"Ah," cried he, with a triumphant air, "I knew it well enough."
The hole was full of rouleaux of twenty-franc pieces; on counting them,
M. Lecoq found that there were nineteen thousand five hundred francs.
The old justice's face betrayed an expression of profound grief.
"That," thought he, "is the price of my poor Sauvresy's life."
M. Lecoq found a small piece of paper, covered with figures, deposited with the gold; it seemed to be Robelot's accounts. He had put on the left hand the sum of forty thousand francs; on the right hand, various sums were inscribed, the total of which was twenty-one thousand five hundred francs. It was only too clear; Mme. Sauvresy had paid Robelot forty thousand francs for the bottle of poison. There was nothing more to learn at his house. They locked the money up in the secretary, and affixed seals everywhere, leaving two men on guard.
But M. Lecoq was not quite satisfied yet. What was the manuscript which Plantat had read? At first he had thought that it was simply a copy of the papers confided to him by Sauvresy; but it could not be that; Sauvresy couldn't have thus described the last agonizing scenes of his life. This mystery mightily worried the detective and dampened the joy he felt at having solved the crime at Valfeuillu. He made one more attempt to surprise Plantat into satisfying his curiosity. Taking him by the coat-lapel, he drew him into the embrasure of a window, and with his most innocent air, said:
"I beg your pardon, are we going back to your house?"
"Why should we? You know the doctor is going to meet us here."
"I think we may need the papers you read to us, to convince Monsieur
Domini."
M. Plantat smiled sadly, and looking steadily at him, replied: