“I am hesitating between two plans,” said Lupin, who seemed very calm. “Either to prevent the interview....”
“How?”
“By forestalling d’Albufex. At nine o’clock, the Growler, the Masher and I climb the ramparts, burst into the fortress, attack the keep, disarm the garrison . . . and the thing’s done: Daubrecq is ours.”
“Unless Sébastiani’s sons fling him through the trapdoor to which the marquis alluded....”
“For that reason,” said Lupin, “I intend to risk that violent measure only as a last resort and in case my other plan should not be practicable.”
“What is the other plan?”
“To witness the interview. If Daubrecq does not speak, it will give us the time to prepare to carry him off under more favourable conditions. If he speaks, if they compel him to reveal the place where the list of the Twenty-seven is hidden, I shall know the truth at the same time as d’Albufex, and I swear to God that I shall turn it to account before he does.”
“Yes, yes,” said Clarisse. “But how do you propose to be present?”
“I don’t know yet,” Lupin confessed. “It depends on certain particulars which the Masher is to bring me and on some which I shall find out for myself.”
He left the inn and did not return until an hour later as night was falling. The Masher joined him.