IV
THE TELL-TALE FILM
"Do look at the man who's playing the butler," said Serge Renine.
"What is there peculiar about him?" asked Hortense.
They were sitting in the balcony at a picture-palace, to which Hortense hadasked to be taken so that she might see on the screen the daughter of alady, now dead, who used to give her piano-lessons. Rose Andree, a lovelygirl with lissome movements and a smiling face, was that evening figuringin a new film, _The Happy Princess_, which she lit up with her highspirits and her warm, glowing beauty.
Renine made no direct reply, but, during a pause in the performance,continued:
"I sometimes console myself for an indifferent film by watching thesubordinate characters. It seems to me that those poor devils, who are madeto rehearse certain scenes ten or twenty times over, must often be thinkingof other things than their parts at the time of the final exposure. Andit's great fun noting those little moments of distraction which revealsomething of their temperament, of their instinct self. As, for instance,in the case of that butler: look!"
The screen now showed a luxuriously served table. The Happy Princess sat atthe head, surrounded by all her suitors. Half-a-dozen footmen moved aboutthe room, under the orders of the butler, a big fellow with a dull, coarseface, a common appearance and a pair of enormous eyebrows which met acrosshis forehead in a single line.
"He looks a brute," said Hortense, "but what do you see in him that'speculiar?"
"Just note how he gazes at the princess and tell me if he doesn't stare ather oftener than he ought to."
"I really haven't noticed anything, so far," said Hortense.
"Why, of course he does!" Serge Renine declared. "It is quite obvious thatin actual life he entertains for Rose Andree personal feelings which arequite out of place in a nameless servant. It is possible that, in reallife, no one has any idea of such a thing; but, on the screen, when he isnot watching himself, or when he thinks that the actors at rehearsal cannotsee him, his secret escapes him. Look...."
The man was standing still. It was the end of dinner. The princess wasdrinking a glass of champagne and he was gloating over her with hisglittering eyes half-hidden behind their heavy lids.
Twice again they surprised in his face those strange expressions to whichRenine ascribed an emotional meaning which Hortense refused to see:
"It's just his way of looking at people," she said.
The first part of the film ended. There were two parts, divided by an_entr'acte_. The notice on the programme stated that "a year hadelapsed and that the Happy Princess was living in a pretty Norman cottage,all hung with creepers, together with her husband, a poor musician."
The princess was still happy, as was evident on the screen, still asattractive as ever and still besieged by the greatest variety of suitors.Nobles and commoners, peasants and financiers, men of all kinds fellswooning at her feet; and prominent among them was a sort of boorishsolitary, a shaggy, half-wild woodcutter, whom she met whenever she wentout for a walk. Armed with his axe, a formidable, crafty being, he prowledaround the cottage; and the spectators felt with a sense of dismay that aperil was hanging over the Happy Princess' head.
"Look at that!" whispered Renine. "Do you realise who the man of the woodsis?"
"No."
"Simply the butler. The same actor is doubling the two parts."
In fact, notwithstanding the new figure which he cut, the butler'smovements and postures were apparent under the heavy gait and roundedshoulders of the woodcutter, even as under the unkempt beard and long,thick hair the once clean-shaven face was visible with the cruel expressionand the bushy line of the eyebrows.
The princess, in the background, was seen to emerge from the thatchedcottage. The man hid himself behind a clump of trees. From time to time,the screen displayed, on an enormously enlarged scale, his fiercely rollingeyes or his murderous hands with their huge thumbs.
"The man frightens me," said Hortense. "He is really terrifying."
"Because he's acting on his own account," said Renine. "You must understandthat, in the space of three or four months that appears to separate thedates at which the two films were made, his passion has made progress; andto him it is not the princess who is coming but Rose Andree."
The man crouched low. The victim approached, gaily and unsuspectingly. Shepassed, heard a sound, stopped and looked about her with a smiling airwhich became attentive, then uneasy, and then more and more anxious. Thewoodcutter had pushed aside the branches and was coming through the copse.
They were now standing face to face. He opened his arms as though to seizeher. She tried to scream, to call out for help; but the arms closed aroundher before she could offer the slightest resistance. Then he threw her overhis shoulder and began to run.
"Are you satisfied?" whispered Renine. "Do you think that this fourth-rateactor would have had all that strength and energy if it had been any otherwoman than Rose Andree?"
Meanwhile the woodcutter was crossing the skirt of a forest and plungingthrough great trees and masses of rocks. After setting the princess down,he cleared the entrance to a cave which the daylight entered by a slantingcrevice.
A succession of views displayed the husband's despair, the search and thediscovery of some small branches which had been broken by the princessand which showed the path that had been taken. Then came the final scene,with the terrible struggle between the man and the woman when the woman,vanquished and exhausted, is flung to the ground, the sudden arrival of thehusband and the shot that puts an end to the brute's life....
* * * * *
"Well," said Renine, when they had left the picture-palace--and hespoke with a certain gravity--"I maintain that the daughter of your oldpiano-teacher has been in danger ever since the day when that last scenewas filmed. I maintain that this scene represents not so much an assault bythe man of the woods on the Happy Princess as a violent and frantic attackby an actor on the woman he desires. Certainly it all happened within thebounds prescribed by the part and nobody saw anything in it--nobody exceptperhaps Rose Andree herself--but I, for my part, have detected flashesof passion which leave not a doubt in my mind. I have seen glances thatbetrayed the wish and even the intention to commit murder. I have seenclenched hands, ready to strangle, in short, a score of details which proveto me that, at that time, the man's instinct was urging him to kill thewoman who could never be his."
"And it all amounts to what?"
"We must protect Rose Andree if she is still in danger and if it is not toolate."
"And to do this?"
"We must get hold of further information."
"From whom?"
"From the World's Cinema Company, which made the film. I will go to themto-morrow morning. Will you wait for me in your flat about lunch-time?"
At heart, Hortense was still sceptical. All these manifestations ofpassion, of which she denied neither the ardour nor the ferocity, seemedto her to be the rational behaviour of a good actor. She had seen nothingof the terrible tragedy which Renine contended that he had divined; andshe wondered whether he was not erring through an excess of imagination.
"Well," she asked, next day, not without a touch of irony, "how far haveyou got? Have you made a good bag? Anything mysterious? Anythingthrilling?"
"Pretty good."
"Oh, really? And your so-called lover...."
"Is one Dalbreque, originally a scene-painter, who played the butler in thefirst part of the film and the man of the woods in the second and was somuch appreciated that they engaged him for a new film. Consequently, he hasbeen acting lately. He was acting near Paris. But, on the morning of Fridaythe 18th of September, he broke into the garage of the World's CinemaCompany and made off with a magnificent car and forty thousand francsin money. Information was lodged with the police; and on the Sunday thecar was found a little way outside Dreux. And up to now the enquiry hasrevealed two things, which will appear in the papers to-morrow: first,Dalbreque is
alleged to have committed a murder which created a great stirlast year, the murder of Bourguet, the jeweller; secondly, on the day afterhis two robberies, Dalbreque was driving through Le Havre in a motor-carwith two men who helped him to carry off, in broad daylight and in acrowded street, a lady whose identity has not yet been discovered."
"Rose Andree?" asked Hortense, uneasily.
"I have just been to Rose Andree's: the World's Cinema Company gave me heraddress. Rose Andree spent this summer travelling and then stayed for afortnight in the Seine-inferieure, where she has a small place of her own,the actual cottage in _The Happy Princess_. On receiving an invitationfrom America to do a film there, she came back to Paris, registered herluggage at the Gare Saint-Lazare and left on Friday the 18th of September,intending to sleep at Le Havre and take Saturday's boat."
"Friday the 18th," muttered Hortense, "the same day on which that man...."
"And it was on the Saturday that a woman was carried off by him atLe Havre. I looked in at the Compagnie Transatlantique and a briefinvestigation showed that Rose Andree had booked a cabin but that thecabin remained unoccupied. The passenger did not turn up."
"This is frightful. She has been carried off. You were right."
"I fear so."
"What have you decided to do?"
"Adolphe, my chauffeur, is outside with the car. Let us go to Le Havre. Upto the present, Rose Andree's disappearance does not seem to have becomeknown. Before it does and before the police identify the woman carried offby Dalbreque with the woman who did not turn up to claim her cabin, we willget on Rose Andree's track."
There was not much said on the journey. At four o'clock Hortense and Reninereached Rouen. But here Renine changed his road.
"Adolphe, take the left bank of the Seine."
He unfolded a motoring-map on his knees and, tracing the route with hisfinger, showed Hortense that, if you draw a line from Le Havre, or ratherfrom Quillebeuf, where the road crosses the Seine, to Dreux, where thestolen car was found, this line passes through Routot, a market-town lyingwest of the forest of Brotonne:
"Now it was in the forest of Brotonne," he continued, "according to what Iheard, that the second part of _The Happy Princess_ was filmed. Andthe question that arises is this: having got hold of Rose Andree, would itnot occur to Dalbreque, when passing near the forest on the Saturday night,to hide his prey there, while his two accomplices went on to Dreux and fromthere returned to Paris? The cave was quite near. Was he not bound to go toit? How should he do otherwise? Wasn't it while running to this cave, a fewmonths ago, that he held in his arms, against his breast, within reach ofhis lips, the woman whom he loved and whom he has now conquered? By everyrule of fate and logic, the adventure is being repeated all over again ...but this time in reality. Rose Andree is a captive. There is no hopeof rescue. The forest is vast and lonely. That night, or on one of thefollowing nights, Rose Andree must surrender ... or die."
Hortense gave a shudder:
"We shall be too late. Besides, you don't suppose that he's keeping her aprisoner?"
"Certainly not. The place I have in mind is at a cross-roads and is not asafe retreat. But we may discover some clue or other."
The shades of night were falling from the tall trees when they entered theancient forest of Brotonne, full of Roman remains and mediaeval relics.Renine knew the forest well and remembered that near a famous oak, knownas the Wine-cask, there was a cave which must be the cave of the HappyPrincess. He found it easily, switched on his electric torch, rummaged inthe dark corners and brought Hortense back to the entrance:
"There's nothing inside," he said, "but here is the evidence which I waslooking for. Dalbreque was obsessed by the recollection of the film, but sowas Rose Andree. The Happy Princess had broken off the tips of the brancheson the way through the forest. Rose Andree has managed to break off some tothe right of this opening, in the hope that she would be discovered as onthe first occasion."
"Yes," said Hortense, "it's a proof that she has been here; but the proofis three weeks old. Since that time...."
"Since that time, she is either dead and buried under a heap of leaves orelse alive in some hole even lonelier than this."
"If so, where is he?"
Renine pricked up his ears. Repeated blows of the axe were sounding fromsome distance, no doubt coming from a part of the forest that was beingcleared.
"He?" said Renine, "I wonder whether he may not have continued to behaveunder the influence of the film and whether the man of the woods in _TheHappy Princess_ has not quite naturally resumed his calling. For how isthe man to live, to obtain his food, without attracting attention? He willhave found a job."
"We can't make sure of that."
"We might, by questioning the woodcutters whom we can hear."
The car took them by a forest-road to another cross-roads where theyentered on foot a track which was deeply rutted by waggon-wheels. The soundof axes ceased. After walking for a quarter of an hour, they met a dozenmen who, having finished work for the day, were returning to the villagesnear by.
"Will this path take us to Routot?" ask Renine, in order to open aconversation with them.
"No, you're turning your backs on it," said one of the men, gruffly.
And he went on, accompanied by his mates.
Hortense and Renine stood rooted to the spot. They had recognized thebutler. His cheeks and chin were shaved, but his upper lip was covered bya black moustache, evidently dyed. The eyebrows no longer met and werereduced to normal dimensions.
* * * * *
Thus, in less than twenty hours, acting on the vague hints supplied by thebearing of a film-actor, Serge Renine had touched the very heart of thetragedy by means of purely psychological arguments.
"Rose Andree is alive," he said. "Otherwise Dalbreque would have left thecountry. The poor thing must be imprisoned and bound up; and he takes hersome food at night."
"We will save her, won't we?"
"Certainly, by keeping a watch on him and, if necessary, but in the lastresort, compelling him by force to give up his secret."
They followed the woodcutter at a distance and, on the pretext that the carneeded overhauling, engaged rooms in the principal inn at Routot.
Attached to the inn was a small cafe from which they were separated by theentrance to the yard and above which were two rooms, reached by a woodenouter staircase, at one side. Dalbreque occupied one of these rooms andRenine took the other for his chauffeur.
Next morning he learnt from Adolphe that Dalbreque, on the previousevening, after all the lights were out, had carried down a bicycle from hisroom and mounted it and had not returned until shortly before sunrise.
The bicycle tracks led Renine to the uninhabited Chateau des Landes, fivemiles from the village. They disappeared in a rocky path which ran besidethe park down to the Seine, opposite the Jumieges peninsula.
Next night, he took up his position there. At eleven o'clock, Dalbrequeclimbed a bank, scrambled over a wire fence, hid his bicycle under thebranches and moved away. It seemed impossible to follow him in the pitchydarkness, on a mossy soil that muffled the sound of footsteps. Renine didnot make the attempt; but, at daybreak, he came with his chauffeur andhunted through the park all the morning. Though the park, which coveredthe side of a hill and was bounded below by the river, was not very large,he found no clue which gave him any reason to suppose that Rose Andree wasimprisoned there.
He therefore went back to the village, with the firm intention of takingaction that evening and employing force:
"This state of things cannot go on," he said to Hortense. "I must rescueRose Andree at all costs and save her from that ruffian's clutches. He mustbe made to speak. He must. Otherwise there's a danger that we may be toolate."
That day was Sunday; and Dalbreque did not go to work. He did not leave hisroom except for lunch and went upstairs again immediately afterwards. Butat three o'clock Renine and Hortense, who were keeping a watch on him fromthe
inn, saw him come down the wooden staircase, with his bicycle on hisshoulder. Leaning it against the bottom step, he inflated the tires andfastened to the handle-bar a rather bulky object wrapped in a newspaper.
"By Jove!" muttered Renine.
"What's the matter?"
In front of the cafe was a small terrace bordered on the right and left byspindle-trees planted in boxes, which were connected by a paling. Behindthe shrubs, sitting on a bank but stooping forward so that they could seeDalbreque through the branches, were four men.
"Police!" said Renine. "What bad luck! If those fellows take a hand, theywill spoil everything."
"Why? On the contrary, I should have thought...."
"Yes, they will. They will put Dalbreque out of the way ... and then? Willthat give us Rose Andree?"
Dalbreque had finished his preparations. Just as he was mounting hisbicycle, the detectives rose in a body, ready to make a dash for him. ButDalbreque, though quite unconscious of their presence, changed his mind andwent back to his room as though he had forgotten something.
"Now's the time!" said Renine. "I'm going to risk it. But it's a difficultsituation and I've no great hopes."
He went out into the yard and, at a moment when the detectives were notlooking, ran up the staircase, as was only natural if he wished to give anorder to his chauffeur. But he had no sooner reached the rustic balcony atthe back of the house, which gave admission to the two bedrooms than hestopped. Dalbreque's door was open. Renine walked in.
Dalbreque stepped back, at once assuming the defensive:
"What do you want? Who said you could...."
"Silence!" whispered Renine, with an imperious gesture. "It's all up withyou!"
"What are you talking about?" growled the man, angrily.
"Lean out of your window. There are four men below on the watch for you toleave, four detectives."
Dalbreque leant over the terrace and muttered an oath:
"On the watch for me?" he said, turning round. "What do I care?"
"They have a warrant."
He folded his arms:
"Shut up with your piffle! A warrant! What's that to me?"
"Listen," said Renine, "and let us waste no time. It's urgent. Your name'sDalbreque, or, at least, that's the name under which you acted in _TheHappy Princess_ and under which the police are looking for you as beingthe murderer of Bourguet the jeweller, the man who stole a motor-car andforty thousand francs from the World's Cinema Company and the man whoabducted a woman at Le Havre. All this is known and proved ... and here'sthe upshot. Four men downstairs. Myself here, my chauffeur in the nextroom. You're done for. Do you want me to save you?"
Dalbreque gave his adversary a long look:
"Who are you?"
"A friend of Rose Andree's," said Renine.
The other started and, to some extent dropping his mask, retorted:
"What are your conditions?"
"Rose Andree, whom you have abducted and tormented, is dying in some holeor corner. Where is she?"
A strange thing occurred and impressed Renine. Dalbreque's face, usually socommon, was lit up by a smile that made it almost attractive. But this wasonly a flashing vision: the man immediately resumed his hard and impassiveexpression.
"And suppose I refuse to speak?" he said.
"So much the worse for you. It means your arrest."
"I dare say; but it means the death of Rose Andree. Who will release her?"
"You. You will speak now, or in an hour, or two hours hence at least. Youwill never have the heart to keep silent and let her die."
Dalbreque shrugged his shoulders. Then, raising his hand, he said:
"I swear on my life that, if they arrest me, not a word will leave mylips."
"What then?"
"Then save me. We will meet this evening at the entrance to the Parc desLandes and say what we have to say."
"Why not at once?"
"I have spoken."
"Will you be there?"
"I shall be there."
Renine reflected. There was something in all this that he failed to grasp.In any case, the frightful danger that threatened Rose Andree dominated thewhole situation; and Renine was not the man to despise this threat and topersist out of vanity in a perilous course. Rose Andree's life came beforeeverything.
He struck several blows on the wall of the next bedroom and called hischauffeur.
"Adolphe, is the car ready?"
"Yes, sir."
"Set her going and pull her up in front of the terrace outside the cafe,right against the boxes so as to block the exit. As for you," he continued,addressing Dalbreque, "you're to jump on your machine and, instead ofmaking off along the road, cross the yard. At the end of the yard is apassage leading into a lane. There you will be free. But no hesitation andno blundering ... else you'll get yourself nabbed. Good luck to you."
He waited till the car was drawn up in accordance with his instructionsand, when he reached it, he began to question his chauffeur, in order toattract the detectives' attention.
One of them, however, having cast a glance through the spindle-trees,caught sight of Dalbreque just as he reached the bottom of the staircase.He gave the alarm and darted forward, followed by his comrades, but hadto run round the car and bumped into the chauffeur, which gave Dalbrequetime to mount his bicycle and cross the yard unimpeded. He thus had someseconds' start. Unfortunately for him as he was about to enter the passageat the back, a troop of boys and girls appeared, returning from vespers. Onhearing the shouts of the detectives, they spread their arms in front ofthe fugitive, who gave two or three lurches and ended by falling.
Cries of triumph were raised:
"Lay hold of him! Stop him!" roared the detectives as they rushed forward.
Renine, seeing that the game was up, ran after the others and called out:
"Stop him!"
He came up with them just as Dalbreque, after regaining his feet, knockedone of the policemen down and levelled his revolver. Renine snatched it outof his hands. But the two other detectives, startled, had also producedtheir weapons. They fired. Dalbreque, hit in the leg and the chest, pitchedforward and fell.
"Thank you, sir," said the inspector to Renine introducing himself. "We owea lot to you."
"It seems to me that you've done for the fellow," said Renine. "Who is he?"
"One Dalbreque, a scoundrel for whom we were looking."
Renine was beside himself. Hortense had joined him by this time; and hegrowled:
"The silly fools! Now they've killed him!"
"Oh, it isn't possible!"
"We shall see. But, whether he's dead or alive, it's death to Rose Andree.How are we to trace her? And what chance have we of finding the place--someinaccessible retreat--where the poor thing is dying of misery andstarvation?"
The detectives and peasants had moved away, bearing Dalbreque with them onan improvised stretcher. Renine, who had at first followed them, in orderto find out what was going to happen, changed his mind and was now standingwith his eyes fixed on the ground. The fall of the bicycle had unfastenedthe parcel which Dalbreque had tied to the handle-bar; and the newspaperhad burst, revealing its contents, a tin saucepan, rusty, dented, batteredand useless.
"What's the meaning of this?" he muttered. "What was the idea?..."
He picked it up examined it. Then he gave a grin and a click of the tongueand chuckled, slowly:
"Don't move an eyelash, my dear. Let all these people clear off. All thisis no business of ours, is it? The troubles of police don't concern us. Weare two motorists travelling for our pleasure and collecting old saucepansif we feel so inclined."
He called his chauffeur:
"Adolphe, take us to the Parc des Landes by a roundabout road."
Half an hour later they reached the sunken track and began to scramble downit on foot beside the wooded slopes. The Seine, which was very low at thistime of day, was lapping against a little jetty near which lay aworm-eaten, mouldering boat, full of pu
ddles of water.
Renine stepped into the boat and at once began to bale out the puddles withhis saucepan. He then drew the boat alongside of the jetty, helped Hortensein and used the one oar which he shipped in a gap in the stern to work herinto midstream:
"I believe I'm there!" he said, with a laugh. "The worst that can happento us is to get our feet wet, for our craft leaks a trifle. But haven't wea saucepan? Oh, blessings on that useful utensil! Almost as soon as I seteyes upon it, I remembered that people use those articles to bale out thebottoms of leaky boats. Why, there was bound to be a boat in the Landeswoods! How was it I never thought of that? But of course Dalbreque made useof her to cross the Seine! And, as she made water, he brought a saucepan."
"Then Rose Andree ...?" asked Hortense.
"Is a prisoner on the other bank, on the Jumieges peninsula. You see thefamous abbey from here."
They ran aground on a beach of big pebbles covered with slime.
"And it can't be very far away," he added. "Dalbreque did not spend thewhole night running about."
A tow-path followed the deserted bank. Another path led away from it. Theychose the second and, passing between orchards enclosed by hedges, came toa landscape that seemed strangely familiar to them. Where had they seenthat pool before, with the willows overhanging it? And where had they seenthat abandoned hovel?
Suddenly both of them stopped with one accord:
"Oh!" said Hortense. "I can hardly believe my eyes!"
Opposite them was the white gate of a large orchard, at the back of which,among groups of old, gnarled apple-trees, appeared a cottage with blueshutters, the cottage of the Happy Princess.
"Of course!" cried Renine. "And I ought to have known it, consideringthat the film showed both this cottage and the forest close by. And isn'teverything happening exactly as in _The Happy Princess_? Isn'tDalbreque dominated by the memory of it? The house, which is certainly theone in which Rose Andree spent the summer, was empty. He has shut her upthere."
"But the house, you told me, was in the Seine-inferieure."
"Well, so are we! To the left of the river, the Eure and the forest ofBrotonne; to the right, the Seine-inferieure. But between them is theobstacle of the river, which is why I didn't connect the two. A hundred andfifty yards of water form a more effective division than dozens of miles."
The gate was locked. They got through the hedge a little lower down andwalked towards the house, which was screened on one side by an old wallshaggy with ivy and roofed with thatch.
"It seems as if there was somebody there," said Hortense. "Didn't I hearthe sound of a window?"
"Listen."
Some one struck a few chords on a piano. Then a voice arose, a woman'svoice softly and solemnly singing a ballad that thrilled with restrainedpassion. The woman's whole soul seemed to breathe itself into the melodiousnotes.
They walked on. The wall concealed them from view, but they saw asitting-room furnished with bright wall-paper and a blue Roman carpet. Thethrobbing voice ceased. The piano ended with a last chord; and the singerrose and appeared framed in the window.
"Rose Andree!" whispered Hortense.
"Well!" said Renine, admitting his astonishment. "This is the last thingthat I expected! Rose Andree! Rose Andree at liberty! And singing Massenetin the sitting room of her cottage!"
"What does it all mean? Do you understand?"
"Yes, but it has taken me long enough! But how could we have guessed ...?"
Although they had never seen her except on the screen, they had not theleast doubt that this was she. It was really Rose Andree, or rather,the Happy Princess, whom they had admired a few days before, amidst thefurniture of that very sitting-room or on the threshold of that verycottage. She was wearing the same dress; her hair was done in the same way;she had on the same bangles and necklaces as in _The Happy Princess_;and her lovely face, with its rosy cheeks and laughing eyes, bore the samelook of joy and serenity.
Some sound must have caught her ear, for she leant over towards a clump ofshrubs beside the cottage and whispered into the silent garden:
"Georges ... Georges ... Is that you, my darling?"
Receiving no reply, she drew herself up and stood smiling at the happythoughts that seemed to flood her being.
But a door opened at the back of the room and an old peasant woman enteredwith a tray laden with bread, butter and milk:
"Here, Rose, my pretty one, I've brought you your supper. Milk fresh fromthe cow...."
And, putting down the tray, she continued:
"Aren't you afraid, Rose, of the chill of the night air? Perhaps you'reexpecting your sweetheart?"
"I haven't a sweetheart, my dear old Catherine."
"What next!" said the old woman, laughing. "Only this morning there werefootprints under the window that didn't look at all proper!"
"A burglar's footprints perhaps, Catherine."
"Well, I don't say they weren't, Rose dear, especially as in your callingyou have a lot of people round you whom it's well to be careful of. Forinstance, your friend Dalbreque, eh? Nice goings on his are! You saw thepaper yesterday. A fellow who has robbed and murdered people and carriedoff a woman at Le Havre ...!"
Hortense and Renine would have much liked to know what Rose Andree thoughtof the revelations, but she had turned her back to them and was sitting ather supper; and the window was now closed, so that they could neither hearher reply nor see the expression of her features.
They waited for a moment. Hortense was listening with an anxious face. ButRenine began to laugh:
"Very funny, really funny! And such an unexpected ending! And we who werehunting for her in some cave or damp cellar, a horrible tomb where the poorthing was dying of hunger! It's a fact, she knew the terrors of that firstnight of captivity; and I maintain that, on that first night, she wasflung, half-dead, into the cave. Only, there you are: the next morningshe was alive! One night was enough to tame the little rogue and tomake Dalbreque as handsome as Prince Charming in her eyes! For see thedifference. On the films or in novels, the Happy Princesses resist orcommit suicide. But in real life ... oh, woman, woman!"
"Yes," said Hortense, "but the man she loves is almost certainly dead."
"And a good thing too! It would be the best solution. What would be theoutcome of this criminal love for a thief and murderer?"
A few minutes passed. Then, amid the peaceful silence of the waning day,mingled with the first shadows of the twilight, they again heard thegrating of the window, which was cautiously opened. Rose Andree leant overthe garden and waited, with her eyes turned to the wall, as though she sawsomething there.
Presently, Renine shook the ivy-branches.
"Ah!" she said. "This time I know you're there! Yes, the ivy's moving.Georges, Georges darling, why do you keep me waiting? Catherine has gone.I am all alone...."
She had knelt down and was distractedly stretching out her shapely armscovered with bangles which clashed with a metallic sound:
"Georges!... Georges!..."
Her every movement, the thrill of her voice, her whole being expresseddesire and love. Hortense, deeply touched, could not help saying:
"How the poor thing loves him! If she but knew...."
"Ah!" cried the girl. "You've spoken. You're there, and you want me to cometo you, don't you? Here I am, Georges!..."
She climbed over the window-ledge and began to run, while Renine went roundthe wall and advanced to meet her.
She stopped short in front of him and stood choking at the sight of thisman and woman whom she did not know and who were stepping out of the veryshadow from which her beloved appeared to her each night.
Renine bowed, gave his name and introduced his companion:
"Madame Hortense Daniel, a pupil and friend of your mother's."
Still motionless with stupefaction, her features drawn, she stammered:
"You know who I am?... And you were there just now?... You heard what Iwas saying ...?"
Renine, without hesitat
ing or pausing in his speech, said:
"You are Rose Andree, the Happy Princess. We saw you on the films the otherevening; and circumstances led us to set out in search of you ... to LeHavre, where you were abducted on the day when you were to have left forAmerica, and to the forest of Brotonne, where you were imprisoned."
She protested eagerly, with a forced laugh:
"What is all this? I have not been to Le Havre. I came straight here.Abducted? Imprisoned? What nonsense!"
"Yes, imprisoned, in the same cave as the Happy Princess; and you broke offsome branches to the right of the cave."
"But how absurd! Who would have abducted me? I have no enemy."
"There is a man in love with you: the one whom you were expecting justnow."
"Yes, my lover," she said, proudly. "Have I not the right to receive whom Ilike?"
"You have the right; you are a free agent. But the man who comes to see youevery evening is wanted by the police. His name is Georges Dalbreque. Hekilled Bourguet the jeweller."
The accusation made her start with indignation and she exclaimed:
"It's a lie! An infamous fabrication of the newspapers! Georges was inParis on the night of the murder. He can prove it."
"He stole a motor car and forty thousand francs in notes."
She retorted vehemently:
"The motor-car was taken back by his friends and the notes will berestored. He never touched them. My leaving for America had made him losehis head."
"Very well. I am quite willing to believe everything that you say. But thepolice may show less faith in these statements and less indulgence."
She became suddenly uneasy and faltered:
"The police.... There's nothing to fear from them.... They won't know...."
"Where to find him? I succeeded, at all events. He's working as awoodcutter, in the forest of Brotonne."
"Yes, but ... you ... that was an accident ... whereas the police...."
The words left her lips with the greatest difficulty. Her voice wastrembling. And suddenly she rushed at Renine, stammering:
"He is arrested?... I am sure of it!... And you have come to tell me....Arrested! Wounded! Dead perhaps?... Oh, please, please!..."
She had no strength left. All her pride, all the certainty of her greatlove gave way to an immense despair and she sobbed out.
"No, he's not dead, is he? No, I feel that he's not dead. Oh, sir, howunjust it all is! He's the gentlest man, the best that ever lived. He haschanged my whole life. Everything is different since I began to love him.And I love him so! I love him! I want to go to him. Take me to him. I wantthem to arrest me too. I love him.... I could not live without him...."
An impulse of sympathy made Hortense put her arms around the girl's neckand say warmly:
"Yes, come. He is not dead, I am sure, only wounded; and Prince Renine willsave him. You will, won't you, Renine?... Come. Make up a story for yourservant: say that you're going somewhere by train and that she is not totell anybody. Be quick. Put on a wrap. We will save him, I swear we will."
Rose Andree went indoors and returned almost at once, disguised beyondrecognition in a long cloak and a veil that shrouded her face; and they alltook the road back to Routot. At the inn, Rose Andree passed as a friendwhom they had been to fetch in the neighbourhood and were taking to Pariswith them. Renine ran out to make enquiries and came back to the two women.
"It's all right. Dalbreque is alive. They have put him to bed in a privateroom at the mayor's offices. He has a broken leg and a rather hightemperature; but all the same they expect to move him to Rouen to-morrowand they have telephoned there for a motor-car."
"And then?" asked Rose Andree, anxiously.
Renine smiled:
"Why, then we shall leave at daybreak. We shall take up our positions in asunken road, rifle in hand, attack the motor-coach and carry off Georges!"
"Oh, don't laugh!" she said, plaintively. "I am so unhappy!"
But the adventure seemed to amuse Renine; and, when he was alone withHortense, he exclaimed:
"You see what comes of preferring dishonour to death! But hang it all, whocould have expected this? It isn't a bit the way in which things happenin the pictures! Once the man of the woods had carried off his victim andconsidering that for three weeks there was no one to defend her, how couldwe imagine--we who had been proceeding all along under the influence ofthe pictures--that in the space of a few hours the victim would become aprincess in love? Confound that Georges! I now understand the sly, humorouslook which I surprised on his mobile features! He remembered, Georges did,and he didn't care a hang for me! Oh, he tricked me nicely! And you, mydear, he tricked you too! And it was all the influence of the film. Theyshow us, at the cinema, a brute beast, a sort of long-haired, ape-facedsavage. What can a man like that be in real life? A brute, inevitably,don't you agree? Well, he's nothing of the kind; he's a Don Juan! Thehumbug!"
"You will save him, won't you?" said Hortense, in a beseeching tone.
"Are you very anxious that I should?"
"Very."
"In that case, promise to give me your hand to kiss."
"You can have both hands, Renine, and gladly."
The night was uneventful. Renine had given orders for the two ladies tobe waked at an early hour. When they came down, the motor was leaving theyard and pulling up in front of the inn. It was raining; and Adolphe, thechauffeur, had fixed up the long, low hood and packed the luggage inside.
Renine called for his bill. They all three took a cup of coffee. But, justas they were leaving the room, one of the inspector's men came rushing in:
"Have you seen him?" he asked. "Isn't he here?"
The inspector himself arrived at a run, greatly excited:
"The prisoner has escaped! He ran back through the inn! He can't be faraway!"
A dozen rustics appeared like a whirlwind. They ransacked the lofts, thestables, the sheds. They scattered over the neighbourhood. But the searchled to no discovery.
"Oh, hang it all!" said Renine, who had taken his part in the hunt. "Howcan it have happened?"
"How do I know?" spluttered the inspector in despair. "I left my three menwatching in the next room. I found them this morning fast asleep, stupefiedby some narcotic which had been mixed with their wine! And the Dalbrequebird had flown!"
"Which way?"
"Through the window. There were evidently accomplices, with ropes and aladder. And, as Dalbreque had a broken leg, they carried him off on thestretcher itself."
"They left no traces?"
"No traces of footsteps, true. The rain has messed everything up. But theywent through the yard, because the stretcher's there."
"You'll find him, Mr. Inspector, there's no doubt of that. In any case, youmay be sure that you won't have any trouble over the affair. I shall be inParis this evening and shall go straight to the prefecture, where I haveinfluential friends."
Renine went back to the two women in the coffee-room and Hortense at oncesaid:
"It was you who carried him off, wasn't it? Please put Rose Andree's mindat rest. She is so terrified!"
He gave Rose Andree his arm and led her to the car. She was staggering andvery pale; and she said, in a faint voice:
"Are we going? And he: is he safe? Won't they catch him again?"
Looking deep into her eyes, he said:
"Swear to me, Rose Andree, that in two months, when he is well and whenI have proved his innocence, swear that you will go away with him toAmerica."
"I swear."
"And that, once there, you will marry him."
"I swear."
He spoke a few words in her ear.
"Ah!" she said. "May Heaven bless you for it!"
Hortense took her seat in front, with Renine, who sat at the wheel. Theinspector, hat in hand, fussed around the car until it moved off.
They drove through the forest, crossed the Seine at La Mailleraie andstruck into the Havre-Rouen road.
"Take off your glove and give me yo
ur hand to kiss," Renine ordered. "Youpromised that you would."
"Oh!" said Hortense. "But it was to be when Dalbreque was saved."
"He is saved."
"Not yet. The police are after him. They may catch him again. He will notbe really saved until he is with Rose Andree."
"He is with Rose Andree," he declared.
"What do you mean?"
"Turn round."
She did so.
In the shadow of the hood, right at the back, behind the chauffeur, RoseAndree was kneeling beside a man lying on the seat.
"Oh," stammered Hortense, "it's incredible! Then it was you who hid himlast night? And he was there, in front of the inn, when the inspector wasseeing us off?"
"Lord, yes! He was there, under the cushions and rugs!"
"It's incredible!" she repeated, utterly bewildered. "It's incredible! Howwere you able to manage it all?"
"I wanted to kiss your hand," he said.
She removed her glove, as he bade her, and raised her hand to his lips.
The car was speeding between the peaceful Seine and the white cliffs thatborder it. They sat silent for a long while. Then he said:
"I had a talk with Dalbreque last night. He's a fine fellow and is readyto do anything for Rose Andree. He's right. A man must do anything forthe woman he loves. He must devote himself to her, offer her all that isbeautiful in this world: joy and happiness ... and, if she should be bored,stirring adventures to distract her, to excite her and to make her smile... or even weep."
Hortense shivered; and her eyes were not quite free from tears. For thefirst time he was alluding to the sentimental adventure that bound them bya tie which as yet was frail, but which became stronger and more enduringwith each of the ventures on which they entered together, pursuing themfeverishly and anxiously to their close. Already she felt powerless anduneasy with this extraordinary man, who subjected events to his will andseemed to play with the destinies of those whom he fought or protected. Hefilled her with dread and at the same time he attracted her. She thought ofhim sometimes as her master, sometimes as an enemy against whom she mustdefend herself, but oftenest as a perturbing friend, full of charm andfascination....