“I do not know,” she responded.
And, at that moment, I heard someone open the door of the tower and Pere Bernier stood on the threshold.
“Ah! it is you, M. Sainclair?”
“Bernier! What has happened?”
“Oh, nothing very serious, M. Sainclair, I am glad to say.” (But his voice was too palpably endeavoring to sound strong and brave for me to feel as reassured as he was trying to make me!) “An accident without any importance whatever. M. Darzac, while placing his revolver on the stand beside his bed, accidentally fired it off. Madame, naturally, was frightened, and screamed; and, as the window of their room was open, she thought that you and M. Rouletabille might have heard something and started out to tell you that it was nothing.”
“M. Darzac has come in, then?”
“He got here almost as soon as you had left the tower, M. Sainclair. And the shot was fired almost immediately after he entered his bedroom. You can guess that I had a pretty fright! I rushed to the door! M. Darzac opened it, himself. Happily, no one was injured!”
“Did Mme. Darzac go to her own room as soon as I left the tower?”
“At once. She heard M. Darzac when he came in and followed him directly to their apartments. They went in almost at the same moment.”
“And M. Darzac? Is he still in his room?”