But at that moment, careful though he had been, the down swelled up within the cushion, the folds and indentations disappeared, the silk covering was stretched smooth.
"Oh!" cried Besnard tragically.

"What have you done ?" Hanaud's face flushed.

He had been guilty of a clumsiness--even he.
Mr.Ricardo took up the tale.
"Yes," he exclaimed, "what have you done ?" Hanaud looked at Ricardo in amazement at his audacity.
"Well, what have I done ?" he asked.

"Come! tell me!" "You have destroyed a clue," replied Ricardo impressively.
The deepest dejection at once overspread Hanaud's burly face.
"Don't say that, M.Ricardo, I beseech you!" he implored.

"A clue! and I have destroyed it! But what kind of a clue?
And how have I destroyed it?
And to what mystery would it be a clue if I hadn't destroyed it?
And what will become of me when I go back to Paris, and say in the Rue de Jerusalem, 'Let me sweep the cellars, my good friends, for M.
Ricardo knows that I destroyed a clue.