nds of
their subordinates.

But who could be suspicious? The success of the plot had been all the
more certain from the fact that the baron's escape seemed likely to
injure the interests of the very parties who had favored it.

Martial thought he knew the details of the escape as exactly as the
fugitives themselves. He had been the author, even if they had been the
actors, of the drama of the preceding night.

He was soon obliged to admit that he was mistaken in this opinion.

The investigation revealed facts which seemed incomprehensible to him.

It was evident that the Baron d'Escorval and Corporal Bavois had been
compelled to accomplish two successive descents.

To do this the prisoners had realized (since they had succeeded) the
necessity of having two ropes. Martial had provided them; the prisoners
must have used them. And yet only one rope could be found--the one which
the peasant woman had perceived hanging from the rocky platform, where
it was made fast to an iron crowbar.

From the window to the platform, there was no rope.

"This is most extraordinary!" murmured Martial, thoughtfully.

"Very strange!" approved M. de Courtornieu.

"How the devil could they have reached the base of the tower?"

"That is what I cannot understand."

But Martial found another cause for surprise.

On examining the rope that remained--the one which had been used in
making the second descent--he discovered that it was not a single piece.
Two pieces had been knotted together. The longest piece had evidently
been too short.

How did this happen? Could the duke have made a mistake in the height of
the cliff? or had the abbe measured the rope incorrectly?

But Martial had also measured it with his eye, and it had seemed to
him that the rope was much longer, fully a third longer, than it now
appeared.

"There must have been some accident," he remarked to his father and to
the marquis; "but what?"

"Well, what does it matter?" replied the marquis, "you have the
compromising letter, have you not?"

But Martial's was one of those minds that never rest when confronted by
an unsolved problem.

He insisted on going to inspect the rocks at the foot of the precipice.

There they discovered large spots of blood.

"One of the fugitives must have fallen," said Martial, quickly, "and was
dangerously wounded!"

"Upon my word!" exclaimed the Duc de Sairmeuse, "if Baron d'Escorval has
broken his neck, I shall be delighted!"