Prosper listening attentively tried hard to comprehend this monologue, which he dared not interrupt.

“Let us seek,” went on the fat man, “this second person, whose conscience pricks him, and yet who dares not reveal anything.”

He read the letter over several times, scanning the sentences, and weighing every word.

“Evidently this letter was composed by a woman,” he finally said.  “Never would one man doing another man a service, and sending him money, use the word ‘succor.’  A man would have said, loan, money, or some other equivalent, but succor, never.  No one but a woman, ignorant of masculine susceptibilities, would have naturally made use of this word to express the idea it represents.  As to the sentence, ‘There is one heart,’ and so on, it could only have been written by a woman.”

“You are mistaken, monsieur,” said Prosper:  “no woman is mixed up in this affair.”

M. Verduret paid no attention to this interruption, perhaps he did not hear it; perhaps he did not care to argue the matter.

“Now, let us see if we can discover whence the printed words were taken to compose this letter.”

He approached the window, and began to study the pasted words with all the scrupulous attention which an antiquarian would devote to an old, half-effaced manuscript.

“Small type,” he said, “very slender and clear; the paper is thin and glossy.  Consequently, these words have not been cut from a newspaper, magazine, or even a novel.  I have seen type like this, I recognize it at once; Didot often uses it, so does Mme. de Tours.”

He stopped with his mouth open, and eyes fixed, appealing laboriously to his memory.

Suddenly he struck his forehead exultantly.

“Now I have it!” he cried; “now I have it!  Why did I not see it at once?  These words have all been cut from a prayer-book.  We will look, at least, and then we shall be certain.”

He moistened one of the words pasted on the paper with his tongue, and, when it was sufficiently softened, he detached it with a pin.  On the other side of this word was printed a Latin word, Deus.

“Ah, ha,” he said with a little laugh of satisfaction.  “I knew it.  Father Taberet would be pleased to see this.  But what has become of the mutilated prayer-book?  Can it have been burned?  No, because a heavy-bound book is not easily burned.  It is thrown in some corner.”

M. Verduret was interrupted by the porter, who returned with the messenger from the Rue Pigalle.

“Ah, here you are,” he said encouragingly.  Then he showed the envelope of the letter, and said: 

“Do you remember bringing this letter here this morning?”

“Perfectly, monsieur.  I took particular notice of the direction; we don’t often see anything like it.”

“Who told you to bring it? a gentleman, or a lady?”

“Neither, monsieur; it was a porter.”