She met no one on the staircase, and, once out of the door at its foot, her difficulties were over, and her escape effected.
She was missed the next morning, and an account of her erratic flight reached the papers, and was published far and wide.

But the name of Miss Caroline Campbell conveyed nothing to the public, and the great trial went on without a soul suspecting the significance of this midnight flitting of an unknown and partially demented girl.
At the house of Dr.Carpenter she met Mr.Moffat.What she told him heartened him greatly for the struggle he saw before him.

Indeed, it altered the whole tone of the defence.

Perceiving from her story, and from what the doctor could tell him of their meeting at the station that her return to town was as yet a secret to every one but themselves, he begged that the secret should continue to be kept, in order that the _coup d'etat_ which he meditated might lose none of its force by anticipation.

Carmel, whose mind was full of her coming ordeal, was willing enough to hide her head until it came; while Dr.Carpenter, alarmed at all this excitement, would have insisted on it in any event.
Carmel wished her brother informed of her return, but the wily lawyer persuaded her to excuse him from taking Arthur into his confidence until the last moment.