“You must know that my friend, who has only been in the business a little while, was formerly a servant, a lady’s maid in several houses; among others she worked for a widow lady who died a little while ago. Well, would you believe that they have taken it into their heads, in the quarter, that that lady was poisoned! That report came to the ears of the authorities; they dug up the dead woman, and it seems that the doctors say the same thing as the neighbors. So they looked into the matter, and they’ve arrested my friend, because she worked for the lady at that time; but the poor child is as pure as this glass of wine, I swear.”
Dufresne listened attentively to Véronique’s story, while Lampin toyed with the other young woman, and Edouard, who had relapsed into his reflections concerning a forgery of which he knew that he was guilty, had thrown himself into an easy-chair in a corner of the room, paying no heed to a story which did not interest him in the least.
“This affair seems to me to be a most remarkable one,” said Dufresne, drawing his chair nearer to Véronique’s; “but what is your friend’s name?”
“Suzanne; she is a good child, on my honor, and incapable of tearing a hair from anybody’s head, I don’t care whose.”
At the name of Suzanne, Dufresne showed signs of perturbation. But instantly recovering himself, he glanced about the room, saw that Murville was not listening, and that Lampin was busy; and he continued to question Véronique.
“It seems to me that your Suzanne will have difficulty in getting out of the scrape, if, as you say, this lady had no other servant than her?”
“Oh! that don’t make any difference; Suzanne suspects who it was that did the job.”
“Really?”
“Yes, my friend. A young man, a friend of the widow, her lover, used to come to see her; he was a gambler, a rascal, a sharper.”
“All right! all right! I understand!—Well?”