“You do not tell the truth, Jacques; and I will tell you why you kept
silent. It is very difficult to make up a story which is to account for
every thing. But you are a clever man: you thought it over, and you made
out a story. There is nothing lacking in it, except probability. You
might tell me that the Countess Claudieuse has unfairly enjoyed the
reputation of a saint, and that she has given you her love; perhaps I
might be willing to believe it. But when you say she has set her own
house on fire, and taken up a gun to shoot her husband, that I can
never, never admit.”
“Still it is the truth.”
“No; for the evidence of Count Claudieuse is precise. He has seen his
murderer; it was a man who fired at him.”
“And who tells you that Count Claudieuse does not know all, and wants to
save his wife, and ruin me? There would be a vengeance for him.”
The objection took the advocate by surprise; but he rejected it at once,
and said,--
“Ah! be silent, or prove.”
“All the letters are burned.”
“When one has been a woman’s lover for five years, there are always
proofs.”
“But you see there are none.”
“Do not insist,” repeated M. Magloire.