Plantat looked curiously at the servant."She's a pearl, my dear friend, who watches over me as if I were her child, and would go through the fire for me.I had a good deal of trouble the other day to prevent her strangling the false railway porter.I picked her out of three or four thousand convicts.She had been convicted of infanticide and arson.I would bet a hundred to one that, during the three years that she has been in my service, she has not even thought of robbing me of so much as a centime."But M.Plantat only listened to him with one ear; he was trying to find an excuse for cutting Janouille's story short, and to lead the conversation to the events of the day before.
"I have, perhaps, incommoded you a little this morning, Monsieur Lecoq?""Me? then you did not see my motto - 'always vigilant?' Why, I've been out ten times this morning; besides marking out work for three of my men.Ah, we have little time to ourselves, I can tell you.
I went to the Vulcan's Forges to see what news I could get of that poor devil of a Guespin.""And what did you hear?"
"That I had guessed right.He changed a five-hundred-franc note there last Wednesday evening at a quarter before ten.""That is to say, he is saved?"
"Well, you may say so.He will be, as soon as we have found Miss Jenny."The old justice of the peace could not avoid showing his uneasiness.
"That will, perhaps, be long and difficult?""Bast! Why so? She is on my black ball there - we shall have her, accidents excepted, before night.""You really think so?"
"I should say I was sure, to anybody but you.Reflect that this girl has been connected with the Count de Tremorel, a man of the world, a prince of the mode.When a girl falls to the gutter, after having, as they say, dazzled all Paris for six months with her luxury, she does not disappear entirely, like a stone in the mud.
When she has lost all her friends there are still her creditors, who follow and watch her, awaiting the day when fortune will smile on her once more.She doesn't trouble herself about them, she thinks they've forgotten her; a mistake! I know a milliner whose head is a perfect dictionary of the fashionable world; she has often done me a good turn.We will go and see her if you say so, after breakfast, and in two hours she will give us Jenny's address.Ah, if I were only as sure of pinching Tremorel!
M.Plantat gave a sigh of relief.The conversation at last took the turn he wished.
"You are thinking of him, then?" asked he.
"Am I?" shouted M.Lecoq, who started from his seat at the question.
"Now just look at my black ball there.I haven't thought of anybody else, mark you, since yesterday; I haven't had a wink of sleep all night for thinking of him.I must have him, and I will!""I don't doubt it; but when?"
"Ah, there it is! Perhaps to-morrow, perhaps in a month; it depends on the correctness of my calculations and the exactness of my plan.""What, is your plan made?"
"And decided on."
M.Plantat became attention itself.
I start from the principle that it is impossible for a man, accompanied by a woman, to hide from the police.In this case, the woman is young, pretty, and in a noticeable condition; three impossibilities more.Admit this, and we'll study Hector's character.He isn't a man of superior shrewdness, for we have found out all his dodges.He isn't a fool, because his dodges deceived people who are by no means fools.He is then a medium sort of a man, and his education, reading, relations, and daily conversation have procured him a number of acquaintances whom he will try to use.Now for his mind.We know the weakness of his character; soft, feeble, vacillating, only acting in the last extremity.We have seen him shrinking from decisive steps, trying always to delay matters.He is given to being deceived by illusions, and to taking his desires for accomplished events.In short, he is a coward.And what is his situation? He has killed his wife, he hopes he has created a belief in his own death, he has eloped with a young girl, and he has got nearly or quite a million of francs in his pocket.Now, this position admitted, as well as the man's character and mind, can we by an effort of thought, reasoning from his known actions, discover what he has done in such and such a case? I think so, and I hope I shall prove it to you."M.Lecoq rose and promenaded, as his habit was, up and down the room."Now let's see," he continued, "how I ought to proceed in order to discover the probable conduct of a man whose antecedents, traits, and mind are known to me.To begin with, I throw off my own individuality and try to assume his.I substitute his will for my own.I cease to be a detective and become this man, whatever he is.In this case, for instance, I know very well what I should do if I were Tremorel.I should take such measures as would throw all the detectives in the universe off the scent.But I must forget Monsieur Lecoq in order to become Hector de Tremorel.How would a man reason who was base enough to rob his friend of his wife, and then see her poison her husband before his very eyes? We already know that Tremorel hesitated a good while before deciding to commit this crime.The logic of events, which fools call fatality, urged him on.It is certain that he looked upon the murder in every point of view, studied its results, and tried to find means to escape from justice.All his acts were determined on long beforehand, and neither immediate necessity nor unforeseen circumstances disturbed his mind.The moment he had decided on the crime, he said to himself: 'Grant that Bertha has been murdered; thanks to my precautions, they think that I have been killed too; Laurence, with whom I elope, writes a letter in which she announces her suicide; I have money, what must I do?' The problem, it seems to me, is fairly put in this way.""Perfectly so," approved M.Plantat.
