At about eleven o’clock in the evening of the 20th of February, 186‒, which chanced to be Shrove Sunday, a party of detectives left the police station near the old Barrière d’Italie to the direct sout...

At about eleven o’clock in the evening of the 20th of February, 186‒, which chanced to be Shrove Sunday, a party of detectives left the police station near the old Barrière d’Italie to the direct sout...

The young police agent to whom Gevrol abandoned what he thought an unnecessary investigation was a debutant in his profession. His name was Lecoq. He was some twenty-five or twenty-six years of age, a...

Obstinate men of Father Absinthe’s stamp, who are at first always inclined to differ from other people’s opinions, are the very individuals who end in madly adopting them. When an idea has at last pen...

That night the vagabonds, who had taken refuge in the neighborhood of the Poivrière, had a very bad time of it; for while those who managed to sleep were disturbed by frightful dreams of a police raid...

It was some distance from the Poivrière to the Rue de Chevaleret, even by way of the plain, and fully four hours had been occupied by Lecoq and his colleague in collecting their elements of informatio...

No consultation held at the bedside of a dying man ever took place in the presence of two physicians so utterly unlike each other as those who accompanied the commissary of police to the Poivrière. On...

When, after a rapid walk of twenty minutes, Lecoq reached the police station near the Barrière d’Italie, the doorkeeper, with his pipe in his mouth, was pacing slowly to and fro before the guardhouse....

Lecoq did not sleep that night, although he had been on his feet for more than forty hours, and had scarcely paused either to eat or drink. Anxiety, hope, and even fatigue itself, had imparted to his ...

Some men are wealthy. They own a carriage drawn by a pair of high-stepping horses, and driven by a coachman in stylish livery; and as they pass by, leaning back on comfortable cushions, they become th...

If it is difficult to extort a confession from a man interested in preserving silence and persuaded that no proofs can be produced against him, it is a yet more arduous task to make a woman, similarly...

The governor of the Depot, a functionary who had gained the reputation of an oracle by twenty years’ experience in prisons and with prisoners⁠—a man whom it was most difficult to deceive⁠—had advised ...

M. Segmuller certainly wished that a number had been branded upon the enigmatical prisoner before him. And yet he did not by any means despair, and his confidence, exaggerated though it might be, was ...

When the prisoner had gone, M. Segmuller sank back in his armchair, literally exhausted. He was in that state of nervous prostration which so often follows protracted but fruitless efforts. He had sca...

Long, narrow, and low of ceiling, having on the one side a row of windows looking on to a small courtyard, and on the other a range of doors, each with a number on its central panel, thus reminding on...

Mardi Gras, or Shrove Tuesday, was very gay that year; that is to say, all places of public resort were crowded. When Lecoq left the Hotel de Mariembourg about midnight, the streets were as full as if...

The extreme uncertainty of the result was another attraction for M. Segmuller’s investigating mind. Given the magnitude of the difficulties that were to be overcome, he rightly considered that if his ...

On his way back to his office, M. Segmuller mentally reviewed the position of affairs; and came to the conclusion that as he had failed to take the citadel of defense by storm, he must resign himself ...

When a heavy stone is thrown into a lake a considerable commotion ensues, the water spouts and seethes and bubbles and frequently a tall jet leaps into the air. But all this agitation only lasts for a...

Yet what a disappointment it produced after the fever of anxiety and expectation that had seized hold of everybody present. This strange epistle furnished no clue whatever to the mystery; and the ray ...

When one of the investigating magistrates of the Tribunal of the Seine wishes to examine a person confined in one of the Paris prisons, he sends by his messenger to the governor of that particular jai...

So the landlady of the Hotel de Mariembourg had given May money. There could be no further doubt on that point after the purchase of this cigar. But had they agreed upon any plan? Had they had suffici...

It was six o’clock, and the dawn was just breaking when Father Absinthe and his companion reached the station-house, where they found the superintendent seated at a small table, making out his report....

On a large canopied bed, sweating and panting beneath the weight of numerous blankets, lay the two-faced oracle⁠—Tirauclair, of the Prefecture⁠—Tabaret, of the Rue Saint Lazare. It was impossible to b...

Lecoq’s confidence in the oracle he was consulting was very great; but even old Tirauclair might be mistaken, and what he had just said seemed such an enormity, so completely beyond the bounds of poss...

How this idea had entered old Tabaret’s head, Lecoq could not understand. A vague suspicion had, it is true, flitted through his own mind; but it was in a moment of despair when he was distracted at h...

On the first Sunday in the month of August, 1815, at ten o’clock precisely⁠—as on every Sunday morning⁠—the sacristan of the parish church at Sairmeuse sounded the three strokes of the bell which warn...

On the first Sunday in the month of August, 1815, at ten o’clock precisely⁠—as on every Sunday morning⁠—the sacristan of the parish church at Sairmeuse sounded the three strokes of the bell which warn...

A gently ascending road, more than two miles in length, shaded by a quadruple row of venerable elms, led from the village to the Château de Sairmeuse. Nothing could be more beautiful than this avenue,...

Few of the inhabitants of Sairmeuse knew, except by name, the terrible duke whose arrival had thrown the whole village into commotion. Some of the oldest residents had a faint recollection of having s...

This name Lacheneur awakened no recollection in the mind of the duke. First, he had never lived at Sairmeuse. And even if he had, what courtier of the ancien régime ever troubled himself about the ind...

The abode of the Baron d’Escorval, that brick structure with stone trimmings which was visible from the superb avenue leading to Sairmeuse, was small and unpretentious. Its chief attraction was a pret...

Maurice and Marie-Anne had loved each other for many years. As children, they had played together in the magnificent grounds surrounding the Château de Sairmeuse, and in the park at Escorval. Together...

The demonstrations which had greeted the Duc de Sairmeuse had been correctly reported by Chanlouineau. Chupin had found the secret of kindling to a white heat the enthusiasm of the cold and calculatin...

Only those who, in the bright springtime of life, have loved, have been loved in return, and have suddenly seen an impassable gulf open between them and happiness, can realize Maurice d’Escorval’s dis...

The Reche, literally translated the “Waste,” where Marie-Anne had promised to meet Maurice, owed its name to the rebellious and sterile character of the soil. Nature seemed to have laid her curse upon...

The Duc de Sairmeuse had slept little and poorly on the night following his return, or his restoration, as he styled it. Inaccessible, as he pretended to be, to the emotions which agitate the common h...

During the decisive moments of life, when one’s entire future depends upon a word, or a gesture, twenty contradictory inspirations can traverse the mind in the time occupied by a flash of lightning. O...

“No, never in my whole life have I met a woman who can compare with this Marie-Anne! What grace and what dignity! Ah! her beauty is divine!” So Martial was thinking while returning to Sairmeuse after ...

The Château de Courtornieu is, next to Sairmeuse, the most magnificent habitation in the arrondissement of Montaignac. The approach to the castle was by a long and narrow road, badly paved. When the c...

If Martial had faithfully reported to Mlle. Blanche all that he heard in the Marquis de Courtornieu’s cabinet, he would probably have astonished her a little. He, himself, if he had sincerely confesse...

It was only two weeks since the Duc de Sairmeuse had returned to France; he had not yet had time to shake the dust of exile from his feet, and already his imagination saw enemies on every side. He had...

The cottage where M. Lacheneur had taken refuge was situated on a hill overlooking the water. It was, as he had said, a small and humble dwelling, but it was rather less miserable than the abodes of m...

The Marquis de Courtornieu idolized his daughter. Everyone spoke of that as an incontestable and uncontested fact. When persons spoke to him of his daughter, they always said: “You, who adore your dau...

After his son’s confession, M. d’Escorval was prudent enough to make no allusion to the hopes he, himself, entertained. “My poor Maurice,” he thought, “is heartbroken, but resigned. It is better for h...

So it was really Maurice d’Escorval whom the Marquis de Sairmeuse had seen leaving Lacheneur’s house. Martial was not certain of it, but the very possibility made his heart swell with anger. “What par...

Ah! ambition is a fine thing! The Duc de Sairmeuse and the Marquis de Courtornieu were past middle age; their lives had been marked by many storms and vicissitudes; they were the possessors of million...

The Duc de Sairmeuse and the Marquis de Courtornieu had more time before them than they supposed. The rebels were advancing, but not so rapidly as Chupin had said. Two circumstances, which it was impo...

The clock in the tower of Sairmeuse was striking the hour of eight when Lacheneur and his little band of followers left the Reche. An hour later, at the Château de Courtornieu, Mlle. Blanche, after fi...

Chupin’s stupefying revelations and the thought that Martial, the heir of his name and dukedom, should degrade himself so low as to enter into a conspiracy with vulgar peasants, drove the Duc de Sairm...

Having penetrated the mystery that enveloped his son’s frequent absence, the Baron d’Escorval had concealed his fears and his chagrin from his wife. It was the first time that he had ever had a secret...

The secret which approaching death had wrestled from Marie-Anne in the fortification at the Croix d’Arcy, Mme. d’Escorval was ignorant of when she joined her entreaties to those of her son to induce t...

“Above all, make haste!” Maurice had said to the messenger charged with bearing a letter to the baroness. Nevertheless, the man did not reach Escorval until nightfall. Beset by a thousand fears, he ha...

In the citadel of Montaignac, within the second line of fortifications, stands an old building known as the chapel. Originally consecrated to worship, the structure had, at the time of which we write,...

The abbé had been right in feeling he could trust the officers to whose care he had confided Maurice. Finding their entreaties would not induce him to leave the citadel, they seized him and literally ...

The prospect of capturing Lacheneur, the chief conspirator, excited the Marquis de Courtornieu so much that he had not been able to tear himself away from the citadel to return home to his dinner. Rem...

Though among the first to be arrested at the time of the panic before Montaignac, the Baron d’Escorval had not for an instant deluded himself with false hopes. “I am a lost man,” he thought. And confr...

Chupin had not taken time to sleep, nor scarcely time to drink, since that unfortunate morning when the Duc de Sairmeuse ordered affixed to the walls of Montaignac, that decree in which he promised tw...

Alone in his cell, Chanlouineau, after Marie-Anne’s departure, abandoned himself to the most frightful despair. He had just given more than life to the woman he loved so fervently. For had he not, in ...

Ah, well, there was one woman, a fair young girl, whose heart had not been touched by the sorrowful scenes of which Montaignac had been the theatre. Mlle. Blanche de Courtornieu smiled as brightly as ...

That Martial de Sairmeuse was to marry Mlle. Blanche de Courtornieu did not surprise the inhabitants of Montaignac in the least. But spreading such a report, with Lacheneur’s execution fresh in the mi...

The ledge of rock upon which Baron d’Escorval and Corporal Bavois rested in their descent from the tower was very narrow. In the widest place it did not measure more than a yard and a half, and its su...

Essentially a woman in grace and beauty, as well as in devotion and tenderness, Marie-Anne was capable of a virile bravery. Her energy and her coolness during those trying days had been the admiration...

When Abbé Midon and Martial de Sairmeuse held their conference, to discuss and to decide upon the arrangements for the Baron d’Escorval’s escape, a difficulty presented itself which threatened to brea...

To disturb the merrymaking at the Château de Sairmeuse; to change the joy of the bridal-day into sadness; to cast a gloom over the nuptials of Martial and Mlle. Blanche de Courtornieu. This, in truth,...

Terrible as Martial imagined the scandal to be which he had created, his conception of it by no means equalled the reality. Had a thunderbolt burst beneath that roof, the guests at Sairmeuse could not...

The twenty-four hours which Blanche had spent in measuring the extent of her terrible misfortune, the duke had spent in raving and swearing. He had not even thought of going to bed. After his fruitles...

One must have lived in the country to know with what inconceivable rapidity news flies from mouth to mouth. Strange as it may seem, the news of the scene at the château reached Father Poignot’s farmho...

To quit Sairmeuse without any display of violence had cost Blanche an almost superhuman effort. The wildest anger convulsed her soul at the very moment, when, with an assumption of melancholy dignity,...

It was the second day after Marie-Anne’s installation at the Borderie. That event was the general topic of conversation; and Chanlouineau’s will was the subject of countless comments. “Here is Monsieu...

The old physician at Vigano, who had come to Marie-Anne’s aid, was an honorable man. His intellect was of a superior order, and his heart was equal to his intelligence. He knew life; he had loved and ...

Detected by Mme. Blanche in a palpable falsehood, Chupin was quite crestfallen for a moment. He saw the pleasing vision of a retreat at Courtornieu vanish; he saw himself suddenly deprived of frequent...

Kneeling by the half-open door, Blanche eagerly watched the workings of the poison which she had administered. She was so near her victim that she could distinguish the throbbing of her temples, and s...

Of all the persons who witnessed Baron d’Escorval’s terrible fall, the abbé was the only one who did not despair. What a learned doctor would not have dared to do, he did. He was a priest; he had fait...

The reason of Mme. Blanche had sustained a frightful shock, when Chupin was obliged to lift her and carry her from Marie-Anne’s chamber. But she lost consciousness entirely when she saw the old poache...

Time gradually heals all wounds, and in less than a year it was difficult to discern any trace of the fierce whirlwind of passion which had devastated the peaceful valley of the Oiselle. What remained...

Martial de Sairmeuse’s unexpected visit to the Château de Courtornieu had alarmed Aunt Medea even more than Blanche. In ten seconds, more ideas passed through her brain than had visited it for ten yea...

Beset by a thousand fears and anxieties, Blanche had failed to notice that Aunt Medea was no longer the same. The change, it is true, had been gradual; it had not struck the servants, but it was none ...

Half reclining upon a sofa, Mme. Blanche was listening to a new book which Aunt Medea was reading aloud, and she did not even raise her head as the servant delivered his message. “A man?” she asked, c...

How was it that Martial had failed to discover or to suspect this state of affairs? A moment’s reflection will explain this fact which is so extraordinary in appearance, so natural in reality. The hea...

A few lines of the article consecrated to Martial de Sairmeuse in the General Biography of the Men of the Century, give the history of his life after his marriage. “Martial de Sairmeuse,” it says ther...

The Duc de Sairmeuse was one of those men who remain superior to all fortuitous circumstances, good or bad. He was a man of vast experience, and great natural shrewdness. His mind was quick to act, an...

Safe, in his own princely mansion, and surrounded by an army of retainers, the Duc de Sairmeuse triumphantly exclaimed: “We have outwitted Lecoq.” In this he was right. But he thought himself forever ...