At The Villa Rose

They followed the road between the bushes until a turn showed them

the garage with its doors open.

"The doors were found unlocked?"

"Just as you see them."

Hanaud nodded. He spoke again to Servettaz. "What did you do with

the key on Tuesday?"

"I gave it to Helene Vauquier, monsieur, after I had locked up the

garage. And she hung it on a nail in the kitchen."

"I see," said Hanaud. "So any one could easily, have found it last

night?"

"Yes, monsieur--if one knew where to look for it."

At the back of the garage a row of petrol-tins stood against the

brick wall.

"Was any petrol taken?" asked Hanaud.

"Yes, monsieur; there was very little petrol in the car when I

went away. More was taken, but it was taken from the middle tins--

these." And he touched the tins.

"I see," said Hanaud, and he raised his eyebrows thoughtfully. The

Commissaire moved with impatience.

"From the middle or from the end--what does it matter?" he

exclaimed. "The petrol was taken."

Hanaud, however, did not dismiss the point so lightly.

"But it is very possible that it does matter," he said gently.

"For example, if Servettaz had had no reason to examine his tins

it might have been some while before he found out that the petrol

had been taken."

"Indeed, yes," said Servettaz. "I might even have forgotten that I

had not used it myself."

"Quite so," said Hanaud, and he turned to Besnard.

"I think that may be important. I do not know," he said.

"But since the car is gone," cried Besnard, "how could the

chauffeur not look immediately at his tins?"

The question had occurred to Ricardo, and he wondered in what way

Hanaud meant to answer it. Hanaud, however, did not mean to answer

it. He took little notice of it at all. He put it aside with a

superb indifference to the opinion which his companions might form

of him.

"Ah, yes," he said, carelessly. "Since the car is gone, as you

say, that is so." And he turned again to Servettaz.

"It was a powerful car?" he asked.

"Sixty horse-power," said Servettaz.

Hanaud turned to the Commissaire.

"You have the number and description, I suppose? It will be as

well to advertise for it. It may have been seen; it must be

somewhere."

The Commissaire replied that the description had already been

printed, and Hanaud, with a nod of approval, examined the ground.

In front of the garage there was a small stone courtyard, but on

its surface there was no trace of a footstep.

"Yet the gravel was wet," he said, shaking his head. "The man who

fetched that car fetched it carefully."

He turned and walked back with his eyes upon the ground. Then he

ran to the grass border between the gravel and the bushes.