The Mystery of the Yellow Room Read online

  The whole of one side of the laboratory was taken up with a large

  chimney, crucibles, ovens, and such implements as are needed for

  chemical experiments; tables, loaded with phials, papers, reports,

  an electrical machine,--an apparatus, as Monsieur Darzac informed

  me, employed by Professor Stangerson to demonstrate the Dissociation

  of Matter under the action of solar light--and other scientific

  implements.

  Along the walls were cabinets, plain or glass-fronted, through which

  were visible microscopes, special photographic apparatus, and a large

  quantity of crystals.

  Rouletabille, who was ferreting in the chimney, put his fingers into

  one of the crucibles. Suddenly he drew himself up, and held up a

  piece of half-consumed paper in his hand. He stepped up to where

  we were talking by one of the windows.

  "Keep that for us, Monsieur Darzac," he said.

  I bent over the piece of scorched paper which Monsieur Darzac took

  from the hand of Rouletabille, and read distinctly the only words

  that remained legible:

  "Presbytery--lost nothing--charm, nor the gar--its brightness."

  Twice since the morning these same meaningless words had struck

  me, and, for the second time, I saw that they produced on the

  Sorbonne professor the same paralysing effect. Monsieur Darzac's

  first anxiety showed itself when he turned his eyes in the direction

  of Daddy Jacques. But, occupied as he was at another window, he

  had seen nothing. Then tremblingly opening his pocket-book he put

  the piece of paper into it, sighing: "My God!"

  During this time, Rouletabille had mounted into the opening of the

  fire-grate--that is to say, he had got upon the bricks of a furnace

  --and was attentively examining the chimney, which grew narrower

  towards the top, the outlet from it being closed with sheets of

  iron, fastened into the brickwork, through which passed three small

  chimneys.

  "Impossible to get out that way," he said, jumping back into the

  laboratory. "Besides, even if he had tried to do it, he would have

  brought all that ironwork down to the ground. No, no; it is not

  on that side we have to search."

  Rouletabille next examined the furniture and opened the doors of the

  cabinet. Then he came to the windows, through which he declared no

  one could possibly have passed. At the second window he found Daddy

  Jacques in contemplation.

  "Well, Daddy Jacques," he said, "what are you looking at?"

  "That policeman who is always going round and round the lake.

  Another of those fellows who think they can see better than anybody

  else!"

  "You don't know Frederic Larsan, Daddy Jacques, or you wouldn't

  speak of him in that way," said Rouletabille in a melancholy tone.

  "If there is anyone who will find the murderer, it will be he."

  And Rouletabille heaved a deep sigh.

  "Before they find him, they will have to learn how they lost him,"

  said Daddy Jacques, stolidly.

  At length we reached the door of The Yellow Room itself.

  "There is the door behind which some terrible scene took place,"

  said Rouletabille, with a solemnity which, under any other

  circumstances, would have been comical.

  CHAPTER VII

  In Which Rouletabille Sets Out on an Expedition Under the Bed

  Rouletabille having pushed open the door of The Yellow Room paused

  on the threshold saying, with an emotion which I only later

  understood, "Ah, the perfume of the lady in black!"

  The chamber was dark. Daddy Jacques was about to open the blinds

  when Rouletabille stopped him.

  "Did not the tragedy take place in complete darkness?" he asked.

  "No, young man, I don't think so. Mademoiselle always had a

  nightlight on her table, and I lit it every evening before she went

  to bed. I was a sort of chambermaid, you must understand, when the

  evening came. The real chambermaid did not come here much before

  the morning. Mademoiselle worked late--far into the night."

  "Where did the table with the night-light stand,--far from the

  bed?"

  "Some way from the bed."

  "Can you light the burner now?"

  "The lamp is broken and the oil that was in it was spilled when the

  table was upset. All the rest of the things in the room remain just

  as they were. I have only to open the blinds for you to see."

  "Wait."

  Rouletabille went back into the laboratory, closed the shutters of

  the two windows and the door of the vestibule.

  When we were in complete darkness, he lit a wax vesta, and asked

  Daddy Jacques to move to the middle of the chamber with it to the

  place where the night-light was burning that night.

  Daddy Jacques who was in his stockings--he usually left his sabots

  in the vestibule--entered The Yellow Room with his bit of a vesta.

  We vaguely distinguished objects overthrown on the floor, a bed in

  one corner, and, in front of us, to the left, the gleam of a

  looking-glass hanging on the wall, near to the bed.

  "That will do!--you may now open the blinds," said Rouletabille.

  "Don't come any further," Daddy Jacques begged, "you may make marks

  with your boots, and nothing must be deranged; it's an idea of the

  magistrate's--though he has nothing more to do here."

  And he pushed open the shutter. The pale daylight entered from

  without, throwing a sinister light on the saffron-coloured walls.

  The floor--for though the laboratory and the vestibule were tiled,

  The Yellow Room had a flooring of wood--was covered with a single

  yellow mat which was large enough to cover nearly the whole room,

  under the bed and under the dressing-table--the only piece of

  furniture that remained upright. The centre round table, the

  night-table and two chairs had been overturned. These did not

  prevent a large stain of blood being visible on the mat, made, as

  Daddy Jacques informed us, by the blood which had flowed from the

  wound on Mademoiselle Stangerson's forehead. Besides these stains,

  drops of blood had fallen in all directions, in line with the visible

  traces of the footsteps--large and black--of the murderer.

  Everything led to the presumption that these drops of blood had

  fallen from the wound of the man who had, for a moment, placed his

  red hand on the wall. There were other traces of the same hand on

  the wall, but much less distinct.

  "See!--see this blood on the wall!" I could not help exclaiming.

  "The man who pressed his hand so heavily upon it in the darkness

  must certainly have thought that he was pushing at a door! That's

  why he pressed on it so hard, leaving on the yellow paper the

  terrible evidence. I don't think there are many hands in the world

  of that sort. It is big and strong and the fingers are nearly all

  one as long as the other! The thumb is wanting and we have only

  the mark of the palm; but if we follow the trace of the hand," I

  continued, "we see that, after leaving its imprint on the wall, the

  touch sought the door, found it, and then felt for the lock--"

  "No doubt," interrupted Rouletabille, c
huckling,--"only there is

  no blood, either on the lock or on the bolt!"

  "What does that prove?" I rejoined with a good sense of which I was

  proud; "he might have opened the lock with his left hand, which

  would have been quite natural, his right hand being wounded."

  "He didn't open it at all!" Daddy Jacques again exclaimed. "We are

  not fools; and there were four of us when we burst open the door!"

  "What a queer hand!--Look what a queer hand it is!" I said.

  "It is a very natural hand," said Rouletabille, "of which the shape

  has been deformed by its having slipped on the wall. The man dried

  his hand on the wall. He must be a man about five feet eight in

  height."

  "How do you come at that?"

  "By the height of the marks on the wall."

  My friend next occupied himself with the mark of the bullet in the

  wall. It was a round hole.

  "This ball was fired straight, not from above, and consequently, not

  from below."

  Rouletabille went back to the door and carefully examined the lock

  and the bolt, satisfying himself that the door had certainly been

  burst open from the outside, and, further, that the key had been

  found in the lock on the inside of the chamber. He finally

  satisfied himself that with the key in the lock, the door could not

  possibly be opened from without with another key. Having made sure

  of all these details, he let fall these words: "That's better!"

  --Then sitting down on the ground, he hastily took off his boots

  and, in his socks, went into the room.

  The first thing he did was to examine minutely the overturned

  furniture. We watched him in silence.

  "Young fellow, you are giving yourself a great deal of trouble,"

  said Daddy Jacques ironically.

  Rouletabille raised his head and said:

  "You have spoken the simple truth, Daddy Jacques; your mistress did

  not have her hair in bands that evening. I was a donkey to have

  believed she did."

  Then, with the suppleness of a serpent, he slipped under the bed.

  Presently we heard him ask:

  "At what time, Monsieur Jacques, did Monsieur and Mademoiselle

  Stangerson arrive at the laboratory?"

  "At six o'clock."

  The voice of Rouletabille continued:

  "Yes,--he's been under here,--that's certain; in fact, there was

  no where else where he could have hidden himself. Here, too, are

  the marks of his hobnails. When you entered--all four of you--did

  you look under the bed?"

  "At once,--we drew it right out of its place--"

  "And between the mattresses?"

  "There was only one on the bed, and on that Mademoiselle was placed;

  and Monsieur Stangerson and the concierge immediately carried it

  into the laboratory. Under the mattress there was nothing but the

  metal netting, which could not conceal anything or anybody.

  Remember, monsieur, that there were four of us and we couldn't fail

  to see everything--the chamber is so small and scantily furnished,

  and all was locked behind in the pavilion."

  I ventured on a hypothesis:

  "Perhaps he got away with the mattress--in the mattress!--Anything

  is possible, in the face of such a mystery! In their distress of

  mind Monsieur Stangerson and the concierge may not have noticed they

  were bearing a double weight; especially if the concierge were an

  accomplice! I throw out this hypothesis for what it is worth, but

  it explains many things,--and particularly the fact that neither

  the laboratory nor the vestibule bear any traces of the footmarks

  found in the room. If, in carrying Mademoiselle on the mattress

  from the laboratory of the chateau, they rested for a moment, there

  might have been an opportunity for the man in it to escape.

  "And then?" asked Rouletabille, deliberately laughing under the bed.

  I felt rather vexed and replied:

  "I don't know,--but anything appears possible"--

  "The examining magistrate had the same idea, monsieur," said Daddy

  Jacques, "and he carefully examined the mattress. He was obliged

  to laugh at the idea, monsieur, as your friend is doing now,--for

  whoever heard of a mattress having a double bottom?"

  I was myself obliged to laugh, on seeing that what I had said was

  absurd; but in an affair like this one hardly knows where an

  absurdity begins or ends.

  My friend alone seemed able to talk intelligently. He called out

  from under the bed.

  "The mat here has been moved out of place,--who did it?"

  "We did, monsieur," explained Daddy Jacques. "When we could not

  find the assassin, we asked ourselves whether there was not some

  hole in the floor--"

  "There is not," replied Rouletabille. "Is there a cellar?"

  "No, there's no cellar. But that has not stopped our searching, and

  has not prevented the examining magistrate and his Registrar from

  studying the floor plank by plank, as if there had been a cellar

  under it."

  The reporter then reappeared. His eyes were sparkling and his

  nostrils quivered. He remained on his hands and knees. He could

  not be better likened than to an admirable sporting dog on the

  scent of some unusual game. And, indeed, he was scenting the steps

  of a man,--the man whom he has sworn to report to his master, the

  manager of the "Epoque." It must not be forgotten that Rouletabille

  was first and last a journalist.

  Thus, on his hands and knees, he made his way to the four corners

  of the room, so to speak, sniffing and going round everything

  --everything that we could see, which was not much, and everything

  that we could not see, which must have been infinite.

  The toilette table was a simple table standing on four legs; there

  was nothing about it by which it could possibly be changed into a

  temporary hiding-place. There was not a closet or cupboard.

  Mademoiselle Stangerson kept her wardrobe at the chateau.

  Rouletabille literally passed his nose and hands along the walls,

  constructed of solid brickwork. When he had finished with the

  walls, and passed his agile fingers over every portion of the

  yellow paper covering them, he reached to the ceiling, which he was

  able to touch by mounting on a chair placed on the toilette table,

  and by moving this ingeniously constructed stage from place to place

  he examined every foot of it. When he had finished his scrutiny of

  the ceiling, where he carefully examined the hole made by the second

  bullet, he approached the window, and, once more, examined the iron

  bars and blinds, all of which were solid and intact. At last, he

  gave a grunt of satisfaction and declared "Now I am at ease!"

  "Well,--do you believe that the poor dear young lady was shut up

  when she was being murdered--when she cried out for help?" wailed

  Daddy Jacques.

  "Yes," said the young reporter, drying his forehead, "The Yellow

  Room was as tightly shut as an iron safe."

  "That," I said, "is why this mystery is the most surprising I know.

  Edgar Allan Poe, in 'The Murders in the Rue Morgue,' invented

  nothing like it. The place of t
hat crime was sufficiently closed

  to prevent the escape of a man; but there was that window through

  which the monkey, the perpetrator of the murder, could slip away!

  But here, there can be no question of an opening of any sort. The

  door was fastened, and through the window blinds, secure as they

  were, not even a fly could enter or get out."

  "True, true," assented Rouletabille as he kept on drying his

  forehead, which seemed to be perspiring less from his recent bodily

  exertion than from his mental agitation. "Indeed, it's a great, a

  beautiful, and a very curious mystery."

  "The Bete du bon Dieu," muttered Daddy Jacques, "the Bete du bon

  Dieu herself, if she had committed the crime, could not have escaped.

  Listen! Do you hear it? Hush!"

  Daddy Jacques made us a sign to keep quiet and, stretching his arm

  towards the wall nearest the forest, listened to something which we

  could not hear.

  "It's answering," he said at length. "I must kill it. It is too

  wicked, but it's the Bete du bon Dieu, and, every night, it goes to

  pray on the tomb of Sainte-Genevieve and nobody dares to touch her,

  for fear that Mother Angenoux should cast an evil spell on them."

  "How big is the Bete du bon Dieu?"

  "Nearly as big as a small retriever,--a monster, I tell you. Ah!

  --I have asked myself more than once whether it was not her that

  took our poor Mademoiselle by the throat with her claws. But the

  Bete du bon Dieu does not wear hobnailed boots, nor fire revolvers,

  nor has she a hand like that!" exclaimed Daddy Jacques, again

  pointing out to us the red mark on the wall. "Besides, we should

  have seen her as well as we would have seen a man--"

  "Evidently," I said. "Before we had seen this Yellow Room, I had

  also asked myself whether the cat of Mother Angenoux--"

  "You also!" cried Rouletabille.

  "Didn't you?" I asked.

  "Not for a moment. After reading the article in the 'Matin,' I knew

  that a cat had nothing to do with the matter. But I swear now that

  a frightful tragedy has been enacted here. You say nothing about

  the Basque cap, or the handkerchief, found here, Daddy Jacques?"

  "Of course, the magistrate has taken them," the old man answered,

  hesitatingly.

  "I haven't seen either the handkerchief or the cap, yet I can tell

  you how they are made," the reporter said to him gravely.

  "Oh, you are very clever," said Daddy Jacques, coughing and

  embarrassed.

  "The handkerchief is a large one, blue with red stripes and the cap

  is an old Basque cap, like the one you are wearing now."

  "You are a wizard!" said Daddy Jacques, trying to laugh and not

  quite succeeding. "How do you know that the handkerchief is blue

  with red stripes?"

  "Because, if it had not been blue with red stripes, it would not

  have been found at all."

  Without giving any further attention to Daddy Jacques, my friend

  took a piece of paper from his pocket, and taking out a pair of

  scissors, bent over the footprints. Placing the paper over one

  of them he began to cut. In a short time he had made a perfect

  pattern which he handed to me, begging me not to lose it.

  He then returned to the window and, pointing to the figure of

  Frederic Larsan, who had not quitted the side of the lake, asked

  Daddy Jacques whether the detective had, like himself, been working

  in The Yellow Room?

  "No," replied Robert Darzac, who, since Rouletabille had handed

  him the piece of scorched paper, had not uttered a word, "He pretends

  that he does not need to examine The Yellow Room. He says that the

  murderer made his escape from it in quite a natural way, and that

  he will, this evening, explain how he did it."