The Hollow Needle - Maurice Leblanc (ebook e reader .txt) 📗

“The attack is about to take place. The fleet is investing the Needle. But, hollow as the Needle is, I don’t see how they propose to enter it.”

He took up the speaking tube:

“Don’t leave the bottom, Charolais. Where are we going? Why, I told you: to Port-Lupin. And at full speed, do you hear? We want water to land by⁠—there’s a lady with us.”

They skimmed over the rocky bed. The seaweed stood up on end like a heavy, dark vegetation and the deep currents made it wave gracefully, stretching and billowing like floating hair.

Another shadow, a longer one.

“That’s the torpedo-boat,” said Lupin. “We shall hear the roar of the guns presently. What will Duguay-Trouin do? Bombard the Needle? Think of what we’re missing, Beautrelet, by not being present at the meeting of Duguay-Trouin and Ganimard! The juncture of the land and naval forces! Hi, Charolais, don’t go to sleep, my man!”

They were moving very fast, for all that. The rocks had been succeeded by sand-fields and then, almost at once, they saw more rocks, which marked the eastern extremity of Étretat, the Porte d’Amont. Fish fled at their approach. One of them, bolder than the rest, fastened on to a porthole and looked at the occupants of the saloon with its great, fixed, staring eyes.

“That’s better,” cried Lupin. “We’re going now. What do you think of my cockleshell, Beautrelet? Not so bad, is she? Do you remember the story of the Seven of Hearts,11 the wretched end of Lacombe, the engineer, and how, after punishing his murderers, I presented the State with his papers and his plans for the construction of a new submarine: one more gift to France? Well, among the plans, I kept those of a submersible motor boat and that is how you come to have the honor of sailing in my company.”

He called to Charolais:

“Take us up, Charolais⁠—there’s no danger now⁠—”

They shot up to the surface and the glass skylight emerged above the water.

They were a mile from the coast, out of sight, therefore, and Beautrelet was now able to realize more fully at what a headlong pace they were traveling. First Fécamp passed before them, then all the Norman seaside places: Saint-Pierre, the Petits⁠—Dalles, Veulettes, Saint-Valéry, Veules, Quiberville. Lupin kept on jesting and Isidore never wearied of watching and listening to him, amazed as he was at the man’s spirits, at his gaiety, his mischievous ways, his careless chaff, his delight in life.

He also noticed Raymonde. The young woman sat silent, nestling up against the man she loved. She had taken his hands between her own and kept on raising her eyes to him; and Beautrelet constantly observed that her hands were twitching and that the wistful sadness of her eyes increased. And, each time, it was like a dumb and sorrowful reply to Lupin’s sallies. One would have thought that his frivolous words, his sarcastic outlook on life, caused her physical pain.

“Hush!” she whispered. “It’s defying destiny to laugh⁠—so many misfortunes can reach us still!”

Opposite Dieppe, they had to dive lest they should be seen by the fishing-craft. And twenty minutes later, they shot at an angle toward the coast and the boat entered a little submarine harbor formed by a regular gap between the rocks, drew up beside a jetty and rose gently to the surface.

Lupin announced:

“Port-Lupin!”

The spot, situated at sixteen miles from Dieppe and twelve from the Treport and protected, moreover, by the two landslips of cliff, was absolutely deserted. A fine sand carpeted the rounded slope of the tiny beach.

“Jump on shore, Beautrelet⁠—Raymonde, give me your hand. You, Charolais, go back to the Needle, see what happens between Ganimard and Duguay-Trouin and come back and tell me at the end of the day. The thing interests me tremendously.”

Beautrelet asked himself with a certain curiosity how they were going to get out of this hemmed-in creek which was called Port-Lupin, when, at the foot of the cliff, he saw the uprights of an iron ladder.

“Isidore,” said Lupin, “if you knew your geography and your history, you would know that we are at the bottom of the gorge of Parfonval, in the parish of Biville. More than a century ago, on the night of the twenty-third of August, 1803, Georges Cadoudal and six accomplices, who had landed in France with the intention of kidnapping the first consul, Bonaparte, scrambled up to the top by the road which I will show you. Since then, this road has been demolished by landslips. But Louis Valméras, better known by the name of Arsène Lupin, had it restored at his own expense and bought the farm of the Neuvillette, where the conspirators spent the first night and where, retired from business and withdrawing from the affairs of this world, he means to lead the life of a respectable country squire with his wife and his mother by his side. The gentleman-burglar is dead! Long live the gentleman-farmer!”

After the ladder came a sort of gully, an abrupt ravine hollowed out, apparently, by the rains, at the end of which they laid hold of a makeshift staircase furnished with a handrail. As Lupin explained, this handrail had been placed where it was in the stead of the estamperche, a long rope fastened to stakes, by which the people of the country, in the old days, used to help themselves down when going to the beach.

After a painful climb of half an hour, they emerged on the tableland, not far from one of those little cabins, dug out of the soil itself, which serve as shelters for the excisemen. And, as it happened, two minutes later, at a turn in the path, one of these customhouse officials appeared.

He drew himself up and saluted.

Lupin asked:

“Any news, Gomel?”

“No, governor.”

“You’ve met no one at all suspicious-looking?”

“No, governor⁠—only⁠—”

“What?”

“My wife⁠—who does dressmaking at the Neuvillette⁠—”

“Yes, I know⁠—Césarine⁠—my mother spoke of her. Well?”

“It seems a sailor