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A fortnight later, S., his mother, and a friend heard more rapping, and a heavy knock on the windows. M. Poupart now gives the explanations of common-sense. The early noises might have had physical causes: master, servants, and neighbours all heard them, but that proves nothing. As to the papers, a wind, or a mouse may have interfered with them.
I may tell you that Louis de Lactre and Reginald Poupart have arrived with me in Paris bent on the same errand, and anxious like myself to testify their gratitude to you; so that we shall be a strong body, and could if necessary ride through France without any pass at all, since one or other of us is sure to find a friend in every town which we may traverse."
"Oh!" said Pigoult, on whose forehead the perspiration, which had not dried, bore testimony to his efforts, "Simon has just told some news that made them all unanimous. Except five persons, Poupart, my grandfather, Mollot, Sinot, and I, all present swore, as at the Jeu de Paume, to employ every means to promote the triumph of Simon Giguet, of whom I have made a mortal enemy.
Then the servants tried in vain to hold back the excited couch, well, these servants may have lied, and, at most, could not examine 'les ressorts secrets qui causaient ce mouvement'. Now, M. Poupart deserts the theory that we can make a bed run about, by lying kicking on it, and he falls back on hidden machinery.
"So you went to that meeting?" said Antonin Goulard to Poupart. "I shall never go again, monsieur le sous-prefet," said the innkeeper. "The son of Monsieur Keller is dead, and I have now no object in going there. God has taken upon himself to clear the ground." "Well, Pigoult, what happened?" cried Olivier Vinet, catching sight of the young notary.
Meanwhile, of all wanderers in Cock Lane, none is more beguiled than sturdy Common-sense, if an explanation is to be provided. Beautiful instances of common-sense explanations, occur in two stories of the last century, the St. Maur affair , and the haunted house of Amiens, . The author of 'Ce qu'on doit penser de l'aventure arrivee a Saint Maur, was M. Poupart, canon of St. Maur, near Paris.
Consequently, Simon took possession of Poupart, and delivered the apothecary Fromaget to his father, who had just come in to make his bow to the electors.
Common ghosts he dismisses on grounds of common-sense; if spirits in Purgatory could appear, they would appear more frequently, and would not draw the curtains of beds, drag at coverlets, turn tables upside down, and make terrible noises, all of which feats are traditional among ghosts. M. Poupart then comes to the adventure at St. Maur.
Thus M. S. was both melancholy, and anxious se donner un divertissement, by frightening his servants, to which end he supplied his bed with machinery that made it jump, and drew the curtains. What kind of secret springs would perform these feats, M. Poupart does not explain.
Poupart, though a most devoted adherent of the Cinq-Cygne family, had been sounded during the last day or two, by Colonel Giguet's valet, with so much cleverness and perseverance that he thought he was doing an ill-turn to the Comte de Gondreville, the enemy of the Cinq-Cygnes, by giving his influence to the election of Simon Giguet; and he was now conversing on that point with the man who accompanied him, an apothecary named Fromaget, who, as he did not furnish his wares to the chateau de Gondreville, desired nothing better than to cabal against the Kellers.
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