In the nature of the case—a woman making a hurried flight from the attentions of the police—he thought it more than likely that the journey would have been to some distant place. While a very clever fugitive might recognise that a change to another part of London was perhaps his safest policy, the mentality of the average criminal leaned towards putting as many miles as possible between himself and the scene of his crime. It was by no means a sound deduction, but in the absence of anything better, he thought the main line trains should be first considered. He looked up the tables and was struck at once by the fact that an important express left at 5.00 p.m. It called at Nottingham, Chesterfield, Sheffield, and Leeds, and there were connections to Harrogate, Bradford, Morecambe, and Heysham for the Belfast boat. But any one of these places might be the starting-point of some further journey, and unless he got a lead of some kind it was quite hopeless to try to follow the traveller. Besides, she might not have gone by this train. There was a 5.5 stopping train to Northampton, a 5.35 to Nottingham, stopping at a number of intermediate places, and a 6.15 express to the north, not to mention local trains. No, he did not see that much was to be gained from the time-tables. He made what inquiries he could at the station, exhibiting the lady’s photograph to officials who were on duty when the trains in question were starting. It was, of course, a forlorn hope, and he was not greatly disappointed when it led to nothing. As another forlorn hope, he wired to the police at Nottingham, Chesterfield, Sheffield, Leeds, Harrogate, Bradford, Morecambe, Heysham, and Belfast, saying that the woman referred to in page four of the previous week’s _Bulletin_ was believed to have gone to their respective towns, and urging that a vigilant lookout be kept for her. French once more felt baffled. Again in this exasperating case he was left at a loose end. The information he gained always seemed to fail him at the critical moment. In something very like desperation he sat down that evening at his desk and spent a couple of hours going through his notes of the case, wondering if by any chance he could find some further clue which he had hitherto overlooked. After careful thought, he decided that there was still one line of research unexplored—an unpromising line, doubtless, but still a line. That list of dealings on the Stock Exchange: could anything be made of that? Would, for example, the secretaries of the various firms be able to tell him who had carried out the transactions in question? If so, it should lead to Mrs. Vane or to some one who knew her intimately. He was not hopeful of the result, but he decided that if next day he had no other news he would look into it. CHAPTER XVII A DEAL IN STOCKS