Jack had had it before. He had even hinted it to Juliet, who laughed it to scorn, and remarked that she knew Simone better than he could possibly know her. Sanders had had the thought, and mentioned it to Manners. But there was no proof; and the Frenchwoman's "shadower" had never seen her go to the office of the Inner Circle. As for letters—Sanders had put Togo onto watching for them. Simone had sent out none at all from the house. Yet now that one bleak glare at the open paper, and both men were as sure as if the woman had confessed.
"You think your editor has been talking, eh?" the detective said. "That's as may be. Anyhow, we know."
The telephone bell rang. Jack took up the receiver. "Yes, Mr. Sanders is here," he replied to some question. "He'll speak with you in a second. Hold the line."
Sanders bounded to the 'phone. "Yes—yes—good!" were the only words he said. But Jack knew he was speaking to his man at the café. Then he turned again to Simone. "Come here and call your friend Defasquelle," he sharply ordered. "Tell him he must turn up at his house at once or there'll be a disaster for you both."
Simone grasped the back of a chair, and clung to it. "I cannot, Monsieur," she gulped. "I know Monsieur Defasquelle only by seeing him here. I——"
"Don't waste words," Sanders cut her short. "It'll be the worse for you if you do. You've just been with him now, at Rudin's. Call him up at his hotel."
"If—if I will not?" she stammered.
"Do you want to go to prison while he's left free—to marry his girl in Marseilles?"
That was a chance shot, but it found its billet.
"He has no girl in Marseilles!" Simone shrilled.