With a restless move, he rose heavily and peered again into the court.  Immediately it was evident what had occurred.  The whole string of lights in the third story had been shut off, and now those of the middle story were following suit.  Only the ground floor remained active with all its lights at the maximum, and every belt moving.

At this unexpected narrowing down of his field of operations he felt greatly relieved.  He had dreaded those long walks through innumerable rooms.  He could manage circling the building once, but three times would have been too much.  In a mood of increased contentment, he started to return to his seat, but found himself stayed by something he saw in what had been but a dimly lighted space when he looked there last.  It was now as bright as the rest and showed him the figure of the superintendent stooping over a woman, explaining to her some intricate manipulation of the work in hand which was evidently quite new to her.  He could see him very plainly, but her figure was more or less hidden.  Not for long though.  The superintendent passed on and she came into full view.  It was Antoinette Duclos.  He was confident of this even before he noted her dress.  When his eyes fell on that, he was sure; there was no mistaking the stripes and the dots.  Antoinette Duclos! and she was where he could reach her in five minutes—­in fact as soon as the superintendent returned.  As he stood and watched her working quite assiduously but in something like isolation, he felt as though ten years had slipped from his age, and trifled with his pleasure as the rest of us do when we behold a despaired-of goal loom suddenly in sight.  Was she the woman he had pictured in his mind’s eye?  Hardly.  Yet there was an admirable directness in her movements.  From the way she went about things, he could plainly see that she would master her duties in no time if Fate did not interpose to prevent.  It certainly was hard to interrupt her in her work just when she was on the way to safety and competence.  But there could be no question of his duty, or of the claims of Mr. Roberts to whatever help might accrue from an understanding of the relation of this woman to events threatening his reputation with such utter destruction.  Her story might free him from all suspicion or it might actually determine his guilt.  Therefore her story must be had, and at once—­if possible, this very night.

But he must wait—­wait for the coming of the superintendent.  He felt safe to do this.  Meanwhile he was determined not to let this woman out of his sight; so, drawing up a chair, he settled down within view of her active figure, from which all rigidity had vanished in the interest she was rapidly developing in her work.  If he could have seen her countenance more clearly, he would have been glad.  There seemed to be a veil between him and it, a hazy indistinctness which he found it difficult to understand; but remembering that he was looking through two windows and on a long diagonal, he accepted this slight drawback with equanimity and was about to indulge in the comfort of a cigar when he saw the scene he still held in view change, and change vividly, to the excitation of a fresh interest and a still more careful watch.