Monsieur Lecoq, v. 1 by Emile Gaboriau (hardest books to read .TXT) 📕

A couple of minutes later, the magistrate and the detective had reached the Depot, which is connected with the Palais de Justice by a narrow passage, especially reserved for official use. The prisoners’ morning rations had just been served to them, and the governor was walking up and down the courtyard, in the company of Inspector Gevrol. As soon as he perceived M. Segmuller he hastened toward him and asked if he had not come about the prisoner May.

As the magistrate nodded assent, the governor at once added: “Well I was only just now telling Inspector Gevrol that I was very well satisfied with May’s behavior. It has not only been quite unnecessary to place him in the strait-waistcoat again, but his mood seems to have changed entirely. He eats with a good appetite; he is as gay as a lark, and he constantly laughs and jests with his keeper.”

Gevrol had pricked up his ears when he heard himself named by the governor, and considering this mention to be a sufficient introduction, he thought there would be no impropriety in his listening to the conversation. Accordingly, he approached the others, and noted with some satisfaction the troubled glances which Lecoq and the magistrate exchanged.

M. Segmuller was plainly perplexed. May’s gay manner to which the governor of the Depot alluded might perhaps have been assumed for the purpose of sustaining his character as a jester and buffoon, it might be due to a certainty of defeating the judicial inquiry, or, who knows? the prisoner had perhaps received some favorable news from outside.

With Lecoq’s last words still ringing in his ears, it is no wonder that the magistrate should have dwelt on this last supposition. “Are you quite sure,” he asked, “that no communication from outside can reach the inmates of the secret cells?”

The governor of the Depot was cut to the quick by M. Segmuller’s implied doubt. What! were his subordinates suspected? Was his own professional honesty impugned? He could not help lifting his hands to heaven in mute protest against such an unjust charge.

“Am I sure?” he exclaimed. “Then you can never have visited the secret cells. You have no idea, then, of their situation; you are unacquainted with the triple bolts that secure the doors; the grating that shuts out the sunlight, to say nothing of the guard who walks beneath the windows day and night. Why, a bird couldn’t even reach the prisoners in those cells.”

Such a description was bound to reassure the most skeptical mind, and M. Segmuller breathed again: “Now that I am easy on that score,” said he, “I should like some information about another prisoner—a fellow named Chupin, who isn’t in the secret cells. I want to know if any visitor came for him yesterday.”

“I must speak to the registrar,” replied the governor, “before I can answer you with certainty. Wait a moment though, here comes a man who can perhaps tell us. He is usually on guard at the entrance. Here, Ferraud, this way!”

The man to whom the governor called hastened to obey the summons.

“Do you know whether any one asked to see the prisoner Chupin yesterday?”

“Yes, sir, I went to fetch Chupin to the parlor myself.”

“And who was his visitor?” eagerly asked Lecoq, “wasn’t he a tall man; very red in the face—”

“Excuse me, sir, the visitor was a lady—his aunt, at least so Chupin told me.”

Neither M. Segmuller nor Lecoq could restrain an exclamation of surprise. “What was she like?” they both asked at the same time.

“She was short,” replied the attendant, “with a very fair complexion and light hair; she seemed to be a very respectable woman.”

“It must have been one of the female fugitives who escaped from the Widow Chupin’s hovel,” exclaimed Lecoq.

Gevrol, hitherto an attentive listener, burst into a loud laugh. “Still that Russian princess,” said he.

Neither the magistrate nor the young detective relished this unseasonable jest. “You forget yourself, sir,” said M. Segmuller severely. “You forget that the sneers you address to your comrade also apply to me!”

The General saw that he had gone too far; and while glancing hatefully at Lecoq, he mumbled an apology to the magistrate. The latter did not apparently hear him, for, bowing to the governor, he motioned Lecoq to follow him away.

“Run to the Prefecture of Police,” he said as soon as they were out of hearing, “and ascertain how and under what pretext this woman obtained permission to see Polyte Chupin.”