Second Gendarme. You're right!
Mouzon. Let us continue. Come, now that you've got so far, confess the whole thing! Here are these good gendarmes who want to go to their grub. [The gendarmes, the recorder, and Mouzon laugh] You confess? No? Then tell me, why did you insist on saying that you remained at home that night?
Etchepare. Because I'd told the gendarmes so and I didn't want to make myself out a liar.
Mouzon. And why did you tell the gendarmes that?
Etchepare. Because I thought they'd arrest me on account of the smuggling.
Mouzon. Good. Then you didn't go to Irissary that night?
Etchepare. No.
Mouzon. Where did you go?
ETCHEPARE. Up the mountain, to look for a horse that had got away the night before, one of a lot we were taking to Spain.
Mouzon. Good. Excellent. That isn't badly thought out—that can be maintained. You went to look for a horse lost on the mountain, a horse which escaped from a lot you were smuggling over the frontier on the previous night. Excellent. If that is true, there is nothing for it but to set you at liberty before we are much older. Now to prove that you've simply to tell me to whom you sold the horse; we shall send for the purchaser, and if he confirms your statement, I will sign your discharge. To whom did you sell the horse?