:

"So, according to you, the wounded man was not able to escape on the
left, because your fellow-servant was watching the door, nor on the
right, because you would have seen him cross the lawn. Logically,
therefore, he is, at the present moment, in the comparatively
restricted space that lies before our eyes."

"I am sure of it."

"And you, mademoiselle?"

"Yes."

"And I, too," said Victor.

The deputy prosecutor exclaimed, with a leer:

"The field of inquiry is quite narrow. We have only to continue the
search commenced four hours ago."

"We may be more fortunate."

M. Filleul took the leather cap from the mantel, examined it and,
beckoning to the sergeant of gendarmes, whispered:

"Sergeant, send one of your men to Dieppe at once. Tell him to go to
Maigret, the hatter, in the Rue de la Barre, and ask M. Maigret to tell
him, if possible, to whom this cap was sold."

The "field of inquiry," in the deputy's phrase, was limited to the
space contained between the house, the lawn on the right and the angle
formed by the left wall and the wall opposite the house, that is to
say, a quadrilateral of about a hundred yards each way, in which the
ruins of Ambrumesy, the famous mediaeval monastery, stood out at
intervals.

They at once noticed the traces left by the fugitive in the trampled
grass. In two places, marks of blackened blood, now almost dried up,
were observed. After the turn at the end of the cloisters, there was
nothing more to be seen, as the nature of the ground, here covered with
pine-needles, did not lend itself to the imprint of a body. But, in
that case, how had the wounded man succeeded in escaping the eyes of
Raymonde, Victor and Albert? There was nothing but a few brakes, which
the servants and the gendarmes had beaten over and over again, and a
number of tombstones, under which they had explored. The examining
magistrate made the gardener, who had the key, open the chapel, a real
gem of carving, a shrine in stone which had been respected by time and
the revolutionaries, and which, with the delicate sculpture work of its
porch and its miniature population of statuettes, was always looked
upon as a marvelous specimen of the Norman-Gothic style. The chapel,
which was very simple in the interior, with no other ornament than its
marble altar, offered no hiding-place. Besides, the fugitive would have
had to obtain admission. And by what means?

The inspection brought them to the little door in