So it is with the events of our daily life, however momentous they may appear at the hour of their occurrence.  It seems as if their impressions would last for years; but no, they speedily sink into the depths of the past, and time obliterates their passage—­just as the water of the lake closes over and hides the stone, for an instant the cause of such commotion.  Thus it was that at the end of a fortnight the frightful crime committed in the Widow Chupin’s drinking-den, the triple murder which had made all Paris shudder, which had furnished the material for so many newspaper articles, and the topic for such indignant comments, was completely forgotten.  Indeed, had the tragedy at the Poivriere occurred in the times of Charlemagne, it could not have passed more thoroughly out of people’s minds.  It was remembered only in three places, at the Depot, at the Prefecture de Police, and at the Palais de Justice.

M. Segmuller’s repeated efforts had proved as unsuccessful as Lecoq’s.  Skilful questioning, ingenious insinuations, forcible threats, and seductive promises had proved powerless to overcome the dogged spirit of absolute denial which persistently animated, not merely the prisoner May, but also the Widow Chupin, her son Polyte, Toinon the Virtuous, and Madame Milner.  The evidence of these various witnesses showed plainly enough that they were all in league with the mysterious accomplice; but what did this knowledge avail?  Their attitude never varied!  And, even if at times their looks gave the lie to their denials, one could always read in their eyes an unshaken determination to conceal the truth.

There were moments when the magistrate, overpowered by a sense of the insufficiency of the purely moral weapons at his disposal, almost regretted that the Inquisition was suppressed.  Yes, in presence of the lies that were told him, lies so impudent that they were almost insults, he no longer wondered at the judicial cruelties of the Middle Ages, or at the use of the muscle-breaking rack, the flesh-burning, red-hot pincers, and other horrible instruments, which, by the physical torture they inflicted, forced the most obstinate culprit to confess.  The prisoner May’s manner was virtually unaltered; and far from showing any signs of weakness, his assurance had, if anything, increased, as though he were confident of ultimate victory and as though he had in some way learned that the prosecution had failed to make the slightest progress.

On one occasion, when summoned before M. Segmuller, he ventured to remark in a tone of covert irony:  “Why do you keep me confined so long in a secret cell?  Am I never to be set at liberty or sent to the assizes.  Am I to suffer much longer on account of your fantastic idea that I am some great personage in disguise?”

“I shall keep you until you have confessed,” was M. Segmuller’s answer.

“Confessed what?”

“Oh! you know very well.”

The prisoner shrugged his shoulders at these last words, and then in a tone of mingled despondency and mockery retorted:  “In that case there is no hope of my ever leaving this cursed prison!”