If you would care to look at
copies of them?"
He offered the duplicates tentatively. Mr. Grimm read them over slowly,
the while Monsieur Rigolot sat nervously staring at him. They, too,
seemed meaningless as bearing on the matter in hand. Finally, Mr. Grimm
nodded, and Monsieur Rigolot resumed:
"And Wednesday night, Monsieur, another strange thing happened. Monsieur
Boissegur smokes many cigarettes, of a kind made especially for him in
France, and shipped to him here. He keeps them in a case on his
dressing-table. On Thursday morning his valet reported to me that _this
case of cigarettes had disappeared_!"
"Of course," observed Mr. Grimm, "Monsieur Boissegur has a latch-key to
the embassy?"
"Of course."
"Anything unusual happen last night--that is, Thursday night?"
"Nothing, Monsieur--that is, nothing we can find."
Mr. Grimm was silent for a time and fell to twisting the seal ring on
his finger. Mr. Campbell turned around and moved a paper weight one inch
to the left, where it belonged, while Monsieur Rigolot, disappointed at
their amazing apathy, squirmed uneasily in his chair.
"It would appear, then," Mr.
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