He took up the cardboard case which he had brought with him and set it on the mantelpiece, and opened it. It contained one of those straw sheaths used to prevent bottles from breaking. There was a bottle in it. Marescal took it out and set it on the table in front of Bregeac.
“There, comrade Bregeac. You recognize it, don’t you? It’s the bottle you stole the other day from Jodot, which I took from you and which a third person stole from me before your eyes. That third person? It was Baron Limézy and no one else. I found it in his lodgings a little while ago. What? Do you understand, darling? This is a real treasure, this bottle is. Look at it, Bregeac. Look at its label and the formula [[214]]on it—of some mineral water—Eau de Jouvence. Here it is. Limézy has corked and sealed it with red sealing-wax. Look at it carefully. Do you see that little piece of rolled-up paper at the bottom of it. It’s certain that you wanted to get it from Jodot—a confession, to a dead certainty. A most compromising specimen of your handwriting. My poor Bregeac!”
It was his hour of triumph. As he knocked off the sealing-wax and uncorked the bottle he threw out phrases and interjections at haphazard.
“Marescal famous all the world over!… Arrest of the express murderers!… Bregeac’s past!… What surprises at the inquiry and at the assizes!… Sauvinoux, you have handcuffs for the girl?… Call Labonce and Tony.… Victory! Complete Victory!”
He turned the bottle upside down. The paper fell out of it. He picked it up, unfolded it, and carried away by this whirl of windy words, like a runner whom his dash carries beyond his goal, without pausing to grasp the meaning, he read out:
“Marescal is a blockhead!” [[215]]
CHAPTER X
WORDS AS GOOD AS ACTIONS
There was a stupefied silence while this incredible sentence went on ringing through the air. Marescal almost doubled up like a man who has received a blow in the stomach. Bregeac, still threatened by Sauvinoux’s revolver, appeared almost as much amazed.