Conscience Part 32

"Have I not always told you so?"

He had also said that Florentin could not be arrested, basing the accusation on the torn b.u.t.ton, and he had said that certainly an 'ordonnance de non-lieu' would be given by the judge; but they wished to remember neither the one nor the other.

Things had reached this state, when one Sat.u.r.day evening Phillis arrived at Saniel's, radiant.

As soon as the door opened she exclaimed:

"He is saved!"

"An ordonnance de non-lieu?"

"No; but now it is of little importance. We can go to the a.s.sizes."

She breathed a sigh which showed how great were her fears, in spite of the confidence she expressed when she repeated that conviction was impossible.

He left his desk, and going toward her, took her in his arms, and made her sit down beside him on the divan.

"You will see that I do not let myself be carried away by an illusion, and that, as I tell you, he is saved, really saved. You know that an ill.u.s.trated paper has published his portrait?"

"I do not read ill.u.s.trated papers."

"You could have seen them at the kiosks where they are displayed. It is there that I saw them yesterday morning when I went out, and I was petrified, red with shame, distracted, not knowing where to hide myself.

'Florentin Cormier, the a.s.sa.s.sin of the Rue Sainte-Anne.' Is it not infamous that an innocent person should be thus dishonored? This was what I said to myself. Where did the paper get the photograph? They came to ask us for one, but you can imagine how I treated them, not knowing how anything good for us would result from such a disgrace."

"And what is the result?"

"The proof that it is not Florentin who was with Caffie at the moment when the a.s.sa.s.sination took place. All day yesterday and all this morning I was filled with the feeling of disgrace that followed me, when at three o'clock I received this little note from the concierge of the Rue Sainte-Anne."

She took from her pocket a piece of paper folded in the form of a letter, which she handed to Saniel.

"MADEMOISELLE: If you will pa.s.s through the Rue Sainte-Anne, I have something to tell you that will give you a great deal of pleasure, I believe.

"I am your servant,

"WIDOW ANAIS BOUCHU."

"You know the lame old concierge has never been willing to admit that my brother could be guilty. Florentin was polite and kind to her during his stay with Caffie, and she is grateful. Very often she has said to me that she is certain the guilty one would be found, and that when it was announced I must tell her. Instead of my telling her the good news, she has written to me. You may be sure I hurried to the Rue Sainte-Anne, expecting to hear something favorable, but we have a proof. When I arrived, the old woman took both of my hands, and told me that she would conduct me immediately to a lady who saw Caffie's a.s.sa.s.sin."

"Saw him!" exclaimed Saniel, struck by a blow that shook him from head to foot.

"She saw him perfectly, as I tell you. She added that this lady was the proprietor of the house, and that she lived in the second wing of the building, on the second story on the court, just opposite to Caffie's office. This lady, who is called Madame Dammauville, widow of a lawyer, is afflicted with paralysis, and I believe has not left her room for a year. The concierge explained this to me while crossing the court and mounting the stairs, but would say no more."

If Phillis had been able to observe Saniel, she would have seen him pale to such a degree that his lips were as white as his cheeks; but she was completely absorbed in what she was saying.

"A servant conducted us to Madame Dammauville, whom I found in a small bed near a window, and the concierge told her who I was. She received me kindly, and after having made me sit down in front of her, she told me that hearing from her concierge that I was exerting myself in my brother's behalf, she had something to tell me which would demonstrate that Caffie's a.s.sa.s.sin was not the man whom the law had arrested and detained. The evening of the a.s.sa.s.sination she was in this same room, lying on this same bed, before this same window, and after having read all day, she reflected and dreamed about her book, while listlessly watching the coming of twilight in the court, that already obscured everything in its shadow. Mechanically she had fixed her eyes on the window of Caffie's office opposite. Suddenly she saw a tall man, whom she took for an upholsterer, approach the window, and try to draw the curtains. Then Caffie rose, and taking the lamp, he came forward in such a way that the light fell full on the face of this upholsterer. You understand, do you not?"

"Yes," murmured Saniel.

"She saw him then plainly enough to remember him, and not to confound him with another. Tall, with long hair, a curled blond beard, and dressed like a gentleman, not like a poor man. The curtains were drawn.

It was fifteen or twenty minutes after five. And it was at this same moment that Caffie was butchered by this false upholsterer, who evidently had only drawn the curtains so that he might kill Caffie in security, and not imagining that some one should see him doing a deed that denounced him as the a.s.sa.s.sin as surely as if he had been surprised with the knife in his hand. On reading the description of Florentin in the newspapers when he was arrested, Madame Dammauville believed the criminal was found--a tall man, with long hair and curled beard. There are some points of resemblance, but in the portrait published in the ill.u.s.trated paper that she received, she did not recognize the man who drew the curtains, and she is certain that the judge is deceived. You see that Florentin is saved!"

BOOK 3.

CHAPTER XXIV. HEDGING

As he did not reply to this cry of triumph, she looked at him in surprise saw his face, pale, agitated, under the shock evidently of a violent emotion that she could not explain to herself.

"What is the matter?" she asked, with uneasiness.

"Nothing," he answered, almost brutally.

"You do not wish to weaken my hope?" she said, not imagining that he could not think of this hope and of Florentin. This was a path to lead him out of his confusion. In following it he would have time to recover himself.

"It is true," he said.

"You do not think that what Madame Dammauville saw proves Florentin's innocence?"

"Would what may be a proof for Madame Dammauville, for you, and for me, be one in the eyes of the law?"

"However--"

"I saw you so joyful that I did not dare to interrupt you."

"Then you believe that this testimony is without value," she murmured, feeling crushed.

"I do not say that. We must reflect, weigh the pro and con, compa.s.s the situation from divers points of view; that is what I try to do, which is the cause of my preoccupation that astonishes you."

"Say that it crushes me; I let myself be carried away."

"You need not be crushed or carried away. Certainly, what this lady told you forms a considerable piece of work."

"Does it not?"

"Without any doubt. But in order that the testimony she gives may be of great consequence, the witness must be worthy of trust."

"Do you believe this lady could have invented such a story?"

"I do not say that; but before all, it is necessary to know who she is."

"The widow of an attorney."

"The widow of an attorney and landowner. Evidently this const.i.tutes a social status that merits consideration from the law; but the moral state, what is it? You say that she is paralyzed?"