
+He seized a large sheet of paper and tore it in such a way as to
+leave only a small rectangular space, on which he copied five lines
+of dots, letters and figures from the printed page. Then, after
+burning the latter, he folded the manuscript sheet in four, sealed
+it with red wax, and gave it to the officer.
+
+"Monsieur, after my death, you must hand this to the Queen and say
+to her, 'From the King, madame--for Your Majesty and for your son.'
+If she does not understand--"
+
+"If she does not understand, sire--"
+
+"You must add, 'It concerns the secret, the secret of the Needle.'
+The Queen will understand."
+
+When he had finished speaking, he flung the book into the embers
+glowing on the hearth.
+
+He ascended the scaffold on the 21st of January.
+
+It took the officer several months, in consequence of the removal of
+the Queen to the Conciergerie, before he could fulfil the mission
+with which he was entrusted. At last, by dint of cunning intrigues,
+he succeeded, one day, in finding himself in the presence of Marie
+Antoinette.
+
+Speaking so that she could just hear him, he said:
+
+"Madame, from the late King, your husband, for Your Majesty and your
+son."
+
+And he gave her the sealed letter.
+
+She satisfied herself that the jailers could not see her, broke the
+seals, appeared surprised at the sight of those undecipherable lines
+and then, all at once, seemed to understand.
+
+She smiled bitterly and the officer caught the words:
+
+"Why so late?"
+
+She hesitated. Where should she hide this dangerous document? At
+last, she opened her book of hours and slipped the paper into a sort
+of secret pocket contrived between the leather of the binding and
+the parchment that covered it.
+
+"Why so late?" she had asked.
+
+It is, in fact, probable that this document, if it could have saved
+her, came too late, for, in the month of October next, Queen Marie
+Antoinette ascended the scaffold in her turn.
+
+Now the officer, when going through his family papers, came upon his
+ancestor's manuscript. From that moment, he had but one idea, which
+was to devote his leisure to elucidating this strange problem. He
+read all the Latin authors, studied all the chronicles of France and
+those of the neighboring countries, visited the monasteries,
+deciphered account-books, cartularies, treaties; and, in this way,
+succeeded in discovering certain references scattered over the ages.
+
+In Book III of Caesar's Commentaries on the Gallic War (MS. edition,
+Alexandria), it is stated that, after the defeat of Veridovix by G.
+Titullius Sabinus, the chief of the Caleti was brought before Caesar
+and that, for his ransom, he revealed the secret of the Needle--
+
+The Treaty of Saint-Clair-sur-Epte, between Charles the Simple and
+Rollo, the chief of the Norse barbarians, gives Rollo's name
+followed by all his titles, among which we read that of Master of
+the Secret of the Needle.
+
+The Saxon Chronicle (Gibson's edition, page 134), speaking of
+William the Conqueror, says that the staff of his banner ended in a
+steel point pierced with an eye, like a needle.
+
+In a rather ambiguous phrase in her examination, Joan of Arc admits
+that she has still a great secret to tell the King of France. To
+which her judges reply, "Yes, we know of what you speak; and that,
+Joan, is why you shall die the death."
+
+Philippe de Comines mentions it in connection with Louis XI., and,
+later, Sully in connection with Henry IV.: "By the virtue of the
+Needle!" the good king sometimes swears.
+
+Between these two, Francis I., in a speech addressed to the notables
+of the Havre, in 1520, uttered this phrase, which has been handed
+down in the diary of a Honfleur burgess; "The Kings of France carry
+secrets that often decide the conduct of affairs and the fate of
+towns."
+
+All these quotations, all the stories relating to the Iron Mask, the
+captain of the guards and his descendant, I have found to-day in a
+pamphlet written by this same descendant and published in the month
+of June, 1815, just before or just after the battle of Waterloo, in
+a period, therefore, of great upheavals, in which the revelations
+which it contained were likely to pass unperceived.
+
+What is the value of this pamphlet? Nothing, you will tell me, and
+we must attach no credit to it. And this is the impression which I
+myself would have carried away, if it had not occurred to me to open
+Caesar's Commentaries at the chapter given. What was my astonishment
+when I came upon the phrase quoted in the little book before me! And
+it was the same thing with the Treaty of Saint-Clair-sur-Epte, with
+the Saxon Chronicle, with the examination of Joan of Arc, in short,
+with all that I have been able to verify up to the present.
+
+Lastly, there is an even more precise fact related by the author of
+the pamphlet of 1815. During the French campaign, he being then an
+officer under Napoleon, his horse dropped dead, one evening, and he
+rang at the door of a castle where he was received by an old knight
+of St. Louis. And, in the course of conversation with the old man,
+he learnt that this castle, standing on the bank of the Creuse, was
+called the Chateau de l'Aiguille, that it had been built and
+christened by Louis XIV., and that, by his express order, it was
+adorned with turrets and with a spire which represented the Needle.
+As its date it bore, it must still bear, the figure 1680.
+
+1680! One year after the publication of the book and the
+imprisonment of the Iron Mask! Everything was now explained: Louis
+XIV., foreseeing that the secret might be noised abroad, had built
+and named that castle so as to offer the quidnuncs a natural
+explanation of the ancient mystery. The Hollow Needle! A castle with
+pointed bell-turrets standing on the bank of the Creuse and
+belonging to the King. People would at once think that they had the
+key to the riddle and all enquiries would cease.
+
+The calculation was just, seeing that, more than two centuries
+later, M. Beautrelet fell into the trap. And this, Sir, is what I
+was leading up to in writing this letter. If Lupin, under the name
+of Anfredi, rented from M. Valmeras the Chateau de l'Aiguille on the
+bank of the Creuse; if, admitting the success of the inevitable
+investigations of M. Beautrelet, he lodged his two prisoners there,
+it was because he admitted the success of the inevitable researches
+made by M. Beautrelet and because, with the object of obtaining the
+peace for which he had asked, he laid for M. Beautrelet precisely
+what we may call the historic trap of Louis XIV.
+
+And hence we come to this undeniable conclusion, that he, Lupin, by
+his unaided lights, without possessing any other facts than those
+which we possess, managed by means of the witchcraft of a really
+extraordinary genius, to decipher the undecipherable document; and
+that he, Lupin, the last heir of the Kings of France, knows the
+royal mystery of the Hollow Needle!
+
+        *       *       *       *       *
+
+Here ended the letter. But, for some minutes, from the passage that
+referred to the Chateau de l'Aiguille onward, it was not
+Beautrelet's but another voice that read it aloud. Realizing his
+defeat, crushed under the weight of his humiliation, Isidore had
+dropped the newspaper and sunk into his chair, with his face buried
+in his hands.
+
+Panting, shaken with excitement by this incredible story, the crowd
+had come gradually nearer and was now pressing round.
+
+With a thrill of anguish, they waited for the words which he would
+say in reply, the objections which he would raise.
+
+He did not stir.
+
+Valmeras gently uncrossed his hands and raised his head.
+
+Isidore Beautrelet was weeping.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER SEVEN
+
+THE TREATISE OF THE NEEDLE
+
+
+It is four o'clock in the morning. Isidore has not returned to the
+Lycee Janson. He has no intention of returning before the end of the
+war of extermination which he has declared against Lupin. This much
+he swore to himself under his breath, while his friends drove off
+with him, all faint and bruised, in a cab.
+
+A mad oath! An absurd and illogical war! What can he do, a single,
+unarmed stripling, against that phenomenon of energy and strength?
+On which side is he to attack him? He is unassailable. Where to
+wound him? He is invulnerable. Where to get at him? He is
+inaccessible.
+
+Four o'clock in the morning. Isidore has again accepted his
+schoolfellow's hospitality. Standing before the chimney in his
+bedroom, with his elbows flat on the mantel-shelf and his two fists
+under his chin, he stares at his image in the looking-glass. He is
+not crying now, he can shed no more tears, nor fling himself about
+on his bed, nor give way to despair, as he has been doing for the
+last two hours and more. He wants to think, to think and understand.
+
+And he does not remove his eyes from those same eyes reflected in
+the glass, as though he hoped to double his powers of thought by
+contemplating his pensive image, as though he hoped to find at the
+back of that mirrored Beautrelet the unsolvable solution of what he
+does not find within himself.
+
+He stands thus until six o'clock, and, little by little, the
+question presents itself to his mind with the strictness of an
+equation, bare and dry and cleared of all the details that
+complicate and obscure it.
+
+Yes, he has made a mistake. Yes, his reading of the document is all
+wrong. The word aiguille does not point to the castle on the Creuse.
+Also, the word demoiselles cannot be applied to Raymonde de Saint-
+Veran and her cousin, because the text of the document dates back
+for centuries.
+
+Therefore, all must be done over again, from the beginning.
+
+How?
+
+One piece of evidence alone would be incontestible: the book
+published under Louis XIV. Now of those hundred copies printed by
+the person who was presumed to be the Man with the Iron Mask only
+two escaped the flames. One was purloined by the captain of the
+guards and lost. The other was kept by Louis XIV., handed down to
+Louis XV., and burnt by Louis XVI. But a copy of the essential page,
+the page containing the solution of the problem, or at least a
+cryptographic solution, was conveyed to Marie Antoinette, who
+slipped it into the binding of her book of hours. What has become of
+this paper? Is it the one which Beautrelet has held in his hands and
+which Lupin recovered from him through Bredoux, the magistrate's
+clerk? Or is it still in Marie Antoinette's book of hours? And the
+question resolves itself into this: what has become of the Queen's
+book of hours?
+
+        *       *       *       *       *
+
+After taking a short rest, Beautrelet consulted his friend's father,
+an old and experienced collector, who was often called upon
+officially to give an expert opinion and who had quite lately been
+invited to advise the director of one of our museums on the drawing
+up of the catalogue.
+
+"Marie Antoinette's book of hours?" he exclaimed. "Why, the Queen
+left it to her waiting-woman, with secret instructions to forward it
+to Count Fersen. After being piously preserved in the count's
+family, it has been, for the last five years, in a glass case--"
+
+"A glass case?"
+
+"In the Musee Carnavalet, quite simply."
+
+"When will the museum be open?"
+
+"At twenty minutes from now, as it is every morning."
+
+        *       *       *       *       *
+
+Isidore and his friend jumped out of a cab at the moment when the
+doors of Madame de Sevigne's old mansion were opening.
+
+"Hullo! M. Beautrelet!"
+
+A dozen voices greeted his arrival. To his great surprise, he
+recognized the whole crowd of reporters who were following up "the
+mystery of the Hollow Needle." And one of them exclaimed:
+
+"Funny, isn't it, that we should all have had the same idea? Take
+care, Arsene Lupin may be among us!"
+
+They entered the museum together. The director was at once informed,
+placed himself entirely at their disposal, took them to the glass
+case and skewed them a poor little volume, devoid of all ornament,
+which certainly had nothing royal about it. Nevertheless, they were
+overcome by a certain emotion at the sight of this object which the
+Queen had touched in those tragic days, which her eyes, red with
+tears, had looked upon--And they dared not take it and hunt through
+it: it was as though they feared lest they should be guilty of a
+sacrilege--
+
+"Come, M. Beautrelet, it's your business!"
+
+He took the book with an anxious gesture. The description
+corresponded with that given by the author of the pamphlet. Outside
+was a parchment cover, dirty, stained and worn in places, and under
+it, the real binding, in stiff leather. With what a thrill
+Beautrelet felt for the hidden pocket! Was it a fairy tale? Or would
+he find the document written by Louis XVI. and bequeathed by the
+queen to her fervent admirer?
+
+At the first page, on the upper side of the book, there was no
+receptacle.
+
+"Nothing," he muttered.
+
+"Nothing," they echoed, palpitating with excitement.
+
+But, at the last page, forcing back the book a little, he at once
+saw that the parchment was not stuck to the binding. He slipped his
+fingers in between--there was something--yes, he felt something--a
+paper--
+
+"Oh!" he gasped, in an accent almost of pain. "Here--is it
+possible?"
+
+"Quick, quick!" they cried. "What are you waiting for?"
+
+He drew out a sheet folded in two.
+
+"Well, read it!--There are words in red ink--Look!--it might be
+blood--pale, faded blood--Read it!--"
+
+        *       *       *       *       *
+
+He read:
+
+To you, Fersen. For my son. 16 October, 1793.
+
+MARIE ANTOINETTE.
+
+        *       *       *       *       *
+
+And suddenly Beautrelet gave a cry of stupefaction. Under the
+queen's signature there were--there were two words, in black ink,
+underlined with a flourish--two words:
+
+ARSENE LUPIN.
+
+All, in turns, took the sheet of paper and the same cry escaped from
+the lips of all of them:
+
+"Marie Antoinette!--Arsene Lupin!"
+
+A great silence followed. That double signature: those two names
+coupled together, discovered hidden in the book of hours; that relic
+in which the poor queen's desperate appeal had slumbered for more
+than a century: that horrible date of the 16th of October, 1793, the
+day on which the Royal head fell: all of this was most dismally and
+disconcertingly tragic.
+
+"Arsene Lupin!" stammered one of the voices, thus emphasizing the
+scare that underlay the sight of that demoniacal name at the foot of
+the hallowed page.
+
+"Yes, Arsene Lupin," repeated Beautrelet. "The Queen's friend was
+unable to understand her desperate dying appeal. He lived with the
+keepsake in his possession which the woman whom he loved had sent
+him and he never guessed the reason of that keepsake. Lupin
+discovered everything, on the other hand--and took it."
+
+"Took what?"
+
+"The document, of course! The document written by Louis XVI.; and it
+is that which I held in my hands. The same appearance, the same
+shape, the same red seals. I understand why Lupin would not leave me
+a document which I could turn to account by merely examining the
+paper, the seals and so on."
+
+"And then?"
+
+"Well, then, since the document is genuine, since I have, with my
+own eyes, seen the marks of the red seals, since Marie Antoinette
+herself assures me, by these few words in her hand, that the whole
+story of the pamphlet, as printed by M. Massiban, is correct,
+because a problem of the Hollow Needle really exists, I am now
+certain to succeed."
+
+"But how? Whether genuine or not, the document is of no use to you
+if you do not manage to decipher it, because Louis XVI. destroyed
+the book that gave the explanation."
+
+"Yes, but the other copy, which King Louis XVI.'s captain of the
+guards snatched from the flames, was not destroyed."
+
+"How do you know?"
+
+"Prove the contrary."
+
+After uttering this defiance, Beautrelet was silent for a time and
+then, slowly, with his eyes closed, as though trying to fix and sum
+up his thoughts, he said:
+
+"Possessing the secret, the captain of the guards begins by
+revealing it bit by bit in the journal found by his descendant. Then
+comes silence. The answer to the riddle is withheld. Why? Because
+the temptation to make use of the secret creeps over him little by
+little and he gives way to it. A proof? His murder. A further proof?
+The magnificent jewel found upon him, which he must undoubtedly have
+taken from some royal treasure the hiding-place of which, unknown to
+all, would just constitute the mystery of the Hollow Needle. Lupin
+conveyed as much to me; Lupin was not lying."
+
+"Then what conclusion do you draw, Beautrelet?"
+
+"I draw this conclusion, my friends, that it be a good thing to
+advertise this story as much as possible, so that people may know,
+through all the papers, that we are looking for a book entitled The
+Treatise of the Needle. It may be fished out from the back shelves
+of some provincial library."
+
+The paragraph was drawn up forthwith; and Beautrelet set to work at
+once, without even waiting for it to produce a result. A first scent
+suggested itself: the murder was committed near Gaillon. He went
+there that same day. Certainly, he did not hope to reconstruct a
+crime perpetrated two hundred years ago. But, all the same, there
+are crimes that leave traces in the memories, in the traditions of a
+countryside. They are recorded in the local chronicles. One day,
+some provincial archaeologist, some lover of old legends, some
+student of the minor incidents of the life of the past makes them
+the subject of an article in a newspaper or of a communication to
+the academy of his departmental town.
+
+Beautreiet saw three or four of these archaeologists. With one of
+them in particular, an old notary, he examined the prison records,
+the ledgers of the old bailiwicks and the parish registers. There
+was no entry referring to the murder of a captain of the guards in
+the seventeenth century.
+
+He refused to be discouraged and continued his search in Paris,
+where the magistrate's examination might have taken place. His
+efforts came to nothing.
+
+But the thought of another track sent him off in a fresh direction.
+Was there no chance of finding out the name of that captain whose
+descendant served in the armies of the Republic and was quartered in
+the Temple during the imprisonment of the Royal family? By dint of
+patient working, he ended by making out a list in which two names at
+least presented an almost complete resemblance: M. de Larbeyrie,
+under Louis XIV., and Citizen Larbrie, under the Terror.
+
+This already was an important point. He stated it with precision in
+a note which he sent to the papers, asking for any information
+concerning this Larbeyrie or his descendants.
+
+It was M. Massiban, the Massiban of the pamphlet, the member of the
+Institute, who replied to him:
+
+        *       *       *       *       *
+
+SIR:
+
+Allow me to call your attention to the following passage of
+Voltaire, which I came upon in his manuscript of Le Siecle de Louis
+XIV. (Chapter XXV: Particularites et anecdotes du regne). The
+passage has been suppressed in all the printed editions:
+
+"I have heard it said by the late M. de Caumartin, intendant of
+finance, who was a friend of Chamillard the minister, that the King
+one day left hurriedly in his carriage at the news that M. de
+Larbeyrie had been murdered and robbed of some magnificent jewels.
+He seemed greatly excited and repeated:
+
+"'All is lost--all is lost--'
+
+"In the following year, the son of this Larbeyrie and his daughter,
+who had married the Marquis de Velines, were banished to their
+estates in Provence and Brittany. We cannot doubt that there is
+something peculiar in this."
+
+
+I, in my turn, will add that we can doubt it all the less inasmuch
+as M. de Chamillard, according to Voltaire, WAS THE LAST MINISTER
+WHO POSSESSED THE STRANGE SECRET OF THE IRON MASK.
+
+You will see for yourself, Sir, the profit that can be derived from
+this passage and the evident link established between the two
+adventures. As for myself, I will not venture to imagine any very
+exact surmise as regards the conduct, the suspicions, and the
+apprehensions of Louis XIV. in these circumstances; but, on the
+other hand, seeing that M. de Larbeyrie left a son, who was probably
+the grandfather of Larbrie the citizen-officer, and also a daughter,
+is it not permissible to suppose that a part of the papers left by
+Larbeyrie came to the daughter and that among these papers was the
+famous copy which the captain of the guards saved from the flames?
+
+I have consulted the Country-house Year-book. There is a Baron de
+Velines living not far from Rennes. Could he be a descendant of the
+marquis? At any rate, I wrote to him yesterday, on chance, to ask if
+he had not in his possession a little old book bearing on its title-
+page the word aiguille; and I am awaiting his reply.
+
+It would give me the greatest pleasure to talk of all these matters
+with you. If you can spare the time, come and see me.
+
+I am, Sir, etc., etc.
+
+P.S.--Of course, I shall not communicate these little discoveries to
+the press. Now that you are near the goal, discretion is essential.
+
+        *       *       *       *       *
+
+Beautrelet absolutely agreed. He even went further: to two
+journalists who were worrying him that morning he gave the most
+fanciful particulars as to his plans and his state of mind.
+
+In the afternoon, he hurried round to see Massiban, who lived at 17,
+Quai Voltaire. To his great surprise, he was told that M. Massiban
+had gone out of town unexpectedly, leaving a note for him in case he
+should call. Isidore opened it and read:
+
+     I have received a telegram which gives me
+     some hope. So I am leaving town and shall sleep
+     at Rennes. You might take the evening train and,
+     without stopping at Rennes, go on to the little
+     station of Velines. We would meet at the castle,
+     which is two miles and a half from the station.
+
+The programme appealed to Beautrelet, and especially the idea that
+he would reach the castle at almost the same time as Massiban, for
+he feared some blunder on the part of that inexperienced man. He
+went back to his friend and spent the rest of the day with him. In
+the evening, he took the Brittany express and got out at Velines as
+six o'clock in the morning.
+
+He did the two and a half miles, between bushy woods, on foot. He
+could see the castle, perched on a height, from a distance: it was a
+hybrid edifice, a mixture of the Renascence and Louis Philippe
+styles, but it bore a stately air, nevertheless, with its four
+turrets and its ivy-mantled draw-bridge.
+
+Isidore felt his heart beat as he approached. Was he really nearing
+the end of his race? Did the castle contain the key to the mystery?
+
+He was not without fear. It all seemed too good to be true; and he
+asked himself if he was not once more acting in obedience to some
+infernal plan contrived by Lupin, if Massiban was not for instance,
+a tool in the hands of his enemy. He burst out laughing:
+
+"Tut, tut, I'm becoming absurd! One would really think that Lupin
+was an infallible person who foresees everything, a sort of divine
+omnipotence against whom nothing can prevail! Dash it all, Lupin
+makes his mistakes; Lupin, too, is at the mercy of circumstances;
+Lupin has an occasional slip! And it is just because of his slip in
+losing the document that I am beginning to have the advantage of
+him. Everything starts from that. And his efforts, when all is said,
+serve only to repair the first blunder."
+
+And blithely, full of confidence, Beautrelet rang the bell.
+
+"Yes, sir?" said the servant who opened the door.
+
+"Can I see the Baron de Velines?"
+
+And he gave the man his card.
+
+"Monsieur le baron is not up yet, but, if monsieur will wait--"
+
+"Has not some one else been asking for him, a gentleman with a white
+beard and a slight stoop?" asked Beautrelet, who knew Massiban's
+appearance from the photographs in the newspapers.
+
+"Yes, the gentleman came about ten minutes ago; I showed him into
+the drawing room. If monsieur will come this way--"
+
+The interview between Massiban and Beautrelet was of the most
+cordial character. Isidore thanked the old man for the first-rate
+information which he owed to him and Massiban expressed his
+admiration for Beautrelet in the warmest terms. Then they exchanged
+impressions on the document, on their prospects of discovering the
+book; and Massiban repeated what he had heard at Rennes regarding M.
+de Velines. The baron was a man of sixty, who had been left a
+widower many years ago and who led a very retired life with his
+daughter, Gabrielle de Villemon. This lady had just suffered a cruel
+blow through the loss of her husband and her eldest son, both of
+whom had died as the result of a motor-car accident.
+
+"Monsieur le baron begs the gentlemen to be good enough to come
+upstairs."
+
+The servant led the way to the first floor, to a large, bare-walled
+room, very simply furnished with desks, pigeon-holes and tables
+covered with papers and account-books.
+
+The baron received them very affably and with the volubility often
+displayed by people who live too much alone. They had great
+difficulty in explaining the object of their visit.
+
+"Oh, yes, I know, you wrote to me about it, M. Massiban. It has
+something to do with a book about a needle, hasn't it, a book which
+is supposed to have come down to me from my ancestors?"
+
+"Just so."
+
+"I may as well tell you that my ancestors and I have fallen out.
+They had funny ideas in those days. I belong to my own time. I have
+broken with the past."
+
+"Yes," said Beautrelet, impatiently, "but have you no recollection
+of having seen the book?--"
+
+"Certainly, I said so in my telegram," he exclaimed, addressing M.
+Massiban, who, in his annoyance, was walking up and down the room
+and looking out of the tall windows. "Certainly--or, at least, my
+daughter thought she had seen the title among the thousands of books
+that lumber up the library, upstairs--for I don't care about reading
+myself--I don't even read the papers. My daughter does, sometimes,
+but only when there is nothing the matter with Georges, her
+remaining son! As for me, as long as my tenants pay their rents and
+my leases are kept up--! You see my account-books: I live in them,
+gentlemen; and I confess that I know absolutely nothing whatever
+about that story of which you wrote to me in your letter, M.
+Massiban--"
+
+Isidore Beautrelet, nerve-shattered at all this talk, interrupted
+him bluntly:
+
+"I beg your pardon, monsieur, but the book--"
+
+"My daughter has looked for it. She looked for it all day
+yesterday."
+
+"Well?"
+
+"Well, she found it; she found it a few hours ago. When you
+arrived--"
+
+"And where is it?"
+
+"Where is it? Why, she put it on that table--there it is--over
+there--"
+
+Isidore gave a bound. At one end of the table, on a muddled heap of
+papers, lay a little book bound in red morocco. He banged his fist
+down upon it, as though he were forbidding anybody to touch it--and
+also a little as though he himself dared not take it up.
+
+"Well!" cried Massiban, greatly excited.
+
+"I have it--here it is--we're there at last!"
+
+"But the title--are you sure?--"
+
+"Why, of course: look!"
+
+"Are you convinced? Have we mastered the secret at last?"
+
+"The front page--what does the front page say?"
+
+"Read: The Whole Truth now first exhibited. One hundred copies
+printed by myself for the instruction of the Court."
+
+"That's it, that's it," muttered Massiban, in a hoarse voice. "It's
+the copy snatched from the flames! It's the very book which Louis
+XIV. condemned."
+
+They turned over the pages. The first part set forth the
+explanations given by Captain de Larbeyrie in his journal.
+
+"Get on, get on!" said Beautrelet, who was in a hurry to come to the
+solution.
+
+"Get on? What do you mean? Not at all! We know that the Man with the
+Iron Mask was imprisoned because he knew and wished to divulge the
+secret of the Royal house of France. But how did he know it? And why
+did he wish to divulge it? Lastly, who was that strange personage? A
+half-brother of Louis XIV., as Voltaire maintained, or Mattioli, the
+Italian minister, as the modern critics declare? Hang it, those are
+questions of the very first interest!"
+
+"Later, later," protested Beautrelet, feverishly turning the pages,
+as though he feared that the book would fly out of his hands before
+he had solved the riddle.
+
+"But--" said Massiban, who doted on historical details.
+
+"We have plenty of time--afterward--let's see the explanation first--"
+
+Suddenly Beautrelet stopped. The document! In the middle of a left-
+hand page, his eyes saw the five mysterious lines of dots and
+figures! He made sure, with a glance, that the text was identical
+with that which he had studied so long; the same arrangement of the
+signs, the same intervals that permitted of the isolation of the
+word demoiselles and the separation of the two words aiguille and
+creuse.
+
+A short note preceded it:
+
+All the necessary indications, it appears, were reduced by King
+Louis XIII. into a little table which I transcribe below.
+
+Here followed the table of dots and figures.
+
+Then came the explanation of the document itself. Beautrelet read,
+in a broken voice:
+
+        *       *       *       *       *
+
+As will be seen, this table, even after we have changed the figures
+into vowels, affords no light. One might say that, in order to
+decipher the puzzle, we must first know it. It is, at most, a clue
+given to those who know the paths of the labyrinth.
+
+Let us take this clue and proceed. I will guide you.
+
+The fourth line first. The fourth line contains measurements and
+indications. By complying with the indications and noting the
+measurements set down, we inevitably attain our object, on
+condition, be it understood, that we know where we are and whither
+we are going, in a word, that we are enlightened as to the real
+meaning of the Hollow Needle. This is what we may learn from the
+first three lines. The first is so conceived to revenge myself on
+the King; I had warned him, for that matter--
+
+        *       *       *       *       *
+
+Beautrelet stopped, nonplussed.
+
+"What? What is it?" said Massiban.
+
+"The words don't make sense."
+
+"No more they do," replied Massiban. "'The first is so conceived to
+revenge myself on the King--' What can that mean?"
+
+"Damn!" yelled Beautrelet.
+
+"Well?"
+
+"Torn! Two pages! The next two pages! Look at the marks!"
+
+He trembled, shaking with rage and disappointment. Massiban bent
+forward.
+
+"It is true--there are the ends of two pages left, like bookbinders'
+guards. The marks seem pretty fresh. They've not been cut, but torn
+out--torn out with violence. Look, all the pages at the end of the
+book have been rumpled."
+
+"But who can have done it? Who?" moaned Isidore, wringing his hands.
+"A servant? An accomplice?"
+
+"All the same, it may date back to a few months since," observed
+Massiban.
+
+"Even so--even so--some one must have hunted out and taken the book
+--Tell me, monsieur," cried Beautrelet, addressing the baron, "is
+there no one whom you suspect?"
+
+"We might ask my daughter."
+
+"Yes--yes--that's it--perhaps she will know."
+
+M. de Velines rang for the footman. A few minutes later, Mme. de
+Villemon entered. She was a young woman, with a sad and resigned
+face. Beautrelet at once asked her:
+
+"You found this volume upstairs, madame, in the library?"
+
+"Yes, in a parcel of books that had not been uncorded."
+
+"And you read it?"
+
+"Yes, last night."
+
+"When you read it, were those two pages missing? Try and remember:
+the two pages following this table of figures and dots?"
+
+"No, certainly not," she said, greatly astonished. "There was no
+page missing at all."
+
+"Still, somebody has torn--"
+
+"But the book did not leave my room last night."
+
+"And this morning?"
+
+"This morning, I brought it down here myself, when M. Massiban's
+arrival was announced."
+
+"Then--?"
+
+"Well, I don't understand--unless--but no."
+
+"What?"
+
+"Georges--my son--this morning--Georges was playing with the book."
+
+She ran out headlong, accompanied by Beautrelet, Massiban and the
+baron. The child was not in his room. They hunted in every
+direction. At last, they found him playing behind the castle. But
+those three people seemed so excited and called him so peremptorily
+to account that he began to yell aloud.
+
+Everybody ran about to right and left. The servants were questioned.
+It was an indescribable tumult. And Beautrelet received the awful
+impression that the truth was ebbing away from him, like water
+trickling through his fingers.
+
+He made an effort to recover himself, took Mme. de Villemon's arm,
+and, followed by the baron and Massiban, led her back to the drawing
+room and said:
+
+"The book is incomplete. Very well. There are two pages torn out;
+but you read them, did you not, madame?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"You know what they contained?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Could you repeat it to us?"
+
+"Certainly. I read the book with a great deal of curiosity, but
+those two pages struck me in particular because the revelations were
+so very interesting."
+
+"Well, then, speak madame, speak, I implore you! Those revelations
+are of exceptional importance. Speak, I beg of you: minutes lost are
+never recovered. The Hollow Needle--"
+
+"Oh, it's quite simple. The Hollow Needle means--"
+
+At that moment, a footman entered the room:
+
+"A letter for madame."
+
+"Oh, but the postman has passed!"
+
+"A boy brought it."
+
+Mme. de Villemon opened the letter, read it, and put her hand to her
+heart, turning suddenly livid and terrified, ready to faint.
+
+The paper had slipped to the floor. Beautrelet picked it up and,
+without troubling to apologize, read:
+
+  Not a word! If you say a word, your son will
+  never wake again.
+
+"My son--my son!" she stammered, too weak even to go to the
+assistance of the threatened child.
+
+Beautrelet reassured her:
+
+"It is not serious--it's a joke. Come, who could be interested?"
+
+"Unless," suggested Massiban, "it was Arsene Lupin."
+
+Beautrelet made him a sign to hold his tongue. He knew quite well,
+of course, that the enemy was there, once more, watchful and
+determined; and that was just why he wanted to tear from Mme. de
+Villemon the decisive words, so long awaited, and to tear them from
+her on the spot, that very moment:
+
+"I beseech you, madame, compose yourself. We are all here. There is
+not the least danger."
+
+Would she speak? He thought so, he hoped so. She stammered out a few
+syllables. But the door opened again. This time, the nurse entered.
+She seemed distraught:
+
+"M. Georges--madame--M. Georges--!"
+
+Suddenly, the mother recovered all her strength. Quicker than any of
+them, and urged by an unfailing instinct, she rushed down the
+staircase, across the hall and on to the terrace. There lay little
+Georges, motionless, on a wicker chair.
+
+"Well, what is it? He's asleep!--"
+
+"He fell asleep suddenly, madame," said the nurse. "I tried to
+prevent him, to carry him to his room. But he was fast asleep and
+his hands--his hands were cold."
+
+"Cold!" gasped the mother. "Yes--it's true. Oh dear, oh dear--IF HE
+ONLY WAKES UP!"
+
+Beautrelet put his hand in his trousers pocket, seized the butt of
+his revolver, cocked it with his forefinger, then suddenly produced
+the weapon and fired at Massiban.
+
+Massiban, as though he were watching the boy's movements, had
+avoided the shot, so to speak, in advance. But already Beautrelet
+had sprung upon him, shouting to the servants:
+
+"Help! It's Lupin!"
+
+Massiban, under the weight of the impact, fell back into one of the
+wicker chairs. In a few seconds, he rose, leaving Beautrelet
+stunned, choking; and, holding the young man's revolver in his
+hands:
+
+"Good!--that's all right!--don't stir--you'll be like that for two
+or three minutes--no more. But, upon my word, you took your time to
+recognize me! Was my make-up as old Massiban so good as all that?"
+
+He was now standing straight up on his legs, his body squared, in a
+formidable attitude, and he grinned as he looked at the three
+petrified footmen and the dumbfounded baron:
+
+"Isidore, you've missed the chance of a lifetime. If you hadn't told
+them I was Lupin, they'd have jumped on me. And, with fellows like
+that, what would have become of me, by Jove, with four to one
+against me?"
+
+He walked up to them:
+
+"Come, my lads, don't be afraid--I shan't hurt you. Wouldn't you
+like a sugar-stick apiece to screw your courage up? Oh, you, by the
+way, hand me back my hundred-franc note, will you? Yes, yes, I know
+you! You're the one I bribed just now to give the letter to your
+mistress. Come hurry, you faithless servant."
+
+He took the blue bank-note which the servant handed him and tore it
+into tiny shreds:
+
+"The price of treachery! It burns my fingers."
+
+He took off his hat and, bowing very low before Mme. de Villemon:
+
+"Will you forgive me, madame? The accidents of life--of mine
+especially--often drive one to acts of cruelty for which I am the
+first to blush. But have no fear for your son: it's a mere prick, a
+little puncture in the arm which I gave him while we were
+questioning him. In an hour, at the most, you won't know that it
+happened. Once more, all my apologies. But I had to make sure of
+your silence." He bowed again, thanked M. de Velines for his kind
+hospitality, took his cane, lit a cigarette, offered one to the
+baron, gave a circular sweep with his hat and, in a patronizing
+tone, said to Beautrelet:
+
+"Good-bye, baby."
+
+And he walked away quietly, puffing the smoke of his cigarette into
+the servants' faces.
+
+Beautrelet waited for a few minutes. Mme. de Villemon, now calmer,
+was watching by her son. He went up to her, with the intention of
+making one last appeal to her. Their eyes met. He said nothing. He
+had understood that she would never speak now, whatever happened.
+There, once more, in that mother's brain, the secret of the Hollow
+Needle lay buried as deeply as in the night of the past.
+
+Then he gave up and went away.
+
+It was half-past ten. There was a train at eleven-fifty. He slowly
+followed the avenue in the park and turned into the road that led to
+the station.
+
+"Well, what do you say to that?"
+
+It was Massiban, or rather Lupin, who appeared out of the wood
+adjoining the road.
+
+"Was it pretty well contrived, or was it not? Is your old friend
+great on the tight-rope, or is he not? I'm sure that you haven't got
+over it, eh, and that you're asking yourself whether the so-called
+Massiban, member of the Academy of Inscriptions and Belles-Lettres,
+ever existed. But, of course, he exists. I'll even show him to you,
+if you're good. But, first, let me give you back your revolver.
+You're looking to see if it's loaded? Certainly, my lad. There are
+five charges left, one of which would be enough to send me ad
+patres.--Well, so you're putting it in your pocket? Quite right. I
+prefer that to what you did up there.--A nasty little impulse, that,
+of yours!--Still, you're young, you suddenly see--in a flash!--that
+you've once more been done by that confounded Lupin and that he is
+standing there in front of you, at three steps from you--and bang!
+You fire!--I'm not angry with you, bless your little heart! To prove
+it, I offer you a seat in my 100 h.p. car. Will that suit you?"
+
+He put his fingers to his mouth and whistled.
+
+The contrast was delicious between the venerable appearance of this
+elderly Massiban and the schoolboy ways and accent which Lupin was
+putting on. Beautrelet could not help laughing.
+
+"He's laughed! He's laughed!" cried Lupin, jumping for joy. "You
+see, baby, what you fall short in is the power of smiling; you're a
+trifle serious for your age. You're a very likeable boy, you have a
+charming candor and simplicity--but you have no sense of humor." He
+placed himself in front of him. "Look here, bet you I make you cry!
+Do you know how I was able to follow up all your inquiry, how I knew
+of the letter Massiban wrote you and his appointment to meet you
+this morning at the Chateau de Velines? Through the prattle of your
+friend, the one you're staying with. You confide in that idiot and
+he loses no time, but goes and tells everything to his best girl.
+And his best girl has no secrets for Lupin.--What did I tell you?
+I've made you feel, anyhow; your eyes are quite wet!--Friendship
+betrayed: that upsets you, eh? Upon my word, you're wonderful! I
+could take you in my arms and hug you! You always wear that look of
+astonishment which goes straight to my heart.--I shall never forget
+the other evening at Gaillon, when you consulted me.--Yes, I was the
+old notary!--But why don't you laugh, youngster? As I said, you have
+no sense of a joke. Look here, what you want is--what shall I call
+it?--imagination, imaginative impulse. Now, I'm full of imaginative
+impulse."
+
+A motor was heard panting not far off. Lupin seized Beautrelet
+roughly by the arm and in a cold voice, looking him straight in the
+eyes:
+
+"You're going to keep quiet now, aren't you? You can see there's
+nothing to be done. Then what's the use of wasting your time and
+energy? There are plenty of highway robbers in the world. Run after
+them and let me be--if not!--It's settled, isn't it?"
+
+He shook him as though to enforce his will upon him. Then he
+grinned:
+
+"Fool that I am! You leave me alone? You're not one of those who let
+go! Oh, I don't know what restrains me! In half a dozen turns of the
+wrist, I could have you bound and gagged--and, in two hours, safe
+under lock and key, for some months to come. And then I could twist
+my thumbs in all security, withdraw to the peaceful retreat prepared
+for me by my ancestors, the Kings of France, and enjoy the treasures
+which they have been good enough to accumulate for me. But no, it is
+doomed that I must go on blundering to the end. I can't help it, we
+all have our weaknesses--and I have one for you. Besides, it's not
+done yet. From now until you put your finger into the hollow of the
+Needle, a good deal of water will flow under the bridges. Dash it
+all, it took me ten days! Me! Lupin! You will want ten years, at
+least! There's that much distance between us, after all!"
+
+The motor arrived, an immense closed car. Lupin opened the door and
+Beautreiet gave a cry. There was a man inside and that man was
+Lupin, or rather Massiban. Suddenly understanding, he burst out
+laughing. Lupin said:
+
+"Don't be afraid, he's sound asleep. I promised that you should see
+him. Do you grasp the situation now? At midnight, I knew of your
+appointment at the castle. At seven in the morning, I was there.
+When Massiban passed, I had only to collect him--give him a tiny
+prick with a needle--and the thing--was done. Sleep old chap, sleep
+away. We'll set you down on the slope. That's it--there--capital--
+right in the sun, then you won't catch cold--good! And our hat in
+our hand.--Spare a copper, kind gentleman!--Oh. my dear old
+Massiban, so you were after Arsene Lupin!"
+
+It was really a huge joke to see the two Massibans face to face, one
+asleep with his head on his chest, the other seriously occupied in
+paying him every sort of attention and respect:
+
+"Pity a poor blind man! There, Massiban, here's two sous and my
+visiting-card. And now, my lads, off we go at the fourth speed. Do
+you hear, driver? You've got to do seventy-five miles an hour. Jump
+in, Isidore. There's a full sitting of the Institute to-day, and
+Massiban is to read a little paper, on I don't know what, at half-
+past three. Well, he'll read them his little paper. I'll dish them
+up a complete Massiban, more real than the real one, with my own
+ideas, on the lacustrine inscriptions. I don't have an opportunity
+of lecturing at the Institute ever day!--Faster, chauffeur: we're
+only doing seventy-one and a half!--Are you afraid? Remember you're
+with Lupin!--Ah, Isidore, and then people say that life is
+monotonous! Why, life's an adorable thing, my boy; only one has to
+know--and I know--. Wasn't it enough to make a man jump out of his
+skin for joy, just now, at the castle, when you were chattering with
+old Velines and I, up against the window, was tearing out the pages
+of the historic book? And then, when you were questioning the Dame
+de Villemon about the Hollow Needle! Would she speak? Yes, she
+would--no, she wouldn't--yes--no. It gave me gooseflesh, I assure
+you.--If she spoke, I should have to build up my life anew, the
+whole scaffolding was destroyed.--Would the footman come in time?
+Yes--no--there he is.--But Beautrelet will unmask me! Never! He's
+too much of a flat! Yes, though--no--there, he's done it--no, he
+hasn't--yes--he's eyeing me--that's it--he's feeling for his
+revolver!--Oh, the delight of it!--Isidore, you're talking too much,
+you'll hurt yourself!--Let's have a snooze, shall we?--I'm dying of
+sleep.--Good night."
+
+Beautrelet looked at him. He seemed almost asleep already. He slept.
+
+The motor-car, darting through space, rushed toward a horizon that
+was constantly reached and as constantly retreated. There was no
+impression of towns, villages, fields or forests; simply space,
+space devoured, swallowed up.
+
+Beautrelet looked at his traveling companion, for a long time, with
+eager curiosity and also with a keen wish to fathom his real
+character through the mask that covered it. And he thought of the
+circumstances that confined them, like that, together, in the close
+contact of that motor car. But, after the excitement and
+disappointment of the morning, tired in his turn, he too fell
+asleep.
+
+When he woke, Lupin was reading. Beautrelet leant over to see the
+title of the book. It was the Epistolae ad Lucilium of Seneca the
+philosopher.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER EIGHT
+
+FROM CAESAR TO LUPIN
+
+
+Dash it all, it took me ten days! Me! Lupin!
+
+You will want ten years, at least!--
+
+These words, uttered by Lupin after leaving the Chateau de Velines,
+had no little influence on Beautrelet's conduct.
+
+Though very calm in the main and invariably master of himself,
+Lupin, nevertheless, was subject to moments of exaltation, of a more
+or less romantic expansiveness, at once theatrical and good-humored,
+when he allowed certain admissions to escape him, certain imprudent
+speeches which a boy like Beautrelet could easily turn to profit.
+
+Rightly or wrongly, Beautrelet read one of these involuntary
+admissions into that phrase. He was entitled to conclude that, if
+Lupin drew a comparison between his own efforts and Beautrelet's in
+pursuit of the truth about the Hollow Needle, it was because the two
+of them possessed identical means of attaining their object, because
+Lupin had no elements of success different from those possessed by
+his adversary. The chances were alike. Now, with the same chances,
+the same elements of success, the same means, ten days had been
+enough for Lupin.
+
+What were those elements, those means, those chances? They were
+reduced, when all was said, to a knowledge of the pamphlet published
+in 1815, a pamphlet which Lupin, no doubt, like Massiban, had found
+by accident and thanks to which he had succeeded in discovering the
+indispensable document in Marie Antoinette's book of hours.
+
+Therefore, the pamphlet and the document were the only two
+fundamental facts upon which Lupin had relied. With these he had
+built up the whole edifice. He had had no extraneous aid. The study
+of the pamphlet and the study of the document--full stop--that was
+all.
+
+Well, could not Beautrelet confine himself to the same ground? What
+was the use of an impossible struggle? What was the use of those
+vain investigations, in which, even supposing that he avoided the
+pitfalls that were multiplied under his feet, he was sure, in the
+end, to achieve the poorest of results?
+
+His decision was clear and immediate; and, in adopting it, he had
+the happy instinct that he was on the right path. He began by
+leaving his Janson-de-Sailly schoolfellow, without indulging in
+useless recriminations, and, taking his portmanteau with him, went
+and installed himself, after much hunting about, in a small hotel
+situated in the very heart of Paris. This hotel he did not leave for
+days. At most, he took his meals at the table d'hote. The rest of
+the time, locked in his room, with the window-curtains close-drawn,
+he spent in thinking.
+
+"Ten days," Arsene Lupin had said.
+
+Beautrelet, striving to forget all that he had done and to remember
+only the elements of the pamphlet and the document, aspired eagerly
+to keep within the limit of those ten days. However the tenth day
+passed and the eleventh and the twelfth; but, on the thirteenth day,
+a gleam lit up his brain and, very soon, with the bewildering
+rapidity of those ideas which develop in us like miraculous plants,
+the truth emerged, blossomed, gathered strength. On the evening of
+the thirteenth day, he certainly did not know the answer to the
+problem, but he knew, to a certainty, one of the methods which Lupin
+had, beyond a doubt, employed.
+
+It was a very simple method, hinging on this one question: Is there
+a link of any sort uniting all the more or less important historic
+events with which the pamphlet connects the mystery of the Hollow
+Needle?
+
+The great diversity of these events made the question difficult to
+answer. Still, the profound examination to which Beautrelet applied
+himself ended by pointing to one essential characteristic which was
+common to them all. Each one of them, without exception, had
+happened within the boundaries of the old kingdom of Neustria, which
+correspond very nearly with those of our present-day Normandy. All
+the heroes of the fantastic adventure are Norman, or become Norman,
+or play their part in the Norman country.
+
+What a fascinating procession through the ages! What a rousing
+spectacle was that of all those barons, dukes and kings, starting
+from such widely opposite points to meet in this particular corner
+of the world! Beautrelet turned the pages of history at haphazard:
+it was Rolf, or Rou, or Rollo, first Duke of Normandy, who was
+master of the secret of the Needle, according to the treaty of
+Saint-Clair-sur-Epte!
+
+It was William the Conqueror, Duke of Normandy and King of England,
+whose bannerstaff was pierced like a needle!
+
+It was at Rouen that the English burnt Joan of Arc, mistress of the
+secret!
+
+And right at the beginning of the adventure, who is that chief of
+the Caleti who pays his ransom to Caesar with the secret of the
+Needle but the chief of the men of the Caux country, which lies in
+the very heart of Normandy?
+
+The supposition becomes more definite. The field narrows. Rouen, the
+banks of the Seine, the Caux country: it really seems as though all
+roads lead in that direction. Two kings of France are mentioned more
+particularly, after the secret is lost by the Dukes of Normandy and
+their heirs, the kings of England, and becomes the royal secret of
+France; and these two are King Henry IV., who laid siege to Rouen
+and won the battle of Arques, near Dieppe, and Francis I., who
+founded the Havre and uttered that suggestive phrase:
+
+"The kings of France carry secrets that often decide the fate of
+towns!"
+
+Rouen, Dieppe, the Havre: the three angles of the triangle, the
+three large towns that occupy the three points. In the centre, the
+Caux country.
+
+The seventeenth century arrives. Louis XIV. burns the book in which
+a person unknown reveals the truth. Captain de Larbeyrie masters a
+copy, profits by the secret thus obtained, steals a certain number
+of jewels and dies by the hand of highway murderers. Now at which
+spot is the ambush laid? At Gaillon! At Gaillon, a little town on
+the road leading from Havre, Rouen or Dieppe to Paris!
+
+A year later, Louis XIV. buys a domain and builds the Chateau de
+l'Aiguille. Where does he select his site? In the Midlands of
+France, with the result that the curious are thrown off the scent
+and do not hunt about in Normandy.
+
+Rouen, Dieppe, the Havre--the Cauchois triangle--everything lies
+there. On one side, the sea; on another, the Seine: on the third,
+the two valleys that lead from Rouen to Dieppe.
+
+A light flashed across Beautrelet's mind. That extent of ground,
+that country of the high tablelands which run from the cliffs of the
+Seine to the cliffs of the Channel almost invariably constituted the
+field of operations of Arsene Lupin. For ten years, it was just this
+district which he parcelled out for his purposes, as though he had
+his haunt in the very centre of the region with which, the legend of
+the Hollow Needle was most closely connected.
+
+The affair of Baron Cahorn? [Footnote: The Seven of Hearts, by
+Maurice Leblanc. II; Arsene Lupin in Prison] Or the banks of the
+Seine, between Rouen and the Havre.
+
+The Thibermenil case? [Footnote: The Seven of Hearts. IX: Holmlock
+Shears Arrives Too Late.] At the other end of the tableland, between
+Rouen and Dieppe.
+
+The Gruchet, Montigny, Crasville burglaries? In the midst of the
+Caux country.
+
+Where was Lupin going when he was attacked and bound hand and foot,
+in his compartment by Pierre Onfrey, the Auteuil murderer?
+[Footnote: The Seven of Hearts. IV: The Mysterious Railway-
+passenger.] To Rouen.
+
+Where was Holmlock Shears, Lupin's prisoner, put on board ship?
+[Footnote: Arsene Lupin versus Holmlock Shears, by Maurice Leblanc,
+Chapter V: Kidnapped.]  Near the Havre.
+
+And what was the scene of the whole of the present tragedy?
+Ambrumesy, on the road between the Havre and Dieppe.
+
+Rouen, Dieppe, the Havre: always the Cauchois triangle.
+
+And so, a few years earlier, possessing the pamphlet and knowing the
+hiding-place in which Marie Antoinette had concealed the document,
+Arsene Lupin had ended by laying his hand on the famous book of
+hours. Once in possession of the document, he took the field,
+"found" and settled down as in a conquered country.
+
+Beautrelet took the field.
+
+He set out in genuine excitement, thinking of the same journey which
+Lupin had taken, of the same hopes with which he must have throbbed
+when he thus went in search of the tremendous secret which was to
+arm him with so great a power. Would his, Beautrelet's efforts have
+the same victorious results?
+
+He left Rouen early in the morning, on foot, with his face very much
+disguised and his bag at the end of a stick on his shoulder, like an
+apprentice doing his round of France. He walked straight to Duclair,
+where he lunched. On leaving this town, he followed the Seine and
+practically did not lose sight of it again. His instinct,
+strengthened, moreover, by numerous influences, always brought him
+back to the sinuous banks of the stately river. When the Chateau du
+Malaquis was robbed, the objects stolen from Baron Cahorn's
+collection were sent by way of the Seine. The old carvings removed
+from the chapel at Ambrumesy were carried to the Seine bank. He
+pictured the whole fleet of pinnaces performing a regular service
+between Rouen and the Havre and draining the works of art and
+treasures from a countryside to dispatch them thence to the land of
+millionaires.
+
+"I'm burning! I'm burning!" muttered the boy, gasping under the
+truth, which came to him in a mighty series of shocks and took away
+his breath.
+
+The checks encountered on the first few days, did not discourage
+him. He had a firm and profound belief in the correctness of the
+supposition that was guiding him. It was bold, perhaps, and
+extravagant; no matter: it was worthy of the adversary pursued. The
+supposition was on a level with the prodigious reality that bore the
+name of Lupin. With a man like that, of what good could it be to
+look elsewhere than in the domain of the enormous, the exaggerated,
+the superhuman?
+
+Jumieges, the Mailleraye, Saint-Wandrille, Caudebec, Tancarville,
+Quillebeuf were places filled with his memories. How often he must
+have contemplated the glory of their Gothic steeples or the splendor
+of their immense ruins!
+
+But the Havre, the neighborhood of the Havre drew Isidore like a
+beacon-fire.
+
+"The kings of France carry secrets that often decide the fate of
+towns!"
+
+Cryptic words which, suddenly, for Beautrelet, shone bright with
+clearness! Was this not an exact statement of the reasons that
+determined Francis I. to create a town on this spot and was not the
+fate of the Havre-de-Grace linked with the very secret of the
+Needle?
+
+"That's it, that's it," stammered Beautrelet, excitedly. "The old
+Norman estuary, one of the essential points, one of the original
+centres around which our French nationality was formed, is completed
+by those two forces, one in full view, alive, known to all, the new
+port commanding the ocean and opening on the world; the other dim
+and obscure, unknown and all the more alarming, inasmuch as it is
+invisible and impalpable. A whole side of the history of France and
+of the royal house is explained by the Needle, even as it explains
+the whole story of Arsene Lupin. The same sources of energy and
+power supply and renew the fortunes of kings and of the adventurer."
+
+Beautrelet ferreted and snuffed from village to village, from the
+river to the sea, with his nose in the wind, his ears pricked,
+trying to compel the inanimate things to surrender their deep
+meaning. Ought this hill-slope to be questioned? Or that forest? Or
+the houses of this hamlet? Or was it among the insignificant phrases
+spoken by that peasant yonder that he might hope to gather the one
+little illuminating word?
+
+One morning, he was lunching at an inn, within sight of Honfleur,
+the old city of the estuary. Opposite him was sitting one of those
+heavy, red-haired Norman horse-dealers who do the fairs of the
+district, whip in hand and clad in a long smock-frock. After a
+moment, it seemed to Beautrelet that the man was looking at him with
+a certain amount of attention, as though he knew him or, at least,
+was trying to recognize him.
+
+"Pooh," he thought, "there's some mistake: I've never seen that
+merchant before, nor he me."
+
+As a matter of fact, the man appeared to take no further interest in
+him. He lit his pipe, called for coffee and brandy, smoked and
+drank.
+
+When Beautrelet had finished his meal, he paid and rose to go. A
+group of men entered just as he was about to leave and he had to
+stand for a few seconds near the table at which the horse-dealer
+sat. He then heard the man say in a low voice:
+
+"Good-afternoon, M. Beautrelet."
+
+Without hesitation, Isidore sat down beside the man and said:
+
+"Yes, that is my name--but who are you? How did you know me?"
+
+"That's not difficult--and yet I've only seen your portrait in the
+papers. But you are so badly--what do you call it in French--so
+badly made-up."
+
+He had a pronounced foreign accent and Beautrelet seemed to
+perceive, as he looked at him, that he too wore a facial disguise
+that entirely altered his features.
+
+"Who are you?" he repeated. "Who are you?"
+
+The stranger smiled:
+
+"Don't you recognize me?"
+
+"No, I never saw you before."
+
+"Nor I you. But think. The papers print my portrait also--and pretty
+often. Well, have you got it?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Holmlock Shears."
+
+It was an amusing and, at the same time, a significant meeting. The
+boy at once saw the full bearing of it. After an exchange of
+compliments, he said to Shears:
+
+"I suppose that you are here--because of 'him'?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"So--so--you think we have a chance--in this direction."
+
+"I'm sure of it."
+
+Beautrelet's delight at finding that Shears's opinion agreed with
+his own was not unmingled with other feelings. If the Englishman
+attained his object, it meant that, at the very best, the two would
+share the victory; and who could tell that Shears would not attain
+it first?
+
+"Have you any proofs? Any clues?"
+
+"Don't be afraid," grinned the Englishman, who understood his
+uneasiness. "I am not treading on your heels. With you, it's the
+document, the pamphlet: things that do not inspire me with any great
+confidence."
+
+"And with you?"
+
+"With me, it's something different."
+
+"Should I be indiscreet, if--?"
+
+"Not at all. You remember the story of the coronet, the story of the
+Duc de Charmerac?" [Footnote: Arsene Lupin, play in four acts, by
+Maurice Leblanc and Francis de Croisset.]
+
+"Yes."
+
+"You remember Victoire, Lupin's old foster-mother, the one whom my
+good friend Ganimard allowed to escape in a sham prison-van?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"I have found Victoire's traces. She lives on a farm, not far from
+National Road No. 25. National Road No. 25 is the road from the
+Havre to Lille. Through Victoire I shall easily get at Lupin."
+
+"It will take long."
+
+"No matter! I have dropped all my cases. This is the only one I care
+about. Between Lupin and me, it's a fight--a fight to the death."
+
+He spoke these words with a sort of ferocity that betrayed all his
+bitterness at the humiliations which he had undergone, all his
+fierce hatred of the great enemy who had tricked him so cruelly.
+
+"Go away, now," he whispered, "we are observed. It's dangerous. But
+mark my words: on the day when Lupin and I meet face to face, it
+will be--it will be tragic."
+
+Beautrelet felt quite reassured on leaving Shears: he need not fear
+that the Englishman would gain on him. And here was one more proof
+which this chance interview had brought him: the road from the Havre
+to Lille passes through Dieppe! It is the great seaside road of the
+Caux country, the coast road commanding the Channel cliffs! And it
+was on a farm near this road that Victoire was installed, Victoire,
+that is to say, Lupin, for one did not move without the other, the
+master without the blindly devoted servant.
+
+"I'm burning! I'm burning!" he repeated to himself. "Whenever
+circumstances bring me a new element of information, it confirms my
+supposition. On the one hand, I have the absolute certainty of the
+banks of the Seine; on the other, the certainty of the National
+Road. The two means of communication meet at the Havre, the town of
+Francis I., the town of the secret. The boundaries are contracting.
+The Caux country is not large; and, even so, I have only the western
+portion of the Caux country to search."
+
+He set to work with renewed stubbornness:
+
+"Anything that Lupin has found," he kept on saying to himself,
+"there is no reason for my not finding."
+
+Certainly, Lupin had some great advantage over him, perhaps a
+thorough acquaintance with the country, a precise knowledge of the
+local legends, or less than that, a memory: invaluable advantages
+these, for he, Beautrelet, knew nothing, was totally ignorant of the
+country, which he had first visited at the time of the Ambrumesy
+burglary and then only rapidly, without lingering.
+
+But what did it matter? Though he had to devote ten years of his
+life to this investigation, he would carry it to a successful issue.
+Lupin was there. He could see him, he could feel him there. He
+expected to come upon him at the next turn of the road, on the skirt
+of the next wood, outside the next village. And, though continually
+disappointed, he seemed to find in each disappointment a fresh
+reason for persisting.
+
+Often, he would fling himself on the slope by the roadside and
+plunge into wild examination of the copy of the document which he
+always carried on him, a copy, that is to say, with vowels taking
+the place of the figures:
+
+e . a . a . . e . . e . a . . a . .
+ a . . . e . e .     . e . oi . e . . e .
+ . ou . . e . o . . . e . . e . o . . e
+
+
+[Illustration: drawing of an outline of paper with writing and
+drawing on it--numbers, dots, some letters, signs and symbols...]
+
+ai . ui . . e           . . eu . e
+
+Often, also, according to his habit, he would lie down flat on his
+stomach in the tall grass and think for hours. He had time enough.
+The future belonged to him.
+
+With wonderful patience, he tramped from the Seine to the sea, and
+from the sea to the Seine, going gradually farther, retracing his
+steps and never quitting the ground until, theoretically speaking,
+there was not a chance left of gathering the smallest particle upon
+it.
+
+He studied and explored Montivilliers and Saint-Romani and Octeville
+and Gonneville and Criquetot.
+
+At night, he knocked at the peasants' doors and asked for a lodging.
+After dinner, they smoked together and chatted. He made them tell
+him the stories which they told one another on the long winter
+nights. And he never omitted to insinuate, slily:
+
+"What about the Needle? The legend of the Hollow Needle? Don't you
+know that?"
+
+"Upon my word, I don't--never heard of it--"
+
+"Just think--an old wives' tale--something that has to do with a
+needle. An enchanted needle, perhaps.--I don't know--"
+
+Nothing. No legend, no recollection. And the next morning he walked
+blithely away again.
+
+One day, he passed through the pretty village of Saint-Jouin, which
+overlooks the sea, and descending among the chaos of rocks that have
+slipped from cliffs, he climbed up to the tableland and went in the
+direction of the dry valley of Bruneval, Cap d'Antifer and the
+little creek of Belle-Plage. He was walking gaily and lightly,
+feeling a little tired, perhaps, but glad to be alive, so glad,
+even, that he forgot Lupin and the mystery of the Hollow Needle and
+Victoire and Shears, and interested himself in the sight of nature:
+the blue sky, the great emerald sea, all glittering in the sunshine.
+
+Some straight slopes and remains of brick walls, in which he seemed
+to recognize the vestiges of a Roman camp, interested him. Then his
+eyes fell upon a sort of little castle, built in imitation of an
+ancient fort, with cracked turrets and Gothic windows. It stood on a
+jagged, rugged, rising promontory, almost detached from the cliff. A
+barred gate, flanked by iron hand-rails and bristling spikes,
+guarded the narrow passage.
+
+Beautrelet succeeded in climbing over, not without some difficulty.
+Over the pointed door, which was closed with an old rusty lock, he
+read the words:
+
+FORT DE FREFOSSE
+
+He did not attempt to enter, but, turning to the right, after going
+down a little slope, he embarked upon a path that ran along a ridge
+of land furnished with a wooden handrail. Right at the end was a
+cave of very small dimensions, forming a sort of watch-tower at the
+point of the rock in which it was hollowed out, a rock falling
+abruptly into the sea.
+
+There was just room to stand up in the middle of the cave.
+Multitudes of inscriptions crossed one another on the walls. An
+almost square hole, cut in the stone, opened like a dormer window on
+the land side, exactly opposite Fort Frefosse, the crenellated top
+of which appeared at thirty or forty yards' distance.
+
+Beautrelet threw off his knapsack and sat down. He had had a hard
+and tiring day. He fell asleep for a little. Then the cool wind that
+blew inside the cave woke him up. He sat for a few minutes without
+moving, absent-minded, vague-eyed. He tried to reflect, to recapture
+his still torpid thoughts. And, as he recovered his consciousness,
+he was on the point of rising, when he received the impression that
+his eyes, suddenly fixed, suddenly wide-open, saw--
+
+A thrill shook him from head to foot. His hands clutched
+convulsively and he felt the beads of perspiration forming at the
+roots of his hair:
+
+"No, no," he stammered. "It's a dream, an hallucination. Let's look:
+it's not possible!"
+
+He plunged down on his knees and stooped over. Two huge letters,
+each perhaps a foot long, appeared cut in relief in the granite of
+the floor. Those two letters, clumsily, but plainly carved, with
+their corners rounded and their surface smoothed by the wear and
+tear of centuries, were a D and an F.
+
+D and F! Oh, bewildering miracle! D and F: just two letters of the
+document! Oh, Beautrelet had no need to consult it to bring before
+his mind that group of letters in the fourth line, the line of the
+measurements and indications! He knew them well! They were inscribed
+for all time at the back of his pupils, encrusted for good and all
+in the very substance of his brain!
+
+He rose to his feet, went down the steep road, climbed back along
+the old fort, hung on to the spikes of the rail again, in order to
+pass, and walked briskly toward a shepherd whose flock was grazing
+some way off on a dip in the tableland:
+
+"That cave, over there--that cave--"
+
+His lips trembled and he tried to find the words that would not
+come. The shepherd looked at him in amazement. At last, Isidore
+repeated:
+
+"Yes, that cave--over there--to the right of the fort. Has it a
+name?"
+
+"Yes, I should think so. All the Etretat folk like to call it the
+Demoiselles."
+
+"What?--What?--What's that you say?"
+
+"Why, of course--it's the Chambre des Demoiselles."
+
+Isidore felt like flying at his throat, as though all the truth
+lived in that man and he hoped to get it from him at one swoop, to
+tear it from him.
+
+The Demoiselles! One of the words, one of the only three known words
+of the document!
+
+A whirlwind of madness shook Beautrelet where he stood. And it rose
+all around him, blew upon him like a tempestuous squall that came
+from the sea, that came from the land, that came from every
+direction and whipped him with great lashes of the truth.
+
+He understood. The document appeared to him in its real sense. The
+Chambre des Demoiselles--Etretat--
+
+"That's it," he thought, his brain filled with light, "it must be
+that. But why didn't I guess earlier?"
+
+He said to the shepherd, in a low voice:
+
+"That will do--go away--you can go--thank you."
+
+The man, not knowing what to think, whistled to his dog and went.
+
+Left alone, Beautrelet returned to the fort. He had almost passed it
+when, suddenly, he dropped to the ground and lay cowering against a
+piece of wall. And, wringing his hands, he thought:
+
+"I must be mad! If 'he' were to see me! Or his accomplices! I've
+been moving about for an hour--!"
+
+He did not stir another limb.
+
+The sun went down. Little by little, the night mingled with the day,
+blurring the outline of things.
+
+Then, with little imperceptible movements, flat on his stomach,
+gliding, crawling, he crept along one of the points of the
+promontory to the extreme edge of the cliff.
+
+He reached it. Stretching out his hands, he pushed aside some tufts
+of grass and his head appeared over the precipice.
+
+Opposite him, almost level with the cliff, in the open sea rose an
+enormous rock, over eighty yards high, a colossal obelisk, standing
+straight on its granite base, which showed at the surface of the
+water, and tapering toward the summit, like the giant tooth of a
+monster of the deep. White with the dirty gray white of the cliff,
+the awful monolith was streaked with horizontal lines marked by
+flint and displaying the slow work of the centuries, which had
+heaped alternate layers of lime and pebble-stone one atop of the
+other.
+
+Here and there, a fissure, a break; and, wherever these occurred, a
+scrap of earth, with grass and leaves.
+
+And all this was mighty and solid and formidable, with the look of
+an indestructible thing against which the furious assault of the
+waves and storms could not prevail. And it was definite and
+permanent and grand, despite the grandeur of the cliffy rampart that
+commanded it, despite the immensity of the space in which it stood.
+
+Beautrelet's nails dug into the soil like the claws of an animal
+ready to leap upon its prey. His eyes penetrated the wrinkled
+texture of the rock, penetrated its skin, so it seemed to him, its
+very flesh. He touched it, felt it, took cognizance and possession
+of it, absorbed and assimilated it.
+
+The horizon turned crimson with all the flames of the vanished sun;
+and long, red clouds, set motionless in the sky, formed glorious
+landscapes, fantastic lagoons, fiery plains, forests of gold, lakes
+of blood, a whole glowing and peaceful phantasmagoria.
+
+The blue of the sky grew darker. Venus shone with a marvelous
+brightness; then other stars lit up, timid as yet.
+
+And Beautrelet suddenly closed his eyes and convulsively pressed his
+folded arms to his forehead. Over there--oh, he felt as though he
+would die for joy, so great was the cruel emotion that wrung his
+heart!--over there, almost at the top of the Needle of Etretat, a
+little below the extreme point round which the sea-mews fluttered, a
+thread of smoke came filtering through a crevice, as though from an
+invisible chimney, a thread of smoke rose in slow spirals in the
+calm air of the twilight.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER NINE
+
+OPEN, SESAME!
+
+
+The Etretat Needle was hollow!
+
+Was it a natural phenomenon, an excavation produced by internal
+cataclysms or by the imperceptible action of the rushing sea and the
+soaking rain? Or was it a superhuman work executed by human beings,
+Gauls, Celts, prehistoric men?
+
+These, no doubt, were insoluble questions; and what did it matter?
+The essence of the thing was contained in this fact: The Needle was
+hollow. At forty or fifty yards from that imposing arch which is
+called the Porte d'Aval and which shoots out from the top of the
+cliff, like the colossal branch of a tree, to take root in the
+submerged rocks, stands an immense limestone cone; and this cone is
+no more than the shell of a pointed cap poised upon the empty
+waters!
+
+A prodigious revelation! After Lupin, here was Beautrelet
+discovering the key to the great riddle that had loomed over more
+than twenty centuries! A key of supreme importance to whoever
+possessed it in the days of old, in those distant times when hordes
+of barbarians rode through and overran the old world! A magic key
+that opens the cyclopean cavern to whole tribes fleeing before the
+enemy! A mysterious key that guards the door of the most inviolable
+shelter! An enchanted key that gives power and ensures
+preponderance!
+
+Because he knows this key, Caesar is able to subdue Gaul. Because
+they know it, the Normans force their sway upon the country and,
+from there, later, backed by that support, conquer the neighboring
+island, conquer Sicily, conquer the East, conquer the new world!
+
+Masters of the secret, the Kings of England lord it over France,
+humble her, dismember her, have themselves crowned at Paris. They
+lose the secret; and the rout begins.
+
+Masters of the secret, the Kings of France push back and overstep
+the narrow limits of their dominion, gradually founding a great
+nation and radiating with glory and power. They forget it or know
+not how to use it; and death, exile, ruin follow.
+
+An invisible kingdom, in mid-water and at ten fathoms from land! An
+unknown fortress, taller than the towers of Notre Dame and built
+upon a granite foundation larger than a public square! What strength
+and what security! From Paris to the sea, by the Seine. There, the
+Havre, the new town, the necessary town. And, sixteen miles thence,
+the Hollow Needle, the impregnable sanctuary!
+
+It is a sanctuary and also a stupendous hiding-place. All the
+treasures of the kings, increasing from century to century, all the
+gold of France, all that they extort from the people, all that they
+snatch from the clergy, all the booty gathered on the battle-fields
+of Europe lie heaped up in the royal cave. Old Merovingian gold
+sous, glittering crown-pieces, doubloons, ducats, florins, guineas;
+and the precious stones and the diamonds; and all the jewels and all
+the ornaments: everything is there. Who could discover it? Who could
+ever learn the impenetrable secret of the Needle? Nobody.
+
+And Lupin becomes that sort of really disproportionate being whom we
+know, that miracle incapable of explanation so long as the truth
+remains in the shadow. Infinite though the resources of his genius
+be, they cannot suffice for the mad struggle which he maintains
+against society. He needs other, more material resources. He needs a
+sure place of retreat, he needs the certainty of impunity, the peace
+that allows of the execution of his plans.
+
+Without the Hollow Needle, Lupin is incomprehensible, a myth, a
+character in a novel, having no connection with reality.
+
+Master of the secret--and of such a secret!--he becomes simply a man
+like another, but gifted with the power of wielding in a superior
+manner the extraordinary weapon with which destiny has endowed him.
+
+        *       *       *       *       *
+
+So the Needle was hollow.
+
+It remained to discover how one obtained access to it.
+
+From the sea, obviously. There must be, on the side of the offing,
+some fissure where boats could land at certain hours of the tide.
+
+But on the side of the land?
+
+Beautrelet lay until ten o'clock at night hanging over the
+precipice, with his eyes riveted on the shadowy mass formed by the
+pyramid, thinking and pondering with all the concentrated effort of
+his mind.
+
+Then he went down to Etretat, selected the cheapest hotel, dined,
+went up to his room and unfolded the document.
+
+It was the merest child's play to him now to establish its exact
+meaning. He at once saw that the three vowels of the word Etretat
+occurred in the first line, in their proper order and at the
+necessary intervals. This first line now read as follows:
+
+e . a . a .. etretat . a ..
+
+What words could come before Etretat? Words, no doubt, that referred
+to the position of the Needle with regard to the town. Now the
+Needle stood on the left, on the west--He ransacked his memory and,
+recollecting that westerly winds are called vents d'aval on the
+coast and that the nearest porte was known as the Porte d'Aval, he
+wrote down:
+
+"En aval d'Etretat . a .."
+
+The second line was that containing the word Demoiselles and, at
+once seeing, in front of that word, the series of all the vowels
+that form part of the words la chambre des, he noted the two
+phrases:
+
+"En aval d'Etretat. La Chambre des Demoiselles."
+
+The third line gave him more trouble; and it was not until some
+groping that, remembering the position, near the Chambre des
+Demoiselles, of the Fort de Frefosse, he ended by almost completely
+reconstructing the document:
+
+"En aval d'Etretat. La Chambre des Demoiselles. Sous le Fort de
+Frefosse. L'Aiguille creuse."
+
+These were the four great formulas, the essential and general
+formulas which you had to know. By means of them, you turned en
+aval, that is to say, below or west of Etretat, entered the Chambre
+des Demoiselles, in all probability passed under Fort Frefosse and
+thus arrived at the Needle.
+
+How? By means of the indications and measurements that constituted
+the fourth line:
+
+[Illustration: drawing of an outline of paper with writing and
+drawing on it--numbers, dots, some letters, signs and symbols...]
+
+These were evidently the more special formulas to enable you to find
+the outlet through which you made your way and the road that led to
+the Needle.
+
+Beautrelet at once presumed--and his surmise was no more than the
+logical consequence of the document--that, if there really was a
+direct communication between the land and the obelisk of the Needle,
+the underground passage must start from the Chambre des Demoiselles,
+pass under Fort Frefosse, descend perpendicularly the three hundred
+feet of cliff and, by means of a tunnel contrived under the rocks of
+the sea, end at the Hollow Needle.
+
+Which was the entrance to the underground passage? Did not the two
+letters D and F, so plainly cut, point to it and admit to it, with
+the aid, perhaps, of some ingenious piece of mechanism?
+
+The whole of the next morning, Isidore strolled about Etretat and
+chatted with everybody he met, in order to try and pick up useful
+information. At last, in the afternoon, he went up the cliff.
+Disguised as a sailor, he had made himself still younger and, in a
+pair of trousers too short for him and a fishing jersey, he looked a
+mere scape-grace of twelve or thirteen.
+
+As soon as he entered the cave, he knelt down before the letters.
+Here a disappointment awaited him. It was no use his striking them,
+pushing them, manipulating them in every way: they refused to move.
+And it was not long, in fact, before he became aware that they were
+really unable to move and that, therefore, they controlled no
+mechanism.
+
+And yet--and yet they must mean something! Inquiries which he had
+made in the village went to show that no one had ever been able to
+explain their existence and that the Abbe Cochet, in his valuable
+little book on Etretat, [Footnote: Les Origines d'Etretat. The Abbe
+Cochet seems to conclude, in the end, that the two letters are the
+initials of a passer-by. The revelations now made prove the fallacy
+of the theory.] had also tried in vain to solve this little puzzle.
+But Isidore knew what the learned Norman archaeologist did not know,
+namely, that the same two letters figured in the document, on the
+line containing the indications. Was it a chance coincidence:
+Impossible. Well, then--?
+
+An idea suddenly occurred to him, an idea so reasonable, so simple
+that he did not doubt its correctness for a second. Were not that D
+and that F the initials of the two most important words in the
+document, the words that represented--together with the Needle--the
+essential stations on the road to be followed: the Chambre des
+Demoiselles and Fort Frefosse: D for Demoiselles, F for Frefosse:
+the connection was too remarkable to be a mere accidental fact.
+
+In that case, the problem stood thus: the two letters D F represent
+the relation that exists between the Chambre des Demoiselles and
+Fort Frefosse, the single letter D, which begins the line,
+represents the Demoiselles, that is to say, the cave in which you
+have to begin by taking up your position, and the single letter F,
+placed in the middle of the line, represents Frefosse, that is to
+say, the probable entrance to the underground passage.
+
+Between these various signs, are two more: first, a sort of
+irregular rectangle, marked with a stripe in the left bottom corner,
+and, next, the figure 19, signs which obviously indicate to those
+inside the cave the means of penetrating beneath the fort.
+
+The shape of this rectangle puzzled Isidore. Was there around him,
+on the walls of the cave, or at any rate within reach of his eyes,
+an inscription, anything whatever, affecting a rectangular shape?
+
+He looked for a long time and was on the point of abandoning that
+particular scent when his eyes fell upon the little opening, pierced
+in the rock, that acted as a window to the chamber.
+
+Now the edges of this opening just formed a rectangle: corrugated,
+uneven, clumsy, but still a rectangle; and Beautrelet at once saw
+that, by placing his two feet on the D and the F carved in the stone
+floor--and this explained the stroke that surmounted the two letters
+in the document--he found himself at the exact height of the window!
+
+He took up his position in this place and gazed out. The window
+looking landward, as we know, he saw, first, the path that connected
+the cave with the land, a path hung between two precipices; and,
+next, he caught sight of the foot of the hillock on which the fort
+stood. To try and see the fort, Beautrelet leaned over to the left
+and it was then that he understood the meaning of the curved stripe,
+the comma that marked the left bottom corner in the document: at the
+bottom on the left-hand side of the window, a piece of flint
+projected and the end of it was curved like a claw. It suggested a
+regular shooter's mark. And, when a man applied his eye to this
+mark, he saw cut out, on the slope of the mound facing him, a
+restricted surface of land occupied almost entirely by an old brick
+wall, a remnant of the original Fort Frefosse or of the old Roman
+oppidum built on this spot.
+
+Beautrelet ran to this piece of wall, which was, perhaps, ten yards
+long. It was covered with grass and plants. There was no indication
+of any kind visible. And yet that figure 19?
+
+He returned to the cave, took from his pocket a ball of string and a
+tape-measure, tied the string to the flint corner, fastened a pebble
+at the nineteenth metre and flung it toward the land side. The
+pebble at most reached the end of the path.
+
+"Idiot that I am!" thought Beautrelet. "Who reckoned by metres in
+those days? The figure 19 means 19 fathoms [Footnote: The toise, or
+fathom, measured 1.949 metres.--Translator's Note.] or nothing!"
+
+Having made the calculation, he ran out the twine, made a knot and
+felt about on the piece of wall for the exact and necessarily one
+point at which the knot, formed at 37 metres from the window of the
+Demoiselles, should touch the Frefosse wall. In a few moments, the
+point of contact was established. With his free hand, he moved aside
+the leaves of mullein that had grown in the interstices. A cry
+escaped him. The knot, which he held pressed down with his fore-
+finger, was in the centre of a little cross carved in relief on a
+brick. And the sign that followed on the figure 19 in the document
+was a cross!
+
+It needed all his will-power to control the excitement with which he
+was overcome. Hurriedly, with convulsive fingers, he clutched the
+cross and, pressing upon it, turned it as he would have turned the
+spokes of a wheel. The brick heaved. He redoubled his effort; it
+moved no further. Then, without turning, he pressed harder. He at
+once felt the brick give way. And, suddenly, there was the click of
+a bolt that is released, the sound of a lock opening and, on the
+right of the brick, to the width of about a yard, the wall swung
+round on a pivot and revealed the orifice of an underground passage.
+
+Like a madman, Beautrelet seized the iron door in which the bricks
+were sealed, pulled it back, violently and closed it. Astonishment,
+delight, the fear of being surprised convulsed his face so as to
+render it unrecognizable. He beheld the awful vision of all that had
+happened there, in front of that door, during twenty centuries; of
+all those people, initiated into the great secret, who had
+penetrated through that issue: Celts, Gauls, Romans, Normans,
+Englishmen, Frenchmen, barons, dukes, kings--and, after all of them,
+Arsene Lupin--and, after Lupin, himself, Beautrelet. He felt that
+his brain was slipping away from him. His eyelids fluttered. He fell
+fainting and rolled to the bottom of the slope, to the very edge of
+the precipice.
+
+        *       *       *       *       *
+
+His task was done, at least the task which he was able to accomplish
+alone, with his unaided resources.
+
+That evening, he wrote a long letter to the chief of the detective
+service, giving a faithful account of the results of his
+investigations and revealing the secret of the Hollow Needle. He
+asked for assistance to complete his work and gave his address.
+
+While waiting for the reply, he spent two consecutive nights in the
+Chambre des Demoiselles. He spent them overcome with fear, his
+nerves shaken with a terror which was increased by the sounds of the
+night. At every moment, he thought he saw shadows approach in his
+direction. People knew of his presence in the cave--they were
+coming--they were murdering him!
+
+His eyes, however, staring madly before them, sustained by all the
+power of his will, clung to the piece of wall.
+
+On the first night, nothing stirred; but, on the second, by the
+light of the stars and a slender crescent-moon, he saw the door open
+and figures emerge from the darkness: he counted two, three, four,
+five of them.
+
+It seemed to him that those five men were carrying fairly large
+loads. He followed them for a little way. They cut straight across
+the fields to the Havre road; and he heard the sound of a motor car
+driving away.
+
+He retraced his steps, skirting a big farm. But, at the turn of the
+road that ran beside it, he had only just time to scramble up a
+slope and hide behind some trees. More men passed--four, five men--
+all carrying packages. And, two minutes later, another motor
+snorted.
+
+This time, he had not the strength to return to his post; and he
+went back to bed.
+
+When he woke and had finished dressing, the hotel waiter brought him
+a letter. He opened it. It contained Ganimard's card.
+
+"At last!" cried Beautrelet, who, after so hard a campaign, was
+really feeling the need of a comrade-in-arms.
+
+He ran downstairs with outstretched hands. Ganimard took them,
+looked at him for a moment and said:
+
+"You're a fine fellow, my lad!"
+
+"Pooh!" he said. "Luck has served me."
+
+"There's no such thing as luck with 'him,'" declared the inspector,
+who always spoke of Lupin in a solemn tone and without mentioning
+his name.
+
+He sat down:
+
+"So we've got him!"
+
+"Just as we've had him twenty times over," said Beautrelet,
+laughing.
+
+"Yes, but to-day--"
+
+"To-day, of course, the case is different. We know his retreat, his
+stronghold, which means, when all is said, that Lupin is Lupin. He
+can escape. The Etretat Needle cannot."
+
+"Why do you suppose that he will escape?" asked Ganimard, anxiously.
+
+"Why do you suppose that he requires to escape?" replied Beautrelet.
+"There is nothing to prove that he is in the Needle at present. Last
+night, eleven of his men left it. He may be one of the eleven."
+
+Ganimard reflected:
+
+"You are right. The great thing is the Hollow Needle. For the rest,
+let us hope that chance will favor us. And now, let us talk."
+
+He resumed his serious voice, his self-important air and said:
+
+"My dear Beautrelet, I have orders to recommend you to observe the
+most absolute discretion in regard to this matter."
+
+"Orders from whom?" asked Beautrelet, jestingly. "The prefect of
+police?"
+
+"Higher than that."
+
+"The prime minister?"
+
+"Higher."
+
+"Whew!"
+
+Ganimard lowered his voice:
+
+"Beautrelet, I was at the Elysee last night. They look upon this
+matter as a state secret of the utmost gravity. There are serious
+reasons for concealing the existence of this citadel--reasons of
+military strategy, in particular. It might become a revictualling
+centre, a magazine for new explosives, for lately-invented
+projectiles, for anything of that sort: the secret arsenal of
+France, in fact."
+
+"But how can they hope to keep a secret like this? In the old days,
+one man alone held it: the king. To-day, already, there are a good
+few of us who know it, without counting Lupin's gang."
+
+"Still, if we gained only ten years', only five years' silence!
+Those five years may be--the saving of us."
+
+"But, in order to capture this citadel, this future arsenal, it will
+have to be attacked, Lupin must be dislodged. And all this cannot be
+done without noise."
+
+"Of course, people will guess something, but they won't know.
+Besides, we can but try."
+
+"All right. What's your plan?"
+
+"Here it is, in two words. To begin with, you are not Isidore
+Beautrelet and there's no question of Arsene Lupin either. You are
+and you remain a small boy of Etretat, who, while strolling about
+the place, caught some fellows coming out of an underground passage.
+This makes you suspect the existence of a flight of steps which cuts
+through the cliff from top to bottom."
+
+"Yes, there are several of those flights of steps along the coast.
+For instance, to the right of Etretat, opposite Benouville, they
+showed me the Devil's Staircase, which every bather knows. And I say
+nothing of the three or four tunnels used by the fishermen."
+
+"So you will guide me and one-half of my men. I shall enter alone,
+or accompanied, that remains to be seen. This much is certain, that
+the attack must be delivered that way. If Lupin is not in the
+Needle, we shall fix up a trap in which he will be caught sooner or
+later. If he is there--"
+
+"If he is there, he will escape from the Needle by the other side,
+the side overlooking the sea."
+
+"In that case, he will at once be arrested by the other half of my
+men."
+
+"Yes, but if, as I presume, you choose a moment when the sea is at
+low ebb, leaving the base of the Needle uncovered, the chase will be
+public, because it will take place before all the men and women
+fishing for mussels, shrimps and shell-fish who swarm on the rocks
+round about."
+
+"That is why I just mean to select the time when the sea is full."
+
+"In that case, he will make off in a boat."
+
+"Ah, but I shall have a dozen fishing-smacks, each of which will be
+commanded by one of my men, and we shall collar him--"
+
+"If he doesn't slip through your dozen smacks, like a fish through
+the meshes."
+
+"All right, then I'll sink him."
+
+"The devil you will! Shall you have guns?"
+
+"Why, of course! There's a torpedo-boat at the Havre at this moment.
+A telegram from me will bring her to the Needle at the appointed
+hour."
+
+"How proud Lupin will be! A torpedo-boat! Well, M. Ganimard, I see
+that you have provided for everything. We have only to go ahead.
+When do we deliver the assault?"
+
+"To-morrow."
+
+"At night?"
+
+"No, by daylight, at the flood-tide, as the clock strikes ten in the
+morning."
+
+"Capital."
+
+        *       *       *       *       *
+
+Under his show of gaiety, Beautrelet concealed a real anguish of
+mind. He did not sleep until the morning, but lay pondering over the
+most impracticable schemes, one after the other.
+
+Ganimard had left him in order to go to Yport, six or seven miles
+from Etretat, where, for prudence's sake, he had told his men to
+meet him, and where he chartered twelve fishing smacks, with the
+ostensible object of taking soundings along the coast.
+
+At a quarter to ten, escorted by a body of twelve stalwart men, he
+met Isidore at the foot of the road that goes up the cliff.
+
+At ten o'clock exactly, they reached the skirt of wall. It was the
+decisive moment.
+
+At ten o'clock exactly.
+
+"Why, what's the matter with you, Beautrelet?" jeered Ganimard.
+"You're quite green in the face!"
+
+"It's as well you can't see yourself, Ganimard," the boy retorted.
+"One would think your last hour had come!"
+
+They both had to sit down and Ganimard swallowed a few mouthfuls of
+rum.
+
+"It's not funk," he said, "but, by Jove, this is an exciting
+business! Each time that I'm on the point of catching him, it takes
+me like that in the pit of the stomach. A dram of rum?"
+
+"No."
+
+"And if you drop behind?"
+
+"That will mean that I'm dead."
+
+"B-r-r-r-r! However, we'll see. And now, open, sesame! No danger of
+our being observed, I suppose?"
+
+"No. The Needle is not so high as the cliff, and, besides, there's a
+bend in the ground where we are."
+
+Beautrelet went to the wall and pressed upon the brick. The bolt was
+released and the underground passage came in sight.
+
+By the gleam of the lanterns which they lit, they saw that it was
+cut in the shape of a vault and that both the vaulting and the floor
+itself were entirely covered with bricks.
+
+They walked for a few seconds and, suddenly, a staircase appeared.
+Beautrelet counted forty-five brick steps, which the slow action of
+many footsteps had worn away in the middle.
+
+"Blow!" said Ganimard, holding his head and stopping suddenly, as
+though he had knocked against something.
+
+"What is it?"
+
+"A door."
+
+"Bother!" muttered Beautrelet, looking at it. "And not an easy one
+to break down either. It's just a solid block of iron."
+
+"We are done," said Ganimard. "There's not even a lock to it."
+
+"Exactly. That's what gives me hope."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"A door is made to open; and, as this one has no lock, that means
+that there is a secret way of opening it."
+
+"And, as we don't know the secret--"
+
+"I shall know it in a minute."
+
+"How?"
+
+"By means of the document. The fourth line has no other object but
+to solve each difficulty as and when it crops up. And the solution
+is comparatively easy, because it's not written with a view to
+throwing searchers off the scent, but to assisting them."
+
+"Comparatively easy! I don't agree with you," cried Ganimard, who
+had unfolded the document. "The number 44 and a triangle with a dot
+in it: that doesn't tell us much!"
+
+"Yes, yes, it does! Look at the door. You see it's strengthened, at
+each corner, with a triangular slab of iron; and the slabs are fixed
+with big nails. Take the left-hand bottom slab and work the nail in
+the corner: I'll lay ten to one we've hit the mark."
+
+"You've lost your bet," said Ganimard, after trying.
+
+"Then the figure 44 must mean--"
+
+In a low voice, reflecting as he spoke, Beautrelet continued:
+
+"Let me see--Ganimard and I are both standing on the bottom step of
+the staircase--there are 45. Why 45, when the figure in the document
+is 44? A coincidence? No. In all this business, there is no such
+thing as a coincidence, at least not an involuntary one. Ganimard,
+be so good as to move one step higher up. That's it, don't leave
+this forty-fourth step. And now I will work the iron nail. And the
+trick's done, or I'll eat my boots!"
+
+The heavy door turned on its hinges. A fairly spacious cavern
+appeared before their eyes.
+
+"We must be exactly under Fort Frefosse," said Beautrelet. "We have
+passed through the different earthy layers by now. There will be no
+more brick. We are in the heart of the solid limestone."
+
+The room was dimly lit by a shaft of daylight that came from the
+other end. Going up to it, they saw that it was a fissure in the
+cliff, contrived in a projecting wall and forming a sort of
+observatory. In front of them, at a distance of fifty yards, the
+impressive mass of the Needle loomed from the waves. On the right,
+quite close, was the arched buttress of the Porte d'Aval and, on the
+left, very far away, closing the graceful curve of a large inlet,
+another rocky gateway, more imposing still, was cut out of the
+cliff; the Manneporte, [Footnote: Magna porta.] which was so wide
+and tall that a three-master could have passed through it with all
+sail set. Behind and everywhere, the sea.
+
+"I don't see our little fleet," said Beautrelet.
+
+"I know," said Ganimard. "The Porte d'Aval hides the whole of the
+coast of Etretat and Yport. But look, over there, in the offing,
+that black line, level with the water--"
+
+"Well?"
+
+"That's our fleet of war, Torpedo-boat No. 25. With her there, Lupin
+is welcome to break loose--if he wants to study the landscape at the
+bottom of the sea."
+
+A baluster marked the entrance to the staircase, near the fissure.
+They started on their way down. From time to time, a little window
+pierced the wall of the cliff; and, each time, they caught sight of
+the Needle, whose mass seemed to them to grow more and more
+colossal.
+
+A little before reaching high-water level, the windows ceased and
+all was dark.
+
+Isidore counted the steps aloud. At the three hundred and fifty-
+eight, they emerged into a wider passage, which was barred by
+another iron door strengthened with slabs and nails.
+
+"We know all about this," said Beautrelet. "The document gives us
+357 and a triangle dotted on the right. We have only to repeat the
+performance."
+
+The second door obeyed like the first. A long, a very long tunnel
+appeared, lit up at intervals by the gleam of a lantern swung from
+the vault. The walls oozed moisture and drops of water fell to the
+ground, so that, to make walking easier a regular pavement of planks
+had been laid from end to end.
+
+"We are passing under the sea," said Beautrelet. "Are you coming,
+Ganimard?"
+
+Without replying, the inspector ventured into the tunnel, followed
+the wooden foot-plank and stopped before a lantern, which he took
+down.
+
+"The utensils may date back to the Middle Ages, but the lighting is
+modern," he said. "Our friends use incandescent mantles."
+
+He continued his way. The tunnel ended in another and a larger cave,
+with, on the opposite side, the first steps of a staircase that led
+upward.
+
+"It's the ascent of the Needle beginning," said Ganimard. "This is
+more serious."
+
+But one of his men called him:
+
+"There's another flight here, sir, on the left."
+
+And, immediately afterward, they discovered a third, on the right.
+
+"The deuce!" muttered the inspector. "This complicates matters. If
+we go by this way, they'll make tracks by that."
+
+"Shall we separate?" asked Beautrelet.
+
+"No, no--that would mean weakening ourselves. It would be better for
+one of us to go ahead and scout."
+
+"I will, if you like--"
+
+"Very well, Beautrelet, you go. I will remain with my men--then
+there will be no fear of anything. There may be other roads through
+the cliff than that by which we came and several roads also through
+the Needle. But it is certain that, between the cliff and the
+Needle, there is no communication except the tunnel. Therefore they
+must pass through this cave. And so I shall stay here till you come
+back. Go ahead, Beautrelet, and be prudent: at the least alarm,
+scoot back again."
+
+Isidore disappeared briskly up the middle staircase. At the
+thirtieth step, a door, an ordinary wooden door, stopped him. He
+seized the handle turned it. The door was not locked.
+
+He entered a room that seemed to him very low owing to its immense
+size. Lit by powerful lamps and supported by squat pillars, with
+long vistas showing between them, it had nearly the same dimensions
+as the Needle itself. It was crammed with packing cases and
+miscellaneous objects--pieces of furniture, oak settees, chests,
+credence-tables, strong-boxes--a whole confused heap of the kind
+which one sees in the basement of an old curiosity shop.
+
+On his right and left, Beautrelet perceived the wells of two
+staircases, the same, no doubt, that started from the cave below. He
+could easily have gone down, therefore, and told Ganimard. But a new
+flight of stairs led upward in front of him and he had the curiosity
+to pursue his investigations alone.
+
+Thirty more steps. A door and then a room, not quite so large as the
+last, Beautrelet thought. And again, opposite him, an ascending
+flight of stairs.
+
+Thirty steps more. A door. A smaller room.
+
+Beautrelet grasped the plan of the works executed inside the Needle.
+It was a series or rooms placed one above the other and, therefore,
+gradually decreasing in size. They all served as store-rooms.
+
+In the fourth, there was no lamp. A little light filtered in through
+clefts in the walls and Beautrelet saw the sea some thirty feet
+below him.
+
+At that moment, he felt himself so far from Ganimard that a certain
+anguish began to take hold of him and he had to master his nerves
+lest he should take to his heels. No danger threatened him, however,
+and the silence around him was even so great that he asked himself
+whether the whole Needle had not been abandoned by Lupin and his
+confederates.
+
+"I shall not go beyond the next floor," he said to himself.
+
+Thirty stairs again and a door. This door was lighter in
+construction and modern in appearance. He pushed it open gently,
+quite prepared for flight. There was no one there. But the room
+differed from the others in its purpose. There were hangings on the
+walls, rugs on the floor. Two magnificent sideboards, laden with
+gold and silver plate, stood facing each other. The little windows
+contrived in the deep, narrow cleft were furnished with glass panes.
+
+In the middle of the room was a richly-decked table, with a lace-
+edged cloth, dishes of fruits and cakes, champagne in decanters and
+flowers, heaps of flowers.
+
+Three places were laid around the table.
+
+Beautrelet walked up. On the napkins were cards with the names of
+the party. He read first:
+
+"Arsene Lupin."
+
+"Mme. Arsene Lupin."
+
+He took up the third card and started back with surprise. It bore
+his own name:
+
+"Isidore Beautrelet!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER TEN
+
+THE TREASURES OF THE KINGS OF FRANCE
+
+
+A curtain was drawn back.
+
+"Good morning, my dear Beautrelet, you're a little late. Lunch was
+fixed for twelve. However, it's only a few minutes--but what's the
+matter? Don't you know me? Have I changed so much?"
+
+In the course of his fight with Lupin, Beautrelet had met with many
+surprises and he was still prepared, at the moment of the final
+catastrophe, to experience any number of further emotions; but the
+shock which he received this time was utterly unexpected. It was not
+astonishment, but stupefaction, terror. The man who stood before
+him, the man whom the brutal force of events compelled him to look
+upon as Arsene Lupin, was--Valmeras! Valmeras, the owner of the
+Chateau de l'Aiguille! Valmeras, the very man to whom he had applied
+for assistance against Arsene Lupin! Valmeras, his companion on the
+expedition to Crozant! Valmeras, the plucky friend who had made
+Raymonde's escape possible by felling one of Lupin's accomplices, or
+pretending to fell him, in the dusk of the great hall! And Valmeras
+was Lupin!
+
+"You--you--So it's you!" he stammered.
+
+"Why not?" exclaimed Lupin. "Did you think that you knew me for good
+and all because you had seen me in the guise of a clergyman or under
+the features of M. Massiban? Alas, when a man selects the position
+in society which I occupy, he must needs make use of his little
+social gifts! If Lupin were not able to change himself, at will,
+into a minister of the Church of England or a member of the Academy
+of Inscriptions and Belles-Lettres, it would be a bad lookout for
+Lupin! Now Lupin, the real Lupin, is here before you, Beautrelet!
+Take a good look at him."
+
+"But then--if it's you--then--Mademoiselle--"
+
+"Yes, Beautrelet, as you say--"
+
+He again drew back the hanging, beckoned and announced:
+
+"Mme. Arsene Lupin."
+
+"Ah," murmured the lad, confounded in spite of everything, "Mlle. de
+Saint-Veran!"
+
+"No, no," protested Lupin. "Mme. Arsene Lupin, or rather, if you
+prefer, Mme. Louis Valmeras, my wedded wife, married to me in
+accordance with the strictest forms of law; and all thanks to you,
+my dear Beautrelet."
+
+He held out his hand to him.
+
+"All my acknowledgements--and no ill will on your side, I trust?"
+
+Strange to say, Beautrelet felt no ill will at all, no sense of
+humiliation, no bitterness. He realized so strongly the immense
+superiority of his adversary that he did not blush at being beaten
+by him. He pressed the offered hand.
+
+"Luncheon is served, ma'am."
+
+A butler had placed a tray of dishes on the table.
+
+"You must excuse us, Beautrelet: my chef is away and we can only
+give you a cold lunch."
+
+Beautrelet felt very little inclined to eat. He sat down, however,
+and was enormously interested in Lupin's attitude. How much exactly
+did he know? Was he aware of the danger he was running? Was he
+ignorant of the presence of Ganimard and his men?
+
+And Lupin continued:
+
+"Yes, thanks to you, my dear friend. Certainly, Raymonde and I loved
+each other from the first. Just so, my boy--Raymonde's abduction,
+her imprisonment, were mere humbug: we loved each other. But neither
+she nor I, when we were free to love, would allow a casual bond at
+the mercy of chance, to be formed between us. The position,
+therefore, was hopeless for Lupin. Fortunately, it ceased to be so
+if I resumed my identity as the Louis Valmeras that I had been from
+a child. It was then that I conceived the idea, as you refused to
+relinquish your quest and had found the Chateau de l'Aiguille, of
+profiting by your obstinacy."
+
+"And my silliness."
+
+"Pooh! Any one would have been caught as you were!"
+
+"So you were really able to succeed because I screened you and
+assisted you?"
+
+"Of course! How could any one suspect Valmeras of being Lupin, when
+Valmeras was Beautrelet's friend and after Valmeras had snatched
+from Lupin's clutches the girl whom Lupin loved? And how charming it
+was! Such delightful memories! The expedition to Crozant! The
+bouquets we found! My pretended love letter to Raymonde! And, later,
+the precautions which I, Valmeras, had to take against myself,
+Lupin, before my marriage! And the night of your great banquet,
+Beautrelet, when you fainted in my arms! Oh, what memories!"
+
+There was a pause. Beautrelet watched Raymonde. She had listened to
+Lupin without saying a word and looked at him with eyes in which he
+read love, passion and something else besides, something which the
+lad could not define, a sort of anxious embarrassment and a vague
+sadness. But Lupin turned his eyes upon her and she gave him an
+affectionate smile. Their hands met over the table.
+
+"What do you say to the way I have arranged my little home,
+Beautrelet?" cried Lupin. "There's a style about it, isn't there? I
+don't pretend that it's as comfortable as it might be. And yet, some
+have been quite satisfied with it; and not the least of mankind,
+either!--Look at the list of distinguished people who have owned the
+Needle in their time and who thought it an honor to leave a mark of
+their sojourn."
+
+On the walls, one below the other, were carved the following names:
+
+JULIUS CAESAR
+CHARLEMAGNE ROLLO
+WILLIAM THE CONQUEROR
+RICHARD COEUR-DE-LEON
+LOUIS XI.
+FRANCIS I.
+HENRY IV.
+LOUIS XIV.
+ARSENE LUPIN
+
+"Whose name will figure after ours?" he continued. "Alas, the list
+is closed! From Caesar to Lupin--and there it ends. Soon the
+nameless mob will come to visit the strange citadel. And to think
+that, but for Lupin, all this would have remained for ever unknown
+to men! Ah Beautrelet, what a feeling of pride was mine on the day
+when I first set foot on this abandoned soil. To have found the lost
+secret and become its master, its sole master! To inherit such an
+inheritance! To live in the Needle, after all those kings!--"
+
+He was interrupted by a gesture of his wife's. She seemed greatly
+agitated.
+
+"There is a noise," she said. "Underneath us.--You can hear it."
+
+"It's the lapping of the water," said Lupin.
+
+"No, indeed it's not. I know the sound of the waves. This is
+something different."
+
+"What would you have it be, darling?" said Lupin, smiling. "I
+invited no one to lunch except Beautrelet." And, addressing the
+servant, "Charolais, did you lock the staircase doors behind the
+gentleman?"
+
+"Yes, sir, and fastened the bolts."
+
+Lupin rose:
+
+"Come, Raymonde, don't shake like that. Why, you're quite pale!"
+
+He spoke a few words to her in an undertone, as also to the servant,
+drew back the curtain and sent them both out of the room.
+
+The noise below grew more distinct. It was a series of dull blows,
+repeated at intervals. Beautrelet thought:
+
+"Ganimard has lost patience and is breaking down the doors."
+
+Lupin resumed the thread of his conversation, speaking very calmly
+and as though he had really not heard:
+
+"By Jove, the Needle was badly damaged when I succeeded in
+discovering it! One could see that no one had possessed the secret
+for more than a century, since Louis XVI. and the Revolution. The
+tunnel was threatening to fall in. The stairs were in a shocking
+state. The water was trickling in from the sea. I had to prop up and
+strengthen and rebuild the whole thing."
+
+Beautrelet could not help asking:
+
+"When you arrived, was it empty?"
+
+"Very nearly. The kings did not use the Needle, as I have done, as a
+warehouse."
+
+"As a place of refuge, then?"
+
+"Yes, no doubt, in times of invasion and during the civil wars. But
+its real destination was to be--how shall I put it?--the strong-room
+or the bank of the kings of France."
+
+The sound of blows increased, more distinctly now. Ganimard must
+have broken down the first door and was attacking the second. There
+was a short silence and then more blows, nearer still. It was the
+third door. Two remained.
+
+Through one of the windows, Beautrelet saw a number of fishing-
+smacks sailing round the Needle and, not far away, floating on the
+waters like a great black fish, the torpedo-boat.
+
+"What a row!" exclaimed Lupin. "One can't hear one's self speak!
+Let's go upstairs, shall we? It may interest you to look over the
+Needle."
+
+They climbed to the floor above, which was protected, like the
+others, by a door which Lupin locked behind him.
+
+"My picture gallery," he said.
+
+The walls were covered with canvases on which Beautrelet recognized
+the most famous signatures. There were Raphael's Madonna of the
+Agnus Dei, Andrea del Sarto's Portrait of Lucrezia Fede, Titian's
+Salome, Botticelli's Madonna and Angels and numbers of Tintorettos,
+Carpaccios, Rembrandts, Velasquez.
+
+"What fine copies!" said Beautrelet, approvingly.
+
+Lupin looked at him with an air of stupefaction:
+
+"What! Copies! You must be mad! The copies are in Madrid, my dear
+fellow, in Florence, Venice, Munich, Amsterdam."
+
+"Then these--"
+
+"Are the original pictures, my lad, patiently collected in all the
+museums of Europe, where I have replaced them, like an honest man,
+with first-rate copies."
+
+"But some day or other--"
+
+"Some day or other, the fraud will be discovered? Well, they will
+find my signature on each canvas--at the back--and they will know
+that it was I who have endowed my country with the original
+masterpieces. After all, I have only done what Napoleon did in
+Italy.--Oh, look, Beautrelet: here are M. de Gesvres's four
+Rubenses!--"
+
+The knocking continued within the hollow of the Needle without
+ceasing.
+
+"I can't stand this!" said Lupin. "Let's go higher."
+
+A fresh staircase. A fresh door.
+
+"The tapestry-room," Lupin announced.
+
+The tapestries were not hung on the walls, but rolled, tied up with
+cord, ticketed; and, in addition, there were parcels of old fabrics
+which Lupin unfolded: wonderful brocades, admirable velvets, soft,
+faded silks, church vestments woven with silver and gold--
+
+They went higher still and Beautrelet saw the room containing the
+clocks and other time-pieces, the book-room--oh, the splendid
+bindings, the precious, undiscoverable volumes, the unique copies
+stolen from the great public libraries--the lace-room, the
+knicknack-room.
+
+And each time the circumference of the room grew smaller.
+
+And each time, now, the sound of knocking was more distant. Ganimard
+was losing ground.
+
+"This is the last room," said Lupin. "The treasury."
+
+This one was quite different. It was round also, but very high and
+conical in shape. It occupied the top of the edifice and its floor
+must have been fifteen or twenty yards below the extreme point of
+the Needle.
+
+On the cliff side there was no window. But on the side of the sea,
+whence there were no indiscreet eyes to fear, two glazed openings
+admitted plenty of light.
+
+The ground was covered with a parqueted flooring of rare wood,
+forming concentric patterns. Against the walls stood glass cases and
+a few pictures.
+
+"The pearls of my collection," said Lupin. "All that you have seen
+so far is for sale. Things come and things go. That's business. But
+here, in this sanctuary, everything is sacred. There is nothing here
+but choice, essential pieces, the best of the best, priceless
+things. Look at these jewels, Beautrelet: Chaldean amulets, Egyptian
+necklaces, Celtic bracelets, Arab chains. Look at these statuettes,
+Beautrelet, at this Greek Venus, this Corinthian Apollo. Look at
+these Tanagras, Beautrelet: all the real Tanagras are here. Outside
+this glass case, there is not a single genuine Tanagra statuette in
+the whole wide world. What a delicious thing to be able to say!--
+Beautrelet, do you remember Thomas and his gang of church-pillagers
+in the South--agents of mine, by the way? Well, here is the Ambazac
+reliquary, the real one, Beautrelet! Do you remember the Louvre
+scandal, the tiara which was admitted to be false, invented and
+manufactured by a modern artist? Here is the tiara of Saitapharnes,
+the real one, Beautrelet! Look, Beautrelet, look with all your eyes:
+here is the marvel of marvels, the supreme masterpiece, the work of
+no mortal brain; here is Leonardo's Gioconda, the real one! Kneel,
+Beautrelet, kneel; all womankind stands before you in this picture."
+
+There was a long silence between them. Below, the sound of blows
+drew nearer. Two or three doors, no more, separated them from
+Ganimard. In the offing, they saw the black back of the torpedo-boat
+and the fishing-smacks cruising to and fro.
+
+The boy asked:
+
+"And the treasure?"
+
+"Ah, my little man, that's what interests you most! None of those
+masterpieces of human art can compete with the contemplation of the
+treasure as a matter of curiosity, eh?--And the whole crowd will be
+like you!--Come, you shall be satisfied."
+
+He stamped his foot, and, in so doing, made one of the discs
+composing the floor-pattern turn right over. Then, lifting it as
+though it were the lid of a box, he uncovered a sort of large round
+bowl, dug in the thickness of the rock. It was empty.
+
+A little farther, he went through the same performance. Another
+large bowl appeared. It was also empty.
+
+He did this three times over again. The three other bowls were
+empty.
+
+"Eh," grinned Lupin. "What a disappointment! Under Louis XL, under
+Henry IV., under Richelieu, the five bowls were full. But think of
+Louis XIV., the folly of Versailles, the wars, the great disasters
+of the reign! And think of Louis XV., the spendthrift king, with his
+Pompadour and his Du Barry! How they must have drawn on the treasure
+in those days! With what thieving claws they must have scratched at
+the stone. You see, there's nothing left."
+
+He stopped.
+
+"Yes, Beautrelet, there is something--the sixth hiding-place! This
+one was intangible. Not one of them dared touch it. It was the very
+last resource, the nest-egg, the something put by for a rainy day.
+Look, Beautrelet!"
+
+He stooped and lifted up the lid. An iron box filled the bowl. Lupin
+took from his pocket a key with a complicated bit and wards and
+opened the box.
+
+A dazzling sight presented itself. Every sort of precious stone
+sparkled there, every color gleamed, the blue of the sapphires, the
+red of the rubies, the green of the emeralds, the yellow of the
+topazes.
+
+"Look, look, little Beautrelet! They have squandered all the cash,
+all the gold, all the silver, all the crown pieces and all the
+ducats and all the doubloons; but the chest with the jewels has
+remained intact. Look at the settings. They belong to every period,
+to every century, to every country. The dowries of the queens are
+here. Each brought her share: Margaret of Scotland and Charlotte of
+Savoy; duchesses of Austria: Eleonore, Elisabeth, Marie-Therese,
+Mary of England and Catherine de Medicis; and all the arch--Marie
+Antoinette. Look at those pearls, Beautrelet! And those diamonds:
+look at the size of the diamonds! Not one of them but is worthy of
+an empress! The Pitt Diamond is no finer!"
+
+He rose to his feet and held up his hand as one taking an oath:
+
+"Beautrelet, you shall tell the world that Lupin has not taken a
+single one of the stones that were in the royal chest, not a single
+one, I swear it on my honor! I had no right to. They are the fortune
+of France."
+
+Below them, Ganimard was making all speed. It was easy to judge by
+the reverberation of the blows that his men were attacking the last
+door but one, the door that gave access to the knicknack-room.
+
+"Let us leave the chest open," said Lupin, "and all the cavities,
+too, all those little empty graves."
+
+He went round the room, examined some of the glass cases, gazed at
+some of the pictures and, as he walked, said, pensively:
+
+"How sad it is to leave all this! What a wrench! The happiest hours
+of my life have been spent here, alone, in the presence of these
+objects which I loved. And my eyes will never behold them again and
+my hands will never touch them again--"
+
+His drawn face bore such an expression of lassitude upon it that
+Beautrelet felt a vague sort of pity for him. Sorrow in that man
+must assume larger proportions than in another, even as joy did, or
+pride, or humiliation. He was now standing by the window, and, with
+his finger pointing to the horizon, said:
+
+"What is sadder still is that I must abandon that, all that! How
+beautiful it is! The boundless sea--the sky.--On either side, the
+cliffs of Etretat with their three natural archways: the Porte
+d'Armont, the Porte d'Aval, the Manneporte--so many triumphal arches
+for the master. And the master was I! I was the king of the story,
+the king of fairyland, the king of the Hollow Needle! A strange and
+supernatural kingdom! From Caesar to Lupin: what a destiny!" He
+burst out laughing. "King of fairyland! Why not say King of Yvetot
+at once? What nonsense! King of the world, yes, that's more like it!
+From this topmost point of the Needle, I ruled the globe! I held it
+in my claws like a prey! Lift the tiara of Saitapharnes,
+Beautrelet.--You see those two telephones? The one on the right
+communicates with Paris: a private line; the one on the left with
+London: a private line. Through London, I am in touch with America,
+Asia, Australia, South Africa. In all those continents, I have my
+offices, my agents, my jackals, my scouts! I drive an international
+trade. I hold the great market in art and antiquities, the world's
+fair! Ah, Beautrelet, there are moments when my power turns my head!
+I feel intoxicated with strength and authority."
+
+The door gave way below. They heard Ganimard and his men running
+about and searching.
+
+After a moment, Lupin continued, in a low voice:
+
+"And now it's over. A little girl crossed my path, a girl with soft
+hair and wistful eyes and an honest, yes, an honest soul--and it's
+over. I myself am demolishing the mighty edifice.--All the rest
+seems absurd and childish to me--nothing counts but her hair--and
+her wistful eyes--and her honest little soul--"
+
+The men came up the staircase. A blow shook the door, the last door--
+
+Lupin seized the boy sharply by the arm:
+
+"Do you understand, Beautrelet, why I let you have things your own
+way when I could have crushed you, time after time, weeks ago? Do
+you understand how you succeeded in getting as far as this? Do you
+understand that I had given each of my men his share of the plunder
+when you met them the other night on the cliff? You do understand,
+don't you? The Hollow Needle is the great adventure. As long as it
+belongs to me, I remain the great adventurer. Once the Needle is
+recaptured, it means that the past and I are parted and that the
+future begins, a future of peace and happiness, in which I shall
+have no occasion to blush when Raymonde's eyes are turned upon me, a
+future--"
+
+He turned furiously toward the door:
+
+"Stop that noise, Ganimard, will you? I haven't finished my speech!"
+
+The blows came faster. It was like the sound of a beam that was
+being hurled against the door. Beautrelet, mad with curiosity, stood
+in front of Lupin and awaited events, without understanding what
+Lupin was doing or contemplating. To give up the Needle was all very
+well; but why was he giving up himself? What was his plan? Did he
+hope to escape from Ganimard? And, on the other hand, where was
+Raymonde?
+
+Lupin, meantime, was murmuring, dreamily:
+
+"An honest man.--Arsene Lupin an honest man--no more robbery--
+leading the life of everybody else.--And why not? There is no reason
+why I should not meet with the same success.--But do stop that now,
+Ganimard! Don't you know, you ass, that I'm uttering historic words
+and that Beautrelet is taking them in for the benefit of posterity?"
+He laughed. "I am wasting my time. Ganimard will never grasp the use
+of my historic words."
+
+He took a piece of red chalk, put a pair of steps to the wall and
+wrote, in large letters:
+
+   Arsene Lupin gives and bequeaths to France
+   all the treasures contained in the Hollow Needle,
+   on the sole condition that these treasures be housed
+   at the Musee du Louvre in rooms which shall be
+   known as the Arsene Lupin Rooms.
+
+"Now," he said, "my conscience is at ease. France and I are quits."
+
+The attackers were striking with all their might. One of the panels
+burst in two. A hand was put through and fumbled for the lock.
+
+"Thunder!" said Lupin. "That idiot of a Ganimard is capable of
+effecting his purpose for once in his life."
+
+He rushed to the lock and removed the key.
+
+"Sold, old chap!--The door's tough.--I have plenty of time--
+Beautrelet, I must say good-bye. And thank you!--For really you
+could have complicated the attack--but you're so tactful!"
+
+While speaking, he moved toward a large triptych by Van der Weyden,
+representing the Wise Men of the East. He shut the right-hand panel
+and, in so doing, exposed a little door concealed behind it and
+seized the handle.
+
+"Good luck to your hunting, Ganimard! And kind regards at home!"
+
+A pistol-shot resounded. Lupin jumped back: "Ah, you rascal, full in
+the heart! Have you been taking lessons? You've done for the Wise
+Man! Full in the heart! Smashed to smithereens, like a pipe at the
+fair!--"
+
+"Lupin, surrender!" roared Ganimard, with his eyes glittering and
+his revolver showing through the broken panel of the door.
+"Surrender, I say!"
+
+"Did the old guard surrender?"
+
+"If you stir a limb, I'll blow your brains out!"
+
+"Nonsense! You can't get me here!"
+
+As a matter of fact, Lupin had moved away; and, though Ganimard was
+able to fire straight in front of him through the breach in the
+door, he could not fire, still less take aim, on the side where
+Lupin stood. Lupin's position was a terrible one for all that,
+because the outlet on which he was relying, the little door behind
+the triptych, opened right in front of Ganimard. To try to escape
+meant to expose himself to the detective's fire; and there were five
+bullets left in the revolver.
+
+"By Jove," he said, laughing, "there's a slump in my shares this
+afternoon! You've done a nice thing. Lupin, old fellow: you wanted a
+last sensation and you've gone a bit too far. You shouldn't have
+talked so much."
+
+He flattened himself against the wall. A further portion of the
+panel had given way under the men's pressure and Ganimard was less
+hampered in his movements. Three yards, no more, separated the two
+antagonists. But Lupin was protected by a glass case with a gilt-
+wood framework.
+
+"Why don't you help, Beautrelet?" cried the old detective, gnashing
+his teeth with rage. "Why don't you shoot him, instead of staring at
+him like that?"
+
+Isidore, in fact, had not budged, had remained, till that moment, an
+eager, but passive spectator. He would have liked to fling himself
+into the contest with all his strength and to bring down the prey
+which he held at his mercy. He was prevented by some inexplicable
+sentiment.
+
+But Ganimard's appeal for assistance shook him. His hand closed on
+the butt of his revolver:
+
+"If I take part in it," he thought, "Lupin is lost. And I have the
+right--it's my duty."
+
+Their eyes met. Lupin's were calm, watchful, almost inquisitive, as
+though, in the awful danger that threatened him, he were interested
+only in the moral problem that held the young man in its clutches.
+Would Isidore decide to give the finishing stroke to the defeated
+enemy?
+
+The door cracked from top to bottom.
+
+"Help, Beautrelet, we've got him!" Ganimard bellowed.
+
+Isidore raised his revolver.
+
+What happened was so quick that he knew of it, so to speak, only by
+the result. He saw Lupin bob down and run along the wall, skimming
+the door right under the weapon which Ganimard was vainly
+brandishing; and he felt himself suddenly flung to the ground,
+picked up the next moment and lifted by an invincible force.
+
+Lupin held him in the air, like a living shield, behind which he hid
+himself.
+
+"Ten to one that I escape, Ganimard! Lupin, you see, has never quite
+exhausted his resources--"
+
+He had taken a couple of brisk steps backward to the triptych.
+Holding Beautrelet with one hand flat against his chest, with the
+other he cleared the passage and closed the little door behind them.
+
+A steep staircase appeared before their eyes.
+
+"Come along," said Lupin, pushing Beautrelet before him. "The land
+forces are beaten--let us turn our attention to the French fleet.--
+After Waterloo, Trafalgar.--You're having some fun for your money,
+eh, my lad?--Oh, how good: listen to them knocking at the triptych
+now!--It's too late, my children.--But hurry along, Beautrelet!"
+
+The staircase, dug out in the wall of the Needle, dug in its very
+crust, turned round and round the pyramid, encircling it like the
+spiral of a tobogganslide. Each hurrying the other, they clattered
+down the treads, taking two or three at a bound. Here and there, a
+ray of light trickled through a fissure; and Beautrelet carried away
+the vision of the fishing-smacks hovering a few dozen fathoms off,
+and of the black torpedo-boat.
+
+They went down and down, Isidore in silence, Lupin still bubbling
+over with merriment:
+
+"I should like to know what Ganimard is doing? Is he tumbling down
+the other staircases to bar the entrance to the tunnel against me?
+No, he's not such a fool as that. He must have left four men there--
+and four men are sufficient--" He stopped. "Listen--they're shouting
+up above. That's it, they've opened the window and are calling to
+their fleet.--Why, look, the men are busy on board the smacks--
+they're exchanging signals.--The torpedo-boat is moving.--Dear old
+torpedo-boat! I know you, you're from the Havre.--Guns' crews to the
+guns!--Hullo, there's the commander!--How are you, Duguay-Trouin?"
+
+He put his arm through a cleft and waved his handkerchief. Then he
+continued his way downstairs:
+
+"The enemy's fleet have set all sail," he said. "We shall be boarded
+before we know where we are. Heavens, what fun!"
+
+They heard the sound of voices below them. They were just then
+approaching the level of the sea and they emerged, almost at once,
+into a large cave into which two lanterns were moving about in the
+dark.
+
+A woman's figure appeared and threw itself on Lupin's neck:
+
+"Quick, quick, I was so nervous about you. What have you been
+doing?--But you're not alone!--"
+
+Lupin reassured her:
+
+"It's our friend Beautrelet.--Just think, Beautrelet had the tact--
+but I'll talk about that later--there's no time now.--Charolais are
+you there? That's right!--And the boat?"
+
+"The boat's ready, sir," Charolais replied,
+
+"Fire away," said Lupin.
+
+In a moment, the noise of a motor crackled and Beautrelet, whose
+eyes were gradually becoming used to the gloom, ended by perceiving
+that they were on a sort of quay, at the edge of the water, and that
+a boat was floating before them.
+
+"A motor boat," said Lupin, completing Beautrelet's observations.
+"This knocks you all of a heap, eh, Isidore, old chap?--You don't
+understand.--Still, you have only to think.--As the water before
+your eyes is no other than the water of the sea, which filters into
+this excavation each high tide, the result is that I have a safe
+little private roadstead all to myself."
+
+"But it's closed," Beautrelet protested. "No one can get in or out."
+
+"Yes, I can," said Lupin; "and I'm going to prove it to you."
+
+He began by handing Raymonde in. Then he came back to fetch
+Beautrelet. The lad hesitated.
+
+"Are you afraid?" asked Lupin.
+
+"What of?"
+
+"Of being sunk by the torpedo-boat."
+
+"No."
+
+"Then you're considering whether it's not your duty to stay with
+Ganimard, law and order, society and morality, instead of going off
+with Lupin, shame, infamy and disgrace."
+
+"Exactly."
+
+"Unfortunately, my boy, you have no choice. For the moment, they
+must believe the two of us dead--and leave me the peace to which a
+prospective honest man is entitled. Later on, when I have given you
+your liberty, you can talk as much as you please--I shall have
+nothing more to fear."
+
+By the way in which Lupin clutched his arm, Beautrelet felt that all
+resistance was useless. Besides, why resist? Had he not discovered
+and handed over the Hollow Needle? What did he care about the rest?
+Had he not the right to humor the irresistible sympathy with which,
+in spite of everything, this man inspired him?
+
+The feeling was so clear in him that he was half inclined to say to
+Lupin:
+
+"Look here, you're running another, a more serious danger; Holmlock
+Shears is on your track."
+
+"Come along!" said Lupin, before Isidore had made up his mind to
+speak.
+
+He obeyed and let Lupin lead him to the boat, the shape of which
+struck him as peculiar and its appearance quite unexpected.
+
+Once on deck, they went down a little steep staircase, or rather a
+ladder hooked on to a trap door, which closed above their heads. At
+the foot of the ladder, brightly lit by a lamp, was a very small
+saloon, where Raymonde was waiting for them and where the three had
+just room to sit down.
+
+Lupin took the mouthpiece of a speaking tube from a hook and gave
+the order:
+
+"Let her go, Charolais!"
+
+Isidore had the unpleasant sensation which one feels when going down
+in a lift: the sensation of the ground vanishing beneath you, the
+impression of emptiness, space. This time, it was the water
+retreating; and space opened out, slowly.
+
+"We're sinking, eh?" grinned Lupin. "Don't be afraid--we've only to
+pass from the upper cave where we were to another little cave,
+situated right at the bottom and half open to the sea, which can be
+entered at low tide. All the shellfish-catchers know it. Ah, ten
+seconds' wait! We're going through the passage and it's very narrow,
+just the size of the submarine."
+
+"But," asked Beautrelet, "how is it that the fishermen who enter the
+lower cave don't know that it's open at the top and that it
+communicates with another from which a staircase starts and runs
+through the Needle? The facts are at the disposal of the first-
+comer."
+
+"Wrong, Beautrelet! The top of the little public cave is closed, at
+low tide, by a movable platform, painted the color of the rock,
+which the sea, when it rises, shifts and carries up with it and,
+when it goes down, fastens firmly over the little cave. That is why
+I am able to pass at high tide. A clever notion, what? It's an idea
+of my own. True, neither Caesar nor Louis XIV., nor, in short, any
+of my distinguished predecessors could have had it, because they did
+not possess submarines. They were satisfied with the staircase,
+which then ran all the way down to the little bottom cave. I did
+away with the last treads of the staircase and invented the trick of
+the movable ceiling: it's a present I'm making to France--Raymonde,
+my love, put out the lamp beside you--we shan't want it now--on the
+contrary--"
+
+A pale light, which seemed to be of the same color as the water, met
+them as they left the cave and made its way into the cabin through
+the two portholes and through a thick glass skylight that projected
+above the planking of the deck and allowed the passengers to inspect
+the upper layers of the sea. And, suddenly, a shadow glided over
+their heads.
+
+"The attack is about to take place. The fleet is investing the
+Needle. But, hollow as the Needle is, I don't see how they propose
+to enter it."
+
+He took up the speaking tube:
+
+"Don't leave the bottom, Charolais. Where are we going? Why, I told
+you: to Port-Lupin. And at full speed, do you hear? We want water to
+land by--there's a lady with us."
+
+They skimmed over the rocky bed. The seaweed stood up on end like a
+heavy, dark vegetation and the deep currents made it wave
+gracefully, stretching and billowing like floating hair.
+
+Another shadow, a longer one.
+
+"That's the torpedo-boat," said Lupin. "We shall hear the roar of
+the guns presently. What will Duguay-Trouin do? Bombard the Needle?
+Think of what we're missing, Beautrelet, by not being present at the
+meeting of Duguay-Trouin and Ganimard! The juncture of the land and
+naval forces! Hi, Charolais, don't go to sleep, my man!"
+
+They were moving very fast, for all that. The rocks had been
+succeeded by sand-fields and then, almost at once, they saw more
+rocks, which marked the eastern extremity of Etretat, the Porte
+d'Amont. Fish fled at their approach. One of them, bolder than the
+rest, fastened on to a porthole and looked at the occupants of the
+saloon with its great, fixed, staring eyes.
+
+"That's better," cried Lupin. "We're going now. What do you think of
+my cockle-shell, Beautrelet? Not so bad, is she? Do you remember the
+story of the Seven of Hearts, [Footnote: The Exploits of Arsene
+Lupin. By Maurice Leblanc. VI: The Seven of Hearts.] the wretched
+end of Lacombe, the engineer, and how, after punishing his
+murderers, I presented the State with his papers and his plans for
+the construction of a new submarine: one more gift to France? Well,
+among the plans, I kept those of a submersible motor boat and that
+is how you come to have the honor of sailing in my company."
+
+He called to Charolais:
+
+"Take us up, Charolais--there's no danger now--"
+
+They shot up to the surface and the glass skylight emerged above the
+water.
+
+They were a mile from the coast, out of sight, therefore, and
+Beautrelet was now able to realize more fully at what a headlong
+pace they were traveling. First Fecamp passed before them, then all
+the Norman seaside places: Saint-Pierre, the Petits--Dalles,
+Veulettes, Saint-Valery, Veules, Quiberville. Lupin kept on jesting
+and Isidore never wearied of watching and listening to him, amazed
+as he was at the man's spirits, at his gaiety, his mischievous ways,
+his careless chaff, his delight in life.
+
+He also noticed Raymonde. The young woman sat silent, nestling up
+against the man she loved. She had taken his hands between her own
+and kept on raising her eyes to him; and Beautrelet constantly
+observed that her hands were twitching and that the wistful sadness
+of her eyes increased. And, each time, it was like a dumb and
+sorrowful reply to Lupin's sallies. One would have thought that his
+frivolous words, his sarcastic outlook on life, caused her physical
+pain.
+
+"Hush!" she whispered. "It's defying destiny to laugh--so many
+misfortunes can reach us still!"
+
+Opposite Dieppe, they had to dive lest they should be seen by the
+fishing-craft. And twenty minutes later, they shot at an angle
+toward the coast and the boat entered a little submarine harbor
+formed by a regular gap between the rocks, drew up beside a jetty
+and rose gently to the surface.
+
+Lupin announced:
+
+"Port-Lupin!"
+
+The spot, situated at sixteen miles from Dieppe and twelve from the
+Treport and protected, moreover, by the two landslips of cliff, was
+absolutely deserted. A fine sand carpeted the rounded slope of the
+tiny beach.
+
+"Jump on shore, Beautrelet--Raymonde, give me your hand. You,
+Charolais, go back to the Needle, see what happens between Ganimard
+and Duguay-Trouin and come back and tell me at the end of the day.
+The thing interests me tremendously."
+
+Beautrelet asked himself with a certain curiosity how they were
+going to get out of this hemmed-in creek which was called Port-
+Lupin, when, at the foot of the cliff, he saw the uprights of an
+iron ladder.
+
+"Isidore," said Lupin, "if you knew your geography and your history,
+you would know that we are at the bottom of the gorge of Parfonval,
+in the parish of Biville. More than a century ago, on the night of
+the twenty-third of August, 1803, Georges Cadoudal and six
+accomplices, who had landed in France with the intention of
+kidnapping the first consul, Bonaparte, scrambled up to the top by
+the road which I will show you. Since then, this road has been
+demolished by landslips. But Louis Valmeras, better known by the
+name of Arsene Lupin, had it restored at his own expense and bought
+the farm of the Neuvillette, where the conspirators spent the first
+night and where, retired from business and withdrawing from the
+affairs of this world, he means to lead the life of a respectable
+country squire with his wife and his mother by his side. The
+gentleman-burglar is dead! Long live the gentleman-farmer!"
+
+After the ladder came a sort of gully, an abrupt ravine hollowed
+out, apparently, by the rains, at the end of which they laid hold of
+a makeshift staircase furnished with a hand-rail. As Lupin
+explained, this hand-rail had been placed where it was in the stead
+of the estamperche, a long rope fastened to stakes, by which the
+people of the country, in the old days, used to help themselves down
+when going to the beach.
+
+After a painful climb of half an hour, they emerged on the
+tableland, not far from one of those little cabins, dug out of the
+soil itself, which serve as shelters for the excisemen. And, as it
+happened, two minutes later, at a turn in the path, one of these
+custom-house officials appeared.
+
+He drew himself up and saluted.
+
+Lupin asked:
+
+"Any news, Gomel?"
+
+"No, governor."
+
+"You've met no one at all suspicious-looking?"
+
+"No, governor--only--"
+
+"What?"
+
+"My wife--who does dressmaking at the Neuvillette--"
+
+"Yes, I know--Cesarine--my mother spoke of her. Well?"
+
+"It seems a sailor was prowling about the village this morning."
+
+"What sort of face had he?"
+
+"Not a natural face--a sort of Englishman's face."
+
+"Ah!" said Lupin, in a tone preoccupied. "And you have given
+Cesarine orders--"
+
+"To keep her eyes open. Yes, governor."
+
+"Very well. Keep a lookout for Charolais's return in two or three
+hours from now. If there's anything, I shall be at the farm."
+
+He walked on and said to Beautrelet:
+
+"This makes me uneasy--is it Shears? Ah, if it's he, in his present
+state of exasperation, I have everything to fear!"
+
+He hesitated a moment: "I wonder if we hadn't better turn back. Yes,
+I have a nasty presentiment of evil."
+
+Gently undulating plains stretched before them as far as the eye
+could see. A little to the left, a series of handsome avenues of
+trees led to the farm of the Neuvillette, the buildings of which
+were now in view. It was the retreat which he had prepared, the
+haven of rest which he had promised Raymonde. Was he, for the sake
+of an absurd idea, to renounce happiness at the very moment when it
+seemed within his reach?
+
+He took Isidore by the arm and, calling his attention to Raymonde,
+who was walking in front of them:
+
+"Look at her. When she walks, her figure has a little swing at the
+waist which I cannot see without quivering. But everything in her
+gives me that thrill of emotion and love: her movements and her
+repose, her silence and the sound of her voice. I tell you, the mere
+fact that I am walking in the track of her footsteps makes me feel
+in the seventh heaven. Ah, Beautrelet, will she ever forget that I
+was once Lupin? Shall I ever be able to wipe out from her memory the
+past which she loathes and detests?" He mastered himself and, with
+obstinate assurance. "She will forget!" he declared. "She will
+forget, because I have made every sacrifice for her sake. I have
+sacrificed the inviolable sanctuary of the Hollow Needle, I have
+sacrificed my treasures, my power, my pride--I will sacrifice
+everything--I don't want to be anything more--but just a man in
+love--and an honest man, because she can only love an honest man.
+After all, why should I not be honest? It is no more degrading than
+anything else!"
+
+The quip escaped him, so to speak, unawares. His voice remained
+serious and free of all chaff. And he muttered, with restrained
+violence:
+
+"Ah, Beautrelet, you see, of all the unbridled joys which I have
+tasted in my adventurous life, there is not one that equals the joy
+with which her look fills me when she is pleased with me. I feel
+quite weak then, and I should like to cry--" Was he crying?
+Beautrelet had an intuition that his eyes were wet with tears. Tears
+in Lupin's eyes!--Tears of love!
+
+They were nearing an old gate that served as an entrance to the
+farm. Lupin stopped for a moment and stammered:
+
+"Why am I afraid?--I feel a sort of weight on my chest. Is the
+adventure of the Hollow Needle not over? Has destiny not accepted
+the issue which I selected?"
+
+Raymonde turned round, looking very anxious.
+
+"Here comes Cesarine. She's running."
+
+The exciseman's wife was hurrying from the farm as fast as she
+could. Lupin rushed up to her:
+
+"What is it? What has happened? Speak!"
+
+Choking, quite out of breath, Cesarine stuttered:
+
+"A man--I saw a man this morning!
+
+"A man--I saw a man in the sitting-room."
+
+"The Englishman of this morning?"
+
+"Yes--but in a different disguise."
+
+"Did he see you?"
+
+"No. He saw your mother. Mme. Valmeras caught him as he was just
+going away."
+
+"Well?"
+
+"He told her that he was looking for Louis Valmeras, that he was a
+friend of yours."
+
+"Then?"
+
+"The madame said that her son had gone abroad--for years."
+
+"And he went away?"
+
+"No, he made signs through the window that overlooks the plain--as
+if he were calling to some one."
+
+Lupin seemed to hesitate. A loud cry tore the air. Raymonde moaned:
+
+"It's your mother--I recognize--"
+
+He flung himself upon her and, dragging her away, in a burst of
+fierce passion:
+
+"Come--let us fly--you first."
+
+But, suddenly, he stopped, distraught, overcome:
+
+"No, I can't do it--it's too awful. Forgive me--Raymonde--that poor
+woman down there--Stay here. Beautrelet, don't leave her."
+
+He darted along the slope that surrounds the farm, turned and
+followed it, at a run, till he came to the gate that opens on the
+plain.
+
+Raymonde, whom Beautrelet had been unable to hold back, arrived
+almost as soon as he did; and Beautrelet, hiding behind the trees,
+saw, in the lonely walk that led from the farm to the gate, three
+men, of whom one, the tallest, went ahead, while the two others were
+holding by the arms a woman who tried to resist and who uttered
+moans of pain.
+
+The daylight was beginning to fade. Nevertheless, Beautrelet
+recognized Holmlock Shears. The woman seemed of a certain age. Her
+livid features were set in a frame of white hair.
+
+They all four came up.
+
+They reached the gate. Shears opened one of the folding leaves.
+
+Then Lupin strode forward and stood in front of him.
+
+The encounter appeared all the more terrible inasmuch as it was
+silent, almost solemn.
+
+For long moments, the two enemies took each other's measure with
+their eyes. An equal hatred distorted the features of both of them.
+Neither moved.
+
+Then Lupin spoke, in a voice of terrifying calmness:
+
+"Tell your men to leave that woman alone."
+
+"No."
+
+It was as though both of them feared to engage in the supreme
+struggle, as though both were collecting all their strength. And
+there were no words wasted this time, no insults, no bantering
+challenges. Silence, a deathlike silence.
+
+Mad with anguish, Raymonde awaited the issue of the duel. Beautrelet
+had caught her arms and was holding her motionless.
+
+After a second, Lupin repeated:
+
+"Order your men to leave that woman alone."
+
+"No."
+
+Lupin said:
+
+"Listen, Shears--"
+
+But he interrupted himself, realizing the silliness of the words. In
+the face of that colossus of pride and will-power which called
+itself Holmlock Shears, of what use were threats?
+
+Resolved upon the worst, suddenly he put his hand to his jacket
+pocket. The Englishman anticipated his movement and, leaping upon
+his prisoner, thrust the barrel of his revolver within two inches of
+her temple:
+
+"If you stir a limb, I fire!"
+
+At the same time his two satellites drew their weapons and aimed
+them at Lupin.
+
+Lupin drew himself up, stifled the rage within him and, coolly, with
+his hands in his pockets and his breast exposed to the enemy, began
+once more:
+
+"Shears, for the third time, let that woman be--"
+
+The Englishman sneered:
+
+"I have no right to touch her, I suppose? Come, come, enough of this
+humbug! Your name isn't Valmeras any more than it's Lupin: you stole
+the name just as you stole the name of Charmerace. And the woman
+whom you pass off as your mother is Victoire, your old accomplice,
+the one who brought you up--" [FOOTNOTE: Arsene Lupin, play in four
+acts, by Maurice Leblanc and Francis de Croisset.]
+
+Shears made a mistake. Carried away by his longing for revenge, he
+glanced across at Raymonde, whom these revelations filled with
+horror. Lupin took advantage of his imprudence. With a sudden
+movement, he fired.
+
+"Damnation!" bellowed Shears, whose arm, pierced by a bullet, fell
+to his side. And, addressing his men, "Shoot, you two! Shoot him
+down!"
+
+But already Lupin was upon them: and not two seconds had elapsed
+before the one on the right was sprawling on the ground, with his
+chest smashed, while the other, with his jaw broken, fell back
+against the gate.
+
+"Hurry up, Victoire. Tie them down. And now, Mr. Englishman, it's
+you and I."
+
+He ducked with an oath:
+
+"Ah, you scoundrel!"
+
+Shears had picked up his revolver with his left hand and was taking
+aim at him.
+
+A shot--a cry of distress--Raymonde had flung herself between the
+two men, facing the Englishman. She staggered back, brought her hand
+to her neck, drew herself up, spun round on her heels and fell at
+Lupin's feet.
+
+"Raymonde!--Raymonde!"
+
+He threw himself upon her, took her in his arms and pressed her to
+him.
+
+"Dead--" he said.
+
+There was a moment of stupefaction. Shears seemed confounded by his
+own act. Victoire stammered:
+
+"My poor boy--my poor boy--"
+
+Beautrelet went up to the young woman and stooped to examine her.
+Lupin repeated:
+
+"Dead--dead--"
+
+He said it in a reflective tone, as though he did not yet
+understand. But his face became hollow, suddenly transformed,
+ravaged by grief. And then he was seized with a sort of madness,
+made senseless gestures, wrung his hands, stamped his feet, like a
+child that suffers more than it is able to bear.
+
+"You villain!" he cried, suddenly, in an access of hatred.
+
+And, flinging Shears back with a formidable blow, he took him by the
+throat and dug his twitching fingers into his flesh.
+
+The Englishman gasped, without even struggling.
+
+"My boy--my boy--" said Victoire, in a voice of entreaty.
+
+Beautrelet ran up. But Lupin had already let go and stood sobbing
+beside his enemy stretched upon the ground.
+
+O pitiful sight! Beautrelet never forgot its tragic horror, he who
+knew all Lupin's love for Raymonde and all that the great adventurer
+had sacrificed of his own being to bring a smile to the face of his
+well-beloved.
+
+Night began to cover the field of battle with a shroud of darkness.
+The three Englishmen lay bound and gagged in the tall grass. Distant
+songs broke the vast silence of the plain. It was the farm-hands
+returning from their work.
+
+Lupin drew himself up. He listened to the monotonous voices. Then he
+glanced at the happy homestead of the Neuvillette, where he had
+hoped to live peacefully with Raymonde. Then he looked at her, the
+poor, loving victim, whom love had killed and who, all white, was
+sleeping her last, eternal sleep.
+
+The men were coming nearer, however.
+
+Then Lupin bent down, took the dead woman in his powerful arms,
+lifted the corpse with a single effort and, bent in two, stretched
+it across his back:
+
+"Let us go, Victoire."
+
+"Let us go, dear."
+
+"Good-bye, Beautrelet," he said.
+
+And, bearing his precious and awful burden followed by his old
+servant, silent and fierce he turned toward the sea and plunged into
+the darkness of the night.
+
+THE END
+
+
+
+The Project Gutenberg Etext of The Hollow Needle, by Maurice Leblanc
+