deal with them, that
is what we are here for!... As for you, content yourself with ordinary
police work, that is your business, and, if it gives you pleasure,
continue your hunt for Fantomas, that will give you all the occupation
you require!... Yes," continued the colonel, while Juve was clenching
his fists with exasperation at this irony which was like so many
flicks of a whip on his face, "Yes, leave these serious affairs to
us--and occupy yourself with Fantomas!"

XI

THE HOODED CLOAK OF FANTOMAS

Leaning on his window-sill, Jerome Fandor was apparently keeping a
strict watch on the comings and goings of the passers-by, who, having
finished their Sunday walk, were bending their steps towards dinner, a
quiet evening, and a reposeful night. Seven o'clock sounded from a
neighbouring clock, its strokes borne through the misty atmosphere,
darkened by fog: it was a peaceful moment, made for pleasurable
relaxation ofter the activities of the day. Jerome Fandor, however,
was not enjoying the charm of the hour. Although his attitude was
apparently tranquil, listless even, inwardly he was in a state of
fury, a condition of feverish enervation.

"To be so near success," he thought; "to be on the point of bringing
in a magnificent haul, and then to get myself locked up, like a fool!
No! Not if I can help it! Why it would be enough to make me strangle
myself with my handkerchief as they believed that wretched Dollon, of
sinister memory, did in the past!"

He smoked cigarette after cigarette, raving to himself, yet never
taking his eyes off the pavements, where tirelessly, ceaselessly, a
stream of pedestrians passed up and down the street.

"Was I mistaken, I wonder!" he went on. "Still, I cannot help fancying
that youth--he was fifteen at the most--that sickly young blackguard
of the Paris pavements who followed me into the tube, then took the
same train as I did, who was behind me as I crossed the Place de la
Concorde, who was continually and persistently on my tracks--I cannot
think he was there by chance!... Well, it is no use worrying myself
into a fever over it!"

Fandor found it almost impossible to recover his tranquillity of mind.
Again and again, in the course of the day, he had come across the same
individuals during his peregrinations, which took him from one end of
Paris to the other: was it accident, coincidence, fatality, or was a
very strict watch being kept over his movements? Thus Fandor had as