Fantômas, Pierre Souvestre [suggested reading .TXT] 📗

"You didn't succeed," M. Muller replied unkindly, "but it doesn't follow that nobody else will!"

M. Louis was not deceived: Henri Verbier evidently did think his neighbour at table a very charming young woman.

Mlle. Jeanne had hardly reached her room on the fifth floor of the hotel, and flung open her window to gaze over the magnificent panorama spread out below her and inhale the still night air, when a gentle tap fell upon the door and, complying with her summons to come in, Henri Verbier entered the room.

"My room is next to yours," he said, "and as I saw you were standing dreaming at your window I thought perhaps you would condescend to smoke an Egyptian cigarette. I have brought some back from Cairo: it is very mild tobacco—real ladies' tobacco."

The girl laughed and took a dainty cigarette from the case that Henri Verbier offered her.

"It's very kind of you to think of me," she said. "I don't make a habit of smoking, but I let myself be tempted sometimes."

"If I have been kind, you can show your gratitude very easily," Henri Verbier replied: "by allowing me to stay here a few minutes and smoke a cigarette with you."

"By all means," said Mlle. Jeanne. "I love to spend a little time at my window at night, to get the air before going to bed. You will prevent me from getting tired of my own company, and can tell me all about Cairo."

"I'm afraid I know very little about Cairo," Henri Verbier replied; "you see I spent almost the whole of my time in the hotel. But as you seem so kind and so friendly disposed I wish you would tell me things."

"But I am a very ignorant young woman."

"You are a woman, and that's enough. Listen: I am a new-comer here, and I am quite aware that my arrival, and my position, will make me some enemies. Now, whom ought I to be on my guard against? Who is there, among the staff, of whom I ought to be careful as doubtful associates? I ask with all the more concern because I will tell you frankly that I had no personal introduction to the Board: I have not got the same chance that you have."

"How do you know I had any introduction?" the girl enquired.

"Gad, I'm sure of it," Henri Verbier answered: he was leaning his elbows on the window-sill and gradually drawing closer to the young cashier. "I don't suppose that an important position like the one you hold, requiring absolute integrity and competence, is given without fullest investigation. Your work is not tiring, but that does not mean it would be entrusted to anybody."

"You are quite right, M. Verbier: I did have an introduction to the Board: and I had first-rate testimonials too."

"Have you been in business long? Two years—three years?"

"Yes," Mlle. Jeanne replied, purposely refraining from being explicit.

"I only asked because I fancy I have seen you before somewhere. I recognise your eyes!" Henri Verbier smiled, and looked meaningly at the girl. "Mlle. Jeanne, on summer nights like this, when you are looking at a lovely view like this, don't you have a funny sort of feeling?"

"No. What do you mean?"

"Oh, I don't know. But you see, I'm a sentimental chap unfortunately, and I really suffer a lot from always living in lonely isolation, without any affection: there are times when I feel as if love were an absolute necessity."

The cashier looked at him ironically.

"That's all foolishness. Love is only stupid, and ought to be guarded against as the worst possible mistake. Love always means misery for working people like us."

"It is you who are foolish," Henri Verbier protested gently, "or else you are mischievous. No: love is not stupid for working people like us; on the contrary, it is the only means we have of attaining perfect happiness. Lovers are rich!"

"In wealth that lets them die of hunger," she scoffed.

"No, no," he answered: "no. Look here: all to-day you and I have been working hard, earning our living; well, suppose you were not laughing at me but we were really lovers, would not this be the time to enjoy the living we have earned?" and as the girl did not reply, Henri Verbier, who like an experienced wooer had been drawing closer to her all the time, until now his shoulder was touching hers, took her hand. "Would not this be sweet?" he said. "I should take your little fingers into mine—like this; I should look at them so tenderly, and raise them to my lips——"

But the girl wrested herself away.

"Let me go! I won't have it! Do you understand?" And then, to mitigate the sharpness of her rebuke, and also to change the conversation, she said: "It is beginning to turn cold. I will put a cloak over my shoulders," and she moved away from the window to unhook a cloak from a peg on the wall.

Henri Verbier watched her without moving.

"How unkind you are!" he said reproachfully, disregarding the angry gleam in her eyes. "Can it really be wrong to enjoy a kiss, on a lovely night like this? If you are cold, Mademoiselle Jeanne, there is a better way of getting warm than by putting a wrap over one's shoulders: and that is by resting in someone else's arms."

He put out his arms as he spoke, ready to catch the girl as she came across the room, and was on the very point of taking her into his arms as he had suggested, when she broke from his grasp with a sudden turn and, furious with rage, dealt him a tremendous blow right on the temple. With a stifled groan, Henri Verbier dropped unconscious to the floor.

Mlle. Jeanne stared at him for a moment, as if dumbfounded. Then with quite amazing rapidity the young cashier sprang to the window and hurriedly closed it. She took down her hat from a hook on the wall, and put it on with a single gesture, opened a drawer and took out a little bag, and then, after listening for a minute to make sure that there was nobody in the passage outside her room, she opened her door, went out, rapidly turned the key behind her and ran down the stairs.

Two minutes later Mlle. Jeanne smilingly passed the porter on duty and wished him good night.

"Bye-bye," she said. "I'm going out to get a little fresh air!"

Slowly, as if emerging from some extraordinary dream, Henri Verbier began to recover from his brief unconsciousness: he could not understand at first what had happened to him, why he was lying on the floor, why his head ached so much, or why his blood-shot eyes saw everything through a mist. He gradually struggled into a sitting posture and looked around the room.

"Nobody here!" he muttered. Then as if the sound of his own voice had brought him back to life, he got up and hurried to the door and shook it furiously. "Locked!" he growled angrily. "And I can call till I'm black in the face! No one has come upstairs yet. I'm trapped!" He turned towards the window, with some idea of calling for help, but as he passed the mirror over the mantelpiece he caught sight of his own reflection and saw the bruise on his forehead, with a tiny stream of blood beginning to trickle from a cut in the skin. He went close to the glass and looked at himself in dismay. "Juve though I am," he murmured, "I've let myself be knocked out by a woman!" And then Juve, for Juve it was, cleverly disguised, uttered a sudden oath, clenching his fists and grinding his teeth in rage. "Confound it all, I'll take my oath that blow was never dealt by any woman!"

M. Etienne Rambert was in the smoking-room of the house which he had purchased a few months previously in the Place Pereire, rue Eugène-Flachat, smoking and chatting with his old friend Barbey, who also was his banker. The two had been discussing investments, and the wealthy merchant had displayed considerable indifference to the banker's recommendation of various gilt-edged securities.

"To tell you the truth, my dear fellow," he said at length, "these things interest me very little; I've got used to big enterprises—am almost what you would call a plunger. Of course you know that nothing is so risky as the development of rubber plantations. No doubt the industry has prospered amazingly since the boom in motor-cars began, but you must remember that I went into it when no one could possibly foresee the immense market that the new means of locomotion would open for our produce. That's enough to prove to you that I'm no coward when it's a question of risking money." The banker nodded: his friend certainly did display a quite extraordinary energy and will-power for a man of his age. "As a matter of fact," M. Rambert went on, "any business of which I am not actually a director, interests me only slightly. You know I am not boasting when I say that my fortune is large enough to justify me in incurring a certain amount of financial risk without having to fear any serious modification of my social position if the ventures should happen to turn out ill. I've got the sporting instinct."

"It's a fine one," M. Barbey said with some enthusiasm. "And I don't mind telling you that if I were not your banker, and so had a certain responsibility in your case, I should not hesitate to put a scheme before you that has been running in my head for a year or two now."

"A scheme of your own, Barbey?" said M. Rambert. "How is it you have never told me about it? I should have thought we were close enough friends for that."

The hint of reproach in the words pricked the banker, and also encouraged him to proceed.

"It's rather a delicate matter, and you will understand my hesitation when I tell you—for I'll burn my boats now—that it isn't any ordinary speculation, such as I am in the habit of recommending to my customers. It is a speculation in which I am interested personally: in short, I want to increase the capital of my Bank, and convert my House into a really large concern."

"Oh-ho!" said M. Etienne Rambert, half to himself. "Well, you are quite right, Barbey. But if you want to suggest that I shall help to finance it, you had better put all the cards on the table and let me know exactly what the position is; I need not say that if nothing comes of it, I shall regard any information you give me as absolutely confidential."

The two men plunged into the subject, and for a good half-hour discussed it in all its bearings, making endless calculations and contemplating all contingencies. At last M. Rambert threw down his pen and looked up.

"I'm accustomed to the American method of hustle, Barbey. In principle I like your proposition quite well; but I won't be one of your financial partners; if the thing goes through I'll be the only one, or not one at all. I know what is in your mind," he went on with a smile, as he noticed the banker's surprise; "you know what my fortune is, or rather you think you do, and you are wondering where I shall get the million sterling, or thereabouts, that you want. Well, make your mind easy about that; if I talk like this, it's because I've got it." The banker's bow was very deferent, and M. Rambert continued: "Yes, the last year or two have been good, even very good, for me. I've made some lucky speculations and my capital has further been increased by some lotteries which have turned