"
"Bah!--explain yourself, please."
"How can you explain the dog's faculty of scent?"
Gevrol shrugged his shoulders. "In short," he replied, "you scent a
melodrama here--a rendezvous of gentlemen in disguise, here at the
Poivriere, at Mother Chupin's house. Well, hunt after the mystery, my
boy; search all you like, you have my permission."
"What! you will allow me?"
"I not only allow you, I order you to do it. You are going to remain
here with any one of your comrades you may select. And if you find
anything that I have not seen, I will allow you to buy me a pair of
spectacles."
II
The young police agent to whom Gevrol abandoned what he thought an
unnecessary investigation was a debutant in his profession. His name
was Lecoq. He was some twenty-five or twenty-six years of age, almost
beardless, very pale, with red lips, and an abundance of wavy black
hair. He was rather short but well proportioned; and each of his
movements betrayed unusual energy. There was nothing remarkable about
his appearance, if we except his eyes, which sparkled brilliantly or
grew extremely dull, according to his mood; and his nose, the large full
nostrils of which had a surprising mobility.
The son of a respectable, well-to-do Norman family, Lecoq had received
a good and solid education. He was prosecuting his law studies in Paris,
when in the same week, blow following blow, he learned that his father
had died, financially ruined, and that his mother had survived him only
a few hours.
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