er
alibi."

"Not possibly," Juve replied. "So we need only trouble ourselves with
Charles Rambert," and warming up to the subject the detective proceeded
to pile up a crushing indictment against the young man. "The crime was
committed so quietly that not the faintest sound was heard; therefore
the murderer was in the house; he went to the Marquise's room and
announced his arrival by a cautious tap on the door; the Marquise then
opened the door to him, and was not surprised to see him, for she knew
him quite well; he went into her room with her and----"

"Oh, come, come!" M. de Presles broke in; "you are romancing now, M.
Juve; you forget that the bedroom door was forced, the best proof of
that being the bolt, which was found wrenched away and hanging literally
at the end of the screws."

"I was expecting you to say that, sir," said Juve with a smile. "But
before I reply I should like to show you something rather quaint." He
led the way across the passage and went into the bedroom of the
Marquise, where order had now been restored; the dead body had been
removed to the library, which was transformed into a _chapelle ardente_,
and two nuns were watching over it there. "Have a good look at this
bolt," he said to M. de Presles. "Is there anything unusual about it?"

"No," said the magistrate.

"Yes, there is," said Juve; "the slide-bolt is out, as when the bolt is
fastened, but the socket into which the slide-bolt slips to fasten the
door to the wall is intact. If the bolt really had been forced, the
socket would have been wrenched away too." Juve next asked M. de Presles
to look closely at the screws that were wrenched halfway out of the
door. "Do you see anything on those?"

The magistrate pointed to their heads.

"There are tiny scratches on them," he said, rather hesitatingly, for in
his inmost heart he knew the detective's real superiority over himself,
"and from those I must infer that the screws have not been wrenched out
by the pressure exerted on the bolt, but really unscrewed, and
therefore----"

"And therefore," Juve broke in, "this is a mere blind, from which we may
certainly draw the conclusion that the murderer wished to make us
believe that the door was forced, whereas in reality it was opened to
him by the Marquise. Therefore the murderer was personally known to
her!"

"The murderer was personally known to her," he repeated. "Now I should
like to remind you of young Charles Rambert's equivocal be