e read it, and looked up with an amused smile, in which there
lurked a trace of malice.

"What a man!" he said. "Nevertheless, Lepine, I think you would better
go. You may be able to assist him! Give him my compliments, and keep me
informed," and he turned back to his secretary.

* * * * *

The Paris office of the Messrs. Cook is at the corner opposite the Opera
House, and here, about ten o'clock on the morning of Thursday, September
28, a little grey-bearded man descended from a fiacre, entered, and,
after a short delay, was admitted to the presence of the manager, who
made it clear at once that he was entirely at the service of his
distinguished visitor.

Lepine sat down and produced from his pocket seven notes of the Bank of
France, for one hundred francs each. They were quite new and had not
even been folded.

"These notes were deposited by you yesterday afternoon," he said. "I
should like to know from whom they were received."

The manager took the notes and glanced at them.

"That will not be difficult, sir," he said. "Our cashier can no doubt
tell us from which of our clerks he received them. Excuse me a moment."

He hurried from the room with the notes in his hand, and Lepine,
strolling to the window, relapsed into his favourite amusement. At no
other corner in the city could it be practised so profitably, for here,
at the meeting of the Boulevards, all Paris, sooner or later, passed;
and not Paris only, but vagrants from every nation. So Lepine watched
the crowd intently, his bright eyes skipping from face to face--a mere
glance at one, a longer glance at another, a close stare at a third.
Perhaps, at the back of his mind, there was the hope that some
incredible good-fortune might send past this corner a shrunken,
white-haired man, leaning on the arm of his dark-haired daughter....

The opening of the door behind him broke into his thoughts, and he
turned to find that the manager had brought another man back with him.

"This is the clerk who received the money," said the manager, and
returned the seven notes to the detective.

Lepine motioned the clerk to be seated, and himself sat down facing him.

"Tell me all that you remember of the transaction," he said.

"It was Tuesday afternoon, sir," the clerk began, "about four o'clock, I
should say, that a man came to the counter and stated that he desired a
stateroom, with two berths, second-class, for the _Prinzsessin
O