The Waxworks Murder

He seemed to be casting about for something to take his mind off it, and he picked up the silver key. With a bewildering change of mood he fired a new statement at me.

'Jeff, I've told you that we are going to plant somebody, to-night, in the Mask Club, to get the conversation between Galant and Gina Prevost. Do you think you could do it?'

'Why not? Will you do it?'

'Why,' I said, 'as a matter of fact, there's nothing I'd like better. But of all the trained men you have here, why bank on my abilities?'

He looked at me whimsically. 'Oh, I don't know. For one thing, because you're the same height and build as Robiquet, and you'll have to use his key and pass inspection, under a mask, when you enter. For another - maybe to see how you, who haven't my fluctuating moods, and don't seem to be given to nerves, will act under fire. It will be dangerous, I warn you.'

'That's the real reason, isn't it?'

‘I suppose so. What do you say?'

'With the greatest of pleasure,' I said, exultantly. A chance to examine that club, the strong drink which is adventure, and the bright eyes of danger . .. He saw my expression, and regarded me sourly.

'Now attend to me ! This is no lark, damn you !'

I sobered appropriately. His agile brain had already darted off along a new vista of speculation,

'I'll give you instructions. . .. First, though, I want to tell you what you may have to expect. Gina Prevost may or may not know who the murderer is; you heard my theory, but it's only a theory. There is nothing in our evidence to support it. But if she does know, Galant will in all likelihood worm it from her much more easily than the whole department of police could do. If we can get a dictograph record ,..'

'Bencolin,' I said, 'who is the murderer?'

It was a direct challenge, on a point which was the sorest of all with his vanity; and I knew that, if he were as puzzled as I fancied, he would tell me; but I also knew that it would anger him beyond measure.

He answered, slowly: 'I don't know. I have no idea.' After a pause, 'I suppose that's what has been so rasping my nerves.'

'And hence the philosophizing?'

He shrugged. 'Probably. Now let me tell you about the sequel to the murder, which I can imagine. There is the irritating part. I can outline the whole scene of the crime, what led up to it and what followed it. But the face of the killer remains a blank. See here....'

Pie hitched his chair round, took another drink, and approached die subject as though he were burrowing under a wall.

'We have carried the story of the murder up to the time when the assassin strikes and Gina Prevost runs away from the passage. From the first time I looked into that passage, I knew that - despite old Augustin's tale of turning off all the lights at eleven-thirty - somebody had turned them on (briefly, at least) in the museum. The bloodstains on the wall, the rifled purse on the floor, all lay in a direct line with the museum door. Light, however dim, had come from there, so that the killer could see his victim and see to loot her purse. So I asked Mademoiselle Augustin, and she admitted having put the lights on for five minutes.

'Now this can lead us to a significant deduction. The killer rifled her purse. What did he want? Not money; it was left untouched. Certainly nothing in the nature of writing, like a letter or card - -'

'Why not?'

'I think you have agreed, have you not, that the light was so very dim that one could with difficulty recognize a face?' he demanded. 'Then how, among all that jumble of envelopes and written matter in her handbag, could he have picked out what he wanted? He couldn't read a word there. But he didn't take the bag or its contents into the museum-landing by the satyr, where the light was fairly good; he tossed them all down. ... No, no! It was some object, Jeff, which he could recognize even in half-darkness. Before determining what this was, and whether or not he found it, let me ask you a question. Why did he carry the body into the museum ?'

'Apparently to hide the fact that she had been murdered in the passage. To throw suspicion away from the Club of Masks.'

Bencolin looked at me with raised eyebrows. Then he sighed.

'My dear fellow,' he said, sadly, 'sometimes you are so profoundly brilliant that ... Ah, well. He carried the body in to make it appear that she had been murdered in the museum, eh ? And, in doing so, he left a big handbag lying slap in the middle of the passage, its contents scattered all over the floor? He left wide open the door to the museum, for everybody to notice? He —'

'Oh, shut up! He might have had to leave in a hurry, and forgotten.'

'And yet still he had time to put the body in the satyr's arms, arrange the drapery over it, and do everything else up to a nicety. .. . Again, no. It won't do. He didn't care where the body was found. He took it into the museum for a very definite purpose, and his putting it in the satyr's arms was an afterthought. Think ! What did you notice about the body?'

'Good God ! The broken gold chain round her neck.'

'Yes. That was the object: the thing she carried on that chain. Do you see now? He thought it would be in her handbag; so he rifled the handbag, and found it wasn't there. ... It must, he reasoned, be about her person somewhere. Very likely the pockets. But in that very dim light he couldn't see the pockets of her coat, he didn't know where she might be carrying it. So — ?'

I bowed. 'All right! He dragged her into the museum-landing, where the light was fairly good.'

'There is another reason. He knew that Gina Prevost (not knowing who it was, of course) had looked in and seen him stab the girl. He had seen her dash out - for all he knew, to scream for a policeman. He couldn't stand there all night, exposed. Somebody had switched on the museum lights; that way was dangerous, but it was less dangerous than remaining in the passage, for he could simply drag the girl into the museum and lock the door behind him. At a pinch, he could always hide. And he wasn't willing to run out of the boulevard door until he had found what he searched for.

'So he went in to the landing beside the satyr. A second more, and he has found the gold chain, and - the object.'

'I suppose you will now proceed to tell me what it was?'

He sat back hi his chair and stared up thoughtfully at the lights.

'I'm not sure, of course. But there are suggestive points. For one thing, even aside from Madame Martel's assuring us that Claudine never wore pendants or anything of that nature, what she carried on that chain was not a light locket, or even a charm such as men carry on their watch-chains. As I pointed out to you, that chain was strong. It had been snapped in two - demonstrating that the object was also strong, and not made with a flimsy link to hold it on. It was probably one of these.'

From the table he took up the silver key. I looked at the round hole in its thumb-grip; I looked back to Bencolin and nodded....

'Claudine Martel's own key,' he amplified, tossing Robiquet's on the desk. 'It is (I admit) sheer conjecture, but in the absence of any more tenable hypothesis, I suggest the key. Why did die murderer want it? Why did he run appalling risks of discovery in order to wrench it off? ... Anyhow, his story is soon complete. He found the key. The idea occurred to him of putting the body in the satyr's arms. He does so, and what happens? As though by a kind of ghastly curtain-fall, the lights go out; Mademoiselle Augustin is satisfied that nothing is amiss in the museum. Not more than five minutes have elapsed since he stabbed his victim. He opens the museum door, slips into the passage, and escapes by way of the boulevard. And he must be damnably puzzled as to why that girl, that intruder who saw him at work, has not summoned the police!'

'Well, if your theory is correct, why didn't she?'

'Because she feared a police investigation, and what it might lead up to in Odette Duchene's case. She wanted to be tangled up in no suspicious events centring round the club, or even to explain her presence there. What she actually did do will be apparent to you....'

'I can guess at it,' I admitted. (I couldn't quite guess it, actually, but another matter thrust itself forward, and I dismissed Gina Prevost to hurry on with it.) 'However there's one thing in your line of campaign which seems inconsistent. You say you believed from the first that the murderer had gone into the museum that night before it closed?'

'Yes.'

'And went in by the front door, ticket and all?' 'Yes.'

'Then why the devil didn't you ask the Augustin woman — she was on guard at the door all evening - who had visited the museum that night? There couldn't have been many people; there never are. She must have seen the murderer go in!'

'Because she wouldn't have told us, and it would have served merely as a warning to the murderer. See here!' He tapped the key on his desk, emphasizing each word. 'I suspect that the killer is a member of that club. Now the good Mademoiselle Augustin is very anxious to protect, not an assassin, but all members of the organization. Failure to protect them from any inquiry might mean the destruction of her very lucrative business. Suppose that one, two, even half a dozen club members had gone in by way of the museum that night, do you imagine we should have got a description of them?'

‘I suppose not,' I acknowledged.

'Eh, weil! And, knowing we were looking for one of them, she might - I say she might - pass a warning, unobtrusively, to all members who might have gone through last night. How many times must I tell you, Jeff, that our salvation rests on having everybody believe, the police included, that this crime is a mere wanton robbery or rape? Don't you remember? - I fostered this idea in Mademoiselle Augustin's mind by saying, carelessly, that Mademoiselle Martel had probably never been in the museum in her life, she breathed more easily afterwards.... In God's name, consider that in those club members we are dealing with some of the greatest names in France! We don't want scandal. We can't "sweat" the truth out of people, as your American forthrightness might like. .. . And here is another point. I am convinced that in some fashion Mademoiselle Augustin plays an important part in this affair. As yet I don't see how. And yet - there are hidden fires there, I am willing to swear! Somehow I think we shall find her bulking large in our thoughts before the case is finished, even though she sits placidly selling tickets. If her father knew .. . '

He was relighting the cigar, which had several times gone out that afternoon; now his hand jerked in mid-air and stopped. It stayed motionless until the flame grew large and toppled. But he did not notice. His eyes had taken on a frozen, startled stare.

In a whisper, as though to test incredible words, he repeated: 'Selling tickets. ... If her father ...'

His lips moved soundlessly. With a spasmodic motion he rose to his feet, rumpling his hair, staring ahead.

'What's the matter? What - - ?' I demanded, and paused as he made a fierce gesture. But still he did not see me. He took a few steps up and down, in and out of the shadows. Once lie let out an incredulous laugh, but he checked himself. I heard him mutter, 'Alibi ,.. that's the alibi,' and again; 'I wonder who the jeweller is? We've got to find the jeweller. 'Look here!'

'Ah, yes! But,' he argued, turning and addressing me with an appearance of easy good sense, 'if you had one, it would be inevitable. You have got to consider the wall. What else could you use. that would do it?'

'How about bromo-seltzer?' I suggested. ' " 'Twas brillig, and the slithy toves did gyre and gimble in the wabe." Blast you!’

I sat down sullenly. His black mood was gone. He rubbed his hands together jubilantly. Then he picked up his glass and held it high.

'Observe a ceremony,' he urged, 'and join me. I drink to the most sportsman-like killer I have ever met. I drink to the only murderer in my whole experience who ever deliberately walked up and presented me with clues.'

How I Ventured into the Club of Masks

The Boulevard de Clichy, Montmartre.

Lights spangled in broken reflections on wet pavements. A whir and honk of taxis, and the murmur of a crowd which slides past with a kind of irregular shuffling. Orchestras blare out against radios. Saucers jar and clink on marble-topped tables, in cafes whose windows are dirty, and their clientele dirtier still; but the grimy windows are dazzling with lights. Floors smell of sawdust, there are many mirrors, the beer is watered, and whiskers flourish. Out of the din, hawkers cry silk neckties at five francs, under wild gas-flares. Visiting young ladies in white wraps and pearls step carefully over the swift water of gutters. Street-walkers, graven of face, with motionless black eyes, sit before glasses of coffee, and seem to be pondering. Forlornly, a consumptive hand-organ gurgles tinkling music. Pedlars, hoarse from talking, will exhibit cardboard thingummies which crow like a rooster when you pull the string, or paper skeletons which dance the can-can when you put a match behind them. Electric signs, red and yellow, flash away with their monotonous gaiety; and the scarlet wheel of the Moulin Rouge revolves on the night sky.

The Boulevard de Clichy, Montmartre. Pivot and pulse of night life, centre of all the tiny streets on which famous night clubs cling to the hill. Rue Pigalle, rue Fontaine, rue Blanche, rue de Clichy, all revolve on a glowing hub, and startled visitors are tilted into them down cobble-stoned ways. Your brain whirls with the bang of jazz. You are drunk, or you mean to get drunk. You have a woman, or you will have one shortly. Certainly unthinking people will tell you that Paris at night has lost its lure. In Berlin, in Rome, in New York (they will say), great, shining temples of hilarity have made Paris haunts seem cheap and dingy; and this they insist on as though they were pointing out the supremacy of the electric refrigerator over a cold well-spring, and it amounts to the same thing. As though efficiency were the object in drinking, or making love or humanly acting the fool. God save you, merry gentlemen! - if this is your object, you will never enjoy the grinning, slipshod way in which Paris does things. This childish mystery, this roar, this damp smell of fresh trees and old sawdust, this do-as-you-please easiness, this splattering of coloured lights, will never turn your head; but memories will be lost to your old age.