"What! you think it was she who—"
"I haven't the slightest doubt of it. I told you so the other day, you recollect?"
"Upon what is this opinion based?"
"Upon something I have seen, a letter of hers which Dargental himself showed me one day after a quarrel he had with this woman. I'm sure too that he kept it."
"What were its contents?"
"Oh! it alluded to a secret which she had confided to him. She had poisoned her husband, I fancy, and feared that Dargental would denounce her. It was only from fear that she consented to marry him, for though she was crazy about him at first, she finally hated him. And so to escape becoming his wife, she had him murdered, I'm sure of it."
"By whom, pray?"
"By some scoundrel who was no doubt instructed to secure the letter, as Dargental's pocket-book is missing."
"Haven't you yourself ever written to Dargental?"
"Oh! yes I have. A hundred times, as I have already told you. I even confessed to you that he had in his possession a letter which I had often begged him to return to me, and which he had promised to give me during the lunch at the Lion d'Or."