a most unfortunate day--six
hours on a stand on the Boulevards, with the rain pouring all the time.
It was simply awful. At midnight I had not made more than a franc and a
half for myself, but I was so wet and miserable and the horse seemed so
done up that I decided to go home. I did grumble, I can tell you.
Well, I had just passed the corner of the Rue Picard, in the Rue du
Chevaleret, when I saw two women standing under a lamp, some little
distance off. I did not pay any attention to them; for when a man is as
old as I am, women--"

"Go on!" said Lecoq, who could not restrain his impatience.

"I had already passed them, when they began to call after me. I
pretended I did not hear them; but one of them ran after the cab,
crying: 'A louis! a louis for yourself!' I hesitated for a moment, when
the woman added: 'And ten francs for the fare!' I then drew up."

Lecoq was boiling over with impatience; but he felt that the wisest
course was not to interrupt the driver with questions, but to listen to
all he had to say.

"As you may suppose," continued the coachman, "I wasn't inclined to
trust two such suspicious characters, alone at that hour and in that
part of the city. So, just as they were about to get into the cab, I
called to them: 'Wait a bit, my little friends, you have promised papa
some sous; where are they?' The one who had called after the cab at once
handed me thirty francs, saying: 'Above all, make haste!'"

"Your recital could not be more minute," exclaimed Lecoq, approvingly.
"Now, how about these two women?"

"What do you mean?"

"I mean what kind of women did they seem to be; what did you take them
for?"

"Oh, for nothing very good!" replied the driver, with a knowing smile.

"Ah! and how were they dressed?"

"Like most of the girls who go to dance at the Rainbow. One of them,
however, was very neat and prim, while the other--well! she was a
terrible dowdy."

"Which ran after you?"

"The girl who was neatly dressed, the one who--" The driver suddenly
paused: some vivid remembrance passed through his brain, and, abruptly
jerking the rains, he brought his horse to a standstill.

"Thunder!" he exclaimed. "Now I think of it, I did notice something
strange. One of the two women called the other 'Madame' as large as
life, while the other said 'thee' and 'thou,' and spoke as if she were
somebody."

"Oh! oh! oh!" exclaimed the young detective, in three different keys.
"And which was it that said '