en, who have
trafficked in every sort of vice, and who have tasted every disgrace,
at times attain a perfection of hypocrisy calculated to deceive the most
subtle penetration. Any one unacquainted with the antecedents of the
landlady of the Poivriere would certainly have been impressed by her
apparent candor, so skillfully did she affect a display of frankness,
surprise, and fear. Her expression would have been simply perfect, had
it not been for her eyes, her small gray eyes, as restless as those of a
caged animal, and gleaming at intervals with craftiness and cunning.

There she stood, mentally rejoicing at the success of her narrative, for
she was convinced that the magistrate placed implicit confidence in her
revelations, although during her recital, delivered, by the way, with
conjurer-like volubility, not a muscle of M. Segmuller's face had
betrayed what was passing in his mind. When she paused, out of breath,
he rose from his seat, and without a word approached his clerk to
inspect the notes taken during the earlier part of the examination.

From the corner where he was quietly seated, Lecoq did not cease
watching the prisoner. "She thinks that it's all over," he muttered to
himself; "she fancies that her deposition is accepted without question."

If such were, indeed, the widow's opinion, she was soon to be
undeceived; for, after addressing a few low-spoken words to the smiling
Goguet, M. Segmuller took a seat near the fireplace, convinced that the
moment had now come to abandon defensive tactics, and open fire on the
enemy's position.

"So, Widow Chupin," he began, "you tell us that you didn't remain for a
single moment with the people who came into your shop that evening!"

"Not a moment."

"They came in and ordered what they wanted; you waited on them, and then
left them to themselves?"

"Yes, my good sir."

"It seems to me impossible that you didn't overhear some words of their
conversation. What were they talking about?"

"I am not in the habit of playing spy over my customers."

"Didn't you hear anything?"

"Nothing at all."

The magistrate shrugged his shoulders with an air of commiseration. "In
other words," he remarked, "you refuse to inform justice--"

"Oh, my good sir!"

"Allow me to finish. All these improbable stories about leaving the shop
and mending your son's clothes in your bedroom are so many inventions.
You have concocted them so as to be able to say to me: 'I didn't see
any