The Golden Triangle Part 64

"The golden triangle? There are problems which we solve more or less by accident, without trying. We are guided to a right solution by external events, among which we choose unconsciously, feeling our way in the dark, examining this one, thrusting aside that one and suddenly beholding the object aimed at. . . . Well, this morning, after taking you to the tombs and burying you under the stone, Essares Bey came back to me. Believing me to be locked into the studio, he had the pretty thought to turn on the gas-meter and then went off to the quay above Berthou's Wharf. Here he hesitated; and his hesitation provided me with a precious clue. He was certainly then thinking of releasing Coralie.

People pa.s.sed and he went away. Knowing where he was going, I returned to your a.s.sistance, told your friends at Essares' house and asked them to look after you. Then I came back here. Indeed, the whole course of events obliged me to come back. It was unlikely that the bags of gold were inside the conduit; and, as the _Belle Helene_ had not taken them off, they must be beyond the garden, outside the conduit and therefore somewhere near here. I explored the barge we are now on, not so much with the object of looking for the bags as with the hope of finding some unexpected piece of information and also, I confess, the four millions in Gregoire's possession. Well, when I start exploring a place where I fail to find what I want, I always remember that capital story of Edgar Allan Poe's, _The Purloined Letter_. Do you recollect? The stolen diplomatic doc.u.ment which was known to be hidden in a certain room. The police investigate every nook and corner of the room and take up all the boards of the floor, without results. But Dupin arrives and almost immediately goes to a card-rack dangling from a little bra.s.s k.n.o.b on the wall and containing a solitary soiled and crumpled letter. This is the doc.u.ment of which he was in search. Well, I instinctively adopted the same process. I looked where no one would dream of looking, in places which do not const.i.tute a hiding-place because it would really be too easy to discover. This gave me the idea of turning the pages of four old directories standing in a row on that shelf. The four millions were there. And I knew all that I wanted to know."

"About what?"

"About Essares' temperament, his habits, the extent of his attainments, his notion of a good hiding-place. We had plunged on the expectation of meeting with difficulties; we ought to have looked at the outside, to have looked at the surface of things. I was a.s.sisted by two further clues. I had noticed that the uprights of the ladder which Ya-Bon must have taken from here had a few grains of sand on them. Lastly, I remembered that Ya-Bon had drawn a triangle on the pavement with a piece of chalk and that this triangle had only two sides, the third side being formed by the foot of the wall. Why this detail? Why not a third line in chalk? . . . To make a long story short, I lit a cigarette, sat down upstairs, on the deck of the barge, and, looking round me, said to myself, 'Lupin, my son, five minutes and no more.' When I say, 'Lupin, my son,' I simply can't resist myself. By the time I had smoked a quarter of the cigarette, I was there."

"You had found out?"

"I had found out. I can't say which of the factors at my disposal kindled the spark. No doubt it was all of them together. It's a rather complicated psychological operation, you know, like a chemical experiment. The correct idea is formed suddenly by mysterious reactions and combinations among the elements in which it existed in a potential stage. And then I was carrying within myself an intuitive principle, a very special incentive which obliged me, which inevitably compelled me, to discover the hiding-place: Little Mother Coralie was there! I knew for certain that failure on my part, prolonged weakness or hesitation would mean her destruction. There was a woman there, within a radius of a dozen yards or so. I had to find out and I found out. The spark was kindled. The elements combined. And I made straight for the sand-heap. I at once saw the marks of footsteps and, almost at the top, the signs of a slight stamping. I started digging. You can imagine my excitement when I first touched one of the bags. But I had no time for excitement. I shifted a few bags. Coralie was there, unconscious, hardly protected from the sand which was slowly stifling her, trickling through, stopping up her eyes, suffocating her. I needn't tell you more, need I? The wharf was deserted, as usual. I got her out. I hailed a taxi. I first took her home. Then I turned my attention to Essares, to Vacherot the porter; and, when I had discovered our enemy's plans, I went and made my arrangements with Dr. Geradec. Lastly, I had you moved to the private hospital on the Boulevard de Montmorency and gave orders for Coralie to be taken there too. And there you are, captain! All done in three hours.

When the doctor's car brought me back to the hospital, Essares arrived at the same time, to have his injuries seen to. I had him safe."

Don Luis ceased speaking. There were no words necessary between the two men. One had done the other the greatest services which a man has it in his power to render; and the other knew that these were services for which no thanks are adequate. And he also knew that he would never have an opportunity to prove his grat.i.tude. Don Luis was in a manner above those proofs, owing to the mere fact that they were impossible. There was no service to be rendered to a man like him, disposing of his resources and performing miracles with the same ease with which we perform the trivial actions of everyday life.

Patrice once again pressed his hand warmly, without a word. Don Luis accepted the homage of this silent emotion and said:

"If ever people talk of a.r.s.ene Lupin before you, captain, say a good word for him, won't you? He deserves it." And he added, with a laugh, "It's funny, but, as I get on in life, I find myself caring about my reputation. The devil was old, the devil a monk would be!"

He p.r.i.c.ked up his ears and, after a moment, said:

"Captain, it is time for us to part. Present my respects to Little Mother Coralie. I shall not have known her, so to speak, and she will not know me. It is better so. Good-by, captain."

"Then we are taking leave of each other?"

"Yes, I hear M. Ma.s.seron. Go to him, will you, and have the kindness to bring him here?"

Patrice hesitated. Why was Don Luis sending him to meet M. Ma.s.seron? Was it so that he, Patrice, might intervene in his favor?

The idea appealed to him; and he ran up the companion-way.

Then a thing happened which Patrice was destined never to understand, something very quick and quite inexplicable. It was as though a long and gloomy adventure were to finish suddenly with melodramatic unexpectedness.

Patrice met M. Ma.s.seron on the deck of the barge.

"Is your friend here?" asked the magistrate.

"Yes. But one word first: you don't mean to . . . ?"

"Have no fear. We shall do him no harm, on the contrary."

The answer was so definite that the officer could find nothing more to say. M. Ma.s.seron went down first, with Patrice following him.

"Hullo!" said Patrice. "I left the cabin-door open!"

He pushed the door. It opened. But Don Luis was no longer in the cabin.

Immediate enquiries showed that no one had seen him go, neither the men remaining on the wharf nor those who had already crossed the gangway.

"When you have time to examine this barge thoroughly," said Patrice, "I've no doubt you will find it pretty nicely faked."

"So your friend has probably escaped through some trap-door and swum away?" asked M. Ma.s.seron, who seemed greatly annoyed.

"I expect so," said Patrice, laughing. "Unless he's gone off on a submarine!"

"A submarine in the Seine?"

"Why not? I don't believe that there's any limit to my friend's resourcefulness and determination."

But what completely dumbfounded M. Ma.s.seron was the discovery, on the table, of a letter directed to himself, the letter which Don Luis had placed there at the beginning of his interview with Patrice.

"Then he knew that I should come here? He foresaw, even before we met, that I should ask him to fulfil certain formalities?"

The letter ran as follows:

"_Sir_,

"Forgive my departure and believe that I, on my side, quite understand the reason that brings you here. My position is not in fact regular; and you are ent.i.tled to ask me for an explanation. I will give you that explanation some day or other. You will then see that, if I serve France in a manner of my own, that manner is not a bad one and that my country will owe me some grat.i.tude for the immense services, if I may venture to use the word, which I have done her during this war. On the day of our interview, I should like you to thank me, sir. You will then--for I know your secret ambition--be prefect of police. Perhaps I shall even be able personally to forward a nomination which I consider well-deserved. I will exert myself in that direction without delay.

"I have the honor to be, etc."

M. Ma.s.seron remained silent for a time.

"A strange character!" he said, at last. "Had he been willing, we should have given him great things to do. That was what I was instructed to tell him."

"You may be sure, sir," said Patrice, "that the things which he is actually doing are greater still." And he added, "A strange character, as you say. And stranger still, more powerful and more extraordinary than you can imagine. If each of the allied nations had had three or four men of his stamp at its disposal, the war would have been over in six months."

"I quite agree," said M. Ma.s.seron. "Only those men are usually solitary, intractable people, who act solely upon their own judgment and refuse to accept any authority. I'll tell you what: they're something like that famous adventurer who, a few years ago, compelled the Kaiser to visit him in prison and obtain his release . . . and afterwards, owing to a disappointment in love, threw himself into the sea from the cliffs at Capri."

"Who was that?"

"Oh, you know the fellow's name as well as I do! . . . Lupin, that's it: a.r.s.ene Lupin."

THE END