“I have it—here it is—we’re there at last!”
“But the title—are you sure?—”
“Why, of course: look!”
“Are you convinced? Have we mastered the secret at last?”
“The front page—what does the front page say?”
“Read: The Whole Truth now first exhibited. One hundred copies printed by myself for the instruction of the Court.”
“That’s it, that’s it,” muttered Massiban, in a hoarse voice. “It’s the copy snatched from the flames! It’s the very book which Louis XIV. condemned.”
They turned over the pages. The first part set forth the explanations given by Captain de Larbeyrie in his journal.
“Get on, get on!” said Beautrelet, who was in a hurry to come to the solution.
“Get on? What do you mean? Not at all! We know that the Man with the Iron Mask was imprisoned because he knew and wished to divulge the secret of the Royal house of France. But how did he know it? And why did he wish to divulge it? Lastly, who was that strange personage? A half-brother of Louis XIV., as Voltaire maintained, or Mattioli, the Italian minister, as the modern critics declare? Hang it, those are questions of the very first interest!”