ques, were
engaged in making an interesting chemical experiment in the part of the
laboratory taken up by the furnaces. Larsan says, unlikely as that may
seem, that the murderer may have slipped behind them. He has already got
the examining magistrate to listen to him. When one looks closely into
it, the reasoning is absurd, seeing that the 'intimate'--if there
is one--must have known that the professor would shortly leave the
pavilion, and that the 'friend' had only to put off operating till
after the professor's departure. Why should he have risked crossing the
laboratory while the professor was in it? And then, when he had got into
The Yellow Room?

"There are many points to be cleared up before Larsan's theory can be
admitted. I sha'n't waste my time over it, for my theory won't allow me
to occupy myself with mere imagination. Only, as I am obliged for the
moment to keep silent, and Larsan sometimes talks, he may finish by
coming out openly against Monsieur Darzac,--if I'm not there," added the
young reporter proudly. "For there are surface evidences against Darzac,
much more convincing than that cane, which remains incomprehensible
to me, all the more so as Larsan does not in the least hesitate to let
Darzac see him with it!--I understand many things in Larsan's theory,
but I can't make anything of that cane.

"Is he still at the chateau?"

"Yes; he hardly ever leaves it!--He sleeps there, as I do, at the
request of Monsieur Stangerson, who has done for him what Monsieur
Robert Darzac has done for me. In spite of the accusation made by Larsan
that Monsieur Stangerson knows who the murderer is he yet affords him
every facility for arriving at the truth,--just as Darzac is doing for
me."

"But you are convinced of Darzac's innocence?"

"At one time I did believe in the possibility of his guilt. That was
when we arrived here for the first time. The time has come for me to
tell you what has passed between Monsieur Darzac and myself."

Here Rouletabille interrupted himself and asked me if I had brought the
revolvers. I showed him them. Having examined both, he pronounced them
excellent, and handed them back to me.

"Shall we have any use for them?" I asked.

"No doubt; this evening. We shall pass the night here--if that won't
tire you?"

"On the contrary," I said with an expression that made Rouletabille
laugh.

"No, no," he said, "this is no time for laughing. You remember the
phrase which was the 'open s