inches from her. She finished by seizing it and nervously
drawing it to her. Our eyes met, and I read in hers so much anxiety and
fear that I could not refrain from speaking to her:

"Are you ill, madame? Shall I open the window?"

Her only reply was a gesture indicating that she was afraid of our
companion. I smiled, as her husband had done, shrugged my shoulders, and
explained to her, in pantomime, that she had nothing to fear, that I
was there, and, besides, the gentleman appeared to be a very harmless
individual. At that moment, he turned toward us, scrutinized both of us
from head to foot, then settled down in his corner and paid us no more
attention.

After a short silence, the lady, as if she had mustered all her energy
to perform a desperate act, said to me, in an almost inaudible voice:

"Do you know who is on our train?"

"Who?"

"He.... he....I assure you...."

"Who is he?"

"Arsene Lupin!"

She had not taken her eyes off our companion, and it was to him rather
than to me that she uttered the syllables of that disquieting name.
He drew his hat over his face. Was that to conceal his agitation or,
simply, to arrange himself for sleep? Then I said to her:

"Yesterday, through contumacy, Arsene Lupin was sentenced to twenty
years' imprisonment at hard labor. Therefore it is improbable that he
would be so imprudent, to-day, as to show himself in public. Moreover,
the newspapers have announced his appearance in Turkey since his escape
from the Sante."

"But he is on this train at the present moment," the lady proclaimed,
with the obvious intention of being heard by our companion; "my husband
is one of the directors in the penitentiary service, and it was the
stationmaster himself who told us that a search was being made for
Arsene Lupin."

"They may have been mistaken---"

"No; he was seen in the waiting-room. He bought a first-class ticket for
Rouen."

"He has disappeared. The guard at the waiting-room door did not see him
pass, and it is supposed that he had got into the express that leaves
ten minutes after us."

"In that case, they will be sure to catch him."

"Unless, at the last moment, he leaped from that train to come here,
into our train.... which is quite probable.... which is almost certain."

"If so, he will be arrested just the same; for the employees and guards
would no doubt observe his passage from one train to the other, and,
when we arrive at Rouen, they will arrest him the