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Updated: June 23, 2025
"Parbleu! I did my best, for I was well paid, and I was always fond of learning." "And you were an apt scholar at Doctor Gendron's, Master Robelot; he makes some very curious studies. His work and experience on poisons are above all remarkable." Robelot's uneasiness became apparent; his look wavered. "Yes;" returned he, "I have seen some strange experiments."
Gendron, "your apothecary is an intelligent man; but you have at Orcival a fellow who quite outdoes him, a fellow who knows how to make money; one Robelot " "Robelot, the bone-setter?" "That's the man. I suspect him of giving consultations, and prescribing sub rosa. He is very clever. In fact I educated him.
Doctor Gendron, with whom you served, was praising your cleverness a moment ago." The bone-setter shuddered, not so imperceptibly as to escape Plantat, who continued: "Yes, the good doctor said he never had so intelligent an assistant. 'Robelot, said he, 'has such an aptitude for chemistry, and so much taste for it besides, that he understands as well as I many of the most delicate operations."
By good luck, at the street corner, I came upon Robelot, the bone-setter 'Come, follow me, said I. He did so; sent away those who were tending monsieur, and bled him in both arms. Shortly after, he breathed, then he opened his eyes, and then he spoke. Now he is quite restored, and is lying on one of the drawing-room lounges, crying with all his might.
You've let out in spite of yourself a secret that tormented you furiously, and you came here to get it back again. You thought that perhaps Monsieur Plantat had not told it to anybody, and you wanted to prevent him from speaking again forever." Robelot made a sign of protesting. "Shut up now," said M. Lecoq. "And your cutlass?" While this conversation was going on, M. Plantat reflected.
He had put on the left hand the sum of forty thousand francs; on the right hand, various sums were inscribed, the total of which was twenty-one thousand five hundred francs. It was only too clear; Mme. Sauvresy had paid Robelot forty thousand francs for the bottle of poison. There was nothing more to learn at his house.
"He'll need you, be assured," said M. Plantat, who added, in a careless tone, which his rapid glance at Robelot belied, "The interest attaching to this case will be intense, and the task difficult. Monsieur Sauvresy's body is to be disinterred." Robelot was certainly prepared for something strange, and he was armed with all his audacity.
"These conjectures are very shrewd," interposed M. Plantat; "but how is it that Guespin did not rejoin his comrades in the Batignolles? For in that way, to a certain degree, he might have provided a kind of alibi." Dr. Gendron had been sitting on the only unbroken chair in the chamber, reflecting on Plantat's sudden embarrassment, when he had spoken of Robelot the bone-setter.
Robelot occupied a little house of three rooms, where he lived by himself; one of the rooms served as a shop, and was full of plants, dried herbs, grain, and other articles appertaining to his vocation as an herbist. He slept in the back room, which was better furnished than most country rooms. His body was placed upon the bed.
"He was a sly rogue, this Robelot, and he was cunning enough to conceal his sudden fortune and patient enough to appear to be years accumulating it. You only find in his secretary effects which he thought he could avow without danger. How much is there in all?" Plantat rapidly added up the different sums, and said: "About fourteen thousand five hundred francs."
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