Court will be happy to grant, if he considers your arguments worth
consideration. But are they? I will submit three objections." Juve bowed
coldly. "First of all, M. Juve, do you believe that a man could assume
disguise with the cleverness that you have just represented? M. Etienne
Rambert is a man of sixty; Gurn is thirty-five. M. Rambert is an elderly
man, slow of movement, and the man who robbed Princess Sonia Danidoff
was a nimble, very active man."

"I have anticipated that objection, sir," Juve said with a smile, "by
saying that Gurn is Fantomas! Nothing is impossible for Fantomas!"

"Suppose that is true," said the President with a wave of his hand, "but
what have you to say to this: you charge Etienne Rambert with the murder
of Mme. de Langrune; but do you not know that Etienne Rambert's son,
Charles Rambert, who, according to the generally received, and most
plausible, opinion was the real murderer of the Marquise, committed
suicide from remorse? If Etienne Rambert was the guilty party, Charles
Rambert would not have taken his own life."

Juve's voice shook a little.

"You would be quite right, sir, if again it were not necessary to add
that Etienne Rambert is Gurn--that is to say, Fantomas! Is it not a
possible hypothesis that Fantomas might have affected the mind of that
lad: have suggested to him that it was he who committed the crime in a
period of somnambulism: and at last have urged him to suicide? Do you
not know the power of suggestion?"

"Suppose that also is true," said the President with another vague wave
of his hand. "I will only put two incontestable facts before you. You
accuse Etienne Rambert of being Gurn, and Etienne Rambert was lost in
the wreck of the _Lancaster_; you also accuse Gurn of having murdered
Dollon, and at the time that murder was committed Gurn was in solitary
confinement in the Sante prison."

This time the detective made a sign as if of defeat.

"If I have waited until to-day to make the statement you have just
listened to, it was obviously because hitherto I have had no absolute
proofs, but merely groups of certainties. I spoke to-day, because I
could keep silent no longer; if I am still without some explanations in
detail, I am sure I shall have them some day. Everything comes to light
sooner or later. And as to the two facts you have just put before me, I
would reply that there is no proof that M. Rambert was lost in the wreck
of the _Lancaster_: it has not been leg