"There was one next to my aunt's room, Monsieur Hanaud, with a communicating door."
Hanaud was puzzled and sat back in his chair. Jim Frobisher thought the time had come for him to interpose. He had been growing more and more restless as the catechism progressed. He could not see any reason why Betty, however readily and easily she answered, should be needlessly pestered.
"Surely, Monsieur Hanaud," he said, "it would save a deal of time if we paid a visit to these rooms and saw them for ourselves."
Hanaud swung round like a thing on a swivel. Admiration beamed in his eyes. He gazed at his junior colleague in wonder.
"But what an idea!" he cried enthusiastically. "What a fine idea! How ingenious! How difficult to conceive! And it is you, Monsieur Frobisher, who have thought of it! I make you my distinguished compliments!" Then all his enthusiasm declined into lassitude. "But what a pity!"
Hanaud waited intently for Jim to ask for an explanation of that sigh, but Jim simply got red in the face and refused to oblige. He had obviously made an asinine suggestion and was being rallied for it in front of the beautiful Betty Harlowe, who looked to him for her salvation; and on the whole he thought Hanaud to be a rather insufferable person as he sat there brightly watching for some second inanity. Hanaud in the end had to explain.
"We should have visited those rooms before now, Monsieur Frobisher. But the Commissaire of Police has sealed them up and without his presence we must not break the seals."
An almost imperceptible movement was made by Betty Harlowe in the window; an almost imperceptible smile flickered for the space of a lightning-flash upon her lips; and Jim saw Hanaud stiffen like a watch-dog when he hears a sound at night.
"You are amused, Mademoiselle?" he asked sharply.
"On the contrary, Monsieur."