Never would a stranger who should have suddenly come into Daniel’s
chamber, upon seeing Crochard’s attitude, have imagined that the
wretch was accused of a capital crime, and was standing there before
a magistrate, in presence of the man whom he had tried three times to
assassinate.
Quite at home in the law, as far as it was studied at the galleys, he
had instantly recognized that his situation was by no means so desperate
as he had at first supposed; that, if the jury rendered a verdict of
guilty of death, it would be against the instigator of the crime, and
that he would probably get off with a few years’ penal servitude.
Hence he had made up his mind about his situation with that almost
bestial indifference which characterizes people who are ready for
everything, and prepared for everything. He had recovered from that
stupor which the discovery of his crime had produced in him, and from
the rage in which he had been thrown by the loss of his bank-notes.
Now there appeared, under the odious personage of the murderer, the
pretentious and ridiculous orator of the streets and prisons, who is
accustomed to make himself heard, and displays his eloquence with great
pride.
He assumed a studied position; and it was evident that he was preparing
himself for his speech, although, afterwards, a good many words escaped
him which are found in no dictionary, but belong to the jargon of the
lowest classes, and serve to express the vilest sentiments.
“It was,” he began, “a Friday, an unlucky day,--a week, about, before
‘The Conquest’ sailed. It might have been two o’clock. I had eaten
nothing; I had not a cent in my pockets and I was walking along the
boulevards, loafing, and thinking how I could procure some money.
“I had crossed several streets, when a carriage stopped close to me; and
I saw a very fine gentleman step out, a cigar in his mouth, a gold
chain across his waistcoat, and a flower in his buttonhole. He entered a
glove-shop.
“At once I said to myself, ‘Curious! I have seen that head somewhere.’
“Thereupon, I go to work, and remain fixed to the front of the shop, a
little at the side, though, you know, at a place where, without being
seen myself, I could very well watch my individual, who laughed and
talked, showing his white teeth, while a pretty girl was trying on
a pair of gloves. The more I looked at him, the more I thought,
‘Positively, Bagnolet, although that sweet soul don’t look as if he were
a member of your society, you know him.’
“However, as I could not put a name to that figure, I was going on my
way, when suddenly my memory came back to me, and I said, ‘_Cretonne_,
it is an old comrade. I shall get my dinner.’
“After all, I was not positively sure; because why? Fifteen years make a
difference in a man, especially when he does not particularly care to be
recognized. But I had a little way of my own to make the thing sure.
“I waited, therefore, for my man; and, at the moment when he crossed the
sidewalk to get into his carriage, I stepped up, and cried out, though
not very loud, ‘Eh, Chevassat!’
“The scamp! They might have fired a cannon at his ear, and he would not
have jumped as he did when I spoke to him. And white he was,--as white
as his collar. But, nevertheless, he was not without his compass, the
screw. He puts up his eyeglass, and looks at me up and down; and then he
says in his finest manner, ‘What is it, my good fellow? Do you want to
speak to me?’
“Thereupon, quite sure of my business now, I say, ‘Yes, to you, Justin
Chevassat. Don’t you recall me? Evariste Crochard, surnamed Bagnolet;
eh? Do you recollect now?’ However, the gentleman continued to hold his
head high, and to look at me. At last he says, ‘_If_ you do not clear
out, I will call a policeman.’ Well, the mustard got into my nose, and I
began to cry, to annoy him, so as to collect a crowd,--
“‘What, what! Policemen, just call them, please do! They will take us
before a magistrate. If I am mistaken, they won’t hang me; but, if I am
not mistaken, they will laugh prodigiously. What have I to risk? Nothing
at all; for I have nothing.’
“I must tell you, that, while I said all this, I looked at him fixedly
with the air of a man who has nothing in his stomach, and who is bent
upon putting something into it. He also looked at me fixedly; and, if
his eyes had been pistols--but they were not. And, when he saw I was
determined, the fine gentleman softened down.
“‘Make no noise,’ he whispered, looking with a frightened air at all the
idlers who commenced to crowd around us. And pretending to laugh
very merrily,--for the benefit of the spectators, you know,--he said,
speaking very low and very rapidly,--
“‘In the costume that you have on, I cannot ask you to get into my
carriage; that would only compromise us both uselessly. I shall send my
coachman back, and walk home. You can follow quietly; and, when we get
into a quiet street, we will take a cab, and talk.’
“As I was sure I could catch him again, if he should try to escape, I
approved the idea. ‘All right. I understand.’”
The magistrate suddenly interrupted the accused. He thought it of great
importance that Crochard’s evidence should be written down, word for
word; and he saw, that, for some little while, the clerk had been unable
to follow.
“Rest a moment, Crochard,” he said.
And when the clerk had filled up what was wanting, and the magistrate
had looked it over, he said to the prisoner,--
“Now you can go on, but speak more slowly.”
The wretch smiled, well pleased. This permission gave him more time to
select his words, and this flattered his vanity; for even the lowest of
these criminals have their weak point, in which their vanity is engaged.
“Don’t let your soup get cold,” he continued. “Chevassat said a
few words to his coachman, who whipped the horse, and there he was,
promenading down the boulevard, turning his cane this way, puffing out
big clouds of smoke, as if he had not the colic at the thought that his
friend Bagnolet was following on his heels.
“I ought to say that he had lots of friends, very genteel friends, who
wished him good-evening as they passed him. There were some even who
stopped him, shook hands with him, and offered to treat him; but he left
them all promptly, saying, ‘Excuse me, pray, I am in a hurry.’
“Why, yes, he was in a hurry; and I who was behind him, and saw and
heard it all, I laughed in my sleeve most heartily.”
Whatever advantage there may be in not interrupting a great talker, who
warms up as he talks, and consequently forgets himself, the magistrate
became impatient.
“Spare us your impressions,” he said peremptorily.
This was not what Crochard expected. He looked hurt, and went on
angrily,--
“In fine, my individual goes down the boulevard as far as the opera,
turns to the right, crosses the open square, and goes down the first
street to the left. Here a cab passes; he hails it; orders the driver to
take _us_ to Vincennes. We get in; and his first care is to let down
the curtains. Then he looks at me with a smile, holds out his hand, and
says, ‘Well, old man! how are you?’
“At first, when I saw myself so well received, I was quite overcome.
Then reflecting, I thought, ‘It is not natural for him to be so soft. He
is getting ready for some trick. Keep your eyes open, Bagnolet.’
“‘Then you are not angry that I spoke to you; eh?’ He laughs, and says,
‘No.’
“Then I, ‘However, you hadn’t exactly a wedding-air when I spoke to
you, and I thought you were looking for a way to get rid of me
unceremoniously.’ But he said very seriously, ‘Look here, I am going to
talk to you quite openly! For a moment I was surprised; but I was not
annoyed. I have long foreseen something of the kind would happen; and
I know that every time I go out I run the risk of meeting a former
comrade. You are not the first who has recognized me, and I am prepared
to save myself all annoyance. If I wanted to get rid of you, this
very evening you would have lost all trace of me, thanks to a little
contrivance I have arranged. Besides, as you are in Paris without leave,
before twenty-four hours are over, you would _be_ in jail.’ He told me
all this so calmly, that I felt it was so, and that the scamp had some
special trick.
“‘Then,’ I said, ‘you rather like meeting an old friend, eh?’
“He looked me straight in the face and replied, ‘Yes; and the proof of
it is, that if you were not here, sitting at my side, and if I had known
where to find you, I should have gone in search of you. I have something
to do for you.’”
Henceforth Bagnolet had reason to be satisfied.
Although the magistrate preserved his impassive appearance, Daniel and
the chief surgeon listened with breathless attention, feeling that the
prisoner had come to the really important part of his confession, from
which, no doubt, much light would be obtained. Lefloch himself listened
with open mouth; and one could follow on his ingenuous countenance all
the emotions produced by the recital of the criminal, who, but for him,
would probably have escaped justice.
“Naturally,” continued Crochard, “when he talked of something to do,
I opened my ears wide. ‘Why,’ I said, ‘I thought you had retired from
business.’ And I really thought he had. ‘You are mistaken,’ he replied.
‘Since I left that place you know of, I have been living nicely. But
I have not put anything aside; and if an accident should happen to me,
which I have reason to fear, I would be destitute.’
“I should have liked very much to know more; but he would not tell me
anything else concerning himself; and I had to give him my whole history
since my release. Oh! that was soon done. I told him how nothing I had
undertaken had ever succeeded; that, finally, I had been a waiter in a
drinking-shop; that they had turned me out; and that for a month now
I had been walking the streets, having not a cent, no clothes, no
lodgings, and no bed but the quarries.
“‘Since that is so,’ he said, ‘you shall see what a comrade is.’ I ought
to say that the cab had been going all the time we were talking, and
that we were out in the suburbs now. My Chevassat raised the blind to
look out; and, as soon as he saw a clothing store, he ordered the driver
to stop there. The driver did so; and then Chevassat said to me, ‘Come,
old man, we’ll begin by dressing you up decently.’ So we get out; and
upon my word, he buys me a shirt, trousers, a coat, and everything else
that was needful; he pays for a silk hat, and a pair of varnished
boots. Farther down the street was a watchmaker. I declare he makes me a
present of a gold watch, which I still have, and which they seized when
they put me in jail. Finally, he has spent his five hundred francs, and
gives me eighty francs to boot, to play the gentleman.
“You need not ask if I thanked him, when we got back into the cab. After
such misery as I had endured, my morals came back with my clothes. I
would have jumped into the fire for Chevassat. Alas! I would not have
been so delighted, if I had known what I should have to pay for all
this; for in the first place”--
“Oh, go on!” broke in the lawyer; “go on!”
Not without some disappointment, Crochard had to acknowledge that
everything purely personal did not seem to excite the deepest interest.
He made a face, full of spite, and then went on, speaking more
rapidly,--
“All these purchases had taken some time; so that it was six o’clock,
and almost dark, when we reached Vincennes. A little before we got into
the town, Chevassat stopped the cab, paid the driver, sends him back,
and, taking me by the arm, says, ‘You must be hungry: let us dine.’
“So we first absorb a glass of absinthe; then he carries me straight to
the best restaurant, asks for a private room, and orders a dinner. Ah,
but a dinner! Merely to hear it ordered from the bill of fare made my
mouth water.
“We sit down; and I, fearing nothing, would not have changed places with
the pope. And I talked, and I ate, and I drank; I drank, perhaps, most;
for I had not had anything to drink for a long time; and, finally, I was
rather excited. Chevassat seemed to have unbuttoned, and told me lots of
funny things which set me a-laughing heartily. But when the coffee had
been brought, with liquors in abundance, and cigars at ten cents apiece,
my individual rises, and pushes the latch in the door; for there was a
latch.
“Then he comes back, and sits down right in front of me, with his elbows
on the table. ‘Now, old man,’ he says, ‘we have had enough laughing and
talking. I am a good fellow, you know; but you understand that I am not
treating you for the sake of your pretty face alone. I want a good stout
fellow; and I thought you might be the man.’
“Upon my word, he told me that in such a peculiar way, that I felt as if
somebody had kicked me in the stomach; and I began to be afraid of him.
Still I concealed my fears, and said, ‘Well, let us see; go it! What’s
the row?’
“At once he replies, ‘As I told you before, I have not laid up a cent.
But if anything should happen to a certain person whom I think of, I
should be rich; and you--why, you might be rich too, if you were willing
to give him a little push with the elbow, so that the thing might happen
to him a little sooner.’”
Earnestly bent upon the part which he had to play for the sake of
carrying out his system of defence, the prisoner assumed more and more
hypocritical repentance, an effort which gave to his wicked face a
peculiarly repulsive expression.
The magistrate, however, though no doubt thoroughly disgusted with this
absurd comedy, did not move a muscle of his face, nor make a gesture,
anxious, as he was, not to break the thread of this important
deposition.
“Ah, sir!” exclaimed Crochard, his hand upon his heart, “when I
heard Chevassat talk that way, my heart turned within me, and I said,
‘Unfortunate man, what do you mean? I should commit a murder? Never! I’d
rather die first!’ He laughed, and replied, ‘Don’t be a fool; who talks
to you of murder? I spoke of an accident. Besides, you would not risk
anything. The thing would happen to him abroad.’ I continued, however,
to refuse, and I spoke even of going away; when Chevassat seized a big
knife, and said, now that I had his secret, I was bound to go on. If
not!--he looked at me with such a terrible air, that, upon my word, I
was frightened, and sat down again.
“Then, all at once, he became as jolly again as before; and, whilst he
kept pouring the brandy into my glass, he explained to me that I would
be a fool to hesitate; that I could never in all my life find such a
chance again of making a fortune; that I would most certainly succeed;
and that then I would have an income, keep a carriage as he did, wear
fine clothes, and have every day a dinner like the one we had just been
enjoying together.
“I became more and more excited. This lot of gold which he held up
before my mind’s eyes dazzled me; and the strong drink I had been taking
incessantly got into my head. Then he flourished again the big knife
before my face; and finally I did not know what I was saying or doing.
I got up; and, striking the table with my fist, I cried out, ‘I am your
man!’”
Although, probably, the whole scene never took place, except in the
prisoner’s imagination, Daniel could not help trembling under his cover,
at the thought of these two wretches arranging for his death, while they
were there, half drunk, glass in hand, and their elbows resting on a
table covered with wine-stains. Lefloch, on his part, stood grasping
the bedstead so hard with his hand, that the wood cracked. Perhaps he
dreamed he held in his grasp the neck of the man who was talking so
coolly of murdering his lieutenant. The lawyer and the doctor thought of
nothing but of watching the contortions of the accused. He had drawn a
handkerchief from his pocket, and rubbed his eyes hard, as if he hoped
thus to bring forth a few tears.
“Come, come!” said the magistrate. “No scene!”