The conversation was a long and evidently a satisfactory one, for on parting, M. Havard extended his hand cordially to his erstwhile fellow worker, while Juve’s face beamed with glad relief, and reawakened hope. CHAPTER XX A WOMAN’S SELF-SACRIFICE 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, standing up on one of the thwarts of the boat, in which indeed he was the only passenger, leapt ashore, in a paroxysm of nervous excitement. “What am I going to find here?” thought the Chief of the Criminal Bureau, “what fresh difficulties am I to be faced with, agitated as I am, and really not knowing what to do? Then how simply grotesque the visit I paid along with the Minister of Justice to that impossible person Tom Bob—grotesque to the uttermost degree! I arrive with a companion who is to be incognito; before I have been there three minutes the man addresses him by his name! I come to charge him with crimes committed at the Grand Duchess Alexandra’s house; he has never set foot inside the place! Then, to crown all, he is rung up by Fantômas, offering him contemptuously a petty piece of revenge—by way of annoying the Department! Then presently, when we reach the prison, it is to find Juve wounded and declaring he knows no more about it than we do!” M. Havard, so formal and precise a man, so staid and deliberate as a rule, was for the moment so enraged he entirely forgot his dignity and dashed helter skelter, running like a schoolboy, across the little terrace separating the Restaurant Azaïs from the lakeside. There were only a few diners that evening occupying the tables, and already the majority were hurrying for the ferry-boat, that was making ready, after landing the Chief on the island, to re-cross to the mainland. Only one man remained seated at a table at the farthest end of the restaurant, where he was finishing his meal. M. Havard recognized this solitary diner at once and ran up to him. “Well?” he panted. Tom Bob lifted his head and recognized the newcomer. Speaking in his quietest tones: “Oh! so there you are, M. Havard?” he observed. “Yes ... well?” again asked the Chief. “Take a chair, Monsieur Havard; you’ll help me drink my coffee? No?” M. Havard was boiling over. “The devil take your coffee!” he shouted. “Have you seen anything?” Still quite unmoved, Tom Bob shrugged. “I have seen,” he said, “that the cooking here is quite decently good and that it’s an excellent place for eating a quiet dinner.” “Devil take you and your dinner! Come now, answer me seriously ... Fantômas?” “Fantômas has not come yet.” M. Havard heaved a sigh of relief, and at last allowed himself to sink into the chair Tom Bob had pushed forward for him. “Not come yet!” he exclaimed, “ah, well, I’m rather relieved after all. It was just a joker then?” “A joker! Whom d’you mean?” “Egad, why, the man who ’phoned you!”