The Clique of Gold, Emile Gaboriau [if you liked this book .txt] 📗

you, that man! We agreed, therefore, that he would pay me four thousand francs in advance, and that, after the accident, he would give me six thousand certain, and a portion of the sum which he would secure.”

“Thus you undertook, for ten thousand francs, to murder a man?”

“I thought”—

“That sum is very far from those fabulous amounts by which you said you had been blinded and carried away.”

“Pardon me! There was that share in the great fortune.”

“Ah! You knew very well that Chevassat would never have paid you anything.”

Crochard’s hands twitched nervously. He cried out,—

“Chevassat cheat me! cochonnere! I would have—but no; he knows me; he would never have dared”—

The magistrate had caught the prisoner’s eye, and, fixing him sternly, he said good-naturedly,—

“Why did you tell me, then, that that man magnetized you, and frightened you out of your wits?”

The wretch had gone into the snare, and, instead of answering, hung his head, and tried to sob.

“Repentance is all very well,” said the lawyer, who did not seem to be in the least touched; “but just now it would be better for you to explain how your trip to Cochin China was arranged. Come, collect yourself, and give us the details.”

“As to that,” he resumed his account, “you see Chevassat explained to me everything at breakfast; and the very same day he gave me the address which you found on the paper in which the bank-notes were wrapped up.”

“What did he give you M. Champcey’s address for?”

“So that I might know him personally.”

“Well, go on.”

“At first, when I heard he was a lieutenant in the navy, I said I must give it up, knowing as I did that with such men there is no trifling. But Chevassat scolded me so terribly, and called me such hard names, that I finally got mad, and promised everything.

“‘Besides,’ he said to me, ‘listen to my plan. The navy department wants mechanics to go to Saigon. They have not gotten their full number yet: so you go and offer yourself. They will accept you, and even pay your journey to Rochefort: a boat will carry you out to the roadstead on board the frigate “Conquest.” Do you know whom you will find on board? Our man, Lieut. Champcey. Well, now, I tell you! that if any accident should happen to him, either during the voyage, or at Saigon, that accident will pass unnoticed, as a letter passes through the post-office.’

“Yes, that’s what he told me, every word of it; and I think I hear him now. And I—I was so completely bewildered, that I had nothing to say in return. However, there was one thing which troubled me; and I thought, ‘Well, after all, they won’t accept me at the navy department, with my antecedents.’

“But, when I mentioned the difficulty to Chevassat, he laughed. Oh, but he laughed! it made me mad.

“‘You are surely more of a fool than I thought,’ he said. ‘Are your condemnations written on your face? No, I should say. Well, as you will exhibit your papers in excellent order, they will take you.’

“I opened my eyes wide, and said, ‘That’s all very pretty, what you say; but the mischief is, that, as I have not worked at my profession for more than fifteen years, I have no papers at all.’ He shrugs his shoulders, and says, ‘You shall have your papers.’ That worries me; and I reply, ‘If I have to steal somebody’s papers, and change my name, I won’t do it.’ But the brigand had his notions. ‘You shall keep your name,’ he said, touching me on the shoulder. ‘You shall always remain Crochard, surnamed Bagnolet; and you shall have your papers as engraver on metal as perfect as anybody can have them.’

“And, to be sure, the second day after that he gave me a set of papers, signatures, seals, all in perfect order.”

“The papers found in your room, you mean?” asked the lawyer.

“Exactly.”

“Where did Chevassat get them?”

“Get them? Why, he had made them himself. He can do anything he chooses with his pen, the scamp! If he takes it into his head to imitate your own handwriting, you would never suspect it.”

Daniel and the old surgeon exchanged glances. This was a strong and very important point in connection with the forged letter that had been sent to the navy department, and claimed to be signed by Daniel himself. The magistrate was as much struck by the fact as they were; but his features remained unchanged; and, pursuing his plan in spite of all the incidents of the examination, he asked,—

“These papers caused no suspicion?”

“None whatever. I had only to show them, and they accepted me. Besides, Chevassat said he would enlist some people in my behalf; perhaps I had been specially recommended.”

“And thus you sailed?”

“Yes. They gave me my ticket, some money for travelling expenses; and, five days after my meeting with Chevassat, I was on board ‘The Conquest.’ Lieut. Champcey was not there. Ah! I began to hope he would not go out on the expedition at all. Unfortunately, he arrived forty- eight hours afterwards, and we sailed at once.”

The marvellous coolness of the wretch showed clearly under his affected trouble; and, while it confounded Daniel and the old surgeon, it filled the faithful Lefloch with growing indignation. He spoke of this abominable plot, of this assassination which had been so carefully plotted, and of the price agreed upon, and partly paid in advance, as if the whole had been a fair commercial operation.

“Now, Crochard,” said the lawyer, “I cannot impress it too strongly on your mind, how important it is for your own interests that you should tell the truth. Remember, all your statements will be verified. Do you know whether Chevassat lives in Paris under an assumed name?”

“No, sir! I have always heard him called Chevassat by everybody.”

“What? By everybody?”

“Well, I mean his concierge, his servants.”

The magistrate seemed for a moment to consider how he should frame his next question; and then he asked, all of a sudden,—

“Suppose that the—accident, as you call it, had succeeded, you would have taken ship; you would have arrived in France; you reach Paris; how would you have found Chevassat to claim your six thousand francs?”

“I should have gone to his house, where I breakfasted with him; and, if he had left, the concierge would have told me where he lived now.”

“Then you really think you saw him at his own rooms? Consider. If you left him only