“Why?”
“She has murdered.”
“So that is your plan?”
“To hand her over to justice; and I shall carry it out, for I hate her.”
He spoke these words in an access of so savage a rancor that Ralph could not fail to understand that henceforth hate would have the better of love in Marescal’s heart.
“All the worse for you, Rudolph. I was going to propose a trifle of promotion to you, something in the way of the post of Commissioner of Police. But you prefer war. Have your own way. Begin with a night in the open air. Nothing is better for the health. As for me, I shall ride to Lourdes on the main line. Twenty kilometers—about three hours’ trot for my fiery steed. And to-night I shall be in Paris, where I [[161]]shall begin by putting Aurelie into a place of safety. Good-by, Rudolph.”
He mounted, fixed his suit-case in front of him as comfortably as he could, and without a saddle or spurs, whistling a hunting song, kicked his horse into a trot, and disappeared in the darkness.
That night in Paris an old lady of the name of Victorine, who had been his nurse, was waiting in a car, outside the house in which Bregeac lived. Ralph was at the wheel.
He kept watch there all night. In the early morning he saw a rag-picker, who was hunting with his hook through the orderly boxes that stood along the curb. Immediately with that sixth sense which enabled him to recognize people by their carriage and bearing, rather than by their faces, he recognized, under the rags and dirty cap, in spite of the fact that he had seen such a very little of him in the garden of the Villa Faradoni and on the road to Nice, the murderer Jodot.