TWO WOMEN AND DEAD MAN.

Auckland Star, Volume LIII, Issue 95, 22 April 1922, Page 19

TWO WOMEN AND DEAD MAN.

ACCUSING FINGER IN COURT,

"sever was a tale of romantic jealousy caused by a husband's infidelity more dramatically told than in the Bordeaux Assize Court by pretty, black-haired Mme. Perron, weli known as a singer and actress on the Paris stage, who recently shot her husband, the director of a Bordeaux theatre. An Impressionable jury gave her the benefit of the "unwritten law" and acquitted her.

Mme. Perron made a love match with her husband just before the war. "I loved him so," was her most frequent Interruption as she sat with a long black widow's veil in the dock.

"We were so happy with our two little children," she said, giving evidence, "but one day my husband paid a fatal visit with his company to Dijon. There he met Mile. Guy, daughter of the director of that theatre, and fell In love with her. She used to come to our lodgings and play with my children," wept the accused woman, "and I never dreamt she was already my husband's mistress.

"When, however, we returned to our own home at Bordeaux, I learnt that Mile. Guy had followed ns and that my husband had found her an apartment lust opposite our house. She g.r. birth to a little boy.

"After a few months of this life I felt I could not stand it, and decided to visit Mile. Guy and ask her to go away and not to ruin the happiness of my home. That woman" —and Mme. Perron pointed to the figure .of Mile. Guy, who was sitting, also clad in a widow's veil, In the well of the court—"had the effrontery when my husband came into the room, there In front of my face, to go up to him and, throwing her arms around him, to kiss him.

"I was mad, and 1 hit her. I hit her again twice when I saw her walking out with my husband in the streets.

"Finally, finding that all my protests and even the scandal I made by these repeated scenes were In vain, I made one last appeal to the husband I loved. He stood at the door of my house that fatal Sunday morning. He had just come back from church with his mistress. He told mc he was going to leave mc for ever.

"He fcalled on both my children to accompany him. He was Infatuated by that woman"—and again Mme. Perron stood up, and. sweeping her black veils aside, pointed an accusing finger at Mile. Guy. who now crouched weeping.

Continuing, she said: "My children cried and begged him to stay, saying they would not leave their mother. He pushed them aside and started to walk away.

"I felt in my vanity bag and pulled out a little pistol I always carried loaded. I pressed the trigger and fired three times and my husband fell dead." There was a long pause after witness said this. "Did you mean to kill or only to wound and frighten him?" suggested her counsel. 1 With almost a shriek of passion, Mme. Perron replied: "I could not see him love another woman. I ought to have shot ber, bnt the pistol was in my hand and I fired. That is all I have to say."