At the Villa Rose

by A. E. W. Mason

  Hanaud, on the other hand, was particularly alert. The discovery of the motor-car had raised his spirits. He sat at the table.

  "I will tell you what we have learnt," he said, "and it is of importance. The three of them—the man, the woman with the red hair, and Mlle. Celie—all drove yesterday night to Geneva. That is only one thing we have learnt."

  "Then you still cling to Geneva?" said Ricardo.

  "More than ever," said Hanaud.

  He turned in his chair towards Wethermill.

  "Ah, my poor friend!" he said, when he saw the young man's distress.

  Harry Wethermill sprang up with a gesture as though to sweep the need of sympathy away.

  "What can I do for you?" he asked.

  "You have a road map, perhaps?" said Hanaud.

  "Yes," said Wethermill, "mine is here. There it is"; and crossing the room he brought it from a sidetable and placed it in front of Hanaud. Hanaud took a pencil from his pocket.

  "One hundred and fifty kilometers was about the distance which the car had travelled. Measure the distances here, and you will see that Geneva is the likely place. It is a good city to hide in. Moreover the car appears at the corner at daylight. How does it appear, there? What road is it which comes out at that corner? The road from Geneva. I am not sorry that it is Geneva, for the Chef de la Surete is a friend of mine."

  "And what else do we know?" asked Ricardo.

  "This," said Hanaud. He paused impressively. "Bring up your chair to the table, M. Wethermill, and consider whether I am right or wrong"; and he waited until Harry Wethermill had obeyed. Then he laughed in a friendly way at himself.

  "I cannot help it," he said; "I have an eye for dramatic effects. I must prepare for them when I know they are coming. And one, I tell you, is coming now."

  He shook his finger at his companions. Ricardo shifted and shuffled in his chair. Harry Wethermill kept his eyes fixed on Hanaud's face, but he was quiet, as he had been throughout the long inquiry.

  Hanaud lit a cigarette and took his time.

  "What I think is this. The man who drove the car into Geneva drove it back, because—he meant to leave it again in the garage of the Villa Rose."

  "Good heavens!" cried Ricardo, flinging himself back. The theory so calmly enunciated took his breath away.

  "Would he have dared?" asked Harry Wethermill.

  Hanaud leaned across and tapped his fingers on the table to emphasise his answer.

  "All through this crime there are two things visible—brains and daring; clever brains and extraordinary daring. Would he have dared? He dared to be at the corner close to the Villa Rose at daylight. Why else should he have returned except to put back the car? Consider! The petrol is taken from tins which Servettaz might never have touched for a fortnight, and by that time he might, as he said, have forgotten whether he had not used them himself. I had this possibility in my mind when I put the questions to Servettaz about the petrol which the Commissaire thought so stupid. The utmost care is taken that there shall be no mould left on the floor of the carriage. The scrap of chiffon was torn off, no doubt, when the women finally left the car, and therefore not noticed, or that, too, would have been removed. That the exterior of the car was dirty betrayed nothing, for Servettaz had left it uncleaned."

  Hanaud leaned back and, step by step, related the journey of the car.

  "The man leaves the gate open; he drives into Geneva the two women, who are careful that their shoes shall leave no marks upon the floor. At Geneva they get out. The man returns. If he can only leave the car in the garage he covers all traces of the course he and his friends have taken. No one would suspect that the car had ever left the garage. At the corner of the road, just as he is turning down to the villa, he sees a sergent-de-ville at the gate. He knows that the murder is discovered. He puts on full speed and goes straight out of the town. What is he to do? He is driving a car for which the police in an hour or two, if not now already, will be surely watching. He is driving it in broad daylight. He must get rid of it, and at once, before people are about to see it, and to see him in it. Imagine his feelings! It is almost enough to make one pity him. Here he is in a car which convicts him as a murderer, and he has nowhere to leave it. He drives through Aix. Then on the outskirts of the town he finds an empty villa. He drives in at the gate, forces the door of the coach-house, and leaves his car there. Now, observe! It is no longer any use for him to pretend that he and his friends did not disappear in that car. The murder is already discovered, and with the murder the disappearance of the car. So he no longer troubles his head about it. He does not remove the traces of mould from the place where his feet rested, which otherwise, no doubt, he would have done. It no longer matters. He has to run to earth now before he is seen. That is all his business. And so the state of the car is explained. It was a bold step to bring that car back—yes, a bold and desperate step. But a clever one. For, if it had succeeded, we should have known nothing of their movements—oh, but nothing—nothing. Ah! I tell you this is no ordinary blundering affair. They are clever people who devised this crime—clever, and of an audacity which is surprising."

  Then Hanaud lit another cigarette.

  Mr. Ricardo, on the other hand, could hardly continue to smoke for excitement.

  "I cannot understand your calmness," he exclaimed.

  "No?" said Hanaud. "Yet it is so obvious. You are the amateur, I am the professional—that is all."

  He looked at his watch and rose to his feet.

  "I must go" he said and as he turned towards the door a cry sprang from Mr. Ricardo's lips "It is true. I am the amateur. Yet I have knowledge, Monsieur Hanaud which the professional would do well to obtain."

  Hanaud turned a guarded face towards Ricardo. There was no longer any raillery in his manner. He spoke slowly, coldly.

  "Let me have it then!"

  "I have driven in my motor-car from Geneva to Aix," Ricardo cried excitedly. "A bridge crosses a ravine high up amongst the mountains. At the bridge there is a Custom House. There—at the Pont de la Caille—your car is stopped. It is searched. You must sign your name in a book. And there is no way round. You would find sure and certain proof whether or no Madame Dauvray's car travelled last night to Geneva. Not so many travellers pass along that road at night. You would find certain proof too of how many people were in the car. For they search carefully at the Pont de la Caille."

  A dark flush overspread Hanaud's face. Ricardo was in the seventh Heaven. He had at last contributed something to the history of this crime. He had repaired an omission. He had supplied knowledge to the omniscient. Wethermill looked up drearily like one who has lost heart.

  "Yes, you must not neglect that clue," he said.

  Hanaud replied testily:

  "It is not a clue. M. Ricardo tells that he travelled from Geneva into France and that his car was searched. Well, we know already that the officers are particular at the Custom Houses of France. But travelling from France into Switzerland is a very different affair. In Switzerland, hardly a glance, hardly a word." That was true. M. Ricardo crestfallen recognized the truth. But his spirits rose again at once. "But the car came back from Geneva into France!" he cried.

  "Yes, but when the car came back, the man was alone in it," Hanaud answered. "I have more important things to attend to. For instance I must know whether by any chance they have caught our man at Marseilles." He laid his hand on Wethermill's shoulder. "And you, my friend, I should counsel you to get some sleep. We may need all our strength tomorrow. I hope so." He was speaking very bravely. "Yes, I hope so."

  Wethermill nodded.

  "I shall try," he said.

  "That's better," said Hanaud cheerfully. "You will both stay here this evening; for if I have news, I can then ring you up."

  Both men agreed, and Hanaud went away. He left Mr. Ricardo profoundly disturbed. "That man will take advice from no one," he declared. "His vanity is colossal. It is true they are not particular at the Swiss Frontier. Still the car would hav
e to stop there. At the Custom House they would know something. Hanaud ought to make inquiries." But neither Ricardo nor Harry Wethermill heard a word more from Hanaud that night.

  Chapter X - News from Geneva

  *

  The next morning, however, before Mr. Ricardo was out of his bed, M. Hanaud was announced. He came stepping gaily into the room, more elephantinely elfish than ever.

  "Send your valet away," he said. And as soon as they were alone he produced a newspaper, which he flourished in Mr. Ricardo's face and then dropped into his hands.

  Ricardo saw staring him in the face a full description of Celia Harland, of her appearance and her dress, of everything except her name, coupled with an intimation that a reward of four thousand francs would be paid to any one who could give information leading to the discovery of her whereabouts to Mr. Ricardo, the Hotel Majestic, Aix-les-Bains!

  Mr. Ricardo sat up in his bed with a sense of outrage.

  "You have done this?" he asked.

  "Yes."

  "Why have you done it?" Mr. Ricardo cried.

  Hanaud advanced to the bed mysteriously on the tips of his toes.

  "I will tell you," he said, in his most confidential tones. "Only it must remain a secret between you and me. I did it—because I have a sense of humour."

  "I hate publicity," said Mr. Ricardo acidly.

  "On the other hand you have four thousand francs," protested the detective. "Besides, what else should I do? If I name myself, the very people we are seeking to catch—who, you may be sure, will be the first to read this advertisement—will know that I, the great, the incomparable Hanaud, am after them; and I do not want them to know that. Besides"—and he spoke now in a gentle and most serious voice—"why should we make life more difficult for Mlle. Celie by telling the world that the police want her? It will be time enough for that when she appears before the Juge d'Instruction."

  Mr. Ricardo grumbled inarticulately, and read through the advertisement again.

  "Besides, your description is incomplete," he said. "There is no mention of the diamond earrings which Celia Harland was wearing when she went away."

  "Ah! so you noticed that!" exclaimed Hanaud. "A little more experience and I should be looking very closely to my laurels. But as for the earrings—I will tell you, Mlle. Celie was not wearing them when she went away from the Villa Rose."

  "But—but," stammered Ricardo, "the case upon the dressing-room table was empty."

  "Still, she was not wearing them, I know," said Hanaud decisively.

  "How do you know?" cried Ricardo, gazing at Hanaud with awe in his eyes. "How could you know?"

  "Because"—and Hanaud struck a majestic attitude, like a king in a play—"because I am the captain of the ship."

  Upon that Mr. Ricardo suffered a return of his ill-humour.

  "I do not like to be trifled with," he remarked, with as much dignity as his ruffled hair and the bed-clothes allowed him. He looked sternly at the newspaper, turning it over, and then he uttered a cry of surprise.

  "But this is yesterday's paper!" he said.

  "Yesterday evening's paper," Hanaud corrected.

  "Printed at Geneva!"

  "Printed, and published and sold at Geneva," said Hanaud.

  "When did you send the advertisement in, then?"

  "I wrote a letter while we were taking our luncheon," Hanaud explained. "The letter was to Besnard, asking him to telegraph the advertisement at once."

  "But you never said a word about it to us," Ricardo grumbled.

  "No. And was I not wise?" said Hanaud, with complacency. "For you would have forbidden me to use your name."

  "Oh, I don't go so far as that," said Ricardo reluctantly. His indignation was rapidly evaporating. For there was growing up in his mind a pleasant perception that the advertisement placed him in the limelight.

  He rose from his bed.

  "You will make yourself comfortable in the sitting-room while I have my bath."

  "I will, indeed," replied Hanaud cheerily. "I have already ordered my morning chocolate. I have hopes that you may have a telegram very soon. This paper was cried last night through the streets of Geneva."

  Ricardo dressed for once in a way with some approach to ordinary celerity, and joined Hanaud.

  "Has nothing come?" he asked.

  "No. This chocolate is very good; it is better than that which I get in my hotel."

  "Good heavens!" cried Ricardo, who was fairly twittering with excitement. "You sit there talking about chocolate while my cup shakes in my fingers."

  "Again I must remind you that you are the amateur, I the professional, my friend."

  As the morning drew on, however, Hanaud's professional quietude deserted him. He began to start at the sound of footsteps in the corridor, to glance every other moment from the window, to eat his cigarettes rather than to smoke them. At eleven o'clock Ricardo's valet brought a telegram into the room. Ricardo seized it.

  "Calmly, my friend," said Hanaud.

  With trembling fingers Ricardo tore it open. He jumped in his chair. Speechless, he handed the telegram to Hanaud. It had been sent from Geneva, and it ran thus:

  "Expect me soon after three.—MARTHE GOBIN."

  Hanaud nodded his head.

  "I told you I had hopes." All his levity had gone in an instant from his manner. He spoke very quietly.

  "I had better send for Wethermill?" asked Ricardo.

  Hanaud shrugged his shoulders.

  "As you like. But why raise hopes in that poor man's breast which an hour or two may dash for ever to the ground? Consider! Marthe Gobin has something to tell us. Think over those eight points of evidence which you drew up yesterday in the Villa des Fleurs, and say whether what she has to tell us is more likely to prove Mlle. Celie's innocence than her guilt. Think well, for I will be guided by you, M. Ricardo," said Hanaud solemnly. "If you think it better that your friend should live in torture until Marthe Gobin comes, and then perhaps suffer worse torture from the news she brings, be it so. You shall decide. If, on the other hand, you think it will be best to leave M. Wethermill in peace until we know her story, be it so. You shall decide."

  Ricardo moved uneasily. The solemnity of Hanaud's manner impressed him. He had no wish to take the responsibility of the decision upon himself. But Hanaud sat with his eyes strangely fixed upon Ricardo, waiting for his answer.

  "Well," said Ricardo, at length, "good news will be none the worse for waiting a few hours. Bad news will be a little the better."

  "Yes," said Hanaud; "so I thought you would decide." He took up a Continental Bradshaw from a bookshelf in the room. "From Geneva she will come through Culoz. Let us see!" He turned over the pages. "There is a train from Culoz which reaches Aix at seven minutes past three. It is by that train she will come. You have a motor-car?"

  "Yes."

  "Very well. Will you pick me up in it at three at my hotel? We will drive down to the station and see the arrivals by that train. It may help us to get some idea of the person with whom we have to deal. That is always an advantage. Now I will leave you, for I have much to do. But I will look in upon M. Wethermill as I go down and tell him that there is as yet no news."

  He took up his hat and stick, and stood for a moment staring out of the window. Then he roused himself from his reverie with a start.

  "You look out upon Mont Revard, I see. I think M. Wethermill's view over the garden and the town is the better one," he said, and went out of the room.

  At three o'clock Ricardo called in his car, which was an open car of high power, at Hanaud's hotel, and the two men went to the station. They waited outside the exit while the passengers gave up their tickets. Amongst them a middle-aged, short woman, of a plethoric tendency, attracted their notice. She was neatly but shabbily dressed in black; her gloves were darned, and she was obviously in a hurry. As she came out she asked a commissionaire:

  "How far is it to the Hotel Majestic?"

  The man told her the hotel was at the very
top of the town, and the way was steep.

  "But madame can go up in the omnibus of the hotel," he suggested. Madame, however, was in too much of a hurry. The omnibus would have to wait for luggage. She hailed a closed cab and drove off inside it.

  "Now, if we go back in the car, we shall be all ready for her when she arrives," said Hanaud.

  They passed the cab, indeed, a few yards up the steep hill which leads from the station. The cab was moving at a walk.

  "She looks honest," said Hanaud, with a sigh of relief. "She is some good bourgeoise anxious to earn four thousand francs."

  They reached the hotel in a few minutes.

  "We may need your car again the moment Marthe Gobin has gone," said Hanaud.

  "It shall wait here," said Ricardo.

  "No," said Hanaud; "let it wait in the little street at the back of my hotel. It will not be so noticeable there. You have petrol for a long journey?"

  Ricardo gave the order quietly to his chauffeur, and followed Hanaud into the hotel. Through a glass window they could see Wethermill smoking a cigar over his coffee.

  "He looks as if he had not slept," said Ricardo.

  Hanaud nodded sympathetically, and beckoned Ricardo past the window.

  "But we are nearing the end. These two days have been for him days of great trouble; one can see that very clearly. And he has done nothing to embarrass us. Men in distress are apt to be a nuisance. I am grateful to M. Wethermill. But we are nearing the end. Who knows? Within an hour or two we may have news for him."

  He spoke with great feeling, and the two men ascended the stairs to Ricardo's rooms. For the second time that day Hanaud's professional calm deserted him. The window overlooked the main entrance to the hotel. Hanaud arranged the room, and, even while he arranged it, ran every other second and leaned from the window to watch for the coming of the cab.

  "Put the bank-notes upon the table," he said hurriedly. "They will persuade her to tell us all that she has to tell. Yes, that will do. She is not in sight yet? No."

  "She could not be. It is a long way from the station," said Ricardo, "and the whole distance is uphill."