File No. 113, Emile Gaboriau [digital e reader txt] 📗

that almost daily happens. But, as to discovering any connection between this robbery and my play, that is another matter.”

M. de Clameran made no reply. A nudge from Lagors had calmed him as if by enchantment.

He looked quietly at the clown, and seemed to regret having uttered the significant words forced from him by angry excitement.

“Very well,” he finally said in his usual haughty tone; “I must have been mistaken. I accept your explanation.”

But the clown, hitherto so humble and silly-looking, seemed to take offence at the word, and, assuming a defiant attitude, said:

“I have not made, nor do I intend making, any explanation.”

“Monsieur,” began De Clameran.

“Allow me to finish, if you please. If, unintentionally, I have offended the wife of a man whom I highly esteem, it is his business to seek redress, and not yours. Perhaps you will tell me he is too old to demand satisfaction: if so, let him send one of his sons. I saw one of them in the ball-room to-night; let him come. You asked me who I am; in return I ask you who are you—you who undertake to act as Mme. Fauvel’s champion? Are you her relative, friend, or ally? What right have you to insult her by pretending to discover an allusion to her in a play invented for amusement?”

There was nothing to be said in reply to this. M. de Clameran sought a means of escape.

“I am a friend of M. Fauvel,” he said, “and this title gives me the right to be as jealous of his reputation as if it were my own. If this is not a sufficient reason for my interference, I must inform you that his family will shortly be mine: I regard myself as his nephew.”

“Ah!”

“Next week, monsieur, my marriage with Madeleine will be publicly announced.”

This news was so unexpected, so startling that for a moment the clown was dumb; and now his surprise was genuine.

But he soon recovered himself, and, bowing with deference, said, with covert irony:

“Permit me to offer my congratulations, monsieur. Besides being the belle to-night, Mlle. Madeleine is worth, I hear, half a million.”

Raoul de Lagors had anxiously been watching the people near them, to see if they overheard this conversation.

“We have had enough of this gossip,” he said, in a disdainful tone; “I will only say one thing more, master clown, and that is, that your tongue is too long.”

“Perhaps it is, my pretty youth, perhaps it is; but my arm is still longer.”

De Clameran here interrupted them by saying:

“It is impossible for one to seek an explanation from a man who conceals his identity under the guise of a fool.”

“You are at liberty, my lord doge, to ask the master of the house who I am—if you dare.”

“You are,” cried Clameran, “you are—”

A warning look from Raoul checked the forge-master from using an epithet which would have led to an affray, or at least a scandalous scene.

The clown stood by with a sardonic smile, and, after a moment’s silence, stared M. de Clameran steadily in the face, and in measured tones said:

“I was the best friend, monsieur, that your brother Gaston ever had. I was his adviser, and the confidant of his last wishes.”

These few words fell like a clap of thunder upon De Clameran.

He turned deadly pale, and stared back with his hands stretched out before him, as if shrinking from a phantom.

He tried to answer, to protest against this assertion, but the words froze on his lips. His fright was pitiable.

“Come, let us go,” said Lagors, who was perfectly cool.

And he dragged Clameran away, half supporting him, for he staggered like a drunken man, and clung to every object he passed, to prevent falling.

“Oh,” exclaimed the clown, in three different tones, “oh, oh!”

He himself was almost as much astonished as the forge-master, and remained rooted to the spot, watching the latter as he slowly left the room.

It was with no decided object in view that he had ventured to use the last mysteriously threatening words, but he had been inspired to do so by his wonderful instinct, which with him was like the scent of a bloodhound.

“What can this mean?” he murmured. “Why was he so frightened? What terrible memory have I awakened in his base soul? I need not boast of my penetration, or the subtlety of my plans. There is a great master, who, without any effort, in an instant destroys all my chimeras; he is called ‘Chance.’”

His mind had wandered far from the present scene, when he was brought back to his situation by someone touching him on the shoulder. It was the man in the Venetian cloak.

“Are you very satisfied, M. Verduret?” he inquired.

“Yes, and no, M. the Count. No, because I have not completely achieved the object I had in view when I asked you for an invitation here to-night; yes, because these two rascals behaved in a manner which dispels all doubt.”

“And yet you complain—”

“I do not complain, M. the Count: on the contrary, I bless chance, or rather Providence, which has just revealed to me the existence of a secret that I did not before even suspect.”

Five or six people approached the count, and he went off with them after giving the clown a friendly nod.

The latter instantly threw aside his banner, and started in pursuit of Mme. Fauvel. He found her sitting on a sofa in the large salon, engaged in an animated conversation with Madeleine.

“Of course they are talking over the scene; but what has become of Lagors and De Clameran?”

He soon saw them wandering among the groups scattered about the room, and eagerly asking questions.

“I will bet my head these honorable gentlemen are trying to find out who I am. Keep it up, my friends, ask everybody in the room; I wish you success!”

They soon gave it up, but were so preoccupied, and anxious to be alone in order to reflect and deliberate, that, without waiting for supper, they took leave of Mme. Fauvel and her niece, saying they were going home.

The clown saw them go up to the dressing-room for their cloaks, and in a few minutes leave the house.

“I have nothing more to do here,” he murmured; “I might as well go too.”

He completely covered his dress with a domino, and started for home, thinking the cold frosty air would cool his confused brain.

He lit a cigar, and, walking up the Rue St. Lazare, crossed the Rue Notre Dame de Lorette, and struck into the Faubourg Montmartre.

A man suddenly started out from some place of concealment, and rushed upon him with a dagger.

Fortunately the clown had a cat-like instinct, which enabled him to protect himself against immediate danger, and detect any which threatened.

He saw, or rather divined, the man crouching in the dark shadow of a house, and had the presence of mind to strike an attitude which enabled him to ward off the assassin by spreading out his arms before him.

This movement certainly saved his life; for he received in his arm a furious stab, which would have instantly killed him had it penetrated his breast.

Anger, more than pain, made him cry out:

“Ah, you villain!”

And recoiling a few feet, he put himself on the defensive.

But the precaution was useless.

Seeing his blow miss, the assassin did not return to the attack, but made rapidly off.

“That was certainly Lagors,” said the clown, “and Clameran must be somewhere near. While I walked around one side of the church, they must have gone the other and lain in wait for me.”

His wound began to pain him; he stood under a gas-lamp to examine it.

It did not appear to be dangerous, but the arm was cut through to the bone.

He tore his handkerchief into four bands, and tied his arm up with the dexterity of a surgeon.

“I must be on the track of some great crime, since these fellows are resolved upon murder. When such cunning rogues are only in danger of the police court, they do not gratuitously risk the chance of being tried for murder.”

He thought by enduring a great deal of pain he might still use his arm; so he started in pursuit of his enemy, taking care to keep in the middle of the road, and avoid all dark corners.

Although he saw no one, he was convinced that he was being pursued.

He was not mistaken. When he reached the Boulevard Montmartre, he crossed the street, and, as he did so, distinguished two shadows which he recognized. They crossed the same street a little higher up.

“I have to deal with desperate men,” he muttered. “They do not even take pains to conceal their pursuit of me. They seem to be accustomed to this kind of adventure, and the carriage trick which fooled Fanferlot would never succeed with them. Besides, my light hat is a perfect beacon to lead them on in the night.” He continued his way up the boulevard, and, without turning his head, was sure that his enemies were thirty feet behind him.

“I must get rid of them somehow,” he said to himself. “I can neither return home nor to the Archangel with these devils at my heels. They are following me to find out where I live, and who I am. If they discover that the clown is M. Verduret, and that M. Verduret is M. Lecoq, my plans will be ruined. They will escape abroad with the money, and I shall be left to console myself with a wounded arm. A pleasant ending to all my exertions!”

The idea of Raoul and Clameran escaping him so exasperated him that for an instant he thought of having them arrested at once.

This was easy; for he had only to rush upon them, scream for help, and they would all three be arrested, carried to the watch-house, and consigned to the commissary of police.

The police often resort to this ingenious and simple means of arresting a malefactor for whom they are on the lookout, and whom they cannot seize without a warrant.

The next day there is a general explanation, and the parties, if innocent, are dismissed.

The clown had sufficient proof to sustain him in the arrest of Lagors. He could show the letter and the mutilated prayer-book, he could reveal the existence of the pawnbroker’s tickets in the house at Vesinet, he could display his wounded arm. He could force Raoul to confess how and why he had assumed the name of Lagors, and what his motive was in passing himself off for a relative of M. Fauvel.

On the other hand, in acting thus hastily, he was insuring the safety of the principal plotter, De Clameran. What proofs had he against him? Not one. He had strong suspicions, but no well-grounded charge to produce against him.

On reflection the clown decided that he would act alone, as he had thus far done, and that alone and unaided he would discover the truth of all his suspicions.

Having reached this decision, the first step to be taken was to put his followers on the wrong scent.

He walked rapidly up the Rue Sebastopol, and, reaching the square of the Arts et Metiers, he abruptly stopped, and asked some insignificant questions of two constables who were standing talking together.

The manoeuvre had the result he expected; Raoul and Clameran stood perfectly still about twenty steps off, not daring to advance.

Twenty steps! That was as much start as the clown wanted. While talking with the constables, he had pulled the bell of the door before which they were standing, and