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Updated: May 19, 2025
The two brothers reached the corner of the rue de l'Autruche just as the king was entering the house of his mistress, Marie Touchet. By the light of the torches which the concierge carried, they distinguished Tavannes and the two Ruggieri. "Hey, Tavannes!" cried the grand-master, running after the king's companion, who had turned and was making his way back to the Louvre, "What happened to you?"
The Duke and the inspector gazed at him with respectful eyes at least, the eyes of the inspector were respectful; the Duke's eyes twinkled. "I am gathering up the threads," said M. Formery. "Inspector, bring up the concierge and his wife. I will question them on the scene of the crime. Their dossier should be here. If it is, bring it up with them; if not, no matter; bring them up without it."
It was there: an old weather-beaten house, with a narrow entrance and a corridor, in the middle of which flowed a dirty, foul-smelling stream of water; the room of the concierge looked like a black hole at the foot of the staircase, the balusters and walls of which were wet with moisture and streaked with dirt; a house of poor working-people, many stories high, and built in the time when this quarter of Paris was almost a suburb.
But I was mistaken: the blouses, who had not had one gun to a hundred the day before, had been all night arming themselves by domiciliary requisitions. The national guard was not believed to be firm. The night before, an hour after I had parted with Miss Hermione, I had made an attempt to see her and Mrs. Leare, without any success. Not even bribery would induce the concierge to let me in.
The red-haired beauty jumped back with a defiant air: "Very well, then! I have taken my letters, they belong to me! I wish to have them! It disgusts me to think that they are left lying about your rooms. Do you think it funny that your orderly should read them to his country-woman? That your concierge should know all about them? I declare men like you have not a scrap of tact, of nice feeling!"
To save my life Claperon substituted the senseless being for me, on the scaffold, and he was executed in my stead. He has quitted the country, and I have been a vagabond on the face of the earth ever since that time. At length I obtained, through the assistance of my sister, the situation of concierge in the Hôtel Marboeuf, in the Rue Grange-Batelière.
By reading every tenth word, he got a consistent message, save that certain supplies, over which the concierge had railed, were special code words for certain regiments. These he could not decipher. "Whoever was to receive this," he said at last, "would have been in possession of complete data of the army, equipment and all, and the location of various regiments.
I was watching the movements of a man, similarly attired to myself, as he crossed and recrossed the courtyard to draw water from the well or to fetch wood from one of the sheds, and then disappeared up the main staircase. A casual, tactful inquiry of the concierge assured me that that man was indeed in the employ of Mr. Farewell.
Gervaise, leaning over her tub and her arms up to the elbows in the soapsuds, nodded in acquiescence. "Yes," continued the concierge, "I have seen many little things." But she started back as Gervaise turned round with a pale face and quivering lips. "Oh, I know nothing," she continued.
We kept there a night-watchman, and both he and the concierge must have been amazed at my appearance. I went up to my own room, had a roaring fire kindled, locked the door, found a smoking-jacket, and then, with a glass of good rye and a cigar, sat down, feeling a delightful sense of joy and security. Next I turned to examine the value of my prize.
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