“You don’t care a rap about me,” she said stormily. “But I find you adorable,” said the Duke. “You keep annoying me,” said Germaine pettishly. “And you do it on purpose. I think it’s in very bad taste. I shall end by taking a dislike to you—I know I shall.” “Wait till we’re married for that, my dear girl,” said the Duke; and he laughed again, with a blithe, boyish cheerfulness, which deepened the angry flush in Germaine’s cheeks. “Can’t you be serious about anything?” she cried. “I am the most serious man in Europe,” said the Duke. Germaine went to the window and stared out of it sulkily. The Duke walked up and down the hall, looking at the pictures of some of his ancestors—somewhat grotesque persons—with humorous appreciation. Between addressing the envelopes Sonia kept glancing at him. Once he caught her eye, and smiled at her. Germaine’s back was eloquent of her displeasure. The Duke stopped at a gap in the line of pictures in which there hung a strip of old tapestry. “I can never understand why you have left all these ancestors of mine staring from the walls and have taken away the quite admirable and interesting portrait of myself,” he said carelessly. Germaine turned sharply from the window; Sonia stopped in the middle of addressing an envelope; and both the girls stared at him in astonishment. “There certainly was a portrait of me where that tapestry hangs. What have you done with it?” said the Duke. “You’re making fun of us again,” said Germaine. “Surely your Grace knows what happened,” said Sonia. “We wrote all the details to you and sent you all the papers three years ago. Didn’t you get them?” said Germaine. “Not a detail or a newspaper. Three years ago I was in the neighbourhood of the South Pole, and lost at that,” said the Duke. “But it was most dramatic, my dear Jacques. All Paris was talking of it,” said Germaine. “Your portrait was stolen.” “Stolen? Who stole it?” said the Duke. Germaine crossed the hall quickly to the gap in the line of pictures. “I’ll show you,” she said. She drew aside the piece of tapestry, and in the middle of the panel over which the portrait of the Duke had hung he saw written in chalk the words: ARSÈNE LUPIN “What do you think of that autograph?” said Germaine. “‘Arsène Lupin?’” said the Duke in a tone of some bewilderment. “He left his signature. It seems that he always does so,” said Sonia in an explanatory tone. “But who is he?” said the Duke. “Arsène Lupin? Surely you know who Arsène Lupin is?” said Germaine impatiently. “I haven’t the slightest notion,” said the Duke.