Books: The Hollow Needle
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Maurice Leblanc >> The Hollow Needle
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"Woe betide the young lady, if she has killed the governor!"
The incident caused a certain stir.
"A word to the wise!" muttered the deputy. "We are now forewarned."
"Monsieur le Comte," said the examining magistrate, "I beg you not
to be alarmed. Nor you either, mademoiselle. This threat is of no
importance, as the police are on the spot. We shall take every
precaution and I will answer for your safety. As for you, gentlemen.
I rely on your discretion. You have been present at this inquiry,
thanks to my excessive kindness toward the Press, and it would be
making me an ill return--"
He interrupted himself, as though an idea had struck him, looked at
the two young men, one after the other, and, going up to the first,
asked:
"What paper do you represent, sir?"
"The Journal de Rouen."
"Have you your credentials?"
"Here."
The card was in order. There was no more to be said. M. Filleul
turned to the other reporter:
"And you, sir?"
"I?"
"Yes, you: what paper do you belong to?"
"Why, Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction, I write for a number of
papers--all over the place--
"Your credentials?"
"I haven't any."
"Oh! How is that?"
"For a newspaper to give you a card, you have to be on its regular
staff."
"Well?"
"Well, I am only an occasional contributor, a free-lance. I send
articles to this newspaper and that. They are published or declined
according to circumstances."
"In that case, what is your name? Where are your papers?"
"My name would tell you nothing. As for papers, I have none."
"You have no paper of any kind to prove your profession!"
"I have no profession."
"But look here, sir," cried the magistrate, with a certain asperity,
"you can't expect to preserve your incognito after introducing
yourself here by a trick and surprising the secrets of the police!"
"I beg to remark, Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction, that you asked me
nothing when I came in, and that therefore I had nothing to say.
Besides, it never struck me that your inquiry was secret, when
everybody was admitted--including even one of the criminals!"
He spoke softly, in a tone of infinite politeness. He was quite a
young man, very tall, very slender and dressed without the least
attempt at fashion, in a jacket and trousers both too small for him.
He had a pink face like a girl's, a broad forehead topped with
close-cropped hair, and a scrubby and ill-trimmed fair beard. His
bright eyes gleamed with intelligence. He seemed not in the least
embarrassed and wore a pleasant smile, free from any shade of
banter.
M. Filleul looked at him with an aggressive air of distrust. The two
gendarmes came forward. The young man exclaimed, gaily:
"Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction, you clearly suspect me of being an
accomplice. But, if that were so, would I not have slipped away at
the right moment, following the example of my fellow-criminal?"
"You might have hoped--"
"Any hope would have been absurd. A moment's reflection, Monsieur le
Juge d'Instruction, will make you agree with me that, logically
speaking--"
M. Filleul looked him straight in the eyes and said, sharply:
"No more jokes! Your name?"
"Isidore Beautrelet."
"Your occupation?"
"Sixth-form pupil at the Lycee Janson-de-Sailly."
M. Filleul opened a pair of startled eyes.
"What are you talking about? Sixth-form pupil--"
"At the Lycee Janson, Rue de la Pompe, number--"
"Oh, look here," exclaimed M. Filleul, "you're trying to take me in!
This won't do, you know; a joke can go too far!"
"I must say, Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction, that your astonishment
surprises me. What is there to prevent my being a sixth-form pupil
at the Lycee Janson? My beard, perhaps? Set your mind at ease: my
beard is false!"
Isidore Beautrelet pulled off the few curls that adorned his chin,
and his beardless face appeared still younger and pinker, a genuine
schoolboy's face. And, with a laugh like a child's, revealing his
white teeth:
"Are you convinced now?" he asked. "Do you want more proofs? Here,
you can read the address on these letters from my father: 'To
Monsieur Isidore Beautrelet, Indoor Pupil, Lycee Janson-de-Sailly.'"
Convinced or not, M. Filleul did not look as if he liked the story.
He asked, gruffly:
"What are you doing here?"
"Why--I'm--I'm improving my mind."
"There are schools for that: yours, for instance."
"You forget, Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction, that this is the
twenty-third of April and that we are in the middle of the Easter
holidays."
"Well?"
"Well, I have every right to spend my holidays as I please."
"Your father--"
"My father lives at the other end of the country, in Savoy, and he
himself advised me to take a little trip on the North Coast."
"With a false beard?"
"Oh, no! That's my own idea. At school, we talk a great deal about
mysterious adventures; we read detective stories, in which people
disguise themselves; we imagine any amount of terrible and intricate
cases. So I thought I would amuse myself; and I put on this false
beard. Besides, I enjoyed the advantage of being taken seriously and
I pretended to be a Paris reporter. That is how, last night, after
an uneventful period of more than a week, I had the pleasure of
making the acquaintance of my Rouen colleague; and, this morning,
when he heard of the Ambrumesy murder, he very kindly suggested that
I should come with him and that we should share the cost of a fly."
Isidore Beautrelet said all this with a frank and artless simplicity
of which it was impossible not to feel the charm. M. Filleul
himself, though maintaining a distrustful reserve, took a certain
pleasure in listening to him. He asked him, in a less peevish tone:
"And are you satisfied with your expedition?"
"Delighted! All the more as I had never been present at a case of
the sort and I find that this one is not lacking in interest."
"Nor in that mysterious intricacy which you prize so highly--"
"And which is so stimulating, Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction! I know
nothing more exciting than to see all the facts coming up out of the
shadow, clustering together, so to speak, and gradually forming the
probable truth."
"The probable truth! You go pretty fast, young man! Do you suggest
that you have your little solution of the riddle ready?"
"Oh, no!" replied Beautrelet, with a laugh.
"Only--it seems to me that there are certain points on which it is
not impossible to form an opinion; and others, even, are so precise
as to warrant--a conclusion."
"Oh, but this is becoming very curious and I shall get to know
something at last! For I confess, to my great confusion, that I know
nothing."
"That is because you have not had time to reflect, Monsieur le Juge
d'Instruction. The great thing is to reflect. Facts very seldom fail
to carry their own explanation!"
"And, according to you, the facts which we have just ascertained
carry their own explanation?"
"Don't you think so yourself? In any case, I have ascertained none
besides those which are set down in the official report."
"Good! So that, if I were to ask you which were the objects stolen
from this room--"
"I should answer that I know."
"Bravo! My gentleman knows more about it than the owner himself. M.
de Gesvres has everything accounted for: M. Isidore Beautrelet has
not. He misses a bookcase in three sections and a life-size statue
which nobody ever noticed. And, if I asked you the name of the
murderer?"
"I should again answer that I know it."
All present gave a start. The deputy and the journalist drew nearer.
M. de Gesvres and the two girls, impressed by Beautrelet's tranquil
assurance, listened attentively.
"You know the murderer's name?"
"Yes."
"And the place where he is concealed, perhaps?"
"Yes."
M. Filleul rubbed his hands.
"What a piece of luck! This capture will do honor to my career. And
can you make me these startling revelations now?"
"Yes, now--or rather, if you do not mind, in an hour or two, when I
shall have assisted at your inquiry to the end."
"No, no, young man, here and now, please." At that moment Raymonde
de Saint-Veran, who had not taken her eyes from Isidore Beautrelet
since the beginning of this scene, came up to M. Filleul:
"Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction--"
"Yes, mademoiselle?"
She hesitated for two or three seconds, with her eyes fixed on
Beautrelet, and then, addressing M. Filleul:
"I should like you to ask monsieur the reason why he was walking
yesterday in the sunk road which leads up to the little door."
It was an unexpected and dramatic stroke. Isidore Beautrelet
appeared nonplussed:
"I, mademoiselle? I? You saw me yesterday?"
Raymonde remained thoughtful, with her eyes upon Beautrelet, as
though she were trying to settle her own conviction, and then said,
in a steady voice:
"At four o'clock in the afternoon, as I was crossing the wood, I met
in the sunk road a young man of monsieur's height, dressed like him
and wearing a beard cut in the same way--and I received a very clear
impression that he was trying to hide."
"And it was I?"
"I could not say that as an absolute certainty, for my recollection
is a little vague. Still--still, I think so--if not, it would be an
unusual resemblance--"
M. Filleul was perplexed. Already taken in by one of the
confederates, was he now going to let himself be tricked by this
self-styled schoolboy? Certainly, the young man's manner spoke in
his favor; but one can never tell!
"What have you to say, sir?"
"That mademoiselle is mistaken, as I can easily show you with one
word. Yesterday, at the time stated, I was at Veules."
"You will have to prove it, you will have to. In any case, the
position is not what it was. Sergeant, one of your men will keep
monsieur company."
Isidore Beautrelet's face denoted a keen vexation.
"Will it be for long?"
"Long enough to collect the necessary information."
"Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction, I beseech you to collect it with
all possible speed and discretion."
"Why?"
"My father is an old man. We are very much attached to each other--
and I would not have him suffer on my account."
The more or less pathetic note in his voice made a bad impression on
M. Filleul. It suggested a scene in a melodrama. Nevertheless, he
promised:
"This evening--or to-morrow at latest, I shall know what to think."
The afternoon was wearing on. The examining magistrate returned to
the ruins of the cloisters, after giving orders that no unauthorized
persons were to be admitted, and patiently, methodically, dividing
the ground into lots which were successively explored, himself
directed the search. But at the end of the day he was no farther
than at the start; and he declared, before an army of reporters who,
during that time, had invaded the chateau:
"Gentlemen, everything leads us to suppose that the wounded man is
here, within our reach; everything, that is, except the reality, the
fact. Therefore, in our humble opinion, he must have escaped and we
shall find him outside."
By way of precaution, however, he arranged, with the sergeant of
gendarmes, for a complete watch to be kept over the park and, after
making a fresh examination of the two drawing rooms, visiting the
whole of the chateau and surrounding himself with all the necessary
information, he took the road back to Dieppe, accompanied by the
deputy prosecutor.
Night fell. As the boudoir was to remain locked, Jean Daval's body
had been moved to another room. Two women from the neighborhood sat
up with it, assisted by Suzanne and Raymonde. Downstairs, young
Isidore Beautrelet slept on the bench in the old oratory, under the
watchful eye of the village policeman, who had been attached to his
person. Outside, the gendarmes, the farmer and a dozen peasants had
taken up their position among the ruins and along the walls.
All was still until eleven o'clock; but, at ten minutes past eleven,
a shot echoed from the other side of the house.
"Attention!" roared the sergeant. "Two men remain here: you,
Fossier--and you, Lecanu--The others at the double!"
They all rushed forward and ran round the house on the left. A
figure was seen to make away in the dark. Then, suddenly, a second
shot drew them farther on, almost to the borders of the farm. And,
all at once, as they arrived, in a band, at the hedge which lines
the orchard, a flame burst out, to the right of the farmhouse, and
other names also rose in a thick column. It was a barn burning,
stuffed to the ridge with straw.
"The scoundrels!" shouted the sergeant. "They've set fire to it.
Have at them, lads! They can't be far away!"
But the wind was turning the flames toward the main building; and it
became necessary, before all things, to ward off the danger. They
all exerted themselves with the greater ardor inasmuch as M. de
Gesvres, hurrying to the scene of the disaster, encouraged them with
the promise of a reward. By the time that they had mastered the
flames, it was two o'clock in the morning. All pursuit would have
been vain.
"We'll look into it by daylight," said the sergeant. "They are sure
to have left traces: we shall find them."
"And I shall not be sorry," added M. de Gesvres, "to learn the
reason of this attack. To set fire to trusses of straw strikes me as
a very useless proceeding."
"Come with me, Monsieur le Comte: I may be able to tell you the
reason."
Together they reached the ruins of the cloisters. The sergeant
called out:
"Lecanu!--Fossier!"
The other gendarmes were already hunting for their comrades whom
they had left standing sentry. They ended by finding them at a few
paces from the little door. The two men were lying full length on
the ground, bound and gagged, with bandages over their eyes.
"Monsieur le Comte," muttered the sergeant, while his men were being
released; "Monsieur le Comte, we have been tricked like children."
"How so?"
"The shots--the attack on the barn--the fire--all so much humbug to
get us down there--a diversion. During that time they were tying up
our two men and the business was done."
"What business?"
"Carrying off the wounded man, of course!"
"You don't mean to say you think--?"
"Think? Why, it's as plain as a pikestaff! The idea came to me ten
minutes ago--but I'm a fool not to have thought of it earlier. We
should have nabbed them all." Quevillon stamped his foot on the
ground, with a sudden attack of rage. "But where, confound it, where
did they go through? Which way did they carry him off? For, dash it
all, we beat the ground all day; and a man can't hide in a tuft of
grass, especially when he's wounded! It's witchcraft, that's what it
is!--"
Nor was this the last surprise awaiting Sergeant Quevillon. At dawn,
when they entered the oratory which had been used as a cell for
young Isidore Beautrelet, they realized that young Isidore
Beautrelet had vanished.
On a chair slept the village policeman, bent in two. By his side
stood a water-bottle and two tumblers. At the bottom of one of those
tumblers a few grains of white powder.
On examination, it was proved, first, that young Isidore Beautrelet
had administered a sleeping draught to the village policeman;
secondly, that he could only have escaped by a window situated at a
height of seven or eight feet in the wall; and lastly--a charming
detail, this--that he could only have reached this window by using
the back of his warder as a footstool.
CHAPTER TWO
ISIDORE BEAUTRELET, SIXTH-FORM SCHOOLBOY
From the Grand Journal.
LATEST NEWS
DOCTOR DELATTRE KIDNAPPED A MAD PIECE OF CRIMINAL DARING
At the moment of going to press, we have received an item of news
which we dare not guarantee as authentic, because of its very
improbable character. We print it, therefore, with all reserve.
Yesterday evening, Dr. Delattre, the well-known surgeon, was
present, with his wife and daughter, at the performance of Hernani
at the Comedie Francaise. At the commencement of the third act, that
is to say, at about ten o'clock, the door of his box opened and a
gentleman, accompanied by two others, leaned over to the doctor and
said to him, in a low voice, but loud enough for Mme. Delattre to
hear:
Doctor, I have a very painful task to fulfil and I shall be very
grateful to you if you will make it as easy for me as you can."
"Who are you, sir?"
"M. Thezard, commissary of police of the first district; and my
instructions are to take you to M. Dudouis, at the prefecture."
"But--"
"Not a word, doctor, I entreat you, not a movement--There is some
regrettable mistake; and that is why we must act in silence and not
attract anybody's attention. You will be back, I have no doubt,
before the end of the performance."
The doctor rose and went with the commissary. At the end of the
performance, he had not returned. Mme. Delattre, greatly alarmed,
drove to the office of the commissary of police. There she found the
real M. Thezard and discovered, to her great terror, that the
individual who had carried off her husband was an impostor.
Inquiries made so far have revealed the fact that the doctor stepped
into a motor car and that the car drove off in the direction of the
Concorde.
Readers will find further details of this incredible adventure in
our second edition.
Incredible though it might be, the adventure was perfectly true.
Besides, the issue was not long delayed and the Grand Journal, while
confirming the story in its midday edition, described in a few lines
the dramatic ending with which it concluded:
ISIDORE BEAUTRELET THE STORY ENDS
AND
GUESS-WORK BEGINS
Dr. Delattre was brought back to 78, Rue Duret, at nine o'clock this
morning, in a motor car which drove away immediately at full speed.
No. 78, Rue Duret, is the address of Dr. Delattre's clinical
surgery, at which he arrives every morning at the same hour. When we
sent in our card, the doctor, though closeted with the chief of the
detective service, was good enough to consent to receive us.
"All that I can tell you," he said, in reply to our questions, "is
that I was treated with the greatest consideration. My three
companions were the most charming people I have ever met,
exquisitely well-mannered and bright and witty talkers: a quality
not to be despised, in view of the length of the journey."
"How long did it take?"
"About four hours and as long returning."
"And what was the object of the journey?"
"I was taken to see a patient whose condition rendered an immediate
operation necessary."
"And was the operation successful?"
"Yes, but the consequences may be dangerous. I would answer for the
patient here. Down there--under his present conditions--"
"Bad conditions?"
"Execrable!--A room in an inn--and the practically absolute
impossibility of being attended to."
"Then what can save him?"
"A miracle--and his constitution, which is an exceptionally strong
one."
"And can you say nothing more about this strange patient?"
"No. In the first place, I have taken an oath; and, secondly, I have
received a present of ten thousand francs for my free surgery. If I
do not keep silence, this sum will be taken from me."
"You are joking! Do you believe that?"
"Indeed I do. The men all struck me as being very much in earnest."
This is the statement made to us by Dr. Delattre. And we know, on
the other hand, that the head of the detective service, in spite of
all his insisting, has not yet succeeded in extracting any more
precise particulars from him as to the operation which he performed,
the patient whom he attended or the district traversed by the car.
It is difficult, therefore, to arrive at the truth.
This truth, which the writer of the interview confessed himself
unable to discover, was guessed by the more or less clear-sighted
minds that perceived a connection with the facts which had occurred
the day before at the Chateau d'Ambrumesy, and which were reported,
down to the smallest detail, in all the newspapers of that day.
There was evidently a coincidence to be reckoned with in the
disappearance of a wounded burglar and the kidnapping of a famous
surgeon.
The judical inquiry, moreover, proved the correctness of the
hypothesis. By following the track of the sham flyman, who had fled
on a bicycle, they were able to show that he had reached the forest
of Arques, at some ten miles' distance, and that from there, after
throwing his bicycle into a ditch, he had gone to the village of
Saint-Nicolas, whence he had dispatched the following telegram:
A. L. N., Post-office 45, Paris. Situation desperate. Operation
urgently necessary. Send celebrity by national road fourteen.
The evidence was undeniable. Once apprised the accomplices in Paris
hastened to make their arrangements. At ten o'clock in the evening
they sent their celebrity by National Road No. 14, which skirts the
forest of Arques and ends at Dieppe. During this time, under cover
of the fire which they themselves had caused, the gang of burglars
carried off their leader and moved him to an inn, where the
operation took place on the arrival of the surgeon, at two o'clock
in the morning.
About that there was no doubt. At Pontoise, at Gournay, at Forges,
Chief-inspector Ganimard, who was sent specially from Paris, with
Inspector Folenfant, as his assistant, ascertained that a motor car
had passed in the course of the previous night. The same on the road
from Dieppe to Ambrumesy. And, though the traces of the car were
lost at about a mile and a half from the chateau, at least a number
of footmarks were seen between the little door in the park wall and
the abbey ruins. Besides, Ganimard remarked that the lock of the
little door had been forced.
So all was explained. It remained to decide which inn the doctor had
spoken of: an easy piece of work for a Ganimard, a professional
ferret, a patient old stager of the police. The number of inns is
limited and this one, given the condition of the wounded man, could
only be one quite close to Ambrumesy. Ganimard and Sergeant
Quevillon set to work. Within a circle of five hundred yards, of a
thousand yards, of fifteen hundred yards, they visited and ransacked
everything that could pass for an inn. But, against all expectation,
the dying man persisted in remaining invisible.
Ganimard became more resolved than ever. He came back to sleep at
the chateau, on the Saturday night, with the intention of making his
personal inquiry on the Sunday. On Sunday morning, he learned that,
during the night, a posse of gendarmes had seen a figure gliding
along the sunk road, outside the wall. Was it an accomplice who had
come back to investigate? Were they to suppose that the leader of
the gang had not left the cloisters or the neighborhood of the
cloisters?
That night, Ganimard openly sent the squad of gendarmes to the farm
and posted himself and Folenfant outside the walls, near the little
door.
A little before midnight, a person passed out of the wood, slipped
between them, went through the door and entered the park. For three
hours, they saw him wander from side to side across the ruins,
stooping, climbing up the old pillars, sometimes remaining for long
minutes without moving. Then he went back to the door and again
passed between the two inspectors.
Ganimard caught him by the collar, while Folenfant seized him round
the body. He made no resistance of any kind and, with the greatest
docility, allowed them to bind his wrists and take him to the house.
But, when they attempted to question him, he replied simply that he
owed them no account of his doings and that he would wait for the
arrival of the examining magistrate. Thereupon, they fastened him
firmly to the foot of a bed, in one of the two adjoining rooms which
they occupied.
At nine o'clock on Monday morning, as soon as M. Filleul had
arrived, Ganimard announced the capture which he had made. The
prisoner was brought downstairs. It was Isidore Beautrelet.
"M. Isidore Beautrelet!" exclaimed M. Filleul with an air of
rapture, holding out both his hands to the newcomer. "What a
delightful surprise! Our excellent amateur detective here! And at
our disposal too! Why, it's a windfall!--M. Chief-inspector, allow
me to introduce to you M. Isidore Beautrelet, a sixth-form pupil at
the Lycee Janson-de-Sailly."
Ganimard seemed a little nonplussed. Isidore made him a very low
bow, as though he were greeting a colleague whom he knew how to
esteem at his true value, and, turning to M. Filleul:
"It appears, Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction, that you have received
a satisfactory account of me?"
"Perfectly satisfactory! To begin with, you were really at Veules-
les-Roses at the time when Mlle. de Saint-Veran thought she saw you
in the sunk road. I dare say we shall discover the identity of your
double. In the second place, you are in very deed Isidore
Beautrelet, a sixth-form pupil and, what is more, an excellent
pupil, industrious at your work and of exemplary behavior. As your
father lives in the country, you go out once a month to his
correspondent, M. Bernod, who is lavish in his praises of you."
"So that--"
"So that you are free, M. Isidore Beautrelet."
"Absolutely free?"
"Absolutely. Oh, I must make just one little condition, all the
same. You can understand that I can't release a gentleman who
administers sleeping-draughts, who escapes by the window and who is
afterward caught in the act of trespassing upon private property. I
can't release him without a compensation of some kind."
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