LITMIR.BIZ

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at this very moment your dear name guards M. Fauvel’s safe.’”

      The truth suddenly burst upon Prosper like a thunderclap. He wrung his hands despairingly, and cried:

      “Yes, oh, yes! I remember now.”

      “Then you can easily understand the rest. One of the scoundrels went to Mme. Fauvel, and compelled her to give up her husband’s key; then, at a venture, placed the movable buttons on the name of Gypsy, opened the safe, and took the three hundred and fifty thousand francs. And Mme. Fauvel must have been terribly frightened before she yielded. The day after the robbery the poor woman was near dying; and it was she who at the greatest risk sent you the ten thousand francs.”

      “But which was the thief, Raoul or Clameran? What enables them to thus tyrannize over Mme. Fauvel? And how does Madeleine come to be mixed up in the affair?”

      “These questions, my dear Prosper, I cannot yet answer; therefore I postpone seeing the judge. I only ask you to wait ten days; and, if I cannot in that time discover the solution of this mystery, I will return and go with you to report to M. Patrigent all that we know.”

      “Are you going to leave the city?”

      “In an hour I shall be on the road to Beaucaire. It was from that neighborhood that Clameran came, as well as Mme. Fauvel, who was a Mlle. de la Verberie before marriage.”

      “Yes, I knew both families.”

      “I must go there to study them. Neither Raoul nor Clameran can escape during my absence. The police are watching them. But you, Prosper, must be prudent. Promise me to remain a prisoner here during my trip.”

      All that M. Verduret asked, Prosper willingly promised. But he did not wish to be left in complete ignorance of his projects for the future, or of his motives in the past.

      “Will you not tell me, monsieur, who you are, and what reasons you had for coming to my rescue?”

      The extraordinary man smiled sadly, and said:

      “I tell, in the presence of Nina, on the day before your marriage with Madeleine.”

      Once left to his own reflections, Prosper began to appreciate the powerful assistance rendered by his friend.

      Recalling the field of investigation gone over by his mysterious protector, he was amazed at its extent.

      How many facts had been discovered in a week, and with what precision, although he had pretended to be on the wrong track! Verduret had grouped his evidence, and reached a result which Prosper felt he never could have hoped to attain by his own exertions.

      He was conscious that he possessed neither Verduret’s penetration nor his subtlety. He did not possess this art of compelling obedience, of creating friends at every step, and the science of making men and circumstances unite in the attainment of a common result.

      He began to regret the absence of his friend, who had risen up in the hour of adversity. He missed the sometimes rough but always kindly voice, which had encouraged and consoled him.

      He felt wofully lost and helpless, not daring to act or think for himself, more timid than a child when deserted by his nurse.

      He had the good sense to follow the recommendations of his mentor. He remained shut up in the Archangel, not even appearing at the windows.

      Twice he had news of M. Verduret. The first time he received a letter in which this friend said he had seen his father, and had had a long talk with him. Afterward, Dubois, M. de Clameran’s valet, came to tell him that his “patron” reported everything as progressing finely.

      On the ninth day of his voluntary seclusion, Prosper began to feel restless, and at ten o’clock at night set forth to take a walk, thinking the fresh air would relieve the headache which had kept him awake the previous night.

      Mme. Alexandre, who seemed to have some knowledge of M. Verduret’s affairs, begged Prosper to remain at home.

      “What can I risk by taking a walk at this time, in a quiet part of the city?” he asked. “I can certainly stroll as far as the Jardin des Plantes without meeting anyone.”

      Unfortunately he did not strictly follow this programme; for, having reached the Orleans railway station, he went into a cafe near by, and called for a glass of ale.

      As he sat sipping his glass, he picked up a daily paper, The Sun, and under the head of “Fashionable Gossip,” signed Jacques Durand, read the following:

      “We understand that the niece of one of our most prominent bankers, M. Andre Fauvel, will shortly be married to M. le Marquis Louis de Clameran. The engagement has been announced.”

      This news, coming upon him so unexpectedly, proved to Prosper the justness of M. Verduret’s calculations.

      Alas! why did not this certainty inspire him with absolute faith? why did it not give him courage to wait, the strength of mind to refrain from acting on his own responsibility?

      Frenzied by distress of mind, he already saw Madeleine indissolubly united to this villain, and, thinking that M. Verduret would perhaps arrive too late to be of use, determined at all risks to throw an obstacle in the way of the marriage.

      He called for pen and paper, and forgetting that no situation can excuse the mean cowardice of an anonymous letter, wrote in a disguised hand the following lines to M. Fauvel:

      “DEAR SIR—You consigned your cashier to prison; you acted prudently, since you were convinced of his dishonesty and faithlessness.

      “But, even if he stole three hundred and fifty thousand francs from your safe, does it follow that he also stole Mme. Fauvel’s diamonds, and pawned them at the Mont-de-Piete, where they now are?

      “Warned as you are, if I were you, I would not be the subject of public scandal. I would watch my wife, and would be distrustful of handsome cousins.

      “Moreover, I would, before signing the marriage contract of Mlle. Madeleine, inquire at the Prefecture of Police, and obtain some information concerning the noble Marquis de Clameran.

      “A FRIEND.”

      Prosper hastened off to post his letter. Fearing that it would not reach M. Fauvel in time, he walked up to the Rue Cardinal Lemoine, and put it in the main letter-box, so as to be certain of its speedy delivery.

      Until now he had not doubted the propriety of his action.

      But now when too late, when he heard the sound of his letter falling into the box, a thousand scruples filled his mind. Was it not wrong to act thus hurriedly? Would not this letter interfere with M. Verduret’s plans? Upon reaching the hotel, his doubts were changed into bitter regrets.

      Joseph Dubois was waiting for him; he had received a despatch from his patron, saying that his business was finished, and that he would return the next evening at nine o’clock.

      Prosper was wretched. He would have given all he had to recover the anonymous letter.

      And he had cause for regret.

      At that very hour M. Verduret was taking his seat in the cars at Tarascon, meditating upon the most advantageous plan to be adopted in pursuance of his discoveries.

      For he had discovered everything, and now must bring matters to a crisis.

      Adding to what he already knew, the story of an old nurse of Mlle. de la Verberie, the affidavit of an old servant who had always lived in the Clameran family, and the depositions of the Vesinet husband and wife who attended M. Lagors at his country house, the latter having been sent to him by Dubois (Fanferlot), with a good deal of information obtained from the prefecture of police, he had worked up a complete case, and could now act upon a chain of evidence without a missing link.

      As he had predicted, he had been compelled to search into the distant past for the first causes of the crime of which Prosper had been the victim.

      The following is the drama, as he wrote it out for the benefit of the judge

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