“You have found the heirs of the Roussel sisters, that much we know; and it is two of those heirs who are threatened with death.  The double murder is to be committed to-night.  But what we do not know is the name of those heirs, who are doubtless not called Roussel.  You must tell us the name.

“Listen to me:  you wrote on a memorandum pad three letters which seem to form the syllable Fau....  Am I right?  Is this the first syllable of a name?  Which is the next letter after those three?  Close your eyes when I mention the right letter.  Is it ‘b?’ Is it ‘c?’”

But there was now not a flicker in the inspector’s pallid face.  The head dropped heavily on the chest.  Verot gave two or three sighs, his frame shook with one great shiver, and he moved no more.

He was dead.

The tragic scene had been enacted so swiftly that the men who were its shuddering spectators remained for a moment confounded.  The solicitor made the sign of the cross and went down on his knees.  The Prefect murmured: 

“Poor Verot!...  He was a good man, who thought only of the service, of his duty.  Instead of going and getting himself seen to—­and who knows?  Perhaps he might have been saved—­he came back here in the hope of communicating his secret.  Poor Verot!—­”

“Was he married?  Are there any children?” asked Don Luis.

“He leaves a wife and three children,” replied the Prefect.

“I will look after them,” said Don Luis simply.

Then, when they brought a doctor and when M. Desmalions gave orders for the corpse to be carried to another room, Don Luis took the doctor aside and said: 

“There is no doubt that Inspector Verot was poisoned.  Look at his wrist:  you will see the mark of a puncture with a ring of inflammation round it.”

“Then he was pricked in that place?”

“Yes, with a pin or the point of a pen; and not as violently as they may have wished, because death did not ensue until some hours later.”

The messengers removed the corpse; and soon there was no one left in the office except the five people whom the Prefect had originally sent for.  The American Secretary of Embassy and the Peruvian attache, considering their continued presence unnecessary, went away, after warmly complimenting Don Luis Perenna on his powers of penetration.

Next came the turn of Major d’Astrignac, who shook his former subordinate by the hand with obvious affection.  And Maitre Lepertais and Perenna, having fixed an appointment for the payment of the legacy, were themselves on the point of leaving, when M. Desmalions entered briskly.

“Ah, so you’re still here, Don Luis Perenna!  I’m glad of that.  I have an idea:  those three letters which you say you made out on the writing-table, are you sure they form the syllable Fau?”

“I think so, Monsieur le Prefet.  See for yourself:  are not these an ‘F,’ an ‘A’ and a ‘U?’ And observe that the ‘F’ is a capital, which made me suspect that the letters are the first syllable of a proper name.”