On the bed were Robert’s clothes and she guessed that they had been subjected to very careful scrutiny.
The ordeal over, the Commissaire asked Lydia questions about her husband’s wardrobe.
They were not difficult to answer, for it was not extensive: two pairs of tennis trousers, two suits besides the one he had on, a dinner-jacket and plus-fours; and she had no reason not to reply truthfully.
It was past seven o’clock when the search was at last concluded.
But the Commissaire had not yet done.
He took up Lydia’s vanity-case which she had brought in from the kitchen and which was lying on a table.
“I am going to take this away with me and also your watch, Madame, if you will kindly give it me.”
“Why?”
“I have reason to suspect that they are stolen goods.”
Lydia stared at him in dismay.
But Colonel Legrand stepped forward.
“You have no right to take them.
Your warrant to search the house does not permit you to remove a single thing from it.”
The Commissaire smiled blandly.
“You are quite right, Monsieur, but my colleague has, on my instructions, secured the necessary authority.”
He made a slight gesture, whereupon the man who had gone away in the car—on an errand which was now patent—produced from his pocket a document which he handed to him.
The Commissaire passed it on to Colonel Legrand.
He read it and turned to Lydia.
“You must do as Monsieur le Commissaire desires.”
She took the watch off her wrist.
The Commissaire put it with the vanity-case in his pocket.
“If my suspicions prove to be unfounded the objects will of course be returned to you.”
When at last they all left and Lydia had bolted the door behind them, Madame Berger hurried across the garden.
Lydia followed her.
Madame Berger gave a cry of consternation when she saw the condition in which the room was.
“The brutes!”
She rushed to the curtains.
They were lying on the floor.
She gave a piercing scream when she saw that the seams had been ripped up.
She flopped on to the ground and turned on Lydia a face contorted with horror.
“Don’t be afraid,” said Lydia.
“They didn’t find the notes.
I found them and destroyed them.
I knew you’d never have the courage.”
She gave her hand to Madame Berger and helped her to her feet.
Madame Berger stared at her.
They had never spoken of the subject that for forty-eight hours had obsessed their tortured thoughts.
But now the time for silence was passed.
Madame Berger seized Lydia’s arm with a cruel grip and in a harsh, intense voice said:
“I swear to you by all the love I bear him that Robert didn’t murder the Englishman.”
“Why do you say that when you know as certainly as I do that he did?”
“Are you going to turn against him?”
“Does it look like it?
Why do you suppose I destroyed those notes?
You must have been mad to think they wouldn’t find them.
Could you think a trained detective would miss such an obvious hiding-place?”
Madame Berger released her hold of Lydia’s arm.
Her expression changed and a sob burst from her throat.
Suddenly she stretched out her arms, took Lydia in them, and pressed her to her breast.
“Oh, my poor child, what trouble, what unhappiness I’ve brought upon you.”