“At the shops—­there will not be so many in Aix at which you can buy skewers—­they may remember to whom they sold one within the last day or so.”

“How do we know it was bought in the last day or so?” cried Hanaud scornfully.  “We have not to do with a man who walks into a shop and buys a single skewer to commit a murder with, and so hands himself over to the police.  How often must I say it!”

The violence of his contempt nettled Ricardo.

“If the murderer did not buy it, how did he obtain it?” he asked obstinately.

“Oh, my friend, could he not have stolen it?  From this or from any hotel in Aix?  Would the loss of a skewer be noticed, do you think?  How many people in Aix today have had rognons a la brochette for their luncheon!  Besides, it is not merely the death of this poor woman which troubles me.  We have lost the evidence which she was going to bring to us.  She had something to tell us about Celie Harland which now we shall never hear.  We have to begin all over again, and I tell you we have not the time to begin all over again.  No, we have not the time.  Time will be lost, and we have no time to lose.”  He buried his face again in his hands and groaned aloud.  His grief was so violent and so sincere that Ricardo, shocked as he was by the murder of Marthe Gobin, set himself to console him.

“But you could not have foreseen that at three o’clock in the afternoon at Aix—­”

Hanaud brushed the excuse aside.

“It is no extenuation.  I ought to have foreseen.  Oh, but I will have no pity now,” he cried, and as he ended the words abruptly his face changed.  He lifted a trembling forefinger and pointed.  There came a sudden look of life into his dull and despairing eyes.

He was pointing to a side-table on which were piled Mr. Ricardo’s letters.

“You have not opened them this morning?” he asked.

“No.  You came while I was still in bed.  I have not thought of them till now.”

Hanaud crossed to the table, and, looking down at the letters, uttered a cry.

“There’s one, the big envelope,” he said, his voice shaking like his hand.  “It has a Swiss stamp.”

He swallowed to moisten his throat.  Ricardo sprang across the room and tore open the envelope.  There was a long letter enclosed in a handwriting unknown to him.  He read aloud the first lines of the letter: 

“I write what I saw and post it tonight, so that no one may be before me with the news.  I will come over tomorrow for the money.”

A low exclamation from Hanaud interrupted the words.

“The signature!  Quick!”

Ricardo turned to the end of the letter.

“Marthe Gobin.”

“She speaks, then!  After all she speaks!” Hanaud whispered in a voice of awe.  He ran to the door of the room, opened it suddenly, and, shutting it again, locked it.  “Quick!  We cannot bring that poor woman back to life; but we may still—­” He did not finish his sentence.  He took the letter unceremoniously from Ricardo’s hand and seated himself at the table.  Over his shoulder Mr. Ricardo, too, read Marthe Gobin’s letter.