The Golden Triangle Maurice Leblanc (smart books to read .txt) 📖

and his own everywhere: on the grave and also on the walls, on the trees and in the very borders of the flowerbeds. They were Coralie Essarès’ name and yours.⁠ ⁠… And for this, for all that had to do with his revenge upon the murderer and with his son and with the dead woman’s daughter, oh, for these matters he had all his wits about him, believe me, sir!”

Patrice stretched his clutching hands and his distraught face towards the porter:

“Proofs, proofs, proofs!” he insisted, in a stifled voice. “Give me proofs at once! There’s someone dying at this moment by that scoundrel’s criminal intentions, there’s a woman at the point of death. Give me proofs!”

“You need have no fear,” said M. Vacherot. “My friend has only one thought, that of saving the woman, not killing her.⁠ ⁠…”

“He lured her and me into the lodge to kill us, as our parents were killed before us.”

“He is trying only to unite you.”

“Yes, in death.”

“No, in life. You are his dearly-loved son. He always spoke of you with pride.”

“He is a ruffian, a monster!” shouted the officer.

“He is the very best man living, sir, and he is your father.”

Patrice started, stung by the insult:

“Proofs,” he roared, “proofs! I forbid you to speak another word until you have proved the truth in a manner admitting of no doubt.”

Without moving from his seat, the old man put out his arm towards an old mahogany escritoire, lowered the lid and, pressing a spring, pulled out one of the drawers. Then he held out a bundle of papers:

“You know your father’s handwriting, don’t you, captain?” he said. “You must have kept letters from him, since the time when you were at school in England. Well, read the letters which he wrote to me. You will see your name repeated a hundred times, the name of his son; and you will see the name of the Coralie whom he meant you to marry. Your whole life⁠—your studies, your journeys, your work⁠—is described in these letters. And you will also find your photographs, which he had taken by various correspondents, and photographs of Coralie, whom he had visited at Salonica. And you will see above all his hatred for Essarès Bey, whose secretary he had become, and his plans of revenge, his patience, his tenacity. And you will also see his despair when he heard of the marriage between Essarès and Coralie and, immediately afterwards, his joy at the thought that his revenge would be more cruel when he succeeded in uniting his son Patrice with Essarès’ wife.”

As the old fellow spoke, he placed the letters one by one under the eyes of Patrice, who had at once recognized his father’s hand and sat greedily devouring sentences in which his own name was constantly repeated. M. Vacherot watched him.

“Have you any more doubts, captain?” he asked, at last.

The officer again pressed his clenched fists to his temples:

“I saw his face,” he said, “above the skylight, in the lodge into which he had locked us.⁠ ⁠… It was gloating over our death, it was a face mad with hatred.⁠ ⁠… He hated us even more than Essarès did.⁠ ⁠…”

“A mistake! Pure imagination!” the old man protested.

“Or madness,” muttered Patrice.

Then he struck the table violently, in a fit of revulsion:

“It’s not true, it’s not true!” he exclaimed. “That man is not my father. What, a scoundrel like that!⁠ ⁠…”

He took a few steps round the little room and, stopping in front of Don Luis, jerked out:

“Let’s go. Else I shall go mad too. It’s a nightmare, there’s no other word for it, a nightmare in which things turn upside down until the brain itself capsizes. Let’s go. Coralie is in danger. That’s the only thing that matters.”

The old man shook his head:

“I’m very much afraid⁠ ⁠…”

“What are you afraid of?” bellowed the officer.

“I’m afraid that my poor friend has been caught up by the person who was following him⁠ ⁠… and then how can he have saved Mme. Essarès? The poor thing was hardly able to breathe, he told me.”

Hanging on to Don Luis’ arm, Patrice staggered out of the porter’s lodge like a drunken man:

“She’s done for, she must be!” he cried.

“Not at all,” said Don Luis. “Siméon is as feverishly active as yourself. He is nearing the catastrophe. He is quaking with fear and not in a condition to weigh his words. Believe me, your Coralie is in no immediate danger. We have some hours before us.”

“But Ya-Bon? Suppose Ya-Bon has laid hands upon him?”

“I gave Ya-Bon orders not to kill him. Therefore, whatever happens, Siméon is alive. That’s the great thing. So long as Siméon is alive, there is nothing to fear. He won’t let your Coralie die.”

“Why not, seeing that he hates her? Why not? What is there in that man’s heart? He devotes all his existence to a work of love on our behalf; and, from one minute to the next, that love turns to execration.”

He pressed Don Luis’ arm and, in a hollow voice, asked:

“Do you believe that he is my father?”

“Siméon Diodokis is your father, captain,” replied Don Luis.

“Ah, don’t, don’t! It’s too horrible! God, but we are in the valley of the shadow!”

“On the contrary,” said Don Luis, “the shadow is lifting slightly; and I confess that our talk with M. Vacherot has given me a little light.”

“Do you mean it?”

But, in Patrice Belval’s fevered brain, one idea jostled another. He suddenly stopped:

“Siméon may have gone back to the porter’s lodge!⁠ ⁠… And we shan’t be there!⁠ ⁠… Perhaps he will bring Coralie back!”

“No,” Don Luis declared, “he would have done that before now, if it could be done. No, it’s for us to go to him.”

“But where?”

“Well, of course, where all the fighting has been⁠ ⁠… where the gold lies. All the enemy’s operations are centered in that gold; and you may be sure that, even in retreat, he can’t get away from it. Besides, we know that he is not far from Berthou’s Wharf.”

Patrice allowed himself to be led along without a