“I had been informed of the arrival of my learned brother; and I went
to receive him myself at the railway station. The train comes in; and
at once I make out my man in the crowd: a fine head, well set in grizzly
hair, a noble eye, eloquent lips. ‘There he is!’ I say to myself. ‘Hm!’
He looked rather dandyish, to be sure, a lot of decorations in his
buttonhole, whiskers trimmed as carefully as the box in my garden,
and, instead of honest spectacles, a pair of eye-glasses. But no man is
perfect. I go up to him, I give him my name, we shake hands, I ask him
to breakfast, he accepts; and here we are at table, he doing justice to
my Bordeaux, and I explaining to him the case systematically. When we
have done, he wishes to see Cocoleu. We go to the hospital; and there,
after merely glancing at the creature, he says, ‘That man is simply the
most complete idiot I have ever seen in my life!’ I was a little taken
aback, and tried to explain the matter to him; but he refuses to listen
to me. I beseech him to see Cocoleu once more: he laughs at me. I feel
hurt, and ask him how he explains the evidence which this idiot gave
on the night of the fire. He laughs again, and replies that he does
not explain it. I begin to discuss the question; and he marches off to
court. And do you know where he dined that day? At the hotel with my
other learned brother of the commission; and there they drew up a report
which makes of Cocoleu the most perfect imbecile that was ever dreamed
of.”
He was walking up and down in the room with long strides, and, unwilling
to listen, he went on,--
“But Master Galpin need not think of crowing over us yet. The end is not
yet; they will not get rid of Dr. Seignebos so easily. I have said that
Cocoleu was a wretched cheat, a miserable impostor, a false witness, and
I shall prove it. Boiscoran can count upon me.”