“I have lost my sleep by it,” he told the commonwealth attorney.  Excellent M. Daubigeon, who had great trouble in moderating his zeal, did not pity him particularly.  He would say in reply,—­

“Whose fault is it?  But you want to rise in the world; and increasing fortune is always followed by increasing care.

“Ah!” said the magistrate.  “I have only done my duty, and, if I had to begin again, I would do just the same.”

Still every day he saw more clearly that he was in a false position.  Public opinion, strongly arrayed against M. de Boiscoran, was not, on that account, very favorable to him.  Everybody believed Jacques guilty, and wanted him to be punished with all the rigor of the law; but, on the other hand, everybody was astonished that M. Galpin should choose to act as magistrate in such a case.  There was a touch of treachery in this proceeding against a former friend, in looking everywhere for evidence against him, in driving him into court, that is to say, towards the galleys or the scaffold; and this revolted people’s consciences.

The very way in which people returned his greeting, or avoided him altogether, made the magistrate aware of the feelings they entertained for him.  This only increased his wrath against Jacques, and, with it his trouble.  He had been congratulated, it is true, by the attorney-general; but there is no certainty in a trial, as long as the accused refuses to confess.  The charges against Jacques, to be sure, were so overwhelming, that his being sent before the court was out of question.  But by the side of the court there is still the jury.

“And in fine, my dear,” said the commonwealth attorney, “you have not a single eye-witness.  And from time immemorial an eye-witness has been looked upon as worth a hundred hearsays.”

“I have Cocoleu,” said M. Galpin, who was rather impatient of all these objections.

“Have the doctors decided that he is not an idiot?”

“No:  Dr. Seignebos alone maintains that doctrine.”

“Well, at least Cocoleu is willing to repeat his evidence?”

“No.”

“Why, then you have virtually no witness!”

Yes, M. Galpin understood it but too well, and hence his anxiety.  The more he studied his accused, the more he found him in an enigmatic and threatening position, which was ominous of evil.

“Can he have an alibi?” he thought.  “Or does he hold in reserve one of those unforeseen revelations, which at the last moment destroy the whole edifice of the prosecution, and cover the prosecuting attorney with ridicule?”

Whenever these thoughts occurred to him, they made big drops of perspiration run down his temples; and then he treated his poor clerk Mechinet like a slave.  And that was not all.  Although he lived more retired than ever, since this case had begun, many a report reached him from the Chandore family.