The Teeth of the Tiger - Maurice Leblanc (feel good books txt) 📗

plaster which closed up an old excavation in the well; and this I at once perceived. It was a stroke of luck, wasn’t it? And it changed the whole situation. My plan was settled at once. While I went on acting my little part of the gentleman about to tumble down an abyss, putting on the most scared face, the most staring eyes, the most hideous grin, I enlarged that excavation, taking care to throw the chunks of plaster in front of me in such a way that their fall made no noise. When the moment came, at the very second when my swooning features vanished before your eyes, I simply jumped into my retreat, thanks to a rather plucky little wriggle of the loins.

“I was saved, because the retreat was dug out on the side where you were moving and because, being dark itself, it cast no light. All that I now had to do was to wait.

“I listened quietly to your threatening speeches. I let the things you flung down the well go past me. And, when I thought you had gone back to Florence, I was preparing to leave my refuge, to return to the light of day, and to fall upon you from behind, when⁠—”

Don Luis turned the cripple over, as though he were a parcel which he was tying up with string, and continued:

“Have you ever been to Tancarville, the old feudal castle in Normandy, on the banks of the Seine? Haven’t you? Well, you must know that, outside the ruins of the keep, there is an old well which, like many other wells of the period, possesses the peculiarity of having two openings, one at the top, facing the sky, and the other a little lower down, hollowed out sideways in the wall and leading to one of the rooms of the keep.

“At Tancarville this second opening is nowadays closed with a grating. Here it was walled up with a layer of small stones and plaster. And it was just the recollection of Tancarville that made me stay, all the more as there was no hurry, since you had had the kindness to inform me that Florence would not join me in the next world until four o’clock. I therefore inspected my refuge and soon realized that, as I had already felt by intuition, it was the foundation of a building which was now demolished and which had the garden laid out on its ruins.

“Well, I went on, groping my way and following the direction which, above ground, would have taken me to the grotto. My presentiments were not deceived. A gleam of daylight made its way at the top of a staircase of which I had struck the bottom step. I went up it and heard the sound of your voice.”

Don Luis turned the cripple over and over and was pretty rough about it. Then he resumed:

“I wish to impress upon you, my dear sir, that the upshot would have been exactly similar if I had attacked you directly and from the start in the open air. But, having said this, I confess that chance favoured me to some purpose. It has often failed me, in the course of our struggle, but this time I had no cause to complain.

“I felt myself in such luck that I never doubted for a second that, having found the entrance to the subterranean passage, I should also find the way out. As a matter of fact, I had only to pull gently at the slight obstacle of a few stacked bricks which hid the opening in order to make my exit amid the remains of the castle keep.

“Guided by the sound of your voice, I slipped through the stones and thus reached the back of the grotto in which Florence lay. Amusing, wasn’t it?

“You can imagine what fun it was to hear you make your little speeches: ‘Answer me, yes or no, Florence. A movement of your head will decide your fate. If it’s yes, I shall release you. If it’s no, you die. Answer me, Florence! A sign of your head: is the answer yes or no?’ And the end, above all, was delicious, when you scrambled to the top of the grotto and started roaring from up there: ‘It’s you who have asked to die, Florence. You asked for it and you’ve got it!’

“Just think what a joke it was: at that moment there was no one in the grotto! Not a soul! With one effort, I had drawn Florence toward me and put her under shelter. And all that you were able to crush with your avalanche of rocks was one or two spiders, perhaps, and a few flies dozing on the flagstones.

“The trick was done and the farce was nearly finished. Act first: Arsène Lupin saved. Act second: Florence Levasseur saved. Act third and last: the monster vanquished⁠ ⁠… absolutely and with a vengeance!”

Don Luis stood up and contemplated his work with a satisfied eye.

“You look like a sausage, my son!” he cried, yielding at last to his sarcastic nature and his habit of treating his enemies familiarly. “A regular sausage! A bit on the thin side, perhaps: a saveloy for poor people! But there, you don’t much care what you look like, I suppose? Besides, you’re rather like that at all times; and, in any case, you’re just the thing for the little display of indoor gymnastics which I have in mind for you. You’ll see: it’s an idea of my own, a really original idea. Don’t be impatient: we shan’t be long.”

He took one of the guns which the cripple had brought to the well and tied to the middle of the gun the end of a twelve or fifteen yards’ length of rope, fastening the other end to the cords with which the cripple was bound, just behind his back. He next took his captive round the body and held him over the well:

“Shut your eyes, if you feel at