ns, they said, on a walking tour. Their names? Brisson did not
remember; but they would be found on the police registration slip which
he had caused them to fill out at once and had sent to the Prefecture
that very evening. He had noticed on the slip that they had come from
Marseilles and were on their way to Nice. Their bags had already arrived
from Marseilles, and, at their direction, he had had them brought up
from the station.

"Where are the bags now?" asked Lepine.

"They directed that they be sent to Nice," explained Brisson. "I
despatched them yesterday morning, as I agreed."

"You have the receipt?"

"But certainly, sir," and Brisson, while his wife held the light,
rummaged in his desk and finally produced the paper in question.

Lepine placed it in his purse beside the hundred-franc note.

"Proceed," he said. "In what way did these strangers occupy themselves
during their stay?"

They were absent from morning till night, it appeared, walking about the
streets, about the docks, visiting the ships in the harbour, climbing
the hills back of the town, and even going as far as Cape Cepet, where
the great fort is--penetrating, in a word, to every nook and corner
which it is possible for visitors to enter. In fact, in the two days of
their stay, they had seen more of Toulon than had Brisson in the twenty
years of his residence.

The details of these expeditions Brisson had learned with the greatest
difficulty, for his guests had talked but little, had kept to
themselves, had discouraged his advances, resented his questions, and
often pretended that they did not understand--all of which was in itself
suspicious. When talking together, they used a language which Brisson
supposed to be English; but he was not familiar with English; knew only
a few words of it, indeed--"money," "damn,"--such words as every one
knows. Their French, also, was very bad,--much worse at some times than
at others....

Lepine finally stopped this flow of language, when it became apparent
that nothing but chaff remained.

"Do any further questions suggest themselves?" he asked, looking first
at Crochard and then at Pigot. "No? You understand, my friends," he
added, turning back to the innkeeper and his wife, "that of all this you
will say nothing--not even to each other. An incautious word, and you
may find yourselves in a most difficult position. On the other hand, if
you are careful, if you are reticent, you will not be forgotten."