Floriot half-rose. His face had paled slightly and his manner was nervous.
"My time is limited!" he broke in, abruptly.
"I beg your pardon, monsieur! I beg your pardon!"
And four fat hands motioned him back to his seat.
"I will be brief!" M. Perissard assured him. "Your marriage was not altogether as happy as it might have been, and one day you had a violent scene. You turned out of your house the lady who had the honor of bearing your name!"
"How do you know this? Who told you?" demanded Floriot. His voice was low and menacing.
"Ah, it is true, then!" exclaimed M. Perissard. The other gave no sign and Perissard took the silence as an assent.
"Very good! After this incident," he continued, hastily. "Madame Floriot traveled. She traveled very far and was more or less--happy. More or less!"
Floriot sprang up, white-faced and trembling.
"She is dead!" he cried. "You have come to tell me she is dead!"
M. Perissard smiled cunningly. He could appreciate good acting.
"_Most_ certainly!" thundered M. Merivel.
"And where is she? In Paris! In France! Where?" cried Floriot, almost too excited for coherency.
M. Perissard was beginning to be really puzzled. Was it possible that this man did not know who the woman of the Three Crowns was? Was it possible that he had not arranged the whole defense?
"Do you really mean that you don't know where your wife is now?" he demanded.
"No! No! But you've come to tell me, haven't you?" He was feverishly eager. He walked up and down before them with quick nervous strides? and looked from one to the other with burning eyes.
"This is really most extraordinary!" declared M. Perissard. "I should have thought with all your means of getting information----"
"I have never heard from her or of her since the day she disappeared!"
"Never?" insisted the other, wonderingly.
"Extraordinary! Isn't it?" M. Perissard appealed to his partner.
"_Most_ extraordinary!" was the prompt response.
Floriot was fairly dancing with excitement and impatience.
"You know where she is and where I can see her?" he demanded.
M. Perissard stroked his chin a moment. All this excitement indicated excellent opportunities for financial advancement and he did not want to spoil anything through unwary haste.