onette--he could, perhaps, suggest something;
and, musing on the strangeness of the adventure, he walked slowly toward
the house of the old man to hold a council with him on the situation.

On the road, his attention was attracted by a disturbance in the street,
and mingling with the crowd, in hope of seizing some of his enemies
exercising their illegal functions on whom the whole weight of his
official vengeance might fall, he for the time forgot his adventure. The
crowd had been drawn together by a difference of opinion between two
gentlemen of the vehicular profession, respecting some right of way, and,
after all the usual expressions of esteem common on such occasions had
been exhausted, one of them drove off, leaving the other at least master
of the field, if he had not got the expected job.

The crowd began to disperse, and with them also was going our friend, the
detective, when, on turning round, he came in contact with Mlle. Monette,
leaning on the arm of her mysterious lover. The light from a lamp above
his head shone immediately on the face of Emma and her admirer, showing
them both as clear as noonday, so that when his glance turned from the
lady to the gentleman, and he obtained a full view of his face, he
expressed his joy at the discovery by a loud "Whew!" which, though a short
sound and soon pronounced, meant a great deal.

For first, it meant that he had made a great discovery; secondly, that he
was not now astonished because he had not succeeded before in his
watchfulness; thirdly--but perhaps the two mentioned may be sufficient;
for, turning sharply round, he made the greatest haste to reach Monette
and inform him, this time, of the result of his espionage.

After a long prelude, stating how fortunate Monette was to have such a
friend as himself, a man who knew everybody and everything, he proceeded
to inform him of the pleasing intelligence that his daughter was in the
habit of meeting, and going to some place (he forgot to say where) with
the most desperate and abandoned character in Paris--one who was so
extremely dexterous in all his schemes that the police, though perfectly
aware of his intentions, had not been able to fix upon him the commission
of any one of his criminal acts, for he changed his appearance so often as
to set at naught all the assiduous exertions of the Corps des Espions.

The unhappy father received from his friend at parting the assurance that
they would catch him yet, and