As Madame de Leautaud still positively denied the truth of these statements, Marie, in self-defence, made them to the judge. She told the whole story of how the diamonds had been given her to sell, that she might remit the amount to a young man in poor circumstances and of humble condition, whose revelations might prove inconvenient. Madame de Leautaud had assisted Marie to take the jewels out of their settings, so as to facilitate their sale. If they had not as yet been sold, it was because she had found it very difficult to dispose of them, both before and after her marriage. She still had them; and they were, in fact, found at Glandier, in the place she indicated. There was never any question as to the identity of the stones, which were recognised in court by the jeweller who had supplied them, and who spoke to their value, some £300, independently of certain pearls which were missing.
The prosecution certainly made out a strong case against Marie Lafarge. The jewels, it was stated, were first missed after a discussion between the two ladies on the difference between paste and real stones. At first Madame de Leautaud made little of her loss. She was careless of her things, and thought her husband or her mother had hidden her jewels somewhere to give her a fright. But they both denied having played her any such trick, and as the jewels were undoubtedly gone, the police were informed, and many of the servants suspected. Suspicion against Madame Lafarge had always rankled in Madame de Leautaud’s mind, and it was soon strengthened by her strange antics with regard to the jewels. On one occasion she defended a servant who had been suspected, promising to find him a place if he were dismissed, as she knew he was innocent. One of her servants told the de Leautauds that her mistress said laughingly she had stolen the jewels and swallowed them. Again, Madame Lafarge had submitted to be mesmerised by Madame de Montbreton, Madame de Leautaud’s sister, and had fallen into an evidently simulated magnetic trance; when, being questioned about the missing jewels, she said they had been removed by a Jew, who had sold them. Other circumstances were adduced as strongly indicating Marie’s guilt. It was observed in Paris, before her marriage, that she had a quantity of fine stones, loose, and she explained that they had been given her at Busagny. Once after her marriage M. Lafarge had asked her for a diamond to cut a pane of glass, and, to his surprise, she produced a number, saying she had owned them from childhood, but that they had only been handed over to her lately by an old servant.
These contradictory explanations told greatly against Madame Lafarge. She made other statements also that were at variance. When first taxed with the theft she pretended that the diamonds had been sent her by an uncle in Toulouse, whose name and address she was, however, unable to give. Next she brought up the story contained in her appealing letter to Madame de Leautaud. It was the story of the young man, Félix Clavé, son of a schoolmaster, with whom the girls had made acquaintance. Having frequently met him when attending mass, they rashly wrote him an anonymous letter, giving him a rendezvous in the garden of the Tuileries. Marie Lafarge declared that the encouragement came from Madame de Leautaud, which the latter denied, and retorted that it was Marie Lafarge who had been the object of the young man’s devotion.
Then Clavé disappeared to Algeria, so Marie declared, as he had written to her from Algiers. Madame de Leautaud said this was impossible, as she had seen him on the stage of the opera. A few months later, Marie alleged, when her friend was with her at Busagny, Madame de Leautaud brought out the diamonds and implored Marie to sell them for her, as she must “absolutely” have money to buy Clavé’s silence. What followed, according to Marie Lafarge, has already been told, except that Madame de Leautaud went through a number of devices to make it appear that the diamonds had been stolen from her, and that then M. de Leautaud was informed of the supposed theft. The gendarmes actually came to search the château and to investigate the robbery next day, although at that time the diamonds were safe in her possession, entrusted to her by Madame de Leautaud.
According to the prosecution, these statements were quite untrue. There had been a theft, and it was soon discovered. The chief of the Paris detective police, M. Allard, had been summoned to Busagny to investigate, and he was satisfied that the robbery had been committed by someone in the château; and, as the servants all bore unimpeachable characters, M. Allard had asked about the other inmates, and the guests. Then M. de Leautaud mentioned Marie Capelle (Lafarge), and hinted that there were several sinister rumours current concerning her, but would not make any distinct charge then. M. Allard now remembered that there had been another mysterious robbery at the house of Madame Garat, Marie Lafarge’s aunt, in Paris, a couple of years before, when a 500 franc note had been stolen, and he had been called in to investigate, but without any result. What if Marie Capelle (Lafarge) had had something to do with this theft?
It must be admitted that these charges, if substantiated, made the case look black against Marie Lafarge. But one, at least, fell entirely to the ground when she was on her defence. It was clearly shown that she could not have stolen the banknote at her aunt’s, Madame Garat’s, for she was in Paris at the time. As regards the diamonds, her story, if she had stuck to one account only—that of the blackmail—would have been plausible, nay probable, enough. It was positively contradicted on oath by the lady most nearly concerned, Madame de Leautaud, and it was not believed by the court; and Marie Lafarge was finally convicted of having stolen the diamonds, and sentenced to two years’ imprisonment. She appealed against this finding, and appeared no less than four times to seek redress, always without success. Meanwhile the graver charge of murder had been gone into and decided against her; so that the shorter sentence for theft was merged into the life sentence.
There were many who believed in Marie’s entire innocence to the very last. Her own maid elected to go with her to prison, and remained by her side for a year. A young girl, cousin of the deceased M. Lafarge, was equally devoted, and also accompanied her to Montpelier gaol. Her advocate, the eminent Maître Lachaud, steadfastly denied her guilt, and years later, when the unfortunate woman died, he regularly sent flowers for her grave.
