The Mystery of the Yellow Room Page 3

reporter; and this evening I shall have to give a little account

  of the play at the Scala."

  "Get in, sir, please," said the Registrar.

  Rouletabille was already in the compartment. I went in after him

  and seated myself by his side. The Registrar followed and closed

  the carriage door.

  Monsieur de Marquet looked at him.

  "Ah, sir," Rouletabille began, "You must not be angry with Monsieur

  de Maleine. It is not with Monsieur de Marquet that I desire to

  have the honour of speaking, but with Monsieur 'Castigat Ridendo.'

  Permit me to congratulate you--personally, as well as the writer

  for the 'Epoque.'" And Rouletabille, having first introduced me,

  introduced himself.

  Monsieur de Marquet, with a nervous gesture, caressed his beard into

  a point, and explained to Rouletabille, in a few words, that he was

  too modest an author to desire that the veil of his pseudonym should

  be publicly raised, and that he hoped the enthusiasm of the

  journalist for the dramatist's work would not lead him to tell the

  public that Monsieur "Castigat Ridendo" and the examining magistrate

  of Corbeil were one and the same person.

  "The work of the dramatic author may interfere," he said, after a

  slight hesitation, "with that of the magistrate, especially in a

  province where one's labours are little more than routine."

  "Oh, you may rely on my discretion!" cried Rouletabille.

  The train was in motion.

  "We have started!" said the examining magistrate, surprised at

  seeing us still in the carriage.

  "Yes, Monsieur,--truth has started," said Rouletabile, smiling

  amiably,--"on its way to the Chateau du Glandier. A fine case,

  Monsieur de Marquet,--a fine case!"

  "An obscure--incredible, unfathomable, inexplicable affair--and

  there is only one thing I fear, Monsieur Rouletabille,--that the

  journalists will be trying to explain it."

  My friend felt this a rap on his knuckles.

  "Yes," he said simply, "that is to be feared. They meddle in

  everything. As for my interest, monsieur, I only referred to it by

  mere chance,--the mere chance of finding myself in the same train

  with you, and in the same compartment of the same carriage."

  "Where are you going, then?" asked Monsieur de Marquet.

  "To the Chateau du Glandier," replied Rouletabille, without turning.

  "You'll not get in, Monsieur Rouletabille!"

  "Will you prevent me?" said my friend, already prepared to fight.

  "Not I!--I like the press and journalists too well to be in any

  way disagreeable to them; but Monsieur Stangerson has given orders

  for his door to be closed against everybody, and it is well guarded.

  Not a journalist was able to pass through the gate of the Glandier

  yesterday."

  Monsieur de Marquet compressed his lips and seemed ready to relapse

  into obstinate silence. He only relaxed a little when Rouletabille

  no longer left him in ignorance of the fact that we were going to

  the Glandier for the purpose of shaking hands with an "old and

  intimate friend," Monsieur Robert Darzac--a man whom Rouletabille

  had perhaps seen once in his life.

  "Poor Robert!" continued the young reporter, "this dreadful affair

  may be his death,--he is so deeply in love with Mademoiselle

  Stangerson."

  "His sufferings are truly painful to witness," escaped like a regret

  from the lips of Monsieur de Marquet.

  "But it is to be hoped that Mademoiselle Stangerson's life will be

  saved."

  "Let us hope so. Her father told me yesterday that, if she does not

  recover, it will not be long before he joins her in the grave. What

  an incalculable loss to science his death would be!"

  "The wound on her temple is serious, is it not?"

  "Evidently; but, by a wonderful chance, it has not proved mortal.

  The blow was given with great force."

  "Then it was not with the revolver she was wounded," said

  Rouletabille, glancing at me in triumph.

  Monsieur de Marquet appeared greatly embarrassed.

  "I didn't say anything--I don't want to say anything--I will not

  say anything," he said. And he turned towards his Registrar as if

  he no longer knew us.

  But Rouletabille was not to be so easily shaken off. He moved

  nearer to the examining magistrate and, drawing a copy of the

  "Matin" from his pocket, he showed it to him and said:

  "There is one thing, Monsieur, which I may enquire of you without

  committing an indiscretion. You have, of course, seen the account

  given in the 'Matin'? It is absurd, is it not?"

  "Not in the slightest, Monsieur."

  "What! The Yellow Room has but one barred window--the bars of

  which have not been moved--and only one door, which had to be

  broken open--and the assassin was not found!"

  "That's so, monsieur,--that's so. That's how the matter stands."

  Rouletabille said no more but plunged into thought. A quarter of

  an hour thus passed.

  Coming back to himself again he said, addressing the magistrate:

  "How did Mademoiselle Stangerson wear her hair on that evening?"

  "I don't know," replied Monsieur de Marquet.

  "That's a very important point," said Rouletabille. "Her hair was

  done up in bands, wasn't it? I feel sure that on that evening, the

  evening of the crime, she had her hair arranged in bands."

  "Then you are mistaken, Monsieur Rouletabille," replied the

  magistrate; "Mademoiselle Stangerson that evening had her hair drawn

  up in a knot on the top of her head,--her usual way of arranging it

  --her forehead completely uncovered. I can assure you, for we have

  carefully examined the wound. There was no blood on the hair, and

  the arrangement of it has not been disturbed since the crime was

  committed."

  "You are sure! You are sure that, on the night of the crime, she

  had not her hair in bands?"

  "Quite sure," the magistrate continued, smiling, "because I

  remember the Doctor saying to me, while he was examining the wound,

  'It is a great pity Mademoiselle Stangerson was in the habit of

  drawing her hair back from her forehead. If she had worn it in

  bands, the blow she received on the temple would have been weakened.'

  It seems strange to me that you should attach so much importance

  to this point."

  "Oh! if she had not her hair in bands, I give it up," said

  Rouletabille, with a despairing gesture.

  "And was the wound on her temple a bad one?" he asked presently.

  "Terrible."

  "With what weapon was it made?"

  "That is a secret of the investigation."

  "Have you found the weapon--whatever it was?"

  The magistrate did not answer.

  "And the wound in the throat?"

  Here the examining magistrate readily confirmed the decision of the

  doctor that, if the murderer had pressed her throat a few seconds

  longer, Mademoiselle Stangerson would have died of strangulation.

  "The affair as reported in the 'Matin,'" said Rouletabille eagerly,

  "seems to me more and more inexplicable. Can you tell me, Monsieur,

  how many openings there are in the p
avilion? I mean doors and

  windows."

  "There are five," replied Monsieur de Marquet, after having coughed

  once or twice, but no longer resisting the desire he felt to talk

  of the whole of the incredible mystery of the affair he was

  investigating. "There are five, of which the door of the vestibule

  is the only entrance to the pavilion,--a door always automatically

  closed, which cannot be opened, either from the outer or inside,

  except with the two special keys which are never out of the

  possession of either Daddy Jacques or Monsieur Stangerson.

  Mademoiselle Stangerson had no need for one, since Daddy Jacques

  lodged in the pavilion and because, during the daytime, she never

  left her father. When they, all four, rushed into The Yellow Room,

  after breaking open the door of the laboratory, the door in the

  vestibule remained closed as usual and, of the two keys for opening

  it, Daddy Jacques had one in his pocket, and Monsieur Stangerson

  the other. As to the windows of the pavilion, there are four; the

  one window of The Yellow Room and those of the laboratory looking

  out on to the country; the window in the vestibule looking into

  the park."

  "It is by that window that he escaped from the pavilion!" cried

  Rouletabille.

  "How do you know that?" demanded Monsieur de Marquet, fixing a

  strange look on my young friend.

  "We'll see later how he got away from The Yellow Room," replied

  Rouletabille, "but he must have left the pavilion by the vestibule

  window."

  "Once more,--how do you know that?"

  "How? Oh, the thing is simple enough! As soon as he found he could

  not escape by the door of the pavilion his only way out was by the

  window in the vestibule, unless he could pass through a grated window.

  The window of The Yellow Room is secured by iron bars, because it

  looks out upon the open country; the two windows of the laboratory

  have to be protected in like manner for the same reason. As the

  murderer got away, I conceive that he found a window that was not

  barred,--that of the vestibule, which opens on to the park,--that

  is to say, into the interior of the estate. There's not much magic

  in all that."

  "Yes," said Monsieur de Marquet, "but what you have not guessed is

  that this single window in the vestibule, though it has no iron bars,

  has solid iron blinds. Now these iron blinds have remained fastened

  by their iron latch; and yet we have proof that the murderer made

  his escape from the, pavilion by that window! Traces of blood on

  the inside wall and on the blinds as well as on the floor, and

  footmarks, of which I have taken the measurements, attest the fact

  that the murderer made his escape that way. But then, how did he

  do it, seeing that the blinds remained fastened on the inside? He

  passed through them like a shadow. But what is more bewildering

  than all is that it is impossible to form any idea as to how the

  murderer got out of The Yellow Room, or how he got across the

  laboratory to reach the vestibule! Ah, yes, Monsieur Rouletabille,

  it is altogether as you said, a fine case, the key to which will

  not be discovered for a long time, I hope."

  "You hope, Monsieur?"

  Monsieur de Marquet corrected himself.

  "I do not hope so,--I think so."

  "Could that window have been closed and refastened after the flight

  of the assassin?" asked Rouletabille.

  "That is what occurred to me for a moment; but it would imply an

  accomplice or accomplices,--and I don't see--"

  After a short silence he added:

  "Ah--if Mademoiselle Stangerson were only well enough to-day to

  be questioned!"

  Rouletabille following up his thought, asked:

  "And the attic?--There must be some opening to that?"

  "Yes; there is a window, or rather skylight, in it, which, as it

  looks out towards the country, Monsieur Stangerson has had barred,

  like the rest of the windows. These bars, as in the other windows,

  have remained intact, and the blinds, which naturally open inwards,

  have not been unfastened. For the rest, we have not discovered

  anything to lead us to suspect that the murderer had passed through

  the attic."

  "It seems clear to you, then, Monsieur, that the murderer escaped

  --nobody knows how--by the window in the vestibule?"

  "Everything goes to prove it."

  "I think so, too," confessed Rouletabille gravely.

  After a brief silence, he continued:

  "If you have not found any traces of the murderer in the attic, such

  as the dirty footmarks similar to those on the floor of The Yellow

  Room, you must come to the conclusion that it was not he who stole

  Daddy Jacques's revolver."

  "There are no footmarks in the attic other than those of Daddy

  Jacques himself," said the magistrate with a significant turn of his

  head. Then, after an apparent decision, he added: "Daddy Jacques

  was with Monsieur Stangerson in the laboratory--and it was lucky

  for him he was."

  "Then what part did his revolver play in the tragedy?--It seems

  very clear that this weapon did less harm to Mademoiselle Stangerson

  than it did to the murderer."

  The magistrate made no reply to this question, which doubtless

  embarrassed him. "Monsieur Stangerson," he said, "tells us that the

  two bullets have been found in The Yellow Room, one embedded in the

  wall stained with the impression of a red hand--a man's large hand

  --and the other in the ceiling."

  "Oh! oh! in the ceiling!" muttered Rouletabille. "In the ceiling!

  That's very curious!--In the ceiling!"

  He puffed awhile in silence at his pipe, enveloping himself in the

  smoke. When we reached Savigny-sur-Orge, I had to tap him on the

  shoulder to arouse him from his dream and come out on to the

  platform of the station.

  There, the magistrate and his Registrar bowed to us, and by rapidly

  getting into a cab that was awaiting them, made us understand that

  they had seen enough of us.

  "How long will it take to walk to the Chateau du Glandier?"

  Rouletabille asked one of the railway porters.

  "An hour and a half or an hour and three quarters--easy walking,"

  the man replied.

  Rouletabille looked up at the sky and, no doubt, finding its

  appearance satisfactory, took my arm and said:

  "Come on!--I need a walk."

  "Are things getting less entangled?" I asked.

  "Not a bit of it!" he said, "more entangled than ever! It's true,

  I have an idea--"

  "What's that?" I asked.

  "I can't tell you what it is just at present--it's an idea

  involving the life or death of two persons at least."

  "Do you think there were accomplices?"

  "I don't think it--"

  We fell into silence. Presently he went on:

  "It was a bit of luck, our falling in with that examining magistrate

  and his Registrar, eh? What did I tell you about that revolver?"

  His head was bent down, he had his hands in his pockets, and he was

  whistling. After a while I heard him murmur:


  "Poor woman!"

  "Is it Mademoiselle Stangerson you are pitying?"

  "Yes; she's a noble woman and worthy of being pitied!--a woman of

  a great, a very great character--I imagine--I imagine."

  "You know her then?"

  "Not at all. I have never seen her."

  "Why, then, do you say that she is a woman of great character?"

  "Because she bravely faced the murderer; because she courageously

  defended herself--and, above all, because of the bullet in the

  ceiling."

  I looked at Rouletabille and inwardly wondered whether he was not

  mocking me, or whether he had not suddenly gone out of his senses.

  But I saw that he had never been less inclined to laugh, and the

  brightness of his keenly intelligent eyes assured me that he

  retained all his reason. Then, too, I was used to his broken way

  of talking, which only left me puzzled as to his meaning, till,

  with a very few clear, rapidly uttered words, he would make the

  drift of his ideas clear to me, and I saw that what he had

  previously said, and which had appeared to me void of meaning, was

  so thoroughly logical that I could not understand how it was I had

  not understood him sooner.

  CHAPTER IV

  "In the Bosom of Wild Nature"

  The Chateau du Glandier is one of the oldest chateaux in the Ile de

  France, where so many building remains of the feudal period are

  still standing. Built originally in the heart of the forest, in the

  reign of Philip le Bel, it now could be seen a few hundred yards

  from the road leading from the village of Sainte-Genevieve to

  Monthery. A mass of inharmonious structures, it is dominated by a

  donjon. When the visitor has mounted the crumbling steps of this

  ancient donjon, he reaches a little plateau where, in the seventeenth

  century, Georges Philibert de Sequigny, Lord of the Glandier,

  Maisons-Neuves and other places, built the existing town in an

  abominably rococo style of architecture.

  It was in this place, seemingly belonging entirely to the past, that

  Professor Stangerson and his daughter installed themselves to lay

  the foundations for the science of the future. Its solitude, in

  the depths of woods, was what, more than all, had pleased them.

  They would have none to witness their labours and intrude on their

  hopes, but the aged stones and grand old oaks. The Glandier

  --ancient Glandierum--was so called from the quantity of glands

  (acorns) which, in all times, had been gathered in that

  neighbourhood. This land, of present mournful interest, had fallen

  back, owing to the negligence or abandonment of its owners, into

  the wild character of primitive nature. The buildings alone, which

  were hidden there, had preserved traces of their strange

  metamorphoses. Every age had left on them its imprint; a bit of

  architecture with which was bound up the remembrance of some terrible

  event, some bloody adventure. Such was the chateau in which science

  had taken refuge--a place seemingly designed to be the theatre of

  mysteries, terror, and death.

  Having explained so far, I cannot refrain from making one further

  reflection. If I have lingered a little over this description of

  the Glandier, it is not because I have reached the right moment for

  creating the necessary atmosphere for the unfolding of the tragedy

  before the eyes of the reader. Indeed, in all this matter, my

  first care will be to be as simple as is possible. I have no

  ambition to be an author. An author is always something of a

  romancer, and God knows, the mystery of The Yellow Room is quite

  full enough of real tragic horror to require no aid from literary

  effects. I am, and only desire to be, a faithful "reporter." My