d reproached Bertomy with
neglecting her.

"It's too bad for you to reproach me," cried the cashier, "for it is
your name which at this very moment guards the safe of M. Fauvel."

Lagors, therefore, had known the password. What did this new discovery
imply? How did it fit in with the rest of the data which Lecoq had so
brilliantly collected?

After his custom, he marshalled once more in his mind all the facts at
his disposal, but they were like so many loose links in a chain. They
required the connecting link to make the chain complete. To find that
link Lecoq spent a month in visiting the old home of the De Clamerans,
the estate formerly occupied by Gaston de Clameron, who had died a few
days before the robbery, and also in a trip to England. When he returned
to Paris, _dossier_ No. 113 was complete.

_III.--The Dossier_

In her extreme youth, Madame Fauvel had been secretly loved by Gaston de
Clameron. It was a result of certain contemptuous words spoken of the
girl he loved that Gaston had committed those deeds which had compelled
him to fly the country. Shortly after his flight, the girl, finding that
she was about to give birth to a child, imparted the secret to her
mother. Fearing a scandal, the mother, accompanied by a faithful nurse,
took her daughter over to England. There, near London, a child was born,
who was immediately handed over to some simple country people to adopt.
The unhappy girl returned to France, and shortly after married M.
Fauvel, the banker.

Years after, the Count Louis de Clameron, who had inherited and ruined
the estates of which his brother Gaston had been deprived, discovered
this secret from the nurse, and finding on inquiries in London that the
child had died, persuaded a young ne'er-do-well Englishman to play the
_role_ of his brother's son. He secretly introduced him to Madame
Fauvel, and through this means obtained what money he required from the
unhappy woman, who feared the discovery of her past secret by her
husband. The situation was complicated by the count falling in love with
Madeline and the sudden appearance of Gaston de Clameron, who was
thought to be dead.

The count poisoned his brother, and then, finding that Madeline refused
to give up Bertomy, determined to accomplish the cashier's ruin, and at
the same time obtain an amount of money large enough to buy off his
fellow-conspirator Lagors. Lagors, having learnt by chance the password
that guarded the safe, w