His advice was followed, the officers fired off their revolvers at a venture in the direction of the splash. And next instant, drowning the sound of the shots, a sharp cry rang through the night:
“Help!... oh!... help!”
“Hit! Fantômas is hit!”
But Tom Bob was already making for the restaurant at a run. A boat lay high and dry on the bank; swiftly he dragged it to the water’s edge, sprang in, and in a few strokes of the oars was at the spot the cries had come from.
“Fantômas” he yelled—he could be clearly heard from the shore—“Fantômas! surrender!”
Other boats came up; each second seemed an eternity. But now M. Havard, leaning over the side of his boat, gripped a dark shape struggling in the water; “I’ve got him!” Then in triumph, he shouted an order to the officer who was at the oars:
“Row, my man, bring us to the shore!... there, beside that tree, it is still burning, so we shall see plain, anyhow!... he must be seriously wounded, he has stopped struggling.”
But as the boat entered the zone illuminated by the blazing tree, M. Havard, still holding the mysterious human body he had gripped in the darkness, could not check an exclamation of dismay.
“Oh! curses on it! curses on it! It is not Fantômas! It is not the man! it is a woman!”
Others helped, and the inert form was soon carried ashore.