"In a day's time," I replied. Our Mother asked me what my "secret" was, and I told her that it merely consisted in nipping off the ends of the stems and dipping them for a while in warm water, but one had to instinctively guess how long they must be kept in the water, and how warm the water must be. Two or three "baths" might be necessary.
The next day, the "snow-balls" looked fresh and beautiful, and the Sister Superior spoke of "Resurrection."
I almost forgot, on that Sunday evening, that I was in prison, and when the Sisters left my cell, it seemed to me that a great part of my sorrow had been taken from me, and flew away on the great white wings of the Sisters' cornettes.
I was no longer alone in my cell. I had the primroses and the "snow-balls," and I laid them, as on a tomb, before my mother's portrait.
Towards the middle of May, Maître Aubin came one morning, excited as I had never seen him before.
He seized both my hands and exclaimed: "You are saved. The murderers have been found. At least, it is an almost sure thing. At any moment you may be set free. I have seldom been so happy!"
I had so often been disappointed that I dared not share my counsel's enthusiasm.
"But, Madame, you must not be sceptical.... Listen!" And he told me that a man called Allaire, who had already been denounced as one of the Impasse Ronsin murderers in an anonymous letter received by M. Hamard, had been arrested at Versailles, where he had been caught stealing at a fair. Investigations had shown that Allaire had been concerned in a burglary with a friend of his, called Tardivel, and a red-haired woman called Batifolier. Allaire had denied his participation in the Steinheil murder, but had admitted that Tardivel had told him all about that murder, in which he, Tardivel, had played a leading part!
I was filled with hope, and yet I feared lest this new turn in events might lead to nothing, as so many others had, and merely mean a postponement of my release or my trial, a longer stay in prison....
I was right, alas! The Tardivel investigations lasted nearly two months, and merely led to the discovery that Allaire was an epileptic, that Tardivel was a lunatic, and that although both were burglars, they had had nothing to do with the Impasse Ronsin drama. Tardivel, to impress Allaire, had boasted that he was the murderer of M. Steinheil and Mme. Japy!