The Blonde Lady Part 49

He put his head between the gla.s.s doors, but at once drew back with a stifled oath. Wilson looked out in his turn. Close to them, a ladder rose against the wall, leaning against the bal.u.s.trade of the balcony.

"By Jove!" said Shears. "There's some one in the boudoir. That's what we heard. Quick, let's take away the ladder!"

But, at that moment, a form slid from the top to the bottom, the ladder was removed and the man who carried it ran swiftly toward the railings, to the place where his accomplices were waiting. Shears and Wilson had darted out. They came up with the man as he was placing the ladder against the railings. Two shots rang out from the other side.

"Wounded?" cried Shears.

"No," replied Wilson.

He caught the man around the body and tried to throw him. But the man turned, seized him with one hand and, with the other, plunged a knife full into his chest. Wilson gave a sigh, staggered and fell.

"d.a.m.nation!" roared Shears. "If they've done for him, I'll do for them!"

He laid Wilson on the lawn and rushed at the ladder. Too late: the man had run up it and, in company with his accomplices, was fleeing through the shrubs.

"Wilson, Wilson, it's not serious, is it? Say it's only a scratch!"

The doors of the house opened suddenly. M. d'Imblevalle was the first to appear, followed by the men-servants carrying candles.

"What is it?" cried the baron. "Is Mr. Wilson hurt?"

"Nothing; only a scratch," repeated Shears, endeavouring to delude himself into the belief.

Wilson was bleeding copiously and his face was deathly pale. Twenty minutes later, the doctor declared that the point of the knife had penetrated to within a quarter of an inch of the heart.

"A quarter of an inch! That Wilson was always a lucky dog!" said Shears, summing up the situation, in an envious tone.

"Lucky ... lucky...." grunted the doctor.

"Why, with his strong const.i.tution, he'll be all right...."

"After six weeks in bed and two months' convalescence."

"No longer?"

"No, unless complications ensue."

"Why on earth should there be any complications?"

Fully rea.s.sured, Shears returned to M. d'Imblevalle in the boudoir. This time, the mysterious visitor had not shown the same discretion. He had laid hands without shame on the diamond-studded snuff-box, on the opal necklace and, generally, on anything that could find room in the pockets of a self-respecting burglar.

The window was still open, one of the panes had been neatly cut out and a summary inquiry held at daybreak showed that the ladder came from the unfinished house and that the burglars must have come that way.

"In short," said M. d'Imblevalle, with a touch of irony in his voice, "it is an exact repet.i.tion of the theft of the Jewish lamp."

"Yes, if we accept the first version favoured by the police."

"Do you still refuse to adopt it? Doesn't this second theft shake your opinion as regards the first?"

"On the contrary, it confirms it."

"It seems incredible! You have the undoubted proof that last night's burglary was committed by somebody from the outside and you still maintain that the Jewish lamp was stolen by one of our people?"

"By some one living in the house."

"Then how do you explain...?"

"I explain nothing, monsieur: I establish two facts, which resemble each other only in appearance, I weigh them separately and I am trying to find the link that connects them."

His conviction seemed so profound, his actions based upon such powerful motives, that the baron gave way:

"Very well. Let us go and inform the commissary of the police."

"On no account!" exclaimed the Englishman, eagerly. "On no account whatever! The police are people whom I apply to only when I want them."

"Still, the shots...?"

"Never mind the shots!"

"Your friend...."

"My friend is only wounded.... Make the doctor hold his tongue.... I will take all the responsibility as regards the police."

Two days elapsed, devoid of all incident, during which Shears pursued his task with a minute care and a conscientiousness that was exasperated by the memory of that daring onslaught, perpetrated under his eyes, despite his presence and without his being able to prevent its success.

He searched the house and garden indefatigably, talked to the servants and paid long visits to the kitchen and stables. And, though he gathered no clue that threw any light upon the subject, he did not lose courage.

"I shall find what I am looking for," he thought, "and I shall find it here. It is not a question now, as in the case of the blonde lady, of walking at hap-hazard and of reaching, by roads unknown to me, an equally unknown goal. This time I am on the battlefield itself. The enemy is no longer the invisible, elusive Lupin, but the flesh-and-blood accomplice who moves within the four walls of this house. Give me the least little particular, and I know where I stand."

This little particular, from which he was to derive such remarkable consequences, with a skill so prodigious that the case of the Jewish Lamp may be looked upon as one in which his detective genius bursts forth most triumphantly, this little particular he was to obtain by accident.

On the third day, entering the room above the boudoir, which was used as a schoolroom for the children, he came upon Henriette, the smaller of the two. She was looking for her scissors.

"You know," she said to Shears, "I make papers too, like the one you got the other evening."

"The other evening?"

"Yes, after dinner. You got a paper with strips on it ... you know, a telegram.... Well, I make them too."

She went out. To any one else, these words would have represented only the insignificant observation of a child; and Shears himself listened without paying much attention and continued his inspection. But, suddenly, he started running after the child, whose last phrase had all at once impressed him. He caught her at the top of the staircase and said:

"So you stick strips on to paper also, do you?"

Henriette, very proudly, declared:

"Yes, I cut out the words and stick them on."