Through the Wall

The details of the hours that followed remained blurred memories in the minds of Alice and her rescuer. There was, first, a period of utter blank when Coquenil, overcome by the...

The night was black and rain was falling in torrents as Paul Coquenil and the commissary rolled away in response to this startling summons of crime. Up the Rue Mozart they sped...

The wheels of justice move swiftly in Paris, and after one quiet day, during which Judge Hauteville was drawing together the threads of the mystery, Kittredge found himself, on...

It is worthy of note that the most remarkable criminal case in which the famous French detective, Paul Coquenil, was ever engaged, a case of more baffling mystery than the Palai...

Coquenil kept his appointment that night at the Three Wise Men and found Papa Tignol waiting for him, his face troubled even to the tip of his luminous purple nose. In vain the...

Passing down the wide staircase, strangely silent now, they entered a long narrow passageway leading to a remote wing of the Palais de Justice. First went the guard with Groener...

It was not until after vespers that Alice was able to leave Notre-Dame and start for the Villa Montmorency--in fact, it was nearly five when, with mingled feelings of confidence...

"There's a peculiarity about those marks, Groener. The little finger of the hand that made them is abnormally, extraordinarily long. Experts say that in a hundred thousand hands...

"Yes, yes?" questioned M. Paul eagerly. "Tell me about my mother. Is she well? Is she worried? Did you give her all my messages? Have you a letter for me?"

After leaving Notre-Dame, Paul Coquenil directed his steps toward the prefecture of police, but halfway across the square he glanced back at the church clock that shows its whit...

"I've been _so_ frightened," she trembled. "The man said you wanted me and I came at once, but, in the automobile, I felt something was wrong and--you know _he_ is outside?" Her...

Two hours later (it was nearly seven) Judge Hauteville sat in his office at the Palais de Justice, hurrying through a meal that had been brought in from a restaurant.

It was a distressed and sleepless night that Alice passed after the torturing scene of her lover's arrest. She would almost have preferred her haunting dreams to this pitiful re...

In accordance with orders, Papa Tignol appeared at the Villa Montmorency betimes the next morning. It was a perfect summer's day and the old man's heart was light as he walked u...

It was a quarter past four, and still night, when Coquenil left the Hôtel des Étrangers; he wore a soft black hat pulled down over his eyes, and a shabby black coat turned up ar...

Kittredge was fortunate in having a sense of humor, it helped him through the horrors of his first night at the depot, which he passed with the scum of Paris streets, thieves, b...

A detective, like an actor or a soldier, must go on fighting and playing his part, regardless of personal feelings. Sorrow brings him no reprieve from duty, so the next morning...

"Yes, but afterwards I changed my mind. My husband had nothing to do with it. If he had, do you suppose I would have told you this? No doubt he has misconducted himself, but----"

When Kittredge, with cloak and bag, stepped into his waiting cab and, for the second time on this villainous night, started down the Champs Elysées he was under no illusion as t...

It was nearly four o'clock when Coquenil left the Ansonia and started up the Champs Elysées, breathing deep of the early morning air. The night was still dark, although day was...

What had happened was very simple. The confessional box from which Alice had vanished was one not in use at the moment, owing to repairs in the wall behind it. These repairs had...

The next day all Paris buzzed and wondered about this Ansonia affair, as it was called. The newspapers printed long accounts of it with elaborate details, and various conjecture...

It was a long night at the Ansonia and a hard night for M. Gritz. France is a land of infinite red tape where even such simple things as getting born or getting married lead to...

Coquenil came back to consciousness his first thought was that the adventure had brought him no pain; he moved his arms and legs and discovered no injury, then he reached out a...

Coquenil's examination of the pistol showed that it was a weapon of good make and that only a single shot had been fired from it; also that this shot had been fired within a few...

One of the great lessons Coquenil had learned in his long experience with mysterious crimes was to be careful of hastily rejecting any evidence because it conflicted with some p...

Coquenil's effort during the next month might be set forth in great detail. It may also be told briefly, which is better, since the result rather than the means is of moment.

A great detective must have infinite patience. That is, the quality next to imagination that will serve him best. Indeed, without patience, his imagination will serve him but in...

Coquenil was neither surprised nor disappointed at the meager results of Alice's visit to the prison. This was merely one move in the game, and it had not been entirely vain, si...

Right across from the Ansonia on the Rue Marboeuf was a little wine shop that remained open all night for the accommodation of cab drivers and belated pedestrians and to this Co...