The sergeant indicated himself.
“Well, if you must know, I am; who are you? what do you want?”
Curtly, in measured tones, the man explained:
“Who am I! I am Tom Bob, American detective, specially known of late days at the Prefecture of Police and in the city for his war against Fantômas!”
The sergeant nodded and saluted; he had heard tell of Tom Bob and recognized the foreign police-officer from the numerous descriptions and portraits he had read and seen of him.
“What can I do to serve you?” he asked.
Tom Bob told him: “You can arrest Fantômas!... at this moment he is close by with his gang of apaches round him; they are all gathered, he and his confederates, in a deserted house, at the far end of the military road, right hand side after the second cross-roads.”
“I can see the shanty from here,” announced the sergeant, “a wretched hovel it is; but who is it tells us ...?”
Tom Bob informed him curtly: