Marthe rested in my arms during the hour of sleep which we snatched out of the mad turmoil of that night. When I was awakened everything came back to me. It was decided that I should go to M. Hamard, and I kept repeating to myself: "I must tell him exactly what the journalists told me, I must not change a word. Otherwise, they have said, I shall be lost and Marthe too." I had suffered so much that I was numb, and had hardly any feeling in my body. I was calm. Nothing mattered.... Still I had one fear, the terrible mob outside, the mob that wanted to kill us all, to set fire to the house. I kissed Mme. Chabrier and gave her some money to look after Marthe, in case anything happened to me.... I had been told so many times during the night that I should be arrested!... I said to Mariette: "Now, you must speak the truth...." She replied: "I will deny everything."... The fresh air in the garden did me good. When I stepped out into the Impasse with Marthe and M. Chabrier, I was surprised to see that no one was there, not even a policeman! Those two men had lied then.... A taxi from the Matin was waiting outside the gate.
"Where are we going?" the driver asked.
"To the Sûreté," I replied.
M. Hamard was not yet up, of course. It was then about 4.20.... We waited awhile; then he arrived, hastily dressed, his hair unbrushed, wearing a night-shirt under his coat, and a pair of black slippers. Utter bewilderment was written on his face.
Some one told me: "M. Hamard is going to write down everything you say."
I said, or rather repeated, everything I had been made to say during the night: no men in black gowns; no stolen jewels; M. Bdl., my friend; Alexandre Wolff, the murderer.
M. Hamard said to me: "You and Wolff will be confronted."
M. Leydet arrived. "You have made a laughing-stock of me," he exclaimed; "why did you not tell me the truth?" ... I said: "Forgive me."
Why did he weep?... I wondered, and said to myself: "If he had had greater tenacity, if he had searched with greater diligence, he would have found the three men and the woman...."
Then Maître Aubin arrived. "What do I hear!" he exclaimed wildly. "You have accused Wolff!"