Works of Robert W Chambers

by Robert W. Chambers

  “What did you do that for?” demanded an officer running up and frowning at the American.

  “Now you don’t suppose I did it for amusement?” retorted Philip, angrily. He heard a burst of laughter near him, and turning saw a tall artillery officer sitting on his horse and regarding him with amusement. The laughter was infectious, and Philip smiled and picked himself up. He had recognized the tall artilleryman who had paid him the pretty compliment in the Café Cardinal, in the quarrel with Rigault and Sarre.

  “Monsieur Landes, pray pardon me. I laughed at your retort, not at you,” said the officer, gravely.

  “I don’t mind,” cried Landes, trying to find some broken bones, and not finding any he walked over to the horse.

  “Poor thing,” he said, “somebody must shoot it.” A soldier stepped forward and gave the wretched brute its coup-de-grace. Landes, finding that his own injuries were confined to the knees of his trousers, picked up his cane and hat and looked around. —

  The artillery officer had dismounted and now came up to him. “I see, Monsieur, that you are uninjured. Permit me to offer you my felicitations and my services.”

  “You are very kind,” said Landes. “I don’t exactly know what to do. I ought to go down to the rue Blanche and point out the murderer of my cabman, but I must go to the Place Pigalle.”

  The lieutenant in charge of the infantry cordon pricked up his ears.

  “Murder?” he asked. Then Landes told the two officers his story.

  “I am dazed yet, it happened so suddenly,” he finished,— “and he was in the uniform of a National Guard, but I know him, Tribert.”

  “In the uniform of a National Guard, you say?”

  “Yes, with a captain’s galons.”

  “Was there any excitement in the street before that?”

  “None that I observed. People were walking about just as usual.” After a pause he added: “I notice that the streets here are empty except for the military.”

  “We have just captured the cannon at Montmartre!” said the artillery officer. “If you are going to the Place Pigalle, permit me to offer you my escort.”

  “Thank you, but that will not be necessary.”

  “Oh, yes, it will be,” smiled the officer. “You cannot get into the Place Pigalle unless a staff officer goes with you.”

  “Then you are very kind, and I accept most gratefully.”

  The lieutenant of the cordon saluted them with great punctiliousness. “Mon capitaine,” he said, “I will send a corporal and four men to the rue Blanche. We will get this Tribert if he is within our zone.”

  “My name is Alain de Carette,” said the artillery officer, turning to Landes. “I know that yours is Philip Landes, because you said so in the Café Cardinal. I simply require your word of honor that you will report to me as witness against this Tribert when he is caught.”

  “You have my word of honor, mon capitaine,” said Landes.

  “It is sufficient.” Then he threw his bridle to a fantassin, saying, “take the horse to the War Ministry, I will go on foot”; and not heeding the polite protests of Landes, took his arm and drew him along the steeply ascending hill. “I seldom enjoy the luxury of walking,” he laughed.

  “You are very good indeed,” replied Landes, warmly.

  “I like Americans,” said the officer. “Here is the Place Pigalle.

  A squadron of cavalry was massed before the fountain in the centre of the square, and vedettes stood at every corner. The Boulevard beyond was occupied by a detachment of gendarmes on foot and a few policemen. There appeared to be no civilians in the streets. The houses were silent and the shutters closed.

  They advanced toward the mounted sentry nearest them. He saluted de Carette’s uniform, and they passed across the square toward the fountain where a group of officers had dismounted and were examining a plan which a young fellow of the Rifle battalion had chalked on the pavement. De Carette saluted and Landes raised his hat.

  “Tiens! C’est Alain!” cried the senior officer cordially, and the others looked up with eager greetings. Landes was presented and permitted at once to pass the lines.

  “Monsieur Landes wishes to visit the Hôtel Perret,” said de Carette.

  “It is empty. The last person to leave was the landlord,” said one of the officers. “There he is now,” he continued, pointing to a café on the corner, “that man looking out of the window.”

  “But the guests?” cried Landes, alarmed.

  “Two of them rode away just as we came into the square this morning. Don’t you remember?” turning to another, who nodded in reply:

  “The pretty girl and her maid? Yes, I remember; the landlord, Perret, was with them.”

  “Send a trooper for the landlord,” said de Carette; “wait a moment, Mr. Landes, we will have Monsieur Perret over here.”

  But Philip could not wait, and with his heart beating anxiously he hurried across the street to the café. The curtains were lowered, the café was almost empty. There was only a young man writing at a desk and a waiter idling aimlessly about. When Philip entered, the young man at the desk glanced up, and immediately dropped his head again. The light was uncertain, his motion was so quick that Philip could not be sure, and yet there was something familiar about his air.

  “Is Monsieur Perret here?” he asked.

  “Yes, Monsieur,” began the waiter,— “no, Monsieur,” he stammered. The man at the desk had turned his back to Landes and was looking at the waiter. All Landes could see of him now was the top of a curly black head over the desk.

  “Monsieur Perret must be here. I saw him from the square,” said Philip. The waiter stole a glance at the man behind the desk, and shook his head.

  “Berry? — oh, Perret. I understood Monsieur to say Berry. No, Monsieur Perret is not here,” and picking up a towel he began to polish the tops of the tables.

  “Are there any guests in the Hôtel Perret?” demanded Landes angrily.

  “No,” said the waiter with alacrity, seeming to feel himself on certain ground, “Monsieur Perret drove the last two away in his carriage—” the legs of the chair in which the man at the desk was sitting scraped on the floor, and the waiter stopped short.

  “Was it Mademoiselle de Brassac and her maid who went this morning?”

  “Yes — no.” The waiter had stepped close to the man at the desk, and Landes heard a low murmur.

  “No, it was not Mademoiselle de Brassac. Mademoiselle de Brassac and her maid left last week,” said the waiter, glibly. —

  “You lie!” said Landes, in a low voice, stepping toward the man at the desk.

  “Mais, Monsieur,” cried the waiter, eagerly, “he ought to know; he is the son of Monsieur Perret.” At the same moment, Philip sprang forward.

  “Imbecile!” said the man at the desk through his teeth, and striking the waiter out of the way, he slid out of his chair and slipped through a door just behind, but not so quickly as to prevent Landes, who rushed forward at the same moment, from getting a view of his face. It was Georgias, the Greek. Philip tried the handle of the door; it would not open. Then he took a small table and used it as a battering ram. He dashed out the panels, one by one, until the frame fell inward and he sprang through into a courtyard from which there was an opening on the next street. Philip looked up and down the street; it was quite empty, and he ran back into the café. The waiter had disappeared. Landes searched the café, found it entirely deserted, returned to the desk where Georgias had been writing, and noticed there an unfinished letter, beginning, “Mon cher Raoul.” This he thrust into his pocket along with a revolver which he found in a top drawer, then he began a rapid examination of the café again. He found a staircase at last, climbed it, and hurried through several floors of empty apartments. The doors were all open, the floors were bare, not a stick of furniture was visible. He hurried back to the café, and going to the big window pulled open the shutters and looked across the square. The cavalry had mounted and were moving, with some a
ppearance of excitement, toward the Boulevard.

  “Captain de Carette!” he shouted, but the tramping of the moving squadron drowned his voice, and the artillery officer did not hear. Philip bitterly regretted the time he had lost in searching alone by himself. He went out and crossed to the Hôtel Perret. There his furious bell-calls and raps were unanswered. A window faced the street in a recess just beside the door. He took out the revolver, broke the glass with the butt of it, and climbed through. The house was perfectly dark. He stumbled over chairs and tables toward a faint ray of light which filtered through a closely curtained window, tore back the curtains, threw open the window, and looked around. He was in the office of a small, but handsome hôtel, furnished in taste, the walls and ceiling panelled in solid oak. Through a glass door he saw a vestibule, and the lower steps of a staircase. He picked a candle out of the concierge’s letter-safe, lighted it, and unhooking every key from the key rack, opened the glass door and mounted the stairs. On the first landing he stopped and selected two keys whose numbers corresponded with the numbers on the doors. The keys fitted, and he entered without trouble. The apartments were empty. He threw the keys away, and mounted the steps of the second floor. Here there was but one apartment. He found the key and entered, but before he had taken one step into the darkened room, the candle was struck from his hand, and something sprang by him. How he managed to get to the window and open it he could not have told, but at last the sunlight broke into the room and he turned to face whatever awaited him. It was a large yellow cat which glared at him, with enormous eyes, from a niche over the door. Her spine was arched, her tail exaggerated. The candle lay on the floor below. Philip burst into a nervous laugh. At the sound of his voice in the empty apartment there came a whine from the bed. Philip went there and saw a small setter puppy curled up on the lace counterpane, trembling and making violent overtures of conciliation. He called the little creature, and it came slowly toward him with a coquetry which is understood to perfection by puppies, and finally rolled over on its back under Landes’ feet, both forepaws faised beseechingly. Philip bent and took it in his arms. The cat, seeing this, relaxed the rigidity of her tail, transformed her back from an arc-de-triomphe into its normal curves, and licked her singed whiskers. Landes, with the puppy in his arms, began a cautious tour of the apartment. On the bed he noticed a valise, half packed. It contained an officer’s undress jacket and some underwear. Beyond it, on the floor, lay a riding crop, boots, spurs, and a dress sword in its case. He passed into the next room and found that it had been recently occupied, for the gas was burning low and toilet articles lay scattered over the tables. A curtain hung across the door at the farther end. A sudden draft stirred this curtain and a subtle odor filled the room. He recognized chloroform! In an instant he drew the curtain and threw open the door. On the floor lay a woman, tied and gagged.

  The puppy, when Landes dropped him, bounded toward the woman but halted suddenly and began circling around her, barking. Landes stood, not knowing what to do; the puppy retreated between his legs. The shades were partly raised, but the windows were closed and the stench of chloroform made him dizzy. He flung open the window, went to the woman, and unloosened the towel about, her face. A sponge fell from her lips and the smell of chloroform became almost unbearable. Holding his breath, he cut the twine that bound her hands and feet and drew her out on to a balcony, which was under the long French window. Sunlight fell across her face and gilded her brown hair, gathered neatly in a cap such as is worn by ladies’ maids. She was dressed as if ready to go out, for she wore gloves and a thick cloth jacket. In one hand she held, tightly clenched, the handle of a reticule, which had evidently been cut away with a knife; the other hand was open and limp and the deadly pallor of her face showed that help had probably come too late. Leaning over the railing of the balcony which looked into the square, in search of help, he saw some hussars watering their horses at the fountain. He shouted to them; they heard, mounted, and galloped into the street directly under the balcony.

  “Is there a surgeon there?” he called down. “No,” shouted back the lieutenant in charge, “what’s up?’

  “Get a surgeon, it’s life or death.”

  “I understand surgery,” cried a sub-officer, after a brief consultation with his superior.

  “Then get in that broken window and come up here quick. Send for an ambulance and a surgeon.” A hussar struck spurs into his horse and rode away toward the Boulevard, and the rest of the troop, after watching the sub-officer scramble in at the window, went back to the fountain and dismounted. The sub-officer came springing up the stairs, looked sharply at Landes, saluted mechanically, and sat down on the balcony beside the woman.

  “Chloroform! Oh!”

  Landes offered his help but it was declined, and he stepped back into the room. It was à dressing-room. Beyond, at the end of a short hall, the door of a bedroom stood partly open. He crossed and looked in, lighted a match and held it above his head, then groped his way to the window and threw it wide open. The room was empty; the odor of chloroform pervaded everything, but the breeze from the open window soon drove that away. As he turned back into the room, the first thing he saw was the photograph of a French officer, in the uniform of the Hussars of the Guard. The officer was the Count de Brassac, and beneath, in the quaint, precise writing of a French school-girl, he read, “My darling father, August 1st, 1869.”

  For the first time he distinctly recalled the face of Jeanne de Brassac. Until now he had only remembered her vaguely as a pretty, graceful school-girl, sister of his comrade, Victor. Now, with a shock, memory awakened, and every incident of that Christmas week was recalled. The drawing-room and the warm firelight, the carving on the chairs, the boyish gestures of Victor, and — Jeanne, the violet eyes, the white throat, the shape of her hand as it lay on her mother’s shoulder. He recollected every detail of her dress; he recalled her voice as she answered her father and went to the piano to sing his favorite song of “Carcassonne.” With a great effort he collected his thoughts and concentrated them on the present. She was gone and her maid had been chloroformed. Why? The diamonds! It was for the diamonds that they had murdered her father. Had they also murdered her? He could hear the officer in the next room working over the inanimate body of the servant, who still clutched in her stiffened hand the fragment of a reticule. Had the diamonds been in that? He sat miserably trying to find some clue to the tragedy, his head in his hands, his heart throbbing painfully, but the face of Jeanne de Brassac rose incessantly before his eyes, and his thoughts would wander back to the firelight and the sweet voice that sang “I never shall see Carcassonne.” He heard the subofficer leave the room and descend the stairs and return almost immediately with several others, who moved about with a banging of sabres and jingle of spurs on the tiled floor. The puppy and the cat, who had taken refuge in this quiet room from the confusion in the other, suddenly began a complicated game of romps. Philip felt a tenderness for these creatures, her pets, and he called them both to him. The cat at first stood on the defensive, but he soon had her lying on the bed asleep. He placed the puppy beside her, and going to the door looked into the next room. The woman was being carried toward the stairs on a stretcher. A group of hussars and officers stood looking on.

  “Is she alive?” asked Philip.

  “At present,” replied a gendarme, shortly.

  “Monsieur, I am sorry,” said the sub-officer, “but you must consider yourself my prisoner.”

  “Prisoner!”

  “I am sorry,” repeated the sub-officer.

  Through the window Landes saw his acquaintance of the morning, de Carette, standing on the balcony, and reached him in two strides.

  “What?” cried de Carette, “nonsense,” and went back into the room with his arm locked in the American’s. “I am responsible for this gentleman, Faure,” he said to the sub-lieutenant, and passed with Landes into the bedroom.

  “My dear fellow, you look like a corpse; this chloroform is nasty s
tuff.”

  “It isn’t the chloroform,” replied Philip.

  “I know it,” replied the other, coolly. “Do you want to confide in me?

  “Yes,” said Philip, and told him all, ending by showing him the unfinished letter left by Georgias in the café. “It’s terrible,” he cried, pacing the room in deep excitement.

  “I fear there can be but one meaning to that letter,” said de Carette.

  Philip stopped in his aimless walk and approached the bed. The Frenchman had been absently stroking the cat’s yellow fur, while he listened, the puppy jealously trying to crowd his hand away.

  “And these? They must be her pets, I suppose,” said Philip. His voice was unsteady. The Frenchman went to the door and gave an order. Then he came back and laid a hand on Philip’s shoulder, saying, “we will find Mademoiselle de Brassac. They dare not harm her.”

  “They killed her father.”

  De Carette’s steel-blue eyes glittered. “A brave officer, — an old man; cowards!”

  A trooper came in carrying a large covered basket. De Carette gently lifted the cat and the puppy into it.

  “We will take care of her pets until we have found her,” he said. “May I send them to your address, Monsieur?”

  “You are very good,” said Landes, warmly.

  “Take them carefully,” ordered the Captain. The trooper saluted. The cat set up a desolate squall, the puppy whined anxiously, the trooper saluted once more with a grave face and marched out, the basket dangling from his long arm, ear-piercing sounds and a violent agitation of the basket cover contrasting with his composure. Standing in the balcony and looking over, they saw him enter a cab driven by a policeman and rattle away. A military ambulance also was slowly moving toward the hospital.