Meanwhile the commissaire, who had opened a drawer, found a will that left everything to me; the doctor, happy to do nothing, stopped putting together the sheets of the manuscript. "I do not dispute them with you. I have signed. I am off." My rights were soon legally confirmed. Meanwhile I thought of the woman who had worn the white dress with yellow embroideries and put her feet in the slippers of blue morocco. I sought her and did not find her. Singular rumours went about, set on foot by the journalists. M. Sandy Rose had been strangled by a woman with whom he had spent the night. She had disappeared at dawn, taking money and jewels. I had no difficulty in exposing the absurdity of this hypothesis, firstly because we had noticed no trace of violence on the body of the defunct, and secondly because many precious stones, as well as a quantity of gold pieces, were found in the same drawer as the will, which was not locked. Little by little there came to be silence concerning the story, and I was alone in sometimes thinking of it. It is certain that Sandy Rose went home on Thursday morning, the 8th of February, about nine o'clock, accompanied by a woman. He took his letters: no letter or paper of earlier date was found in the Sunday packet. It is also certain that he went out with this woman about midday, and that they returned about eight, this time without speaking to the concierge, without answering her question: "Monsieur Sandy Rose, aren't you going to take your letters?" Finally, from that moment on, the concierge saw no one, neither Sandy Rose nor the lady, whose name she did not know, though, she says, she had noticed her light-coloured, almost white, dress; and adds, "I was surprised at it, because of the colour." On Friday morning, she knocked, at the hour at which she was accustomed to come and clean out the rooms. She knocked again in the afternoon, and rang the bell; in vain. It was the same on Saturday and Sunday, and she had therefore concluded that he was away, as was not unlikely, for my friend sometimes went to spend a week at Menton, and never went alone. These little facts, whose accuracy I cannot doubt, do not contradict certain details that have been read in my friend's manuscript, but I am far from offering them as a proof of the veracity of his story. I give on the one hand the manuscript, as the will obliges me, and on the other the result of my inquiry, as friendship demands; that is all. I must note one last detail. No trace of food was found in the flat, except some paper that had been used in wrapping up cakes, or perhaps a pâté, and six empty champagne bottles. But there is nothing to prove that these relics are contemporaneous with the period that interests us. It is, however, probable enough. The telegram mentioned on page 36 has not been printed by the _Northern Atlantic Herald_. It is even doubtful if it was ever sent off. At least, the inquiries I have made have been without result.