File No. 113 by Emile Gaboriau (classic literature books TXT) 📕

with suppressed anger, and he looked as if about to be struck by apoplexy. Prosper was as pale and motionless as a corpse.

Silent and immovable, they stood glaring at each other with mortal hatred.

M. Verduret curiously watched these two enemies, with the indifference and coolness of a philosopher, who, in the most violent outbursts of human passion, merely sees subjects for meditation and study.

Finally, the silence becoming more and more threatening, he decided to break it by speaking to the banker:

“I suppose you know, monsieur, that my young relative has just been released from prison.”

“Yes,” replied M. Fauvel, making an effort to control himself, “yes, for want of sufficient proof.”

“Exactly so, monsieur, and this want of proof, as stated in the decision of ‘Not proven,’ ruins the prospects of my relative, and compels him to leave here at once for America.”

M. Fauvel’s features relaxed as if he had been relieved of some fearful agony.

“Ah, he is going away,” he said, “he is going abroad.”

There was no mistaking the resentful, almost insulting intonation of the words, “going away!”

M. Verduret took no notice of M. Fauvel’s manner.

“It appears to me,” he continued, in an easy tone, “that Prosper’s determination is a wise one. I merely wished him, before leaving Paris, to come and pay his respects to his former chief.”

The banker smiled bitterly.

“M. Bertomy might have spared us both this painful meeting. I have nothing to say to him, and of course he can have nothing to tell me.”

This was a formal dismissal; and M. Verduret, understanding it thus, bowed to M. Fauvel, and left the room, accompanied by Prosper, who had not opened his lips.

They had reached the street before Prosper recovered the use of his tongue.

“I hope you are satisfied, monsieur,” he said, in a gloomy tone; “you exacted this painful step, and I could only acquiesce. Have I gained anything by adding this humiliation to the others which I have suffered?”

“You have not, but I have,” replied M. Verduret. “I could find no way of gaining access to M. Fauvel, save through you; and now I have found out what I wanted to know. I am convinced that M. Fauvel had nothing to do with the robbery.”

“Oh, monsieur!” objected Prosper, “innocence can be feigned.”

“Certainly, but not to this extent. And this is not all. I wished to find out if M. Fauvel would be accessible to certain suspicions. I am now confident that he is.”

Prosper and his companion had stopped to talk more at their ease, near the corner of the Rue Lafitte, in the middle of a large space which had lately been cleared by pulling down an old house.

M. Verduret seemed to be anxious, and was constantly looking around as if he expected someone.

He soon uttered an exclamation of satisfaction.

At the other end of the vacant space, he saw Cavaillon, who was bareheaded and running.

He was so excited that he did not even stop to shake hands with Prosper, but darted up to M. Verduret, and said:

“They have gone, monsieur!”

“How long since?”

“They went about a quarter of an hour ago.”

“The deuce they did! Then we have not an instant to lose.”

He handed Cavaillon the note he had written some hours before at Prosper’s house.

“Here, send him this, and then return at once to your desk; you might be missed. It was very imprudent in you to come out without your hat.”

Cavaillon ran off as quickly as he had come. Prosper was stupefied.

“What!” he exclaimed. “You know Cavaillon?”

“So it seems,” answered M. Verduret with a smile, “but we have no time to talk; come on, hurry!”

“Where are we gong now?”

“You will soon know; walk fast!”

And he set the example by striding rapidly toward the Rue Lafayette. As they went along he continued talking more to himself than to Prosper.

“Ah,” said he, “it is not by putting both feet in one shoe, that one wins a race. The track once found, we should never rest an instant. When the savage discovers the footprints of an enemy, he follows it persistently, knowing that falling rain or a gust of wind may efface the footprints at any moment. It is the same with us: the most trifling incident may destroy the traces we are following up.”

M. Verduret suddenly stopped before a door bearing the number 81.

“We are going in here,” he said to Prosper; “come.”

They went up the steps, and stopped on the second floor, before a door over which was a large sign, “Fashionable Dressmaker.”

A handsome bell-rope hung on the wall, but M. Verduret did not touch it. He tapped with the ends of his fingers in a peculiar way, and the door instantly opened as if someone had been watching for his signal on the other side.

The door was opened by a neatly dressed woman of about forty. She quietly ushered M. Verduret and Prosper into a neat dining-room with several doors opening into it.

This woman bowed humbly to M. Verduret, as if he were some superior being.

He scarcely noticed her salutation, but questioned her with a look. His look said:

“Well?”

She bowed affirmatively:

“Yes.”

“In there?” asked M. Verduret in a low tone, pointing to one of the doors.

“No,” said the woman in the same tone, “over there, in the little parlor.”

M. Verduret opened the door pointed out, and pushed Prosper into the little parlor, whispering, as he did so:

“Go in, and keep your presence of mind.”

But his injunction was useless. The instant he cast his eyes around the room into which he had so unceremoniously been pushed without any warning, Prosper exclaimed, in a startled voice:

“Madeleine!”

It was indeed M. Fauvel’s niece, looking more beautiful than ever. Hers was that calm, dignified beauty which imposes admiration and respect.

Standing in the middle of the room, near a table covered