because I loved you, love you still, will always love you!"
Lady Beltham, overcome, let herself fall into Chaleck's arms, her head
resting on her lover's shoulder as she wept hot tears.
Lady Beltham was once more enslaved, a captive! More than two years ago
she had broken with the mysterious and terrible being whom she had once
egged on to kill her husband, and with whom she then committed the most
appalling of crimes. During this separation the unhappy woman had tried
to pull herself together, to acquire a fresh honesty of mind and body, a
new soul; dreamed of finding again in religion some help, some
forgetfulness. She had later experienced the frightful tortures of
jealousy, knowing her late lover had mistresses! But she resisted the
craving to see him again, and pictured him to herself in such terrible
guise that she felt an overwhelming fear of finding herself face to face
with him. Now the season of calm and quiet she had evoked was suddenly
dispelled. First came the mysterious disappearance of her confession and
the weird crime of the Cité Frochot following on its loss. To be sure
she did not then know that Doctor Chaleck, of whom the papers spoke, was
none other than Gurn, but had they not in _La Capitale_ spoken of
Fantômas in that connection? And at this disquieting comparison Lady
Beltham had felt sinister forebodings. Other mysteries had then
supervened, unaccountable to the guilty lady who by that time was
already seeking her new birth in the bosom of Religion. Alas! her
miseries were to grow definite enough.
At the very gate of the convent an innocent man, Bonardin, the actor,
fell victim to the attack of Juve, also innocent, and in that affair she
felt the complicity of her late lover grow more and more certain. She
then received a letter from him, followed by a second. Gurn called her
to his place--their place--the mansion at Neuilly, every Tuesday night.
She held out several times despite threatened reprisals. At last she
yielded and went: she expected Gurn--it was Chaleck she found. The two
were one!
From henceforth she was faced with this accomplice, guilty of new
crimes, clothed in a new personality, already under suspicion, which
doubtless he would cast off only to assume another which would enable
him still further to extend the list of his crimes! But despite all the
horror her lover inspired her with she felt herself tamed again,
powerless to resist him, ready to do anything the moment he bade her!
She inquired feebly:
"Who was it killed Mme. Raymond? Was it that ruffian--whom they speak of
in the papers--Loupart?"
"Well, not exactly!"
"Then was it you? Speak, I would rather know."
"It was neither he nor I, and yet it was to some extent both."
"I do not understand."
"It is rather difficult to understand. Our 'executioner' does not lack
originality. I may say it is something which lives yet does not think."
"Who is it! Who is it!"
"Why not ask Detective Juve. Oh! Juve, too, would like to know who the
deuce all these people are. Gurn, Chaleck, Loupart, and, above
all--Fantômas!"
"Fantômas! Ah, I scarcely dare utter that name. And yet a doubt
oppresses my heart! Tell me, are you not, yourself--Fantômas?"
Chaleck freed himself gently, for Lady Beltham had wound her arms round
his neck.
"I know nothing, I am merely the lover who loves you."
"Then let us go far away. Let us begin a new existence together. Will
you? Come!" She stopped all at once--"I heard a noise." Chaleck, too,
listened. Some slight creakings had, indeed, disturbed the hush of the
room. But outside the wind and the rain whirled around the dilapidated,
lonely abode, and it was not surprising that unaccountable sounds should
be audible in the stillness. Once more Lady Beltham built up her plans,
catching a glimpse of a future all peace and happiness.
With a brief, harsh remark, Chaleck brought her back to reality.
"All that cannot be, at least for the moment, we must first----"
Lady Beltham laid her hand on his lips.
"Do not speak!" she begged. "A fresh crime--that's what you mean?"
"A vengeance, an execution! A man has set himself to run me down, has
determined my ruin: between us it is a struggle without quarter; my life
is not safe but at the cost of his, so he must perish. In four days they
will find Detective Juve dead in his own bed. And with him will finally
vanish the fiction he has evoked of Fantômas! Fantômas! Ah, if society
knew--if humanity, instead of being what it is--but it matters little!"
"And Fantômas? What will become of him--of you?"
"Have I told you that I was Fantômas?"
"No," stammered she, "but----"
* * * * *
The dim light of a pale dawn filtered through the closed shutters of the
big drawing-room in which lover and mistress had met again, after long
weeks of separation, to call up sinister memories. For all their hopes
the limit of the tribulations to which they were a prey seemed still far
off.
Chaleck blew out the lamp. He drew aside the curtains. Sharply he put an
end to the interview:
"I am off, Lady Beltham. Soon we shall meet again. Never let anyone
suspect what we have said to each other--Farewell."
The hapless woman, crushed and broken by emotion, remained nearly an
hour alone in the great room. Then the requirements of her official life
came to her mind. It was necessary to return to the convent at Nogent.
* * * * *
Extricating themselves painfully from the pipes of the great stove, Juve
and Fandor, covered with plaster, wreathed with cobwebs, and freely
sprinkled with dust, fell back suddenly into the middle of the cellar.
The two men, heedless of the disarray of their dress and their painful
cramped limbs, spoke both at once, dumbfounded but joyful:
"Well, Juve?"
"Well, Fandor, we got something for our money."
"Oh, what a lovely night, Juve; I wouldn't have given up my place for a
fortune."
"We had front seats, though to be sure the velvet armchairs were
lacking."
They were silent for a moment, their minds fully occupied with a crowd
of ideas. So Chaleck and Loupart were one and the same? And Lady Beltham
was indeed the accomplice of Gurn. An unhappy accomplice, repentant,
wretched, a criminal through love.
"Fandor, they are ours now. Let us act!"
The pair, not sorry to breathe a little more easily than they had done
for the past few hours, went upstairs, reached the ground floor and made
their way into the drawing-room, where during the night Doctor Chaleck
and Lady Beltham had had their memorable interview.
Juve, without a word, paced up and down the room, poking in all the
corners, then gave a cry:
"Here is the famous mouth of the heater which that brute Chaleck tried
to shut, and I persisted in opening so as not to lose a word of his
instructive conversation. No matter, if he felt cold, what did I feel
like?"
"The fact is," added Fandor, whose hoarse voice bore witness to the
difficulties he had just passed through, "these stove pipes have very
little comfort about them."
"What can you expect?" cried Juve. "The architect did not think of us
when he built the house. And now, Fandor, we have a hard task before us
and we need all the luck we can get. For certainly it is Fantômas we
have unearthed: Fantômas, the lover of Lady Beltham, the slayer of her
husband, the murderer of Valgrand, the master that got rid of Mme.
Raymond! Gurn, Chaleck, Loupart. The one being who can be all those and
himself too--Fantômas."
As the two friends left Lady Beltham's house without attracting notice,
the detective drew from his pocket a species of little scale which he
showed Fandor.
"What do you make of that?"
"I haven't the least idea."
"Well, I have, and it may put us in the way of a great discovery. Did
you notice that Chaleck did not say definitely who the 'executioner' of
Mme. Raymond was?"
"To be sure."
"Well, I believe that I have a morsel of this 'executioner' in my
pocket."
XXXII
THE SILENT EXECUTIONER
Juve was in his study smoking a cigarette. It was nine in the evening.
The door leading to the lobby opened and Fandor walked in.
"All right, this evening?"
"All right. What brings you here, Fandor?"
The journalist smiled and pointed to a calendar on the wall: "The fact
that--it's this evening, Juve."
"The date fixed by Chaleck or Fantômas for my demise. To-morrow morning
I am to be found in my bed, strangled, crushed, or something of the
sort. I suppose you've come to get a farewell interview for _La
Capitale_. To gather the minutest details of the frightful crime so that
you can publish a special edition. '_The tragedy in Rue Bonaparte! Juve
overcome by Fantômas!_'"
Fandor listened, amused at the detective's outburst.
"You'd be angry with me, Juve," he declared, in the same jocular strain,
"for passing by such a sensational piece of news, wouldn't you?"
"That is so. And then I own I expected my last evening to be a lonely
one, there was a feeling of sadness at the bottom of my heart. I thought
that before dying I should have liked to say farewell to young Fandor,
whose life I am continually putting in peril by my crazy ventures, but
whom I love as the surest of companions, the sagest of advisers, the
most discreet of confidants."
Fandor was touched. With a spontaneous movement he sprang to the
armchair in which Juve sat, seized and wrung the detective's hands.
"What?"
"I shall stay here. You don't suppose I'm going to leave you to pass
this night alone?"
Juve, touched beyond measure by Fandor's words, seemed uncertain what he
ought to decide.
"I can't pretend, Fandor, that your presence is not agreeable, and I'm
grateful to you for your sympathy; I knew I could count on you: but
after all, lad, we must look ahead and consider all contingencies.
Fantômas may succeed! Now you know what I have set out to do; if I
should fail, I should like to think that you would carry on the work as
my successor and put an end to Fantômas."
"But, Juve, you are threatened by Fantômas; that is why I am here to
help you."
"Well, I have no bed to put you in."
Fandor, taken aback, stared at the detective. The latter rose and began
walking about the room, then turned sharply and gazed at the young man:
"You are quite determined to stay with me?"
"Yes."
"And if I bade you go?"
"I should disobey you."
"Very well, then," concluded Juve, shrugging his shoulders, "come along
and light me."
The detective passed out of the apartment and made for the stairs.
"Where are we bound for?" asked Fandor.
"The garret," Juve replied.
A quarter of an hour later Juve and Fandor dragged into the bedroom a
huge open-work wicker-basket.
"Whew!" cried Juve, mopping his forehead, "no one would believe it was
so heavy."
Fandor smiled.
"It's full of rubbish. Really, Juve, you are not a tidy man!"
Juve, without reply, proceeded to empty the basket, pulling out books,
linen, pieces of wood, carpet, rolls of paper; in fact, the accumulated
refuse of fifteen years.
"What is your height?" he asked.
"If I remember right, five feet ten."
Juve got out his pocket measure and took the length of the crate.
"That's all right," he murmured. "You'll be quite snug and comfortable
in it."
Fandor burst out:
"You're a cheerful host, Juve. You bottle up your guests in cages now!"
Juve placed a mattress at the bottom of the basket and laid two blankets
over that, then he put a pillow on top. Patting the bedding to make it
smooth, he declared with a laugh:
"I fear nothing, but I have taken precautions. I have posted two men in
the porter's lodge. I have loaded my revolver, and dined comfortably.
About half-past eleven I shall go to bed as usual. However, instead of
going to sleep I shall endeavour to keep awake. At dinner I took three
cups of coffee, and when you go I shall drink a fourth."
"Excuse me," said Fandor, "but I am not going away."
"There! You'll sleep splendid inside that, Fandor."
The journalist, used to the devices of his friend, nodded his head. Juve
had already taken off his coat and waistcoat and now drew from a box
three belts half a yard in breadth and studded outside with sharp
points. "Look, Fandor! I shall be completely protected when I am swathed
in them. Oh," he added, "I was going to forget my leg guards!"
Juve went back to the box and took out two other rolls, also studded
with spikes. Fandor looked in amazement at this gear and Juve observed
laughingly:
"It will cost me a pair of sheets and maybe a mattress."
"What does it mean?"
"These defensive works have a double object. To protect me against
Fantômas, or the 'executioner' he will send, and also I shall be able to
determine the civil status of the 'executioner' in question."
Fandor, more and more puzzled, inspected the iron spikes, which were two
or more inches in length.
"This contrivance is not new," said Juve; "Liabeuf wore arm guards like
these under his jacket, and when the officers wanted to seize him they
tore their hands."
"I know, I know," replied Fandor, "but----"
The detective all at once laid a finger on his lips.
"It's now twenty past eleven, and I am in the habit of being in bed at
half past. Fantômas is bound to know it: when he comes or sends, he must
not notice anything out of the way. Get into your wicker case and shut
the lid down carefully. By the by, I shall leave the window slightly
open."
"Isn't that a bit risky?"
"It is one of my habits, and not to make Fantômas suspicious I alter my
ways in nothing."
Fandor settled himself in his case and Juve also got into bed. As he put
out the light he gave a warning.
"We mustn't close an eye or utter a word. Whatever happens, don't move.
But when I call, strike a light at once and come to me."
"All right," replied Fandor.
* * * * *
"Fandor!"
Juve's cry rent the stillness of the night, loud and compelling. The
journalist leaped from his wicker-basket so abruptly that he knocked
against the lamp stand and the lamp fell to the floor. Fandor searched
for his matches in vain.
"Light up, Fandor!" shouted Juve.
The noise of a struggle, the dull thud of a fall on the floor, maddened
the journalist. In the darkness he heard Juve groaning, scraping the
floor with his boots, making violent efforts to resist some mysterious
assailant.
"Be quick, in God's name," implored the pain-wrung voice of the
detective. Fandor trod on the glass of the lamp, which broke. He
tripped, knocked his head against a press, rebounded, then suddenly
uttered a terrible cry. His hands, outstretched apart, in the gloom, had
brushed a cold, shiny body which slid under his palms.
"Fandor! Help, Fandor!"
Desperate, Fandor plunged haphazard about the disordered chamber,
wrapped in darkness. Suddenly, he rushed into the study hard by, found
there another lamp which he lit in haste, and hurried back with it.
A fearful sight wrung a cry of terror from him. Juve, on his knees on
the floor, was covered with blood.
"Juve!"
"It's all right, Fandor. Some one has bled, but not I."
The detective rushed to the open window and leaned out into the dark
night.
"Listen!" he cried. "Do you hear that low hissing, that dull rustling?"
"Yes. I heard it just now."
"It was the 'executioner.'"
The detective drew back into the room, shut the window, pulled down the
blinds, and then took off his armour. Curiously he examined the stains
of blood, the tiny shreds of flesh that had remained on the points.
"We have no more to fear now," he said, "the stroke has been tried--and
has failed."
"Juve! tell me what has just happened? I may be an idiot, but I don't
understand at all!"
"You are no fool, Fandor; far from it, but if in many circumstances you
reason and argue with considerable aptness, I grant you far less
deductive faculty. That does not seem to be your forte."
Fandor seated himself before the detective, and the latter held forth.
"When we found ourselves faced with the first crime, that of the Cité
Frochot, and our notice was drawn to the elusive Fantômas, we were
unable to decide in what manner that hapless Mme. Raymond, whom we then
took for Lady Beltham, had been done to death. Now, remember, Fandor,
that during that night of mystery, hidden behind the curtains in
Chaleck's study we heard weird rustlings and faint sort of hissings,
didn't we?"
"We did," admitted Fandor, at a loss, "but go on, Juve."
"When we were called to investigate the attack on the American, Dixon,
it was easy for us to conclude that the attempt of which the pugilist
had been the object was the outcome of the same plan of battle as that
which cost the widow Valgrand her life. The mysterious 'executioner,'
which Chaleck did not disguise from Lady Beltham, was thus a being
endowed with vigour enough to completely crush a woman's body, and
likely do as much to that of an ordinary man. But the 'executioner' in
question was not strong enough to get the better of the grand physique
of the champion pugilist, since it failed in its attempt.
"This instrument 'of limited power,' if I may so describe it, must then
be, not a mechanism which nothing can resist, but a living being! It
must also be a creature striking panic, terrifying, formidable: you ask
why, Fandor?"
"Yes, to be sure."
"I am going to tell you. If our poor friend Josephine were not still in
a high fever she would certainly uphold me. You remember the business on
the Boulevard Pereire? Chaleck or Fantômas wants to be rid of the woman
he loved under the guise of Loupart, since he has gone back to Lady
Beltham. Moreover, Josephine chatters too much with Dixon, with the
police.
"Chaleck, Fantômas, therefore, goes up to Josephine's. After having told
the poor creature I know not what yarn, he departs, leaving behind in
his hold-all, the instrument. Now this last, when it shows itself, so
terrifies the poor girl that she throws herself out of the window."
"I begin to see what you mean," said the journalist.
"Listen," replied Juve. "The mysterious, nameless and terrible
accomplice of Fantômas, is no other than a snake! A snake trained to
crush bodies in its coils. After having long suspected its existence, I
began to be sure of it when I found that strange scale at Neuilly. This
accounts for the incomprehensible state of Mme. Valgrand's body, the
extraordinary attempt on Dixon, the murderous thing that terrified
Josephine! That is why, expecting to-night's visit, I barbed myself with
iron like a knight of old, feeling pretty sure that if the hands of the
officers were torn by the armlets of Liabeuf, the coils of Fantômas'
serpent would be flayed on touching my sharp spikes."
"Juve!" cried Fandor, "if I hadn't had the bad luck to upset the lamp,
we should have caught this frightful beast."
"Probably, but what should we have done with it? After all, it's better
that it should go back to Fantômas."
"But you haven't yet told me what happened!"
The young man's face displayed such curiosity that Juve burst out
laughing.
"Journalist! Incorrigible newsmonger! All right, take notes for your
article describing this appalling adventure. So, then, Fandor, the lamp
once out, the hours go by, a trifle more slowly in the darkness than in
the light. You are silent and still like a little Moses in your wicker
cradle. As for me, armoured as I was, I tried not to stir in my bed--to
spare the sheets--Juve is not wealthy. Midnight, one o'clock, two, the
quarter past. How long it is!--Then, an alarm! A cat that mews
strangely. Then comes that little hissing sound I begin to know.
Hiss--hiss! Oh, what a horrid feeling! I guess that the window is
opening wider. You heard, as I did, Fandor, the revolting scales grit on
the boards. But you didn't know what it was, whereas I did know it was
the snake! I swear to you it needed all my pluck not to flinch, for I
wanted at any cost to see it through to the end, and know whether,
behind this reptile, Fantômas was not going to show his vile snout.
"Ah, the brute, how quickly he went to work. As I was listening, my
muscles tense, my nerves on edge, I suddenly felt my sheet stir--the
foul beast is trained to attack beds, remember the attack on Dixon--and
suddenly it was the grip, furious, quick as a whip stroke, twining about
me. I was thrown down, tossed, shaken, torn like a feather, tied up like
a sausage!
"My arms glued to my body, my loins hampered. I intended not to say a
word, I had faith in my iron-work; but to be frank, I was scared,
awfully scared. And I yelled: 'Fandor! Help!'
"Oh, those accursed moments. He began to squeeze horribly when all at
once I felt a cold liquid flow over my skin--blood. The brute was
wounded. We still wrestled, and you tripped in the darkness and smashed
the glass of the lamp, and I was choking gradually. All my life I shall
remember it. And then, what relief, what joy when the grip slackened,
when he gives up and makes off. The beast glided over the floor, reached
the window, hissed frantically and vanished. There, M. Reporter, you
have impressions from life, and rough ones, too! Well, the luck is
turning, and I think it is veering to our quarter. Things are going from
bad to worse for Fantômas. I tell you, Fandor, we shall nab him before
long!"
XXXIII
A SCANDAL IN THE CLOISTER
Slight sounds, scarcely audible, disturbed the peace of the cloister. In
the absolute silence of the night, vague noises could be distinguished.
Furtive steps, whisperings, doors opened or shut cautiously. Then the
blinking light of a candle shone at a casement, two or three other
windows were illuminated and the hubbub grew general. Voices were heard,
frightened interjections, the stir increased in the long corridor on
which cells opened. Generally the curtains of these cells were
discreetly drawn; now they were being pulled aside. Drowsy faces looked
out of the gloom; the excitement increased.
"Sister Marguerite! Sister Vincent! Sister Clotilde! What is it? What is
happening? Listen!"
The alarmed nuns gathered at the far end of the passage. The worthy
women, roused from their rest, had hastily arranged their coifs, and
chastely wrapped themselves in their flowing robes. They turned their
frightened faces toward the chapel.
"Burglars!" murmured the Sister who was treasurer of the convent,
thinking of the cup of gold that the humble little sisterhood preserved
as a relic with jealous care.
Another Sister, recently come from the creuse, from which she had been
driven by the laws, did not conceal her fears.
"More emissaries of the government! They are going to turn us out!"
The Senior, Sister Vincent, quivering with alarm, stammered:
"It is a revolution--I saw that in '70."
A heap of chairs under the vaulting suddenly toppled down. Panic
stricken, the sisters crowded closed together, not daring to go to the
chapel, which was joined to the passage by a little staircase.
"And the Mother Superior, what did she think of it all--what would she
say?"
They drew near the cell, a little apart from the others, occupied by the
lady, who, on taking the headship of the "House," had brought with her
precious personal assistance and a good deal of money as well. Sister
Vincent, who had gone forward and was about to enter the little
chamber, drew back.
"Our Holy Mother," she informed the others, "is at her prayers."
At this very moment broken cries rang down the passage. Sister Frances,
the janitress, who everyone believed was calmly slumbering in her lodge,
suddenly appeared, her eyes wild, her garments in disarray.
The sisters gathered round her, but the helpless woman shrieked, quite
beside herself.
"Let me go! Let us flee! I have seen the devil! He is there! In the
church! It is frightful!"
Mad with terror, the Sister explained in disjointed phrases what had
alarmed her. She had heard a noise and fancied it might be the
gardener's dog shut by mistake in the chapel. Then behold! At the moment
she entered the choir the stained-glass window above the shrine of St.
Clotilde, their patroness, suddenly gave way, and through the opening
appeared a supernatural being who came toward her ejaculating words she
could not understand. Armed with a great cudgel, he struck right and
left, making a terrible uproar.
Thereupon the janitress made an effort to escape, but the demon barred
her path, and in a sepulchral voice commanded her to go for the Mother
Superior and bid her come at once, if she did not want the worst of
evils to fall upon the sisterhood.