...There was no struggle, no violence; the whole affair was a sham... he explains. The lock of the door was not tampered with, and a false key could not have been used since the real key was found in the lock on the inside.... Therefore, Mme. Steinheil herself opened the door to admit her accomplice!... Pay no attention to M. Bdl's. attitude, gentlemen of the jury... you cannot expect a man who has been a lover of a woman to give evidence against her.... To clear herself, she accuses people right and left, anybody and everybody.... Why did she resuscitate a case which was almost forgotten? On account of M. Bdl's. attitude. Her husband objected to divorce. She was in financial difficulties. M. Bdl. was rich.... She killed her husband.... When she accused others of the crime she committed, she was in a nervous state, and it was the paroxysms of frenzy due to the pitiless and maddening questions of some journalists which, she says, caused her to make false accusations.... And yet in this Court, gentlemen of the jury, you have seen her self-controlled, fearless, impudent, answering all questions readily, unhesitatingly.... Remember that this woman lies as she breathes....
"... The men in black gowns, the red-haired woman? A fable!... A political side to the mystery? Nonsense!... Burglary? There was none!... Why did those who killed M. Steinheil and Mme. Japy not murder Mme. Steinheil as well? She claims that it is because they took her for her daughter.... But I say that murderers can be as well recognised by a girl of sixteen as by a woman of thirty-nine.... In either case they would have had no pity.... The fact that she was spared proves that she took part in the crime....
"She was bound so loosely that she could easily have freed herself, rushed to the window, and shouted for help.... But she had to play a part, and she did so.... She was ill when they found her the next morning? Of course she was! Any woman would be upset after having murdered her husband and witnessed the death of her mother....
"... What extraordinary burglars, gentlemen of the jury. They had revolvers, but committed the crime with cords and wadding!...
"How did the crime take place? It is quite clear:
"Mme. Steinheil hates her husband and wants to get rid of him because, on the one hand, there is a husband whom she despises, and, on the other, a wealthy lover whose wife she aspires to become. She tells herself that if she is found one night bound, near the body of her husband, everybody will believe her guilty. Then, with her perfidious temperament, she summons her mother to Paris to the house in the Impasse Ronsin, not to kill her, but to have her there as a witness of the simulated attack. She devises that both her mother and herself are to be bound.
"Mme. Steinheil goes down and opens the door to a man or woman, but probably a woman.
"We had not sufficient proof to effect an arrest.... Then Mme. Steinheil and that woman, or Mme. Steinheil and that man, go upstairs after having taken the cord in the kitchen. It was not intended to murder Mme. Japy, but an unforeseen event occurs while she is being fastened and the wadding forced into her mouth.... M. Steinheil is awakened by her cries, and the two women, or the woman and the man, rush at him. One holds his body, the other strangles him. The painter falls dead....
"Meanwhile, Mme. Japy's false teeth have become unfastened, and she died by suffocation; but, to make sure of her death, they strangled her. At first I did not believe that Mme. Steinheil was guilty. But now my conviction is established. If I had had the slightest doubt I would have told you so, but, on the contrary, I say that the work betrays its author, and the author is there."
I looked up at M. Trouard-Riolle and see him pointing to me. An extraordinary incident then occurs: the Advocate-General, turning to the jury, adds: "She was the author of the crime; and finding some one, rather a woman than a man, in her more or less immediate entourage, she summoned that woman, or she summoned that man, relying on his or her silence. If it had been possible for the law to seize the one or the other, we should have had them arrested. But we do not think we had enough proofs to know and to say: 'It is this, or that one....' Gentlemen, you must accept the responsibility of a sentence as I accept that of accusing, I hand you the sword of justice, trusting that you will return a verdict both wise and firm."