The Secret Tomb by Maurice Leblanc (i like reading .txt) 📕

“Yes.”

“Then he’s sleeping like a log; and we can go straight to him. Not another word!”

On their way they stopped at a door. It was the dressing-room adjoining the boudoir of the Countess. Saint-Quentin set his ladder against it and climbed through the transom.

Three minutes later he came back.

“Did you find the cardboard box?” Dorothy asked.

“Yes. I found it on the table, took the earrings out of it, and put the box back in its place with the rubber ring round it.”

They went on down the passage.

Each bedroom had a dressing-room and a closet which served as wardrobe attached to it. They stopped before the last transom; Saint-Quentin climbed through it and opened the door of the dressing-room for Dorothy.

There was a door between the dressing-room and the bedroom. Dorothy opened it an inch and let a ray from her lantern fall on the bed.

“He’s asleep,” she whispered.

She drew a large handkerchief from her bag, uncorked a small bottle of chloroform and poured some drops on the handkerchief.

Across the bed, in his clothes, like a man suddenly overcome by sleep, d’Estreicher was sleeping so deeply that the young girl switched on the electric light. Then very gently she placed the chloroformed handkerchief over his face.

The man sighed, writhed, and was still.

Very cautiously Dorothy and Saint-Quentin passed two slipknots in a rope over both of his arms and tied the two ends of it round the iron uprights of the bed. Then quickly without bothering about him they wrapped the bedclothes round his body and legs, and tied them round him with the tablecloth and curtain-cords.

Then d’Estreicher did awake. He tried to defend himself⁠—too late. He called out. Dorothy gagged him with a napkin.

Next morning the Count and Countess de Chagny were taking their coffee with Raoul Davernoie in the big dining-room of the château when the porter came to inform them that at daybreak the directress of Dorothy’s Circus had asked him to open the gates and that the caravan had departed. The directress had left a letter addressed to the Count de Chagny. All three of them went upstairs to the Countess’s boudoir. The letter ran as follows:

“My cousin”⁠—offended by her brusqueness, the Count started⁠—then he went on:

“My cousin: I took an oath, and I keep it. The man who was making excavations round the château and last night stole the earrings, is the same person who five years ago stole the medal and poisoned my father.

“I hand him over to you. Let justice take its course.

“Dorothy, Princess of Argonne.”

The Count and Countess and their cousin gazed at one another in amazement. What did it mean? Who was the culprit. How and where had she handed him over?

“It’s a pity that d’Estreicher isn’t down,” said the Count. “He is so helpful.”

The Countess took up the cardboard box which d’Estreicher had entrusted to her and opened it without more ado. The box contained exactly what Dorothy had told them, some white pebbles and shells. Then why did d’Estreicher seem to attach so much importance to his finding it?

Someone knocked gently at the boudoir door. It was the majordomo, the Count’s confidential man.

“What is it, Dominique?”

“The château was broken into last night.”

“Impossible!” the Count declared in a positive tone. “The doors were all locked. Where did they break in?”

“I don’t know. But I’ve found a ladder against the wall by Monsieur d’Estreicher’s bedroom; and the transom is broken. The criminals made their way into the dressing-room and when they had done the job, came out through the bedroom door.”

“What job?”

“I don’t know, sir. I didn’t like to go further into the matter by myself. I put everything back in its place.”

The Count de Chagny drew a hundred-franc note from his pocket.

“Not a word of this, Dominique. Watch the corridor and see that no one disturbs us.”

Raoul and his wife followed him. The door between d’Estreicher’s dressing-room and bedroom was half open. The smell of chloroform filled the room.

The Count uttered a cry.

On his bed lay d’Estreicher gagged and safely bound to it. His eyes were rolling wildly. He was groaning.

Beside him lay the muffler which Dorothy had described as belonging to the man who was engaged in making excavations.

On the table, well in sight, lay the sapphire earrings.

But a terrifying, overwhelming sight met the eyes of all three of them simultaneously⁠—the irrefutable proof of the murder of Jean d’Argonne and the theft of the medal. His right arm, bare, was stretched out across the bed, fastened by the wrist. And on that arm they read, tattooed:

In robore fortuna.

Every day, at the easy walk or slack trot of One-eyed Magpie, Dorothy’s Circus moved on. In the afternoon they gave their performance; after it they strolled about those old towns of France, the picturesque charm of which appealed so strongly to the young girl. Domfront, Mortain, Avranches, Fougères, Vitré, feudal cities, girdled in places by their fortifications, or bristling with their ancient keeps.⁠ ⁠… Dorothy visited them with all the emotion of a creature who understands the past and evokes it with a passionate enthusiasm.

She visited them alone, even as she walked alone along the high roads, with so manifest a desire to keep to herself that the others, while watching her with anxious eyes and silently begging for a glance from their little mother, did not speak a word to her.

That lasted a week, a very dull week for the children. The pale Saint-Quentin walked at the head of One-eyed Magpie as he would have walked at the head of a horse drawing a hearse. Castor and Pollux fought no longer. As for the captain he buried himself in the perusal of his lesson-books and wore himself out over addition and subtraction, knowing that Dorothy, the schoolmistress of the troupe, as a rule deeply appreciated these fits of industry. His efforts were vain. Dorothy was thinking of something else.

Every morning, at the first village