"Have you no carriage at hand?" he said, sharply; "or do you want to collect a crowd in the street?"
The cab, however, which had been waiting a few doors lower down, drove up while he was speaking. The sergeant hurried him in; the half-dozen loiterers who had already gathered about us pressed eagerly forward; two of the soldiers and the sergeant got inside; Müller and I scrambled up beside the driver; word was given "to the Préfecture of Police;" and we drove rapidly away down the Rue du Faubourg St. Denis, through the arch of Louis Quatorze, out upon the bright noisy Boulevard, and on through thoroughfares as brilliant and crowded as at midday, towards the quays and the river.
Arrived at the Quai des Ortëvres, we alighted at the Préfecture, and were conducted through a series of ante-rooms and corridors into the presence of the same bald-headed Chef de Bureau whom we had seen on each previous occasion. He looked up as we came in, pressed the spring of a small bell that stood upon his desk, and growled something in the ear of a clerk who answered the summons.
"Sergeant," he said, pompously, "bring the prisoner under the gas-burner."
Lenoir, without waiting to be brought, took a couple of steps forward, and placed himself in the light.
Monsieur le Chef then took out his double eye-glass, and proceeded to compare Lenoir's face, feature by feature, with a photograph which he took out of his pocket-book for the purpose.
"Are you prepared, Monsieur," he said, addressing Müller for the first time--"are you, I say, prepared to identify the prisoner upon oath?"
"Within certain limitations--yes," replied Müller.
"Certain limitations!" exclaimed the Chef, testily. "What do you mean by 'certain limitations?' Here is the man whom you accuse, and here is the photograph. Are you, I repeat, prepared to make your deposition before Monsieur le Préfet that they are one and the same person?"
"I am neither more nor less prepared, Monsieur," said Müller, "than you are; or than Monsieur le Préfet, when he has the opportunity of judging. As I have already had the honor of informing you, I saw the prisoner for the first time about two months since. Having reason to believe that he was living in Paris under an assumed name, and wearing a decoration to which he had no right, I prosecuted certain inquiries about him. The result of those inquiries led me to conclude that he was an escaped convict from the Bagnes of Toulon. Never having seen him at Toulon, I was unable to prove this fact without assistance. You, Monsieur, have furnished that assistance, and the proof is now in your hand. It only remains for Monsieur le Préfet and yourself to decide upon its value."