M. Lemoine—King Victor

M. Lemoine—King Victor is a pursuit shaped by the gap between suspicion and proof: the French detective has tracked a resourceful criminal across identities and countries, while King Victor repeatedly escapes the consequences of being recognized. The connection links Paris robberies, a false royal identity used to obtain American investment, and the detective’s belief that Victor has returned to Chimneys after Prince Michael’s death.

The pursuit begins in Paris

M. Lemoine describes King Victor as a celebrated but elusive criminal whose real name is unknown. Victor is said to speak five languages and to be exceptionally skilled in disguise; although his father was reportedly English or Irish, his own criminal career had been centered chiefly in Paris. Nearly eight years before the present investigation, he was carrying out a series of daring robberies there under the name Captain O’Neill.

The French authorities suspected that Captain O’Neill was King Victor, but suspicion alone did not provide the proof needed to establish the identity. They also suspected that the actress Angèle Mory, who performed at the Folies Bergeres, was associated with Victor’s operations. Again, they could not prove the connection. Lemoine’s account therefore begins not with a solved case but with a pattern the police could see and a central identity they could not securely establish.

Evasion and the American fraud

Victor’s release from prison did not bring him within the authorities’ control. Lemoine says that the French detectives tried to keep track of him, but Victor gave them the slip almost immediately. They expected him to travel to England; instead, he went to the United States. That unexpected route illustrates the practical difficulty of pursuing a man whose movements and identities repeatedly frustrate prediction.

In America, Victor exploited the report that Prince Nicholas had died in the Congo years earlier. Because such a distant death was difficult to verify, he presented himself as the supposedly deceased prince brought back to life and used the identity to secure a large sum of American dollars in connection with oil concessions. His impersonation was exposed by accident, forcing him to leave the country in haste. Lemoine characterizes the operation as an enormous bluff: Victor did not merely conceal himself but made a presumed royal identity the instrument of a financial deception.

The trail returns to Chimneys

After the American exposure, Victor did come to England, giving Lemoine a reason to expect that their paths would cross again. The detective believes Victor will sooner or later come to Chimneys and allows that he may already be there. His suspicion reaches back to the night Prince Michael died: Lemoine thinks Victor was at Chimneys then, and that he returned on the previous night as well. Asked whether the latter visit was another attempt, Lemoine confirms that it was.

This places the pursuit beside the investigation of Prince Michael’s death without making Lemoine’s suspicion equivalent to proof. The detective connects Victor to the setting and to two significant nights, but the available account does not establish what Victor did there or demonstrate that he caused the prince’s death. The distinction matters: Lemoine’s expertise is presented through the breadth of the trail he reconstructs, while the criminal’s ability to vanish leaves the decisive facts unsettled.

A pursuit measured by uncertainty

The relationship between detective and fugitive is defined by repeated near-identification. In Paris, the police suspected Victor’s identity as Captain O’Neill but could not prove it; in America, Victor’s impersonation of Prince Nicholas collapsed only through accident; after his release, he escaped surveillance and chose a destination his pursuers had not expected. Each episode advances the investigation while confirming how little ordinary tracking can guarantee against him.

Lemoine’s account also broadens the story’s pattern of imposture: Victor’s disguises are not confined to physical appearance but extend to names, royal status, and the financial promises attached to that status. By the time Lemoine reaches Chimneys, the reader has reason to see the supposed prince, the Paris robber, and the fugitive as facets of one carefully concealed criminal identity. Yet the relation remains a pursuit rather than a completed capture in this account: the detective has found the likely destination, but Victor’s presence and precise part in the events remain matters to be established.