“The advice I give you, my dear client, is, in my eyes, the best; it is
the advice I would give my own brother. But, unfortunately, I cannot say
it is infallible. You must decide yourself. Whatever you may resolve, I
am still at your service.”
Jacques made no reply. His elbows resting on the table, his face in his
hands, he remained motionless, like a statue, absorbed in his thoughts.
What should he do? Should he follow his first impulse, tear the veil
aside, and proclaim the truth? That was a doubtful policy, but also,
what a triumph if he succeeded!
Should he adopt the views of his counsel, employ subterfuges and
falsehoods? That was more certain of success; but to be successful in
this way--was that a real victory?
Jacques was in a terrible perplexity. He felt it but too clearly. The
decision he must form now would decide his fate. Suddenly he raised his
head, and said,--
“What is your advice, M. Magloire?”
The great advocate of Sauveterre frowned angrily; and said, in a
somewhat rough tone of voice,--
“I have had the honor to place before your mother all that my young
colleague has just told you. M. Folgat has but one fault,--he is too
cautious. The physician must not ask what his patient thinks of his
remedies: he must prescribe them. It may be that our prescriptions do
not meet with success; but, if you do not follow them, you are most
assuredly lost.”
Jacques hesitated for some minutes longer. These prescriptions, as M.
Magloire called them, were painfully repugnant to his chivalrous and
open character.
“Would it be worth while,” he murmured, “to be acquitted on such terms?
Would I really be exculpated by such proceedings? Would not my whole
life thereafter be disgraced by suspicions? I should not come out
from the trial with a clear acquittal: I should have escaped by a mere
chance.”
“That would still better than to go, by a clear judgment, to the
galleys,” said M. Magloire brutally.
This word, “the galleys,” made Jacques bound. He rose, walked up and
down a few times in his room, and then, placing himself in front of his
counsel, said,--
“I put myself in your hands, gentlemen. Tell me what I must do.”
Jacques had at least this merit, if he once formed a resolution, he was
sure to adhere to it. Calm now, and self-possessed, he sat down, and
said, with a melancholy smile,--
“Let us hear the plan of battle.”
This plan had been for a month now the one great thought of M. Folgat.
All his intelligence, all his sagacity and knowledge of the world, had
been brought to bear upon this case, which he had made his own, so
to say, by his almost passionate interest. He knew the tactics of the
prosecution as well as M. Galpin himself, and he knew its weak and its
strong side even better than M. Galpin.
“We shall go on, therefore,” he began, “as if there was no such person
as the Countess Claudieuse. We know nothing of her. We shall say nothing
of the meeting at Valpinson, nor of the burned letters.”
“That is settled.”
“That being so, we must next look, not for the manner in which we spent
our time, but for our purpose in going out the evening of the crime.
Ah! If we could suggest a plausible, a very probable purpose, I should
almost guarantee our success; for we need not hesitate to say there is
the turning-point of the whole case, on which all the discussions will
turn.”