Devil's Score: A Tale of decadent omen….

by Edouard Jourdan

  There were, apparently, spiritualistic manifestations - appearances, to put it better - much more impressive than the swinging of Palmyra and the small shocks of her feet on the floor. True apparitions have been spoken of, luminous heads emerging in the darkness, phosphorescent hands and indecisive forms floating for a moment. Voices rose in space; to answer without lips and without language to the accusations of Appollonius of Endor. But these wonders for him were nothing new. It was the small change of the sessions in which mediums lent their support. He did not attach importance to it, having accustomed to live thus, among the ghosts.

  It was in vain that Johan sought to get him out of these cryptic tasks to bring him back to the troubles, even the dangers, of isolation. The old man did not feel some and did not see others. Moreover, Charlotte now dominated him completely. When Johan risked timid overtures on the second floor of the mansion, now vacant, where Katarina and he could have settled, Mr. Edgar Bansberg pretended to be distracted and not to hear.

  Johan did not return. But his incurable tenderness was hurt once more; and he also suffered to see his most legitimate interest impaired.

  Because this phase of its history coincided with great financial embarrassment. His expenses had not ceased to be excessive, the Purple Concert was closed for two months, Johan had borrowed from an usurer ten thousand francs which came due on September 1, and, seeing, to pay this debt that the alternative of selling Karikal's Coal mining downward or of yielding below the value of his beloved Katarina's expensive jewels, the poor artist tasted in all his bitterness the persistent aversion of the rich man his father.

  He had little chance of succeeding, but he was determined to solicit the necessary ten thousand francs from him. Katarina encouraged him, saying he had nothing to lose from this attempt; and Regina, decidedly promoted to the rank of confidante, pushed it herself.

  It was under these conditions that Johan left his house on the 30th of August, about eight o'clock in the evening, and took the road to the Rue d'Assas, at the moment when, summoned by the commissary Massu, I entered his cabinet to speak with Inspector Sicot and to talk about the assassination of M. de Varmand.

  Johan had delayed his approach to the last limit. In case of refusal, he had twenty-four hours to turn around.

  Her concierge was taking the cool on the doorstep. Although it was nearly dark, she noticed her absent and upset look. He noticed it and tried to overcome his weakness.

  It dissipated when he arrived at his destination, to make room for a surprise not without anxiety.

  It was because the door of the little mansion was ajar, and such a negligence, so contrary to the custom, immediately seemed to him a sign of misfortune.

  He rang. But no one came, and the tinkle of the bell awoke only the resonances of the vestibule.

  Having retreated, he saw, in the light of a street lamp, only dark windows, those at the bottom, hidden from their shutters.

  He came back to the door, and from the outside, wrapping his mouth with his hands, he timidly called:

  - Charlotte! ... Valentine! … Dad! ... silent house. Deserted house. Then he entered, stiff with emotion.

  On the right, the door of the living room was not more closed than that of the street. She was crouching on darkness. He pushed it.

  - No one? he said aloud, trying to relax his throat and take a male and stubborn accent. No one? ...

  He searched for the switch.

  No power.

  So, feeling that we had to finish, that time was passing, that a life depended perhaps on his coolness and his speed, he went into the dark, to the window he knew there, on the right.

  He progressed slowly, behind the vanguard of his open hands, his eyes disproportionately enlarged ...

  Something made him stumble, which was not a stool. He stooped. It was a fallen chair. He straightened it and went on his way blind, arms outstretched.

  Another thing stopped him, a weak touch on the thigh. He recognized the turntable, but realized with horror that it was slimy. He pushed her back into a tension, lost his head, and, all shuddering, threw himself sharply at the window he guessed.

  He only reached her after hitting an armchair with a force that only terror could give her.

  At last his moving hands seized a curtain. The cords made the pulleys creak, the window opened, the shutters beat, and the lamppost brought into the room its poor sidewalk.

  Mr. Edgar Bansberg appeared in favor of gas. He was sitting in an armchair against the fireplace ... Only in this place was the body of the old man. And not his head. From his neck emanated a strange bloody bouquet, nuanced by different shades of red, pink and white. The blood had coagulated leaving a sort of vermilion crust around the old man's vertebrae, white and milky. The putrefaction of this headless body would soon begin its work, gradually changing this macabre landscape. It could be clearly seen that the dead man had been decapitated with a mixture of awkwardness and bestiality; he had probably had to knock five or six times to behead him. The weapon of crime was this barbaric that she was not very sharp ...

  Johan saw his father's head, planted on a sort of pointed tool, at the back of the room. The tool was actually one of those harpoons used in New England to hunt whales and sperm whales. The old man had always loved this kind of maritime relics. What irony! To be thus mutilated and obliged to look at eternity, his head planted on this pointed tool which he extolled nomadic exoticism.

  Edgar's head presented this frightful gaze, whose immobile character had the overwhelming and frightening lucidity of cathedrals. From his dry mouth, one could see that a torrent of vomit and blood had flowed, like a volcanic eruption. From the top of his skull came a point, which gave him the stiff, grotesque, and almost comical air of a Prussian vaudeville soldier.

  The sight he had in front of him made him crazy. Johan would have committed suicide rather than staying one second more alone with his decapitated father, rather than laying hands on him. The idea of​​preventing justice immediately, without stumbling, possessed him, as if the salvation of his soul had been subordinated to this step. And he, who had not had enough vehemence to reproach Valentin with the same cowardice, escaped from the house of crime, running as best he could.

  The clock struck eight-fifteen when he burst into Mr. Massu's study.

  We were talking quietly, the Commissioner, Inspector Sicot and me. We saw this little lame man, terrified by fear, out of breath, hasty, rushing into the midst of us, and vainly trying to articulate his request.

  He waved us to follow him. Sicot wanted to stay, but I told him that Mr. Johan Bansberg would testify in the Varmand affair.

  - My father ... just been ... murdered! stammered Johan. The commissioner swore.

  - It gets rough and it gets complicated, said Sicot.

  "I left things as they were," said Johan. Come, please ... There is no one in the mansion ...

  "Wash your hands," said the inspector; they are full of blood.

  He looked at them insanely.

  We were struck with terror, and my companions exchanged a glance which I surprised with alarm.

  8 – POLICE WORKS

  Inspector Sicot was not a stranger to me. I had met him many times during my career. Any business had given me the opportunity to see him "working" with method and sagacity. But I was still wondering if his talents as a specialist deserved the reputation they had been given at “Quai des Orfèvres”. This is to say the professional interest that had inspired me with the murder of M. de Varmand, when it had appeared to me that Sicot and the mediums were about to go to war about this crime. This is to say how passionate was this second murder, committed under the same roof, which doubled the mystery of the Rue d'Assas and proposed to Sicot an enlarged task.

  An intelligent man, this Sicot, but a man, and who showed him well, because he liked to laugh and was sometimes wrong. A man in the middle of all the others. A short, ragged character, with a strong forehead, a frank eye, a direct look, with biceps full of sleeves and ca
lves of a hunter on foot. Someone living and imperfect. Nothing foolproof, but all of a good detective who does what he can. No fancies, no English pipe, no American cigar that is quit and smoked at the same time. An inspector filled with zeal and going, as our Security has several. Not very distinguished, no doubt, and sadly enamored of tautological turns. But volume, relief: enough volume to hold its place in existence, too much relief to be content to live between the pages of a novel.

  I was anxious to see him at work, and, on leaving the police station in the Rue d'Assas, I walked beside him, as if near a champion, who was accompanied to the stadium, before applauding him.

  On the way, Johan, in a broken voice, told us about his entrance to his father, his horror and his flight. He repeated with pitiful insistence that he had not disturbed anything; that he had only remained a minute; that his concierge had seen him leave his house at eight o'clock, rather a little later ... I leave to think the bad impression that it could do! If only the poor boy had seemed convinced of what he was certifying! But far from it! He spoke, in truth, as if he had wanted to convince himself!

  I thought it necessary to take Sicot apart and to inform him about Johan's mental state, and about the accidental cause that had aroused him.

  We arrived.

  Electricity worked.

  - What does that mean? exclaimed Johan.

  "That means," said Sicot, "that you turned the switch wrong, or that the murderer was still there during your visit and took the time to restore the circuit before disappearing. What purpose? To surprise us? To make some quick investigation? Or ... what do I know?

  I realized that he thought, "Or to compromise you. Unless you lied to us. "

  Johan was hot.

  We entered the living room. Sicot closed the window and had all the lamps.

  He approached the corpse, as well as the head grotesquely planted on his harpoon and examined it from point to point, without touching the two parts of the body.

  - Hem! He whispered. It's weird ... Leave the weapon ... He's dead. But lukewarm. Not long ago ... A while ago this man was still alive. You would have arrived a little earlier, Sir, perhaps you prevented the tragedy ...

  Johan sat in a corner.

  The inspector passed the review of the crime scene.

  Around the round table, here and there, seats made a circle comprising the assassin's chair.

  Sicot sniffed the air.

  "In all frankness and sincerity," he said, "I affirm and declare that a spiritist session was in full swing when the victim was struck.

  The absence of the Valentin couple seemed to me most suspicious. Charlotte's face had always displeased me. But I thought it profitable to let the inspector indulge his research independently.

  He had taken a penknife out of his pocket, and was carefully cutting off the upholstery of a chair.

  - What have I always said! Here, look at that!

  The seat formed a kind of box, and from this box Sicot had extracted, one after the other, several shriveled objects which unfolded before our eyes. They were wigs (white, black, red), fake beards, a flesh-colored silk mask, a beautifully painted jersey head, a rubber hand that inflated by blowing inside ...

  - Here is the arsenal! he said. It is with this that one abuses credulity and good faith! Subterfuge and trickery! See under the chair this hatch of fabric, that's where the medium pulled the accessory he needed. At this chair, now! ... This time, the hatch is on the side ... A secret, again. Well, always let's take a break!

  The opened armchair let us see a bottle of smell, a piece of phosphorus, a small bag full of pins, a greyish-white crepe de chine voucher, and something resembling the frame of an umbrella.

  This frame, unfolded and covered with white crepe, took the vague aspect of a ghost with its shroud.

  - Here they are, the materializations! was doing Sicot. And the dematerializations! Here they are, tangible and photographic forms! Gentlemen, you now know what to do with it. Ghosts and demons, that's what it is! A scam!

  We listened to him. We attended his exploits.

  "It's okay," he said. Let's leave all these accessories ...

  He returned to the corpse. And warned the murder weapon ...

  - Serp marked with a "666", he says. Fantasy of the best taste ... Nice work. One shot? No, five or six ...

  With his fingertips, he removed the clothes of the beheaded victim, his linen, his flannel, and showed us two wounds rigorously the same, one in the heart, the other in the middle of the chest, both shaped figures ... Two "666" engraved in the flesh.

  - It's art or I do not know it! said the commissioner stupefied.

  - Yes? Well! old man, "replied Sicot," if my suppositions prove true, you have not finished shouting at the miracle ... way of speaking.

  We saw him then seize a portable lamp and, with the aid of his light, examine with a magnifying glass the edge of the door, the wood of the backs of chairs, the table, the marble of the chimney and especially the handle of the billhook.

  That done, he showed us, on this sleeve, cloudy tasks where, for my part, I distinguished only uninteresting stains.

  - Do you see that? he said.

  But he was interrupted by the sound of a passe-partout furring the lock of the front door, and immediately the Valentine's couple were before us. They were in Sunday clothes.

  At our sight, at the spectacle of their undoubtedly massacred master, the servants gave themselves up to all the expressions of stupor and despair. In a few words, the commissioner told them about the assassination.

  - That's it! that's it! Charlotte said. She handed us a telegram.

  "We received this telegram yesterday evening," Valentine added. Sicot read, without letting go of the knife:

  "Sister sick. We are waiting for you tomorrow. Eugene. "

  Charlotte went on:

  - Eugene, he's my brother-in-law. He lives in Bar-le-Duc. So we left this morning for Bar-le-Duc, very bored because our boss had a meeting tonight and I loved to be absent in those moments!

  "Your sister was well, was not she? and your brother-in-law had sent no telegram, "the inspector translated.

  - Ah! I knew that all these devils would end badly!

  Charlotte, however, in her corner, gave him a look of contempt and infantile reproach.

  Johan flinched as if under accusation. At the end of his strength, he averted his eyes, shrugged his shoulders imperceptibly, and shut himself up in the silence of his torpor.

  - A nice rubbish rag! muttered the commissioner.

  I had infinite pity for him. But could I say that a doubt had not crept into my mind? This satisfaction that I was going to feel a few minutes later during Sicot's monologue, was not it the obscure relief of the charge being removed from Katarina's husband?

  - And who killed him! Charlotte said.

  - Who is it? said Sicot, who was still gently holding the bloody knife.

  He was nibbling at his short mustaches, and from beneath his dense and sturdy forehead he was staring into the dream, a point, fixedly.

  Anxious sicot? Sicot disconcerted?

  At last he spoke, but without that good humor which had amused him before. It was clear that speaking did not prevent him from thinking of anything else, and that he continued to pursue in a forest of dreams a game that was fleeing.

  "If I believed my eyes," he said, "but can I dispense with believing them? - I have only to make amends before the altar of spiritualism ... I do not admit that the death of M. de Varmand is supernatural. I do not admit that the death of Mr. Edgar Bansberg is supernatural. And yet, this time, I arrive first on the scene; what I discover is the proof that we have not touched anything: and what I discover is also the proof of the impossible! ... And it's me who falls on it! Chance and inevitability! ...

  Mr. Massu nudged my elbow and gave me a barely apprehending blink, the meaning of which escaped me.

  "Gentlemen," continued the inspector, "Mr. Edgar Bansberg has been assassinated in a manner as fantasti
c as his friend M. de Varmand.

  He stopped and put the handle of the murder tool under his nose.

  - Feel!

  A smell of phosphorus permeated the horn.

  "I will not express my surprise," the policeman scoffed, when I recognized, on examination of the wounds, a way of stabbing that remained for me eerily familiar. The sight of these crucial wounds reminded me of a formidable old foe. Not being able to believe a single testimony, I looked for other proofs of his passage here; and I found them in several places, even on the handle of the knife! These are the fingerprints he has left, the imprint especially of his left middle finger - see on the handle - a print that is very characteristic, with its small scar and its convolution in the opposite direction. The trace of this finger is as well known to me as this stab. They both detect the identity of the criminal. This criminal, who was left-handed, is called Danvers. It is the murderer of Sister Loudun, and of the Tucquegnieux-Danvers family whom I had arrested a long time ago, Danvers whom I had judged, condemned and executed on the guillotine.