“Have you informed the police?”
“Not yet. First of all, I must get clear in my own mind a little. I’m in mourning already, so from that point of view (as regards the dress question, I mean) there’s no need to bother; but you see, as soon as the victim’s name is published, I shall have to communicate with the family, send telegrams, write letters, make arrangements for the funeral, go to Naples to fetch the body.... Oh! my dear Lafcadio, there’s this congress I’ve got to attend—would you mind—would you consent to fetching the body in my place?”
“We’ll see about it.”
“That is, of course, if it won’t upset you too much. In the meantime I’m sparing my sister-in-law a period of cruel anxiety. She’ll never suspect from the vague accounts in the newspapers.... But to return to my subject. Well, then, when I read this paragraph in the paper, I said to myself: ‘This crime, which I can imagine to myself so easily, which I can reconstruct, which I can see—I know, I tell you, I know the reason for which it was committed; I know that if it hadn’t been for the inducement of the six thousand francs, it would never have been committed.’”
“But suppose....”
“Yes, yes. Let’s suppose for a moment that there had been no six thousand francs—or, better still, that the criminal didn’t take them—why, he’d have been my hero!”
Lafcadio in the meantime had risen; he picked up the paper which Julius had let fall, and opening it at the second page:
“I see,” he said in as cool a voice as he could muster, “I see that you haven’t read the latest news. That is exactly what has happened. The criminal did not take the six thousand francs. Look here! Read this: ‘The motive of the crime, therefore, does not appear to be robbery.’”
Julius snatched the sheet that Lafcadio held out to him, read it eagerly, then passed his hand over his eyes, then sat down, then got up abruptly, darted towards Lafcadio, and seizing him with both arms, exclaimed:
“The motive of the crime not robbery!” and he shook Lafcadio in a kind of transport. “The motive of the crime not robbery! Why, then”—he pushed Lafcadio from him, rushed to the other end of the room, fanned himself, struck his forehead, blew his nose—“Why, then, I know—good heavens!—I know why the ruffian murdered him.... Oh! my unfortunate friend! Oh, poor Fleurissoire! So it was true what he said! And I who thought he was out of his mind! Why, then, it’s appalling!”