e told the truth,
I will endeavour to obtain some slight favour for you--a shorter
sentence, perhaps."

"I have told you the truth, m'sieur. It is surely the duty of every
Frenchman, even though he be a thief like myself, to unmask a spy."

"Most certainly," declared the official. "And I am very glad indeed that
you have told me. I shall make a report to the Prefect of Police this
morning, and tell him the name of my informant. The matter will be
dealt with at once by the political department of the Surete."

"The Baron will not be told who informed against him?" asked Adolphe
anxiously.

"Certainly not. But if Ralph Ansell is arrested, he will be charged with
assisting foreign spies--a charge quite as serious as breaking into the
Baron's house."

"He hated the Baron because the latter had discharged him from his
secret service."

"What were his duties?"

"Ah! that I do not quite know, except that he performed delicate
missions, and sometimes went abroad, to Holland, England, Norway, and
other places."

"Ansell evidently knew the arrangements of the house--eh?"

"He had been to see the Baron in secret many times."

"And been well paid for his work, I suppose?"

"Oh, yes; heavily paid."

"Well," remarked the police official, "you may rest assured that the
Baron will, in future, be well watched. We have no love for foreign
spies in Paris, as you know."

And then the commissary went on to question Carlier closely regarding
his antecedents and his connection with the notorious Bonnemain gang,
which had now been so fortunately broken up.

To all his questions Adolphe replied quite frankly, concealing nothing,
well knowing that his sentence would not be made heavier if he spoke
openly.

"I've heard stories of you for a long time, Carlier," the commissary
said at last. "And I suppose we should not have met now, except for the
blackguardly action of this man who posed as your friend."

"No. I should have escaped, I expect, just as I have done so often that
my friends call me 'The Eel,' on account, I suppose, of my
slipperiness!" And he grimaced.

The official laughed, and, with a word of thanks for the information
concerning the Baron, both captor and prisoner passed back into the
living-room, where the police-agents were concluding their searching
investigations.

Nothing had been found of an incriminating nature, and the commissary
now saw that the man arrested had spoken the truth.

While Ansell's