rolled his eyes tragically, and in a dramatic tone, added:

"Then he bought a dirk knife!"

The judge felt that he was triumphing over M. Lecoq.

"Well," said he to the detective in his most ironical tone, "what
do you think of your friend now? What do you say to this honest
and worthy young man, who, on the very night of the crime, leaves
a wedding where he would have had a good time, to go and buy a
hammer, a chisel, and a dirk--everything, in short, used in the
murder and the mutilation of the body?"

Dr. Gendron seemed a little disconcerted at this, but a sly smile
overspread M. Plantat's face. As for M. Lecoq, he had the air of
one who is shocked by objections which he knows he ought to
annihilate by a word, and yet who is fain to be resigned to waste
time in useless talk, which he might put to great profit.

"I think, Monsieur," said he, very humbly, "that the murderers at
Valfeuillu did not use either a hammer or a chisel, or a file, and
that they brought no instrument at all from outside--since they
used a hammer."

"And didn't they have a dirk besides?" asked the judge in a
bantering tone, confident that he was on the right path.

"That is another question, I confess; but it is a difficult one
to answer."

He began to lose patience. He turned toward the Corbeil policeman,
and abruptly asked him:

"Is this all you know?"

The big man with the thick eyebrows superciliously eyed this little
Parisian who dared to question him thus. He hesitated so long that
M. Lecoq, more rudely than before, repeated his question.

"Yes, that's all," said Goulard at last, "and I think it's
sufficient; the judge thinks so too; and he is the only person who
gives me orders, and whose approbation I wish for."

M. Lecoq shrugged his shoulders, and proceeded:

"Let's see; did you ask what was the shape of the dirk bought by
Guespin? Was it long or short, wide or narrow?"

"Faith, no. What was the use?"

"Simply, my brave fellow, to compare this weapon with the victim's
wounds, and to see whether its handle corresponds to that which left
a distinct and visible imprint between the victim's shoulders."

"I forgot it; but it is easily remedied."

"An oversight may, of course, be pardoned; but you can at least tell
us in what sort of money Guespin paid for his purchases?"

The poor man seemed so embarrassed, humiliated, and vexed, that the
judge hastened to his assistance.

"The money is of little consequence, it s