XXV
THE TRAP
"Twelve o'clock! Hang it! I've just time to get there to keep my engagement with Josephine."
Juve was going down Belleville hill as fast as his legs could take him by a short cut past the Sèvres school. He cast a mocking glance toward the little police station which stands smart and trim at one side of the high road.
"Pity," he murmured, "that I can't escort my friends to that delightful country house."
Then he hastened his pace still more. He was growing angry.
"I told Fandor to be at Nogent Station exactly at 1.30. It is now five past twelve and I am still at Sèvres. Matters are getting complicated. Oh, I'll take the tramway to Versailles' gate. From there I'll drive to Nogent Station in a taxi."
He put this plan into execution, and was lucky enough to find a place in the Louvre-Versailles' tram.
"All things considered, I have not wasted my morning. Poor Dixon! He was lucky to get off so cheaply. It would seem now that Josephine told the truth in saying he is not an accomplice of the Gang."