ell in behind the deputy chief and left the Place du
Palais-Bourbon. The siege was raised.

"And now to work!" said Don Luis. "My hands are free, and we shall make
things hum."

He called the butler.

"Serve lunch; and ask Mlle. Levasseur to come and speak to me
immediately after."

He went to the dining-room and sat down, placing on the table the
photograph which M. Desmalions had left behind; and, bending over it, he
examined it attentively. It was a little faded, a little worn, as
photographs have a tendency to become when they lie about in pocket-books
or among papers; but the picture was quite clear. It was the radiant
picture of a young woman in evening dress, with bare arms and shoulders,
with flowers and leaves in her hair and a smile upon her face.

"Mlle. Levasseur, Mlle. Levasseur," he said. "Is it possible!"

In a corner was a half-obliterated and hardly visible signature. He made
out, "Florence," the girl's name, no doubt. And he repeated:

"Mlle. Levasseur, Florence Levasseur. How did her photograph come to be
in Inspector Verot's pocket-book? And what is the connection between
this adventure and the reader of the Hungarian count from whom I took
over the house?"

He remembered the incident of the iron curtain. He remembered the article
in the _Echo de France_, an article aimed against him, of which he had
found the rough draft in his own courtyard. And, above all, he thought of
the problem of that broken walking-stick conveyed into his study.

And, while his mind was striving to read these events clearly, while he
tried to settle the part played by Mlle. Levasseur, his eyes remained
fixed upon the photograph and he gazed absent-mindedly at the pretty
lines of the mouth, the charming smile, the graceful curve of the neck,
the admirable sweep of the shoulders.

The door opened suddenly and Mlle. Levasseur burst into the room.
Perenna, who had dismissed the butler, was raising to his lips a glass of
water which he had just filled for himself. She sprang forward, seized
his arm, snatched the glass from him and flung it on the carpet, where it
smashed to pieces.

"Have you drunk any of it? Have you drunk any of it?" she gasped, in a
choking voice.

He replied:

"No, not yet. Why?"

She stammered:

"The water in that bottle ... the water in that bottle--"

"Well?"

"It's poisoned!"

He leapt from his chair and, in his turn, gripped her arm fiercely:

"What's that? Poisoned! Are you cer