The two men looked each other straight in the eyes. Don Luis smiled amiably. Weber was livid; he shook in every limb and was plainly striving to contain himself.
Near him stood a couple of journalists and four detectives.
"By Jove! the beggars are there for me!" thought Don Luis. "But their confusion shows that they did not believe that I should have the cheek to come. Are they going to arrest me?"
Weber did not move, but in the end his face expressed a certain satisfaction as though he were saying:
"I've got you this time, my fine fellow, and you shan't escape me."
The office messenger returned and, without a word, led the way for Don Luis. Perenna passed in front of Weber with the politest of bows, bestowed a friendly little nod on the detectives, and entered.
The Comte d'Astrignac hurried up to him at once, with hands outstretched, thus showing that all the tittle-tattle in no way affected the esteem in which he continued to hold Private Perenna of the Foreign Legion. But the Prefect of Police maintained an attitude of reserve which was very significant. He went on turning over the papers which he was examining and conversed in a low voice with the solicitor and the American Secretary of Embassy.
Don Luis thought to himself:
"My dear Lupin, there's some one going to leave this room with the bracelets on his wrists. If it's not the real culprit, it'll be you, my poor old chap."
And he remembered the early part of the case, when he was in the workroom at Fauville's house, before the magistrates, and had either to deliver the criminal to justice or to incur the penalty of immediate arrest. In the same way, from the start to the finish of the struggle, he had been obliged, while fighting the invisible enemy, to expose himself to the attacks of the law with no means of defending himself except by indispensable victories.