Claude."...
Dr. Cumberly bent yet lower, watching the speaker's face.
"A murder!" he whispered.
"I do not say so," replied Max, "but it certainly might have been. The
case then must, indeed, have ended miserably, as far as I was concerned,
if I had not chanced upon a letter which the otherwise prudent Madame
Jean had forgotten to destroy. Triomphe! It was a letter of instruction,
and definitely it proved that she was no more than a kind of glorified
concierge, and that the chief of the opium group was in London."
"Undoubtedly in London. There was no address on the letter, and no date,
and it was curiously signed: Mr. King."
"Mr. King!"
Dr. Cumberly rose slowly from his chair, and took a step toward M. Max.
"You are interested?" said the detective, and shrugged his shoulders,
whilst his mobile mouth shaped itself in a grim smile. "Pardieu! I
knew you would be! Acting upon another clue which the letter--priceless
letter--contained, I visited the Credit Lyonnais. I discovered that an
account had been opened there by Mr. Henry Leroux of London on behalf of
his wife, Mira Leroux, to the amount of a thousand pounds."
"A thousand pounds--really!" cried Dr. Cumberly, drawing his heavy brows
together--"as much as that?"
"Certainly.
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