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Updated: June 23, 2025
"The countess had committed the only and the last imprudence of her whole life: she had remained three weeks longer in Paris than was agreed upon; and her impatient husband threatened to come for her. "'I must go back to Valpinson, she said; 'for there is nothing I would not do to keep up the reputation I have managed to make for myself.
As owner of Boiscoran, I could, henceforth, live as much as I chose in the province; and at all events come there whenever I liked, without anybody's inquiring for my reasons." Jacques de Boiscoran was evidently anxious to have done with his recital, to come to that night of the fire at Valpinson, and to learn at last from the eminent advocate of Sauveterre what he had to fear or to hope.
It explains how one of my cartridge-cases was found near the ruins, and why I had to wash my hands when I reached home." Nothing seemed to be able to shake the lawyer's conviction. He asked, "And the day after, when they came to arrest you, what was your first impression?" "I thought at once of Valpinson." "And when you were told that a crime had been committed?"
Three other witnesses who had turned up during the investigation confirmed this evidence; and by these means alone, and by comparing the hours, M. Galpin succeeded in proving, almost beyond doubt, that the accused had gone to Valpinson, and nowhere else, and that he had been there at the time the crime was committed. What was he doing there?
And, without minding the ruts and the stones in the road, M. Seneschal went on repeating all he knew about the owners of Valpinson. Count Trivulce Claudieuse was the last scion of one of the oldest families of the county. At sixteen, about 1829, he had entered the navy as an ensign, and for many years he had appeared at Sauveterre only rarely, and at long intervals.
'It was half-past eight, says Ribot, 'when M. de Boiscoran crossed the canal at the Seille swamps. He might, therefore, have easily reached Valpinson at half-past nine. At that hour the crime had not yet been committed. When was he seen returning home? Gaudry and the woman Courtois have told you the hour, after eleven o'clock.
M. de Besson's attempt at reconciliation had utterly failed; the countess lived at Valpinson; and I went back to Paris. "Still I was unable to shake off the impression; and the memory of the dinner at M. de Besson's house was still in my mind, when a month later, at a party at my mother's brother's, M. de Chalusse, I thought I recognized the Countess Claudieuse. It was she.
"Keep up, my friends!" said the mayor as he passed them, "keep up!" Three minutes farther on, a peasant on horseback appeared in the dark, riding along like a forlorn knight in a romance. M. Daubigeon ordered him to halt. He stopped. "You come from Valpinson?" asked M. Seneschal. "Yes," replied the peasant. "How is the count?" "He has come to at last." "What does the doctor say?"
And sitting down, he asked Cocoleu, "Come, my boy, listen to me, and try to understand what I say. Do you know what has happened at Valpinson?" "Fire," replied the idiot. "Yes, my friend, fire, which burns down the house of your benefactor, fire, which has killed two good men. But that is not all: they have tried to murder the count.
Between his own house and Valpinson there are two public roads, one by Brechy, and another around the swamps. Does M. de Boiscoran take either of the two? No. He cuts straight across the marshes, at the risk of sinking in, or of getting wet from head to foot.
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