What had happened? By way of what mysterious adventures had the corpse of sugar refiner Thomery reached that empty room in rue Lecourbe, where Jérôme Fandor had come across it?
Two days previous, on the afternoon of Elizabeth Dollon's arrest, Monsieur Thomery was working in his study, when a servant came to tell him that a lady wished to speak to him.
"Did she give you her name?" asked Thomery.
"No, monsieur, this person said her name would tell you nothing; but she was sure monsieur would see her, for she would only detain him a minute or two...."
Piles of papers were stacked on the great sugar refiner's study table: typists were laying numerous letters before him, which awaited his signature. Thomery thought to himself:
"I have still a good half-hour's work before me ... deuce take this importunate visitor!" He was on the point of saying he could not see any one, when the servant added:
"This person declares she comes with reference to Madame the Princess Danidoff."
Though he was a man of business, Thomery was a gallant man also; and very much in love; his approaching marriage with the Princess, which had been kept secret, was now known. The name of Princess Danidoff settled the question.
"Very well, let her come in!"
The manservant disappeared a minute, then ushered into the study a very unassuming woman of uncertain age and quite ordinary looking.