"Why, de Grandin," I exclaimed, grasping his small sinewy hand, "fancy meeting you this way! I called at the École de Médecine the day after I arrived, but they told mo you were off on one of your wild goose chases and only heaven knew when you'd be back."
He tweaked the points of his mustache alternately as he answered with another grin. "But of course! Those dull-witted ones would term my researches in the domain of inexact science a wild goose hunt. Pardieu! They have no vision beyond their test tubes and retorts, those ones."
"What is it this time?" I asked as we caught step. "A criminal investigation or a ghost-breaking expedition?"
"Morbleu!" he answered with a chuckle; "I think, perhaps, it is a little of both. Listen, my friend, do you know the country about Rouen?"
"Not I," I replied. "This is my first trip to France, and I've been here only three days."
"Ah, yes," he returned, "your ignorance of our geography is truly deplorable; but it can be remedied. Have you an inflexible program mapped out?"
"No. This is my first vacation in ten years, and I've made no plans, except to get as far away from medicine as possible."
"Good!" he applauded. "I can promise yon a complete change from your American practise, my friend, such a change as will banish all thoughts of patients, pills and prescriptions entirely from your head. Will you join me?"
"Hm, that depends," I temporized. "What sort of case are you working on?" Discretion was the better part of acceptance when talking with Jules de Grandin, I knew. Educated for the profession of medicine. one of the foremost anatomists and physiologists of his generation, and a shining light in the University of Paris faculty, this restless, energetic little scientist had chosen criminology and occult investigation as a recreation from his vocational work, and had gained almost as much fame in these activities as he had in the medical world. During the war he had been a prominent, though necessarily anonymous, member of the Allied Intelligence Service, since the Armistice he had penetrated nearly every quarter of the globe on special missions for the French Ministry of Justice. It behooved me to move cautiously when he invited me to share an exploit with him; the trail might lead to India, Greenland or Tierra del Fuego before the case was closed.
"Eh bien," he laughed. "You are ever the old cautious one, Friend Trowbridge. Never will you commit yourself until you have seen blue-prints and specifications of the enterprize. Very well, then, listen:
"Near Rouen stands the very ancient château of the de Broussac family. Parts of it were built as early as the Eleventh Century, none of it is less than two hundred years old. The family has dwindled steadily in wealth and importance until the last two generations have been reduced to living on the income derived from renting the chateau to wealthy foreigners.
"A common story, n'est-ce-pas? Very well, wait, comes now the uncommon part: Within the past year the Château Broussac has had no less than six tenants; no renter has remained in possession for more than two months, and each tenancy has terminated in a tragedy of some sort.
"Stories of this kind get about; houses acquire unsavory reputations, even as people do, and tenants are becoming hard to find for the château. Monsieur Bergeret, the de
