“Well, I’ll go myself,” cried old Goussot. “Light me a lantern, somebody!”
But, at that moment, three gendarmes arrived; and a number of village lads also came up to hear the latest.
The sergeant of gendarmes was a man of method. He first insisted on hearing the whole story, in full detail; then he stopped to think; then he questioned the four brothers, separately, and took his time for reflection after each deposition. When he had learnt from them that the tramp had fled toward the back of the estate, that he had been lost sight of repeatedly and that he had finally disappeared near a place known as the Crows’ Knoll, he meditated once more and announced his conclusion:
“Better wait. Old Trainard might slip through our hands, amidst all the confusion of a pursuit in the dark, and then good night, everybody!”
The farmer shrugged his shoulders and, cursing under his breath, yielded to the sergeant’s arguments. That worthy organized a strict watch, distributed the brothers Goussot and the lads from the village under his men’s eyes, made sure that the ladders were locked away and established his headquarters in the dining-room, where he and Farmer Goussot sat and nodded over a decanter of old brandy.
The night passed quietly. Every two hours, the sergeant went his rounds and inspected the posts. There were no alarms. Old Trainard did not budge from his hole.
The battle began at break of day.
It lasted four hours.
In those four hours, the thirteen acres of land within the walls were searched, explored, gone over in every direction by a score of men who beat the bushes with sticks, trampled over the tall grass, rummaged in the hollows of the trees and scattered the heaps of dry leaves. And old Trainard remained invisible.
“Well, this is a bit thick!” growled Goussot.
“Beats me altogether,” retorted the sergeant.
And indeed there was no explaining the phenomenon. For, after all, apart from a few old clumps of laurels and spindle-trees, which were thoroughly beaten, all the trees were bare. There was no building, no shed, no stack, nothing, in short, that could serve as a hiding-place.
As for the wall, a careful inspection convinced even the sergeant that it was physically impossible to scale it.
In the afternoon, the investigations were begun all over again in the presence of the examining-magistrate and the public-prosecutor’s deputy. The results were no more successful. Nay, worse, the officials looked upon the matter as so suspicious that they could not restrain their ill-humour and asked:
“Are you quite sure, Farmer Goussot, that you and your sons haven’t been seeing double?”
“And what about my wife?” retorted the farmer, red with anger. “Did she see double when the scamp had her by the throat? Go and look at the marks, if you doubt me!”
“Very well. But then where is the scamp?”
“Here, between those four walls.”
“Very well. Then ferret him out. We give it up. It’s quite clear, that if a man were hidden within the precincts of this farm, we should have found him by now.”
“I swear I’ll lay hands on him, true as I stand here!” shouted Farmer Goussot. “It shall not be said that I’ve been robbed of six thousand francs. Yes, six thousand! There were three cows I sold; and then the wheat-crop; and then the apples. Six thousand-franc notes, which I was just going to take to the bank. Well, I swear to Heaven that the money’s as good as in my pocket!”
“That’s all right and I wish you luck,” said the examining-magistrate, as he went away, followed by the deputy and the gendarmes.
The neighbours also walked off in a more or less facetious mood. And, by the end of the afternoon, none remained but the Goussots and the two farm-labourers.
Old Goussot at once explained his plan. By day, they were to search. At night, they were to keep an incessant watch. It would last as long as it had to. Hang it, old Trainard was a man like other men; and men have to eat and drink! Old Trainard must needs, therefore, come out of his earth to eat and drink.
“At most,” said Goussot, “he can have a few crusts of bread in his pocket, or even pull up a root or two at night. But, as far as drink’s concerned, no go. There’s only the spring. And he’ll be a clever dog if he gets near that.”
He himself, that evening, took up his stand near the spring. Three hours later, his eldest son relieved him. The other brothers and the farmhands slept in the house, each taking his turn of the watch and keeping all the lamps and candles lit, so that there might be no surprise.
So it went on for fourteen consecutive nights. And for fourteen days, while two of the men and Mother Goussot remained on guard, the five others explored the Héberville ground.
At the end of that fortnight, not a sign.
The farmer never ceased storming. He sent for a retired detective-inspector who lived in the neighbouring town. The inspector stayed with him for a whole week. He found neither old Trainard nor the least clue that could give them any hope of finding old Trainard.
“It’s a bit thick!” repeated Farmer Goussot. “For he’s there, the rascal! As far as being anywhere goes, he’s there. So. …”
Planting himself on the threshold, he railed at the enemy at the top of his voice:
“You blithering idiot, would you rather croak in your hole than fork out the money? Then croak, you pig!”
And Mother Goussot, in her turn, yelped, in her shrill voice:
“Is it prison you’re afraid of? Hand over the notes and you can hook it!”
But old Trainard did not breathe a word; and the husband and wife tired their lungs in vain.
Shocking days passed. Farmer Goussot could no longer sleep, lay shivering with fever. The sons became morose and quarrelsome and never let their
