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.
