Beadle's New York Dime Library, No. 196 — page 22: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

_ 22 wee a eee t— SC ss sss ssn ‘Ah, you are a king, my jewel!” she ex- claimed. “It is no wonder you have pros- pered.” This conversation took place at night; the air were seated in the reception-room of the etreat; and at this point one of the attendants interrupted the interview with the information that a gentleman desired speech with Monsieur Peloton. The lady once more discreetly retired, and the servant admitted the person. Peloton sprung to his feetin amazement when he saw that it was the young Englishman who had placed the refractory patient in the institu- tion. ** Aha, monsieur, you are welcome! From the bottom of my soul am [ glad to see you; and this madman of yours, ha! you are come totake him away? It is good! I am glad of it! Neverin all my life have I hed so much trouble. Wait fora moment! I will fetch you the balance of your money, although it is against the rule of my establishment to return any fees once paid, but in this case I will make an exception in your favorif you will only take your English devil away !” The visitor laughed in the face of the excited and gesticulating Frenchman. ** You return money?” hecried. ‘‘ Well, then, the heavens must be ready to fall!” Peloton was so astonished at tue stranger’s accurate knowledge that he forgot his excite- ment and stared open-mouthed at him. In truth, he had not the remotest idea of return- ing a sou; on the contrary, he had planned to extort an additional fee on account of the trouble he had had with the new patient. “Oh, no, my dear fellow, you must not try to play that game upon me, because it will not work. Iknow you altogether too well. You have had trouble, I suppose, but you must take into consideration that the price I paid was large enough to cover it.” ‘*No, no!” Peloton returned, in haste, “a thousand times no! This man is a demon, mi- lord, a perfect devil!” and then he proceeded to re an account, considerably exaggerated, of the struggle the patient had made and the des- eg means which had been adopted to subdue m. The young man listened as calmly as though .he was notin the least interested in the affair, and Peloton was puzzled. ‘Well, Monsieur Peloton, if the man ‘is as badly wounded as you state, it is quite plain that he will not be apt togive you much trouble for some time, so for a month at least he may as well remain here.” ‘* Ah, monsieur, but do you not think I ought to have something extra for all this trouble? Consider the care the wounded man must have.” ‘Make your mind easy about that; you have not found me hard at a bargain in the past and I will be as liberal in the future.” ‘*Ah, milord, you Englishmen have noble hearts!” cried the master of the Retreat, with a low bow. ‘Perhaps I had better see him; then I shall be able to judge of his condition,” the other suggested. eloton shook his head. ‘“What is the matter—why do you object?” ‘Do you think it is wise in his present state?” ‘‘What reason is there why I should not see him?” ‘‘He is in a fever, monsieur, and any agita- tion might be dangerous.” ‘Do not be alarmed on that score; I shall not agitate him.” Peloton expressed considerable doubt about this, and the young man explained that his per- son was unknown to the patient, which fact as- tonished the Frenchman still more. ‘‘ Just as you say, monsieur,” he remarked. “Have the kindness to follow me.” The visitor was conducted to the’ apartment where the patient had been placed, and on te way thither he propounded a single ques- on: ! “Did you call in a doctor?” “Oh no,” replied Peloton, with a cunning leer. ‘‘ You must understand, monsieur, that in such an establishment as this we do not care to have any outsiders poking about. Besides, I am something of a surgeon, myself, and in this case quite expert enough to do all that was necessary.” **Good! him,” ao otker nodded; the iiea struck him favor- ably.: In a shabbily-furnished sleeping chamber the visicor found the old man, reposing on a small iron bedstead, and in utter darkness. Peloton, with a grin to the patient, by means of which he intended to express his friendly feelings, set the candle he carried upon the lit- tle table by the head of the bed and then with- drew. The wounded man fixed his eyes wistfully upon his visitor as the young man took posses- sion of the only chair in the room and drawing it to the bedside sat down. **My dear sir, I have been called upon to ex- amine your wound,” he said, with a very broad English accent. I am the doctor, then, to call upon La Marmoset, the Detective Queen The old man sat bolt upright in the bed, trem- bling with excitement. ‘* You speak English—you are an Englishman and I am saved, thank God!” he cried. ‘“‘Gently, my dear sir! Do not agitate your- self,” the other continued. ‘*You will take me away from here—from this hell of torture! This is a lunatic asylum, is it not?” ** You really must not give way to this excite- ment or I shall be obliged to retire. I have come to examine your wound.” ‘Oh, that is all right; if don’t amount to anything—an ugly scratch, but that is all. These infernal frog-eaters attended to it. I have had considerable experience in stich mat- ters and I know what Iam talking about. All that worries me is staying here, and if you are a man you will get me out.” The other shook his head. ‘*Tl am almost a stranger in this country and if you are at all acquainted with the laws—” ‘Laws!” cried the sick man, vehemently, ‘‘what have laws to do with my detention here? I have been kidnapped, and the law will rescue me from this den and punish these wretches if I can only get my complaint before the proper authorities,’ and at this point the speaker fancied that he detected an incredulous look stealing over the face of the other. ‘ But of course you too believe that lam crazy and that all this talkis but the ravings of a mad- man. It is only natural; I have read of such things a hundred times, but I never dreamed it would come home to me so forcibly. If these scoundrels had not robbed me of my private papers [I could easily convince you, though, that lam anything but mad. I understand it all! [am the victim of a deep-laid plot. It is necessary to silence me, and by shutting me up here I am silenced, although why these des- perate men did not kill me outright is a mys- tery, because from this place I shall surely es- cape some day, and then I will have ample satisfaction for this terrible outrage!” ‘** But these papers that you speak of—who do you suppose has them—the keeper of this in- stitution?” “Oh no; the cunning brain that planned this fiendish scheme, and has succeeded in carrying it out so well, would never have trusted any- thing of importance to that big brute, He is fit to act as my jailer—fit to keep me here until the purpose, to further which I am shut up here, is accomplished, but beyond that | feel sure he is as ignorant of the plans and plots of this master fiend as I am.” ‘** Who has the papers, then?” ‘The cunning devil who entrapped me so cleverly, and who has apvarently blotted me out of the world. To secure those documents— which, beyond a doubt, in some ingenious man- ner if was discovered I carried upon my person, I was insnared,” **But have you no copies elsewhere?” ** None, but it doesn’t matter; all I want now is to get out of this.” “‘Hush! I hear footsteps in the hall. I will see you again, and in the mean time be patient, and [ will do all I canfor you,” and the speaker rose to his feet and listened intently for a mo- ment. ‘* You understand that I must keep my suspicions to ra ai for if the superintendent suspected that believed there was anything wrong he would quickly take measures to make you appear insane even if you were not so.” ‘* Yes, yes; L have read of such things, but I thought in my superior wisdom that it was all a pack of lies, coined out of the writer’s brain, and that it was not possible for any such thing to occur in this life; but truth is stranger than fiction, and the mind of man cannot conceive anything stranger than the acts which the son of man wills.” . ‘*Be patient and all will be well. [shall be obliged to move slowly in this matter, for this is a country of strange laws; if may be a week or two before I can find grounds whereupon to act. Adieu!” and then he passed out into the hall, taking’ the candle with him, and there in the solitude he clinched his hands and cried: “Where are those papers? What demon plucked them from my grasp?’ CHAPTER XXXVI. ‘*MANY A SLIP "TWIXT CUP AND LIP.” ** AT last, at last!” the Detective Queen cried, in wild exultation, as she possessed herself of the documents upon the table. Ste had recognized the pocket-book, for it was a peculiar one, of a kind not commonly in use in France; she felt sida sure that the papers were those of which she had been in search—the valuable documents that were to play a most important part in swaying the des- tinies of fifty millions of francs. Sne placed the lantern upon the table, and by its light proceeded to examine the prize. As anticipated they were the papers sought— the documents brought across the sea by the ill- fated American, who had disappeared in so mysterious a manner. ‘Aha! I shall triumph!” she exclaimed, after she had finished her inspection, and began to carefully fold them up and stow them away in the pocket-book. ‘*‘ And now the question ' - arises, how came these articles here? Who is it that has been playing hide-and-seek in the Ho- tel Morel? hat mortal can possibly have « knowledge of these secret ways in this old house, and what object has that person to pos- sess himself of these documents and to conceal! them here? Who is it that has entered this struggle in this manner and under which ban- ner does he range himself? for it is a man, of course; no woman could have accomplished it. And then, the papers, which were in the Ameri- can’s possession—how were they obtained?’ ‘*Oh, mon Dieu!” she cried, after a moment's pause, pressing her hands tightly to her tem- ples, ‘‘f bave made my head ache with ail these questions, and why should I worry my brains with them? What care I to guess the puzzle? The documents are mine at last, and that is one most important point gained. No matter who stole them from the American—no matter why they were stolen or brought here, they are in my possession, and if I do not make a good use of them, then La Marmoset is not as wise as she is believed tobe. But this unknown, who fights in the dark! I donot like the idea, and I will not rest satisfied until I discover who it is, and for whom he is acting,’ and there was a look of almost fierce determination upon her features. As she reached forward to take up the bull’s- eye there wasa peculiar noise—a whirr in the air. The lantern was struck violently from the table to the floor and extinguished, thus plung- ng. the room into total darkness, a Marmoset drew a long breath; she knew what bad occurred; some one had noiselessly entered the vault and with a well-directed mis- sile had hurled the lantern from the table, The mysterious unknown who had contrived to possess himself of the important papers car- ried by the American—who had frightened the Countess Morel by his stealthy steps across her apartment at the dead hour of the night on his way to the vault by the secret passage, was at hand, and it was plain from his first movement that he had come to do battle for the documents which he bad so carefully hidden away. La Marmoset’s breath came thick and hard, for she believed she was on the eve of a des- perate struggle, but not in the least did she shrink from the encounter, rendered still more horrible by the dense gloom that enshrouded the vault. In an instant she thrust the pocket-book con- taining the papers into the bosom of her blouse, and then drew the trusty revolver, her constant. companion. The click of the lock, as she brought the ham- mer up to full cock, resounded clearly through. the vault, and the spy listened anxiously, ex- pecting a similar sound to come from the dark- ness before her. She had faced about immedi- ately after the lantern had fal'en, understand- ing that the missile must have come from the rear. But no answering click of pistol-hammer reached her ears; all that she could distinguish —and her ears were as sharp as the animal whose name she bore—was a slight sound like a od pans breathing. sue leveled her revolver straight before her and fired. It was a random shot of course, and she had little hope that the bullet would reach the m- truder, but she relied upon the flash of the pow- der to light up the apartment so that she would be able to see where the unknown was and. what he was like. For amoment the powder flash did illuminate the gloom, but La Marmoset failed to accom- plish her object; nothing but the bare stone walls met her eyes! A peculiar sort of dread began to creep over her; for the first time in her life she had en- countered an antagonist who caused her to know the meaning of the word fear. She comprehended fully the movement which had been made. After extinguishing the lan- tern, the unseen had changed his position, and, taking advantage of the darkness, had glided around to her rear. Quickly recocking the pistol the Queen wheeled, and, as she did so, she was suddenly seized by the throat by fingers so hard and bony that they seemed like steel. Although taken at a most decided disadvan- tage, she grappled with the assailant. But, vain was the struggle; the gripe around her throat tightened; her head began to swim, and her senses to desert her. In fearful agony she strove to break the clutch that was choking the life out of her. Her limbs trembled; she reeled—gasped, beat the air wildly fora moment with her hands; then her head seemed on fire; her senses deserted her and she fell, writhing in agony, to the floor. The mysterious unknown had triumphed, and, despite her skill and courage, La Marmoset, the Detective Queen, was beaten at last. The last thing she remembered was the despe- rate attempt she made to break the gripe upon her throat; then came a blank—a blank that was so near death that it might have been death itself, but for the wonderful endurance with which the woman was gi'ted. How long she remained insensible she know (e) ,OOKS C Keto) am a * a —— ee i. es e