THE VOW.
For a second, pale with alarm, Ralph Ansell glanced around the room.
Suddenly an idea suggested itself. He was always resourceful.
Next moment he dashed across to the door and locked it, afterwards
rushing to the door which led into the bedroom--the room in which his
friend was bathing his wound. There was a bolt upon the door, and this
he slipped, thus imprisoning the man who was, as yet, unconscious of
danger.
Then, crossing to where Adolphe's jacket hung, he quickly drew out the
twenty-five thousand francs in notes and placed them in his own pocket.
He held his breath and listened. As yet, all was quiet, save for a man's
rough voice below. He was apparently in conversation with Mme. Brouet's
husband.
That was sufficient for Ansell.
Quickly he pushed away the table from the centre of the room, and,
kicking aside the Japanese grass-mats, there was revealed in the floor a
trap-door with an iron ring in it.
Without more ado he lifted the heavy flap, disclosing the cavernous
darkness of a kind of shaft which led to the cellar, whence there was a
secret exit into a neighbouring street. Placing his foot upon the first
rung of the rickety ladder, he quickly disappeared, closing the flap
after him and bolting it from beneath.
Thus Adolphe, robbed and imprisoned by the man he had trusted so
implicitly, was left to his fate.
Scarcely had the fugitive, carrying with him the whole of the booty,
closed down the flap in the floor when Adolphe, whose hand was very
painful and bleeding profusely, suddenly heard the voices below.
He started, crept to the window, and looked cautiously down into the
courtyard.
Two men were there--men whom he instantly recognised as police agents in
plain clothes.
"The Eel" listened for a second, then dashed to the door to warn Ralph.
He turned the handle, but, to his surprise and dismay, found the door
bolted.
"Ralph! Ralph!" he cried. "Are you there? Quick! Let me in! The police!"
There was no response.
"Ralph!" he repeated. "Quick! The police are below!"
And he tugged frantically at the door. But it was securely fastened.
He was caught--like a rat in a trap!
Bending, he peered through the keyhole, surprised to discover that the
table had been moved. He could see, too, that the matting had been cast
aside, revealing the trap-door. That house had long been the abode of
thieves. Bonnemain himself had lived in those same rooms for six years,
and he had had the secret exit constructed. More than once it had been
used, and the fugitive escaped by that secret way.
In a moment the grim truth flashed across Adolphe's mind. Ansell had for
some reason bolted the door, and had forgotten to unlock it before
escaping.
But why had he not warned him?
The voices outside were now raised, and he could hear the tramp of
several other men over the moss-grown stones of the weedy courtyard.
Not a second was to be lost; therefore, taking up one of the
rush-bottomed chairs and raising it above his head, he advanced to the
door and brought it down with a crash upon the panel just over the lock.
A great crack showed, and by a second heavy blow the panel gave way
sufficiently to allow him to insert his hand and draw the bolt from the
opposite side.
He dashed across the living-room to where his coat hung, in order to
seize his portion of the booty. Quickly he searched the pockets, but in
vain!
The notes were gone!
Then, for the first time, he realised that he had been robbed, and from
his dry lips there fell a fierce vow of vengeance against the man whose
willing tool he had been--the man whose wife had left him because of his
callous brutality.
Twice he searched his pockets, then he cast his coat from him in despair
and, bending to the floor, tugged at the iron ring.
That, too, was secured. He could not lift it because the scoundrel had
bolted it from beneath. Not only had he stolen his money, but he had
made him a prisoner, knowing that he must fall into the hands of the
police.
With his long, black hair ruffled, his great, dark eyes starting from
their sockets, and both fists clenched in desperation, he gazed wildly
around for some means of escape. There were none. Heavy footsteps
sounded upon the uncarpeted stairs, yet if he attempted to jump from the
window he would fall into the arms of the police, who had by this time
surrounded the house.
This was Ralph's revenge--because he had taken his poor little wife's
part, because he had prevented him from striking her down!
A bitter thought arose in the young thief's heart. He bit his lip, and
in an undertone declared:
"If ever I meet the cowardly blackguard I will kill him! That I swear.
Not only has he robbed me, but he has also betrayed me to the police,
knowing that I must be sent to prison, while he will remain safe!"
At that instant there came a heavy banging upon the door, while a loud,
imperative voice cried:
"We are agents of police. Open--in the name of the law!"
The victim shrank back in terror. It was the end of his criminal career!
He never dreamed that the police were so hot upon their track, and that
they had been traced right over from Neuilly.
"Open--in the name of the law!" was again repeated, loud and commanding,
followed by a sharp rapping.
For a few seconds Adolphe stood motionless, his fist still clenched, his
terrified eyes fixed upon the door. He seemed rooted to the spot.
"Open this door--or we shall break it down!" shouted the police-officer
on the stairs.
Then, finding resistance impossible, Ansell's victim was compelled to
bow to the inevitable.
He crossed the room slowly, turned the key, and drew the bolt.
Next second three men in plain clothes and a couple of police-agents in
uniform burst into the room, and Adolphe found himself seized roughly
and secured.
"Just caught you, my young friend!" laughed the police-commissary, with
satisfaction. He wore an overcoat and hard felt hat, and carried in his
hand an ebony cane with silver knob.
Adolphe, in the hands of the two other men in plain clothes, made no
reply, but at the moment Mme. Brouet entered at the door, with
curiosity, to watch the proceedings.
The commissary, noticing the smashed panel of the bedroom door, ran
inside, while the men in uniform quickly searched the place.
"Where is 'The American'?" asked the commissary, of Adolphe. "We know he
is here, somewhere. You need not affect innocence, for your hand tells
the truth. You and he did the job at the Baron de Rycker's, and you left
a large blood-stain behind. What have you done with the stolen
property--eh? Now, out with it! Give it up, and it will be better for
you when in court."
"I haven't any," protested the young man. "Ralph has it all."
"Where is he?"
"I don't know. He locked me in yonder room and got away."
"Got away with the swag? Ah! Just like 'The American'! He did that same
trick three years ago. I remember a complaint made by one of your
fraternity whom I arrested at Versailles," replied the commissary. "How
did he get away?"
Adolphe pointed to where the commissary was standing, and the official,
looking down, saw, to his surprise, for the first time, the rusty ring
in the floor.
He bent and tried to raise it, but found it firmly secured.
"He's gone!" he cried to the two agents in uniform, who were cyclists,
wearing the flat-peaked caps with the arms of the City of Paris upon
them. "Go out and scour all the streets in the neighbourhood. You may
catch him yet!"
Without a second's delay, both men dashed out to do the bidding of their
superior officer.
Adolphe Carlier was left with the two agents of the Surete--both dark,
shrewd little men, broad-shouldered, and short of stature,--while the
commissary, who wore the button of the Legion d'Honneur in his overcoat,
made a tour of the apartment.
Another agent of police, in plain clothes, entered and saluted.
"Did you see anything of the fugitive, Leblanc?" asked the commissary
eagerly.
"Nothing, m'sieur. I came along from the depot, but met nobody."
"Search this place," he said. "There is some stolen stuff hidden in this
rat-hole, I expect."
"I tell you Ralph Ansell has it all," declared the man held by the two
officers, who were now allowing him to bandage up his hand, prior to
putting handcuffs upon his wrists. "Arrest Ansell, and you will find
everything upon him."
"Do you live here?" asked the commissary.
"No. Ansell lives here with his wife."
"His wife! Where is she?"
"I don't know. She was here at dinner-time, but now she's gone. She's
left him."
"Why?"
"Because of his brutality." And Adolphe described the scene of the
previous night.
"We must find her," said the commissary, decisively. "Perhaps she knows
something. Ansell and you are the last two members of the Bonnemain
gang. Am I not correct?"
"Quite, m'sieur."
"I thought I was," and the commissary smiled. "Well," he added, "your
friend robbed you and threw you right into our hands. No wonder you are
ready to give him away."
The commissary well knew the ways of criminals, and was also aware with
what murderous hatred a man was regarded who robbed his accomplice.
"Do not discuss him, m'sieur," replied the man under arrest. "He has
placed me in your hands, and I am helpless. I suppose I shall only get
what I deserve," he added, in a low, pensive tone.
"You are reasonable, Carlier, and I'm glad to see it," responded the
commissary in a softer tone. "Your friend is an arrant blackguard to
have treated his wife as he has, and to have betrayed you because you
took her part. But you surely knew how unscrupulous he was, and also
that he was a most dangerous character. We know of one or two of his
exploits, and I may tell you that if he is caught, there are two charges
of murder against him."
"I know," replied the thief, briefly. "Though you have arrested me, I
can truly say that I have never raised a knife, or fired a revolver, or
attempted to take the life of any man."
"You will not be charged with any crime more serious than burglary,
Carlier," replied the official. "But besides the Baron's affair
to-night, there is also the robbery at the widow's apartment in the Rue
Leonce Reynaud, the theft from the Chateau des Grandes Vignes, out at
Moret in the Forest of Fontainebleau, and the safe-breaking at
Thessier's in the Boulevard des Italiens. You were in all of them,
remember."
"M'sieur knows," replied Adolphe with a grim smile.
"It is my duty to know, eh?" was the rather sympathetic reply, for the
commissary had quickly seen that this member of the broken Bonnemain
gang, which had for years given such trouble to the Surete, was, though
a criminal and outwardly a rough scoundrel of the Apache type, yet
nevertheless a man possessed of better feelings than the ordinary thief.
The treatment that Carlier had received at his friend's hands had
crushed him. He did not crave for mercy, as so many criminals did when
suddenly cornered and placed under arrest. He merely regarded it as a
stroke of ill-luck, and with the true sportsman-like air "faced the
music."
As a matter of fact, he was wondering at that moment what had become of
little Mme. Ansell, and whether the efforts of the police to discover
her would be successful. No doubt they would, for one cannot travel far
in Paris if one is searched for by the Surete, unless one is a
professional thief, and therefore knows the holes in the underworld of
Parisian life in which to hide successfully.
The commissary, pointing with his stick at the movable cupboard, ordered
one of the agents to search it, and then, moving from one object to
another, he had everything turned upside down in search of any property
which might be concealed. The cupboard and sideboard were shifted away
from the wall, the chairs were examined, the pictures taken down and
pulled from their frames; indeed, no stone was left unturned.
When the French police make a search, they do so with a creditable
thoroughness.
Adolphe, the gyves upon his wrists, craved a cigarette, and a
police-officer took one from the packet lying upon the sideboard. Then,
with both hands, the prisoner lit it, and sat upon a chair watching them
turn the place upside down.
In the adjoining room they investigated everything. They even cut open
the mattress and searched for stolen jewellery or bank-notes.
"It's no use, m'sieur; there is nothing here," Carlier assured the
commissary. "We have not done a job for a long time."
"Are you sure that 'The American' has it all?" asked the official
earnestly.
"I've already told m'sieur," was "The Eel's" reply. "And, further, may I
crave a favour?"
"What is that?"
"To speak alone with you just for a moment. I want to tell you
something--for your ear alone."
The official was instantly suspicious. But, as the prisoner was securely
handcuffed, there was, he saw, no danger.
So he permitted him to pass inside the disordered bedroom, and then he
closed the broken door.