e. de Lamotte, and her reputed signature to the deed
of sale on February 12, led him to suspect that he was dealing with a
case of murder.

When Derues returned to Paris from Lyons, on March 11, he found that the
police had already visited the house and questioned his wife, and
that he himself was under close surveillance. A day or two later the
advocate, Duclos, revealed to the magistrate the fictitious character
of the loan of 100,000 livres, which Derues alleged that he had paid
to Mme. de Lamotte as the price of Buisson-Souef. When the new power of
attorney purporting to be signed by Mme. de Lamotte arrived from
Lyons, and the signature was compared with that on the deed of sale of
Buisson-Souef to Derues, both were pronounced to be forgeries. Derues
was arrested and lodged in the Prison of For l'Eveque.

The approach of danger had not dashed the spirits of the little man, nor
was he without partisans in Paris. Opinion in the city was divided as
to the truth of his account of Mme. de Lamotte's elopement. The nobility
were on the side of the injured de Lamotte, but the bourgeoisie
accepted the grocer's story and made merry over the deceived husband.
Interrogated, however, by the magistrate of the Chatelet, Derues'
position became more difficult. Under the stress of close questioning
the flimsy fabric of his financial statements fell to pieces like a
house of cards. He had to admit that he had never paid Mme. de Lamotte
100,000 livres; he had paid her only 25,000 livres in gold; further
pressed he said that the 25,000 livres had been made up partly in gold,
partly in bills; but where the gold had come from, or on whom he had
drawn the bills, he could not explain. Still his position was not
desperate; and he knew it. In the absence of Mme. de Lamotte he could
not be charged with fraud or forgery; and until her body was discovered,
it would be impossible to charge him with murder.

A month passed; Mme. Derues, who had made a belated attempt to follow
her husband's example by impersonating Mme. de Lamotte in Paris, had
been arrested and imprisoned in the Grand Chatelet; when, on April 18,
information was received by the authorities which determined them to
explore the wine-cellar in the Rue de la Mortellerie. Whether the woman
who had let the cellar to Derues, or the creditor who had met him taking
his cask of wine there, had informed the investigating magistrate, seems
uncertain. In any case, the corpse of the unhappy