There was a pause. Then the doctor formulated his demand in plain tones:
“I shall want two millions.”
This time Siméon remained impassive. He felt that he was in the man’s clutches, like a mouse clawed by a cat. The doctor was playing with him, letting him go and catching him again, without giving him the least hope of escaping from this grim sport.
“This is blackmail,” he said, quietly.
The doctor nodded:
“There’s no other word for it,” he admitted. “It’s blackmail. Moreover, it’s a case of blackmail in which I have not the excuse of creating the opportunity that gives me my advantage. A wonderful chance comes within reach of my hand. I grab at it, as you would do in my place. What else is possible? I have had a few differences, which you know of, with the police. We’ve signed a peace, the police and I. But my professional position has been so much injured that I cannot afford to reject with scorn what you so kindly bring me.”
“Suppose I refuse to submit?”
“Then I shall telephone to the headquarters of police, with whom I stand in great favor at present, as I am able to do them a good turn now and again.”
Siméon glanced at the window and at the door. The doctor had his hand on the receiver of the telephone. There was no way out of it.
“Very well,” he declared. “After all, it’s better so. You know me; and I know you. We can come to terms.”
“On the basis suggested?”
“Yes. Tell me your plan.”
“No, it’s not worth while. I have my methods; and there’s no object in revealing them beforehand. The point is to secure your escape and to put an end to your present danger. I’ll answer for all that.”
“What guarantee have I … ?”
“You will pay me half the money now and the other half when the business is done. There remains the matter of the passport, a secondary matter for me. Still, we shall have to make one out. In what name is it to be?”
“Any name you like.”
The doctor took a sheet of paper and wrote down the description, looking at Siméon between the phrases and muttering:
“Gray hair. … Clean-shaven. … Yellow spectacles. …”
Then he stopped and asked:
“But how do I know that I shall be paid the money? That’s essential, you know. I want banknotes, real ones.”
“You shall have them.”
“Where are they?”
“In a hiding-place that can’t be got at.”
“Tell me where.”
“I have no objection. Even if I give you a clue to the general position, you’ll never find it.”
“Well, go on.”
“Grégoire had the money in her keeping, four million francs. It’s on board the barge. We’ll go there together and I’ll count you out the first million.”
“You say those millions are on board the barge?”
“Yes.”
“And there are four of those millions?”
“Yes.”
“I won’t accept any of them in payment.”
“Why not? You must be mad!”
“Why not? Because you can’t pay a man with what already belongs to him.”
“What’s that you’re saying?” cried Siméon, in dismay.
“Those four millions belong to me, so you can’t offer them to me.”
Siméon shrugged his shoulders:
“You’re talking nonsense. For the money to belong to you, it must first be in your possession.”
“Certainly.”
“And is it?”
“It is.”
“Explain yourself, explain yourself at once!” snarled Siméon, beside himself with anger and alarm.
“I will explain myself. The hiding-place that couldn’t be got at consisted of four old books, back numbers of Bottin’s directory for Paris and the provinces, each in two volumes. The four volumes were hollow inside, as though they had been scooped out; and there was a million francs in each of them.”
“You lie! You lie!”
“They were on a shelf, in a little lumber-room next the cabin.”
“Well, what then?”
“What then? They’re here.”
“Here?”
“Yes, here, on that bookshelf, in front of your nose. So, in the circumstances, you see, as I am already the lawful owner, I can’t accept …”
“You thief! You thief!” shouted Siméon, shaking with rage and clenching his fist. “You’re nothing but a thief; and I’ll make you disgorge. Oh, you dirty thief!”
Dr. Géradec smiled very calmly and raised his hand in protest:
“This is strong language and quite unjustified! quite unjustified! Let me remind you that Mme. Mosgranem honored me with her affection. One day, or rather one morning, after a moment of expansiveness, ‘My dear friend,’ she said—she used to call me her dear friend—‘my dear friend, when I die’—she was given to those gloomy forebodings—‘when I die, I bequeath to you the contents of my home!’ Her home, at that moment, was the barge. Do you suggest that I should insult her memory by refusing to obey so sacred a wish?”
Old Siméon was not listening. An infernal thought was awakening in him; and he turned to the doctor with a movement of affrighted attention.
“We are wasting precious time, my dear sir,” said the doctor. “What have you decided to do?”
He was playing with the sheet of paper on which he had written the particulars required for the passport. Siméon came up to him without a word. At last the old man whispered:
“Give me that sheet of paper. … I want to see …”
He took the paper out of the doctor’s hand, ran his eyes down it and suddenly leapt backwards:
“What name have you put? What name have you put? What right have you to give me that name? Why did you do it?”
“You told me to put any name I pleased, you know.”
“But why this one? Why this one?”
“Can it be your own?”
The old man started with terror and, bending lower and lower over the doctor, said, in a trembling voice:
“One man alone, one man alone was capable of guessing …”
There was a long pause. Then the doctor gave a little chuckle:
“I know that only one man was capable of it. So let’s take it that I’m the man.”
“One man alone,” continued the other, while his breath once again seemed to fail him, “one man alone could find the hiding-place of the four millions in a few seconds.”
The doctor did not answer. He smiled; and his features gradually relaxed.
In a
