In the garden, near Mrs. Kesselbach's house, he saw Geneviève sitting on a bench with Pierre Leduc and a thick-set gentleman wearing a single eye-glass. The three were talking and none of them saw him. But several people came out of the house: M. Formerie, M. Weber, a magistrate's clerk, and two inspectors. Geneviève went indoors and the gentleman with the eye-glass went up and spoke to the examining-magistrate and the deputy-chief of the detective-service and walked away with them slowly.
Sernine came beside the bench where Pierre Leduc was sitting and whispered:
"Don't move, Pierre Leduc; it's I."
"You! . . . you! . . ."
It was the third time that the young man saw Sernine since the awful night at Versailles; and each time it upset him.
"Tell me . . . who is the fellow with the eye-glass?"
Pierre Leduc turned pale and jabbered. Sernine pinched his arm:
"Answer me, confound it! Who is he?"
"Baron Altenheim."
"Where does he come from?"