Castles in the Air Read online

  5.

  When I turned the corner of the street and came is sight of thesqualid house where I lodged, I felt like a being from another world.Twenty thousand francs--a fortune!--was waiting for me inside thosedingy walls. Yes, twenty thousand, for by now I had fully made up mymind. I had two documents concealed beneath the floor of mybedroom--one so like the other that none could tell them apart. One ofthese I would restore to the lovely being who had offered me tenthousand francs for it, and the other I would sell to my first anduncouth client for another ten thousand francs!

  Four hundred! Bah! Ten thousand shall you pay for the treaty, myfriend of the Danish or Russian Secret Service! Ten thousand!--it isworth that to you!

  In that happy frame of mind I reached the front door of my dingyabode. Imagine my surprise on being confronted with two agents ofpolice, each with fixed bayonet, who refused to let me pass.

  "But I lodge here," I said.

  "Your name?" queried one of the men. "Hector Ratichon," Ireplied. Whereupon they gave me leave to enter.

  It was very mysterious. My heart beat furiously. Fear for the safetyof my precious papers held me in a death-like grip. I ran straight tomy room, locked the door after me, and pulled the curtains together infront of the window. Then, with hands that trembled as if with ague, Ipulled aside the strip of carpet which concealed the hiding-place ofwhat meant a fortune to me.

  I nearly fainted with joy; the papers were there--quite safely. I tookthem out and replaced them inside my coat.

  Then I ran up to see if Theodore was in. I found him in bed. He toldme that he had left the office whilst my visitors were still with me,as he felt terribly sick. He had been greatly upset when, about anhour ago, the maid-of-all-work had informed him that the police werein the house, that they would allow no one--except the persons lodgingin the house--to enter it, and no one, once in, would be allowed toleave. How long these orders would hold good Theodore did not know.

  I left him moaning and groaning and declaring that he felt very ill,and I went in quest of information. The corporal in command of thegendarmes was exceedingly curt with me at first, but after a time heunbent and condescended to tell me that my landlord had been denouncedfor permitting a Bonapartiste club to hold its sittings in his house.So far so good. Such denunciations were very frequent these days, andoften ended unpleasantly for those concerned, but the affair hadobviously nothing to do with me. I felt that I could breathe again.But there was still the matter of the consigne. If no one, save thepersons who lodged in the house, would be allowed to enter it, howwould M. Charles Saurez contrive to call for the stolen document and,incidentally, to hand me over the ten thousand francs I was hoping for?And if no one, once inside the house, would be allowed to leave it,how could I meet Mlle. Geoffroy to-morrow at two o'clock in my officeand receive ten thousand francs from her in exchange for the preciouspaper?

  Moreover the longer the police stayed in this house and poked theirnoses about in affairs that concerned hardworking citizens likemyself--why--the greater the risk would be of the matter of the stolendocument coming to light.

  It was positively maddening.

  I never undressed that night, but just lay down on my bed, thinking.The house was very still at times, but at others I could hear thetramp of the police agents up and down the stairs and also outside mywindow. The latter gave on a small, dilapidated back garden which hada wooden fence at the end of it. Beyond it were some market gardensbelonging to a M. Lorraine. It did not take me very long to realizethat that way lay my fortune of twenty thousand francs. But for themoment I remained very still. My plan was already made. At aboutmidnight I went to the window and opened it cautiously. I had heard nonoise from that direction for some time, and I bent my ear to listen.

  Not a sound! Either the sentry was asleep, or he had gone on hisround, and for a few moments the way was free. Without a moment'shesitation I swung my leg over the sill.

  Still no sound. My heart beat so fast that I could almost hear it. Thenight was very dark. A thin mist-like drizzle was falling; in fact theweather conditions were absolutely perfect for my purpose. With utmostwariness I allowed myself to drop from the window-ledge on to the softground below.

  If I was caught by the sentry I had my answer ready: I was going tomeet my sweetheart at the end of the garden. It is an excuse whichalways meets with the sympathy of every true-hearted Frenchman. Thesentry would, of course, order me back to my room, but I doubt if hewould ill-use me; the denunciation was against the landlord, notagainst me.

  Still not a sound. I could have danced with joy. Five minutes more andI would be across the garden and over that wooden fence, and once moreon my way to fortune. My fall from the window had been light, as myroom was on the ground floor; but I had fallen on my knees, and now,as I picked myself up, I looked up, and it seemed to me as if I sawTheodore's ugly face at his attic window. Certainly there was a lightthere, and I may have been mistaken as to Theodore's face beingvisible. The very next second the light was extinguished and I wasleft in doubt.

  But I did not pause to think. In a moment I was across the garden, myhands gripped the top of the wooden fence, I hoisted myself up--withsome difficulty, I confess--but at last I succeeded. I threw my legover and gently dropped down on the other side.

  Then suddenly two rough arms encircled my waist, and before I couldattempt to free myself a cloth was thrown over my head, and I waslifted up and carried away, half suffocated and like an insentientbundle.

  When the cloth was removed from my face I was half sitting, halflying, in an arm-chair in a strange room which was lighted by an oillamp that hung from the ceiling above. In front of me stood M. ArthurGeoffroy and that beast Theodore.

  M. Arthur Geoffroy was coolly folding up the two valuable papers forthe possession of which I had risked a convict ship and New Caledonia,and which would have meant affluence for me for many days to come.

  It was Theodore who had removed the cloth from my face. As soon as Ihad recovered my breath I made a rush for him, for I wanted tostrangle him. But M. Arthur Geoffroy was too quick and too strong forme. He pushed me back into the chair.

  "Easy, easy, M. Ratichon," he said pleasantly; "do not vent your wrathupon this good fellow. Believe me, though his actions may havedeprived you of a few thousand francs, they have also saved you fromlasting and biting remorse. This document, which you stole from M. deMarsan and so ingeniously duplicated, involved the honour of our Kingand our country, as well as the life of an innocent man. My sister'sfiance would never have survived the loss of the document which hadbeen entrusted to his honour."

  "I would have returned it to Mademoiselle to-morrow," I murmured.

  "Only one copy of it, I think," he retorted; "the other you would havesold to whichever spy of the Danish or Russian Governments happened tohave employed you in this discreditable business."

  "How did you know?" I said involuntarily.

  "Through a very simple process of reasoning, my good M. Ratichon," hereplied blandly. "You are a very clever man, no doubt, but thecleverest of us is at times apt to make a mistake. You made two, and Iprofited by them. Firstly, after my sister and I left you thisafternoon, you never made the slightest pretence of making inquiriesor collecting information about the mysterious theft of the document.I kept an eye on you throughout the evening. You left your office andstrolled for a while on the quays; you had an excellent dinner at theRestaurant des Anglais; then you settled down to your coffee andliqueur. Well, my good M. Ratichon, obviously you would have been moreactive in the matter if you had not known exactly where and when andhow to lay your hands upon the document, for the recovery of which mysister had offered you ten thousand francs."

  I groaned. I had not been quite so circumspect as I ought to havebeen, but who would have thought--

  "I have had something to do with police work in my day," continued M.Geoffroy blandly, "though not of late years; but my knowledge of theirmethods is not altogether rusty and my powers of observation are notyet dulled. Duri
ng my sister's visit to you this afternoon I noticedthe blouse and cap of a commissionnaire lying in a bundle in a cornerof your room. Now, though M. de Marsan has been in a burning feversince he discovered his loss, he kept just sufficient presence of mindat the moment to say nothing about that loss to any of theChancellerie officials, but to go straight home to his apartments inthe Rue Royale and to send for my sister and for me. When we came tohim he was already partly delirious, but he pointed to a parcel and aletter which he had brought away from his office. The parcel proved tobe an empty box and the letter a blank sheet of paper; but the mostcasual inquiry of the concierge at the Chancellerie elicited the factthat a commissionaire had brought these things in the course of themorning. That was your second mistake, my good M. Ratichon; not a verygrave one, perhaps, but I have been in the police, and somehow, themoment I caught sight of that blouse and cap in your office, I couldnot help connecting it with the commissionnaire who had brought abogus parcel and letter to my future brother-in-law a few minutesbefore that mysterious and unexplained altercation took place in thecorridor."

  Again I groaned. I felt as a child in the hands of that horridcreature who seemed to be dissecting all the thoughts which had runriot through my mind these past twenty hours.

  "It was all very simple, my good M. Ratichon," now concluded mytormentor still quite amiably. "Another time you will have to be morecareful, will you not? You will also have to bestow more confidence uponyour partner or servant. Directly I had seen that commissionnaire'sblouse and cap, I set to work to make friends with M. Theodore. When mysister and I left your office in the Rue Daunou, we found him waitingfor us at the bottom of the stairs. Five francs loosened his tongue: hesuspected that you were up to some game in which you did not mean him tohave a share; he also told us that you had spent two hours in laboriouswriting, and that you and he both lodged at a dilapidated little inn,called the 'Grey Cat,' in Passy. I think he was rather disappointed thatwe did not shower more questions, and therefore more emoluments, uponhim. Well, after I had denounced this house to the police as aBonapartiste club, and saw it put under the usual consigne, I bribed thecorporal of the gendarmerie in charge of it to let me have Theodore'scompany for the little job I had in hand, and also to clear the backgarden of sentries so as to give you a chance and the desire to escape.All the rest you know. Money will do many things, my good M. Ratichon,and you see how simple it all was. It would have been still more simpleif the stolen document had not been such an important one that the veryexistence of it must be kept a secret even from the police. So I couldnot have you shadowed and arrested as a thief in the usual manner!However, I have the document and its ingenious copy, which is all thatmatters. Would to God," he added with a suppressed curse, "that I couldget hold equally easily of the Secret Service agent to whom you, aFrenchman, were going to sell the honour of your country!"

  Then it was that--though broken in spirit and burning with thoughts ofthe punishment I would mete out to Theodore--my full facultiesreturned to me, and I queried abruptly:

  "What would you give to get him?"

  "Five hundred francs," he replied without hesitation. "Can you findhim?"

  "Make it a thousand," I retorted, "and you shall have him."

  "How?"

  "Will you give me five hundred francs now," I insisted, "and anotherfive hundred when you have the man, and I will tell you?"

  "Agreed," he said impatiently.

  But I was not to be played with by him again. I waited in silenceuntil he had taken a pocket-book from the inside of his coat andcounted out five hundred francs, which he kept in his hand.

  "Now--" he commanded.

  "The man," I then announced calmly, "will call on me for the documentat my lodgings at the hostelry of the 'Grey Cat' to-morrow morning atnine o'clock."

  "Good," rejoined M. Geoffroy. "We shall be there."

  He made no demur about giving me the five hundred francs, but half mypleasure in receiving them vanished when I saw Theodore's bleary eyesfixed ravenously upon them.

  "Another five hundred francs," M. Geoffroy went on quietly, "will beyours as soon as the spy is in our hands."

  I did get that further five hundred of course, for M. Charles Saurezwas punctual to the minute, and M. Geoffroy was there with the policeto apprehend him. But to think that I might have had twentythousand--!

  And I had to give Theodore fifty francs on the transaction, as hethreatened me with the police when I talked of giving him the sack.

  But we were quite good friends again after that until-- But youshall judge.

  CHAPTER II

  A FOOL'S PARADISE