“What more natural, indeed!” breathed my companion, and I fancied that he looked at me with a new interest in his eyes.  “It is good reasoning, Mr. Lester.”

“It seemed to explain a situation for which no other explanation has been found,” I said.  “And it had also the merit of picturesqueness.”

“It is unique,” he agreed eagerly, his eyes burning like two coals of fire, so intense was his interest.  “I have been from boyhood,” he added, noticing my glance, “a lover of tales of mystery.  They have for me a fascination I cannot explain; there is in my blood something that responds to them.  I feel sometimes that I would have made a great detective—­or a great criminal.  Instead of which, I am merely a dealer in curios.  You can understand how I am fascinated by a story so outre as this.”

“Perhaps you can assist us,” I suggested, “for that theory of mine has been completely disproved.”

“Disproved?  In what way?” he demanded.

“The secret drawer has been found....”

“Comment?” he cried, his voice sharp with surprise.  “Found?  The secret drawer has been found?”

“Yes, and there was no poisoned mechanism guarding it.”

He breathed deeply for an instant; then he pulled himself together with a little laugh.

“Really,” he said, “I must not indulge myself in this way.  It is a kind of intoxication.  But you say that the drawer was found and that there was no poison?  Was the drawer empty?”

“No, there was a packet of letters in it.”

“Delicious!  Love letters, of a certainty! Billets-doux from the great Louis to the Montespan, perhaps?”

“No, unfortunately they were of a much more recent date.  They have been restored to their owner.  I hope that you agree with me that that was the right thing to do?”

He sat for a moment regarding me narrowly, and I had an uneasy feeling that, since he undoubtedly knew of whom the cabinet had been purchased, he was reconstructing the story more completely than I would have wished him to do.

“Since the letters have been returned,” he said, at last, a little drily, “it is useless to discuss the matter.  But no doubt I should approve if all the circumstances were known to me.  Especially if it was to assist a lady.”

“It was,” I said, and I saw from his face that he understood.

“Then you did well,” he said.  “Has no other explanation been found for the death of Mr. Vantine and of this stranger?”

“I think not.  The coroner will hold his inquest to-morrow.  He has deferred it in the hope that some new evidence would be discovered.”

“And none has been discovered?”

“I have heard of none.”

“You do not even know who this stranger was?”

“Oh, yes, we have discovered that.  He was a worthless fellow named Drouet.”

“A Frenchman?”

“Yes, living in an attic in the Rue de la Huchette, at Paris.”