FILE NO. 113 (Unabridged). Emile Gaboriau
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It was magnificent weather, a bright spring morning. As the coach went along Rue Montmartre, Prosper kept his head out of the window, at the same time smilingly complaining at being imprisoned on such a lovely day, when everything outside was so sunny and pleasant.
“It is singular,” he said, “I never felt so great a desire to take a walk.”
One of the bailiffs, a large, jovial, red-faced man, received this remark with a hearty burst of laughter, and said:
“I understand.”
To the court clerk, while he was going through the formalities of the commitment, Prosper replied with haughty brevity to the indispensable questions asked him.
But when he was ordered to empty his pockets on the table, and they began to search him, his eyes flashed with indignation, and a single tear dropped upon his flushed cheek. In an instant he had recovered his stony calmness, and stood up motionless, with his arms raised in the air so that the rough creatures about him could more conveniently ransack him from head to foot, to assure themselves that he had no suspicious object hid under his clothes.
The search would have, perhaps, been carried to the most ignominious lengths, but for the intervention of a middle-aged man of rather distinguished appearance, who wore a white cravat and gold spectacles, and was sitting quite at home by the fire.
He started with surprise, and seemed much agitated, when he saw Prosper brought in by the bailiffs; he stepped forward, and seemed about to speak to him, then suddenly changed his mind, and sat down again.
In spite of his own troubles, Prosper could not help seeing that this man kept his eyes fastened upon him. Did he know him? Vainly did he try to recollect having met him before.
This man, treated with all the deference due to a chief, was no less a personage than M. Lecoq, a celebrated member of the detective corps.
When the men who were searching Prosper were about to take off his boots, saying that a knife might be concealed in them. M. Lecoq waved them aside with an air of authority, and said:
“You have done enough.”
He was obeyed. All the formalities being ended, the unfortunate cashier was taken to a narrow cell; the heavily barred door was swung to and locked upon him; he breathed freely; at last he was alone.
Yes, he believed himself to be alone. He was ignorant that a prison is made of glass, that the accused is like a miserable insect under the microscope of an entomologist. He knew not that the walls have stretched ears and watchful eyes.
He was so sure of being alone that he at once gave vent to his suppressed feelings, and, dropping his mask of impassibility, burst into a flood of tears. His long-restrained anger now flashed out like a smouldering fire.
In a paroxysm of rage he uttered imprecations and curses. He dashed himself against the prison-walls like a wild beast in a cage.
Prosper Bertomy was not the man he appeared to be.
This haughty, correct gentleman had ardent passions and a fiery temperament.
One day, when he was about twenty-four years of age, he had become suddenly fired by ambition. While all of his desires were repressed, imprisoned in his low estate, like an athlete in a strait-jacket, seeing around him all these rich people with whom money assumed the place of the wand in the fairy-tale, he envied their lot.
He studied the beginnings of these financial princes, and found that at the starting-point they possessed far less than himself.
How, then, had they succeeded? By force of energy, industry, and assurance.
He determined to imitate and excel them.
From this day, with a force of will much less rare than we think, he imposed silence upon his instincts. He reformed not his morals, but his manners; and so strictly did he conform to the rules of decorum, that he was regarded as a model of propriety by those who knew him, and had faith in his character; and his capabilities and ambition inspired the prophecy that he would be successful in attaining eminence and wealth.
And the end of all was this: imprisoned for robbery; that is, ruined!
For he did not attempt to deceive himself. He knew that, guilty or innocent, a man once suspected is as ineffaceably branded as the shoulder of a galley-slave.
Therefore what was the use of struggling? What benefit was a triumph which could not wash out the stain?
When the jailer brought him his supper, he found him lying on his pallet, with his face buried in the pillow, weeping bitterly.
Ah, he was not hungry now! Now that he was alone, he fed upon his own bitter thoughts. He sank from a state of frenzy into one of stupefying despair, and vainly did he endeavor to clear his confused mind, and account for the dark cloud gathering about him; no loop-hole for escape did he discover.
The night was long and terrible, and for the first time he had nothing to count the hours by, as they slowly dragged on, but the measured tread of the patrol who came to relieve the sentinels. He was wretched.
At dawn he dropped into a sleep, a heavy, oppressive sleep, which was more wearisome than refreshing; from which he was startled by the rough voice of the jailer.
“Come, monsieur,” he said, “it is time for you to appear before the judge of instruction.”
He jumped up at once, and, without stopping to repair his disordered toilet, said:
“Come on, quick!”
The constable remarked, as they walked along:
“You are very fortunate in having your case brought before an honest man.”
He was right.
Endowed with remarkable penetration, firm, unbiased, equally free from false pity and excessive severity, M. Patrigent possessed in an eminent degree all the qualities necessary for the delicate and difficult office of judge of instruction.
Perhaps he was wanting in the feverish activity which is sometimes necessary for coming to a quick and just decision; but he possessed unwearying patience, which nothing could discourage. He would cheerfully devote years to the examination of a case; he was even now engaged on a case of Belgian bank-notes, of which he did not collect all the threads, and solve the mystery, until after four years’ investigation.
Thus it was always to his office that they brought the endless lawsuits, half-finished inquests, and tangled cases.
This was the man before whom they were taking Prosper; and they were taking him by a difficult road.
He was escorted along a corridor, through a room full of policemen, down a narrow flight of steps, across a kind of cellar, and then up a steep staircase which seemed to have no terminus.
Finally he reached a long narrow galley, upon which opened many doors, bearing different numbers.
The custodian of the unhappy cashier stopped before one of these doors, and said:
“Here we are; here your fate will be decided.”
At this remark, uttered in a tone of deep commiseration, Prosper could not refrain from shuddering.
It was only too true, that on the other side of this door was a man upon whose decision his freedom depended.
Summoning all his courage, he turned the door-knob, and was about to enter when the constable stopped him.
“Don’t be in such haste,” he said; “you must sit down here, and wait till your turn comes; then you will be called.”
The wretched man obeyed, and his keeper took a seat beside him.
Nothing is more terrible and lugubrious than this gallery of the judges of instruction.
Stretching the whole length of the wall is a wooden bench blackened by constant use. This bench has for the last ten years been daily occupied by all the murderers, thieves, and suspicious