“He wouldn’t know my name.  Please say it’s the girl who sells candles in Notre-Dame.”

“Huh!  I’ll tell him.  Wait here,” and with scant courtesy the old servant left Alice standing in the blue-tiled hallway, near a long diamond-paned window.  A moment later Melanie reappeared with mollified countenance.  “M.  Paul says will you please take a seat in here.”  She opened the study door and pointed to one of the big red-leather chairs.  “He’ll be down in a moment.”

Left alone, Alice glanced in surprise about this strange room.  She saw a photograph of Caesar and his master on the wall and went nearer to look at it.  Then she noticed the collection of plaster hands and was just bending over it when Coquenil entered, wearing a loosely cut house garment of pale yellow with dark-green braid around the jacket and down the legs of the trousers.  He looked pale, almost haggard, but his face lighted in welcome as he came forward.

[Illustration:  “She was just bending over it when Coquenil entered.”]

“Glad to see you,” he said.

She had not heard his step and turned with a start of surprise.

“I—­I beg your pardon,” she murmured in embarrassment.

“Are you interested in my plaster casts?” he asked pleasantly.

“I was looking at this hand,” replied the girl.  “I have seen one like it.”

Coquenil shook his head good-naturedly.  “That is very improbable.”

Alice looked closer.  “Oh, but I have,” she insisted.

“You mean in a museum?”

“No, no, in life—­I am positive I have.”

M. Paul listened with increasing interest.  “You have seen a hand with a little finger as long as this one?”

“Yes; it’s as long as the third finger and square at the end.  I’ve often noticed it.”

“Then you have seen something very uncommon, mademoiselle, something I have never seen.  That is the most remarkable hand in my collection; it is the hand of a man who lived nearly two hundred years ago.  He was one of the greatest criminals the world has ever known.”

“Really?” cried Alice, her eyes wide with sudden fright.  “I—­I must have been mistaken.”

But now the detective’s curiosity was aroused.  “Would you mind telling me the name of the person—­of course it’s a man—­who has this hand?”

“Yes,” said Alice, “it’s a man, but I should not like to give his name after what you have told me.”

“He is a good man?”

“Oh, yes.”

“A kind man?”

“Yes.”

“A man that you like?”

“Why—­er—­why, yes, I like him,” she replied, but the detective noticed a strange, anxious look in her eyes.  And immediately he changed the subject.

“You’ll have a cup of tea with me, won’t you?  I’ve asked Melanie to bring it in.  Then we can talk comfortably.  By the way, you haven’t told me your name.”

“My name is Alice Groener,” she answered simply.