"This at once threw a new light upon the matter, although I will admit a confusing one. Someone else, besides the nurse, desired the box of cigarettes removed as evidence; someone, in fact, who belonged to, or had friends in, the house. Who could this be? I could think of no one, outside of Mary Lanahan herself, but the chauffeur, François."
"Why did you first suspect him?" asked Mr. Stapleton.
"Because he was the only person, besides the nurse, who was present at the time of the kidnapping. I did not abandon my suspicions of either the nurse or Valentin. I fully believed that they knew a great deal more about the affair than they admitted. But I became convinced that François, too, was in the thing. He had testified that he was asleep when the affair occurred. I concluded at once that he was lying.
"At the first opportunity, therefore, I made a thorough search of his room, and found the box of cigarettes hidden in a clock on his mantel."
"Ha! I did not know that," exclaimed the Prefect. "What were they doing there?"
"I concluded that the fellow with the black beard who stole them from Valentin, in order to prevent their use as evidence against him, turned them over to François for a definite purpose."
"And that purpose was?"
"Their use in subsequent crimes of a similar nature."
Mr. Stapleton and the Prefect gazed at Duvall in bewilderment. "Explain yourself, my friend," exclaimed the latter. "I confess I do not understand what you are talking about. Who, may I ask, really smoked the cigarette, the remains of which you found in the grass?"
"Mary Lanahan," said the detective, with a smile.