If
      we allow that Madame Rogêt, from her age and grief, could not go
      over, (which is allowing a great deal,) there certainly must have
      been some one who would have thought it worth while to go over
      and attend the investigation, if they thought the body was that
      of Marie. Nobody went over. There was nothing said or heard about
      the matter in the Rue Pavée St. Andrée, that reached even the
      occupants of the same building. M. St. Eustache, the lover and
      intended husband of Marie, who boarded in her mother’s house,
      deposes that he did not hear of the discovery of the body of his
      intended until the next morning, when M. Beauvais came into his
      chamber and told him of it. For an item of news like this, it
      strikes us it was very coolly received.”

      In this way the journal endeavored to create the impression of an
      apathy on the part of the relatives of Marie, inconsistent with
      the supposition that these relatives believed the corpse to be
      hers. Its insinuations amount to this: that Marie, with the
      connivance of her friends, had absented herself from the city for
      reasons involving a charge against her chastity; and that these
      friends, upon the discovery of a corpse in the Seine, somewhat
      resembling that of the girl, had availed themselves of the
      opportunity to impress the public with the belief of her death. But L’Etoile was again over-hasty. It was distinctly proved that
      no apathy, such as was imagined, existed; that the old lady was
      exceedingly feeble, and so agitated as to be unable to attend to
      any duty; that St. Eustache, so far from receiving the news
      coolly, was distracted with grief, and bore himself so
      frantically, that M. Beauvais prevailed upon a friend and
      relative to take charge of him, and prevent his attending the
      examination at the disinterment. Moreover, although it was stated
      by L’Etoile, that the corpse was re-interred at the public
      expense—that an advantageous offer of private sculpture was
      absolutely declined by the family—and that no member of the
      family attended the ceremonial;—although, I say, all this was
      asserted by L’Etoile in furtherance of the impression it designed
      to convey—yet all this was satisfactorily disproved. In a
      subsequent number of the paper, an attempt was made to throw
      suspicion upon Beauvais himself. The editor says:

      “Now, then, a change comes over the matter. We are told that on
      one occasion, while a Madame B—— was at Madame Rogêt’s house, M.
      Beauvais, who was going out, told her that a gendarme was
      expected there, and she, Madame B., must not say anything to the
      gendarme until he returned, but let the matter be for him.... In
      the present posture of affairs, M. Beauvais appears to have the
      whole matter locked up in his head. A single step cannot be taken
      without M. Beauvais, for, go which way you will, you run against
      him.... For some reason, he determined that nobody shall have any
      thing to do with the proceedings but himself, and he has elbowed
      the male relatives out of the way, according to their
      representations, in a very singular manner. He seems to have been
      very much averse to permitting the relatives to see the body.”

      By the following fact, some color was given to the suspicion thus
      thrown upon Beauvais. A visitor at his office, a few days prior
      to the girl’s disappearance, and during the absence of its
      occupant, had observed a rose in the key-hole of the door, and
      the name “Marie” inscribed upon a slate which hung near at hand. The general impression, so far as we were enabled to glean it
      from the newspapers, seemed to be, that Marie had been the victim
      of a gang of desperadoes—that by these she had been borne across
      the river, maltreated and murdered. Le Commerciel, (*11) however,
      a print of extensive influence, was earnest in combating this
      popular idea. I quote a passage or two from its columns:

      “We are persuaded that pursuit has hitherto been on a false
      scent, so far as it has been directed to the Barrière du Roule. It is impossible that a person so well known to thousands as this
      young woman was, should have passed three blocks without some one
      having seen her; and any one who saw her would have remembered
      it, for she interested all who knew her. It was when the streets
      were full of people, when she went out.... It is impossible that
      she could have gone to the Barrière du Roule, or to the Rue des
      Drômes, without being recognized by a dozen persons; yet no one
      has come forward who saw her outside of her mother’s door, and
      there is no evidence, except the testimony concerning her
      expressed intentions, that she did go out at all. Her gown was
      torn, bound round her, and tied; and by that the body was carried
      as a bundle. If the murder had been committed at the Barrière du
      Roule, there would have been no necessity for any such
      arrangement. The fact that the body was found floating near the
      Barrière, is no proof as to where it was thrown into the
      water..... A piece of one of the unfortunate girl’s petticoats,
      two feet long and one foot wide, was torn out and tied under her
      chin around the back of her head, probably to prevent screams. This was done by fellows who had no pocket-handkerchief.”

      A day or two before the Prefect called upon us, however, some
      important information reached the police, which seemed to
      overthrow, at least, the chief portion of Le Commerciel’s
      argument. Two small boys, sons of a Madame Deluc, while roaming
      among the woods near the Barrière du Roule, chanced to penetrate
      a close thicket, within which were three or four large stones,
      forming a kind of seat, with a back and footstool. On the upper
      stone lay a white petticoat; on the second a silk scarf. A
      parasol, gloves, and a pocket-handkerchief were also here found. The handkerchief bore the name “Marie Rogêt.” Fragments of dress
      were discovered on the brambles around. The earth was trampled,
      the bushes were broken, and there was every evidence of a
      struggle. Between the thicket and the river, the fences were
      found taken down, and the ground bore evidence of some heavy
      burthen having been dragged along it. A weekly paper, Le Soleil,(*12) had the following comments upon
      this discovery—comments which merely echoed the sentiment of the
      whole Parisian press:

      “The things had all evidently been there at least three or four
      weeks; they were all mildewed down hard with the action of the
      rain and stuck together from mildew. The grass had grown around
      and over some of them.