Arsène Lupin, Gentleman-thief (Penguin Classics)

by Leblanc, Maurice

  Ganimard smiled and sat down, and the prisoner, glad of the opportunity of speaking, continued:

  “By Jove, what a treat to see a decent man’s face! I am sick of the looks of all those spies who go through my cell and my pockets ten times a day, to make sure that I am not planning an escape. Gad, how fond the government must be of me!”

  “They show their taste.”

  “No, no! I should be so happy if they would let me lead my quiet little life.”

  “On other people’s money.”

  “Just so. It would be so simple. But I’m letting my tongue run on. I’m talking nonsense, and I dare say you’re in a hurry. Come, Ganimard, tell me to what I owe the honor of this visit?”

  “The Cahorn case,” said Ganimard, straight out.

  “Stop! Wait a bit…. You see, I have so many on hand! First, let me search my brain for the Cahorn pigeon-hole…. Ah, I have it! Cahorn case, Chateau du Malaquis, Seine-Inferieure…. Two Rubens, a Watteau, and a few minor trifles.”

  “Trifles!”

  “Oh yes; all this is of small importance. I have bigger things on hand. However, you’re interested in the case, and that’s enough for me…. Go ahead, Ganimard.”

  “I need not tell you, need I, how far we have got with the investigation?”

  “No, not at all. I have seen the morning papers. And I will even take the liberty of saying that you are not making much progress.”

  “That’s just why I have come to throw myself upon your kindness.”

  “I am entirely at your service.”

  “First of all, the thing was done by you, was it not?”

  “From start to finish.”

  “The registered letter? The telegram?”

  “Were sent by yours truly; in fact, I ought to have the receipts somewhere.”

  Arsène opened the drawer of a little deal table which, with the bed and the stool, composed all the furniture of his cell, took out two scraps of paper, and handed them to Ganimard.

  “Hullo!” cried the latter. “Why, I thought you were being kept under constant observation and searched on the slightest pretext. And it appears that you read the papers and collect post-office receipts….”

  “Bah! Those men are such fools! They rip up the lining of my waistcoat, explore the soles of my boots, listen at the walls of my cell; but not one of them ever thought that Arsène Lupin would be silly enough to choose so obvious a hiding-place. That’s just what I reckoned on.”

  Ganimard exclaimed, in amusement:

  “What a funny chap you are! You’re beyond me! Come, tell me the story.”

  “Oh, I say! Not so fast! Initiate you into all my secrets… reveal my little tricks to you? That’s a serious matter.”

  “Was I wrong in thinking that I could rely on you to oblige me?”

  “No, Ganimard, and, as you insist upon it…”

  Arsène Lupin took two or three strides across his cell. Then, stopping:

  “What do you think of my letter to the baron?” he asked.

  “I think you wanted to have some fun, to tickle the gallery a bit.”

  “Ah, there you go! Tickle the gallery, indeed! Upon my word, Ganimard, I gave you credit for more sense! Do you really imagine that I, Arsène Lupin, waste my time with such childish pranks as that? Is it likely that I should have written the letter if I could have rifled the baron without it? Do try and understand that the letter was the indispensable starting-point— the main-spring that set the whole machine in motion. Look here, let us proceed in order, and, if you like, prepare the Malaquis burglary together.”

  “Very well.”

  “Now follow me. I have to do with an impregnable and closely guarded castle. Am I to throw up the game and give up the treasures which I covet because the castle that contains them happens to be inaccessible?”

  “Clearly not.”

  “Am I to try to carry it by assault, as in the old days, at the head of a band of adventurers?”

  “That would be childish.”

  “Am I to enter it by stealth?”

  “Impossible.”

  “There remains only one way, which is to get myself invited by the owner of the aforesaid castle.”

  “It’s an original idea.”

  “And so easy! Suppose that one day the said owner receives a letter, warning him of a plot hatched against him by one Arsène Lupin, a notorious housebreaker. What is he sure to do?”

  “Send the letter to the public prosecutor.”

  “Who will laugh at him, because the said Lupin is actually locked up! The natural consequence is the utter bewilderment of the worthy man, who is ready and anxious to ask the assistance of the first-comer. Am I right?”

  “Quite so.”

  “And if he happens to read in the local news-sheet that a famous detective is staying in the neighborhood…”

  “He will go and apply to that detective.”

  “Exactly. But, on the other hand, let us assume that, foreseeing this inevitable step, Arsène Lupin has asked one of his ablest friends to take up his quarters at Caudebec, to pick up acquaintance with a contributor to the Reveil, a paper to which the baron, mark you, subscribes, and to drop a hint that he is so-and-so, the famous detective. What will happen next?”

  “The contributor will send a paragraph to the Reveil, stating that the detective is staying at Caudebec.”

  “Exactly; and one of two things follows: either the fish (I mean Cahorn) does not rise to the bait, in which case nothing happens, or else (and this is the more likely presumption) he nibbles, in which case you have our dear Cahorn imploring the assistance of one of my own friends against me!”

  “This is becoming more and more original.”

  “Of course the sham detective begins by refusing. Thereupon a telegram from Arsène Lupin. Dismay of the baron, who renews his entreaties with my friend, and offers him so much to watch over his safety. The friend aforesaid accepts, and brings with him two chaps of our gang, who, during the night, while Cahorn is kept in sight by his protector, remove a certain number of things through the window, and lower them with ropes into a barge freighted for the purpose. It’s as simple as… Lupin.”

  “And it’s just wonderful,” cried Ganimard, “and I have no words in which to praise the boldness of the idea and the ingenuity of the details! But I can hardly imagine a detective so illustrious that his name should have attracted and impressed the baron to that extent.”

  “There is one and one only.”

  “Who?”

  “The most illustrious of them all, the archenemy of Arsène Lupin—in short, Inspector Ganimard.”

  “What! myself?”

  “Yourself, Ganimard. And that’s the delightful part of it: if you go down and persuade the baron to talk you will end by discovering that it is your duty to arrest yourself, just as you arrested me in America. A humorous revenge, what? I shall have Ganimard arrested by Ganimard!”

  Arsène Lupin laughed long and loud, while the inspector bit his lips with vexation. The joke did not appear to him worthy of so much merriment.

  The entrance of a warder gave him time to recover. The man brought the meal which Arsène Lupin, by special favor, was allowed to have sent in from the neighboring restaurant. After placing the tray on the table he went away. Arsène sat down, broke his bread, ate a mouthful or two, and continued:

  “But be easy, my dear Ganimard, you will not have to go down there. I am going to reveal a thing to you that will strike you dumb: the Cahorn case is about to be withdrawn.”

  “What?”

  “About to be withdrawn, I said.”

  “Nonsense! I have just left the chief.”

  “And then? Does Monsieur Dudouis know more than I do about what concerns me? You must learn that Ganimard— excuse me—that the sham Ganimard has remained on very good terms with Baron Cahorn. The baron—and this is the main reason why he has kept the thing quiet—has charged him with the very delicate mission of negotiating a deal with me; and t
he chances are that, by this time, on payment of a certain sum, the baron is once more in possession of his pet knicknacks, in return for which he will withdraw the charge. Wherefore, there is no question of theft. Wherefore, the public prosecutor will have to abandon…”

  Ganimard gazed at the prisoner with an air of stupefaction.

  “But how do you know all this?”

  “I have just received the telegram I was expecting.”

  “You have just received a telegram?”

  “This very moment, my friend. I was too polite to read it in your presence. But if you will allow me…”

  “You’re poking fun at me, Lupin.”

  “Be so good, my dear friend, as to cut off the top of that egg gently. You will see for yourself that I am not poking fun at you.”

  Ganimard obeyed mechanically, and broke the egg with the blade of a knife. A cry of surprise escaped him. The shell was empty but for a sheet of blue paper. At Arsène’s request, he unfolded it. It was a telegram, or, rather, a portion of a telegram, from which the postal indications had been removed. He read:

  “Arrangement settled. Hundred thousand spondulics5 delivered. All well.”

  “Hundred thousand spondulics?” he uttered.

  “Yes, a hundred thousand francs. It’s not much, but these are hard times…. And my general expenses are so heavy! If you knew the amount of my budget… it’s like the budget of a big town!”

  Ganimard rose to go. His ill-humor had left him. He thought for a few moments, and cast a mental glance over the whole business, to try to discover a weak point. Then, in a voice that frankly revealed his admiration as an expert, he said:

  “It’s a good thing that there are not dozens like you, or there would be nothing for us but to shut up shop.”

  Arsène Lupin assumed a modest simper, and replied:

  “Oh, I had to do something to amuse myself, to occupy my spare time… especially as this stroke could only succeed while I was in prison.”

  “What do you mean?” exclaimed Ganimard. “Your trial, your defence, your examination: isn’t that enough for you to amuse yourself with?”

  “No, because I have decided not to attend my trial.”

  “Oh, I say!”

  Arsène Lupin repeated, deliberately:

  “I shall not attend my trial.”

  “Really!”

  “Why, my dear fellow, you surely don’t think that I mean to rot in gaol? The mere suggestion is an insult. Let me tell you that Arsène Lupin remains in prison as long as he thinks fit, and not a moment longer.”

  “It might have been more prudent to begin by not entering it,” said the inspector, ironically.

  “Ah, so you’re chaffing me, sirrah? Do you remember that you had the honor to effect my arrest? Well, learn from me, my respectable friend, that no one, neither you nor another, could have laid a hand upon me if a much more important interest had not occupied my attention at that critical moment.”

  “You surprise me.”

  “A woman had cast her eyes upon me, Ganimard, and I loved her. Do you realize all that the fact implies when a woman whom one loves casts her eyes upon one? I cared about little else, I assure you. And that is why I’m here.”

  “Since some considerable time, allow me to observe.”

  “I was anxious to forget. Don’t laugh; it was a charming adventure, and I still have a touching recollection of it… And then I am suffering a little from nervous prostration. We lead such a feverish existence nowadays! It’s a good thing to take a rest-cure from time to time. And there’s no place for it like this. They carry out the cure in all its strictness at the Sante.”

  “Arsène Lupin,” said Ganimard, “you’re pulling my leg.”

  “Ganimard,” replied Lupin, “this is Friday. On Wednesday next I’ll come and smoke a cigar with you in the Rue Pergolese at four o’clock in the afternoon.”

  “Arsène Lupin, I shall expect you.”

  They shook hands like two friends who have a proper sense of each other’s value, and the old detective turned towards the door.

  “Ganimard!”

  Ganimard looked round.

  “What is it?”

  “Ganimard, you’ve forgotten your watch.”

  “My watch?”

  “Yes, I’ve just found it in my pocket.”

  He returned it, with apologies.

  “Forgive me. They’ve taken mine, but that’s no reason why I should rob you of yours—especially as I have a chronometer here which keeps perfect time and satisfies all my requirements.”

  He took out of the drawer a large, thick, comfortable-looking gold watch, hanging to a heavy chain.

  “And out of whose pocket does this come?” asked Ganimard.

  Arsène Lupin carelessly inspected the initials:

  “ ‘J. B.’… Oh yes, I remember: Jules Bouvier, my examining magistrate, a charming fellow….”

  THE ESCAPE OF ARSÈNE LUPIN

  Arsène Lupin finished his mid-day meal, took a good cigar from his pocket, and complacently studied the gold-lettered inscription on its band. At that moment the door of his cell opened. He had just a second in which to throw the cigar into the drawer of the table and to move away. The warden came in to tell him that it was time to take his exercise.

  “I was waiting for you, old chap!” cried Lupin, with his unfailing good-humor.

  They went out together. Hardly had they turned the corner of the passage when two men entered the cell and began to make a minute examination. One of these was Inspector Dieuzy, the other Inspector Folenfant.

  They wanted to have the matter settled once and for all. There was no doubt about it: Arsène Lupin was keeping up a correspondence with the outside world and communicating with his confidants. Only the day before the Grand Journal had published the following lines, addressed to its legal contributor:

  “SIR,—In an article published a few days ago you ventured to express yourself concerning me in utterly unwarrantable terms. I shall come and call you to account a day or two before my trial commences.

  “Yours faithfully,

  “ARSENE LUPIN.”

  The handwriting was Arsène Lupin’s. Therefore, he was sending letters. Therefore, he was receiving letters. Therefore, it was certain that he was preparing the escape which he had so arrogantly announced.

  The position was becoming intolerable. By arrangement with the examining magistrate, M. Dudouis himself, the head of the detective service, went to the Santé to explain to the prison governor the measures which it was thought advisable to take, and on his arrival he sent two of his men to the prisoner’s cell.

  The men raised every one of the flag-stones, took the bed to pieces, did all that is usually done in such cases, and ended by discovering nothing. They were about to abandon their search when the warden came running in, and said:

  “The drawer… look in the drawer of the table! I thought I saw him shut it when I came in just now.”

  They looked, and Dieuzy exclaimed:

  “Gad, we’ve caught our customer this time!”

  Folenfant stopped him.

  “Don’t do anything, my lad; let the chief take the inventory.”

  “Still, this Havana…”

  “Leave it alone, and let us tell the chief.”

  Two minutes later M. Dudouis was exploring the contents of the drawer. He found, first, a collection of press-cuttings concerning Arsène Lupin; next, a tobacco-pouch, a pipe, and some foreign post-paper; and, lastly, two books.

  He looked at the titles: Carlyle’s Heroes and Hero-worship,1 in English, and a charming Elzevir,2 in the contemporary binding: a German translation of the Manual of Epictetus,3 published at Leyden in 1634. He glanced through them, and observed that every page was scored, underlined, and annotated. Were these conventional signs, or were they marks denoting the reader’s devotion to a particular book?

  “We’ll go into this in detail,” said M. Dudouis.

  He investigated the tobacco-pouch, the
pipe. Then, taking up the magnificent cigar in its gold band:

  “By Jove!” he cried, “our friend does himself well! A Henry Clay!”4

  With the mechanical movement of a smoker he put it to his ear and crackled it. An exclamation escaped him. The cigar had given way under the pressure of his fingers! He examined it more attentively, and soon perceived something that showed white between the leaves of the tobacco. And carefully, with the aid of a pin, he drew out a scroll of very thin paper, no thicker than a toothpick. It was a note. He unrolled it, and read the following words, in a small, female hand:

  “Maria has taken the other’s place. Eight out of ten are prepared. On pressing outside foot, metal panel moves upward. H. P. will wait from 12 to 16 daily. But where? Reply at once. Have no fear: your friend is looking after you.”

  M. Dudouis reflected for a moment and said:

  “That’s clear enough…. Maria, the prison-van… the eight compartments…. Twelve to sixteen; that is, from twelve to four o’clock….”

  “But who is H. P.? Who is to wait for him?”

  “H. P. stands for horse-power, of course—a motor-car.”

  He rose and asked:

  “Had the prisoner finished his lunch?”

  “Yes.”

  “And, as he has not yet read this message, as the condition of the cigar shows, the chances are that he had only just received it.”

  “By what means?”

  “How can I tell? In his food; inside a roll or a potato.”

  “That’s impossible. He was only permitted to have his meals from the outside so that we might trap him and we have found nothing.”

  “We will look for Lupin’s reply this evening. Meantime keep him out of his cell. I will take this to Monsieur Bouvier,5 the examining magistrate. If he agrees, we will have the letter photographed at once, and in an hour’s time you can put these other things back in the drawer, together with an exactly similar cigar containing the original message. The prisoner must not be allowed to suspect anything.”

  It was not without a certain curiosity that M. Dudouis, accompanied by Inspector Dieuzy, returned to the office of the Sante in the evening. In a corner, on the stove, were three plates.