ter something you
cannot explain. Besides, you overlook the fact that the crime was
committed at twenty minutes past eleven in the evening, as is shown
by the clock, while the nocturnal visit, mentioned by the concierge,
occurred at three o'clock in the morning."

Officers of the law frequently form a hasty conviction as to the guilt
of a suspected person, and then distort all subsequent discoveries
to conform to their established theory. The deplorable antecedents of
Victor Danegre, habitual criminal, drunkard and rake, influenced
the judge, and despite the fact that nothing new was discovered in
corroboration of the early clues, his official opinion remained firm and
unshaken. He closed his investigation, and, a few weeks later, the trial
commenced. It proved to be slow and tedious. The judge was listless,
and the public prosecutor presented the case in a careless manner. Under
those circumstances, Danegre's counsel had an easy task. He pointed out
the defects and inconsistencies of the case for the prosecution, and
argued that the evidence was quite insufficient to convict the accused.
Who had made the key, the indispensable key without which Danegre, on
leaving the apartment, could not have locked the door behind him? Who
had ever seen such a key, and what had become of it? Who had seen the
assassin's knife, and where is it now?

"In any event," argued the prisoner's counsel, "the prosecution must
prove, beyond any reasonable doubt, that the prisoner committed the
murder. The prosecution must show that the mysterious individual who
entered the house at three o'clock in the morning is not the guilty
party. To be sure, the clock indicated eleven o'clock. But what of that?
I contend, that proves nothing. The assassin could turn the hands of the
clock to any hour he pleased, and thus deceive us in regard to the exact
hour of the crime."

Victor Danegre was acquitted.

He left the prison on Friday about dusk in the evening, weak and
depressed by his six months' imprisonment. The inquisition, the
solitude, the trial, the deliberations of the jury, combined to fill
him with a nervous fear. At night, he had been afflicted with terrible
nightmares and haunted by weird visions of the scaffold. He was a mental
and physical wreck.

Under the assumed name of Anatole Dufour, he rented a small room on the
heights of Montmartre, and lived by doing odd jobs wherever he could
find them. He led a pitiful existence. Three times,