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You know the doctor is going to meet us here." "I think we may need the papers you read to us, to convince Monsieur Domini." M. Plantat smiled sadly, and looking steadily at him, replied: "You are very sly, Monsieur Lecoq; but I too am sly enough to keep the last key of the mystery of which you hold all the others." "Believe me " stammered M. Lecoq.
He did not reflect that the countess's skirts, in being dragged along the grass, pressing it down and breaking it for a considerable space, spoiled his trick. Nor did he think that her elegant and well-curved feet, encased in small high-heeled boots, would mould themselves in the damp earth of the lawn, and thus leave against him a proof clearer than the day." M. Plantat rose abruptly.
"Doubtless we shall now hear something important about Guespin." "Are you expecting some new witness?" asked M. Plantat. "No; I expect one of the Corbeil police to whom I have given an important mission." "Regarding Guespin?" "Yes. Very early this morning a young working-woman of the town, whom Guespin has been courting, brought me an excellent photograph of him.
It was really the bone-setter, working his jaws nervously. His adversary had thrown him down by the famous knee-stroke which is the last resort of the worst prowlers about the Parisian barriers. But it was not so much Robelot's presence which surprised M. Plantat and his friend.
Gendron would have been puzzled to say what he had eaten. The dinner was nearly over, when M. Plantat began to be annoyed by the constraint which the presence of the servants put upon the party. He called to the cook: "You will give us our coffee in the library, and may then retire, as well as Louis." "But these gentlemen do not know their rooms," insisted Mme.
"You see," said he, while they were waiting to be served, "we must try to get at Laurence without Tremorel's knowing it. We must have a ten minutes' talk with her alone, and in the house. That is a condition absolutely necessary to our success." M. Plantat had evidently been expecting some immediate and decisive action, for M. Lecoq's remark filled him with alarm.
"He will speak now," said he, so full of confidence that his eyes shone, and he forgot the portrait of the dear defunct, "for I have three means of unloosening his tongue, one of which is sure to succeed. But before he comes I should like to know one thing. Do you know whether Tremorel saw Jenny after Sauvresy's death?" "Jenny?" asked M. Plantat, a little surprised. "Yes." "Certainly he did."
M. Plantat insisted on examining the wound, and was not satisfied until the doctor declared it to be a very slight one. "Come, Master Robelot," said the old man, "what were you doing here?" The bone-setter did not reply. "Take care," insisted M. Plantat, "your silence will confirm us in the idea that you came with the worst designs."
This mystery mightily worried the detective and dampened the joy he felt at having solved the crime at Valfeuillu. He made one more attempt to surprise Plantat into satisfying his curiosity. Taking him by the coat-lapel, he drew him into the embrasure of a window, and with his most innocent air, said: "I beg your pardon, are we going back to your house?" "Why should we?
As he went, he staggered like a drunken man. M. Lecoq went up to M. Plantat, and taking off his hat: "I surrender," said he, "and bow to you; you are great, like my master, the great Tabaret." The detective's amour-propre was clearly aroused; his professional zeal was inspired; he found himself before a great crime one of those crimes which triple the sale of the Gazette of the Courts.
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