"What's the matter? Your eyes are shut."

"It amuses me to keep them shut. Do you mind?"

"Singular man!" mattered the other. "What makes you think I ate an orange?"

[Illustration: "'What's the matter? Your eyes are shut.'"]

"I got the smell of it when you tore the peel off and I heard the seeds
drop."

The baron's voice showed growing interest. "Where do you think you are?"

"In a deep underground room where you store firewood."

"Extraordinary!"

"Not at all. The floor is covered with chips of it and this bag is full of
shavings."

"How do you know we are underground?"

"By the smell of the floor and because you need a candle when it's full
daylight above."

"Then you know what time it is?" asked the other incredulously.

"Why--er--I can tell by looking." He opened his eyes. "Ah, it's earlier
than I thought, it's barely seven."

"How the devil do you know that?"

Coquenil did not answer for a moment. He was looking about him wonderingly,
noting the damp stone walls and high vaulted ceiling of a large windowless
chamber. By the uncertain light of the baron's candle he made out an arched
passageway at one side and around the walls piles of logs carefully roped
and stacked together.

"Your candle hasn't burned more than an hour," answered the detective.

"It might be a second candle."

M. Paul shook his head. "Then you wouldn't have been eating your breakfast
orange. And you wouldn't have been waiting so patiently."

The two men eyed each other keenly.

"Coquenil," said De Heidelmann-Bruck slowly, "I give you credit for
unusual cleverness, but if you tell me you have any inkling what I am
waiting for----"

"It's more than inkling," answered the detective quietly, "I _know_ that
you are waiting for the girl."

"The girl?" The other started.

"The girl Alice or--Mary your stepdaughter."

"God Almighty!" burst out the baron. "What a guess!"

M. Paul shook his head. "No, not a guess, a fair deduction. My ring is
gone. It was on my hand before you gave me that chloroform. You took it.
That means you needed it. Why? To get the girl! You knew it would bring
her, though _how_ you knew it is more than I can understand."

"Gibelin heard you speak of the ring to Pougeot that night in the
automobile."

"Ah! And how did you know where the girl was?"

"Guessed it partly and--had Pougeot followed."

"And she's coming here?"

The baron nodded. "She ought to be here shortly." Then with a quick,