"Yes! They are searching the shop, knocking the books about, imagining
we are hidden among them!... But, from what I know of Juve, in a very
short time he will have ferreted out the trap door and will descend as
we have done. He will never be such a fool as to think we have gone
down the shop stairs."

"Oh!" groaned Bobinette: "Whatever shall we do?"

Vagualame calmly turned on his pocket electric torch, approached an
immense pile of illustrated magazines stacked in a corner. He struck
three blows on it, saying in a low clear voice:

"Open! Open to brothers!"

Bobinette, frightened past speech, saw the immense pile of volumes
oscillate, then noiselessly divide, disclosing a secret door.

Vagualame pulled her towards it, saying in a joking tone:

"You see how useful it is to have friends of all sorts! Your employer,
Olga Damitroff, was well advised when she once told me when and where
the Nihilists gather together in Paris to plot against the Czar!"

Vagualame brought her into a large room, lit by torches, where a score
of young men were assembled. They rose and reverently saluted
Vagualame, who approached them with outstretched hand.

When Juve entered, he soon satisfied himself that only Sophie remained
in the library. He gave orders to keep strict guard over the
proprietress, notwithstanding her loud protestations.

"Do not permit anyone to leave the premises," he repeated to the men
stationed at the door--"except myself, of course."

He turned to others.

"Move all these volumes! There may be a hide-hole concealed behind
them.... Keep guard at the top of the little staircase. It is the only
way of escape ... I am going to make a tour of the cellars and expect
to run my game to earth by this staircase."...

Sophie again protested.

"There is nothing in my cellars that ought not to be there! I don't
understand what the police want here!"

Juve paid no attention to these protestations. He went towards the
corner at the farther end of the shop.

Juve knew all the dens in Paris; there was not a secret society he did
not know of--societies, political and otherwise, holding mysterious
meetings in these places: he knew of the existence of this trap-door
and slide which led to the cellars below this library.

"We will go down to the Nihilists," said he.

Before the interested eyes of his subordinates, Juve set the trap in
motion. A counter weight closed it over his head.

Juve rolled into the cellar but