“Could you oblige me with a light, Rudolph?” said the intruder.
“Could you oblige me with a light!” That disconcerting phrase, already heard in Paris, already read in his private note-book! What did it mean! And this familiarity! That wink?
“Who are you? T-T-The m-m-man on the express? The third confederate? Impossible!” stammered Marescal.
He was no coward; on more than one occasion he [[106]]had faced two or three adversaries with uncommon courage. But this was an adversary such as he had never met before, who employed unheard-of means, and with whom he found himself in a condition of permanent inferiority. Shaken and speechless, he stood on the defensive, almost, for the moment, paralyzed.
Ralph seized the advantage surprise had given him. He said imperiously to the girl: “Put the four letters on the corner of the mantelpiece.”
Like an automaton she took an envelope from her bosom and set it on the mantelpiece.
“Are the four letters in it?” he snapped.
Staring at him, she nodded.
“Right! Now slip out quickly by the corridor, and goodbye. I don’t think that we’re likely to meet again. Goodbye. Good luck!”
Without a word, she hurried across the room, unlocked the door, slipped through it, and was gone.