Monsieur Lecoq, v. 1, Emile Gaboriau [books to get back into reading .txt] 📗
- Author: Emile Gaboriau
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When the authorities were undecided what course to pursue in some great case, they invariably said: “Let us go and consult Tirauclair.” For this was the name by which he was most generally known: a sobriquet derived from a phrase which was always on his lips. He was constantly saying: “Il faut que cela se tire au clair: That must be brought to light.” Hence, the not altogether inappropriate appellation of “Pere Tirauclair,” or “Father Bring-to-Light.”
Perhaps this sobriquet assisted him in keeping his occupation secret from his friends among the general public. At all events they never suspected them. His disturbed life when he was working up a case, the strange visitors he received, his frequent and prolonged absences from home, were all imputed to a very unreasonable inclination to gallantry. His concierge was deceived as well as his friends, and laughing at his supposed infatuation, disrespectfully called him an old libertine. It was only the officials of the detective force who knew that Tirauclair and Tabaret were one and the same person.
Lecoq was trying to gain hope and courage by reflecting on the career of this eccentric man, when the buxom housekeeper reentered the library and announced that the physician had left. At the same time she opened a door and exclaimed: “This is the room; you gentlemen can enter now.”
XXIII
On a large canopied bed, sweating and panting beneath the weight of numerous blankets, lay the two-faced oracle—Tirauclair, of the Prefecture—Tabaret, of the Rue Saint Lazare. It was impossible to believe that the owner of such a face, in which a look of stupidity was mingled with one of perpetual astonishment, could possess superior talent, or even an average amount of intelligence. With his retreating forehead, and his immense ears, his odious turned-up nose, tiny eyes, and coarse, thick lips, M. Tabaret seemed an excellent type of the ignorant, pennywise, petty rentier class. Whenever he took his walks abroad, the juvenile street Arabs would impudently shout after him or try to mimic his favorite grimace. And yet his ungainliness did not seem to worry him in the least, while he appeared to take real pleasure in increasing his appearance of stupidity, solacing himself with the reflection that “he is not really a genius who seems to be one.”
At the sight of the two detectives, whom he knew very well, his eyes sparkled with pleasure. “Good morning, Lecoq, my boy,” said he. “Good morning, my old Absinthe. So you think enough down there of poor Papa Tirauclair to come and see him?”
“We need your advice, Monsieur Tabaret.”
“Ah, ah!”
“We have just been as completely outwitted as if we were babies in long clothes.”
“What! was your man such a very cunning fellow?”
Lecoq heaved a sigh. “So cunning,” he replied, “that, if I were superstitious, I should say he was the devil himself.”
The sick man’s face wore a comical expression of envy. “What! you have found a treasure like that,” said he, “and you complain! Why, it is a magnificent opportunity—a chance to be proud of! You see, my boys, everything has degenerated in these days. The race of great criminals is dying out—those who’ve succeeded the old stock are like counterfeit coins. There’s scarcely anything left outside a crowd of low offenders who are not worth the shoe leather expended in pursuing them. It is enough to disgust a detective, upon my word. No more trouble, emotion, anxiety, or excitement. When a crime is committed nowadays, the criminal is in jail the next morning, you’ve only to take the omnibus, and go to the culprit’s house and arrest him. He’s always found, the more the pity. But what has your fellow been up to?”
“He has killed three men.”
“Oh! oh! oh!” said old Tabaret, in three different tones, plainly implying that this criminal was evidently superior to others of his species. “And where did this happen?”
“In a wine-shop near the barriere.”
“Oh, yes, I recollect: a man named May. The murders were committed in the Widow Chupin’s cabin. I saw the case mentioned in the ‘Gazette des Tribunaux,’ and your comrade, Fanferlot l’Ecureuil, who comes to see me, told me you were strangely puzzled about the prisoner’s identity. So you are charged with investigating the affair? So much the better. Tell me all about it, and I will assist you as well as I can.”
Suddenly checking himself, and lowering his voice, Tirauclair added: “But first of all, just do me the favor to get up. Now, wait a moment, and when I motion you, open that door there, on the left, very suddenly. Mariette, my housekeeper, who is curiosity incarnate, is standing there listening. I hear her hair rubbing against the lock. Now!”
The young detective immediately obeyed, and Mariette, caught in the act, hastened away, pursued by her master’s sarcasms. “You might have known that you couldn’t succeed at that!” he shouted after her.
Although Lecoq and Father Absinthe were much nearer the door than old Tirauclair, neither of them had heard the slightest sound; and they looked at each other in astonishment, wondering whether their host had been playing a little farce for their benefit, or whether his sense of hearing was really so acute as this incident would seem to indicate.
“Now,” said Tabaret, settling himself more comfortably upon his pillows—“now I will listen to you, my boy. Mariette will not come back again.”
On his way to Tabaret’s, Lecoq had busied himself in preparing his story; and it was in the clearest possible manner that he related all the particulars, from the moment when Gevrol opened the door of the Poivriere to the instant when May leaped over the garden wall in the rear of the Hotel de Sairmeuse.
While the young detective was telling his story, old Tabaret seemed completely transformed. His gout was entirely forgotten. According to the different phases of the recital, he either turned and twisted on his bed, uttering little cries of delight or disappointment, or else lay motionless, plunged in the same kind of ecstatic reverie which enthusiastic admirers of classical music yield themselves up to while listening to one of the great Beethoven’s divine sonatas.
“If I had been there! If only I had been there!” he murmured regretfully every now and then through his set teeth, though when Lecoq’s story was finished, enthusiasm seemed
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