The Works of Guy de Maupassant Volume VI Part 48

He rose, and stammered: "Thanks, thanks; do not say 'yes' to anyone yet, I beg of you; wait a little longer, I entreat you. Will you promise me this much?"

She murmured, somewhat uneasily, and without understanding what he wanted: "Yes, I promise you."

Du Roy threw the lump of bread he still held in his hand into the water, and fled as though he had lost his head, without wis.h.i.+ng her good-bye.

All the fish rushed eagerly at this lump of crumb, which floated, not having been kneaded in the fingers, and nibbled it with greedy mouths.

They dragged it away to the other end of the basin, and forming a moving cl.u.s.ter, a kind of animated and twisting flower, a live flower fallen into the water head downwards.

Susan, surprised and uneasy, got up and returned slowly to the dining-room. The journalist had left.

He came home very calm, and as Madeleine was writing letters, said to her: "Are you going to dine at the Walters' on Friday? I am going."

She hesitated, and replied: "No. I do not feel very well. I would rather stay at home."

He remarked: "Just as you like."

Then he took his hat and went out again at once. For some time past he had been keeping watch over her, following her about, knowing all her movements. The hour he had been awaiting was at length at hand. He had not been deceived by the tone in which she had said: "I would rather stay at home."

He was very amiable towards her during the next few days. He even appeared lively, which was not usual, and she said: "You are growing quite nice again."

He dressed early on the Friday, in order to make some calls before going to the governor's, he said. He started just before six, after kissing his wife, and went and took a cab at the Place Notre Dame de Lorette. He said to the driver: "Pull up in front of No. 17, Rue Fontaine, and stay there till I tell you to go on again. Then drive to the c.o.c.k Pheasant restaurant in the Rue Lafayette."

The cab started at a slow trot, and Du Roy drew down the blinds. As soon as he was opposite the door he did not take his eyes off it. After waiting ten minutes he saw Madeleine come out and go in the direction of the outer boulevards. As soon as she had got far enough off he put his head through the window, and said to the driver: "Go on." The cab started again, and landed him in front of the c.o.c.k Pheasant, a well-known middle-cla.s.s restaurant. George went into the main dining-room and ate slowly, looking at his watch from time to time. At half-past seven, when he had finished his coffee, drank two liqueurs of brandy, and slowly smoked a good cigar, he went out, hailed another cab that was going by empty, and was driven to the Rue La Rochefoucauld. He ascended without making any inquiry of the doorkeeper, to the third story of the house he had told the man to drive to, and when a servant opened the door to him, said: "Monsieur Guibert de Lorme is at home, is he not?"

"Yes sir."

He was ushered into the drawing-room, where he waited for a few minutes.

Then a gentleman came in, tall, and with a military bearing, gray-haired though still young, and wearing the ribbon of the Legion of Honor. Du Roy bowed, and said: "As I foresaw, Mr. Commissionary, my wife is now dining with her lover in the furnished rooms they have hired in the Rue des Martyrs."

The commissary of police bowed, saying: "I am at your service, sir."

George continued: "You have until nine o'clock, have you not? That limit of time pa.s.sed, you can no longer enter a private dwelling to prove adultery."

"No, sir; seven o'clock in winter, nine o'clock from the 31st March. It is the 5th of April, so we have till nine o'clock.

"Very well, Mr. Commissionary, I have a cab downstairs; we can take the officers who will accompany you, and wait a little before the door. The later we arrive the best chance we have of catching them in the act."

"As you like, sir."

The commissary left the room, and then returned with an overcoat, hiding his tri-colored sash. He drew back to let Du Roy pa.s.s out first. But the journalist, who was preoccupied, declined to do so, and kept saying: "After you, sir, after you."

The commissary said: "Go first, sir, I am at home."

George bowed, and pa.s.sed out. They went first to the police office to pick up three officers in plain clothes who were awaiting them, for George had given notice during the day that the surprise would take place that evening. One of the men got on the box beside the driver. The other two entered the cab, which reached the Rue des Martyrs. Du Roy said: "I have a plan of the rooms. They are on the second floor. We shall first find a little ante-room, then a dining-room, then the bedroom. The three rooms open into one another. There is no way out to facilitate flight. There is a locksmith a little further on. He is holding himself in readiness to be called upon by you."

When they arrived opposite the house it was only a quarter past eight, and they waited in silence for more than twenty minutes. But when he saw the three quarters about to strike, George said: "Let us start now."

They went up the stairs without troubling themselves about the doorkeeper, who, indeed, did not notice them. One of the officers remained in the street to keep watch on the front door. The four men stopped at the second floor, and George put his ear to the door and then looked through the keyhole. He neither heard nor saw anything. He rang the bell.

The commissary said to the officers: "You will remain in readiness till called on."

And they waited. At the end of two or three minutes George again pulled the bell several times in succession. They noted a noise from the further end of the rooms, and then a slight step approached. Someone was coming to spy who was there. The journalist then rapped smartly on the panel of the door. A voice, a woman's voice, that an attempt was evidently being made to disguise asked: "Who is there?"

The commissary replied: "Open, in the name of the law."

The voice repeated: "Who are you?"

"I am the commissary of police. Open the door, or I will have it broken in."

The voice went on: "What do you want?"

Du Roy said: "It is I. It is useless to seek to escape."

The light steps, the tread of bare feet, was heard to withdraw, and then in a few seconds to return.

George said: "If you won't open, we will break in the door."

He grasped the handle, and pushed slowly with his shoulder. As there was no longer any reply, he suddenly gave such a violent and vigorous shock that the old lock gave way. The screws were torn out of the wood, and he almost fell over Madeleine, who was standing in the ante-room, clad in a chemise and petticoat, her hair down, her legs bare, and a candle in her hand.

He exclaimed: "It is she, we have them," and darted forward into the rooms. The commissary, having taken off his hat, followed him, and the startled woman came after, lighting the way. They crossed a drawing-room, the uncleaned table of which displayed the remnants of a repast--empty champagne bottles, an open pot of fatted goose liver, the body of a fowl, and some half-eaten bits of bread. Two plates piled on the sideboard were piled with oyster sh.e.l.ls.

The bedroom seemed disordered, as though by a struggle. A dress was thrown over a chair, a pair of trousers hung astride the arm of another.

Four boots, two large and two small, lay on their sides at the foot of the bed. It was the room of a house let out in furnished lodgings, with commonplace furniture, filled with that hateful and sickening smell of all such places, the odor of all the people who had slept or lived there a day or six months. A plate of cakes, a bottle of chartreuse, and two liqueur gla.s.ses, still half full, enc.u.mbered the mantel-shelf. The upper part of the bronze clock was hidden by a man's hat.

The commissary turned round sharply, and looking Madeleine straight in the face, said: "You are Madame Claire Madeleine Du Roy, wife of Monsieur Prosper George Du Roy, journalist, here present?"

She uttered in a choking voice: "Yes, sir."

"What are you doing here?" She did not answer.

The commissary went on: "What are you doing here? I find you away from home, almost undressed, in furnished apartments. What did you come here for?" He waited for a few moments. Then, as she still remained silent, he continued: "Since you will not confess, madame, I shall be obliged to verify the state of things."

In the bed could be seen the outline of a form hidden beneath the clothes. The commissary approached and said: "Sir."

The man in bed did not stir. He seemed to have his back turned, and his head buried under a pillow. The commissary touched what seemed to be his shoulder, and said: "Sir, do not, I beg of you, force me to take action."

But the form still remained as motionless as a corpse. Du Roy, who had advanced quickly, seized the bed-clothes, pulled them down, and tearing away the pillow, revealed the pale face of Monsieur Laroche-Mathieu. He bent over him, and, quivering with the desire to seize him by the throat and strangle him, said, between his clenched teeth: "Have at least the courage of your infamy."

The commissary again asked: "Who are you?"

The bewildered lover not replying, he continued: "I am a commissary of police, and I summon you to tell me your name."

George, who was quivering with brutal wrath, shouted: "Answer, you coward, or I will tell your name myself."

Then the man in the bed stammered: "Mr. Commissary, you ought not to allow me to be insulted by this person. Is it with you or with him that I have to do? Is it to you or to him that I have to answer?"

His mouth seemed to be dried up as he spoke.

The commissary replied: "With me, sir; with me alone. I ask you who you are?"