The Golden Triangle Part 50

"I was mad, Patrice. Yes, I go mad at times. All these tragedies have turned my head. My own Coralie's death . . . and then my life in Essares' shadow . . . and then . . . and then, above all, the gold!

. . . Did I really try to kill you both? I no longer remember. Or at least I remember a dream I had: it happened in the lodge, didn't it, as before? Oh, madness! What a torture! I'm like a man in the galleys. I have to do things against my will! . . . Then it was in the lodge, was it, as before? And in the same manner? With the same implements? . . .

Yes, in my dream, I went through all my agony over again . . . and that of my darling. . . . But, instead of being tortured, I was the torturer . . . What a torment!"

He spoke low, inside himself, with hesitations and intervals and an unspeakable air of suffering. Don Luis kept his eyes fixed on him, as though trying to discover what he was aiming at. And Simeon continued:

"My poor Patrice! . . . I was so fond of you! . . . And now you are my worst enemy! . . . How indeed could it be otherwise? . . . How could you forget? . . . Oh, why didn't they lock me up after Essares' death?

It was then that I felt my brain going. . . ."

"So it was you who killed him?" asked Patrice.

"No, no, that's just it: somebody else robbed me of my revenge."

"Who?"

"I don't know. . . . The whole business is incomprehensible to me. . . .

Don't speak of it. . . . It all pains me. . . . I have suffered so since Coralie's death!"

"Coralie!" exclaimed Patrice.

"Yes, the woman I loved. . . . As for little Coralie, I've suffered also on her account. . . . She ought not to have married Essares."

"Where is she?" asked Patrice, in agony.

"I can't tell you."

"Oh," cried Patrice, shaking with rage, "you mean she's dead!"

"No, she's alive, I swear it."

"Then where is she? That's the only thing that matters. All the rest belongs to the past. But this thing, a woman's life, Coralie's life . . ."

"Listen."

Simeon stopped and gave a glance at Don Luis;

"Tell him to go away," he said.

Don Luis laughed:

"Of course! Little Mother Coralie is hidden in the same place as the bags of gold. To save her means surrendering the bags of gold."

"Well?" said Patrice, in an almost aggressive tone.

"Well, captain," replied Don Luis, not without a certain touch of banter in his voice, "if this honorable gentleman suggested that you should release him on parole so that he might go and fetch your Coralie, I don't suppose you'd accept?"

"No."

"You haven't the least confidence in him, have you? And you're right.

The honorable gentleman, mad though he may be, gave such proofs of mental superiority and balance, when he sent us trundling down the road to Mantes, that it would be dangerous to attach the least credit to his promises. The consequence is . . ."

"Well?"

"This, captain, that the honorable gentleman means to propose a bargain to you, which may be couched thus: 'You can have Coralie, but I'll keep the gold.'"

"And then?"

"And then? It would be a capital notion, if you were alone with the honorable gentleman. The bargain would soon be concluded. But I'm here . . . by Jupiter!"

Patrice had drawn himself up. He stepped towards Don Luis and said, in a voice which became openly hostile:

"I presume that you won't raise any opposition. It's a matter of a woman's life."

"No doubt. But, on the other hand, it's a matter of three hundred million francs."

"Then you refuse?"

"Refuse? I should think so!"

"You refuse when that woman is at her last gasp? You would rather she died? . . . Look here, you seem to forget that this is my affair, that . . . that . . ."

The two men were standing close together. Don Luis retained that chaffing calmness, that air of knowing more than he chose to say, which irritated Patrice. At heart Patrice, while yielding to Don Luis'

mastery, resented it and felt a certain embarra.s.sment at accepting the services of a man with whose past he was so well acquainted.

"Then you actually refuse?" he rapped out, clenching his fists.

"Yes," said Don Luis, preserving his coolness. "Yes, Captain Belval, I refuse this bargain, which I consider absurd. Why, it's the confidence-trick! By Jingo! Three hundred millions! Give up a windfall like that? Never. But I haven't the least objection to leaving you alone with the honorable gentleman. That's what he wants, isn't it?"

"Yes."

"Well, talk it over between yourselves. Sign the compact. The honorable gentleman, who, for his part, has every confidence in his son, will tell you the whereabouts of the hiding-place; and you shall release your Coralie."

"And you? What about you?" snarled Patrice, angrily.

"I? I'm going to complete my little enquiry into the present and the past by revisiting the room where you nearly met your death. See you later, captain. And, whatever you do, insist on guarantees."

Switching on his pocket-lamp, Don Luis entered the lodge and walked straight to the studio. Patrice saw the electric rays playing on the panels between the walled-up windows. He went back to where Simeon sat:

"Now then," he said, in a voice of authority. "Be quick about it."

"Are you sure he's not listening?"

"Quite sure."

"Be careful with him, Patrice. He means to take the gold and keep it."

"Don't waste time," said Patrice, impatiently. "Get to Coralie."

"I've told you Coralie was alive."