“Who was it?”

“Ah!  That I do not know,” she answered.  “I did not see him, but I heard him, the step of a man.  It was this rascal who killed him, you may be sure.”

This seemed likely.

“He went out while I was on the stairs; he knew the customs of the house.”

Saniel continued his report.

After having questioned and cross-questioned the concierge without being able to make her say more, the commissioner dismissed her, and leaving Saniel at his work, he passed into Caffie’s office, where he remained a long time.

When he returned he brought a small note-book that he consulted.  Without doubt it was the book of Caffie’s safe, simple and primitive, like everything relating to the old man’s habits, governed by the narrowest economy in his expenses, as well as in his work.

“According to this note-book,” the commissioner said to his secretary, “thirty-five or thirty-six thousand francs must have been taken from the safe; but there are left deeds and papers for a large sum.”

Saniel, who had finished his report, did not take his eyes from the note-book, and what he could see reassured him.  Evidently these accounts were reduced to a minimum:  a date, a name, a sum, and after this name a capital P, which, without doubt, meant “paid.”  It was hardly possible that with such a system Caffie had ever taken the trouble to enter the number of the bills that had passed through his hands; in any case, if he did, it was not in this note-book.  Would another one be found?

“My report is finished,” he said.  “Here it is.”

“Since you are here, perhaps you can give me some information concerning the habits of the victim and the persons he received.”

“Not at all.  I have known him but a short time, and he was my patient, as I was his client, by accident.  He undertook an affair for me, and I gave him advice; he was in the last stage of diabetes.  The assassin hastened his death only a short time-a few days.”

“That is nothing; he hastened it.”

“Oh, certainly!  Otherwise, if he is skilful in cutting throats, perhaps he is less so in making a diagnosis of their maladies.”

“That is probable,” responded the commissioner, smiling.  “You think it was a butcher?”

“It seems probable.”

“The knife?”

“He might have stolen it or found it.”

“But the mode of operating?”

“That, it seems to me, is the point from where we should start.”

Saniel could remain no longer, and he rose to leave.

“You have my address,” he said; “but I must tell you, if you want me, I leave to-morrow for Nice.  But I shall be absent only just long enough to go and return.”

“If we want you, it will not be for several days.  We shall not get on very rapidly, we have so little to guide us.”

CHAPTER XV