“Too often. But I ’ve made him understand that his face does n’t please me, and, for a month past, he has n’t been here. The Donjon Inn has never existed for him!—he has n’t had time!—been too much engaged in paying court to the landlady of the Three Lilies at Saint-Michel. A bad fellow!—There is n’t an honest man who can bear him. Why, the concierges of the château would turn their eyes away from a picture of him!”
“The concierges of the château are honest people, then?”
“Yes, they are, as true as my name’s Mathieu, monsieur. I believe them to be honest.”
“Yet they ’ve been arrested?”
“What does that prove?—But I don’t want to mix myself up in other people’s affairs.”
“And what do you think of the murder?”
“Of the murder of poor Mademoiselle Stangerson?—A good girl much loved everywhere in the country. That ’s what I think of it—and many things besides; but that ’s nobody’s business.”
“Not even mine?” insisted Rouletabille.
The innkeeper looked at him sideways and said gruffly:
“Not even yours.”