The Hollow Needle; Further adventures of Arsene Lupin Part 21

SIR: I cannot pretend but that my modest personality, which would certainly have pa.s.sed unnoticed in more heroic times, has acquired a certain prominence in the dull and feeble period in which we live. But there is a limit beyond which the morbid curiosity of the crowd cannot go without becoming indecently indiscreet. If the walls that surround our private lives be not respected, what is to safeguard the rights of the citizen?

Will those who differ plead the higher interest of truth? An empty pretext in so far as I am concerned, because the truth is known and I raise no difficulty about making an official confession of the truth in writing. Yes, Mlle. de Saint-Veran is alive. Yes, I love her. Yes, I have the mortification not to be loved by her. Yes, the results of the boy Beautrelet's inquiry are wonderful in their precision and accuracy. Yes, we agree on every point. There is no riddle left. There is no mystery. Well, then, what?

Injured to the very depths of my soul, bleeding still from cruel wounds, I ask that my more intimate feelings and secret hopes may no longer be delivered to the malevolence of the public. I ask for peace, the peace which I need to conquer the affection of Mlle. de Saint-Veran and to wipe out from her memory the thousand little injuries which she has had to suffer at the hands of her uncle and cousin-this has not been told-because of her position as a poor relation. Mlle. de Saint-Veran will forget this hateful past. All that she can desire, were it the fairest jewel in the world, were it the most unattainable treasure, I shall lay at her feet. She will be happy. She will love me.

But, if I am to succeed, once more, I require peace. That is why I lay down my arms and hold out the olive-branch to my enemies-while warning them, with every magnanimity on my part, that a refusal on theirs might bring down upon them the gravest consequences.

One word more on the subject of Mr. Harlington. This name conceals the ident.i.ty of an excellent fellow, who is secretary to Cooley, the American millionaire, and instructed by him to lay hands upon every object of ancient art in Europe which it is possible to discover. His evil star brought him into touch with my friend Etienne de Vaudreix, ALIAS a.r.s.ene Lupin, ALIAS myself. He learnt, in this way, that a certain M. de Gesvres was willing to part with four pictures by Rubens, ostensibly on the condition that they were replaced by copies and that the bargain to which he was consenting remained unknown. My friend Vaudreix also undertook to persuade M. de Gesvres to sell his chapel. The negotiations were conducted with entire good faith on the side of my friend Vaudreix and with charming ingenuousness on the side of Mr. Harlington, until the day when the Rubenses and the carvings from the chapel were in a safe place and Mr. Harlington in prison. There remains nothing, therefore, to be done but to release the unfortunate American, because he was content to play the modest part of a dupe; to brand the millionaire Cooley, because, for fear of possible unpleasantness, he did not protest against his secretary's arrest; and to congratulate my friend Etienne de Vaudreix, because he is revenging the outraged morality of the public by keeping the hundred thousand francs which he was paid on account by that singularly unattractive person, Cooley.

Pray, pardon the length of this letter and permit me to be, Sir,

Your obedient servant, a.r.s.eNE LUPIN.

Isidore weighed the words of this communication as minutely, perhaps, as he had studied the doc.u.ment concerning the Hollow Needle. He went on the principle, the correctness of which was easily proved, that Lupin had never taken the trouble to send one of his amusing letters to the press without absolute necessity, without some motive which events were sure, sooner or later, to bring to light.

What was the motive for this particular letter? For what hidden reason was Lupin confessing his love and the failure of that love? Was it there that Beautrelet had to seek, or in the explanations regarding Mr. Harlington, or further still, between the lines, behind all those words whose apparent meaning had perhaps no other object than to suggest some wicked, perfidious, misleading little idea?

For hours, the young man, confined to his compartment, remained pensive and anxious. The letter filled him with mistrust, as though it had been written for his benefit and were destined to lead him, personally, into error. For the first time and because he found himself confronted not with a direct attack, but with an ambiguous, indefinable method of fighting, he underwent a distinct sensation of fear. And, when he thought of his good old, easy-going father, kidnapped through his fault, he asked himself, with a pang, whether he was not mad to continue so unequal a contest. Was the result not certain? Had Lupin not won the game in advance?

It was but a short moment of weakness. When he alighted from his compartment, at six o'clock in the morning, refreshed by a few hours' sleep, he had recovered all his confidence.

On the platform, Froberval, the dockyard clerk who had given hospitality to M. Beautrelet, senior, was waiting for him, accompanied by his daughter Charlotte, an imp of twelve or thirteen.

"Well?" cried Isidore.

The worthy man beginning to moan and groan, he interrupted him, dragged him to a neighboring tavern, ordered coffee and began to put plain questions, without permitting the other the slightest digression:

"My father has not been carried off, has he? It was impossible."

"Impossible. Still, he has disappeared."

"Since when?"

"We don't know."

"What!"

"No. Yesterday morning, at six o'clock, as I had not seen him come down as usual, I opened his door. He was gone."

"But was he there on the day before, two days ago?"

"Yes. On the day before yesterday, he did not leave his room. He was a little tired; and Charlotte took his lunch up to him at twelve and his dinner at seven in the evening."

"So it was between seven o'clock in the evening, on the day before yesterday, and six o'clock on yesterday morning that he disappeared?"

"Yes, during the night before last. Only-"

"Only what?"

"Well, it's like this: you can't leave the a.r.s.enal at night."

"Do you mean that he has not left it?"

"That's impossible! My friends and I have searched the whole naval harbor."

"Then he has left it!"

"Impossible, every outlet is guarded!"

Beautrelet reflected and then said:

"What next?"

"Next, I hurried to the commandant's and informed the officer in charge."

"Did he come to your house?"

"Yes; and a gentleman from the public prosecutor's also. They searched all through the morning; and, when I saw that they were making no progress and that there was no hope left, I telegraphed to you."

"Was the bed disarranged in his room?"

"No."

"Nor the room disturbed in any way?"

"No. I found his pipe in its usual place, with his tobacco and the book which he was reading. There was even this little photograph of yourself in the middle of the book, marking the page."

"Let me see it."

Froberval pa.s.sed him the photograph. Beautrelet gave a start of surprise. He had recognized himself in the snapshot, standing, with his two hands in his pockets, on a lawn from which rose trees and ruins.

Froberval added:

"It must be the last portrait of yourself which you sent him. Look, on the back, you will see the date, 3 April, the name of the photographer, R. de Val, and the name of the town, Lion-Lion-sur-Mer, perhaps."

Isidore turned the photograph over and read this little note, in his own handwriting:

"R. de Val.-3.4-Lion."

He was silent for a few minutes and resumed:

"My father hadn't shown you that snapshot yet?"

"No-and that's just what astonished me when I saw it yesterday-for your father used so often to talk to us about you."

There was a fresh pause, greatly prolonged. Froberval muttered:

"I have business at the workshop. We might as well go in-"