When the Judge had brought down the interrogation of the Countess to
the production of the small glass bottle, he paused, and with a
long-drawn “Ah!” of satisfaction, looked round at his colleagues.
Both M. Floçon and the Commissary nodded their heads approvingly,
plainly sharing his triumph.
Then they all put their heads together in close, whispered conference.
“Admirable, M. le Juge!” said the detective. “You have been most
adroit. It is a clear case.”
“No doubt,” said the Commissary, who was a blunt, rather coarse person,
believing that to take anybody and everybody into custody is always the
safest and simplest course. “It looks black against her. I think she
ought to be arrested at once.”
“We might, indeed we ought to have more evidence, more definite
evidence, perhaps?” The Judge was musing over the facts as he knew
them. “I should like, before going further, to look at the car,” he
said, suddenly coming to a conclusion.
M. Floçon readily agreed. “We will go together,” he said, adding,
“Madame will remain here, please, until we return. It may not be for
long.”
“And afterwards?” asked the Countess, whose nervousness had if anything
increased during the whispered colloquy of the officials.
“Ah, afterwards! Who knows?” was the reply, with a shrug of the
shoulders, all most enigmatic and unsatisfactory.
“What have we against her?” said the Judge, as soon as they had gained
the absolute privacy of the sleeping-car.
“The bottle of laudanum and the porter’s condition. He was undoubtedly
drugged,” answered the detective; and the discussion which followed
took the form of a dialogue between them, for the Commissary took no
part in it.
“Yes; but why by the Countess? How do we know that positively?”
“It is her bottle,” said M. Floçon.
“Her story may be true—that she missed it, that the maid took it.”
“We have nothing whatever against the maid. We know nothing about her.”
“No. Except that she has disappeared. But that tells more against her
mistress. It is all very vague. I do not see my way quite, as yet.”
“But the fragment of lace, the broken beading? Surely, M. le Juge, they
are a woman’s, and only one woman was in the car—”
“So far as we know.”
“But if these could be proved to be hers?”
“Ah! if you could prove that!”
“Easy enough. Have her searched, here at once, in the station. There is
a female searcher attached to the detention-room.”
“It is a strong measure. She is a lady.”
“Ladies who commit crimes must not expect to be handled with kid
gloves.”
“She is an Englishwoman, or with English connections; titled, too. I
hesitate, upon my word. Suppose we are wrong? It may lead to
unpleasantness. M. le Prefet is anxious to avoid complications possibly
international.”
As he spoke, he bent over, and, taking a magnifier from his pocket,
examined the lace, which still fluttered where it was caught.
“It is fine lace, I think. What say you, M. Floçon? You may be more
experienced in such matters.”
“The finest, or nearly so; I believe it is Valenciennes—the trimming of
some underclothing, I should think. That surely is sufficient, M. le
Juge?”
M. Beaumont le Hardi gave a reluctant consent, and the Chief went back
himself to see that the searching was undertaken without loss of time.
The Countess protested, but vainly, against this new indignity. What
could she do? A prisoner, practically friendless,—for the General was
not within reach,—to resist was out of the question. Indeed, she was
plainly told that force would be employed unless she submitted with a
good grace. There was nothing for it but to obey.
Mother Tontaine, as the female searcher called herself, was an
evil-visaged, corpulent old creature, with a sickly, soft, insinuating
voice, and a greasy, familiar manner that was most offensive. They had
given her the scrap of torn lace and the débris of the jet as a guide,
with very particular directions to see if they corresponded with any
part of the lady’s apparel.
She soon showed her quality.
“Aha! oho! What is this, my pretty princess? How comes so great a lady
into the hands of Mother Tontaine? But I will not harm you, my beauty,
my pretty, my little one. Oh, no, no, I will not trouble you, dearie.
No, trust to me;” and she held out one skinny claw, and looked the
other way. The Countess did not or would not understand.
“Madame has money?” went on the old hag in a half-threatening,
half-coaxing whisper, as she came up quite close, and fastened on her
victim like a bird of prey.
“If you mean that I am to bribe you—”
“Fie, the nasty word! But just a small present, a pretty gift, one or
two yellow bits, twenty, thirty, forty francs—you’d better.” She shook
the soft arm she held roughly, and anything seemed preferable than to
be touched by this horrible woman.
“Wait, wait!” cried the Countess, shivering all over, and, feeling
hastily for her purse, she took out several napoleons.
“Aha! oho! One, two, three,” said the searcher in a fat, wheedling
voice. “Four, yes, four, five;” and she clinked the coins together in
her palm, while a covetous light came into her faded eyes at the joyous
sound. “Five—make it five at once, d’ye hear me?—or I’ll call them in
and tell them. That will go against you, my princess. What, try to
bribe a poor old woman, Mother Tontaine, honest and incorruptible
Tontaine? Five, then, five!”
With trembling haste the Countess emptied the whole contents of her
purse in the old hag’s hand.
“_Bon aubaine_. Nice pickings. It is a misery what they pay me here. I
am, oh, so poor, and I have children, many babies. You will not tell
them—the police—you dare not. No, no, no.”
Thus muttering to herself, she shambled across the room to a corner,
where she stowed the money safely away. Then she came back, showed the
bit of lace, and pressed it into the Countess’s hands.
“Do you know this, little one? Where it comes from, where there is much
more? I was told to look for it, to search for it on you;” and with a
quick gesture she lifted the edge of the Countess’s skirt, dropping it
next moment with a low, chuckling laugh.
“Oho! aha! You were right, my pretty, to pay me, my pretty—right. And
some day, to-day, to-morrow, whenever I ask you, you will remember
Mother Tontaine.”
The Countess listened with dismay. What had she done? Put herself into
the power of this greedy and unscrupulous old beldame?
“And this, my princess? What have we here, aha?”
Mère Tontaine held up next the broken bit of jet ornament for
inspection, and as the Countess leaned forward to examine it more
closely, gave it into her hand.
“You recognize it, of course. But be careful, my pretty! Beware! If any
one were looking, it would ruin you. I could not save you then. Sh! say
nothing, only look, and quick, give it me back. I must have it to
show.”
All this time the Countess was turning the jet over and over in her
open palm, with a perplexed, disturbed, but hardly a terrified air.
Yes, she knew it, or thought she knew it. It had been—But how had it
come here, into the possession of this base myrmidon of the French
police?
“Give it me, quick!” There was a loud knock at the door. “They are
coming. Remember!” Mother Tontaine put her long finger to her lip. “Not
a word! I have found nothing, of course. Nothing, I can swear to that,
and you will not forget Mother Tontaine?”
Now M. Floçon stood at the open door awaiting the searcher’s report. He
looked much disconcerted when the old woman took him on one side and
briefly explained that the search had been altogether fruitless.
There was nothing to justify suspicion, nothing, so far as she could
find.
The detective looked from one to the other—from the hag he had employed
in this unpleasant quest, to the lady on whom it had been tried. The
Countess, to his surprise, did not complain. He had expected further
and strong upbraidings. Strange to say, she took it very quietly. There
was no indignation in her face. She was still pale, and her hands
trembled, but she said nothing, made no reference, at least, to what
she had just gone through.
Again he took counsel with his colleague, while the Countess was kept
apart.
“What next, M. Floçon?” asked the Judge. “What shall we do with her?”
“Let her go,” answered the detective, briefly.
“What! do you suggest this, sir,” said the Judge, slyly. “After your
strong and well-grounded suspicions?”
“They are as strong as ever, stronger: and I feel sure I shall yet
justify them. But what I wish now is to let her go at large, under
surveillance.”
“Ah! you would shadow her?”
“Precisely. By a good agent. Galipaud, for instance. He speaks English,
and he can, if necessary, follow her anywhere, even to England.”
“She can be extradited,” said the Commissary, with his one prominent
idea of arrest.
“Do you agree, M. le Juge? Then, if you will permit me, I will give the
necessary orders, and perhaps you will inform the lady that she is free
to leave the station?”
The Countess now had reason to change her opinion of the French
officials. Great politeness now replaced the first severity that had
been so cruel. She was told, with many bows and apologies, that her
regretted but unavoidable detention was at an end. Not only was she
freely allowed to depart, but she was escorted by both M. Floçon and
the Commissary outside, to where an omnibus was in waiting, and all her
baggage piled on top, even to the dressing-bag, which had been neatly
repacked for her.
But the little silver-topped vial had not been restored to her, nor the
handkerchief.
In her joy at her deliverance, either she had not given these a second
thought, or she did not wish to appear anxious to recover them.
Nor did she notice that, as the bus passed through the gates at the
bottom of the large slope that leads from the Lyons Station, it was
followed at a discreet distance by a modest fiacre, which pulled up,
eventually, outside the Hôtel Madagascar. Its occupant, M. Galipaud,
kept the Countess in sight, and, entering the hotel at her heels,
waited till she had left the office, when he held a long conference
with the proprietor.