Forest City press. (Forest City, Potter County, D.T. [S.D.]) 1883-19??, 1918-07-18

INTO account. there was not the
shadow of a fresh fact to enable
me to alter the verdict. The
charges accumulated against the
two prisoners We're the same, and
were so grave that 40 examining
magistrate would have hesitated
for d second to commit them for
trial, nor any jury to bring them
IN guilty. | will not speak of Ma
RE Fauville: you had only to
think OF the marks of her teeth to
be absolutely certain. But CASTOR
Sauverand, the son of Victor Sau-
verand and consequently the heir
of Cosmo Neutrality-suspicious.
Sauycrand, the man with the
ebony walking stick and the muir
derer of Chief Inspector Ancenis
was he not just as guilty as
Marie Fauvillc, incriminatcd with
her by the mysterious letters, in
eliminated by the very revelation
of the husband whom they had
killcd2
"And yet why did that sudden
change take place in me?" he
asked. "Why did | go against
the evidence? Why did l credit
an incredible fact? Why did L
admit the inadmissible? Why2
Well. no doubt, because truth has
an accent that rings in the ears in
a manner all its own. On the one
side, every proof, every fact,
every reality, every certainty; on
the other, a story, a story told by
one OF the three criminals, and
therefore, presumptively, absurd
and untrue from start to finish.
But a story told in a frank voice,
a clear, dispassionate, closely
woven story, free from complica-
tions or improbabilities, a story
which supplied no positive solu-
ton, but which, by its very hon
esty, obliged any impartial mind
to- reconsider the solution arrived
at. believed the story"
The explanation which Lupin
gave me was not complete. |
asked:
"And Florence Levasseur?"
"Florence?"
Eyes, you don't tell me what
you thought. What was yollr
opinion about her? Everything
tended to incriminate her not only
i'll your eyes, because, logically
speaking, she had taken part in
all the attempts to murder you,
but also in the eyes of the police.
They knew that she used to pay
Sauverand clandestine visits at
his house on the Boulevard Rich
ard Wallace. They had found her
photograph in Inspector Verot's
memorandum book, and then
and then all the rest: your accu-
satlons, Your certainties. Was all
that modified by Sauverand's
story? To your mind, was Flor
ence innocent or guilty?"
He hesitated, seemed on the
point of replying directly and
frankly to my question, but could
not bring himself to do so, and
81 wished to have confidence.
In order to act, | must have full
and entire confidence, whatever
doubts might still assail me, what
ever darkness might still en-
shroud this or that part of the
adventure. l therefore believed.
And, believing, | acted according
to my belief"
Acting, to Don Luis Perenna,
during those hours of forced in
activity, consisted solely in per-
petually repeating to himself Gas
ton Sauverand's account of the
events. He tried to reconstitute it
IN all it's details, to remember the
very least sentences, the appar-
emily most insignificant phrases.
And he examined those sentences,
scrutinized those phrases one by
one, in order to extract such par
ticle of the truth as they con-
tanned.
For the truth was there. Sau-
verand had said so and Perenna
did not doubt it. The whole sim
lister affair, all that constituted
the case of the Mornington inher-
itance and tho trauedu of thu