"Well," he said, "my explanation is becoming quite plausible. Just hear what I have positively ascertained to be the fact. In the time from nine to eleven o'clock, on the night of the crime, there was not a soul at the parsonage in Brechy. The priest was dining with M.
Besson, at his house; and his servant had gone out to meet him with a lantern.""I understand," said M. Magloire.
"Why should you not have gone to see the priest at Brechy, my dear client? In the first place, you had to arrange the details of the ceremony with him; then, as he is your friend, and a man of experience, and a priest, you wanted to ask him for his advice before taking so grave a step, and, finally, you intended to fulfil that religious duty of which he spoke, and which you were rather reluctant to comply with.""Well said!" approved the eminent lawyer of Sauveterre,--"very well said!""So, you see, my dear client, it was for the purpose of consulting the priest at Brechy that you deprived yourself of the pleasure of spending the evening with your betrothed. Now let us see how that answers the allegations of the prosecution. They ask you why you took to the marshes. Why? Because it was the shortest way, and you were afraid of finding the priest in bed. Nothing more natural; for it is well known that the excellent man is in the habit of going to bed at nine o'clock. Still you had put yourself out in vain; for, when you knocked at the door of the parsonage, nobody came to open."Here M. Magloire interrupted his colleague, saying,--"So far, all is very well. But now there comes a very great improbability. No one would think of going through the forest of Rochepommier in order to return from Brechy to Boiscoran. If you knew the country"--"I know it; for I have carefully explored it. And the proof of it is, that, having foreseen the objection, I have found an answer. While M.
de Boiscoran knocked at the door, a little peasant-girl passed by, and told him that she had just met the priest at a place called the Marshalls' Cross-roads. As the parsonage stands quite isolated, at the end of the village, such an incident is very probable. As for the priest, chance led me to learn this: precisely at the hour at which M.
de Boiscoran would have been at Brechy, a priest passed the Marshalls'
Cross-roads; and this priest, whom I have seen, belongs to the next parish. He also dined at M. Besson's, and had just been sent for to attend a dying woman. The little girl, therefore, did not tell a story; she only made a mistake.""Excellent!" said M. Magloire.
"Still," continued M. Folgat, "after this information, what did M. de Boiscoran do? He went on; and, hoping every moment to meet the priest, he walked as far as the forest of Rochepommier. Finding, at last, that the peasant-girl had--purposely or not--led him astray, he determined to return to Boiscoran through the woods. But he was in very bad humor at having thus lost an evening which he might have spent with his betrothed; and this made him swear and curse, as the witness Gaudry has testified."The famous lawyer of Sauveterre shook his head.
"That is ingenious, I admit; and I confess, in all humility, that Icould not have suggested any thing as good. But--for there is a but--your story sins by its very simplicity. The prosecution will say, 'If that is the truth, why did not M. de Boiscoran say so at once? And what need was there to consult his counsel?' "M. Folgat showed in his face that he was making a great effort to meet the objection. After a while, he replied,--"I know but too well that that is the weak spot in our armor,--a very weak spot, too; for it is quite clear, that, if M. de Boiscoran had given this explanation on the day of his arrest, he would have been released instantly. But what better can be found? What else can be found? However, this is only a rough sketch of my plan, and I have never put it into words yet till now. With your assistance, M.
Magloire, with the aid of Mechinet, to whom I am already indebted for very valuable information, with the aid of all our friends, in fine, Icannot help hoping that I may be able to improve my plan by adding some mysterious secret which may help to explain M. de Boiscoran's reticence. I thought, at one time, of calling in politics, and to pretend, that, on account of the peculiar views of which he is suspected, M. de Boiscoran preferred keeping his relations with the priest at Brechy a secret.""Oh, that would have been most unfortunate!" broke in M. Magloire. "We are not only religious at Sauveterre, we are devout, my good colleague,--excessively devout.""And I have given up that idea."
Jacques, who had till now kept silent and motionless, now raised himself suddenly to his full height, and cried, in a voice of concentrated rage,--"Is it not too bad, is it not atrocious, that we should be compelled to concoct a falsehood? And I am innocent! What more could be done if I were a murderer?"Jacques was perfectly right: it was monstrous that he should be absolutely forced to conceal the truth. But his counsel took no notice of his indignation: they were too deeply absorbed in examining minutely their system of defence.
"Let us go on to the other points of the accusation," said M.
Magloire.
"If my version is accepted," replied M. Folgat, "the rest follows as a matter of course. But will they accept it? On the day on which he was arrested, M. de Boiscoran, trying to find an excuse for having been out that night, has said that he had gone to see his wood-merchant at Brechy. That was a disastrous imprudence. And here is the real danger.
