“And, on the other hand, what a host of good actions!  What countless proofs of disinterested generosity!  A burglar?  I admit it.  A swindler?  I don’t deny it.  He was all that.  But he was something more than that.  And, while he amused the gallery with his skill and ingenuity, he roused the general enthusiasm in other ways.

“People laughed at his practical jokes, but they loved his pluck, his courage, his adventurous spirit, his contempt for danger, his shrewd insight, his unfailing good humour, his reckless energy:  all qualities that stood out at a period when the most active virtues of our race had reached their zenith, the period of the motor car and the aeroplane....

“One day,” he said, as a joke, “I should like my epitaph to read, ’Here lies Arsene Lupin, adventurer.’” That was quite correct.  He was a master of adventure.

“And, if the spirit of adventure led him too often to put his hand in other people’s pockets, it also led him to battlefields where it gives those who are worthy opportunity to fight and win titles of distinction which are not within reach of all.  It was there that he gained his.  It is there that you should see him at work, spending his strength braving death, and defying destiny.  And it is because of this that you must forgive him, even if he did sometimes get the better of a commissary of police or steal the watch of an examining magistrate.  Let us show some indulgence to our professors of energy.”

And, nodding his head, Don Luis concludes: 

“Then, you see, he had another virtue which is not to be despised.  It is a virtue for which we should be grateful to him in these gray days of ours:  he knew how to smile!”

THE END