"But, I'd rather talk to you; really, I would. You can ask me questions and—and then tell him. Go on, I don't mind. M. Kittredge was not my lover—there! Please make that perfectly clear. He was a dear, loyal friend, but nothing more."
"Was he enough of a friend to be jealous of Martinez?"
"What was there to make him jealous?"
"Well," smiled Coquenil, "I can imagine that if a dear, loyal friend found the lady he was dear and loyal to having supper with another man in a private room, he might be jealous."
To which Pussy replied with an accent of finality but with a shade of pique: "The best proof that M. Kittredge would not be jealous of me is that he loves another woman."
"The girl at Notre-Dame?"
"Yes."
"But Martinez knew her, too. There might have been trouble over her," ventured M. Paul shrewdly.
She shook her head with eager positiveness. "There was no trouble."
"You never knew of any quarrel between Kittredge and Martinez? No words?"
"Never."
"Madam," continued Coquenil, "as you have allowed me to speak frankly, I am going to ask if you feel inclined to make a special effort to help M. Kittredge?"
"Of course I do."
"Even at the sacrifice of your own feelings?"
"What do you mean?"
"Let me go back a minute. Yesterday you made a plucky effort to serve your friend, you gave money for a lawyer to defend him, you even said you would come forward and testify in his favor if it became necessary."
"Ah, the girl has seen you?"
"More than that, she has seen M. Kittredge at the prison. And I am sorry to tell you that your generous purposes have accomplished nothing. He refuses to accept your money and——"
"I told you he didn't love me," she interrupted with a touch of bitterness.
"We must have better evidence than that, just as we must have better evidence of his innocence than your testimony. After all, you don't know that he did not fire this shot, you could not see through the wall, and for all you can say, M. Kittredge may have been in Number Seven."
"I suppose that's true," admitted Pussy dolefully.
"So we come back to the question of motive; his love for you or his hatred of the Spaniard might be a motive, but if we can prove that there was no such love and no such hatred, then we shall have rendered him a great service and enormously improved his chances of getting out of prison. Do you follow me?"
"Perfectly. But how can we prove it?"
The detective leaned closer and said impressively: "If these things are true, it ought to be set forth in Kittredge's letters to you."
It was another chance shot, and Coquenil watched the effect anxiously.
"His letters to me!" she cried with a start of dismay, while M. Paul nodded complacently. "He never wrote me letters—that is, not many, and—whatever there were, I—I destroyed."
Coquenil eyed her keenly and shook his head. "A woman like you would never write to a man oftener than he wrote to her, and Kittredge had a thick bundle of your letters. It was only Saturday night that he burned them, along with that photograph of you in the lace dress."
It seemed to Pussy that a cold hand was closing over her heart; it was ghastly, it was positively uncanny the things this man had found out. She looked at him in frightened appeal, and then, with a gesture of half surrender: "For Heaven's sake, how much more do you know about me?"
"I know that you have a bundle of Kittredge's letters here, possibly in that desk." He pointed to a charming piece of old mahogany inlaid with ivory. He had made this last deduction by following her eyes through these last tortured minutes.
"It isn't true; I—I tell you I destroyed the letters." And he knew she was lying.
M. Paul glanced at his watch and then said quietly: "Would you mind asking if some one is waiting for me outside?"
So thoroughly was the agitated lady under the spell of Coquenil's power that she now attached extraordinary importance to his slightest word or act. It seemed to her, as she pressed the bell, that she was precipitating some nameless catastrophe.
"Is anyone waiting for this gentleman?" she asked, all in a tremble, when the servant appeared.
"Yes, madam, two men are waiting," replied the valet.
She noticed, with a shiver, that he said two men, not two gentlemen.
"That's all," nodded Coquenil; "I'll let you know when I want them." And when the valet had withdrawn: "They have come from the prefecture in regard to these letters."
Pussy rose and her face was deathly white. "You mean they are policemen? My house is full of policemen?"
"Be calm, my dear lady, there are only two in the house and two outside."
"Oh, the shame of it, the scandal of it!" she wailed.
"A murder isn't a pleasant thing at the best and—as I said, they have come for the letters."
"You told them to come?"
"No, the judge told them to come. I hoped I might be able to spare you the annoyance of a search."
"A search?" she cried, and realizing her helplessness, she sank down on a sofa and began to cry. "It will disgrace me, it will break up my home, it will ruin my life!" She could hear the gossips of the American Colony rolling this choice morsel under their tongues, Pussy Wilmott's house had been searched by the police for letters from her lover!
Then, suddenly, clutching at a last straw of hope, she yielded or seemed to yield. "As long as a search must be made," she said with a sort of half-defiant dignity, "I prefer to have you make it, and not these men."
"I think that is wise," bowed M. Paul.
"In which room will you begin?"
"In this room."
"I give you my word there are no letters here, but, as you don't believe me, why—do what you like."
"I would like to look in that desk," said the detective.
"Very well—look!"
Coquenil went to the desk and examined it carefully. There were two drawers in a raised part at the back, there was a long, wide drawer in front, and over this a space like a drawer under a large inlaid cover, hinged at the back. He searched everywhere here, but found no sign of the expected letters.
"I must have been mistaken," he muttered, and he continued his search in other parts of the room, Pussy hovering about with changing expressions that reminded M. Paul of children's faces when they play the game of "hot or cold."
"Well," he said, with an air of disappointment, "I find nothing here. Suppose we try another room."
"Certainly," she agreed, and her face brightened in such evident relief that he turned to her suddenly and said almost regretfully, as a generous adversary might speak to one whom he hopelessly outclasses: "Madam, I hear you are fond of gambling. You should study the game of poker, which teaches us to hide our feelings. Now then," he walked back quickly to the desk, "I want you to open this secret drawer."
He spoke with a sudden sternness that quite disconcerted poor Pussy. She stood before him frozen with fear, unable to lie any more, unable even to speak. A big tear of weakness and humiliation gathered and rolled down her cheek, and then, still silent, she took a hairpin from her hair, inserted one leg of it into a tiny hole quite lost in the ornamental work at the back of the desk, pushed against a hidden spring, and presto! a small secret drawer shot forward. In this drawer lay a packet of letters tied with a ribbon.
"Are