The truth is only revealed to those who compel it to emerge from the darkness; and it often happens that, when one believes it to be a long way off, chance comes and sets it in the very place one has prepared for it. One’s merit consists in the quality of that preparation. On awaking, Ralph’s eyes fell on the book he had been reading. Its cover had been again covered with a piece of cloth cut out of one of those squares of black cloth which photographers use to cover their cameras.
Ralph hunted about. In a corner of a cupboard, devoted apparently to odds and ends, he found one of those very squares of cloth. Three round pieces of about the size of a plate had been cut out of it.
“Here we are!” he said to himself in some excitement. “I am in luck! The three masks of the train-robbers came from this house! Here is the irrefutable proof of it. It does throw a lot of light on the affair.” [[173]]
The truth now appeared to him so natural, so exactly in keeping with the unexpressed intuitions he had had, and to a certain extent so entertaining in its simplicity, that he laughed aloud in that silent house.
“Perfect—perfect,” he said to himself. “Fortune itself will supply me with the missing facts. Henceforward she will enter my service, and all the details of the affair are going to come at my call and range themselves in order before me in the full light of day.”
At eight o’clock in the morning the caretaker of the villa made his Sunday round of the ground floor and satisfied himself that the seals were unbroken. At nine Ralph went down into the dining-room, and opened a window, leaving the shutters closed, just above the spot on which Jodot was accustomed to sit.
Jodot arrived punctually. He came with his sack, which he set against the wall. Then he sat down and began his meal. Over it he talked to himself, but in so low a voice that Ralph could not catch his words. His meal consisted of sausages and cheese washed down by a jug of red wine; and after it he lit a pipe, the smoke of which rose to Ralph’s nostrils.
This first pipe was followed by a second, then by a third. So two hours passed, without Ralph’s being able to understand the reason of this long stay. Through a hole in the shutter he could see Jodot’s ragged trouser-legs and his boots down at heel. Beyond them flowed the river. Passers-by came and [[174]]went. Bregeac must be on the watch in one of the arbors of the restaurant.
At last, a few minutes before noon, Jodot uttered these words:
“Hang it all! Nothing fresh? But it’s pretty stiff, dammit!”