“That seems rather foolish, doesn’t it?” I queried.

“Not from his point of view.  He doesn’t steal because he needs money, but because he needs excitement.”

“You know who he is, then?” I demanded.

“I think I do—­I hope I do; but I am not going to tell even you till I’m sure.  I’ll say this—­if he is who I think he is, it would be a delight to match one’s brains with his.  We haven’t got any one like him over here—­which is a pity!”

I was inclined to doubt this, for I have no romantic admiration for gentlemen burglars, even in fiction.  However picturesque and chivalric, a thief is, after all, a thief.  Perhaps it is my training as a lawyer, or perhaps I am simply narrow, but crime, however brilliantly carried out, seems to me a sordid and unlovely thing.  I know quite well that there are many people who look at these things from a different angle, Godfrey is one of them.

I pointed out to him now that, if his intuitions were correct, he would soon have a chance to match his wits with those of the Great Unknown.

“Yes,” he agreed, “and I’m scared to death—­I have been ever since I began to suspect his identity.  I feel like a tyro going up against a master in a game of chess—­mate in six moves!”

“I shouldn’t consider you exactly a tyro,” I said, drily.

“It’s long odds that the Great Unknown will,” Godfrey retorted, and bade me good-bye.

Except for that chance meeting, I saw nothing of him, and in this I was disappointed, for there were many things about the whole affair which I did not understand.  In fact, when I sat down of an evening and lit my pipe and began to think it over, I found that I understood nothing at all.  Godfrey’s theory held together perfectly, so far as I could see, but it led nowhere.  How had Drouet and Vantine been killed?  Why had they been killed?  What was the secret of the cabinet?  In a word, what was all this mystery about?  Not one of these questions could I answer; and the solutions I guessed at seemed so absurd that I dismissed them in disgust.  In the end, I found that the affair was interfering with my work, and I banished it from my mind, turning my face resolutely away from it whenever it tried to break into my thoughts.

But though I could shut it out of my waking hours successfully enough, I could not control my sleeping ones, and my dreams became more and more horrible.  Always there was the serpent with dripping fangs, sometimes with Armand’s head, sometimes with a face unknown to me, but hideous beyond description; its slimy body glittered with inlay and arabesque; its scaly legs were curved like those of the Boule cabinet; sometimes the golden sun glittered on its forehead like a great eye.  Over and over again I saw this monster slay its three victims; and always, when that was done, it raised its head and glared at me, as though selecting me for the fourth....  But I shall not try to describe those dreams; even yet I cannot recall them without a shudder.