She seized my hands: "Look here, Madame, I have had enough of all this. Leave me alone. I am not in a mood to give explanations. You had better return to Marthe and go to bed.... Do you hear?"
Her attitude and her tone frightened me so much that I hurried away. I spent the rest of the night on a chair, watching over Marthe, listening to every noise. I seriously thought of calling M. Hamard's attention to the events of that night, but Mariette had been an exemplary servant for many, many years. I suspected her son, who, I had been told, was extremely violent and had had several encounters with the police, but I could not believe that old Mariette had had anything to do with the crime. And I thought of her daughter and her son-in-law, Mme. and M. Geoffrey, who had both always been most devoted. The wife constantly came to my house to do odd jobs, and the husband was ever ready to help. They kept the house when we were away on a holiday, and I could rely on them implicitly.... If I accused Mariette and her son in any way, they would all suffer, alas!... I thought, too, that possibly there was nothing evil in that midnight visit to the attic and the cellar. Perhaps, after all, Mariette had wished to have a private conversation with her son, and had wanted to show or give him various things of hers.... Perhaps her angry attitude towards me could be explained by the fact that she feared lest I should suspect her son, as I had done Couillard. Perhaps she was as distracted as I was myself, and almost irresponsible for what she did or said!...
At the same time, I was trembling with fear, and wondering.... At daybreak, I fell asleep out of sheer exhaustion, but was soon awakened by the banging of the doors. I went out to see what the matter was.
M. Hamard had arrived with a whole troop of detectives to carry out investigations throughout my house. The workmen came as usual, and also a small crowd of journalists. Mariette was furious, and swore like a trooper.
Suddenly, a man rushed in through the gate. He came to me and said: "I hear that M. Hamard, the Chief of the Sûreté, is here. Please Mademoiselle, tell him I absolutely must speak to him!"
"Well, and what have you to tell him?" said M. Hamard. He turned to me, and whispered: "You see, people still take you for your daughter!" Then, addressing the man, whose name was Wagner, he added: "You can talk before this lady. She is Mme. Steinheil herself, and I am M. Hamard."
He waved the journalists away, for all had, of course, eagerly pressed around us. The man then breathlessly declared that he could give most valuable information about Alexandre Wolff; that Wolff, on the day after the crime, had a great deal of money in his possession.... M. Hamard asked me to leave him alone with the man; and I withdrew.
For practically the whole of the day, the detectives searched the house. They examined everything in Mariette's lodge, searched the cellar, and also the attic. I helped them. I felt sure that they would discover something that would lead to the complete solution of the problem which was driving me crazy. But the detectives found nothing, and I grew desperate.
The attic was a vast one, and encumbered with boxes, furniture, models' costumes and what not.... I went up to watch the detectives at work. I wondered what had happened during the night, when Mariette and her son had been there! Those words: "There are three missing...." haunted me. I was care-worn and ill. I had not slept for forty-eight hours and I had gone through a thousand maddening anxieties.... I wanted the men to find something.... It seemed to me that they were not keen enough, that they did not search as thoroughly as they should.... I rushed to my room, took a tiny diamond in a box, rushed back to the attic, and dropped it in the dust. Yes! that was a good idea. They would renew their efforts, now.... I called their attention to the glittering speck, and one of the detectives picked up the small diamond. M. Hamard, who was present, quickly pocketed the stone, and remarked: "We will have to find out whether it is a real diamond or mere paste."
The detectives left the house at the end of the afternoon. The journalists were at liberty to come in now, and they did come in! Fifty or sixty of them. They scampered in like wild beasts! They asked questions of every one in the house. Even those I had thought ponderous and dignified lost all control of themselves.... A shower of questions rained upon me. "Write anything you please," I said wearily, "but do leave me alone, I must sleep, I must forget all this...." I locked myself up in a room and snatched an hour's sleep, and it was Marthe's turn to watch over her mother....