oiselle Stangerson adores Monsieur
Darzac.

"All these reflections ran through my brain like a flash of lightning.
What would I not give to know!

"It is possible that there was some reason for the awful silence. My
intervention might do more harm than good. How could I tell? How could I
know I might not any moment cause another crime? If I could only see and
know, without breaking that silence!

"I left the ante-room and descended the central stairs to the vestibule
and, as silently as possible, made my way to the little room on the
ground-floor where Daddy Jacques had been sleeping since the attack made
at the pavilion.

"I found him dressed, his eyes wide open, almost haggard. He did not
seem surprised to see me. He told me that he had got up because he
had heard the cry of the Bete du bon Dieu, and because he had heard
footsteps in the park, close to his window, out of which he had looked
and, just then, had seen a black shadow pass by. I asked him whether
he had a firearm of any kind. No, he no longer kept one, since the
examining magistrate had taken his revolver from him. We went out
together, by a little back door, into the park, and stole along the
chateau to the point which is just below Mademoiselle Stangerson's
window.

"I placed Daddy Jacques against the wall, ordering him not to stir from
the spot, while I, taking advantage of a moment when the moon was hidden
by a cloud, moved to the front of the window, out of the patch of light
which came from it,--for the window was half-open! If I could only know
what was passing in that silent chamber! I returned to Daddy Jacques and
whispered the word 'ladder' in his ear. At first I had thought of the
tree which, a week ago, served me for an observatory; but I immediately
saw that, from the way the window was half-opened, I should not be able
to see from that point of view anything that was passing in the room;
and I wanted, not only to see, but to hear, and--to act.

"Greatly agitated, almost trembling, Daddy Jacques disappeared for a
moment and returned without the ladder, but making signs to me with his
arms, as signals to me to come quickly to him. When I got near him he
gasped: 'Come!'

"'I went to the donjon in search of my ladder, and in the lower part of
the donjon which serves me and the gardener for a lumber room, I found
the door open and the ladder gone. On coming out, that's what I caught
sight of by the light of the moon.

"And he pointed to