The other smiled wanly and nodded. He sat down properly. He was about to speak. Suddenly, he let out a hoarse cry. He stared at a point behind us. He extended an arm and murmured: ‘There! There!’
We all turned around. A sheet of paper had been attached to the door. It read, in enormous letters: ‘IF YOU TALK, YOU WILL DIE.’ We all seemed frozen to the spot, each asking himself the same question: “Who had done that?” Jacques, who was standing closest to the door, made a move to tear the paper down. Jannin stopped him:
‘There may be fingerprints. Besides, the harm is done.’
The prisoner had fallen again into his state of prostration. All the professor’s eloquence could not drag anything out of him other than:
‘I’m scared!’
Eventually, Richard gave up and asked us all to leave.
‘I can only see one solution,’ said Bob. ‘Let him stay the night here, securely guarded. Tomorrow morning, rested and refreshed, he’s bound to talk.’
‘Here? But where? I’ve no confidence in the police station, which can be approached from too many directions. I prefer....’
Just at that moment, the commandant of the fort rejoined us.
‘Not far from here,’ he said, ‘is a concrete bunker. It’s empty at the moment. If we put a bed in there, your man will be safe. The walls and ceiling are more than a metre thick, and there are four metres of earth on the top and around the sides. The floor is a concrete slab. There are absolutely no openings except for a steel door fifty centimetres thick. It uses the same type of lock as a safe. There are only two keys: I have one, and the Gouverneur Militaire de Paris has the other. In addition, there are two bolts on the inside, which your man can activate, and which cannot be reached from the outside. He could not be more safe than there.’
‘Let’s take a look.’
The bunker wasn’t very big: three metres by two, and just over two metres high. The door took up the whole front width, with a recess of twenty centimetres. The entire bunker sat on a concrete base. The door lock activated three vertical steel bars, which fit into three holes in the concrete. In addition, there were two huge bolts which could only be shut from the inside. There were only three other openings: at the front, at ground level, were two air vents measuring five centimetres by ten, covered with a very tight wire-mesh; and a ventilation pipe in the ceiling, four centimetres in diameter, with two elbow bends in it, that came out at the top of the mound of soil covering the bunker.
The careful examination by Richard, Jannin and Bob fully satisfied them. Enclosed in this veritable safe, our man would be absolutely secure from any attack.
‘Nevertheless,’ said the professor, ‘it’s theoretically possible to project an asphyxiating gas through one of the small openings. So I would ask you to place two trusted sentries outside, one at the top and one at the bottom.’
‘And I,’ added Jannin, ‘will provide reinforcements through a couple of inspectors.’
A military bed was brought in, consisting of two bedsteads and three planks, with a mattress and three bedcovers. Everything was examined thoroughly by suspicious eyes. I forgot to mention that the bunker was illuminated by a single electric light bulb.
‘Shall we give him anything to eat?’ asked the commandant.
‘No, it’s not necessary, and I don’t want to tempt the devil. But, if I might use your pharmacy, I’ll prepare a sedative and give it to him myself. After a good night’s sleep, we should be able to get something out of him.’
And so Gregor Stepanovich was taken to the bunker. At the door he was given Richard’s potion. He went inside and we could hear the heavy bolts sliding into place. The sentries took up their positions. The head guard was given strict instructions.
I looked at my watch. It was half-past five. Night had almost fallen. All of our little group slowly took the path leading to our waiting vehicles.
XIII
THE THIRTEENTH BULLET
Monday, December 6
I apologise for prefacing the very simple account which follows with a comment. I just want to make it clear that it has been stripped of all literary cachet, so it resembles a court transcript. The facts speak for themselves. But, given the strangeness of the events awaiting us on that morning of Monday, December 6, I want to draw the reader’s attention to the importance of the account. He will find there, without exception, every detail of the most profound and most incomprehensible mystery ever to challenge a criminologist. The enthusiasm that everyone (officials and amateurs) had was multiplied tenfold by the conviction of each that solving the mystery, and putting the hitherto invulnerable criminal out of action, depended on their explanation.
And now for the drama....
At nine o’clock in the chilly morning, we met in the courtyard of the fort of Noisy-le-Sec. Our group had grown considerably. There wasnow a large tribe of journalists and photographers, as well as two cameramen with their apparatus and aides. All that encircled by several hundred troops at a loose end, in dirty fatigues. In addition, there was a very strict identity check in effect at the entrance, so that, despite several attempts to jump the queue, the vast majority of onlookers remained outside.
We were several metres from the bunker, but nobody had approached it. Only the two sentries, bayonets at the ready, and a police inspector were tapping their feet in the intervening space. The reports from that night did not indicate any activity.
Now
