Her visit to the church had lasted a long time, so it was almost five o’clock when she arrived at the Place Malesherbes. When she went in, those present included the Baron d’Escarbes, an old habitué of the foyer Opéra, the journalist Michel Georges-Michel—only one of whose two Michels was serious, but whose writings were lively—among others.15 After having touched on various topics, the conversation naturally turned to the sorcerer of the day, to whom three great dailies had devoted articles that morning.
The Baron d’Escarbes, whose age permitted him to speak frankly, said: “All these phenomena of more-or-less white magic, suggestion and somnambulism have been known throughout the ages. I’ll remain skeptical, until one of these sorcerers has experimented on himself.”
With those words, Marc Vanel came in. Brought up to date, he turned to d’Escarbes. “You’re right, Monsieur. The marvelous doesn’t exist. There’s only science and the manifestation of physical laws—except that the person who knows how to make use of them can obtain effects that even subjugate the incredulous.”
Alexane stopped him, in the casual manner of an illustrious and eccentric dancer to whom everything is permitted. “In the homes of my friends, my dear Doctor, you are a diviner, a famous sorcerer. In my salon, shall I have no more than a perfect gentleman?”
“The spirit blows where it will, where it can, Madame. It’s a question of atmosphere; inspiration is necessary.”
Meanwhile, Marc Vanel drew nearer to the pretty blonde Comtesse Simone d’Armez, in order to greet her.
She looked at him, somewhat troubled. Simone had tried hard to forget her dream. Dr. Vanel’s face caused it to revive in her mind, and she felt like an ingénue of adultery, pious and tortured by remorse, who never wants to see her lover—the cause of a temporary weakness—again, but who meets him unexpectedly.
He took her to one side, laughing and mocking imperceptibly.
“Did you have pleasant dreams last night, my dear Madame?”
Simone d’Armez feigned levity. “Yes—you even played an absurd role in them.”
“You lack indulgence—or should I say charity?” he said, maliciously, gazing at her. Whatever the circumstances, I would always reproach myself for appearing absurd to you, my dear Madame, even in a dream. All in all, though. I cannot complain if I have had the joy, even chimerically, of your company.”
“The worst thing is that you frightened me terribly. It’s for that reason that I’m critical of you; I have no other reproaches to make. You had, however, announced your visit, and I was forewarned.”
“Oh! Do you truly believe in that power, then? Have I misused it?”
Mark Vanel, while fixing the young woman with his gaze as if to read the depths of her mind and penetrate her thoughts, had asked the question in a soft voice, with the anxious expression of a lover fearful of having annoyed his idol.
“No, since it was a dream,” replies Simone. “It was an imagination, a phantom made of memories—of chic, to employ fashionable parlance. You’re not culpable, since it could not have been your person.”
“Who can tell? Who can tell? Who can tell?” He said it three times, as he had acted during the night.
She was visibly emotional. Her slender white hands, very long, with fingernails as bright as rose petals, were trembling slightly. She wanted to hide her disturbance, and deployed her fan over her face.
Marc Vanel imposed on her the vision of the true flesh of the luminous nocturnal mask. A frisson ran through her entire body. The eyes were similar to those of the phantom lover. Was that polite, respectable socialite, similar to all the rest in the uniform modern costume, the Devil, then? She submitted once again, as in the dark, to the mysterious grip. Was that man the invisible faun who had taken and possessed her so completely, in spite of herself?
“I’ve seen someone who resembled you,” she said, “but he didn’t speak.”
“He acted. Perhaps it was I.”
“Hey, over there!” shouted the journalist, his voice teasing. “We’re reclaiming you, Comtesse; it’s necessary to be suspicious of sorcery in little corners.”
III. The Fortins’ Investigation
Jeanne Fortin and her father had taken a few hours rest, leaving the laboratory and the two patients in Frédéric’s care. They came together again at one o’clock in the afternoon in the dining room, with an appetite that was justified by the fatigues and emotions of the night.
After the meal, not having anything to do, for the moment, with regard to the two new subjects—because, for Jeanne, they were only subjects of study—the young scientist resolved, by way of distraction, to pursue the investigation of Julien de Vandeuvre. Consulting a social directory, she had no difficulty finding his address: 20 Rue de la Comtesse-de-Noailles.
She got dressed and went down into Paris.
Addressing herself to the concierge of the luxurious building, Jeanne Fortin was rewarded for her audacity.
“We’ve been sent by the agency. You have a furnished apartment, it seems?”
“Yes, Madame, in the fourth floor. Antechamber, drawing room, dining room, two bedrooms, bathroom, and a maid’s room on the sixth.”
“That’s perfect. How much?”
“A thousand a month plus charges. Three months in advance.”
“Can we move in immediately?”
“If you wish. The tenancy agreement won’t be ready until tomorrow, though.”
“That’s annoying! We’ll have to spend the night at a hotel.”
“Oh. I can see who I’m dealing with. You can settle things tomorrow with the manager. I’ll go telephone him.”
Dr. Fortin slipped a hundred francs into the porter’s hand. “Take that for now. I’ll give you the denier à Dieu tomorrow.16 Would you like to show us the apartment now?”
They took the elevator, reaching the fourth floor in a matter of seconds.
“This elevator functions marvelously,” said Fortin. “I’m interested in such things; I’m the director of the Société Locomobile de Montlevoy, in the Indre.”
“Yes, it works very well, but it doesn’t please everyone. The tenant on the third claims that the noise, although it’s very quiet, as you can see, prevents him from sleeping. It’s true that he has his bed directly behind the elevator shaft.”
“Can’t he move his bed?”
“Yes—he even has a beautiful room on the far side, but then he’d be directly over Monsieur Vendeuvre’s bedroom on the second-floor, and as Monsieur Vandeuvre socializes a great deal and comes back at all hours, he’d still be woken up. Bah! He’s a maniac—an eccentric.”
While talking they had looked over the apartment.
“It’s exactly what we’re looking for—so, we can sleep here tonight?”
“If you want to.”
“We’ll go fetch our suitcases and come back after dinner.”
When the doctor and his daughter came back, the concierges, put in a good mood by another hundred-franc bill, were untiringly obliging, and put themselves a the disposal of “Monsieur and Mademoiselle Grandeau.”
At about one o’clock in the morning, when everyone in the house was asleep, the two new tenants went down to Julien de Vandeuvre’s floor and, by means of his keys, entered it honestly. Jeanne went to close the curtains hermetically, and then switched on the light. First they made a tour of the five rooms comprising the apartment. After the antechamber there was a small drawing room, a dining room, two bedrooms and then a large drawing room, cluttered with works of art, paintings, bronzes and trinkets. Having glanced at it all, they returned to the antechamber and began a minute inspection.
Fortin was the first to make a discovery: “There’s a louis d’or here on the carpet.”
“And another one!” said Jeanne. “Are there always louis d’or, then?”
“We’re not the first to come in here since the tenant’s death. This is the proof.”
“What did you find out from the porters?”
“The Vandeuvres are
old Touranian nobility. Julien only came back four days ago from his estate in Vandeuvre, where he went to collect his mother’s legacy. Nobody knows how much—about four million, they think.”
“They’re not surprised by their tenant’s absence?”
“No, he’s often absent. Hunting parties or long excursions by automobile with his friends.”
“Who takes care of the apartment?”
“An old family maidservant—on holiday with friends since her master’s departure, which is to say, for ten days. She probably doesn’t know about his return, and, consequently, his death. That explains why she hasn’t come back.”
“What relations does this Vandeuvre have?”
“Numerous and aristocratic.”
“An elegant imbecile.”
“A very chic microbe.”
“If he has any important papers, they ought to be here. The concierges don’t know about any serious liaison?”
“In the last few months Julien has been visited several times by a veiled woman. The young man takes all sorts of precautions to bring her in.”
“I think we’re on the right track. Let’s sum up: Julien has a liaison with a married woman. He comes back from the province with an inheritance. On his return he goes to buy some jewelry for his mistress, and, the following evening, he’s murdered and his body is ‘found’ on the public highway. It only remains for us to discover the name of the woman and the money from the inheritance.”
“The two louis dropped in the antechamber lead me to believe that our resuscitated coffers have already received an interested visit.”
“The game’s afoot!” said Jeanne. “Very amusing, the occupation of detective.”
After having inspected the drawing room without any result, Jeanne said: “Let’s take a look at the bedroom. “There’s an old writing desk, and I believe this is the moment to use the little bunch of keys we found in his waistcoat.”
“Click…clack!” muttered Fortin. “This is the one. Ah! Whoever searched this put the papers back pell-mell. Here are two drawers that are full, and the other two are empty.”
“Look—a considerable number of title deeds...”
“What about Julien’s personal fortune? Or the inheritance?”
“Look, here’s another heap of deeds and bonds.”
“Not important. Note that we’re only finding deeds—no banknotes or gold.”
“There are some letters. They might put us on the track of the woman.”
Having made two piles, they began reading them with minute attention.
“Nothing!” said Jeane Fortin, after an hour of research. “You?”
“Let’s look elsewhere—the cupboard near the fireplace. The key? Here it is…damn! What a mess!”
It was a kind of Japanese cabinet; when the two front panels were open, they were confronted by ten drawers. They, too, were in great disorder. Little packets of letters, ribbons, dried flowers, perfumed handkerchiefs and small grooming implements were stuffed in and piled up.
“Some of these objects must have been disseminated over the furniture. During the visits of the woman in question, Julien must have put all the relics of former amours that he didn’t want his current lover to see in here.”
“In that case, if there are any to do with that lady, they ought to be in evidence.”
“They ought to be—but the posthumous visitors have made them disappear...”
Dr. Fortin lifted up the sheetmetal screen shielding the fireplace. “Ah! Burnt papers!”
“Don’t disturb the ashes,” said Jeanne, swiftly.
Both kneeling in front of a small piled of blackened papers, they examined it attentively.
“It sometimes happens,” said Jeanne, that when one burns papers written in ordinary ink, that the charred sheet remained intact. Then the letters, once black, show up white on the carbonized sheet. Here’s an example...”
Displaying a fragment of a letter, she succeeded in deciphering a few words. “It’s the top sheet of the letter,” she said. “Tuesday 17 May...it’s May now. It was, therefore, prior to Julien’s departure... Lower down: My dear friend…depart…vexes me... Evidently: Your departure vexes me... That’s very little help to our investigation.”
“There’s another fragment,” Fortin said.
Jeanne took out a visiting card, and, with infinite precaution, succeeded in disengaging the new fragment without causing it to disintegrate. “And think of your Sophie often…and a P.S.: Write to me every day... That’s all. Now let’s search the ashes. Look—what’s that?”
“A piece of a picture frame.”
“But I recognize that…yes, it’s like the one I have in my bedroom—the one containing the photograph of the pupils at the Berton school.”
“There must be lots of similar frames.”
“That’s where you’re mistaken, for those frames were made by a woodcarver who worked at the school for a month. He repaired Madame Berton’s old furniture, and when the photographer came to bring the photos, he offered those who wanted one to make frames with the fragments of a rosewood cupboard that was being thrown out.”
“Hum! Were there a lot of pupils at the Burton school?”
“I remember that he ran off a hundred photographs, because several pupils asked for two or three for relatives.”
“Then we can easily go astray.”
“No, Father, so far as I know, there were only eight of us from Paris. Taking away me and Simone d’Armez, that only leaves six. Well, the woman we’re looking for is named Sophie, and of the six pupils presently in Paris, there’s only Sophie Jenson, who married the député Arsène Vauclin. Now, I know that Simone sees her sometimes. Sophie married Arsène Vauclin three years ago, a former clerk of her father’s, a former journalist and businessman, who went into politics. I believe that couple to be capable of anything in order to make a fortune. She’s already invited me, via Simone d’Armez, to go to her soirées. As a child, Sophie Vauclin was much feared because of her critical temperament, and was somewhat inclined to bad behavior, but she interested me because of her inexhaustible cheerfulness and her insouciance—of good as of evil. Such a woman, in association with an arriviste like Vauclin, might be very dangerous. Furthermore, it seems to me that I recognize Sophie’s handwriting in the fragments of the burned missives. I ought to have a note from her, in which she asked me for the formula for some cologne. I’ll look for it when we get back to the Red Nest.”
“In that case, we have nothing more to do here.”
“Let’s make one last tour of inspection and then go to bed. Tomorrow—or, rather, this morning—we can go home to look after our patients. If I have time after dinner, I’ll go to see Simone d’Armez.”
“By the way,” said Fortin, “shall we put Marc Vanel in the picture with regard to our little investigation? I think he shares our ideas in many respects.”
“Yes,” said Jeanne, “he’s certainly very strong. Try to hang on to him. I repeat that I think he’d be a splendid collaborator for us.”
IV. The Love of a God
The afternoon was beautiful, sunlit and perfumed, and Marc Vanel yielded to the charms of spring as he went through the Bois de Boulogne, green with all the young leaves.
He was on his way to the Fortins’ house at Saint-Cloud. Since the evening when he had dined with them and his friend Tchitcherine, he had often taken the road to the wild property. He felt irresistibly attracted to it by the ever more cordial welcome he received and the experiments pursued by the scientist and his daughter.
To tell the truth, though, neither the strangeness of the dwelling, in which he rediscovered corners of distant nature, nor curiosity regarding the extraordinary endeavors of his friends, nor the calm, restful evenings he spent with them dreaming in the belvedere would have been enough to attract him in isolation. The real cause of his frequent visits to the Fortins was the cherished image of Jeanne, which haunted him, and which he could no longer rid himself.
He
loved her. That was it: he had thought that all that was finished; he had thought himself sheltered from the dangerous charm of women; he had arranged his life so that the human species could never again cause him any concern or chagrin—but he had found in his path the only creature who could trouble him.
However, the genius of the young woman—which rose to his own level—exasperated him. Jeanne Fortin, his equal, scientifically, certainly admired the scientist in him, but did not take an interest in the man. And the man was vexed, because Marc was a sensualist, and what he loved above all in women was their possession. Then again, he had a rival, all the more powerful because Jeanne owed him a great deal, and he thought her perfectly capable of giving herself—who could tell?—without love, to pay her debt. Furthermore, he sensed that to act with Jeanne Fortin as he had with Simone d’Armez would close the door of the Red Nest to him forever.
He had initially been subject, without being aware of it, to the special seduction that emanated from Jeanne when she spoke about her science, her fabulous discoveries. She communicated a sort of fever, a sacred fire, of which one retained the influence for a long time—and Vanel experienced the effects more than anyone else because he understood her better. So he, Vanel, had fallen madly in love with her, sensing that she was his equal, a higher being placed among women as he was, among men: a magnificent superhuman.
He found her in the abandoned garden, clad entirely in white, gathering nenuphar flowers, leaning over the edge of the old pond with the tranquil murky water. She seemed thus to be an enchantress or a princess of legend in a park of another century—and Marc Vanel watched her for some time without revealing his presence.
Finally, he showed himself.
“Bonjour, Marc,” she said. “How kind of you to come to see friends, instead of accepting tea with the beautiful ladies who pay court to you. Do you realize that you might unwittingly be disdaining enormous fortunes?”
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