I am frequently asked this question: "How did you make the acquaintance of Arsene Lupin?"
My connection with Arsene Lupin was well known. The details that I gather concerning that mysterious man, the irrefutable facts that I present, the new evidence that I produce, the interpretation that I place on certain acts of which the public has seen only the exterior manifestations without being able to discover the secret reasons or the invisible mechanism, all establish, if not an intimacy, at least amicable relations and regular confidences.
But how did I make his acquaintance? Why was I selected to be his historiographer? Why I, and not some one else?
The answer is simple: chance alone presided over my choice; my merit was not considered. It was chance that put me in his way. It was by chance that I was participant in one of his strangest and most mysterious adventures; and by chance that I was an actor in a drama of which he was the marvelous stage director; an obscure and intricate drama, bristling with such thrilling events that I feel a certain embarrassment in undertaking to describe it.
The first act takes place during that memorable night of 22 June, of which so much has already been said. And, for my part, I attribute the anomalous conduct of which I was guilty on that occasion to the unusual from of mind in which I found myself on my return home. I had dined with some friends at the Cascade restaurant, and, the entire evening, whilst we smoked and the orchestra played melancholy waltzes, we talked only of crimes and thefts, and dark and frightful intrigues. That is always a poor overture to a night's sleep.
The Saint-Martins went away in an automobile. Jean Daspry—that delightful, heedless Daspry who, six months later, was killed in such a tragic manner on the frontier of Morocco—Jean Daspry and I returned on foot through the dark, warm night. When we arrived in front of the little house in which I had lived for a year at Neuilly, on the boulevard Maillot, he said to me:
"Are you afraid?"
"What an idea!"
"But this house is so isolated....no neighbors....vacant lots....Really, I am not a coward, and yet—-"
"Well, you are very cheering, I must say."
"Oh! I say that as I would say anything else. The Saint-Martins have impressed me with their stories of brigands and thieves."
We shook hands and said good-night. I took out my key and opened the door.
"Well, that is good," I murmured, "Antoine has forgotten to light a candle."
Then I recalled the fact that Antoine was away; I had given him a short leave of absence. Forthwith, I was disagreeably oppressed by the darkness and silence of the night. I ascended the stairs on tiptoe, and reached my room as quickly as possible; then, contrary to my usual habit, I turned the key and pushed the bolt.
The light of my candle restored my courage. Yet I was careful to take my revolver from its case—a large, powerful weapon—and place it beside my bed. That precaution completed my reassurance. I laid down and, as usual, took a book from my night-table to read myself to sleep. Then I received a great surprise. Instead of the paper-knife with which I had marked my place on the preceding, I found an envelope, closed with five seals of red wax. I seized it eagerly. It was addressed to me, and marked: "Urgent."
A letter! A letter addressed to me! Who could have put it in that place? Nervously, I tore open the envelope, and read:
"From the moment you open this letter, whatever happens, whatever you may hear, do not move, do not utter one cry. Otherwise you are doomed."
I am not a coward, and, quite as well as another, I can face real danger, or smile at the visionary perils of imagination. But, let me repeat, I was in an anomalous condition of mind, with my nerves set on edge by the events of the evening. Besides, was there not, in my present situation, something startling and mysterious, calculated to disturb the most courageous spirit?
My feverish fingers clutched the sheet of paper, and I read and re- read those threatening words: "Do not move, do not utter one cry. Otherwise, you are doomed."
"Nonsense!" I thought. "It is a joke; the work of some cheerful idiot."
I was about to laugh—a good loud laugh. Who prevented me? What haunting fear compressed my throat?
At least, I would blow out the candle. No, I could not do it. "Do not move, or you are doomed," were the words he had written.
These auto-suggestions are frequently more imperious than the most positive realities; but why should I struggle against them? I had simply to close my eyes. I did so.