The Classic Mystery Collection - Arthur Conan Doyle [5916]
"What do I care for all these lies?" sneered the girl, impatiently tapping her foot on the floor. "Why do you bore me? I am not interested! I should like to see Jean. Ha! Where have you put him?"
"You'll see him soon enough, Mazi. I've got just a few more records to show you, and then I'm done. Now we come to the time when, after he found he couldn't get out of a legal marriage, Jean put his foot in it, so to speak. He was tied right, this time, so he took refuge in a lie when he wanted to shake off the bonds of matrimony, as my friend Jack Young would say. He told his wife - and she was his wife, and is yet - he told her the ceremony was a fake, that the priest was a false one, in his pay."
"All lies! What do I care?" sneered Mazi, again shrugging her shoulders.
"Well, now let's get along. After our friend Jean found he was tired of his wife he shamed her into leaving him and she went - well, that isn't pleasant to dwell on, either. Except that he's the villain responsible for her going to the dogs. He sent her there just as he would have sent you, Mazi, except for what has happened."
"You mean he is not my husband?"
"Not in the least."
"I do not believe you. It is all lies. These women are but jealous. Proceed."
"That's about all there is to it, Mazi, except to show you the letter from your own priest, who confirms the fact that the priest who married Jean Carnot and Annie Tighe was legally authorized to do so, both by the laws of his own church and those of New York State, where the ceremony took place. You will believe Father Capoti, won't you?" and he laid beside the girl a letter which she read eagerly.
This time she said nothing about lies, but her face turned deadly pale.
"And this is the last exhibit," went on the colonel, as he laid a photograph before Mazi. It showed a man and a girl, evidently in their wedding finery, and the face of the man was that of Jean Forette, and that of the girl was of the woman who had groveled on the sand at the feet of the chauffeur the night before, - Morocco Kate.
"Look on the back," suggested the detective, and when Mazi turned the photograph over she read:
"The happiest day of my life - Jean Carnot."
"If you happen to have any love letters from him - and I guess you have," went on the colonel, "you might compare the writing and - "
"I have no need, monsieur," was the low answer. "I - God help me. - I believe now! Oh, the liar! If I could see him now - "
"I rather thought you'd want to," murmured the colonel. "Bring him in!" he called.
The door opened, and, handcuffed to a stalwart officer, in slunk Jean of the many names.
Mazi sprang to her feet, her face livid. She would have leaped at the prisoner, but the colonel held her back. But he could not hold back the flood of voluble French that poured from her lips.
"Liar! Dog!" she hissed at him. "And so you have deceived me as you deceived others! You lied - and I thought he lied!" and she motioned to the colonel. "Oh, what a silly fool I've been! But now my eyes are open! I see! I see!"
With a quick gesture, before the colonel could stop her, she tore in half the picture that had swept away all her doubts.
"Mustn't do that!" chided the colonel, as he picked up the pieces which she was about to grind under her feet. "I'll need that at the trial."
"You - you beast!" whispered the girl, but the whisper seemed louder than a shout would have been. "You beast! No longer will I lie for you. Why you wanted me to, I do not know. Yes, I do! It was so that you might be with some one else when you should have been with me. Listen, all of you!" she cried, as she flung her arms wide. "No longer will I shield him. He told me to say that he was with me when that golf man - Monsieur Carwell died - before he died - but he was not. No