ronstadt.
They stepped well within the shadow, as though not wishing to be seen,
and stood gazing out on the harbour. Directly before them, at a distance
of not more than three hundred yards, _La Liberte_ was moored. It was at
her they stared, with eyes expectant and uneasy. At dawn, _La Liberte_
blew up, and one of these men cried out some words of German."

"What were they?"

"Unfortunately the person who overheard them does not know German. He
understood only the first two words, 'Ach Gott!'"

"And the men?" cried Delcasse. "What became of them?"

"They strode rapidly away along the quay, and were lost to sight."

Delcasse dropped into his chair, his face dark with passion.

"What do you infer from this circumstance?" he demanded.

"There is only one possible inference," answered Crochard. "At five
minutes before dawn this morning, there were, in this city of Toulon,
two Germans who knew that _La Liberte_ was to be destroyed."

A moment's silence followed. Those words, terrible as they were,
astounding as they were, carried conviction with them.

"Tell me," said Delcasse, at last, "how you discovered all this."

"I have been spending the month at Nice," Crochard explained. "I learned
of the disaster as soon as I was up this morning, and I came at once to
Toulon. Monsieur will understand that, in the many years during which I
have been at variance with society, I have made many friends and gained
a certain power in quarters of which Monsieur knows little. One of
these friends is the proprietor of the cafe which occupies the ground
floor of the house on the Quai de Cronstadt. I stopped to see him,
because his house is close to the scene of the disaster--so close,
indeed, that all of its windows were shattered. It was he who gave me
the first clue."

"Go on," said Delcasse, who had been listening intently. "I need not say
how deeply all this interests me."

"My friend had arranged to go to Marseilles this morning," Crochard
continued, "to make a purchase of wine. The train, he tells me, leaves
at six o'clock. It was about fifteen minutes before that hour when, as
he started to open his door, two men stepped into the little vestibule,
as though to screen themselves from observation. He peered through the
curtain, thinking they might be friends, and found that he did not know
them. Gazing from the darkness of the interior, he could see them very
well. They were staring at _La Liberte_, as I have said, their f