But just as they came to the corner of the Rue Auber, the door of a court-yard on their left was thrown open, and without slowing up the cab ran through it.
Three men appeared at either door, Ralph was gripped and roughly dragged away before he could even make a show of resistance.
He heard Josephine, who had remained in the cab, say: “Saint Lazare Station! And be quick about it!”
The six men rushed him into the house, shoved him into a badly lighted room, and locked its massive door on him.
The exaltation which Ralph had been enjoying did not immediately abate. He went on laughing and joking, but in a growing fury and in tones that changed as it grew.
“Bravo, Josephine!... But what a master-stroke!... What a shot! Right in the middle of the bull’s-eye and when I was least expecting it.... How funny she must have found my songs of triumph! ‘I am cut out for conquest, for the extraordinary and the fabulous!’ Idiot that I was! When one is capable of such blunders, one should keep one’s mouth shut. What a smash!”
He flung himself on the door. What was the use? It was the door of a cell. He tried to jump up to the little window which let in that dim light. There was no way of reaching it.
Then a noise caught his ear; and he perceived that a loophole had been cut in the corner of the wall, just under the ceiling, and that the barrel of a rifle was pointing at him, and that it followed his every movement.
All his anger turned on the invisible marksman; and he abused him freely.