had left that town with anything but an enviable reputation. Coming to Paris, where he barely subsisted on the price of the Masses which he said at Saint-Esprit, he had, by his assumed piety, succeeded in winning the confidence of M. and Mme. de Montgomery. After entering the Count's service, Gagnard had lived lavishly, spending far more than his salary.
As for Pierre Vincent, the son of a poor tanner of Mans, he had been, while yet a youth, an accomplice in a murder. To escape the pursuit of justice, he sought an asylum in the army and enlisted in a regiment in Normandy, under the name of Belestre. Once a soldier, he did not renounce crime, and he deserted after having killed a sergeant. Returning to his home, where he had the audacity to reappear, he had lived by begging and stealing. After his intimacy with Gagnard, a change seemed to take place in his fortunes, and he bought, near Mans, a farm for which he paid more than nine thousand livres.
These two men were arrested, not on suspicion of having robbed the Count, but, as often happens, on account of another crime, which delivered them into the hands of justice. Belestre was taken in the act of robbing a pedler. Gagnard fell into the hands of the police for having been present at the murder of a carpenter.
The woman De la Comble was found, and she told all that she knew of these two men, and furnished the most precise details as to the robbery executed in the Place Royale. Belestre had done the deed, and Gagnard had furnished the necessary information as well as impressions of the locks, by the aid of which Belestre had manufactured false keys.
Vincent Belestre suffered the torture without confessing; Gagnard, less firm, confessed the crime, and Belestre also confessed before being hanged.
The innocence of the unhappy D'Anglades was now clear, as well as the error of justice. Madame d'Anglade had no difficulty in obtaining letters of revision from the king. She commenced a suit against the Count de Montgomery for damages. The struggle was long and bitter. Finally, by a decree, dated June 17, 1693, Parliament rehabilitated the memory of the dead, justified Madame d'Anglade, and ordered the Count de Mont gomery to restore the sum which had been adjudged him, and, besides, to pay all the expenses of the trial.
A poor reparation, however, for all these two poor innocent persons had suffered!
