"I do not know if it is for that," interrupted the Commissioner; "but it is evident that a recent note in the _Officiel_ points directly to the illegal wearing of foreign decorations. You do not read the _Officiel_, Monsieur de Lissac." Guy shrugged his shoulders as if he considered the matter perfectly ridiculous. It seemed to him that behind the alleged pretext there was some secret cause, something like a feminine intrigue. He vaguely recalled that he had seen Marianne one evening at Madame de Marsy's smile at the Prefect of Police, that Jouvenet who flirted so agreeably with that pretty girl in a corner of the salon. And then, too, at the theatre, in Marianne's box, the prefect found his way. At the first moment, the idea that Marianne had a hand in this arrest took possession of his mind. He saw her standing before him at his house, posing her little nervous, fidgety hand on his breast at the very spot occupied by this rosette; again he saw her smiling mysteriously, accompanying it with a caress which seemed to suggest the desire to end in a scratch. Was it really true that Marianne was sufficiently audacious to have brought about this coup de theatre? No, there was some error. The stupid zeal of some subordinate officer was manifested in this outrage. Some cowardly charge had perhaps been made against him at the prefecture. Every man who crosses a street has so many enemies that look at him as he passes as if they would spy on him! There are so many undeclared hatreds crawling in the rotten depths of this Parisian bog! One fine morning one feels one's self stung in the heel. It is nothing: only some anonymous gossip; some unknown person taking revenge! At the prefecture, they would doubtless inform Guy as to the cause of the attack: in questioning him, he would himself certainly be permitted to interrogate. He was stunned on arriving at the clerk's office to find that they took his description, just as they would that of a common offender, a night-walker or a rascal. He wished to enter a protest and became annoyed. He flew into a rage for a moment, then he reflected that there was nothing to be done but to submit to the bites of the iron teeth of the police routine in which he was suddenly entangled. They searched his pockets and he felt their vile hands graze his skin. He experienced a strongly rebellious sentiment and notwithstanding his present enforced calm, from time to time he demanded to see the Prefect of Police, the Chief of the Municipal Police, the _Juge d'Instruction_, he did not know whom, but at least some one who was responsible. "You have my card, send my card to Monsieur Jouvenet; he knows me!" They made no reply. The Commissioner who had arrested him was not there. Guy found himself in the presence of what were as pieces of human machinery, working silently, without noise of wheels, and caring for his protests no more than they did for the wind that blew through the corridors.