“Look here, this is how it has been.  The Marchese Ludovico has made love to this girl—­has made her in love with him—­taking the matter au grand serieux, in the way girls will—­specially, I am told, it is the way, with those Venetian women.  Well, by ill chance, as the devil would have it, she sees her lover starting on a tete-a-tete expedition into the Pineta with this other girl—­just the woman of all others in the world, as I am given to understand, to be a dangerous rival, and to excite a deadly jealousy.  This much we have in evidence.  Further, we know that the girl Paolina was expected to return from her expedition to St. Apollinare early in the morning—­ say at nine o’clock, or thereabouts—­whereas she did not return till several hours afterwards.  In addition to all this, we have now ascertained that when she left the church she did not set out on her return towards the city, as she might naturally be expected to have done; but, on the contrary, went in the direction of the Pineta.  Then, assuming the story, told by the Marchese to be true, we know that, about the very time that this Paolina was entering the forest, her rival was lying asleep and alone there in the immediate neighbourhood.  We know that the means adopted for the perpetration of the crime were such as to be quite within a woman’s physical power, and that the weapon used for the purpose such as a woman may much more readily be supposed to have about her than a man; what do you say to that as a theory of the facts?  Is not the evidence overpoweringly strong against this Venetian?”

“Of course my own attention had been called to the case of suspicion against her.  But I confess I had not been struck by the last circumstance you mention; and it seems to me a very strong one.  How can it be supposed that a man—­a man like the Marchese Ludovico—­ should chance to have a needle about him?  The case of suspicion against him, mark, altogether excludes the notion that he went out prepared to take the life of this unfortunate woman.  It is suggested that he put her to death in order to escape from the ruin that would have ensued from his uncle’s marriage with her.  No other possible motive for such a deed can be conceived.  But he knew nothing of any such purpose on the part of the Marchese till the girl herself told him of it as they were driving together to the forest.  Therefore, he had not come out prepared with a needle for the purpose of committing murder.  Neither, it is true, does the theory we are considering suppose that Paolina came out prepared to do such a deed.  But the weapon used is a needle.  Is it more likely that a man or that a woman should have by chance such an article about them?  I confess it seems to me that this circumstance alone is sufficient to turn the scale of the probabilities unmistakably.”