w."

"Who told you that we supposed the theft might have been committed in
that way?"

"But.... the necklace was in the cabinet, wasn't it?"

"How do you know that?"

"Why, I have always known that it was kept there at night. It had been
mentioned in my presence."

Her face, though still young, bore unmistakable traces of sorrow and
resignation. And it now assumed an expression of anxiety as if some
danger threatened her. She drew her son toward her. The child took her
hand, and kissed it affectionately.

When they were alone again, the count said to the commissary:

"I do not suppose you suspect Henriette. I can answer for her. She is
honesty itself."

"I quite agree with you," replied Mon. Valorbe. "At most, I thought
there might have been an unconscious complicity. But I confess that even
that theory must be abandoned, as it does not help solve the problem now
before us."

The commissary of police abandoned the investigation, which was now
taken up and completed by the examining judge. He questioned the
servants, examined the condition of the bolt, experimented with the
opening and closing of the cabinet window, and explored the little court
from top to bottom. All was in vain. The bolt was intact. The window
could not be opened or closed from the outside.

The inquiries especially concerned Henriette, for, in spite of
everything, they always turned in her direction. They made a thorough
investigation of her past life, and ascertained that, during the last
three years, she had left the house only four times, and her business,
on those occasions, was satisfactorily explained. As a matter of fact,
she acted as chambermaid and seamstress to the countess, who treated her
with great strictness and even severity.

At the end of a week, the examining judge had secured no more definite
information than the commissary of police. The judge said:

"Admitting that we know the guilty party, which we do not, we are
confronted by the fact that we do not know how the theft was
committed. We are brought face to face with two obstacles: a door and a
window--both closed and fastened. It is thus a double mystery. How could
anyone enter, and, moreover, how could any one escape, leaving behind
him a bolted door and a fastened window?"

At the end of four months, the secret opinion of the judge was that the
count and countess, being hard pressed for money, which was their normal
condition, had sold the Queen's Necklace. He