“Devilish funny,” they grinned; “none of your jokes on us, Fantômas! everybody knows it was you.”
Juve took heedful note of the information; yes, the crime should be set down to the account of the real culprit. He went on with his questions:
“And the bank collector? who did the murder of the Rue Saint-Fargeau?”
A chorus of voices answered him: “
Moche, it was Père Moche.”
But one voice protested; someone had sprung lightly over the gaping grave and stood before Juve. It was Paulet. The young apache with the light eyes and pallid complexion growled out:
“Moche never did anything but make his profit out of the crime; he robbed me of the money, as he’s robbed me of my wench, to marry her to the rich Englishman; but as God’s above me, I swear it was I, Paulet, all on my own, who did in the bank messenger!”
“Bravo!” rose the answering cry; “bravo! it’s you, Paulet, for the big prize!”
But now mother Toulouche, the hag who had hauled out the strongbox from the half decomposed corpse, emerged from the dark corner where she had been crouching ever since.
“And for me,” she vociferated in her screaming voice, “why don’t they question me? ask me what I’m good for? Well, I’m going to tell you, whether or no. Hear me, Fantômas, and you, mates, too. The man who lies rotting there, down there in the fat, damp earth, the man who lies rotting there, bone naked, uncoffined, well, that’s my work, mine! Fantômas,” she persisted, “it was me did the hardest job of all. By Père Moche’s orders, I sought out this man on the open sea aboard the liner La Lorraine. I boarded the big ship when the tug brought out her pilot to them; slipping on deck when no one was looking, I crept down to the fellow’s cabin. I had no weapon, and I was only an old woman against a man in the prime of life. Well, I was a match for him all the same; I sprang at his face, and with my bare teeth I tore out his throat! To stop his blood fouling the carpet, I licked it up with my tongue. The man fell dead without a cry. Then I sewed him up in a big sack, and when we got near port, I pitched him into the water. Next night, with Père Moche to help, we fished up the body, poking about with a long pole in the mud at bottom of the dock-basin. And for three days did I cart the carrion about, till I buried it with my own hands under the flags in this cave here! That’s what I did, Fantômas, I, a poor old woman; say, have I the guts, am I brave, or am I not?”