"Ah," he murmured, disconcerted by the turn of events and not knowing
what to decide, "why, oh, why did they not obey my instructions? We are
separated now--"
Downstairs the detectives were battering at the door of the passage in
which they were imprisoned. Perhaps he would still have time to reach his
motor before they succeeded in breaking down the door. Nevertheless, he
preferred to take the same road as Florence and Sauverand, which gave him
the hope of saving them and of rescuing them in case of danger.
He therefore stepped over the side of the chest, placed his foot on the
top rung and went down. Some twenty bars brought him to the middle of the
first floor. Here, by the light of his electric lantern, he entered a
sort of low, vaulted tunnel, dug, as he thought, in the wall, and so
narrow that he could only walk along it sideways.
Thirty yards farther there was a bend, at right angles; and next, at the
end of another tunnel of the same length, a trapdoor, which stood open,
revealing the rungs of a second ladder. He did not doubt that the
fugitives had gone this way.
It was quite light at the bottom. Here he found himself in a cupboard
which was also open and which, on ordinary occasions, must have been
covered by curtains that were now drawn. This cupboard faced a bed that
filled almost the whole space of an alcove. On passing through the alcove
and reaching a room from which it was separated only by a slender
partition, to his great surprise, he recognized Florence's sitting-room.
This time, he knew where he was. The exit, which was not secret, as it
led to the Place du Palais-Bourbon, but nevertheless very safe, was that
which Sauverand generally used when Florence admitted him.
Don Luis therefore went through the entrance hall and down the steps and,
a little way before the pantry, came upon the cellar stairs. He ran down
these and soon recognized the low door that served to admit the
wine-casks. The daylight filtered in through a small, grated spy-hole. He
groped till he found the lock. Glad to have come to the end of his
expedition, he opened the door.
"Hang it all!" he growled, leaping back and clutching at the lock, which
he managed to fasten again.
Two policemen in uniform were guarding the exit, two policemen who had
tried to seize him as he appeared.
Where did those two men come from? Had they prevented the escape of
Sauverand and Florence? But in that case Don Luis would have met the two
fugitives, as he had come by exactly the same road as they.
"No," he thought, "they effected their flight before the exit was
watched. But, by Jove! it's my turn to clear out; and that's not easy.
Shall I let myself be caught in my burrow like a rabbit?"
He went up the cellar stairs again, intending to hasten matters, to slip
into the courtyard through the outhouses, to jump into his motor, and to
clear a way for himself. But, when he was just reaching the yard, near
the coach-house, he saw four detectives, four of those whom he had
imprisoned, come up waving their arms and shouting. And he also became
aware of a regular uproar near the main gate and the porter's lodge. A
number of men were all talking together, raising their voices in violent
discussion.
Perhaps he might profit by this opportunity to steal outside under cover
of the disorder. At the risk of being seen, he put out his head. And what
he saw astounded him.
Gaston Sauverand stood with his back to the wall of the lodge, surrounded
by policemen and detectives who pushed and insulted him. The handcuffs
were on his wrists.
Gaston Sauverand a prisoner! What had happened between the two fugitives
and the police?
His heart wrung with anguish, he leaned out still farther. But he did not
see Florence. The girl had no doubt succeeded in escaping.
Weber's appearance on the steps and the deputy chief's first words
confirmed his hopes. Weber was mad with rage. His recent captivity and
the humiliation of his defeat exasperated him.
"Ah!" he roared, as he saw the prisoner. "There's one of them, at any
rate! Gaston Sauverand! Choice game, that!... Where did you catch him?"
"On the Place du Palais-Bourbon," said one of the inspectors. "We saw him
slinking out through the cellar door."
"And his accomplice, the Levasseur girl?"
"We missed her, Deputy Chief. She was the first out."
"And Don Luis? You haven't let him leave the house, I hope? I gave
orders."
"He tried to get out through the cellar door five minutes after."
"Who said so?"
"One of the men in uniform posted outside the door."
"Well?"
"The beggar went back into the cellar."
Weber gave a shout of delight.
"We've got him! And it's a nasty business for him! Charge of resisting
the police!... Complicity ... We shall be able to unmask him at last.
Tally-ho, my lads, tally-ho! Two men to guard Sauverand, four men on the
Place du Palais-Bourbon, revolver in hand. Two men on the roof. The rest
stick to me. We'll begin with the Levasseur girl's room and we'll take
his room next. Hark, forward, my lads!"
Don Luis did not wait for the enemies' attack. Knowing their intentions,
he beat a retreat, unseen, toward Florence's rooms. Here, as Weber did
not yet know the short cut through the outhouses, he had time to make
sure that the trapdoor was in perfect working order, and that there was
no reason why they should discover the existence of a secret cupboard at
the back of the alcove, behind the curtains of the bed.
Once inside the passage, he went up the first staircase, followed the
long corridor contrived in the wall, climbed the ladder leading to the
boudoir, and, perceiving that this second trapdoor fitted the woodwork so
closely that no one could suspect anything, he closed it over him. A few
minutes later he heard the noise of men making a search above his head.
And so, on the twenty-fourth of May, at five o'clock in the afternoon,
the position was as follows: Florence Levasseur with a warrant out
against her, Gaston Sauverand in prison, Marie Fauville in prison and
refusing all food, and Don Luis, who believed in their innocence and who
alone could have saved them, Don Luis was being blockaded in his own
house and hunted down by a score of detectives.
As for the Mornington inheritance, there could be no more question of
that, because the legatee, in his turn, had set himself in open rebellion
against society.
"Capital!" said Don Luis, with a grin. "This is life as I understand it.
The question is a simple one and may be put in different ways. How can a
wretched, unwashed beggar, with not a penny in his pocket, make a fortune
in twenty-four hours without setting foot outside his hovel? How can a
general, with no soldiers and no ammunition left, win a battle which he
has lost? In short, how shall I, Arsène Lupin, manage to be present
to-morrow evening at the meeting which will be held on the Boulevard
Suchet and to behave in such a way as to save Marie Fauville, Florence
Levasseur, Gaston Sauverand, and my excellent friend Don Luis Perenna in
the bargain?"
Dull blows came from somewhere. The men must be hunting the roofs and
sounding the walls.
Don Luis stretched himself flat on the floor, hid his face in his folded
arms and, shutting his eyes, murmured:
"Let's think."