The Blonde Lady Part 27

"Do your best not to be recognized before you can help it."

He himself slipped behind a newspaper-kiosk, without losing sight of a.r.s.ene Lupin who was leaning over Lady Cliveden, smiling.

The inspector crossed the street, looking straight before him, with his hands in his pockets. But, the moment he reached the opposite pavement, he veered briskly round and sprang up the steps.

A shrill whistle sounded.... Ganimard knocked up against the head-waiter, who suddenly blocked the entrance and pushed him back with indignation, as he might push back any intruder whose doubtful attire would have disgraced the luxury of the establishment. Ganimard staggered. At the same moment, the gentleman in the frock-coat came out.

He took the part of the inspector and began a violent discussion with the head-waiter. Both of them had hold of Ganimard, one pushing him forward, the other back, until, in spite of all his efforts and angry protests, the unhappy man was hustled to the bottom of the steps.

A crowd gathered at once. Two policemen, attracted by the excitement, tried to make their way through; but they encountered an incomprehensible resistance and were unable to get clear of the shoulders that pushed against them, the backs that barred their progress.

And, suddenly, as though by enchantment, the way was opened!... The head-waiter, realizing his mistake, made the most abject apologies; the gentleman in the frock-coat withdrew his a.s.sistance; the crowd parted, the policemen pa.s.sed in; and Ganimard rushed toward the table with the six guests.... There were only five left! He looked round: there was no way out except the door.

"Where is the person who was sitting here?" he shouted to the five bewildered guests. "Yes, there were six of you.... Where is the sixth?"

"M. Destro?"

"No, no: a.r.s.ene Lupin!"

A waiter stepped up:

"The gentleman has just gone up to the mezzanine floor."

Ganimard flew upstairs. The mezzanine floor consisted of private rooms and had a separate exit to the boulevard!

"It's no use now," groaned Ganimard. "He's far away by this time!"

He was not so very far away, two hundred yards at most, in the omnibus running between the Bastille and the Madeleine, which lumbered peacefully along behind its three horses, crossing the Place de l'Opera and going down the Boulevard des Capucines. Two tall fellows in bowler hats stood talking on the conductor's platform. On the top, near the steps, a little old man sat dozing: it was Holmlock Shears.

And, with his head swaying from side to side, rocked by the movement of the omnibus, the Englishman soliloquized:

"Ah, if dear old Wilson could see me now, how proud he would be of his chief!... Pooh, it was easy to foresee, from the moment when the whistle sounded that the game was up and that there was nothing serious to be done, except to keep a watch around the restaurant! But that devil of a man adds a zest to life, and no mistake!"

On reaching the end of the journey, Shears leant over, saw a.r.s.ene Lupin pa.s.s out in front of his guards and heard him mutter:

"At the etoile."

"The etoile, just so: an a.s.signation. I shall be there. I'll let him go ahead in that motor-cab, while I follow his two pals in a four-wheeler."

The two pals went off on foot, made for the etoile and rang at the door of No 40, Rue Chalgrin, a house with a narrow frontage. Shears found a hiding place in the shadow of a recess formed by the angle of that unfrequented little street.

One of the two windows on the ground floor opened and a man in a bowler hat closed the shutters. The window s.p.a.ce above the shutters was lit up.

In ten minutes' time, a gentleman came and rang at the same door; and, immediately afterward, another person. And, at last, a motor-cab drew up and Shears saw two people get out: a.r.s.ene Lupin and a lady wrapped in a cloak and a thick veil.

"The blonde lady, I presume," thought Shears, as the cab drove away.

He waited for a moment, went up to the house, climbed on to the window-ledge and, by standing on tip-toe, succeeded in peering into the room through that part of the window which the shutters failed to cover.

a.r.s.ene Lupin was leaning against the chimney and talking in an animated fashion. The others stood round and listened attentively. Shears recognized the gentleman in the frock-coat and thought he recognized the head-waiter of the restaurant. As for the blonde lady, she was sitting in a chair, with her back turned toward him.

"They are holding a council," he thought. "This evening's occurrences have alarmed them and they feel a need to discuss things.... Oh, if I could only catch them all at one swoop!"

One of the accomplices moved and Shears leapt down and fell back into the shadow. The gentleman in the frock-coat and the head-waiter left the house. Then the first floor was lit up and some one closed the window-shutters. It was now dark above and below.

"He and she have remained on the ground floor," said Holmlock to himself. "The two accomplices live on the first story."

He waited during a part of the night without stirring from his place, fearing lest a.r.s.ene Lupin should go away during his absence. At four o'clock in the morning, seeing two policemen at the end of the street, he went up to them, explained the position and left them to watch the house.

Then he went to Ganimard's flat in the Rue Pergolese and told the servant to wake him.

"I've got him again."

"a.r.s.ene Lupin?"

"Yes."

"If you haven't got him any better than you did just now, I may as well go back to bed. However, let's go and see the commissary."

They went to the Rue Mesnil and, from there, to the house of the commissary, M. Decointre. Next, accompanied by half a dozen men, they returned to the Rue Chalgrin.

"Any news?" asked Shears of the two policemen watching the house.

"No, sir; none."

The daylight was beginning to show in the sky when the commissary, after disposing his men, rang and entered the lodge of the concierge.

Terrified by this intrusion, the woman, all trembling, said that there was no tenant on the ground floor.

"What do you mean; no tenant?" cried Ganimard.

"No, it's the people on the first floor, two gentlemen called Leroux....

They have furnished the apartment below for some relations from the country...."

"A lady and gentleman?"

"Yes."

"Did they come with them last night?"

"They may have.... I was asleep.... I don't think so, though, for here's the key--they didn't ask for it."

With this key, the commissary opened the door on the other side of the pa.s.sage. The ground floor flat contained only two rooms: they were empty.

"Impossible!" said Shears. "I saw them both here."

The commissary grinned:

"I dare say; but they are not here now."