e bedroom was a small one. The air was admitted by a special system of
ventilation, for the dormer window was hermetically closed by a wooden
shutter tightly nailed down.

"I took the precaution last year," Hippolyte Fauville explained. "I used
to make my electrical experiments in this room and was afraid of being
spied upon, so I closed the aperture opening on the roof."

And he added in a low voice:

"They have been prowling around me for a long time."

The two men went downstairs again.

Fauville looked at his watch.

"A quarter past ten: bedtime, I am exceedingly tired, and you will
excuse me--"

It was arranged that Perenna and Mazeroux should make themselves
comfortable in a couple of easy chairs which they carried into the
passage between the study and the entrance hall. But, before bidding them
good-night, Hippolyte Fauville, who, although greatly excited, had
appeared until then to retain his self-control, was seized with a sudden
attack of weakness. He uttered a faint cry. Don Luis turned round and saw
the sweat pouring like gleaming water down his face and neck, while he
shook with fever and anguish.

"What's the matter?" asked Perenna.

"I'm frightened! I'm frightened!" he said.

"This is madness!" cried Don Luis. "Aren't we here, the two of us? We can
easily spend the night with you, if you prefer, by your bedside."

Fauville replied by shaking Perenna violently by the shoulder, and, with
distorted features, stammering:

"If there were ten of you--if there were twenty of you with me, you need
not think that it would spoil their schemes! They can do anything they
please, do you hear, anything! They have already killed Inspector
Verot--they will kill me--and they will kill my son. Oh, the blackguards!
My God, take pity on me! The awful terror of it! The pain I suffer!"

He had fallen on his knees and was striking his breast and repeating:

"O God, have pity on me! I can't die! I can't let my son die! Have pity
on me, I beseech Thee!"

He sprang to his feet and led Perenna to a glass-fronted case, which
he rolled back on its brass castors, revealing a small safe built
into the wall.

"You will find my whole story here, written up day by day for the past
three years. If anything should happen to me, revenge will be easy."

He hurriedly turned the letters of the padlock and, with a key which he
took from his pocket, opened the safe.

It was three fourths empty; but on one of the shelves, be