Maurice Leblanc - Arsene Lupin Part 29 of 99

CHAPTER VIII THE DUKE ARRIVES

The morning was gloomy, and the police-station with its bare, white-washed walls—their white expanse was only broken by notice-boards to which were pinned portraits of criminals with details of their appearance, their crime, and the reward offered for their apprehension—with its shabby furniture, and its dingy fireplace, presented a dismal and sordid appearance entirely in keeping with the September grey. The inspector sat at his desk, yawning after a night which had passed without an arrest. He was waiting to be relieved. The policeman at the door and the two policemen sitting on a bench by the wall yawned in sympathy.
The silence of the street was broken by the rattle of an uncommonly noisy motor-car. It stopped before the door of the police-station, and the eyes of the inspector and his men turned, idly expectant, to the door of the office.
It opened, and a young man in motor-coat and cap stood on the threshold.
He looked round the office with alert eyes, which took in everything, and said, in a brisk, incisive voice: “I am the Duke of Charmerace. I am here on behalf of M. Gournay-Martin. Last evening he received a letter from Arsène Lupin saying he was going to break into his Paris house this very morning.”
At the name of Arsène Lupin the inspector sprang from his chair, the policemen from their bench. On the instant they were wide awake, attentive, full of zeal.
“The letter, your Grace!” said the inspector briskly.
The Duke pulled off his glove, drew the letter from the breast-pocket of his under-coat, and handed it to the inspector.
The inspector glanced through it, and said. “Yes, I know the handwriting well.” Then he read it carefully, and added, “Yes, yes: it’s his usual letter.”
“There’s no time to be lost,” said the Duke quickly. “I ought to have been here hours ago—hours. I had a break-down. I’m afraid I’m too late as it is.”
“Come along, your Grace—come along, you,” said the inspector briskly.
The four of them hurried out of the office and down the steps of the police-station. In the roadway stood a long grey racing-car, caked with muds—grey mud, brown mud, red mud—from end to end. It looked as if it had brought samples of the soil of France from many districts.
“Come along; I’ll take you in the car. Your men can trot along beside us,” said the Duke to the inspector.
He slipped into the car, the inspector jumped in and took the seat beside him, and they started. They went slowly, to allow the two policemen to keep up with them. Indeed, the car could not have made any great pace, for the tyre of the off hind-wheel was punctured and deflated.
In three minutes they came to the Gournay-Martin house, a wide-fronted mass of undistinguished masonry, in an undistinguished row of exactly the same pattern. There were no signs that any one was living in it. Blinds were drawn, shutters were up over all the windows, upper and lower. No smoke came from any of its chimneys, though indeed it was full early for that.
Pulling a bunch of keys from his pocket, the Duke ran up the steps. The inspector followed him. The Duke looked at the bunch, picked out the latch-key, and fitted it into the lock. It did not open it. He drew it out and tried another key and another. The door remained locked.
“Let me, your Grace,” said the inspector. “I’m more used to it. I shall be quicker.”
The Duke handed the keys to him, and, one after another, the inspector fitted them into the lock. It was useless. None of them opened the door.
“They’ve given me the wrong keys,” said the Duke, with some vexation. “Or no—stay—I see what’s happened. The keys have been changed.”
“Changed?” said the inspector. “When? Where?”
“Last night at Charmerace,” said the Duke. “M. Gournay-Martin declared that he saw a burglar slip out of one of the windows of the hall of the château, and we found the lock of the bureau in which the keys were kept broken.”
The inspector seized the knocker, and hammered on the door.
“Try that door there,” he cried to his men, pointing to a side-door on the right, the tradesmen’s entrance, giving access to the back of the house. It was locked. There came no sound of movement in the house in answer to the inspector’s knocking.
“Where’s the concierge?” he said.
The Duke shrugged his shoulders. “There’s a housekeeper, too—a woman named Victoire,” he said. “Let’s hope we don’t find them with their throats cut.”
“That isn’t Lupin’s way,” said the inspector. “They won’t have come to much harm.”

#M_Gournay-Martin #ArsèneLupin #Paris #Duke #France #Grace #Charmerace #Lupin #ArseneLupin #MauriceLeBlanc #mystery #booktoot

Maurice Leblanc - Arsene Lupin Part 22 of 99

CHAPTER VI AGAIN THE CHAROLAIS

Hardly had the door closed behind the millionaire when the head of M. Charolais appeared at one of the windows opening on to the terrace. He looked round the empty hall, whistled softly, and stepped inside. Inside of ten seconds his three sons came in through the windows, and with them came Jean, the millionaire’s chauffeur.
“Take the door into the outer hall, Jean,” said M. Charolais, in a low voice. “Bernard, take that door into the drawing-room. Pierre and Louis, help me go through the drawers. The whole family is going to Paris, and if we’re not quick we shan’t get the cars.”
“That comes of this silly fondness for warning people of a coup,” growled Jean, as he hurried to the door of the outer hall. “It would have been so simple to rob the Paris house without sending that infernal letter. It was sure to knock them all silly.”
“What harm can the letter do, you fool?” said M. Charolais. “It’s Sunday. We want them knocked silly for to-morrow, to get hold of the coronet. Oh, to get hold of that coronet! It must be in Paris. I’ve been ransacking this château for hours.”
Jean opened the door of the outer hall half an inch, and glued his eyes to it. Bernard had done the same with the door opening into the drawing-room. M. Charolais, Pierre, and Louis were opening drawers, ransacking them, and shutting them with infinite quickness and noiselessly.
“Bureau! Which is the bureau? The place is stuffed with bureaux!” growled M. Charolais. “I must have those keys.”
“That plain thing with the brass handles in the middle on the left—that’s a bureau,” said Bernard softly.
“Why didn’t you say so?” growled M. Charolais.
He dashed to it, and tried it. It was locked.
“Locked, of course! Just my luck! Come and get it open, Pierre. Be smart!”
The son he had described as an engineer came quickly to the bureau, fitting together as he came the two halves of a small jemmy. He fitted it into the top of the flap. There was a crunch, and the old lock gave. He opened the flap, and he and M. Charolais pulled open drawer after drawer.
“Quick! Here’s that fat old fool!” said Jean, in a hoarse, hissing whisper.
He moved down the hall, blowing out one of the lamps as he passed it. In the seventh drawer lay a bunch of keys. M. Charolais snatched it up, glanced at it, took a bunch of keys from his own pocket, put it in the drawer, closed it, closed the flap, and rushed to the window. Jean and his sons were already out on the terrace.
M. Charolais was still a yard from the window when the door into the outer hall opened and in came M. Gournay-Martin.
He caught a glimpse of a back vanishing through the window, and bellowed: “Hi! A man! A burglar! Firmin! Firmin!”
He ran blundering down the hall, tangled his feet in the fragments of the broken chair, and came sprawling a thundering cropper, which knocked every breath of wind out of his capacious body. He lay flat on his face for a couple of minutes, his broad back wriggling convulsively—a pathetic sight!—in the painful effort to get his breath back. Then he sat up, and with perfect frankness burst into tears. He sobbed and blubbered, like a small child that has hurt itself, for three or four minutes. Then, having recovered his magnificent voice, he bellowed furiously: “Firmin! Firmin! Charmerace! Charmerace!”
Then he rose painfully to his feet, and stood staring at the open windows.
Presently he roared again: “Firmin! Firmin! Charmerace! Charmerace!”
He kept looking at the window with terrified eyes, as though he expected somebody to step in and cut his throat from ear to ear.
“Firmin! Firmin! Charmerace! Charmerace!” he bellowed again.
The Duke came quietly into the hall, dressed in a heavy motor-coat, his motor-cap on his head, and carrying a kit-bag in his hand.
“Did I hear you call?” he said.
“Call?” said the millionaire. “I shouted. The burglars are here already. I’ve just seen one of them. He was bolting through the middle window.”
The Duke raised his eyebrows.
“Nerves,” he said gently—“nerves.”
“Nerves be hanged!” said the millionaire. “I tell you I saw him as plainly as I see you.”
“Well, you can’t see me at all, seeing that you’re lighting an acre and a half of hall with a single lamp,” said the Duke, still in a tone of utter incredulity.
“It’s that fool Firmin! He ought to have lighted six. Firmin! Firmin!” bellowed the millionaire.

#CHAROLAIS #M_Charolais #Jean #Bernard #Pierre #Louis #Paris #M_Gournay-Martin #Firmin #Charmerace #ArseneLupin #MauriceLeBlanc #mystery #booktoot

Maurice Leblanc - Arsene Lupin Part 18 of 99

CHAPTER V A LETTER FROM LUPIN

The Duke stood for a while staring thoughtfully at the door through which Sonia had passed, a faint smile playing round his lips. He crossed the hall to the Chippendale bureau, took a cigarette from a box which stood on the ledge of it, beside the morocco case which held the pendant, lighted it, and went slowly out on to the terrace. He crossed it slowly, paused for a moment on the edge of it, and looked across the stretch of country with musing eyes, which saw nothing of its beauty. Then he turned to the right, went down a flight of steps to the lower terrace, crossed the lawn, and took a narrow path which led into the heart of a shrubbery of tall deodoras. In the middle of it he came to one of those old stone benches, moss-covered and weather-stained, which adorn the gardens of so many French châteaux. It faced a marble basin from which rose the slender column of a pattering fountain. The figure of a Cupid danced joyously on a tall pedestal to the right of the basin. The Duke sat down on the bench, and was still, with that rare stillness which only comes of nerves in perfect harmony, his brow knitted in careful thought. Now and again the frown cleared from his face, and his intent features relaxed into a faint smile, a smile of pleasant memory. Once he rose, walked round the fountains frowning, came back to the bench, and sat down again. The early September dusk was upon him when at last he rose and with quick steps took his way through the shrubbery, with the air of a man whose mind, for good or ill, was at last made up.
When he came on to the upper terrace his eyes fell on a group which stood at the further corner, near the entrance of the château, and he sauntered slowly up to it.
In the middle of it stood M. Gournay-Martin, a big, round, flabby hulk of a man. He was nearly as red in the face as M. Charolais; and he looked a great deal redder owing to the extreme whiteness of the whiskers which stuck out on either side of his vast expanse of cheek. As he came up, it struck the Duke as rather odd that he should have the Charolais eyes, set close together; any one who did not know that they were strangers to one another might have thought it a family likeness.
The millionaire was waving his hands and roaring after the manner of a man who has cultivated the art of brow-beating those with whom he does business; and as the Duke neared the group, he caught the words:
“No; that’s the lowest I’ll take. Take it or leave it. You can say Yes, or you can say Good-bye; and I don’t care a hang which.”
“It’s very dear,” said M. Charolais, in a mournful tone.
“Dear!” roared M. Gournay-Martin. “I should like to see any one else sell a hundred horse-power car for eight hundred pounds. Why, my good sir, you’re having me!”
“No, no,” protested M. Charolais feebly.
“I tell you you’re having me,” roared M. Gournay-Martin. “I’m letting you have a magnificent car for which I paid thirteen hundred pounds for eight hundred! It’s scandalous the way you’ve beaten me down!”
“No, no,” protested M. Charolais.
He seemed frightened out of his life by the vehemence of the big man.
“You wait till you’ve seen how it goes,” said M. Gournay-Martin.
“Eight hundred is very dear,” said M. Charolais.
“Come, come! You’re too sharp, that’s what you are. But don’t say any more till you’ve tried the car.”
He turned to his chauffeur, who stood by watching the struggle with an appreciative grin on his brown face, and said: “Now, Jean, take these gentlemen to the garage, and run them down to the station. Show them what the car can do. Do whatever they ask you—everything.”
He winked at Jean, turned again to M. Charolais, and said: “You know, M. Charolais, you’re too good a man of business for me. You’re hot stuff, that’s what you are—hot stuff. You go along and try the car. Good-bye—good-bye.”
The four Charolais murmured good-bye in deep depression, and went off with Jean, wearing something of the air of whipped dogs. When they had gone round the corner the millionaire turned to the Duke and said, with a chuckle: “He’ll buy the car all right—had him fine!”
“No business success of yours could surprise me,” said the Duke blandly, with a faint, ironical smile.
M. Gournay-Martin’s little pig’s eyes danced and sparkled; and the smiles flowed over the distended skin of his face like little ripples over a stagnant pool, reluctantly. It seemed to be too tightly stretched for smiles.

#CHAPTERV #Sonia #Chippendale #French #Cupid #M_Gournay-Martin #M_Charolais #Charolais #eighthundredpounds #thirteenhundredpounds #Jean #M_Gournay-Martin’s #ArseneLupin #MauriceLeBlanc #mystery #booktoot

Maurice Leblanc - Arsene Lupin Part 13 of 99

“Oh, come! what on earth do you mean?” said the Duke. “You’re getting quite incomprehensible, my dear girl.”
“Well, I’ll make it clear to you. One morning papa received a letter—but wait. Sonia, get me the Lupin papers out of the bureau.”
Sonia rose from the writing-table, and went to a bureau, an admirable example of the work of the great English maker, Chippendale. It stood on the other side of the hall between an Oriental cabinet and a sixteenth-century Italian cabinet—for all the world as if it were standing in a crowded curiosity shop—with the natural effect that the three pieces, by their mere incongruity, took something each from the beauty of the other. Sonia raised the flap of the bureau, and taking from one of the drawers a small portfolio, turned over the papers in it and handed a letter to the Duke.
“This is the envelope,” she said. “It’s addressed to M. Gournay-Martin, Collector, at the château de Charmerace, Ile-et-Vilaine.”
The Duke opened the envelope and took out a letter.
“It’s an odd handwriting,” he said.
“Read it—carefully,” said Germaine.
It was an uncommon handwriting. The letters of it were small, but perfectly formed. It looked the handwriting of a man who knew exactly what he wanted to say, and liked to say it with extreme precision. The letter ran:
“DEAR SIR,”
“Please forgive my writing to you without our having been introduced to one another; but I flatter myself that you know me, at any rate, by name.”
“There is in the drawing-room next your hall a Gainsborough of admirable quality which affords me infinite pleasure. Your Goyas in the same drawing-room are also to my liking, as well as your Van Dyck. In the further drawing-room I note the Renaissance cabinets—a marvellous pair—the Flemish tapestry, the Fragonard, the clock signed Boulle, and various other objects of less importance. But above all I have set my heart on that coronet which you bought at the sale of the Marquise de Ferronaye, and which was formerly worn by the unfortunate Princesse de Lamballe. I take the greatest interest in this coronet: in the first place, on account of the charming and tragic memories which it calls up in the mind of a poet passionately fond of history, and in the second place—though it is hardly worth while talking about that kind of thing—on account of its intrinsic value. I reckon indeed that the stones in your coronet are, at the very lowest, worth half a million francs.”
“I beg you, my dear sir, to have these different objects properly packed up, and to forward them, addressed to me, carriage paid, to the Batignolles Station. Failing this, I shall Proceed to remove them myself on the night of Thursday, August 7th.”
“Please pardon the slight trouble to which I am putting you, and believe me,”
“Yours very sincerely,” “ARSÈNE LUPIN.”
“P.S.—It occurs to me that the pictures have not glass before them. It would be as well to repair this omission before forwarding them to me, and I am sure that you will take this extra trouble cheerfully. I am aware, of course, that some of the best judges declare that a picture loses some of its quality when seen through glass. But it preserves them, and we should always be ready and willing to sacrifice a portion of our own pleasure for the benefit of posterity. France demands it of us.—A. L.”
The Duke laughed, and said, “Really, this is extraordinarily funny. It must have made your father laugh.”
“Laugh?” said Germaine. “You should have seen his face. He took it seriously enough, I can tell you.”
“Not to the point of forwarding the things to Batignolles, I hope,” said the Duke.

#Sonia #Lupin #English #Chippendale #Oriental #Italian #M_Gournay-Martin #Collector #deCharmerace #Germaine #Renaissance #Flemish #Fragonard #Boulle #PrincessedeLamballe #halfamillionfrancs #BatignollesStation #ARSÈNELUPIN #France #us_—A_ #ArseneLupin #MauriceLeBlanc #mystery #booktoot

Maurice Leblanc - Arsene Lupin Part 8 of 99

“Yes, my boy; it’s a very fine château,” said M. Charolais, looking round the hall with appreciative but greedy eyes.
There was a pause.
“It’s a very fine château, young ladies,” said M. Charolais.
“Yes; but excuse me, what is it you have called about?” said Germaine.
M. Charolais crossed his legs, leant back in his chair, thrust his thumbs into the arm-holes of his waistcoat, and said: “Well, we’ve come about the advertisement we saw in the RENNES ADVERTISER, that M. Gournay-Martin wanted to get rid of a motor-car; and my son is always saying to me, ‘I should like a motor-car which rushes the hills, papa.’ He means a sixty horse-power.”
“We’ve got a sixty horse-power; but it’s not for sale. My father is even using it himself to-day,” said Germaine.
“Perhaps it’s the car we saw in the stable-yard,” said M. Charolais.
“No; that’s a thirty to forty horse-power. It belongs to me. But if your son really loves rushing hills, as you say, we have a hundred horse-power car which my father wants to get rid of. Wait; where’s the photograph of it, Sonia? It ought to be here somewhere.”
The two girls rose, went to a table set against the wall beyond the window, and began turning over the papers with which it was loaded in the search for the photograph. They had barely turned their backs, when the hand of young Charolais shot out as swiftly as the tongue of a lizard catching a fly, closed round the silver statuette on the top of the cabinet beside him, and flashed it into his jacket pocket.
Charolais was watching the two girls; one would have said that he had eyes for nothing else, yet, without moving a muscle of his face, set in its perpetual beaming smile, he hissed in an angry whisper, “Drop it, you idiot! Put it back!”
The young man scowled askance at him.
“Curse you! Put it back!” hissed Charolais.
The young man’s arm shot out with the same quickness, and the statuette stood in its place.
There was just the faintest sigh of relief from Charolais, as Germaine turned and came to him with the photograph in her hand. She gave it to him.
“Ah, here we are,” he said, putting on a pair of gold-rimmed pince-nez. “A hundred horse-power car. Well, well, this is something to talk over. What’s the least you’ll take for it?”
“I have nothing to do with this kind of thing,” cried Germaine. “You must see my father. He will be back from Rennes soon. Then you can settle the matter with him.”
M. Charolais rose, and said: “Very good. We will go now, and come back presently. I’m sorry to have intruded on you, young ladies—taking up your time like this—”
“Not at all—not at all,” murmured Germaine politely.
“Good-bye—good-bye,” said M. Charolais; and he and his son went to the door, and bowed themselves out.
“What creatures!” said Germaine, going to the window, as the door closed behind the two visitors. “All the same, if they do buy the hundred horse-power, papa will be awfully pleased. It is odd about that pane. I wonder how it happened. It’s odd too that Jacques hasn’t come back yet. He told me that he would be here between half-past four and five.”
“And the Du Buits have not come either,” said Sonia. “But it’s hardly five yet.”
“Yes; that’s so. The Du Buits have not come either. What on earth are you wasting your time for?” she added sharply, raising her voice. “Just finish addressing those letters while you’re waiting.”
“They’re nearly finished,” said Sonia.
“Nearly isn’t quite. Get on with them, can’t you!” snapped Germaine.
Sonia went back to the writing-table; just the slightest deepening of the faint pink roses in her cheeks marked her sense of Germaine’s rudeness. After three years as companion to Germaine Gournay-Martin, she was well inured to millionaire manners; they had almost lost the power to move her.
Germaine dropped into a chair for twenty seconds; then flung out of it.
“Ten minutes to five!” she cried. “Jacques is late. It’s the first time I’ve ever known him late.”
She went to the window, and looked across the wide stretch of meadow-land and woodland on which the château, set on the very crown of the ridge, looked down. The road, running with the irritating straightness of so many of the roads of France, was visible for a full three miles. It was empty.

#M_Charolais #Germaine #M_Gournay-Martin #Sonia #Charolais #Rennes #Jacques #GermaineGournay-Martin #France #threemiles #ArseneLupin #MauriceLeBlanc #mystery #booktoot

Maurice Leblanc - Arsene Lupin Part 7 of 99

CHAPTER II THE COMING OF THE CHAROLAIS

Sonia went back to her table, and once more began putting wedding-cards in their envelopes and addressing them. Germaine moved restlessly about the room, fidgeting with the bric-a-brac on the cabinets, shifting the pieces about, interrupting Sonia to ask whether she preferred this arrangement or that, throwing herself into a chair to read a magazine, getting up in a couple of minutes to straighten a picture on the wall, throwing out all the while idle questions not worth answering. Ninety-nine human beings would have been irritated to exasperation by her fidgeting; Sonia endured it with a perfect patience. Five times Germaine asked her whether she should wear her heliotrope or her pink gown at a forthcoming dinner at Madame de Relzières’. Five times Sonia said, without the slightest variation in her tone, “I think you look better in the pink.” And all the while the pile of addressed envelopes rose steadily.
Presently the door opened, and Alfred stood on the threshold.
“Two gentlemen have called to see you, miss,” he said.
“Ah, the two Du Buits,” cried Germaine.
“They didn’t give their names, miss.”
“A gentleman in the prime of life and a younger one?” said Germaine.
“Yes, miss.”
“I thought so. Show them in.”
“Yes, miss. And have you any orders for me to give Victoire when we get to Paris?” said Alfred.
“No. Are you starting soon?”
“Yes, miss. We’re all going by the seven o’clock train. It’s a long way from here to Paris; we shall only reach it at nine in the morning. That will give us just time to get the house ready for you by the time you get there to-morrow evening,” said Alfred.
“Is everything packed?”
“Yes, miss—everything. The cart has already taken the heavy luggage to the station. All you’ll have to do is to see after your bags.”
“That’s all right. Show M. du Buit and his brother in,” said Germaine.
She moved to a chair near the window, and disposed herself in an attitude of studied, and obviously studied, grace.
As she leant her head at a charming angle back against the tall back of the chair, her eyes fell on the window, and they opened wide.
“Why, whatever’s this?” she cried, pointing to it.
“Whatever’s what?” said Sonia, without raising her eyes from the envelope she was addressing.
“Why, the window. Look! one of the panes has been taken out. It looks as if it had been cut.”
“So it has—just at the level of the fastening,” said Sonia. And the two girls stared at the gap.
“Haven’t you noticed it before?” said Germaine.
“No; the broken glass must have fallen outside,” said Sonia.
The noise of the opening of the door drew their attention from the window. Two figures were advancing towards them—a short, round, tubby man of fifty-five, red-faced, bald, with bright grey eyes, which seemed to be continually dancing away from meeting the eyes of any other human being. Behind him came a slim young man, dark and grave. For all the difference in their colouring, it was clear that they were father and son: their eyes were set so close together. The son seemed to have inherited, along with her black eyes, his mother’s nose, thin and aquiline; the nose of the father started thin from the brow, but ended in a scarlet bulb eloquent of an exhaustive acquaintance with the vintages of the world.
Germaine rose, looking at them with an air of some surprise and uncertainty: these were not her friends, the Du Buits.
The elder man, advancing with a smiling bonhomie, bowed, and said in an adenoid voice, ingratiating of tone: “I’m M. Charolais, young ladies—M. Charolais—retired brewer—chevalier of the Legion of Honour—landowner at Rennes. Let me introduce my son.” The young man bowed awkwardly. “We came from Rennes this morning, and we lunched at Kerlor’s farm.”
“Shall I order tea for them?” whispered Sonia.
“Gracious, no!” said Germaine sharply under her breath; then, louder, she said to M. Charolais, “And what is your object in calling?”
“We asked to see your father,” said M. Charolais, smiling with broad amiability, while his eyes danced across her face, avoiding any meeting with hers. “The footman told us that M. Gournay-Martin was out, but that his daughter was at home. And we were unable, quite unable, to deny ourselves the pleasure of meeting you.” With that he sat down; and his son followed his example.
Sonia and Germaine, taken aback, looked at one another in some perplexity.
“What a fine château, papa!” said the young man.

#CHAPTERII #CHAROLAIS #Germaine #Sonia #MadamedeRelzières’ #Alfred #DuBuits #Paris #M_Charolais #LegionofHonour #Rennes #Kerlor #M_Gournay-Martin #ArseneLupin #MauriceLeBlanc #mystery #booktoot

Maurice Leblanc - Arsene Lupin Part 2 of 99

CHAPTER I THE MILLIONAIRE’S DAUGHTER

The rays of the September sun flooded the great halls of the old château of the Dukes of Charmerace, lighting up with their mellow glow the spoils of so many ages and many lands, jumbled together with the execrable taste which so often afflicts those whose only standard of value is money. The golden light warmed the panelled walls and old furniture to a dull lustre, and gave back to the fading gilt of the First Empire chairs and couches something of its old brightness. It illumined the long line of pictures on the walls, pictures of dead and gone Charmeraces, the stern or debonair faces of the men, soldiers, statesmen, dandies, the gentle or imperious faces of beautiful women. It flashed back from armour of brightly polished steel, and drew dull gleams from armour of bronze. The hues of rare porcelain, of the rich inlays of Oriental or Renaissance cabinets, mingled with the hues of the pictures, the tapestry, the Persian rugs about the polished floor to fill the hall with a rich glow of colour.
But of all the beautiful and precious things which the sun-rays warmed to a clearer beauty, the face of the girl who sat writing at a table in front of the long windows, which opened on to the centuries-old turf of the broad terrace, was the most beautiful and the most precious.
It was a delicate, almost frail, beauty. Her skin was clear with the transparent lustre of old porcelain, and her pale cheeks were only tinted with the pink of the faintest roses. Her straight nose was delicately cut, her rounded chin admirably moulded. A lover of beauty would have been at a loss whether more to admire her clear, germander eyes, so melting and so adorable, or the sensitive mouth, with its rather full lips, inviting all the kisses. But assuredly he would have been grieved by the perpetual air of sadness which rested on the beautiful face—the wistful melancholy of the Slav, deepened by something of personal misfortune and suffering.
Her face was framed by a mass of soft fair hair, shot with strands of gold where the sunlight fell on it; and little curls, rebellious to the comb, strayed over her white forehead, tiny feathers of gold.
She was addressing envelopes, and a long list of names lay on her left hand. When she had addressed an envelope, she slipped into it a wedding-card. On each was printed:
“M. Gournay-Martin has the honour to inform you of the marriage of his daughter Germaine to the Duke of Charmerace.”
She wrote steadily on, adding envelope after envelope to the pile ready for the post, which rose in front of her. But now and again, when the flushed and laughing girls who were playing lawn-tennis on the terrace, raised their voices higher than usual as they called the score, and distracted her attention from her work, her gaze strayed through the open window and lingered on them wistfully; and as her eyes came back to her task she sighed with so faint a wistfulness that she hardly knew she sighed. Then a voice from the terrace cried, “Sonia! Sonia!”
“Yes. Mlle. Germaine?” answered the writing girl.
“Tea! Order tea, will you?” cried the voice, a petulant voice, rather harsh to the ear.
“Very well, Mlle. Germaine,” said Sonia; and having finished addressing the envelope under her pen, she laid it on the pile ready to be posted, and, crossing the room to the old, wide fireplace, she rang the bell.
She stood by the fireplace a moment, restoring to its place a rose which had fallen from a vase on the mantelpiece; and her attitude, as with arms upraised she arranged the flowers, displayed the delightful line of a slender figure. As she let fall her arms to her side, a footman entered the room.
“Will you please bring the tea, Alfred,” she said in a charming voice of that pure, bell-like tone which has been Nature’s most precious gift to but a few of the greatest actresses.
“For how many, miss?” said Alfred.
“For four—unless your master has come back.”
“Oh, no; he’s not back yet, miss. He went in the car to Rennes to lunch; and it’s a good many miles away. He won’t be back for another hour.”
“And the Duke—he’s not back from his ride yet, is he?”
“Not yet, miss,” said Alfred, turning to go.
“One moment,” said Sonia. “Have all of you got your things packed for the journey to Paris? You will have to start soon, you know. Are all the maids ready?”

#Charmeraces #Oriental #Renaissance #Persian #Slav #M_Gournay-Martin #Germaine #Sonia #Mlle #Alfred #Rennes #Paris #ArseneLupin #MauriceLeBlanc #mystery #booktoot

Maurice Leblanc - Arsene Lupin Maurice Leblanc - Arsene Lupin Part 8 of 99

“Yes, my boy; it’s a very fine château,” said M. Charolais, looking round the hall with appreciative but greedy eyes.
There was a pause.
“It’s a very fine château, young ladies,” said M. Charolais.
“Yes; but excuse me, what is it you have called about?” said Germaine.
M. Charolais crossed his legs, leant back in his chair, thrust his thumbs into the arm-holes of his waistcoat, and said: “Well, we’ve come about the advertisement we saw in the RENNES ADVERTISER, that M. Gournay-Martin wanted to get rid of a motor-car; and my son is always saying to me, ‘I should like a motor-car which rushes the hills, papa.’ He means a sixty horse-power.”
“We’ve got a sixty horse-power; but it’s not for sale. My father is even using it himself to-day,” said Germaine.
“Perhaps it’s the car we saw in the stable-yard,” said M. Charolais.
“No; that’s a thirty to forty horse-power. It belongs to me. But if your son really loves rushing hills, as you say, we have a hundred horse-power car which my father wants to get rid of. Wait; where’s the photograph of it, Sonia? It ought to be here somewhere.”
The two girls rose, went to a table set against the wall beyond the window, and began turning over the papers with which it was loaded in the search for the photograph. They had barely turned their backs, when the hand of young Charolais shot out as swiftly as the tongue of a lizard catching a fly, closed round the silver statuette on the top of the cabinet beside him, and flashed it into his jacket pocket.
Charolais was watching the two girls; one would have said that he had eyes for nothing else, yet, without moving a muscle of his face, set in its perpetual beaming smile, he hissed in an angry whisper, “Drop it, you idiot! Put it back!”
The young man scowled askance at him.
“Curse you! Put it back!” hissed Charolais.
The young man’s arm shot out with the same quickness, and the statuette stood in its place.
There was just the faintest sigh of relief from Charolais, as Germaine turned and came to him with the photograph in her hand. She gave it to him.
“Ah, here we are,” he said, putting on a pair of gold-rimmed pince-nez. “A hundred horse-power car. Well, well, this is something to talk over. What’s the least you’ll take for it?”
“I have nothing to do with this kind of thing,” cried Germaine. “You must see my father. He will be back from Rennes soon. Then you can settle the matter with him.”
M. Charolais rose, and said: “Very good. We will go now, and come back presently. I’m sorry to have intruded on you, young ladies—taking up your time like this—”
“Not at all—not at all,” murmured Germaine politely.
“Good-bye—good-bye,” said M. Charolais; and he and his son went to the door, and bowed themselves out.
“What creatures!” said Germaine, going to the window, as the door closed behind the two visitors. “All the same, if they do buy the hundred horse-power, papa will be awfully pleased. It is odd about that pane. I wonder how it happened. It’s odd too that Jacques hasn’t come back yet. He told me that he would be here between half-past four and five.”
“And the Du Buits have not come either,” said Sonia. “But it’s hardly five yet.”
“Yes; that’s so. The Du Buits have not come either. What on earth are you wasting your time for?” she added sharply, raising her voice. “Just finish addressing those letters while you’re waiting.”
“They’re nearly finished,” said Sonia.
“Nearly isn’t quite. Get on with them, can’t you!” snapped Germaine.
Sonia went back to the writing-table; just the slightest deepening of the faint pink roses in her cheeks marked her sense of Germaine’s rudeness. After three years as companion to Germaine Gournay-Martin, she was well inured to millionaire manners; they had almost lost the power to move her.
Germaine dropped into a chair for twenty seconds; then flung out of it.
“Ten minutes to five!” she cried. “Jacques is late. It’s the first time I’ve ever known him late.”
She went to the window, and looked across the wide stretch of meadow-land and woodland on which the château, set on the very crown of the ridge, looked down. The road, running with the irritating straightness of so many of the roads of France, was visible for a full three miles. It was empty.

#M_Charolais #Germaine #M_Gournay-Martin #Sonia #Charolais #Rennes #Jacques #GermaineGournay-Martin #first #France #threemiles #ArseneLupin #MauriceLeBlanc #mystery #booktoot

Maurice Leblanc - Arsene Lupin

CHAPTER II THE COMING OF THE CHAROLAIS

Sonia went back to her table, and once more began putting wedding-cards in their envelopes and addressing them. Germaine moved restlessly about the room, fidgeting with the bric-a-brac on the cabinets, shifting the pieces about, interrupting Sonia to ask whether she preferred this arrangement or that, throwing herself into a chair to read a magazine, getting up in a couple of minutes to straighten a picture on the wall, throwing out all the while idle questions not worth answering. Ninety-nine human beings would have been irritated to exasperation by her fidgeting; Sonia endured it with a perfect patience. Five times Germaine asked her whether she should wear her heliotrope or her pink gown at a forthcoming dinner at Madame de Relzières’. Five times Sonia said, without the slightest variation in her tone, “I think you look better in the pink.” And all the while the pile of addressed envelopes rose steadily.
Presently the door opened, and Alfred stood on the threshold.
“Two gentlemen have called to see you, miss,” he said.
“Ah, the two Du Buits,” cried Germaine.
“They didn’t give their names, miss.”
“A gentleman in the prime of life and a younger one?” said Germaine.
“Yes, miss.”
“I thought so. Show them in.”
“Yes, miss. And have you any orders for me to give Victoire when we get to Paris?” said Alfred.
“No. Are you starting soon?”
“Yes, miss. We’re all going by the seven o’clock train. It’s a long way from here to Paris; we shall only reach it at nine in the morning. That will give us just time to get the house ready for you by the time you get there to-morrow evening,” said Alfred.
“Is everything packed?”
“Yes, miss—everything. The cart has already taken the heavy luggage to the station. All you’ll have to do is to see after your bags.”
“That’s all right. Show M. du Buit and his brother in,” said Germaine.
She moved to a chair near the window, and disposed herself in an attitude of studied, and obviously studied, grace.
As she leant her head at a charming angle back against the tall back of the chair, her eyes fell on the window, and they opened wide.
“Why, whatever’s this?” she cried, pointing to it.
“Whatever’s what?” said Sonia, without raising her eyes from the envelope she was addressing.
“Why, the window. Look! one of the panes has been taken out. It looks as if it had been cut.”
“So it has—just at the level of the fastening,” said Sonia. And the two girls stared at the gap.
“Haven’t you noticed it before?” said Germaine.
“No; the broken glass must have fallen outside,” said Sonia.
The noise of the opening of the door drew their attention from the window. Two figures were advancing towards them—a short, round, tubby man of fifty-five, red-faced, bald, with bright grey eyes, which seemed to be continually dancing away from meeting the eyes of any other human being. Behind him came a slim young man, dark and grave. For all the difference in their colouring, it was clear that they were father and son: their eyes were set so close together. The son seemed to have inherited, along with her black eyes, his mother’s nose, thin and aquiline; the nose of the father started thin from the brow, but ended in a scarlet bulb eloquent of an exhaustive acquaintance with the vintages of the world.
Germaine rose, looking at them with an air of some surprise and uncertainty: these were not her friends, the Du Buits.
The elder man, advancing with a smiling bonhomie, bowed, and said in an adenoid voice, ingratiating of tone: “I’m M. Charolais, young ladies—M. Charolais—retired brewer—chevalier of the Legion of Honour—landowner at Rennes. Let me introduce my son.” The young man bowed awkwardly. “We came from Rennes this morning, and we lunched at Kerlor’s farm.”
“Shall I order tea for them?” whispered Sonia.
“Gracious, no!” said Germaine sharply under her breath; then, louder, she said to M. Charolais, “And what is your object in calling?”
“We asked to see your father,” said M. Charolais, smiling with broad amiability, while his eyes danced across her face, avoiding any meeting with hers. “The footman told us that M. Gournay-Martin was out, but that his daughter was at home. And we were unable, quite unable, to deny ourselves the pleasure of meeting you.” With that he sat down; and his son followed his example.
Sonia and Germaine, taken aback, looked at one another in some perplexity.
“What a fine château, papa!” said the young man.

#CHAPTERII #CHAROLAIS #Germaine #Sonia #MadamedeRelzières’ #Alfred #DuBuits #Paris #M_Charolais #LegionofHonour #Rennes #Kerlor #M_Gournay-Martin #ArseneLupin #MauriceLeBlanc #mystery #booktoot