This injunction was entirely unnecessary. Never had the young detective’s faculties been more keenly on the alert. It was in an emphatic voice that the sick man then read: “Escorval (Louis-Guillaume, baron d’).--Diplomatist and politician, born at Montaignac, December 3d, 1769; of an old family of lawyers. He was completing his studies in Paris at the outbreak of the Revolution and embraced the popular cause with all the ardor of youth. But, soon disapproving the excesses committed in the name of Liberty, he sided with the Reactionists, advised, perhaps, by Roederer, who was one of his relatives. Commended to the favor of the First Counsel by M. de Talleyrand, he began his diplomatic career with a mission to Switzerland; and during the existence of the First Empire he was entrusted with many important negotiations. Devoted to the Emperor, he found himself gravely compromised at the advent of the Second Restoration. At the time of the celebrated rising at Montaignac, he was arrested on the double charge of high treason and conspiracy. He was tried by a military commission, and condemned to death. The sentence was not executed, however. He owed his life to the noble devotion and heroic energy of a priest, one of his friends, the Abbe Midon, cure of the little village of Sairmeuse. The baron d’Escorval had only one son, who embraced the judicial profession at a very early age.” Lecoq was intensely disappointed. “I understand,” he remarked. “This is the biography of our magistrate’s father. Only I don’t see that it teaches us anything.” An ironical smile curved old Tirauclair’s lips. “It teaches us that M. d’Escorval’s father was condemned to death,” he replied. “That’s something, I assure you. A little patience, and you will soon know everything.” Having found a new leaf, he recommenced to read: “Sairmeuse (Anne-Marie-Victor de Tingry, Duc de).--A French general and politician, born at the chateau de Sairmeuse, near Montaignac, in 1758. The Sairmeuse family is one of the oldest and most illustrious in France. It must not be confounded with the ducal family of Sermeuse, whose name is written with an ‘e.’ Leaving France at the beginning of the Revolution, Anne de Sairmeuse began by serving in the army of Conde. Some years later he offered his sword to Russia; and it is asserted by some of his biographers that he was fighting in the Russian ranks at the time of the disastrous retreat from Moscow. Returning to France with the Bourbons, he became notorious by the intensity of his ultra-royalist opinions. It is certain that he had the good fortune to regain possession of his immense family estates; and the rank and dignities which he had gained in foreign lands were confirmed. Appointed by the king to preside at the military commission charged with arresting and trying the conspirators of Montaignac his zeal and severity resulted in the capture and conviction of all the parties implicated.”