“Why do you persist in lying?” cried Monsieur de Marquet, turning to the concierges. “Do you think the police are the fools you are? Everything points to the fact that you were out of doors and near the pavilion at the time of the tragedy. What were you doing there? So far as I am concerned,” he said, turning to Monsieur Stangerson, “I can only explain the escape of the murderer on the assumption of help from these two accomplices. As soon as the door was forced open, and while you, Monsieur Stangerson, were occupied with your unfortunate child, the concierge and his wife facilitated the flight of the murderer, who, screening himself behind them, reached the window in the vestibule, and sprang out of it into the park. The concierge closed the window after him and fastened the blinds, which certainly could not have closed and fastened of themselves. That is the conclusion I have arrived at. If anyone here has any other idea, let him state it.” Monsieur Stangerson intervened:— “What you say was impossible. I do not believe either in the guilt or in the connivance of my concierges, though I cannot understand what they were doing in the park at that late hour of the night. I say it was impossible, because Madame Bernier held the lamp and did not move from the threshold of the room; because I, as soon as the door was forced open, threw myself on my knees beside my daughter, and no one could have left or entered the room by the door, without passing over her body and forcing his way by me! Daddy Jacques and the concierge had but to cast a glance round the chamber and under the bed, as I had done on entering, to see that there was nobody in it but my daughter lying on the floor.” “What do you think, Monsieur Darzac?” asked the magistrate. Monsieur Darzac replied that he had no opinion to express. Monsieur Dax, the Chief of the Sûreté, who, so far, had been listening and examining the room, at length deigned to open his lips:— “While search is being made for the criminal, we had better try to find out the motive for the crime; that will advance us a little,” he said. Turning towards Monsieur Stangerson, he continued, in the even, intelligent tone indicative of a strong character, “I understand that Mademoiselle was shortly to have been married?” The professor looked sadly at Monsieur Robert Darzac. “With my friend here, whom I should have been happy to call my son—with Monsieur Robert Darzac.” “Mademoiselle Stangerson is much better and is rapidly recovering from her wounds. The marriage is simply delayed, is it not, Monsieur?” insisted the Chief of the Sûreté. “I hope so.” “What! Is there any doubt about that?” Monsieur Stangerson did not answer. Monsieur Robert Darzac seemed agitated. I saw that his hand trembled as it fingered his watch-chain. Monsieur Dax coughed, as did Monsieur de Marquet. Both were evidently embarrassed.