duplicate letters it was probable, in fact quite certain, that the words he could form from those letters would be incomplete, and that the original words had been completed with letters taken from other pages. Under those conditions he obtained the following solution, errors and omissions excepted:
REPOND Z—CH—237.
The first word was quite clear: répondez [reply], a letter E is missing because it occurs twice in the word, and the book furnished only one letter of each kind.
As to the second incomplete word, no doubt it formed, with the aid of the number 237, an address to which the reply was to be sent. They appointed Saturday as the time, and requested a reply to be sent to the address CH. 237.
Or, perhaps, CH. 237 was an address for a letter to be sent to the “general delivery” of some postoffice, or, again, they might form a part of some incomplete word. Holmes searched the book once more, but did not discover that any other letters had been removed. Therefore, until further orders, he decided to adhere to the foregoing interpretation.
Henriette returned and observed what he was doing.
“Amusing, isn’t it?”
“Yes, very amusing,” he replied. “But, have you any other papers?… Or, rather, words already cut out that I can paste?”
“Papers?… No.… And Mademoiselle wouldn’t like it.”
“Mademoiselle?”
“Yes, she has scolded me already.”
“Why?”
“Because I have told you some things…and she says that a person should never tell things about those they love.”
“You are quite right.”
Henriette was delighted to receive his approbation, in fact so highly pleased that she took from a little silk bag that was pinned to her dress some scraps of cloth, three buttons, two cubes of sugar and, lastly, a piece of paper which she handed to Holmes.
“See, I give it to you just the same.”
It was the number of a cab—8,279.
“Where did this number come from?”
“It fell out of her pocketbook.”
“When?”
“Sunday, at mass, when she was taking out some sous for the collection.”
“Exactly! And now I shall tell you how to keep from being scolded again. Do not tell Mademoiselle that you saw me.”
Holmes then went to Mon. d’Imblevalle and questioned him in regard to Mademoiselle. The baron replied, indignantly:
“Alice Demun! How can you imagine such a thing? It is utterly impossible!”
“How long has she been in your service?”
“Only a year, but there is no one in the house in whom I have greater confidence.”
“Why have I not seen her yet?”
“She has been away for a few days.”
“But she is here now.”
“Yes; since her return she has been watching at the bedside of your friend. She has all the qualities of a nurse…gentle…thoughtful…Monsieur Wilson seems much pleased.…”
“Ah!” said Holmes, who had completely neglected to inquire about his friend. After a moment’s reflection he asked:
“Did she go out on Sunday morning?”
“The day after the theft?”
“Yes.”
The baron called his wife and asked her. She replied:
“Mademoiselle went to the eleven o’clock mass with the children, as usual.”
“But before that?”
“Before that? No.… Let me see!… I was so upset by the theft…but I remember now that, on the evening before, she asked permission to go out on Sunday morning…to see a cousin who was passing through Paris, I think. But, surely, you don’t suspect her?”
“Of course not…but I would like to see her.”
He went to Wilson’s room. A woman dressed in a gray cloth dress, as in the hospitals, was bending over the invalid, giving him a drink. When she turned her face Holmes recognized her as the young girl who had accosted him at the railway station.
Alice Demun smiled sweetly; her great serious, innocent eyes showed no sign of embarrassment. The Englishman tried to speak, muttered a few syllables, and stopped. Then she resumed her work, acting quite naturally under Holmes’ astonished gaze, moved the bottles, unrolled and rolled cotton bandages, and again regarded Holmes with her charming smile of pure innocence.
He turned on his heels, descended the stairs, noticed Mon. d’Imblevalle’s automobile in the courtyard, jumped into it, and went to Levallois, to the office of the cab company whose address was printed on the paper he had received from Henriette. The man who had driven carriage number 8,279 on Sunday morning not being there, Holmes dismissed the automobile and waited for the man’s return. He told Holmes that he had picked up a woman in the vicinity of the Parc Monceau, a young woman dressed in black, wearing a heavy veil, and, apparently, quite nervous.
“Did she have a package?”
“Yes, quite a long package.”
“Where did you take her?”
“Avenue des Ternes, corner of the Place Saint-Ferdinand. She remained there about ten minutes, and then returned to the Parc Monceau.”
“Could you recognize the house in the avenue des Ternes?”
“Parbleu! Shall I take you there?”
“Presently. First take me to 36 quai des Orfèvres.”
At the police office he saw Detective Ganimard.
“Monsieur Ganimard, are you at liberty?”
“If it has anything to do with Lupin—no!”
“It has something to do with Lupin.”
“Then I do not go.”
“What! you surrender—”
“I bow to the inevitable. I am tired of the unequal struggle, in which we are sure to be defeated. Lupin is stronger than I am—stronger than the two of us; therefore, we must surrender.”
“I will not surrender.”
“He will make you, as he has all others.”
“And you would be pleased to see it—eh, Ganimard?”
“At all events, it is true,” said Ganimard, frankly. “And since you are determined to pursue the game, I will go with you.”
Together they entered the carriage and were driven to the avenue des Ternes. Upon their order the carriage stopped on the other side of the street, at some distance from the house, in front of a little café, on the terrace of which the two men took seats amongst the shrubbery. It was commencing to grow dark.
“Waiter,” said Holmes, “some writing material.”
He wrote a note, recalled the waiter and gave him the letter with instructions to deliver it to the concierge of the house which he pointed out.
In a few minutes the concierge stood before them. Holmes asked him if, on the Sunday morning, he had seen a young woman dressed in black.
“In black! Yes, about nine o’clock. She went to the second floor.”
“Have you seen her often?”
“No, but for some time—well, during the last few weeks, I have seen her almost every day.”
“And