“Coralie,” he said, without lowering his hands, “Coralie … tell me where she is and I’ll spare your life.”
The old man started. His evil nature was stimulated by the remembrance of Coralie; and he recovered a part of his energy at the possibility of wrongdoing. He gave a cruel laugh:
“No, no,” he answered. “Coralie in one scale and I in the other? I’d rather die. Besides, Coralie’s hiding-place is where the gold is. No, never! I may just as well die.”
“Kill him then, captain,” said Don Luis, intervening. “Kill him, since he prefers it.”
Once more the thought of immediate murder and revenge sent the red blood rushing to the officer’s face. But the same hesitation unnerved him.
“No, no,” he said, in a low voice, “I can’t do it.”
“Why not?” Don Luis insisted. “It’s so easy. Come along! Wring his neck, like a chicken’s, and have done with it!”
“I can’t.”
“But why? Do you dislike the thought of strangling him? Does it repel you? And yet, if it were a Boche, on the battlefield …”
“Yes … but this man …”
“Is it your hands that refuse? The idea of taking hold of the flesh and squeezing? … Here, captain, take my revolver and blow out his brains.”
Patrice accepted the weapon eagerly and aimed it at old Siméon. The silence was appalling. Old Siméon’s eyes had closed and drops of sweat were streaming down his livid cheeks.
At last the officer lowered his arm:
“I can’t do it,” he said.
“Nonsense,” said Don Luis. “Get on with the work.”
“No. … No. …”
“But, in Heaven’s name, why not?”
“I can’t.”
“You can’t? Shall I tell you the reason? You are thinking of that man as if he were your father.”
“Perhaps it’s that,” said the officer, speaking very low. “There’s a chance of it, you know.”
“What does it matter, if he’s a beast and a blackguard?”
“No, no, I haven’t the right. Let him die by all means, but not by my hand. I haven’t the right.”
“You have the right.”
“No, it would be abominable! It would be monstrous!”
Don Luis went up to him and, tapping him on the shoulder, said, gravely:
“You surely don’t believe that I should stand here, urging you to kill that man, if he were your father?”
Patrice looked at him wildly:
“Do you know something? Do you know something for certain? Oh, for Heaven’s sake … !”
Don Luis continued:
“Do you believe that I would even encourage you to hate him, if he were your father?”
“Oh!” exclaimed Patrice. “Do you mean that he’s not my father?”
“Of course he’s not!” cried Don Luis, with irresistible conviction and increasing eagerness. “Your father indeed! Why, look at him! Look at that scoundrelly head. Every sort of vice and violence is written on the brute’s face. Throughout this adventure, from the first day to the last, there was not a crime committed but was his handiwork: not one, do you follow me? There were not two criminals, as we thought, not Essarès, to begin the hellish business, and old Siméon, to finish it. There was only one criminal, one, do you understand, Patrice? Before killing Coralie and Ya-Bon and Vacherot the porter and the woman who was his own accomplice, he killed others! He killed one other in particular, one whose flesh and blood you are, the man whose dying cries you heard over the telephone, the man who called you Patrice and who only lived for you! He killed that man; and that man was your father, Patrice; he was Armand Belval! Now do you understand?”
Patrice did not understand. Don Luis’ words fell uncomprehended; not one of them lit up the darkness of Patrice’s brain. However, one thought insistently possessed him; and he stammered:
“That was my father? I heard his voice, you say? Then it was he who called to me?”
“Yes, Patrice, your father.”
“And the man who killed him … ?”
“Was this one,” said Don Luis, pointing to Siméon.
The old man remained motionless, wild-eyed, like a felon awaiting sentence of death. Patrice, quivering with rage, stared at him fixedly:
“Who are you? Who are you?” he asked. And, turning to Don Luis, “Tell me his name, I beseech you. I want to know his name, before I destroy him.”
“His name? Haven’t you guessed it yet? Why, from the very first day, I took it for granted! After all, it was the only possible theory.”
“But what theory? What was it you took for granted?” cried Patrice, impatiently.
“Do you really want to know?”
“Oh, please! I’m longing to kill him, but I must first know his name.”
“Well, then …”
There was a long silence between the two men, as they stood close together, looking into each other’s eyes. Then Lupin let fall these four syllables:
“Essarès Bey.”
Patrice felt a shock that ran through him from head to foot. Not for a second did he try to understand by what prodigy this revelation came to be merely an expression of the truth. He instantly accepted this truth, as though it were undeniable and proved by the most evident facts. The man was Essarès Bey and had killed his father. He had killed him, so to speak, twice over: first years ago, in the lodge in the garden, taking from him all the light of life and any reason for living; and again the other day, in the library, when Armand Belval had telephoned to his son.
This time Patrice was determined to do the deed. His eyes expressed an indomitable resolution. His father’s murderer, Coralie’s murderer, must die then and there. His duty was clear and precise. The terrible Essarès was doomed to die by the hand of the son and the bridegroom.
“Say your prayers,” said Patrice, coldly. “In ten seconds you will be a dead man.”
He counted out the seconds and, at the tenth, was about to fire, when his enemy, in an access of mad energy proving that, under the outward appearance of old Siméon, there was hidden a man still young and vigorous, shouted with a violence so extraordinary that it made Patrice hesitate:
“Very well, kill me! … Yes, let it be finished! …
