came from?"
It was, but I had no answer when Duponte inquired about the ownership and character of that address. After having offered my expert services as guide to Baltimore! I explained that the building adjoined an engine house for one of the city's fire engine companies, the Vigilant Fire Company, and said perhaps it was part of the company.
The street door of the place from which the Baron and Bonjour had emerged was stiff but unlocked. It opened onto a dark corridor that slanted down to another door. A heavy-set man, perhaps one of the firemen from the adjoining company, opened the door from the other side. From the long stairwell behind him came down fleeting shouts of joy. Or of terror, it was hard to decide which.
The doorkeeper's sheer width was impenetrable. He stared menacingly. I thought to remain quiet and still. Only when he motioned with his hand did it seem necessary to move closer.
"Pass-word," he said.
I looked anxiously at Duponte, who was now peering down at the floor.
"Pass-word to go upstairs," the doorkeeper continued in an undertone that was meant to frighten-and did.
Duponte had entered a sort of trance, letting his eyes glide over the floor, around the walls, up the stairs, and to the doorkeeper himself. What a moment to lose attention! Meanwhile, from the doorkeeper's throat there could be heard a canine grumble as though at the slightest movement from us he would strike out.
With an explosive thrust, the doorkeeper grabbed my wrist.
"I'll ask you jack-dandies for the last time, 'cause I ain't joking. The pass-word!" It felt like the bone would snap if I tried to move.
"Release the young man, good sir," said Duponte quietly, looking up, "and I shall provide you with your pass-word."
The doorkeeper blinked dryly a few times at Duponte, then cranked open his grip. I pulled my arm to safety. The man said to Duponte, as though he had never pronounced the words before, and would certainly not pronounce them again without murdering someone, "Pass-word." The doorkeeper and I both stared at my companion doubtfully.
Duponte squared his body to his confronter and spoke two words.
"Rosy God."
Chapter 13
EVEN WITH MY unshakable faith in Duponte's analytic talents; even with the breathless tales I had heard of his achievements from newspapers, commissionnaires, and policemen in Paris; even remembering what I had witnessed in the Parisian gardens and in the revelation of the stowaway on the steamship; even remembering that Poe himself had pointed in his direction through his tales as a genius separate from all others; even with all this, still I could not believe what happened in the damp corridor of this building. The doorkeeper glared, stepped aside, then motioned us forward to the threshold behind him...
The signal that had admitted us-as in some nursery tale of magic-this "Rosy God," I had heard occasionally on the street as a low phrase for red wine. What extraordinary cipher could have been seen in the floors, in the walls, in the stairs, in the doorkeeper's countenance or dress, that had led Duponte to decipher the code of entrance-a password that might change with the season or every hour-into this private and well-guarded den?
"How did you," I said, stopping midway on the creaking stairs. "Monsieur, the pass-word-"
"Aside! Aside!" A man lurching over the stairs from above squeezed past us. Duponte accelerated our climb. The raucous shouts from above became clearer.
The upper floor was a small room filled with smoke and noise. Firemen and tottering rowdies sat at gaming tables and called for more drinks from thinly clad bargirls, dresses only barely covering the milky white of their necks. One rogue sprawled out flat on a bed of sharp oyster shells, while one of his comrades kicked him over to the left for a better place to stand for a billiards game.
Duponte found a small, broken table more or less right at the center, where we were conspicuous. Heated stares followed us into our rickety chairs. Duponte sat and nodded to a waitress as though entering a respectable cafe on the sidewalks of Paris.
"Monsieur," I whispered, taking a seat, "you must tell me directly-how is it you knew the pass-word to admit us?"
"The explanation is rather simple. I did not give the pass-word."
"My dear Duponte! It was like an 'open sesame'! If this were two centuries earlier, you would have burned as a witch. I cannot stand to continue without being enlightened as to this point!"
Duponte rubbed one of his eyes as though just waking up.