HEN the telephone in Durant's room tinkled, he knew instinctively it was fate calling.
He had finished breakfast, had just closed his bags; in another five minutes he would have been paying his bill and leaving the little hostelry in the Rue Vignon. And then the sharp, insistent summons! Even as he reached for the instrument, his eyes flitted out to the old narrow Paris street below—no, escape was hopeless.
“M. Durant?” It was the voice of the hotel proprietor. “There are some gentlemen here asking for you.”
The peculiar intonation made Durant divine the truth.
“Of the police?” he inquired.
“Yes, m'sieur.”
“Ask them to come up to my room, if you please.”
Durant laid the instrument on its rack. Caught, then! Not quick enough in get ting away. He should have gone at once to Makoff's house the previous night, as soon as he learned its address. He had seen by the morning papers that Woroff the dancer, chief assistant to Boris Makoff, master of crime, had been killed the previous afternoon; his slayers were arrested, caught red-handed. The papers did not say it was thanks to Durant that they were caught—only the subprefect of police knew it. And now he had run down Durant!
“Enter!” called Durant, to the sharp rap at the door.
To his surprise, he saw it was the subprefect, but alone. M. Ducasse entered, with a bow, and stood for a moment regarding his prey. He was a handsome man—thinly bearded, his face proud, aquiline, powerful, his eyes cruelly cold; in his expression was something sardonic, as though he found the world humorous and bitter.
This man battled against all the underworld of Paris, and made a fair job of it.
“Good morning, M. Durant,” he said. White teeth showed through his beard as he smiled. “You see, I have discovered your name, have found you! You did me a good turn yesterday, for which I owe you thanks, but I could not have so intelligent and able a man loose in Paris without knowing more about him.”
“So you have come to arrest me?” asked Durant. The other gestured.
“I have come to barter freedom—for information.”
EETING those piercing, indomitable eyes, Durant made his decision swiftly. He was now dealing with a Frenchman, to whom the personal appeal meant everything. Defiance would only bring down violence.
“Be seated, M. Ducasse,” he said, and fumbled for pipe and tobacco. The subprefect took a chair, adjusted the flower in his buttonhole, and smiled.
“You aroused my curiosity yesterday, m'sieur,” he said. “An American, allied with thugs! An honest man mixed up with thieves! You even mentioned a gang of which I had never heard—an incredible thing, I assure you!”
Durant nodded, and smiled cynically.
“You want to know more about me?”
“I already know something. Since the war you have been employed in a bank here. Sometime ago you were called to America by the death of a relative; you are now wealthy. Eh?”
“Correct enough.” Durant sat on the table, puffed at his pipe, swung a leg carelessly. “Coming over on the boat, I met a lady. I had often seen her, here in Paris; now I met her. By sheer accident, I learned that she was in the grip of a blackmailer, a criminal organizer, a man who plans and carries out large and small things. I undertook to free her from his grip. As a preliminary step, I got into his good graces, joined his gang. The lady in question is Baronne Glincka, widow of a Russian—an American girl whose marriage was unlucky. The man is her former husband's relative, one Boris Makoff.”
“The Baronne Glincka!” murmured M. Ducasse, lifting his brows.
“Who is forced to assist Boris at his work, forced to pay heavily, forced to lend her position and talent to further his schemes.”
“I know her, though I would never have dreamed this,” said the other. “But I do not know Boris Makoff, or anyone of that name.”
“He calls himself Baron Glincka—”
“Ah! That man!” The eyes of Ducasse flamed suddenly. “You mean it? Why, it seems impossible, fantastic! He is well known—wealthy, a Russian noble—”
“A criminal,” said Durant. “There is my story, m'sieur, in brief.”
Ducasse, inspecting him with frank curiosity, shook his head slowly.
“You have taken on an impossible achievement, m'sieur.”
Durant laughed at him. “So? But he does not suspect me. I have discovered where he lives. I am going to him. Yesterday three of his best men were removed. When I have stripped away his defenses, I shall secure the documents which give him his hold on the Baronne, and my work is done.”
“An impossibility.” And now Ducasse spoke gravely. “But you speak of stripping! That is a harsh word, m'sieur, as you use it. It means killing.”