"So did you break Mademoiselle Deschamps's leg or not?"

Gaston leaned back in the small, elegant armchair, and it creaked pitifully under his weight. He was sitting in a small room at a low table (God, why did the castle have furniture designed for dwarves?), and across from him sat two military marshals. One of them was asking questions, and the other was writing something down quickly, so that his pen left fancy ink stains on the paper. Belle was being questioned in the room across the hall, and Prince Adam in the next room to the left down the hall. Gaston yawned. He wanted to eat and sleep. Sleep and eat. He'd been up all night, nervous, then he'd drunk half a bottle of cognac, then there'd been Belle and Jeannette's altercation, and now fatigue had come over him, no matter how much he rubbed his ears. His thoughts were jumbled and his eyes were slipping of their own accord. The conversation was going in the wrong direction, and Gaston could not steer it in the right direction.

"Tell the truth," said the marshal who was taking notes.

"I am telling the truth, damn it!" Gaston got angry. "You don't let me tell you what happened. You're interrupting me."

"And we don't need you to bullshit us. Just answer our questions truthfully, that's all we need you to do. Unless, of course, you have something to hide. You don't have anything to hide, do you?"

"Of course not.

I'm not a degenerate and a criminal like these two... "

"Okay, answer for yourself.

Let's go again, just yes or no. Did you hit Mademoiselle Deschamps on the leg so that her leg was broken?"

"Who is Mademoiselle Deschamps?" Gaston asked tiredly.

"Jeannette Deschamps," said the marshal with exaggerated calmness.

"Mademoiselle? So she's not even married?" Gaston grinned.

"Answer the question, yes or no?"

"Yes, I hit her.

But before that they put something in our champagne.."

"That's it, that's it, I only want the answers to the questions," the marshal stopped his explanation.

"But you won't understand anything! They're human traffickers! It's-"

"Let's not you tell me how to work.

Another question, why did you go to Toulon?"

There was silence.

"To look at the sea" would be a strange answer.

"Did you and your wife want to sell something? Meat? Were you going to the fair? Mind you, we'll check what you say."

"No, we... We just... We were recently married and wanted to go to another town. For nothing, so to speak."

"Interesting thing for commoners to do. "

"I have money," Gaston shrugged.

"Oh, we noticed that. How did you meet Mademoiselle Deschamps and Monsieur Thomas?"

"Monsieur Thomas is probably Paul, right?"

"That's right.

"They met us by chance on the street and suggested we have dinner together and go for a walk the next day."

"Do you know how much a night at the hotel you stayed at? "

"No, they offered to pay.

But I had money."

"Do you always accept strangers paying for you?"

"No," Gaston shook his head.

The more he answered the questions, the worse the end result became. He tried to add clarity. "I agreed to have them pay for us because, in turn, I offered to let them come to our village. Here I would pay for them, for all their shopping and stops at the tavern. "

"Why would they come to your village?

Don't be ridiculous. There are only two streets."

Gaston thought for a moment. Suddenly a great idea was born in his clouded brain. "There's a castle here. A local place of interest. He pronounced the word "place of interest" without hesitation and glanced victoriously at the marshals. The other one, the one with the pen, was diligently taking notes.

"We'll talk more about the castle. Let's talk about your wife. Is she always so... aggressive?"

"Of course not!" Gaston was indignant. "She is the most harmless person in the world! She is quiet and modest, likes to read..."

"Read? Books? You let your wife read?"

He shouldn't have mentioned reading.

"She reads ladies' novels," Gaston waved his hand. "Nothing too horrible."

"Hmm... You say she's not aggressive. We saw her attack poor Mademoiselle Deschamps out of the blue."

"She was just jealous of me. That's the first time that's ever happened. Everyone has bad days, Belle too."

"Did she ever hit you? Or anyone else?"

"Not once."

"Okay, write down that he was looking away, so he's lying," the marshal said to his partner.

"It's true!"

"We'll figure it out. Now listen to me carefully and answer truthfully and carefully. You need to remember exactly what happened."

"Okay."

The marshal folded his hands in front of him, gathering his thoughts. The other marshal dipped a pen in the inkwell and brought it over the paper, preparing to write down his answers.

"You told me that you saw your wife hit the Marquis through the window."

"No, I did not, but I heard a scream and the sound of a blow."

"Okay. When you looked through the window, was your wife standing or sitting or lying down?"

"She was standing."

"So she wasn't lying in bed? Her clothes weren't torn?"

"Thank God, no!"

"Then what makes you think she was being raped? You say she stood up and hit a helpless old marquis? And she remembered to take her diamond bracelet when she ran away with you."

"I- Look, but it's obvious! She was held there. We were drugged with some kind of poison, and we passed out. I've heard talk of us being sold-"

"No, no, no. You talk to me about talking after you woke up from your drunkenness, and I'll talk to you about actions. Your wife wasn't beaten, her clothes weren't torn, and yet she hit a man on the head so hard that he has constant headaches," the marshal tapped his fingers on the table. "I'll get you out of this. It's a hornet's nest in here. I'll tell you what happened. You and your wife are robbers, she lures rich people, and then she deals with them herself or with your help. And you help her escape. If it was as you say, how did you find the apartment where you say your wife was being held captive so quickly?"

"I was just lucky, I overheard in the tavern..."

"Amazing luck."

Gaston became nervous. Belle's idea to send the marshals on the trail of Jeannette and Paul was impossible without Belle herself, and Gaston could not handle tricky questions. In irritation, he pounded his fist on the table:

"Instead of wasting time on me, you'd go check out the house which address I gave you! A little more and they'll flee with the loot from the castle. What's amazing is that you let these obviously criminal people go! Ask anyone. Belle and I are respected townspeople. Ask Prince Adam!"

"All right, just calm down and keep your hands to yourself. If you want to talk about your buddy, so be it. What's his real name?"

"Whom?" Gaston asked, not understanding the question at all.

"Your, as you call him, "Prince Adam."

"I call him? That's what everyone calls him - Prince Adam."

The marshal, in turn, slammed his fist on the table and jumped up from his seat, pacing the room:

"Oh, well, that's enough! Your Prince Adam has been dead and rotten for ten years! And who did you bring in his place, that's what I'm interested in! Who lives in the castle and uses the prince's property..."

Gaston leaned back in his chair and laughed, though it wasn't funny to him:

"Prince Adam is alive. He is. Everyone can attest to that. Ask any of his servants. "

"The servants probably killed him," the marshal said and sat back in his chair. "They say the young man was quite bad boy... And you found a way to get some things from the castle, brought your handsome friend here, and he began to pretend to be a prince. And the servants, of course, keep quiet because if they don't, everyone will know they killed the Prince. This must be conveyed to Paris, Francois," said the marshal to his comrade. "This is a serious matter. We have accidentally stumbled upon a terrible crime. The prince suddenly disappeared ten years ago, but for some reason no one looked for him. It was like an obsession. Now there's some guy and his buddy hunter walking around the castle. Maybe it's because it's in a godforsaken place and no one's come to check it out."

"It's Prince Adam," Gaston repeated. "No one killed him, he's been living here all these ten years."

"Really? Why didn't he meet his relatives?

Didn't go to Paris? Didn't answer his letters?"

"Because he was cursed, dammit, and turned into a horned creature and his servants into household utensils," Gaston replied mentally. But he did not say so aloud, of course, or he might have claimed the tender care of Monsieur d'Arque and life in his beautiful madhouse.

"He was ill,' Gaston answered at last. "You know, aristocrats are often ill-with nerves. Migraines and all that sort of thing."

"Do you even know what a migraine is, smart ass?"

"No."

"It's a headache."

Gaston clenched his temples with his hands. Looks like he had a migraine, too.

"You can look at his portrait. There was one there, sort of... what did they say... in the West Wing, torn, but you could see what the prince looked like in his youth. And that he looked like himself now," Gaston smiled, proud of his guess.

"We have seen how this 'prince', behaves. His so-called servants offered us breakfast and he joined us. Look, aristocratic manners are not an empty word. This man eats like an animal, like a pig eating out of a bowl. He can't be a prince. And he's as drunk as you are, like a beast, probably drinking with you. Who are you to have a prince drinking with you?"

"He's my friend," Gaston replied, leaning back in his chair, no longer trying to convince the marshals.

"Very well. Since he is your friend, perhaps you will go with him and your wife to Paris? There he will meet his relatives, and they will recognize him... or not. Your wife should also be spoken to outside this godforsaken place. I think you, as a good husband, will not leave her alone," he was silent. "You can refuse, of course, and even sic your so-called guards on us, but if you are decent honest people, don't you want to clear up all the law's claims against you? You don't want reinforcements to arrive here from Paris in a few days, do you? Think it over."

The marshals rose and went out, and Gaston remained seated in the creaky little chair. After a while Belle entered the room.

"Did it go badly too?" She asked, guessing from his face that the conversation had been unpleasant. -

"They offer to go to Paris," replied Gaston, grinning wryly."

Belle came closer to him and, sitting down on the table, began to twist a strand of hair thoughtfully on her finger.

"I've dreamed of visiting Paris someday..." she said with a slight chuckle. The situation was absurd.

"Where dreams lead..." Gaston replied in tune with her.