Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1890-03-15

OF Duverdier Florestan could learn nothing
further. He lived on fourth floor in a street
near the Pantheon and he dabbled in expert
ments in chemistry and electricity. but in
spite OF these scientific tastes he was said to be
an idler and pretender who had never
brought the smallest scheme to a successful re-
suit
"A man Of schemes and Dreams" said
florestan's informant; IAN idle vagabond who
Is content to live upon women"
AN idle vagabond who is content to live
upon women" Musing over those words as he
walked under the trees i'll the Champs Elysees
on his way homeward after a night at Bohe-
milan club in the Boulevard Michel Florestan
was suddenly reminded of the story Of An
toinette Morel and her brother and the hun
dred-pound note.
Claude Morel, a chemists assistant. alone in
PARIS with an only sister, whose heart was
almost broken by the loss Of her English
lover.
Louise Marcel. a women who in every look
and accent bore the tokens of great sorrow,
might, allowing for the effect of grief and ILL
ness, be the age of Antoinette Morel, who
would now be about thirty.
What if he had stumbled accidentally upon
the very couple of whom he was in quest!
What if Leon Duverdier and Louis Marcel were
Claude Morel and his sister Antoinette hiding
under changed names? The very fact of the
altered names would be significant Of evil and
would give rise to the darkest suspicion.
known to have escaped arrest and to have fed
to London with his sister after the last days of
the commune, and it was within the close of
the commune that Robert Hatrell was muir
dered by an unknown foreigner in London
lodging house.
There was that in the countenance and man.
ner of Louise Marcel which told of more har-
rowing grief than an ordinary love affair which
had ended in parting. She had the aspect of
one over whose youth there had passed some
great horror. a grief too terrible to be out
lived or forgotten. Those premature gray
hairs the deep lines upon the pallid forehead,
the sunken cheeks and haggard eyes. were the
lasting witness of an undying agony. and her
horror of Duverdier had been expressed in an
manner on the night when Flor
estan saw her start up and leave the room at
his entrance.
He remembered her extraordinary emotion
upon hearing Miss Hatrells name at the opera.
the keen interest with which she had looked
at mother and daughter.
He had forgotten the incident until this mo-
ment, engrossed in far different thoughts but
1t came back TO him vividly tonight and for
the moment it seemed to him conclusive evil
dence of some past and strong link between
Louise Marcel and the name of Hatrell.
Yet. he reflected presently, the association
might be of another nature than that which he
imagined. The fact that Duverdier was an ad-
venturer and a student of chemistry might
have no bearing upon the existence of Claude
Morel, the chemists assistant. The idea that
Louise Marcel and Leon Duverdier were
brother and sister might be utterly without
foundation.
AT any rate will try to put my suspicious
to the test" he said to himself. IF Louise
Marcel is the emotional woman L take her to
be it will be easy to shake her firmness and to
see behind the veil.'
He determined to make an early opportunity
of being alone with the strange. pale woman,
whose untold sorrow had touched him from
their first meeting. He was haunted all
through a wakeful night with shapes of horror
the phantasm picture of the murder in the
shabby Bloomsbury lodging; the face of Leon
cruel and callous, i'll the very act of
the face of Robert Hatreli. which he
in his boyhood-frank, open, at
tractive.
1t was a mere chimera, doubtless, this wild
fancy about Leon Duverdier. a nightmare
dream engendered out of the small social mys-
terry OF the Rue st. Guillaume-a very common
story, after all, common as dirt. A wicked
mother; a beautiful girl sold like a slave in an
Eastern market; wealth, luxury, infamy, ennui
and vexatiOn jumbled together in two shame
full lives that did well to hide their iufamy from
the worlds ken. He had brooded too long
over this commonplace domestic drama and
now he must needs try to establish link be-
tween these three women and the murder III
Denmark street.
Foolish the fancy might be he meant to
test 1t to the uttermost, and for this purpose
went to the chief Office of the criminal police
OF Paris early next morning and contrived to
get admitted to one Of the heads of the depart
ment