Remember this date, it is highly
important. I am now going to tell you about that curious phrase.
On the evening before the crime, that is to say, on the 23rd,
Monsieur and Mademoiselle Stangerson were at a reception at the
Elysee. I know that, because I was there on duty, having to
interview one of the savants of the Academy of Philadelphia, who
was being feted there. I had never before seen either Monsieur or
Mademoiselle Stangerson. I was seated in the room which precedes
the Salon des Ambassadeurs, and, tired of being jostled by so many
noble personages, I had fallen into a vague reverie, when I scented
near me the perfume of the lady in black.
"Do you ask me what is the 'perfume of the lady in black'? It must
suffice for you to know that it is a perfume of which I am very fond,
because it was that of a lady who had been very kind to me in my
childhood,--a lady whom I had always seen dressed in black. The
lady who, that evening, was scented with the perfume of the lady in
black, was dressed in white. She was wonderfully beautiful.
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