the journey--you spoke to her frequently?"

"I? Oh, dear, no, not at all. I noticed her, certainly; I could not help
it, and perhaps I ought to tell her mistress. She seemed to make friends
a little too readily with people."

"As for instance--?"

"With the porter to begin with. I saw them together at Laroche, in the
buffet at the bar; and that Italian, the man who was in here before me;
indeed, with the murdered man. She seemed to know them all."

"Do you imply that the maid might be of use in this inquiry?"

"Most assuredly I do. As I tell you, she was constantly in and out of
the car, and more or less intimate with several of the passengers."

"Including her mistress, the Countess," put in M. Flocon.

The General laughed pleasantly.

"Most ladies are, I presume, on intimate terms with their maids. They
say no man is a hero to his valet. It is the same, I suppose, with the
other sex."

"So intimate," went on the little detective, with much malicious
emphasis, "that now the maid has disappeared lest she might be asked
inconvenient questions about her mistress."

"Disappeared? You are sure?"

"She cannot be found, that is all we know."

"It is as I thought, then. She it was who left the car!" cried Sir
Charles, with so much vehemence that the officials were startled out of
their dignified reserve, and shouted back almost in a breath: "Explain
yourself. Quick, quick. What in God's name do you mean?"

"I had my suspicions from the first, and I will tell you why. At Laroche
the car emptied, as you may have heard; every one except the Countess,
at least, went over to the restaurant for early coffee; I with the rest.
I was one of the first to finish, and I strolled back to the platform to
get a few whiffs of a cigarette. At that moment I saw, or thought I saw,
the end of a skirt disappearing into the sleeping-car. I concluded it
was this maid, Hortense, who was taking her mistress a cup of coffee.
Then my brother came up, we exchanged a few words, and entered the car
together."

"By the same door as that through which you had seen the skirt pass?"

"No, by the other. My brother went back to his berth, but I paused in
the corridor to finish my cigarette after the train had gone on. By this
time every one but myself had returned to his berth, and I was on the
point of lying down again for half an hour, when I distinctly heard the
handle turned of the compartment I knew to be vacant all through the
run."

"T