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The baron did not wince. He walked up to Lupin and asked, without abandoning his imperturbable coolness:

“Who are you?”

Lupin burst out laughing.

“What can it matter who I am? Take it that I am an emissary of fate, looming out of the darkness for your destruction!”

He sprang from his chair, seized the baron by the shoulder and jerked out:

“Yes, for your destruction, my bold baron! Listen to me! Your wife’s three millions, almost all the princess’s jewels, the money you received to-day from the sale of your stud and your real estate: it’s all there, in your pocket, or in that safe. Your flight is prepared. Look, I can see the leather of your portmanteau behind that hanging. The papers on your desk are in order. This very night, you would have done a guy. This very night, disguised beyond recognition, after taking all your precautions, you would have joined your chorus-girl, the creature for whose sake you have committed murder, that same Nelly Darbal, no doubt, whom Ganimard arrested in Belgium. But for one sudden, unforeseen obstacle: the police, the twelve detectives who, thanks to Lavernoux’s revelations, have been posted under your windows. They’ve cooked your goose, old chap!… Well, I’ll save you. A word through the telephone; and, by three or four o’clock in the morning, twenty of my friends will have removed the obstacle, polished off the twelve detectives, and you and I will slip away quietly. My conditions? Almost nothing; a trifle to you: we share the millions and the jewels. Is it a bargain?”