The staff at the Lodge consisted in its entirety of one old maid-servant, a little deaf and very short-sighted, who combined the functions, as occasion demanded, of parlour-maid, cook and gardener. Notwithstanding these manifold duties, Valentine hardly ever left her kitchen-range, which was situated in an extension built on to the house and opening directly upon the street.
This was where I found her. She did not seem surprised at my return—nothing, for that matter, ever surprised or perturbed her—and I at once saw that she was still living outside the course of events and that she would be unable to tell me anything useful. I gathered, however, that my uncle and Bérangère had gone out half an hour earlier.
"Together?" I asked.
"Good gracious, no! The master came through the kitchen and said, 'I'm going to post a letter. Then I shall go to the Yard.' He left a bottle behind him, you know, one of those blue medicine-bottles which he uses for his experiments."
"Where did he leave it, Valentine?"
"Why, over there, on the dresser. He must have forgotten it when he put on his overcoat, for he never parts with those bottles of his."
"It's not there, Valentine."
"Now that's a funny thing! M. Dorgeroux hasn't been back, I know."
"And has no one else been?"
"No. Yes, there has, though; a gentleman, a gentleman who came for Mlle. Bérangère a little while after."