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But I had seen the valley between those mountains, the only possible entrance to that mysterious land. Nothing could fail us now. I cast my eyes beyond her toward the mist-wrapped tops of the far Laurentians and the plains. And a sense of an inevitable fate came over me as I perceived far away a tiny, crawling ant upon the snows Simon Leroux's dog sleigh.
And thus we will check M. Leroux's designs, which have doubtless included this point. And so, with half a day's start, you will have nothing to fear from him only remember that he has no scruples. Still, I do not think he will catch you and Mlle. Jacqueline before you reach Château Duchaine," he ended, chuckling at his sagacity.
'You are the bearer of a message from Guy Aylmer? 'I am, my lord. He prays you hasten to his assistance, for the butchers and skinners are attacking Maitre Leroux's house, and had begun to hammer on the door when I was still in the street. If they make their way in, they will surely kill all they find in there. They are shouting, 'Death to the Armagnacs! Death to the English spies!
The lights in the auditorium were partially lowered, and he prayed, devoutly, that they would remain so; for now, glancing out of the corner of his right eye, he saw the speakers. The taller of the two, a man wearing a glistening brown overall and rain-drenched tweed cap, was the detective who had been in Leroux's study and who had ordered him to his room on the night of the murder!
Then: "You are right, Helen," he agreed. "I should know your pluck well enough. But if Inspector Dunbar is gone, the police may refuse to admit us"... "Then let us hurry!" cried Helen. "I am afraid they will take away"... Side by side they descended to Henry Leroux's flat, ringing the bell, which, an hour earlier, the lady of the civet furs had rung. A sergeant in uniform opened the door.
The flight seemed to have exhausted the last flicker of vitality in the old man, for he sank down upon the blankets in a somnolent condition. I could readily understand how his perpetual fear of discovery, intensified through many years of solitude, had grown to be an obsession, and how Leroux's idle threats had stimulated his weakened will to one last effort to escape.
They returned to the study, and Inspector Dunbar, for the first time since his arrival, walked across and examined the fragmentary message, raising his eyebrows when he discovered that it was written upon the same paper as Leroux's MSS. He glanced, too, at the pen lying on a page of "Martin Zeda" near the lamp and at the inky splash which told how hastily the pen had been dropped.
The cab hailed by Gianapolis drew up beside the two, and M. Max entered it. "Good morning, M. Gaston." "Good morning, Mr. Gianapolis." And now, Henry Leroux, Denise Ryland and Helen Cumberly were speeding along the Richmond Road beneath a sky which smiled upon Leroux's convalescence; for this was a perfect autumn morning which ordinarily had gladdened him, but which saddened him to-day.
In truth, I was in no hurry to go. As she drew me back and closed the door behind us I heard the footsteps pause and turn along the corridor. I knew that heavy gait as well as though I already saw Leroux's hard face before my eyes. Jacqueline pushed me inside the room behind her father's chair and closed, but did not hasp, the door.
The table-clock ticked merrily on; SCRATCH SCRATCH SPLUTTER SCRATCH went Henry Leroux's pen; for this up-to-date litterateur, essayist by inclination, creator of "Martin Zeda, Criminal Scientist" by popular clamor, was yet old-fashioned enough, and sufficient of an enthusiast, to pen his work, while lesser men dictated.
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