The Extraordinary Adventures of Arsène Lupin, Gentleman-Burglar
A profound silence followed the statement. The judge, nonplused for a
moment, exclaimed:
“Ah! What do you mean? That is absurd!”
The detective continued:
“At first sight there is a certain resemblance, but if you carefully
consider the nose, the mouth, the hair, the color of skin, you will
see that it is not Arsène Lupin. And the eyes! Did he ever have those
alcoholic eyes!”
“Come, come, witness! What do you mean? Do you pretend to say that we
are trying the wrong man?”
“In my opinion, yes. Arsène Lupin has, in some manner, contrived to put
this poor devil in his place, unless this man is a willing accomplice.”
This dramatic dénouement caused much laughter and excitement amongst the
spectators. The judge adjourned the trial, and sent for Mon. Bouvier,
the gaoler, and guards employed in the prison.
When the trial was resumed, Mon. Bouvier and the gaoler examined the
accused and declared that there was only a very slight resemblance
between the prisoner and Arsène Lupin.
“Well, then!” exclaimed the judge, “who is this man? Where does he come
from? What is he in prison for?”
Two of the prison-guards were called and both of them declared that the
prisoner was Arsène Lupin. The judged breathed once more.
But one of the guards then said:
“Yes, yes, I think it is he.”
“What!” cried the judge, impatiently, “you *think* it is he! What do you
mean by that?”
“Well, I saw very little of the prisoner. He was placed in my charge in
the evening and, for two months, he seldom stirred, but laid on his bed
with his face to the wall.”
“What about the time prior to those two months?”
“Before that he occupied a cell in another part of the prison. He was
not in cell 24.”
Here the head gaoler interrupted, and said:
“We changed him to another cell after his attempted escape.”
“But you, monsieur, you have seen him during those two months?”
“I had no occasion to see him. He was always quiet and orderly.”
“And this prisoner is not Arsène Lupin?”
“No.”
“Then who is he?” demanded the judge.
“I do not know.”
“Then we have before us a man who was substituted for Arsène Lupin, two
months ago. How do you explain that?”
“I cannot.”
In absolute despair, the judge turned to the accused and addressed him
in a conciliatory tone:
“Prisoner, can you tell me how, and since when, you became an inmate of
the Prison de la Santé?”
The engaging manner of the judge was calculated to disarm the mistrust
and awaken the understanding of the accused man. He tried to reply.
Finally, under clever and gentle questioning, he succeeded in framing a
few phrases from which the following story was gleaned: Two months ago
he had been taken to the Dépôt, examined and released. As he was leaving
the building, a free man, he was seized by two guards and placed in the
prison-van. Since then he had occupied cell 24. He was contented there,
plenty to eat, and he slept well--so he did not complain.
All that seemed probable; and, amidst the mirth and excitement of the
spectators, the judge adjourned the trial until the story could be
investigated and verified.
* * * * *
The following facts were at once established by an examination of the
prison records: Eight weeks before a man named Baudru Désiré had slept
at the Dépôt. He was released the next day, and left the Dépôt at two
o’clock in the afternoon. On the same day at two o’clock, having been
examined for the last time, Arsène Lupin left the Dépôt in a prison-van.
Had the guards made a mistake? Had they been deceived by the resemblance
and carelessly substituted this man for their prisoner?
Another question suggested itself: Had the substitution been arranged in
advance? In that event Baudru must have been an accomplice and must have
caused his own arrest for the express purpose of taking Lupin’s
place. But then, by what miracle had such a plan, based on a series of
improbable chances, been carried to success?
Baudru Désiré was turned over to the anthropological service; they
had never seen anything like him. However, they easily traced his past
history. He was known at Courbevois, at Asnières and at Levallois.
He lived on alms and slept in one of those rag-picker’s huts near the
barrier de Ternes. He had disappeared from there a year ago.
Had he been enticed away by Arsène Lupin? There was no evidence to that
effect. And even if that was so, it did not explain the flight of the
prisoner. That still remained a mystery. Amongst twenty theories which
sought to explain it, not one was satisfactory. Of the escape itself,
there was no doubt; an escape that was incomprehensible, sensational,
in which the public, as well as the officers of the law, could detect
a carefully prepared plan, a combination of circumstances marvelously
dove-tailed, whereof the dénouement fully justified the confident
prediction of Arsène Lupin: “I shall not be present at my trial.”
After a month of patient investigation, the problem remained unsolved.
The poor devil of a Baudru could not be kept in prison indefinitely, and
to place him on trial would be ridiculous. There was no charge against
him. Consequently, he was released; but the chief of the Sûrété resolved
to keep him under surveillance. This idea originated with Ganimard. From
his point of view there was neither complicity nor chance. Baudru was
an instrument upon which Arsène Lupin had played with his extraordinary
skill. Baudru, when set at liberty, would lead them to Arsène Lupin or,
at least, to some of his accomplices. The two inspectors, Folenfant and
Dieuzy, were assigned to assist Ganimard.
One foggy morning in January the prison gates opened and Baudru Désiré
stepped forth--a free man. At first he appeared to be quite embarrassed,
and walked like a person who has no precise idea whither he is going.
He followed the rue de la Santé and the rue Saint Jacques. He stopped in
front of an old-clothes shop, removed his jacket and his vest, sold his
vest on which he realized a few sous; then, replacing his jacket, he
proceeded on his way. He crossed the Seine. At the Châtelet an
omnibus passed him. He wished to enter it, but there was no place.
The controller advised him to secure a number, so he entered the
waiting-room.
Ganimard called to his two assistants, and, without removing his eyes
from the waiting room, he said to them:
“Stop a carriage.... no, two. That will be better. I will go with one of
you, and we will follow him.”
The men obeyed. Yet Baudru did not appear. Ganimard entered the
waiting-room. It was empty.
“Idiot that I am!” he muttered, “I forgot there was another exit.”
There was an interior corridor extending from the waiting-room to the
rue Saint Martin. Ganimard rushed through it and arrived just in time to
observe Baudru upon the top of the Batignolles-Jardin de Plates omnibus
as it was turning the corner of the rue de Rivoli. He ran and caught
the omnibus. But he had lost his two assistants. He must continue the
pursuit alone. In his anger he was inclined to seize the man by the
collar without ceremony. Was it not with premeditation and by means of
an ingenious ruse that his pretended imbecile had separated him from his
assistants?
He looked at Baudru. The latter was asleep on the bench, his head
rolling from side to side, his mouth half-opened, and an incredible
expression of stupidity on his blotched face. No, such an adversary was
incapable of deceiving old Ganimard. It was a stroke of luck--nothing
more.
At the Galleries-Lafayette, the man leaped from the omnibus and took
the La Muette tramway, following the boulevard Haussmann and the
avenue Victor Hugo. Baudru alighted at La Muette station; and, with a
nonchalant air, strolled into the Bois de Boulogne.
He wandered through one path after another, and sometimes retraced his
steps. What was he seeking? Had he any definite object? At the end of
an hour, he appeared to be faint from fatigue, and, noticing a bench, he
sat down. The spot, not far from Auteuil, on the edge of a pond hidden
amongst the trees, was absolutely deserted. After the lapse of another
half-hour, Ganimard became impatient and resolved to speak to the man.
He approached and took a seat beside Baudru, lighted a cigarette, traced
some figures in the sand with the end of his cane, and said:
“It’s a pleasant day.”
No response. But, suddenly the man burst into laughter, a happy,
mirthful laugh, spontaneous and irresistible. Ganimard felt his hair
stand on end in horror and surprise. It was that laugh, that infernal
laugh he knew so well!
With a sudden movement, he seized the man by the collar and looked at
him with a keen, penetrating gaze; and found that he no longer saw the
man Baudru. To be sure, he saw Baudru; but, at the same time, he saw the
other, the real man, Lupin. He discovered the intense life in the eyes,
he filled up the shrunken features, he perceived the real flesh beneath
the flabby skin, the real mouth through the grimaces that deformed it.
Those were the eyes and mouth of the other, and especially his keen,
alert, mocking expression, so clear and youthful!
“Arsène Lupin, Arsène Lupin,” he stammered.
Then, in a sudden fit of rage, he seized Lupin by the throat and tried
to hold him down. In spite of his fifty years, he still possessed
unusual strength, whilst his adversary was apparently in a weak
condition. But the struggle was a brief one. Arsène Lupin made only a
slight movement, and, as suddenly as he had made the attack, Ganimard
released his hold. His right arm fell inert, useless.
“If you had taken lessons in jiu-jitsu at the quai des Orfèvres,” said
Lupin, “you would know that that blow is called udi-shi-ghi in Japanese.
A second more, and I would have broken your arm and that would have been
just what you deserve. I am surprised that you, an old friend whom I
respect and before whom I voluntarily expose my incognito, should abuse
my confidence in that violent manner. It is unworthy--Ah! What’s the
matter?”
Ganimard did not reply. That escape for which he deemed himself
responsible--was it not he, Ganimard, who, by his sensational evidence,
had led the court into serious error? That escape appeared to him like
a dark cloud on his professional career. A tear rolled down his cheek to
his gray moustache.
“Oh! mon Dieu, Ganimard, don’t take it to heart. If you had not spoken,
I would have arranged for some one else to do it. I couldn’t allow poor
Baudru Désiré to be convicted.”
“Then,” murmured Ganimard, “it was you that was there? And now you are
here?”
“It is I, always I, only I.”
“Can it be possible?”
“Oh, it is not the work of a sorcerer. Simply, as the judge remarked at
the trial, the apprenticeship of a dozen years that equips a man to cope
successfully with all the obstacles in life.”
“But your face? Your eyes?”
“You can understand that if I worked eighteen months with Doctor Altier
at the Saint-Louis hospital, it was not out of love for the work. I
considered that he, who would one day have the honor of calling himself
Arsène Lupin, ought to be exempt from the ordinary laws governing
appearance and identity. Appearance? That can be modified at will. For
instance, a hypodermic injection of paraffine will puff up the skin at
the desired spot. Pyrogallic acid will change your skin to that of an
Indian. The juice of the greater celandine will adorn you with the most
beautiful eruptions and tumors. Another chemical affects the growth of
your beard and hair; another changes the tone of your voice. Add to that
two months of dieting in cell 24; exercises repeated a thousand times to
enable me to hold my features in a certain grimace, to carry my head
at a certain inclination, and adapt my back and shoulders to a stooping