The Eight Strokes of the Clock by Maurice Leblanc Page A

motorcycle was available. You slipped out during the performance. You went to Suresnes. You killed Cousin Guillaume. You took the sixty banknotes and left them at your rooms. And at five o’clock you went back to fetch the ladies.”
    Dutreuil had listened with an expression at once mocking and flurried, casting an occasional glance at Inspector Morisseau as though to enlist him as a witness:
    “The man’s mad,” it seemed to say. “It’s no use being angry with him.”
    When Rénine had finished, he began to laugh:
    “Very funny! … A capital joke! … So it was I whom the neighbours saw going and returning on the motorcycle?”
    “It was you disguised in Jacques Aubrieux’s clothes.”
    “And it was my fingerprints that were found on the bottle in M. Guillaume’s pantry?”
    “The bottle had been opened by Jacques Aubrieux at lunch, in his own house, and it was you who took it with you to serve as evidence.”
    “Funnier and funnier!” cried Dutreuil, who had the air of being frankly amused. “Then I contrived the whole affair so that Jacques Aubrieux might be accused of the crime?”
    “It was the safest means of not being accused yourself.”
    “Yes, but Jacques is a friend whom I have known from childhood.”
    “You’re in love with his wife.”
    The young man gave a sudden, infuriated start:
    “You dare! … What! You dare make such an infamous suggestion?”
    “I have proof of it.”
    “That’s a lie! I have always respected Madeleine Aubrieux and revered her …”
    “Apparently. But you’re in love with her. You desire her. Don’t contradict me. I have abundant proof of it.”
    “That’s a lie, I tell you! You have only known me a few hours!”
    “Come, come! I’ve been quietly watching you for days, waiting for the moment to pounce upon you.”
    He took the young man by the shoulders and shook him:
    “Come, Dutreuil, confess! I hold all the proofs in my hand. I have witnesses whom we shall meet presently at the criminal investigation department. Confess, can’t you? In spite of everything, you’re tortured by remorse. Remember your dismay, at the restaurant, when you had seen the newspaper. What? Jacques Aubrieux condemned to die? That’s more than you bargained for! Penal servitude would have suited your book, but the scaffold! … Jacques Aubrieux executed tomorrow, an innocent man! … Confess, won’t you? Confess to save your own skin! Own up!”
    Bending over the other, he was trying with all his might to extort a confession from him. But Dutreuil drew himself up and coldly, with a sort of scorn in his voice, said:
    “Sir, you are a madman. Not a word that you have said has any sense in it. All your accusations are false. What about the banknotes? Did you find them at my place as you said you would?”
    Rénine, exasperated, clenched his fist in his face:
    “Oh, you swine, I’ll dish you yet, I swear I will!”
    He drew the inspector aside:
    “Well, what do you say to it? An arrant rogue, isn’t he?”
    The inspector nodded his head:
    “It may be … But, all the same … so far there’s no real evidence.”
    “Wait, M. Morisseau,” said Rénine. “Wait until we’ve had our interview with M. Dudouis. For we shall see M. Dudouis at the prefecture, shall we not?”
    “Yes, he’ll be there at three o’clock.”
    “Well, you’ll be convinced, Mr. Inspector! I tell you here and now that you will be convinced.”
    Rénine was chuckling like a man who feels certain of the course of events. Hortense, who was standing near him and was able to speak to him without being heard by the others, asked, in a low voice:
    “You’ve got him, haven’t you?”
    He nodded his head in assent:
    “Got him? I should think I have! All the same, I’m no farther forward than I was at the beginning.”
    “But this is awful! And your proofs?”
    “Not the shadow of a proof … I was hoping to trip him up. But he’s kept his feet, the rascal!”
    “Still, you’re certain it’s