hour. Yet it is
unusual, as the detective imagined, for a passenger, and especially an
Italian, to lie under an open window in a sleeping-berth when travelling
by express train before daylight in March.

Who opened that window, then, and why? Perhaps some further facts might
be found on the outside of the car. With this idea, M. Flocon left it,
and passed on to the line or permanent way.

Here he found himself a good deal below the level of the car. These
sleepers have no foot-boards like ordinary carriages; access to them is
gained from a platform by the steps at each end. The Chief was short of
stature, and he could only approach the window outside by calling one of
the guards and ordering him to make the small ladder (_faire la petite
echelle_). This meant stooping and giving a back, on which little M.
Flocon climbed nimbly, and so was raised to the necessary height.

A close scrutiny revealed nothing unusual. The exterior of the car was
encrusted with the mud and dust gathered in the journey, none of which
appeared to have been disturbed.

M. Flocon reentered the carriage neither disappointed nor pleased; his
mind was in an open state, ready to receive any impressions, and as yet
only one that was at all clear and distinct was borne in on him.

This was the presence of the lace and the jet beads in the theatre of
the crime. The inference was fair and simple. He came logically and
surely to this:

1. That some woman had entered the compartment.

2. That whether or not she had come in before the crime, she was there
after the window had been opened, which was not done by the murdered
man.

3. That she had leaned out, or partly passed out, of the window at some
time or other, as the scrap of lace testified.

4. Why had she leaned out? To seek some means of exit or escape, of
course.

But escape from whom? from what? The murderer? Then she must know him,
and unless an accomplice (if so, why run from him?), she would give up
her knowledge on compulsion, if not voluntarily, as seemed doubtful,
seeing she (his suspicions were consolidating) had not done so already.

But there might be another even stronger reason to attempt escape at
such imminent risk as leaving an express train at full speed. To escape
from her own act and the consequences it must entail--escape from
horror first, from detection next, and then from arrest and punishment.

All this would imperiously impel even a weak woman to face the worst