813

"You shall take that man's place. You are that man!"

Gérard shuddered with revolt and disgust:

"Oh, no, he is dead!.. And then.. it is a crime!.. No, I want a new life, made for me, thought out for me.. an unknown name.."

"That man, I tell you!" cried Sernine, irresistible in his energy and authority. "You shall be that man and none other! That man, because his destiny is magnificent, because his name is illustrious, and because he hands down to you a thrice-venerable heritage of ancestral dignity and pride."

"It is a crime!" moaned Baupré, faltering.

"You shall be that man!" spoke Sernine, with unparalleled vehemence. "You shall be that man! If not, you become Baupré again; and over Baupré I own rights of life and death. Choose."

He drew his revolver, cocked it and took aim at the young man:

"Choose," he repeated.

The expression of his face was implacable. Gérard was frightened and sank down on his bed sobbing:

"I wish to live!"

"You wish it firmly, irrevocably?"

"Yes, a thousand times yes! After the terrible thing which I attempted, death appals me… Anything.. anything rather than death!.. Anything!.. Pain.. hunger.. illness.. every torture, every shame.. crime itself, if need be.. but not death!"

He shivered with fever and agony, as though the great enemy were still prowling round him and as though he felt himself powerless to escape from its clutches. The prince redoubled his efforts and, in a fervent voice, holding him under him like a prey:

"I will ask nothing impossible of you, nothing wrong… If there is anything, I am responsible… No, no crime.. a little pain at most… A little of your blood must flow. But what is that, compared with the dread of dying?"

"Pain is indifferent to me."

"Then here and now!" shouted Sernine. "Here and now! Ten seconds of pain and that is all… Ten seconds and the other's life is yours.."

He had seized him round the body and forced him down on a chair; and he now held the young man's left hand flat on the table, with his five fingers spread out. He swiftly took a knife from his pocket, pressed the blade against the little finger, between the first and second joints, and commanded:

"Strike! Strike your own blow. One blow of the fist and that is all!"

He had taken Gérard's right hand and was trying to bring it down upon the other like a hammer.

Gérard writhed and twisted, convulsed with horror. He understood:

"Never!" he stuttered. "Never!"

"Strike! One blow and it's done! One blow and you will be like that man: no one will recognize you."

"Tell me his name.."

"Strike first!"

"Never! Oh, what torture!.. I beseech you.. presently.."

"Now… I insist.. you must."

"No.. no.. I can't do it.."

"Strike, you fool! It means fortune, fame, love.."

Gérard raised his fist with a sudden movement.

"Love," he said, "yes.. for that, yes.."

"You will love and be loved," said Sernine. "Your betrothed awaits you. I have chosen her myself. She is the purest of the pure, the fairest of the fair. But you must win her. Strike!"

The lad's arm stiffened for the fatal blow; but the instinct of self-preservation was too strong for him. His body was wrung with a superhuman effort. He suddenly released himself from Sernine's hold and fled.

He rushed like a madman to the other room. A yell of terror escaped him, at the sight of the abominable vision, and he came back and fell on his knees before Sernine, beside the table.

"Strike!" said the prince, again spreading out the lad's fingers and fixing the blade of the knife.

What followed was done mechanically. With an automatic movement, with haggard eyes and a livid face, the young man raised his fist and struck:

"Ah!" he cried, with a moan of pain.

A small piece of flesh was separated from the little finger. Blood flowed. For the third time, Gérard fainted.

Sernine looked at him for a second or two and said, gently:

"Poor little chap!.. There, I'll reward you for what you've done; and a hundred times over. I always pay generously."

He went downstairs and found the doctor waiting below:

"It's done. Go upstairs, you, and make a little cut in his right cheek, similar to Pierre Leduc's. The two scars must be exactly alike. I shall come back for you in an hour."

"Where are you going?"

"To take the air. My heart feels anyhow."

Outside he drew a long breath and lit another cigarette:

"A good day's work," he muttered. "A little over-crowded, a little tiring, but fruitful, really fruitful. I am Dolores Kesselbach's friend. I am Geneviève's friend. I have manufactured a new Pierre Leduc, a very presentable one and entirely at my disposal. Lastly, I have found Geneviève a husband of the sort that you don't find by the dozen. Now my task is done. I have only to gather the fruit of my efforts. It's your turn to work, M. Lenormand. I, for my part, am ready." And he added, thinking of the poor mutilated lad whom he had dazzled with his promises, "Only – for there is an 'only' – I have not the slightest notion who this Pierre Leduc was, whose place I have magnanimously awarded to that good young man. And that's very annoying… For when all is said, there's nothing to prove to me that Pierre Leduc was not the son of a pork-butcher!."

CHAPTER V

M. LENORMAND AT WORK

On the morning of the 31st of May, all the newspapers reminded their readers that Lupin, in a letter addressed to M. Lenormand, had announced the escape of the messenger Jérôme for that date. And one of them summed up the situation, as it then stood, in very able terms:

"The horrible carnage at the Palace Hotel took place as far back as the 17th of April. What has been discovered since? Nothing.

"There were three clues: the cigarette-case, the initials L and M and the parcel of clothes left behind in the office of the hotel. What advantage has been taken of these clues? None.