Again the Prefect pressed a pedal. A panel, and this time a different panel from the first, slid back, and again the secretary appeared.
Monsieur Beaucourt said a brief word or two, and a few moments later a tabulated list, written in round-hand, lay before him.
"Here are all the accidents which have occurred in Paris during the last ninety hours."
He ran his eyes down the list; and then, rising, handed the sheets to
Senator Burton.
"I think this disposes of the idea that an accident may have befallen your friend in the streets," said the Prefect briefly.
And the Senator, handing back the list, acknowledged that this was so.
"May I ask if you know much of the habits and way of life of this vanished bridegroom?" asked the Prefect thoughtfully. "I understand he belongs to the British Colony here."
"Mr. Dampier was not my friend," said the Senator hurriedly. "It is Mrs.
Dampier—"
"Ah, yes—I understand—the three weeks' bride? It is she you know. Well, Monsieur le Sénateur, the best thing you and I can do is to look at the artist's dossier. That is quite likely to provide us with a useful clue."
The Senator felt a thrill of anticipatory interest. All his life he had heard of the dossiers kept by the Paris police, of how every dweller in the great city, however famous, however obscure, had a record in which the most intimate details of their lives were set down in black and white. Somehow he had never quite believed in these French police dossiers.