‘I did,’ he answered, ‘there was “Return to” in French, English, and German, and the name of a Paris firm.’ ‘Do you recollect the name?’ The young man paused in thought. ‘No, monsieur,’ he replied, after a few seconds, ‘I regret to say I have quite forgotten it.’ ‘I suppose you wouldn’t recognise it if you heard it? It was not, for example, Messrs. Dupierre, the monumental sculptors, of Grenelle?’ The clerk hesitated again. ‘Possibly it was, monsieur, but I fear I could not say definitely.’ ‘Well, I am greatly obliged for what you have told me, any way. Just one other question. What was in the cask?’ ‘It was invoiced _Statuary_, but of course I did not see it opened, and don’t know if the description was correct.’ Burnley thanked the young man and turned out of the great station. Certainly it sounded as if this was a similar cask to that he had taken to Scotland Yard, if it was not the same one. Of course, he had to remember that even if it were one of Messrs. Dupierre’s, which was not proven, there were a large number of these casks in circulation, and it did not follow that this one was connected with his quest. But the whole circumstances gave him to think, and he felt that his bewilderment was not lessened by the new development. As he walked slowly down the rue de Lafayette towards his hotel, he racked his brains in the endeavour to piece together into a connected whole the various facts he had learnt. He strolled on into the Tuileries and, choosing a quiet spot under a tree, sat down to think the matter out. And first, as to these mysterious journeyings of casks. He went over the three in his mind. First, there was the cask sent out by Messrs. Dupierre on the Tuesday evening after the dinner-party, which travelled via Havre and Southampton, and which was received at Waterloo on the following morning by a black-bearded man, believed to have been Felix. That cask was addressed to Felix and it contained a statue. Then there was the second cask, sent out from Paris two days later--on the Thursday evening--which went via Rouen and long sea, and which was undoubtedly received at St. Katherine’s Docks by Felix. This number two cask contained the body of Madame Annette Boirac. And finally, there was what he might call number three cask, which was sent from London to Paris on that same Thursday, and which was claimed on arrival at the Gare du Nord by a M. Jaques de Belleville. This cask, like both the others, was labelled ‘Statuary,’ but whether that was really its contents was not known.