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

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 Vélines. 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 Vélines 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 Renaissance and Louis Philippe styles, but it bore a stately air, nevertheless, with its four turrets and its ivy-mantled drawbridge.

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 Vélines?”

And he gave the man his card.

“Monsieur le baron is not up yet, but, if monsieur will wait⁠—”

“Has not someone 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 Vélines. 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 motorcar 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, pigeonholes 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