"She had a key to the garden of this house," replied Monsieur de Marcey; "but let us go to her cottage and see if we cannot find some proof which may help us to discover the authors of this crime!"
They returned to the cottage, they visited and examined every corner; but except in Isaure’s bedroom, they found nothing disturbed in the house.
"She has carried away a part of her clothes!" said the baron, who seemed overwhelmed by Isaure’s disappearance.
"Can she have gone voluntarily?" cried Edouard.
"Voluntarily!" said Alfred; "does not this wounded dog prove, on the contrary, that someone forced his way into the house to carry Isaure away? The entrance was effected through the garden. Had Isaure any money with her?"
"She may have had some fifty louis," said the baron.
"That money is no longer here," cried Edouard; "so it must have been a robber who came here. But would a robber have taken Isaure away with him?"
They left the house, and were crossing the yard when Alfred spied something that glistened against the wall; he held his light to it and saw at his feet a sword still dripping with blood; it seemed evident that that was the weapon with which Vaillant had been wounded. They at once examined the sword with care. It was a weapon which seemed to be very old, the hilt was broken in several places, and it was impossible to distinguish the characters which had once been carved on the blade, which seemed to be of finely tempered steel.
"Such a weapon cannot have belonged to a thief," said the baron.
The young men agreed with him, and they lost themselves in innumerable conjectures. Suddenly, Alfred exclaimed: