The Waxworks Murder

'But wouldn't it?' I asked, feigning surprise.

'Why do you - why does everybody - assume that I care for nothing but — !' She checked herself on the edge of an outburst. She went on calmly: 'You have surprised a secret, monsieur. You see me as I have always wanted to be. But please don't try to evade. What do you mean?'

I lit a cigarette deliberately. 'First, mademoiselle, we must assume certain things. We must agree that you were formerly part owner, and are now full owner of the Club of Masks.'

'Why must we assume that?'

'Mademoiselle, please! It's perfectly legal, you know. .. . It was an inspiration, brought about by a clout on the head after having heard certain things from Monsieur Galant. Then, too, that bank balance of a million francs! It could hardly have come from being a mere - shall we say, gatekeeper?'

The last was a chance shot, which had just then occurred to me. But I suddenly realized it must be the truth, and that I had been blind for not perceiving it before. A million francs, I should have known, was too huge a sum to have been amassed only from providing a second entrance.

'Therefore ... I think I can provide you with proof that Galant intends to betray you. If I do, can you get me out of here?'

'Ah! So you still are dependent on me!' she said, with satisfaction.

I nodded. She glanced at the revolver; on an impulse she dropped it beside her chair. Then she came over and sat down beside me on the chaise-longue, looking down into my face. My eyes must have shown that I felt her nearness,

that I took in her lips and eyes with an expression which had nothing to do with bankruptcy. Yes, she felt that regard, and she was not displeased. She had lost her snappish austerity. She breathed a little more heavily, and

her half-closed eyes glittered. I continued to smoke placidly

'Why are you here?' she demanded.

'To get evidence in a murder case. That is all.'

'And - did you get it?'

'Yes.'

'I hope you found, then, that it did not implicate me?'

'It did not implicate you in the least, Mademoiselle Augustin. And it need not at all implicate the club, either.'

She clenched her hands. 'The club! The club! Is that all you can say? Do you think that everything with me is a matter of business? Listen. Do you know why this place has been the dream of my life ?'

The hard mouth dropped a little. She pounded slowly on the cushions; she stared past my shoulder, and said, in a tense voice:

'There is only one complete joy. That is leading two lives - the drudge and - and the princess. Contrasting them and tasting them each day. I have done that. Each day is a new dream. I sit out in my glass booth by day; I wear cotton stockings, and fight with the butcher, and scrape for a sou.

I scream abuse at the street children, hand tickets into grimy paws, cook cabbage over a wood stove, and mend my father's shirts. I do all this faithfully; I delight in scrubbing the floor '

Then Mlle Augustin shrugged. 'Because at night I can feel then a thousand times more fully the pleasures of - this. Bien! the day is finished. I close up. I see my father to bed. And then I come back here. Each time it is like walking into the Arabian Nights.'

Her low voice trailed away. She crossed her arms over her breast and pressed hard; she seemed to be breathing deeply, like one under an anaesthetic, and to be carried away by it. She seemed also to be savouring the incense, the texture of the satin gown, the deep and gleaming opulence of the room - and her dark-red slipper brushed up and down, slowly, the deep rug. Her head was half thrown back, the eyes gleaming and heavy-lidded. . . .

I crushed out my cigarette. I half rose.

And then suddenly, at my movement, the dreaming vanished. A queer little smile twisted her lips.

'But I play with my emotions,' she said, 'a long time -before taking them. Lie down. Rest your head.'

I applauded, making no sound, and bowed. Again we spoke to each other without words. None the less I said: 'But it would be picturesque. With the bodyguard searching for me out there with knives.. ..'

'Now that we begin to understand each other, will you tell me what you meant about "saving" me ?'

'Yes. I'm delighted to do the damned prudent lad an ill turn. As a matter of fact, I am going to tell you everything I heard to-night.'

'Is it wise?'

'No. If you have a guilty conscience of either murder — '

She shook me by the shoulder. 'I swear to you that all I know about - about either of them is what I read in the papers! And if you hadn't told me last night that the two were connected, I shouldn't have known it.'

'Yet, my dear girl, you lied last night. You said you had seen Odette Duchene leave the waxworks.'

'That was because of my father. And that was all! Your friend Monsieur Bencolin knows as much. ... I tell you I simply supposed she had gone out by the other door, into the boulevard.'

I blew smoke rings at the ceiling. Once you drove this young lady into a corner, you could keep her there. I pointed out:

'But, being one of the owners here, you must have known she wasn't a member of the club. How, then, did you account for her "leaving by the other door" ?'

'In time,' she mused, studying me, 'you may be very nearly as good at questioning as Monsieur Bencolin. Oh, a long time. . . . But listen. There are exceptions. If Monsieur Galant gives orders - they can go in. I can definitely prove that I was in the booth all day. I know nothing! Do you believe it?'

I risked everything. I told her all I had heard that night. For, if she believed my story about Galant's intent to wreck the club, then I had an ally of the most powerful sort.

' .. . So,' I concluded, 'if there's a safe in the office, and you know the combination, you might just open it and see whether or not these messages to the newspapers have been prepared.'

She sat quietly while I was talking, but now her face had again assumed that rigidity of last night. She looked dangerous.

'Wait here,' she said.

She left the room by a door at the far end, locking it after her. I lay back on the cushions. Heigho! Everything was topsy-turvy. They were searching the club for me, and here I sat cosily in their midst, with comfortable cushions under me and cigarettes within reach. The situation was almost perfect. No luckier words had ever been spoken than those of Galant when he told of his last joke. If Marie Augustin really found the evidence in the safe, then I fancied I should hear whatever she happened to know about these murders.

She returned in less than five minutes. Closing the door with a snap, she stood with her back to it. Her eyes were dull with anger, and I saw that she had papers in her hands. As though she made a sudden decision, she went to one of the braziers of hammered gold in which the incense was smoking, removed the plate of incense, and threw the papers into it. Then she struck a match.

A flame licked up out of the gold bowl. Against the black-and-gilt background, ornamented with hieroglyphics and storks, she looked like a priestess. Only when the fire had died did she straighten up from staring at it.

She said, 'I am ready to go to Monsieur Bencolin and swear that I saw my friend Galant stab the Duchene girl.'

'And did you?'

'No.' A dull vindictive monosyllable. She walked over slowly; I had again the fancy of a grim-faced priestess. Every muscle in her body seemed to be tight. 'But,' she added, 'I guarantee to make a good story of it.'

'I don't know that it will be necessary. And - this sudden dropping of caution ? You keep insisting that you fear your father will...'

'Not any longer. He knows.'

I swung my legs off the chaise-longue, sat up, and looked at her. The room swam a bit; little hammers began to pound at the base of my eyes, and my head seemed to be rising towards the ceiling in long spiralling motions.

'He knows,' she repeated. 'There's an end to concealment. I can figure in the papers as well as anybody. And I think I shall enjoy it.'

'Who told him?'

'I think he has suspected some time. But I have him' - she pressed her finger and thumb together contemptuously - 'like that. Besides, I am going to see Galant in a condemned cell if it costs everything.'

The suppressed fury in her voice made me wonder whether there had ever been anything between these two. But I kept silent while she went on: 'Then I end my career as a slave. I will travel. I will have jewels, and rooms in a hotel overlooking the sea, and - and gentlemen, like yourself, to pay me compliments. And there will be one of them, like yourself, whom I can't rule. ... But first,' she amended, smiling dangerously, 'I will settle things.'

'You mean,' I said, 'you are willing to help the police with everything you know?'

'Yes. I will swear I saw Galant —'

'And I tell you again it won't be necessary to perjure yourself! With the evidence of Mademoiselle Prevost and myself, we have him. You can help us much more,' I insisted, trying to hold her gaze, 'by telling the truth.'

'About what?'

'By telling everything you know for a fact. Bencolin is convinced that you saw the murderer of Claudine Martel.'

Her eyes opened wide. 'So you still don't believe me! I insist —'

'Oh, not knowing it was the murderer, necessarily! But he believes that the murderer walked into the waxworks last night before your father closed up; that he was hidden there. Moreover, that the murderer was a member of the club, whom you knew. Do you know how you can help us most? Simply by telling what club members came in that way last night.'

She stared at me uncomprehending!)', her eyebrows rising. Then she laughed; she sat down with a swashbuckling air, and shook me by the shoulder.

'Do you mean,' she cried — 'do you mean that the great Bencolin - the infallible, the great lord of logic - do you mean that he has been so thoroughly fooled? Tiens! this is too good!'

'Stop laughing! What do you mean - fooled?'

I twisted her round to face me. Her eyes, still hard and mocking, ran over my face.

'Just that! If the murderer was a member of the club, he didn't come in that night through the waxworks. I saw everybody who did come in all day, and, my dear boy, there were no members among them. Tiens! but your face is funny ! Did you think he was always right? Why, I could have told you all this long ago.'

I hardly heard her laughter. A whole edifice of theory, spires and towers and pinnacles, had been reared on that assumption; now, suddenly, the blocks seemed to come down with a roar. In an instant, if this were true, the whole of it became wreckage.

'Listen,' she said, disengaging her shoulder. 'I think I should make a better detective than any of you. And I can tell you —'

'Wait! The murderer couldn't have come any way except in through that waxworks! The whole arrangement of doors ...'

Again she laughed. 'My dear boy, I am not saying the murderer didn't come that way. Through the waxworks, I grant you. But you are wrong in looking for a member of the club. And now I can tell you two things.'

'Well?'

She put her hands on her lips, breathing deeply. Her face was flushed with triumph, and the lids drooped over her eyes.

'This much, then, which the whole Paris force doesn't seem to have uncovered,' she told me. 'First - I know where the weapon is hidden.'

What!'

'And second,' she went on, imperturbably, 'I know that the crime was almost certainly committed by a woman.'

A Dead Man Pushes Open a Window

This thing was getting to be too much for me. I felt as a certain celebrated wanderer in a topsy-turvy land must have felt when the whole court of justice dissolved and rained down in a shower of playing-cards. Nonsense sounded like sense, and sense like nonsense.

'Ah, well,' I said, resignedly, after a long pause - 'ah, well!...'

She inquired with the utmost politeness: 'It surprises you?'

'Damn you! are you joking?'

'Not in the least,' she assured me, patting her hair. 'After that detective's cheap tricks last night, I am sorry I could not have told him first. However, I shall reserve that pleasure.'

'Now, first of all,' I said, desperately - 'first of all, you say you have found the weapon ?'

‘I know where it is, yes. I haven't disturbed it. Tell me - by the way, what is your name? - -' She broke off.

'My name is Marie. What were you saying?'

'Tell me, didn't the police search every inch of the waxworks, and the passage, and everywhere else, without finding it?'

'Yes, yes, go on! Your triumph is delicious. I know, but —‘

'But they failed, Monsieur Marie, because they neglected an ancient rule. The knife was right in front of them all the time; so they didn't see it. Now, did you go down into the Gallery of Horrors?'

'Yes. Just before I discovered the body.'

'Did you notice that masterly tableau just at the foot of the stairs? I mean the stabbing of Marat. Marat lies halfway out of his bathtub, the knife in his chest, blood streaming from it. Well, my dear boy, some of that blood was real.'

'You mean - - ?'

'I mean,' she said, composedly, 'that the killer went down into that room. She removed the knife from the wax chest of Marat. When papa built that figure he used the longest, sharpest, deadliest knife he could find; wax never dulled its edge, it was sheathed from dirt and rust, and it could easily be pulled out. When the killer had finished with her work, she replaced it in Marat's chest. The police looked at it last night, and hundreds of people have looked at it to-day, but nobody noticed.'

I saw again that grisy tableau in the cellar, as I had seen it the night before, and remarked its hideous realism. And then I remembered another thing, which caused me very heartily to curse myself. It was right there - there, in front of Marat - that I had heard something dripping. Later I had attributed it to the figure of the satyr, where the body was; but with the slightest grain of sense I should have realized I could not have heard blood drip from such a distance. It came from the Marat tableau all the time. . ..

'Well,' I demanded, 'how did you notice it?'

'Ah! So I am again to be under suspicion? (Give me a cigarette, will you?) No, no; I could not avoid noticing. Monsieur Marie, I have lived in that waxworks all my life. If a single button is out of place on any of the figures, I know it....'

'Yes?'

'When I looked through this morning, I saw a dozen small changes. Marat's writing-board had been pushed a quarter of an inch to the left. Somebody had brushed past Charlotte Corday's skirt and ruffled a fold. Most of all - the dagger was not quite buried to the hilt in his wax chest, and a few spots beside the tub were not painted blood.'

'Did you touch it?'

She lifted a whimsical eyebrow. 'Oh, no! I waited for the police to discover it. I imagined I should wait a long time.'

'There may be fingerprints everywhere.. ..'

'Possibly,' she replied, with indifference. She waited for me to light the cigarette she had taken from the lacquer box. Then she said: ‘I am not greatly interested in Mademoiselle Martel's murder. But I didn't think you would overlook the leads that it must have been a woman - a woman who was not a member of the club.'

'Why?'

'The killer was after something which she wore on a gold chain round her neck.' She looked at me sharply. 'Isn't that clear?'

'We have already decided that it was the silver key.'

'Our opinions,' she murmured, 'coincide. I am happy to have thought of the same thing as the great Bencolin. Good! - Well, my dear boy, why did the killer want that key, except to get into the club? How did you yourself get here to-night?'

'Borrowed a key from a member.'

'Yes. You borrowed a man's key, which could be examined and checked at the door. Well, what on earth good would Mademoiselle Martel's key have done the murderer if the murderer had been a man? I am beginning to think he is stupid, that Bencolin ! . .. A woman took it. A woman who must have looked at least a little like Mademoiselle Martel herself, so that she could get in.'

She leaned back, stretching her arms above her head.

'Now,' I suggested, smiling, 'if you can produce a reason why the murderer wanted to get into the club ... ?'

'I am afraid that would be a little too much.'

'Or if I could find out whether a woman, presenting Mademoiselle Martel's key, got past the guards last night

She said, dryly, ‘I don't suppose you would care to go out and ask them, would you ?' 'You could.'

'Listen, my dear boy.' She exhaled smoke savagely. 'I don't care who killed Claudine Martel. I wouldn't walk a step out of my way to help you on that, because, whoever else it was, it couldn't have been Galant. So much I gather from what you've told me. All I want to do is get him - do you understand?'

'One involves the other.'

Her eyes narrowed. 'How so?'

'He's accessory after the fact, isn't he? - both he and the Prevost woman? And she's willing to turn State's evidence.'

She smoked for the first time in silence, and then nodded. 'Good. That goes. Now, then, what's the plan of campaign?'

'The first thing is whether you can get me out of here. Can you ?'

She shrugged. 'Something, my friend, has got to be done. They'll have finished looking in all the other rooms for you before very many minutes, and then . .. ' Drawing a finger across her throat, she studied me. 'I could, of course, call in my own attendants, gather the guests round, and march you out in full view. Dare Galant to do anything about it. It might mean trouble... .'

I saw her narrowed eyes fixed on me speculatively again. I shook my head.

'That won't do. Galant would be warned. He might not start a fight, but he'd be sure to get away before the police could be summoned.'

She said, tensely: 'Good child ! I like you better. Then have you nerve enough to try to get out of the front door in disguise? I'll go with you. You could pass as my - lover.'

'It would be a pleasure,' I said, 'even to adopt the pose.'

She tried not to notice that. She set her lips stonily.

'It will be dangerous. If you are caught. . .'

Again the whole heady excitement of juggling dynamite took possession of me. I said, truthfully : 'Believe me, mademoiselle, I have had more pure fun here to-night than in the last six years of my life. The adventure should end in glory.... Have you got a drink?’

'Be sensible! . .. Bien! You will have to leave your own coat and hat here. I can get you others. You must take off that bandage, and pull the hat down over the sticking-plaster; I don't think it will bleed. Your shirt is a mess also; you must cover it up. Have you a mask?'

'I lost it somewhere. In the court, I think.'

'I'll get you one that will cover your whole face. Finally, there's this. They'll guard the door well, and they'll probably ask everybody to exhibit his key on leaving. And they must have realized by now the key you are using. I'll get another. Wait while I look round. In the meantime, there is Napoleon brandy in that cabinet by the dressing-table.'

She hurried out of the door again. But this time she did not lock it. I got up. Pain darted up from the back of my skull and flowed in dizzy waves across my eyes, and my legs still felt light. But the exhilaration of the whole night steadied me. I leaned against the edge of the chaise-longue until the floor stopped wobbling and the room swam round again into focus. Then I picked my way over to the cabinet she had indicated.

The brandy was a Napoleon cognac, 1811, in a basket of silver filigree. Remembering how I had drunk brandy the night before, under this girl's stern and domestic eye, the whole fantasy became gloriously funny. I tossed down a huge drink, and felt its warmth crawl along my veins. That was better. I poured another. Then I caught sight of myself in a mirror over the dressing-table. . . . Gad! what a spectre! Like the result of a week's spree, pallor and all; bandage round my head, shirt a red-splattered ruin, and - so! That rat's knife had ripped the sleeve of my coat half-way up. He came fairly close, after all. I toasted the image in the mirror, gulping down a second big one. Steady! The image blurred a little. Brandy must have a queer effect when you felt like this.

I did a sort of eccentric dance-step, quite involuntarily, and surprised myself by bursting into laughter. The gilded storks and peacocks on the wall panels acquired a friendly expression. I noted the smoke of incense curling past the bronze bowls which held the lights, and the reek of the place had become intolerably hot.

Presently Marie Augustin came in. She had a soft black hat, rather too large, which she must have stolen from some guest, and a long cloak. When the arrangements had been made, we stood under the gilt cabinet, ready to put on our masks. She had turned out all the lights except the ornate silver one, shaped like a pagoda, which burnt on top of the cabinet....

The absence of light intensified the silence of this room. Now, faintly, I could hear the deep murmur of the orchestra from beyond the walls. Her face looked up, old ivory in the glow of the silver lamp. Her eyebrows were thin arches, her lips painted dark red....

'And,' she was saying, 'if we get past the outer door, what then?'

'Down into the waxworks. I must look at that knife,' I said, all the while conscious that I was not thinking about the knife at all. 'After that, the telephone. You had better give me your revolver.'

She passed it over. It was only a brushing of finger tips, but I could not move for looking at her. You thought of stuffy parlours with horsehair furniture; and behind these, mistily taking form, the weird glitter of the Arabian Nights. Slowly she reached up towards the chain of the lamp.

‘I wear black,' she said, pulling the mask down over her face. 'That is because - I have never had a lover.'

Inscrutable eyes shone for a moment through the holes in the mask. Then the light went out....

When we started for the door, she first motioned me back and glanced into the outer office. Then she nodded, and I followed through a dim room, hung with fantastic rugs, down to the glass-panelled door leading to the passage. In my hand I had the silver key belonging (she had said) to a member who had recently left for America. The murmur of the orchestra grew louder in our ears; it restored that dream-instability of a world peopled with goblins in vari-coloured masks. It was growing late, and the revel would nearly have reached its climax. .. .

Now its noise flowed out to engulf us. Down the dark passage I saw the great arch of the hall. Laughter was mingled with the hum of people; quick speech, breathlessness, and the clinking of glasses. It was subdued, but that only heightened its fierce tensity. A voice would break out, to be instantly repressed. Across it the orchestra rolled music in thick, sickly-sweet waves. We were inside, now; inside tall arches of black marble, with mirrors cunningly arranged so that the parade of arches seemed to extend itself endlessly. I had again that illusion of an undersea twilight, as at the waxworks. But now the dusk swam with goblins. Black masks, green masks, scarlet masks; figures split weirdly by the mirrors. Figures arm in arm, moving, black broadcloth and rustling gowns; or figures seated in corners, multiplied by the mirrors, with cigarette-ends palely glowing.

I glanced at Marie Augustin, whose arm was hooked in mine. She was spectral also. In a mirror near me there appeared a disembodied arm. It tilted a swathed bottle, and somebody laughed. There were alcoves where low round tables with glass tops were lighted from within; these lights shone upon the pale colours of wine in glasses, with bubbles rising; and they shone on the lower faces, smiling or intent, of the people who sat motionless there....

Leaning against one pillar was a white-mask. The figure had its hand in its inside pocket. Another white-mask went slipping along the aisles. By the mirror-trick, it seemed to move miles among the arches. The pound and thunder of the orchestra was almost over our heads now ... and the orchestra, peering goblin-like from behind palms, all wore white masks.. ..

I felt Marie Augustin pressing my arm tightly. Her nervousness steadied me as we walked slowly across the hall., but I seemed to feel the white-masks staring from behind. What would it be like to be shot in the back, with a silencer on the pistol? Under this noise, not even the faint plop could be heard. They could fire, and you could be carried out, quietly and unobserved, as a drunk, after you had fallen.

I tried to move slowly. My heart was pounding heavily, and the brandy I had taken seemed now only to muddle my head. Would a bullet in the back be clean and almost painless, or would it stab like a hot iron ? Would —.

The noise was diminishing. I could smell flowers now, above the heat and perfume, from the passage at the other end. We moved out into the lounge. I stared straight across at the faces of two white-masked apaches who still sat in the alcove, eyes on the door. In the scarlet-and-black flicker of light from the bronze satyrs there, the white-masks rose. ...

I gripped the butt of my pistol in my pocket. They sauntered forward. They peered at us and went on. .. .

Down the lounge towards the foyer, a slow progress. It was not real; it could not be real! The palms of my hands were clammy, and once my companion's step faltered. If they found her assisting me! Knock-knock; it was our footsteps, or my heart, or both.. . .

'Your key, monsieur?' said a low voice at my elbow. 'Monsieur is leaving?'

I was prepared for it, but, even so, that ominous 'Monsieur is leaving?' seemed to be delivered with a delighted leer. 'Monsieur will not leave,' it seemed to say: 'Monsieur, instead, will remain indefinitely.' I held out my key to a white-mask.

'Ah,' it said, 'Monsieur Darzac! Thank you. monsieur!⁵ Then white-mask shrank back as Marie Augustin lifted her own slightly; he recognized her, and hurried across to open the door. A last glimpse of the marble pillars in the foyer, of the heavy blue decorations, of white-mask grinning; then the hum of the orchestra died and we were out. .. .

For a moment I felt weak. I put my head against the bricks of the wall, feeling the coldness of the passage blow deliciously under my cloak.

'Good child !' whispered Marie Augustin.

I could not see her in the dark, but I could feel her body pressing against my side. Triumph went singing and bounding along my veins. We had Galant now! Oh, we had him! . .. 'Where to?^’ I heard her murmur.

'The waxworks. We must look for that knife. Then I'll phone Bencolin. He's waiting at the Palais de Justice ... I suppose we must go round to the front to get into the waxworks ?'

'No. I have a key for the passage door. It's the only one, though. The rest of the people must go out the other way.'

She was leading me up towards the back door to the museum. I felt sweat running down from under my arms, and my wound pounded anew; it was beginning to bleed once more. But the triumph of escaping gave pleasure even to that. It was an honourable scar. I said:

'Wait, I'll strike a match.'

The match flame sputtered up. Suddenly Marie Augustin's fingers dug into my arm. ...

'O my God !' she whispered, 'what's that?' 'What?'

She was pointing to the door which led into the back of the museum. It stood ajar.

We stood there staring at it until the flame crumpled up and went out. Open. You could see the gleam of the catch, and the stuffy air blew out into our faces. Some intuition told me that we were not yet through with horrors for this night. The door even swung and creaked a little, suggestively. It was here that the murderer had stood last night when he launched himself at Claudine Martel. I wondered whether we mould see a green light suddenly spring up there, and, silhouetted against it, a head and shoulders. . ..

'Do you suppose,' she whispered, 'there's somebody — ?'

'We can see.' I put one arm around her, drew the revolver, and pushed the door open with my feet. Then I went through into darkness.

'We'll have to get the lights on,' she was insisting in a tense voice. 'Let me lead you. I know every step of the way in the dark. Up to the main grotto. . .. Watch the steps, now.'

She did not even grope as we went through the door, through the cubbyhole, and out on the landing. In thick darkness I felt the edge of the satyr's robe brush my wrist and I started as at the touch of a reptile. Our footfalls scraped on the gritty stone; the damp and musty air had an almost strangling quality. I stumbled on the stair. If there were anybody else about, that person must certainly have heard us.

How she picked her way along in the dark I do not know. I had lost all sense of direction after climbing the stairs and heading towards the grotto. But you could feel the presence of all the wax figures, indefinably sinister, as you could smell their clothes and hair. I remembered old Augustin's words, touching my ears as though somebody had just murmured there, 'If any of them ever moved, I should go mad. . ..'

Marie Augustin let go my arm. There were a clink of metal and a rasp of a switch thrown into place. Green twilight illuminated the main grotto, where we stood now. She was smiling at me, very white.

'Come on,' she muttered. 'You wanted to go down to the Gallery of Horrors and look for the knife. ... '

Again we traversed the grotto. It was just as it had looked the night before, when I found the body in the satyr's arms. Our footsteps scraped and echoed in the enclosed staircase. No matter how cautiously you approached, the figure of the satyr alv’ays seemed to appear as with a spring at you. It was in place again, the green lamp burning behind it in the corner. I shuddered when I remembered its robe brushing my hand. . . .

The Gallery of Horrors. I could see coloured coats, and wax faces peering out, in a dimness which was even more eerie than the dark. We were close to the Marat tableau now; yet for some reason I hated to look at it. Dread kept my eyes fixed on the floor. Something seemed to whisper, with little words which were as the tapping of hammers on my ear drums, that I should see a ghastly thing. ... I raised my eyes slowly. No. It was the same. There was the iron railing in front of it. There was Marat, naked above the waist, lying backwards, his glass eyes glaring at me upside down. There was the serving-woman in the red cap, shouting to the soldiers at the door, and seizing the wrist of pale Charlotte, the murderess. I saw the dim, pale September sunlight drooping through the window. . .. No! Something was wrong. Something was missing. .. .

In the heavy unnatural silence, Marie Augustin's voice boomed.

'The knife is gone,' she said.

Yes. there was his bluish hand clutching at a chest thick with blood, but no knife protruded from it. My companion's breath whistled through her nostrils. We did not think; we knew that we were very close to murder which was not done in wax. The weird, yellowish light seemed to grow even more dim. ... I ducked under the iron railings and went up among the figures of the tableau, and she followed me ....

The boards in the flooring of that mimic-room creaked under my feet. A little shiver seemed to run through the figures there; I noticed that the serving-woman's foot was almost out of the cloth slipper she wore. By passing inside that railing, you actually seemed to step into the past. The waxworks was blotted out. We were in a dirty brown-painted room high up in old Paris of the Revolution. There was a map hanging disarranged on the wall. Through the window, past the brick wall where dead vines hung, I thought I could see the roofs of the Boulevard Saint-Germain. We, like the figures, were simply frozen after the horror of a murder committed here. I turned, and the serving-woman leered at me, the soldier's eyes were fixed on Marie Augustin.

All of a sudden Marie screamed. ... There was a creak, and one of the window-panes swung open. A face was pushed through, looking at us.

Framed in the window, it showed huge white eyeballs and irises pushed up under the upper lids. Its mouth hung open in a sort of hideous grin. Then the mouth was obscured by a gush of blood. It gurgled, its head twitched sideways, and I saw that there was a knife projecting from the neck. It was the face of Etienne Galant.

He uttered a sort of whimpering moan. He plucked once at the knife in his throat, and then pitched forward over the sill into the room.

The Killer of the Waxworks

I stop here, momentarily, in the writing. Even the tracing down of that scene on paper brings it back so vividly that it shakes my nerves and I feel only the exhaustion I felt then. As the climax of all that night's events, I think that it might have broken steadier nerves than mine. Ever since I had entered the club at eleven-thirty, the terrific pace had steadily mounted until almost anybody, I believe, would have been at the breaking-point. For weeks afterwards, Galant's face rode my nightmares, as I saw it in that single awful instant before he crashed through the window at our feet. A leaf, brushing my window at the dead of night, or even the sudden creak of a casement, would bring it back with such clearness that I shouted for lights....

So I hope I shall not be accused of weakness if I say that I remember nothing very clearly for half an hour. Later, Marie Augustin told me that everything was very quiet and orderly. She says that she shrieked and ran, falling over the iron railings; that I caught her and carried her upstairs, quietly; and that we went in to telephone Bencolin. Our talk was to discuss, with the utmost seriousness, what a bad bump on the head you could get if you tumbled on that railing and hit the stone floor.. . .

But I don't remember that. The next thing which comes back with any clearness is the frowsy room with the horsehair furniture, and the shaded lamp on the table. I was sitting in a rocking-chair, drinking something, and across from me stood Bencolin. In another chair Marie sat with her hands over her eyes. Apparently I must have told the whole story, rather clearly, to Bencolin, for I was just describing Galant when memory returned. The room seemed to be full of people. Inspector Durrand was there, and half a dozen gendarmes, and old Augustin in a wool nightshirt.

Inspector Durrand was looking somewhat pale. When I had finished, there was a long silence.

'And the murderer - got Galant,' he said, slowly.

Again I found myself talking, in a coherent and even normal way. 'Yes. It simplifies things, doesn't it? But how he got down there I don't know. The last time I saw him was up in his room, when he set his thugs on me. Maybe an appointment...'

Durrand hesitated, gnawing at his under lip. Then he came forward, put out his hand, and said, gruffly: 'Young man .. . shake hands, will you?'

'Yes,' said Bencolin. 'It wasn't bad, Jeff. And that knife .. . messieurs, we were all fools. We have Mademoiselle Augustin to thank for showing us.'

Leaning on his stick, he looked at her. Her face was pinched as she lifted it, but she met his gaze mockingly. The flame-coloured gown was disarranged.

'I owed it to you, monsieur, from last night,' she said, coolly. 'And I think you will have to accept my analysis of the crime, after all.'

Bencolin frowned. 'I am not sure that I can go all the way with you, mademoiselle. We shall see. In the meantime —'

'Have you looked at the body?' I demanded. 'Was he stabbed with the knife from the wax figure?'

'Yes. And the murderer took no trouble to hide finger-prints. The case is complete, Jeff. Thanks to you and mademoiselle, we now know everything, including the details of Mademoiselle Duchene's death.' He stared sombrely at the lamp. 'Hic jacet Etienne Galant! He will never settle his debt with me now.'

'How the devil did he get behind that window? That's what I can't understand.'

'Why, it seems fairly clear. You know that enclosed stair, between the walls, which goes down from the cubbyhole behind the various tableaux from the Gallery of Horrors?'

'Yes. You mean the place where you go to fix the lights ?'

He nodded. 'The murderer stabbed Galant either in that cubbyhole or close to it. Galant must have started to run; he tripped and fell down the stairs, and then he must have crawled behind the tableaux, trying to find a way out. He was just at the end of his rope when he found that window in the Marat group. And he died before we got here.'

'The - the same person who killed Claudine Martel?'

'Undoubtedly. And now . . . Durrand!'

'Yes, monsieur?'

'Take four of your men and get into the club. Smash the door, if necessary. And if they feel like putting up a fight —'

A tight little smile went over the inspector's face. He squared his shoulders and pulled his hat farther down. In a pleased tone he asked, 'What then?'

'Try the tear gas first. If they still feel nasty, use your guns. But I don't think they will. Don't put anybody under arrest. Find out when and why Galant went out to-night. Search the house. If Mademoiselle Prevost is still there, bring her here.'

'May I request,' said Marie Augustin still coolly, 'that you do this, if possible, without alarming the guests?'

'I am afraid, mademoiselle, that a certain amount of alarm is inevitable.' Bencolin smiled. 'However, it will probably be best to dismiss all the guests before getting down to business, Durrand. All servants are to be held. Under cover of the exit, you ought to be able to find Mademoiselle Prevost. She may still be in room eighteen. That's all. Try and be quick about it.'

Durrand saluted and beckoned to four of his gendarmes. One of the others he stationed in the vestibule, and sent the sixth out to the street. Then there was a silence. I settled back in the chair, nerves twitching, but blissfully at peace. Anything now, I thought (oh, very wrongly!), must come in the nature of an anti-climax. There was pleasure in everything: in the ticking of a tin clock, in the coal fire burning beneath an old black-marble fireplace, in the shaded lamp and the worn tablecloth. Sipping hot coffee, I glanced at my companions. Bencolin, gaunt in his black cloak and soft dark hat, poked moodily at the rug with his stick. Marie Augustin's shoulders gleamed in the lamp-light; her big eyes were fixed on a sewing-basket with a sort of cynical pitying look. You couldn't feel anything now. I couldn't, at least. There was a sort of numbness of shock which prevented thoughts, or emotions of any kind. We were spent. There was only the fire snapping, and the friendly tick of the clock.. . .

Then I became aware of old Augustin. His grey flannel nightshirt stretched almost to his feet and gave him an absurd appearance. On top of a long, scrawny neck his head was bent forward; the fan of white whiskers wagged, and the red eyes kept blinking and blinking with an expression of solicitude. Tiny and bobbing he flopped across the room in a pair of leather slippers much too large. In his hands he had a black dusty shawl.

'Put this round your shoulders, Marie,' he urged, in his piping voice. 'You'll catch cold.'

She seemed on the point of laughing. But he was very serious. He arranged the ugly thing on her shoulders with a nicety, and her amusement died. 'Is - is it all right, papa ?' she asked gently. 'You know now.'

He gulped. Then he turned his old eyes on us with some savagery.

'Why, of course, Marie. Anything you do - is all right. I'll protect you. You trust - your old daddy, Marie.'

Patting her shoulder, he continued to defy us with his eyes.

'I will, papa. Hadn't you better go to bed?'

'You're always trying to send me to bed, cherie! And I won't go. I'll stay and protect you. Now, now!'

Very slowly Bencolin removed his cloak. He put hat and stick on the table, drew out a chair, and sat down, his fingers tapping his temple. Something in the look he directed at Augustin attracted my attention....

'Monsieur’ Bencolin said, 'you are very fond of your daughter, are you not?'

He spoke idly. But Mile Augustin reached up and grasped the old man's hand with abruptness, as though she were thrusting herself before him. It was she who said:

'What do you mean ?'

'Why, certainly he's right!' piped the old man, tightening his thin chest. 'Don't press my hand, Marie. It's swollen. I--'

'And no matter what she might have done, you would always shield her, wouldn't you?' the detective continued, still idly.

'Yes, naturally! Why do you ask?'

Bencolin's eyes seemed to be looking inward. 'The standards of the world,' he said, 'should be at least understandable. I don't know. They are altogether mad, sometimes. ‘ wonder how I should feel. . .'

His voice trailed off, rather puzzled, and then he passed a hand across his forehead. In a steady, rather vicious voice Marie interposed:

'I don't know what this means, monsieur. But it would strike me that you had business of more import than sitting here talking about the "standards of the world". Your business is to arrest a murderer.'

'That's just it,' he agreed, nodding in a preoccupied way. 'My business is - to arrest a murderer.'

He spoke almost sadly. The ticking of the tin clock seemed to have slowed down. Bencolin examined the toe of his shoe, moving it about on the carpet. He observed :

'We know the first part of the story. We know that Odette Duchene was enticed here, and we know by whom; we know that she fell from a window, and then was stabbed by Galant. . . . But our real, terrifying killer? Mademoiselle, who stabbed Claudine Martel and Galant?'

'I don't know! That is your affair, not mine. I have told Monsieur Marie why I think it was a woman.' 'And the motive ?'

The girl made an impatient gesture. 'Isn't that clear enough? Don't you agree that it was vengeance?'

'It was vengeance,' said Bencolin. 'But a very extraordinary sort of vengeance. I don't know whether any of you could understand, or even whether ‘ understand. It's an odd crime. You explain the theft of the key by saying that a woman - who was avenging the death of Mademoiselle Duchene by killing Claudine Martel - used it to enter the club. H'm.

There was a knock at the door. It had an almost portentous effect.

'Come in!' said the detective. 'Ah ... good evening, Gap-tain! You know all the people here, I think?'

Chaumont, very straight but somewhat pale, entered the room. He bowed to the others, cast a startled look at the bandages round my head, and then turned towards Bencolin with an exclamation on his lips... .

'I took the liberty,' said the detective, 'of summoning Monsieur Chaumont here after I heard from you, Jeff. I thought he would be interested.'

'I - I hope I don't intrude?' Chaumont asked. 'You sounded excited over the telephone. What - what has happened?'

'Sit down, my friend. We have discovered a number of things.' Still he did not look at the young man, but kept his eyes on his shoe. His voice was very quiet. 'For example, your fiancee, Mademoiselle Duchene, met her death at the direct instigation of Claudine Martel, and of Galant also. Please don't get excited, now. . ..'

After a long pause Chaumont said: 'I - I'm not excited. I don't know what I am.... Will you explain?'

He stumbled into a chair, where he kept running his hat round his fingers. Slowly and carefully Bencolin proceeded to tell him everything I had learned that night. ' ... So you see, my friend,' he continued, 'Galant believed you were the murderer. Are you ?'

He asked the question carelessly. Chaumont was stricken dumb. Long ago he had dropped his hat and gripped the arms of the chair, but he was merely incoherent. He tried to stammer something; his brown face grew even more pale ... Abruptly his words tumbled out:

'They suspect me? Me? O my God! Look here, do you think I'd do a thing like that? Stab a girl in the back, and.. !'

'Softly,' murmured Bencolin. 'I know you didn't.'

A coal dropped with a rattle from the grate. The stupor of my nerves had begun to wear off; Chaumont's protests jabbed like lancets. I felt that the coffee was burning my throat. .. .

'You seem to think,' Marie Augustin snapped, 'that you do know who is guilty. And you've overlooked - everything of importance.'

There was a wrinkle between Bencolin's brows. He said, deprecatingly :

'Well ... not exactly everything, mademoiselle. No, I should hardly say that.'

Something was going to happen. You sensed it, though you did not know what direction it would take. But I could see the small vein beating on Bencolin's forehead as though in time to the tick of the tin clock.

'There is just one flaw, mademoiselle, in your theory that the killer stole Mademoiselle Martel's key in order to get into the club.' The detective mused. 'Well, well - let us say two flaws.'

The girl shrugged.

'First, mademoiselle, you can give no earthly reason why the killer should have wanted to go into the club after the stabbing. . . . The second point is simply that I know your theory is wrong.'

He rose to his feet slowly. All of us immediately tried to move backwards, though he was still very quiet and his look was almost absent. The clock ticked loudly. . . .

'Say whatever you like about my stupidity, mademoiselle. I grant it! I came very close to bungling this case altogether. Oh, yes. It was only this afternoon, very late, that the whole truth came to me. I take no credit for it. The killer deliberately gave me clues; the killer gave me an even chance to guess. That is why this is the strangest crime in my experience. ...

'Fool!' His eyes suddenly glittered. He straightened his shoulders. I shot an uneasy look round the circle. ...

Chaumont sat hunched back in his chair. Marie Augustin leaned forward into the lamp-light; her underlip was turned down, her eyes were as ebony in the light, and her grip tightened on old Augustin's arm.. . .

'Fool!' Bencolin repeated. His eyes again became vacant. 'You remember, Jeff, my telling you this afternoon that I should have to find the jeweller? Well, I have done so. That was where he got the watch repaired.'

'What watch?'

He seemed surprised at the question I flung at him.

'Why ... you know those particles of glass, tiny ones, we found in the passage? There was one sticking to the bricks of the wall. . . .'

Nobody spoke. The pounding of my heart choked me. ...

'You see, it was almost inevitable that the murderer had that happen, particularly in such a cramped space. He smashed the crystal of his wrist watch when he stabbed Claudine. . . . Yes, it was almost inevitable, because . . . '

'What the hell are you talking about?'

'Because,' Bencolin told me thoughtfully, 'Colonel Martel has only one arm.'