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M. Mathias comes out to open it himself, every morning at the stroke of six, winter and summer. Well, it's past eight now. I called and shouted. Nobody answered. So we came on here." "You might have enquired at old M. de Gorne's," said the sergeant. "He lives on the high-road." "On my word, so I might! I never thought of that." "We'd better go there now," the sergeant decided.
Deputy?" asked Renine. "Do you mind? The mistake which the sergeant and I made this morning was to investigate only the footprints left by the alleged murderer and to neglect Mathias de Gorne's. Why indeed should they have attracted our attention? Yet it was precisely there that the crux of the whole affair was to be found." They stepped into the orchard and went to the well.
Two of his men went with him, as well as the peasants and a locksmith whose services were called into requisition. Renine joined the party. Soon, at the end of the village, they reached old de Gorne's farmyard, which Renine recognized by Hortense's description of its position. The old fellow was harnessing his horse and trap.
It seemed as though Jerome's composure had increased Madame de Gorne's assurance. She replied: "I did not come to, monsieur, until I was at the chateau." "It's most extraordinary. Didn't you hear the three shots which were heard by almost every one in the village?" "I did not." "And did you see nothing of what happened beside the well?" "Nothing did happen. M. Vignal has told you so."
But a farm-labourer and a woman arrived, who said that they were in Mathias de Gorne's service, that they had been away for two days because of the intervening Sunday and that they had come straight from the manor-house, where they were unable to obtain admission: "The gate of the grounds is locked, sergeant," said the man. "It's the first time I've known this to happen.
"'What, the father neither? "'The handsome young man is the last descendant of the people who bought the chateau long ago. This explains old de Gorne's hatred. Jerome Vignal I know him and am very fond of him is a good-looking fellow and very well off; and he has sworn to run off with Natalie de Gorne. It's the old man who says so, whenever he has had a drop too much. There, listen!
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