HOW ETHAN AND LONGSWORD MET A MAN NAMED FOCHARD
Captain Jones did not propose to leave Paris for a few days, and this
gave Ethan an idea.
“When Danvers and Siki and the rest of them rode away from the
Burgundian King the other night they came in the direction of Paris.
I think that it would be as well were Shamus and myself to look about
in the districts most frequented by sailors; we might come upon the
Lascar, somewhere.”
As the commander of the Ranger approved of this, the two set out that
afternoon.
“We’ll take our blades wid us,” said the Irish dragoon; “the civil
authorities of Paris don’t look out for things very well, so I’ve
heard, Master Ethan, and as there are lots of cut-purses in all big
cities we’d as well be on the safe side.”
Paris of pre-revolutionary days was vastly different from the present
city. Its poor, like those of the country places, were poor indeed,
while its rich were magnificently superior in manner and most splendid
in dress. Squalor and grandeur were to be seen on every hand; the
noisome dens of the Faubourg San Antoine, which less than a score of
years afterward were to hurl their hordes of red-capped, blood-hungry
maniacs into the vortex of the “Terror,” and the beautiful structures
of the rich were not far separated. Ethan and Longsword, as they walked
about, wondered how such a state of things could exist among a people
apparently so highly schooled in all the refinements of civilization.
Evening drew on and still they were afoot; both began to grow somewhat
hungry.
“I think,” said Ethan, “that we had better be getting back to our
lodgings.”
“I’ve been thinking that same for some time,” said Longsword. “A
rasher of bacon and eggs, as that landlady cooks them, would be mighty
comforting, so it would.”
They proceeded along for some time; then their progress became a
hesitating sort of thing, and at last they stopped.
“Shamus,” asked Ethan, a laugh in his voice, “where do we live?”
“Faith, then, Master Ethan, I don’t know. Ye see I have no French, and
these bla’guard names that they give these streets get the better of
me.”
“Then,” said Ethan, “we are lost.”
“But we can ask some one the way.”
“We could if we knew what street to ask for--but we don’t.”
Longsword pulled a long face, and pondered.
“Sorra the taste of supper will we get to-night,” mourned he.
“Did the street sound anything to you like Rue Constantine?” asked
Ethan, after a pause.
“It did,” answered Shamus eagerly. “It is very much like it, faith!”
“Then we’ll try for that.”
A shopman was appealed to and he directed them with much earnestness.
“You will not take the next turn, nor the next,” he explained in rapid
French. “But the next after that you will take, for that is the Rue
Constantine. It runs but the one direction from here, so if you walk
along it and look carefully you cannot miss your house, monsieurs.”
They thanked the man and made their way in the direction indicated.
When they turned into the Rue Constantine, Longsword said:
“Here it is, sure enough. I remember us passing that great building
over there some time since. Faix, and it’d be a queer thing entirely if
we hadn’t found our way back, so it would.”
But Ethan seemed rather doubtful. Gazing about, he said:
“Don’t be quite so sure about your big building, Shamus. We’ve passed
quite a number of them in the last few hours.”
“Ah, but we are right anyway, Master Ethan, as you’ll find. A half hour
will see us doing justice to that good French woman’s fine cooking.”
They strode along for more than a half hour; at length Ethan saw that
doubt was shaking the confidence of Longsword. He laughed gleefully.
“Well, we may yet stay in the streets supperless all night,” said he.
“Are you very hungry, Shamus?”
“Master Ethan,” said the trooper, “this walk has given me an appetite
such as I haven’t had since I were a bit of a gossoon at home in
Tipperary.”
This solemn assurance and the feeling manner with which it was
delivered was too much for Ethan. He leaned against a pillar of a
building which they were passing and shouted with mirth.
“You’ll kill me yet, you old death’s head,” cried he at length. “But,
go on, let’s see if we can’t make you happy by finding the house and
the supper that you so long for.”
Some distance farther along Shamus uttered an exclamation of delight.
“Here we are, sure,” said he. “The brown building with the railings
about it and the wide roof like a bird box.”
“There are many such houses in Paris,” said Ethan. “And we’ve passed
some of them within the last ten minutes.”
“But none wid the window gardens at the second floor,” declared
Longsword. “Sure, the landlady’s wee bit of a daughter were telling
me the names of all the flowers while ye and the captain were off to
the commissioner’s this morning. Of course I couldn’t understand a word
she said, but that made no differ at all, at all. Oh, yes, this is the
house.”
The window gardens settled it with Ethan, so they went up the high
stone steps and beat a sharp rat-tat upon the big brass knocker.
The Rue Constantine was dark; there were few people abroad, as the
night was cold and the frozen snow upon the walks made the footing
treacherous. Lights gleamed from a few windows, the curtains of which
had not been drawn; now and then a vehicle would go rattling heavily
by, crunching the ice under its wheels. The door opened and a bald old
man with spectacles looked at them sharply from the threshold.
“Where are you from?” he asked, in an odd sort of way.
“The United States,” answered Ethan, wonderingly.
The bald man stood aside and allowed them to enter; then he closed the
door and said rather angrily,
“You should have answered, America.”
Ethan and Longsword exchanged glances and smiled. They had not seen the
old man before, and looked at him curiously. Of course, the Irishman
did not understand what he said, but his shining pall and his jerky
way of looking over the rims of his big spectacles was sufficient for
Longsword; he nodded and smiled to the old man, in great good humor.
“Is the captain at home, do you know?” asked Ethan.
The bald man cackled shrilly.
“The captain,” said he. “So you call him that, do you?”
“Of course.”
“Ah! Very good. And a splendid captain he is, I think.”
As he spoke the old man opened a door disclosing a very well-appointed
room lighted by a number of wax candles.
“Will you step in?” he asked. “The captain said that you were to wait
for him here.”
The two stepped wonderingly into the room. The old man followed them
just beyond the doorway, and then paused.
“He is within there,” spoke he, with a nod of the head toward a door
that communicated, apparently, with another room. “He is engaged with
the person whom you have been in search of.”
“Not Siki,” exclaimed Ethan.
“We are to mention no names, if you please,” warned the old man,
looking over the horn rims of his glasses, and wagging his head in
strong disapproval.
While Ethan was yet gazing at him in astonishment, he nodded and
disappeared, closing the door behind him.
“What a queer looking old codger,” said the Irish trooper. “What talk
had he?”
Ethan translated the words of the man and Longsword opened his eyes in
wonder.
“Is it possible that Captain Jones told this old fellow about the
document and its loss,” cried he. “Faith and it don’t seem likely, so
it don’t.”
“Indeed it does not,” responded Ethan. “And yet what else are we to
understand by his words? He knew that you and I were out in search
of some one; and he said that that some one was at present with the
captain.”
“It has a queer look to me,” said Longsword, scratching his head in a
puzzled fashion. “And do ye know, Master Ethan, the house seems to have
a strange look, too; faith it don’t seem the same at all, at all.”
“Nonsense,” laughed Ethan. “Don’t let your imagination run riot, old
fellow. You and I are not well enough acquainted with the house to know
how it looks.”
Just then there was the sound of a door opening and closing. Then they
heard voices in the hall, as though some one had stepped out of the
adjoining room.
“Yes,” said one of the voices, “I understood that you were being sought
for anxiously all the afternoon.”
“By whom?” asked another voice.
“By Messieurs Danvers and Wheelock. They are in my reception room
waiting for me at this moment.”
“Had you better not introduce me; you know that I have not met them as
yet.”
“No more have I. You’d better wait until I’ve settled this matter with
them. Come to-morrow and I’ll be able to give you full information as
to the price that will be paid if the dispatch is recovered.”
“I’m afraid it never will be. These Lascars are cunning dogs.”
“But Siki made the mistake of trying to dispose of the paper in Paris.
That is how we found him out. No one would have suspected that he had
it, but for that. And a man who makes a mistake once, may do so again.”
“You are right. Good-night, Monsieur Fochard. I will call upon you
to-morrow as you request.”
The door leading to the street opened, and the other voice returned.
“Good-night, monsieur. Have no fear. I think all will be well in the
end.”
The door then closed, and the man Fochard returned to the room
adjoining. Ethan gripped Longsword’s arm in a clasp that made even that
man of iron wince.
“No matter what happens,” said he, “express no surprise. Act as though
you considered it all as a matter of course.”
“What is it?” queried Longsword, astonished at his young master’s
manner.
“We are in the wrong house. And we have stumbled upon a clue to the
missing dispatch.”
The door leading into the next room was now thrown open, and a stout,
florid man in a velvet coat and with a great bunch of seals hanging
from a heavy gold watch chain, stepped into the room.
“Gentlemen,” said he, advancing and holding out both hands, “I am most
delighted to meet you.”
When he had shaken hands with them he continued, addressing Longsword,
“You are Monsieur Danvers, I take it.”
“He does not speak French,” Ethan informed the man.
Fochard expressed his surprise with a shrug.
“Not speak French! That is odd. How then did his government come to
choose him for this work in France?”
“You forget, monsieur,” said Ethan coolly, “that his coming to
France was by accident. The dispatch got this far because our plans
miscarried. Danvers’ working ground is the United States, and a
knowledge of the French language is not necessary there.”
“True, true,” answered Fochard. “I had forgotten that. Then Monsieur
Wheelock, I will express myself through you, if you will be so kind, as
I speak no English.”
“I shall be pleased to do anything that I can to help the matter along.”
Fochard laughed and patted him upon the back.
“We shall all be pleased to do what we can in this matter,” chuckled
he. “Ah, the dispatch must indeed be an important one! Ten thousand
pounds in English gold! Think of it. No wonder the rascally Lascar
desired to secure it all for himself.”
While he was speaking Fochard led the way into the adjoining room and
closing the door, bowed them into chairs with the utmost politeness.
The apartment was much smaller than the one they had just left; the
walls were lined with walnut cabinets, each numbered and lettered; a
desk piled with papers stood beneath a huge, swinging lamp.
“I am most glad,” said Monsieur Fochard, “that this matter came to my
notice while there was yet some chance of success.”
Ethan bowed, and repeated the man’s words in English to Longsword. The
latter seemed astonished and was about to ask some questions, but a
secret signal from Ethan stopped him.
“At first I thought,” said the Frenchman, “that the Lascar would try to
sell the paper back to the Americans. And in this I was not very far
wrong. He would have endeavored to do so had he not discovered that
they could not afford to pay so much for it as the English.”
“How do you manage to find these things out?” asked Ethan curiously.
Fochard laughed, clasped his plump white hands before him and twirled
his thumbs.
“My agents are everywhere, even in King Louis’ bedchamber,” he replied.
“The system that I have built up is the result of years of labor. There
is nothing of importance happens in Paris that I do not know. When
the loss of this American dispatch filtered through to me, I at once
communicated with you and appointed this meeting.”
“It was most kind of you,” said Ethan after he had acquainted Longsword
with the outline of what Fochard had said. He did this because he had
a lurking suspicion that the man might not be so ignorant of English
as he professed to be. “But,” the boy proceeded, “has anything further
been discovered?”
“There has been important information brought to me within the past
hour; in fact the agent who brought it was Garvace, and he left but a
few moments ago. The Lascar once served the English Earl of Selkirk in
some capacity and is, so it is understood, now on his way to some port
where he can get a ship for England or Scotland and so place the papers
in the Earl’s hands for the crown.”
“Do you know what port he is headed for?”
“No; but like as not it is Brest or Nantes; or perhaps L’Orient.”
“He is wounded and may perhaps be delayed upon that account,” said
Ethan.
“Yes, that is true; however, I have taken no chances with him, for he
is a most cunning rascal. My agents are after him. Not a vessel will
leave any French port until it has been searched for him in my secret
way.”
“Can we do anything to assist you?”
“Not in France, no. But we have learned that the Earl of Selkirk is
most likely to be found at this time of the year at his place on St.
Mary’s Isle. It is there Siki will make his way should he succeed in
eluding us. My advice to you is to go there with your men, and wait for
him.”
“Your advice,” said Ethan, who had been repeating all this to his
companion, “is good.”
“That, then,” said Fochard, rising as a sign that the interview was at
an end, “is all that I can do for you, now. You will pardon me, I know;
but I have most important matters that claim my attention.”
“Then we will not detain you,” said Ethan.
As he led them out of the room, and toward the street door, Fochard
continued:
“The division of the reward is understood, then, to be as I desired.
Half to me and half to Monsieur Danvers to be shared among our
respective agents as we see fit.”
“Monsieur Danvers will be perfectly satisfied with that arrangement, I
have no doubt,” said Ethan.
“Tell him to consider the matter and send me word by messenger before
he leaves Paris. I like these little matters settled at the beginning.
And now, gentlemen, I will bid you good-night.”
They then found themselves shaking hands with the secret agent upon his
door-step; a moment later the door had closed and they were standing
upon the frozen walk, gazing at each other in astonishment.