Delphi Collected Works of Maurice Leblanc (Illustrated) (Delphi Series Nine Book 17)

by Maurice Leblanc

  “I see,” said M. Desmalions. “But how did you go from the opera to Mme. d’Ersingen’s?”

  For the first time, Mme. Fauville seemed to understand that she was the victim of a regular cross-examination; and her look and attitude betrayed a certain uneasiness. She replied:

  “I took a motor cab.”

  “In the street?”

  “On the Place de l’Opéra.”

  “At twelve o’clock, therefore?”

  “No, at half-past eleven: I left before the opera was over.”

  “You were in a hurry to get to your friend’s?”

  “Yes … or rather—”

  She stopped; her cheeks were scarlet; her lips and chin trembled; and she asked:

  “Why do you ask me all these questions?”

  “They are necessary, Madame. They may throw a light on what we want to know. I beg you, therefore, to answer them. At what time did you reach your friend’s house?”

  “I hardly know. I did not notice the time.”

  “Did you go straight there?”

  “Almost.”

  “How do you mean, almost?”

  “I had a little headache and told the driver to go up the Champs

  Elysées and the Avenue du Bois — very slowly — and then down the Champs

  Elysées again—”

  She was becoming more and more embarrassed. Her voice grew indistinct.

  She lowered her head and was silent.

  Certainly her silence contained no confession, and there was nothing entitling any one to believe that her dejection was other than a consequence of her grief. But yet she seemed so weary as to give the impression that, feeling herself lost, she was giving up the fight. And it was almost a feeling of pity that was entertained for this woman against whom all the circumstances seemed to be conspiring, and who defended herself so badly that her cross-examiner hesitated to press her yet further.

  M. Desmalions, in fact, wore an irresolute air, as if the victory had been too easy, and as if he had some scruple about pursuing it.

  Mechanically he observed Perenna, who passed him a slip of paper, saying:

  “Mme. d’Ersingen’s telephone number.”

  M. Desmalions murmured:

  “Yes, true, they may know—”

  And, taking down the receiver, he asked for number 325.04. He was connected at once and continued:

  “Who is that speaking?… The butler? Ah! Is Mme. d’Ersingen at home?… No?… Or Monsieur?… Not he, either?… Never mind, you can tell me what I want to know. I am M. Desmalions, the Prefect of Police, and I need certain information. At what time did Mme. Fauville come last night?… What do you say?… Are you sure?… At two o’clock in the morning?… Not before?… And she went away?… In ten minutes time?… Good … But you’re certain you are not mistaken about the time when she arrived? I must know this positively: it is most important…. You say it was two o’clock in the morning? Two o’clock in the morning?… Very well…. Thank you.”

  When M. Desmalions turned round, he saw Mme. Fauville standing beside him and looking at him with an expression of mad anguish. And one and the same idea occurred to the mind of all the onlookers. They were in the presence either of an absolutely innocent woman or else of an exceptional actress whose face lent itself to the most perfect simulation of innocence.

  “What do you want?” she stammered. “What does this mean? Explain yourself!”

  Then M. Desmalions asked simply:

  “What were you doing last night between half-past eleven in the evening and two o’clock in the morning?”

  It was a terrifying question at the stage which the examination had reached, a fatal question implying:

  “If you cannot give us an exact and strict account of the way in which you employed your time while the crime was being committed, we have the right to conclude that you were not alien to the murder of your husband and stepson—”

  She understood it in this sense and staggered on her feet, moaning:

  “It’s horrible!… horrible!”

  The Prefect repeated:

  “What were you doing? The question must be quite easy to answer.”

  “Oh,” she cried, in the same piteous tone, “how can you believe!… Oh, no, no, it’s not possible! How can you believe!”

  “I believe nothing yet,” he said. “Besides, you can establish the truth with a single word.”

  It seemed, from the movement of her lips and the sudden gesture of resolution that shook her frame, as though she were about to speak that word. But all at once she appeared stupefied and dumfounded, pronounced a few unintelligible syllables, and fell huddled into a chair, sobbing convulsively and uttering cries of despair.

  It was tantamount to a confession. At the very least, it was a confession of her inability to supply the plausible explanation which would have put an end to the discussion.

  The Prefect of Police moved away from her and spoke in a low voice to the examining magistrate and the public prosecutor. Perenna and Sergeant Mazeroux were left alone together, side by side.

  Mazeroux whispered:

  “What did I tell you? I knew you would find out! Oh, what a man you are!

  The way you managed!”

  He was beaming at the thought that the chief was clear of the matter and that he had no more crows to pluck with his, Mazeroux’s, superiors, whom he revered almost as much as he did the chief. Everybody was now agreed; they were “friends all round”; and Mazeroux was choking with delight.

  “They’ll lock her up, eh?”

  “No,” said Perenna. “There’s not enough ‘hold’ on her for them to issue a warrant.”

  “What!” growled Mazeroux indignantly. “Not enough hold? I hope, in any case, that you won’t let her go. She made no bones, you know, about attacking you! Come, Chief, polish her off, a she-devil like that!”

  Don Luis remained pensive. He was thinking of the unheard-of coincidences, the accumulation of facts that bore down on Mme. Fauville from every side. And the decisive proof which would join all these different facts together and give to the accusation the grounds which it still lacked was one which Perenna was able to supply. This was the marks of the teeth in the apple hidden among the shrubs in the garden. To the police these would be as good as any fingerprint, all the more as they could compare the marks with those on the cake of chocolate.

  Nevertheless, he hesitated; and, concentrating his anxious attention, he watched, with mingled feelings of pity and repulsion, that woman who, to all seeming, had killed her husband and her husband’s son. Was he to give her the finishing stroke? Had he the right to play the part of judge? And supposing he were wrong?

  * * * * *

  Meantime, M. Desmalions had walked up to him and, while pretending to speak to Mazeroux, was really asking Perenna:

  “What do you think of it?”

  Mazeroux shook his head. Perenna replied:

  “I think, Monsieur le Préfet, that, if this woman is guilty, she is defending herself, for all her cleverness, with inconceivable lack of skill.”

  “Meaning — ?”

  “Meaning that she was doubtless only a tool in the hands of an accomplice.”

  “An accomplice?”

  “Remember, Monsieur le Préfet, her husband’s exclamation in your office yesterday: ‘Oh, the scoundrels! the scoundrels!’ There is, therefore, at least one accomplice, who perhaps is the same as the man who was present, as Sergeant Mazeroux must have told you, in the Café du Pont-Neuf when Inspector Vérot was last there: a man with a reddish-brown beard, carrying an ebony walking-stick with a silver handle. So that—”

  “So that,” said M. Desmalions, completing the sentence, “by arresting Mme. Fauville to-day, merely on suspicion, we have a chance of laying our hands on the accomplice.”

  Perenna did not reply. The Prefect continued, thoughtfully:

  “Arrest her … arrest her…. We should need a proof for that…. Did you receive no clue?”

 
“None at all, Monsieur le Préfet. True, my search was only summary.”

  “But ours was most minute. We have been through every corner of the room.”

  “And the garden, Monsieur le Préfet?”

  “The garden also.”

  “With the same care?”

  “Perhaps not…. But I think—”

  “I think, on the contrary, Monsieur le Préfet, that, as the murderers passed through the garden in coming and going, there might be a chance—”

  “Mazeroux,” said M. Desmalions, “go outside and make a more thorough inspection.”

  The sergeant went out. Perenna, who was once more standing at one side, heard the Prefect of Police repeating to the examining magistrate:

  “Ah, if we only had a proof, just one! The woman is evidently guilty. The presumption against her is too great! … And then there are Cosmo Mornington’s millions…. But, on the other hand, look at her … look at all the honesty in that pretty face of hers, look at all the sincerity of her grief.”

  She was still crying, with fitful sobs and starts of indignant protest that made her clench her fists. At one moment she took her tear-soaked handkerchief, bit it with her teeth and tore it, after the manner of certain actresses.

  Perenna saw those beautiful white teeth, a little wide, moist and gleaming, rending the dainty cambric. And he thought of the marks of teeth on the apple. And he was seized with an extreme longing to know the truth. Was it the same pair of jaws that had left its impress in the pulp of the fruit?

  Mazeroux returned. M. Desmalions moved briskly toward the sergeant, who showed him the apple which he had found under the ivy. And Perenna at once realized the supreme importance which the Prefect of Police attached to Mazeroux’s explanations and to his unexpected discovery.

  A conversation of some length took place between the magistrates and ended in the decision which Don Luis foresaw. M. Desmalions walked across the room to Mme. Fauville. It was the catastrophe. He reflected for a second on the manner in which he should open this final contest, and then he asked:

  “Are you still unable, Madame, to tell us how you employed your time last night?”

  She made an effort and whispered:

  “Yes, yes…. I took a taxi and drove about. … I also walked a little—”

  “That is a fact which we can easily verify when we have found the driver of the taxi. Meanwhile, there is an opportunity of removing the somewhat … grievous impression which your silence has left on our minds.”

  “I am quite ready—”

  “It is this: the person or one of the persons who took part in the crime appears to have bitten into an apple which was afterward thrown away in the garden and which has just been found. To put an end to any suppositions concerning yourself, we should like you to perform the same action.”

  “Oh, certainly!” she cried, eagerly. “If this is all you need to convince you—”

  She took one of the three apples which Desmalions handed her from the dish and lifted it to her mouth.

  It was a decisive act. If the two marks resembled each other, the proof existed, assured and undeniable.

  Before completing her movement, she stopped short, as though seized with a sudden fear…. Fear of what? Fear of the monstrous chance that might be her undoing? Or fear rather of the dread weapon which she was about to deliver against herself? In any case nothing accused her with greater directness than this last hesitation, which was incomprehensible if she was innocent, but clear as day if she was guilty!

  “What are you afraid of, Madame?” asked M. Desmalions.

  “Nothing, nothing,” she said, shuddering. “I don’t know…. I am afraid of everything…. It is all so horrible—”

  “But, Madame, I assure you that what we are asking of you has no sort of importance and, I am persuaded, can only have a fortunate result for you. If you don’t mind, therefore—”

  She raised her hand higher and yet higher, with a slowness that betrayed her uneasiness. And really, in the fashion in which things were happening, the scene was marked by a certain solemnity and tragedy that wrung every heart.

  “And, if I refuse?” she asked, suddenly.

  “You are absolutely entitled to refuse,” said the Prefect of Police. “But is it worth while, Madame? I am sure that your counsel would be the first to advise you—”

  “My counsel?” she stammered, understanding the formidable meaning conveyed by that reply.

  And, suddenly, with a fierce resolve and the almost ferocious air that contorts the face when great dangers threaten, she made the movement which they were pressing her to make. She opened her mouth. They saw the gleam of the white teeth. At one bite, the white teeth dug into the fruit.

  “There you are, Monsieur,” she said.

  M. Desmalions turned to the examining magistrate.

  “Have you the apple found in the garden?”

  “Here, Monsieur le Préfet.”

  M. Desmalions put the two apples side by side.

  And those who crowded round him, anxiously looking on, all uttered one exclamation.

  The two marks of teeth were identical.

  Identical! Certainly, before declaring the identity of every detail, the absolute analogy of the marks of each tooth, they must wait for the results of the expert’s report. But there was one thing which there was no mistaking and that was the complete similarity of the two curves.

  In either fruit the rounded arch was bent according to the same inflection. The two semicircles could have fitted one into the other, both very narrow, both a little long-shaped and oval and of a restricted radius which was the very character of the jaw.

  The men did not speak a word. M. Desmalions raised his head. Mme. Fauville did not move, stood livid and mad with terror. But all the sentiments of terror, stupor and indignation that she might simulate with her mobile face and her immense gifts as an actress, did not prevail against the compelling proof that presented itself to every eye.

  The two imprints were identical! The same teeth had bitten into both apples!

  “Madame—” the Prefect of Police began.

  “No, no,” she cried, seized with a fit of fury, “no, it’s not true…. This is all just a nightmare…. No, you are never going to arrest me? I in prison! Why, it’s horrible!… What have I done? Oh, I swear that you are mistaken—”

  She took her head between her hands.

  “Oh, my brain is throbbing as if it would burst! What does all this mean? I have done no wrong…. I knew nothing. It was you who told me this morning…. Could I have suspected? My poor husband … and that dear Edmond who loved me … and whom I loved! Why should I have killed them? Tell me that! Why don’t you answer?” she demanded. “People don’t commit murder without a motive…. Well?… Well?… Answer me, can’t you?”

  And once more convulsed with anger, standing in an aggressive attitude, with her clenched hands outstretched at the group of magistrates, she screamed:

  “You’re no better than butchers … you have no right to torture a woman like this…. Oh, how horrible! To accuse me … to arrest me … for nothing! … Oh, it’s abominable! … What butchers you all are! … And it’s you in particular,” addressing Perenna, “it’s you — yes, I know — it’s you who are the enemy.

  “Oh, I understand! You had your reasons, you were here last night…. Then why don’t they arrest you? Why not you, as you were here and I was not and know nothing, absolutely nothing of what happened…. Why isn’t it you?”

  The last words were pronounced in a hardly intelligible fashion. She had no strength left. She had to sit down, with her head bent over her knees, and she wept once more, abundantly.

  Perenna went up to her and, raising her forehead and uncovering the tear-stained face, said:

  “The imprints of teeth in both apples are absolutely identical. There is therefore no doubt whatever but that the first comes from you as well as the second.”

  “No!” she said.

  “Yes,” he
affirmed. “That is a fact which it is materially impossible to deny. But the first impression may have been left by you before last night, that is to say, you may have bitten that apple yesterday, for instance—”

  She stammered:

  “Do you think so? Yes, perhaps, I seem to remember — yesterday morning—”

  But the Prefect of Police interrupted her.

  “It is useless, Madame; I have just questioned your servant, Silvestre. He bought the fruit himself at eight o’clock last evening. When M. Fauville went to bed, there were four apples in the dish. At eight o’clock this morning there were only three. Therefore the one found in the garden is incontestably the fourth; and this fourth apple was marked last night. And the mark is the mark of your teeth.”

  She stammered:

  “It was not I … it was not I … that mark is not mine.”

  “But—”

  “That mark is not mine…. I swear it as I hope to be saved…. And I also swear that I shall die, yes, die…. I prefer death to prison…. I shall kill myself…. I shall kill myself—”

  Her eyes were staring before her. She stiffened her muscles and made a supreme effort to rise from her chair. But, once on her feet, she tottered and fell fainting on the floor.

  While she was being seen to, Mazeroux beckoned to Don Luis and whispered:

  “Clear out, Chief.”

  “Ah, so the orders are revoked? I’m free?”

  “Chief, take a look at the beggar who came in ten minutes ago and who’s talking to the Prefect. Do you know him?”

  “Hang it all!” said Perenna, after glancing at a large red-faced man who did not take his eyes off him. “Hang it, it’s Weber, the deputy chief!”

  “And he’s recognized you, Chief! He recognized Lupin at first sight.

  There’s no fake that he can’t see through. He’s got the knack of it.

  Well, Chief, just think of all the tricks you’ve played on him and ask

  yourself if he’ll stick at anything to have his revenge!”

  “And you think he has told the Prefect?”

  “Of course he has; and the Prefect has ordered my mates to keep you in view. If you make the least show of trying to escape them, they’ll collar you.”

  “In that case, there’s nothing to be done?”