the car had followed that particular
road on the previous night?

They examined every yard of the ground, they questioned everybody. At
last, they succeeded in learning that, on the Saturday evening, a
limousine had stopped outside a grocer's shop in a small town situated
about two hundred miles from Saint-Nicolas, on a highway branching out
of the national road. The driver had first filled his tank, bought some
spare cans of petrol and lastly taken away a small stock of provisions:
a ham, fruit, biscuits, wine and a half-bottle of Three Star brandy.

There was a lady on the driver's seat. She did not get down. The blinds
of the limousine were drawn. One of these blinds was seen to move
several times. The shopman was positive that there was somebody inside.

Presuming the shopman's evidence to be correct, then the problem became
even more complicated, for, so far, no clue had revealed the presence of
a third person.

Meanwhile, as the travellers had supplied themselves with provisions, it
remained to be discovered what they had done with them and what had
become of the remains.

The detectives retraced their steps. It was not until they came to the
fork of the two roads, at a spot eleven or twelve miles from
Saint-Nicolas, that they met a shepherd who, in answer to their
questions, directed them to a neighbouring field, hidden from view
behind the screen of bushes, where he had seen an empty bottle and other
things.

The detectives were convinced at the first examination. The motor-car
had stopped there; and the unknown travellers, probably after a night's
rest in their car, had breakfasted and resumed their journey in the
course of the morning.

One unmistakable proof was the half-bottle of Three Star brandy sold by
the grocer. This bottle had its neck broken clean off with a stone. The
stone employed for the purpose was picked up, as was the neck of the
bottle, with its cork, covered with a tin-foil seal. The seal showed
marks of attempts that had been made to uncork the bottle in the
ordinary manner.

The detectives continued their search and followed a ditch that ran
along the field at right angles to the road. It ended in a little
spring, hidden under brambles, which seemed to emit an offensive smell.
On lifting the brambles, they perceived a corpse, the corpse of a man
whose head had been smashed in, so that it formed little more than a
sort of pulp, swarming with vermin. The body was dressed in jacket