The Secret of the Night by Gaston Leroux (best free ebook reader .txt) 📖

he starts and works till ten. From ten to eleven he promenades.”

“In the jail-yard?” asked Rouletabille innocently.

“What’s that you say? Ah, you are an enfant terrible! Certainly we do well to send you away. Until eleven he promenades in a pathway of the park. From eleven to one he holds audience; luncheon at one; then he spends the time until half-past two with his family.”

“What does he eat?”

“Soup. His Majesty is wonderfully fond of soup. He takes it at every meal. After luncheon he smokes, but never a cigar—always cigarettes, gifts of the Sultan; and he only drinks one liqueur, Maraschino. At half-past two he goes out again for a little air—always in his park; then he sets himself to work until eight o’clock. It is simply frightful work, with heaps of useless papers and numberless signatures. No secretary can spare him that ungrateful bureaucratic duty. He must sign, sign, sign, and read, read, read the reports. And it is work without any beginning or end; as soon as some reports go, others arrive. At eight o’clock, dinner, and then more signatures, working right up to eleven o’clock. At eleven o’clock he goes to bed.”

“And he sleeps to the rhythmical tramp of the guards on patrol,” added Rouletabille, bluntly.

“O young man, young man!”

“Pardon me, Monsieur le Grand Marechal,” said the reporter, rising; “I am, indeed, a disturbing spirit and I know that I have nothing more to do in this country. You will not see me any more, Monsieur le Grand Marechal; but before leaving I ought to tell you how much I have been touched by the hospitality of your great nation. That hospitality is sometimes a little dangerous, but it is always magnificent. No other nation in the world knows like the Russians how to receive a man, Your Excellency. I speak as I feel; and that isn’t affected by my manner of quitting you, for you know also how to put a man to the door. Adieu, then; without any rancor. My most respectful homage to His Majesty. Ah, just one word more! You will recall that Natacha Feodorovna was engaged to poor Boris Mourazoff, still another young man who has disappeared and who, before disappearing, charged me to deliver to General Trebassof’s daughter this last token—these two little ikons. I entrust you with this mission, Monsieur le Grand Marechal. Your servant, Excellency.”

Rouletabille re-descended the great Kaniouche. “Now,” said he to himself, “it is my turn to buy farewell presents.” And he made his way slowly across la Place des Grandes-Ecuries and the bridge of the Katharine canal. He entered Aptiekarski-Pereoulok and pushed open Pere Alexis’s door, under the arch, at the back of the obscure court.

“Health and prosperity, Alexis Hutch!”

“Ah, you again, little man! Well? Koupriane has let you know the result of my analyses?”

“Yes, yes. Tell me, Alexis Hutch, you are sure you are not mistaken? You don’t think you might be mistaken? Think carefully before you answer. It is a question of life or death.”

“For whom?”

“For me.”

“For you, good little friend! You want to make your old Pere Alexis laugh—or weep!”

“Answer me.”

“No, I couldn’t be mistaken. The thing is as certain as that we two are here—arsenate of soda in the stains on the two napkins and traces of arsenate of soda in two of the four glasses; none in the carafe, none in the little bottle, none in the two glasses. I say it before you and before God.”

“So it is really true. Thank you, Alexis Hutch. Koupriane has not tried to deceive me. There has been nothing of that sort. Well, do you know, Alexis Hutch, who has poured the poison? It is she or I. And as it is not I, it is she. And since it is she, well, I am going to die!”

“You love her, then?” inquired Pere Alexis.

“No,” replied Rouletabille, with a self-mocking smile. “No, I don’t love her. But if it is she who poured the poison, then it was not Michael Nikolaievitch, and it is I who had Michael Nikolaievitch killed. You can see now that therefore I must die. Show me your finest images.

“Ah, my little one, if you will permit your old Alexis to make you a gift, I would offer you these two poor ikons that are certainly from the convent of Troitza at its best period. See how beautiful they are, and old. Have you ever seen so beautiful a Mother of God? And this St. Luke, would you believe that the hand had been mended, eh? Two little masterpieces, little friend! If the old masters of Salonika returned to the world they would be satisfied with their pupils at Troitza. But you mustn’t kill yourself at your age!”

“Come, bat ouclzka (little father), I accept your gift, and, if I meet the old Salonican masters on the road I am going to travel, I shan’t fail to tell them there is no person here below who appreciates them like a certain pere of Aptiekarski-Pereoulok, Alexis Hutch.”

So saying Rouletabille wrapped up the two little ikons and put them in his pocket. The Saint Luke would be sure to appeal to his friend Sainclair. As to the Mother of God, that would be his dying gift to the Dame en noir.

“Ah, you are sad, little son; and your voice, as it sounds now, hurts me.”

Rouletabille turned his head at the sound of two moujiks who entered, carrying a long basket.

“What do you want?” demanded Pere Alexis in Russian, “and what is that you are bringing in? Do you intend to fill that huge basket with my goods? In that case you are very welcome and I am your humble servant.”

But the two chuckled.

“Yes, yes, we have come to rid your shop of a wretched piece of goods that litters it.”

“What is this you say?” inquired the old man, anxiously, and drawing near Rouletabille. “Little friend, watch these men; I don’t recognize their faces and I can’t understand why they have come here.”

Rouletabille looked at the new-comers, who drew near the counter, after depositing their long basket close to the door. There was a sarcastic and malicious mocking way about them that struck him from the first. But while they kept up their jabbering with Pere Alexis he filled his pipe and proceeded to light it. Just then the door was pushed open again and three men entered, simply dressed, like respectable small merchants. They also acted curiously and looked all around the shop. Pere Alexis grew more and more alarmed and the others pulled rudely at his beard.

“I believe these men here have come to rob me,” he cried in French. “What do you say, my son?—Shall I call the police?”

“Hold on,” replied Rouletabille impassively. “They are all armed; they have revolvers in their pockets.”

Pere Alexis’s teeth commenced to chatter. As he tried to get near the door he was roughly pushed back and a final personage entered,