Part 44 (2/2)
”Yours very truly, ”BARON VICTOR D'IMBLEVALLE.”
”Well,” said Shears, ”this comes just at the right time: why shouldn't I take a little run to Paris? I haven't been there since my famous duel with a.r.s.ene Lupin and I shan't be sorry to re-visit it under rather more peaceful conditions.”
He tore the cheque into four pieces and, while Wilson, whose arm had not yet recovered from the injury received in the course of the aforesaid encounter, was inveighing bitterly against Paris and all its inhabitants, he opened the second envelope.
A movement of irritation at once escaped him; he knitted his brow as he read the letter and, when he had finished, he crumpled it into a ball and threw it angrily on the floor.
”What's the matter?” exclaimed Wilson, in amazement.
He picked up the ball, unfolded it and read, with ever-increasing stupefaction:
”MY DEAR MAiTRE:
”You know my admiration for you and the interest which I take in your reputation. Well, accept my advice and have nothing to do with the case in which you are asked to a.s.sist. Your interference would do a great deal of harm, all your efforts would only bring about a pitiable result and you would be obliged publicly to acknowledge your defeat.
”I am exceedingly anxious to spare you this humiliation and I beg you, in the name of our mutual friends.h.i.+p, to remain very quietly by your fireside.
”Give my kind remembrances to Dr. Wilson and accept for yourself the respectful compliments of
”Yours most sincerely, ”a.r.s.eNE LUPIN.”
”a.r.s.ene Lupin!” repeated Wilson, in bewilderment.
Shears banged the table with his fist:
”Oh, I'm getting sick of the brute! He laughs at me as if I were a schoolboy! I am publicly to acknowledge my defeat, am I? Didn't I compel him to give up the blue diamond?”
”He's afraid of you,” suggested Wilson.
”You're talking nonsense! a.r.s.ene Lupin is never afraid; and the proof is that he challenges me.”
”But how does he come to know of Baron d'Imblevalle's letter?”
”How can I tell? You're asking silly questions, my dear fellow!”
”I thought ... I imagined....”
”What? That I am a sorcerer?”
”No, but I have seen you perform such marvels!”
”No one is able to perform marvels.... I no more than another. I make reflections, deductions, conclusions, but I don't make guesses. Only fools make guesses.”
Wilson adopted the modest att.i.tude of a beaten dog and did his best, lest he should be a fool, not to guess why Shears was striding angrily up and down the room. But, when Shears rang for the servant and asked for his travelling-bag, Wilson thought himself ent.i.tled, since this was a material fact, to reflect, deduce and conclude that his chief was going on a journey.
The same mental operation enabled him to declare, in the tone of a man who has no fear of the possibility of a mistake:
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