second, that we must have been observed at Franchard itself by some

occult observer, and dogged throughout the day with a skill and
patience that I venture to qualify as consummate. No ordinary man,

no occasionalcriminal, would have shown himself capable of this
combination. We have in our neighbourhood, it is far from

improbable, a retiredbandit of the highest order of intelligence.'
'Good heaven!' cried the horrified Anastasie. 'Henri, how can

you?'
'My cherished one, this is a process of induction,' said the

Doctor. 'If any of my steps are unsound, correct me. You are
silent? Then do not, I beseech you, be so vulgarly illogical as to

revolt from my conclusion. We have now arrived,' he resumed, 'at
some idea of the composition of the gang - for I incline to the

hypothesis of more than one - and we now leave this room, which can
disclose no more, and turn our attention to the court and garden.

(Jean-Marie, I trust you are observantly following my various
steps; this is an excellent piece of education for you.) Come with

me to the door. No steps on the court; it is unfortunate our court
should be paved. On what small matters hang the destiny of these

delicate investigations! Hey! What have we here? I have led on
to the very spot,' he said, standing grandly backward and

indicating the green gate. 'An escalade, as you can now see for
yourselves, has taken place.'

Sure enough, the green paint was in several places scratched and
broken; and one of the panels preserved the print of a nailed shoe.

The foot had slipped, however, and it was difficult to estimate the
size of the shoe, and impossible to distinguish the pattern of the

nails.
'The whole robbery,' concluded the Doctor, 'step by step, has been

reconstituted. Inductive science can no further go.'
'It is wonderful,' said his wife. 'You should indeed have been a

detective, Henri. I had no idea of your talents.'
'My dear,' replied Desprez, condescendingly, 'a man of scientific

imagination combines the lesser faculties; he is a detective just
as he is a publicist or a general; these are but local applications

of his special talent. But now,' he continued, 'would you have me
go further? Would you have me lay my finger on the culprits - or

rather, for I cannot promise quite so much, point out to you the
very house where they consort? It may be a satisfaction, at least

it is all we are likely to get, since we are denied the remedy of
law. I reach the further stage in this way. In order to fill my

outline of the robbery, I require a man likely to be in the forest
idling, I require a man of education, I require a man superior to

considerations of morality. The three requisites all centre in
Tentaillon's boarders. They are painters, therefore they are

continually lounging in the forest. They are painters, therefore
they are not unlikely to have some smattering of education.

Lastly, because they are painters, they are probably immoral. And
this I prove in two ways. First, painting is an art which merely

addresses the eye; it does not in any particular exercise the moral
sense. And second, painting, in common with all the other arts,

implies the dangerous quality of imagination. A man of imagination
is never moral; he outsoars literal demarcations and reviews life

under too many shifting lights to rest content with the invidious
distinctions of the law!'

'But you always say - at least, so I understood you' - said madame,
'that these lads display no imagination whatever.'

'My dear, they displayed imagination, and of a very fantastic
order, too,' returned the Doctor, 'when they embraced their

beggarly profession. Besides - and this is an argument exactly
suited to your intellectual level - many of them are English and

American. Where else should we expect to find a thief? - And now
you had better get your coffee. Because we have lost a treasure,

there is no reason for starving. For my part, I shall break my
fast with white wine. I feel unaccountably heated and thirsty to-

day. I can only attribute it to the shock of the discovery. And
yet, you will bear me out, I supported the emotion nobly.'

The Doctor had now talked himself back into an admirable humour;
and as he sat in the arbour and slowly imbibed a large allowance of

white wine and picked a little bread and cheese with no very
impetuous appetite, if a third of his meditations ran upon the

missing treasure, the other two-thirds were more pleasingly busied
in the retrospect of his detective skill.

About eleven Casimir arrived; he had caught an early train to
Fontainebleau, and driven over to save time; and now his cab was

stabled at Tentaillon's, and he remarked, studying his watch, that
he could spare an hour and a half. He was much the man of

business, decisively spoken, given to frowning in an intellectual
manner. Anastasie's born brother, he did not waste much sentiment

on the lady, gave her an English family kiss, and demanded a meal
without delay.

'You can tell me your story while we eat,' he observed. 'Anything
good to-day, Stasie?'

He was promised something good. The trio sat down to table in the
arbour, Jean-Marie waiting as well as eating, and the Doctor

recounted what had happened in his richest narrative manner.
Casimir heard it with explosions of laughter.

'What a streak of luck for you, my good brother,' he observed, when
the tale was over. 'If you had gone to Paris, you would have

played dick-duck-drake with the whole consignment in three months.
Your own would have followed; and you would have come to me in a

procession like the last time. But I give you warning - Stasie may
weep and Henri ratiocinate - it will not serve you twice. Your

next collapse will be fatal. I thought I had told you so, Stasie?
Hey? No sense?'

The Doctor winced and looked furtively at Jean-Marie; but the boy
seemed apathetic.

'And then again,' broke out Casimir, 'what children you are -
vicious children, my faith! How could you tell the value of this

trash? It might have been worth nothing, or next door.'
'Pardon me,' said the Doctor. 'You have your usual flow of

spirits, I perceive, but even less than your usual deliberation. I
am not entirely ignorant of these matters.'

'Not entirely ignorant of anything ever I heard of,' interrupted
Casimir, bowing, and raising his glass with a sort of pert

politeness.
'At least,' resumed the Doctor, 'I gave my mind to the subject -

that you may be willing to believe - and I estimated that our
capital would be doubled.' And he described the nature of the

find.
'My word of honour!' said Casimir, 'I half believe you! But much

would depend on the quality of the gold.'
'The quality, my dear Casimir, was - ' And the Doctor, in default

of language, kissed his finger-tips.
'I would not take your word for it, my good friend,' retorted the

man of business. 'You are a man of very rosy views. But this
robbery,' he continued - 'this robbery is an odd thing. Of course

I pass over your nonsense about gangs and landscape-painters. For
me, that is a dream. Who was in the house last night?'

'None but ourselves,' replied the Doctor.
'And this young gentleman?' asked Casimir, jerking a nod in the

direction of Jean-Marie.
'He too' - the Doctor bowed.

'Well; and if it is a fair question, who is he?' pursued the
brother-in-law.

'Jean-Marie,' answered the Doctor, 'combines the functions of a son
and stable-boy. He began as the latter, but he rose rapidly to the

more honourable rank in our affections. He is, I may say, the