The Teeth of the Tiger, Maurice Leblanc [top 10 inspirational books TXT] 📗

forced the dead man to reveal his secret. He disclosed, as though he had been present throughout, the hateful vengeance conceived in the darkness and carried out in the tomb.

M. Desmalions showed all his admiration by his silence and by certain movements of his head. And Perenna took a keen enjoyment in the strange fact that he, who was being hunted down by the police a few hours ago, should now be sitting in a motor car beside the head of that same force.

Nothing threw into greater relief the masterly manner in which he had conducted the business and the importance which the police attached to the results obtained. The value of his collaboration was such that they were willing to forget the incidents of the last two days. The grudge which Weber bore him was now of no avail against Don Luis Perenna.

M. Desmalions, meanwhile, began briefly to review the new solutions, and he concluded by still discussing certain points.

“Yes, that’s it⁠ ⁠… there is not the least shadow of a doubt.⁠ ⁠… We agree.⁠ ⁠… It’s that and nothing else. Still, one or two things remain obscure. First of all, the mark of the teeth. This, notwithstanding the husband’s admission, is a fact which we cannot neglect.”

“I believe that the explanation is a very simple one, Monsieur le Préfet. I will give it to you as soon as I am able to support it with the necessary proofs.”

“Very well. But another question: how is it that Weber, yesterday morning, found that sheet of paper relating to the explosion in Mlle. Levasseur’s room?”

“And how was it,” added Don Luis, laughing, “that I found there the list of the five dates corresponding with the delivery of the letters?”

“So you are of my opinion?” said M. Desmalions. “The part played by Mlle. Levasseur is at least suspicious.”

“I believe that everything will be cleared up, Monsieur le Préfet, and that you need now only question Mme. Fauville and Gaston Sauverand in order to dispel these last obscurities and remove all suspicion from Mlle. Levasseur.”

“And then,” insisted M. Desmalions, “there is one more fact that strikes me as odd. Hippolyte Fauville does not once mention the Mornington inheritance in his confession. Why? Did he not know of it? Are we to suppose that there is no connection, beyond a mere casual coincidence, between the series of crimes and that bequest?”

“There, I am entirely of your opinion, Monsieur le Préfet. Hippolyte Fauville’s silence as to that bequest perplexes me a little, I confess. But all the same I look upon it as comparatively unimportant. The main thing is Fauville’s guilt and the prisoners’ innocence.”

Don Luis’s delight was pure and unbounded. From his point of view, the sinister tragedy was at an end with the discovery of the confession written by Hippolyte Fauville. Anything not explained in those lines would be explained by the details to be supplied by Mme. Fauville, Florence Levasseur, and Gaston Sauverand. He himself had lost all interest in the matter.

The car drew up at Saint-Lazare, the wretched, sordid old prison which is still waiting to be pulled down.

The Prefect jumped out. The door was opened at once.

“Is the prison governor there?” he asked. “Quick! send for him, it’s urgent.”

Then, unable to wait, he at once hastened toward the corridors leading to the infirmary and, as he reached the first-floor landing, came up against the governor himself.

“Mme. Fauville,” he said, without waste of time. “I want to see her⁠—”

But he stopped short when he saw the expression of consternation on the prison governor’s face.

“Well, what is it?” he asked. “What’s the matter?”

“Why, haven’t you heard, Monsieur le Préfet?” stammered the governor. “I telephoned to the office, you know⁠—”

“Speak! What is it?”

“Mme. Fauville died this morning. She managed somehow to take poison.”

M. Desmalions seized the governor by the arm and ran to the infirmary, followed by Perenna and Mazeroux.

He saw Marie Fauville lying on a bed in one of the rooms. Her pale face and her shoulders were stained with brown patches, similar to those which had marked the bodies of Inspector Vérot, Hippolyte Fauville, and his son Edmond.

Greatly upset, the Prefect murmured:

“But the poison⁠—where did it come from?”

“This phial and syringe were found under her pillow, Monsieur le Préfet.”

“Under her pillow? But how did they get there? How did they reach her? Who gave them to her?”

“We don’t know yet, Monsieur le Préfet.”

M. Desmalions looked at Don Luis. So Hippolyte Fauville’s suicide had not put an end to the series of crimes! His action had done more than aim at Marie’s death by the hand of the law: it had now driven her to take poison! Was it possible? Was it admissible that the dead man’s revenge should still continue in the same automatic and anonymous manner?

Or rather⁠—or rather, was there not some other mysterious will which was secretly and as audaciously carrying on Hippolyte Fauville’s diabolical work?

Two days later came a fresh sensation: Gaston Sauverand was found dying in his cell. He had had the courage to strangle himself with his bedsheet. All efforts to restore him to life were vain.

On the table near him lay a half-dozen newspaper cuttings, which had been passed to him by an unknown hand. All of them told the news of Marie Fauville’s death.

XV The Heir to the Hundred Millions

On the fourth evening after the tragic events related, an old cabdriver, almost entirely hidden in a huge greatcoat, rang at Perenna’s door and sent up a letter to Don Luis. He was at once shown into the study on the first floor. Hardly taking time to throw off his greatcoat, he rushed at Don Luis:

“It’s all up with you this time, Chief!” he exclaimed. “This is no moment for joking: pack up your trunks and be off as quick as you can!”

Don Luis, who sat quietly smoking in an easy chair, answered:

“Which will you have, Mazeroux? A cigar or a cigarette?”

Mazeroux at once grew indignant.

“But look here, Chief, don’t you read the papers?”

“Worse luck!”

“In that case, the situation