第2章

"It's Leonard, the valet!" cried Gilbert.

"If he makes a fuss, I'll out him," growled Vaucheray.

"You'll jolly well do nothing of the sort, do you hear, Vaucheray?" said Lupin, peremptorily.And he darted off in pursuit of the servant.He first went through a dining-room, where he saw a lamp still lit, with plates and a bottle around it, and he found Leonard at the further end of a pantry, making vain efforts to open the window:

"Don't move, sportie! No kid! Ah, the brute!

He had thrown himself flat on the floor, on seeing Leonard raise his arm at him.Three shots were fired in the dusk of the pantry; and then the valet came tumbling to the ground, seized by the legs by Lupin, who snatched his weapon from him and gripped him by the throat:

"Get out, you dirty brute!" he growled."He very nearly did for me...

Here, Vaucheray, secure this gentleman!

He threw the light of his pocket-lantern on the servant's face and chuckled:

"He's not a pretty gentleman either...You can't have a very clear conscience, Leonard; besides, to play flunkey to Daubrecq the deputy...!

Have you finished, Vaucheray? I don't want to hang about here for ever!""There's no danger, governor," said Gilbert.

"Oh, really?...So you think that shots can't be heard?...""Quite impossible."

"No matter, we must look sharp.Vaucheray, take the lamp and let's go upstairs."He took Gilbert by the arm and, as he dragged him to the first floor:

"You ass," he said, "is that the way you make inquiries? Wasn't I right to have my doubts?""Look here, governor, I couldn't know that he would change his mind and come back to dinner.""One's got to know everything when one has the honour of breaking into people's houses.You numskull! I'll remember you and Vaucheray...a nice pair of gossoons!..."The sight of the furniture on the first floor pacified Lupin and he started on his inventory with the satisfied air of a collector who has looked in to treat himself to a few works of art:

"By Jingo! There's not much of it, but what there is is pucka! There's nothing the matter with this representative of the people in the question of taste.Four Aubusson chairs...A bureau signed 'Percier-Fontaine,' for a wager...Two inlays by Gouttieres...A genuine Fragonard and a sham Nattier which any American millionaire will swallow for the asking: in short, a fortune...And there are curmudgeons who pretend that there's nothing but faked stuff left.Dash it all, why don't they do as I do?

They should look about!"

Gilbert and Vaucheray, following Lupin's orders and instructions, at once proceeded methodically to remove the bulkier pieces.The first boat was filled in half an hour; and it was decided that the Growler and the Masher should go on ahead and begin to load the motor-car.

Lupin went to see them start.On returning to the house, it struck him, as he passed through the hall, that he heard a voice in the pantry.He went there and found Leonard lying flat on his stomach, quite alone, with his hands tied behind his back:

"So it's you growling, my confidential flunkey? Don't get excited: it's almost finished.Only, if you make too much noise, you'll oblige us to take severer measures...Do you like pears? We might give you one, you know: a choke-pear!..."As he went upstairs, he again heard the same sound and, stopping to listen, he caught these words, uttered in a hoarse, groaning voice, which came, beyond a doubt, from the pantry:

"Help!...Murder!...Help!...I shall be killed!...Inform the commissary!""The fellow's clean off his chump!" muttered Lupin."By Jove!...To disturb the police at nine o'clock in the evening: there's a notion for you!"He set to work again.It took longer than he expected, for they discovered in the cupboards all sorts of valuable knickknacks which it would have been very wrong to disdain and, on the other hand, Vaucheray and Gilbert were going about their investigations with signs of laboured concentration that nonplussed him.

At long last, he lost his patience:

"That will do!" he said."We're not going to spoil the whole job and keep the motor waiting for the sake of the few odd bits that remain.

I'm taking the boat."

They were now by the waterside and Lupin went down the steps.Gilbert held him back:

"I say, governor, we want one more look round five minutes, no longer.""But what for, dash it all?"

"Well, it's like this: we were told of an old reliquary, something stunning...""Well?"

"We can't lay our hands on it.And I was thinking...There's a cupboard with a big lock to it in the pantry...You see, we can't very well..."He was already on his way to the villa.Vaucheray ran back too.

"I'll give you ten minutes, not a second longer!" cried Lupin."In ten minutes, I'm off."But the ten minutes passed and he was still waiting.

He looked at his watch:

"A quarter-past nine," he said to himself."This is madness."And he also remembered that Gilbert and Vaucheray had behaved rather queerly throughout the removal of the things, keeping close together and apparently watching each other.What could be happening?

Lupin mechanically returned to the house, urged by a feeling of anxiety which he was unable to explain; and, at the same time, he listened to a dull sound which rose in the distance, from the direction of Eughien, and which seemed to be coming nearer...People strolling about, no doubt...

He gave a sharp whistle and then went to the main gate, to take a glance down the avenue.But, suddeniy, as he was opening the gate, a shot rang out, followed by a yell of pain.He returned at a run, went round the house, leapt up the steps and rushed to the dining-room:

"Blast it all, what are you doing there, you two?"Gilbert and Vaucheray, locked in a furious embrace, were rolling on the floor, uttering cries of rage.Their clothes were dripping with blood.

Lupin flew at them to separate them.But already Gilbert had got his adversary down and was wrenching out of his hand something which Lupin had no time to see.And Vaucheray, who was losing blood through a wound in the shoulder, fainted.