“Well?”
“We can’t lay our hands on it. And I was thinking.... There’s a cupboard with a big lock to it in the pantry.... You see, we can’t very well....”
He was already on his way to the villa. Vaucheray ran back too.
“I’ll give you ten minutes, not a second longer!” cried Lupin. “In ten minutes, I’m off.”
But the ten minutes passed and he was still waiting.
He looked at his watch:
“A quarter-past nine,” he said to himself. “This is madness.”
And he also remembered that Gilbert and Vaucheray had behaved rather queerly throughout the removal of the things, keeping close together and apparently watching each other. What could be happening?
Lupin mechanically returned to the house, urged by a feeling of anxiety which he was unable to explain; and, at the same time, he listened to a dull sound which rose in the distance, from the direction of Enghien, and which seemed to be coming nearer.... People strolling about, no doubt....
He gave a sharp whistle and then went to the main gate, to take a glance down the avenue. But, suddenly, as he was opening the gate, a shot rang out, followed by a yell of pain. He returned at a run, went round the house, leapt up the steps and rushed to the dining-room: