Within an Inch of His Life Part 95

He had no reason for mistrusting his agent; and yet his apprehensions became so serious, that he went out of his way to look in at the hospital. The lady superior received him, as a matter of course, with all the signs of profound respect; and, when he inquired about Cocoleu, she added,--

"Would you like to see him?"

"I confess I should be very glad to do so."

"Come with me, then."

She took him into the garden, and there asked a gardener,--

"Where is the idiot?"

The man put his spade into the ground; and, with that affected reverence which characterizes all persons employed in a convent, he answered,--

"The idiot is down there in the middle avenue, mother, in his usual place, you know, which nothing will induce him to leave."

M. Galpin and the lady superior found him there. They had taken off the rags which he wore when he was admitted, and put him into the hospital-dress, which was a large gray coat and a cotton cap. He did not look any more intelligent for that; but he was less repulsive. He was seated on the ground, playing with the gravel.

"Well, my boy," asked M. Galpin, "how do you like this?"

He raised his inane face, and fixed his dull eye on the lady superior; but he made no reply.

"Would you like to go back to Valpinson?" asked the lawyer again. He shuddered, but did not open his lips.

"Look here," said M. Galpin, "answer me, and I'll give you a ten-cent piece."

No: Cocoleu was at his play again.

"That is the way he is always," declared the lady superior. "Since he is here, no one has ever gotten a word out of him. Promises, threats, nothing has any effect. One day I thought I would try an experiment; and, instead of letting him have his breakfast, I said to him, 'You shall have nothing to eat till you say, "I am hungry."' At the end of twenty-four hours I had to let him have his pittance; for he would have starved himself sooner than utter a word."

"What does Dr. Seignebos think of him?"

"The doctor does not want to hear his name mentioned," replied the lady superior.

And, raising her eyes to heaven, she added,--

"And that is a clear proof, that, but for the direct intervention of Providence, the poor creature would never have denounced the crime which he had witnessed."

Immediately, however, she returned to earthly things, and asked,--

"But will you not relieve us soon of this poor idiot, who is a heavy charge on our hospital? Why not send him back to his village, where he found his support before? We have quite a number of sick and poor, and very little room."

"We must wait, sister, till M. de Boiscoran's trial is finished,"

replied the magistrate.

The lady superior looked resigned, and said,--

"That is what the mayor told me, and it is very provoking, I must say: however, they have allowed me to turn him out of the room which they had given him at first. I have sent him to the Insane Ward. That is the name we give to a few little rooms, enclosed by a wall, where we keep the poor insane, who are sent to us provisionally."

Here she was interrupted by the janitor of the hospital, who came up, bowing.

"What do you want?" she asked.

Vaudevin, the janitor, handed her a note.

"A man brought by a gendarme," he replied. "Immediately to be admitted."

The lady superior read the note, signed by Dr. Seignebos.

"Epileptic," she said, "and somewhat idiotic: as if we wanted any more!

And a stranger into the bargain! Really Dr. Seignebos is too yielding.

Why does he not send all these people to their own parish to be taken care of?"

And, with a very elastic step for her age, she went to the parlor, followed by M. Galpin and the janitor. They had put the new patient in there, and, sunk upon a bench, he looked the picture of utter idiocy.

After having looked at him for a minute, she said,--

"Put him in the Insane Ward: he can keep Cocoleu company. And let the sister know at the drug-room. But no, I will go myself. You will excuse me, sir."

And then she left the room. M. Galpin was much comforted.

"There is no danger here," he said to himself. "And if M. Folgat counts upon any incident during the trial, Cocoleu, at all events, will not furnish it to him."

XXVII.

At the same hour when the magistrate left the hospital, Dr. Seignebos and M. Folgat parted, after a frugal breakfast,--the one to visit his patients, the other to go to the prison. The young advocate was very much troubled. He hung his head as he went down the street; and the diplomatic citizens who compared his dejected appearance with the victorious air of M. Galpin came to the conclusion that Jacques de Boiscoran was irrevocably lost.

At that moment M. Folgat was almost of their opinion. He had to pa.s.s through one of those attacks of discouragement, to which the most energetic men succ.u.mb at times, when they are bent upon pursuing an uncertain end which they ardently desire.

The declarations made by little Martha and the governess had literally overwhelmed him. Just when he thought he had the end of the thread in his hand, the tangle had become worse than ever. And so it had been from the commencement. At every step he took, the problem had become more complicated than ever. At every effort he made, the darkness, instead of being dispelled, had become deeper. Not that he as yet doubted Jacques's innocence. No! The suspicion which for a moment had flashed through his mind had pa.s.sed away instantly. He admitted, with Dr. Seignebos, the possibility that there was an accomplice, and that it was Cocoleu, in all probability, who had been charged with the execution of the crime.

But how could that fact be made useful to the defence? He saw no way.

Goudar was an able man; and the manner in which he had introduced himself into the hospital and Cocoleu's company indicated a master. But however cunning he was, however experienced in all the tricks of his profession, how could he ever hope to make a man confess who intrenched himself behind the rampart of feigned imbecility? If he had only had an abundance of time before him! But the days were counted, and he would have to hurry his measures.

"I feel like giving it up," thought the young lawyer.

In the meantime he had reached the prison. He felt the necessity of concealing his anxiety. While Blangin went before him through the long pa.s.sages, rattling his keys, he endeavored to give to his features an expression of hopeful confidence.

"At last you come!" cried Jacques.

He had evidently suffered terribly since the day before. A feverish restlessness had disordered his features, and reddened his eyes. He was shaking with nervous tremor. Still he waited till the jailer had shut the door; and then he asked hoa.r.s.ely,--

"What did she say?"

M. Folgat gave him a minute account of his mission, quoting the words of the countess almost literally.

"That is just like her!" exclaimed the prisoner. "I think I can hear her! What a woman! To defy me in this way!"