CHAPTER XXIII

STUNNING NEWS

On going to see Nougarede, Saniel vaguely fancied the lawyer would tell him that an acquittal was certain if Florentin passed to the assizes, and even that an ‘ordonnance de non-lieu’ was probable.  But his hope was not realized.

“The adventure of the button for you or me would not have the same gravity as for this boy; we have no antecedents on which presumptions might be established, but he has.  The forty-five francs which constitute an embezzlement for a salaried man will be, certainly, a starting-point for the accusation; one commences by a weakness and finishes by a crime.  Do you not hear the advocate-general?  He will begin by presenting the portrait of the honest, laborious, exact, scrupulous clerk, content with a little, and getting satisfaction from his duties accomplished; then, in opposition, he will pass to the clerk of to-day, as irregular in his work as in his conduct, full of desires, in a hurry to enjoy, discontented with everything and everybody, with others as with himself.  And he will go on to speak of the embezzlement of the forty-five francs as the beginning of the crimes that led to the assassination.  You may be sure if the affair goes to the assizes that you will hear these words and more, and I assure you that it will be difficult for us to destroy the impression that he will produce on the jury.  But I hope we shall succeed.”

He had to give up the idea of obtaining the ‘ordonnance de non-lieu’, and to tell himself that the ‘affaire’ would come before the assizes; but it does not follow that one is condemned for what one is accused of, and Saniel persisted in believing that Florentin would not be.  Assuredly, the prison was hard for the poor boy, and the trial before the jury, with all the ignominy that necessarily accompanies it, would be harder yet.  But, after all, it would all disappear in the joy of acquittal; when that time came, there would be found, surely, some ingenious idea, sympathy, effective support, to pay him for all that he would have suffered.  Certainly, things would come to pass thus, and the acquittal would be carried with a high hand.

He said this to himself again and again, and from the day when he put the affair in Nougarede’s hands, he often went to see him, to hear him repeat it.

“He cannot be condemned; can he?”

“One may always be condemned, even when one is innocent; as one may die at any time, you know that, even with excellent health.”

In one of these visits he met Madame Nougarede, who had then been several days married, and on recognizing in her the young virgin with a child, of whom Caffie showed him the portrait, he was strengthened in his idea that conscience, such as it was understood, was decidedly a strange weighing-machine, which might be made to say whatever one chose.  Of what good were these hypocrisies, and whom did they deceive?