CHAPTER XXIX
The Mystery of Mademoiselle Stangerson
During the days that followed I had several opportunities to question
him as to his reason for his voyage to America, but I obtained no
more precise answers than he had given me on the evening of the
adjournment of the trial, when we were on the train for Paris. One
day, however, on my still pressing him, he said:
"Can't you understand that I had to know Larsan's true personality?"
"No doubt," I said, "but why did you go to America to find that out?"
He sat smoking his pipe, and made no further reply. I began to see
that I was touching on the secret that concerned Mademoiselle
Stangerson. Rouletabille evidently had found it necessary to go to
America to find out what the mysterious tie was that bound her to
Larsan by so strange and terrible a bond. In America he had learned
who Larsan was and had obtained information which closed his mouth.
He had been to Philadelphia.
And now, what was this mystery which held Mademoiselle Stangerson
and Monsieur Robert Darzac in so inexplicable a silence? After so
many years and the publicity given the case by a curious and
shameless press; now that Monsieur Stangerson knows all and has
forgiven all, all may be told. In every phase of this remarkable
story Mademoiselle Stangerson had always been the sufferer.
The beginning dates from the time when, as a young girl, she was
living with her father in Philadelphia. A visitor at the house,
a Frenchman, had succeeded by his wit, grace and persistent
attention, in gaining her affections. He was said to be rich and
had asked her of her father. Monsieur Stangerson, on making
inquiries as to Monsieur Jean Roussel, found that the man was a
swindler and an adventurer. Jean Roussel was but another of the
many names under which the notorious Ballmeyer, a fugitive from
France, tried to hide himself. Monsieur Stangerson did not know
of his identity with Ballmeyer; he learned that the man was simply
undesirable for his daughter. He not only refused to give his
consent to the marriage but denied him admission into the house.
Mathilde Stangerson, however, had fallen in love. To her Jean
Roussel was everything that her love painted him. She was indignant
at her father's attitude, and did not conceal her feelings. Her
father sent her to stay with an aunt in Cincinnati. There she was
joined by Jean Roussel and, in spite of the reverence she felt for
her father, ran away with him to get married.
They went to Louisville and lived there for some time. One morning,
however, a knock came at the door of the house in which they were
and the police entered to arrest Jean Roussel. It was then that
Mathilde Stangerson, or Roussel, learned that her husband was no
other than the notorious Ballmeyer!
The young woman in her despair tried to commit suicide. She failed
in this, and was forced to rejoin her aunt in Cincinnati, The old
lady was overjoyed to see her again. She had been anxiously
searching for her and had not dared to tell Monsieur Stangerson of
her disappearance. Mathilde swore her to secrecy, so that her father
should not know she had been away. A month later, Mademoiselle
Stangerson returned to her father, repentant, her heart dead within
her, hoping only one thing: that she would never again see her
husband, the horrible Ballmeyer. A report was spread, a few weeks
later, that he was dead, and she now determined to atone for her
disobedience by a life of labour and devotion for her father. And
she kept her word.
All this she had confessed to Robert Darzac, and, believing Ballmeyer
dead, had given herself to the joy of a union with him. But fate had
resuscitated Jean Roussel--the Ballmeyer of her youth. He had taken
steps to let her know that he would never allow her to marry Darzac
--that he still loved her.
Mademoiselle Stangerson never for one moment hesitated to confide
in Monsieur Darzac. She showed him the letter in which Jean Roussel
asked her to recall the first hours of their union in their beautiful
and charming Louisville home. "The presbytery has lost nothing of
its charm, nor the garden its brightness," he had written. The
scoundrel pretended to be rich and claimed the right of taking her
back to Louisville. She had told Darzac that if her father should
know of her dishonour, she would kill herself. Monsieur Darzac had
sworn to silence her persecutor, even if he had to kill him. He
was outwitted and would have succumbed had it not been for the
genius of Rouletabille.
Mademoiselle Stangerson was herself helpless in the hands of such a
villain. She had tried to kill him when he had first threatened and
then attacked her in The Yellow Room. She had, unfortunately,
failed, and felt herself condemned to be for ever at the mercy of
this unscrupulous wretch who was continually demanding her presence
at clandestine interviews. When he sent her the letter through the
Post Office, asking her to meet him, she had refused. The result
of her refusal was the tragedy of The Yellow Room. The second time
he wrote asking for a meeting, the letter reaching her in her sick
chamber, she had avoided him by sleeping with her servants. In that
letter the scoundrel had warned her that, since she was too ill to
come to him, he would come to her, and that he would be in her
chamber at a particular hour on a particular night. Knowing that
she had everything to fear from Ballmeyer, she had left her chamber
on that night. It was then that the incident of the "inexplicable
gallery" occurred.
The third time she had determined to keep the appointment. He
asked for it in the letter he had written in her own room, on the
night of the incident in the gallery, which he left on her desk.
In that letter he threatened to burn her father's papers if she
did not meet him. It was to rescue these papers that she made up
her mind to see him. She did not for one moment doubt that the
wretch would carry out his threat if she persisted in avoiding him,
and in that case the labours of her father's lifetime would be for
ever lost. Since the meeting was thus inevitable, she resolved to
see her husband and appeal to his better nature. It was for this
interview that she had prepared herself on the night the keeper was
killed. They did meet, and what passed between them may be imagined.
He insisted that she renounce Darzac. She, on her part, affirmed
her love for him. He stabbed her in his anger, determined to convict
Darzac of the crime. As Larsan he could do it, and had so managed
things that Darzac could never explain how he had employed the time
of his absence from the chateau. Ballmeyer's precautions were most
cunningly taken.
Larsan had threatened Darzac as he had threatened Mathilde--with
the same weapon, and the same threats. He wrote Darzac urgent
letters, declaring himself ready to deliver up the letters that had
passed between him and his wife, and to leave them for ever, if he
would pay him his price. He asked Darzac to meet him for the
purpose of arranging the matter, appointing the time when Larsan
would be with Mademoiselle Stangerson. When Darzac went to Epinay,
expecting to find Ballmeyer or Larsan there, he was met by an
accomplice of Larsan's, and kept waiting until such time as the
"coincidence" could be established.
It was all done with Machiavellian cunning; but Ballmeyer had
reckoned without Joseph Rouletabille.
Now that the Mystery of The Yellow Room has been cleared up, this
is not the time to tell of Rouletabille's adventures in America.
Knowing the young reporter as we do, we can understand with what
acumen he had traced, step by step, the story of Mathilde Stangerson
and Jean Roussel. At Philadelphia he had quickly informed himself
as to Arthur William Rance. There he learned of Rance's act of
devotion and the reward he thought himself entitled to for it. A
rumour of his marriage with Mademoiselle Stangerson had once found
its way into the drawing-rooms of Philadelphia. He also learned of
Rance's continued attentions to her and his importunities for her
hand. He had taken to drink, he had said, to drown his grief at
his unrequited love. It can now be understood why Rouletabille
had shown so marked a coolness of demeanour towards Rance when they
met in the witnesses' room, on the day of the trial.
The strange Roussel-Stangerson mystery had now been laid bare. Who
was this Jean Roussel? Rouletabille had traced him from Philadelphia
to Cincinnati. In Cincinnati he became acquainted with the old aunt,
and had found means to open her mouth. The story of Ballmeyer's
arrest threw the right light on the whole story. He visited the
"presbytery"--a small and pretty dwelling in the old colonial style
--which had, indeed, "lost nothing of its charm." Then, abandoning
his pursuit of traces of Mademoiselle Stangerson, he took up those
of Ballmeyer. He followed them from prison to prison, from crime
to crime. Finally, as he was about leaving for Europe, he learned
in New York that Ballmeyer had, five years before, embarked for
France with some valuable papers belonging to a merchant of New
Orleans whom he had murdered.
And yet the whole of this mystery has not been revealed.
Mademoiselle Stangerson had a child, by her husband,--a son. The
infant was born in the old aunt's house. No one knew of it, so
well had the aunt managed to conceal the event.
What became of that son?--That is another story which, so far, I
am not permitted to relate.
About two months after these events, I came upon Rouletabille sitting
on a bench in the Palais de Justice, looking very depressed.
"What's the matter, old man?" I asked. "You are looking very down.
cast. How are your friends getting on?"
"Apart from you," he said, "I have no friends."
"I hope that Monsieur Darzac--"
"No doubt."
"And Mademoiselle Stangerson--How is she?"
"Better--much better."
"Then you ought not to be sad."
"I am sad," he said, "because I am thinking of the perfume of the
lady in black--"
"The perfume of the lady in black!--I have heard you often refer
to it. Tell me why it troubles you."
"Perhaps--some day; some day," said Rouletabille.
And he heaved a profound sigh.
