The Hollow Needle, Maurice Leblanc [fiction novels to read .TXT] 📗

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-Véran, 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 Valméras. “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-Véran⁠—”

They all four went down the stairs. When they reached the bottom, Valméras 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-Véran, he asked them about the people who lived at the castle, and, particularly, about the habits of Arsène 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 Éguzon, 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 Valméras, 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 Valméras 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 Château de l’Aiguille; and the authorities would have been entitled to challenge the statements of Beautrelet and his father, of Valméras and Mlle. de Saint-Véran, had they not ended by discovering, in a room next to that occupied by the young girl, some half-dozen exquisite bouquets with Arsène 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-Véran 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-Véran 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!⁠—Arsène’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-Véran 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