Читать книгу The Destroyer: A Tale of International Intrigue - Burton Egbert Stevenson - Страница 10

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M. Delcassé and M. Lépine were still in conference when Pigot was announced. He was admitted without delay, and made his report briefly and clearly. It could have been summed up in a sentence: neither by him nor by his agents had anything been discovered to indicate, even remotely, that the catastrophe had been the result of intention; every rumour to that effect had been sifted and disproved; La Liberté had been destroyed from within and not from without.

"Another 'accident,' then," grunted Delcassé gloomily. "But I do not believe it! Something—something here"—and he smote his forehead—"tells me that it was not an accident!"

Pigot, as a practical detective, had no faith in intuition; but whatever his thoughts may have been, he managed to mask them behind an impenetrable countenance.

"Our investigations have but just begun," Lépine pointed out. "They will be continued without pause. I will conduct them in person. No circumstance, however trivial, will be overlooked."

"I know you are a good man, Lépine," said the Minister wearily; "I know there is none more clever. But something more than cleverness is needed here—we need genius, inspiration." He stopped abruptly and rose from his chair. "I am sure you will do your best. Remember, if there is any discovery, I am to be told at once."

Pigot, who had been standing with lips compressed, undergoing a violent inward struggle, at last managed to open them.

"I have a man outside," he said, as though repeating a lesson, "who requests an audience with M. Delcassé. He asserts that La Liberté was blown up by the Germans, and that he can prove it."

Delcassé whirled as on a pivot and stared at the speaker.

"But, name of God!" he stammered, barely able to speak for excitement, "why have you not introduced this man at once? Why have you wasted our time. … "

He stopped and took a rapid turn up and down the room. When he spoke again, his voice was quite composed.

"Introduce the man at once," he commanded.

"I think it would be well," said Pigot tonelessly, "that M. Delcassé should first be informed as to the name and character of this man."

Again Delcassé stared.

"Explain yourself!" he cried. "Who is the man?"

"His name is Crochard, sir," Pigot replied.

Delcassé evidently did not recognise the name, but Lépine's face was suddenly illumined.

"Crochard," he explained, "is the most adroit, the most daring, the most accomplished scoundrel with whom I have ever had to deal. Surely Monsieur remembers the affair of the Michaelovitch diamonds?"

"Ah, yes!" cried Delcassé, his face, too, lighting. "So that was Crochard!"

"Crochard the Invincible, he calls himself," growled Pigot. "He is a great braggart."

"And with some reason," added Lépine. "We have never yet been able to convict him."

"He restored the Mazarin diamond to the Louvre, did he not?" queried the Minister. "And also the Mona Lisa?"

"The Mazarin certainly," assented Lépine. "As for the Mona Lisa, I have never been quite certain. There is a rumour that the original is now owned by an American millionaire, and that the picture returned to the Louvre is only a copy—a wonderful one, it is true. Where did you meet him, Pigot?"

Pigot related the story of the meeting, while Delcassé listened thoughtfully.

"Is he to be trusted?" he asked, when Pigot had finished.

"In this affair I believe so," answered Lépine quietly. "He may be as good a patriot as you or I. If he is really in earnest, he can be of immense assistance. He has absolute command of the underworld, and a thousand sources of information which are closed to the police. At least, it can do no harm to hear what he has to say."

Delcassé agreed with a nod, and sat down again.

"Bring him in," he said, and a moment later Crochard entered.

If M. Delcassé had expected to perceive anything of the criminal in the man who bowed to him respectfully from the threshold, he was most thoroughly disappointed. What he did see was a well-built man in the very prime of life, with clear and fearless eyes of greenish-grey flecked with yellow, a face singularly open and engaging, and a manner as easy and self-possessed as Delcassé's own. The only sign of approaching age was the sprinkle of grey in the crisp, brown hair, but this served rather to accentuate the youthfulness of the face, covered now by a coat of tan which bespoke a summer spent in the open. In any company, this man would have been notable.

"M. Crochard, I believe," said Delcassé, and involuntarily the great Minister arose and returned his visitor's bow. "Be seated, sir."

"Thank you," said Crochard, and sat down. "I see that we are going to appreciate each other," he added, and looked at Delcassé with a friendly smile.

That gentleman's eyes were twinkling behind his glasses, and his lips twitched under his heavy moustache.

"It always pleases me to meet a distinguished man," he said, "in whatever field of endeavour. M. Lépine tells me that you are most distinguished."

"M. Lépine has every reason to know," agreed Crochard, and glanced smilingly toward the Prefect.

"Though, since I have eyes, I can see that for myself," added the Minister. "Why did you wish to see me?"

"I wished to see you, sir," answered Crochard, suddenly serious, "because I have long recognised in you the only man whom France possesses who sees clearly the struggle which is ahead of her, who prepares ceaselessly for that struggle, and who is strong enough to guide her through it triumphantly."

"To what struggle do you refer?" inquired the Minister, but his shining eyes belied his careless tone.

"The struggle to regain possession of Alsace-Lorraine and to avenge ourselves upon the nation which once humiliated us."

A slow flush crept into Delcassé's cheeks, and his lips tightened.

"You foresee such a struggle?" he asked.

"As clearly as you do yourself, sir."

"Well, yes!" cried Delcassé, and smote the arm of his chair a heavy blow. "I do foresee such a struggle—I have never denied it; and for twenty years I have laboured to prepare for it. You can understand, then, what a blow it is to me—how terrible, how disheartening—to have all my calculations blasted by such accidents as that of to-day!"

"Pardon me, sir," said Crochard, in a low tone, "but the destruction of La Liberté was not an accident!"

"You assert that?"

"I do. And furthermore I assert that it was the work of Germany!"

Delcassé sprang from his chair, his face livid.

"The proof!" he cried. "The proof!"

"The proof, sir, is this: at five minutes before dawn, this morning, two strangers, attired as pedestrians, with knapsacks on their backs, stopped in the recess of the doorway of Number Ten, Quai de Cronstadt. They stepped well within the shadow, as though not wishing to be seen, and stood gazing out on the harbour. Directly before them, at a distance of not more than three hundred yards, La Liberté was moored. It was at her they stared, with eyes expectant and uneasy. At dawn, La Liberté blew up, and one of these men cried out some words of German."

"What were they?"

"Unfortunately the person who overheard them does not know German. He understood only the first two words, 'Ach Gott!'"

"And the men?" cried Delcassé. "What became of them?"

"They strode rapidly away along the quay, and were lost to sight."

Delcassé dropped into his chair, his face dark with passion.

"What do you infer from this circumstance?" he demanded.

"There is only one possible inference," answered Crochard. "At five minutes before dawn this morning, there were, in this city of Toulon, two Germans who knew that La Liberté was to be destroyed."

A moment's silence followed. Those words, terrible as they were, astounding as they were, carried conviction with them.

"Tell me," said Delcassé, at last, "how you discovered all this."

"I have been spending the month at Nice," Crochard explained. "I learned of the disaster as soon as I was up this morning, and I came at once to Toulon. Monsieur will understand that, in the many years during which I have been at variance with society, I have made many friends and gained a certain power in quarters of which Monsieur knows little. One of these friends is the proprietor of the café which occupies the ground floor of the house on the Quai de Cronstadt. I stopped to see him, because his house is close to the scene of the disaster—so close, indeed, that all of its windows were shattered. It was he who gave me the first clue."

"Go on," said Delcassé, who had been listening intently. "I need not say how deeply all this interests me."

"My friend had arranged to go to Marseilles this morning," Crochard continued, "to make a purchase of wine. The train, he tells me, leaves at six o'clock. It was about fifteen minutes before that hour when, as he started to open his door, two men stepped into the little vestibule, as though to screen themselves from observation. He peered through the curtain, thinking they might be friends, and found that he did not know them. Gazing from the darkness of the interior, he could see them very well. They were staring at La Liberté, as I have said, their faces rigid with emotion; and then came the explosion, which, without question, they anticipated."

"You have a description of them?" broke in Delcassé.

"An excellent description. They were men of middle age, heavily built and clean-shaven. Their faces were deeply tanned, as with long exposure, and had that fulness about the lips which bespeaks the German. They wore caps and walking-suits with knee trousers. Each had strapped upon his back a small knapsack."

Lépine, who had been taking rapid notes, looked up with gleaming eyes.

"We shall find these men," he said. "It will not be difficult."

"More difficult than you suppose, M. Lépine," said Crochard dryly.

Lépine looked at him.

"What do you mean?" he asked.

Crochard turned to Delcassé with a little deprecating gesture.

"Before I proceed," he said, "I must be certain of my position here. With you, sir, no explanations are necessary; we understand each other and we have no past to prejudice us. But M. le Prefect and I are old enemies. We respect each other, but we always welcome an opportunity to try conclusions. Until this affair is ended, I propose a truce."

"I will go further than that," retorted Lépine, "and call it an alliance. I shall welcome your help. I have already told M. Delcassé that you are probably as good a patriot as he or I."

"I shall try to prove that you are right," said Crochard, his eyes shining. "There is one more condition. In this affair, it may be necessary for me to call to my assistance certain persons for whom the police are looking. Should they be recognised while so engaged, no effort must be made to arrest them."

"I agree," said Lépine, instantly.

Crochard leaned back in his chair with a sigh of satisfaction.

"I am ready to proceed," he said. "Let us, for the time, forget our differences."

"I have already forgotten them," said Lépine.

Delcassé had listened to this interchange with smiling lips.

"Magnificent!" he cried. "I shall remember this scene all my life. And now to work!"

"First," said Lépine, "permit me to inquire of Inspector Pigot how it happened that neither he nor his men heard anything of these two strangers?"

Pigot flushed darkly and opened his lips to defend himself, but Crochard silenced him with a little gesture.

"I can explain that," he said. "Pigot is not a genius, it is true, but neither is he quite a fool, and I should grieve to see him blamed for something not his fault. I was careful to warn my friend to repeat his story to no one. That, I think, was the wisest course. Those men must not know that we suspect them."

Delcassé nodded.

"You are right," he agreed. "Are you possessed of any further information?"

"I had only a few hours," Crochard apologised; "but I did what I could. I learned that two men resembling these, and undoubtedly the same, had been staying since Friday at the Hotel du Nord. The proprietor of that house informed me that they left before daybreak this morning to walk to Frejus."

"Ah, then," began Delcassé.

"But they did not go to Frejus," Crochard added. "They stopped at Salins, which they reached about ten o'clock, boarded a small steam-yacht which was waiting there, and at once put out to sea. I fear they are beyond our reach."

Delcassé stamped his foot.

"What, then, is to be done?" he demanded.

"It seems to me most important that we identify these men," said Crochard; "then we shall know where to look for them."

"Yes," agreed Delcassé; "but how are they to be identified?"

"There are, no doubt, in the files of your department, photographs of the most prominent German officers, both of army and navy. I believe these men to be officers—one, at least—the other may belong to the secret service. I would suggest that these photographs be brought to Toulon, and that it also be ascertained which officers are on leave of absence, or not with their commands. Probably it will be necessary to search only among the general officers. An affair so important would not be entrusted to a subordinate."

Delcassé made a quick note.

"The photographs will be here to-morrow," he promised.

"I would further suggest that the innkeeper be strictly interrogated," Crochard went on. "I ventured to ask him only a careless question or two; he does not know me, and I did not wish to arouse his suspicions."

Lépine arose.

"I will see him at once," he said.

Crochard rose also.

"And I will accompany you. That is all the information I have at present, sir," he added to Delcassé.

"It is a great deal," said the Minister quickly. "Just before you came, I was remarking to Lépine that what we needed in this affair was a man of genius. Well, I think that we have found him!"

Crochard flushed with pleasure.

"I thank you, sir," he said.

"And I thank you for coming to me," said Delcassé. "You are doing France a great service. I shall not forget it. Until morning, then."

Crochard bowed and left the room with the two detectives.

Delcassé sat for a moment deep in thought; then he summoned his secretary, gave the necessary order about the photographs and dictated a cipher telegram to the chief of his secret service at Berlin. That done, he bade his secretary good night, dismissed him and went to bed.

But not to sleep. Turning at full length upon his back, his arms above his head, he stared steadily up into the darkness until his brain, freed of all lesser problems, all vagrant thoughts, was concentrated upon the great problem which now confronted it:

How had the destruction of La Liberté been accomplished?

It was, of course, the work of Germany. Those two strangers, who spoke German in a moment of great excitement, who had arrived five minutes before the disaster, who had hastened away immediately afterwards, who had lied about their destination, and for whom a steam-yacht had been waiting—all this, as Crochard said, could have but one meaning.

And then Delcassé fairly bounded in the bed. Fool that he had been not to think of it! There was another proof! The telegram from the Emperor!

He lay a moment trembling, then calmed himself by a mighty effort. How was it the Emperor had learned so promptly of the disaster? There was only one possible answer: an emissary had hastened to flash the news to him—an emissary dressed, prepared, who needed to delay for no investigation, since the roar of the explosion told him everything—one of the men, perhaps, who had waited on the quay. And Delcassé, biting his nails, his face wet with perspiration, pictured to himself the Emperor also waiting, pacing restlessly back and forth, until the word should come! He gnashed his teeth with rage, this good Frenchman, and shook trembling fists up into the darkness. Ah, Germany should pay! Germany should pay!

But again he calmed himself, wiped his forehead, and composed himself for thought.

How had La Liberté been destroyed? There was the question which must be answered, and at once.

By a mine, set to explode at a certain hour? Delcassé shook his head. It was absurd to suppose that a mine could be planted in a harbour as strictly guarded and policed as that of Toulon. By a torpedo, then, which could be launched some distance away? But that was even more absurd. The launching of a torpedo required a complex mechanism; as well suppose that an enemy would be able to install a cannon on the docks unobserved. By a submarine? But La Liberté had lain at anchor in an enclosed basin; besides there were the outer basins, patrol boats, sentries, the constant coming and going of sailors and marines, of launches, of boats of all kinds. How could an enemy creep unobserved past all these?

True, the accident had occurred at dawn, when every one but the sentries was asleep. But even at that hour the harbour was strictly guarded. An enemy, to enter unseen, would have to be impalpable, invisible. …

Besides, how could a mine or a torpedo or a submarine have caused the explosion of the magazines, one after the other, at regular intervals—"spaced," one of the officers had said, "like the reports of a heavy gun." First one had been fired, and then a second, and then a third; Delcassé, closing his eyes, had a vision of a ghostly figure stealing from one to another, torch in hand. …

His mind roved back again over his talk with Lépine. Could it have been done by wireless? Not the ordinary wireless, but some subtle variant of ether waves, some new form of radio-activity, which in some way caused combustion? There was an enemy which could flit unseen from magazine to magazine, which no locks nor bars could guard against. …

His heart faltered at the thought. The possessor of such a secret would have the world at his mercy. No ship would be safe, no fort, no artillery-caisson. Armies and navies alike would melt before him, destroyed by the explosion of their own ammunition. Ah, if France possessed that secret. …

He shook his head impatiently and turned on his side.

"I am dreaming foolish dreams," he told himself. "It is time to sleep."