The long arm of Fantômas

The bank collector deposited his peaked cap on a straw-bottomed chair beside him, mopped his streaming brow, and moistening his thumb with a rapid, eminently professional moveme...

The Boulevard de Belleville at nine o’clock at night presents a grim and forbidding aspect. Long rows of flickering gaslamps cast wan reflections over the far-stretching pavemen...

It was M. Moche. The old man was even dirtier than usual, his hat crammed down over his ears—a huge topper, all dinted and dulled; his brow was wrinkled in deep and serious thou...

Towards five o’clock that afternoon a busy-looking individual was crossing the Tuileries gardens at a rapid pace. Without a moment’s hesitation, like a man accustomed to follow...

“Oh! for me, it’s nothing to me. I don’t care a hang; you’re a tremendous cute chap, that’s all I want to know; your patent of nobility you can leave with your ‘uncle,’ if that’...

For nearly two hours, Jérôme Fandor had been back in his garret, the lumber-room M. Moche had put at his disposal, albeit without making any further provision for his accommodat...

“Long live the Minister of Justice! Bravo, Ferrand! bravo! bravo!” These and the like cordial acclamations were still echoing in Désiré Ferrand’s ears as the Minister, in his el...

“In the little bowl on the side-table,” replied the Chief of the Criminal Investigation Department from where he knelt on the carpet, while Professor Ardell, who was holding bet...

Nini Guinon was furious; turning sharply round, she thus apostrophized an individual who had just signalized his presence by tickling her ribs more roughly than agreeably. It wa...

The _Lorraine_ had just entered the port of Hâvre after an excellent passage across the Atlantic. As usual, her passenger list was a full one, and bore many names well known in...

All was bustle and movement in the great entrance-hall of the Hôtel Terminus, the imposing edifice that rears its bulk immediately outside the Gare Saint-Lazare; there was a nev...

The American detective Tom Bob was no ordinary man. The very first day after his arrival he had signalized his presence and drawn public attention to himself in a manner at once...

Elisabeth Dollon was busily engaged installing her belongings in the new flat in the Rue de l’Evangile, into which she had moved the previous evening. The girl possessed a modes...

“You appear to me, my dear fellow, to be enjoying yourself just like the fashionable folk, and you are the most ungrateful chap on earth to go on talking about ‘the cruelty of F...

M. Moche was in a generous mood that morning. He now beckoned to the waiter of the drinking shop where he sat with a companion, the apache known by the nickname of the “Gasman,”...

Heavy-eyed, with a smarting brow and a raging headache, Ascott awoke late the following morning. It was about ten o’clock when the young man in the big four-poster, whose twiste...

In the drives of the Parc des Princes, as a rule deserted in the evening, the sombre ways that start from the fortifications and unite Paris with Boulogne-sur-Seine, ways border...

M. Havard was almost apologetic, almost polite, a fact which in his case was proof positive of the deepest respect. Habitually plain-spoken, accustomed to give orders in clear,...

It was the hour of general _réveillée_ at the prison of _La Santé_. Along the corridors, still in semi-darkness, tramped the warders, jangling their ponderous bunches of keys, o...

The ferry-boat that plies between the bank of the lake and the Ile de Beauté on which the Restaurant Azaïs stands had not actually touched the landing-stage before M. Havard, st...

“You are mistaken. Then, to begin with, the doctor forbids you to talk; you must obey his orders so as to get well, and you know very well you have to get well quickly.”

Tom Bob had been waiting some while in a small room reserved for the use of callers on the ground floor of the house. The detective seemed extremely impatient, again and again h...

As Ascott desired the wedding was carried out in the strictest privacy. The party reached the _Mairie_ at an early hour. Ascott had for witnesses his man servant John, and a cas...

It was nine o’clock, and the storm was at its height. The rain came down in torrents, the wind blew fiercely, lightning blazed and thunder bellowed. The streets were deserted, f...

Juve was a free man. The Juge d’Instruction, M. Fuselier, who had all along been sceptical as to the generally accepted theory of the identity of the police-officer with Fantôma...

As he heard the ominous words, Juve shuddered, brave man as he was. The police-officer in the course of his adventurous life had gone through such ups and downs of fortune, take...

An hour or so before these events, while it was still night, the police-officers on duty at the head Commissariat office at Alfort were roused from the peaceful doze they were i...

It was broad daylight by this time and the morning, still a trifle chilly, gave promise of a very fine day. The tragic scenes just enacted had had, thanks to the radiant beams o...

The Grand Duchess Alexandra gave vent to an exclamation expressive both of surprise and triumph, as she greeted the visitor who stood before her. The latter, dropping his eyes a...