He looked at it with stupid eyes, examined it, turned it over in every direction and, suddenly, gave a cry, the cry of a man struck with a horrible idea. And he stood like that, livid, with trembling hands and wild, staring eyes.
"Speak, come, speak!" said M. Lenormand.
"Oh," he said, as though blinded with light, "now all is explained! . . ."
"Speak, speak!"
He walked across to the windows with a tottering step, then returned and, rushing up to the chief detective:
"Sir, sir . . . Rudolf's murderer . . . I'll tell you. . . . Well . . ."
He stopped short.
"Well?"
There was a moment's pause. . . . Was the name of the odious criminal about to echo through the great silence of the office, between those walls which had heard so many accusations, so many confessions? M. Lenormand felt as if he were on the brink of the unfathomable abyss and as if a voice were mounting, mounting up to him. . . . A few seconds more and he would know. . . .
"No," muttered Steinweg, "no, I can't. . . ."