r whether he is alive or dead."

"A pretty riddle to guess," remarked Tantaine.

"An enigma that it is impossible to solve," returned Perpignan. "How is
one to get hold of a boy who vanished ten years ago, and who must now be
a grown-up man?"

"We could do it."

Tantaine's tone was so decided, that the other man looked sharply at
him with a vague suspicion rising in his breast that the affair had also
been placed in Mascarin's hands; and if so, whether he had worked it
with more success than himself.

"You might, for all I know; but I felt that the clue was absolutely
wanting," answered Perpignan sulkily. "I put on a bold face, however,
and asked for the boy's description. The man told me that he could
provide me with an accurate one, for that many people, notably the lady
superior, remembered the lad. He could also give other details which
might be useful."

"And these you obtained, of course?"

"Not yet."

"Are you joking?"

"Not a bit. I do not know whether the old man was sharp enough to read
in the expression of my features that I had not the smallest hope of
success; be that as it may, he could give me no further information that
day, declaring that he came in only to consult me, and that everything
must be done in a most confidential way. I hastened to assure him that
my office was a perfect tomb of secrets. He told me that he took that
for granted. Then telling me that he wished me to draw up a _precis_ of
my intended course, he took out a note for five hundred francs, which
he handed to me for my time. I refused to take it, though it cost me
a struggle to do so, for I thought that I should make more out of him
later on. But he insisted on my taking it, saying that he would see me
again soon, and that Catenac would communicate with me. He left me less
interested in the search than in who this old man could possibly be."

Tantaine felt that Perpignan was telling the truth.

"Did you not try and find out that?" asked he.

Perpignan hesitated; but feeling convinced that there was no loophole
for escape, he answered, "Hardly had my visitor left than, slipping on
a cap and a workman's blouse, I followed him in his track, and saw him
enter one of the finest houses in the Rue de Varennes."

"He lived there then?"

"He did, and he was a very well-known man--the Duke de Champdoce."

"Yes, I know all that," answered Tantaine, placidly, "but I can't, for
the life of me, imagine the connection between the