“Very good,” muttered Fanferlot, “I’ve got them now. There is no use of hurrying any more.”
While the coachman was gathering up his reins, Fanferlot prepared his legs; and, when the coach started, he followed in a brisk trot, determined upon following it to the end of the earth.
The cab went up the Boulevard Sebastopol. It went pretty fast; but it was not for nothing that Fanferlot had won the name of “Squirrel.” With his elbows glued to his sides, and holding his breath, he ran on.
By the time he had reached the Boulevard St. Denis, he began to get breathless, and stiff from a pain in his side. The cabman abruptly turned into the Rue Faubourg St. Martin.
But Fanferlot, who, at eight years of age, had been familiar with every street in Paris, was not to be baffled: he was a man of resources. He seized the springs of the coach, raised himself up by the strength of his wrists, and hung on behind, with his legs resting on the axle-tree of the back wheels. He was not quite comfortable, but then, he no longer ran the risk of being distanced.
“Now,” he chuckled, behind his false beard, “you may drive as fast as you please, M. Cabby.”
The man whipped up his horses, and drove furiously along the hilly street of the Faubourg St. Martin.
Finally the cab stopped in front of a wine-store, and the driver jumped down from his seat, and went in.
The detective also left his uncomfortable post, and crouching in a doorway, waited for Gypsy and her companion to get out, with the intention of following closely upon their heels.
Five minutes passed, and still there were no signs of them.