midnight
Nine in every ten detectives maintained that she was still in Brussels , and house after house , mansion after mansion was searched . Three days after the abduction word came from London that four men and a young woman , apparently insane , all roughly attired , had come to that city from Ostend , and had disappeared before the officials were fully cognizant of their arrival . The woman , according to the statements of men who saw her on the train , was beautiful and pale as with the sickness that promised death . It was past midnight , after a wild ride through the storm , when an old gentleman and his wife , with their sick daughter , boarded a fast eastbound train at Namur . Had the officers of the law known of the abduction at that hour it would have been an easy matter to discover that the loose-flowing gown which enveloped the almost unconscious , partially veiled daughter , hid a garment of silk so fine that the whole world had read columns concerning its beauty . The gray beard of the rather distinguished old man could have been removed : at a single grasp , while the wife , also veiled , wore the clothing of a man underneath the skirts . The father and mother were all attention to their unfortunate child , who looked into their faces with wide , hopeless eyes and uttered no word of complaint , no sound of pain .