The Slaves of Paris - Émile Gaboriau (macos ebook reader .txt) 📗

long before the bandage is removed from your eyes. Can you not read the quality of this foolish boy, who has not a manly instinct in him?”

“Enough!” she cried, “enough! I am not such a coward as to allow you to insult my husband.”

He shuddered at the thought that his words might cost him his daughter’s love, but Hortebise interposed by putting his arm round Flavia’s waist and leading her from the room. When he returned, he observed⁠—

“I cannot understand your anger. It seems to me that all recrimination is most indiscreet, for you can at any moment break off this marriage.”

“Do you think it is nothing for me to be at the mercy of that cowardly wretch, Paul?”

“Not more so than you are by the foolish weakness of your daughter. Is not Paul our accomplice? And are we any more compromised because he has discovered the secret of your triple personality?”

“Ah! you have not a father’s feelings. Up till now Paul did not know that I was Mascarin, and believed me to be the victim of blackmailers. As a dupe he respected me, as an accomplice he will scorn me. This disastrous marriage must be hastened.”

Paul and Flavia’s marriage took place at the end of the next week, and Paul left his simple bachelor abode to take possession of the magnificent suite of rooms prepared for him by the banker in his house in the Rue Montmartre. The change was great, but Paul was no longer surprised at anything. He did not feel the faintest tinge of remorse; he only feared one thing, and that was that by some blunder he might compromise his future, when the eventful day arrived which would give him the social position and standing of heir to a dukedom.

When, however, the Duke de Champdoce came, accompanied by Perpignan, the young imposter rose to the level of his masters, and played his part with most consummate skill. The Duke, whose life had been one long scene of misery, and who had so cruelly expiated the sins of his youth, seemed to have become suddenly lenient; and had Paul obeyed him, he would at once have established himself with his young wife at the Hotel de Champdoce, but Martin Rigal put a veto upon this, for he was not quite satisfied that his son-in-law was really the heir to the Champdoce dukedom; and finally it was agreed that the Duke should come to breakfast the next morning and take away Paul. Eleven was the hour fixed, but the Duke appeared at the banker’s house at ten, where he, Catenac, Hortebise, and Paul were assembled together in solemn conclave.

“Now, papa,” said Flavia, who kept her father on thorns by her gay and frolicsome criticisms, “you will no longer blame me for falling in love with a poor Bohemian, for you see that he is a Champdoce, and that his father possesses millions.”

The Duke was now seated on the sofa, holding the hand of the young man whom he believed to be his son tightly in his. The Duchess, to whom he had given a hint of what was going on, had been taken seriously ill from over-excitement, but had recovered herself a little, and the Duke was describing this when he was suddenly interrupted by a series of full and heavy blows struck upon the other side of the wall of the room. A pickaxe was evidently at work. The whole house was shaken by the violence of the attack, and a screen, which stood near the spot, was thrown down.

The plotters gazed upon each other with pale and terror-stricken faces, for it was evident that the fresh brick wall, the work of Mascarin and Beaumarchef, was being destroyed. The Duke sat in perfect amazement, for the alarm of his host and his friends was plainly evident. He could feel Paul’s hand tremble in his, but could not understand why work evidently going on in the next house could cause such feelings of alarm. Flavia was the only one who had no suspicion, and she remarked, “Dear me! I should like to know the meaning of this disturbance.”

“I will send and inquire,” said her father; but scarcely had he opened the door than he retreated with a wild expression of terror in his face, and his arms stretched out in front of him, as though to bar the approach of some terrible spectre. In the doorway stood an eminently respectable-looking gentleman, wearing a pair of gold-rimmed spectacles, and behind him a commissary of police, girt with his official scarf, while farther back still were half a dozen police officers.

“M. Lecoq,” cried the three confederates in one breath, while through their minds flashed the same terrible idea⁠—“We are lost.”

The celebrated detective advanced slowly into the room, curiously watching the group collected there. There was an air of entire satisfaction visible on his countenance.

“Aha!” he said, “I was right, it seems. I was sure that I was making no mistake in rapping at the other side of the wall. I knew that it would be heard in here.”

By this time, however, the banker had, to all outward appearance, regained his self-command.

“What do you want here?” asked he insolently. “What is the meaning of this intrusion?”

“This gentleman will explain,” returned Lecoq, stepping aside to make way for the commissary of police to come forward. “But, to shorten matters, I may tell you that I have obtained a warrant for your arrest, Martin Rigal, alias Tantaine, alias Mascarin.”

“I don’t understand you!”

“Indeed. Do you think that Tantaine has cleaned his hands so completely that not a drop of André’s blood clings to the fingers of Martin Rigal?”

“On my word, you are speaking in riddles.”

A bland smile passed over Lecoq’s face as, drawing a folded letter from his pocket, he answered⁠—

“Perhaps you are acquainted with the handwriting of your daughter. Well, then, listen to what she wrote not so very long ago to the very Paul who is sitting on the sofa there.

“ ‘