The Teeth of the Tiger Part 93

"Well, you've foreseen every contingency," said Valenglay, "and the business seems to me to be finished. But there's one problem that remains unexplained, the one perhaps that interested the public most. I mean the marks of the teeth in the apple, the teeth of the tiger, as they have been called, which were certainly Mme. Fauville's teeth, innocent though she was. Monsieur le Prefet declares that you have solved this problem."

"Yes, Monsieur le President, and Jean Vernocq's papers prove that I was right. Besides, the problem is quite simple. The apple was marked with Mme. Fauville's teeth, but Mme. Fauville never bit the apple."

"Come, come!"

"Monsieur le President, Hippolyte Fauville very nearly said as much when he mentioned this mystery in his posthumous confession."

"Hippolyte Fauville was a madman."

"Yes, but a lucid madman and capable of reasoning with the most appalling logic. Some years ago, at Palermo, Mme. Fauville had a very bad fall, hitting her mouth against the marble top of a table, with the result that a number of her teeth, in both the upper and the lower jaw, were loosened. To repair the damage and to make the gold plate intended to strengthen the teeth, a plate which Mme. Fauville wore for several months, the dentist, as usual, took an impression of her mouth.

"M. Fauville happened to have kept the mould; and he used it to print the marks of his wife's teeth in the cake of chocolate shortly before his death and in the apple on the night of his death. When this was done, he put the mould with the other things which the explosion was meant to, and did, destroy."

Don Luis's explanation was followed by a silence. The thing was so simple that the Prime Minister was quite astonished. The whole tragedy, the whole charge, everything that had caused Marie's despair and death and the death of Gaston Sauverand: all this rested on an infinitely small detail which had occurred to none of the millions and millions of people who had interested themselves so enthusiastically in the mystery of the teeth of the tiger.

The teeth of the tiger! Everybody had clung stubbornly to an apparently invincible argument. As the marks on the apple and the print of Mme.

Fauville's teeth were identical, and as no two persons in the world were able, in theory or practice, to produce the same print with their teeth, Mme. Fauville must needs be guilty.

Nay, more, the argument seemed so absolute that, from the day on which Mme. Fauville's innocence became known, the problem had remained unsolved, while no one seemed capable of conceiving the one paltry idea: that it was possible to obtain the print of a tooth in another way than by a live bite of that same tooth!

"It's like the egg of Columbus," said Valenglay, laughing. "It had to be thought of."

"You are right, Monsieur le President. People don't think of those things. Here is another instance: may I remind you that during the period when a.r.s.ene Lupin was known at the same time as M. Lenormand and as Prince Paul Sernine, no one noticed that the name Paul Sernine was merely an anagram of a.r.s.ene Lupin? Well, it's just the same to-day: Luis Perenna also is an anagram of a.r.s.ene Lupin. The two names are composed of the same eleven letters, neither more nor less. And yet, although it was the second time, n.o.body thought of making that little comparison. The egg of Columbus again! It had to be thought of!"

Valenglay was a little surprised at the revelation. It seemed as if that devil of a man had sworn to puzzle him up to the last moment and to bewilder him by the most unexpected sensational news. And how well this last detail depicted the fellow, a queer mixture of dignity and impudence, of mischief and simplicity, of smiling chaff and disconcerting charm, a sort of hero who, while conquering kingdoms by most incredible adventures, amused himself by mixing up the letters on his name so as to catch the public napping!

The interview was nearly at an end. Valenglay said to Perenna:

"Monsieur, you have done wonders in this business and ended by keeping your word and handing over the criminal. I also will keep my word. You are free."

"I thank you, Monsieur le President. But what about Sergeant Mazeroux?"

"He will be released this morning. Monsieur le Prefet de Police has arranged matters so that the public do not know of the arrest of either of you. You are Don Luis Perenna. There is no reason why you should not remain Don Luis Perenna."

"And Florence Leva.s.seur, Monsieur le President?"

"Let her go before the examining magistrate of her own accord. He is bound to discharge her. Once free and acquitted of any charge or even suspicion, she will certainly be recognized as Cosmo Mornington's legal heiress and will receive the hundred millions."

"She will not keep it, Monsieur le President."

"How do you mean?"

"Florence Leva.s.seur doesn't want the money. It has been the cause of unspeakably awful crimes. She hates the very thought of it."

"What then?"

"Cosmo Mornington's hundred millions will be wholly devoted to making roads and building schools in the south of Morocco and the northern Congo."

"In the Mauretanian Empire which you are giving us?" said Valenglay, laughing. "By Jove, it's a fine work and I second it with all my heart.

An empire and an imperial budget to keep it up with! Upon my word, Don Luis has behaved well to his country, and has handsomely paid the debts--of a.r.s.ene Lupin!"

A month later Don Luis Perenna and Mazeroux embarked in the yacht which had brought Don Luis to France. Florence was with them. Before sailing they heard of the death of Jean Vernocq, who had managed to poison himself in spite of all the precautions taken to prevent him.

On his arrival in Africa, Don Luis Perenna, Sultan of Mauretania, found his old a.s.sociates and accredited Mazeroux to them and to his grand dignitaries. He organized the government to follow on his abdication and precede the annexation of the new empire by France, and he had several secret interviews on the Moorish border with General Leauty, commanding the French troops, interviews in the course of which they thought out all the measures to be executed in succession so as to lend to the conquest of Morocco an appearance of facility which would otherwise be difficult to explain.

The future was now a.s.sured. Soon the thin screen of rebellious tribes standing between the French and the pacified districts would fall to pieces, revealing an orderly empire, provided with a regular const.i.tution, with good roads, schools, and courts of law, a flouris.h.i.+ng empire in full working order.

Then, when his task was done, Don Luis abdicated.

He has now been back for over two years. Every one remembers the stir caused by his marriage with Florence Leva.s.seur. The controversy was renewed; and many of the newspapers clamoured for a.r.s.ene Lupin's arrest.

But what could the authorities do?

Although n.o.body doubted who he really was, although the name of a.r.s.ene Lupin and the name of Don Luis Perenna consisted of the same letters, and people ended by remarking the coincidence, legally speaking, a.r.s.ene Lupin was dead and Don Luis Perenna was alive; and there was no possibility of bringing a.r.s.ene Lupin back to life or of killing Don Luis Perenna.

He is to-day living in the village of Saint-Maclou, among those charming valleys which run down to the Oise. Who does not know his modest little pink-washed house, with its green shutters and its garden filled with bright flowers? People make up parties to go there from Paris on Sundays, in the hope of catching a sight, through the elder hedges, of the man who was a.r.s.ene Lupin, or of meeting him in the village square.

He is there, with his hair just touched with gray, his still youthful features, and a young man's bearing; and Florence is there, too, with her pretty figure and the halo of fair hair around her happy face, unclouded by even the shadow of an unpleasant recollection.

Very often visitors come and knock at the little wooden gate. They are unfortunate people imploring the master's aid, victims of oppression, weaklings who have gone under in the struggle, reckless persons who have been ruined by their pa.s.sions.

For all these Don Luis is full of pity. He gives them his full attention, the help of his far-seeing advice, his experience, his strength, and even his time, disappearing for days and weeks to fight the good fight once more.

And sometimes also it is an emissary from the Prefect's office or some subordinate of the police who comes to submit a complex case to his judgment. Here again Don Luis applies the whole of his wonderful mind to the business.

In addition to this, in addition to his old books on ethics and philosophy, to which he has returned with such pleasure, he cultivates his garden. He dotes on his flowers. He is proud of them. He takes prizes at the shows; and the success is still remembered of the treble carnation, streaked red and yellow, which he exhibited as the "a.r.s.ene carnation."

But he works hardest at certain large flowers that blossom in summer.

During July and the first half of August they fill two thirds of his lawn and all the borders of his kitchen-garden. Beautiful, decorative plants, standing erect like flag-staffs, they proudly raise their spiky heads of all colours: blue, violet, mauve, pink, white.

They are lupins and include every variety: Cruikshank's lupin, the two-coloured lupin, the scented lupin, and the last to appear, Lupin's lupin. They are all there, resplendent, in serried ranks like an army of soldiers, each striving to outstrip the others and to hold up the thickest and gaudiest spike to the sun. They are all there; and, at the entrance to the walk that leads to their motley beds, is a streamer with this device, taken from an exquisite sonnet of Jose Maria de Heredia:

"And in my kitchen-garden lupins grow."

You will say that this is a confession. But why not?

In the evening, when a few privileged neighbours meet at his house--the justice of the peace, the notary, Major Comte d'Astrignac, who has also gone to live at Saint-Maclou--Don Luis is not afraid to speak of a.r.s.ene Lupin.

"I used to see a great deal of him," he says. "He was not a bad man. I will not go so far as to compare him with the Seven Sages, or even to hold him up as an example to future generations, but still we must judge him with a certain indulgence.

"He did a vast amount of good and a moderate amount of harm. Those who suffered through him deserved what they got; and fate would have punished them sooner or later if he had not forestalled her. Between a Lupin who selected his victims among the ruck of wicked rich men and some big company promoter who deliberately ruins numbers of poor people, would you hesitate for a moment? Does not Lupin come out best?

"And, on the other hand, what a host of good actions! What countless proofs of disinterested generosity! A burglar? I admit it. A swindler? I don't deny it. He was all that. But he was something more than that. And, while he amused the gallery with his skill and ingenuity, he roused the general enthusiasm in other ways.

"People laughed at his practical jokes, but they loved his pluck, his courage, his adventurous spirit, his contempt for danger, his shrewd insight, his unfailing good humour, his reckless energy: all qualities that stood out at a period when the most active virtues of our race had reached their zenith, the period of the motor car and the aeroplane....