He turned towards her frankly: "Oh! very well, I can charge you, since you were the cause of it."
Then, facing the President again he said:
"I will continue. We used to go to Passy every Saturday evening, so as to be able to begin fishing at daybreak the next morning. It is a habit which has become a second nature with us, as the saying is. Three years ago this summer I discovered a place, oh! such a spot! Oh! there! in the shade, eight feet of water at least and perhaps ten, a hole with _retour_ under the bank, a regular nest for fish and a paradise for the fisherman. I might look upon that hole as my property, Monsieur le Président, as I was its Christopher Columbus. Everybody in the neighborhood knew it, without making any opposition. They used to say: 'That is Renard's place;' and nobody would have gone to it, not even Monsieur Plumsay, who is well known, be it said without any offense, for boning other peoples' places.
"Well, I returned to my place of which I felt certain, just as if I had owned it. I had scarcely got there on Saturday, when I got into _Delila_, with my wife. _Delila_ is my Norwegian boat, which I had built by Fourmaise, and which is light and safe. Well, as I said, we got into the boat and we were going to bait, and for baiting, there is nobody to be compared with me, and they all know it. You want to know with what I bait? I cannot answer that question; it has nothing to do with the accident; I cannot answer, that is my secret. There are more than three hundred people who have asked me; I have been offered glasses of brandy and liquors, fried fish, matelotes,[16] to make me tell! But just go and try whether the chub will come. Ah! they have patted my stomach to get at my secret, my recipe.... Only my wife knows ... and she will not tell it, any more than I shall!... Is not that so Mélie?"
The President of the Court interrupted him.
"Just get to the facts as soon as you can," and the accused continued: "I am getting to them; I am getting to them. Well, on Saturday July 8, we left by the twenty-five past five train, and before dinner we went to ground-bait as usual. The weather promised to keep fine, and I said to Mélie: 'All right for to-morrow!' And she replied: 'It looks like it.' We never talk more than that together.