第53章

"What's the good? What's the use of finding out how he came, when we know that he did come?"He examined the letter for some time, turned it over and over, then stood up and said:

"Come along."

"Where to?"

"Gare de Lyon."

"Are you sure?"

"I am sure of nothing with Daubrecq.But, as we have to choose, according to the contents of the letter, between the Gare de l'Est and the Gare de Lyon, I am presuming that his business, his pleasure and his health are more likely to take Daubrecq in the direction of Marseilles and the Riviera than to the Gare de l'Est."________________________________________________________________________These are the only two main-line stations in Paris with the word de in their name.The others have du, as the Gare du Nord or the Gare du Luxembourg, d' as the Gare d'Orleans, or no particle at all, as the Gare Saint-Lazare or the Gare Montpamasse.- Translator's Note.

________________________________________________________________________It was past seven when Lupin and his companions left the Hotel Franklin.

A motor-car took them across Paris at full speed, but they soon saw that Clarisse Mergy was not outside the station, nor in the waiting-rooms, nor on any of the platforms.

"Still," muttered Lupin, whose agitation grew as the obstacles increased, "still, if Daubrecq booked a berth in a sleeping-car, it can only have been in an evening train.And it is barely half-past seven!"A train was starting, the night express.They had time to rush along the corridor.Nobody...neither Mme.Mergy nor Daubrecq...

But, as they were all three going, a porter accosted them near the refreshment-room:

"Is one of you gentlemen looking for a lady?""Yes, yes,...I am," said Lupin."Quick, what is it?""Oh, it's you, sir! The lady told me there might be three of you or two of you....And I didn't know...""But, in heaven's name, speak, man! What lady?""The lady who spent the whole day on the pavement, with the luggage, waiting.""Well, out with it! Has she taken a train?""Yes, the train-de-luxe, at six-thirty: she made up her mind at the last moment, she told me to say.And I was also to say that the gentleman was in the same train and that they were going to Monte Carlo.""Damn it!" muttered Lupin."We ought to have taken the express just now!

There's nothing left but the evening trains, and they crawl! We've lost over three hours."The wait seemed interminable.They booked their seats.They telephoned to the proprietor of the Hotel Franklin to send on their letters to Monte Carlo.They dined.They read the papers.At last, at half-past nine, the train started.

And so, by a really tragic series of circumstances, at the most critical moment of the contest, Lupin was turning his back on the battlefield and going away, at haphazard, to seek, he knew not where, and beat, he knew not how, the most formidable and elusive enemy that he had ever fought.

And this was happening four days, five days at most, before the inevitable execution of Gilbert and Vaucheray.

It was a bad and painful night for Lupin.The more he studied the situation the more terrible it appeared to him.On every side he was faced with uncertainty, darkness, confusion, helplessness.

True, he knew the secret of the crystal stopper.But how was he to know that Daubrecq would not change or had not already changed his tactics?

How was he to know that the list of the Twenty-seven was still inside that crystal stopper or that the crystal stopper was still inside the object where Daubrecq had first hidden it?