"So was I."
"And do you know anything?"
"I know a great deal."
"What? Speak!"
Leaning on his stick, M. Lenormand took a little contemplative walk across the spacious room. Then he sat down opposite Valenglay, brushed the facings of his olive-green coat with his finger-tips, settled his spectacles on his nose and said, plainly:
"M. le Président, I hold three trump-cards in my hand. First, I know the name under which Arsène Lupin is hiding at this moment, the name under which he lived on the Boulevard Haussmann, receiving his assistants daily, reconstructing and directing his gang."
"But then why, in heaven's name, don't you arrest him?"
"I did not receive these particulars until later. The prince—let us call him Prince Dash—has disappeared. He is abroad, on other business."
"And, if he does not return . . ."
"The position which he occupies, the manner in which he has flung himself into the Kesselbach case, necessitate his return and under the same name."