Beautrelet gave a smile.
“Don’t laugh—answer!”
“My answer is that I am very sorry to disappoint you, but I have promised to speak and I shall speak.”
“Speak in the sense which I have told you.”
“I shall speak the truth,” cried Beautrelet, eagerly. “It is something which you can’t understand, the pleasure, the need, rather, of saying the thing that is and saying it aloud. The truth is here, in this brain which has guessed it and discovered it; and it will come out, all naked and quivering. The article, therefore, will be printed as I wrote it. The world shall know that Lupin is alive and shall know the reason why he wished to be considered dead. The world shall know all.” And he added, calmly, “And my father shall not be kidnapped.”
Once again, they were both silent, with their eyes still fixed upon each other. They watched each other. Their swords were engaged up to the hilt. And it was like the heavy silence that goes before the mortal blow. Which of the two was to strike it?
Lupin said, between his teeth:
“Failing my instructions to the contrary, two of my friends have orders to enter your father’s room to-night, at three o’clock in the morning, to seize him and carry him off to join Ganimard and Holmlock Shears.”
A burst of shrill laughter interrupted him:
“Why, you highwayman, don’t you understand,” cried Beautrelet, “that I have taken my precautions? So you think that I am innocent enough, ass enough, to have sent my father home to his lonely little house in the open country!” Oh, the gay, bantering laughter that lit up the boy’s face! It was a new sort of laugh on his lips, a laugh that showed the influence of Lupin himself. And the familiar form of address which he adopted placed him at once on his adversary’s level. He continued: