had nothing to add to, or to subtract from,
his previous evidence. He merely asked for the jury's particular
attention; for, although he was adducing nothing new in the case
actually before them, he had some unexpected disclosures to make about
the prisoner's personal culpability. The first point which he desired to
emphasise was that human intelligence should hesitate before no
improbability, however improbable, provided that some explanation was
humanly conceivable, and no definite material object rendered the
improbability an impossibility. His whole statement would be based on
the principle that the probable is incontestable and true, until proof
of the contrary has been established.

"Gentlemen," he went on, "hitherto the police have remained impotent,
and justice has been disarmed, in presence of a number of serious cases
of crime, committed recently and still unsolved. Let me recall these
cases to your memory: they were the murder of the Marquise de Langrune
at her chateau of Beaulieu; the robberies from Mme. Van den Rosen and
the Princess Sonia Danidoff; the murder of Dollon, the former steward of
the Marquise de Langrune, when on his way from the neighbourhood of
Saint-Jaury to Paris in obedience to a summons sent him by M. Germain
Fuselier; and, lastly, the murder of Lord Beltham, prior to the cases
just enumerated, for which the prisoner in the dock is at this moment
standing his trial. Gentlemen, I have to say that all these cases, the
Beltham, Langrune and Dollon murders, and the Rosen-Danidoff burglaries,
are absolutely and indisputably to be attributed to one and the same
individual, to that man standing there--Gurn!"

Having made this extraordinary assertion, Juve again turned round
towards the prisoner. That mysterious person appeared to be keenly
interested in what the detective said, but it would have been difficult
to say whether he was merely surprised, or not rather perturbed and
excited as well. Juve hushed, with a wave of his hand, the murmur that
ran round the court, and resumed his address.

"My assertion that Gurn is the sole person responsible for all these
crimes has surprised you, gentlemen, but I have proofs which must, I
think, convince you. I will not go into the details of each of those
cases, for the newspapers have made you quite familiar with them, but I
will be as brief and as lucid as I can.

"My first point, gentlemen, is this: the murderer of the Marquise de
Langrune and the