While sitting on a bench in one of the long, cold corridors, the porter and his wife saw pass before them prisoners led by their jailers; some looked menacing, while others had a cringing air and seemed to try to escape notice. These two persons felt that they were playing rôles as important as those in a melodrama at the Ambigu. The time seemed long to them, and M. Ginory did not call them as soon as they wished that he would. They thought of their home, which, while they were detained there, would be invaded by the curious, the gossips and reporters. "How slow these Judges are," growled Moniche. When he was conducted into the presence of M. Ginory and his registrar, and seated upon a chair, he was much confused and less bitter. He felt a vague terror of all the paraphernalia of justice which surrounded him. He felt that he was running some great danger, and to the Judge's questions he replied with extreme prudence. Thanks to him and his wife M. Ginory found out a great deal about M. Rovère's private life; he penetrated into that apparently hidden existence, he searched to see if he could discover, among the people who had visited the old ex-Consul the one among all others who might have committed the deed. "You never saw the woman who visited Rovère?" "Yes. The veiled lady. The Woman in Black. But I do not know her. No one knew her." The story told by the portress about the time when she surprised the stranger and Rovère with the papers in his hand in front of the open safe made quite an impression on the Examining Magistrate. "Do you know the name of the visitor?" "No, Monsieur," the portress replied. "But if you should see him again would you recognize him?" "Certainly! I see his face there, before me!" She made haste to return to her home so that she might relate her impressions to her fellow gossips. The worthy couple left the court puffed up with self-esteem because of the rôle which they had been called upon to play. The obsequies were to be held the next day, and the prospect of a dramatic day in which M. and Mme. Moniche would still play this important rôle, created in them an agony which was almost joyous. The crowd around the house of the crime was always large. Some few passers-by stopped--stopped before the stone façade behind which a murder had been committed. The reporters returned again and again for news, and the couple, greedy for glory, could not open a paper without seeing their names printed in large letters. One journal had that morning even published an especial article: "Interviews with M. and Mme. Moniche."