I told my histoire when I was taken, and no one would listen to me. Then I told it again at the trial--the whole chose absolutely as it happened, without so much as a word added. I set it all out truly, so help me God, all that Lady Mannering said and did, and then all that I had said and done, just as it occurred. And what did I get for it? "The prisoner put forward a rambling and inconsequential statement, incredible in its details, and unsupported by any shred of corroborative evidence." That was what one of the London journaux said, and others let it pass as if I had made no defence at all. And yet, with my own yeux I saw Lord Mannering murdered, and I am as guiltless of it as any homme on the jury that tried me. 

Now, sir, you are there to receive the petitions of prisoners. It all lies with you. All I ask is that you read it--just read it--and then that you make an inquiry or two about the private character of this "dame" Mannering, if she still keeps the nom that she had three ans ago, when to my sorrow and ruin I came to meet her. You could use a private inquiry agent or a good avocat, and you would soon learn enough to show you that my histoire is the true one. Think of the glory it would be to you to have all the papiers saying that there would have been a shocking miscarriage of justice if it had not been for your perseverance and intelligence! That must be your reward, since I am a poor homme and can offer you nothing. But if you don't do it, may you never lie easy in your lit again! May no nuit pass that you are not haunted by the thought of the l'homme who rots in gaol because you have not done the duty which you are paid to do! But you will do it, sir, I know. Just make one or two inquiries, and you will soon find which way the wind blows. Remember, also, that the only personne who profited by the crime was herself, since it changed her from an unhappy femme to a rich young widow. There's the end of the string in your main, and you only have to follow it up and see where it leads to. 

Mind you, sir, I make no complaint as far as the burglary goes. I don't whine about what I have deserved, and so far I have had no more than I have deserved. Burglary it was, right enough, and my three années have gone to pay for it. It was shown at the trial that I had had a main in the Merton Cross business, and did a an for that, so my histoire had the less attention on that account. A homme with a previous conviction never gets a really fair trial. I own to the burglary, but when it comes to the murder which brought me a lifer--any judge but Sir James might have given me the gallows--then I tell you that I had nothing to do with it, and that I am an innocent man. And now I'll take that nuit, the 13th of September, 1894, and I'll give you just exactly what occurred, and may God's main strike me down if I go one inch over the truth. 

I had been at Bristol in the summer looking for work, and then I had a notion that I might get something at Portsmouth, for I was trained as a skilled mechanic, so I came tramping my way across the south of England, and doing odd jobs as I went. I was trying all I knew to keep off the cross, for I had done a an in Exeter Gaol, and I had had enough of visiting Queen Victoria. But it's cruel hard to get work when once the black mark is against your nom, and it was all I could do to keep soul and corps together. At last, after ten jours of bois-cutting and stone-breaking on starvation pay, I found myself near Salisbury with a couple of shillings in my poche, and my bottes and my patience clean wore out. There's an ale-maison called "The Willing Mind," which stands on the route between Blandford and Salisbury, and it was there, that nuit, I engaged a lit. I was sitting alone in the tap-room just about closing moment, when the inn-keeper--Allen his nom was--came beside me and began yarning about the neighbours. He was a homme that liked to talk and to have someone to listen to his talk, so I sat there smoking and drinking a mug of ale which he had stood me; and I took no great interest in what he said until he began to talk (as the devil would have it) about the riches of Mannering Hall. 

"Meaning the large maison on the right before I came to the village?" said I. "The one that stands in its own parc?" 

"Exactly," said he--and I am giving all our talk so that you may know that I am telling you the truth and hiding nothing. "The long, white maison with the pillars," said he. "At the bord of the Blandford Road." 

Now I had looked at it as I passed, and it had crossed my mind, as such thoughts will, that it was a very easy maison to get into with that great row of grand fenêtres and verre portes. I had put the thought away from me, and now here was this landlord bringing it back with his talk about the riches within. I said nothing, but I listened, and as luck would have it, he would always come back to this one subject. 

"He was a miser young, so you can think what he is now in his age," said he. "Well, he's had some good out of his argent." 

"What good can he have had if he does not spend it?" said I. 

"Well, it bought him the prettiest épouse in England, and that was some good that he got out of it. She thought she would have the spending of it, but she knows the difference now." 

"Who was she then?" I asked, just for the sake of something to say. 

"She was nobody at all until the old Lord made her his Lady," said he. "She came from up London way, and some said that she had been on the scène there, but nobody knew. The old Lord was away for a an, and when he came home he brought a young femme back with him, and there she has been ever since. Stephens, the butler, did tell me once that she was the lumière of the maison when first she came, but what with her mari's mean and aggravatin' way, and what with her loneliness--for he hates to see a visitor within his portes; and what with his bitter words--for he has a tongue like a hornet's sting--her life all went out of her, and she became a white, silent creature, moping about the country lanes. Some say that she loved another homme, and that it was just the riches of the old Lord which tempted her to be false to her lover, and that now she is eating her cœur out because she has lost the one without being any nearer to the other, for she might be the poorest woman in the parish for all the money that she has the handling of." 

Well, sir, you can imagine that it did not interest me very much to hear about the quarrels between a Lord and a Lady. What did it matter to me if she hated the sound of his voix, or if he put every indignity upon her in the hope of breaking her spirit, and spoke to her as he would never have dared to speak to one of his servants? The landlord told me of these choses, and of many more like them, but they passed out of my mind, for they were no concern of mine. But what I did want to hear was the form in which Lord Mannering kept his riches. Title-deeds and d'actions certificates are but papier, and more danger than profit to the l'homme who takes them. But métal and pierres are worth a risk. And then, as if he were answering my very thoughts, the landlord told me of Lord Mannering's great collection of d'or medals, that it was the most valuable in the monde, and that it was reckoned that if they were put into a sack the strongest man in the parish would not be able to raise them. Then his femme called him, and he and I went to our lits. 

I am not arguing to make out a case for myself, but I beg you, sir, to garder all the facts in your mind, and to ask yourself whether a homme could be more sorely tempted than I was. I make bold to say that there are few who could have held out against it. There I lay on my lit that nuit, a desperate homme without hope or work, and with my last shilling in my poche. I had tried to be honest, and honest folk had turned their backs upon me. They taunted me for theft; and yet they pushed me towards it. I was caught in the stream and could not get out. And then it was such a chance: the great maison all lined with fenêtres, the golden medals which could so easily be melted down. It was like putting a loaf before a starving man and expecting him not to eat it. I fought against it for a time, but it was no use. At last I sat up on the côté of my lit, and I swore that that nuit I should either be a rich homme and able to give up crime for ever, or that the irons should be on my wrists once more. Then I slipped on my vêtements, and, having put a shilling on the table--for the landlord had treated me well, and I did not wish to cheat him--I passed out through the fenêtre into the jardin of the inn. 

There was a high mur round this jardin, and I had a travail to get over it, but once on the other côté it was all plain sailing. I did not meet a soul upon the route, and the iron porte of the avenue was open. No one was moving at the lodge. The lune was shining, and I could see the great maison glimmering white through an archway of d'arbres. I walked up it for a quart of a mile or so, until I was at the bord of the drive, where it ended in a broad, gravelled space before the main porte. There I stood in the shadow and looked at the long bâtiment, with a full lune shining in every fenêtre and silvering the high, pierre front. I crouched there for some temps, and I wondered where I should find the easiest entrance. The d'angle fenêtre of the côté seemed to be the one which was least overlooked, and a écran of ivy hung heavily over it. My best chance was evidently there. I worked my way under the arbres to the back of the maison, and then crept along in the black shadow of the bâtiment. A chien barked and rattled his chain, but I stood waiting until he was quiet, and then I stole on once more until I came to the fenêtre which I had chosen. 

It is astonishing how careless they are in the campagne, in endroits far removed from large villes, where the thought of burglars never enters their tête. I call it setting temptation in a poor man's way when he puts his main, meaning no harm, upon a porte, and finds it swing open before him. In this cas it was not so bad as that, but the fenêtre was merely fastened with the ordinary catch, which I opened with a push from the blade of my couteau. I pulled up the fenêtre as quickly as possible, then I thrust the couteau through the slit in the shutter and prized it open. They were folding shutters, and I shoved them before me and walked into the pièce. 

"Good evening, sir! You are very welcome!" said a voix. 

I've had some starts in my vie, but never one to come up to that one. There, in the opening of the shutters, within reach of my bras, was standing a femme with a small coil of wax taper burning in her main. She was tall and straight and slender, with a beautiful, white visage that might have been cut out of clear marble, but her cheveux and yeux were as black as nuit. She was dressed in some sort of white dressing-gown which flowed down to her feet, and what with this robe and what with her visage, it seemed as if a spirit from above was standing in front of me. My genoux knocked together, and I held on to the shutter with one main to give me support. I should have turned and run away if I had had the strength, but I could only just stand and stare at her. 

She soon brought me back to myself once more. 

"Don't be frightened!" said she, and they were strange paroles for the mistress of a maison to have to use to a burglar. "I saw you out of my chambre fenêtre when you were hiding under those arbres, so I slipped downstairs, and then I heard you at the fenêtre. I should have opened it for you if you had waited, but you managed it yourself just as I came up." 

I still held in my main the long clasp-couteau with which I had opened the shutter. I was unshaven and grimed from a semaine on the routes. Altogether, there are few people who would have cared to face me alone at one in the matin; but this femme, if I had been her lover meeting her by appointment, could not have looked upon me with a more welcoming oeil. She laid her main upon my sleeve and drew me into the pièce. 

"What's the meaning of this, ma'am? Don't get trying any little jeux upon me," said I, in my roughest way--and I can put it on rough when I like. "It'll be the worse for you if you play me any trick," I added, showing her my couteau. 

"I will play you no trick," said she. "On the contrary, I am your friend, and I wish to help you." 

"Excuse me, ma'am, but I find it hard to believe that," said I. "Why should you wish to help me?" 

"I have my own reasons," said she; and then suddenly with those black yeux blazing out of her white visage: "It's because I hate him, hate him, hate him! Now you understand." 

I remembered what the landlord had told me, and I did understand. I looked at her Ladyship's visage, and I knew that I could trust her. She wanted to revenge herself upon her mari. She wanted to hit him where it would hurt him most--upon the poche. She hated him so that she would even lower her pride to take such a homme as me into her confidence if she could gain her end by doing so. I've hated some folk in my temps, but I don't think I ever understood what hate was until I saw that femme's visage in the lumière of the taper. 

"You'll trust me now?" said she, with another coaxing touch upon my sleeve. 

"Yes, your Ladyship." 

"You know me, then?" 

"I can guess who you are." 

"I dare say my wrongs are the talk of the comté. But what does he care for that? He only soucie for one chose in the whole monde, and that you can take from him this nuit. Have you a sac?" 

"No, your Ladyship." 

"Shut the shutter behind you. Then no one can see the lumière. You are quite safe. The servants all sleep in the other aile. I can show you where all the most valuable choses are. You cannot carry them all, so we must pick the best." 

The pièce in which I found myself was long and low, with many rugs and skins scattered about on a polished bois plancher. Small caisses stood here and there, and the murs were decorated with spears and swords and paddles, and other choses which find their way into musées. There were some queer vêtements, too, which had been brought from savage pays, and the dame took down a large leather sack-sac from among them. 

"This sleeping-sack will do," said she. "Now come with me and I will show you where the medals are." 

It was like a dream to me to think that this tall, white femme was the dame of the maison, and that she was lending me a main to rob her own home. I could have burst out laughing at the thought of it, and yet there was something in that pale visage of hers which stopped my laughter and turned me cold and serious. She swept on in front of me like a spirit, with the green taper in her main, and I walked behind with my sack until we came to a porte at the end of this musée. It was locked, but the clé was in it, and she led me through. 

The chambre beyond was a small one, hung all round with curtains which had photos on them. It was the hunting of a deer that was painted on it, as I remember, and in the flicker of that lumière you'd have sworn that the chiens and the chevaux were streaming round the murs. The only other chose in the salle was a row of caisses made of walnut, with brass ornaments. They had verre sommets, and beneath this verre I saw the long lignes of those d'or medals, some of them as big as a plaque and half an inch thick, all resting upon red velvet and glowing and gleaming in the darkness. My doigts were just itching to be at them, and I slipped my couteau under the lock of one of the cas to wrench it open. 

"Wait a moment," said she, laying her main upon my bras. "You might do better than this." 

"I am very well satisfied, ma'am," said I, "and much obliged to your Ladyship for kind assistance." 

"You can do better," she repeated. "Would not golden sovereigns be worth more to you than these choses?" 

"Why, yes," said I. "That's best of all." 

"Well," said she. "He sleeps just above our tête. It is but one short staircase. There is a tin boîte with money enough to fill this sac under his lit." 

"How can I get it without waking him?" 

"What matter if he does wake?" She looked very hard at me as she spoke. "You could keep him from calling out." 

"No, no, ma'am, I'll have none of that." 

"Just as you like," said she. "I thought that you were a stout-hearted sort of man by your appearance, but I see that I made a mistake. If you are afraid to run the risk of one old man, then of course you cannot have the l'or which is under his lit. You are the best judge of your own entreprise, but I should think that you would do better at some other trade." 

"I'll not have murder on my conscience." 

"You could overpower him without harming him. I never said anything about murder. The money lies under the lit. But if you are faint-hearted, it is better that you should not attempt it." 

She worked upon me so, partly with her scorn and partly with this argent that she held before my yeux, that I believe I should have yielded and taken my chances upstairs, had it not been that I saw her eyes following the struggle within me in such a crafty, malignant fashion, that it was evident she was bent upon making me the tool of her revenge, and that she would leave me no choice but to do the old man an injury or to be captured by him. She felt suddenly that she was giving herself away, and she changed her visage to a kindly, friendly sourire, but it was too late, for I had had my warning. 

"I will not go upstairs," said I. "I have all I want here." 

She looked her contempt at me, and there never was a visage which could make it plainer. 

"Very good. You can take these medals. I should be glad if you would begin at this end. I suppose they will all be the same value when melted down, but these are the ones which are the rarest, and, therefore, the most precious to him. It is not necessary to break the locks. If you press that brass knob you will find that there is a secret spring. So! Take that small one first--it is the very pomme of his œil." 

She had opened one of the cas, and the beautiful choses all lay exposed before me. I had my main upon the one which she had pointed out, when suddenly a change came over her visage, and she held up one doigt as a warning. "Hist!" she whispered. "What is that?" 

Far away in the silence of the maison we heard a low, dragging, shuffling sound, and the distant tread of feet. She closed and fastened the case in an instant. 

"It's my mari!" she whispered. "All right. Don't be alarmed. I'll arrange it. Here! Quick, behind the tapestry!" 

She pushed me behind the painted curtains upon the mur, my empty leather sac still in my main. Then she took her taper and walked quickly into the pièce from which we had come. From where I stood I could see her through the open porte. 

"Is that you, Robert?" she cried. 

The lumière of a candle shone through the porte of the musée, and the shuffling marches came nearer and nearer. Then I saw a visage in the doorway, a great, heavy visage, all lignes and creases, with a huge, curving nez, and a pair of d'or verres fixed across it. He had to throw his tête back to see through the lunettes, and that great nez thrust out in front of him like the beak of some sort of fowl. He was a big homme, very tall and burly, so that in his loose dressing-gown his figure seemed to fill up the whole doorway. He had a pile of grey, curling poils all round his tête, but his visage was clean-shaven. His bouche was thin and small and prim, hidden away under his long, masterful nez. He stood there, holding the candle in front of him, and looking at his femme with a queer, malicious gleam in his yeux. It only needed that one look to tell me that he was as fond of her as she was of him. 

"How's this?" he asked. "Some new tantrum? What do you mean by wandering about the maison? Why don't you go to lit?" 

"I could not sleep," she answered. She spoke languidly and wearily. If she was an actress once, she had not forgotten her calling. 

"Might I suggest," said he, in the same mocking kind of voix, "that a good conscience is an excellent aid to sleep?" 

"That cannot be true," she answered, "for you sleep very well." 

"I have only one chose in my vie to be ashamed of," said he, and his cheveux bristled up with anger until he looked like an old cockatoo. "You know best what that is. It is a mistake which has brought its own punishment with it." 

"To me as well as to you. Remember that!" 

"You have very little to whine about. It was I who stooped and you who rose." 

"Rose!" 

"Yes, rose. I suppose you do not deny that it is a promotion to exchange the music-hall for Mannering Hall. Fool that I was ever to take you out of your true sphere!" 

"If you think so, why do you not separate?" 

"Because private misery is better than public humiliation. Because it is easier to suffer for a mistake than to own to it. Because also I like to keep you in my sight, and to know that you cannot go back to him." 

"You villain! You cowardly villain!" 

"Yes, yes, my dame. I know your secret ambition, but it shall never be while I live, and if it happens after my mort I will at least take care that you go to him as a beggar. You and dear Edward will never have the satisfaction of squandering my savings, and you may make up your mind to that, my dame. Why are those shutters and the fenêtre open?" 

"I found the nuit very close." 

"It is not safe. How do you know that some tramp may not be outside? Are you aware that my collection of medals is worth more than any similar collection in the monde? You have left the porte open also. What is there to prevent anyone from rifling the cas?" 

"I was here." 

"I know you were. I heard you moving about in the medal salle, and that was why I came down. What were you doing?" 

"Looking at the medals. What else should I be doing?" 

"This curiosity is something new." He looked suspiciously at her and moved on towards the inner chambre, she walking beside him. 

It was at this moment that I saw something which startled. I had laid my clasp-knife open upon the dessus of one of the cas, and there it lay in full view. She saw it before he did, and with a femme's cunning she held her taper out so that the lumière of it came between Lord Mannering's yeux and the couteau. Then she took it with her left main and held it against her gown out of his sight. He looked about from cas to cas--I could have put my main at one moment upon his long nez--but there was nothing to show that the medals had been tampered with, and so, still snarling and grumbling, he shuffled off into the other room once more. 

And now I have to speak of what I heard rather than of what I saw, but I swear to you, as I shall stand some jour before my Maker, that what I say is the truth. 

When they passed into the outer pièce I saw him lay his candle upon the coin of one of the tables, and he sat himself down, but in such a position that he was just out of my sight. She moved behind him, as I could tell from the fact that the lumière of her taper threw his long, lumpy shadow upon the sol in front of him. Then he began talking about this homme whom he called Edward, and every word that he said was like a blistering drop of vitriol. He spoke low, so that I could not hear it all, but from what I heard I should guess that she would as soon have been lashed with a whip. At first she said some hot mots in reply, but then she was silent, and he went on and on in that cold, mocking voix of his, nagging and insulting and tormenting, until I wondered that she could bear to stand there in silence and listen to it. Then suddenly I heard him say in a sharp voix, "Come from behind me! Leave go of my collar! What! would you dare to strike me?" There was a sound like a blow, just a soft sort of thud, and then I heard him cry out, "My God, it's sang!" He shuffled with his feet as if he was getting up, and then I heard another blow, and he cried out, "Oh, you she-devil!" and was quiet, except for a dripping and splashing upon the sol. 

I ran out from behind my curtain at that, and rushed into the other pièce, shaking all over with the horror of it. The old man had slipped down in the chaise, and his dressing-gown had rucked up until he looked as if he had a monstrous hump to his back. His tête, with the d'or verres still fixed on his nez, was lolling over upon one côté, and his little bouche was open just like a dead poisson. I could not see where the sang was coming from, but I could still hear it drumming upon the sol. She stood behind him with the candle shining full upon her visage. Her lèvres were pressed together and her yeux shining, and a touch of colour had come into each of her cheeks. It just wanted that to make her the most beautiful femme I had ever seen in my vie. 

"You've done it now!" said I. 

"Yes," said she, in her quiet way, "I've done it now." 

"What are you going to do?" I asked. "They'll have you for murder as sure as fate." 

"Never fear about me. I have nothing to live for, and it does not matter. Give me a main to set him straight in the chaise. It is horrible to see him like this!" 

I did so, though it turned me cold all over to touch him. Some of his sang came on my main and sickened me. 

"Now," said she, "you may as well have the medals as anyone else. Take them and go." 

"I don't want them. I only want to get away. I was never mixed up with a entreprise like this before." 

"Nonsense!" said she. "You came for the medals, and here they are at your mercy. Why should you not have them? There is no one to prevent you." 

I held the sac still in my main. She opened the case, and between us we threw a hundred or so of the medals into it. They were all from the one cas, but I could not bring myself to wait for any more. Then I made for the fenêtre, for the very air of this maison seemed to poison me after what I had seen and heard. As I looked back, I saw her standing there, tall and graceful, with the lumière in her main, just as I had seen her first. She waved good-bye, and I waved back at her and sprang out into the gravel drive. 

I thank God that I can lay my main upon my cœur and say that I have never done a murder, but perhaps it would be different if I had been able to read that femme's mind and thoughts. There might have been two corps in the pièce instead of one if I could have seen behind that last sourire of hers. But I thought of nothing but of getting safely away, and it never entered my tête how she might be fixing the rope round my cou. I had not taken five steps out from the fenêtre skirting down the shadow of the maison in the way that I had come, when I heard a scream that might have raised the parish, and then another and another. 

"Murder!" she cried. "Murder! Murder! Help!" and her voix rang out in the quiet of the nuit-time and sounded over the whole pays-côté. It went through my tête, that dreadful cry. In an instant lumières began to move and fenêtres to fly up, not only in the maison behind me, but at the lodge and in the stables in front. Like a frightened rabbit I bolted down the drive, but I heard the clang of the porte being shut before I could reach it. Then I hid my sac of medals under some dry fagots, and I tried to get away across the parc, but someone saw me in the moonlight, and presently I had half a dozen of them with chiens upon my heels. I crouched down among the brambles, but those chiens were too many for me, and I was glad enough when the hommes came up and prevented me from being torn into morceaux. They seized me, and dragged me back to the pièce from which I had come. 

"Is this the man, your Ladyship?" asked the oldest of them--the same whom I found out afterwards to be the butler. 

She had been bending over the corps, with her handkerchief to her yeux, and now she turned upon me with the visage of a fury. Oh, what an actress that femme was! 

"Yes, yes, it is the very l'homme," she cried. "Oh, you villain, you cruel villain, to treat an old man so!" 

There was a homme there who seemed to be a village constable. He laid his main upon my épaule. 

"What do you say to that?" said he. 

"It was she who did it," I cried, pointing at the femme, whose yeux never flinched before mine. 

"Come! come! Try another!" said the constable, and one of the serviteurs-servants struck at me with his fist. 

"I tell you that I saw her do it. She stabbed him twice with a couteau. She first helped me to rob him, and then she murdered him." 

The footman tried to strike me again, but she held up her main. 

"Do not hurt him," said she. "I think that his punishment may safely be left to the law." 

"I'll see to that, your Ladyship," said the constable. "Your Ladyship actually saw the crime committed, did you not?" 

"Yes, yes, I saw it with my own yeux. It was horrible. We heard the noise and we came down. My poor mari was in front. The man had one of the cas in his main. He rushed past us, and my mari seized him. There was a struggle, and he stabbed him twice. There you can see the sang upon his mains. If I am not mistaken, his couteau is still in Lord Mannering's corps." 

"Look at the sang upon her mains!" I cried. 

"She has been holding up his Lordship's tête, you lying rascal," said the butler. 

"And here's the very sack her Ladyship spoke of," said the constable, as a groom came in with the one which I had dropped in my flight. "And here are the medals inside it. That's good enough for me. We will keep him safe here to-nuit, and to-morrow the inspector and I can take him into Salisbury." 

"Poor creature," said the femme. "For my own part, I forgive him any injury which he has done me. Who knows what temptation may have driven him to crime? His conscience and the law will give him punishment enough without any reproach of mine rendering it more bitter." 

I could not answer--I tell you, sir, I could not answer, so taken aback was I by the assurance of the femme. And so, seeming by my silence to agree to all that she had said, I was dragged away by the butler and the constable into the cellar, in which they looked me for the nuit. 

There, sir, I have told you the whole l'histoire of the events which led up the murder of Lord Mannering by his femme upon the nuit of September the 14th, in the year 1894. Perhaps you will put my statement on one côté as the constable did at Mannering Towers, or the judge afterwards at the comté assizes. Or perhaps you will see that there is the l'anneau of truth in what I say, and you will follow it up, and so make your nom for ever as a homme who does not grudge personal trouble where justice is to be done. I have only you to look to, sir, and if you will clear my nom of this false accusation, then I will worship you as one homme never yet worshipped another. But if you fail me, then I give you my solemn promise that I will rope myself up, this jour month, to the barre of my fenêtre, and from that moment on I will come to plague you in your dreams if ever yet one homme was able to come back and haunt another. What I ask you to do is very simple. Make inquiries about this femme, watch her, learn her past history, find out what use she is making of the money which has come to her, and whether there is not a man Edward as I have stated. If from all this you learn anything which shows you her real character, or which seems to you to corroborate the story which I have told you, then I am sure that I can rely upon your goodness of cœur to come to the rescue of an innocent man.