He paused for a moment or two, then added abruptly: 

“Would you care to go?  The matter is important,” he went on quietly, “and I am willing to pay you.  It means a couple of nights’ journey—­a halt in the mountains during the day—­and there will be ten thousand francs for you if the ‘toys’ reach St. Claude safely.”

I suppose that something in my face betrayed the eagerness which I felt.  Here was indeed the finger of Providence pointing to the best means of undoing this abominable criminal.  Not that I intended to risk my neck for any ten thousand francs he chose to offer me, but as the trusted guide of his ingenuous “babies” I could convoy them—­not to St. Claude, as he blandly believed, but straight into the arms of Leroux and the customs officials.

“Then that is understood,” he said in his usual dictatorial manner, taking my consent for granted.  “Ten thousand francs.  And you will accompany these gentlemen and their ‘babies’ as far as St. Claude?”

“I am a poor man, Sir,” I responded meekly.

“Of course you are,” he broke in roughly.

Then from a number of papers which lay upon the table, he selected one which he held out to me.

“Do you know St. Cergues?” he asked.

“Yes,” I replied.  “It is a short walk from Gex.”

“This,” he added, pointing to a paper which I had taken from him, “is a plan of the village and of the Pass of Cergues close by.  Study it carefully.  At some point some way up the pass, which I have marked with a cross, I and my men with the ‘babies’ will be waiting for you to-morrow evening at eight o’clock.  You cannot possibly fail to find the spot, for the plan is very accurate and very minute, and it is less than five hundred metres from the last house at the entrance of the pass.  I shall escort the men until then, and hand them over into your charge for the mountain journey.  Is that clear?”

“Perfectly.”

“Very well, then; you may go.  The carriage is outside the door.  You know your way.”

He dismissed me with a curt nod, and the next two minutes saw me outside this house of mystery and installed inside the ramshackle vehicle on my way back to my lodgings.

I was worn out with fatigue and excitement, and I imagine that I slept most of the way.  Certain it is that the journey home was not nearly so long as the outward one had been.  The rain was still coming down heavily, but I cared nothing about the weather, nothing about fatigue.  My path to fame and fortune had been made easier for me than in my wildest dreams I would have dared to hope.  In the morning I would see Leroux and make final arrangements for the capture of those impudent smugglers, and I thought the best way would be for him to meet me and the “babies” and the “toys” at the very outset of our journey, as I did not greatly relish the idea of crossing lonely and dangerous mountain paths in the company of these ruffians.