At nine o'clock in the morning, the staff of that great evening paper, La Capitale, were assembled in the vast editorial room, writing out their copy, in the midst of a perfect hubbub of continual comings and goings, of regular shindies, of perpetual discussions.
A stranger entering this room, which among its frequenters went by the name of "The Wild Beasts' Cage," might easily have thought he was witnessing some thirty schoolboys at play in recreation time, instead of being in the presence of famous journalists celebrated for their reports and articles.
Jérôme Fandor had no sooner appeared on the threshold than he was accorded a variety of greetings—ironical, cordial, fault-finding, sympathetic. But he ignored them all; for, like most of those who came into the editorial room at this hour, he was preoccupied with one thing only—where the caprice of his editorial secretary would send him flying for news, in the course of a few minutes? On what difficult and delicate quest would he be despatched? It depended on the exigencies of passing events, on how questions of the hour struck the editorial secretary, in relation to Fandor.
Just as he had expected, the editorial secretary called him.
"Hey! Fandor, come here a minute! I am on the make-up: what have you got for to-day?"
"I don't know. Who has charge of the landing of the King of Spain?"
"Maray. He has just left. Have you seen the last issue of l'Havas?"
"Here it is. … "
The two men ran rapidly through the night's telegrams.
"Deplorably empty!" remarked the editorial secretary. "But where am I to send you? … Ah, now I have it! That article of yours on the rue Norvins affair, yesterday evening, was interesting—it made the others squirm, I know! Isn't there anything more to be got out of that story?"
"What do you want?"
"Can't you stick in something just a little bit scandalous about the Baroness de Vibray? Or about Dollon? About no matter whom, in fact? After all, it's our one and only crime to-day, and you must put in something under that head! … "
Jérôme Fandor seemed to hesitate.
"Would you like me to rake up the past—refer to what happened before?"
"What past?"
"Come now, you must have an inkling of what I refer to!"
"Not I!"
"Ah, my dear fellow, it will not be the first time we have had to mention these personages in our columns! … Just cast your mind back to the Gurn affair! … "
"Ah, the drama in which a great lady was implicated … to her detriment! Lady … Lady Beltham?"
"You have got it! These Dollons—Jacques and Elizabeth—did you know it?—happen to be the children of old Dollon, who was murdered in the train—an extraordinary murder!—when on his way to Paris, to give evidence in the Gurn case?"
"Why, of course! I remember perfectly!" declared the editorial secretary: "Dollon, the father, was the Marquise de Langrune's steward! … The old lady who was murdered! … Isn't that so?"
"That's it! … But, after the death of his mistress, he entered the service of the Baroness de Vibray, she who was assassinated yesterday!"
"Well, I must say they have not been favoured by fortune," said the secretary jokingly. "But, look here, Fandor—like father, like son, eh? … If this young Dollon has murdered Madame de Vibray, doesn't that make you think that his father was the murderer of the Marquise de Langrune?"
Jérôme Fandor shook his head:
"No, old boy, yesterday's crime was ordinary, even common-place, but the assassination of the Marquise de Langrune, on the contrary, gave the police no end of bother."
"They did not find out anything, did they?"
"Why, yes! … Don't you remember? … Naturally enough, it must all seem rather remote to you, but I have all the details as clearly in mind as if they had happened only yesterday. … The Gurn affair was one of the first I had a hand in, with Juve … it was in connection with that very affair I made my start here on La Capitale."[2]
Fandor grew pale:
"And you were jolly proud of it, eh, Fandor? … Good Heavens, how you did hold forth about this Juve! And you regularly fed us up with this villain, so mysterious, so extraordinary, who was never run to earth, could not be captured, was capable of the most inhuman cruelties, capable of devising the most unimaginable tricks and stratagems—this Fantômas!"
Fandor grew pale:
"My dear fellow," said he, "never speak sneeringly or jokingly of Fantômas! … No doubt it is taken for granted, by the public at any rate, that Fantômas is an invention of Juve and myself: that Fantômas never existed! … And that because this monster, who is a man of genius, has never been identified; because not a soul has been able to lay hands on him … ; and because, as you know, this fruitless pursuit has cost poor Juve his life. … "
"The truth is, this famous detective died a foul death!"
"No! You are mistaken! Juve died on the field of honour! When, after a terribly difficult and dangerous investigation, he succeeded (by this time it was no longer the Gurn-Fantômas affair, but that of the boulevard Inkermann at Neuilly) in cornering Fantômas, he was well aware that he risked his life in entering the bandit's abode. What happened was that the villain found means to blow up the house, and to bury Juve underneath the ruins.[3] Fantômas has proved the stronger; but, according to my ideas, Juve has had, none the less, the finest death he could desire—death in the midst of the fight—a useful death!"
"Useful? In what way? … "
"My dear fellow," cried Fandor, in a tone of vigorous denial, "in the opinion of all unprejudiced minds, the death of Juve has proved, proved up to the hilt, the existence of Fantômas. … More, it has forced this villain to disappear; it has restored peace, tranquillity to society. … At the cost of his life, Juve has scored a final triumph, he has deprived Fantômas of the power to do harm—pared his claws in fact."
"The truth is he is never mentioned now by a soul … for all that, Fandor, only to see you smile! Why—," and the editorial secretary shook a threatening finger at his colleague: "I'll wager you still believe in Fantômas! … That one fine day you will write us a rattling good article, announcing some fresh Fantômas crime!"
Jérôme Fandor made no direct reply to this—it was useless to try and convince those who had not closely followed the records of crimes perpetrated during recent years: you could not make them believe in the existence of Fantômas. Fandor knew; but, Juve dead, was there another soul who could know the true facts?
All he said was:
"Well, my dear fellow, this does not tell us what we are to fill up the paper with now! … If the doings connected with Fantômas are frightful, rousing our feelings in the highest degree, I repeat that yesterday's crime bears no resemblance to them: we can put in a paragraph or so—that is all!"
"No way, is there, of compromising anyone with our Baroness de Vibray?"
"I don't think so! It's a perfectly common-place affair. An elderly woman patronises a young painter, whose mistress she may or may not be, and she ends up by getting herself assassinated when the young man imagines he is mentioned in her will."
"Ah! good! Well, I think you will have to fall back on the opening of the artesian well. That suit you?"
"Oh, quite all right! … If you like I can give you my copy in half an hour. I know who are going to speak at the inauguration ceremony, and I can add names this evening! You know I am a bit of a specialist as regards reports written beforehand!"
Fandor