he descent by the balanced oscillations of
the stone, and so ascertaining the even size of the opening, as far as
the line would go. This was the work of a few minutes.

Fandor did not hesitate: he was eager to embark on the descent.

"After all," he murmured, "though I may find myself face to face with a
band of assassins--what of it? It is all in the night's risks!"

He fastened the end of the cord to one of the neighbouring
chimneys--fastened it firmly; then, his revolver handily stuck in his
belt, Fandor seized the cord, twisted it round his legs, and let himself
slowly down through the narrow opening.

It was a perilous descent! Fandor did not know whether his cord was long
enough, and, lost in the darkness, with only the gleam of light from his
lantern to guide him, he was naturally afraid of reaching the end of his
rope unawares, and of falling into the black void beneath. But what he
observed in the course of his descent excited him so much that he almost
forgot the danger he was running. To those at all practised in police
detective work, it was clear as daylight that men had passed this way,
and recently.

"Here is a dislodged stone," muttered Fandor. "And here are scrapes and
scratches--fresh ... and ... that mark looks like blood!"

Pushing his knees and his shoulders against the wall to support himself
and stay his movements, he examined the mark. There was no doubt
possible: Fandor's sharp eyes and the lantern's light had picked out a
little red patch, which sullied one of the projecting stones in the
chimney walls:

"This," reflected our amateur detective, "only confirms Dollon's death:
if the wound which caused this mark had been made by a living body, the
mark would have been larger, and there would have been others, for it
must come from an abrasion of the skin made during the descent. But this
blood mark has resulted from a dead body knocking against the stones of
the wall: it is not a mark make by flowing blood, but by blood crushed
out."

He descended a few yards further:

"Here's a find!" he cried. He had just perceived some hairs sticking to
the rough surface of the stones. Again, with arched shoulders and bent
knees, he supported himself against the wall, examined his discovery,
left half the hairs where they were, took the rest, and carefully placed
them in his pocket-book:

"The police must not be able to say that I have arranged this for their
benefit," Fandor remarked. "Cost what