“I am very sorry, M. Nicole. Another time....”
“It was the same thing at eight o’clock this morning, when I was waiting for the motor which was bringing Daubrecq to me in his trunk: I had to march up and down the Place de Clichy, so as to prevent the car from stopping outside the door of my place and your men from interfering in my private affairs. Otherwise, once again, Gilbert and Clarisse Mergy would have been lost.”
“But,” said Prasville, “those painful events, it seems to me, are only delayed for a day, two days, three days at most. To avert them for good and all we should want....”
“The real list, I suppose?”
“Exactly. And I daresay you haven’t got it.”
“Yes, I have.”
“The genuine list?”
“The genuine, the undoubtedly genuine list.”
“With the cross of Lorraine?”
“With the cross of Lorraine.”