Page 149 - down-and-out-in-paris-and-london

sion; it was suggested that the cocaine could be put into the
tins and passed off as face-powder. The powder was hastily
thrown out of the window and the cocaine substituted, and
the tins were put openly on Roucolle’s table, as though there
there were nothing to conceal. A few minutes later the po-
lice came to search Roucolle’s room. They tapped the walls
and looked up the chimney and turned out the drawers and
examined the floorboards, and then, just as they were about
to give it up, having found nothing, the inspector noticed
the tins on the table.
‘TIENS,’ he said, ‘have a look at those tins. I hadn’t no-
ticed them. What’s in them, eh?’
‘Face-powder,’ said the Pole as calmly as he could man-
age. But at the same instant Roucolle let out a loud groaning
noise, from alarm, and the police became suspicious im-
mediately. They opened one of the tins and tipped out the
contents, and after smelling it, the inspector said that he be-
lieved it was cocaine. Roucolle and the Pole began swearing
on the names of the saints that it was only face-powder; but
it was no use, the more they protested the more suspicious
the police became. The two men were arrested and led off to
the police station, followed by half the quarter.
At the station, Roucolle and the Pole were interrogated
by the Commissaire while a tin of the cocaine was sent away
to be analysed. Charlie said that the scene Roucolle made
was beyond description. He wept, prayed, made contradic-
tory statements and denounced the Pole all at once, so loud
that he could be heard half a street away. The policemen al-
most burst with laughing at him.

1 Down and Out in Paris and London