“Well!  But why, then, did you say it was M. de Boiscoran who shot the count?”

“They said at first it was me.  I did not like that.  I would rather they should cut off his head than mine.”

He shuddered as he said this, so that Goudar, afraid of having gone rather too fast, took up his violin, and gave him a verse of his song to quiet him.  Then accompanying his words still now and then with a few notes, and after having allowed Cocoleu to caress his bottle once more, he asked again,—­

“Where did you get a gun?”

“I—­I had taken it from the count to shoot birds:  and I—­I have it still—­still.  It is hid in the hole where Michael found me.”

Poor Dr. Seignebos could not stand it any longer.  He suddenly pushed open the door, and, rushing into the court, he cried,—­

“Bravo, Goudar!  Well done!”

At the noise, Cocoleu had started up.  He evidently understood it all; for terror drove the fumes of the wine out of his mind in an instant, and he looked frightened to death.

“Ah, you scoundrel!” he howled.

And, throwing himself upon Goudar, he plunged his knife twice into him.

The movement was so rapid and so sudden, that it had been impossible to prevent it.  Pushing M. Folgat violently back as he tried to disarm him, Cocoleu leaped into a corner of the court, and there, looking like a wild beast driven to bay, his eyes bloodshot, his mouth foaming, he threatened with his formidable knife to kill any one who should come near him.

At the cries of M. Daubigeon and M. Galpin, the assistants in the hospital came rushing in.  The struggle, however, would probably have been a long one, notwithstanding their numbers, if one of the keepers had not, with great presence of mind, climbed up to the top of the wall, and caught the arm of the wretch in a noose.  By these means he was thrown down in a moment, disarmed, and rendered harmless.

“You—­you may—­may do—­do what you—­you choose; I—­I won’t say—­say another w-w-word!”

In the meantime, poor Dr. Seignebos, who had unwillingly caused the catastrophe, was distressed beyond measure; still he hastened to the assistance of Goudar, who lay insensible on the sand of the court.  The two wounds which the detective had received were quite serious, but not fatal, or even very dangerous, as the knife had been turned aside by the ribs.  He was at once carried into one of the private rooms of the hospital, and soon recovered his consciousness.

When he saw all four of the gentlemen bending anxiously over his bed, he murmured with a mournful smile,—­

“Well, was I not right when I said that my profession is a rascally profession?”

“But you are at liberty now to give it up,” replied M. Folgat, “provided always a certain house in Vine Street should not prove too small for your ambition.”

The pale face of the detective recovered its color for a moment.