"I don't understand."

"You soon will. Remember, I promised you the whole truth."

"But it seems to me-"

"A little patience, Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction. So far, you have had no cause to complain of me. It is a fine day. Go for a walk, lunch at the chateau, smoke your pipe. I shall be back by four o'clock. As for my school, well, I don't care: I shall take the night train."

They had reached the out-houses at the back of the chateau. Beautrelet jumped on his bicycle and rode away.

At Dieppe, he stopped at the office of the local paper, the Vigie, and examined the file for the last fortnight. Then he went on to the market-town of Envermeu, six or seven miles farther. At Envermeu, he talked to the mayor, the rector and the local policeman. The church-clock struck three. His inquiry was finished.

He returned singing for joy. He pressed upon the two pedals turn by turn, with an equal and powerful rhythm; his chest opened wide to take in the keen air that blew from the sea. And, from time to time, he forgot himself to the extent of uttering shouts of triumph to the sky, when he thought of the aim which he was pursuing and of the success that was crowning his efforts.

Ambrumesy appeared in sight. He coasted at full speed down the slope leading to the chateau. The top rows of venerable trees that line the road seemed to run to meet him and to vanish behind him forthwith. And, all at once, he uttered a cry. In a sudden vision, he had seen a rope stretched from one tree to another, across the road.

His machine gave a jolt and stopped short. Beautrelet was flung three yards forward, with immense violence, and it seemed to him that only chance, a miraculous chance, caused him to escape a heap of pebbles on which, logically, he ought to have broken his head.

He lay for a few seconds stunned. Then, all covered with bruises, with the skin flayed from his knees, he examined the spot. On the right lay a small wood, by which his aggressor had no doubt fled. Beautrelet untied the rope. To the tree on the left around which it was fastened a small piece of paper was fixed with string. Beautrelet unfolded it and read:

"The third and last warning."

He went on to the chateau, put a few questions to the servants and joined the examining magistrate in a room on the ground floor, at the end of the right wing, where M. Filleul used to sit in the course of his operations. M. Filleul was writing, with his clerk seated opposite to him. At a sign from him, the clerk left the room; and the magistrate exclaimed:

"Why, what have you been doing to yourself, M. Beautrelet? Your hands are covered with blood."

"It's nothing, it's nothing," said the young man. "Just a fall occasioned by this rope, which was stretched in front of my bicycle. I will only ask you to observe that the rope comes from the chateau. Not longer than twenty minutes ago, it was being used to dry linen on, outside the laundry."

"You don't mean to say so!"

"Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction, I am being watched here, by some one in the very heart of the place, who can see me, who can hear me and who, minute by minute, observes my actions and knows my intentions."

"Do you think so?"

"I am sure of it. It is for you to discover him and you will have no difficulty in that. As for myself, I want to have finished and to give you the promised explanations. I have made faster progress than our adversaries expected and I am convinced that they mean to take vigorous measures on their side. The circle is closing around me. The danger is approaching. I feel it."

"Nonsense, Beautrelet-"

"You wait and see! For the moment, let us lose no time. And, first, a question on a point which I want to have done with at once. Have you spoken to anybody of that doc.u.ment which Sergeant Quevillon picked up and handed you in my presence?"

"No, indeed; not to a soul. But do you attach any value-?"

"The greatest value. It's an idea of mine, an idea, I confess, which does not rest upon a proof of any kind-for, up to the present, I have not succeeded in deciphering the doc.u.ment. And therefore I am mentioning it-so that we need not come back to it."

Beautrelet pressed his hand on M. Filleul's and whispered:

"Don't speak-there's some one listening-outside-"

The gravel creaked. Beautrelet ran to the window and leaned out:

"There's no one there-but the border has been trodden down-we can easily identify the footprints-"

He closed the window and sat down again:

"You see, Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction, the enemy has even ceased to take the most ordinary precautions-he has not time left-he too feels that the hour is urgent. Let us be quick, therefore, and speak, since they do not wish us to speak."

He laid the doc.u.ment on the table and held it in position, unfolded:

"One observation, Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction, to begin with. The paper consists almost entirely of dots and figures. And in the first three lines and the fifth-the only ones with which we have to do at present, for the fourth seems to present an entirely different character-not one of those figures is higher than the figure 5. There is, therefore, a great chance that each of these figures represents one of the five vowels, taken in alphabetical order. Let us put down the result."

He wrote on a separate piece of paper:

E . A . A . . E . . E . A . . A . .

A ... E . E . . E OI . E . . E .

. OU . . E . O ... E . . E . O . . E AI . UI . . E . . EU . E

Then he continued:

"As you see, this does not give us much to go upon. The key is, at the same time, very easy, because the inventor has contented himself with replacing the vowels by figures and the consonants by dots, and very difficult, if not impossible, because he has taken no further trouble to complicate the problem."

"It is certainly pretty obscure."

"Let us try to throw some light upon it. The second line is divided into two parts; and the second part appears in such a way that it probably forms one word. If we now seek to replace the intermediary dots by consonants, we arrive at the conclusion, after searching and casting about, that the only consonants which are logically able to support the vowels are also logically able to produce only one word, the word DEMOISELLES."

"That would refer to Mlle. de Gesvres and Mlle. de Saint-Veran."

"Undoubtedly."

"And do you see nothing more?"

"Yes. I also note an hiatus in the middle of the last line; and, if I apply a similar operation to the beginning of the line, I at once see that the only consonant able to take the place of the dot between the diphthongs FAI and UI is the letter G and that, when I have thus formed the first five letters of the word, AIGUI, it is natural and inevitable that, with the two next dots and the final E, I should arrive at the word AIGUILLE."

"Yes, the word AIGUILLE forces itself upon us."

"Finally, for the last word, I have three vowels and three consonants. I cast about again, I try all the letters, one after the other, and, starting with the principle that the two first letters are necessary consonants, I find that three words apply: F*EUVE, PREUVE and CREUSE. I eliminate the words F*EUVE and PREUVE, as possessing no possible relation to a needle, and I keep the word CREUSE."

"Making 'hollow needle'! By jove! I admit that your solution is correct, because it needs must be; but how does it help us?"

"Not at all," said Beautrelet, in a thoughtful tone. "Not at all, for the moment.-Later on, we shall see.-I have an idea that a number of things are included in the puzzling conjunction of those two words, AIGUILLE CREUSE. What is troubling me at present is rather the material on which the doc.u.ment is written, the paper employed.-Do they still manufacture this sort of rather coa.r.s.e-grained parchment? And then this ivory color.-And those folds-the wear of those folds-and, lastly, look, those marks of red sealing-wax, on the back-"

At that moment Beautrelet, was interrupted by Bredoux, the magistrate's clerk, who opened the door and announced the unexpected arrival of the chief public prosecutor. M. Filleul rose:

"Anything new? Is Monsieur le Procureur General downstairs?"

"No, Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction. Monsieur le Procureur General has not left his carriage. He is only pa.s.sing through Ambrumesy and begs you to be good enough to go down to him at the gate. He only has a word to say to you."

"That's curious," muttered M. Filleul. "However-we shall see. Excuse me, Beautrelet, I shan't be long."

He went away. His footsteps sounded outside. Then the clerk closed the door, turned the key and put it in his pocket.