The Duke turned from the window, glanced at the wall opposite, then, as if something had caught his eye, went quickly to it.
“Look here,” he said, and he pointed to the middle of one of the empty spaces in which a picture had hung.
There, written neatly in blue chalk, were the words:
ARSÈNE LUPIN
“This is a job for Guerchard,” said the inspector. “But I had better get an examining magistrate to take the matter in hand first.” And he ran to the telephone.
The Duke opened the folding doors which led into the second drawing-room. The shutters of the windows were open, and it was plain that Arsène Lupin had plundered it also of everything that had struck his fancy. In the gaps between the pictures on the walls was again the signature “Arsène Lupin.”
The inspector was shouting impatiently into the telephone, bidding a servant wake her master instantly. He did not leave the telephone till he was sure that she had done so, that her master was actually awake, and had been informed of the crime. The Duke sat down in an easy chair and waited for him.
When he had finished telephoning, the inspector began to search the two rooms for traces of the burglars. He found nothing, not even a finger-mark.
When he had gone through the two rooms he said, “The next thing to do is to find the house-keeper. She may be sleeping still—she may not even have heard the noise of the burglars.”
“I find all this extremely interesting,” said the Duke; and he followed the inspector out of the room.