to this which he pretended to have made, appeared to me very extraordinary, considering the state in which he was found. I could not bring myself to believe that he himself felt quite assured of the correctness of his reminiscences. I determined, nevertheless, to turn them to the best account I could; but still I required a more definite point to start from. The torn address was, in my estimation, an enigma, which must first be solved; and, to effect this, I racked my brains day and night, and at last felt satisfied, that, excepting the name, (respecting which I had but few doubts,) the perfect address would run thus:—
A Monsieur ,
Marchand de vins,
Barrière Rochechouart.
Chaussée de Clignancourt.
It was therefore evident that the assassins were in league with a wine-merchant of that neighbourhood;—perhaps the wine-merchant himself was one of the perpetrators of the crime. I set my plans to work, so as to know the truth as quickly as possible; and before the end of the day I was satisfied that I had been right in directing my suspicions towards an individual named Raoul. This man had become known to me under very unfavourable auspices; he passed for one of the most daring traffickers in contraband goods, and the cabaret kept by him had long been marked out as the rendezvous where a crowd of suspicious persons nightly celebrated their riotous orgies. Raoul had moreover married the sister of a liberated galley-slave; and I was informed that he was linked in with persons of both sexes, of characters as desperate as their fortunes. In a word, his reputation was that of a loose and profligate man; and whenever a crime was denounced, if he had not positively participated in it, all thought themselves warranted in saying to him, "If it were not done by yourself, at least it was the work of your brother, or some of your relations."
Raoul, however, contrived to anticipate every scheme
