which, as you know, I entered. I found there under their bed, some springs and brass wire. ‘Ah!’ I thought, ‘these things explain why they were out in the park at night!’ I was not surprised at the dogged silence they maintained before the examining magistrate, even under the accusation so grave as that of being accomplices in the crime. Poaching would save them from the Assize Court, but it would lose them their places; and, as they were perfectly sure of their innocence of the crime they hoped it would soon be established, and then their poaching might go on as usual. They could always confess later. I, however, hastened their confession by means of the document Monsieur Stangerson signed. They gave all the necessary ‘proofs,’ were set at liberty, and have now a lively gratitude for me. Why did I not get them released sooner? Because I was not sure that nothing more than poaching was against them. I wanted to study the ground. As the days went by, my conviction became more and more certain. The day after the events of the inexplicable gallery I had need of help I could rely on, so I resolved to have them released at once.”
That was how Joseph Rouletabille explained himself. Once more I could not but be astonished at the simplicity of the reasoning which had brought him to the truth of the matter. Certainly this was no big thing; but I think, myself, that the young man will, one of these days, explain with the same simplicity, the fearful tragedy in The Yellow Room as well as the phenomenon of the inexplicable gallery.
We reached the Donjon Inn and entered it.
This time we did not see the landlord, but were received with a pleasant smile by the hostess. I have already described the room in which we found ourselves, and I have given a glimpse of the charming blonde woman with the gentle eyes who now immediately began to prepare our breakfast.
“How’s Daddy Mathieu?” asked Rouletabille.
“Not much better–not much better; he is still confined to his bed.”
“His rheumatism still sticks to him, then?”
“Yes. Last night I was again obliged to give him morphine–the only drug that gives him any relief.”
She spoke in a soft voice. Everything about her expressed gentleness. She was, indeed, a beautiful woman; somewhat with an air of indolence, with great eyes seemingly black and blue–amorous eyes. Was she happy with her crabbed, rheumatic husband? The scene at which we had once been present did not lead us to believe that she was; yet there was something in her bearing that was not suggestive of despair. She disappeared into the kitchen to prepare our repast, leaving on the table a bottle of excellent cider. Rouletabille filled our earthenware mugs, loaded his pipe, and quietly explained to me his reason for asking me to come to the Glandier with revolvers.
“Yes,” he said, contemplatively looking at the clouds of smoke he was puffing out, “yes, my dear boy, I expect the assassin to-night.” A brief silence followed, which I took care not to interrupt, and then he went on:
“Last night, just as I was going to bed, Monsieur Robert Darzac knocked at my room. When he came in he confided to me that he was compelled to go to Paris the next day, that is, this morning. The reason which made this journey necessary was at once peremptory and mysterious; it was not possible for him to explain its object to me. ‘I go, and yet,’ he added, ‘I would give my life not to leave Mademoiselle Stangerson at this moment.’ He did not try to hide that he believed her to be once more in danger. ‘It will not greatly astonish me if something happens to-morrow night,’ he avowed, ‘and yet I must be absent. I cannot be back at the Glandier before the morning of the day after to-morrow.’
“I asked him to explain himself, and this is all he would tell me. His anticipation of coming danger had come to him solely from the coincidence that Mademoiselle Stangerson had been twice attacked, and both times when he had been absent. On the night of the incident of the inexplicable gallery he had been obliged to be away from the Glandier. On the night of the tragedy in The Yellow Room he had also not been able to be at the Glandier, though this was the first time he had declared himself on the matter. Now a man so moved who would still go away must be acting under compulsion–must be obeying a will stronger than his own. That was how I reasoned, and I told him so. He replied ‘Perhaps.’–I asked him if Mademoiselle Stangerson was compelling him. He protested that she was not. His determination to go to Paris had been taken without any conference with Mademoiselle Stangerson.
“To cut the story short, he repeated that his belief in the possibility of a fresh attack was founded entirely on the extraordinary coincidence. ‘If anything happens to Mademoiselle Stangerson,’ he said, ‘it would be terrible for both of us. For her, because her life would be in danger; for me because I could neither defend her from the attack nor tell of where I had been. I am perfectly aware of the suspicions cast on me. The examining magistrate and Monsieur Larsan are both on the point of believing in my guilt. Larsan tracked me the last time I went to Paris, and I had all the trouble in the world to get rid of him.’
“‘Why do you not tell me the name of the murderer now, if you know it?’ I cried.
“Monsieur Darzac appeared extremely troubled by my question, and replied to me in a hesitating tone:
“‘I?–I know the name of the murderer? Why, how could I know his name?’
“I at once replied: ‘From Mademoiselle Stangerson.’
“He grew so pale that I thought he was about to faint, and I saw that I had hit the nail right on the head. Mademoiselle and he knew the name of the murderer! When he recovered himself, he said to me: ‘I am going to leave you. Since you have been here I have appreciated your exceptional intelligence and your unequalled ingenuity. But I ask this service of you. Perhaps I am wrong to fear an attack during the coming night; but, as I must act with foresight, I count on you to frustrate any attempt that may be made. Take every step needful to protect Mademoiselle Stangerson. Keep a most careful watch of her room. Don’t go to sleep, nor allow yourself one moment of repose. The man we dread is remarkably cunning–with a cunning that has never been equalled. If you keep watch his very cunning may save her; because it’s impossible that he should not know that you are watching; and knowing it, he may not venture.’
“‘Have you spoken of all this to Monsieur Stangerson?’
“‘No. I do not wish him to ask me, as you just now did, for the name of the murderer. I tell you all this, Monsieur Rouletabille, because I have great, very great, confidence in you. I know that you do not suspect me.’
“The poor man spoke in jerks. He was evidently suffering. I pitied him, the more because I felt sure that he would rather allow himself to be killed than tell me who the murderer was. As for Mademoiselle Stangerson, I felt that she would rather allow herself to be murdered than denounce the man of The Yellow Room and of the inexplicable gallery. The man must be dominating her, or both, by some inscrutable power. They were dreading nothing so much as the chance of Monsieur Stangerson knowing that his daughter was ‘held’ by her assailant. I made Monsieur Darzac understand that he had explained himself sufficiently, and that he might refrain from telling me any more than he had already told me. I promised him to watch through the night. He insisted that I should establish an absolutely impassable barrier around Mademoiselle Stangerson’s chamber, around the boudoir where the nurses were sleeping, and around the drawing-room where, since the affair of the inexplicable gallery, Monsieur Stangerson had slept. In short, I was to put a cordon round the whole apartment.
“From his insistence I gathered that Monsieur Darzac intended not only to make it impossible for the expected man to reach the chamber of Mademoiselle Stangerson, but to make that impossibility so visibly clear that, seeing himself expected, he would at once go away. That was how I interpreted his final words when we parted: ‘You may mention your suspicions of the expected attack to Monsieur Stangerson, to Daddy Jacques, to Frederic Larsan, and to anybody in the chateau.’
“The poor fellow left me hardly knowing what he was saying. My silence and my eyes told him that I had guessed a large part of his secret. And, indeed, he must have been at his wits’ end, to have come to me at such a time, and to abandon Mademoiselle Stangerson in spite of his fixed idea as to the consequence.
“When he was gone, I began to think that I should have to use even a greater cunning than his so that if the man should come that night, he might not for a moment suspect that his coming had been expected. Certainly! I would allow him to get in far enough, so that, dead or alive, I might see his face clearly! He must be got rid of. Mademoiselle Stangerson must be freed from this continual impending danger.
“Yes, my boy,” said Rouletabille, after placing his pipe on the table, and emptying his mug of cider, “I must see his face distinctly, so as to make sure to impress it on that part of my brain where I have drawn my circle of reasoning.”
The landlady re-appeared at that moment, bringing in the traditional bacon omelette. Rouletabille chaffed her a little, and she took the chaff with the most charming good humour.
“She is much jollier when Daddy Mathieu is in bed with his rheumatism,” Rouletabille said to me.
But I had eyes neither for Rouletabille nor for the landlady’s smiles. I was entirely absorbed over the last words of my young friend and in thinking over Monsieur Robert Darzac’s strange behaviour.
When he had finished his omelette and we were again alone, Rouletabille continued the tale of his confidences.
“When I sent you my telegram this morning,” he said, “I had only the word of Monsieur Darzac, that ‘perhaps’ the assassin would come to-night. I can now say that he will certainly come. I expect him.”
“What has made you feel this certainty?”
“I have been sure since half-past ten o’clock this morning that he would come. I knew that before we saw Arthur Rance at the window in the court.”
“Ah!” I said, “But, again–what made you so sure? And why since half-past ten this morning?”
“Because, at half-past ten, I had proof that Mademoiselle Stangerson was making as many efforts to permit of the murderer’s entrance as Monsieur Robert Darzac had taken precautions against it.”
“Is that possible!” I cried. “Haven’t you told me that Mademoiselle Stangerson loves Monsieur Robert Darzac?”
“I told you so because it is the truth.”
“Then do you see nothing strange–“
“Everything in this business is strange, my friend; but take my word for it, the strangeness you now feel is nothing to the strangeness that’s to come!”
“It must be admitted, then,” I said, “that Mademoiselle Stangerson and her murderer are in communication–at any rate in writing?”
“Admit it, my friend, admit it! You don’t risk anything! I told you about the letter left on her table, on the night of the inexplicable gallery affair,–the letter that disappeared into the pocket of Mademoiselle Stangerson. Why should it not have been a summons to a meeting? Might he not, as soon as he was sure of Darzac’s absence, appoint the meeting for ‘the coming night?”
And my friend laughed silently. There are moments when I ask myself if he is not laughing at me.
The door of the inn opened. Rouletabille was on his feet so suddenly that one might have thought he had received an electric shock.
“Mr. Arthur Rance!” he cried.
Mr. Arthur Rance stood before us calmly bowing.
CHAPTER XX
An Act of Mademoiselle Stangerson
“You remember me, Monsieur?” asked Rouletabille.
“Perfectly!” replied Arthur Rance. “I recognise you as the lad at the bar. [The face of Rouletabille crimsoned at being called a “lad.”] I want to shake hands with you. You are a bright little fellow.”
The American extended his hand and Rouletabille, relaxing his frown, shook it and introduced Mr. Arthur Rance to me. He invited him to share our meal.
“No thanks. I breakfasted with Monsieur Stangerson.”
Arthur Rance spoke French perfectly,–almost without an accent.
“I did not expect to have the pleasure of seeing you again, Monsieur. I thought you were to have left France the day after the reception at the Elysee.”
Rouletabille and I, outwardly indifferent, listened most intently for every word the American would say.
The man’s purplish red face, his heavy eyelids, the nervous twitchings, all spoke of his addiction to drink. How came it that so sorry a specimen of a man should be so intimate with Monsieur Stangerson?
Some days later, I learned from Frederic Larsan–who, like ourselves, was surprised and mystified by his appearance and reception at the chateau–that Mr. Rance had been an inebriate for only about fifteen years; that is to say, since the professor and his daughter left Philadelphia. During the time the Stangersons lived in America they were very intimate with Arthur Rance, who was one of the most distinguished phrenologists of the new world. Owing to new experiments, he had made enormous strides beyond the science of Gall and Lavater. The friendliness with which he was received at the Glandier may be explained by the fact that he had once rendered Mademoiselle Stangerson a great service by stopping, at the peril of his own life, the runaway horses of her carriage. The immediate result of that could, however, have been no more than a mere friendly association with the Stangersons; certainly, not a love affair.
Frederic Larsan did not tell me where he had picked up this information; but he appeared to be quite sure of what he said.
Had we known these facts at the time Arthur Rance met us at the Donjon Inn, his presence at the chateau might not have puzzled us, but they could not have failed to increase our interest in the man himself. The American must have been at least forty-five years old. He spoke in a perfectly natural tone in reply to Rouletabille’s question.
“I put off my return to America when I heard of the attack on Mademoiselle Stangerson. I wanted to be certain the lady had not been killed, and I shall not go away until she is perfectly recovered.”
Arthur Rance then took the lead in talk, paying no heed to some of Rouletabille’s questions. He gave us, without our inviting him, his personal views on the subject of the tragedy,–views which, as well as I could make out, were not far from those held by Frederic Larzan. The American also thought that Robert Darzac had something to do with the matter. He did not mention him by name, but there was no room to doubt whom he meant. He told us he was aware of the efforts young Rouletabille was making to unravel the tangled skein of The Yellow Room mystery. He explained that Monsieur Stangerson had related to him all that had taken place in the inexplicable gallery. He several times expressed his regret at Monsieur Darzac’s absence from the chateau on all these occasions, and thought that Monsieur Darzac had done cleverly in allying himself with Monsieur Joseph Rouletabille, who could not fail, sooner or later, to discover the murderer. He spoke the last sentence with unconcealed irony. Then he rose, bowed to us, and left the inn.
Rouletabille watched him through the window.
“An odd fish, that!” he said.
“Do you think he’ll pass the night at the Glandier?” I asked.
To my amazement the young reporter answered that it was a matter of entire indifference to him whether he did or not.
As to how we spent our time during the afternoon, all I need say is that Rouletabille led me to the grotto of Sainte-Genevieve, and, all the time, talked of every subject but the one in which we were most interested. Towards evening I was surprised to find Rouletabille making none of the preparations I had expected him to make. I spoke to him about it when night had come on, and we were once more in his room. He replied that all his arrangements had already been made, and this time the murderer would not get away from him.
I expressed some doubt on this, reminding him of his disappearance in the gallery, and suggested that the same phenomenon might occur again. He answered that he hoped it would. He desired nothing more. I did not insist, knowing by experience how useless that would have been. He told me that, with the help of the concierges, the chateau had since early dawn been watched in such a way that nobody could approach it without his knowing it, and that he had no concern for those who might have left it and remained without.
It was then six o’clock by his watch. Rising, he made a sign to me to follow him, and, without in the least tying to conceal his movements or the sound of his footsteps, he led me through the gallery. We reached the ‘right’ gallery and came to the landing-place which we crossed. We then continued our way in the gallery of the left wing, passing Professor Stangerson’s apartment.
At the far end of the gallery, before coming to the donjon, is the room occupied by Arthur Rance. We knew that, because we had seen him at the window looking on to the court. The door of the room opens on to the end of the gallery, exactly facing the east window, at the extremity of the ‘right’ gallery, where Rouletabille had placed Daddy Jacques, and commands an uninterrupted view of the gallery from end to end of the chateau.
“That ‘off-turning’ gallery,” said Rouletabille, “I reserve for myself; when I tell you you’ll come and take your place here.”
And he made me enter a little dark, triangular closet built in a bend of the wall, to the left of the door of Arthur Rance’s room. From this recess I could see all that occurred in the gallery as well as if I had been standing in front of Arthur Rance’s door, and I could watch that door, too. The door of the closet, which was to be my place of observation, was fitted with panels of transparent glass. In the gallery, where all the lamps had been lit, it was quite light. In the closet, however, it was quite dark. It was a splendid place from which to observe and remain unobserved.
I was soon to play the part of a spy–a common policeman. I wonder what my leader at the bar would have said had he known! I was not altogether pleased with my duties, but I could not refuse Rouletabille the assistance he had begged me to give him. I took care not to make him see that I in the least objected, and for several reasons. I wanted to oblige him; I did not wish him to think me a coward; I was filled with curiosity; and it was too late for me to draw back, even had I determined to do so. That I had not had these scruples sooner was because my curiosity had quite got the better of me. I might also urge that I was helping to save the life of a woman, and even a lawyer may do that conscientiously.
We returned along the gallery. On reaching the door of Mademoiselle Stangerson’s apartment, it opened from a push given by the steward who was waiting at the dinner-table. (Monsieur Stangerson had, for the last three days, dined with his daughter in the drawing-room on the first floor.) As the door remained open, we distinctly saw Mademoiselle Stangerson, taking advantage of the steward’s absence, and while her father was stooping to pick up something he had let fall, pour the contents of a phial into Monsieur Stangerson’s glass.
CHAPTER XXI
On the Watch
The act, which staggered me, did not appear to affect Rouletabille much. We returned to his room and, without even referring to what we had seen, he gave me his final instructions for the night. First we were to go to dinner; after dinner, I was to take my stand in the dark closet and wait there as long as it was necessary–to look out for what might happen.
“If you see anything before I do,” he explained, “you must let me know. If the man gets into the ‘right’ gallery by any other way than the ‘off-turning’ gallery, you will see him before I shall, because you have a view along the whole length of the ‘right’ gallery, while I can only command a view of the ‘off-turning’ gallery. All you need do to let me know is to undo the cord holding the curtain of the ‘right’ gallery window, nearest to the dark closet. The curtain will fall of itself and immediately leave a square of shadow where previously there had been a square of light. To do this, you need but stretch your hand out of the closet, I shall understand your signal perfectly.”
“And then?”
“Then you will see me coming round the corner of the ‘off-turning’ gallery.”
“What am I to do then?”
“You will immediately come towards me, behind the man; but I shall already be upon him, and shall have seen his face.”
I attempted a feeble smile.
“Why do you smile? Well, you may smile while you have the chance, but I swear you’ll have no time for that a few hours from now.
“And if the man escapes?”
“So much the better,” said Rouletabille, coolly, “I don’t want to capture him. He may take himself off any way he can. I will let him go–after I have seen his face. That’s all I want. I shall know afterwards what to do so that as far as Mademoiselle Stangerson is concerned he shall be dead to her even though he continues to live. If I took him alive, Mademoiselle Stangerson and Robert Darzac would, perhaps, never forgive me! And I wish to retain their good-will and respect.
“Seeing, as I have just now seen, Mademoiselle Stangerson pour a narcotic into her father’s glass, so that he might not be awake to interrupt the conversation she is going to have with her murderer, you can imagine she would not be grateful to me if I brought the man of The Yellow Room and the inexplicable gallery, bound and gagged, to her father. I realise now that if I am to save the unhappy lady, I must silence the man and not capture him. To kill a human being is no small thing. Besides, that’s not my business, unless the man himself makes it my business. On the other hand, to render him forever silent without the lady’s assent and confidence is to act on one’s own initiative and assumes a knowledge of everything with nothing for a basis. Fortunately, my friend, I have guessed, no, I have reasoned it all out. All that I ask of the man who is coming to-night is to bring me his face, so that it may enter–“
“Into the circle?”
“Exactly! And his face won’t surprise me!”
“But I thought you saw his face on the night when you sprang into the chamber?”
“Only imperfectly. The candle was on the floor; and, his beard–“
“Will he wear his beard this evening?”
“I think I can say for certain that he will. But the gallery is light and, now, I know–or–at least, my brain knows–and my eyes will see.”
“If we are here only to see him and let him escape, why are we armed?”
“Because, if the man of The Yellow Room and the inexplicable gallery knows that I know, he is capable of doing anything! We should then have to defend ourselves.”
“And you are sure he will come to-night?”
“As sure as that you are standing there! This morning, at half-past ten o’clock, Mademoiselle Stangerson, in the cleverest way in the world, arranged to have no nurses to-night. She gave them leave of absence for twenty-four hours, under some plausible pretexts, and did not desire anybody to be with her but her father, while they are away. Her father, who is to sleep in the boudoir, has gladly consented to the arrangement. Darzac’s departure and what he told me, as well as the extraordinary precautions Mademoiselle Stangerson is taking to be alone to-night leaves me no room for doubt. She has prepared the way for the coming of the man whom Darzac dreads.”
“That’s awful!”
“It is!”
“And what we saw her do was done to send her father to sleep?”
“Yes.”
“Then there are but two of us for to-night’s work?”
“Four; the concierge and his wife will watch at all hazards. I don’t set much value on them before–but the concierge may be useful after–if there’s to be any killing!”
“Then you think there may be?”
“If he wishes it.”
“Why haven’t you brought in Daddy Jacques?–Have you made no use of him to-day?”
“No,” replied Rouletabille sharply.
I kept silence for awhile, then, anxious to know his thoughts, I asked him point blank:
“Why not tell Arthur Rance?–He may be of great assistance to us?”
“Oh!” said Rouletabille crossly, “then you want to let everybody into Mademoiselle Stangerson’s secrets?–Come, let us go to dinner; it is time. This evening we dine in Frederic Larsan’s room,–at least, if he is not on the heels of Darzac. He sticks to him like a leech. But, anyhow, if he is not there now, I am quite sure he will be, to-night! He’s the one I am going to knock over!”
At this moment we heard a noise in the room near us.
“It must be he,” said Rouletabille.
“I forgot to ask you,” I said, “if we are to make any allusion to to-night’s business when we are with this policeman. I take it we are not. Is that so?”
“Evidently. We are going to operate alone, on our own personal account.”
“So that all the glory will be ours?”
Rouletabille laughed.
We dined with Frederic Larsan in his room. He told us he had just come in and invited us to be seated at table. We ate our dinner in the best of humours, and I had no difficulty in appreciating the feelings of certainty which both Rouletabille and Larsan felt. Rouletabille told the great Fred that I had come on a chance visit, and that he had asked me to stay and help him in the heavy batch of writing he had to get through for the “Epoque.” I was going back to Paris, he said, by the eleven o’clock train, taking his “copy,” which took a story form, recounting the principal episodes in the mysteries of the Glandier. Larsan smiled at the explanation like a man who was not fooled and politely refrains from making the slightest remark on matters which did not concern him.
With infinite precautions as to the words they used, and even as to the tones of their voices, Larsan and Rouletabille discussed, for a long time, Mr. Arthur Rance’s appearance at the chateau, and his past in America, about which they expressed a desire to know more, at any rate, so far as his relations with the Stangersons. At one time, Larsan, who appeared to me to be unwell, said, with an effort:
“I think, Monsieur Rouletabille, that we’ve not much more to do at the Glandier, and that we sha’n’t sleep here many more nights.”
“I think so, too, Monsieur Fred.”
“Then you think the conclusion of the matter has been reached?”
“I think, indeed, that we have nothing more to find out,” replied Rouletabille.
“Have you found your criminal?” asked Larsan.
“Have you?”
“Yes.”
“So have I,” said Rouletabille.
“Can it be the same man?”
“I don’t know if you have swerved from your original idea,” said the young reporter. Then he added, with emphasis: “Monsieur Darzac is an honest man!”
“Are you sure of that?” asked Larsan. “Well, I am sure he is not. So it’s a fight then?”
“Yes, it is a fight. But I shall beat you, Monsieur Frederic Larsan.”
“Youth never doubts anything,” said the great Fred laughingly, and held out his hand to me by way of conclusion.
Rouletabille’s answer came like an echo:
“Not anything!”
Suddenly Larsan, who had risen to wish us goodnight, pressed both his hands to his chest and staggered. He was obliged to lean on Rouletabille for support, and to save himself from falling.
“Oh! Oh!” he cried. “What is the matter with me?–Have I been poisoned?”
He looked at us with haggard eyes. We questioned him vainly; he did not answer us. He had sunk into an armchair and we could get not a word from him. We were extremely distressed, both on his account and on our own, for we had partaken of all the dishes he had eaten. He seemed to be out of pain; but his heavy head had fallen on his shoulder and his eyelids were tightly closed. Rouletabille bent over him, listening for the beatings of the heart.
My friend’s face, however, when he stood up, was as calm as it had been a moment before agitated.
“He is asleep,” he said.
He led me to his chamber, after closing Larsan’s room.
“The drug?” I asked. “Does Mademoiselle Stangerson wish to put everybody to sleep, to-night?”
“Perhaps,” replied Rouletabille; but I could see he was thinking of something else.
“But what about us?” I exclaimed. “How do we know that we have not been drugged?”
“Do you feel indisposed?” Rouletabille asked me coolly.
“Not in the least.”
“Do you feel any inclination to go to sleep?”
“None whatever.”
“Well, then, my friend, smoke this excellent cigar.”
And he handed me a choice Havana, one Monsieur Darzac had given him, while he lit his briarwood–his eternal briarwood.
We remained in his room until about ten o’clock without a word passing between us. Buried in an armchair Rouletabille sat and smoked steadily, his brow in thought and a far-away look in his eyes. On the stroke of ten he took off his boots and signalled to me to do the same. As we stood in our socks he said, in so low a tone that I guessed, rather than heard, the word:
“Revolver.”
I drew my revolver from my jacket pocket.
“Cock it!” he said.
I did as he directed.
Then moving towards the door of his room, he opened it with infinite precaution; it made no sound. We were in the “off-turning” gallery. Rouletabille made another sign to me which I understood to mean that I was to take up my post in the dark closet.
When I was some distance from him, he rejoined me and embraced me; and then I saw him, with the same precaution, return to his room. Astonished by his embrace, and somewhat disquieted by it, I arrived at the right gallery without difficulty, crossing the landing-place, and reaching the dark closet.
Before entering it I examined the curtain-cord of the window and found that I had only to release it from its fastening with my fingers for the curtain to fall by its own weight and hide the square of light from Rouletabille–the signal agreed upon. The sound of a footstep made me halt before Arthur Rance’s door. He was not yet in bed, then! How was it that, being in the chateau, he had not dined with Monsieur Stangerson and his daughter? I had not seen him at table with them, at the moment when we looked in.
I retired into the dark closet. I found myself perfectly situated. I could see along the whole length of the gallery. Nothing, absolutely nothing could pass there without my seeing it. But what was going to pass there? Rouletabille’s embrace came back to my mind. I argued that people don’t part from each, other in that way unless on an important or dangerous occasion. Was I then in danger?
My hand closed on the butt of my revolver and I waited. I am not a hero; but neither am I a coward.
I waited about an hour, and during all that time I saw nothing unusual. The rain, which had begun to come down strongly towards nine o’clock, had now ceased.
My friend had told me that, probably, nothing would occur before midnight or one o’clock in the morning. It was not more than half-past eleven, however, when I heard the door of Arthur Rance’s room open very slowly. The door remained open for a minute, which seemed to me a long time. As it opened into the gallery, that is to say, outwards, I could not see what was passing in the room behind the door.
At that moment I noticed a strange sound, three times repeated, coming from the park. Ordinarily I should not have attached any more importance to it than I would to the noise of cats on the roof. But the third time, the mew was so sharp and penetrating that I remembered what I had heard about the cry of the Bete du bon Dieu. As the cry had accompanied all the events at the Glandier, I could not refrain from shuddering at the thought.
Directly afterwards I saw a man appear on the outside of the door, and close it after him. At first I could not recognise him, for his back was towards me and he was bending over a rather bulky package. When he had closed the door and picked up the package, he turned towards the dark closet, and then I saw who he was. He was the forest-keeper, the Green Man. He was wearing the same costume that he had worn when I first saw him on the road in front of the Donjon Inn. There was no doubt about his being the keeper. As the cry of the Bete du Bon Dieu came for the third time, he put down the package and went to the second window, counting from the dark closet. I dared not risk making any movement, fearing I might betray my presence.
Arriving at the window, he peered out on to the park. The night was now light, the moon showing at intervals. The Green Man raised his arms twice, making signs which I did not understand; then, leaving the window, he again took up his package and moved along the gallery towards the landing-place.
Rouletabille had instructed me to undo the curtain-cord when I saw anything. Was Rouletabille expecting this? It was not my business to question. All I had to do was obey instructions. I unfastened the window-cord; my heart beating the while as if it would burst. The man reached the landing-place, but, to my utter surprise–I had expected to see him continue to pass along the gallery–I saw him descend the stairs leading to the vestibule.
What was I to do? I looked stupidly at the heavy curtain which had shut the light from the window. The signal had been given, and I did not see Rouletabille appear at the corner of the off-turning gallery. Nobody appeared. I was exceedingly perplexed. Half an hour passed, an age to me. What was I to do now, even if I saw something? The signal once given I could not give it a second time. To venture into the gallery might upset all Rouletabille’s plans. After all, I had nothing to reproach myself for, and if something had happened that my friend had not expected he could only blame himself. Unable to be of any further assistance to him by means of a signal, I left the dark closet and, still in my socks, made my way to the “off-turning” gallery.
There was no one there. I went to the door of Rouletabille’s room and listened. I could hear nothing. I knocked gently. There was no answer. I turned the door-handle and the door opened. I entered. Rouletabille lay extended at full length on the floor.
CHAPTER XXII
The Incredible Body
I bent in great anxiety over the body of the reporter and had the joy to find that he was deeply sleeping, the same unhealthy sleep that I had seen fall upon Frederic Larsan. He had succumbed to the influence of the same drug that had been mixed with our food. How was it then, that I, also, had not been overcome by it? I reflected that the drug must have been put into our wine; because that would explain my condition. I never drink when eating. Naturally inclined to obesity, I am restricted to a dry diet. I shook Rouletabille, but could not succeed in waking him. This, no doubt, was the work of Mademoiselle Stangerson.
She had certainly thought it necessary to guard herself against this young man as well as her father. I recalled that the steward, in serving us, had recommended an excellent Chablis which, no doubt, had come from the professor’s table.
More-than a quarter of an hour passed. I resolved, under the pressing circumstances, to resort to extreme measures. I threw a pitcher of cold water over Rouletabille’s head. He opened his eyes. I beat his face, and raised him up. I felt him stiffen in my arms and heard him murmur: “Go on, go on; but don’t make any noise.” I pinched him and shook him until he was able to stand up. We were saved!
“They sent me to sleep,” he said. “Ah! I passed an awful quarter of an hour before giving way. But it is over now. Don’t leave me.”
He had no sooner uttered those words than we were thrilled by a frightful cry that rang through the chateau,–a veritable death cry.
“Malheur!” roared Rouletabille; “we shall be too late!”
He tried to rush to the door, but he was too dazed, and fell against the wall. I was already in the gallery, revolver in hand, rushing like a madman towards Mademoiselle Stangerson’s room. The moment I arrived at the intersection of the “off-turning” gallery and the “right” gallery, I saw a figure leaving her apartment, which, in a few strides had reached the landing-place.
I was not master of myself. I fired. The report from the revolver made a deafening noise; but the man continued his flight down the stairs. I ran behind him, shouting: “Stop!–stop! or I will kill you!” As I rushed after him down the stairs, I came face to face with Arthur Rance coming from the left wing of the chateau, yelling: “What is it? What is it?” We arrived almost at the same time at the foot of the staircase. The window of the vestibule was open. We distinctly saw the form of a man running away. Instinctively we fired our revolvers in his direction. He was not more than ten paces in front of us; he staggered and we thought he was going to fall. We had sprung out of the window, but the man dashed off with renewed vigour. I was in my socks, and the American was barefooted. There being no hope of overtaking him, we fired our last cartridges at him. But he still kept on running, going along the right side of the court towards the end of the right wing of the chateau, which had no other outlet than the door of the little chamber occupied by the forest-keeper. The man, though he was evidently wounded by our bullets, was now twenty yards ahead of us. Suddenly, behind us, and above our heads, a window in the gallery opened and we heard the voice of Rouletabille crying out desperately:
“Fire, Bernier!–Fire!”
At that moment the clear moonlight night was further lit by a broad flash. By its light we saw Daddy Bernier with his gun on the threshold of the donjon door.
He had taken good aim. The shadow fell. But as it had reached the end of the right wing of the chateau, it fell on the other side of the angle of the building; that is to say, we saw it about to fall, but not the actual sinking to the ground. Bernier, Arthur Rance and myself reached the other side twenty seconds later. The shadow was lying dead at our feet.
Aroused from his lethargy by the cries and reports, Larsan opened the window of his chamber and called out to us. Rouletabille, quite awake now, joined us at the same moment, and I cried out to him:
“He is dead!–is dead!”
“So much the better,” he said. “Take him into the vestibule of the chateau.” Then as if on second thought, he said: “No!–no! Let us put him in his own room.”
Rouletabille knocked at the door. Nobody answered. Naturally, this did not surprise me.
“He is evidently not there, otherwise he would have come out,” said the reporter. “Let us carry him to the vestibule then.”
Since reaching the dead shadow, a thick cloud had covered the moon and darkened the night, so that we were unable to make out the features. Daddy Jacques, who had now joined us, helped us to carry the body into the vestibule, where we laid it down on the lower step of the stairs. On the way, I had felt my hands wet from the warm blood flowing from the wounds.
Daddy Jacques flew to the kitchen and returned with a lantern. He held it close to the face of the dead shadow, and we recognised the keeper, the man called by the landlord of the Donjon Inn the Green Man, whom, an hour earlier, I had seen come out of Arthur Rance’s chamber carrying a parcel. But what I had seen I could only tell Rouletabille later, when we were alone.
Rouletabille and Frederic Larsan experienced a cruel disappointment at the result of the night’s adventure. They could only look in consternation and stupefaction at the body of the Green Man.
Daddy Jacques showed a stupidly sorrowful face and with silly lamentations kept repeating that we were mistaken–the keeper could not be the assailant. We were obliged to compel him to be quiet. He could not have shown greater grief had the body been that of his own son. I noticed, while all the rest of us were more or less undressed and barefooted, that he was fully clothed.
Rouletabille had not left the body. Kneeling on the flagstones by the light of Daddy Jacques’s lantern he removed the clothes from the body and laid bare its breast. Then snatching the lantern from Daddy Jacques, he held it over the corpse and saw a gaping wound. Rising suddenly he exclaimed in a voice filled with savage irony:
“The man you believe to have been shot was killed by the stab of a knife in his heart!”
I thought Rouletabille had gone mad; but, bending over the body, I quickly satisfied myself that Rouletabille was right. Not a sign of a bullet anywhere–the wound, evidently made by a sharp blade, had penetrated the heart.
CHAPTER XXIII
The Double Scent
I had hardly recovered from the surprise into which this new discovery had plunged me, when Rouletabille touched me on the shoulder and asked me to follow him into his room.
“What are we going to do there?”
“To think the matter over.”
I confess I was in no condition for doing much thinking, nor could I understand how Rouletabille could so control himself as to be able calmly to sit down for reflection when he must have known that Mademoiselle Stangerson was at that moment almost on the point of death. But his self-control was more than I could explain. Closing the door of his room, he motioned me to a chair and, seating himself before me, took out his pipe. We sat there for some time in silence and then I fell asleep.
When I awoke it was daylight. It was eight o’clock by my watch. Rouletabille was no longer in the room. I rose to go out when the door opened and my friend re-entered. He had evidently lost no time.
“How about Mademoiselle Stangerson?” I asked him.
“Her condition, though very alarming, is not desperate.”
“When did you leave this room?”
“Towards dawn.”
“I guess you have been hard at work?”
“Rather!”
“Have you found out anything?”
“Two sets of footprints!”
“Do they explain anything?”
“Yes.”
“Have they anything to do with the mystery of the keeper’s body?”
“Yes; the mystery is no longer a mystery. This morning, walking round the chateau, I found two distinct sets of footprints, made at the same time, last night. They were made by two persons walking side by side. I followed them from the court towards the oak grove. Larsan joined me. They were the same kind of footprints as were made at the time of the assault in The Yellow Room–one set was from clumsy boots and the other was made by neat ones, except that the big toe of one of the sets was of a different size from the one measured in The Yellow Room incident. I compared the marks with the paper patterns I had previously made.
“Still following the tracks of the prints, Larsan and I passed out of the oak grove and reached the border of the lake. There they turned off to a little path leading to the high road to Epinay where we lost the traces in the newly macadamised highway.
“We went back to the chateau and parted at the courtyard. We met again, however, in Daddy Jacques’s room to which our separate trains of thinking had led us both. We found the old servant in bed. His clothes on the chair were wet through and his boots very muddy. He certainly did not get into that state in helping us to carry the body of the keeper. It was not raining then. Then his face showed extreme fatigue and he looked at us out of terror-stricken eyes.
“On our first questioning him he told us that he had gone to bed immediately after the doctor had arrived. On pressing him, however, for it was evident to us he was not speaking the truth, he confessed that he had been away from the chateau. He explained his absence by saying that he had a headache and went out into the fresh air, but had gone no further than the oak grove. When we then described to him the whole route he had followed, he sat up in bed trembling.
“‘And you were not alone!’ cried Larsan.
“‘Did you see it then?’ gasped Daddy Jacques.
“‘What?’ I asked.
“‘The phantom–the black phantom!’
“Then he told us that for several nights he had seen what he kept calling the black phantom. It came into the park at the stroke of midnight and glided stealthily through the trees; it appeared to him to pass through the trunks of the trees. Twice he had seen it from his window, by the light of the moon and had risen and followed the strange apparition. The night before last he had almost overtaken it; but it had vanished at the corner of the donjon. Last night, however, he had not left the chateau, his mind being disturbed by a presentiment that some new crime would be attempted. Suddenly he saw the black phantom rush out from somewhere in the middle of the court. He followed it to the lake and to the high road to Epinay, where the phantom suddenly disappeared.
“‘Did you see his face?’ demanded Larsan.
“‘No!–I saw nothing but black veils.’
“‘Did you go out after what passed on the gallery?’
“‘I could not!–I was terrified.’
“‘Daddy Jacques,’ I said, in a threatening voice, ‘you did not follow it; you and the phantom walked to Epinay together–arm in arm!’
“‘No!’ he cried, turning his eyes away, ‘I did not. It came on to pour, and–I turned back. I don’t know what became of the black phantom.”
“We left him, and when we were outside I turned to Larsan, looking him full in the face, and put my question suddenly to take him off his guard:
“‘An accomplice?’
“‘How can I tell?’ he replied, shrugging his shoulders. ‘You can’t be sure of anything in a case like this. Twenty-four hours ago I would have sworn that there was no accomplice!’ He left me saying he was off to Epinay.”
“Well, what do you make of it?” I asked Rouletabille, after he had ended his recital. “Personally I am utterly in the dark. I can’t make anything out of it. What do you gather?”
“Everything! Everything!” he exclaimed. “But,” he said abruptly, “let’s find out more about Mademoiselle Stangerson.”
CHAPTER XXIV
Rouletabille Knows the Two Halves of the Murderer
Mademoiselle Stangerson had been almost murdered for the second time. Unfortunately, she was in too weak a state to bear the severer injuries of this second attack as well as she had those of the first. She had received three wounds in the breast from the murderer’s knife, and she lay long between life and death. Her strong physique, however, saved her; but though she recovered physically it was found that her mind had been affected. The slightest allusion to the terrible incident sent her into delirium, and the arrest of Robert Darzac which followed on the day following the tragic death of the keeper seemed to sink her fine intelligence into complete melancholia.
Robert Darzac arrived at the chateau towards half-past nine. I saw him hurrying through the park, his hair and clothes in disorder and his face a deadly white. Rouletabille and I were looking out of a window in the gallery. He saw us, and gave a despairing cry: “I’m too late!”
Rouletabille answered: “She lives!”
A minute later Darzac had gone into Mademoiselle Stangerson’s room and, through the door, we could hear his heart-rending sobs.
“There’s a fate about this place!” groaned Rouletabille. “Some infernal gods must be watching over the misfortunes of this family! –If I had not been drugged, I should have saved Mademoiselle Stangerson. I should have silenced him forever. And the keeper would not have been killed!”
Monsieur Darzac came in to speak with us. His distress was terrible. Rouletabille told him everything: his preparations for Mademoiselle Stangerson’s safety; his plans for either capturing or for disposing of the assailant for ever; and how he would have succeeded had it not been for the drugging.
“If only you had trusted me!” said the young man, in a low tone. “If you had but begged Mademoiselle Stangerson to confide in me! –But, then, everybody here distrusts everybody else, the daughter distrusts her father, and even her lover. While you ask me to protect her she is doing all she can to frustrate me. That was why I came on the scene too late!”
At Monsieur Robert Darzac’s request Rouletabille described the whole scene. Leaning on the wall, to prevent himself from falling, he had made his way to Mademoiselle Stangerson’s room, while we were running after the supposed murderer. The ante-room door was open and when he entered he found Mademoiselle Stangerson lying partly thrown over the desk. Her dressing-gown was dyed with the blood flowing from her bosom. Still under the influence of the drug, he felt he was walking in a horrible nightmare.
He went back to the gallery automatically, opened a window, shouted his order to fire, and then returned to the room. He crossed the deserted boudoir, entered the drawing-room, and tried to rouse Monsieur Stangerson who was lying on a sofa. Monsieur Stangerson rose stupidly and let himself be drawn by Rouletabille into the room where, on seeing his daughter’s body, he uttered a heart-rending cry. Both united their feeble strength and carried her to her bed.
On his way to join us Rouletabille passed by the desk. On the floor, near it, he saw a large packet. He knelt down and, finding the wrapper loose, he examined it, and made out an enormous quantity of papers and photographs. On one of the papers he read: “New differential electroscopic condenser. Fundamental properties of substance intermediary between ponderable matter and imponderable ether.” Strange irony of fate that the professor’s precious papers should be restored to him at the very time when an attempt was being made to deprive him of his daughter’s life! What are papers worth to him now?
The morning following that awful night saw Monsieur de Marquet once more at the chateau, with his Registrar and gendarmes. Of course we were all questioned. Rouletabille and I had already agreed on what to say. I kept back any information as to my being in the dark closet and said nothing about the drugging. We did not wish to suggest in any way that Mademoiselle Stangerson had been expecting her nocturnal visitor. The poor woman might, perhaps, never recover, and it was none of our business to lift the veil of a secret the preservation of which she had paid for so dearly.
Arthur Rance told everybody, in a manner so natural that it astonished me, that he had last seen the keeper towards eleven o’clock of that fatal night. He had come for his valise, he said, which he was to take for him early next morning to the Saint-Michel station, and had been kept out late running after poachers. Arthur Rance had, indeed, intended to leave the chateau and, according to his habit, to walk to the station.
Monsieur Stangerson confirmed what Rance had said, adding that he had not asked Rance to dine with him because his friend had taken his final leave of them both earlier in the evening. Monsieur Rance had had tea served him in his room, because he had complained of a slight indisposition.
Bernier testified, instructed by Rouletabille, that the keeper had ordered him to meet at a spot near the oak grove, for the purpose of looking out for poachers. Finding that the keeper did not keep his appointment, he, Bernier, had gone in search of him. He had almost arrived at the donjon, when he saw a figure running swiftly in a direction opposite to him, towards the right wing of the chateau. He heard revolver shots from behind the figure and saw Rouletabille at one of the gallery windows. He heard Rouletabille call out to him to fire, and he had fired. He believed he had killed the man until he learned, after Rouletabille had uncovered the body, that the man had died from a knife thrust. Who had given it he could not imagine. “Nobody could have been near the spot without my seeing him.” When the examining magistrate reminded him that the spot where the body was found was very dark and that he himself had not been able to recognise the keeper before firing, Daddy Bernier replied that neither had they seen the other body; nor had they found it. In the narrow court where five people were standing it would have been strange if the other body, had it been there, could have escaped. The only door that opened into the court was that of the keeper’s room, and that door was closed, and the key of it was found in the keeper’s pocket.
However that might be, the examining magistrate did not pursue his inquiry further in this direction. He was evidently convinced that we had missed the man we were chasing and we had come upon the keeper’s body in our chase. This matter of the keeper was another matter entirely. He wanted to satisfy himself about that without any further delay. Probably it fitted in with the conclusions he had already arrived at as to the keeper and his intrigues with the wife of Mathieu, the landlord of the Donjon Inn. This Mathieu, later in the afternoon, was arrested and taken to Corbeil in spite of his rheumatism. He had been heard to threaten the keeper, and though no evidence against him had been found at his inn, the evidence of carters who had heard the threats was enough to justify his retention.
The examination had proceeded thus far when, to our surprise, Frederic Larsan returned to the chateau. He was accompanied by one of the employes of the railway. At that moment Rance and I were in the vestibule discussing Mathieu’s guilt or innocence, while Rouletabille stood apart buried, apparently, in thought. The examining magistrate and his Registrar were in the little green drawing-room, while Darzac was with the doctor and Stangerson in the lady’s chamber. As Frederic Larsan entered the vestibule with the railway employed, Rouletabille and I at once recognised him by the small blond beard. We exchanged meaningful glances. Larsan had himself announced to the examining magistrate by the gendarme and entered with the railway servant as Daddy Jacques came out. Some ten minutes went by during which Rouletabille appeared extremely impatient. The door of the drawing-room was then opened and we heard the magistrate calling to the gendarme who entered. Presently he came out, mounted the stairs and, coming back shortly, went in to the magistrate and said:
“Monsieur,–Monsieur Robert Darzac will not come!”
“What! Not come!” cried Monsieur de Marquet.
“He says he cannot leave Mademoiselle Stangerson in her present state.”
“Very well,” said Monsieur de Marquet; “then we’ll go to him.”
Monsieur de Marquet and the gendarme mounted the stairs. He made a sign to Larsan and the railroad employe to follow. Rouletabille and I went along too.
On reaching the door of Mademoiselle Stangerson’s chamber, Monsieur de Marquet knocked. A chambermaid appeared. It was Sylvia, with her hair all in disorder and consternation showing on her face.
“Is Monsieur Stangerson within?” asked the magistrate.
“Yes, Monsieur.”
“Tell him that I wish to speak with him.”
Stangerson came out. His appearance was wretched in the extreme.
“What do you want?” he demanded of the magistrate. “May I not be left in peace, Monsieur?”
“Monsieur,” said the magistrate, “it is absolutely necessary that I should see Monsieur Darzac at once. If you cannot induce him to come, I shall be compelled to use the help of the law.”
The professor made no reply. He looked at us all like a man being led to execution, and then went back into the room.
Almost immediately after Monsieur Robert Darzac came out. He was very pale. He looked at us and, his eyes falling on the railway servant, his features stiffened and he could hardly repress a groan.
We were all much moved by the appearance of the man. We felt that what was about to happen would decide the fate of Monsieur Robert Darzac. Frederic Larsan’s face alone was radiant, showing a joy as of a dog that had at last got its prey.
Pointing to the railway servant, Monsieur de Marquet said to Monsieur Darzac:
“Do you recognise this man, Monsieur?”
“I do,” said Monsieur Darzac, in a tone which he vainly tried to make firm. “He is an employe at the station at Epinay-sur-Orge.”
“This young man,” went on Monsieur de Marquet, “affirms that he saw you get off the train at Epinay-sur-Orge–“
“That night,” said Monsieur Darzac, interrupting, “at half-past ten –it is quite true.”
An interval of silence followed.
“Monsieur Darzac,” the magistrate went on in a tone of deep emotion, “Monsieur Darzac, what were you doing that night, at Epinay-sur-Orge –at that time?”
Monsieur Darzac remained silent, simply closing his eyes.
“Monsieur Darzac,” insisted Monsieur de Marquet, “can you tell me how you employed your time, that night?”
Monsieur Darzac opened his eyes. He seemed to have recovered his self-control.
“No, Monsieur.”
“Think, Monsieur! For, if you persist in your strange refusal, I shall be under the painful necessity of keeping you at my disposition.”
“I refuse.”
“Monsieur Darzac!–in the name of the law, I arrest you!”
The magistrate had no sooner pronounced the words than I saw Rouletabille move quickly towards Monsieur Darzac. He would certainly have spoken to him, but Darzac, by a gesture, held him off. As the gendarme approached his prisoner, a despairing cry rang through the room:
“Robert!–Robert!”
We recognised the voice of Mademoiselle Stangerson. We all shuddered. Larsan himself turned pale. Monsieur Darzac, in response to the cry, had flown back into the room.
The magistrate, the gendarme, and Larsan followed closely after. Rouletabille and I remained on the threshold. It was a heart-breaking sight that met our eyes. Mademoiselle Stangerson, with a face of deathly pallor, had risen on her bed, in spite of the restraining efforts of two doctors and her father. She was holding out her trembling arms towards Robert Darzac, on whom Larsan and the gendarme had laid hands. Her distended eyes saw –she understood–her lips seemed to form a word, but nobody made it out; and she fell back insensible.
Monsieur Darzac was hurried out of the room and placed in the vestibule to wait for the vehicle Larsan had gone to fetch. We were all overcome by emotion and even Monsieur de Marquet had tears in his eyes. Rouletabille took advantage of the opportunity to say to Monsieur Darzac:
“Are you going to put in any defense?”
“No!” replied the prisoner.
“Very well, then I will, Monsieur.”
“You cannot do it,” said the unhappy man with a faint smile.
“I can–and I will.”
Rouletabille’s voice had in it a strange strength and confidence.
“I can do it, Monsieur Robert Darzac, because I know more than you do!”
“Come! Come!” murmured Darzac, almost angrily.
“Have no fear! I shall know only what will benefit you.”
“You must know nothing, young man, if you want me to be grateful.”
Rouletabille shook his head, going close up to Darzac.
“Listen to what I am about to say,” he said in a low tone, “and let it give you confidence. You do not know the name of the murderer. Mademoiselle Stangerson knows it; but only half of it; but I know his two halves; I know the whole man!”
Robert Darzac opened his eyes, with a look that showed he had not understood a word of what Rouletabille had said to him. At that moment the conveyance arrived, driven by Frederic Larsan. Darzac and the gendarme entered it, Larsan remaining on the driver’s seat. The prisoner was taken to Corbeil.
CHAPTER XXV
Rouletabille Goes on a Journey
That same evening Rouletabille and I left the Glandier. We were very glad to get away and there was nothing more to keep us there. I declared my intention to give up the whole matter. It had been too much for me. Rouletabille, with a friendly tap on my shoulder, confessed that he had nothing more to learn at the Glandier; he had learned there all it had to tell him. We reached Paris about eight o’clock, dined, and then, tired out, we separated, agreeing to meet the next morning at my rooms.
Rouletabille arrived next day at the hour agreed on. He was dressed in a suit of English tweed, with an ulster on his arm, and a valise in his hand. Evidently he had prepared himself for a journey.
“How long shall you be away?” I asked.
“A month or two,” he said. “It all depends.”
I asked him no more questions.
“Do you know,” he asked, “what the word was that Mademoiselle Stangerson tried to say before she fainted?”
“No–nobody heard it.”
“I heard it!” replied Rouletabille. “She said ‘Speak!'”
“Do you think Darzac will speak?”
“Never.”
I was about to make some further observations, but he wrung my hand warmly and wished me good-bye. I had only time to ask him one question before he left.
“Are you not afraid that other attempts may be made while you’re away?”
“No! Not now that Darzac is in prison,” he answered.
With this strange remark he left. I was not to see him again until the day of Darzac’s trial at the court when he appeared to explain the inexplicable.
CHAPTER XXVI
In Which Joseph Rouletabille Is Awaited with Impatience
On the 15th of January, that is to say, two months and a half after the tragic events I have narrated, the “Epoque” printed, as the first column of the front page, the following sensational article: “The Seine-et-Oise jury is summoned to-day to give its verdict on one of the most mysterious affairs in the annals of crime. There never has been a case with so many obscure, incomprehensible, and inexplicable points. And yet the prosecution has not hesitated to put into the prisoner’s dock a man who is respected, esteemed, and loved by all who knew him–a young savant, the hope of French science, whose whole life has been devoted to knowledge and truth. When Paris heard of Monsieur Robert Darzac’s arrest a unanimous cry of protest arose from all sides. The whole Sorbonne, disgraced by this act of the examining magistrate, asserted its belief in the innocence of Mademoiselle Stangerson’s fiance. Monsieur Stangerson was loud in his denunciation of this miscarriage of justice. There is no doubt in the mind of anybody that could the victim speak she would claim from the jurors of Seine-et-Oise the man she wishes to make her husband and whom the prosecution would send to the scaffold. It is to be hoped that Mademoiselle Stangerson will shortly recover her reason, which has been temporarily unhinged by the horrible mystery at the Glandier. The question before the jury is the one we propose to deal with this very day.
“We have decided not to permit twelve worthy men to commit a disgraceful miscarriage of justice. We confess that the remarkable coincidences, the many convicting evidences, and the inexplicable silence on the part of the accused, as well as a total absence of any evidence for an alibi, were enough to warrant the bench of judges in assuming that in this man alone was centered the truth of the affair. The evidences are, in appearance, so overwhelming against Monsieur Robert Darzac that a detective so well informed, so intelligent, and generally so successful, as Monsieur Frederic Larsan, may be excused for having been misled by them. Up to now everything has gone against Monsieur Robert Darzac in the magisterial inquiry. To-day, however, we are going to defend him before the jury, and we are going to bring to the witness stand a light that will illumine the whole mystery of the Glandier. For we possess the truth.
“If we have not spoken sooner, it is because the interests of certain parties in the case demand that we should take that course. Our readers may remember the unsigned reports we published relating to the ‘Left foot of the Rue Oberkampf,’ at the time of the famous robbery of the Credit Universel, and the famous case of the ‘Gold Ingots of the Mint.’ In both those cases we were able to discover the truth long before even the excellent ingenuity of Frederic Larsan had been able to unravel it. These reports were written by our youngest reporter, Joseph Rouletabille, a youth of eighteen, whose fame to-morrow will be world-wide. When attention was first drawn to the Glandier case, our youthful reporter was on the spot and installed in the chateau, when every other representative of the press had been denied admission. He worked side by side with Frederic Larsan. He was amazed and terrified at the grave mistake the celebrated detective was about to make, and tried to divert him from the false scent he was following; but the great Fred refused to receive instructions from this young journalist. We know now where it brought Monsieur Robert Darzac.
“But now, France must know–the whole world must know, that, on the very evening on which Monsieur Darzac was arrested, young Rouletabille entered our editorial office and informed us that he was about to go away on a journey. ‘How long I shall be away,’ he said, ‘I cannot say; perhaps a month–perhaps two–perhaps three perhaps I may never return. Here is a letter. If I am not back on the day on which Monsieur Darzac is to appear before the Assize Court, have this letter opened and read to the court, after all the witnesses have been heard. Arrange it with Monsieur Darzac’s counsel. Monsieur Darzac is innocent. In this letter is written the name of the murderer; and–that is all I have to say. I am leaving to get my proofs–for the irrefutable evidence of the murderer’s guilt.’ Our reporter departed. For a long time we were without news from him; but, a week ago, a stranger called upon our manager and said: ‘Act in accordance with the instructions of Joseph Rouletabille, if it becomes necessary to do so. The letter left by him holds the truth.’ The gentleman who brought us this message would not give us his name.
“To-day, the 15th of January, is the day of the trial. Joseph Rouletabille has not returned. It may be we shall never see him again. The press also counts its heroes, its martyrs to duty. It may be he is no longer living. We shall know how to avenge him. Our manager will, this afternoon, be at the Court of Assize at Versailles, with the letter–the letter containing the name of the murderer!”
Those Parisians who flocked to the Assize Court at Versailles, to be present at the trial of what was known as the “Mystery of The Yellow Room,” will certainly remember the terrible crush at the Saint-Lazare station. The ordinary trains were so full that special trains had to be made up. The article in the “Epoque” had so excited the populace that discussion was rife everywhere even to the verge of blows. Partisans of Rouletabille fought with the supporters of Frederic Larsan. Curiously enough the excitement was due less to the fact that an innocent man was in danger of a wrongful conviction than to the interest taken in their own ideas as to the Mystery of The Yellow Room. Each had his explanation to which each held fast. Those who explained the crime on Frederic Larsan’s theory would not admit that there could be any doubt as to the perspicacity of the popular detective. Others who had arrived at a different solution, naturally insisted that this was Rouletabille’s explanation, though they did not as yet know what that was.
With the day’s “Epoque” in their hands, the “Larsans” and the “Rouletabilles” fought and shoved each other on the steps of the Palais de Justice, right into the court itself. Those who could not get in remained in the neighbourhood until evening and were, with great difficulty, kept back by the soldiery and the police. They became hungry for news, welcoming the most absurd rumours. At one time the rumour spread that Monsieur Stangerson himself had been arrested in the court and had confessed to being the murderer. This goes to show to what a pitch of madness nervous excitement may carry people. Rouletabille was still expected. Some pretended to know him; and when a young man with a “pass” crossed the open space which separated the crowd from the Court House, a scuffle took place. Cries were raised of “Rouletabille!–there’s Rouletabille!” The arrival of the manager of the paper was the signal for a great demonstration. Some applauded, others hissed.
The trial itself was presided over by Monsieur de Rocouz, a judge filled with the prejudice of his class, but a man honest at heart. The witnesses had been called. I was there, of course, as were all who had, in any way, been in touch with the mysteries of the Glandier. Monsieur Stangerson–looking many years older and almost unrecognisable–Larsan, Arthur Rance, with his face ruddy as ever, Daddy Jacques, Daddy Mathieu, who was brought into court handcuffed between two gendarmes, Madame Mathieu, in tears, the two Berniers, the two nurses, the steward, all the domestics of the chateau, the employe of the Paris Post Office, the railway employe from Epinay, some friends of Monsieur and Mademoiselle Stangerson, and all Monsieur Darzac’s witnesses. I was lucky enough to be called early in the trial, so that I was then able to watch and be present at almost the whole of the proceedings.
The court was so crowded that many lawyers were compelled to find seats on the steps. Behind the bench of justices were representatives from other benches. Monsieur Robert Darzac stood in the prisoner’s dock between policemen, tall, handsome, and calm. A murmur of admiration rather than of compassion greeted his appearance. He leaned forward towards his counsel, Maitre Henri Robert, who, assisted by his chief secretary, Maitre Andre Hesse, was busily turning over the folios of his brief.
Many expected that Monsieur Stangerson, after giving his evidence, would have gone over to the prisoner and shaken hands with him; but he left the court without another word. It was remarked that the jurors appeared to be deeply interested in a rapid conversation which the manager of the “Epoque” was having with Maitre Henri Robert. The manager, later, sat down in the front row of the public seats. Some were surprised that he was not asked to remain with the other witnesses in the room reserved for them.
The reading of the indictment was got through, as it always is, without any incident. I shall not here report the long examination to which Monsieur Darzac was subjected. He answered all the questions quickly and easily. His silence as to the important matters of which we know was dead against him. It would seem as if this reticence would be fatal for him. He resented the President’s reprimands. He was told that his silence might mean death.
“Very well,” he said; “I will submit to it; but I am innocent.”
With that splendid ability which has made his fame, Maitre Robert took advantage of the incident, and tried to show that it brought out in noble relief his client’s character; for only heroic natures could remain silent for moral reasons in face of such a danger. The eminent advocate however, only succeeded in assuring those who were already assured of Darzac’s innocence. At the adjournment Rouletabille had not yet arrived. Every time a door opened, all eyes there turned towards it and back to the manager of the “Epoque,” who sat impassive in his place. When he once was feeling in his pocket a loud murmur of expectation followed. The letter!
It is not, however, my intention to report in detail the course of the trial. My readers are sufficiently acquainted with the mysteries surrounding the Glandier case to enable me to go on to the really dramatic denouement of this ever-memorable day.
When the trial was resumed, Maitre Henri Robert questioned Daddy Mathieu as to his complicity in the death of the keeper. His wife was also brought in and was confronted by her husband. She burst into tears and confessed that she had been the keeper’s mistress, and that her husband had suspected it. She again, however, affirmed that he had had nothing to do with the murder of her lover. Maitre Henri Robert thereupon asked the court to hear Frederic Larsan on this point.
“In a short conversation which I have had with Frederic Larsan, during the adjournment,” declared the advocate, “he has made me understand that the death of the keeper may have been brought about otherwise than by the hand of Mathieu. It will be interesting to hear Frederic Larsan’s theory.”
Frederic Larsan was brought in. His explanation was quite clear.
“I see no necessity,” he said, “for bringing Mathieu in this. I have told Monsieur de Marquet that the man’s threats had biassed the examining magistrate against him. To me the attempt to murder Mademoiselle and the death of the keeper are the work of one and the same person. Mademoiselle Stangerson’s murderer, flying through the court, was fired on; it was thought he was struck, perhaps killed. As a matter of fact, he only stumbled at the moment of his disappearance behind the corner of the right wing of the chateau. There he encountered the keeper who, no doubt, tried to seize him. The murderer had in his hand the knife with which he had stabbed Mademoiselle Stangerson and with this he killed the keeper.”
This very simple explanation appeared at once plausible and satisfying. A murmur of approbation was heard.
“And the murderer? What became of him?” asked the President.
“He was evidently hidden in an obscure corner at the end of the court. After the people had left the court carrying with them the body of the keeper, the murderer quietly made his escape.”
The words had scarcely left Larsan’s mouth when from the back of the court came a youthful voice:
“I agree with Frederic Larsan as to the death of the keeper; but I do not agree with him as to the way the murderer escaped!”
Everybody turned round, astonished. The clerks of the court sprang towards the speaker, calling out silence, and the President angrily ordered the intruder to be immediately expelled. The same clear voice, however, was again heard:
“It is I, Monsieur President–Joseph Rouletabille!”
CHAPTER XXVII
In Which Joseph Rouletabille Appears in All His Glory
The excitement was extreme. Cries from fainting women were to be heard amid the extraordinary bustle and stir. The “majesty of the law” was utterly forgotten. The President tried in vain to make himself heard. Rouletabille made his way forward with difficulty, but by dint of much elbowing reached his manager and greeted him cordially. The letter was passed to him and pocketing it he turned to the witness-box. He was dressed exactly as on the day he left me even to the ulster over his arm. Turning to the President, he said:
“I beg your pardon, Monsieur President, but I have only just arrived from America. The steamer was late. My name is Joseph Rouletabille!”
The silence which followed his stepping into the witness-box was broken by laughter when his words were heard. Everybody seemed relieved and glad to find him there, as if in the expectation of hearing the truth at last.
But the President was extremely incensed:
“So, you are Joseph Rouletabille,” he replied; “well, young man, I’ll teach you what comes of making a farce of justice. By virtue of my discretionary power, I hold you at the court’s disposition.”
“I ask nothing better, Monsieur President. I have come here for that purpose. I humbly beg the court’s pardon for the disturbance of which I have been the innocent cause. I beg you to believe that nobody has a greater respect for the court than I have. I came in as I could.” He smiled.
“Take him away!” ordered the President.
Maitre Henri Robert intervened. He began by apologising for the young man, who, he said, was moved only by the best intentions. He made the President understand that the evidence of a witness who had slept at the Glandier during the whole of that eventful week could not be omitted, and the present witness, moreover, had come to name the real murderer.
“Are you going to tell us who the murderer was?” asked the President, somewhat convinced though still sceptical.
“I have come for that purpose, Monsieur President!” replied Rouletabille.
An attempt at applause was silenced by the usher.
“Joseph Rouletabille,” said Maitre Henri Robert, “has not been regularly subpoenaed as a witness, but I hope, Monsieur President, you will examine him in virtue of your discretionary powers.”
“Very well!” said the President, “we will question him. But we must proceed in order.”
The Advocate-General rose:
“It would, perhaps, be better,” he said, “if the young man were to tell us now whom he suspects.”
The President nodded ironically:
“If the Advocate-General attaches importance to the deposition of Monsieur Joseph Rouletabille, I see no reason why this witness should not give us the name of the murderer.”
A pin drop could have been heard. Rouletabille stood silent looking sympathetically at Darzac, who, for the first time since the opening of the trial, showed himself agitated.
“Well,” cried the President, “we wait for the name of the murderer.” Rouletabille, feeling in his waistcoat pocket, drew his watch and, looking at it, said:
“Monsieur President, I cannot name the murderer before half-past six o’clock!”
Loud murmurs of disappointment filled the room. Some of the lawyers were heard to say: “He’s making fun of us!”
The President in a stern voice, said:
“This joke has gone far enough. You may retire, Monsieur, into the witnesses’ room. I hold you at our disposition.”
Rouletabille protested.
“I assure you, Monsieur President,” he cried in his sharp, clear voice, “that when I do name the murderer you will understand why I could not speak before half-past six. I assert this on my honour. I can, however, give you now some explanation of the murder of the keeper. Monsieur Frederic Larsan, who has seen me at work at the Glandier, can tell you with what care I studied this case. I found myself compelled to differ with him in arresting Monsieur Robert Darzac, who is innocent. Monsieur Larsan knows of my good faith and knows that some importance may be attached to my discoveries, which have often corroborated his own.”
Frederic Larsan said:
“Monsieur President, it will be interesting to hear Monsieur Joseph Rouletabille, especially as he differs from me.”
A murmur of approbation greeted the detective’s speech. He was a good sportsman and accepted the challenge. The struggle between the two promised to be exciting.
As the President remained silent, Frederic Larsan continued:
“We agree that the murderer of the keeper was the assailant of Mademoiselle Stangerson; but as we are not agreed as to how the murderer escaped, I am curious to hear Monsieur Rouletabille’s explanation.”
“I have no doubt you are,” said my friend.
General laughter followed this remark. The President angrily declared that if it was repeated, he would have the court cleared.
“Now, young man,” said the President, “you have heard Monsieur Frederic Larsan; how did the murderer get away from the court?”
Rouletabille looked at Madame Mathieu, who smiled back at him sadly.
“Since Madame Mathieu,” he said, “has freely admitted her intimacy with the keeper–“
“Why, it’s the boy!” exclaimed Daddy Mathieu.
“Remove that man!” ordered the President.
Mathieu was removed from the court. Rouletabille went on:
“Since she has made this confession, I am free to tell you that she often met the keeper at night on the first floor of the donjon, in the room which was once an oratory. These meetings became more frequent when her husband was laid up by his rheumatism. She gave him morphine to ease his pain and to give herself more time for the meetings. Madame Mathieu came to the chateau that night, enveloped in a large black shawl which served also as a disguise. This was the phantom that disturbed Daddy Jacques. She knew how to imitate the mewing of Mother Angenoux’ cat and she would make the cries to advise the keeper of her presence. The recent repairs of the donjon did not interfere with their meetings in the keeper’s old room, in the donjon, since the new room assigned to him at the end of the right wing was separated from the steward’s room by a partition only.
“Previous to the tragedy in the courtyard Madame Mathieu and the keeper left the donjon together. I learnt these facts from my examination of the footmarks in the court the next morning. Bernier, the concierge, whom I had stationed behind the donjon–as he will explain himself–could not see what passed in the court. He did not reach the court until he heard the revolver shots, and then he fired. When the woman parted from the man she went towards the open gate of the court, while he returned to his room.
“He had almost reached the door when the revolvers rang out. He had just reached the corner when a shadow bounded by. Meanwhile, Madame Mathieu, surprised by the revolver shots and by the entrance of people into the court, crouched in the darkness. The court is a large one and, being near the gate, she might easily have passed out unseen. But she remained and saw the body being carried away. In great agony of mind she neared the vestibule and saw the dead body of her lover on the stairs lit up by Daddy Jacques’ lantern. She then fled; and Daddy Jacques joined her.
“That same night, before the murder, Daddy Jacques had been awakened by the cat’s cry, and, looking through his window, had seen the black phantom. Hastily dressing himself he went out and recognised her. He is an old friend of Madame Mathieu, and when she saw him she had to tell him of her relations with the keeper and begged his assistance. Daddy Jacques took pity on her and accompanied her through the oak grove out of the park, past the border of the lake to the road to Epinay. From there it was but a very short distance to her home.
“Daddy Jacques returned to the chateau, and, seeing how important it was for Madame Mathieu’s presence at the chateau to remain unknown, he did all he could to hide it. I appeal to Monsieur Larsan, who saw me, next morning, examine the two sets of footprints.”
Here Rouletabille turning towards Madame Mathieu, with a bow, said:
“The footprints of Madame bear a strange resemblance to the neat footprints of the murderer.”
Madame Mathieu trembled and looked at him with wide eyes as if in wonder at what he would say next.
“Madame has a shapely foot, long and rather large for a woman. The imprint, with its pointed toe, is very like that of the murderer’s.”
A movement in the court was repressed by Rouletabille. He held their attention at once.
“I hasten to add,” he went on, “that I attach no importance to this. Outward signs like these are often liable to lead us into error, if we do not reason rightly. Monsieur Robert Darzac’s footprints are also like the murderer’s, and yet he is not the murderer!”
The President turning to Madame Mathieu asked:
“Is that in accordance with what you know occurred?”
“Yes, Monsieur President,” she replied, “it is as if Monsieur Rouletabille had been behind us.”
“Did you see the murderer running towards the end of the right wing?”
“Yes, as clearly as I saw them afterwards carrying the keeper’s body.”
“What became of the murderer?–You were in the courtyard and could easily have seen.
“I saw nothing of him, Monsieur President. It became quite dark just then.”
“Then Monsieur Rouletabille,” said the President, “must explain how the murderer made his escape.”
Rouletabille continued:
“It was impossible for the murderer to escape by the way he had entered the court without our seeing him; or if we couldn’t see him we must certainly have felt him, since the court is a very narrow one enclosed in high iron railings.”
“Then if the man was hemmed in that narrow square, how is it you did not find him?–I have been asking you that for the last half hour.”
“Monsieur President,” replied Rouletabille, “I cannot answer that question before half-past six!”
By this time the people in the court-room were beginning to believe in this new witness. They were amused by his melodramatic action in thus fixing the hour; but they seemed to have confidence in the outcome. As for the President, it looked as if he also had made up his mind to take the young man in the same way. He had certainly been impressed by Rouletabille’s explanation of Madame Mathieu’s part.
“Well, Monsieur Rouletabille,” he said, “as you say; but don’t let us see any more of you before half-past six.”
Rouletabille bowed to the President, and made his way to the door of the witnesses’ room.
I quietly made my way through the crowd and left the court almost at the same time as Rouletabille. He greeted me heartily, and looked happy.
“I’ll not ask you, my dear fellow,” I said, smiling, “what you’ve been doing in America; because I’ve no doubt you’ll say you can’t tell me until after half-past six.”
“No, my dear Sainclair, I’ll tell you right now why I went to America. I went in search of the name of the other half of the murderer!”
“The name of the other half?”
“Exactly. When we last left the Glandier I knew there were two halves to the murderer and the name of only one of them. I went to America for the name of the other half.”
I was too puzzled to answer. Just then we entered the witnesses’ room, and Rouletabille was immediately surrounded. He showed himself very friendly to all except Arthur Rance to whom he exhibited a marked coldness of manner. Frederic Larsan came in also. Rouletabille went up and shook him heartily by the hand. His manner toward the detective showed that he had got the better of the policeman. Larsan smiled and asked him what he had been doing in America, Rouletabille began by telling him some anecdotes of his voyage. They then turned aside together apparently with the object of speaking confidentially. I, therefore, discreetly left them and, being curious to hear the evidence, returned to my seat in the court-room where the public plainly showed its lack of interest in what was going on in their impatience for Rouletabille’s return at the appointed time.
On the stroke of half-past six Joseph Rouletabille was again brought in. It is impossible for me to picture the tense excitement which appeared on every face, as he made his way to the bar. Darzac rose to his feet, frightfully pale.
The President, addressing Rouletabille, said gravely:
“I will not ask you to take the oath, because you have not been regularly summoned; but I trust there is no need to urge upon you the gravity of the statement you are about to make.”
Rouletabille looked the President quite calmly and steadily in the face, and replied:
“Yes, Monsieur.”
“At your last appearance here,” said the President, “we had arrived at the point where you were to tell us how the murderer escaped, and also his name. Now, Monsieur Rouletabille, we await your explanation.”
“Very well, Monsieur,” began my friend amidst a profound silence. “I had explained how it was impossible for the murderer to get away without being seen. And yet he was there with us in the courtyard.”
“And you did not see him? At least that is what the prosecution declares.”
“No! We all of us saw him, Monsieur le President!” cried Rouletabille.
“Then why was he not arrested?”
“Because no one, besides myself, knew that he was the murderer. It would have spoiled my plans to have had him arrested, and I had then no proof other than my own reasoning. I was convinced we had the murderer before us and that we were actually looking at him. I have now brought what I consider the indisputable proof.”
“Speak out, Monsieur! Tell us the murderer’s name.”
“You will find it on the list of names present in the court on the night of the tragedy,” replied Rouletabille.
The people present in the court-room began showing impatience. Some of them even called for the name, and were silenced by the usher.
“The list includes Daddy Jacques, Bernier the concierge, and Mr. Arthur Rance,” said the President. “Do you accuse any of these?”
“No, Monsieur!”
“Then I do not understand what you are driving at. There was no other person at the end of the court.”
“Yes, Monsieur, there was, not at the end, but above the court, who was leaning out of the window.”
“Do you mean Frederic Larsan!” exclaimed the President.
“Yes! Frederic Larsan!” replied Rouletabille in a ringing tone. “Frederic Larsan is the murderer!”
The court-room became immediately filled with loud and indignant protests. So astonished was he that the President did not attempt to quiet it. The quick silence which followed was broken by the distinctly whispered words from the lips of Robert Darzac:
“It’s impossible! He’s mad!”
“You dare to accuse Frederic Larsan, Monsieur?” asked the President. “If you are not mad, what are your proofs?”