“What makes you believe it?”

“This.”

And Rouletabille handed Koupriane the message he had received that same morning.

“Oh, oh,” cried Koupriane.  “You are under watch!  Look out.”

“I have nothing to fear; I’m not bothering myself about anything further.  Yes, we have an affair of the revolutionaries, but not of the usual kind.  The way they are going about it isn’t like one of their young men that the Central Committee arms with a bomb and who is sacrificed in advance.”

“Where are the tracks that you have traced?”

“Right up to the little Krestowsky Villa.”

Koupriane bounded from his chair.

“Occupied by Boris.  Parbleu!  Now we have them.  I see it all now.  Boris, another cracked brain!  And he is engaged.  If he plays the part of the Revolutionaries, the affair would work out big for him.”

“That villa,” said Rouletabille quietly, “is also occupied by Michael Korosakoff.”

“He is the most loyal, the most reliable soldier of the Tsar.”

“No one is ever sure of anything, my dear Monsieur Koupriane.”

“Oh, I am sure of a man like that.”

“No man is ever sure of any man, my dear Monsieur Koupriane.”

“I am, in every case, for those I employ.”

“You are wrong.”

“What do you say?”

“Something that can serve you in the enterprise you are going to undertake, because I trust you can catch the murderer right in his nest.  To do that, I’ll not conceal from you that I think your agents will have to be enormously clever.  They will have to watch the datcha des Iles at night, without anyone possibly suspecting it.  No more maroon coats with false astrakhan trimmings, eh?  But Apaches, Apaches on the wartrail, who blend themselves with the ground, with the trees, with the stones in the roadway.  But among those Apaches don’t send that agent of your Secret Service who watched the window while the assassin climbed to it.”

“What?”

“Why, these climbs that you can read the proofs of on the wall and on the iron forgings of the balcony went on while your agents, night and day, were watching the villa.  Have you noticed, monsieur, that it was always the same agent who took the post at night, behind the villa, under the window?  General Trebassof’s book in which he kept a statement of the exact disposal of each of your men during the period of siege was most instructive on that point.  The other posts changed in turn, but the same agent, when he was among the guard, demanded always that same post, which was not disputed by anybody, since it is no fun to pass the hours of the night behind a wall, in an empty field.  The others much preferred to roll away the time watching in the villa or in front of the lodge, where vodka and Crimean wine, kwass and pivo, kirsch and tchi, never ran short.  That agent’s name is Touman.”

“Touman!  Impossible!  He is one of the best agents from Kiew.  He was recommended by Gounsovski.”