All this he said decisively, as though he had been present during the night in question; and so great was his power of persuasion that from the very first he shook the certainty of those who for more than a quarter of a century had never doubted.
The two women and their son pressed round him and questioned him with breathless anxiety:
"Then you think that she may know ... that she may be able to tell us....?"
He corrected himself:
"I don't say yes and I don't say no. All I say is that there was something in her behaviour during those hours that does not tally with her statements and with reality. All the vast and intolerable mystery that has weighed down upon you three arises not from a momentary lack of attention but from something of which we do not know, but of which she does. That is what I maintain; and that is what happened."
Jean Louis said, in a husky voice:
"She is alive.... She lives at Carhaix.... We can send for her...."
Hortense at once proposed:
"Would you like me to go for her? I will take the motor and bring her back with me. Where does she live?"
"In the middle of the town, at a little draper's shop. The chauffeur will show you. Mlle. Boussignol: everybody knows her...."