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Updated: May 13, 2025
"No," said Beautrelet, "I shall want a few more particulars. Leave her with me. Besides, I want to talk to her. I knew her when she was quite small." Froberval went away. Beautrelet and the little girl remained alone in the tavern smoking room. A few minutes passed, a waiter entered, cleared away some cups and left the room again.
"Yes, I shall take the next train back." "What! Why, you don't know your inquiry " "My inquiry is finished. I know pretty well all that I wanted to know. I shall have left Cherbourg in an hour." Froberval rose to go. He looked at Beautrelet with an air of absolute bewilderment, hesitated a moment and then took his cap: "Are you coming, Charlotte?"
Already he was on his feet and, without giving a thought to Froberval, without even troubling about the child, who stood gazing at him in stupefaction, he opened the door and ran to the station: "Chateauroux, madame a ticket for Chateauroux " "Over Mans and Tours?" asked the booking-clerk. "Of course the shortest way. Shall I be there for lunch?" "Oh, no!" "For dinner? Bedtime ?" "Oh, no!
Froberval muttered: "I have business at the workshop. We might as well go in " He was silent. Isidore had not taken his eyes from the photograph, was examining it from every point of view. At last, the boy asked: "Is there such a thing as an inn called the Lion d'Or at a short league outside the town?" "Yes, about a league from here." "On the Route de Valognes, is it?"
"He left in broad daylight, though he waited until dark to go to the meeting-place." "But, confound it, he didn't leave his room the whole of the day before yesterday!" "There is one way of making sure: run down to the dockyard, Froberval, and look for one of the men who were on guard in the afternoon, two days ago. Only, be quick, if you wish to find me here." "Are you going?"
"Was the bed disarranged in his room?" "No." "Nor the room disturbed in any way?" "No. I found his pipe in its usual place, with his tobacco and the book which he was reading. There was even this little photograph of yourself in the middle of the book, marking the page." "Let me see it." Froberval passed him the photograph. Beautrelet gave a start of surprise.
They imitated my writing on the back of the photograph and specified the meeting-place: Valognes Road, 3 kilometres 400, Lion Inn. My father came and they seized him, that's all." "Very well," muttered Froberval, dumbfounded, "very well. I admit it things happened as you say but that does not explain how he was able to leave during the night."
When he alighted from his compartment, at six o'clock in the morning, refreshed by a few hours' sleep, he had recovered all his confidence. On the platform, Froberval, the dockyard clerk who had given hospitality to M. Beautrelet, senior, was waiting for him, accompanied by his daughter Charlotte, an imp of twelve or thirteen. "Well?" cried Isidore.
He had recognized himself in the snapshot, standing, with his two hands in his pockets, on a lawn from which rose trees and ruins. Froberval added: "It must be the last portrait of yourself which you sent him. Look, on the back, you will see the date, 3 April, the name of the photographer, R. de Val, and the name of the town, Lion Lion-sur-Mer, perhaps."
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