Collected Works of Gaston Leroux

by Gaston Leroux

  What would she say if she knew Durin had given the necklace back to me? She had warned me to beware of him.... But she could never have foreseen anything as strange as this. When I tell her she can’t help but congratulate me.

  A knock. It was Helena, pale and nervous.

  “You have seen him? Have you seen Durin? What did he say?”

  “That he was afraid. And he gave me the necklace.”

  “The necklace? And he took back the other one?”

  “Of course, Helena.”

  She was suddenly silent.

  “Why, Helena, didn’t I do right?”

  Her features tightened. When I tried to explain she motioned me to be silent. At last, a gentle expression came into her eyes.

  “You remember, don’t you, darling, that Natalie advised you not to be stupid? You have been just that; but you were lucky, lucky. If you hadn’t been lucky I don’t know what would have happened — or rather, I know too well. Well, darling, will you give me my necklace now....”

  I gave it to her. Before she put it on her neck she kissed the twelfth pearl. Then she threw her arms about me.

  “It was God who sent you into my life, Rudy,” she said adoringly. “I love you — and I will love you for ever and ever.” —

  I was going to question her. But already she had fled.

  * * * * *

  An hour later I went to the dining-room. I had put a pistol in my pocket; it gave me a feeling of confidence. Durin’s enemy was Sir Philip Skarlett. I couldn’t imagine Clotilde and Natalie protecting me against him. Victor himself didn’t seem to be harbouring the least grudge against me. That left me free to protect Helena — an honourable and chivalrous rôle, I thought. All the same, if Durin... but no! I was there, solidly planted on both feet, clear-eyed and calm. I had a feeling of being ready for anything.

  The steward and two huge butlers were waiting to serve me.

  “Where is Gregory?” Durin asked.

  “He is ill, your lordship.”

  Durin made no reply. He was as hungry as Helena seemed to be. Everyone talked. They were cool — and ready, too. His lordship showed a lively interest in trans-Atlantic flying. He seemed to know all about aeroplanes; the skill required of the pilots, the possible landing-places. I spoke of weather conditions, of fogs, of the winds. Really no one would have thought that the slightest danger was imminent.

  Dinner over, Durin rose. I thought he was a little pale.

  “You will serve coffee in my study,” he said.

  This was not the usual custom; I remembered that the other day he had said it was the only safe spot in the castle.

  He sat down by the fireplace, lit his cigar, and fell to thinking. He seemed to be totally unaware that Helena and I were there. Helena was turning the pages of an illustrated magazine. It was an utterly commonplace scene — the husband smoking, the wife looking at pictures; their intimate friend sitting in an armchair a trifle flushed by the excellent meal. The evening wore on to nearly eleven.

  “Suppose we have a little bridge?” his lordship suggested, adding, “We must kill time some way.”

  He went to bring the table from a corner of the wide room, put it before the fireplace, sat down and took up the cards.

  “I don’t like three-handed bridge,” he said.

  Rubber followed rubber, without his being able to win even one. After a while he threw down his cards.

  “It’s terrible,” he said. “Even by cheating a little I can’t win!”

  He got up and began to pace the room. Suddenly he seized a bottle of Scotch and poured himself a large drink. Then he seemed to think better of it and put the glass down.

  “What’s the use?” he said. Then, “How time drags! Can they have changed their minds about to-night?”

  He went back and buried himself in his chair, closing his eyes as though he were going to sleep.

  “I should have ordered a fire here. It’s cold.”

  As he spoke, every electric light in the room went out.

  XVII.

  HELENA HAD NOT TOLD A LIE

  ALL THE ELECTRIC lights had gone out. I didn’t like that — not at all.

  “Helena,” I shouted, “where are you? Helena?”

  I felt a hand on my mouth.

  “Keep quiet,” was whispered in my ear.

  Midnight struck.

  I assure you I am not superstitious. Why the beads of perspiration on my brow? Why was I trembling?

  As the twelfth stroke resounded, a terrible cry pierced the halls.

  “Patrick! Patrick! Come avenge your master.” Then silence. I knew very well it was Victor.... Victor the barber... screaming like a cheap actor in a melodrama. I should have laughed at it, and yet, here I was in agony; I didn’t dare stir.... I was waiting... waiting... for the terrible thing about to happen!

  Suddenly the lights came on again... at last.... I looked to see if Durin was in his chair. Yes... he was... but his legs and arms were bound with rope. Helena, free, was seated facing him, very white.

  There was no one else in the room... only the three of us.

  I went over and sat by Helena. Why didn’t she speak to me? She sat there in front of Durin, as still as a statue of Terror. His expression was mocking. The hour had come for him to play his trump card!

  We were not to sit there silent for long. The door opened; Sir Philip Skarlett entered, preceded by the two huge butlers who had served us at table. The room seemed made for a man like him and he came in as though he was perfectly at home. Behind him walked a short, stout, bald-headed man. Patrick! Then two or three Scotsmen whose faces I remembered.... The last one to enter was just going to close the door, when he bowed... it was Natalie!

  She came in and looked around. She seemed no more impressed than if she were about to sit down and type a play. She threw a furtive glance at me. Her presence brought me back to life, like a breath of fresh air on the face of a drunken man. Natalie was there. We were back in the twentieth century.

  Meanwhile, Sir Philip seated himself in a high-backed armchair. Patrick stood at his right. The two liveried butlers were stationed on either side of the fireplace. One watched Durin; the other, Helena. The other men stood at the door.

  Sir Philip Skarlett turned his pale eyes on Durin and said:

  “You are my brother’s murderer. I am here to judge you and to punish you. If you can prove that you are not his murderer and will go away, you will hear no more from me. You have a lawyer here. He may defend you if he wishes to.”

  “I think I’m quite able to defend myself,” Durin answered in a steady voice. “But I shall have to know first upon what you base such a monstrous, stupid accusation.”

  “One has only to determine who profited by the crime,” Sir Philip answered. “My brother was killed; one of the motives was a pearl necklace which was stolen from him.... You will admit that if the necklace is found in your possession I will have the right to conclude that you were the murderer.”

  “Certainly,” Durin answered Quietly.

  Fortunately, Sir Philip did not look towards me. I had sunk into an armchair.

  If anyone had asked me a question I could not have answered. The scales had just dropped from my eyes. Durin had given me die real necklace because he realized it was the one real proof that anyone could raise against him. What an idiot I had been! What a fool! He had duped me, duped again. I was the murderer, because I had the necklace. The pseudo-clergyman had taken the necklace from under Sir Archibald’s pillow and had fled with it. The pseudo-clergyman? He had the necklace now. So, the murderer was Mr. Antonin Rose! I understood everything; even why Helena had wanted me to get away. She knew everything; she did; knew that I was lost if anyone found the real necklace on me. She suspected that Durin would hand it over to me — probably he had told her. That was why she had said: “Beware of Durin!” And she had taken possession of it so that it wouldn’t be found on me! Heaven grant that she had hidden it well.

  “You admit, then,” s
aid Sir Philip, “that you are the murderer?”

  “No, not at all.”

  “Still, you have the necklace.”

  “No, I haven’t got it.”

  “Patrick,” he commanded, “take the necklace off his neck.”

  “I’m sorry I’m bound up with these ropes, otherwise it would give me pleasure to hand the pearls to you myself.” And he smiled.

  He was right to smile. They would find the imitation necklace around his neck — the twelfth pearl not spotted. His chance to jeer at Sir Philip. Meanwhile, he was jeering at me. His ironic smile said:

  “I’m cleverer than you are, you stupid little Frenchman!”

  Luckily, Helena had taken the real necklace from me. They would have found it on me and I would have been shut up with the “Green Lady.”

  While I was thinking these things, Patrick approached Durin and took the necklace from his neck. He gave it to Sir Philip. He did not even look at it, but said:

  “Do what I ordered.”

  Immediately the two liveried butlers came forward.

  “Stop,” said Durin, looking at them in such a way that they hesitated. “Sir Philip, that’s not the Skarlett necklace. It’s the imitation — the imitation your brother knew.”

  Sir Philip looked for a moment at the pearls in his hand. He ran them through his thin fingers.

  “Do you think you can teach me how to recognize the Skarlett pearls? One is false; the twelfth. It dishonours the others. But it’s only an insult, added to your crime. I can forgive the insult — but not the crime.”

  “What are you waiting for?” he asked the butlers.

  When they took hold of him, he shouted, “Look again, Sir Philip! The necklace is false... the necklace is false.”

  Sir Philip only shrugged his shoulders and the servants started to drag off the struggling Durin.

  “Sir Philip, you said that I could present my defence. I ask that my lawyer be allowed to speak. You promised it, Sir Philip, you promised.”

  Disgust was written on the features of the tall nobleman.

  “I had hoped,” he said, “that the condemned man would be more brave. Speak,” he said to me.

  What could I say? Only fragments of thoughts came to mind. But... was it the false necklace that Durin had given me a while ago, and was it the real necklace that I had given to him? So, Helena had really deceived me? She had really replaced the spotted pearl with a pearl from the false necklace! And thus the necklace I had wanted right along to take from Durin was the false one; the one Durin was now branding as an imitation was the real one. We were equally foolish. We had both pilfered the false necklace! Stupidly, at Deauville, I had given him back the real one, thinking I was stealing from him. Equally stupidly, he had restored it to me, thinking it was the imitation. And he, holding the false one, thought he had the real one. So, when he schemed to trick me a little while ago, he came to give me back the false one, thinking it was the real one. And he asked me to give him back the false one, thinking it was the real one.

  I had to defend the accused man, so I arose.

  “Sir Philip,” I said, “are you absolutely certain that the necklace that man had is a real necklace of real pearls?”

  “I bear witness that it is the necklace of the Skarlett family — barring the twelfth pearl, which is false. I am quite ready to submit it to any expert.”

  “I too know pearls when I see them,” said Durin. “Let me look at the necklace.”

  “Give it to him, Patrick.”

  Durin looked, and turned ashen white.

  “May I touch it?” he asked.

  “Yes.”

  The necklace slipped through his fingers. Then, in a slow voice, he said:

  “I admit that all the pearls except the twelfth are real, just as you say, Sir Philip.”

  He looked at Helena with a curious expression.

  “Nevertheless, I swear that I thought I had the false one. Of course, I would never think of retaining the real Skarlett necklace. You may do with me what you will.... But my blood will cry out for vengeance against you. If I were a thief, if I were a burglar who was willing to commit murder to get pearls, wouldn’t I have sold them already?”

  That argument seemed to make no impression on Sir Philip.

  “The case is closed,” he said. “The accused has just admitted that the possessor of the stolen pearls must unquestionably be the murderer. Well, he had the pearls. On the other hand, if he had known that they were false, he wouldn’t have worn them around his neck to prevent their being stolen. Obey, therefore, you men!”

  He signalled to the butlers to lead Durin out. Then he turned towards Patrick.

  “Thank you, Patrick. It was you who revealed the whole thing to me. Providence wished it.”

  Then he spoke to the two Scotsmen who had listened to the whole proceedings in deep silence.

  “If anyone believes that I have judged wrongly, let him come forward and so declare.”

  No one stirred.

  “So then, you will no longer see nor hear my brother’s ghost. The castle is purified. Sir Archibald will now be able to go back to rest again in his tomb. Pray for him, my children.?. and now you may withdraw.”

  At that instant a joyous cry resounded through the castle.

  “Thank you, Patrick. You have avenged me. Good-bye.”

  Patrick and the Scotsmen crossed themselves, trembling and in deep awe.

  We remained alone in the great hall, Sir Philip, Helena and I. For some minutes the tall, gaunt man looked at us.

  “Now I ask you to leave as quickly as possible.... I am sure you don’t take me for a fool. It will be better if we never meet again.”

  “Very well,” said a voice; it was Natalie’s.

  XVIII.

  THE FUTURE

  HELENA AND I didn’t say a word. The next day we were on the Calais boat.

  “From now on you will believe me, Rudy, won’t you?” Helena asked.

  She was stretched out in a steamer-chair.

  “You will believe me. I had told you the truth. You know it now, don’t you?”

  “Yes, Helena. You changed the twelfth pearl. And so... he was thinking all the time that it was the real necklace.”

  “We could have left two months ago.”

  “What difference does that make, as long as we are leaving now!”

  “Yes...” she said... “but we are leaving without the necklace. And where are we going?”

  I was a little annoyed.

  “Do you miss him, Helena? Confess that you miss him.”

  “Certainly not, darling. But perhaps he misses us. But to be always safe from him, we need the necklace!”

  Strange woman. Already she had forgotten the agony of Black Rooks, and feared that Durin would get out of his castle dungeon.

  “Helena, he will live on, but he can never escape, never!”

  “Never, Rudy, never!”

  She thought a moment.

  “Your friend Natalie saved us. She loves you very much, Natalie does. I can’t bear her. Do you think she’ll get the necklace eventually?”

  “Oh no, Sir Philip will certainly give it to Clotilde.”

  “Ah!”

  But in a moment she smiled.

  “She’s very nice, my sister-in-law. And so is Natalie. I don’t understand why they didn’t want me to die. Perhaps they wanted to spare you pain, Rudy?”

  The train is rushing towards Paris....

  Only towards Paris?

  You used to complain, my dear master, of your poor, stale life. You used to long for the woman who is now yours.

  Are you happy?

  THE END

  The Short Fiction

  Nice, located in the French Riviera, on the south east coast of France on the Mediterranean Sea — Leroux spent his later years living in this city.

  53 boulevard Gambetta, Nice — Leroux rented an apartment here from 1919 until his death in 1927.

  Miscellaneous Short Stories
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br />   CONTENTS

  THE HAUNTED CHAIR

  Chapter 1. Death Strikes Twice

  Chapter 2. The Haunted Chair

  Chapter 3. The Walking Box

  Chapter 4. Martin Latouche

  Chapter 5. Death Strikes Again

  Chapter 6. A Scream in the Night

  Chapter 7. The Man Who Could Not Read

  Chapter 8. Eliphas de la Nox

  Chapter 9. Lalouette Becomes Afraid

  Chapter 10. The Dungeon of Living Death

  Chapter 11. A Flight Into the Night

  Chapter 12. The Assassin Confesses

  A TERRIBLE TALE

  THE MYSTERY OF THE FOUR HUSBANDS

  THE INN OF TERROR

  THE WOMAN WITH THE VELVET COLLAR

  THE CRIME ON CHRISTMAS NIGHT

  IN LETTERS OF FIRE

  THE GOLD AXE

  Leroux in later years

  THE HAUNTED CHAIR

  Translated by Mildred Gleason Prochet and Morris Bentinck, 1931

  Chapter 1. Death Strikes Twice

  ‘THEY SAY THE man doesn’t know what fear is.’

  ‘Maybe so, but he’s courting death. Let’s hope, though, that he’ll escape. Come on, we must hurry!’

  Gaston Lalouette looked up, startled. He was a kindly man, around forty-five, who for the last six years had kept a shop in the Rue Laffitte where he sold pictures and antiques. Today he had been wandering about the left bank of the Seine examining the old prints and oddities which the stall-keepers of that section of Paris display to lure the leisurely passer-by.

  As he turned he was jostled by a group of college boys, wearing the students’ béret. Coming down the Rue Bonaparte, they were too absorbed in excited conversation to beg Lalouette’s pardon as they hurried past. Lalouette hid his impatience, and laid their incivility to the fact that they were probably on their way to witness a duel, the outcome of which, he gathered, would be fatal.