“Aren’t I? Do you know what guest came to mind when you mentioned that supposition of a chambermaid? Julien de Vandeuvre!”
She went frightfully pale and bit her lip. Homo-Deus was still smiling, however, and saying terrible things with the most amused expression. Jeanne Fortin and her father had been unable to repress a shudder, however, for they were wondering exactly how far Marc would push his ferocity.
These people know, thought Madame Vauclin. So why haven’t they denounced us? Ignorant of the role that the Invisible had played in those adventures, she did not understand.
Time passed. In order to help her old school friend, who seemed distressed, recover somewhat, Jeanne gave her a tour of the curious house: the dining room overlooking the magnificent countryside; the belvedere, from which the setting sun could be seen setting the horizon ablaze with its red fire. She showed her the laboratory in the basement, and made the electrical machinery throw off formidable sparks, so effectively that the frightened visitor emerged from the fantastic dwelling with the idea that those people were lunatics or geniuses.
Outside, in the liberated park, Jeanne and Sophie found the scientist and Vanel again. There was no further mention of the affair of the Avenue Henri-Martin.
As the afternoon was finishing with an agreeable atmospheric warmth, and the décor, although wild, incited mute contemplation, the criminal felt herself influenced by the calm and purity of the ambience, and suddenly thought that if she lived here, so far from human life, permanently, she would never know any torment again.
Here, everything was reposed and shielded by philosophical security. Soon, she would return to Paris, the furnace—and it would be necessary to recommence the struggle, the hard labor of society. It would also be necessary to defend herself against people, things and hazards. Then, even though she sensed that she was in the company of latent hostilities, she suddenly experienced the need to prolong the moment, and she accepted an invitation to tea, which Frédéric served on a table in the garden.
IX. The Man With Seven Faces
Among the faces that have figured in this story along with the Baruyer brothers, Vauclin and his wife, Barsac and the others, little has been seen, at least in the foreground, of Walesport’s cold, tanned, clean-shaven visage, illuminated by two little gray eyes that pierced other people.
Like that other equivocal Manitou, Basil Zaharoff,31 a resident alien with a murky past, the mysterious friend of Barthou, and a great dignitary of the Légion d’honneur for reasons of political economy, William Walesport liked to remain in the wings. Walesport, however, a vulture of smaller wingspan, could only sport around his neck on gala evenings the red cravat of a Commander. The government had established the difference in beaks and claws between the two raptors. And that was why events put the faces of Baruyer, Vauclin and Crémiot in the light, while leaving that of the foreigner in relative obscurity. And yet, he manipulated the others like puppets.
Walesport had not always had that name. It would certainly have been difficult to recover the name on his birth certificate. Where did he come from? Who was he? One day, Baruyer had nearly found out. As he came out of the bank in the American’s company an emaciated man dressed in rags had approached them. At the sight of him, in spite of his sang-froid, Walesport had been unable to suppress a start.
“So,” said the man, in English and in a mocking tone, “It’s no longer Jimmy that you call yourself? It doesn’t matter, I’m glad to see you again. What! You don’t recognize your old friend Sullivan? We have, however, pulled enough stunts together.”
“The man’s mad!” Walesport exclaimed, white with rage. “He’s trying to get money out of me.”
At that moment, Albert Baruyer had the same suspicion. In fact, the pauper followed them. “Oh, very well, you’re putting on a swagger, my old Jimmy—that’s all right. But let me have a few dollars.”
“You see—it’s extortion. Anyway, the best thing to do, to get rid of the wretch, is to give him alms. Perhaps, deep down, he’s worthy of interest.”
With a terrible glare, he gave the man a twenty-franc bill, which he pocketed briskly.
“Well, you’re not generous...but we’ll meet again.” As Walesport moved away with long strides, he added: “Go on then, cowboy, I’ll find you again.”
That scene had impressed Albert Baruyer, who, on reflection, regretted not having learned more. Always short of money, squandering his it gambling or to satisfy the caprices of women, he would have been delighted to possess serious and precise information regarding the sire who manipulated the bank’s millions. One day, he read in the latest news section of the paper that a wretched foreigner in rags, carrying papers in the name of Sullivan and letters indicating that he had been resident in Chicago had been found on the road running alongside the Seine between the bridges of Pureax and Suresnes, no longer showing any signs of life, having been run over by an automobile. Albert Baruyer understood the forceful decisiveness of William Walesport and the stupidity of attacking him.
He it was that Madame Vauclin judged capable of combating the danger that threatened them. She went to find him and made him party to her suspicions as well as the certainties she had been able to gather. For her, the obscure enemies who had aborted all the affairs planned in the most absolute mystery—the ones who had resuscitated Vandeuvre, killed old Mère Baruyer, provoked Albert’s madness, saved Barssac and aided the Rodock son—could not be anyone other than Fortin and his daughter, those exalted geniuses who execrated triumphant society, the pick of the bunch, in sum, and were posing as redressers of wrongs.
Walesport’s own suspicions were primarily directed at Marc Vanel. By his own experience, and that of his master Zaharoff, he knew how dangerous self-effacing individuals could be, and he had an instinctive dislike of the sorcerer in question.
Madame Vauclin explained why, in her opinion, Homo-Deus was a friend of the Fortins. She had caught a glimpse of the doctor’s love for the young woman, and that was the probable reason for their intimacy.
“Ah!” said Walesport. “The charlatan is in love? He’s vulnerable, then. Well, I shall have my revenge.”
“How?”
The cosmopolitan adventurer had no desire to reveal his plans, but he had a terribly resolute expression. Their vengeance was in good hands.
X. The Mind of an Examining Magistrate
When the examining magistrate Amédée Sauliet went into his study that day, he hastened to pick up the file containing the mysterious affair of the Avenue Henri-Martin. Setting aside the less interesting cases, he went through the evidence already accumulated.
“It’s very thin,” he muttered, weighing the dossier in his hand, “but it will grow...”
Police reports had arrived that morning. He read them attentively. No clues. The tenants, all honorable, were above suspicion, and the most conscientious searches of the private lives of the valets, cooks and soubrettes had not turned up the end of any suggestive thread. It was, however, necessary at all costs to orient the investigation. Public opinion was impassioned. Monsieur Sauliet did not complain about that noise, which put him in the public eye, but the papers would tire of the mystery and another crime would take possession of the news. Monsieur Sauliet, a worldly and elegant magistrate, was enthusiastic for advancement and notoriety.
He started abruptly. On a sheet of white paper placed on the desk in isolation, the magistrate read two lines written in blue pencil: The victim is Julien de Vandeuvre. Follow that trail.
The magistrate stood up and shouted: “Bonichon, close the doors! There’s someone here!”
The clerk rose to his feet slowly, because he had rheumatism, but the two men did not discover anyone, either under the green sofa placed at the back of the study or behind the heavy curtains of the windows.
“But that piece of paper didn’t get here on its own!” stammered the magistrate.
He rang for the office boy and interrogated him. He had not seen anyone either; he was sure that the door o
f the study had not opened since Monsieur Sauliet’s arrival.
The office boy withdrew. Then, the examining magistrate, weary of searching, went to sit down again, and uttered an exclamation.
“Monsieur Bonichon! Monsieur Bonichon! The documents from the file—where are they?”
They had vanished! All the police reports, the interrogations of the domestics, the indications collected and the information on the tenants of the building, had gone—stolen! As the frightened magistrate, with sweat on his temples, looked around with haggard and anxious eyes, he suddenly saw a flame springing up in the fireplace. It was the documents from the file that were burning.
The clerk and his boss ran forward, but they were unable to save the slightest fragment from the mass of papers, and as they stood there, mute with surprise and dread, strident sardonic laughter burst forth behind them, which made their hair stand on end. The door opened by itself and closed again the same way. They had the sensation that an invisible being had just gone out. They looked at one another without being able to say a word, and when, after several seconds, they were able to recover their composure, the clerk risked: “Perhaps, Monsieur le Juge, the advice is worth following...”
“Perhaps,” echoed the examining magistrate. “Go right away, Monsieur Bonichon, to ask the Sûreté to make enquiries about this Julien de Vandeuvre. A file has already been opened on the occasion of his disappearance—I need all that information by this evening. We’ll work on it tonight. Come to my house after dinner, because I’m in a hurry to clarify this dark affair.”
Monsieur Saulet adjusted his cravat in front of a mirror hidden behind a curtain. He filed his fingernails carefully, looked at himself once more, and went out, with a pale cane under his arm, the handle of which was carved from a moonstone.
XI. Banquo’s Ghost
It had not been difficult, of course, to ascertain that the cadaver interred in the plaster was Julien de Vandeuvre. The height was the same, the death appeared to date back to the time of the young man’s disappearance and—this was serious—the last time the latter had been seen was at a soirée at the Vauclins’ residence, in the very building where his body had been found. In the matter of his identification, therefore, there was no possible doubt, all the more so as the family had furnished an indication—a fracture of the little finger, resulting from an old riding accident—that was easily discovered. Another fracture, however, of the vertebral column, repaired and then recently broken again, testified clearly enough to the cause of death.
What amazed the medical examiners, of course, and troubled the examining magistrate, were traces of a trepanation, of which the skull revealed the perfect sutures. Now, the family declared that they knew nothing about that operation, which had, according to the experts, been carried out by a skilled surgeon. What did that imply?
An autopsy, well-executed although difficult, also gave the rupture of the vertebral column as the cause of death. And Monsieur Sauliet had the declarations of the notaries and Vandeuvre’s parents; he could not be in any doubt as to the motive for the murder: the vanished millions of his mother’s legacy and the bonds representing the murdered man’s personal fortune were sufficient explanation.
Who had struck the blow, then? The examining magistrate was not floundering for long; the Invisible returned to his study and deposited another sheet of paper on his desk, one which was written, simply: Cherchez la femme.
He had found her. Police reports recorded Julien de Vandeuvre’s attentions with regard to Madame Vauclin. It was obvious that Julien de Vandeuvre was in love with Madame Vauclin, offering her gifts that she had accepted. She was, therefore, his mistress, for the reports did not affirm the virtue of the député’s wife. They also identified her liaison with Albert Baruyer. And that had been bound to cause the examining magistrate some embarrassment. He was delving into very complicated lives, the lives of notorious, influential individuals, and it was necessary to proceed with tact and infinite circumspection.
Nevertheless, greatly intrigued, passionately attached to the case, which might bring him a real glory—he was congratulated for having identified the dead man so rapidly—he pursued his research methodically, without weakness. He would have liked to interrogate Albert Baruyer, but the man was mad. Then it had been necessary for him to summon the Vauclins under the guise of them being witnesses, of course, capable for furnishing useful information to the law.
Their deposition, however, had disappointed him. The député expressed astonishment, with a certain arrogance, at being disturbed on a matter of which he had no knowledge.
“However,” the examining magistrate ventured, “Monsieur Julien de Vaneuvre was your guest on the evening of the disappearance.”
“Pardon me, Monsieur le Juge, but there’s no proof that he disappeared on that day.”
“No one has seen him since.”
“Have the domestics been interrogated? Are you sure that Monsieur de Vandeuvre did not return to his apartment after leaving my house?”
The investigation had revealed that Julien had only been back to his apartment once since he had been to Vandeuvre to collect his mother’s legacy. His only domestic, an old maidservant, had not heard from her master since that return and she had not seen him since. On her advice, the family—a sister and a brother-in-law—had made enquiries, but with no result. The young man’s enigmatic visit to the Vauclins was all the more singular because he had presented himself under another name—but no one had been deceived, and it really was Julien de Vandeuvre who had been at the house in the Avenue Henri-Martin that night.
Monsieur Sauliet smiled.
“Listen, Monsieur le Député, if I’ve asked you to furnish a few items of information, it’s because I wanted to retrace the use of the victim’s time from the moment that he left you. Do you remember what time he left?”
“In truth, no, Monsieur le Juge. There were so many people there that evening...”
“Evidently.”
Suddenly, Vauclin slapped his forehead. An idea had just occurred to him, which might lead the law further astray.
“Now I think of it,” he said, “Vandeuvre was in evening dress, naturally. Now you tell me that he hadn’t been to his apartment. Where, then, did he usually live, since he must have dressed there in order to go out into society? Have you, Monsieur le Juge, discovered Vandeuvre’s other dwelling, where the key to the enigma doubtless resides?”
“I’ll find out—but that won’t explain, in any fashion, why the cadaver was buried in your home.”
“Pardon me,” Vauclin corrected, “not in my home, but in the building that I inhabit.”
The examining magistrate was unnerved. He was unable to retain the necessary calmness.
“Not in your home…not in your home? It’s bizarre, all the same. No other tenant of the house was acquainted with Vaneuvre, intimately or distantly, and it’s on the evening that he was seen in your drawing room that he disappeared...”
Vauclin cut him off with a harsh voice: “What are you saying, Monsieur?”
And without being invited to do so, Vauclin put on his hat and left.
“I believe,” the examining magistate stammered, “that I’ve just committed a gaffe!”
Monsieur Sauliet was increasingly convinced of the culpability of the Vauclins, but did not have the means of confounding them. Cherchez la femme, the Invisible had said to him, but if the woman were as strong as her husband, he would have difficulty making her confess her guilt.
Mechanically, he riffled through the dossier in quest of the piece of paper on which the mysterious advice had been written. He had no difficulty finding it, but beneath the phrase Cherchez la femme other lines had been written more recently.
Strange, the examining magistrate said to himself. This Invisible comes here as if he were at home. Let’s see—what has he written now?
Adjusting his lorgnon on his nose he read:
During the excavations carried out at Pompeii, the diggers dis
covered bizarre cavities. An engineer had the idea of pouring plaster into them; he thus obtained an exact mold of human bodies buried in the ash for eighteen hundred years. Those molds are in the museum in Naples. Do the same with the plaster mold in which Monsieur de Vandeuvre was buried, and confront the guilty parties with the resuscitated specter.
“Well, well—the idea is original and will do honor to my imagination. It’s a matter of finding a specialist. Well, I have the affair well in hand.” He rang.
“Is Bonichon still here?” he asked the office boy.
“Yes, Monsieur le Juge.”
“Send him to me, then.”
Shortly thereafter, the clerk came into the study. “Monsieur le Juge has need of me?”
“Yes. If my memory serves me right, you asked my permission to attend your sister’s wedding.”
“Yes, Monsieur; she’s marrying a molder from the Montparnasse district, Paolo Besani.”
“Does he know his métier well?”
“He’s an artist of his profession.”
“Perfect. Well, I have a job for him, but it has to be done quickly. Take me to your brother-in-law’s home.”
The first result of the conversation between Monsieur Sauliet and the molder Besani was that a crew of workmen presented themselves with a court order to remove the debris of the masonry left under seal in the attic of the house in the Avenue Henri-Martin, which they did with the utmost care.
A week later, a large heavy crate was brought to the Palais de Justice and taken up to the examining magistrate’s study.
The day after the receipt of that crate, the Vauclin household received a new summons to appear. The employee on duty said that he had orders to send in Madame Vauclin first.
With a gesture, the examining magistrate offered his visitor a seat. She was trembling somewhat internally, but was determine not to allow herself to be intimidated.
Homo-Deus Page 28