.The trouble was that to do any good he must disclose his return to, and re-establish himself in his old identity with, the very people who were most likely to get him thrown into prison. Of these, by far the most dangerous, was Joseph Fouché.
Fouché was doubly dangerous because he knew Roger's real name and nationality. It was very probable that he had passed that information on to other people after Roger had last left Paris; but he, at all events, was fully aware that Roger was an English spy. Therefore, as a first step, before anything else could be attempted, Roger had to find out if he had passed on that information, and to whom; then either buy his silence or kill him. ' Over an hour elapsed before Roger saw a tall, thin figure turn the corner under the lamp and come with long strides, yet quiet footfalls, towards him. He knew then that within a few minutes he must enter on the deadly contest he had set himself, and again pit his wits against a man who was as cunning as a serpent and as remorseless as a pack of jackals.
chapter xxi
INTO THE LION'S DEN
As Fouché approached, Roger slipped his hand into the pocket of his coat, cocked the small pistol, and drew it out Once before he had had an opportunity to kill Fouché without endangering himself. To have done so could well have been considered as an act of justice, executed on a man who had sent many hundreds of innocent people to their deaths; but from personal scruples Roger had refrained. Now, a second chance had arisen. He had only to fire both barrels at point-blank range, then take to his heels, for Fouché to be gasping out his life in the gutter and himself swallowed up in the pitch dark night.
His hatred of Fouché was such that his fingers itched upon the triggers. Had he pressed them he would have saved himself many future dangers and difficulties; but he could not be certain that killing Fouché would make Paris again safe for himself. Only Fouché could be tricked or persuaded into telling him the degree of risk he would run should he disclose himself to their old associates.
Without suspecting his presence, Fouché walked past him to the door, took out a key, unlocked and opened it. Stepping up behind him Roger pressed the pistol into the small of his back and said quietly:
"Go inside. Make no noise. Take sue paces then turn and face me. Lift a finger or raise your voice and I shall put two bullets into your liver."
The lights in the room above had gone out soon after Roger had begun his vigil; so Madame Fouché could be assumed to have gone to bed and was, he hoped, asleep. But the narrow hall-way was still lit by a single candle in a cheap china holder on a small deal table. Without a word Fouché walked past it, then turned round. Meanwhile Roger had closed the door and stood with his back to it, watching his old enemy narrowly.
Fouché was then thirty-two, and a more unattractive looking man it would have been difficult to imagine. His cadaverous face had a corpse-like hue, his hair was thin and reddish, his eyes pale, fish-like and lacking all expression; his nose was long and, in spite of his frequent snufflings, it sometimes had a drip on its end, as he suffered from a perpetual cold. His tall, bony frame suggested that of a skeleton, and he looked too weak and ill to be capable of any effort; but no appearance could possibly have been more deceptive. Actually he possessed considerable physical strength, and his mind was such a dynamo of energy that he often worked for twenty-four hours on end without relaxation.
As a means of preventing people from guessing his thoughts he had formed the habit of never meeting anyone's eyes with his own; but his shifty glance had swiftly taken in Roger, from his bewhiskered face to his shiny boots, and after a moment his bloodless lips moved to utter the words:
"So, Englishman, you have come back."
"How did you recognize me?" Roger asked with quick interest
"By your voice, your hands, and your principal features. Any one of the three would have given me the clue to your identity. I have trained myself to be observant in such matters. There was, too, the manner of your arrival. I took it for granted that when you did appear you would take the precaution of catching me unprepared."
"You were, then, expecting me to return to Paris?"
"Certainly. I have been wondering for some months past why you had not done so."
"You surprise me somewhat as many men in my peculiar circumstances might well have decided against ever again risking their necks in this pit of vipers."
Foucne" shrugged. "Ah, but not a man of your resource and courage. How otherwise could you hope to reap the benefit of your last great coup’
"I thank you for the compliment; but I might have sent someone else on my behalf."
"That would not have been in keeping with your character. You are too vain to believe that anyone other than yourself could have played the Royal Flush you hold to the best possible advantage. You ad to return to Paris yourself, and you had to come to me." Matters were developing in a manner entirely unlike anything that Roger had visualized, and after a second's thought, he said: "You are, then, prepared to talk business?" "Of course. Surely you did not suppose that I should refuse, and do my best to get you arrested the moment your back was turned? I am not such a fool as to cut off my nose to spite my own face. Put your pistol away and come into the living-room. We will discuss our mutual interests over a glass of wine."
Roger needed no telling that not one single word Fouché uttered could be relied upon, but it now seemed possible that his formidable enemy believed that there was more to be gained from a temporary alliance than by an immediate betrayal, so he lowered his pistol and nodded.
Picking up the candlestick, Fouché led the way through a doorway opposite the foot of the stairs, and set it down on a table where some cold food had been left for him. Glancing round, Roger saw that the inside of this obscure dwelling was no better than its outside. It was clean and neat, but sparsely furnished, and inplaces the plaster was peeling from the walls. He wondered what Fouché had done with the ill-gotten gains he had accumulated during the Revolution, and assumed that this apparent poverty was no more than a mask assumed to protect himself now that the tide had turned and he might be accused of peculation.
Fouché picked up a bottle of red wine that was already a quarter empty, fetched an extra glass from a cupboard and poured out Both men sat down and Fouché made no comment when Roger, knowing that he must continue to observe every possible precaution against sudden treachery, laid the still cocked pistol on the table beside him. Lifting his glass, Fouché said with a pale smile:
"Weill Here's to the little Capet May he make the fortunes of us both."
Roger knew that young Louis XVII would now never make anyone's fortune, but he echoed the toast and drank of the cheap red wine, then he asked:
"How, think you, can we handle the matter to the best advantage?"
With his bony hands Fouché made a little gesture to which no significance could be attached. "There appeared to me two ways to play this game. Had you arrived earlier m the year we might have lackmailed a great sum out of the Government to refrain from exposing the fact that the child in the Temple was not Marie Antoinette's son. That would have entailed handing him over to them. Alternatively, we could have sold him for an equally large sum to the emigres. But since then an event has occurred which greatly alters the situation."
Pausing, he took a mouthful of wine, then went on: "The death in June of the boy whom everyone but a few of us believed to be the young King will make the Government much less inclined to submit to blackmail. With one of the children in a grave no physical comparison of them can now be made, and as Citizen Simon so debased the real little Capet, turning him into a witless caricature of his former self, should they take the line that we have produced a fake most people would believe them. That factor, too, now seriously prejudices our chances of selling him to the emigres. The Comte de Provence, having had himself proclaimed King, can hardly be expected to welcome the resurrection of his nephew, and might decide also to declare the boy a fake, whether he really believed that to be so or not"