“And last night, how was it?”
“The wind was from the west, as it always is when we have a storm.”
“So that you have heard nothing? You do not know what a terrible calamity”—
“A calamity? I do not understand you, sir.”
This conversation had taken place in the court-yard: and at this moment there appeared two gendarmes on horseback, whom M. Galpin had sent for just before he left Valpinson.
When old Anthony saw them, he exclaimed,—
“Great God! what is the meaning of this? I must wake master.”
The magistrate stopped him, saying harshly,—
“Not a step! Don’t say a word!”
And pointing out Ribot to the gendarmes, he said,—
“Keep that lad under your eyes, and let him have no communication with anybody.”
Then, turning again to Anthony, he said,—
“Now show us to M. de Boiscoran’s bedroom.”
VIII.
In spite of its grand feudal air, the chateau at Boiscoran was, after all, little more than a bachelor’s modest home, and in a very bad state of preservation. Of the eighty or a hundred rooms which it contained, hardly more than eight or ten were furnished, and this only in the simplest possible manner,—a sitting-room, a dining-room, a few guest-chambers: this was all M. de Boiscoran required during his rare visits to the place. He himself used in the second story a small room, the door of which opened upon the great staircase.
When they reached this door, guided by old Anthony, the magistrate said to the servant,—
“Knock!”
The man obeyed: and immediately a youthful, hearty voice replied from within,—
“Who is there?”
“It is I,” said the faithful servant. “I should like”—
“Go to the devil!” broke in the voice.
“But, sir”—
“Let me sleep, rascal. I have not been able to close an eye till now.” The magistrate, becoming impatient, pushed the servant aside, and, seizing the door-knob tried to open it; it was locked inside. But he lost no time in saying,—
“It is I, M. de Boiscoran: open, if you please!”
“Ah, dear M. Galpin!” replied the voice cheerfully.
“I must speak to you.”
“And I am at your service, illustrious jurist. Just give me time to veil my Apollonian form in a pair of trousers, and I appear.”
Almost immediately, the door opened; and M. de Boiscoran presented himself, his hair dishevelled, his eyes heavy with sleep, but looking bright in his youth and full health, with smiling lips and open hands.
“Upon my word!” he said. “That was a happy inspiration you had, my dear Galpin. You come to join me at breakfast?”
And, bowing to M. Daubigeon, he added,—
“Not to say how much I thank you for bringing our excellent commonwealth attorney with you. This is a veritable judicial visit”—
But he paused, chilled as he was by M. Daubigeon’s icy face, and amazed at M. Galpin’s refusal to take his proffered hand.
“Why,” he said, “what is the matter, my dear friend?”
The magistrate had never been stiffer in his life, when he replied,—
“We shall have to forget our relations, sir. It is not as a friend I come to-day, but as a magistrate.”
M. de Boiscoran looked confounded; but not a shadow of trouble appeared on his frank and open face.
“I’ll be hanged,” he said, “if I understand”—
“Let us go in,” said M. Galpin.
They went in; and, as they passed the door, Mechinet whispered into the attorney’s ear,—
“Sir, that man is certainly innocent. A guilty man would never have received us thus.”
“Silence, sir!” said the commonwealth attorney, however much he was probably of his clerk’s opinion. “Silence!”
And grave and sad he went and stood in one of the window embrasures. M. Galpin remained standing in the centre of the room, trying to see every thing in it, and to fix it in his memory, down to the smallest details. The prevailing disorder showed clearly how hastily M. de Boiscoran had gone to bed the night before. His clothes, his boots, his shirt, his waistcoat, and his straw hat lay scattered about on the chairs and on the floor. He wore those light gray trousers, which had been succcessively seen and recognized by Cocoleu, by Ribot, by Gaudry, and by Mrs. Courtois.
“Now, sir,” began M. de Boiscoran, with that slight angry tone of voice which shows that a man thinks a joke has been carried far enough, “will you please tell me what procures for me the honor of this early visit?”
Not a muscle in M. Galpin’s face was moving. As if the question had been addressed to some one else, he said coldly,—
“Will you please show us your hands, sir?”
M. de Boiscoran’s cheeks turned crimson; and his eyes assumed an expression of strange perplexity.
“If this is a joke,” he said, “it has perhaps lasted long enough.”
He was evidently getting angry. M. Daubigeon thought it better to interfere, and thus he said,—
“Unfortunately, sir, the question is a most serious one. Do what the magistrate desires.”
More and more amazed, M. de Boiscoran looked rapidly around him. In the door stood Anthony, his faithful old servant, with anguish on his face. Near the fireplace, the clerk had improvised a table, and put his paper, his pens, and his horn inkstand in readiness. Then with a shrug of his shoulders, which showed that he failed to understand, M. de Boiscoran showed his hands.
They were perfectly clean and white: the long nails were carefully cleaned also.
“When did you last wash your hands?” asked M. Galpin, after having examined them minutely.
At this question, M. de Boiscoran’s face brightened up; and, breaking out into a hearty laugh, he said,—
“Upon my word! I confess you nearly caught me. I was on the point of getting angry. I almost feared”—
“And there was good reason for fear,” said M. Galpin; “for a terrible charge has been brought against you. And it may be, that on your answer to my question, ridiculous as it seems to you, your honor may depend, and perhaps your liberty.”
This time there was no mistake possible. M. de Boiscoran felt that kind of terror which the law inspires even in the best of men, when they find themselves suddenly accused of a crime. He turned pale, and then he said in a troubled voice,—
“What! A charge has been brought against me, and you, M. Galpin, come to my house to examine me?”
“I am a magistrate, sir.”
“But you were also my friend. If anyone should have dared in my presence to accuse you of a crime, of a mean act, of something infamous, I should have defended you, sir, with all my energy, without hesitation, and without a doubt. I should have defended you till absolute, undeniable evidence should have been brought forward of your culpability; and even then I should have pitied you, remembering that I had esteemed you so highly as to favor your alliance with my family. But you—I am accused, I do not know of what, falsely, wrongly; and at once you hasten hither, you believe the charge, and consent to become my judge. Well, let it be so! I washed my hands last night after coming home.”
M. Galpin had not boasted too much in praising his self-possession and his perfect control over himself. He did not move when the terrible words fell upon his ear; and he asked again in the same calm tone,—
“What has become of the water you used for that purpose?”
“It is probably still there, in my dressing-room.”
The magistrate at once went in. On the marble table stood a basin full of water. That water was black and dirty. At the bottom lay particles of charcoal. On the top, mixed with the soapsuds, were swimming some extremely slight but unmistakable fragments of charred paper. With infinite care the magistrate carried the basin to the table at which Mechinet had taken a seat; and, pointing at it, he asked M. de Boiscoran,—
“Is that the water in which you washed your hands last night after coming home?”
“Yes,” replied the other with an air of careless indifference.
“You had been handling charcoal, or some inflammable material.”
“Don’t you see?”
Standing face to face, the commonwealth attorney and clerk exchanged rapid glances. They had had the same feeling at that moment. If M. de Boiscoran was innocent, he was certainly a marvellously cool and energetic man, or he was carrying out a long-premeditated plan of action; for every one of his answers seemed to tighten the net in which he was taken. The magistrate himself seemed to be struck by this; but it was only for a moment, and then, turning to the clerk, he said,—
“Write that down!”
He dictated to him the whole evidence, most minutely and accurately, correcting himself every now and then to substitute a better word, or to improve his style. When he had read it over he said,—
“Let us go on, sir. You were out last night?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Having left the house at eight, you returned only around midnight.”
“After midnight.”
“You took your gun?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Where is it?”
With an air of indifference, M. de Boiscoran pointed at it in the corner of the fireplace, and said,—
“There it is!”
M. Galpin took it up quickly. It was a superb weapon, double-barrelled, of unusually fine make, and very elegant. On the beautifully carved woodwork the manufacturer’s name, Clebb, was engraven.
“When did you last fire this gun?” asked the magistrate.
“Some four or five days ago.”
“What for?”
“To shoot some rabbits who infested my woods.”
M. Galpin raised and lowered the cock with all possible care: he noticed that it was the Remington patent. Then he opened the chamber, and found that the gun was loaded. Each barrel had a cartridge in it. Then he put the gun back in its place, and, pulling from his pocket the leaden cartridge-case which Pitard had found, he showed it to M. de Boiscoran, and asked him,—
“Do you recognize this?”
“Perfectly!” replied the other. “It is a case of one of the cartridges which I have probably thrown away as useless.”
“Do you think you are the only one in this country who has a gun by this maker?”
“I do not think it: I am quite sure of it.”
“So that you must, as a matter of course, have been at a spot where such a cartridge-case as this has been found?”
“Not necessarily. I have often seen children pick up these things, and play with them.”
The clerk, while he made his pen fly across his paper, could not resist the temptation of making all kinds of faces. He was too well acquainted with lawyers’ tactics not to understand M. Galpin’s policy perfectly well, and to see how cunningly it was devised to make every fact strengthen the suspicion against M. de Boiscoran.
“It is a close game,” he said to himself.
The magistrate had taken a seat.
“If that is so,” he began again, “I beg you will give me an account of how you spent the evening after eight o’clock: do not hurry, consider, take your time; for your answers are of the utmost importance.”
M. de Boiscoran had so far remained quite cool; but his calmness betrayed one of those terrible storms within, which may break forth, no one knows when. This warning, and, even more so, the tone in which it was given, revolted him as a most hideous hypocrisy. And, breaking out all of a sudden, he cried,—
“After all, sir, what do you want of me? What am I accused of?”
M. Galpin did not stir. He replied,—
“You will hear it at the proper time. First answer my question, and believe me in your own interest. Answer frankly. What did you do last night?”
“How do I know? I walked about.”
“That is no answer.”
“Still it is so. I went out with no specific purpose: I walked at haphazard.”
“Your gun on your shoulder?”
“I always take my gun: my servant can tell you so.”
“Did you cross the Seille marshes?”
“No.”
The magistrate shook his head gravely. He said,—
“You are not telling the truth.”
“Sir!”
“Your boots there at the foot of the bed speak against you. Where does the mud come from with which they are covered?”
“The meadows around Boiscoran are very wet.”
“Do not attempt to deny it. You have been seen there.”
“But”—
“Young Ribot met you at the moment when you were crossing the canal.”
M. de Boiscoran made no reply.
“Where were you going?” asked the magistrate.
For the first time a real embarrassment appeared in the features of the accused,—the embarrassment of a man who suddenly sees an abyss opening before him. He hesitated; and, seeing that it was useless to deny, he said,—
“I was going to Brechy.”
“To whom?”
“To my wood-merchant, who has bought all this year’s wood. I did not find him at home, and came back on the high road.”
M. Galpin stopped him by a gesture.
“That is not so,” he said severely.
“Oh!”
“You never went to Brechy.”
“I beg your pardon.”
“And the proof is, that, about eleven o’clock, you were hurriedly crossing the forest of Rochepommier.”
“I?”
“Yes, you! And do not say No; for there are your trousers torn to pieces by the thorns and briers through which you must have made your way.”
“There are briers elsewhere as well as in the forest.”
“To be sure; but you were seen there.”
“By whom?”
“By Gaudry the poacher. And he saw so much of you, that he could tell us in what a bad humor you were. You were very angry. You were talking loud, and pulling the leaves from the trees.”
As he said so, the magistrate got up and took the shooting-jacket, which was lying on a chair not far from him. He searched the pockets, and pulled out of one a handful of leaves.
“Look here! you see, Gaudry has told the truth.”
“There are leaves everywhere,” said M. de Boiscoran half aloud.
“Yes; but a woman, Mrs. Courtois, saw you come out of the forest of Rochepommier. You helped her to put a sack of flour on her ass, which she could not lift alone. Do you deny it? No, you are right; for, look here! on the sleeve of your coat I see something white, which, no doubt, is flour from her bag.”
M. de Boiscoran hung his head. The magistrate went on,—
“You confess, then, that last night, between ten and eleven you were at Valpinson?”
“No, sir, I do not.”
“But this cartridge-case which I have just shown you was picked up at Valpinson, close by the ruins of the old castle.”
“Well, sir, have I not told you before that I have seen a hundred times children pick up these cases to play with? Besides, if I had really been at Valpinson, why should I deny it?”
M. Galpin rose to his full height, and said in the most solemn manner,—
“I am going to tell you why! Last night, between ten and eleven, Valpinson was set on fire; and it has been burnt to the ground.”
“Oh!”
“Last night Count Claudieuse was fired at twice.”
“Great God!”
“And it is thought, in fact there are strong reasons to think, that you, Jacques de Boiscoran, are the incendiary and the assassin.”
IX.
M. de Boiscoran looked around him like a man who has suddenly been seized with vertigo, pale, as if all his blood had rushed to his heart.
He saw nothing but mournful, dismayed faces.
Anthony, his old trusted servant, was leaning against the doorpost, as if he feared to fall. The clerk was mending his pen in the air, overcome with amazement. M. Daubigeon hung his head.
“This is horrible!” he murmured: “this is horrible!”
He fell heavily into a chair, pressing his hands on his heart, as if to keep down the sobs that threatened to rise. M. Galpin alone seemed to remain perfectly cool. The law, which he imagined he was representing in all its dignity, knows nothing of emotions. His thin lips even trembled a little, as if a slight smile was about to burst forth: it was the cold smile of the ambitious man, who thinks he has played his little part well.
Did not every thing tend to prove that Jacques de Boiscoran was the guilty man, and that, in the alternative between a friend, and an opportunity of gaining high distinction, he had chosen well? After the silence of a minute, which seemed to be a century, he went and stood, with arms crossed on his chest, before the accused, and asked him,—
“Do you confess?”
M. de Boiscoran sprang up as if moved by a spring, and said,—
“What? What do you want me to confess?”
“That you have committed the crime at Valpinson.”
The young man pressed his hands convulsively on his brow, and cried out,—
“But I am mad! I should have committed such a fearful, cowardly crime? Is that possible? Is that likely? I might confess, and you would not believe me. No! I am sure you would not believe my own words.”
He would have moved the marble on his mantelpiece sooner than M. Galpin. The latter replied in icy tones,—
“I am not part of the question here. Why will you refer to relations which must be forgotten? It is no longer the friend who speaks to you, not even the man, but simply the magistrate. You were seen”—
“Who is the wretch?”
“Cocoleu!”
M. de Boiscoran seemed to be overwhelmed. He stammered,—
“Cocoleu? That poor epileptic idiot whom the Countess Claudieuse has picked up?”
“The same.”
“And upon the strength of the senseless words of a poor imbecile I am charged with incendiarism, with murder?”
Never had the magistrate made such efforts to assume an air of impassive dignity and icy solemnity, as when he replied,—
“For an hour, at least, poor Cocoleu has been in the full enjoyment of his faculties. The ways of Providence are inscrutable.”
“But sir”—
“And what does Cocoleu depose? He says he saw you kindle the fire with your own hands, then conceal yourself behind a pile of wood, and fire twice at Count Claudieuse.”
“And all that appears quite natural to you?”
“No! At first it shocked me as it shocked everybody. You seem to be far above all suspicion. But a moment afterwards they pick up the cartridge-case, which can only have belonged to you. Then, upon my arrival here, I surprise you in bed, and find the water in which you have washed your hands black with coal, and little pieces of charred paper swimming on top of it.”
“Yes,” said M. de Boiscoran in an undertone: “it is fate.”
“And that is not all,” continued the magistrate, raising his voice, “I examine you, and you admit having been out from eight o’clock till after midnight. I ask what you have been doing, and you refuse to tell me. I insist, and you tell a falsehood. In order to overwhelm you, I am forced to quote the evidence of young Ribot, of Gaudry, and Mrs. Courtois, who have seen you at the very places where you deny having been. That circumstance alone condemns you. Why should you not be willing to tell me what you have been doing during those four hours? You claim to be innocent. Help me, then, to establish your innocence. Speak, tell me what you were doing between eight and midnight.”
M. de Boiscoran had no time to answer.
For some time already, half-suppressed cries, and the sound of a large crowd, had come up from the courtyard. A gendarme came in quite excited; and, turning to the magistrate and the commonwealth attorney, he said,—
“Gentlemen, there are several hundred peasants, men and women, in the yard, who clamor for M. de Boiscoran. They threaten to drag him down to the river. Some of the men are armed with pitchforks; but the women are the maddest. My comrade and I have done our best to keep them quiet.”
And just then, as if to confirm what he said, the cries came nearer, growing louder and louder; and one could distinctly hear,—
“Drown Boiscoran! Let us drown the incendiary!”
The attorney rose, and told the gendarme,—
“Go down and tell these people that the authorities are this moment examining the accused; that they interrupt us; and that, if they keep on, they will have to do with me.”
The gendarme obeyed his orders. M. de Boiscoran had turned deadly pale. He said to himself,—
“These unfortunate people believe my guilt!”
“Yes,” said M. Galpin, who had overheard the words; “and you would comprehend their rage, for which there is good reason, if you knew all that has happened.”
“What else?”
“Two Sauveterre firemen, one the father of five children, have perished in the flames. Two other men, a farmer from Brechy, and a gendarme who tried to rescue them, have been so seriously burned that their lives are in danger.”
M. de Boiscoran said nothing.
“And it is you,” continued the magistrate, “who is charged with all these calamities. You see how important it is for you to exculpate yourself.”
“Ah! how can I?”
“If you are innocent, nothing is easier. Tell us how you employed yourself last night.”
“I have told you all I can say.”
The magistrate seemed to reflect for a full minute; then he said,—
“Take care, M. de Boiscoran: I shall have to have you arrested.”
“Do so.”
“I shall be obliged to order your arrest at once, and to send you to jail in Sauveterre.”
“Very well.”
“Then you confess?”
“I confess that I am the victim of an unheard-of combination of circumstances; I confess that you are right, and that certain fatalities can only be explained by the belief in Providence: but I swear by all that is holy in the world, I am innocent.”
“Prove it.”
“Ah! would I not do it if I could?”
“Be good enough, then, to dress, sir, and to follow the gendarmes.”
Without a word, M. de Boiscoran went into his dressing-room, followed by his servant, who carried him his clothes. M. Galpin was so busy dictating to the clerk the latter part of the examination, that he seemed to forget his prisoner. Old Anthony availed himself of this opportunity.
“Sir,” he whispered into his master’s ear while helping him to put on his clothes.
“What?”
“Hush! Don’t speak so loud! The other window is open. It is only about twenty feet to the ground: the ground is soft. Close by is one of the cellar openings; and in there, you know, there is the old hiding-place. It is only five miles to the coast, and I will have a good horse ready for you to-night, at the park-gate.”
A bitter smile rose on M. de Boiscoran’s lips, as he said,—
“And you too, my old friend: you think I am guilty?”
“I conjure you,” said Anthony, “I answer for any thing. It is barely twenty feet. In your mother’s name”—
But, instead of answering him, M. de Boiscoran turned round, and called M. Galpin. When he had come in, he said to him, “Look at that window, sir! I have money, fast horses; and the sea is only five miles off. A guilty man would have escaped. I stay here; for I am innocent.”
In one point, at least, M. de Boiscoran had been right. Nothing would have been easier for him than to escape, to get into the garden, and to reach the hiding-place which his servant had suggested to him. But after that? He had, to be sure, with old Anthony’s assistance, some chance of escaping altogether. But, after all, he might have been found out in his hiding-place, or he might have been overtaken in his ride to the coast. Even if he had succeeded, what would have become of him? His flight would necessarily have been looked upon as a confession of his guilt.
Under such circumstances, to resist the temptation to escape, and to make this resistance well known, was in fact not so much an evidence of innocence as a proof of great cleverness. M. Galpin, at all events, looked upon it in that light; for he judged others by himself. Carefully and cunningly calculating every step he took in life, he did not believe in sudden inspirations. He said, therefore, with an ironical smile, which was to show that he was not so easily taken in,—
“Very well, sir. This circumstance shall be mentioned, as well as the others, at the trial.”
Very differently thought the commonwealth attorney and the clerk. If the magistrate had been too much engaged in his dictation to notice any thing, they had been perfectly able to notice the great excitement under which the accused had naturally labored. Perfectly amazed at first, and thinking, for a moment, that the whole was a joke, he had next become furiously angry; then fear and utter dejection had followed one another. But in precise proportion as the charges had accumulated, and the evidence had become overwhelming, he had, so far from becoming demoralized, seemed to recover his assurance.
“There is something curious about it,” growled Mechinet. M. Daubigeon, on the other hand, said nothing; but when M. de Boiscoran came out of his dressing-room, fully dressed and ready, he said,—
“One more question, sir.”
The poor man bowed. He was pale, but calm and self-possessed.
“I am ready to reply,” he said.
“I’ll be brief. You seemed to be surprised and indignant at any one’s daring to accuse you. That was weakness. Justice is but the work of man, and must needs judge by appearances. If you reflect, you will see that the appearances are all against you.”
“I see it but too clearly.”
“If you were on a jury, you would not hesitate to pronounce a man guilty upon such evidence.”
“No, sir, no!”
The commonwealth attorney bounded from his chair. He said,—
“You are not sincere!”
M. de Boiscoran sadly shook his head, and replied,—
“I speak to you without the slightest hope of convincing you, but in all sincerity. No, I should not condemn a man, as you say, if he asserted his innocence, and if I did not see any reason for his crime. For, after all, unless a man is mad, he does not commit a crime for nothing. Now I ask you, how could I, upon whom fortune has always smiled; I who am on the eve of marrying one whom I love passionately,—how could I have set Valpinson on fire, and tried to murder Count Claudieuse?”
M. Galpin had scarcely been able to disguise his impatience, when he saw the attorney take part in the affair. Seizing, therefore, the opportunity to interfere, he said,—
“Your reason, sir, was hatred. You hated the count and the countess mortally. Do not protest: it is of no use. Everybody knows it; and you yourself have told me so.”
M. de Boiscoran looked as if he were growing still more pale, and then replied in a tone of crushing disdain,—
“Even if that were so, I do not see what right you have to abuse the confidence of a friend, after having declared, upon your arrival here, that all friendship between us had ceased. But that is not so. I never told you any such thing. As my feelings have never changed, I can repeat literally what I have said. I have told you that the count was a troublesome neighbor, a stickler for his rights, and almost absurdly attached to his preserves. I have also told you, that, if he declared my public opinions to be abominable, I looked upon his as ridiculous and dangerous. As for the countess, I have simply said, half in jest, that so perfect a person was not to my taste; and that I should be very unhappy if my wife were a Madonna, who hardly ever deigned to put her foot upon the ground.”
“And that was the only reason why you once pointed your gun at Count Claudieuse? A little more blood rushing to your head would have made you a murderer on that day.”
A terrible spasm betrayed M. de Boiscoran’s fury; but he checked himself, and said,—
“My passion was less fiery than it may have looked. I have the most profound respect for the count’s character. It is an additional grief to me that he should have accused me.”
“But he has not accused you!” broke in M. Daubigeon. “On the contrary, he was the first and the most eager to defend you.”
And, in spite of the signs which M. Galpin made, he continued,—
“Unfortunately that has nothing to do with the force of the evidence against you. If you persist in keeping silence, you must look for a criminal trial for the galleys. If you are innocent, why not explain the matter? What do you wait for? What do you hope?”
“Nothing.”
Mechinet had, in the meantime, completed the official report.
“We must go,” said M. Galpin
“Am I at liberty,” asked M. de Boiscoran, “to write a few lines to my father and my mother? They are old: such an event may kill them.”
“Impossible!” said the magistrate.
Then, turning to Anthony, he said,—
“I am going to put the seals on this room, and I shall leave it in the meanwhile in your keeping. You know your duty, and the penalties to which you would be subject, if, at the proper time, every thing is not found in the same condition in which it is left now. Now, how shall we get back to Sauveterre?”
After mature deliberation it was decided that M. de Boiscoran should go in one of his own carriages, accompanied by one of the gendarmes. M. Daubigeon, the magistrate, and the clerk would return in the mayor’s carriage, driven by Ribot, who was furious at being kept under surveillance.
“Let us be off,” said the magistrate, when the last formalities had been fulfilled.
M. de Boiscoran came down slowly. He knew the court was full of furious peasants; and he expected to be received with hootings. It was not so. The gendarme whom the attorney had sent down had done his duty so well, that not a cry was heard. But when he had taken his seat in the carriage, and the horse went off at a trot, fierce curses arose, and a shower of stones fell, one of which wounded a gendarme.
“Upon my word, you bring ill luck, prisoner,” said the man, a friend of the other gendarme who had been so much injured at the fire.
M. de Boiscoran made no reply. He sank back into the corner, and seemed to fall into a kind of stupor, from which he did not rouse himself till the carriage drove into the yard of the prison at Sauveterre. On the threshold stood Master Blangin, the jailer, smiling with delight at the idea of receiving so distinguished a prisoner.
“I am going to give you my best room,” he said, “but first I have to give a receipt to the gendarme, and to enter you in my book.” Thereupon he took down his huge, greasy register, and wrote the name of Jacques de Boiscoran beneath that of Trumence Cheminot, a vagabond who had just been arrested for having broken into a garden.
It was all over. Jacques de Boiscoran was a prisoner, to be kept in close confinement.
SECOND PART—THE BOISCORAN TRIAL
I.
The Paris house of the Boiscoran family, No. 216 University Street, is a house of modest appearance. The yard in front is small; and the few square yards of damp soil in the rear hardly deserve the name of a garden. But appearances are deceptive. The inside is marvellously comfortable; careful and painstaking hands have made every provision for ease; and the rooms display that solid splendor for which our age has lost the taste. The vestibule contains a superb mosaic, brought home from Venice, in 1798, by one of the Boiscorans, who had degenerated, and followed the fortunes of Napoleon. The balusters of the great staircase are a masterpiece of iron work; and the wainscoting in the dining-room has no rival in Paris.
All this, however, is a mere nothing in comparison with the marquis’s cabinet of curiosities. It fills the whole depth, and half the width, of the upper story; is lighted from above like a huge atelier; and would fill the heart of an artist with delight. Immense glass cases, which stand all around against the walls, hold the treasures of the marquis,—priceless collections of enamels, ivories, bronzes, unique manuscripts, matchless porcelains, and, above all, his faiences, his dear faiences, the pride and the torment of his old age.
The owner was well worthy of such a setting.
Though sixty-one years old at that time, the marquis was as straight as ever, and most aristocratically lean. He had a perfectly magnificent nose, which absorbed immense quantities of snuff; his mouth was large, but well furnished; and his brilliant eyes shone with that restless cunning which betrayed the amateur, who has continually to deal with sharp and eager dealers in curiosities and second-hand articles of vertu.
In the year 1845 he had reached the summit of his renown by a great speech on the question of public meetings; but at that hour his watch seemed to have stopped. All his ideas were those of an Orleanist. His appearance, his costume, his high cravat, his whiskers, and the way he brushed his hair, all betrayed the admirer and friend of the citizen king. But for all that, he did not trouble himself about politics; in fact, he troubled himself about nothing at all. With the only condition that his inoffensive passion should be respected, the marchioness was allowed to rule supreme in the house, administering her large fortune, ruling her only son, and deciding all questions without the right of appeal. It was perfectly useless to ask the marquis any thing: his answer was invariably,—
“Ask my wife.”
The good man had, the evening before, purchased a little at haphazard, a large lot of faiences, representing scenes of the Revolution; and at about three o’clock, he was busy, magnifying-glass in hand, examining his dishes and plates, when the door was suddenly opened.
The marchioness came in, holding a blue paper in her hand. Six or seven years younger than her husband, she was the very companion for such an idle, indolent man. In her walk, in her manner, and in her voice, she showed at once the woman who stands at the wheel, and means to be obeyed. Her once celebrated beauty had left remarkable traces enough to justify her pretensions. She denied having any claims to being considered handsome, since it was impossible to deny or conceal the ravages of time, and hence by far her best policy was to accept old age with good grace. Still, if the marchioness did not grow younger, she pretended to be older than she really was. She had her gray hair puffed out with considerable affectation, so as to contrast all the more forcibly with her ruddy, blooming cheeks, which a girl might have envied and she often thought of powdering her hair.
She was so painfully excited, and almost undone, when she came into her husband’s cabinet, that even he, who for many a year had made it a rule of his life to show no emotion, was seriously troubled. Laying aside the dish which he was examining, he said with an anxious voice,—
“What is the matter? What has happened?”
“A terrible misfortune.”
“Is Jacques dead?” cried the old collector.
The marchioness shook her head.
“No! It is something worse, perhaps”—
The old man, who has risen at the sight of his wife, sank slowly back into his chair.
“Tell me,” he stammered out,—“tell me. I have courage.”
She handed him the blue paper which she had brought in, and said slowly,—
“Here. A telegram which I have just received from old Anthony, our son’s valet.”
With trembling hands the old marquis unfolded the paper, and read,—
“Terrible misfortune! Master Jacques accused of having set the chateau at Valpinson on fire, and murdered Count Claudieuse. Terrible evidence against him. When examined, hardly any defence. Just arrested and carried to jail. In despair. What must I do?”
The marchioness had feared lest the marquis should have been crushed by this despatch, which in its laconic terms betrayed Anthony’s abject terror. But it was not so. He put it back on the table in the calmest manner, and said, shrugging his shoulders,—
“It is absurd!”
His wife did not understand it. She began again,—
“You have not read it carefully, my friend”—
“I understand,” he broke in, “that our son is accused of a crime which he has not and can not have committed. You surely do not doubt his innocence? What a mother you would be! On my part, I assure you I am perfectly tranquil. Jacques an incendiary! Jacques a murderer! That is nonsense!”
“Ah! you did not read the telegram,” exclaimed the marchioness.
“I beg your pardon.”
“You did not see that there was evidence against him.”
“If there had been none, he could not have been arrested. Of course, the thing is disagreeable: it is painful.”
“But he did not defend himself.”
“Upon my word! Do you think that if to-morrow somebody accused me of having robbed the till of some shopkeeper, I would take the trouble to defend myself?”
“But do you not see that Anthony evidently thinks our son is guilty?”
“Anthony is an old fool!” declared the marquis.
Then pulling out his snuffbox, and stuffing his nose full of snuff, he said,—
“Besides, let us consider. Did you not tell me that Jacques is in love with that little Dionysia Chandore?”
“Desperately. Like a real child.”
“And she?”
“She adores Jacques.”
“Well. And did you not also tell me that the wedding-day was fixed?”
“Yes, three days ago.”
“Has Jacques written to you about the matter?”
“An excellent letter.”
“In which he tells you he is coming up?”
“Yes: he wanted to purchase the wedding-presents himself.” With a gesture of magnificent indifference the marquis tapped the top of his snuffbox, and said,—
“And you think a boy like our Jacques, a Boiscoran, in love, and beloved, who is about to be married, and has his head full of wedding-presents, could have committed such a horrible crime? Such things are not worth discussing, and, with your leave, I shall return to my occupation.”
If doubt is contagious, confidence is still more so. Gradually the marchioness felt reassured by the perfect assurance of her husband. The blood came back to her cheeks; and smiles reappeared on pale lips. She said in a stronger voice,—
“In fact, I may have been too easily frightened.”
The marquis assented by a gesture.
“Yes, much too easily, my dear. And, between us, I would not say much about it. How could the officers help accusing our Jacques if his own mother suspects him?”
The marchioness had taken up the telegram, and was reading it over once more.
“And yet,” she said, answering her own objections, “who in my place would not have been frightened? This name of Claudieuse especially”—
“Why? It is the name of an excellent and most honorable gentleman,—the best man in the world, in spite of his sea-dog manners.”
“Jacques hates him, my dear.”
“Jacques does not mind him any more than that.”
“They have repeatedly quarrelled.”
“Of course. Claudieuse is a furious legitimist; and as such he always talks with the utmost contempt of all of us who have been attached to the Orleans family.”
“Jacques has been at law with him.”
“And he has done right, only he ought to have carried the matter through. Claudieuse has claims on the Magpie, which divides our lands,—absurd claims. He wants at all seasons, and according as he may desire, to direct the waters of the little stream into his own channels, and thus drown the meadows at Boiscoran, which are lower than his own. Even my brother, who was an angel in patience and gentleness, had his troubles with this tyrant.”
But the marchioness was not convinced yet.
“There was another trouble,” she said.
“What?”
“Ah! I should like to know myself.”
“Has Jacques hinted at any thing?”
“No. I only know this. Last year, at the Duchess of Champdoce’s, I met by chance the Countess Claudieuse and her children. The young woman is perfectly charming; and, as we were going to give a ball the week after, it occurred to me to invite her at once. She refused, and did so in such an icy, formal manner, that I did not insist.”
“She probably does not like dancing,” growled the marquis.
“That same evening I mentioned the matter to Jacques. He seemed to be very angry, and told me, in a manner that was hardly compatible with respect, that I had been very wrong, and that he had his reasons for not desiring to come in contact with those people.”
The marquis felt so secure, that he only listened with partial attention, looking all the time aside at his precious faiences.
“Well,” he said at last, “Jacques detests the Claudieuses. What does that prove? God be thanked, we do not murder all the people we detest!”
His wife did not insist any longer. She only asked,—
“Well, what must we do?”
She was so little in the habit of consulting her husband, that he was quite surprised.
“The first thing is to get Jacques out of jail. We must see—we ought to ask for advice.”
At this moment a light knock was heard at the door.
“Come in!” he said.
A servant came in, bringing a large envelope, marked “Telegraphic Despatch. Private.”
“Upon my word!” cried the marquis. “I thought so. Now we shall be all right again.”
The servant had left the room. He tore open the envelope; but at the first glance at the contents the smile vanished, he turned pale, and just said,—
“Great God!”
Quick as lightning, the marchioness seized the fatal paper. She read at a glance,—
“Come quick. Jacques in prison; close confinement; accused of horrible crime. The whole town says he is guilty, and that he has confessed. Infamous calumny! His judge is his former friend, Galpin, who was to marry his cousin Lavarande. Know nothing except that Jacques is innocent. Abominable intrigue! Grandpa Chandore and I will do what can be done. Your help indispensable. Come, come!
“DIONYSIA CHANDORE.”
“Ah, my son is lost!” cried the marchioness with tears in her eyes. The marquis, however, had recovered already from the shock.
“And I—I say more than ever, with Dionysia, who is a brave girl, Jacques is innocent. But I see he is in danger. A criminal prosecution is always an ugly affair. A man in close confinement may be made to say any thing.”
“We must do something,” said the mother, nearly mad with grief.
“Yes, and without losing a minute. We have friends: let us see who among them can help us.”
“I might write to M. Margeril.”
The marquis, who had turned quite pale, became livid.
“What!” he cried. “You dare utter that name in my presence?”
“He is all powerful; and my son is in danger.”
The marquis stopped her with a threatening gesture, and cried with an accent of bitter hatred,—
“I would a thousand times rather my son should die innocent on the scaffold than owe his safety to that man!”
His wife seemed to be on the point of fainting.
“Great God! And yet you know very well that I was only a little indiscreet.”
“No more!” said the marquis harshly.
Then, recovering his self-control by a powerful effort, he went on,—
“Before we attempt any thing, we must know how the matter stands. You will leave for Sauveterre this evening.”
“Alone?”
“No. I will find some able lawyer,—a reliable jurist, who is not a politician,—if such a one can be found nowadays. He will tell you what to do, and will write to me, so that I can do here whatever may be best. Dionysia is right. Jacques must be the victim of some abominable intrigue. Nevertheless, we shall save him; but we must keep cool, perfectly cool.”
And as he said this he rang the bell so violently, that a number of servants came rushing in at once.
“Quick,” he said; “send for my lawyer, Mr. Chapelain. Take a carriage.”
The servant who took the order was so expeditious, that, in less than twenty minutes, M. Chapelain arrived.
“Ah! we want all your experience, my friend,” said the marquis to him. “Look here. Read these telegrams.”
Fortunately, the lawyer had such control over himself, that he did not betray what he felt; for he believed Jacques guilty, knowing as he did how reluctant courts generally are to order the arrest of a suspected person.
“I know the man for the marchioness,” he said at last.
“Ah!”
“A young man whose modesty alone has kept him from distinguishing himself so far, although I know he is one of the best jurists at the bar, and an admirable speaker.”
“What is his name?”
“Manuel Folgat. I shall send him to you at once.”
Two hours later, M. Chapelain’s protégé appeared at the house of the Boiscorans. He was a man of thirty-one or thirty-two, with large, wide-open eyes, whose whole appearance was breathing intelligence and energy.
The marquis was pleased with him, and after having told him all he knew about Jacques’s position, endeavored to inform him as to the people down at Sauveterre,—who would be likely to be friends, and who enemies, recommending to him, above all, to trust M. Seneschal, an old friend of the family, and a most influential man in that community.
“Whatever is humanly possible shall be done, sir,” said the lawyer.
That same evening, at fifteen minutes past eight, the Marchioness of Boiscoran and Manuel Folgat took their seats in the train for Orleans.
II.
The railway which connects Sauveterre with the Orleans line enjoys a certain celebrity on account of a series of utterly useless curves, which defy all common sense, and which would undoubtedly be the source of countless accidents, if the trains were not prohibited from going faster than eight or ten miles an hour.
The depot has been built—no doubt for the greater convenience of travellers—at a distance of two miles from town, on a place where formerly the first banker of Sauveterre had his beautiful gardens. The pretty road which leads to it is lined on both sides with inns and taverns, on market-days full of peasants, who try to rob each other, glass in hand, and lips overflowing with protestations of honesty. On ordinary days even, the road is quite lively; for the walk to the railway has become a favorite promenade. People go out to see the trains start or come in, to examine the new arrivals, or to exchange confidences as to the reasons why Mr. or Mrs. So-and-so have made up their mind to travel.
It was nine o’clock in the morning when the train which brought the marchioness and Manuel Folgat at last reached Sauveterre. The former was overcome by fatigue and anxiety, having spent the whole night in discussing the chances for her son’s safety, and was all the more exhausted as the lawyer had taken care not to encourage her hopes.
For he also shared, in secret at least, M. Chapelain’s doubts. He, also, had said to himself, that a man like M. de Boiscoran is not apt to be arrested, unless there are strong reasons, and almost overwhelming proofs of his guilt in the hands of the authorities.
The train was slackening speed.
“If only Dionysia and her father,” sighed the marchioness, “have thought of sending a carriage to meet us.”
“Why so?” asked Manuel Folgat.
“Because I do not want all the world to see my grief and my tears.”
The young lawyer shook his head, and said,—
“You will certainly not do that, madame, if you are disposed to follow my advice.”
She looked at him quite amazed; but he insisted.
“I mean you must not look as if you wished not to be seen: that would be a great, almost irreparable mistake. What would they think if they saw you in tears and great distress? They would say you were sure of your son’s guilt; and the few who may still doubt will doubt no longer. You must control public opinion from the beginning; for it is absolute in these small communities, where everybody is under somebody else’s immediate influence. Public opinion is all powerful; and say what you will, it controls even the jurymen in their deliberations.”
“That is true,” said the marchioness: “that is but too true.”
“Therefore, madame, you must summon all your energy, conceal your maternal anxiety in your innermost heart, dry your tears, and show nothing but the most perfect confidence. Let everybody say, as he sees you, ‘No mother could look so who thinks her son guilty.’”
The marchioness straightened herself, and said,—
“You are right, sir; and I thank you. I must try to impress public opinion as you say; and, so far from wishing to find the station deserted, I shall be delighted to see it full of people. I will show you what a woman can do who thinks of her son’s life.”
The Marchioness of Boiscoran was a woman of rare power.
Drawing her comb from her dressing-case, she repaired the disorder of her coiffure; with a few skilful strokes she smoothed her dress; her features, by a supreme effort of will, resumed their usual serenity; she forced her lips to smile without betraying the effort it cost her; and then she said in a clear, firm voice,—
“Look at me, sir. Can I show myself now?”
The train stopped at the station. Manuel Folgat jumped out lightly; and, offering the marchioness his hand to assist her, he said,—
“You will be pleased with yourself, madam. Your courage will not be useless. All Sauveterre seems to be here.”
This was more than half true. Ever since the night before, a report had been current,—no one knew how it had started,—that the “murderer’s mother,” as they charitably called her, would arrive by the nine o’clock train; and everybody had determined to happen to be at the station at that hour. In a place where gossip lives for three days upon the last new dress from Paris, such an opportunity for a little excitement was not to be neglected. No one thought for a moment of what the poor old lady would probably feel upon being compelled thus to face a whole town; for at Sauveterre curiosity has at least the merit, that it is not hypocritical. Everybody is openly indiscreet, and by no means ashamed of it. They place themselves right in front of you, and look at you, and try to find out the secret of your joy or your grief.
It must be borne in mind, however, that public opinion was running strongly against M. de Boiscoran. If there had been nothing against him but the fire at Valpinson, and the attempts upon Count Claudieuse, that would have been a small matter. But the fire had had terrible consequences. Two men had perished in it; and two others had been so severely wounded as to put their lives in jeopardy. Only the evening before, a sad procession had passed through the streets of Sauveterre. In a cart covered with a cloth, and followed by two priests, the almost carbonized remains of Bolton the drummer, and of poor Guillebault, had been brought home. The whole city had seen the widow go to the mayor’s office, holding in her arms her youngest child, while the four others clung to her dress.
All these misfortunes were traced back to Jacques, who was loaded with curses; and the people now thought of receiving his mother, the marchioness, with fierce hootings.
“There she is, there she is!” they said in the crowd, when she appeared in the station, leaning upon M. Folgat’s arm.
But they did not say another word, so great was their surprise at her appearance. Immediately two parties were formed. “She puts a bold face on it,” said some; while others declared, “She is quite sure of her son’s innocence.”
At all events, she had presence of mind enough to see what an impression she produced, and how well she had done to follow M. Folgat’s advice. It gave her additional strength. As she distinguished in the crowd some people whom she knew, she went up to them, and, smiling, said,—
“Well, you know what has happened to us. It is unheard of! Here is the liberty of a man like my son at the mercy of the first foolish notion that enters the head of a magistrate. I heard the news yesterday by telegram, and came down at once with this gentleman, a friend of ours, and one of the first lawyers of Paris.”
M. Folgat looked embarrassed: he would have liked more considerate words. Still he could not help supporting the marchioness in what she had said.
“These gentlemen of the court,” he said in measured tones, “will perhaps be sorry for what they have done.”
Fortunately a young man, whose whole livery consisted in a gold-laced cap, came up to them at this moment.
“M. de Chandore’s carriage is here,” he said.
“Very well,” replied the marchioness.
And bowing to the good people of Sauveterre, who were quite dumfounded by her assurance, she said,—
“Pardon me if I leave you so soon; but M. de Chandore expects us. I shall, however, be happy to call upon you soon, on my son’s arm.”
The house of the Chandore family stands on the other side of the New-Market Place, at the very top of the street, which is hardly more than a line of steps, which the mayor persistently calls upon the municipal council to grade, and which the latter as persistently refuse to improve. The building is quite new, massive but ugly, and has at the side a pretentious little tower with a peaked roof, which Dr. Seignebos calls a perpetual menace of the feudal system.
It is true the Chandores once upon a time were great feudal lords, and for a long time exhibited a profound contempt for all who could not boast of noble ancestors and a deep hatred of revolutionary ideas. But if they had ever been formidable, they had long since ceased to be so. Of the whole great family,—one of the most numerous and most powerful of the province,—only one member survived, the Baron de Chandore, and a girl, his granddaughter, betrothed to Jacques de Boiscoran. Dionysia was an orphan. She was barely three years old, when within five months, she lost her father, who fell in a duel, and her mother, who had not the strength to survive the man whom she had loved. This was certainly for the child a terrible misfortune; but she was not left uncared for nor unloved. Her grandfather bestowed all his affections upon her; and the two sisters of her mother, the Misses Lavarande, then already no longer young, determined never to marry, so as to devote themselves exclusively to their niece. From that day the two good ladies had wished to live in the baron’s house; but from the beginning he had utterly refused to listen to their propositions, asserting that he was perfectly able himself to watch over the child, and wanted to have her all to himself. All he would grant was, that the ladies might spend the day with Dionysia whenever they chose.
Hence arose a certain rivalry between the aunts and the grandfather, which led both parties to most amazing exaggerations. Each one did what could be done to engage the affections of the little girl; each one was willing to pay any price for the most trifling caress. At five years Dionysia had every toy that had ever been invented. At ten she was dressed like the first lady of the land, and had jewelry in abundance.
The grandfather, in the meantime, had been metamorphosed from head to foot. Rough, rigid, and severe, he had suddenly become a “love of a father.” The fierce look had vanished from his eyes, the scorn from his lips; and both had given way to soft glances and smooth words. He was seen daily trotting through the streets, and going from shop to shop on errands for his grandchild. He invited her little friends, arranged picnics for her, helped her drive her hoops, and if needs be, led in a cotillion.
If Dionysia looked displeased, he trembled. If she coughed, he turned pale. Once she was sick: she had the measles. He staid up for twelve nights in succession, and sent to Paris for doctors, who laughed in his face.
And yet the two old ladies found means to exceed his folly.
If Dionysia learned any thing at all, it was only because she herself insisted upon it: otherwise the writing-master and the music-master would have been sent away at the slightest sign of weariness.
Sauveterre saw it, and shrugged its shoulders.
“What a wretched education!” the ladies said. “Such weakness is absolutely unheard of. They tender the child a sorry service.”