Left alone—he kept neither housekeeper nor office-boy—the old fellow stretched himself in one of the old leather-covered armchairs in the dining room. Through the open window came a breath of cool air. M. Moche sat in his shirt sleeves, enjoying the evening freshness, and presently took advantage of his momentary leisure to inhale a huge pinch of snuff. Not a sound came from without—vehicles are few and far between in the Rue Saint-Fargeau—and only faint and far away in the distance could be caught the occasional tinkle of the bells of the electric trams that, in this remote quarter of Paris, link up the outer suburbs with the central districts of the capital. Suddenly, M. Moche started violently; from the floor above a dull, heavy thud reached his ear. He found no difficulty in identifying the sound—it was that of some heavy object falling on the floor above his head. The old man scratched his chin and muttered half aloud: “It’s a piece of furniture overset ... or a body!” For a minute or two he stood hesitating, but M. Moche was a man of a curious and inquiring turn of mind. Abandoning the siesta he was proposing to enjoy, he crept cautiously from the salon, and crossed the outer room of the flat, which opened directly on the landing; then, stepping noiselessly in his felt slippers, he climbed the stairs leading to the upper floor without a sound. On the fifth floor of No. 125 Rue Saint-Fargeau, there had been residing for some weeks, in a pretty enough, albeit cheap, set of rooms, two individuals who appeared at first blush to be just an amiable pair of turtle-doves. They were quite young; the united ages of the two would barely have equalled that of M. Moche! The man looked twenty-three at most; his companion, a dainty, slim little person, a brunette with great dark eyes, had seen some sixteen summers at the outside. They were lover and mistress, their names, his Paulet, hers Nini. The pair had set up house together in the Rue Saint-Fargeau after their union one Easter eve in the tenderest, but unconsecrated bonds of love. The two had known each other from childhood. Paulet was the son of a worthy woman who kept the porter’s lodge at a big house in the Rue de la Goutte-d’Or. Nini lived in the same house, whither she had come as quite a child with her mother, a respectable working woman, Mme. Guinon by name, widow of an employé on the railway.