That he had wounded him was plainly evident. Therefore, in satisfaction, the two men stood and watched to see the fugitive rise again. But they watched in vain. If he did rise, it was beneath the great bridge, where the dark shadow obscured him, for it was not yet daylight. Ralph Ansell, alias "The American," and alias half-a-dozen other names, known in criminal circles in Paris, London, and New York, sank in the swift, muddy Seine flood--and disappeared. CHAPTER XIII. SISTERS IN SILENCE. Just before eleven o'clock on the following morning two sisters of the Order of Saint Agnes, one of the religious Orders which devote themselves to nursing the poor, were passing through the Tuileries Gardens, sombre figures in their ample plain, black habits, black head-dresses, and deep, white collars, their hands beneath their gowns and gaze downturned, when one of them chanced to note the frail, pathetic little figure of a woman resting upon one of the seats. It was Jean Ansell. Worn and weary after hours of aimless wandering, she had entered those gardens so beloved of Parisian _bonnes_ and children, and sunk down upon that seat just within the high railings skirting the busy Rue de Rivoli, and had then burst into bitter tears. Her young heart was broken. Within sound of the hum of the never-ceasing motor traffic, up and down that fine, straight street of colonnades to the great Place de la Concorde, where the fountains were playing, the stream of everyday life of the Gay City had passed her by. None cared--none, indeed, heed a woman's tears. Men glanced at her and shrugged their shoulders, and the women who went by only grinned. Her troubles were no concern of theirs. Hatless, with only an old black shawl about her, and with her apron still on, she found herself hungry, homeless, and abandoned. Moreover, she was the wedded wife of a dangerous criminal! Those who passed her by little dreamed of the strange tragedy that was hers, of the incidents of the past night, of the burglary, the betrayal, the arrest, the flight, and the crowning tragedy. Indeed, she herself sat in ignorance of what had happened to the pair after they had left the house. She was only wondering whether Ralph had found her note, and whether on reading it, he had experienced any pang of regret. She was only an encumbrance. He had bluntly told her so. And as she again burst into tears, for the twentieth time in the half-hour she had rested upon that seat, the two grave-faced sisters noticed her. Then, after discussing her at a distance, they ventured to approach. She was sitting in blank despair, her elbow upon the arm of the seat, her head bent, her hand upon her brow, her whole frame convulsed by sobs. "Sister, you are in trouble," exclaimed the elder of the two thin-faced, ascetic-looking women, addressing her as she placed a hand tenderly upon her shoulder. "Can we be of any assistance?"