The smothering canopy was then lowered, but not so
noiselessly as I had seen it lowered. When I mentioned this to
the Sub-prefect, his answer, simple as it was, had a terrible
significance. "My men," said he, "are working down the bed-top
for the first time--the men whose money you won were in better
practice."
We left the house in the sole possession of two police
agents--every one of the inmates being removed to prison on the
spot. The Sub-prefect, after taking down my _"proces verbal"_ in
his office, returned with me to my hotel to get my passport. "Do
you think," I asked, as I gave it to him, "that any men have
really been smothered in that bed, as they tried to smother
_me?_"
"I have seen dozens of drowned men laid out at the Morgue,"
answered the Sub-prefect, "in whose pocket-books were found
letters stating that they had committed suicide in the Seine,
because they had lost everything at the gaming table. Do I know
how many of those men entered the same gambling-house that _you_
entered? won as _you_ won? took that bed as _you_ took it? slept
in it? were smothered in it? and were privately thrown into the
river, with a letter of explanation written by the murderers and
placed in their pocket-books? No man can say how many or how few
have suffered the fate from which you have escaped. The people of
the gambling-house kept their bedstead machinery a secret from
_us_--even from the police! The dead kept the rest of the secret
for them.
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