"No, a thousand times, no!"
"Baptiste, go and bring the commissary of police," said Béroli, addressing the man on his right. "Go at once, and do not return without him."
"A moment," supplicated Andréas, making a sign to the commissionnaire to stop. "Let us see if we cannot arrange this business; what will you take to end the affair?"
"I will have no arrangements; I require nothing, but that you should copy and sign this letter."
Seeing there was nothing for it but to agree to Béroli's proposal, Andréas began to think, how he could manage to decamp with the ring, as soon as he received it from the hands of his mistress.
So, seating himself at the table, on which all the implements for writing had been previously prepared, and under the eye of Béroli, he copied the missive word for word.
Two hours afterwards, Andréas was set at liberty, and Béroli had obtained possession of the celebrated ring.
This is how it was managed:
The chère amie of Andréas, on receiving his note, hastened in a carriage to the house he had indicated, taking the ring with her; but no sooner did the carriage stop at the door of No. 22, Rue Meslay, than a commissary of police, with his badge of office (the scarf), and accompanied by a sergent-de-ville, opened the door of the carriage and got in, directing the coachman to go to the prefecture of police in the Rue de Jerusalem.
On their way thither, the commissary explained to the fair messenger, that, having been ordered by the police to keep a watch on No. 22, Rue Meslay, he stopped a man coming out of that house, who was the bearer of a letter, and that after reading the contents of it, he had substituted one of the police for the original messenger.