The Broker, beaten and disabled, made no further resistance. While his pals were binding him, Lupin stooped over them and dealt them two terrific blows on the head with the butt-end of his revolver. They sank down in a heap.
"That's a good piece of work," he said, taking breath. "Pity there are not another fifty of them. I was just in the mood. . . . And all so easily done . . . with a smile on one's face. . . . What do you think of it, Broker?"
The scoundrel lay cursing. Lupin said:
"Cheer up, old man! Console yourself with the thought that you are helping in a good action, the rescue of Mrs. Kesselbach. She will thank you in person for your gallantry."
He went to the door of the second room and opened it:
"What's this?" he said, stopping on the threshold, taken aback, dumfounded.
The room was empty.
He went to the window, saw a ladder leaning against the balcony, a telescopic steel ladder, and muttered:
"Kidnapped . . . kidnapped . . . Louis de Malreich. . . . Oh, the villain! . . ."