"There is only one possible inference," answered Crochard. "At five minutes before dawn this morning, there were, in this city of Toulon, two Germans who knew that La Liberté was to be destroyed."
A moment's silence followed. Those words, terrible as they were, astounding as they were, carried conviction with them.
"Tell me," said Delcassé, at last, "how you discovered all this."
"I have been spending the month at Nice," Crochard explained. "I learned of the disaster as soon as I was up this morning, and I came at once to Toulon. Monsieur will understand that, in the many years during which I have been at variance with society, I have made many friends and gained a certain power in quarters of which Monsieur knows little. One of these friends is the proprietor of the café which occupies the ground floor of the house on the Quai de Cronstadt. I stopped to see him, because his house is close to the scene of the disaster—so close, indeed, that all of its windows were shattered. It was he who gave me the first clue."
"Go on," said Delcassé, who had been listening intently. "I need not say how deeply all this interests me."
"My friend had arranged to go to Marseilles this morning," Crochard continued, "to make a purchase of wine. The train, he tells me, leaves at six o'clock. It was about fifteen minutes before that hour when, as he started to open his door, two men stepped into the little vestibule, as though to screen themselves from observation. He peered through the curtain, thinking they might be friends, and found that he did not know them. Gazing from the darkness of the interior, he could see them very well. They were staring at La Liberté, as I have said, their faces rigid with emotion; and then came the explosion, which, without question, they anticipated."
"You have a description of them?" broke in Delcassé.
"An excellent description. They were men of middle age, heavily built and clean-shaven. Their faces were deeply tanned, as with long exposure, and had that fulness about the lips which bespeaks the German. They wore caps and walking-suits with knee trousers. Each had strapped upon his back a small knapsack."
Lépine, who had been taking rapid notes, looked up with gleaming eyes.
"We shall find these men," he said. "It will not be difficult."