Читать книгу The Man in Grey - Baroness Orczy - Страница 8

Table of Contents

Buried in a capacious armchair, beside a cheerfully blazing fire, M. le Procureur Impérial had allowed the copy of the Moniteur which he had been reading to drop from his shapely hands on to the floor. He had closed his eyes and half an hour had gone by in peaceful somnolence, even while M. Lefèvre, chief commissary of police, was cooling his heels in the antechamber, preparatory to being received in audience on most urgent business.

M. le Procureur Impérial never did anything in a hurry, and, on principle, always kept a subordinate waiting until any officiousness or impertinence which might have been lurking in the latter’s mind had been duly squelched by weariness and sore feet.

So it was only after he had indulged in a short and refreshing nap that M. de Saint-Tropèze rang for his servant, and ordered him to introduce M. Lefèvre, chief commissary of police. The latter, a choleric, apoplectic, loud-voiced official, entered the audience chamber in a distinctly chastened spirit. He had been shown the original letter of credentials sent to M. le Procureur by the Minister, and yesterday he had caught sight of the small grey-clad figure as it flitted noiselessly along the narrow streets of the city. And inwardly the brave commissary of police had then and there perpetrated an act of high treason, for he had sworn at the ineptitude of the grand Ministries in Paris, which sent a pack of incompetent agents to interfere with those who were capable of dealing with their own local affairs.

Monsieur le Procureur Impérial, who no doubt sympathised with the worthy man’s grievances, was inclined to be gracious.

“Well? And what is it now, my good Monsieur Lefèvre?” he asked as soon as the commissary was seated.

“In one moment, Monsieur le Procureur,” growled Lefèvre. “First of all, will you tell me what I am to do about that secret agent who has come here, I suppose, to poke his ugly nose into my affairs?”

“What you are to do about him?” rejoined M. de Saint-Tropèze with a smile. “I have shown you the Minister’s letter: he says that we must leave all matters in the hands of his accredited agent.”

“By your leave,” quoth Lefèvre wrathfully, “that accredited agent might as well be polishing the flagstones of the Paris boulevards, for all the good that he will do down here.”

“You think so?” queried M. le Procureur, and with a detached air, he fell into his customary contemplation of his nails. “And with your permission,” continued the commissary, “I will proceed with my own investigations of the outrages committed by those abominable Chouans, for that bundle of conceit will never get the hang of the affair.”

“But the Minister says that we must not interfere. We must render all the assistance that we can.”

“Bah! we’ll render assistance when it is needed,” retorted Lefèvre captiously. “But in the meantime I am not going to let that wooden-legged scoundrel slip through my fingers, to please any grey-coated marmoset who thinks he can lord it over me in my own district.”

M. de Saint-Tropèze appeared interested.

“You have a clue?” he asked.

“More than that. I know who killed Maxence.”

“Ah! You have got the man? Well done, my brave Lefèvre,” exclaimed M. le Procureur, without, however, a very great show of enthusiasm.

“I haven’t got him yet,” parried Lefèvre. “But I have the description of the rascal. A little patience and I can lay my hands on him—provided that busybody does not interfere.”

“Who is he, then?” queried M. de Saint-Tropèze.

“One of those damned Chouans.”

“You are sure?”

“Absolutely. All day yesterday I was busy interrogating witnesses, who I knew must have been along the road between Lonrai and the city in the small hours of the morning—workpeople and so on, who go to and from their work every morning of their lives. Well! after a good deal of trouble we have been able to establish that the murder was actually committed between the hours of five and half-past, because although no one appears actually to have heard the pistol shot, the people who were on the road before five saw nothing suspicious, whilst the two louts who subsequently discovered the body actually heard the tower clock of Notre Dame striking the half-hour at the very time.”

“Well? And—”

“No fewer than three of the witnesses state that they saw a man with a queer-shaped lip, dressed in a ragged coat and breeches, and with stockingless feet thrust into sabots, hanging about the road shortly before five o’clock. They gave him a wide berth, for they took him to be a Chouan on the prowl.”

“Why should a Chouan trouble to kill a wretched man who has not a five-franc piece to bless himself with?”

“That’s what we’ve got to find out,” rejoined the commissary of police, “and we will find it out, too, as soon as we’ve got the ruffian and the rest of the gang. I know the rogue, mind you—the man with the queer lip. I have had my eye on him for some time. Oh! he belongs to the gang, I’ll stake mine oath on it: a youngish man who should be in the army and is obviously a deserter—a ne’er-do-well who never does a day’s honest work and disappears o’ nights. What his name is and where he comes from I do not know. But through him we’ll get the others, including the chief of the gang—the man with the wooden leg.”

“God grant you may succeed!” ejaculated M. le Procureur sententiously. “These perpetual outrages in one’s district are a fearful strain on one’s nerves. By the way,” he added, as he passed his shapely hand over a number of miscellaneous papers which lay in a heap upon his desk, “I don’t usually take heed of anonymous letters, but one came to me this morning which might be worth your consideration.”

He selected a tattered, greasy paper from the heap, fingering it gingerly, and having carefully unfolded it passed it across the table to the chief commissary of police. Lefèvre smoothed the paper out: the writing was almost illegible, and grease and dirt had helped further to confuse the characters, but the commissary had had some experience of such communications, and contrived slowly to decipher the scrawl.

“It is a denunciation, of course,” he said. “The rogues appear to be quarrelling amongst themselves. ‘If,’ says the writer of the epistle, ‘M. le Procureur will send his police to-night between the hours of ten and twelve to the Cache-Renard woods and they follow the directions given below, they will come across the money and valuables which were taken from the mail-coach last Wednesday, and also those who robbed the coach and murdered Mme. de Pléllan’s valet. Strike the first bridle-path on the right after entering the wood by the main road, until you come to a fallen fir tree lying across another narrow path; dismount here and follow this track for a further three hundred mètres, till you come to a group of five larches in the midst of a thicket of birch and oak. Stand with your back to the larch that is farthest from you, and face the thicket; there you will perceive another track which runs straight into the depths of the wood, follow it until you come to a tiny clearing, at the bottom of which the thicket will seem so dense that you would deem it impenetrable. Plunge into it boldly to where a nest of broken branches reveals the presence of human footsteps, and in front of you you will see a kind of hut composed of dead branches and caked mud and covered with a rough thatch of heather. In that hut you will find that for which you seek.’”

“Do you think it worth while to act upon this anonymous denunciation?” queried M. Saint-Tropèze when Lefèvre had finished reading.

“I certainly do,” replied the commissary. “In any case it can do no harm.”

“You must take plenty of men with you.”

“Leave that to me, Monsieur le Procureur,” rejoined Lefèvre, “and I’ll see that they are well armed, too.”

“What about the secret agent?”

Lefèvre swore.

“That worm?” was his sole but very expressive comment.

“Will you see him about the matter?”

“What do you think?”

“I suppose you must.”

“And if he gives me orders?”

“You must obey them, of course. Have you seen him this morning?”

“Yes. He had ordered me to come to his lodgings in the Rue de France.”

“What did he want?”

“The scrap of paper which we had found in the breeches’ pocket of Maxence.”

“You gave it to him?”

“Of course,” growled Lefèvre savagely. “Haven’t we all got to obey him?”

“You left him in his lodgings, then?”

“Yes.”

“Doing what?”

“Reading a book.”

“Reading a book?” exclaimed M. de Saint-Tropèze with a harsh laugh. “What book?”

“I just noticed the title,” replied Lefèvre, “though I’m nothing of a scholar and books don’t interest me.”

“What was the title?”

“Corinne,” said the commissary of police.

Apparently M. le Procureur Impérial had come to the end of the questions which he desired to put to the worthy M. Lefèvre, for he said nothing more, but remained leaning back in his chair and gazing straight out of the window beside him. His pale, aristocratic profile looked almost like chiselled marble against the purple damask of the cushions. He seemed absorbed in thought, or else supremely bored; M. Lefèvre—nothing of a psychologist, despite his calling—could not have said which.

The ticking of the massive Louis XIV clock upon the mantelpiece and the sizzling of damp wood on the hearth alone broke the silence which reigned in the stately apartment. Through the closed window the manifold sounds which emanate from a busy city came discreet and subdued.

Instinctively M. Lefèvre’s glance followed that of his chief: he, too, fell to gazing out of the window where only a few passers-by were seen hurrying homewards on this late dreary October afternoon. Suddenly he perceived the narrow, shrinking figure of the little Man in Grey gliding swiftly down the narrow street. The commissary of police smothered the savage oath which had risen to his lips: he turned to his chief, and even his obtuse perceptions were aroused by what he saw. M. le Procureur Impérial was no longer leaning back listlessly against the damask cushions: he was leaning forward, his fine, white hands clutching the arms of his chair. He, too, had apparently caught sight of the grey-clad figure, for his eyes, wide open and resentful, followed it as it glided along, and on his whole face there was such an expression of hatred and savagery that the worthy commissary felt unaccountably awed and subdued. Next moment, however, he thought he must have been dreaming, for M. de Saint-Tropèze had once more turned to him with that frigid urbanity which became his aristocratic personality so well.

“Well, my good Lefèvre,” he said, “I don’t really think that I can help you further in any way. I quite appreciate your mistrust of the obtrusive stranger, and personally I cannot avoid a suspicion that he will hamper you by interfering at a critical moment to-night during your expedition against the Chouans. He may just be the cause of their slipping through your fingers, which would be such a terrible pity now that you have gathered the net so skilfully around them.”

Lefèvre rose, and with firm, deliberate movements tightened the belt around his portly waist, re-adjusted the set of his tunic, and generally contrived to give himself an air of determination and energy.

“I’ll say nothing to the shrimp about our expedition to-night,” he said with sullen resolution. “That is, unless you, Monsieur le Procureur, give me orders to do so.”

“Oh, I?” rejoined M. de Saint-Tropèze carelessly. “I won’t say anything one way or the other. The whole matter is out of my hands and you must act as you think best. Whatever happens,” he added slowly and emphatically, “you will get no blame from me.”

Which was such an extraordinary thing for M. le Procureur to say—who was one of the most pedantic, censorious and autocratic of men—that the good Lefèvre spoke of it afterwards to M. le préfet and to one or two of his friends. He could not understand this attitude of humility and obedience on the part of his chief: but everyone agreed that it was small wonder M. le Procureur Impérial was upset, seeing that the presence of that secret police agent in Alençon was a direct snub to all the municipal and departmental authorities throughout the district, and M. de Saint-Tropèze was sure to resent it more than anyone else, for he was very proud, and acknowledged to be one of the most capable of highly-placed officials in the whole of France.