_M. Mifroid’s Theory_
|WHEN M. Mifroid recovered sufficiently from the shock of his fall, the
first thing that worried him was that he would be “out of the game.”
Even at the moment of his fall his presence of mind did not fail him,
and he knew that he was falling into one of the thousand-year-old
quarries, which crossed under Paris in their intricate meanderings. He
experienced that feeling accompanied by a light, painful torpor which
follows a swoon caused by shock.
He was in the catacombs!
His first thought was to try and find the lights which he had just
bought, and so find out how the passage lay. He felt sure that they
must have fallen through the hole with him. The darkness seemed to weigh
heavily on his eyelids, and a great feeling of depression came over
him. Without getting up, for by an imprudent movement he would lose the
knowledge of the exact place where he had fallen, he spread his hands
about him and was relieved to find his package again. He feared at first
that the lamps would be broken, but soon felt that it was not so; and
breaking open the package, he pressed the button on one of the lamps.
The cavern was lighted with a fairy brightness, and he could not keep
from smiling as he thought of the unfortunates who, shut up in some
cavern, generally drag themselves along, holding their breath, behind a
paltry snuff of a candle, which at any moment might flicker out.
He got up then and examined the vault. He knew of the work of repairing
the track, and knew that they neared the end, but when he saw that the
hole through which he had fallen was closed, a feeling akin to fear came
over him.
Now some meters of earth separated him from the outside world, unless it
was possible for him to get up to this place which they had filled in.
He, however, flashed his light around, and after surveying the walls and
the vaults, he came across a prostrate body. The sight at first gave
him a shock, but on examination he found it to be the body of M.
Longuet—the body of the new Cartouche. He examined it and noticed that
it did not bear a single trace of serious wounds. The man was stunned,
as he had been himself, and without doubt he would not be slow in coming
out of that swoon. He recalled that M. Lecamus had presented him to his
friend in the Champs Elysées, and behold, he was now mixed up with him
like the worst kind of assassins.
Just then M. Longuet breathed a sigh, stretched his arm, and complained
of some pains. He arose, and, saluting M. Mifroid, asked him where
they were. M. Mifroid told him. He did not seem at all distressed, but
drawing forth his portfolio, he traced some lines which resembled a
plan, and showed them to M. Mifroid, saying:
“M. le Commissioner, we are at the bottom of the catacombs. It is an
extraordinary event. How we are going to get out I do not know, but that
which is distressing me most at the present moment is what has happened
to the express train.” M. Mifroid demanded some explanation, and M.
Longuet related to him, with the closest detail, the disappearance
and re-appearance of the carriage and the train. For the better
understanding of the track he drew a plan out as follows:
A H D C B
This he showed to M. Mifroid.
He explained how the train had disappeared between A and B. How he had
turned the switch at H and waited at D for the train to pass on to
the side track. He described how the train had never come, and how the
carriage had appeared and disappeared.
M. Mifroid became greatly interested, and begged him to repeat the
story. “And when did this happen?” asked he. “It has not yet been
reported to me.”
“It happened several hours ago,” said Théophraste, “and it should
have been reported by now.”
M. Mifroid examined the plan for about five minutes, and after
reflecting for a while, asked Théophraste a few questions. Suddenly he
burst out laughing and said: “Why, what a difficult problem. I have
solved it in five minutes.
“You said there were five men at A and five men at B. It passes
through B, but not A. You were at D, and because you did not see, it
did not pass? Consequently, your train vanished. Well, I say the train
exists between A and B, and must be somewhere between B and I, that is
sure; the train is in the sandhill.”
“I swear not!” said Théophraste. “I was at D expecting the train, and I
did not leave the track.”
“It can be nowhere else, for five men saw it pass B and the five men
at A are equally certain it didn’t pass them. Therefore I say that as
only you were at D it passed that point, and undoubtedly switched off
on I, since it could not be otherwise. By a necessary chance, while the
first cars of the train were engulfed in the sand hillock, which covered
it up (imagine that the line H is too short for the engineer to have had
time to avoid the accident), the yoke chain of the last car was broken,
and so the last carriage was forced by the baggage car to descend as far
as D, on the track, which was slightly up-grade, since it wrent into
a sand hillock. Then after going down to H and back to D, you saw the
carriage and Signor Petito in the doorway. Your Signor Petito opened the
carriage door, perhaps to throw himself out, as soon as he was aware of
the imminent catastrophe, and as the latter caused a shock, it closed
the door on the head of your Signor Petito.
“Now, having despoiled Signor Petito of his clothing, you walk into
the fields to read his papers. When you return the carriage is no longer
there. Now, then. Since there was a declivity, and since there was a
wind, the carriage, after having rolled as far as H, is found on the
line A—B, where the trainmen certainly have found it by this time. Do
you understand now? Do you understand all except that you did not see
the train pass D? You are deaf sometimes, M. Longuet?”
“I have already had the honor of telling you so.”
“Imagine that you were deaf while you were waiting for the train at D.
You did not hear then?”
“No, but I should have seen it.”
“Already you did not hear it. That is much. Possibly you turned your
head for three seconds. Three seconds, that is to say, one second and
thirty hundredths longer than is necessary to see an express train of
four carriages pass before you, which, being late, made 120 to the hour.
M. Longuet, the train disappeared, or, rather, seemed to disappear,
because you were deaf and turned your head for a brief space of time.”
M. Longuet raised his arms to the limit toward the vaults of the
catacombs.