A Servant of Satan: Romantic Career of Prado the Assassin — page 18: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

10 A SERVANT OF SATAN. face resumed traces of its former appearance. Day after — day I sat in court and listened to the evidence against him. The impression which the latter left on my mind was that, however guilty he undoubtedly had been of other crimes— possibly even of murder—he was, nevertheless, innocent of the death of Marie Aguetant, the charge on which he was executed. ‘The crime was too brutal and too coarse in its method to have been perpetrated by his hand. Moreover, the evidence against him in the matter was not direct, but only circumstantial. Neither the jewelry nor the bonds which he was alleged to have stolen from the murdered woman have ever been discovered. Neither has the weapon with which the deed was committed been found, and the only evidence against him was that of two women, both of loose morals, and both of whom considered themselves to have been betrayed by him. The one, Eugenie Forrestier, — a well-known femme galante, saw in the trial a means of advertising her charms, which she has succeeded in doing in a most profitable manner. The other, Mauricette Cou- rouneau, the mother of his child, had fallen in love with a young German and was under promise to marry him as soon as ever the trial was completed, and ‘‘ Prado’s head had rolled into the basket of Monsieur de Paris.” Shortly after the sentence had been pronounced upon the man whom I had known as ‘‘Comte Linska de Castillon ” I visited him in his prison, and subsequently at his request called several times again to see him. He seemed very calm and collected. Death apparently had no terrors for him, and on one occasion he recalled the curious coincidence _ that our first meeting had been on our way home from the execution of the regicide Otero. The only thing which he seemed to dread was that his aged father—his one and solitary affection in the world—should learn of his disgrace. In answer to my repeated inquiries as to who his father was he invariably put me off with asmile, exclaiming, ‘‘ Demain, ——— comicbooks.com —