set around the canvas of my report.  The president submits his questions to the jury; what emotion!  The fate of my drama is being decided.  The jury, perhaps, answers, ‘Not guilty;’ very well, my piece was bad, I am hissed.  If ‘Guilty,’ on the contrary, the piece was good, I am applauded, and victorious.  The next day I can go and see my hero, and slapping him on the shoulder, say to him, ‘You have lost, old fellow, I am too much for you!’”

Was M. Lecoq in earnest now, or was he playing a part?  What was the object of this autobiography?  Without appearing to notice the surprise of his companions, he lit a fresh cigar; then, whether designedly or not, instead of replacing the lamp with which he lit it on the table, he put it on one corner of the mantel.  Thus M. Plantat’s face was in full view, while that of M. Lecoq remained in shadow.

“I ought to confess,” he continued, “without false modesty, that I have rarely been hissed.  Like every man I have my Achilles heel.  I have conquered the demon of play, but I have not triumphed over my passion for woman.”

He sighed heavily, with the resigned gesture of a man who has chosen his path.  “It’s this way.  There is a woman, before whom I am but an idiot.  Yes, I the detective, the terror of thieves and murderers, who have divulged the combinations of all the sharpers of all the nations, who for ten years have swum amid vice and crime; who wash the dirty linen of all the corruptions, who have measured the depths of human infamy; I who know all, who have seen and heard all; I, Lecoq, am before her, more simple and credulous than an infant.  She deceives me—­I see it—­and she proves that I have seen wrongly.  She lies—­I know it, I prove it to her—­and I believe her.  It is because this is one of those passions,” he added, in a low, mournful tone, “that age, far from extinguishing, only fans, and to which the consciousness of shame and powerlessness adds fire.  One loves, and the certainty that he cannot be loved in return is one of those griefs which you must have felt to know its depth.  In a moment of reason, one sees and judges himself; he says, no, it’s impossible, she is almost a child, I almost an old man.  He says this—­but always, in the heart, more potent than reason, than will, than experience, a ray of hope remains, and he says to himself, ‘who knows—­perhaps!’ He awaits, what—­a miracle?  There are none, nowadays.  No matter, he hopes on.”

M. Lecoq stopped, as if his emotion prevented his going on.  M. Plantat had continued to smoke mechanically, puffing the smoke out at regular intervals; but his face seemed troubled, his glance was unsteady, his hands trembled.  He got up, took the lamp from the mantel and replaced it on the table, and sat down again.  The significance of this scene at last struck Dr. Gendron.

In short, M. Lecoq, without departing widely from the truth, had just attempted one of the most daring experiments of his repertoire, and he judged it useless to go further.  He knew now what he wished to know.  After a moment’s silence, he shuddered as though awaking from a dream, and pulling out his watch, said: