Somewhere along the Avenue du Maine, as Moreau, Léa, and I headed toward the jail where Sylvestre was awaiting his trial, I bumped into Louise Pascal once again. "Miss Brackenborough," she said somewhat bitterly. "Aren't you supposed to be at work?"

"How do you know my schedule?" I asked.

"I have my methods," Miss Pascal said. "Now what are you doing running around the city with these two good-for-nothings?"

"I take offense to that!" Léa exclaimed. "Meet me at the fencing hall, Miss Pascal, and I'll show you exactly what I'm good for."

Pascal seemed rather alarmed. "I don't want to fight you, Miss Valencourt," she said hastily.

"What?" Léa said. "Are you too scared?"

"Yes!" Pascal exclaimed. "I barely know how to fence - I won't be talked into dueling the master swordswoman of Paris." Léa smirked, while Pascal turned to me. "I take back what I said earlier, but Miss Brackenborough, you still haven't answered my question."

"We're...uhh...going to the district jail to visit Mr. Sylvestre," I said.

"We're going to break him out!" Léa exclaimed, but I quickly covered her mouth, hoping that Miss Pascal hadn't heard our plan, as vague and ill-conceived as it was.

Pascal wrote something down in her notebook, and all of a sudden, I had an idea. "Could I see your notebook?" I asked.

Pascal was silent for a while, looking rather nervous as she flipped through the notebook, but after several moments had passed, she tore out a few pages and then handed the notebook to me. "There's some confidential information in there, but most of the details pertaining to Bergmann and Lajoie murder should be safe for you to peruse at your leisure," she explained as she stuffed the pages that she'd torn out into her purse.

I opened up the book, and I soon found some interesting information in Miss Pascal's pages upon pages of reports.

I spoke to Bertrand Sylvestre's next-door neighbor, Marie-Rose Pernot, at four in the afternoon today. She was thankfully willing to discuss the events of the night of Lajoie's murder with me, and she disclosed several useful details. She was playing cards during the afternoon with her grown son, who had come over to visit, and after he left around five o'clock, she went outside to water her garden. While she was outside, she watched Bertrand and Sophie Sylvestre come outside with croquet mallets, and they proceeded to play a game of croquet. Madame Pernot tended to her garden for a long time, going inside around 6:30 to eat dinner with her husband, and according to Pernot, at this point, the Sylvestres were still playing croquet. She paid less attention to her neighbors in the evening, but she mentioned that "those damn neighbors" had just gone inside when she went to bed at ten o'clock. According to those who were in the rehearsal room, they heard gunshots sometime between 6:10 and 6:15 PM, and Lajoie's body was discovered in the corridor shortly afterwards - since Mr. Sylvestre was seen playing croquet with his daughter at this time, there is little to no possibility that he could have killed Mr. Lajoie.

"Have you shown this to the police?" I asked Miss Pascal.

"They don't listen to people like you and I, Miss Brackenborough."

"It's worth a try," I said.

Pascal sighed. "If you want, you can take the pages about Sylvestre to the police station," she said. "Don't get your hopes up though. They've never trusted me, and I doubt you'll fare any better."

"Thank you, Miss Pascal!" I exclaimed as I tore a few pages out of the notebook and then ran off with Léa and a rather exhausted Moreau. Pascal shrugged and headed off in the opposite direction, but with these pages in my hands, I felt like I knew what I was doing for once. Not only could we break Sylvestre out of jail, but we could prove his innocence too.

When we finally made it to the jail, a massive, imposing cinder-block building, Léa snuck around to the side of the building, climbed up a nearby tree, and opened up a vent. "This is how I got out of here last time," she said.

Moreau rolled his eyes and said, "Why am I not surprised that you've somehow done this before?"

"We don't have time for this, Moreau," Léa said. "Follow me."

I grabbed onto the lowest branch and hoisted myself onto it, and as I continued to climb the tree, I was careful not to snag my skirt again. However, Moreau remained on the ground, frozen in place. "Mr. Moreau! Come on!" I exclaimed.

"Can I stay here instead?" he said.

Léa groaned. "Don't be such a wet blanket, Moreau."

"I'm serious," Moreau said as he sat down on a nearby bench. "I'm not going in there. I'm not going to risk getting caught."

"Suit yourself, but you'll miss out on all the fun," Léa said as she climbed into the secret passage. I hesitated for a moment - after all, Moreau had a point. The last thing I wanted was to end up in jail like Mr. Sylvestre. I looked back at him, and when our eyes met, Moreau said, "Good luck, Miss Brackenborough."

"Thanks, Mr. Moreau," I said before I climbed into the tunnel and followed Léa into the jail.

The passage was cramped and unbelievably cold, and Léa and I both struggled to squeeze through. It was certainly unpleasant, but eventually, we heard door slamming, keys jangling, prisoners shouting. We were getting close.

Finally, we made it to the end of the tunnel, and we stumbled into the jail. There were cells all around us, prisoners sleeping, reading books, writing letters, but none of them looked remotely like Sylvestre. Léa started walking down the hallway, but before she could get very far, one of the guards stopped her.

"What the devil is going on here?" he shouted, but Léa pulled out her sword, and as the guard shifted to the right, trying to avoid being stabbed, Léa took his keys and ran. The guard, of course, sprinted after her, but Léa had enough of a head start to make it to Sylvestre's cell and unlock the door before the guard caught up to her.

I couldn't see much from where I was standing, but I could hear Sylvestre's voice, clear as day. "Miss Valencourt?" he said. "What are you doing here?"

"Trying to get you out of here, obviously," Léa said. She unlocked the jail cell, and as she sprinted away, Sylvestre reluctantly followed her. As the guards chased after them, the two of them ran over to me. Sylvestre looked just as haggard as Moreau did, but nevertheless, the adrenaline kept him going as we sprinted down the hallway and toward the door.

With the guards right behind us, Léa quickly pushed the door open, and Sylvestre, Léa, and I all raced outside. Once we made it out, we all went in different directions: Léa headed over to Moreau, while Sylvestre ran home, eager to return home to Jean-Luc and Sophie. Certainly, they would wonder why their father was home from New Caledonia so early, but hopefully, they would be happy enough to have him home that they wouldn't think too hard about it. "Thank you, Miss Brackenborough, Miss Valencourt," he said before he disappeared from view, trying to get home before the police caught him.

I glanced across the street, toward the police station, and in an instant, I knew exactly what I had to do with the pages I'd taken from Miss Pascal. As I ran across the street, narrowly dodging an oncoming carriage, Léa shouted, "Mattie! What are you doing?"

"I'm dropping off the report Miss Pascal gave me," I explained. Once I got to the other side of the street, I opened up the mailbox, slipped the notebook pages inside, and gently closed it, leaving no trace of my presence. As soon as they saw Miss Pascal's notes, they would have to leave Sylvestre alone. After all, it was clear he wasn't the killer.

I walked back to the bench next to the jail cell, where Moreau was fast asleep, snoring softly as his glasses slanted forward, looking like they were about to fall off of his face. I gently tapped his shoulder, and he jolted awake.

"Wake up, sleeping beauty," I said. "We're headed home."

"We are?" Moreau said as he adjusted his glasses. "Did you...?" I nodded, and he said, "I didn't actually think that was going to work."

"Me neither, honestly," I said.

There was a sweet moment of silence, and then Moreau looked into my eyes and said, "I should have thanked you earlier for making me take a break from practicing. I don't think this is exactly how I expected to spend my break, but you're looking out for me, making sure I take care of myself, and for that, I'm truly grateful."

I smiled and said, "You're welcome, Mr. Moreau."

"Are you going back to the boarding house too?" Moreau asked.

"I think so," I said.

All of a sudden, Léa turned to me and said, "Actually, Mattie, I'd love to talk to you if you have a moment."

Léa started to walk away, and I followed her. "I'll see you later, Mr. Moreau," I said as we headed our separate ways.

"Goodbye, Miss Brackenborough," Moreau said. "I'll see you back at the boarding house."

As Moreau returned home, Léa and I wandered through the streets of Paris until we found a lovely spot on the banks of the Seine. Léa stopped and sat down, her blue eyes looking out over the water, the wind tousling her hair. I soon sat down next to her, and I gazed toward the river, the water rippling, flowing through the city and traveling onwards until it reached the English Channel, hundreds of miles away. For a long while, we sat there, watching the waves roll by, but eventually, Léa turned toward me and broke the silence.

"You don't know about Moreau, do you?"