Had Rovere any enemies?"

"I do not know of any."

The Magistrate swung around by a detour habitual with him to Jacques
Dantin's last visit to the murdered man, and begged him to be precise,
and asked him if anything had especially struck him during that last
interview with his friend.

"The idea of suicide having been immediately dropped on the simple
examination of the wound, no doubt exists as to the cause of death.
Rovere was assassinated. By whom? In your last interview was there any
talk between you of any uneasiness which he felt in regard to anything?
Was he occupied with any especial affair? Had he--sometimes one has
presentiments--any presentiment of an impending evil, that he was
running any danger?"

"No," Dantin replied. "Rovere made no allusion to me of any peril which
he feared. I have asked myself who could have any interest in his death.
One might have done the deed for plunder."

"That seems very probable to me," said the Magistrate, "but the
examination made in the apartment proves that not a thing had been
touched. Theft was not the motive."

"Then?" asked Dantin.

The sanguine face of the Magistrate, that robust visage, with its
massive jaws, lighted up with a sort of ironical expression.

"Then we are here to search for the truth and to find it." In this
response, made in a mocking tone, the registrar, who knew every varying
shade of tone in his Chief's voice, raised his head, for in this tone he
detected a menace.

"Will you tell me all that passed in that last interview?"

"Nothing whatever which could in any way put justice on the track of the
criminal."

"But yet can you, or, rather, I should say, ought you not to relate to
me all that was said or done? The slightest circumstance might enlighten
us."

"Rovere spoke to me of private affairs," Dantin replied, but quickly
added: "They were insignificant things."

"What are insignificant things?"

"Remembrances--family matters."

"Family things are not insignificant, above all in a case like this. Had
Rovere any family? No relative assisted at the obsequies."

Jacques Dantin seemed troubled, unnerved rather, and this time it was
plainly visible. He replied in a short tone, which was almost brusque:

"He talked of the past."

"What past?" asked the Judge, quickly.

"Of his youth--of moral debts."

M. Ginory turned around in his chair, leaned back, and said in a caustic
tone: "Truly, Monsieur, you certainly ought to complet