a journalist!" protested the colonel.

Juve smiled slily.

"A journalist not like the others--it was Jerome Fandor, Colonel!...
He went to de Naarboveck's to fulfill a mission entrusted to him by
those in high places. The Minister of War."...

The Under-Secretary cut the inspector short.

"We know all about that, Monsieur Juve ... besides the person whom the
Minister wished to learn something about was not Monsieur de
Naarboveck's daughter, but her companion--a young woman named
Berthe."...

"And nicknamed Bobinette!" finished Juve.

"What do you think of her?" asked the Under-Secretary.

Juve's reply was an indirect one.

"The more I think about it, the more I am tempted to believe that
Wilhelmine de Naarboveck was Brocq's mistress--oh, in the right way,
in all honour!--and that in the background, surreptitiously, a third
person pushed herself into their confidence was the recipient of their
secret, and on this account she could take a good many liberties with
them. Berthe, or Bobinette, was this third person, of course!... She
is known to have visited Brocq repeatedly.... Now, what was she doing
there--what was her object? Well, we have to get a clear idea of what
happened and draw our conclusions. Remember, Brocq left his flat in
great haste on the afternoon of his assassination; he took a taxi at
the des Saints-Peres, and drove off in pursuit of someone.... Why, we
do not know, yet; but this someone was a woman, and I am convinced the
woman was Bobinette."

"What is Bobinette's social position?"

"Gentlemen, I wish I could define it in a single word, but it is here
that I enter the region of enigmas. Here is mystery on mystery.
Without breaking the seal of professional secrecy, I may tell you that
this woman should be known to me; I say 'should' because I still lack
precise information about her; I await this information with
impatience--I fear it also, for, gentlemen."...

Juve stopped short, got up, and began pacing the immense room. Drawing
up before the Under-Secretary and Colonel Hofferman, he gazed at them.
His manner was impressive.

"Gentlemen," said he, in a quiet penetrating voice, and with an air of
intense conviction: "Gentlemen, if my conjectures are correct,
Bobinette is naught but a girl of low birth--of the lowest--a creature
who will stick at nothing, who has been mixed up with a band of
criminals, the most cunning, the most artful, the most unscrupulous,
the most dangerous band of c