“Well, Mr. Yelverton. I’ve only told you exactly what Harold told me. He added the words: ‘After all, poor Stanley’s death will prevent a good deal leaking out. His lips are closed, and it means security to several persons.’ I wonder what he meant?”
“I wonder! He must have been in possession of some secret which closely affected certain persons,” I said. “And probably Ruthen is one of those who now feel secure.”
“Perhaps. Who knows?” the girl remarked reflectively as she crushed her cigarette-end into the ash tray and rose to leave. “At any rate, I thought you would like to know, as you seem so interested in Stanley.”
I thanked her, and left her at the corner of Chancery Lane in order to return to my office.
Saumur! I knew that it was an old-world town—the center of a wine-growing country—somewhere on the broad Loire.
I searched among my books, looked it up, and found that it was two hundred and seventy miles from Paris by the Orleans Railway, and that if I traveled by the through express, I could go direct by way of St. Pierre-des-Corps and Savonnières. I resolved to make a swift journey out there and enquire for myself.
Next morning I left London and in the afternoon of the following day I entered a small hotel, the Budan, at the end of the long stone bridge which spans the Loire at Saumur. I lost no time in making my inquiries in the old Huguenot town, famed for its sparkling wines. At the Prefecture of Police I saw the Prefect himself, a brisk little man with a stubble of white hair, most courteous and attentive.
An automobile accident, and fatal? He would have the records examined, if I would return next morning.
I dined, spent the evening in the Café de la Paix adjoining the Post Office, and next morning returned to the Prefect.
Again he received me most courteously in his barely furnished office, and when I was seated he rang his bell, whereupon an inspector in plain clothes entered with some papers in his hand.