Arsène Lupin intervenes
and Monsieur Gassire, as was his custom, breakfasted in leisurely
fashion, opened his letters and glanced through the morning paper while
he awaited the arrival of his clerks.
Suddenly, just five minutes before nine, he thought he heard a noise in
his bedroom. Remembering the bundle of securities which he had left in
there, he jumped up, overturning his coffee-cup in his agitation. In a
twinkling he was in the other room, but—the bundle of securities had
vanished! At the very same moment he heard the hall-door on the landing
slam violently.
Monsieur Gassire tried to open it, but it was a spring lock and he had
left the key on his desk. He was afraid that if he went to get it the
thief would escape without being seen.
He therefore opened the hall window, which gave on the street. It was
physically impossible for any one to have had time to leave the
building. In any case, the street was empty.
Mastering his excitement, Monsieur Nicolas Gassire refrained from
crying “Thief!” But, a minute later, when he caught sight of his head
clerk coming towards the house from the direction of the neighboring
boulevard, he beckoned furiously to him.
“Hurry up, Sarlonat!” he cried, leaning out of the window. “Come in,
lock the street door and don’t let any one out. I’ve been robbed!”
As soon as his commands had been obeyed, he hastened downstairs,
panting and distraught.
“Tell me, Sarlonat, have you seen anybody?”
“Not a soul, monsieur.”
He hurried to the concierge’s little room, which was wedged between the
foot of the stairs and a small, dark courtyard. She was sweeping the
floor.
“Madame Alain, I’ve been robbed!” he cried. “Is any one hiding here?”
“Why, no, monsieur,” faltered the poor woman in utter bewilderment.
“Where do you keep the key to my flat?”
“I put it here, monsieur, behind the clock. Anyhow, no one could have
taken it, for I’ve not stirred out of my room this last half-hour.”
“That means that instead of coming down the thief must have run
upstairs. Oh, this is terrible, terrible!”
Nicolas Gassire went back to the street door. His other two clerks had
just come on the scene. Hurriedly, in a few breathless words, he gave
them their orders. They were to let no one enter or leave the house
until he came back.
“You understand, Sarlonat? No one.”
He dashed upstairs and into his flat. In an instant he had grabbed hold
of the telephone.
“Hello!” he bawled into the mouthpiece, “hello! Put me through to the
Préfecture!... No, I don’t mean police headquarters, you fool, I mean
the café de la Préfecture ... what number is it?... How should I
know?... Hurry!... Give me information.... Oh, be quick, be quick,
can’t you!”
Dancing with rage the little man at last succeeded in getting on to the
proprietor of the café, and thundered:
“Is Inspector Béchoux there? Then call him to the telephone—at once.
Hurry ... hurry! I want him on business. There’s no time to lose....
Hello!... Inspector Béchoux? This is Gassire speaking, Béchoux.... Yes,
I’m all right ... at least, I’m not ... I’ve just been robbed of some
securities—a whole bundle.... I’m waiting for you.... What’s that? Say
it again!... You can’t come? You’re off on your holiday? Holiday be
hanged, man! Béchoux, you must come, as quickly as possible! Your
twelve African mining shares were in the bundle!”
Monsieur Gassire heard a volcanic monosyllable at the other end, which
fully reassured him on the score of Inspector Béchoux’s purpose and
promptitude. Indeed, it was barely a quarter of an hour before
Inspector Béchoux arrived, running, his face a study in abject anxiety.
He rushed up to the stockbroker.
“My Nigger Boys! My Twelve Little Nigger Boys! All my savings! What’s
become of them?”
“Stolen, along with the bonds and shares of other clients ... and all
my own securities.”
“Stolen?”
“Yes, from my bedroom, half an hour ago!”
“Damnation! But what were my Nigger Boys doing in your room?”
“I took the bundle out of the safe at the Crédit Lyonnais yesterday to
deposit it at another bank, nearer here. And I made the mistake of——”
Béchoux’s hand descended heavily on the other’s shoulder.
“I shall hold you responsible, Gassire. You will have to make good my
loss.”
“How can I? I’m ruined.”
“What do you mean? You have this house.”
“Mortgaged to the hilt!”
The two men faced each other, convulsed with rage and shouting
unintelligibly.
The concierge and the three clerks had also lost their heads, and were
barring the way to two girls from the top floor, who had just come down
and were quite determined to be allowed out.
“Nobody shall leave this house!” roared Béchoux, beside himself with
fury. “Nobody shall leave this house until my Twelve Little Nigger Boys
are restored to me!”
“Perhaps we’d better call in help,” suggested Gassire. “There’s the
butcher’s boy ... and the grocer ... they’re both dependable.”
“Not for me,” the inspector pronounced with decision. “If we need some
one else we’ll telephone the Barnett Agency in the rue Laborde. Then
we’ll notify the police. But for the moment that would be sheer waste
of time. Action is what we want!”
He tried to control himself and to regain the pontifical calm that best
befits a police inspector. But he was trembling from head to foot, and
his quivering mouth betrayed his distress.
“Keep your head,” he told Gassire. “After all, we have the whip hand.
Nobody has left the house. The thing is to retrieve my little Nigger
Boys before any one can find a way of sneaking them out of the
building. That’s all that really matters.”
He turned to the two girls and began to question them. He ascertained
that one was a typist who copied reports and circulars at home. The
other gave lessons in flute-playing, also at home. They were both
anxious to get out and do their marketing before lunch, but Béchoux was
adamant.
“I’m sorry,” he said, “but this door stays closed for the morning.
Monsieur Gassire, two of your clerks shall mount guard here. The third
can run errands for the tenants. In the afternoon the latter will be
allowed out, but with my permission only in each case, and all parcels,
boxes, baskets or packages of any kind will be submitted to a rigorous
search. You have your orders. Now, Monsieur Gassire, it is for us to
get to work. The concierge will lead the way.”
The building was so planned as to make investigation easy. There were
three upper stories, with a single flat on each floor. This made four
flats in the house, counting that on the ground floor, which was
temporarily unoccupied. Monsieur Gassire lived on the first floor. On
the second dwelt Monsieur Touffémont, an ex-Cabinet Minister. The top
floor was partitioned off into two flatlets, occupied by Mademoiselle
Legoffier, the typist, and Mademoiselle Haveline, who taught the flute.
That morning Monsieur Touffémont had left at half-past eight for the
Chambre des Députés, where he was president of a commission. Since his
flat was cleaned by a woman who came in daily at lunch-time and had not
yet arrived, they decided to await his return.
First, then, they explored the girls’ rooms thoroughly, and satisfied
themselves that the missing securities were not there.
Next they searched every corner of the attic at the top of the house,
getting up there by means of a ladder.
After this, choking with dust, they came downstairs again and searched
the courtyard and Monsieur Gassire’s own flat.
Their efforts went unrewarded. In bitterness of spirit, Béchoux brooded
over the unkind fate that had overtaken his Twelve Little Nigger Boys.
Towards noon Monsieur Touffémont came in. He proved to be an earnest
parliamentarian, burdened with the type of portfolio proper to the use
of an ex-Cabinet Minister. His industry commanded the respect of all
parties in the house, and his rare but masterly interventions could
make a Cabinet tremble apprehensively.
With measured tread he approached the concierge’s room and asked for
his letters. Gassire came up to him and told him of the theft.
Touffémont gave him that grave attention he seemed to bestow even on
the most flippant utterances. Then he promised his coöperation if
Gassire decided to call in the police, and urged at the same time that
they should search his flat.
“You never know,” he said. “Someone might have got in with a skeleton
key.”
Accordingly they searched the flat, but here again they drew a blank.
Béchoux and Gassire tried to keep one another’s courage up by voicing
each in turn his meed of hope and comfort, but their words rang hollow
and their faces grew drawn and pale.
At last they thought they would go in search of refreshment to a small
café just opposite, so placed that they could keep an eye on the home
all the time. But when they got there, Béchoux found he had no
appetite. The Twelve Little Nigger Boys lay heavy on his stomach.
Gassire said that he felt dizzy. No, he wouldn’t take anything, thank
you. They both went over and over what had happened, trying to find
some ray of reassurance in the prevailing gloom.
“It’s quite obvious,” said Béchoux. “Someone got into your flat and
stole the securities. Well, as the thief can’t have escaped from the
building, that means that he or she is still in the house.”
“Absolutely,” agreed Gassire.
“And if he or she is in the house, my Twelve Little Nigger Boys are
there too. Hang it all, they can’t have flown out through the roof!”
“Not unless they were nigger angels,” suggested Gassire.
“So,” Béchoux went on, ignoring him, “we are forced to the conclusion
that——”
He never finished the sentence. Suddenly a look of terror came into his
eyes, and he stared speechless at someone who was jauntily approaching
the house opposite.
“Barnett!” he whispered. “Barnett! How did he get to know of this?”
“You mentioned him, and the Barnett Agency in the rue Laborde,” Gassire
confessed, not without hesitation, “and I thought that, in the
appalling circumstances, it was just worth giving him a ring.”
“You fool!” spluttered Béchoux. “Who’s in charge of the case, anyhow?
You or me? Barnett has nothing to do with this. We must be on our guard
against him or there will be the devil to pay. Let Barnett in on this?
Not much!”
Béchoux was quite sure in his own mind that Barnett’s assistance would
prove the last straw. Jim Barnett in the house and on the case would
only mean that, if the mystery were solved, a bundle of securities,
including Twelve Little Nigger Boys of vital import to their owner,
would surely vanish into thin air.
He tore across the street, and, as Barnett raised his hand to the bell,
he seized his arm and said in trembling tones:
“Get out! Hop it! We don’t want your help. You were called in by
mistake. Cut along now, and be quick about it.”
Barnett gave him an astonished stare full of reproach and childlike
innocence.
“My dear Béchoux, what’s the matter? Tell your Uncle Barnett! You seem
a trifle rattled, old lad. Still sore about the grandfather clocks of
Baron de Gravières? And those gold teeth? Left, right!”
“Get out, I tell you!”
“Then they told me the truth just now on the telephone? Have you really
been robbed of your savings? And don’t you want your Uncle Barnett to
lend a helping hand?”
“My Uncle Barnett can go to hell!” declared Béchoux, furious. “I know
all about your helping hand! It goes into other people’s pockets and
helps itself.”
“Are you in a stew because of your Twelve Little Nigger Boys?”
“I shall be if you come poking your nose in!”
“Oh, all right. I leave you to it!”
“You’re off, then?” Béchoux’s frown cleared.
“Rather not! I’ve come here on business.”
He turned to Gassire, who had joined them and was holding the door
ajar.
“Can you tell me if Mademoiselle Haveline lives here—Mademoiselle