Part 18 (1/2)

It was about nine o'clock in the morning when the Prefect of Police entered the study in which the incomprehensible tragedy of that double murder had been enacted.

He did not even bow to Don Luis; and the magistrates who accompanied him might have thought that Don Luis was merely an a.s.sistant of Sergeant Mazeroux, if the chief detective had not made it his business to tell them, in a few words, the part played by the stranger.

M. Desmalions briefly examined the two corpses and received a rapid explanation from Mazeroux. Then, returning to the hall, he went up to a drawing-room on the first floor, where Mme. Fauville, who had been informed of his visit, joined him almost at once.

Perenna, who had not stirred from the pa.s.sage, slipped into the hall himself. The servants of the house, who by this time had heard of the murder, were crossing it in every direction. He went down the few stairs leading to a ground-floor landing, on which the front door opened.

There were two men there, of whom one said:

”You can't pa.s.s.”

”But--”

”You can't pa.s.s: those are our orders.”

”Your orders? Who gave them?”

”The Prefect himself.”

”No luck,” said Perenna, laughing. ”I have been up all night and I am starving. Is there no way of getting something to eat?”

The two policemen exchanged glances and one of them beckoned to Silvestre and spoke to him. Silvestre went toward the dining-room, and returned with a horseshoe roll.

”Good,” thought Don Luis, after thanking him. ”This settles it. I'm nabbed. That's what I wanted to know. But M. Desmalions is deficient in logic. For, if it's a.r.s.ene Lupin whom he means to detain here, all these worthy plain-clothesmen are hardly enough; and, if it's Don Luis Perenna, they are superfluous, because the flight of Master Perenna would deprive Master Perenna of every chance of seeing the colour of my poor Cosmo's shekels. Having said which, I will take a chair.”

He resumed his seat in the pa.s.sage and awaited events.

Through the open door of the study he saw the magistrates pursuing their investigations. The divisional surgeon made a first examination of the two bodies and at once recognized the same symptoms of poisoning which he himself had perceived, the evening before, on the corpse of Inspector Verot.

Next, the detectives took up the bodies and carried them to the adjoining bedrooms which the father and son formerly occupied on the second floor of the house.

The Prefect of Police then came downstairs; and Don Luis heard him say to the magistrates:

”Poor woman! She refused to understand.... When at last she understood, she fell to the ground in a dead faint. Only think, her husband and her son at one blow!... Poor thing!”

From that moment Perenna heard and saw nothing. The door was shut. The Prefect must afterward have given some order through the outside, through the communication with the front door offered by the garden, for the two detectives came and took up their positions in the hall, at the entrance to the pa.s.sage, on the right and left of the dividing curtain.

”One thing's certain,” thought Don Luis. ”My shares are not booming. What a state Alexandre must be in! Oh, what a state!”

At twelve o'clock Silvestre brought him some food on a tray.

And the long and painful wait began anew.

In the study and in the house, the inquiry, which had been adjourned for lunch, was resumed. Perenna heard footsteps and the sound of voices on every side. At last, feeling tired and bored, he leaned back in his chair and fell asleep.

It was four o'clock when Sergeant Mazeroux came and woke him. As he led him to the study, Mazeroux whispered:

”Well, have you discovered him?”