Fantômas - Pierre Souvestre (books to read for self improvement TXT) 📗

in the possession of a man who travelled much, and always had to be referring to the dates of sailing to distant parts of the world."

In the bookcase was a box, made to represent a bound book, and containing a collection of ordnance maps. Juve took them out to make sure that no loose papers were included among them, and one by one unfolded every map.

Then a sharp exclamation burst from his lips.

"Good Lord! Now there——"

In his surprise he sprang up so abruptly that he pushed back his chair, and overturned it. His excitement was so great that his hands were shaking as he carefully spread out upon the desk one of the ordnance maps he had taken from the case.

"It's the map of the centre district all right: the map which shows Cahors, and Brives, and Saint-Jaury and—Beaulieu! And the missing piece—it is the missing piece that would give that precise district!"

Juve stared at the map with hypnotised gaze; for a piece had been cut out of it, cut out with a penknife neatly and carefully, and that piece must have shown the exact district where the château stood which had been occupied by the Marquise de Langrune.

"Oh, if I could only prove it: prove that the piece missing from this map, this map belonging to Gurn, is really and truly the piece I found near Verrières Station just after the murder of the Marquise de Langrune—what a triumph that would be! What a damning proof! What astounding consequences this discovery of mine might have!"

Juve made a careful note of the number of the map, quickly and nervously, folded it up again, and prepared to leave the flat.

He had made but a step or two towards the door when a sharp ring at the bell made him jump.

"The deuce!" he exclaimed softly; "who can be coming to ring Gurn up when everybody in Paris knows he has been arrested?" and he felt mechanically in his pocket to make sure that his revolver was there. Then he smiled. "What a fool I am! Of course it is only Mme. Doulenques, wondering why I am staying here so long."

He strode to the door, flung it wide open, and then recoiled in astonishment.

"You?" he exclaimed, surveying the caller from top to toe. "You? Charles Rambert! Or, I should say, Jérôme Fandor! Now what the deuce does this mean?"

XXIII. The Wreck of the "Lancaster"

Jérôme Fandor entered the room without a word. Juve closed the door behind him. The boy was very pale and manifestly much upset.

"What is the matter?" said Juve.

"Something terrible has happened," the boy answered. "I have just heard awful news: my poor father is dead!"

"What?" Juve exclaimed sharply. "M. Etienne Rambert dead?"

Jérôme Fandor put a newspaper into the detective's hand. "Read that," he said, and pointed to an article on the front page with a huge head-line: "Wreck of the 'Lancaster': 150 Lives Lost." There were tears in his eyes, and he had such obvious difficulty in restraining his grief, that Juve saw that to read the article would be the speediest way to find out what had occurred.

The Red Star liner Lancaster, plying between Caracas and Southampton, had gone down with all hands the night before, just off the Isle of Wight, and at the moment of going to press only one person was known to have been saved. There was a good sea running, but it was by no means rough, and the vessel was still within sight of the lighthouse and making for the open sea at full speed, when the lighthousemen suddenly saw her literally blown into the air and then disappear beneath the waves. The alarm was given immediately and boats of all kinds put off to the scene of the disaster, but though a great deal of wreckage was still floating about, only one man of the crew was seen, clinging to a spar; he was picked up by the Campbell and taken to hospital, where he was interviewed by The Times, without, however, being able to throw any light upon what was an almost unprecedented catastrophe in the history of the sea. All he could say was that the liner had just got up full speed and was making a perfectly normal beginning of her trip, when suddenly a tremendous explosion occurred. He himself was engaged at the moment fastening the tarpaulins over the baggage hold, and he was confident that the explosion occurred among the cargo. But he could give absolutely no more information: the entire ship seemed to be riven asunder, and he was thrown into the sea, stunned, and knew no more until he recovered consciousness and found himself aboard the Campbell.

"It's quite incomprehensible," Juve muttered; "surely there can't have been any powder aboard? No explosives are carried on these great liners; they only take passengers and the mails." He scanned the list of passengers. "Etienne Rambert's name is given among the first-class passengers, right enough," he said. "Well, it's odd!"

Jérôme Fandor heaved a profound sigh.

"It is a fatality which I shall never get over," he said. "When you told me the other day that you knew I was innocent, I ought to have gone to see my father, in spite of what you said. I am sure he would have believed me and come to see you; then you could have convinced him, and I should not have this horrible grief of remembering that he had died without learning that his son was not a bad man, but was quite deserving of his affection."

Jérôme Fandor was making a brave struggle to maintain his self-control, and Juve looked at him without concealing the real sympathy he felt for him in his grief. He put his hand kindly on his shoulder.

"Listen, my dear boy; odd as you may think it, you can take my word for it that there is no need for you to despair; there is nothing to prove that your father is dead; he may not have been on board."

The boy looked up in surprise.

"What do you mean, Juve?"

"I don't want to say anything, my boy, except that you would be very wrong to give way to distress at present. If you have any confidence in me, you may believe me when I say that. There is nothing yet to prove that you have had this loss: and, besides, you still have your mother, who is perfectly sure to get quite well: do you understand?—perfectly sure!" He changed the subject abruptly. "There is one thing I should like to know: what the dickens brought you here?"

"You were the first person I thought of in my trouble," Fandor replied. "Directly I read about the disaster in that paper I came to tell you at once."

"Yes, I quite understand that," Juve answered. "What I do not understand is how you guessed that you would find me here, in Gurn's flat."

The question seemed to perturb the boy.

"It—it was quite by chance," he stammered.

"That is the kind of explanation one offers to fools," Juve retorted. "By what chance did you see me come into this house? What the deuce were you doing in the rue Lévert?" The lad showed some inclination to make for the door, but Juve stayed him peremptorily. "Answer my question, please: how did you know I was here?"

Driven into a corner, the boy blurted out the truth:

"I had followed you."

"Followed me?" Juve exclaimed. "Where from?"

"From your rooms."

"You mean, and you may as well own up to it at once, that you were shadowing me."

"Well, yes, M. Juve, it is true," Fandor confessed, all in one breath. "I was shadowing you: I do every day!"

Juve was dumbfounded.

"Every day? And I never saw you! Gad, you are jolly clever! And may I enquire why you have been exercising this supervision over me?"

Jérôme Fandor hung his head.

"Forgive me," he faltered; "I have been very stupid. I thought you—I thought you were—Fantômas!"

The idea tickled the detective so much that he dropped back into a chair to laugh at his ease.

"'Pon my word," he said, "you have an imagination! And what made you suppose that I was Fantômas?"

"M. Juve," Fandor said earnestly, "I made a vow that I would find out the truth, and discover the scoundrel who has made such awful havoc of my life. But I did not know where to begin. From all you have said I realised that Fantômas was a most extraordinarily clever man; I did not know anyone who could be cleverer than you; and so I watched you! It was merely logical!"

Far from being angry, Juve was rather flattered.

"I am amazed by what you have just told me, my boy," he said with a smile. "In the first place your reasoning is not at all bad. Of course it is obvious that I cannot suspect myself of being Fantômas, but I quite admit that if I were in your place I might make the supposition, wild as it may seem. And, in the next place, you have shadowed me without my becoming aware of the fact, and that is very good indeed: a proof that you are uncommonly smart." He looked at the lad attentively for a few moments, and then went on more gravely: "Are you satisfied now that your hypothesis was wrong? Or do you still suspect me?"

"No, I don't suspect you now," Fandor declared; "not since I saw you come into this house; Fantômas certainly would not have come to search Gurn's rooms because——"

He stopped, and Juve, who was looking at him keenly, did not make him finish what he was saying.

"Shall I tell you something?" he said at last. "If you continue to display as much thought and initiative in the career you have chosen as you have just displayed, you will very soon be the first newspaper detective of the day!" He jumped up and led the boy off. "Come along: I've got to go to the Law Courts at once."

"You've found out something fresh?"

"I'm going to ask them to call an interesting witness in the Gurn affair."

Rain had been falling heavily all the morning and afternoon, but within the last few minutes it had almost stopped. Dollon, the steward, put his hand out of the window and found that only a few drops were falling now from the heavy grey sky.

He was an invaluable servant, and a few months after the death of the Marquise de Langrune, the Baronne de Vibray had gladly offered him a situation, and a cottage on her estate at Querelles.

He walked across the room, and called his son.

"Jacques, would you like to come with me? I am going down to the river to see that the sluices have been opened properly. The banks are anything but sound, and these rains will flood us out one of these days."

The steward and his son went down the garden towards the stream which formed one boundary of Mme. de Vibray's park.

"Look, father," Jacques exclaimed, "the postman is calling us."

The postman, a crusty but good-hearted fellow, came hurrying up to the steward.

"You do make me run, M. Dollon," he complained. "I went to your house this morning to take you a letter, but you weren't there."

"You might have left it with anybody."

"Excuse me!" the man retorted; "it's against the regulations: I've got an official letter for you, and I can only give it to you yourself," and he held out an envelope which Dollon tore open.

"Magistrates' office?" he said enquiringly, as he glanced at the heading of the notepaper. "Who can be writing to me from the Law Courts?" He read the letter aloud:

"Sir: As time does not permit of a regular summons being sent to you by an usher of the court, I beg you to be so good as to come to Paris immediately, the day after to-morrow if possible, and attend at my office,