Twelve or thirteen miles from Souillac the main line from Brives to
Cahors, which flanks the slope, describes a rather sharp curve. The
journey is a particularly picturesque one, and travellers who make it
during the daytime have much that is interesting and agreeable to see;
but while they are admiring the country, which marks the transition from
the severe region of the Limousin to the more laughing landscapes on the
confines of the Midi, the train suddenly plunges into a tunnel which
runs for half a mile and more through the heart of the mountain slope.
Leaving the tunnel, the line continues along the slope, then gradually
descends towards Souillac. Two or three miles from that little station,
which is a junction, the line runs alongside the highroad to Salignac,
skirts for a brief distance the Corrèze, one of the largest tributaries
on the right bank of the Dordogne, and then plunges into the heart of
Lot.
Torrential winter rains had seriously affected the railway embankment,
particularly near the mouth of the tunnel; a succession of heavy storms
in the early part of December had so greatly weakened the ballast that
the chief engineers of the Company had been hastily summoned to the
scene of the mischief. The experts decided that very important repairs
were required close to the Souillac end of the tunnel. It was necessary
to put in a complete system of drainage, with underground pipes through
which the water that came down from the mountain could escape between
the ballast and the side of the rock and so pass underneath the
permanent way. The sleepers, too, had been loosened by the bad weather,
and some of them had perished so much that the chairs were no longer
fast, a matter which was all the more serious because the line described
a very sharp curve at that precise spot.
Gangs of first-class navvies had been hurriedly requisitioned, but in
spite of the fact that an exceptional rate of wages was paid, a local
strike had broken out and for some days all work was stopped. Gradually,
however, moderate counsels prevailed and for over a week now, nearly all
the men had taken up their tools again. Nevertheless, for a month past,
these various circumstances had resulted in all the trains running
between Brives and Cahors, being regularly half an hour late. Further,
in view of the dangerous state of the line, all engine drivers coming
from Brives had received orders to stop their trains two hundred yards
from the end of the tunnel, and all drivers coming from Cahors to stop
their trains five hundred yards before the entrance to the tunnel, so
that should a train appear while any work was going on which rendered it
dangerous to pass, it could wait until the work was completed. The order
was also issued with the primary object of preventing the workers on the
line from being taken by surprise.
* * * * *
Day was just breaking this grey December morning, when the gang of
navvies set to work under a foreman, fixing on the down line the new
sleepers which had been brought up the day before. Suddenly a shrill
whistle was heard, and in the gaping black mouth of the tunnel the light
of two lamps became visible; a train bound for Cahors had stopped in
accordance with orders, and was calling for permission to pass.
The foreman ranged his men on either side of the down line and walked to
a small cabin erected at the mouth of the tunnel, where he pulled the
hand-signal so as to show the green light, thereby authorising the train
to proceed on its way.
There was a second short, sharp whistle; heavy puffs escaped from the
engine, and belching forth a dense volume of black smoke it slowly
emerged from the tunnel, followed by a long train of carriages, the
windows of which were frosted all over by the cold temperature outside.
A man approached the cabin allotted to the plate-layer in charge of that
section of the line in which the tunnel was included.
"I suppose this is the train due at Verrières at 6.55?" he said
carelessly.
"Yes," the plate-layer answered, "but it's late, for the clock down
there in the valley struck seven several minutes ago."
The train had gone by: the three red lamps fastened at the end of it
were already lost in the morning mist.
The man who spoke to the plate-layer was no other than François Paul,
the tramp who had been discharged by the magistrate installed at the
château of Beaulieu, at precisely the same time the day before, after a
brief examination. In spite of the deep wrinkle furrowed in his brow the
man seemed to make an effort to appear friendly and to want to carry on
the conversation.
"There aren't many people in this morning train," he remarked,
"specially in the first-class carriages."
The plate-layer appeared in no wise unwilling to postpone for a few
moments his tiring and chilly underground patrol; he put down his pick
before answering.
"Well, that's not surprising, is it? People who are rich enough to
travel first-class always come by the express which gets to Brives at
2.50 A.M."
"I see," said François Paul; "that's reasonable: and more practical for
travellers to Brives or Cahors. But what about the people who want to
get out at Gourdon, or Souillac, or Verrières, or any of the small
stations where the express doesn't stop?"
"I don't know," said the plate-layer; "but I suppose they have to get
out at Brives or Cahors and drive, or else travel by the day trains,
which are fast to Brives and slow afterwards."
François Paul did not press the matter. He lit a pipe and breathed upon
his benumbed fingers.
"Hard times, these, and no mistake!"
The plate-layer seemed sorry for him.
"I don't suppose you're an independent gentleman, but why don't you try
to get taken on here?" he suggested. "They want hands here."
"Oh, do they?"
"That's the fact; this is the foreman coming along now: would you like
me to speak to him for you?"
"No hurry," replied François Paul. "'Course, I'm not saying no, but I
should like to see what sort of work it is they're doing here: it might
not suit me; I shall still have time to get a couple of words with him,"
and with his eyes on the ground the tramp slowly walked along the
embankment away from the plate-layer.
The foreman met and passed him, and came up to the plate-layer at the
mouth of the tunnel.
"Well, Michu, how goes it with you? Still got the old complaint?"
"Middling, boss," the worthy fellow answered: "just keeping up, you
know. And how's yourself? And the work? When shall you finish? I don't
know if you know it, but these trains stopping regularly in my section
give me an extra lot of work."
"How's that?" the foreman enquired in surprise.
"The engine drivers take advantage of the stop to empty their ash-pans,
and they leave a great heap of mess there in my tunnel, which I'm
obliged to clear away. In the ordinary way they dump it somewhere else:
where, I don't know, but not in my tunnel, and that's all I care about."
The foreman laughed.
"You're a good 'un, Michu! If I were you I would ask the Company to give
me another man or two."
"And do you suppose the Company would?" Michu retorted. "By the way,
that poor devil who is going along there, shivering with cold and
hunger, was grumbling to me just now, and I advised him to ask you to
take him on. What do you think he said? Why, that he would have a look
at the work first, and off he went."
"It's a fact, Michu, that it's mighty difficult to come across people
who mean business nowadays. It's quite true that I want more hands. But
if that chap doesn't ask me to engage him in another minute, I'll kick
him out. The embankment is not public property, and I don't trust these
rascals who are for ever coming and going among the workmen to see what
mischief they can make. I'll go and cast an eye over the bolts and
things, for there are all sorts of vagrants about the neighbourhood just
now."
"And criminals, too," said old Michu. "I suppose you have heard of the
murder up at the château of Beaulieu?"
"Rather! My men are talking of nothing else. But you are right, Michu, I
will get a closer look at all strangers, and at your friend in
particular."
The foreman stopped abruptly; he had been examining the foot of the
embankment, and was standing quite still, watching. The plate-layer
followed his glance, and also stood fixed. After a few moments' silence
the two men looked at each other and smiled. In the half-light of the
valley they had seen the outline of a gendarme; he was on foot and
appeared to be looking for somebody, while making no attempt to remain
unseen himself.
"Good!" whispered Michu; "that's sergeant Doucet: I know him by his
stripes. They say the murder was not committed by anyone belonging to
this part of the country; everybody was fond of the Marquise de
Langrune."
"Look! Look!" the foreman broke in, pointing to the gendarme who was
slowly climbing up the embankment. "It looks as if the sergeant were
making for the gentleman who was looking for work just now and hoped he
would not find it. The sergeant's got a word for him, eh, what?"
"That might be," said Michu after a moment's further watching. "That
chap has a villainous, ugly face. One can tell from the way he's dressed
that he don't belong to our parts."
The two men waited with utmost interest to see what was going to happen.
Sergeant Doucet reached the top of the embankment at last and hurried
past the navvies, who stopped their work to stare inquisitively after
the representative of authority. Fifty yards beyond them, François Paul,
wrapped in thought, was walking slowly down towards the station of
Verrières. Hearing the sound of steps behind him, he turned. When he saw
the sergeant he frowned. He glanced rapidly about him and saw that while
he was alone with the gendarme, so that no one could overhear what they
said, however loudly they might speak, they were yet in such a position
that every sign and movement they made would be perfectly visible to
whoever might watch them. And as the gendarme paused a few paces from
him and--remarkable fact--seemed to be on the point of bringing his hand
to his cap in salute, the mysterious tramp rapped out:
"I thought I said no one was to disturb me, sergeant?"
The sergeant took a pace forward.
"I beg your pardon, Inspector, but I have important news for you."
For this François Paul, whom the sergeant thus respectfully addressed as
Inspector, was no other than an officer of the secret police who had
been sent down to Beaulieu the day before from head-quarters in Paris.
He was no ordinary officer. As if M. Havard had had an idea that the
Langrune affair would prove to be puzzling and complicated, he had
singled out the very best of his detectives, the most expert inspector
of them all--Juve. It was Juve who for the last forty-eight hours had
been prowling about the château of Beaulieu disguised as a tramp, and
had had himself arrested with Bouzille that he might prosecute his own
investigations without raising the slightest suspicion as to his real
identity.
Juve made a face expressive of his vexation at the over-deferential
attitude of the sergeant.
"Do pay attention!" he said low. "We are being watched. If I must go
back with you, pretend to arrest me. Slip the handcuffs on me!"
"I beg your pardon, Inspector: I don't like to," the gendarme answered.
For all reply, Juve turned his back on him.
"Look here," he said, "I will take a step or two forward as if I meant
to run away; then you must put your hand on my shoulder roughly, and I
will stumble; when I do, slip the bracelets on."
From the mouth of the tunnel the plate-layer, the foreman and the
navvies all followed with their eyes the unintelligible conversation
passing between the gendarme and the tramp a hundred yards away.
Suddenly they saw the man try to get off and the sergeant seize him
almost simultaneously. A few minutes later the individual, with his
hands linked together in front of him, was obediently descending the
steep slope of the embankment, by the gendarme's side, and then the two
men disappeared behind a clump of trees.
"I understand why that chap was not very keen on getting taken on here,"
said the foreman. "His conscience was none too easy!"
As they walked briskly in the direction of Beaulieu Juve asked the
sergeant:
"What has happened at the château, then?"
"They know who the murderer is, Inspector," the sergeant answered.
"Little Mlle. Thérèse----"