"You mean Pierre Channet, the painter, Monsieur?"
I had, of course, never heard of Pierre Channet, the painter, in my life, but I nodded as knowingly as if I had been on the most intimate relations with him for years. Then, again, this was my only way of getting down to his personal level, the only way I could draw him out and get at his real character. By taking his side of the question, he would unbosom himself the more freely, and, perhaps, incidentally, some of the peccadilloes—some of the most wicked.
"He will not think, Monsieur. They pulled him out of the river last month."
"Drowned?"
His answer gave me a little start, but I did not betray myself.
"So they said. The water trickled along his nose for two days as he lay on the slab, before they found out who he was."
"In the morgue?" I inquired in a tone of surprise. I spoke as if this part of the story had not reached me.
"In the morgue, Monsieur."
The repeated words came as cold and merciless as the drops of water that fell on poor Channet as he lay under the gas-jets.
"Drowned himself for love of Mademoiselle Béraud, you say?"