The Lerouge Case by Emile Gaboriau (classic literature list TXT) 📖

“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