hment of the crime
and left the chateau directly it was accomplished. What should you say,
sir, of a criminal completing his deed, then hurrying over the couple of
miles that separate Beaulieu from the railway, and catching a passing
train, and on his way climbing the embankment at the spot where I found
the footprints I mentioned."

"I should say," the magistrate replied, "that you can't jump into a
moving train as you can into a passing tram, and further, that at night
none but express trains run between Brives and Cahors."

"All right," said Juve: "I will merely point out that owing to the work
on the line at present, all trains have stopped at the beginning of the
tunnel for the last two months. If the murderer had planned to escape in
that way he might very well have been aware of this regular stoppage."

The magistrates confidence was a little shaken by these new deductions
on the part of the detective, but he submitted yet another objection.

"We have not found any traces round about the chateau."

"Strictly speaking, no, we have not," Juve admitted; "but it is clear
that if the murderer walked on the grass, and he probably did so, he
walked on it during the night, that is to say, before the morning dew.
Now everybody knows that when the dew rises in the early morning, grass
that has been bent down by any passing man or animal, stands up again in
its original position, thereby destroying all traces; so if the murderer
did walk on the lawn when he was getting away, nobody could tell that he
had done so. Nevertheless, on the lawn in front of the window of the
room where the murder was committed I have observed, not exactly
footprints, but signs that the earth has been disturbed at that spot. I
imagine that if I were to jump out of a first floor window on to the
soft surface of a lawn, and wanted to efface the marks of my boots, I
should smooth the earth and the grass around them in just the same way
that the little piece of lawn I speak of seems to have been smoothed."

"I should like to have a look at that," said M. de Presles.

"Well, there's no difficulty about it," Juve replied. "Come along."

The two men hurried down the staircase and out of the house. When they
reached the patch of grass which the inspector said had been "made up,"
they crouched down and scrutinised it closely. Just by the side of the
grass, even overhanging it a little, a large rhubarb plant outspread its
thick, dentelated leaves almo