She sent one glance at him, the gamine in her terrified at the Law as represented in the man before her, and then bewildered, rushed to Jim and caught him by the hand.
"Courage, mon ami," she gasped. "You 'ave on'y to speak de truth."
"I'm not frightened," he said, "but you, Piquette—a prison——"
"It's not'ing——" she said bravely, but he saw that she was on the point of breaking.
"And now," broke in the Commissaire, who had watched this byplay with some interest, "I am sorry that we must be off. Come."
And giving some instructions as to the witnesses to one of the Agents de police who had accompanied him, and taking the revolver which Horton silently offered him, he led the way down the stair, with Piquette and Horton following, policemen at their elbows.
A great crowd had assembled in the street and courtyard below. Horton caught a glimpse of the white cap and whiter face of Madame Toupin at the door of her loge, and then was hurried by a policeman into a carriage which was awaiting them. He saw poor Piquette put into another one and they drove off in the direction of the Prefecture de Police, where he was shown without ceremony into a cell alone to await a further investigation upon the morrow.
He sank down upon the cot, buried his head in his hands and tried to think.
Quinlevin was at the bottom of this—Quinlevin—Tricot. One of them had done this dastardly thing, believing to save their skins and thinking that they were killing him. But how had the murderer gotten away? How? How?
CHAPTER XXIII