"People don't kill their wives for the sole reason that they are tired
of them and love others. They quit their wives, live with the new
loves--that's all. That happens every day, and neither the law nor
public opinion condemns such people with great severity."
"But it was the wife who had the fortune."
"That wasn't the case here. I have been posting myself up. M. de
Tremorel had a hundred thousand crowns, the remains of a colossal
fortune saved by his friend Sauvresy; and his wife by the marriage
contract made over a half million to him. A man can live in ease
anywhere on eight hundred thousand francs. Besides, the count was master
of all the funds of the estate. He could sell, buy, realize, borrow,
deposit, and draw funds at will."
The doctor had nothing to reply. M. Lecoq went on, speaking with a
certain hesitation, while his eyes interrogated M. Plantat.
"We must find the reasons of this murder, and the motives of the
assassin's terrible resolution--in the past. Some crime so indissolubly
linked the count and countess, that only the death of one of them could
free the other. I suspected this crime the first thing this morning, and
have seen it all the way through; and the man that we have just shut up
in there--Robelot--who wanted to murder Monsieur Plantat, was either the
agent or the accomplice of this crime."
The doctor had not been present at the various episodes which, during
the day at Valfeuillu and in the evening at the mayor's, had established
a tacit understanding between Plantat and Lecoq. He needed all the
shrewdness he possessed to fill up the gaps and understand the hidden
meanings of the conversation to which he had been listening for two
hours. M. Lecoq's last words shed a ray of light upon it all, and the
doctor cried, "Sauvresy!"
"Yes--Sauvresy," answered M. Lecoq. "And the paper which the murderer
hunted for so eagerly, for which he neglected his safety and risked his
life, must contain the certain proof of the crime."
M. Plantat, despite the most significant looks and the direct
provocation to make an explanation, was silent. He seemed a hundred
leagues off in his thoughts, and his eyes, wandering in space, seemed to
follow forgotten episodes in the mists of the past. M. Lecoq, after a
brief pause, decided to strike a bold blow.
"What a past that must have been," exclaimed he, "which could drive a
young, rich, happy man like Hector de Tremorel to plan in cool blood
such a crime, to resign himself to disappear after it, to cease to
exist, as it were to lose all at once his personality, his position, his
honor and his name! What a past must be that which drives a young girl
of twenty to suicide!"