“He never went out.”
“Good. Does he have relatives?”
“An old uncle that he never sees, because they’d quarreled.”
“Monsieur Grillard.”
“That’s right. Do you know him?”
Rosamour made an equivocal gesture that might have passed for a negation. “But I’m told that the uncle and nephew had been reconciled, to such an extent that Monsieur Bémolisant had made a statue of his uncle. It must, therefore, have been necessary for him to visit him quite often?”
“I don’t know; so far as I know, he only saw Monsieur Grillard once.”
“On December the thirty-first, no?”
“Precisely. It’s an easy date to remember. I even recall that Népomucène came back late and went up to his studio with Monsieur Pilesèche, his uncle’s laboratory assistant, so that, when they didn’t come down for lunch, I went up to knock on his door. It was one o’clock and he hadn’t thought of going to table.”
“Did the Messieurs seem a trifle emotional, overexcited?”
“Your question reminds me that they did, in fact, have a slightly singular air. Monsieur Pilesèche had even taken off his coat and dusted it, which seemed bizarre to me. But it’s not astonishing that they were a little overexcited, for that was the day when Monsieur Leroux had convinced my husband to exhibit his work.”
“Ah! His statue was finished?”
“Yes, it had just been brought.”
“Monsieur Bémolisant had been occupied with the statue for a long time?”
“I can tell you that I’d never heard mention of it before.”
“That’s odd.”
“All the odder because my husband likes to talk about the artistic ideas that are on his mind.”
Good, thought Rosamour. There’s a statue that no one has mentioned the day before, and whose arrival coincides with the visit to the uncle. That’s what was in the box; that much is evident. But it doesn’t help us to discover what has become of the original.
After that aside he resumed: “And you’ve doubtless informed Monsieur Grillard of his nephew’s disappearance?”
“No, Monsieur. I confess that the idea never occurred to me. I don’t know him at all, personally, and he doesn’t seem to be desirous of making my acquaintance.”
“And since then you’ve had no news of him?”
“No, Monsieur. When the laboratory assistant came here in recent days I asked about him, because the worthy Monsieur Pilesèche never talks about him otherwise. The poor man is very ill, he told me.”
“Well, Madame,” the policeman said then, in his most solemn tone, emphasizing his words, “I can be more explicit. The house in which your uncle lived burned down yesterday, and Monsieur Grillard has disappeared.”
“In the flames?” asked Madame Bémolisant, whom Rosamour was observing from the corner of his eye, but whose face expressed nothing but the sharpest surprise and the most sincere horror.
“I don’t believe so.”
“But what is it necessary to suppose, then? Monsieur Grillard was ill and couldn’t leave his room. Someone must have removed him!”
“All suppositions are admissible; it’s all a matter of finding the right one. Who are Monsieur Grillard’s heirs?”
“My husband and his cousin Sophie, who is at the convent of Fontenay-sous-Bois,” Madame Bémolisant replied, without hesitation. “You believe that a thief…?”
“I don’t believe anything, Madame. Until now, I haven’t settled on any hypothesis. But I can’t hide from you any longer that this disappearance, coinciding with that of your husband and Monsieur Pilesèche, who was with him, permits the gravest suspicions.
“Oh! Monsieur, you’re frightening me. You’ve taken a solemn tone. Good God, what is it? What are these suppositions?”
It was evident that the young woman was sincere and knew nothing; it would not have been possible to play a learned role so perfectly.
“Can one not suppose,” the policeman added, measuring the effect of his words, “that the laboratory assistant and your husband have something to do with the old man’s disappearance?”
“I don’t understand,” Hélène replied, with a naivety that was not feigned.
“Monsieur Bémolisant saw Monsieur Grillard on the thirty-first of December. Admit for a moment that the latter received his nephew with some sarcasm; a dispute might have followed. Your husband is quick-tempered, impatient—you recognize that yourself. He might have been carried away, and in a moment of anger...”
“Enough, Monsieur, enough! Your supposition wounds me, and I can’t tolerate the formation of such an accusation in my presence.”
She had risen to her feet, cold and dignified, her hand extended in an energetic gesture. But Rosamour, without quitting his chair and without departing from his calmness, continued in the same tone of voice.
“You’re wrong to get so excited so soon,” he said. “One doesn’t respond to an explicit accusation with a disdainful silence. I’m pointing out a danger to you; it’s necessary to confront it and tackle the enemy hand-to hand.”
“My husband, a murderer!”
“Unintentionally.”
“No, Monsieur, it’s not possible. You’re lying...”
“It’s not me that it’s necessary to accuse, for the hypothesis isn’t mine. Furthermore, I will say that I’m seeking the truth without any prejudice. But it’s up to you, Madame, since you’re sure of your husband’s innocence, to help me bring it to light. I’ve told you the hypothesis that will seem the most plausible to many people; do you have another to put in its place?”
“What do you want me to say? I’m overwhelmed by that frightful accusation. It’s a hammer-blow that has stunned me, and I can only cry loudly in the ardor of my conviction that he’s innocent!”
“That is unfortunately insufficient to counter the charges against him. But you can see the frankness with which I’m acting toward you; return the favor. Trust me. Be sure that nothing would give me greater joy than demonstrating Monsieur Bémolisant’s innocence, if he is innocent. Think, then! Everything accuses him, and I have to destroy that scaffolding. It’s a task worthy of me. I’m speaking to you as an artist, after having spoken to you as a man, for I have a heart, you see; I’m accessible to pity, to generous sentiments, and when I see a weak individual in tears, a woman devoid of support, I’m always tempted to spring to her defense...
“It’s agreed, then; henceforth, we’re allies. You’ll help me as much as you can to discover the truth. But it’s understood that you’ll speak without any afterthought, that you won’t hide anything from me under the pretext that it might be unfavorable to your thesis. I’m a confessor; it’s necessary to tell me everything.”
Finally, resignedly, she said: “Question me, Monsieur. I’ll answer.”
The conversation was a long one. In spite of the excellent memory on which he pried himself, Rosamour took notes.
When he parted from Madame Bémolisant, he addressed a few words of encouragement to her. “Have confidence,” he said, “and whatever happens, don’t worry. I don’t know whether I’ll be able to come back to see you soon; I might be forced to depart on a journey sooner than I would wish—but even if you don’t hear mention of me, have no fear; I’ll be watching and working.”
He headed for the door. “Oh,” he said, turning round. “If the gentleman who was leaving as I arrived comes back, send him away—and above all, don’t tell him anything. He’s one of those swindlers who only seeks to fish in troubled waters.”
When Rosamour was back in the street, he lit a cigar philosophically and hummed a tune from an operetta. It wouldn’t take much, he thought, for that poor woman’s conviction to persuade me. Instinctively, moreover, it seems to me that they’re two imbeciles who are running away naively, without having killed anyone. At any rate, Madame Bémolisant is a precious auxiliary in finding them. But where’s the body?
He went into a small restaurant, where he at
e a hasty meal, and prepared to make a tour of the editorial offices of the principal newspapers. His principle was that the press ought, for anyone who knew how to play the game, to be the best auxiliary of the examining magistrate and the policemen—but it was necessary, for that, not to let it spread indiscreet information as it liked. The best way to make sure of that was to inform it himself.
He recounted the story in his own fashion, enlivening the details that it suited him to publish and not neglecting to say, in accordance with the well-known fallacious formula, that the police were on the track of the mysteriously vanished individuals.
After which, Rosamour hastened to go to bed. He had nothing better to do. Were the reporters not taking charge of the task now?
The following day, in fact, the principal newspapers published long sensational articles under the headline The Mystery of the Panthéon, which imparted to the public the marvelous discoveries of their reporters. It was demonstrated, by peremptory reasoning, that the celebrated artist Bémolisant had not been murdered, but had fled with the laboratory assistant of the eminent physiologist Grillard. What means of locomotion had the fugitives employed? In what direction was it necessary to look for them? As many questions calculated to deflect less skilful individuals.
We have, said one of the articles, discovered the merchant who rented his handcart, and, furnished with an exact description and the number of the vehicle, it was not difficult to assure ourselves that no cart fitting that description has been abandoned in Paris, or even in the suburbs. On the other hand, the package that the artist was carrying is too singular and recognizable for it to have gone unnoticed at a railway station; in reality, the two men have not taken a train. They must have passed through the fortifications on foot, which seems to be confirmed by the declaration of a customs officer at the Porte de Bercy. We shall know before long where the fugitives are. Our reporters and cyclists are departing in all directions.
Rosamour rubbed his hands.
The next day, a benevolent reader notified a newspaper that he had encountered two travelers answering the description, in a state of complete dilapidation, at Voves, on the Vendôme line, a hundred kilometers from Paris.
“Where the devil are they going?” Rosamour asked himself—and answered himself almost immediately: “To Saint-Nazaire, no doubt. They’re counting on embarking there for America. At the rate they’re going, I have a week in hand.”
He went to give an account of his initial results to the examining magistrate, Monsieur Fischer, who had been taken the mysterious affair in hand, substituting himself for the commissioner. Then he prepared to continue his search.
In order to obtain more precise information he sent a description of the fugitives everywhere, but without issuing any arrest warrant. He wanted to keep track of them and have them watched, but not arrested prematurely.
That description, which he communicated to the press, was a marvel of sagacity.
The Bureau of Anthropometric Measurements had succeeded in reconstituting Bémolisant’s characteristic dimensions with the sole aid of a photograph and clothing found at his home. As for Pilesèche, it had been necessary to do without his photograph, none of which existed. From the size of the footwear left at his lodgings it had been concluded that he was about one meter seventy tall—above average. His garments had indicated his corpulence; the traces left by the friction of jutting bones at his elbows, knees and shoulders had furnished other measurements. That was the scientific method, applied in its fullest extent.
When Monsieur Boissonnald came to knock on Madame Bémolisant’s door to find out whether the night had given her advice, the artist’s wife contented herself with telling him that, on due reflection, she had renounced any further research.
The enquiry agent withdrew, slightly discomfited by the vanishing of a nice windfall; cases being scarce and time being short, it was important not to miss any opportunities that cropped up, but he was particularly vexed to see the ground being cut from under his feet by the Prefecture of Police—for he was not duped by that defeat, having recognized Rosamour, and not doubting for an instant the part the latter had played in his disappointment. If the Prefecture was going to snatch the bread out of his mouth, his métier was going to become impossible.
Enveloping Rosamour in his resentment, he thought, angrily: I’ll pay you back for this. If I can do you a bad turn, in my fashion, you’ll be disenchanted before long.
X. The Result of a Session of Hypnotism
There was a veritable snowstorm that evening, and the wind was shaking the windows of the Cheval Boiteux inn—said to be the best in the village of Briseval, at the end of the bridge over the Loir—rudely.
The frightful weather was not at all to the liking of a fairground performer whose bright leotard could be seen beneath a threadbare overcoat, and who was counting on putting on a little display of his various skills in the main room, where the local bigwigs ordinarily gathered, with the precious assistance of Miss Adda, his acolyte, who was to submit with a good grace to the most curious, amusing and simultaneously instructive experiments in hypnotic suggestion.
The showman put of the commencement of the session as long as possible, for the audience only consisted of two big fellows playing billiards and a few peasants drinking their mazagrans and chatting around a table in the midst of a cloud of smoke.
Miss Adda was sitting next to the stove, from which a damp mist was rising. She was short and thin, with pale, fatigued features, a sad and pensive expression, hiding her pink stockings and short spangled skirt under a grimy tartan deprived for the fringes that had once ornamented it.
The showman, who called himself Professor Joël, was, by contrast, a solid fellow, all muscles; his black hair was plastered over his narrow forehead by pomade. His sharp face was provided with a superb aquiline nose beneath which extended the long waxed tips of a shiny moustache. He was striding back and forth impatiently in front of the stove, slowly sipping a glass of eau-de-vie.
An old woman was knitting at the counter, indifferent to everything that was not a purchase.
Suddenly, the door opened under a gust of wind, which entered violently, chasing snow and cold into the overheated room, and with it came the two strangest individuals imaginable.
Imagine two tall bodies in long frock coats, their shoulders disappearing under the snow, collars turned up over the icy rivers of their beards, clutching unspeakable top hats. Their shoes were enveloped in muddy snowballs, while long yellow streaks climbed the legs of frayed, worn trousers that were crying mercy.
“The door! The door!” clamored the chorus of young peasants, who knew about city ways.
One of the newcomers, blinded by the light and the warm vapor of the inn turned round awkwardly, grabbed the batten of the door, which was banging on the wall, and sealed the hole though which the wind was blowing.
Then both of them let themselves fall on to the nearest bench, a few paces away from Miss Adda, whom that abrupt interruption had snatched from her reverie and was staring at them with an extinct gaze. They seemed half-dead of cold and fatigue. The shorter one nevertheless stood up and went toward the innkeeper.
“Madame,” he said, his jaw numbed by cold and scarcely capable of articulating the words, “be good enough to give us some good hot soup, quickly, and a bottle of wine. After that, we’ll see.”
The worthy woman inspected their sorry state—but, given the frightful weather, who would have looked any better? She hastened to bring them what they wanted, and when she uncovered the fuming soup-tureen, the man said to the hostess, but not very loudly, as if in a confidential tone: “We have a crate on a handcart with us; we’ve put it in the shed. Please keep an eye on it.”
“People hereabouts aren’t in the habit of stealing,” the old woman snapped.
“It wouldn’t be easy to take away, I know—but still, it’s necessary that you know that it’s ours.”
“All right. Are you staying here overnight?”
&
nbsp; “Yes, let us have a small room.”
Then they began eating like starvelings, without saying anything more. Miss Adda was staring at them obstinately, and involuntarily. As soon as they had come in, a magnetic force had imposed itself on her will, making her turn her head in their direction. Her gaze was drawn to one of them in particular, whose tall gangling body was bent over his plate.
The two travelers asked what else could be served to them, and in the blink of an eye had swallowed a bowl of mutton stew and a large chunk of cheese.
That substantial repast seemed to cheer them up. They sat back on the bench with a certain air of satisfaction, as hot coffee was brought to them.
“Oof! That’s better,” gasped the older one. “I was absolutely done in.”
“We’re not out of difficulty yet, my dear Pil…my dear friend,” the other replied. “We’re not half way yet.”
They were talking in low voices, leaning toward one another.
“In spite of everything, we ought to count ourselves lucky, the way things are going, and if it weren’t for those damned newspapers talking about us and making me anxious. I could believe that we’d been forgotten.”
“Yes, but you read that note in the Figaro.”
“Bah! The papers want to seem well-informed. If they were on our track, we’d have been arrested already, damn it.”
“I wish I could share your confidence.”
At the same moment, two gendarmes came in, immediately followed by a traveler enveloped in an ample fur coat.
The arrival of those worthy representatives of the authority appeared to disturb the two travelers. They huddled over a newspaper, the reading of which suddenly seemed to absorb them completely. The gendarmes paid no heed to them, and went to sit down in a corner, with their usual solemn tread.
The Nickel Man Page 21