This was a ray of light. In less than an instant Magloire had unhooked and taken down the cage. Between the boards, at the bottom, twelve hundred-franc bank-bills were found.
This discovery seemed to crush the workman. As to his wife, she began to utter piercing shrieks, protesting that both she and her husband were innocent. They were arrested, conveyed to head-quarters, and questioned by the magistrate. Their answers were precisely the same.
They acknowledged having received a visit from their employer Saturday evening. He seemed so ill that they asked him to take something to drink, but he refused. He had come, he said, to give a large order, and proposed that Tarot should undertake it, employing his own workmen. They replied that they had no means to do so, whereupon their employer answered: "No matter, I'll supply the money." And laid twelve hundred-franc bills on the table.
At eleven o'clock M. Jandidier asked his workman to accompany him; he was going to the Faubourg Saint Antoine. Tarot went as far as the Place de la Bastile, crossing the foot-bridge of Constantine, and walking along the canal.
The magistrate asked both husband and wife the very natural question:
Monday morning, hearing of M. Jandidier's disappearance, they were seized with terror. Tarot said to his wife: "If it is known that our employer came here, that I crossed the bridge and followed the edge of the canal with him, I shall be seriously compromised. If this money were found in our possession we should be lost."
The wife then wanted to burn the notes, but Tarot opposed the plan, intending to return them to the family.
This explanation was reasonable and plausible, if not probable, but it was merely an explanation. Tarot and his wife were kept under arrest.
A week after, the magistrate was still greatly perplexed. Three more examinations had not enabled him to come to any fixed conclusion.
Were Tarot and his wife innocent? Were they simply marvelously clever in maintaining a probable story?
The magistrate knew not what to think, when one morning a strange rumor spread abroad. The Maison Jandidier had failed. A detective sent to make inquiries, brought back the most startling news. M. Jandidier, who people supposed to be so rich, was ruined, utterly ruined, and for three years had kept up his credit by all sorts of expedients. There was not a thousand francs in his house, and his notes due at the end of the month amounted to sixty-seven thousand, five hundred francs.
