“I was detained.”

She took off her hat and cloak hastily.

“You have learned nothing?” the mother asked, bringing in the soup.

“No.”

“They spoke to you of nothing?” Florentin continued in a low voice.

“They spoke to me of nothing else; or I heard only that when I was not addressed directly.”

“What was said?”

“No one believes that the investigations of the police bear on the button.”

“You see, Florentin,” Madame Cormier interrupted, smiling at her son.

But he shook his head.

“However, the opinion of all has a value,” Phillis cried.

“Speak lower,” Florentin said.

“It is thought that it is impossible for the police to find, among the two or three thousand tailors in Paris, all those who use the buttons marked A. P. And if they did find them, they could not designate all their customers to whom they have furnished these buttons.  It is really looking for a needle in a bundle of hay.”

“When one takes plenty of time, one finds a needle in a bundle of hay,” Florentin said.

“You ask me what I heard, and I tell you.  But I do not depend entirely on that.  As I passed near the Rue Louis-le-Grand, I went to Doctor Saniel’s; it being his office hour I hoped to find him.”

“You told him the situation?” Florentin exclaimed.

In any other circumstances she would have replied frankly, explaining that she had perfect confidence in Saniel; but when she saw her brother’s agitation, she could not exasperate him by this avowal, above all, because she could not at the same time give her reasons for her faith in him.  She must reassure him before everything.

“No,” she said, “but I spoke of Caffie to Doctor Saniel without his being surprised.  As he made the first deposition, was it not natural that my curiosity should wish to learn a little more than the newspapers tell?”

“Never mind, the act must appear strange.”

“I think not.  But, anyhow, the interest that we have to learn all made me overlook this; and I think, when I have told you the doctor’s opinion, you will not regret my visit.”

“And this opinion?” Madame Cormier asked.

“His opinion is, that there was no struggle between Caffie and the assassin, whereas the position of Caffie in the chair where he was attacked proves that he was surprised.  Therefore, if there was no struggle, there was no button torn off, and all the scaffolding of the police falls to the ground.”

Madame Cormier breathed a profound sigh of deliverance.

“You see,” she said to her son.

“And the doctor’s opinion is not the opinion of the first-comer, it is not even that of an ordinary physician.  It is that of the physician who has certified to the death, and who, more than any one, has power, has authority, to say how it was given—­by surprise, without struggle, without a button being pulled off.”