"Do you not know that at his preliminary examination your brother declared that he had not received a single visitor during the evening preceding the tragedy? How then do you explain the fact that the Baroness de Vibray was found dead in his studio, and at his side, when no one had seen her enter it? Did your brother make a mistake? Please tell me what you think about it!"
Elizabeth gazed anxiously at the young journalist, then fixed her eyes on the floor. Her hands twitched; she began to twist her fingers feverishly:
"Do trust me!" begged Jérôme Fandor. "Please tell me what you think!"
Elizabeth rose, took several steps, and placed herself in front of the journalist:
"Ah, monsieur, there is something mysterious, which I cannot explain! As a matter of fact, someone must have come to see my brother that evening: I cannot assert it as a fact beyond dispute certainly: but in my own mind I feel quite sure about it."
"But you must have more proof of it than that?" cried Fandor.
"But—there is more!" cried Elizabeth, as if enlightened by a sudden discovery: "There is a fact!..."
"Tell me, do!" cried Fandor, intensely interested.
"Well, just imagine, then! Among the papers scattered over his table, and close to his book, which was open, I noticed a sort of list of names and addresses, written on our own note-paper, and in the kind of green ink we use—so—well ..."
"So," interrupted the journalist, "you came to the conclusion that this list had been written at your brother's house?"