For the next three evenings La Touche and the porters had a busy time. White-haired carters turned up at the Hôtel d’Arles literally in dozens, till the management threatened an ejectment and talked of a claim for fresh carpets. But all was fruitless. The man they wanted did not appear. On the third day, amongst other letters sent on from the Business Supplies Company, was one which immediately interested La Touche. ‘In reply to your circular letter of the 18th inst.,’ wrote Messrs. Corot, Fils, of the rue de Rivoli, ‘we have a man in our employment who, at the end of March, answered your description. His name is Jean Dubois, of 18b rue de Falaise, near Les Halles. About that time, however, he ceased shaving and has now grown a beard and moustache. We have asked him to call with you.’ Was it, thought La Touche, merely a coincidence that this clean-shaven carter should begin to grow a beard immediately after the delivery of the cask? When two more days passed and the man did not turn up, La Touche determined to call on him. Accordingly the next evening he arranged for Mallet and one of the porters to deal with the men at the Hôtel d’Arles, while he himself in company with the other set out to find Dubois. The rue de Falaise turned out to be a narrow, dirty street of high, sombre buildings, with the word slum writ large across their grimy frontages. At 18b, La Touche ascended and knocked at a ramshackle door on a dark stone landing. It was opened by a slatternly woman, who stood, silently waiting for him to speak, in the gloom of the threshold. La Touche addressed her with his usual suavity. ‘Good-evening, madame. Is this where M. Jean Dubois of Messrs. Corot, Fils lives?’ The woman signified assent, but without inviting her visitor in. ‘I have a little job for him. Could I see him, please?’ ‘He’s not in, monsieur.’ ‘That’s unfortunate for me and for him too, I fancy. Can you tell me where I should find him?’ The woman shrugged her shoulders. ‘I cannot tell, monsieur.’ She spoke in a dull, toneless way, as if the struggle for existence had sapped away all her interest in life. La Touche took out a five-franc piece and pushed it into her hand. ‘You get hold of him for me,’ he said, ‘I want this little job done and he could do it. It’ll get him into no trouble, and I’ll pay him well.’ The woman hesitated. Then, after a few seconds, she said:-- ‘If I tell you where he is, will you give me away?’ ‘No, on my honour. We shall have found him by accident.’ ‘Come this way, then, monsieur.’ She led them down the stairs and out again into the dingy street. Passing along it like a furtive shadow she turned twice, then halted at the corner of a third street. ‘Down there, monsieur,’ she pointed. ‘You see that café with the coloured glass windows? He’ll be in there,’ and without waiting for an acknowledgment she slipped away, vanishing silently into the gloom.