informed me of this last evening. However, when I reached the prefecture
you had gone."

"I had some work to do."

"Yes?"

"At the station-house near the Barriere d'Italie. I wanted to know
whether the floor of the cell was paved or tiled." So saying, Lecoq paid
the score, saluted his superior officer, and went out.

"Thunder!" exclaimed Gevrol, striking his glass violently upon the
counter. "Thunder! how that fellow provokes me! He does not know the A
B C of his profession. When he can't discover anything, he invents
wonderful stories, and then misleads the magistrates with his
high-sounding phrases, in the hope of gaining promotion. I'll give him
advancement with a vengeance! I'll teach him to set himself above me!"

Lecoq had not been deceived. The evening before, he had visited the
station-house where the prisoner had first been confined, and had
compared the soil of the cell floor with the dust he had placed in
his pocket; and he carried away with him, as he believed, one of those
crushing proofs that often suffice to extort from the most obstinate
criminal a complete confession. If Lecoq was in haste to part company
with Gevrol, it was because he was anxious to pursue his investigations
still further, before appearing in M. d'Escorval's presence. He was
determined to find the cab-driver who had been stopped by the two women
in the Rue du Chevaleret; and with this object in view, he had obtained
at the prefecture the names and addresses of all the cab-owners hiring
between the road to Fontainebleau and the Seine.