“You saw it, too,” I pointed out, “as soon as I mentioned it.”

“Yes; but you mentioned it in a way which made its importance manifest.  I couldn’t help seeing it.  And I believe that we have both arrived at practically the same conclusions.  Here they are,” and he checked them off on his fingers.  “The cabinet contains a secret drawer.  This is inevitable, if it really belonged to Madame de Montespan.  Any cabinet made for her would be certain to have a secret drawer—­she would require it, just as she would require lace on her underwear or jewelled buttons on her gloves.  That drawer, since it was, perhaps, to contain such priceless documents as the love letters of a king—­even more so, if the love letters were from another man! —­must be adequately guarded, and therefore a mechanism was devised to stab the person attempting to open it and to inject into the wound a poison so powerful as to cause instant death.  Am I right so far?”

“Wonderfully right,” I nodded.  “I had not put it so clearly, even to myself.  Go ahead.”

“We come to the conclusion, then,” continued Godfrey, “that the business of this unknown Frenchman with Vantine in some way concerned this cabinet.”

“Vantine himself thought so,” I broke in.  “He told me afterwards that it was because he thought so he consented to see him.”

“Good!  That would seem to indicate that we are on the right track.  The Frenchman’s business, then, had something to do with this cabinet, and with this secret drawer.  Left to himself, he discovered the cabinet in the room adjoining the ante-room, attempted to open the drawer, and was killed.”

“Yes,” I agreed; “and now how about Vantine?”

“Vantine’s death isn’t so simply explained.  Presumably the unknown woman also called on business relating to the cabinet.  She, also, wanted to open the secret drawer, in order to secure its contents —­that seems fairly certain from her connection with the first caller.”

“You still think it was her photograph he carried in his watch?”

“I am sure of it.  But how did it happen that it was Vantine who was killed?  Did the woman, warned by the fate of the man, deliberately set Vantine to open the drawer in order that she might run no risk?  Or was she also ignorant of the mechanism?  Above all, did she succeed in getting away with the contents of the drawer?”

“What was the contents of the drawer?” I demanded.

“Ah, if we only knew!”

“Perhaps the woman had nothing to do with it.  Vantine himself told me that he was going to make a careful examination of the cabinet.  No doubt that is exactly what he was doing when the woman’s arrival interrupted him.  He might have let her out of the house himself, and then, returning to the cabinet, stumbled upon the secret drawer after she had gone.”

“Yes; that is quite possible, too.  At any rate, you agree with me that both men were killed in some such way as I have described?”