"Come, my lad," said the famous detective, "tell me what has set you against Gaspard."
"He's going to skip."
"Is that so? Well, this is serious."
"It's a fact. I got it from one of the men in the restaurant. My man was told of it by Corbut."
"Corbut?"
"Yes; and there's another suspicious circumstance. There's a Frenchwoman who is going to give little old New York the shake at the same time as Gaspard. They're going back to sunny France together.
"Now, nobody knows this but the man I talked with. Gaspard thinks that Corbut was the only one who knew it.
"So it was for Gaspard's interest, in case he really did this job, and lifted some valuable plunder off that woman, to get Corbut out of the way.
"Did he pay Corbut to skip first? And is he now identifying Tom, Dick and Harry for the purpose of bothering us and keeping us busy till he can light out?"
"It's worth looking into," said Nick. "At any rate, you stick to Gaspard. I'll put somebody else onto Hammond."