"Stop, stop, Master Jerome Riquet, we are undoubtedly satisfied that the papers are not in your valise, and I think it probable that you have had nothing to do with the matter; but you threw out an insinuation just now of which we must hear more. What was the meaning of the words you made use of when you said that, you would not be answerable that more than a scrap was not found amongst the baggage of some that are accusing others?"
Jerome Riquet hesitated, and either felt or affected a disinclination to explain himself; but Pelisson persisted, notwithstanding sundry twitches of the sleeve given to him both by the Abbé de St. Helie and the Bishop himself.
"I must have this matter cleared up," said Pelisson, "and I do not rise till it is. Explain yourself, sir, or I shall apply both to your lord and to the governor, to insist upon your so doing."
Jerome Riquet looked towards the Count, who immediately said, "What your meaning was, Riquet, you best know; but you must have had some meaning, and it is fit that you should explain it."
"Well, then," said Riquet, shaking his head upon his shoulders with an important look, "what I mean is this; that if ever I saw a man who had an inclination to see the contents of a packet that did not belong to him, it was Monsieur le Curé de Guadrieul there. He knows very well that he talked to me for half an hour of how easy it would be to get the packet out of the bag, and he seemed to have a very great inclination to do it."
While he made this insinuation, the dull, fat, leaden-looking mass of the Curé de Guadrieul was seen heaving with some internal convulsion: his breath came thick, his cheeks and his breast expanded, his eyes grew red and fierce, his hands trembled with rage; and starting up from his seat he exclaimed,--
"Me? me? By the Lord I will strangle thee with my own hands," and he sprang towards Jerome Riquet, as if to execute his threat; while the governor exclaimed in a voice of thunder, "Sit down, sir; and, as you have joined in accusing others, learn to bear the retaliation, as indeed you must."
"Can he deny what I say?" demanded Riquet, stretching out his three fore-fingers, and shaking them in the Curé's face; "can he deny that he talked to me for half an hour about the easiness of purloining the commission, and told me of a thousand instances of the same kind, that have taken place before now? No, he cannot deny it!"
"I did talk to thee, base miscreant," said the Curé, still swelling with rage, "but it was to show why I always sat upon the bag, and slept with it under my head, ever after that affair with the robbers."
"Mark that, gentlemen," said the Count de Morseiul.