Presently Fandor was descending the grand staircase of the Palais, steadying the uncertain steps of poor Elizabeth Dollon.
"I implore you to help me!" she cried: "Help me: help us! My brother is guiltless—I could swear to that! … He must—must be found! … This hideous nightmare must end!"
"Mademoiselle, I ask nothing better, only … where to find him?"
"Ah, I have no idea, none! … I implore you, you who must know influential people in high places, do not leave any stone unturned, do all that is humanly possible to save him—to save us!"
Intensely moved by the poor girl's anguish of mind, Fandor could not trust himself to speak. He bent his head in the affirmative merely. Hailing a cab, he put her into it, gave the address to the driver, and as he was closing the door Elizabeth cried:
"Do all that is humanly possible—do everything in the world!"
"I swear to you I will get at the truth," was Fandor's parting promise. The cab had disappeared, but our journalist stood motionless, absorbed in his reflections. At last, uttering his thoughts aloud, he said:
"If the Baroness de Vibray has written that she has killed herself, then she has killed herself, and Dollon is innocent. It's true the letter may be fictitious … therefore we must put it aside—we have no guarantee as to its genuineness. … Here is the problem: Jacques Dollon is dead, and yet has left the Dépôt! Yes, but how?"
Jérôme Fandor went off in the direction of the offices of La Capitale so absorbed in thought that he jostled the passers-by, without noticing the angry glances bestowed on him:
"Jacques Dollon, dead, has left the Dépôt!" He repeated this improbable statement, so absurd, of necessity incorrect; repeated it to the point of satiety:
"Jacques Dollon is dead, and he has got away from the Dépôt!"
Then, in an illuminating flash, he perceived the solution of this apparently insoluble problem:
"A mystery such as this is incomprehensible, inexplicable, impossible, except in connection with one man! There is only one individual in the world capable of making a dead man seem to be alive after his death—and this individual is—Fantômas!"
To formulate this conclusion was to give himself a thrilling shock. … Since the disappearance of Juve, he had never had occasion to suspect the presence, the intervention of Fantômas in connection with any of the crimes he had investigated as reporter and student of human nature.
Fantômas! The sound of that name evoked the worst horrors! Fantômas! This bandit, this criminal who has not shrunk from any cruelty, any horror—Fantômas is crime personified!
Fantômas! He sticks at nothing!
Pronouncing these syllables of evil omen, Fandor lived over again all the extraordinary, improbable, impossible things that had really happened, and had put him on the watch for this terrifying assassin.
Fantômas!
It was certain that to whatever degree he had participated in the assassination of the Baroness de Vibray, one must not be astonished at anything; neither at anything inconceivable, nor at any mysterious details connected with the murder.
Fantômas!
He was the daring criminal—daring beyond all bounds of credibility. And whatever might be the dexterity, the ingenuity, the ability, the devotion of those who were pursuing him, such were his tricks, such his craft and cunning, such the fertility of his invention, so well conceived his devices, so great his audacity, that there were grounds for fearing he would never be brought to justice, and punished for his abominable crimes!
Fantômas!
Ah, if life ever brought Jérôme Fandor and this bandit face to face, there would ensue a struggle of every hour, day, and moment—a struggle of the most terrible nature, a struggle in which man was pitted against man, a struggle without pity, without mercy—a fight to the death! Fantômas would assuredly defend himself with all the immense elusive powers at his command: Jérôme Fandor would pursue him with heart and soul, with his very life itself! It was not only to satisfy his sense of duty at the promptings of honour that the journalist would take action: he would have as guide for his acts, and to animate his will, the passion of hate, and the hope of avenging his friend Juve, fallen a victim to the mysterious blows of Fantômas.
In his article for La Capitale Fandor did not directly mention the possible participation of Fantômas in the crime of the rue Norvins. When it was finished he returned to his modest little flat on the fifth floor in the rue Bergere. He was about to enter the vestibule, when he noticed a piece of paper, which must have been slipped under his door. He stooped and picked up an envelope:
"Why, it is a letter—and there is no name and no stamp on it!"
Entering his study, he seated himself at his table and prepared to begin work. Then he bethought him of the letter, which he had carelessly thrown on the mantelpiece. He tore it open, and drew out a sheet of letter paper.
"Whatever is this?" he cried. His astonishment was natural enough, for the message was oddly put together. To prevent his handwriting being recognised, Fandor's correspondent had cut letters out of a newspaper, and had stuck them together in the desired order. The two or three lines of printed matter were as follows:
"Jérôme Fandor, pay attention, great attention! The affair on which you are concentrating all your powers is worthy of all possible interest, but may have terribly dangerous consequences."
Of course there was no signature.
Evidently the warning referred to the Dollon case.
"Why," exclaimed Fandor, "this is simply an invitation not to busy myself hunting for the guilty persons! … Who has sent this invitation and warning? Surely the sender is the assassin, to whose interest it is that the inquiry into the rue Norvins murder should be dropped! … It must be Jacques Dollon! … But how could Dollon know my address? How could he have found time between his flight from the Dépôt and the present minute, to put this message of printed letters together, and take it to the rue Bergere? … And that at the risk of encountering someone who could recognise him, and might have him arrested afresh? Had he accomplices?"
Fandor was puzzled, agitated:
"But I am mad! … mad! It cannot be Dollon! … Dollon is dead—dead as a door nail—dead beyond dispute, because fifty men have seen him dead; dead, because the Dépôt doctors have certified his death!"
Daylight was fading; evening was coming on; Fandor was still turning the whole affair over in his mind. Every now and again he murmured:
"Fantômas! Fantômas has to do with this extraordinary, this mysterious affair! Fantômas is in it! … Fantômas!"
IV
A SURPRISING ITINERARY
Jérôme Fandor had passed a bad night!
Visions of horror had continually arisen in his troubled mind. Between nightmare after nightmare he had heard all the horrors of the night sound out in the darkness and the glimmering dawn. Then he had fallen into a heavy sleep, which had left him on awaking broken with fatigue. He had given himself a cold douche, and this had calmed his nerves; then he had dressed quickly. When eight o'clock struck he was at his writing-table, thinking things over:
"It's no laughing matter. I thought at first that the Dollon