Who had put the child there? He could not have walked from the cottage; that was impossible.
She was half-way home when she noticed a parcel lying on the floor of the car, and she let down the front window and spoke to the chauffeur. It was not Mordon, but a man whom she had hired with the car.
"It came from the hospital, madame," he said. "The porter asked me if I came from Villa Casa. It was something sent to the hospital to be disinfected. There was a charge of seven francs for the service, madame, and this I paid."
She nodded.
She picked up the parcel—it was addressed to "Mademoiselle Jean Briggerland" and bore the label of the hospital.
Lydia sat back in the car with her eyes closed, tired of turning over this problem, yet determined to get to the bottom of the mystery.
Jean was out when she got back and she carried the parcel to her own room. She was trying to keep out of her mind the very possibility that such a hideous crime could have been conceived as that which all the evidence indicated had been attempted. Very resolutely she refused to believe that such a thing could have happened. There must be some explanation for the presence of the cross in her bed. Possibly it had been found after the wet sheets had been taken to the servants' part of the house.
She rang the bell, and the maid who had given her the trinket came.
"Tell me," said Lydia, "where was this cross found?"
"In your bed, mademoiselle."