"I am going to have you arrested, Mme. Giry, as a thief!"
"Say that again!"
And Mme. Giry caught Mr. Manager Richard a mighty box on the ear,
before Mr. Manager Moncharmin had time to intervene. But it was not
the withered hand of the angry old beldame that fell on the managerial
ear, but the envelope itself, the cause of all the trouble, the magic
envelope that opened with the blow, scattering the bank-notes, which
escaped in a fantastic whirl of giant butterflies.
The two managers gave a shout, and the same thought made them both go
on their knees, feverishly, picking up and hurriedly examining the
precious scraps of paper.
"Are they still genuine, Moncharmin?"
"Are they still genuine, Richard?"
"Yes, they are still genuine!"
Above their heads, Mme. Giry's three teeth were clashing in a noisy
contest, full of hideous interjections. But all that could be clearly
distinguished was this LEIT-MOTIF: "I, a thief! ... I, a thief, I?"
She choked with rage. She shouted: "I never heard of such a thing!"
And, suddenly, she darted up to Richard again.
"In any case," she yelped, "you, M. Richard, ought to know better than
I where the twenty thousand francs went to!"
"I?" asked Richard, astounded. "And how should I know?"
Moncharmin, looking severe and dissatisfied, at once insisted that the
good lady should explain herself.
"What does this mean, Mme. Giry?" he asked. "And why do you say that
M. Richard ought to know better than you where the twenty-thousand
francs went to?"
As for Richard, who felt himself turning red under Moncharmin's eyes,
he took Mme. Giry by the wrist and shook it violently. In a voice
growling and rolling like thunder, he roared: "Why should I know better than you where the twenty-thousand francs
went to? Why? Answer me!"
"Because they went into your pocket!" gasped the old woman, looking at
him as if he were the devil incarnate.
Richard would have rushed upon Mme. Giry, if Moncharmin had not stayed
his avenging hand and hastened to ask her, more gently: "How can you suspect my partner, M. Richard, of putting twenty-thousand
francs in his pocket?"
"I never said that," declared Mme. Giry, "seeing that it was myself who
put the twenty-thousand francs into M. Richard's pocket." And she
added, under her voice, "There! It's out! ... And may the ghost
forgive me!"
Richard began bellowing anew, but Moncharmin authoritatively ordered
him to be silent.
"Allow me! Allow me! Let the woman explain herself. Let me question
her." And he added: "It is really astonishing that you should take up
such a tone! ... We are on the verge of clearing up the whole mystery.
And you're in a rage! ... You're wrong to behave like that... I'm
enjoying myself immensely."
Mme. Giry, like the martyr that she was, raised her head, her face
beaming with faith in her own innocence.