Page:The Teeth of the Tiger - Leblanc - 1914.djvu/41

 and I alone have the key of the safe in which I put away documents of that importance every evening."

"The safe has not been broken into? There has been no burglary at your office?"

"No."

"You saw Cosmo Mornington in the morning?"

"Yes, on a Friday morning."

"What did you do with the will until the evening, until you locked it away in your safe?"

"I probably put it in the drawer of my desk."

"And the drawer was not forced?"

Maître Lepertuis seemed taken aback and made no reply.

"Well?" asked Perenna.

"Well, yes, I remember … there was something that day … that same Friday."

"Are you sure?"

"Yes. When I came in from lunch I noticed that the drawer was not locked, although I had locked it beyond the least doubt. At the time I attached comparatively little importance to the incident. To-day, I understand, I understand"

Thus, little by little, were all the suppositions conceived by Don Luis verified: suppositions resting, it is true, upon just one or two clues, but yet containing an amount of intuition, of divination, that was really surprising in a man who had been present at none of the events between which he traced the connection so skilfully.

"We will lose no time, Monsieur," said the Prefect of Police, "in checking your statements, which you will confess to be a little venturesome, by the more positive evidence of one of my detectives who has the