The Essential Maurice Leblanc Collection. Морис Леблан
Duke with his ironic smile. "Women never do stop to think--where one of their heroes is concerned. And did you do it?"
"How could I? If I only could! If I could find Lupin entangled with a woman like Ganimard did--well--" said Guerchard between his teeth.
"He'd never get out of YOUR clutches," said the Duke with conviction.
"I think not--I think not," said Guerchard grimly. "But come, I may as well get on."
He walked across the turf to the foot of the ladder and looked at the footprints round it. He made but a cursory examination of them, and took his way down the garden-path, out of the door in the wall into the space about the house that was building. He was not long examining it, and he went right through it out into the street on which the house would face when it was finished. He looked up and down it, and began to retrace his footsteps.
"I've seen all I want to see out here. We may as well go back to the house," he said to the Duke.
"I hope you've seen what you expected to see," said the Duke.
"Exactly what I expected to see--exactly," said Guerchard.
"That's as it should be," said the Duke.
They went back to the house and found M. Formery in the drawing-room, still engaged in the process of reconstruction.
"The thing to do now is to hunt the neighbourhood for witnesses of the departure of the burglars with their booty. Loaded as they were with such bulky objects, they must have had a big conveyance. Somebody must have noticed it. They must have wondered why it was standing in front of a half-built house. Somebody may have actually seen the burglars loading it, though it was so early in the morning. Bonavent had better inquire at every house in the street on which that half-built house faces. Did you happen to notice the name of it?" said M. Formery.
"It's Sureau Street," said Guerchard. "But Dieusy has been hunting the neighbourhood for some one who saw the burglars loading their conveyance, or saw it waiting to be loaded, for the last hour."
"Good," said M. Formery. "We are getting on."
M. Formery was silent. Guerchard and the Duke sat down and lighted cigarettes.
"You found plenty of traces," said M. Formery, waving his hand towards the window.
"Yes; I've found plenty of traces," said Guerchard.
"Of Lupin?" said M. Formery, with a faint sneer.
"No; not of Lupin," said Guerchard.
A smile of warm satisfaction illumined M. Formery's face:
"What did I tell you?" he said. "I'm glad that you've changed your mind about that."
"I have hardly changed my mind," said Guerchard, in his husky, gentle voice.
There came a loud knocking on the front door, the sound of excited voices on the stairs. The door opened, and in burst M. Gournay-Martin. He took one glance round the devastated room, raised his clenched hands towards the ceiling, and bellowed, "The scoundrels! the dirty scoundrels!" And his voice stuck in his throat. He tottered across the room to a couch, dropped heavily to it, gazed round the scene of desolation, and burst into tears.
Germaine and Sonia came into the room. The Duke stepped forward to greet them.
"Do stop crying, papa. You're as hoarse as a crow as it is," said Germaine impatiently. Then, turning on the Duke with a frown, she said: "I think that joke of yours about the train was simply disgraceful, Jacques. A joke's a joke, but to send us out to the station on a night like last night, through all that heavy rain, when you knew all the time that there was no quarter-to-nine train--it was simply disgraceful."
"I really don't know what you're talking about," said the Duke quietly. "Wasn't there a quarter-to-nine train?"
"Of course there wasn't," said Germaine. "The time-table was years old. I think it was the most senseless attempt at a joke I ever heard of."
"It doesn't seem to me to be a joke at all," said the Duke quietly. "At any rate, it isn't the kind of a joke I make--it would be detestable. I never thought to look at the date of the time-table. I keep a box of cigarettes in that drawer, and I have noticed the time-table there. Of course, it may have been lying there for years. It was stupid of me not to look at the date."
"I said it was a mistake. I was sure that his Grace would not do anything so unkind as that," said Sonia.
The Duke smiled at her.
"Well, all I can say is, it was very stupid of you not to look at the date," said Germaine.
M. Gournay-Martin rose to his feet and wailed, in the most heartrending fashion: "My pictures! My wonderful pictures! Such investments! And my cabinets! My Renaissance cabinets! They can't be replaced! They were unique! They were worth a hundred and fifty thousand francs."
M. Formery stepped forward with an air and said, "I am distressed, M. Gournay-Martin--truly distressed by your loss. I am M. Formery, examining magistrate."
"It is a tragedy, M. Formery--a tragedy!" groaned the millionaire.
"Do not let it upset you too much. We shall find your masterpieces--we shall find them. Only give us time," said M. Formery in a tone of warm encouragement.
The face of the millionaire brightened a little.
"And, after all, you have the consolation, that the burglars did not get hold of the gem of your collection. They have not stolen the coronet of the Princesse de Lamballe," said M. Formery.
"No," said the Duke. "They have not touched this safe. It is unopened."
"What has that got to do with it?" growled the millionaire quickly. "That safe is empty."
"Empty ... but your coronet?" cried the Duke.
"Good heavens! Then they HAVE stolen it," cried the millionaire hoarsely, in a panic-stricken voice.
"But they can't have--this safe hasn't been touched," said the Duke.
"But the coronet never was in that safe. It was--have they entered my bedroom?" said the millionaire.
"No," said M. Formery.
"They don't seem to have gone through any of the rooms except these two," said the Duke.
"Ah, then my mind is at rest about that. The safe in my bedroom has only two keys. Here is one." He took a key from his waistcoat pocket and held it out to them. "And the other is in this safe."
The face of M. Formery was lighted up with a splendid satisfaction. He might have rescued the coronet with his own hands. He cried triumphantly, "There, you see!"
"See? See?" cried the millionaire in a sudden bellow. "I see that they have robbed me--plundered me. Oh, my pictures! My wonderful pictures! Such investments!"
CHAPTER XII
THE THEFT OF THE PENDANT
They stood round the millionaire observing his anguish, with eyes in which shone various degrees of sympathy. As if no longer able to bear the sight of such woe, Sonia slipped out of the room.
The millionaire lamented his loss and abused the thieves by turns, but always at the top of his magnificent voice.
Suddenly a fresh idea struck him. He clapped his hand to his brow and cried: "That eight hundred pounds! Charolais will never buy the Mercrac now! He was not a bona fide purchaser!"
The Duke's lips parted slightly and his eyes opened a trifle wider than their wont. He turned sharply on his heel, and almost sprang into the other drawing-room. There he laughed at his ease.
M.