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The Gray Wolf carefully adjusts the climbers on his feet and descends the spire. Tictocq takes out his notebook and writes in it. "At last," he says, "I have a clue." Monsieur le Compte Carnaignole Cusheau, once known as the Gray Wolf, stands in the magnificent drawing-room of his palace on East 47th Street.
"Come to this room to-morrow afternoon at 6 o'clock with the landlord, the Populist Candidate, and any other witnesses elected from both parties, and I will return the socks." "Bien, Monsieur; schlafen sie wohl." "Au revoir." The Chairman of the Democratic Executive Committee, Platform No.2, bowed courteously and withdrew. Tictocq sent for the bell boy. "Did you go to room 76 last night?"
"I saw you do it, and your own confession on the spire of Notadam." The Count laughed and took a paper from his pocket. "Read this," he said, "here is proof that Marie Cusheau died of heart failure." Tictocq looked at the paper. It was a check for 100,000 francs. Tictocq dismissed the gensd'arme with a wave of his hand.
As he stands with reeking hands above the corpse, amid a deep silence, the old, gray-bearded man who has been watching the scene springs forward, tears off his false beard and locks, and Tictocq, the famous French detective, stands before them. Spellbound and immovable, the denizens of the cellar gaze at the greatest modern detective as he goes about the customary duties of his office.
Twenty minutes later a dark and muffled figure was seen to emerge from a recess in the mullioned wall of the Arc de Triomphe and pass rapidly northward. It was no other than Tictocq, the detective. The network of evidence was fast being drawn about the murderer of Marie Cusheau. It is midnight on the steeple of the Cathedral of Notadam.
Last Wednesday afternoon a well-dressed gentleman knocked at the door of Tictocq's room in the hotel. The detective opened the door. "Monsieur Tictocq, I believe," said the gentleman. "You will see on the register that I sign my name Q. X. Jones," said Tictocq, "and gentlemen would understand that I wish to be known as such.
Three days after his confession to Tictocq, he happened to look in the pockets of a discarded pair of pants and found twenty million francs in gold. Suddenly the door opens and Tictocq, the detective, with a dozen gensd'arme, enters the room. "You are my prisoner," says the detective. "On what charge?" "The murder of Marie Cusheau on the night of August 17th." "Your proofs?"
While Tictocq is watching with lynx-like eyes the hill of Montmartre, he suddenly hears a heavy breathing beside him, and turning, gazes into the ferocious eyes of the Gray Wolf. Carnaignole Cusheau had put on his W. U. Tel. Co. climbers and climbed the steeple. "Parbleu, monsieur," says Tictocq. "To whom am I indebted for the honor of this visit?" The Gray Wolf smiled softly and depreciatingly.
The Populists turn their backs. "The damage is already done," they said. "The people have heard the story. You have yet time to withdraw decently before the race." All left the room except Tictocq and the Democrats. "Let's all go down and open a bottle of fizz on the Finance Committee," said the Chairman of the Executive Committee, Platform No. 2. Or The Mystery of the Rue de Peychaud
Old Francois Beongfallong, the great astronomer, who is studying the sidereal spheres from his attic window in the Rue de Bologny, shudders as he turns his telescope upon the solitary figure upon the spire. "Sacre Bleu!" he hisses between his new celluloid teeth. "It is Tictocq, the detective. I wonder whom he is following now?"
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