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130 "I shall be delighted to secure your aid."

Monsieur Drubarde and his guest descended the ladder. The detective put on a gray overcoat, which concealed and subjugated the airiness of his summer attire. He put on the hat of sober commonplace existence, and contrived to give himself an almost patriarchal aspect before he left his lodging.

The street in which Madame Lemarque had been living when the nuns of Dinan last heard of her was a narrow and shabby little street between Saint-Sulpice and the Luxembourg. The house was decently kept, and had a respectable air, and was evidently not one of those caravanserais where lodgers come and go with every term. It had a settled sober appearance, and the brass plates upon the door told of permanent residents with reputable avocations. One of these plates informed society that Mesdames Lemarque and Beauville, Robes et Modes, occupied the third floor. The staircase was clean and quiet, and the first sound that saluted Mr. Heathcote's ears as he went up-stairs was the screech of a parrot, which became momentarily louder as the visitors approached the third floor.

On the door on the left of the landing appeared another brass plate—Mesdames Lemarque et Beauville, Robes, Modes, Chapeaux.

Heathcote rang the bell. He felt curiously agitated at the thought that in the next minute he might be face to face with the dead girl's grandmother.

The door was opened by an elderly woman in black, very sallow, very thin, with prominent cheekbones and hungry black eyes. She was neatly clad, her rusty silk gown fitting her fleshless form to perfection, her linen collar and cuffs spotlessly clean, her iron-gray hair carefully arranged; but poverty was stamped upon every fold of her gown, and written in every line upon her forehead.

"Madame Lemarque?" inquired Heathcote, while the ci-devant police-officer looked over his shoulder.

"No, I am not Madame Lemarque, but I am her business representative. Any orders intended for Madame Lemarque can be executed by me. I am Mademoiselle Beauville."

"Alas, Mademoiselle, it is not a question of orders," replied Heathcote, in his most courteous tones. "I have come on a painful errand. I have to impart very sad news to Madame Lemarque."

Madame Beauville sighed and shrugged her thin shoulders.

"Madame Lemarque is taking her rest in a place where all the events of this earth are alike indifferent," she said. "Take the trouble to enter my humble apartment, gentlemen. Madame Lemarque was my partner and my friend."

Heathcote and his companion followed the dressmaker into her little salon, where a dilapidated old gray cockatoo was clam-