The Lady Sleuths MEGAPACK ™: 20 Modern and Classic Tales of Female Detectives

by Catherine Louisa Pirkis

  “Having said all this, Cardillac took me into his secret strong-room and showed me his collection of jewels; the King does not possess its equal. To each ornament was fastened a small label stating for whom it had been made, and when taken back—by theft, robbery, or murder.

  “‘On your wedding day, Olivier,’ he said, in a solemn tone, ‘you will swear me a solemn oath, with your hand on the crucifix, that as soon as I am dead you will at once convert all these treasures into dust by a process which I will tell you of. I will not have any human being, least of all Madelon and you, come into possession of those stones that have been bought with blood.’

  “Shut up in this labyrinth of crime, torn in twain by love and abhorrence, I was like one of the damned to whom a glorified angel points, with gentle smile, the upward way, whilst Satan holds him down with red-hot talons, and the angel’s loving smile, reflecting all the bliss of paradise, becomes, to him, the very keenest of his tortures I thought of flight, even of suicide, but Madelon! Blame me, blame me, Mademoiselle, for having been too weak to overcome a passion which fettered me to my destruction. I shall be atoning for my weakness by a shameful death. One day Cardillac came in in unusually fine spirits. He kissed and caressed Madelon, cast most affectionate looks at me, drank a bottle of good wine at table, which he only did on high-days and holidays, sang and made merry. Madelon had left us and I was going to the workshop.

  “‘Sit still, lad,’ cried Cardillac, ‘no more work today; let’s drink the health of the most worthy and charming lady in all Paris.’

  “When we had clinked our glasses, and he had emptied a bumper, he said: ‘Tell me, Olivier, how do you like these lines?

  “Un amant qui craint les voleurs

  N’est point digne d’amour.”’

  “And he told me what had transpired between you and the King in Madame de Maintenon’s salon, adding that he had always respected you more than any other human being, and that his reverence and esteem for your qualities was such that his Evil Star paled before you,” and he would have no fear that, were you to wear the finest piece of his work that ever he made, the spectre would ever prompt him to thoughts of murder.

  “‘Listen, Olivier,’ he said, ‘to what I am going to do. A considerable time ago I had to make a necklace and bracelets for Henrietta of England, supplying the stones myself. I made of this the best piece of work that ever I turned out, and it broke my heart to part with the ornaments, which had become the very treasures of my soul. You know of her unfortunate death by assassination. The things remained with me, and now I shall send them to Mademoiselle de Scudéri, in the name of the dreaded band, as a token of respect and gratitude. Besides its being an unmistakable mark of her triumph, it will be a richly deserted sign of my contempt for Desgrais and his men. You shall take her the jewels.’

  “When he mentioned your name, Mademoiselle, dark veils seemed to be lifted, revealing the bright memory of my happy childhood, which rose again in glowing colours before me. A wonderful comfort came into my soul, a ray of hope, driving the dark shadows away. Cardillac saw the effect his words had produced upon me, and gave it his own interpretation. ‘My idea seems to please you,’ he said. ‘I must declare that a deep inward voice, very unlike that which cries for blood like a raving wild beast, commanded me to do this thing. Many times I feel the strangest ideas come into my mind—an inward fear, the dread of something terrible, the awe whereof seems to come breathing into this present time from some distant other world, seizes powerfully upon me. I even feel, at such times, that the deeds which my Evil Star has committed by means of me may be charged to the account of my immortal soul, though it has no part in them. In one of those moods I determined that I would make a beautiful diamond crown for the Virgin in the Church of St. Eustache. But the indescribable dread always came upon me, stronger than ever, when I set to work at it, so that I have abandoned it altogether. Now it seems to me that in presenting Mademoiselle de Scudéri with the finest work I have ever turned out, I am offering a humble sacrifice to goodness and virtue personified, and imploring their powerful intercession.’

  “Cardillac, well acquainted with all the minutiae of your manner of life told me how and when to take the ornaments to you. My whole being rejoiced, for Heaven seemed to be showing me, through the atrocious Cardillac, the way to escape from the hell in which I was being tortured. Quite contrary to Cardillac’s wish, I resolved that I would get access to you and speak with you. As Anne Brusson’s son and your former pet, I thought I would throw myself at your feet and tell you everything. I knew that you would keep the secret, out of consideration for the unheard-of misery which its disclosure would bring upon Madelon, but that your grand and brilliant intellect would be sure to find means to put an end to Cardillac’s wickedness without disclosing it. Do not ask me what those means were to have been; I cannot tell. But that you would rescue Madelon and me I believed as firmly as I do in the intercession of the Holy Virgin. You know, Mademoiselle, that my intention was frustrated that night; but I did not lose hope of being more fortunate another time.

  “By-and-by Cardillac suddenly lost all his good spirits; he crept moodily about, uttered unintelligible words, and worked his arms as if warding off something hostile. His mind seemed full of evil thoughts. For a whole morning he had been going on in this way. At last he sat down at the worktable, sprang up again angrily, looked out of window, and then said gravely and gloomily: ‘I wish Henrietta of England had had my jewels.’ Those words filled me with terror. I knew that his diseased mind was again possessed by a terrible lust for murder, that the voice of the demon was again loud in his ears. I saw your life threatened by that dread spirit of murder. If Cardillac could get his jewels back again into his hands you were safe. The danger grew greater every instant. I met you on the Pont Neuf, made my way to your carriage, threw you the note which implored you to give the jewels back to Cardillac immediately. You did not come. My fear became despair, when next day Cardillac spoke of nothing but the priceless jewels he had seen last night in his dreams. I could only suppose that this referred to your jewels, and I felt sure he was brooding over some murderous attack, which he had determined to carry out that night. Save you I must, should it cost Cardillac’s life.

  “After the evening prayer when he had shut himself up in his room as usual, I got into the courtyard through a window, slipped out through the opening of the wall, and stationed myself close at hand, in the deepest shadow. Very soon Cardillac came out, and went gliding softly down the street. I followed him. He took the direction of the Rue St. Honoré. My heart beat fast. All at once he disappeared from me. I determined to place myself at your door. Just as fate had ordered matters on the first occasion of my witnessing one of his crimes, there came along past me an officer, trilling and singing; he did not see me. Instantly a dark form sprang out and attacked him. Cardillac! I determined to prevent this murder. I gave a loud shout, and was on the spot in a couple of paces. Not the officer, but Cardillac, fell gasping to the ground, mortally wounded. The officer let his dagger fall, drew his sword, and stood on the defensive, thinking I was the murderer’s accomplice. But he hastened away when he saw that, instead of concerning myself about him, I was examining the fallen man. Cardillac was still alive. I took up the dagger dropped by the officer, stuck it in my belt and, lifting Cardillac on to my shoulders, carried him with difficulty to the house, and up the secret stair to the workshop. The rest you know.

  “You perceive, Mademoiselle, that my only crime was that I refrained from giving Madelon’s father up to justice, thereby making an end of his crimes. I am quite innocent of murder. No torture will draw from me the secret of Cardillac’s iniquities. Not through any action of mine shall that Eternal Power, which has for all this time hidden from Madelon her father’s gruesome crimes, break in upon her now, to her destruction; nor shall earthly vengeance drag the corpse of Cardillac out of the soil which covers it, and brand his moulder
ing bones with infamy. No; the beloved of my soul shall mourn me as an innocent victim. Time will mitigate her sorrow for me, but her grief for her father’s terrible crimes nothing would ever assuage.”

  Olivier ceased, and a torrent of tears fell down his cheeks. He threw himself at Mademoiselle de Scudéri’s feet, saying imploringly: “You are convinced that I am innocent; I know you are. Be merciful to me. Tell me how Madelon is faring.”

  Mademoiselle de Scudéri summoned La Martinière, and in a few minutes Madelon was clinging to Olivier’s neck.

  “Now that you are here, all is well. I knew that this noble-hearted lady would save you,” Madelon cried over and over again; and Olivier forgot his fate, and all that threatened him.

  He was free and happy. In the most touching manner they bewailed what each had suffered for the other, and embraced afresh, and wept for joy at being together again.

  Had Mademoiselle de Scudéri not been convinced of Olivier’s innocence before, she must have been so when she saw those two lovers forgetting, in the rapture of the moment, the world, their sufferings and their indescribable sorrows.

  “None but a guiltless heart,” she cried, “would be capable of such blissful forgetfulness.”

  The morning light came breaking into the room, and Desgrais knocked gently at the door, reminding them that it was time to take Olivier away, as it could not be done later without attracting attention. The lovers had to part.

  The dim anticipations which Mademoiselle de Scudéri had felt when Olivier first came in had now embodied themselves in reality—in a terrible fashion. The son of her much-loved Anne was, though innocent, implicated in a manner which apparently made it impossible to save him from a shameful death. She admired his heroism, which led him to prefer death, loaded with the imputation of guilt, to the betrayal of a secret which would kill Madelon. In the whole realm of possibility, she could see no mode of saving the unfortunate lad from his gruesome prison and the dreadful trial. Yet it was firmly impressed on her mind that she must not shrink from any sacrifice to prevent this most crying injustice.

  She tortured herself with all kinds of plans and projects, which were chiefly of the most impracticable and impossible kind—rejected as soon as formed. Every glimmer of hope grew fainter and fainter, and she well-nigh despaired. But Madelon’s pious, absolute, childlike confidence, the inspired manner in which she spoke of her lover, soon to be free and to take her to his heart as his wife, restored Mademoiselle de Scudéri’s hopes to some extent.

  By way of beginning to do something, she wrote to La Regnie a long letter, in which she said that Olivier Brusson had proved to her in the most credible manner his entire innocence of Cardillac’s murder, and that nothing but a heroic resolution to carry to the grave with him a secret, the disclosure of which would bring destruction upon an innocent and virtuous person, withheld him from laying a statement before the Court, which would completely clear him from all guilt and show that he had never belonged to the band at all. With the best eloquence at her command, she said everything she could think of which might be expected to soften La Regnie’s hard heart.

  He replied to this in a few hours, saying he was very glad that Olivier had so thoroughly justified himself in the eyes of his kind patron and protector; but, as for his heroic resolution to carry to the grave with him a secret relating to the crime with which he was charged, he regretted that the Chambre Ardente could feel no admiration for heroism of that description, but must endeavour to dispel it by powerful means. In three days’ time, he had little doubt, he would be in possession of the wondrous secret, which would probably bring many strange matters to light.

  Mademoiselle de Scudéri knew well what the terrible La Regnie meant by the “powerful means,” which were to break down Olivier’s heroism. It was but too clear that the unfortunate wretch was threatened with the torture. In her mortal anxiety it at last occurred to her that, were it only to gain time, the advice of a lawyer would be of some service.

  Pierre Arnaud d’Andilly was at that time the most celebrated advocate in Paris. His goodness of heart and his highly honourable character were on a par with his professional skill and his comprehensive mind. To him she repaired, and told him the whole tale, as far as it was possible to do so without divulging Olivier’s secret. She expected that d’Andilly would warmly espouse the cause of this innocent man, but in this she was woefully disappointed. He listened silently to what she had to say, and then, with a quiet smile, answered in the words of Boileau, “Le vrai peut quelquefois n’être point vraisemblable.” He showed her that there were the most grave and marked suspicions against Olivier; that La Regnie’s action was by no means severe or premature, but wholly regular; indeed, that to act otherwise would be to neglect his duty as a Judge. He did not believe that he—d’Andilly—could save Brusson from the rack, by the very ablest of pleading. Nobody could do that but Brusson himself, either by making the fullest confession, or by accurately relating the circumstances of Cardillac’s murder, which might lead to further discoveries.

  “Then I will throw myself at the King’s feet and sue for mercy,” cried Mademoiselle de Scudéri, her voice choked by weeping.

  “For Heaven’s sake, do not do that,” cried d’Andilly. “Keep that in reserve for the last extremity. If it fails you once, it is lost for ever. The King will not pardon a criminal like Brusson; the people would justly complain of the danger to them. Possibly Brusson may manage to dispel the suspicion against him, by revealing his secret, or in some other way. Then would be the time to resort to the King, who would not ask what was or was not legally proved, but be guided by his own conviction.”

  Mademoiselle de Scudéri could not but agree with what d’Andilly’s great experience dictated. She was sitting in her room, pondering as to what—in the name of the Virgin and all the saints—she should try next to do, when La Martinière came to say that the Count de Miossens, Colonel of one of the King’s Body Guard, was most anxious to speak with her.

  “Pardon me, Mademoiselle,” said the Colonel, bowing with a soldier’s courtesy, “for disturbing you, and breaking in upon you at such an hour. Two words will be sufficient excuse for me. I come about Olivier Brusson.”

  “Olivier Brusson,” cried Mademoiselle de Scudéri, eagerly anticipating what she was going to hear; “that most unfortunate of men! What have you to say of him?”

  “I knew,” said Miossens, laughing again, “that your protégé’s name would ensure me a favourable hearing. Everybody is convinced of Brusson’s guilt. I know you think otherwise, and it is said your opinion rests on what he himself has told you. With me the case is different. Nobody can be more certain than I that Brusson is innocent of Cardillac’s death.”

  “Speak! Oh, speak!” cried Mademoiselle Scudéri.

  “I was the man who stabbed the old goldsmith in the Rue St Honoré, close to your door,” said the Colonel.

  “You—you!” cried Mademoiselle de Scudéri. “In the name of all the Saints, how?”

  “And I vow to you, Mademoiselle, that I am very proud of my achievement. Cardillac, I must tell you, was a most abandoned hypocritical old ruffian, who went about at night robbing and murdering people, and was never suspected of anything of the kind. I don’t myself know from whence it came that I felt a suspicion of the old scoundrel, when he seemed so distressed at handing me over some work which I had got him to do for me; when he carefully wormed out of me for whom I designed it, and cross-questioned my valet as to the times when I was in the habit of going to see a certain lady. It struck me long ago, that everyone who was murdered by these unknown hands had the selfsame wound, and I saw quite clearly that the murderer had practiced to the utmost perfection of certainty that particular thrust, which must kill instantaneously—and that he reckoned upon it; so that, if it were to fail, the fight would be fair. This led me to employ a precaution so very simple and obvious that I cannot i
magine how somebody else did not think of it long ago. I wore a light breastplate of steel under my dress. Cardillac set upon me from behind. He grasped me with the strength of a giant, but his finely directed thrust glided off the steel breastplate. I then freed myself from his clutch, and planted my dagger in his heart.”

  “And you have said nothing?” said Mademoiselle de Scudéri. “You have not told the authorities anything about this?”

  “Allow me to point out to you, Mademoiselle,” said he, “that to have done that would have involved me in a most terrible legal investigation, probably ending in my ruin. La Regnie, who scents out crime everywhere, would not have been at all likely to believe me at once, when I accused the good, respectable, exemplary Cardillac of being an habitual murderer. The sword of Justice would, most probably, have turned its point against me.”

  “Impossible,” said Mademoiselle de Scudéri. “Your rank—your position—”

  “Oh!” interrupted Miossens, “remember the Maréchal de Luxembourg; he took it into his head to have his horoscope cast by Le Sage, and was suspected of poisoning, and put in the Bastille. No; by Saint Dionys! not one moment of freedom—not the tip of one of my ears, would I trust to that raging La Regnie, who would be delighted to put his knife to all our throats.”

  “But this brings an innocent man to the scaffold,” said Mademoiselle de Scudéri.

  “Innocent, Mademoiselle!” cried Miossens. “Do you call Cardillac’s accomplice an innocent man? He who assisted him in his crimes, and has deserved death a hundred times? No, in verity; he suffers justly; although I told you the true state of the case in the hope that you might somehow make use of it in the interests of your protégé, without bringing me into the clutches of the Chambre Ardente.”