“Jean Daval woke me up. I had been sleeping badly, for that matter, with gleams of consciousness in which I seemed to hear noises, when, suddenly opening my eyes, I saw Daval standing at the foot of my bed, with his candle in his hand and fully dressed—as he is now, for he often worked late into the night. He seemed greatly excited and said, in a low voice: ‘There’s some one in the drawing room.’ I heard a noise myself. I got up and softly pushed the door leading to this boudoir. At the same moment, the door over there, which opens into the big drawing room, was thrown back and a man appeared who leaped at me and stunned me with a blow on the temple. I am telling you this without any details, Monsieur le Juge d’Instruction, for the simple reason that I remember only the principal facts, and that these facts followed upon one another with extraordinary swiftness.” “And after that?—” “After that, I don’t know—I fainted. When I came to, Daval lay stretched by my side, mortally wounded.” “At first sight, do you suspect no one?” “No one.” “You have no enemy?” “I know of none.” “Nor M. Daval either?” “Daval! An enemy? He was the best creature that ever lived. M. Daval was my secretary for twenty years and, I may say, my confidant; and I have never seen him surrounded with anything but love and friendship.” “Still, there has been a burglary and there has been a murder: there must be a motive for all that.” “The motive? Why, it was robbery pure and simple.” “Robbery? Have you been robbed of something, then?” “No, nothing.” “In that case—?” “In that case, if they have stolen nothing and if nothing is missing, they at least took something away.” “What?” “I don’t know. But my daughter and my niece will tell you, with absolute certainty, that they saw two men in succession cross the park and that those two men were carrying fairly heavy loads.” “The young ladies—” “The young ladies may have been dreaming, you think? I should be tempted to believe it, for I have been exhausting myself in inquiries and suppositions ever since this morning. However, it is easy enough to question them.” The two cousins were sent for to the big drawing room. Suzanne, still quite pale and trembling, could hardly speak. Raymonde, who was more energetic, more of a man, better looking, too, with the golden glint in her brown eyes, described the events of the night and the part which she had played in them. “So I may take it, mademoiselle, that your evidence is positive?” “Absolutely. The men who went across the park were carrying things away with them.” “And the third man?” “He went from here empty-handed.” “Could you describe him to us?” “He kept on dazzling us with the light of his lantern. All that I could say is that he is tall and heavily built.” “Is that how he appeared to you, mademoiselle?” asked the magistrate, turning to Suzanne de Gesvres. “Yes—or, rather, no,” said Suzanne, reflecting. “I thought he was about the middle height and slender.”