"NOW," M. SAMUEL said, in the assured voice of one who dealt with trivial matters, and has no doubt that his request will be granted as casually as it is made, "perhaps you'll tell me what happened."

"You mean when I called here yesterday afternoon? I just ran up to say good-bye to Miss Thurlow - she's my cousin, you know - and found nobody here, so I didn't stay. I'd only got about three minutes, in any case, before I had to leave for the train."

"Nobody?"

"Mr. Thurlow may have been in his own room. I didn't try to disturb him there."

"And Miss Thurlow may have been in hers?"

"No. I knocked on her door. I'm sure she'd have answered if she d been there."

"But Mr. Thurlow would doubtless have heard you knock?"

"I don't know. Mr. Thurlow could tell you that best himself."

"So he could. But will he?"

"I've no doubt he would. But I can't see that it matters. It would only show I was here, and I've told you that."

"I must judge of that. . . . We must reconstruct. . . . You saw no one, alive or dead?"

"No. I certainly didn't. A dead body in the middle of a room isn't the sort of thing you overlook or forget."

"But no! We will agree there. And after you left no one came in or out till Miss Thurlow returned a few minutes later, and the dead body was here?"

"How on earth can I say that? I don't know what happened

"Miss Thurlow came in. We know when you left. You were seen."

"Naturally. I did it openly enough. Probably I was also seen to come up, in which case it will be known that it was a mere moment that I was here."

"It appears that no one saw you come up."

"Or M. Reynard?"

"No. Did you come up together?"

"I have answered that already."

"Did you hear anything while you were here? Any sound of voices or other noise? Anything, perhaps, from Mr. Thurlow's room?

"No. Nothing at all."

M. Samuel changed the subject abruptly:

"Mr. Kindell, what business had you in Paris?"

"Nothing very definite."

"And the indefinite business was?"

"Nothing to do with murdering M. Reynard, or anyone else."

"Will you answer my question, and leave me to judge of that?"

"I'm afraid I can't add to the answer I have already given."

"Which was no answer at all. . . . Mr. Kindell, do you realize that your attitude must lead, if you are so foolish as to continue it, to your arrest?"

"I don't see what more you can expect me to say. I have told you all I know of the matter, which is practically nothing."

"Pardon me that I cannot agree. You admitted in my hearing that M. Reynard was known to you."

"He must have been known to very many. There is no crime in that."

"But there is a deduction that his call at this hotel was not disconnected with that acquaintance. He knew many who wished that he did not know them. If he called here to detain a gentleman whom he knew to be on the point of leaving Paris - - "

"Then why should he have gone to the floor above?"

"He may have been unsure of your room."

"He could have enquired at the desk. . . . Perhaps he did and that would show you that he was not looking for me."

"Of course, we have not overlooked that. He made no such enquiry But there is a most likely presumption that he saw you on your way to the floor above, and followed you to this apartment."

"And when he got here, I was ready to crawl up behind him and cut his throat with a knife which I keep ready for such occasions? I should call it a grotesque improbability. And all done without a sound that Mr. Thurlow could hear!"

"But it was done without any such sound, if Mr. Thurlow is to be believed."

"Then you can conclude that Reynard came here with a definite purpose, and that the man who killed him followed him not the other way round - with the equally definite purpose of murder, to prevent whatever he was going to do. Find out why Reynard came to this room, and I should say the murderer would be in the bag."

M. Samuel received this advice in a momentary silence, stroking his chin. It was a version of what had occurred which had been present to his own mind, and he saw its probabilities; but he saw also that there were many other possibilities of almost equal plausibility. It was an explanation that might be mere theory, or more probably come from a mind which knew supporting facts which it would not disclose. He was far from sure that he was questioning a guilty man, but he was sure that he could tell him more than he did, and he was resolved both to get at the concealed fac............