"I'm going up, show me the way," said Lupin, with his foot on the stairs. "It's the third floor, isn't it, on the left?" "But I mustn't!" moaned the portress, running after him. "Besides, I haven't the key ... the doctor...." They climbed the three flights, one behind the other. On the landing, Lupin took a tool from his pocket and, disregarding the woman's protests, inserted it in the lock. The door yielded almost immediately. We went in. At the back of a small dark room we saw a streak of light filtering through a door that had been left ajar. Lupin ran across the room and, on reaching the threshold, gave a cry: "Too late! Oh, hang it all!" The portress fell on her knees, as though fainting. I entered the bedroom, in my turn, and saw a man lying half-dressed on the carpet, with his legs drawn up under him, his arms contorted and his face quite white, an emaciated, fleshless face, with the eyes still staring in terror and the mouth twisted into a hideous grin. "He's dead," said Lupin, after a rapid examination. "But why?" I exclaimed. "There's not a trace of blood!" "Yes, yes, there is," replied Lupin, pointing to two or three drops that showed on the chest, through the open shirt. "Look, they must have taken him by the throat with one hand and pricked him to the heart with the other. I say, 'pricked,' because really the wound can't be seen. It suggests a hole made by a very long needle." [Illustration: "_Lupin took a tool from his pocket ... and inserted it in the lock_"] He looked on the floor, all round the corpse. There was nothing to attract his attention, except a little pocket-mirror, the little mirror with which M. Lavernoux had amused himself by making the sunbeams dance through space. But, suddenly, as the portress was breaking into lamentations and calling for help, Lupin flung himself on her and shook her: "Stop that!... Listen to me ... you can call out later.... Listen to me and answer me. It is most important. M. Lavernoux had a friend living in this street, had he not? On the same side, to the right? An intimate friend?" "Yes." "A friend whom he used to meet at the cafe in the evening and with whom he exchanged the illustrated papers?" "Yes." "Was the friend an Englishman?" "Yes." "What's his name?" "Mr. Hargrove." "Where does he live?" "At No. 92 in this street." "One word more: had that old doctor been attending him long?" "No. I did not know him. He came on the evening when M. Lavernoux was taken ill." Without another word, Lupin dragged me away once more, ran down the stairs and, once in the street, turned to the right, which took us past my flat again. Four doors further, he stopped at No. 92, a small, low-storied house, of which the ground-floor was occupied by the proprietor of a dram-shop, who stood smoking in his doorway, next to the entrance-passage. Lupin asked if Mr. Hargrove was at home.