The Mystery of Orcival 10 – Gaboriau · Verses Across
Literature · Detective Fiction
The Mystery of Orcival 10Chapter 10
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Literature · Detective Fiction
The Mystery of Orcival 10
Chapter 10
GaboriauEnglish
M. Plantat's house was small and narrow; a philosopher's house. Three large rooms on the ground-floor, four chambers in the first story, an attic under the roof for the servants, composed all its apartments. Everywhere the carelessness of a man who has withdrawn from the world into himself, for years, ceasing to have the least interest in the objects which surround him, was apparent. The furniture was shabby, though it had been elegant; the mouldings had come off, the clocks had ceased to keep time, the chairs showed the stuffing of their cushions, the curtains, in places, were faded by the sun. The library alone betrayed a daily care and attention.
Long rows of books in calf and gilt were ranged on the carved oaken shelves, a movable table near the fireplace contained M. Plantat's favorite books, the discreet friends of his solitude. A spacious conservatory, fitted with every accessory and convenience, was his only luxury. In it flourished one hundred and thirty-seven varieties of briars.
Two servants, the widow Petit, cook and house-keeper, and Louis, gardener, inhabited the house. If they did not make it a noisy one, it was because Plantat, who talked little, detested also to hear others talk. Silence was there a despotic law. It was very hard for Mme. Petit, especially at first. She was very talkative, so talkative that when she found no one to chat with, she went to confession; to confess was to chat. She came near leaving the place twenty times; but the thought of an assured pension restrained her. Gradually she became accustomed to govern her tongue, and to this cloistral silence. But she revenged herself outside for the privations of the household, and regained among the neighbors the time lost at home.
She was very much wrought up on the day of the murder. At eleven o'clock, after going out for news, she had prepared monsieur's dinner; but he did not appear. She waited one, two hours, five hours, keeping her water boiling for the eggs; no monsieur. She wanted to send Louis to look for him, but Louis being a poor talker and not curious, asked her to go herself. The house was besieged by the female neighbors, who, thinking that Mme. Petit ought to be well posted, came for news; no news to give.
Toward five o'clock, giving up all thought of breakfast, she began to prepare for dinner. But when the village bell struck eight o'clock, monsieur had not made his appearance. At nine, the good woman was beside herself, and began to scold Louis, who had just come in from watering the garden, and, seated at the kitchen table, was soberly eating a plate of soup.
The bell rung.
"Ah, there's monsieur, at last."
No, it was not monsieur, but a little boy, whom M. Plantat had sent from Valfeuillu to apprise Mme. Petit that he would soon return, bringing with him two guests who would dine and sleep at the house. The worthy woman nearly fainted. It was the first time that M. Plantat had invited anyone to dinner for five years. There was some mystery at the bottom of it--so thought Mme. Petit, and her anger doubled with her curiosity.
"To order a dinner at this hour," she grumbled. "Has he got common-sense, then?" But reflecting that time pressed, she continued:
"Go along, Louis; this is not the moment for two feet to stay in one shoe. Hurry up, and wring three chickens' heads; see if there ain't some ripe grapes in the conservatory; bring on some preserves; fetch some wine from the cellar!" The dinner was well advanced when the bell rung again. This time Baptiste appeared, in exceeding bad humor, bearing M. Lecoq's night-gown.
"See here," said he to the cook, "what the person, who is with your master, gave me to bring here."
"What person?"
"How do I know? He's a spy sent down from Paris about this Valfeuillu affair; not much good, probably--ill-bred--a brute--and a wretch."
"But he's not alone with monsieur?"
"No; Doctor Gendron is with them."
Mme. Petit burned to get some news out of Baptiste; but Baptiste also burned to get back and know what was taking place at his master's--so off he went, without having left any news behind.
An hour or more passed, and Mme. Petit had just angrily declared to Louis that she was going to throw the dinner out the window, when her master at last appeared, followed by his guests. They had not exchanged a word after they left the mayor's. Aside from the fatigues of the evening, they wished to reflect, and to resume their self-command. Mme. Petit found it useless to question their faces--they told her nothing. But she did not agree with Baptiste about M. Lecoq: she thought him good-humored, and rather silly. Though the party was less silent at the dinner-table, all avoided, as if by tacit consent, any allusion to the events of the day. No one would ever have thought that they had just been witnesses of, almost actors in, the Valfeuillu drama, they were so calm, and talked so glibly of indifferent things. From time to time, indeed, a question remained unanswered, or a reply came tardily; but nothing of the sensations and thoughts, which were concealed beneath the uttered commonplaces, appeared on the surface.
Louis passed to and fro behind the diners, his white cloth on his arm, carving and passing the wine. Mme. Petit brought in the dishes, and came in thrice as often as was necessary, her ears wide open, leaving the door ajar as often as she dared. Poor woman! she had prepared an excellent dinner, and nobody paid any attention to it.
M. Lecoq was fond of tit-bits; yet, when Louis placed on the table a dish of superb grapes--quite out of season--his mouth did not so much as expand into a smile. Dr. Gendron would have been puzzled to say what he had eaten. The dinner was nearly over, when M. Plantat began to be annoyed by the constraint which the presence of the servants put upon the party. He called to the cook:
"You will give us our coffee in the library, and may then retire, as well as Louis."
"But these gentlemen do not know their rooms," insisted Mme. Petit, whose eavesdropping projects were checked by this order. "They will, perhaps, need something."
"I will show them their rooms," said M. Plantat, dryly. "And if they need anything, I shall be here."
They went into the library. M. Plantat brought out a box of cigars and passed them round:
"It will be healthful to smoke a little before retiring."
M. Lecoq lit an aromatic weed, and remarked:
"You two may go to bed if you like; I am condemned, I see, to a sleepless night. But before I go to writing, I wish to ask you a few things, Monsieur Plantat."
M. Plantat bowed in token of assent.
"We must resume our conversation," continued the detective, "and compare our inferences. All our lights are not too much to throw a little daylight upon this affair, which is one of the darkest I have ever met with. The situation is dangerous, and time presses. On our acuteness depends the fate of several innocent persons, upon whom rest very serious charges. We have a theory: but Monsieur Domini also has one, and his, let us confess, is based upon material facts, while ours rests upon very disputable sensations and logic."
"We have more than sensations," responded M. Plantat.
"I agree with you," said the doctor, "but we must prove it."
"And I will prove it, parbleu," cried M. Lecoq, eagerly. "The affair is complicated and difficult--so much the better. Eh! If it were simple, I would go back to Paris instanter, and to-morrow I would send you one of my men. I leave easy riddles to infants. What I want is the inexplicable enigmas, so as to unravel it; a struggle, to show my strength; obstacles, to conquer them."
M. Plantat and the doctor looked steadily at the speaker. He was as if transfigured. It was the same yellow-haired and whiskered man, in a long overcoat: yet the voice, the physiognomy, the very features, had changed. His eyes shone with the fire of his enthusiasm, his voice was metallic and vibrating, his imperious gesture affirmed the audacity and energy of his resolution.
"If you think, my friends," pursued he, "that they don't manufacture detectives like me at so much a year, you are right. When I was twenty years old, I took service with an astronomer, as his calculator, after a long course of study. He gave me my breakfasts and seventy francs a month; by means of which I dressed well, and covered I know not how many square feet with figures daily."
M. Lecoq puffed vigorously at his cigar a moment, casting a curious glance at M. Plantat. Then he resumed:
"Well, you may imagine that I wasn't the happiest of men. I forgot to mention that I had two little vices: I loved the women, and I loved play. All are not perfect. My salary seemed too small, and while I added up my columns of figures, I was looking about for a way to make a rapid fortune. There is, indeed, but one means; to appropriate somebody else's money, shrewdly enough not to be found out. I thought about it day and night. My mind was fertile in expedients, and I formed a hundred projects, each more practicable than the others. I should frighten you if I were to tell you half of what I imagined in those days. If many thieves of my calibre existed, you'd have to blot the word 'property' out of the dictionary. Precautions, as well as safes, would be useless. Happily for men of property, criminals are idiots."
"What is he coming to?" thought the doctor.
"One day, I became afraid of my own thoughts. I had just been inventing a little arrangement by which a man could rob any banker whatever of 200,000 francs without any more danger or difficulty than I raise this cup. So I said to myself, 'Well, my boy, if this goes on a little longer, a moment will come when, from the idea, you will naturally proceed to the practice.' Having, however, been born an honest lad--a mere chance--and being determined to use the talents which nature had given me, eight days afterward I bid my astronomer good-morning, and went to the prefecture. My fear of being a burglar drove me into the police."
"And you are satisfied with the exchange?" asked Dr. Gendron.
"I' faith, Doctor, my first regret is yet to come. I am happy, because I am free to exercise my peculiar faculties with usefulness to my race. Existence has an enormous attraction for me, because I have still a passion which overrides all others--curiosity."
The detective smiled, and continued:
"There are people who have a mania for the theatre. It is like my own mania. Only, I can't understand how people can take pleasure in the wretched display of fictions, which are to real life what a tallow dip is to the sun. It seems to me monstrous that people can be interested in sentiments which, though well represented, are fictitious. What! can you laugh at the witticisms of a comedian, whom you know to be the struggling father of a family? Can you pity the sad fate of the poor actress who poisons herself, when you know that on going out you will meet her on the boulevards? It's pitiable!"
"Let's shut up the theatres," suggested Dr. Gendron.
"I am more difficult to please than the public," returned M. Lecoq. "I must have veritable comedies, or real dramas. My theatre is--society. My actors laugh honestly, or weep with genuine tears. A crime is committed--that is the prologue; I reach the scene, the first act begins. I seize at a glance the minutest shades of the scenery. Then I try to penetrate the motives, I group the characters, I link the episodes to the central fact, I bind in a bundle all the circumstances. The action soon reaches the crisis, the thread of my inductions conducts me to the guilty person; I divine him, arrest him, deliver him up. Then comes the great scene; the accused struggles, tries tricks, splits straws; but the judge, armed with the arms I have forged for him, overwhelms the wretch; he does not confess, but he is confounded. And how many secondary personages, accomplices, friends, enemies, witnesses are grouped about the principal criminal! Some are terrible, frightful, gloomy--others grotesque. And you know not what the ludicrous in the horrible is. My last scene is the court of assize. The prosecutor speaks, but it is I who furnished his ideas; his phrases are embroideries set around the canvas of my report. The president submits his questions to the jury; what emotion! The fate of my drama is being decided. The jury, perhaps, answers, 'Not guilty;' very well, my piece was bad, I am hissed. If 'Guilty,' on the contrary, the piece was good, I am applauded, and victorious. The next day I can go and see my hero, and slapping him on the shoulder, say to him, 'You have lost, old fellow, I am too much for you!'"
Was M. Lecoq in earnest now, or was he playing a part? What was the object of this autobiography? Without appearing to notice the surprise of his companions, he lit a fresh cigar; then, whether designedly or not, instead of replacing the lamp with which he lit it on the table, he put it on one corner of the mantel. Thus M. Plantat's face was in full view, while that of M. Lecoq remained in shadow.
"I ought to confess," he continued, "without false modesty, that I have rarely been hissed. Like every man I have my Achilles heel. I have conquered the demon of play, but I have not triumphed over my passion for woman."
He sighed heavily, with the resigned gesture of a man who has chosen his path. "It's this way. There is a woman, before whom I am but an idiot. Yes, I the detective, the terror of thieves and murderers, who have divulged the combinations of all the sharpers of all the nations, who for ten years have swum amid vice and crime; who wash the dirty linen of all the corruptions, who have measured the depths of human infamy; I who know all, who have seen and heard all; I, Lecoq, am before her, more simple and credulous than an infant. She deceives me--I see it--and she proves that I have seen wrongly. She lies--I know it, I prove it to her--and I believe her. It is because this is one of those passions," he added, in a low, mournful tone, "that age, far from extinguishing, only fans, and to which the consciousness of shame and powerlessness adds fire. One loves, and the certainty that he cannot be loved in return is one of those griefs which you must have felt to know its depth. In a moment of reason, one sees and judges himself; he says, no, it's impossible, she is almost a child, I almost an old man. He says this--but always, in the heart, more potent than reason, than will, than experience, a ray of hope remains, and he says to himself, 'who knows--perhaps!' He awaits, what--a miracle? There are none, nowadays. No matter, he hopes on."
M. Lecoq stopped, as if his emotion prevented his going on. M. Plantat had continued to smoke mechanically, puffing the smoke out at regular intervals; but his face seemed troubled, his glance was unsteady, his hands trembled. He got up, took the lamp from the mantel and replaced it on the table, and sat down again. The significance of this scene at last struck Dr. Gendron.
In short, M. Lecoq, without departing widely from the truth, had just attempted one of the most daring experiments of his repertoire, and he judged it useless to go further. He knew now what he wished to know. After a moment's silence, he shuddered as though awaking from a dream, and pulling out his watch, said:
"Par le Dieu! How I chat on, while time flies!"
"And Guespin is in prison," remarked the doctor.
"We will have him out," answered the detective, "if, indeed, he is innocent; for this time I have mastered the mystery, my romance, if you wish, and without any gap. There is, however, one fact of the utmost importance, that I by myself cannot explain."
"What?" asked M. Plantat.
"Is it possible that Monsieur de Tremorel had a very great interest in finding something--a deed, a letter, a paper of some sort--something of a small size, secreted in his own house?"
"Yes--that is possible," returned the justice of the peace.
"But I must know for certain."
M. Plantat reflected a moment.
"Well then," he went on, "I am sure, perfectly sure, that if Madame de Tremorel had died suddenly, the count would have ransacked the house to find a certain paper, which he knew to be in his wife's possession, and which I myself have had in my hands."
"Then," said M. Lecoq, "there's the drama complete. On reaching Valfeuillu, I, like you, was struck with the frightful disorder of the rooms. Like you, I thought at first that this disorder was the result of design. I was wrong; a more careful scrutiny has convinced me of it. The assassin, it is true, threw everything into disorder, broke the furniture, hacked the chairs in order to make us think that some furious villains had been there. But amid these acts of premeditated violence I have followed up the involuntary traces of an exact, minute, and I may say patient search. Everything seemed turned topsy-turvy by chance; articles were broken open with the hatchet, which might have been opened with the hands; drawers had been forced which were not shut, and the keys of which were in the locks. Was this folly? No. For really no corner or crevice where a letter might be hid has been neglected. The table and bureau-drawers had been thrown here and there, but the narrow spaces between the drawers had been examined--I saw proofs of it, for I found the imprints of fingers on the dust which lay in these spaces. The books had been thrown pell-mell upon the floor, but every one of them had been handled, and some of them with such violence that the bindings were torn off. We found the mantel-shelves in their places, but every one had been lifted up. The chairs were not hacked with a sword, for the mere purpose of ripping the cloth--the seats were thus examined. My conviction of the certainty that there had been a most desperate search, at first roused my suspicions. I said to myself, 'The villains have been looking for the money which was concealed; therefore they did not belong to the household.'"
"But," observed the doctor, "they might belong to the house, and yet not know the money was hidden; for Guespin--"
"Permit me," interrupted M. Lecoq, "I will explain myself. On the other hand, I found indications that the assassin must have been closely connected with Madame de Tremorel--her lover, or her husband. These were the ideas that then struck me."
"And now?"
"Now," responded the detective, "with the certainty that something besides booty might have been the object of the search, I am not far from thinking that the guilty man is he whose body is being searched for--the Count Hector de Tremorel."
M. Plantat and Dr. Gendron had divined the name; but neither had as yet dared to utter his suspicions. They awaited this name of Tremorel; and yet, pronounced as it was in the middle of the night, in this great sombre room, by this at least strange personage, it made them shudder with an indescribable fright.
"Observe," resumed M. Lecoq, "what I say; I believe it to be so. In my eyes, the count's guilt is only as yet extremely probable. Let us see if we three can reach the certainty of it. You see, gentlemen, the inquest of a crime is nothing more nor less than the solution of a problem. Given the crime, proved, patent, you commence by seeking out all the circumstances, whether serious or superficial; the details and the particulars. When these have been carefully gathered, you classify them, and put them in their order and date. You thus know the victim, the crime, and the circumstances; it remains to find the third term of the problem, that is, x, the unknown quantity--the guilty party. The task is a difficult one, but not so difficult as is imagined. The object is to find a man whose guilt explains all the circumstances, all the details found--all, understand me. Find such a man, and it is probable--and in nine cases out of ten, the probability becomes a reality--that you hold the perpetrator of the crime."
So clear had been M. Lecoq's exposition, so logical his argument, that his hearers could not repress an admiring exclamation:
"Very good! Very good!"
"Let us then examine together if the assumed guilt of the Count de Tremorel explains all the circumstances of the crime at Valfeuillu."
He was about to continue when Dr. Gendron, who sat near the window, rose abruptly.
"There is someone in the garden," said he.
All approached the window. The weather was glorious, the night very clear, and a large open space lay before the library window; they looked out, but saw no one.
"You are mistaken, Doctor," said Plantat, resuming his arm-chair.
M. Lecoq continued:
"Now let us suppose that, under the influence of certain events that we will examine presently, Monsieur de Tremorel had made up his mind to get rid of his wife. The crime once resolved upon, it was clear that the count must have reflected, and sought out the means of committing it with impunity; he must have weighed the circumstances, and estimated the perils of his act. Let us admit, also, that the events which led him to this extremity were such that he feared to be disturbed, and that he also feared that a search would be made for certain things, even should his wife die a natural death."
"That is true," said M. Plantat, nodding his head.
"Monsieur de Tremorel, then, determined to kill his wife, brutally, with a knife, with the idea of so arranging everything, as to make it believed that he too had been assassinated; and he also decided to endeavor to thrust suspicion on an innocent person, or at least, an accomplice infinitely less guilty than he.
"He made up his mind in advance, in adopting this course, to disappear, fly, conceal himself, change his personality; to suppress, in short, Count Hector de Tremorel, and make for himself, under another name, a new position and identity. These hypotheses, easily admitted, suffice to explain the whole series of otherwise inconsistent circumstances. They explain to us in the first place, how it was that on the very night of the murder, there was a large fortune in ready money at Valfeuillu; and this seems to me decisive. Why, when a man receives sums like this, which he proposes to keep by him, he conceals the fact as carefully as possible. Monsieur de Tremorel had not this common prudence. He shows his bundles of bank-notes freely, handles them, parades them; the servants see them, almost touch them. He wants everybody to know and repeat that there is a large sum in the house, easy to take, carry off, and conceal. And what time of all times, does he choose for this display? Exactly the moment when he knows, and everyone in the neighborhood knows, that he is going to pass the night at the chateau, alone with Madame de Tremorel.
"For he is aware that all his servants are invited, on the evening of July 8th to the wedding of the former cook. So well aware of it is he, that he defrays the wedding expenses, and himself names the day. You will perhaps say that it was by chance that this money was sent to Valfeuillu on the very night of the crime. At the worst that might be admitted. But believe me, there was no chance about it, and I will prove it. We will go to-morrow to the count's banker, and will inquire whether the count did not ask him, by letter or verbally, to send him these funds precisely on July 8th. Well, if he says yes, if he shows us such a letter, or if he declares that the money was called for in person, you will confess, no doubt, that I have more than a probability in favor of my theory."
Both his hearers bowed in token of assent.
"So far, then, there is no objection."
"Not the least," said M. Plantat.
"My conjectures have also the advantage of shedding light on Guespin's position. Honestly, his appearance is against him, and justifies his arrest. Was he an accomplice or entirely innocent? We certainly cannot yet decide. But it is a fact that he has fallen into an admirably well-laid trap. The count, in selecting him for his victim, took all care that every doubt possible should weigh upon him. I would wager that Monsieur de Tremorel, who knew this fellow's history, thought that his antecedents would add probability to the suspicions against him, and would weigh with a terrible weight in the scales of justice. Perhaps, too, he said to himself that Guespin would be sure to prove his innocence in the end, and he only wished to gain time to elude the first search. It is impossible that we can be deceived. We know that the countess died of the first blow, as if thunderstruck. She did not struggle; therefore she could not have torn a piece of cloth off the assassin's vest. If you admit Guespin's guilt, you admit that he was idiot enough to put a piece of his vest in his victim's hand; you admit that he was such a fool as to go and throw this torn and bloody vest into the Seine, from a bridge, in a place where he might know search would be made--and all this, without taking the common precaution of attaching it to a stone to carry it to the bottom. That would be absurd.
"To me, then, this piece of cloth, this smeared vest, indicate at once Guespin's innocence and the count's guilt."
"But," objected Dr. Gendron, "if Guespin is innocent, why don't he talk? Why don't he prove an alibi? How was it he had his purse full of money?"
"Observe," resumed the detective, "that I don't say he is innocent; we are still among the probabilities. Can't you suppose that the count, perfidious enough to set a trap for his servant, was shrewd enough to deprive him of every means of proving an alibi?"
"But you yourself deny the count's shrewdness."
"I beg your pardon; please hear me. The count's plan was excellent, and shows a superior kind of perversity; the execution alone was defective. This is because the plan was conceived and perfected in safety, while when the crime had been committed, the murderer, distressed, frightened at his danger, lost his coolness and only half executed his project. But there are other suppositions. It might be asked whether, while Madame de Tremorel was being murdered, Guespin might not have been committing some other crime elsewhere."
This conjecture seemed so improbable to the doctor that he could not avoid objecting to it. "Oh!" muttered he.
"Don't forget," replied Lecoq, "that the field of conjectures has no bounds. Imagine whatever complication of events you may, I am ready to maintain that such a complication has occurred or will present itself. Lieuben, a German lunatic, bet that he would succeed in turning up a pack of cards in the order stated in the written agreement. He turned and turned ten hours per day for twenty years. He had repeated the operation 4,246,028 times, when he succeeded."
M. Lecoq was about to proceed with another illustration, when M. Plantat interrupted him by a gesture.
"I admit your hypotheses; I think they are more than probable--they are true."
M. Lecoq, as he spoke, paced up and down between the window and the book-shelves, stopping at emphatic words, like a general who dictates to his aides the plan of the morrow's battle. To his auditors, he seemed a new man, with serious features, an eye bright with intelligence, his sentences clear and concise--the Lecoq, in short, which the magistrates who have employed his talents, would recognize.
"Now," he resumed, "hear me. It is ten o'clock at night. No noise without, the road deserted, the village lights extinguished, the chateau servants away at Paris. The count and countess are alone at Valfeuillu.
"They have gone to their bedroom.
"The countess has seated herself at the table where tea has been served. The count, as he talks with her, paces up and down the chamber.
"Madame de Tremorel has no ill presentiment; her husband, the past few days, has been more amiable, more attentive than ever. She mistrusts nothing, and so the count can approach her from behind, without her thinking of turning her head.
"When she hears him coming up softly, she imagines that he is going to surprise her with a kiss. He, meanwhile, armed with a long dagger, stands beside his wife. He knows where to strike that the wound may be mortal. He chooses the place at a glance; takes aim; strikes a terrible blow--so terrible that the handle of the dagger imprints itself on both sides of the wound. The countess falls without a sound, bruising her forehead on the edge of the table, which is overturned. Is not the position of the terrible wound below the left shoulder thus explained--a wound almost vertical, its direction being from right to left?"
The doctor made a motion of assent.
"And who, besides a woman's lover or her husband is admitted to her chamber, or can approach her when she is seated without her turning round?"
"That's clear," muttered M. Plantat.
"The countess is now dead," pursued M. Lecoq. "The assassin's first emotion is one of triumph. He is at last rid of her who was his wife, whom he hated enough to murder her, and to change his happy, splendid, envied existence for a frightful life, henceforth without country, friend, or refuge, proscribed by all nations, tracked by all the police, punishable by the laws of all the world! His second thought is of this letter or paper, this object of small size which he knows to be in his wife's keeping, which he has demanded a hundred times, which she would not give up to him, and which he must have."
"Add," interrupted M. Plantat, "that this paper was one of the motives of the crime."
"The count thinks he knows where it is. He imagines that he can put his hand on it at once. He is mistaken. He looks into all the drawers and bureaus used by his wife--and finds nothing. He searches every corner, he lifts up the shelves, overturns everything in the chamber--nothing. An idea strikes him. Is this letter under the mantel-shelf? By a turn of the arm he lifts it--down the clock tumbles and stops. It is not yet half-past ten."
"Yes," murmured the doctor, "the clock betrays that."
"The count finds nothing under the mantel-shelf except the dust, which has retained traces of his fingers. Then he begins to be anxious. Where can this paper be, for which he has risked his life? He grows angry. How search the locked drawers? The keys are on the carpet--I found them among the debris of the tea service--but he does not see them. He must have some implement with which to break open everything. He goes downstairs for a hatchet. The drunkenness of blood and vengeance is dissipated on the staircase; his terrors begin. All the dark corners are peopled, now, with those spectres which form the cortege of assassins; he is frightened, and hurries on. He soon goes up again, armed with a large hatchet--that found on the second story--and makes the pieces of wood fly about him. He goes about like a maniac, rips up the furniture at hazard; but he pursues a desperate search, the traces of which I have followed, among the debris. Nothing, always nothing! Everything in the room is topsy-turvy; he goes into his cabinet and continues the destruction; the hatchet rises and falls without rest. He breaks his own bureau, since he may find something concealed there of which he is ignorant. This bureau belonged to the first husband--to Sauvresy. He takes out all the books in the library, one by one, shakes them furiously, and throws them about the floor. The infernal paper is undiscoverable. His distress is now too great for him to pursue the search with the least method. His wandering reason no longer guides him. He staggers, without calculation, from one thing to another, fumbling a dozen times in the same drawer, while he completely forgets others just by him. Then he thinks that this paper may have been hid in the stuffing of a chair. He seizes a sword, and to be certain, he slashes up the drawing-room chairs and sofas and those in the other rooms."
M. Lecoq's voice, accent, gestures, gave a vivid character to his recital. The hearer might imagine that he saw the crime committed, and was present at the terrible scenes which he described. His companions held their breath, unwilling by a movement to distract his attention.
"At this moment," pursued he, "the count's rage and terror were at their height. He had said to himself, when he planned the murder, that he would kill his wife, get possession of the letter, execute his plan quickly, and fly. And now all his projects were baffled! How much time was being lost, when each minute diminished the chances of escape! Then the probability of a thousand dangers which had not occurred to him, entered his mind. What if some friend should suddenly arrive, expecting his hospitality, as had occurred twenty times? What if a passer-by on the road should notice a light flying from room to room? Might not one of the servants return? When he is in the drawing-room, he thinks he hears someone ring at the gate; such is his terror, that he lets his candle fall--for I have found the marks of it on the carpet. He hears strange noises, such as never before assailed his ears; he thinks he hears walking in the next room; the floor creaks. Is his wife really dead; will she not suddenly rise up, run to the window, and scream for help? Beset by these terrors, he returns to the bedroom, seizes his dagger, and again strikes the poor countess. But his hand is so unsteady that the wounds are light. You have observed, doctor, that all these wounds take the same direction. They form right angles with the body, proving that the victim was lying down when they were inflicted. Then, in the excess of his frenzy, he strikes the body with his feet, and his heels form the contusions discovered by the autopsy."
M. Lecoq paused to take breath. He not only narrated the drama, he acted it, adding gesture to word; and each of his phrases made a scene, explained a fact, and dissipated a doubt. Like all true artists who wrap themselves up in the character they represent, the detective really felt something of the sensations which he interpreted, and his expressive face was terrible in its contortions.
"That," he resumed, "is the first act of the drama. An irresistible prostration succeeds the count's furious passion. The various circumstances which I am describing to you are to be noticed in nearly all great crimes. The assassin is always seized, after the murder, with a horrible and singular hatred against his victim, and he often mutilates the body. Then comes the period of a prostration so great, of torpor so irresistible, that murderers have been known literally to go to sleep in the blood, that they have been surprised sleeping, and that it was with great difficulty that they were awakened. The count, when he has frightfully disfigured the poor lady, falls into an arm-chair; indeed, the cloth of one of the chairs has retained some wrinkles, which shows that someone had sat in it. What are then the count's thoughts? He reflects on the long hours which have elapsed, upon the few hours which remain to him. He reflects that he has found nothing; that he will hardly have time, before day, to execute his plans for turning suspicion from him, and assure his safety, by creating an impression that he, too, has been murdered. And he must fly at once--fly, without that accursed paper. He summons up his energies, rises, and do you know what he does? He seizes a pair of scissors and cuts off his long, carefully cultivated beard."
"Ah!" interrupted M. Plantat, "that's why you examined the portrait so closely."
M. Lecoq was too intent on following the thread of his deductions to note the interruption.
"This is one of those vulgar details," pursued he, "whose very insignificance makes them terrible, when they are attended by certain circumstances. Now imagine the Count de Tremorel, pale, covered with his wife's blood, shaving himself before his glass; rubbing the soap over his face, in that room all topsy-turvy, while three steps off lies the still warm and palpitating body! It was an act of terrible courage, believe me, to look at himself in the glass after a murder--one of which few criminals are capable. The count's hands, however, trembled so violently that he could scarcely hold his razor, and his face must have been cut several times."
"What!" said Dr. Gendron, "do you imagine that the count spared the time to shave?"
"I am positively sure of it, pos-i-tive-ly. A towel on which I have found one of those marks which a razor leaves when it is wiped--and one only--has put me on the track of this fact. I looked about, and found a box of razors, one of which had recently been used, for it was still moist; and I have carefully preserved both the towel and the box. And if these proofs are not enough, I will send to Paris for two of my men, who will find, somewhere in the house or the garden, both the count's beard and the cloth with which he wiped his razor. As to the fact which surprises you, Doctor, it seems to me very natural; more, it is the necessary result of the plan he adopted. Monsieur de Tremorel has always worn his full beard: he cuts it off, and his appearance is so entirely altered, that if he met anyone in his flight, he would not be recognized."
The doctor was apparently convinced, for he cried:
"It's clear--it's evident,"
"Once thus disguised, the count hastens to carry out the rest of his plan, to arrange everything to throw the law off the scent, and to make it appear that he, as well as his wife, has been murdered. He hunts up Guespin's vest, tears it out at the pocket, and puts a piece of it in the countess's hand. Then taking the body in his arms, crosswise, he goes downstairs. The wounds bleed frightfully--hence the numerous stains discovered all along his path. Reaching the foot of the staircase he is obliged to put the countess down, in order to open the garden-door. This explains the large stain in the vestibule. The count, having opened the door, returns for the body and carries it in his arms as far as the edge of the lawn; there he stops carrying it, and drags it by the shoulders, walking backward, trying thus to create the impression that his own body has been dragged across there and thrown into the Seine. But the wretch forgot two things which betray him to us. He did not reflect that the countess's skirts, in being dragged along the grass, pressing it down and breaking it for a considerable space, spoiled his trick. Nor did he think that her elegant and well-curved feet, encased in small high-heeled boots, would mould themselves in the damp earth of the lawn, and thus leave against him a proof clearer than the day."
M. Plantat rose abruptly.
"Ah," said he, "you said nothing of this before."
"Nor of several other things, either. But I was before ignorant of some facts which I now know; and as I had reason to suppose that you were better informed than I, I was not sorry to avenge myself for a caution which seemed to me mysterious."
"Well, you are avenged," remarked the doctor, smiling.
"On the other side of the lawn," continued M. Lecoq, "the count again took up the countess's body. But forgetting the effect of water when it spirts, or--who knows?--disliking to soil himself, instead of throwing her violently in the river, he put her down softly, with great precaution. That's not all. He wished it to appear that there had been a terrible struggle. What does he do? Stirs up the sand with the end of his foot. And he thinks that will deceive the police!"
"Having got rid of the body, the count returns to the house. Time presses, but he is still anxious to find the paper. He hastens to take the last measures to assure his safety. He smears his slippers and handkerchief with blood. He throws his handkerchief and one of his slippers on the sward, and the other slipper into the river. His haste explains the incomplete execution of his manoeuvres. He hurries--and commits blunder after blunder. He does not reflect that his valet will explain about the empty bottles which he puts on the table. He thinks he is turning wine into the five glasses--it is vinegar, which will prove that no one has drunk out of them. He ascends, puts forward the hands of the clock, but forgets to put the hands and the striking bell in harmony. He rumples up the bed, but he does it awkwardly--and it is impossible to reconcile these three facts, the bed crumpled, the clock showing twenty minutes past three, and the countess dressed as if it were mid-day. He adds as much as he can to the disorder of the room. He smears a sheet with blood; also the bed-curtains and furniture. Then he marks the door with the imprint of a bloody hand, too distinct and precise not to be done designedly. Is there so far a circumstance or detail of the crime, which does not explain the count's guilt?"
"There's the hatchet," answered M. Plantat, "found on the second story, the position of which seemed so strange to you."
"I am coming to that. There is one point in this mysterious affair, which, thanks to you, is now clear. We know that Madame de Tremorel, known to her husband, possessed and concealed a paper or a letter, which he wanted, and which she obstinately refused to give up in spite of all his entreaties. You have told us that the anxiety--perhaps the necessity--to have this paper, was a powerful motive of the crime. We will not be rash then in supposing that the importance of this paper was immense--entirely beyond an ordinary affair. It must have been, somehow, very damaging to one or the other. To whom? To both, or only the count? Here I am reduced to conjectures. It is certain that it was a menace--capable of being executed at any moment--suspended over the head of him or them concerned by it. Madame de Tremorel surely regarded this paper either as a security, or as a terrible arm which put her husband at her mercy. It was surely to deliver himself from this perpetual menace that the count killed his wife."
The logic was so clear, the last words brought the evidence out so lucidly and forcibly, that his hearers were struck with admiration. They both cried:
"Very good!"
"Now," resumed M. Lecoq, "from the various elements which have served to form our conviction, we must conclude that the contents of this letter, if it can be found, will clear away our last doubts, will explain the crime, and will render the assassin's precautions wholly useless. The count, therefore, must do everything in the world, must attempt the impossible, not to leave this danger behind him. His preparations for flight ended, Hector, in spite of his deadly peril, of the speeding time, of the coming day, instead of flying recommences with more desperation than ever his useless search. Again he goes through all the furniture, the books, the papers--in vain. Then he determines to search the second story, and armed with his hatchet, goes up to it. He has already attacked a bureau, when he hears a cry in the garden. He runs to the window--what does he see? Philippe and old Bertaud are standing on the river-bank under the willows, near the corpse. Can you imagine his immense terror? Now, there's not a second to lose--he has already delayed too long. The danger is near, terrible. Daylight has come, the crime is discovered, they are coming, he sees himself lost beyond hope. He must fly, fly at once, at the peril of being seen, met, arrested. He throws the hatchet down violently--it cuts the floor. He rushes down, slips the bank-notes in his pocket, seizes Guespin's torn and smeared vest, which he will throw into the river from the bridge, and saves himself by the garden. Forgetting all caution, confused, beside himself, covered with blood, he runs, clears the ditch, and it is he whom old Bertaud sees making for the forest of Mauprevoir, where he intends to arrange the disorder of his clothes. For the moment he is safe. But he leaves behind him this letter, which is, believe me, a formidable witness, which will enlighten justice and will betray his guilt and the perfidy of his projects. For he has not found it, but we will find it; it is necessary for us to have it to defeat Monsieur Domini, and to change our doubts into certainty."
