Le mystère de la chambre jaune. English Read online

  CHAPTER VIII. The Examining Magistrate Questions Mademoiselle Stangerson

  Two minutes later, as Rouletabille was bending over the footprintsdiscovered in the park, under the window of the vestibule, a man,evidently a servant at the chateau, came towards us rapidly and calledout to Monsieur Darzac then coming out of the pavilion:

  "Monsieur Robert, the magistrate, you know, is questioningMademoiselle."

  Monsieur Darzac uttered a muttered excuse to us and set off runningtowards the chateau, the man running after him.

  "If the corpse can speak," I said, "it would be interesting to bethere."

  "We must know," said my friend. "Let's go to the chateau." And he drewme with him. But, at the chateau, a gendarme placed in the vestibuledenied us admission up the staircase of the first floor. We were obligedto wait down stairs.

  This is what passed in the chamber of the victim while we were waitingbelow.

  The family doctor, finding that Mademoiselle Stangerson was muchbetter, but fearing a relapse which would no longer permit of her beingquestioned, had thought it his duty to inform the examining magistrateof this, who decided to proceed immediately with a brief examination.At this examination, the Registrar, Monsieur Stangerson, and thedoctor were present. Later, I obtained the text of the report of theexamination, and I give it here, in all its legal dryness:

  "Question. Are you able, mademoiselle, without too much fatiguingyourself, to give some necessary details of the frightful attack ofwhich you have been the victim?

  "Answer. I feel much better, monsieur, and I will tell you all I know.When I entered my chamber I did not notice anything unusual there.

  "Q. Excuse me, mademoiselle,--if you will allow me, I will ask you somequestions and you will answer them. That will fatigue you less thanmaking a long recital.

  "A. Do so, monsieur.

  "Q. What did you do on that day?--I want you to be as minute and preciseas possible. I wish to know all you did that day, if it is not askingtoo much of you.

  "A. I rose late, at ten o'clock, for my father and I had returned homelate on the night previously, having been to dinner at the receptiongiven by the President of the Republic, in honour of the Academy ofScience of Philadelphia. When I left my chamber, at half-past ten, myfather was already at work in the laboratory. We worked togethertill midday. We then took half-an-hour's walk in the park, as we wereaccustomed to do, before breakfasting at the chateau. After breakfast,we took another walk for half an hour, and then returned to thelaboratory. There we found my chambermaid, who had come to set my roomin order. I went into The Yellow Room to give her some slight orders andshe directly afterwards left the pavilion, and I resumed my work withmy father. At five o'clock, we again went for a walk in the park andafterward had tea.

  "Q. Before leaving the pavilion at five o'clock, did you go into yourchamber?

  "A. No, monsieur, my father went into it, at my request to bring me myhat.

  "Q. And he found nothing suspicious there?

  "A. Evidently no, monsieur.

  "Q. It is, then, almost certain that the murderer was not yet concealedunder the bed. When you went out, was the door of the room locked?

  "A. No, there was no reason for locking it.

  "Q. You were absent from the pavilion some length of time, MonsieurStangerson and you?

  "A. About an hour.

  "Q. It was during that hour, no doubt, that the murderer got into thepavilion. But how? Nobody knows. Footmarks have been found in the park,leading away from the window of the vestibule, but none has been foundgoing towards it. Did you notice whether the vestibule window was openwhen you went out?

  "A. I don't remember.

  "Monsieur Stangerson. It was closed.

  "Q. And when you returned?

  "Mademoiselle Stangerson. I did not notice.

  "M. Stangerson. It was still closed. I remember remarking aloud: 'DaddyJacques must surely have opened it while we were away.'

  "Q. Strange!--Do you recollect, Monsieur Stangerson, if during yourabsence, and before going out, he had opened it? You returned to thelaboratory at six o'clock and resumed work?

  "Mademoiselle Stangerson. Yes, monsieur.

  "Q. And you did not leave the laboratory from that hour up to the momentwhen you entered your chamber?

  "M. Stangerson. Neither my daughter nor I, monsieur. We were engaged onwork that was pressing, and we lost not a moment,--neglecting everythingelse on that account.

  "Q. Did you dine in the laboratory?

  "A. For that reason.

  "Q. Are you accustomed to dine in the laboratory?

  "A. We rarely dine there.

  "Q. Could the murderer have known that you would dine there thatevening?

  "M. Stangerson. Good Heavens!--I think not. It was only when we returnedto the pavilion at six o'clock, that we decided, my daughter and I,to dine there. At that moment I was spoken to by my gamekeeper, whodetained me a moment, to ask me to accompany him on an urgent tour ofinspection in a part of the woods which I had decided to thin. I putthis off until the next day, and begged him, as he was going by thechateau, to tell the steward that we should dine in the laboratory.He left me, to execute the errand and I rejoined my daughter, who wasalready at work.

  "Q. At what hour, mademoiselle, did you go to your chamber while yourfather continued to work there?

  "A. At midnight.

  "Q. Did Daddy Jacques enter The Yellow Room in the course of theevening?

  "A. To shut the blinds and light the night-light.

  "Q. He saw nothing suspicious?

  "A. He would have told us if he had seen. Daddy Jacques is an honest manand very attached to me.

  "Q. You affirm, Monsieur Stangerson, that Daddy Jacques remained withyou all the time you were in the laboratory?

  "M. Stangerson. I am sure of it. I have no doubt of that.

  "Q. When you entered your chamber, mademoiselle, you immediately shutthe door and locked and bolted it? That was taking unusual precautions,knowing that your father and your servant were there? Were you in fearof something, then?

  "A. My father would be returning to the chateau and Daddy Jacques wouldbe going to his bed. And, in fact, I did fear something.

  "Q. You were so much in fear of something that you borrowed DaddyJacques's revolver without telling him you had done so?

  "A. That is true. I did not wish to alarm anybody,--the more, because myfears might have proved to have been foolish.

  "Q. What was it you feared?

  "A. I hardly know how to tell you. For several nights, I seemed tohear, both in the park and out of the park, round the pavilion, unusualsounds, sometimes footsteps, at other times the cracking of branches.The night before the attack on me, when I did not get to bed beforethree o'clock in the morning, on our return from the Elysee, I stood fora moment before my window, and I felt sure I saw shadows.

  "Q. How many?

  "A. Two. They moved round the lake,--then the moon became clouded andI lost sight of them. At this time of the season, every year, I havegenerally returned to my apartment in the chateau for the winter; butthis year I said to myself that I would not quit the pavilion beforemy father had finished the resume of his works on the 'Dissociation ofMatter' for the Academy. I did not wish that that important work, whichwas to have been finished in the course of a few days, should be delayedby a change in our daily habit. You can well understand that I did notwish to speak of my childish fears to my father, nor did I say anythingto Daddy Jacques who, I knew, would not have been able to hold histongue. Knowing that he had a revolver in his room, I took advantage ofhis absence and borrowed it, placing it in the drawer of my night-table.

  "Q. You know of no enemies you have?

  "A. None.

  "Q. You understand, mademoiselle, that these precautions are calculated to cause surprise?

  "M. Stangerson. Evidently, my child, such precautions are very surprising.

  "A. No;--because I have told you that I had bee
n uneasy for two nights.

  "M. Stangerson. You ought to have told me of that! This misfortune would have been avoided.

  "Q. The door of The Yellow Room locked, did you go to bed?

  "A. Yes, and, being very tired, I at once went to sleep.

  "Q. The night-light was still burning?

  "A. Yes, but it gave a very feeble light.

  "Q. Then, mademoiselle, tell us what happened.

  "A. I do not know whether I had been long asleep, but suddenly I awoke--and uttered a loud cry.

  "M. Stangerson. Yes--a horrible cry--'Murder!'--It still rings in my ears.

  "Q. You uttered a loud cry?

  "A. A man was in my chamber. He sprang at me and tried to strangle me. I was nearly stifled when suddenly I was able to reach the drawer of my night-table and grasp the revolver which I had placed in it. At that moment the man had forced me to the foot of my bed and brandished in over my head a sort of mace. But I had fired. He immediately struck a terrible blow at my head. All that, monsieur, passed more rapidly than I can tell it, and I know nothing more.

  "Q. Nothing?--Have you no idea as to how the assassin could escape from your chamber?

  "A. None whatever--I know nothing more. One does not know what is passing around one, when one is unconscious.

  "Q. Was the man you saw tall or short, little or big?

  "A. I only saw a shadow which appeared to me formidable.

  "Q. You cannot give us any indication?

  "A. I know nothing more, monsieur, than that a man threw himself upon me and that I fired at him. I know nothing more."

  Here the interrogation of Mademoiselle Stangerson concluded.

  Rouletabille waited patiently for Monsieur Robert Darzac, who soonappeared.

  From a room near the chamber of Mademoiselle Stangerson, he had heardthe interrogatory and now came to recount it to my friend with greatexactitude, aided by an excellent memory. His docility still surprisedme. Thanks to hasty pencil-notes, he was able to reproduce, almosttextually, the questions and the answers given.

  It looked as if Monsieur Darzac were being employeeed as the secretary ofmy young friend and acted as if he could refuse him nothing; nay, more,as if under a compulsion to do so.

  The fact of the closed window struck the reporter as it had struck themagistrate. Rouletabille asked Darzac to repeat once more MademoiselleStangerson's account of how she and her father had spent their timeon the day of the tragedy, as she had stated it to the magistrate. Thecircumstance of the dinner in the laboratory seemed to interest him inthe highest degree; and he had it repeated to him three times. He alsowanted to be sure that the forest-keeper knew that the professor and hisdaughter were going to dine in the laboratory, and how he had come toknow it.

  When Monsieur Darzac had finished, I said: "The examination has notadvanced the problem much."

  "It has put it back," said Monsieur Darzac.

  "It has thrown light upon it," said Rouletabille, thoughtfully.