The Inspector nodded, and beginning at the sending of the clerk Tom Broughton to check the consignment of wine at the Rouen steamer, he related all the strange events that had taken place, the discovery of the cask, and the suspicions aroused, the forged note, the removal of the cask, the getting rid of Harkness, the tracing and second disappearance of the cask, its ultimate recovery, its sinister contents, and finally, a list of the points which might yield clues if followed up. The two men listened intently, but without interrupting. After he had finished they sat silently in thought. ‘In one point I do not quite follow you, Mr. Burnley,’ said the Chief at last. ‘You appear to assume that this murdered woman was a Parisienne. But what are your reasons for that?’ ‘The cask came from Paris. That is certain, as you will see from the steamship’s documents. Then the letter to Felix purports to be from a Parisian, a M. Le Gautier, and both it and the note pinned to the body were typed on French paper. Further, the label on the cask bore the name of a Paris firm.’ ‘It does not seem to me very conclusive. The cask admittedly came from Paris, but might not Paris have been only the last stage of a longer journey? How, for example, do we know that it was not from London, or Brussels, or Berlin, in the first instance, and rebooked at Paris with the object of laying a false scent? With regard to the letter, I understand you did not see the envelope. Therefore it does not seem to be evidence. As for the French paper, Felix had been frequently in France, and he might be responsible for that. The label, again, was a re-addressed old one. Might it not therefore have been taken off some quite different package and put on the cask?’ ‘I admit the evidence is far from conclusive, though it might be said in answer to your first point about the re-addressing of the cask in Paris, that such would involve a confederate here. In any case it seemed to both our Chief and myself that Paris should be our first point of inquiry.’ ‘But yes, monsieur, in that I entirely agree. I only wished to make the point that you have no real evidence that the solution of the problem lies here.’ ‘I’m afraid we have not.’ ‘Well, to proceed. As you have suggested, the first point is to ascertain if any one resembling the dead woman has disappeared recently. Your doctor says that she has been dead for a week or longer, but I do not think that we can confine our inquiries to that period only. She might have been kidnapped and held a prisoner for a considerable time previous to her death. I should say that it is not likely, but it may have happened.’ He lifted his telephone, pressing another button. ‘Bring me the list of disappearances of persons in the Paris area during the last four weeks, or rather’--he stopped and looked at the others--‘the disappearances in all France for the same period.’ In a few seconds a clerk entered with some papers.