"What I can't understand, sir," said Michel, "is the telephone call we got toward morning from here asking for help at the office in the Rue Rochefoucauld. Either the victim herself 'phoned, and in that case she did not die, as we think, in the early part of the night, or it was not she, and then——"
Juve smiled.
"You are right in putting the problem that way, but to my mind it is easy to solve. The call was not given by the murdered woman for, remember, when we raised the body at half-past six it was already cold. Now the call was not given till six, when the woman had been dead some little time. That I am sure of, and you will see the report of the medical expert will uphold me."
"Then it was a third person who gave it?"
"Yes, and one who sought to have the crime discovered as soon as possible, and who reckoned on the officers coming from the Central Station, but did not expect Fandor or me to come back."
"Then according to you, sir, the murderer knew of your presence behind the curtain in the study while the crime was being committed."
"I can't tell about the murderer, but Doctor Chaleck certainly knew we were there. That man must have watched us all night, known the exact instant we left the house, and immediately afterwards got some one to telephone or must have done so himself."
Michel, becoming more and more convinced by Juve's reasoning, went on:
"At any rate, the existence of two studies, in all respects similar, goes to show a carefully premeditated plan, but there is something I can't account for. When you came back to the study where we found the dead woman, you found traces of mud by the window brought in by your shoes. You must therefore have been watching through the night the room where the crime was committed."
Juve was about to put in a word, but Michel, launched on his train of argument, continued: