Bobinette's astonishment was so evident that Hogshead Geoffrey, whose powers of observation were small, was struck by his sister's expression.

"You know that old fellow?" he asked. "If he bothers you you've but to pass the word, you know, and I'll soon put him on the other side of the door!"

This amiable offer terrified the girl. She felt sure Vagualame was not at The Crying Calf by chance. He had probably followed her—wished to have a word with her.... She must fall in with his wishes. She must cut short this interview with her brother. After all, it was only to pass the time she had come.

"Keep quiet, Geoffrey," she said: "I do not know the old boy, and you deceive yourself if you think he annoys me!... Besides, my dear Geoffrey, I must be off!"

"Be off!... Whatever's come to you, Bobine?"

"I have business on hand elsewhere.... And now that I know you are quite well, Geoffrey, I shall continue my walk."

"True?" protested the bewildered giant: "You're going to cut your stick already?"

"Call the governor!... There's a twenty-franc piece for you! Pay for your drinks and keep the rest," was Bobinette's effective reply.

Hogshead calmed down at once.

"As long as you pay up, Bobine, I've nothing to say; but, all the same, you have queer ideas.... You bring me here to keep an appointment, and then, we're not five minutes together, when up you get on the trot again!"

Bobinette caught her brother's huge fist in a quick handshake, made for the door of The Crying Calf, turned out of rue Monge at a slow pace, convinced that Vagualame would join her.

The street was deserted. Bobinette kept in the shadow, avoiding the bright patches cast on the silent roadway from the wine-shops and taverns still open and alight.

She had been walking about five minutes when she felt that someone was walking behind her, hastening to overtake her.... A hand was laid on her shoulder: Vagualame was beside her, regulating his steps by hers.

"Is that species of giant your brother?" he asked.

Bobinette nodded.

"You are free, then?" she asked, breathing hard.

"It looks like it!"

"Who released you?"

"Let us hurry!" said Vagualame: "Let us seek shelter."

"Where?"

"You will see—with friends."

What did it matter to Bobinette where they were going while strange doubts and horrid fears filled her mind?

"Who released you?"

They were passing beneath a street lamp. Vagualame noted that Bobinette was regarding him with defiant eyes. Was this really Vagualame? Was he an impostor?

Vagualame read her thoughts.

"Bobinette, you are nothing but a fool!" announced the old accordion player: "The man arrested at your place was a detective, who had got himself up like me to take you in!... You let him trick you! You are an imbecile!"

Bobinette stopped.

"But then ... if a detective made himself up to resemble you, it means they know you are guilty! It means they are after you! Why, it's a mad thing you are doing, coming to meet me in that rig out! Why have you not disguised yourself?"

Vagualame smiled.

"Possibly I have reason for it, a plan you know nothing about, Bobinette!... But, let us return to the false Vagualame. How was it you did not detect the fraud, if only by the voice?... How is it you have not guessed the truth since?... When you received my telegram at Rouen it should have been as clear as daylight to you!... Eh!"

Bobinette kept silence.

"Well, we will not dwell on the past," declared Vagualame, with an air of magnanimity: "Fortunately your extraordinary simplicity has not had any particular consequences—save the stupid way you let them get hold of the gun piece, and allowed the false Corporal Vinson to escape!"... In a menacing tone he said: "We will return to that question later."

"But," faltered Bobinette: "How could I act otherwise?"

Vagualame threw her such a look, a look so charged with fierce contempt that she could no longer doubt that she was face to face with her master. This master would not allow argument, discussion: well she knew that!

She screwed up her courage to ask:

"How did you learn my address?"

"That is my business!" he declared: "What I want to know I get to know—you must have seen that by this time!"

"How is it, then, you called at The Crying Calf to-day?... Geoffrey did not know you: he alone knew I was coming to see him!... You followed me?"

"Suppose I did follow you?"... Vagualame's tone changed: it became imperious.

"Have you quite finished asking me silly questions?... I consider it is my turn to put a question or two to you—What are you doing?"

Bobinette bent her head.

"You have a right to know," she murmured: "When you sent me that letter, after I took refuge in La Chapelle, telling me to go to the house of a Madame Olga Dimitroff and present myself for the post of companion, I went. She engaged me. I am still with her."

"To take refuge in an hotel was an idiotic thing to do, Bobinette.... The police could easily have nabbed you there if they had had a mind to. That is why I sent you to one of my old friends—to a person to whom I could recommend you!... Well, Bobinette, you will have to leave that house!"

The young woman bent her head, mastered, ready to accept any orders of Vagualame's before they were issued. All she asked, in a timid voice, was: "Where am I to go then?"

"Far from here."

"Why?"

Vagualame's smile was evil. His reply was like a series of sword thrusts.

"Because Juve has good eyes; because Fandor also begins to see clear.... The net begins to tighten.... I shall find means to slip through it!... I am not of those who are caught like a mouse in a trap.... But, as for you—you with your simplicity—it is high time to put you out of reach of the police!... I am going to give you some money. Five days hence, disguised as a gipsy, you are to be on the road from Sceaux to Versailles, at eleven o'clock at night, by the first milestone on the left side after the aeroplane garage.... You have followed me?"

Bobinette was trembling.

"Disguised as a gipsy, Vagualame? Why?"

"That is no concern of yours!... You have only to do as I tell you. I give orders, but not explanations!"

Vagualame felt in his pockets. He held out a note-book.

"You will find two fifty-franc notes in this. It is more than you need for a suitable disguise. I will give you more money when you start off, because I am going to send you to a foreign country."

Whilst talking, Vagualame and Bobinette had gone a long way from The Crying Calf. By a labyrinth of little streets, all darkness and mystery, Vagualame had led his companion to a kind of blind alley: a tall house blocked the end of it. A large shop on the ground floor occupied half the front of it. Although the iron shutters had been drawn down, light from the interior penetrated through apertures to the street—thin rays of light.

Vagualame laid a brutal hand on Bobinette.

"Attend to what I say: it is no joking matter. You are coming in with me. I am going to introduce you to my many friends here, whom I have recently got to know: they may say things that will astonish you, but do not show surprise.... I bring you here that you may know where to find me during the five days you remain in Paris.... You have only to write a letter and bring it to the woman who keeps this library. Address to Vagualame: it will reach me."

"Yes," replied Bobinette.

Vagualame knocked three separate times, then twice quickly, on the iron shutters. A key turned in the lock: the door opened. Vagualame thrust Bobinette across the threshold. Out of the obscurity of the streets whipped by an icy wind and torrents of rain, Bobinette found herself in a brilliantly lighted book-shop.

She stood dazzled.

A young woman came forward.

"Good evening, Sophie," said Vagualame: "Anything new?"

"Nothing new, Vagualame!"

Bobinette looked about her. She saw piles of books and collections of magazines and papers. The shop was crowded with them.

"Sophie, I bring a new friend—a sure friend—who may have to bring you a letter for me one of these days," said Vagualame.

The proprietress looked curiously at Bobinette. All she said was:

"Have our brothers been warned, Vagualame?"

"They have not been told yet; but I shall present my friend to them at the first opportunity."

There was loud knocking at the shutters! Voices were heard shouting:

"Open! Open! Open! The police!"

Bobinette grew ashen with terror.

"It is all up!" thought the desperate girl: "They will see Vagualame is free! They will find me with him! We are caught!"

She turned frantically to Vagualame. He stood calm and collected.

"Ah!" said he with a touch of raillery, looking at the proprietress: "They have been warned that you are again breaking the work law!"

Shaking a threatening finger at the rigid Sophie, Vagualame went to the shop entrance. He looked through the large keyhole to see who was demanding admittance at this late hour.... A look, and Vagualame turned, caught Sophie by the arm, and whispered:

"Detective Juve!... Inspector Michel!... Keep cool, Sophie! They cannot know all the ins and outs of your place."

Two strides and Vagualame joined Bobinette. He dragged her to the end of the shop, reached a corner, turned it, and they were standing on boards clear of books: it was hidden from the main part of the shop and from the entrance.

"Draw your skirts between your legs!" he commanded. "Don't utter a sound!... Don't be afraid!"

Vagualame was right. The police had surrounded the mysterious shop.

Noiselessly, gliding past the houses like shadows, revolver in hand, dark lantern at waist, fifteen detectives in plain clothes had converged on the tall house in the blind alley.

Juve was speaking low.

"Careful, Michel! We have seen our birds enter. They are inside.... I shall follow them!... Meanwhile, do not stir from this door.... There is no other issue.... Do not allow a soul to pass—not one!"

"Never fear, Juve!"

Information dropped by Corporal Vinson, who had been taken to The Crying Calf by Vagualame, more than once had caused Juve to keep a strict watch on the wine-shop for some days. He had seen first Bobinette and then Vagualame enter the place.... When Bobinette came out, almost immediately, he felt sure she had not had time for a talk with Vagualame.... When Vagualame soon followed, Juve had shadowed the old accordion player in the darkness: behind him followed his men on the trail of both.

When he saw Vagualame and Bobinette enter the library he exclaimed, in thought:

"I have them!... I know the house! I am going to arrest FantÔmas and his accomplice!"

Cool as a cucumber now that the decisive, ardently-longed-for moment was at hand, Juve repeated his instructions: he did not mean to leave anything to chance.

"You understand then, Michel, not one single person is to leave these premises. Even I can only be permitted to pass when I say to you: 'It is I, Juve,... Let me pass!' You thoroughly understand?"

"Perfectly," replied Michel.

Juve turned to his four picked men:

"Gentlemen! Are you ready?"

Revolver in one hand, lantern in the other, Juve knocked loudly on the shuttered shop door.

"In the name of the law! Open! Open! Open!... The police!"

A bare three minutes had elapsed between Juve's first summons and the opening of the library door.

Vagualame had made profitable use of the three minutes.

"Don't utter a sound! Don't be afraid!" Vagualame had repeated to Bobinette: "They will not take us this time!"

Hustled, dragged to the spot already described, Bobinette now felt the ground giving way beneath her. She rolled on to a steeply inclined plane. Gliding down into the void, clutching Vagualame, she heard a dull sound: it was the trap falling to.

"Quiet!" repeated Vagualame, as Bobinette rolled on to the wood flooring of a sort of cellar piled high with books. He signed to the girl to listen.

"Yes! They are searching the shop, knocking the books about, imagining we are hidden among them!... But, from what I know of Juve, in a very short time he will have ferreted out the trap door and will descend as we have done. He will never be such a fool as to think we have gone down the shop stairs."

"Oh!" groaned Bobinette: "Whatever shall we do?"

Vagualame calmly turned on his pocket electric torch, approached an immense pile of illustrated magazines stacked in a corner. He struck three blows on it, saying in a low clear voice:

"Open! Open to brothers!"

Bobinette, frightened past speech, saw the immense pile of volumes oscillate, then noiselessly divide, disclosing a secret door.

Vagualame pulled her towards it, saying in a joking tone:

"You see how useful it is to have friends of all sorts! Your employer, Olga Damitroff, was well advised when she once told me when and where the Nihilists gather together in Paris to plot against the Czar!"

Vagualame brought her into a large room, lit by torches, where a score of young men were assembled. They rose and reverently saluted Vagualame, who approached them with outstretched hand.

When Juve entered, he soon satisfied himself that only Sophie remained in the library. He gave orders to keep strict guard over the proprietress, notwithstanding her loud protestations.

"Do not permit anyone to leave the premises," he repeated to the men stationed at the door—"except myself, of course."

He turned to others.

"Move all these volumes! There may be a hide-hole concealed behind them.... Keep guard at the top of the little staircase. It is the only way of escape ... I am going to make a tour of the cellars and expect to run my game to earth by this staircase."...

Sophie again protested.

"There is nothing in my cellars that ought not to be there! I don't understand what the police want here!"

Juve paid no attention to these protestations. He went towards the corner at the farther end of the shop.

Juve knew all the dens in Paris; there was not a secret society he did not know of—societies, political and otherwise, holding mysterious meetings in these places: he knew of the existence of this trap-door and slide which led to the cellars below this library.

"We will go down to the Nihilists," said he.

Before the interested eyes of his subordinates, Juve set the trap in motion. A counter weight closed it over his head.

Juve rolled into the cellar but a few seconds after Vagualame and Bobinette had escaped from it!... To tell the truth, Juve did not know of the hidden entrance to the secret room. Dizzy from his rapid glide downwards, Juve raised his lantern. He was not surprised to find this retreat empty. He knew the slide led to second and lower series of cellars....

His eye caught a movement. The huge stack of magazines, looking as if it would topple over, so much on the slant was it, was slowly moving into an upright position again! He leaped forward, thrusting his revolver between the opening of the two portions, and prevented them from joining completely!...

What was going on behind this tricky collection of magazines, which had undoubtedly just opened to give passage to Vagualame and Bobinette?

Juve glued his ear to the fissure which marked the edge of the hidden door.... Ah!... Voices of men in discussion!... Juve could not distinguish all that the voices were saying, but a word reached his ear, clear, unmistakable—FantÔmas!

He listened intently.

"You are right," remarked an invisible speaker: "It is to FantÔmas we owe all these police visits and annoyances—his crimes exasperate the police—and to justify themselves in the opinion of the public they track us down more vigorously than ever!"

Another voice answered:

"I know for certain that these coppers are after FantÔmas to-night!"

Shouts and hoots resounded.

Menacing voices repeated:

"Since FantÔmas is indirectly our persecutor, let us avenge ourselves on FantÔmas!... What matters one life compared with the cause we defend—the cause of a whole people!... If FantÔmas is in our way, troubles us, let us kill him!... Trokoff will be here to-morrow, this evening perhaps! Trokoff will guide us! Trokoff will find this mysterious bandit who does us so much harm! Trokoff is a valiant man!... We do not know him, but we know what he has done!"

Juve smiled a sardonic smile. He thrust his hand into the opening wedged apart by his revolver, widened the space, opened the secret door, and entered the assembly room of the Nihilists.

"God save Russia!"

Juve pronounced these words with unction, in a solemn voice.

"God save Poland," was the reply. The oldest man present, who had thus been spokesman for the assembly advanced towards the stranger.

"Who are you?" he demanded.

Without the quiver of an eyelid, an eyelash, Juve answered: "I am he whom you have awaited.... He who will direct your arms—guide you! I am Trokoff!"

"Let but one of these inspired fanatics, who hold life cheap, guess that I belong to the police, and they would kill me without mercy or pity," thought Juve, as he faced the assembly of revolutionaries with a serene countenance.

There were no threatening looks. They believed themselves to be in the presence of Trokoff. Had he not opened the door?... Only Trokoff, the expected, the longed for, could have done that!

The assembly acclaimed him:

"Trokoff! We for Russia welcome you! God be with you, Trokoff! Heaven guard you!"

"God be with you, brothers!"

Juve advanced, scrutinising each in turn: neither Vagualame nor Bobinette were among them.

Juve addressed them:

"My brothers! You know that the police are now searching the shop overhead: it is a serious moment!"

One of the Nihilists stepped forward.

"We know it, Trokoff! Our brother, Vagualame, accompanied by a young disciple, came to warn us but a minute ago. Be assured, brother! The police are not searching for us this evening.... It is the vile wretch FantÔmas they are after!... A criminal ruffian, foe of all liberty, whom we have condemned to death.... Therefore we are not disquieted. Vagualame has just left us.... He will direct the suspicions of the police into another channel. He told us he knew a way of quieting their suspicions."...

"If only Michel does not allow this arch-bandit to slip through his fingers!" reflected Juve, as he listened with unmoved countenance to these remarkable statements. Before the Nihilist could say more, Juve made a declaration:

"Vagualame deceives himself, brother. I must go up at once to give him the aid of my strong arm, otherwise we are finished!... I know only the secret entrance here: guide me to the other exit, so that I may not attract the attention of the police: we do not want our secret entrance discovered!"

"It shall be as you desire, brother. Follow me; but be prudent."

Marching at the Nihilist's heels, after many twists and turns, Juve arrived at the foot of a quite ordinary staircase.

"You have only to mount, brother Trokoff. These stairs lead straight into the shop. If the police ask where you come from, you have only to say that you were looking in the first cellar for a book!... But what matters it if they do visit the cellars! They will never find the hidden door!"

Juve bent his head.

"Thanks, brother! Peace be with you!"

The Nihilist turned away. No sooner was he out of sight than Juve tore up the stairs to complete the arrest of Vagualame and Bobinette!

Inspector Michel had not stirred from his appointed place by the door leading to the street.

He had been on guard about half an hour when Juve, livid, frantic, rushed towards him.

"You have let them go out, Michel!" he shouted: "They are not here!"

"No one has gone out at this door, Chief! I give you my word on it!... But, may I ask how you managed to slip back again without my having noticed you! Deuced clever, I call it!... No one, I say, has left these premises either before or after you!"

"What's that you say?" Juve stared at Michel as if he had taken leave of his senses.

"What I say, Chief, is—the only individuals whom I have allowed to pass out are you and your woman prisoner."

"I and my woman prisoner?" Juve could have howled with rage. He caught the calm, collected Michel by the coat collar, and dragged him outside the shop. Juve looked so desperate, so at his wit's end, that Michel wondered.

"Come now, Chief!" he remonstrated; "I am not dreaming, am I?... Ten minutes ago you came to me here, and you said:

"'Don't move, Michel! Let me pass. I am Juve! I take a prisoner to the station and will return.'"

Juve had grown deadly calm.

"I was disguised, Michel, was I not?"

"Yes. You had put on your Vagualame disguise."

Juve bit his lip till the blood came. That arch-bandit had done him again! Juve could not but admire his coolness and resource. He had known how to take in Michel, because Michel had arrested Juve when disguised as Vagualame at de Naarboveck's house.... Michel would naturally think his chief had again assumed the Vagualame disguise for a purpose! Oh, it was the devil's own cleverness!

Juve glared at Michel.

"It was the real Vagualame, I tell you!" shouted Juve.... "It was not I disguised as Vagualame!... It was Vagualame in person, I tell you!... It is Vagualame himself whom you have allowed to escape!"

There was a pause—terrible, heart-sickening.

Michel drew himself up.

"What then, Chief?"

Juve's anger gave place to compassion.

"It is really not your fault, my poor Michel. How could you imagine the infernal trick this bandit was playing on you?... I bear you no grudge for it, Michel!"

But Michel was inconsolable. He had committed an irreparable blunder!

Juve slipped his arm through that of his miserable subordinate. The pair made their way to Headquarters at the head of the little column of subordinates who, understanding that Juve had not found what he sought, were cursing inwardly at the failure of their expedition....

The moment Juve realised that Michel had allowed Vagualame-FantÔmas to escape, he had called off his men. He did not wish the Russian revolutionaries cornered and arrested at present.... Possibly Vagualame believed Juve and his men had come to find the Nihilists, and, having failed, had left the premises in a rage!

Sophie would report to the bandit—but she had not heard everything! Thought Juve:

"He will hardly guess that I entered the assembly below by the secret door and made them believe I was Trokoff!... It leaves a way open for future transactions!... Some day, not so far ahead, I may return, may find that devil's Will o' the Wisp of a bandit there and nab him at last!"... Did Michel suspect there were Nihilists on the premises?

"Tell me," questioned Juve: "Did you overhear any suspicious talk?... This Sophie did not say anything interesting?"

"Nothing whatever, Chief."

"Your men, Michel, do not know what individual we are after?"

Michel laughed.

"Oh, they are a hundred leagues off the truth!... That they were out to arrest FantÔmas!... Just imagine, Chief! This afternoon, a complaint was lodged at Headquarters with reference to the theft of a bear! The theft was committed at Troyes, at the fair.... Our men are persuaded that to-night's search has to do with this bear-stealing case!... All the more so because, just as we started on this expedition, one of my men, whose home is at Sceaux, told us that his brother, a driver down there, had been ordered to go in five days' time, with two horses, and at five in the morning, on the road to Robinson, and take a gipsy van twenty kilometres from there!... He thought there was something very queer about such a rendezvous as that!"

Juve's interest in this piece of news was keen!