“Maray. He has just left. Have you seen the last issue of Havas?... Here it is...”

The two men ran rapidly through the night’s telegrams.

“Deplorably empty!” remarked the editorial secretary. “But where am I to send you? – Ah, now I have it!

That article of yours on the rue Norvins affair, yesterday evening, was interesting – it made the others squirm, I know! Isn’t there anything more to be got out of that story?”

“What do you want?”

“Can’t you stick in something just a little bit scandalous about the Baroness de Vibray? Or about Dollon?

About no matter whom, in fact? After all, it’s our one and only crime today, and you must put in something under that head!” Jérôme Fandor seemed to hesitate.

“Would you like me to rake up the past – refer to what happened before?”

“What past?”

“Come now, you must have an inkling of what I’m referring to...”

“Not I!”

“Ah, my dear fellow, it will not be the first time we have had to mention these personages in our columns!... Just cast your mind back to the Gurn affair!...”

“Ah, the drama in which a great lady was implicated to her detriment! Lady – Lady Beltham?”

“You’ve got it! These Dollons – Jacques and Elizabeth – did you know it? – happen to be the children of old Dollon, who was murdered in the train – an extraordinary murder! – when on his way to Paris, to give evidence in the Gurn case!”

“Why, of course! I remember perfectly!” declared the editorial secretary: “Dollon, the father, was the Marquise de Langrune’s steward!... The old lady who was murdered!... Isn’t that so?”

“That’s it!... But, after the death of his mistress, he entered the service of the Baroness de Vibray, the lady who was assassinated yesterday!”

“Well, I must say they have not been favoured by fortune,” said the secretary jokingly. “But, look here, Fandor – like father, like son, eh?... If this young Dollon has murdered Madame de Vibray, doesn’t that make you think that his father was the murderer of the Marquise de Langrune?”

Jérôme Fandor shook his head:

“No, old boy, yesterday’s crime was ordinary, even common-place; but the assassination of the Marquise de Langrune, on the contrary, gave the police no end of bother.”

“They didn't find out anything, did they?”

“Why, yes!... Don’t you remember?... Naturally enough, it must all seem rather remote to you, but I have all the details as clearly in my mind as if they had happened only yesterday.... The Gurn affair was one of the first I had a hand in, with Juve... it was in connection with that very affair that I made my start here on La Capitale.”