Does Monsieur know that Monsieur Mardoche, one of the most distinguished of our Juges d'Instruction, took up this case with enthusiasm; that the police were never more earnest than in their endeavour to find poor Marie Prévol's murderer? Does Monsieur know that it was a double murder, and that the Baron de Maucroix, a young man of high family and large fortune, was also a victim? Does Monsieur suppose that the Baron's friends were idle—that no inducement was offered to the police?"
"I am aware of all this, Mademoiselle, and I know that the cleverest police in the world—"
"Except Russia. We must always bow to the superior genius of the north," interjected Drubarde.
"I am aware that the police failed. But you must consider, Mademoiselle, that when the police of Paris were keenest in their pursuit of the assassin, the assassin was most upon his guard. The consciousness of his crime, the horror of his position, intensified his intelligence. He had but one thought—to escape detection. Every act, every movement, every word was planned with that purpose. But now ten years have gone by—ten years of security. The murderer may be less guarded, more open to detection. He will have grown careless—foolhardy even—believing that after such an interval detection must be impossible. If Mademoiselle will do me the honour to touch glasses, we will discuss this question at our leisure."
He had filled the three glasses, but he had perceived that the dressmaker had a delicacy in drinking the wine he had provided, so he took up his glass and offered the edge of it to hers; and, emboldened by this friendly movement, the spinster clinked her glass against the rim of his, then against that of the patriarchal Drubarde, while the cockatoo, wondering at this unwonted revelry, screeched his loudest.
"To your good health, gentlemen," faltered the dressmaker, before she sipped her wine.
"To the speedy discovery of Marie Prévol's murderer," said Heathcote.
"Did you know our poor Marie, Monsieur, that you are thus interested in her dark fate?"
"No, Mademoiselle."
"O, if you had but known her, I should understand your desire to avenge her death. She was so lovely. To know her was to adore her. Even a soured old maid such as I could but yield to her charm. She was as loving as she was lovable; a clinging disposition, a poetical nature. Her life was not blameless, perhaps—who knows? We will not scrutinise too closely. She was as different from those harpies whom one hears of in Paris as a wild rose in the hedge is different from a jewel that has gone the round of every Mont-de-Piété in the city. Her heart was pure as the heart of a child. She had no ambition
