The Widow Lerouge by Émile Gaboriau (page 7)

illustrious name, an immense fortune. No! You tell me that this sacrifice will be for his good. No! My child is mine; I will keep him. The world has no honours, no riches, which can replace a mother’s love. You wish to give me in exchange, that other woman’s child. Never! What! you would have that woman embrace my boy! It is impossible. Take away this strange child from me; he fills me with horror; I want my own! Ah, do not insist, do not threaten me with anger, do not leave me. I should give in, and then, I should die. Guy, forget this fatal project, the thought of it alone is a crime. Cannot my prayers, my tears, can nothing move you? Ah, well, God will punish us. All will be discovered. The day will come when these children will demand a fearful reckoning. Guy, I foresee the future; I see my son coming towards me, justly angered. What does he say, great heaven! Oh, those letters, those letters, sweet memories of our love! My son, he threatens me! He strikes me! Ah, help! A son strike his mother. Tell no one of it, though. O my God, what torture! Yet he knows well that I am his mother. He pretends not to believe me. Lord, this is too much! Guy! pardon! oh, my only friend! I have neither the power to resist, nor the courage to obey you.”

At this moment the door opening on to the landing opened, and Noel appeared, pale as usual, but calm and composed. The dying woman saw him, and the sight affected her like an electric shock. A terrible shudder shook her frame; her eyes grew inordinately large, her hair seemed to stand on end. She raised herself on her pillows, stretched out her arm in the direction where Noel stood, and in a loud voice exclaimed, “Assassin!”

She fell back convulsively on the bed. Some one hastened forward: she was dead.

A deep silence prevailed.

Such is the majesty of death, and the terror which accompanies it, that, in its presence, even the strongest and most sceptical bow their heads.

For a time, passions and interests are forgotten. Involuntarily we are drawn together, when some mutual friend breathes his last in our presence.

All the bystanders were deeply moved by this painful scene, this last confession, wrested so to say from the delirium.

And the last word uttered by Madame Gerdy, “assassin,” surprised no one.

All, excepting the nun, knew of the awful accusation which had been made against Albert.

To him they applied the unfortunate mother’s malediction.

Noel seemed quite broken hearted. Kneeling by the bedside of her who had been as a mother to him, he took one of her hands, and pressed it close to his lips.

“Dead!” he groaned, “she is dead!”

The nun and the priest knelt beside him, and repeated in a low voice the prayers for the dead.

They implored God to shed his peace and mercy on the departed soul.

They begged for a little happiness in heaven for her who had suffered so much on earth.

Fallen into a chair, his head thrown back, the Count de Commarin was more overwhelmed and more livid than this dead woman, his old love, once so beautiful.

Claire and the doctor hastened to assist him.

They undid his cravat, and took off his shirt collar, for he was suffocating. With the help of the old soldier, whose red, tearful eyes, told of suppressed grief, they moved the count’s chair to the half-opened window to give him a little air. Three days before, this scene would have killed him. But the heart hardens by misfortune, like hands by labour.

“His tears have saved him,” whispered the doctor to Claire.

M. de Commarin gradually recovered, and, as his thoughts became clearer, his sufferings returned.

Prostration follows great mental shocks. Nature seems to collect her strength to sustain the misfortune. We do not feel all its intensity at once; it is only afterwards that we realize the extent and profundity of the evil.

The count’s gaze was fixed upon the bed where lay Valerie’s body. There, then, was all that remained of her. The soul, that soul so devoted and so tender, had flown.

What would he not have given if God would have restored that unfortunate woman to life for a day, or even for an hour? With what transports of repentance he would have cast himself at her feet, to implore her pardon, to tell her how much he detested his past conduct! How had he acknowledged the inexhaustible love of that angel? Upon a mere suspicion, without deigning to inquire, without giving her a hearing, he had treated her with the coldest contempt. Why had he not seen her again? He would have spared himself twenty years of doubt as to Albert’s birth. Instead of an isolated existence, he would have led a happy, joyous life.

Then he remembered the countess’s death. She also had loved him, and had died of her love.

He had not understood them; he had killed them both.

The hour of expiation had come; and he could not say: “Lord, the punishment is too great.”

And yet, what punishment, what misfortunes, during the last five days!

“Yes,” he stammered, “she predicted it. Why did I not listen to her?”

Madame Gerdy’s brother pitied the old man, so severely tried. He held out his hand.

“M. de Commarin,” he said, in a grave, sad voice, “my sister forgave you long ago, even if she ever had any ill feeling against you. It is my turn to-day; I forgive you sincerely.”

“Thank you, sir,” murmured the count, “thank you!” and then he added: “What a death!”

“Yes,” murmured Claire, “she breathed her last in the idea that her son was guilty of a crime. And we were not able to undeceive her.”

“At least,” cried the count, “her son should be free to render her his last duties; yes, he must be. Noel!”

The advocate had approached his father, and heard all.

“I have promised, father,” he replied, “to save him.”

For the first time, Mademoiselle d’Arlange was face to face with Noel. Their eyes met, and she could not restrain a movement of repugnance, which the advocate perceived.

“Albert is already saved,” she said proudly. “What we ask is, that prompt justice shall be done him; that he shall be immediately set at liberty. The magistrate now knows the truth.”

“The truth?” exclaimed the advocate.

“Yes; Albert passed at my house, with me, the evening the crime was committed.”

Noel looked at her surprised; so singular a confession from such a mouth, without explanation, might well surprise him.

She drew herself up haughtily.

“I am Mademoiselle Claire d’Arlange, sir,” said she.

M. de Commarin now quickly ran over all the incidents reported by Claire.

When he had finished, Noel replied: “You see, sir, my position at this moment, to-morrow–“

“To-morrow?” interrupted the count, “you said, I believe, to-morrow! Honour demands, sir, that we act to-day, at this moment. You can show your love for this poor woman much better by delivering her son than by praying for her.”

Noel bowed low.

“To hear your wish, sir, is to obey it,” he said; “I go. This evening, at your house, I shall have the honour of giving you an account of my proceedings. Perhaps I shall be able to bring Albert with me.”

He spoke, and, again embracing the dead woman, went out.

Soon the count and Mademoiselle d’Arlange also retired.

The old soldier went to the Mayor, to give notice of the death, and to fulfil the necessary formalities.

The nun alone remained, awaiting the priest, which the cure had promised to send to watch the corpse.

The daughter of St. Vincent felt neither fear nor embarrassment, she had been so many times in a similar position. Her prayers said, she arose and went about the room, arranging everything as it should be in the presence of death. She removed all traces of the illness, put away the medicine bottles, burnt some sugar upon the fire shovel, and, on a table covered with a white cloth at the head of the bed, placed some lighted candles, a crucifix with holy water, and a branch of palm.

CHAPTER XVII.

Greatly troubled and perplexed by Mademoiselle d’Arlange’s revelations, M. Daburon was ascending the stairs that led to the offices of the investigating magistrates, when he saw old Tabaret coming towards him. The sight pleased him, and he at once called out: “M. Tabaret!”

But the old fellow, who showed signs of the most intense agitation, was scarcely disposed to stop, or to lose a single minute.

“You must excuse me, sir,” he said, bowing, “but I am expected at home.”

“I hope, however–“

“Oh, he is innocent,” interrupted old Tabaret. “I have already some proofs; and before three days– But you are going to see Gevrol’s man with the earrings. He is very cunning, Gevrol; I misjudged him.”

And without listening to another word, he hurried away, jumping down three steps at a times, at the risk of breaking his neck.

M. Daburon, greatly disappointed, also hastened on.

In the passage, on a bench of rough wood before his office door, Albert sat awaiting him, under the charge of a Garde de Paris.

“You will be summoned immediately, sir,” said the magistrate to the prisoner, as he opened his door.

In the office, Constant was talking with a skinny little man, who might have been taken, from his dress, for a well-to-do inhabitant of Batignolles, had it not been for the enormous pin in imitation gold which shone in his cravat, and betrayed the detective.

“You received my letters?” asked M. Daburon of his clerk.

“Your orders have been executed, sir; the prisoner is without, and here is M. Martin, who this moment arrived from the neighbourhood of the Invalides.”

“That is well,” said the magistrate in a satisfied tone. And, turning towards the detective, “Well, M. Martin,” he asked, “what did you see?”

“The walls had been scaled, sir.”

“Lately?”

“Five or six days ago.”

“You are sure of this?”

“As sure as I am that I see M. Constant at this moment mending his pen.”

“The marks are plain?”

“As plain as the nose on my face, sir, if I may so express myself. The thief–it was done by a thief, I imagine,” continued M. Martin, who was a great talker–“the thief entered the garden before the rain, and went away after it, as you had conjectured. This circumstance is easy to establish by examining the marks on the wall of the ascent and the descent on the side towards the street. These marks are several abrasions, evidently made by feet of some one climbing. The first are clean; the others, muddy. The scamp–he was a nimble fellow–in getting in, pulled himself up by the strength of his wrists; but when going away, he enjoyed the luxury of a ladder, which he threw down as soon as he was on the top of the wall. It is to see where he placed it, by holes made in the ground by the fellow’s weight; and also by the mortar which has been knocked away from the top of the wall.”

“Is that all?” asked the magistrate.

“Not yet, sir. Three of the pieces of glass which cover the top of the wall have been removed. Several of the acacia branches, which extend over the wall have been twisted or broken. Adhering to the thorns of one of these branches, I found this little piece of lavender kid, which appears to me to belong to a glove.”

The magistrate eagerly seized the piece of kid.

It had evidently come from a glove.

“You took care, I hope, M. Martin,” said M. Daburon, “not to attract attention at the house where you made this investigation?”

“Certainly, sir. I first of all examined the exterior of the wall at my leisure. After that, leaving my hat at a wine shop round the corner, I called at the Marchioness d’Arlange’s house, pretending to be the servant of a neighbouring duchess, who was in despair at having lost a favourite, and, if I may so speak, an eloquent parrot. I was very kindly given permission to explore the garden; and, as I spoke as disrespectfully as possible of my pretended mistress they, no doubt, took me for a genuine servant.”

“You are an adroit and prompt fellow, M. Martin,” interrupted the magistrate. “I am well satisfied with you; and I will report you favourably at headquarters.”

He rang his bell, while the detective, delighted at the praise he had received, moved backwards to the door, bowing the while.

Albert was then brought in.

“Have you decided, sir,” asked the investigating magistrate without preamble, “to give me a true account of how you spent last Tuesday evening?”

“I have already told you, sir.”

“No, sir, you have not; and I regret to say that you lied to me.”

Albert, at this apparent insult, turned red, and his eyes flashed.

“I know all that you did on that evening,” continued the magistrate, “because justice, as I have already told you, is ignorant of nothing that it is important for it to know.”

Then, looking straight into Albert’s eyes, he continued slowly: “I have seen Mademoiselle Claire d’Arlange.”

On hearing that name, the prisoner’s features, contracted by a firm resolve not to give way, relaxed.

It seemed as though he experienced an immense sensation of delight, like a man who escapes almost by a miracle from an imminent danger which he had despaired of avoiding. However, he made no reply.

“Mademoiselle d’Arlange,” continued the magistrate, “has told me where you were on Tuesday evening.”

Albert still hesitated.

“I am not setting a trap for you,” added M. Daburon; “I give you my word of honour. She has told me all, you understand?”

This time Albert decided to speak.

His explanations corresponded exactly with Claire’s; not one detail more. Henceforth, doubt was impossible.

Mademoiselle d’Arlange had not been imposed upon. Either Albert was innocent, or she was his accomplice.

Could she knowingly be the accomplice of such an odious crime? No; she could not even be suspected of it.

But who then was the assassin?

For, when a crime has been committed, justice demands a culprit.

“You see, sir,” said the magistrate severely to Albert, “you did deceive me. You risked your life, sir, and, what is also very serious, you exposed me, you exposed justice, to commit a most deplorable mistake. Why did you not tell me the truth at once?”

“Mademoiselle d’Arlange, sir,” replied Albert, “in according me a meeting, trusted in my honour.”

“And you would have died sooner than mention that interview?” interrupted M. Daburon with a touch of irony. “That is all very fine, sir, and worthy of the days of chivalry!”

“I am not the hero that you suppose, sir,” replied the prisoner simply. “If I told you that I did not count on Claire, I should be telling a falsehood. I was waiting for her. I knew that, on learning of my arrest, she would brave everything to save me. But her friends might have hid it from her; and that was what I feared. In that event, I do not think, so far as one can answer for oneself, that I should have mentioned her name.”

There was no appearance of bravado. What Albert said, he thought and felt. M. Daburon regretted his irony.

“Sir,” he said kindly, “you must return to your prison. I cannot release you yet; but you will be no longer in solitary confinement. You will be treated with every attention due to a prisoner whose innocence appears probable.”

Albert bowed, and thanked him; and was then removed.

“We are now ready for Gevrol,” said the magistrate to his clerk.

The chief of detectives was absent: he had been sent for from the Prefecture of Police; but his witness, the man with the earrings, was waiting in the passage.

He was told to enter.

He was one of those short, thick-set men, powerful as oaks, who look as though they could carry almost any weight on their broad shoulders.

His white hair and whiskers set off his features, hardened and tanned by the inclemency of the weather, the sea winds and the heat of the tropics.

He had large callous black hands, with big sinewy fingers which must have possessed the strength of a vice.

Great earrings in the form of anchors hung from his ears. He was dressed in the costume of a well-to-do Normandy fisherman, out for a holiday.

The clerk was obliged to push him into the office, for this son of the ocean was timid and abashed when on shore.

He advanced, balancing himself first on one leg, then on the other, with that irregular walk of the sailor, who, used to the rolling and tossing of the waves, is surprised to find anything immovable beneath his feet.

To give himself confidence, he fumbled over his soft felt hat, decorated with little lead medals, like the cap of king Louis XI. of devout memory, and also adorned with some if that worsted twist made by the young country girls, on a primitive frame composed of four or five pins stuck in a hollow cork.

M. Daburon examined him, and estimated him at a glance. There was no doubt but that he was the sunburnt man described by one of the witnesses at La Jonchere.

It was also impossible to doubt his honesty. His open countenance displayed sincerity and good nature.

“Your name?” demanded the investigating magistrate.

“Marie Pierre Lerouge.”

“Are you, then, related to Claudine Lerouge?”

“I am her husband, sir.”

What, the husband of the victim alive, and the police ignorant of his existence!

Thus thought M. Daburon.

What, then, does this wonderful progress in invention accomplish?

To-day, precisely as twenty years ago, when Justice is in doubt, it requires the same inordinate loss of time and money to obtain the slightest information.

On Friday, they had written to inquire about Claudine’s past life; it was now Monday, and no reply had arrived.

And yet photography was in existence, and the electric telegraph. They had at their service a thousand means, formerly unknown; and they made no use of them.

“Every one,” said the magistrate, “believed her a widow. She herself pretended to be one.”

“Yes, for in that way she partly excused her conduct. Besides, it was an arrangement between ourselves. I had told her that I would have nothing more to do with her.”

“Indeed? Well, you know that she is dead, victim of an odious crime?”

“The detective who brought me here told me of it, sir,” replied the sailor, his face darkening. “She was a wretch!” he added in a hollow voice.

“How? You, her husband, accuse her?”

“I have but too good reason to do so, sir. Ah, my dead father, who foresaw it all at the time, warned me! I laughed, when he said, ‘Take care, or she will dishonour us all.’ He was right. Through her, I have been hunted down by the police, just like some skulking thief. Everywhere that they inquired after me with their warrant, people must have said ‘Ah, ha, he has then committed some crime!’ And here I am before a magistrate! Ah, sir, what a disgrace! The Lerouges have been honest people, from father to son, ever since the world began. Inquire of all who have ever had dealings with me, they will tell you, ‘Lerouge’s word is as good as another man’s writing.’ Yes, she was a wicked woman; and I have often told her that she would come to a bad end.”

“You told her that?”

“More than a hundred times, sir.”

“Why? Come, my friend, do not be uneasy, your honour is not at stake here, no one questions it. When did you warn her so wisely?”

“Ah, a long time ago, sir,” replied the sailor, “the first time was more than thirty years back. She had ambition even in her blood; she wished to mix herself up in the intrigues of the great. It was that that ruined her. She said that one got money for keeping secrets; and I said that one got disgraced and that was all. To help the great to hide their villainies, and to expect happiness from it, is like making your bed of thorns, in the hope of sleeping well. But she had a will of her own.”

“You were her husband, though,” objected M. Daburon, “you had the right to command her obedience.”

The sailor shook his head, and heaved a deep sigh.

“Alas, sir! it was I who obeyed.”

To proceed by short inquiries with a witness, when you have no idea of the information he brings, is but to lose time in attempting to gain it. When you think you are approaching the important fact, you may be just avoiding it. It is much better to give the witness the rein, and to listen carefully, putting him back on the track should he get too far away. It is the surest and easiest method. This was the course M. Daburon adopted, all the time cursing Gevrol’s absence, as he by a single word could have shortened by a good half the examination, the importance of which, by the way, the magistrate did not even suspect.

“In what intrigues did your wife mingle?” asked he. “Go on, my friend, tell me everything exactly; here, you know, we must have not only the truth, but the whole truth.”

Lerouge placed his hat on a chair. Then he began alternately to pull his fingers, making them crack almost sufficiently to break them, and ultimately scratched his head violently. It was his way of arranging his ideas.

“I must tell you,” he began, “that it will be thirty-five years on St. John’s day since I fell in love with Claudine. She was a pretty, neat, fascinating girl, with a voice sweeter than honey. She was the most beautiful girl in our part of the country, straight as a mast, supple as a willow, graceful and strong as a racing boat. Her eyes sparkled like old cider; her hair was black, her teeth as white as pearls, and her breath was as fresh as the sea breeze. The misfortune was, that she hadn’t a sou, while we were in easy circumstances. Her mother, who was the widow of I can’t say how many husbands, was, saving your presence, a bad woman, and my father was the worthiest man alive. When I spoke to the old fellow of marrying Claudine he swore fiercely, and eight days after, he sent me to Porto on a schooner belonging to one of our neighbours, just to give me a change of air. I came back, at the end of six months, thinner than a marling spike, but more in love than ever. Recollections of Claudine scorched me like a fire. I could scarcely eat or drink; but I felt that she loved me a little in return, for I was a fine young fellow, and more than one girl had set her cap at me. Then my father, seeing that he could do nothing, that I was wasting away, and was on the road to join my mother in the cemetery, decided to let me complete my folly. So one evening, after we had returned from fishing and I got up from supper without tasting it, he said to me, ‘Marry the hag’s daughter, and let’s have no more of this.’ I remember it distinctly, because, when I heard the old fellow call my love such a name, I flew into a great passion, and almost wanted to kill him. Ah, one never gains anything by marrying in opposition to one’s parents!”

The worthy fellow was lost in the midst of his recollections. He was very far from his story. The investigating magistrate attempted to bring him back into the right path, “Come to the point,” he said.

“I am going to, sir; but it was necessary to begin at the beginning. I married. The evening after the wedding, and when the relatives and guests had departed, I was about to join my wife, when I perceived my father all alone in a corner weeping. The sight touched my heart, and I had a foreboding of evil; but it quickly passed away. It is so delightful during the first six months one passes with a dearly loved wife! One seems to be surrounded by mists that change the very rocks into palaces and temples so completely that novices are taken in. For two years, in spite of a few little quarrels, everything went on nicely. Claudine managed me like a child. Ah, she was cunning! She might have seized and bound me, and carried me to market and sold me, without my noticing it. Her great fault was her love of finery. All that I earned, and my business was very prosperous, she put on her back. Every week there was something new, dresses, jewels, bonnets, the devil’s baubles, which the dealers invent for the perdition of the female sex. The neighbors chattered, but I thought it was all right. At the baptism of our son, who was called Jacques after my father, to please her, I squandered all I had economized during my youth, more than three hundred pistoles, with which I had intended purchasing a meadow that lay in the midst of our property.”

M. Daburon was boiling over with impatience, but he could do nothing.

“Go on, go on,” he said every time Lerouge seemed inclined to stop.

“I was well enough pleased,” continued the sailor, “until one morning I saw one of the Count de Commarin’s servants entering our house; the count’s chateau is only about a mile from where I lived on the other side of the town. It was a fellow named Germain whom I didn’t like at all. It was said about the country that he had been mixed up in the seduction of poor Thomassine, a fine young girl who lived near us; she appears to have pleased the count, and one day suddenly disappeared. I asked my wife what the fellow wanted; she replied that he had come to ask her to take a child to nurse. I would not hear of it at first, for our means were sufficient to allow Claudine to keep all her milk for our own child. But she gave me the very best of reasons. She said she regretted her past flirtations and her extravagance. She wished to earn a little money, being ashamed of doing nothing while I was killing myself with work. She wanted to save, to economize, so that our child should not be obliged in his turn to go to sea. She was to get a very good price, that we could save up to go towards the three hundred pistoles. That confounded meadow, to which she alluded, decided me.”

“Did she not tell you of the commission with which she was charged?” asked the magistrate.

This question astonished Lerouge. He thought that there was good reason to say that justice sees and knows everything.

“Not then,” he answered, “but you will see. Eight days after, the postman brought a letter, asking her to go to Paris to fetch the child. It arrived in the evening. ‘Very well,’ said she, ‘I will start to-morrow by the diligence.’ I didn’t say a word then; but next morning, when she was about to take her seat in the diligence, I declared that I was going with her. She didn’t seem at all angry, on the contrary. She kissed me, and I was delighted. At Paris, she was to call for the little one at a Madame Gerdy’s, who lived on the Boulevard. We arranged that she should go alone, while I awaited for her at our inn. After she had gone, I grew uneasy. I went out soon after, and prowled about near Madame Gerdy’s house, making inquiries of the servants and others; I soon discovered that she was the Count de Commarin’s mistress. I felt so annoyed that, if I had been master, my wife should have come away without the little bastard. I am only a poor sailor, and I know that a man sometimes forgets himself. One takes too much to drink, for instance, or goes out on the loose with some friends; but that a man with a wife and children should live with another woman and give her what really belongs to his legitimate offspring, I think is bad–very bad. Is it not so, sir?”

The investigating magistrate moved impatiently in his chair. “Will this man never come to the point,” he muttered. “Yes, you are perfectly right,” he added aloud; “but never mind your thoughts. Go on, go on!”

“Claudine, sir, was more obstinate than a mule. After three days of violent discussion, she obtained from me a reluctant consent, between two kisses. Then she told me that we were not going to return home by the diligence. The lady, who feared the fatigue of the journey for her child, had arranged that we should travel back by short stages, in her carriage, and drawn by her horses. For she was kept in grand style. I was ass enough to be delighted, because it gave me a chance to see the country at my leisure. We were, therefore, installed with the children, mine and the other, in an elegant carriage, drawn by magnificent animals, and driven by a coachman in livery. My wife was mad with joy; she kissed me over and over again, and chinked handfuls of gold in my face. I felt as foolish as an honest husband who finds money in his house which he didn’t earn himself. Seeing how I felt, Claudine, hoping to pacify me, resolved to tell me the whole truth. ‘See here,’ she said to me,–“

Lerouge stopped, and, changing his tone, said, “You understand that it is my wife who is speaking?”

“Yes, yes. Go on.”

“She said to me, shaking her pocket full of money, ‘See here, my man, we shall always have as much of this as ever we may want, and this is why: The count, who also had a legitimate child at the same time as this bastard, wishes that this one shall bear his name instead of the other; and this can be accomplished, thanks to me. On the road, we shall meet at the inn, where we are to sleep, M. Germain and the nurse to whom they have entrusted the legitimate son. We shall be put in the same room, and, during the night, I am to change the little ones, who have been purposely dressed alike. For this the count gives me eight thousand francs down, and a life annuity of a thousand francs.'”

“And you!” exclaimed the magistrate, “you, who call yourself an honest man, permitted such villainy, when one word would have been sufficient to prevent it?”

“Sir, I beg of you,” entreated Lerouge, “permit me to finish.”

“Well, continue!”

“I could say nothing at first, I was so choked with rage. I must have looked terrible. But she, who was generally afraid of me when I was in a passion, burst out laughing, and said, ‘What a fool you are! Listen, before turning sour like a bowl of milk. The count is the only one who wants this change made; and he is the one that’s to pay for it. His mistress, this little one’s mother, doesn’t want it at all; she merely pretended to consent, so as not to quarrel with her lover, and because she has got a plan of her own. She took me aside, during my visit in her room, and, after having made me swear secrecy on a crucifix, she told me that she couldn’t bear the idea of separating herself from her babe forever, and of bringing up another’s child. She added that, if I would agree not to change the children, and not to tell the count, she would give me ten thousand francs down, and guarantee me an annuity equal to the one the count had promised me. She declared, also, that she could easily find out whether I kept my word, as she had made a mark of recognition on her little one. She didn’t show me the mark; and I have examined him carefully, but can’t find it. Do you understand now? I merely take care of this little fellow here. I tell the count that I have changed the children; we receive from both sides, and Jacques will be rich. Now kiss your little wife who has more sense than you, you old dear!’ That, sir, is word for word what Claudine said to me.”

The rough sailor drew from his pocket a large blue-checked handkerchief, and blew his nose so violently that the windows shook. It was his way of weeping.

M. Daburon was confounded. Since the beginning of this sad affair, he had encountered surprise after surprise. Scarcely had he got his ideas in order on one point, when all his attention was directed to another.

He felt himself utterly routed. What was he about to learn now? He longed to interrogate quickly, but he saw that Lerouge told his story with difficulty, laboriously disentangling his recollections; he was guided by a single thread which the least interruption might seriously entangle.

“What Claudine proposed to me,” continued the sailor, “was villainous; and I am an honest man. But she kneaded me to her will as easily as a baker kneads dough. She turned my heart topsy-turvy: she made me see white as snow that which was really as black as ink. How I loved her! She proved to me that we were wronging no one, that we were making little Jacques’s fortune, and I was silenced. At evening we arrived at some village; and the coachman, stopping the carriage before an inn, told us we were to sleep there. We entered, and who do you think we saw? That scamp, Germain, with a nurse carrying a child dressed so exactly like the one we had that I was startled. They had journeyed there, like ourselves, in one of the count’s carriages. A suspicion crossed my mind. How could I be sure that Claudine had not invented the second story to pacify me? She was certainly capable of it. I was enraged. I had consented to the one wickedness, but not to the other. I resolved not to lose sight of the little bastard, swearing that they shouldn’t change it; so I kept him all the evening on my knees, and to be all the more sure, I tied my handkerchief about his waist. Ah! the plan had been well laid. After supper, some one spoke of retiring, and then it turned out that there were only two double-bedded rooms in the house. It seemed as though it had been built expressly for the scheme. The innkeeper said that the two nurses might sleep in one room, and Germain and myself in the other. Do you understand, sir? Add to this, that during the evening I had surprised looks of intelligence passing between my wife and that rascally servant, and you can imagine how furious I was. It was conscience that spoke; and I was trying to silence it. I knew very well that I was doing wrong; and I almost wished myself dead. Why is it that women can turn an honest man’s conscience about like a weather-cock with their wheedling?”

M. Daburon’s only reply was a heavy blow of his fist on the table.

Lerouge proceeded more quickly.

“As for me, I upset that arrangement, pretending to be too jealous to leave my wife a minute. They were obliged to give way to me. The other nurse went up to bed first. Claudine and I followed soon afterwards. My wife undressed and got into bed with our son and the little bastard. I did not undress. Under the pretext that I should be in the way of the children, I installed myself in a chair near the bed, determined not to shut my eyes, and to keep close watch. I put out the candle, in order to let the women sleep, though I could not think of doing so myself; and I thought of my father, and of what he would say, if he ever heard of my behaviour. Towards midnight, I heard Claudine moving. I held my breath. She was getting out of bed. Was she going to change the children? Now, I knew that she was not; then, I felt sure that she was. I was beside myself, and seizing her by the arm, I commenced to beat her roughly, giving free vent to all that I had on my heart. I spoke in a loud voice, the same as when I am on board ship in a storm; I swore like a fiend, I raised a frightful disturbance. The other nurse cried out as though she were being murdered. At this uproar, Germain rushed in with a lighted candle. The sight of him finished me. Not knowing what I was doing, I drew from my pocket a long Spanish knife, which I always carried, and seizing the cursed bastard, I thrust the blade through his arm, crying, ‘This way, at least, he can’t be changed without my knowing it; he is marked for life!'”

Lerouge could scarcely utter another word. Great drops of sweat stood out upon his brow, then, trickling down his cheeks, lodged in the deep wrinkles of his face. He panted; but the magistrate’s stern glance harassed him, and urged him on, like the whip which flogs the negro slave overcome with fatigue.

“The little fellow’s wound,” he resumed, “was terrible. It bled dreadfully, and he might have died; but I didn’t think of that. I was only troubled about the future, about what might happen afterwards. I declared that I would write out all that had occurred, and that everyone should sign it. This was done; we could all four write. Germain didn’t dare resist; for I spoke with knife in hand. He wrote his name first, begging me to say nothing about it to the count, swearing that, for his part, he would never breathe a word of it, and pledging the other nurse to a like secrecy.”

“And have you kept this paper?” asked M. Daburon.

“Yes, sir, and as the detective to whom I confessed all, advised me to bring it with me, I went to take it from the place where I always kept it, and I have it here.”

“Give it to me.”

Lerouge took from his coat pocket an old parchment pocket-book, fastened with a leather thong, and withdrew from it a paper yellowed by age and carefully sealed.

“Here it is,” said he. “The paper hasn’t been opened since that accursed night.”

And, in fact, when the magistrate unfolded it, some dust fell out, which had been used to keep the writing, when wet, from blotting.

It was really a brief description of the scene, described by the old sailor. The four signatures were there.

“What has become of the witnesses who signed this declaration?” murmured the magistrate, speaking to himself.

Lerouge, who thought the question was put to him, replied, “Germain is dead. I have been told that he was drowned when out rowing. Claudine has just been assassinated; but the other nurse still lives. I even know that she spoke of the affair to her husband, for he hinted as much to me. His name is Brosette, and she lives in the village of Commarin itself.”

“And what next?” asked the magistrate, after having taken down the name and address.

“The next day, sir, Claudine managed to pacify me, and extorted a promise of secrecy. The child was scarcely ill at all; but he retained an enormous scar on his arm.”

“Was Madame Gerdy informed of what took place?”

“I do not think so, sir. But I would rather say that I do not know.”

“What! you do not know?”

“Yes, sir, I swear it. You see my ignorance comes from what happened afterwards.”

“What happened, then?”

The sailor hesitated.

“That, sir, concerns only myself, and–“

“My friend,” interrupted the magistrate, “you are an honest man, I believe; in fact, I am sure of it. But once in your life, influenced by a wicked woman, you did wrong, you became an accomplice in a very guilty action. Repair that error by speaking truly now. All that is said here, and which is not directly connected with the crime, will remain secret; even I will forget it immediately. Fear nothing, therefore; and, if you experience some humiliation, think that it is your punishment for the past.”

“Alas, sir,” answered the sailor, “I have been already greatly punished; and it is a long time since my troubles began. Money, wickedly acquired, brings no good. On arriving home, I bought the wretched meadow for much more than it was worth; and the day I walked over it, feeling that is was actually mine, closed my happiness. Claudine was a coquette; but she had a great many other vices. When she realised how much money we had these vices showed themselves, just like a fire, smouldering at the bottom of the hold, bursts forth when you open the hatches. From slightly greedy as she had been, she became a regular glutton. In our house there was feasting without end. Whenever I went to sea, she would entertain the worst women in the place; and there was nothing too good or too expensive for them. She would get so drunk that she would have to be put to bed. Well, one night, when she thought me at Rouen, I returned unexpectedly. I entered, and found her with a man. And such a man, sir! A miserable looking wretch, ugly, dirty, stinking; shunned by everyone; in a word the bailiff’s clerk. I should have killed him, like the vermin that he was; it was my right, but he was such a pitiful object. I took him by the neck and pitched him out of the window, without opening it! It didn’t kill him. Then I fell upon my wife, and beat her until she couldn’t stir.”

Lerouge spoke in a hoarse voice, every now and then thrusting his fists into his eyes.

“I pardoned her,” he continued; “but the man who beats his wife and then pardons her is lost. In the future, she took better precautions, became a greater hypocrite, and that was all. In the meanwhile, Madame Gerdy took back her child; and Claudine had nothing more to restrain her. Protected and counselled by her mother, whom she had taken to live with us, on the pretence of looking after Jacques, she managed to deceive me for more than a year. I thought she had given up her bad habits, but not at all; she lived a most disgraceful life. My house became the resort of all the good-for-nothing rogues in the country, for whom my wife brought out bottles of wine and brandy, whenever I was away at sea, and they got drunk promiscuously. When money failed, she wrote to the count or his mistress, and the orgies continued. Occasionally I had doubts which disturbed me; and then without reason, for a simple yes or no, I would beat her until I was tired, and then I would forgive her, like a coward, like a fool. It was a cursed life. I don’t know which gave me the most pleasure, embracing her or beating her. My neighbors despised me, and turned their backs on me; they believed me an accomplice or a willing dupe. I heard, afterwards, that they believed I profited by my wife’s misconduct; while in reality she paid her lovers. At all events, people wondered where all the money came from that was spent in my house. To distinguish me from a cousin of mine, also named Lerouge, they tacked an infamous word on to my name. What disgrace! And I knew nothing of all the scandal, no, nothing. Was I not the husband? Fortunately, though, my poor father was dead.”

M. Daburon pitied the speaker sincerely.

“Rest a while, my friend,” he said; “compose yourself.”

“No,” replied the sailor, “I would rather get through with it quickly. One man, the priest, had the charity to tell me of it. If ever he should want Lerouge! Without losing a minute, I went and saw a lawyer, and asked him how an honest sailor who had had the misfortune to marry a hussy ought to act. He said that nothing could be done. To go to law was simply to publish abroad one’s own dishonour, while a separation would accomplish nothing. When once a man has given his name to a woman, he told me, he cannot take it back; it belongs to her for the rest of her days, and she has a right to dispose of it. She may sully it, cover it with mire, drag it from wine shop to wine shop, and her husband can do nothing. That being the case, my course was soon taken. That same day, I sold the fatal meadow, and sent the proceeds of it to Claudine, wishing to keep nothing of the price of shame. I then had a document drawn up, authorising her to administer our property, but not allowing her either to sell or mortgage it. Then I wrote her a letter in which I told her that she need never expect to hear of me again, that I was nothing more to her, and that she might look upon herself as a widow. That same night I went away with my son.”

“And what became of your wife after your departure?”

“I cannot say, sir; I only know that she quitted the neighbourhood a year after I did.”

“You have never lived with her since?”

“Never.”

“But you were at her house three days before the crime was committed.”

“That is true, but it was absolutely necessary. I had had much trouble to find her, no one knew what had become of her. Fortunately my notary was able to procure Madame Gerdy’s address; he wrote to her, and that is how I learnt that Claudine was living at La Jonchere. I was then at Rome. Captain Gervais, who is a friend of mine, offered to take me to Paris on his boat, and I accepted. Ah, sir, what a shock I experienced when I entered her house! My wife did not know me! By constantly telling everyone that I was dead, she had without a doubt ended by believing it herself. When I told her my name, she fell back in her chair. The wretched woman had not changed in the least; she had by her side a glass and a bottle of brandy–“

“All this doesn’t explain why you went to seek your wife.”

“It was on Jacques’s account, sir, that I went. The youngster has grown to be a man; and he wants to marry. For that, his mother’s consent was necessary; and I was taking to Claudine a document which the notary had drawn up, and which she signed. This is it.”

M. Daburon took the paper, and appeared to read it attentively. After a moment he asked: “Have you thought who could have assassinated your wife?”

Lerouge made no reply.

“Do you suspect any one?” persisted the magistrate.

“Well, sir,” replied the sailor, “what can I say? I thought that Claudine had wearied out the people from whom she drew money, like water from a well; or else getting drunk one day, she had blabbed too freely.”

The testimony being as complete as possible, M. Daburon dismissed Lerouge, at the same time telling him to wait for Gevrol, who would take him to a hotel, where he might wait, at the disposal of justice, until further orders.

“All your expenses will be paid you,” added the magistrate.

Lerouge had scarcely left, when an extraordinary, unheard of, unprecedented event took place in the magistrate’s office. Constant, the serious, impressive, immovable, deaf and dumb Constant, rose from his seat and spoke.

He broke a silence of fifteen years. He forgot himself so far as to offer an opinion.

“This, sir,” said he, “is a most extraordinary affair.”

Very extraordinary, truly, thought M. Daburon, and calculated to rout all predictions, all preconceived opinions.

Why had he, the magistrate, moved with such deplorable haste? Why before risking anything, had he not waited to possess all the elements of this important case, to hold all the threads of this complicated drama?

Justice is accused of slowness; but it is this very slowness that constitutes its strength and surety, its almost infallibility. One scarcely knows what a time evidence takes to produce itself. There is no knowing what important testimony investigations apparently useless may reveal.

When the entanglement of the various passions and motives seems hopeless, an unknown personage presents himself, coming from no one knows where, and it is he who explains everything.

M. Daburon, usually the most prudent of men, had considered as simple one of the most complex of cases. He had acted in a mysterious crime, which demanded the utmost caution, as carelessly as though it were a case of simple misdemeanour. Why? Because his memory had not left him his free deliberation, judgment, and discernment. He had feared equally appearing weak and being revengeful. Thinking himself sure of his facts, he had been carried away by his animosity. And yet how often had he not asked himself: Where is duty? But then, when one is at all doubtful about duty, one is on the wrong road.

The singular part of it all was that the magistrate’s faults sprang from his very honesty. He had been led astray by a too great refinement of conscience. The scruples which troubled him had filled his mind with phantoms, and had prompted in him the passionate animosity he had displayed at a certain moment.

Calmer now, he examined the case more soundly. As a whole, thank heaven! there was nothing done which could not be repaired. He accused himself, however, none the less harshly. Chance alone had stopped him. At that moment he resolved that he would never undertake another investigation. His profession henceforth inspired him with an unconquerable loathing. Then his interview with Claire had re-opened all the old wounds in his heart, and they bled more painfully than ever. He felt, in despair, that his life was broken, ruined. A man may well feel so, when all women are as nothing to him except one, whom he may never dare hope to possess. Too pious a man to think of suicide, he asked himself with anguish what would become of him when he threw aside his magistrate’s robes.

Then he turned again to the business in hand. In any case, innocent or guilty, Albert was really the Viscount de Commarin, the count’s legitimate son. But was he guilty? Evidently he was not.

“I think,” exclaimed M. Daburon suddenly, “I must speak to the Count de Commarin. Constant, send to his house a message for him to come here at once; if he is not at home, he must be sought for.”

M. Daburon felt that an unpleasant duty was before him. He would be obliged to say to the old nobleman: “Sir, your legitimate son is not Noel, but Albert.” What a position, not only painful, but bordering on the ridiculous! As a compensation, though, he could tell him that Albert was innocent.

To Noel he would also have to tell the truth: hurl him to earth, after having raised him among the clouds. What a blow it would be! But, without a doubt, the count would make him some compensation; at least, he ought to.

“Now,” murmured the magistrate, “who can be the criminal?”

An idea crossed his mind, at first it seemed to him absurd. He rejected it, then thought of it again. He examined it in all its various aspects. He had almost adopted it, when M. de Commarin entered. M. Daburon’s messenger had arrived just as the count was alighting from his carriage, on returning with Claire from Madame Gerdy’s.

CHAPTER XVIII.

Old Tabaret talked, but he acted also.

Abandoned by the investigating magistrate to his own resources, he set to work without losing a minute and without taking a moment’s rest.

The story of the cabriolet, drawn by a swift horse, was exact in every particular.

Lavish with his money, the old fellow had gathered together a dozen detectives on leave or rogues out of work; and at the head of these worthy assistants, seconded by his friend Lecoq, he had gone to Bougival.

He had actually searched the country, house by house, with the obstinacy and the patience of a maniac hunting for a needle in a hay- stack.

His efforts were not absolutely wasted.

After three days’ investigation, he felt comparatively certain that the assassin had not left the train at Rueil, as all the people of Bougival, La Jonchere, and Marly do, but had gone on as far as Chatou.

Tabaret thought he recognized him in a man described to him by the porters at that station as rather young, dark, and with black whiskers, carrying an overcoat and an umbrella.

This person, who arrived by the train which left Paris for St. Germain at thirty-five minutes past eight in the evening, had appeared to be in a very great hurry.

On quitting the station, he had started off at a rapid pace on the road which led to Bougival. Upon the way, two men from Marly and a woman from La Malmaison had noticed him on account of his rapid pace. He smoked as he hurried along.

On crossing the bridge which joins the two banks of the Seine at Bougival, he had been still more noticed.

It is usual to pay a toll on crossing this bridge; and the supposed assassin had apparently forgotten this circumstance. He passed without paying, keeping up his rapid pace, pressing his elbows to his side, husbanding his breath, and the gate-keeper was obliged to run after him for his toll.

He seemed greatly annoyed at the circumstance, threw the man a ten sou piece, and hurried on, without waiting for the nine sous change.

Nor was that all.

The station master at Rueil remembered, that, two minutes before the quarter past ten train came up, a passenger arrived very agitated, and so out of breath that he could scarcely ask for a second class ticket for Paris.

The appearance of this man corresponded exactly with the description given of him by the porters at Chatou, and by the gatekeeper at the bridge.

Finally, the old man thought he was on the track of some one who entered the same carriage as the breathless passenger. He had been told of a baker living at Asnieres, and he had written to him, asking him to call at his house.

Such was old Tabaret’s information, when on the Monday morning he called at the Palais de Justice, in order to find out if the record of Widow Lerouge’s past life had been received. He found that nothing had arrived, but in the passage he met Gevrol and his man.

The chief of detectives was triumphant, and showed it too. As soon as he saw Tabaret, he called out, “Well, my illustrious mare’s-nest hunter, what news? Have you had any more scoundrels guillotined since the other day? Ah, you old rogue, you want to oust me from my place I can see!”

The old man was sadly changed.

The consciousness of his mistake made him humble and meek. These pleasantries, which a few days before would have made him angry, now did not touch him. Instead of retaliating, he bowed his head in such a penitent manner that Gevrol was astonished.

“Jeer at me, my good M. Gevrol,” he replied, “mock me without pity; you are right, I deserve it all.”

“Ah, come now,” said the chief, “have you then performed some new masterpiece, you impetuous old fellow?”

Old Tabaret shook his head sadly.

“I have delivered up an innocent man,” he said, “and justice will not restore him his freedom.”

Gevrol was delighted, and rubbed his hands until he almost wore away the skin.

“This is fine,” he sang out, “this is capital. To bring criminals to justice is of no account at all. But to free the innocent, by Jove! that is the last touch of art. Tirauclair, you are an immense wonder; and I bow before you.”

And at the same time, he raised his hat ironically.

“Don’t crush me,” replied the old fellow. “As you know, in spite of my grey hairs, I am young in the profession. Because chance served me three or four times, I became foolishly proud. I have learned too late that I am not all that I had thought myself; I am but an apprentice, and success has turned my head; while you, M. Gevrol, you are the master of all of us. Instead of laughing, pray help me, aid me with your advice and your experience. Alone, I can do nothing, while with your assistance—-!”

Gevrol is vain in the highest degree.

Tabaret’s submission tickled his pretensions as a detective immensely; for in reality he thought the old man very clever. He was softened.

“I suppose,” he said patronisingly, “you refer to the La Jonchere affair?”

“Alas! yes, my dear M. Gevrol, I wished to work without you, and I have got myself into a pretty mess.”

Cunning old Tabaret kept his countenance as penitent as that of a sacristan caught eating meat on a Friday; but he was inwardly laughing and rejoicing all the while.

“Conceited fool!” he thought, “I will flatter you so much that you will end by doing everything I want.”

M. Gevrol rubbed his nose, put out his lower lip, and said, “Ah,– hem!”

He pretended to hesitate; but it was only because he enjoyed prolonging the old amateur’s discomfiture.

“Come,” said he at last, “cheer up, old Tirauclair. I’m a good fellow at heart, and I’ll give you a lift. That’s kind, isn’t it? But, to-day, I’m too busy, I’ve an appointment to keep. Come to me to-morrow morning, and we’ll talk it over. But before we part I’ll give you a light to find your way with. Do you know who that witness is that I’ve brought?”

“No; but tell me, my good M. Gevrol.”

“Well, that fellow on the bench there, who is waiting for M. Daburon, is the husband of the victim of the La Jonchere tragedy!”

“Is it possible?” exclaimed old Tabaret, perfectly astounded. Then, after reflecting a moment, he added, “You are joking with me.”

“No, upon my word. Go and ask him his name; he will tell you that it is Pierre Lerouge.”

“She wasn’t a widow then?”

“It appears not,” replied Gevrol sarcastically, “since there is her happy spouse.”

“Whew!” muttered the old fellow. “And does he know anything?”

In a few sentences, the chief of detectives related to his amateur colleague the story that Lerouge was about to tell the investigating magistrate.

“What do you say to that?” he asked when he came to the end.

“What do I say to that?” stammered old Tabaret, whose countenance indicated intense astonishment; “what do I say to that? I don’t say anything. But I think,–no, I don’t think anything either!”

“A slight surprise, eh?” said Gevrol, beaming.

“Say rather an immense one,” replied Tabaret.

But suddenly he started, and gave his forehead a hard blow with his fist.

“And my baker!” he cried, “I will see you to-morrow, then, M. Gevrol.”

“He is crazed,” thought the head detective.

The old fellow was sane enough, but he had suddenly recollected the Asnieres baker, whom he had asked to call at his house. Would he still find him there?

Going down the stairs he met M. Daburon; but, as one has already seen, he hardly deigned to reply to him.

He was soon outside, and trotted off along the quays.

“Now,” said he to himself, “let us consider. Noel is once more plain Noel Gerdy. He won’t feel very pleased, for he thought so much of having a great name. Pshaw! if he likes, I’ll adopt him. Tabaret doesn’t sound so well as Commarin, but it’s at least a name. Anyhow, Gevrol’s story in no way affects Albert’s situation nor my convictions. He is the legitimate son; so much the better for him! That however, would not prove his innocence to me, if I doubted it. He evidently knew nothing of these surprising circumstances, any more than his father. He must have believed as well as the count in the substitution having taken place. Madame Gerdy, too, must have been ignorant of these facts; they probably invented some story to explain the scar. Yes, but Madame Gerdy certainly knew that Noel was really her son, for when he was returned to her, she no doubt looked for the mark she had made on him. Then, when Noel discovered the count’s letters, she must have hastened to explain to him–“

Old Tabaret stopped as suddenly as if further progress were obstructed by some dangerous reptile. He was terrified at the conclusion he had reached.

“Noel, then, must have assassinated Widow Lerouge, to prevent her confessing that the substitution had never taken place, and have burnt the letters and papers which proved it!”

But he repelled this supposition with horror, as every honest man drives away a detestable thought which by accident enters his mind.

“What an old idiot I am!” he exclaimed, resuming his walk; “this is the result of the horrible profession I once gloried in following! Suspect Noel, my boy, my sole heir, the personification of virtue and honour! Noel, whom ten years of constant intercourse have taught me to esteem and admire to such a degree that I would speak for him as I would for myself! Men of his class must indeed be moved by terrible passions to cause them to shed blood; and I have always known Noel to have but two passions, his mother and his profession. And I dare even to breath a suspicion against this noble soul? I ought to be whipped! Old fool! isn’t the lesson you have already received sufficiently terrible? Will you never be more cautious?”

Thus he reasoned, trying to dismiss his disquieting thoughts, and restraining his habits of investigation; but in his heart a tormenting voice constantly whispered, “Suppose it is Noel.”

He at length reached the Rue St. Lazare. Before the door of his house stood a magnificent horse harnessed to an elegant blue brougham. At the sight of these he stopped.

“A handsome animal!” he said to himself; “my tenants receive some swell people.”

They apparently received visitors of an opposite class also, for, at that moment, he saw M. Clergeot came out, worthy M. Clergeot, whose presence in a house betrayed ruin just as surely as the presence of the undertakers announce a death. The old detective, who knew everybody, was well acquainted with the worthy banker. He had even done business with him once, when collecting books. He stopped him and said: “Halloa! you old crocodile, you have clients, then, in my house?”

“So it seems,” replied Clergeot dryly, for he does not like being treated with such familiarity.

“Ah! ah!” said old Tabaret. And, prompted by the very natural curiosity of a landlord who is bound to be very careful about the financial condition of his tenants, he added, “Who the deuce are you ruining now?”

“I am ruining no one,” replied M. Clergeot, with an air of offended dignity. “Have you ever had reason to complain of me whenever we have done business together? I think not. Mention me to the young advocate up there, if you like; he will tell you whether he has reason to regret knowing me.”

These words produced a painful impression on Tabaret. What, Noel, the prudent Noel, one of Clergeot’s customers! What did it mean? Perhaps there was no harm in it; but then he remembered the fifteen thousand francs he had lent Noel on the Thursday.

“Yes,” said he, wishing to obtain some more information, “I know that M. Gerdy spends a pretty round sum.”

Clergeot has the delicacy never to leave his clients undefended when attacked.

“It isn’t he personally,” he objected, “who makes the money dance; its that charming little woman of his. Ah, she’s no bigger than your thumb, but she’d eat the devil, hoofs, horns, and all!”

What! Noel had a mistress, a woman whom Clergeot himself, the friend of such creatures, considered expensive! The revelation, at such a moment, pierced the old man’s heart. But he dissembled. A gesture, a look, might awaken the usurer’s mistrust, and close his mouth.

“That’s well known,” replied Tabaret in a careless tone. “Youth must have it’s day. But what do you suppose the wench costs him a year?”

“Oh, I don’t know! He made the mistake of not fixing a price with her. According to my calculation, she must have, during the four years that she has been under his protection, cost him close upon five hundred thousand francs.”

Four years? Five hundred thousand francs! These words, these figures, burst like bombshells on old Tabaret’s brain. Half a million! In that case, Noel was utterly ruined. But then–

“It is a great deal,” said he, succeeding by desperate efforts in hiding his emotion; “it is enormous. M. Gerdy, however, has resources.”

“He!” interrupted the usurer, shrugging his shoulders. “Not even that!” he added, snapping his fingers; “He is utterly cleaned out. But, if he owes you money, do not be anxious. He is a sly dog. He is going to be married; and I have just renewed bills of his for twenty- six thousand francs. Good-bye, M. Tabaret.”

The usurer hurried away, leaving the poor old fellow standing like a milestone in the middle of the pavement. He experienced something of that terrible grief which breaks a father’s heart when he begins to realize that his dearly loved son is perhaps the worst of scoundrels.

And, yet, such was his confidence in Noel that he again struggled with his reason to resist the suspicions which tormented him. Perhaps the usurer had been slandering his friend. People who lend their money at more than ten per cent are capable of anything. Evidently he had exaggerated the extent of Noel’s follies.

And, supposing it were true? Have not many men done just such insane things for women, without ceasing to be honest?

As he was about to enter his house, a whirlwind of silk, lace, and velvet, stopped the way. A pretty young brunette came out and jumped as lightly as a bird into the blue brougham.

Old Tabaret was a gallant man, and the young woman was most charming, but he never even looked at her. He passed in, and found his concierge standing, cap in hand, and tenderly examining a twenty franc piece.

“Ah, sir,” said the man, “such a pretty young person, and so lady- like! If you had only been here five minutes sooner.”

“What lady? why?”

“That elegant lady, who just went out, sir; she came to make some inquiries about M. Gerdy. She gave me twenty francs for answering her questions. It seems that the gentleman is going to be married; and she was evidently much annoyed about it. Superb creature! I have an idea that she is his mistress. I know now why he goes out every night.”

“M. Gerdy?”

“Yes, sir, but I never mentioned it to you, because he seemed to wish to hide it. He never asks me to open the door for him, no, not he. He slips out by the little stable door. I have often said to myself, ‘Perhaps he doesn’t want to disturb me; it is very thoughtful on his part, and he seems to enjoy it so.'”

The concierge spoke with his eyes fixed on the gold piece. When he raised his head to examine the countenance of his lord and master, old Tabaret had disappeared.

“There’s another!” said the concierge to himself. “I’ll bet a hundred sous, that he’s running after the superb creature! Run ahead, go it, old dotard, you shall have a little bit, but not much, for it’s very expensive!”

The concierge was right. Old Tabaret was running after the lady in the blue brougham.

“She will tell me all,” he thought, and with a bound he was in the street. He reached it just in time to see the blue brougham turn the corner of the Rue St. Lazare.

“Heavens!” he murmured. “I shall lose sight of her, and yet she can tell me the truth.”

He was in one of those states of nervous excitement which engender prodigies. He ran to the end of the Rue St. Lazare as rapidly as if he had been a young man of twenty.

Joy! He saw the blue brougham a short distance from him in the Rue du Havre, stopped in the midst of a block of carriages.

“I have her,” said he to himself. He looked all about him, but there was not an empty cab to be seen. Gladly would he have cried, like Richard the III., “My kingdom for a cab!”

The brougham got out of the entanglement, and started off rapidly towards the Rue Tronchet. The old fellow followed.

He kept his ground. The brougham gained but little upon him.

While running in the middle of the street, at the same time looking out for a cab, he kept saying to himself: “Hurry on, old fellow, hurry on. When one has no brains, one must use one’s legs. Why didn’t you think to get this woman’s address from Clergeot? You must hurry yourself, my old friend, you must hurry yourself! When one goes in for being a detective, one should be fit for the profession, and have the shanks of a deer.”

But he was losing ground, plainly losing ground. He was only halfway down the Rue Tronchet, and quite tired out; he felt that his legs could not carry him a hundred steps farther, and the brougham had almost reached the Madeleine.

At last an open cab, going in the same direction as himself, passed by. He made a sign, more despairing than any drowning man ever made. The sign was seen. He made a supreme effort, and with a bound jumped into the vehicle without touching the step.

“There,” he gasped, “that blue brougham, twenty francs!”

“All right!” replied the coachman, nodding.

And he covered his ill-conditioned horse with vigorous blows, muttering, “A jealous husband following his wife; that’s evident. Gee up!”

As for old Tabaret, he was a long time recovering himself, his strength was almost exhausted.

For more than a minute, he could not catch his breath. They were soon on the Boulevards. He stood up in the cab leaning against the driver’s seat.

“I don’t see the brougham anywhere,” he said.

“Oh, I see it all right, sir. But it is drawn by a splendid horse!”

“Yours ought to be a better one. I said twenty francs; I’ll make it forty.”

The driver whipped up his horse most mercilessly, and growled, “It’s no use, I must catch her. For twenty francs, I would have let her escape; for I love the girls, and am on their side. But, fancy! Forty francs! I wonder how such an ugly man can be so jealous.”

Old Tabaret tried in every way to occupy his mind with other matters. He did not wish to reflect before seeing the woman, speaking with her, and carefully questioning her.

He was sure that by one word she would either condemn or save her lover.

“What! condemn Noel? Ah, well! yes.”

The idea that Noel was the assassin harassed and tormented him, and buzzed in his brain, like the moth which flies again and again against the window where it sees a light.

As they passed the Chaussee d’Antin, the brougham was scarcely thirty paces in advance. The cab driver turned, and said: “But the Brougham is stopping.”

“Then stop also. Don’t lose sight of it; but be ready to follow it again as soon as it goes off.”

Old Tabaret leaned as far as he could out of the cab.

The young woman alighted, crossed the pavement, and entered a shop where cashmeres and laces were sold.

“There,” thought the old fellow, “is where the thousand franc notes go! Half a million in four years! What can these creatures do with the money so lavishly bestowed upon them? Do they eat it? On the altar of what caprices do they squander these fortunes? They must have the devil’s own potions which they give to drink to the idiots who ruin themselves for them. They must possess some peculiar art of preparing and spicing pleasure; since, once they get hold of a man, he sacrifices everything before forsaking them.”

The cab moved on once more, but soon stopped again.

The brougham had made a fresh pause, this time in front of a curiosity shop.

“The woman wants then to buy out half of Paris!” said old Tabaret to himself in a passion. “Yes, if Noel committed the crime, it was she who forced him to it. These are my fifteen thousand francs that she is frittering away now. How long will they last her? It must have been for money, then, that Noel murdered Widow Lerouge. If so, he is the lowest, the most infamous of men! What a monster of dissimulation and hypocrisy! And to think that he would be my heir, if I should die here of rage! For it is written in my will in so many words, ‘I bequeath to my son, Noel Gerdy!’ If he is guilty, there isn’t a punishment sufficiently severe for him. But is this woman never going home?”

The woman was in no hurry. The weather was charming, her dress irresistible, and she intended showing herself off. She visited three or four more shops, and at last stopped at a confectioner’s, where she remained for more than a quarter of an hour.

The old fellow, devoured by anxiety, moved about and stamped in his cab. It was torture thus to be kept from the key to a terrible enigma by the caprice of a worthless hussy! He was dying to rush after her, to seize her by the arm, and cry out to her: “Home, wretched, creature, home at once! What are you doing here? Don’t you know that at this moment your lover, he whom you have ruined, is suspected of an assassination? Home, then, that I may question you, that I may learn from you whether he is innocent or guilty. For you will tell me, without knowing it. Ah! I have prepared a fine trap for you! Go home, then, this anxiety is killing me!”

She returned to her carriage. It started off once more, passed up the Rue de Faubourg Montmarte, turned into the Rue de Provence, deposited its fair freight at her own door, and drove away.

“She lives here,” said old Tabaret, with a sigh of relief.

He got out of the cab, gave the driver his forty francs, bade him wait, and followed in the young woman’s footsteps.

“The old fellow is patient,” thought the driver; “and the little brunette is caught.”

The detective opened the door of the concierge’s lodge.

“What is the name of the lady who just came in?” he demanded.

The concierge did not seem disposed to reply.

“Her name!” insisted the old man.

The tone was so sharp, so imperative, that the concierge was upset.

“Madame Juliette Chaffour,” he answered.

“On what floor does she reside?”

“On the second, the door opposite the stairs.”

A minute later, the old man was waiting in Madame Juliette’s drawing- room. Madame was dressing, the maid informed him, and would be down directly.

Tabaret was astonished at the luxury of the room. There was nothing flaring or coarse, or in bad taste. It was not at all like the apartment of a kept woman. The old fellow, who knew a good deal about such things, saw that everything was of great value. The ornaments on the mantelpiece alone must have cost, at the lowest estimate, twenty thousand francs.

“Clergeot,” thought he, “didn’t exaggerate a bit.”

Juliette’s entrance disturbed his reflections.

She had taken off her dress, and had hastily thrown about her a loose black dressing-gown, trimmed with cherry-coloured satin. Her beautiful hair, slightly disordered after her drive, fell in cascades about her neck, and curled behind her delicate ears. She dazzled old Tabaret. He began to understand.

“You wished, sir, to speak with me?” she inquired, bowing gracefully.

“Madame,” replied M. Tabaret, “I am a friend of Noel Gerdy’s, I may say his best friend, and–“

“Pray sit down, sir,” interrupted the young woman.

She placed herself on a sofa, just showing the tips of her little feet encased in slippers matching her dressing-gown, while the old man sat down in a chair.

“I come, madame,” he resumed, “on very serious business. Your presence at M. Gerdy’s–“

“Ah,” cried Juliette, “he already knows of my visit? Then he must employ a detective.”

“My dear child–” began Tabaret, paternally.

“Oh! I know, sir, what your errand is. Noel has sent you here to scold me. He forbade my going to his house, but I couldn’t help it. It’s annoying to have a puzzle for a lover, a man whom one knows nothing whatever about, a riddle in a black coat and a white cravat, a sad and mysterious being–“

“You have been imprudent.”

“Why? Because he is going to get married? Why does he not admit it then?”

“Suppose that it is not true.”

“Oh, but it is! He told that old shark Clergeot so, who repeated it to me. Any way, he must be plotting something in that head of his; for the last month he has been so peculiar, he has changed so, that I hardly recognize him.”

Old Tabaret was especially anxious to know whether Noel had prepared an /alibi/ for the evening of the crime. For him that was the grand question. If he had, he was certainly guilty; if not, he might still be innocent. Madame Juliette, he had no doubt, could enlighten him on that point.

Consequently he had presented himself with his lesson all prepared, his little trap all set.

The young woman’s outburst disconcerted him a little; but trusting to the chances of conversation, he resumed.

“Will you oppose Noel’s marriage, then?”

“His marriage!” cried Juliette, bursting out into a laugh; “ah, the poor boy! If he meets no worse obstacle than myself, his path will be smooth. Let him marry by all means, the sooner the better, and let me hear no more of him.”

“You don’t love him, then?” asked the old fellow, surprised at this amiable frankness.

“Listen, sir. I have loved him a great deal, but everything has an end. For four years, I, who am so fond of pleasure, have passed an intolerable existence. If Noel doesn’t leave me, I shall be obliged to leave him. I am tired of having a lover who is ashamed of me and who despises me.”

“If he despises you, my pretty lady, he scarcely shows it here,” replied old Tabaret, casting a significant glance about the room.

“You mean,” said she rising, “that he spends a great deal of money on me. It’s true. He pretends that he has ruined himself on my account; it’s very possible. But what’s that to me! I am not a grabbing woman; and I would much have preferred less money and more regard. My extravagance has been inspired by anger and want of occupation. M. Gerdy treats me like a mercenary woman; and so I act like one. We are quits.”

“You know very well that he worships you.”

“He? I tell you he is ashamed of me. He hides me as though I were some horrible disease. You are the first of his friends to whom I have ever spoken. Ask him how often he takes me out. One would think that my presence dishonoured him. Why, no longer ago than last Tuesday, we went to the theatre! He hired an entire box. But do you think that he sat in it with me? Not at all. He slipped away and I saw no more of him the whole evening.”

“How so? Were you obliged to return home alone?”

“No. At the end of the play, towards midnight, he deigned to reappear. We had arranged to go to the masked ball at the Opera and then to have some supper. Ah, it was amusing! At the ball, he didn’t dare to let down his hood, or take off his mask. At supper, I had to treat him like a perfect stranger, because some of his friends were present.”

This, then, was the /alibi/ prepared in case of trouble. Juliette, had she been less carried away by her own feelings, would have noticed old Tabaret’s emotion, and would certainly have held her tongue. He was perfectly livid, and trembled like a leaf.

“Well,” he said, making a great effort to utter the words, “the supper, I suppose, was none the less gay for that.”

“Gay!” echoed the young woman, shrugging her shoulders; “you do not seem to know much of your friend. If you ever ask him to dinner, take good care not to give him anything to drink. Wine makes him as merry as a funeral procession. At the second bottle, he was more tipsy than a cork; so much so, that he lost nearly everything he had with him: his overcoat, purse, umbrella, cigar-case–“

Old Tabaret couldn’t sit and listen any longer; he jumped to his feet like a raving madman.

“Miserable wretch!” he cried, “infamous scoundrel! It is he; but I have him!”

And he rushed out, leaving Juliette so terrified that she called her maid.

“Child,” said she, “I have just made some awful blunder, have let some secret out. I am sure that something dreadful is going to happen; I feel it. That old rogue was no friend of Noel’s, he came to circumvent me, to lead me by the nose; and he succeeded. Without knowing it I must have spoken against Noel. What can I have said? I have thought carefully, and can remember nothing; but he must be warned though. I will write him a line, while you find a messenger to take it.”

Old Tabaret was soon in his cab and hurrying towards the Prefecture of Police. Noel an assassin! His hate was without bounds, as formerly had been his confiding affection. He had been cruelly deceived, unworthily duped, by the vilest and the most criminal of men. He thirsted for vengeance; he asked himself what punishment would be great enough for the crime.

“For he not only assassinated Claudine,” thought he, “but he so arranged the whole thing as to have an innocent man accused and condemned. And who can say that he did not kill his poor mother?”

He regretted the abolition of torture, the refined cruelty of the middle ages: quartering, the stake, the wheel. The guillotine acts so quickly that the condemned man has scarcely time to feel the cold steel cutting through his muscles; it is nothing more than a fillip on the neck. Through trying so much to mitigate the pain of death, it has now become little more than a joke, and might be abolished altogether.

The certainty of confounding Noel, of delivering him up to justice, of taking vengeance upon him, alone kept old Tabaret up.

“It is clear,” he murmured, “that the wretch forgot his things at the railway station, in his haste to rejoin his mistress. Will they still be found there? If he has had the prudence to go boldly, and ask for them under a false name, I can see no further proofs against him. Madame Chaffour’s evidence won’t help me. The hussy, seeing her lover in danger, will deny what she has just told me; she will assert that Noel left her long after ten o’clock. But I cannot think he has dared to go to the railway station again.”

About half way down the Rue Richelieu, M. Tabaret was seized with a sudden giddiness.

“I am going to have an attack, I fear,” thought he. “If I die, Noel will escape, and will be my heir. A man should always keep his will constantly with him, to be able to destroy it, if necessary.”

A few steps further on, he saw a doctor’s plate on a door; he stopped the cab, and rushed into the house. He was so excited, so beside himself, his eyes had such a wild expression, that the doctor was almost afraid of his peculiar patient, who said to him hoarsely: “Bleed me!”

The doctor ventured an objection; but already the old fellow had taken off his coat, and drawn up one of his shirtsleeves.

“Bleed me!” he repeated. “Do you want me to die?”

The doctor finally obeyed, and old Tabaret came out quieted and relieved.

An hour later, armed with the necessary power, and accompanied by a policeman, he proceeded to the lost property office at the St. Lazare railway station, to make the necessary search. It resulted as he had expected. He learnt that, on the evening of Shrove Tuesday, there had been found in one of the second class carriages, of train No. 45, an overcoat and an umbrella. He was shown the articles; and he at once recognised them as belonging to Noel. In one of the pockets of the overcoat, he found a pair of lavender kid gloves, frayed and soiled, as well as a return ticket from Chatou, which had not been used.

In hurrying on, in pursuit of the truth, old Tabaret knew only too well, what it was. His conviction, unwillingly formed when Clergeot had told him of Noel’s follies, had since been strengthened in a number of other ways. When with Juliette, he had felt positively sure, and yet, at this last moment, when doubt had become impossible, he was, on beholding the evidence arrayed against Noel, absolutely thunderstruck.

“Onwards!” he cried at last. “Now to arrest him.”

And, without losing an instant, he hastened to the Palais de Justice, where he hoped to find the investigating magistrate. Notwithstanding the lateness of the hour, M. Daburon was still in his office. He was conversing with the Count de Commarin, having related to him the facts revealed by Pierre Lerouge whom the count had believed dead many years before.

Old Tabaret entered like a whirlwind, too distracted to notice the presence of a stranger.

“Sir,” he cried, stuttering with suppressed rage, “we have discovered the real assassin! It is he, my adopted son, my heir, Noel!”

“Noel!” repeated M. Daburon, rising. And then in a lower tone, he added, “I suspected it.”

“A warrant is necessary at once,” continued the old fellow. “If we lose a minute, he will slip through our fingers. He will know that he is discovered, if his mistress has time to warn him of my visit. Hasten, sir, hasten!”

M. Daburon opened his lips to ask an explanation; but the old detective continued: “That is not all. An innocent man, Albert, is still in prison.”

“He will not be so an hour longer,” replied the magistrate; “a moment before your arrival, I had made arrangements to have him released. We must now occupy ourselves with the other one.”

Neither old Tabaret nor M. Daburon had noticed the disappearance of the Count de Commarin. On hearing Noel’s name mentioned, he gained the door quietly, and rushed out into the passage.

CHAPTER XIX.

Noel had promised to use every effort, to attempt even the impossible, to obtain Albert’s release. He in fact did interview the Public Prosecutor and some members of the bar, but managed to be repulsed everywhere. At four o’clock, he called at the Count de Commarin’s house, to inform his father of the ill success of his efforts.

“The Count has gone out,” said Denis; “but if you will take the trouble to wait—-“

“I will wait,” answered Noel.

“Then,” replied the valet, “will you please follow me? I have the count’s orders to show you into his private room.”

This confidence gave Noel an idea of his new power. He was at home, henceforth, in that magnificent house, he was the master, the heir! His glance, which wandered over the entire room, noticed the genealogical tree, hanging on the wall. He approached it, and read.

It was like a page, and one of the most illustrious, taken from the golden book of French nobility. Every name which has a place in our history was there. The Commarins had mingled their blood with all the great families; two of them had even married daughters of royalty. A warm glow of pride filled the advocate’s heart, his pulse beat quicker, he raised his head haughtily, as he murmured, “Viscount de Commarin!”

The door opened. He turned, and saw the count entering. As Noel was about to bow respectfully, he was petrified by the look of hatred, anger, and contempt on his father’s face.

A shiver ran through his veins; his teeth chattered; he felt that he was lost.

“Wretch!” cried the count.

And, dreading his own violence, the old nobleman threw his cane into a corner. He was unwilling to strike his son; he considered him unworthy of being struck by his hand. Then there was a moment of mortal silence, which seemed to both of them a century.

At the same time their minds were filled with thoughts, which would require a volume to transcribe.

Noel had the courage to speak first.

“Sir,” he began.

“Silence!” exclaimed the count hoarsely; “be silent! Can it be, heaven forgive me! that you are my son? Alas, I cannot doubt it now! Wretch! you knew well that you were Madame Gerdy’s son. Infamous villain! you not only committed this murder, but you did everything to cause an innocent man to be charged with your crime! Parricide! you have also killed your mother.”

The advocate attempted to stammer forth a protest.

“You killed her,” continued the count with increased energy, “if not by poison, at least by your crime. I understand all now; she was not delirious this morning. But you know as well as I do what she was saying. You were listening, and, if you dared to enter at that moment when one word more would have betrayed you, it was because you had calculated the effect of your presence. It was to you that she addressed her last word, ‘Assassin!'”

Little by little, Noel had retired to the end of the room, and he stood leaning against the wall, his head thrown back, his hair on end, his look haggard. A convulsive trembling shook his frame. His face betrayed a terror most horrible to see, the terror of the criminal found out.

“I know all, you see,” continued the count; “and I am not alone in my knowledge. At this moment, a warrant of arrest is issued against you.”

A cry of rage like a hollow rattle burst from the advocate’s breast. His lips, which were hanging through terror, now grew firm. Overwhelmed in the very midst of his triumph, he struggled against this fright. He drew himself up with a look of defiance.

M. de Commarin, without seeming to pay any attention to Noel, approached his writing table, and opened a drawer.

“My duty,” said he, “would be to leave you to the executioner who awaits you; but I remember that I have the misfortune to be your father. Sit down; write and sign a confession of your crime. You will then find fire-arms in this drawer. May heaven forgive you!”

The old nobleman moved towards the door. Noel with a sign stopped him, and drawing at the same time a revolver from his pocket, he said: “Your fire-arms are needless, sir; my precautions, as you see, are already taken; they will never catch me alive. Only—-“

“Only?” repeated the count harshly.

“I must tell you, sir,” continued the advocate coldly, “that I do not choose to kill myself–at least, not at present.”

“Ah!” cried M. de Commarin in disgust, “you are a coward!”

“No, sir, not a coward; but I will not kill myself until I am sure that every opening is closed against me, that I cannot save myself.”

“Miserable wretch!” said the count, threateningly, “must I then do it myself?”

He moved towards the drawer, but Noel closed it with a kick.

“Listen to me, sir,” said he, in that hoarse, quick tone, which men use in moments of imminent danger, “do not let us waste in vain words the few moments’ respite left me. I have committed a crime, it is true, and I do not attempt to justify it; but who laid the foundation of it, if not yourself? Now, you do me the favor of offering me a pistol. Thanks. I must decline it. This generosity is not through any regard for me. You only wish to avoid the scandal of my trial, and the disgrace which cannot fail to reflect upon your name.”

The count was about to reply.

“Permit me,” interrupted Noel imperiously. “I do not choose to kill myself; I wish to save my life, if possible. Supply me with the means of escape; and I promise you that I will sooner die than be captured. I say, supply me with means, for I have not twenty francs in the world. My last thousand franc note was nearly all gone the day when– you understand me. There isn’t sufficient money at home to give my mother a decent burial. Therefore, I say, give me some money.”

“Never!”

“Then I will deliver myself up to justice, and you will see what will happen to the name you hold so dear!”

The count, mad with rage, rushed to his table for a pistol. Noel placed himself before him.

“Oh, do not let us have any struggle,” said he coldly; “I am the strongest.”

M. de Commarin recoiled. By thus speaking of the trial, of the scandal and of the disgrace, the advocate had made an impression upon him.

For a moment hesitating between love for his name and his burning desire to see this wretch punished, the old nobleman stood undecided.

Finally his feeling for his rank triumphed.

“Let us end this,” he said in a tremulous voice, filled with the utmost contempt; “let us end this disgraceful scene. What do you demand of me?”

“I have already told you, money, all that you have here. But make up your mind quickly.”

On the previous Saturday the count had withdrawn from his bankers the sum he had destined for fitting up the apartments of him whom he thought was his legitimate child.

“I have eighty thousand francs here,” he replied.

“That’s very little,” said the advocate; “but give them to me. I will tell you though that I had counted on you for five hundred thousand francs. If I succeed in escaping my pursuers, you must hold at my disposal the balance, four hundred and twenty thousand francs. Will you pledge yourself to give them to me at the first demand? I will find some means of sending for them, without any risk to myself. At that price, you need never fear hearing of me again.”

By way of reply, the count opened a little iron chest imbedded in the wall, and took out a roll of bank notes, which he threw at Noel’s feet.

An angry look flashed in the advocate’s eyes, as he took one step towards his father.

“Oh! take care!” he said threateningly; “people who, like me, have nothing to lose are dangerous. I can yet give myself up, and—-“

He stooped down, however, and picked up the notes.