The commissary looked at him sharply, and asked:
"How do you know that?"
"Ansell told me."
"Are you quite certain?"
"Quite. Ansell has done some jobs for him, and has been well paid for them. He has acted as a spy for our enemies."
"A spy as well as a thief--eh?"
"Exactly, m"sieur. Ansell has been in the Baron"s pay for nearly two years."
"But this allegation is quite unsubstantiated. The Baron de Rycker is well known and highly popular in Paris. He moves in the best society, and the Ministers frequently dine at his table."
"I know that, m"sieur. But search that safe in the little room upstairs--the safe we opened. Go there in pretence of examining our finger-prints, and you will find in the safe quant.i.ties of compromising papers. It was that collection of secret correspondence which we were after when the alarm-bell rang. We intended to secure it and sell it back to Germany."
"If what you say is really true, Carlier, our friends in Berlin would probably give you quite a handsome price for it," replied the official thoughtfully.
He had watched the thief"s face, and knew that he was telling the truth.
"Will you have inquiries made?" urged the thief.
"Most certainly," was the reply. "And if I find you have told the truth, I will endeavour to obtain some slight favour for you--a shorter sentence, perhaps."
"I have told you the truth, m"sieur. It is surely the duty of every Frenchman, even though he be a thief like myself, to unmask a spy."
"Most certainly," declared the official. "And I am very glad indeed that you have told me. I shall make a report to the Prefect of Police this morning, and tell him the name of my informant. The matter will be dealt with at once by the political department of the Surete."
"The Baron will not be told who informed against him?" asked Adolphe anxiously.
"Certainly not. But if Ralph Ansell is arrested, he will be charged with a.s.sisting foreign spies--a charge quite as serious as breaking into the Baron"s house."
"He hated the Baron because the latter had discharged him from his secret service."
"What were his duties?"
"Ah! that I do not quite know, except that he performed delicate missions, and sometimes went abroad, to Holland, England, Norway, and other places."
"Ansell evidently knew the arrangements of the house--eh?"
"He had been to see the Baron in secret many times."
"And been well paid for his work, I suppose?"
"Oh, yes; heavily paid."
"Well," remarked the police official, "you may rest a.s.sured that the Baron will, in future, be well watched. We have no love for foreign spies in Paris, as you know."
And then the commissary went on to question Carlier closely regarding his antecedents and his connection with the notorious Bonnemain gang, which had now been so fortunately broken up.
To all his questions Adolphe replied quite frankly, concealing nothing, well knowing that his sentence would not be made heavier if he spoke openly.
"I"ve heard stories of you for a long time, Carlier," the commissary said at last. "And I suppose we should not have met now, except for the blackguardly action of this man who posed as your friend."
"No. I should have escaped, I expect, just as I have done so often that my friends call me "The Eel," on account, I suppose, of my slipperiness!" And he grimaced.
The official laughed, and, with a word of thanks for the information concerning the Baron, both captor and prisoner pa.s.sed back into the living-room, where the police-agents were concluding their searching investigations.
Nothing had been found of an incriminating nature, and the commissary now saw that the man arrested had spoken the truth.
While Ansell"s house was being turned upside down and Adolphe and the commissary were exchanging confidences, "The American" was having a truly hot and exciting time, as indeed he richly deserved.
Having entered the shaft, after securing the trap-door with its stout, iron bolt, he descended the rickety ladder to the cellar; thence, pa.s.sing by a short tunnel, which Bonnemain had constructed with his own hands, he ascended a few rough wooden steps, and found himself in a lean-to outhouse close to a door in a high wall which led into a side street.
Creeping to the door he drew the bolt, and in a moment was free.
Turning to the left, he took to his heels, and ran as fast as his legs would carry him, intending, if possible, to get away to the country.
He was elated at his narrow escape, and how cleverly he had tricked his friend, with whom he knew the police would be busy and so allow him time to get clean away.
He was lithe and active, and a good runner. Therefore in his rubber-soled shoes he ran swiftly in the grey light of early morning, turning corner after corner, doubling and re-doubling until he came to a main thoroughfare. Then, walking slowly, he crossed it, and dived into a maze of small turnings, all of which were familiar to him.
His first idea had been to seek refuge in the house of a friend--a thief, like himself, named Toussaint--but such a course would, he reflected, be highly dangerous. The police knew Toussaint to be a friend of his, and would, perhaps, go there in search of him.
No. The best course was to get away into the country, and then to Belgium or Spain. With that snug little sum in his pocket, he could live quietly for at least a year.
At last, out of breath, he ceased running, and, moreover, he noticed some men, going to their work early, look askance at his hurry.
So he walked quietly, and lit a cigarette so as to a.s.sume an air of unconcern.
""The Eel" has been trapped at last," he laughed to himself. Then, as he put his hand into the outside pocket of his jacket, it came into contact with Jean"s letter of farewell.
He drew it out, glanced at it, and put it into his inner pocket with an imprecation followed by a triumphant laugh.
Then he whistled in a low tone to himself a popular and catchy refrain.
He was walking along briskly, smiling within himself at his alert cleverness at escaping, when, on suddenly turning the corner of a narrow street close to the Seine, he found himself face to face with two agents of police on cycles.
They were about a hundred yards away and coming in his direction. They instantly recognised him. They were the two men sent out by the commissary.
In a moment, by the att.i.tude of the two officers, Ralph Ansell realised his danger. But too late. They threw down their cycles and fell upon him.
For a few seconds there was a fierce struggle, but in desperation Ansell drew his revolver and fired point-blank at one of his captors, who staggered and fell back with a bullet-wound in the face.
Then in a moment the thief had wrenched himself free and was away.
The sound of the shot alarmed two other police-cyclists who were in the vicinity, and, attracted by the shouts of the injured man"s companion, they were soon on the scene, and lost no time in pursuing the fugitive.