the drawing-room, the veranda, the garden and the entrance lodge at
the gate. In the veranda the man in the maroon frock-coat trimmed
with false astrakhan seemed still to be asleep on the sofa; in one
of the corners of the drawing-room another individual, silent and
motionless as a statue, dressed exactly the same, in a maroon
frock-coat with false astrakhan, stood with his hands behind his
back seemingly struck with general paralysis at the sight of a
flaring sunset which illumined as with a torch the golden spires of
Saints Peter and Paul. And in the garden and before the lodge
three others dressed in maroon roved like souls in pain over the
lawn or back and forth at the entrance. Rouletabille motioned to
Madame Matrena, stepped back into the sitting-room and closed the
door.

"Police?" he asked.

Matrena Petrovna nodded her head and put her finger to her mouth
in a naive way, as one would caution a child to silence.
Rouletabille smiled.

"How many are there?"

"Ten, relieved every six hours."

"That makes forty unknown men around your house each day."

"Not unknown," she replied. "Police."

"Yet, in spite of them, you have had the affair of the bouquet in
the general's chamber."