Picaud smiled disdainfully, and his old friend ceased to speak. He left him still lying on the truckle-bed, where he had flung him down, and did not loosen his bonds. Allut even added to the severity of the restraints which held the prisoner, and passed around his waist a large, thick girdle of iron, fastened by a chain to three huge rings riveted to the wall. Having done this, Allut sat down to supper; and as Picaud saw that Allut did not offer him a portion, he said:
“I am hungry!”
“What will you pay if I give you some bread and water?”
“I’ve no money.”
“You have sixteen millions and more,” rejoined Allut; and he gave Picaud such details respecting the deposits of his funds in England, Germany, Italy, and France, that the miser felt his whole body shiver.
“You are dreaming!”
“You may dream, then, that you are eating.”
Allut went away and remained absent all the night; about seven in the morning he returned and had breakfast. The sight of the viands redoubled Picaud’s torments of hunger.
“Give me something to eat!” he said.
“What will you pay if I give you some bread and water?”
“Nothing.”
“Well, we’ll see who is tired first!”
And he went away again.
He returned at three in the afternoon; Picaud had had no food for twenty-eight hours, and implored pity from his jailer, to whom he offered twenty sous for a pound of bread.
“Listen!” said Allut, “here are my terms. I will give you something to eat twice a day, and you will pay for each meal twenty-five thousand francs.”
Picaud groaned, and writhed on his bed, while the other remained motionless.
“This is my last word. Choose; take your time. You had no pity on your friends; I will be pitiless toward you!”
The wretched prisoner passed the rest of the day and the following night in the rage of hunger and despair; his moral anguish reached its climax; hell was in his heart. His sufferings were such that he was seized with tetanus, as if the nerves were torn; his head wandered, the rays of heavenly intelligence were extinguished beneath this flood of passions carried to their furthest limit. Allut, pitiless as he was, was quick to perceive that the human frame could be tortured too much; his old friend was no longer capable of discernment; he was a mere machine, still sensible to physical pain, but incapable of fighting against it or repelling it. He had to renounce his hope of getting a word from him. Allut fell into despair at the thought that if Picaud died no means were left by which he could get hold of his victim’s immense property. In his rage he struck himself, but detecting a diabolical smile on the livid face of Picaud, he flung himself on him like a wild beast, bit him, stabbe d his eyes, disemboweled him, and then, rushing from the spot, left Paris and crossed to England.
In that country he fell sick, in 1828, and confessed to a French Catholic priest. In his repentance for his crimes he dictated to the clergyman all the details of this terrible history, and signed each page. Allut died in peace with God, and received Christian burial. After his death, Abbe P – sent to the Paris police the valuable document from which the strange facts above recorded have been derived. He wrote also the following letter:
“MONSIEUR LE PREFET:
“I have had the happiness of bringing to repentance a very great sinner. He believed, and I agreed with him, that it would be advisable to communicate to you a series of horrible events in which the unhappy man had been at once actor and victim. By following the indications furnished in the note annexed to this sheet, you will discover the subterranean chamber where the remains of the wretched and unfortunate Picaud, the victim of his own passions and hate, may still be found. God grants pardon. Men, in their pride, wish to do more than God; they pursue vengeance, and vengeance crushes them.
“Antoine Allut sought in vain for the spot where his victim’s treasures were deposited. He entered his room secretly by night, but no book, deed, or document, and no sum of money fell into his hands. I inclose the addresses and instructions how to find the two lodgings which, under his two assumed names, Picaud occupied in Paris.
“Even on the bed of death Allut refused to tell me how he had obtained his knowledge of the facts related in the document, or who informed him of the crimes and wealth of Picaud; only, just before expiring, he said: ‘Father, the faith of no man is more living than mine, for I have seen and heard a soul that had left the body.’
“Nothing then indicated delirium on the part of Allut. He had just made his solemn profession of faith. The men of this age are presumptuous; in their ignorance, their refusal to believe seems to them wisdom. The ways of God are infinite. Let us adore and submit.
“I have the honor, etc., etc.”
（Archives of the Police Department.）