It was a touch and go affair. Madame Beroldy’s story was hardly credible. But this woman, whose fairy tales of royal intrigues had been so easily accepted, had the supreme art of making herself believed. Her address to the jury was a masterpiece. The tears streaming down her face, she spoke of her child, of her woman’s honour—of her desire to keep her reputation untarnished for the child’s sake. She admitted that, Georges Conneau having been her lover, she might perhaps be held morally responsible for the crime—but, before God, nothing more! She knew that she had committed a grave fault in not denouncing Conneau to the law, but she declared in a broken voice that that was a thing no woman could have done.… She had loved him! Could she let her hand be the one to send him to the Guillotine? She had been guilty of much, but she was innocent of the terrible crime imputed to her. However that may have been, her eloquence and personality won the day. Madame Beroldy, amidst a scene of unparalleled excitement, was acquitted. Despite the utmost endeavours of the police, Georges Conneau was never traced. As for Madame Beroldy, nothing more was heard of her. Taking the child with her, she left Paris to begin a new life. 17 We Make Further Investigations I have set down the Beroldy case in full. Of course all the details did not present themselves to my memory as I have recounted them here. Nevertheless, I recalled the case fairly accurately. It had attracted a great deal of interest at the time, and had been fully reported by the English papers, so that it did not need much effort of memory on my part to recollect the salient details. Just for the moment, in my excitement, it seemed to clear up the whole matter. I admit that I am impulsive, and Poirot deplores my custom of jumping to conclusions, but I think I had some excuse in this instance. The remarkable way in which this discovery justified Poirot’s point of view struck me at once. “Poirot,” I said, “I congratulate you. I see everything now.” “If that is indeed the truth, _I___ congratulate _you___, _mon ami___. For as a rule you are not famous for seeing—eh, is it not so?” I felt a little annoyed. “Come now, don’t rub it in. You’ve been so confoundedly mysterious all along with your hints and your insignificant details that any one might fail to see what you were driving at.” Poirot lit one of his little cigarettes with his usual precision. Then he looked up. “And since you see everything now, _mon ami___, what exactly is it that you see?” “Why, that it was Madame Daubreuil—Beroldy, who murdered Mr. Renauld. The similarity of the two cases proves that beyond a doubt.” “Then you consider that Madame Beroldy was wrongly acquitted? That in actual fact she was guilty of connivance in her husband’s murder?” I opened my eyes wide. “But of course! Don’t you?” Poirot walked to the end of the room, absentmindedly straightened a chair, and then said thoughtfully.