At the commencement of his career — and that of journalism is a ticklish one — he had been greatly helped by Juve, whose knowledge and advice had been invaluable to him. Fandor had been involved — particularly during the last few years — in the most sensational crimes, in the most mysterious affairs, and, whether by chance or voluntarily, he had played a real part in them. He had not been content to take up the position of onlooker and historian only.
Fandor had made his post an important one: he had to be seriously reckoned with. He had enemies, adversaries far from contemptible, and time and again the journalist who, with his friend Juve, had taken part in terrible man-hunts, had attracted towards himself venomous hatreds, all the more disquieting in that his adversaries were of those who keep in the shade and never come into the open for a face-to-face tussle.
Finally, and above all, Fandor, coupled with his friend, detective Juve, had either distinguished himself gloriously or covered himself with ridicule, but in either case he had attracted public attention by his epic combats with the most deadly personality of the age — the elusive Fantômas.
But our holiday-making journalist, whistling the latest air, all the rage, gave no thought to all that. He was reveling in the idea that a few hours hence he would be installed in a comfortable sleeping compartment, to awake next morning on the wonderful Côte d'Azur, inundated with light, drenched in the perfume of tropical flowers, bathed in the radiance of eternal summer.
Ah, then, eight hundred miles and more would separate him from the offices of La Capitale, of the police stations, of wretched dens and hovels with their pestilential smells, would separate him from this everlasting bad weather, from the cold, the wet, which were the ordinary concomitants of his daily existence. To the devil with all that! No more copy to feed printer and paper with! No more people to be interviewed! Hurrah! Here were the holidays! It was leave of absence, and liberty.
The telephone bell rang.
Fandor hesitated a moment. Should he answer it?
According to custom, the journalist "had left" the evening before: he could plead his leave, which was in order, and say, like Louis XIV, "After me the deluge!"
This famous saying would have suited the moment, for it was at that instant precisely that an inky cloud burst over Paris and emptied torrents of water over the darkened city.
Perhaps a friend had rung him up — or it was a mistake! So arguing, Fandor unhooked the receiver.
Having listened a moment, he instinctively adopted a more respectful attitude, as if his interlocutor at the other end of the line could see him.
Fandor replied in quick monosyllables, closing the conversation with these words:
"Agreed. Presently, then chief."
As the journalist hung up the receiver his expression changed: he frowned, and pulling at his moustache with a nervous hand, fretting and fuming.
"Hang it! It only wanted this," he grumbled.
Fandor had been called up by M. Dupont, of L'Aube, the well-known opportunist deputy, who was the manager of La Capitale as well. M. Dupont was only a nominal manager, and generally contented himself with writing up his editorial without even taking it to the office. He left the real management to his son-in-law, whose function was that of editor-in-chief. Thus Fandor had been extremely astonished when his "Head," as he was called in the editorial department, had rung him up.
M. Dupont had summoned him to the Chamber of Deputies, for three o'clock in the afternoon: his chief wished to give him some information for an article on a matter which interested him particularly. Fandor was puzzled, anxious.
What could it be? The chief could not know that he was taking his holiday.
"Bah!" said he, "Dupont evidently does not know. I will go to our meeting-place and will explain my approaching departure to him, and the devil's in it if he does not pass on this bit of reporting to one of my colleagues!"
"Madame Angélique," continued Fandor in a joyous voice, turning to the breathless old housekeeper who had just come back laden with parcels, "Get me lunch quickly. Then you must strap up my portmanteau. This evening I am going to make off, whatever happens!"
For two hours, interminable hours they seemed, Fandor had waited for M. Dupont in the Hall des Perdus1 of the Palais-Bourbon. The deputy was at a sitting of the Chamber. If the ushers were to be believed, the discussion was likely to go on interminably. Several times our young journalist had thought he would simply make off without word said, excusing himself on the score of a misunderstanding when eight hundred odd miles lay between him and the directorial thunders. But he was too scrupulous a journalist, too professionally honest to follow the prompting of his desires.
So, champing his bit, Fandor had stood his ground.
As he was looking at his watch for the hundred and fiftieth time, he quickly rose and hastened towards two men who came out of a corridor: they were M. Dupont and a personage whom Fandor recognised at once. He bowed respectfully to them, shaking hands with the cordial M. Dupont, who said to his companion:
"My dear Minister, let me present to you my young collaborator, Jérôme Fandor."
"It is a name not unknown to me," replied the minister; then, having innumerable calls on his time, he quickly disappeared.
A few minutes after, in one of the little sitting-rooms reserved for Parliamentary Commissions, the manager of La Capitale was conversing with his chief reporter.
"It was not to present me to the minister that you sent for me, my dear Chief — unless you intend to get me an appointment as sub-prefect, in which case."...
"In which case?" questioned M. Dupont gently.
Fandor's reply was frank.
"In which case, even before being nominated, I should tender you my resignation: it is not a profession which tempts me much!"
"Reassure yourself, Fandor, I have no intention whatever of sending you to live in the provinces: but if I asked you to see me here, it was with reference to a very delicate affair about which I mean to give you instructions — I insist on this word."
"Good," thought Fandor. "It's all up with my holiday!"
He tried to ask this question before his chief went into details, but M. Dupont interrupted him with a movement of his hand.
"You will leave for your holiday a few hours later, my dear fellow, and you can take eight days in addition."
Fandor bowed. He could not dispute his chief's decision — and he had gained by this arrangement.
"My dear Fandor," said his chief, coming to the main point, "we published yesterday evening, as you, of course, know, a short paragraph on the death of an artillery officer, Captain Brocq.... There is something mysterious about his death. Captain Brocq who, owing to his functions, was attached to the Second Bureau of the Staff Headquarters, that is to say, the Intelligence Department, was in touch with different sets of people: it would be interesting to get some information about them. I mentioned this just now to the Minister of War, and to the Minister for Home Affairs: both are agreed, that, without making too much noise about this incident, we should institute enquiries, discreet, of course, but also pretty exhaustive. You are the only man on the paper possessed of the necessary tact and ability to carry the thing through successfully."
An hour later, under the pouring rain, Fandor, with turned-up trousers, his greatcoat collar raised, was walking stoically along the Esplanade