Atlas Nightshade

Day 135

“I say approaches; for the night had not yet arrived. It was only

about dusk that the indecent haste of these ‘miscreants’ offended

the sober eyes of Madame Deluc. But we are told that it was upon

this very evening that Madame Deluc, as well as her eldest son,

‘heard the screams of a female in the vicinity of the inn.’ And

in what words does Madame Deluc designate the period of the

evening at which these screams were heard? ‘It was soon after

dark,’ she says. But ‘soon after dark,’ is, at least, dark; and

‘about dusk’ is as certainly daylight. Thus it is abundantly

clear that the gang quitted the Barrière du Roule prior to the

screams overheard (?) by Madame Deluc. And although, in all the

many reports of the evidence, the relative expressions in

question are distinctly and inv