"Of Monday morning?"
"Yes, sir; of Monday morning."
"At what hour was the next train for Paris?"
"At eight-fifteen, sir, the express departs."
"The girl had no companion?"
"She certainly had a companion, or she would not have bought two tickets."
"Perhaps the inspector at the gate can tell us something," the chief suggested, and the clerk was dismissed and the inspector summoned. But he could give them no information. There had been many passengers for the express, and, besides, every one, himself included, was so distressed and overwrought by the catastrophe of the morning that there had not been the usual attention to detail. The inquiry was extended to the baggage-porters, but with no better success. They, too, had been upset by the disaster and had thought of nothing else. Some of them had frankly deserted their posts in order to hasten to the harbour-front. None of those who remained had noticed a white-haired man and a dark-haired girl.
"Come!" said Lépine savagely to himself, as he left the station. "This is not getting ahead—we must try the cabs. But first...."
He turned toward the Prefecture and quickened his step, for suddenly he scented a new danger. This white-haired man, then, was in the pay of Germany. He had destroyed La Liberté for a price—an immense price, no doubt! And now he had gone to Paris. From there, where would he go? To Brest, perhaps, to work similar mischief there. Lépine shivered a little. The best men he had left at Paris must be sent to Brest with instructions to arrest the fugitives at sight. Two people, so unusual in appearance, would find it difficult to avoid the police in so small a town. But in Paris—that was different. Yet even there something might be done. And then there was always chance, divine chance, which might, at any moment, deliver them into his hands. Ah, if only he were strolling along the Boulevards, looking into this face and that!