Gendron seemed a little disconcerted at this, but a sly smile
overspread M. Plantat's face. As for M. Lecoq, he had the air of
one who is shocked by objections which he knows he ought to
annihilate by a word, and yet who is fain to be resigned to waste
time in useless talk, which he might put to great profit.
"I think, Monsieur," said he, very humbly, "that the murderers at
Valfeuillu did not use either a hammer or a chisel, or a file, and
that they brought no instrument at all from outside--since they
used a hammer."
"And didn't they have a dirk besides?" asked the judge in a
bantering tone, confident that he was on the right path.
"That is another question, I confess; but it is a difficult one
to answer."
He began to lose patience. He turned toward the
Corbeil policeman, and abruptly asked him:
"Is this all you know?"
The big man with the thick eyebrows superciliously eyed this little
Parisian who dared to question him thus. He hesitated so long that
M. Lecoq, more rudely than before, repeated his question.
"Yes, that's all," said Goulard at last, "and I think it's
sufficient; the judge thinks so too; and he is the only person who
gives me orders, and whose approbation I wish for.
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