“You have searched his luggage and his rooms, times without number.”

“And found nothing; nothing that I might use effectively.  But there is this saving grace; he on his side knows nothing.”

“I would I were sure of that also.  Eh, well; I leave the affair in your hands, and they are capable ones.  When the time comes, act, act upon your own initiative.  In this matter we shall give no accounting to Germany.”

“No, because what I do must be done secretly.  It will not matter that Germany also knows and waits.  But this is true; if we do not circumvent him, she will make use of whatever he does.”

“It has its whimsical side.  Here is a man who may some day blow up France, and yet we can put no hand on him till he throws the bomb.”

“But there is always time to stop the flight of the bomb.  That shall be my concern; that is, if monsieur is not becoming discouraged and desires me to occupy myself with other things.  I repeat:  I have rheumatism, I apprehend the damp.  He will go to America.”

“Ah!  It would be a very good plan if he remained there.”

The little man did not reply.

“But you say in your reports that you have seen him going about with some of the Orleanists.  What is your inference there?”

“I have not yet formed one.  It is a bit of a riddle there, for the crow and the eagle do not fly together.”

“Well, follow him to America.”

“Thanks.  The pay is good and the work is congenial.”  The tone of the little man was softly given to irony.

Gray-haired, rosy-cheeked, a face smooth as a boy’s, twinkling eyes behind spectacles, he was one of the most astute, learned, and patient of the French secret police.  And he did not care the flip of his strong brown fingers for the methods of Vidocq or Lecoq.  His only disguise was that not one of the criminal police of the world knew him or had ever heard of him; and save his chief and three ministers of war—­for French cabinets are given to change—­his own immediate friends knew him as a butterfly hunter, a searcher for beetles and scarabs, who, indeed, was one of the first authorities in France on the subjects:  Anatole Ferraud, who went about, hither and thither, with a little red button in his buttonhole and a tongue facile in a dozen languages.

“Very well, monsieur.  I trust that in the near future I may bring you good news.”

“He will become nothing or the most desperate man in Europe.”

“Admitted.”

“He is a scholar, too.”

“All the more interesting.”

“As a student in Munich he has fought his three duels.  He has been a war correspondent under fire.  He is a great fencer, a fine shot, a daring rider.”

“And penniless.  What a country they have over there beyond the Rhine!  He would never have troubled his head about it, had they not harried him.  To stir up France, to wound her if possible!  He will be a man of great courage and resource,” said the secret agent, drawing the palms of his hands together.