'But it is a crime! You will kill him!' Madame Martineau interrupted. 'You have not been ordered to kill him, have you?'
'I am acting under orders,' Gilquin replied in a rougher tone, for he wished to curtail the entreaties which he thought were coming.
But a gleam of desperate anger flashed across Madame Martineau's plump face, and her eyes glanced round the room, as though she were trying to discover some possible means of saving her husband. However, she calmed herself by an effort, and reverted to her previous demeanour, like a strong-minded woman who realises that tears can be of no service.
'God will punish you, sir,' she quietly said, after a short pause, during which she had kept her eyes fixed on Gilquin.
Then, without a tear or entreaty she turned to lean over the chair in which her husband lay dying. Gilquin had merely smiled.
Just at this moment the corporal, who had gone in person to the Golden Lion, came back to say that the landlord asserted he had not got a vehicle of any sort. The arrest of the notary, who was extremely popular in the neighbourhood, must have been noised abroad, and the landlord was doubtless concealing his conveyances; for two hours previously, when the commissary had questioned him on the subject, he had promised to let him have an old brougham which he let out for drives in the neighbourhood.
'Go and search the inn!' cried Gilquin, enraged by this fresh obstacle. 'Search every house in the village! Do they think they will have a game with us? And be quick, I have an engagement to keep, and have no time to spare. I give you a quarter of an hour.'
The corporal hurried off again, taking his men with him; and each went in a different direction. Three-quarters of an hour passed, however, and then another quarter, and then another. At the end of an hour and a half one of the gendarmes returned with a very long face. All his searching had been futile. Gilquin, who had grown feverishly excited, kept rushing about and looking out of the window into the twilight. The ball would certainly begin without him, he reflected, and the head-master's wife would consider him guilty of great discourtesy. Each time that he went past the notary's chair he almost choked with anger. Never had any criminal caused him so much trouble as that man who lay there perfectly motionless, becoming ever paler and colder.
It was past seven o'clock when the corporal returned with a beaming countenance. He had at last discovered the landlord's old brougham, concealed in a shed half a mile from the village. The horse was harnessed and between the shafts, and it was the animal's snorting which had enabled him to discover it. However, when the vehicle was at the door, it became necessary to dress M. Martineau, and this took a very long time. His wife very slowly and deliberately put him on some clean white stockings and a clean white shirt. Then she dressed him in black from head to foot; black trousers, frock-coat and waistcoat. She would not allow the gendarmes to render her the slightest assistance. The notary quietly yielded to her touch. A lamp had been lighted, and Gilquin stood tapping his hands together impatiently, while the corporal remained perfectly still, his three-cornered hat casting a huge shadow upon the ceiling.
'Come, come, haven't you done now?' Gilquin repeated.