Arsène Lupin versus Herlock Sholmes Read online

  “An inch and a half of the heart! Wilson always was lucky!” said Sholmes, in an envious tone.

  “Lucky … lucky … ” muttered the doctor.

  “Of course! Why, with his robust constitution he will soon be out again.”

  “Six weeks in bed and two months of convalescence.”

  “Not more?”

  “No, unless complications set in.”

  “Oh! The devil! What does he want complications for?”

  Fully reassured, Sholmes joined the baron in the boudoir. This time the mysterious visitor had not exercised the same restraint. Ruthlessly, he had laid his vicious hand upon the diamond snuff-box, upon the opal necklace, and, in a general way, upon everything that could find a place in the greedy pockets of an enterprising burglar.

  The window was still open; one of the window-panes had been neatly cut; and, in the morning, a summary investigation showed that the ladder belonged to the house then in course of construction.

  “Now, you can see,” said Mon. d’Imblevalle, with a touch of irony, “it is an exact repetition of the affair of the Jewish lamp.”

  “Yes, if we accept the first theory adopted by the police.”

  “Haven’t you adopted it yet? Doesn’t this second theft shatter your theory in regard to the first?”

  “It only confirms it, monsieur.”

  “That is incredible! You have positive evidence that last night’s theft was committed by an outsider, and yet you adhere to your theory that the Jewish lamp was stolen by someone in the house.”

  “Yes, I am sure of it.”

  “How do you explain it?”

  “I do not explain anything, monsieur; I have established two facts which do not appear to have any relation to each other, and yet I am seeking the missing link that connects them.”

  His conviction seemed to be so earnest and positive that the baron submitted to it, and said:

  “Very well, we will notify the police—”

  “Not at all!” exclaimed the Englishman, quickly, “not at all! I intend to ask for their assistance when I need it—but not before.”

  “But the attack on your friend?”

  “That’s of no consequence. He is only wounded. Secure the license of the doctor. I shall be responsible for the legal side of the affair.”

  The next two days proved uneventful. Yet Sholmes was investigating the case with a minute care, and with a sense of wounded pride resulting from that audacious theft, committed under his nose, in spite of his presence and beyond his power to prevent it. He made a thorough investigation of the house and garden, interviewed the servants, and paid lengthy visits to the kitchen and stables. And, although his efforts were fruitless, he did not despair.

  “I will succeed,” he thought, “and the solution must be sought within the walls of this house. This affair is quite different from that of the Blonde Lady, where I had to work in the dark, on unknown ground. This time I am on the battlefield itself. The enemy is not the elusive and invisible Lupin, but the accomplice, in flesh and blood, who lives and moves within the confines of this house. Let me secure the slightest clue and the game is mine!”

  That clue was furnished to him by accident.

  On the afternoon of the third day, when he entered a room located above the boudoir, which served as a study for the children, he found Henriette, the younger of the two sisters. She was looking for her scissors.

  “You know,” she said to Sholmes, “I make papers like that you received the other evening.”

  “The other evening?”

  “Yes, just as dinner was over, you received a paper with marks on it … you know, a telegram … Well, I make them, too.”

  She left the room. To anyone else these words would seem to be nothing more than the insignificant remark of a child, and Sholmes himself listened to them with a distracted air and continued his investigation. But, suddenly, he ran after the child, and overtook her at the head of the stairs. He said to her:

  “So you paste stamps and marks on papers?”

  Henriette, very proudly, replied:

  “Yes, I cut them out and paste them on.”

  “Who taught you that little game?”

  “Mademoiselle … my governess … I have seen her do it often. She takes words out of the newspapers and pastes them—”

  “What does she make out of them?”

  “Telegrams and letters that she sends away.”

  Herlock Sholmes returned to the study, greatly puzzled by the information and seeking to draw from it a logical deduction. There was a pile of newspapers on the mantel. He opened them and found that many words and, in some places, entire lines had been cut out. But, after reading a few of the word’s which preceded or followed, he decided that the missing words had been cut out at random—probably by the child. It was possible that one of the newspapers had been cut by mademoiselle; but how could he assure himself that such was the case?

  Mechanically, Sholmes turned over the school-books on the table; then others which were lying on the shelf of a bookcase. Suddenly he uttered a cry of joy. In a corner of the bookcase, under a pile of old exercise books, he found a child’s alphabet-book, in which the letters were ornamented with pictures, and on one of the pages of that book he discovered a place where a word had been removed. He examined it. It was a list of the days of the week. Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, etc. The word “Saturday” was missing. Now, the theft of the Jewish lamp had occurred on a Saturday night.

  Sholmes experienced that slight fluttering of the heart which always announced to him, in the clearest manner, that he had discovered the road which leads to victory. That ray of truth, that feeling of certainty, never deceived him.

  With nervous fingers he hastened to examine the balance of the book. Very soon he made another discovery. It was a page composed of capital letters, followed by a line of figures. Nine of those letters and three of those figures had been carefully cut out. Sholmes made a list of the missing letters and figures in his memorandum book, in alphabetical and numerical order, and obtained the following result:

  CDEHNOPEZ—237.

  “Well! At first sight, it is a rather formidable puzzle,” he murmured, “but, by transposing the letters and using all of them, is it possible to form one, two or three complete words?”

  Sholmes tried it, in vain.

  Only one solution seemed possible; it constantly appeared before him, no matter which way he tried to juggle the letters, until, at length, he was satisfied it was the true solution, since it harmonized with the logic of the facts and the general circumstances of the case.

  As that page of the book did not contain any duplicate letters it was probable, in fact quite certain, that the words he could form from those letters would be incomplete, and that the original words had been completed with letters taken from other pages. Under those conditions he obtained the following solution, errors and omissions excepted:

  REPOND Z—CH—237.

  The first word was quite clear: répondez [reply], a letter E is missing because it occurs twice in the word, and the book furnished only one letter of each kind.

  As to the second incomplete word, no doubt it formed, with the aid of the number 237, an address to which the reply was to be sent. They appointed Saturday as the time, and requested a reply to be sent to the address CH. 237.

  Or, perhaps, CH. 237 was an address for a letter to be sent to the “general delivery” of some post office, or, again, they might form a part of some incomplete word. Sholmes searched the book once more, but did not discover that any other letters had been removed. Therefore, until further orders, he decided to adhere to the foregoing interpretation.

  Henriette returned and observed what he was doing.

  “Amusing, isn’t it?”

  “Yes, very amusing,” he replied. “But, have you any other papers? … Or, rather, words already cut out that I can paste?”

  “Papers? … No … And Mademoiselle wouldn’t like it.”

 
“Mademoiselle?”

  “Yes, she has scolded me already.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I have told you some things … and she says that a person should never tell things about those they love.”

  “You are quite right.”

  Henriette was delighted to receive his approbation, in fact so highly pleased that she took from a little silk bag that was pinned to her dress some scraps of cloth, three buttons, two cubes of sugar and, lastly, a piece of paper which she handed to Sholmes.

  “See, I give it to you just the same.”

  It was the number of a cab—8,279.

  “Where did this number come from?”

  “It fell out of her pocketbook.”

  “When?”

  “Sunday, at mass, when she was taking out some sous for the collection.”

  “Exactly! And now I shall tell you how to keep from being scolded again. Do not tell Mademoiselle that you saw me.”

  Sholmes then went to Mon. d’Imblevalle and questioned him in regard to Mademoiselle. The baron replied, indignantly:

  “Alice Demun! How can you imagine such a thing? It is utterly impossible!”

  “How long has she been in your service?”

  “Only a year, but there is no one in the house in whom I have greater confidence.”

  “Why have I not seen her yet?”

  “She has been away for a few days.”

  “But she is here now.”

  “Yes; since her return she has been watching at the bedside of your friend. She has all the qualities of a nurse … gentle … thoughtful … Monsieur Wilson seems much pleased. … ”

  “Ah!” said Sholmes, who had completely neglected to enquire about his friend. After a moment’s reflection he asked:

  “Did she go out on Sunday morning?”

  “The day after the theft?”

  “Yes.”

  The baron called his wife and asked her. She replied:

  “Mademoiselle went to the eleven o’clock mass with the children, as usual.”

  “But before that?”

  “Before that? No … Let me see! … I was so upset by the theft … but I remember now that, on the evening before, she asked permission to go out on Sunday morning … to see a cousin who was passing through Paris, I think. But, surely, you don’t suspect her?”

  “Of course not … but I would like to see her.”

  He went to Wilson’s room. A woman dressed in a gray cloth dress, as in the hospitals, was bending over the invalid, giving him a drink. When she turned her face Sholmes recognized her as the young girl who had accosted him at the railway station.

  Alice Demun smiled sweetly; her great serious, innocent eyes showed no sign of embarrassment. The Englishman tried to speak, muttered a few syllables, and stopped. Then she resumed her work, acting quite naturally under Sholmes’ astonished gaze, moved the bottles, unrolled and rolled cotton bandages, and again regarded Sholmes with her charming smile of pure innocence.

  He turned on his heels, descended the stairs, noticed Mon. d’Imblevalle’s automobile in the courtyard, jumped into it, and went to Levallois, to the office of the cab company whose address was printed on the paper he had received from Henriette. The man who had driven carriage number 8,279 on Sunday morning not being there, Sholmes dismissed the automobile and waited for the man’s return. He told Sholmes that he had picked up a woman in the vicinity of the Parc Monceau, a young woman dressed in black, wearing a heavy veil, and, apparently, quite nervous.

  “Did she have a package?”

  “Yes, quite a long package.”

  “Where did you take her?”

  “Avenue des Ternes, corner of the Place Saint-Ferdinand. She remained there about ten minutes, and then returned to the Parc Monceau.”

  “Could you recognize the house in the avenue des Ternes?”

  “Parbleu! Shall I take you there?”

  “Presently. First take me to 36 quai des Orfèvres.”

  At the police office he saw Detective Ganimard.

  “Monsieur Ganimard, are you at liberty?”

  “If it has anything to do with Lupin—no!”

  “It has something to do with Lupin.”

  “Then I do not go.”

  “What? You surrender—”

  “I bow to the inevitable. I am tired of the unequal struggle, in which we are sure to be defeated. Lupin is stronger than I am—stronger than the two of us; therefore, we must surrender.”

  “I will not surrender.”

  “He will make you, as he has all others.”

  “And you would be pleased to see it—eh, Ganimard?”

  “At all events, it is true,” said Ganimard, frankly. “And since you are determined to pursue the game, I will go with you.”

  Together they entered the carriage and were driven to the avenue des Ternes. Upon their order the carriage stopped on the other side of the street, at some distance from the house, in front of a little café, on the terrace of which the two men took seats amongst the shrubbery. It was commencing to grow dark.

  “Waiter,” said Sholmes, “some writing material.”

  He wrote a note, recalled the waiter and gave him the letter with instructions to deliver it to the concierge of the house which he pointed out.

  In a few minutes the concierge stood before them. Sholmes asked him if, on the Sunday morning, he had seen a young woman dressed in black.

  “In black! Yes, about nine o’clock. She went to the second floor.”

  “Have you seen her often?”

  “No, but for some time—well, during the last few weeks, I have seen her almost every day.”

  “And since Sunday?”

  “Only once … until to-day.”

  “What? Did she come to-day?”

  “She is here now.”

  “Here now?”

  “Yes, she came about ten minutes ago. Her carriage is standing in the Place Saint-Ferdinand, as usual. I met her at the door.”

  “Who is the occupant of the second floor?”

  “There are two: a modiste, Mademoiselle Langeais, and a gentleman who rented two furnished rooms a month ago under the name of Bresson.”

  “Why do you say ‘under the name’?”

  “Because I have an idea that it is an assumed name. My wife takes care of his rooms, and … well, there are not two shirts there with the same initials.”

  “Is he there much of the time?”

  “No; he is nearly always out. He has not been here for three days.”

  “Was he here on Saturday night?”

  “Saturday night? … Let me think … Yes, Saturday night, he came in and stayed all night.”

  “What sort of a man is he?”

  “Well, I can scarcely answer that. He is so changeable. He is, by turns, big, little, fat, thin … dark and light. I do not always recognize him.”

  Ganimard and Sholmes exchanged looks.

  “That is he, all right,” said Ganimard.

  “Ah!” said the concierge, “there is the girl now.”

  Mademoiselle had just emerged from the house and was walking toward her carriage in the Place Saint-Ferdinand.

  “And there is Monsieur Bresson.”

  “Monsieur Bresson? Which is he?”

  “The man with the parcel under his arm.”

  “But he is not looking after the girl. She is going to her carriage alone.”

  “Yes, I have never seen them together.”

  The two detectives had arisen. By the light of the street-lamps they recognized the form of Arsène Lupin, who had started off in a direction opposite to that taken by the girl.

  “Which will you follow?” asked Ganimard.

  “I will follow him, of course. He’s the biggest game.”

  “Then I will follow the girl,” proposed Ganimard.

  “No, no,” said Sholmes, quickly, who did not wish to disclose the girl’s identity to Ganimard, “I know where to find her. Come with me.”

 
They followed Lupin at a safe distance, taking care to conceal themselves as well as possible amongst the moving throng and behind the newspaper kiosks. They found the pursuit an easy one, as he walked steadily forward without turning to the right or left, but with a slight limp in the right leg, so slight as to require the keen eye of a professional observer to detect it. Ganimard observed it, and said:

  “He is pretending to be lame. Ah! If we could only collect two or three policemen and pounce on our man! We run a chance to lose him.”

  But they did not meet any policemen before they reached the Porte des Ternes, and, having passed the fortifications, there was no prospect of receiving any assistance.

  “We had better separate,” said Sholmes, “as there are so few people on the street.”

  They were now on the boulevard Victor-Hugo. They walked one on each side of the street, and kept well in the shadow of the trees. They continued thus for twenty minutes, when Lupin turned to the left and followed the Seine. Very soon they saw him descend to the edge of the river. He remained there only a few seconds, but they could not observe his movements. Then Lupin retraced his steps. His pursuers concealed themselves in the shadow of a gateway. Lupin passed in front of them. His parcel had disappeared. And as he walked away another man emerged from the shelter of a house and glided amongst the trees.

  “He seems to be following him also,” said Sholmes, in a low voice.

  The pursuit continued, but was now embarrassed by the presence of the third man. Lupin returned the same way, passed through the Porte des Ternes, and re-entered the house in the avenue des Ternes.

  The concierge was closing the house for the night when Ganimard presented himself.

  “Did you see him?”

  “Yes,” replied the concierge, “I was putting out the gas on the landing when he closed and bolted his door.”

  “Is there any person with him?”

  “No; he has no servant. He never eats here.”

  “Is there a servants’ stairway?”

  “No.”

  Ganimard said to Sholmes:

  “I had better stand at the door of his room while you go for the commissary of police in the rue Demours.”