Читать книгу Messengers of Evil - Marcel Allain - Страница 17

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Jérôme Fandor had passed a bad night!

Visions of horror had continually arisen in his troubled mind. Between nightmare after nightmare he had heard all the horrors of the night sound out in the darkness and the glimmering dawn. Then he had fallen into a heavy sleep, which had left him on awaking broken with fatigue. He had given himself a cold douche, and this had calmed his nerves; then he had dressed quickly. When eight o'clock struck he was at his writing-table, thinking things over:

"It's no laughing matter. I thought at first that the Dollon affair was quite ordinary; but I am mistaken. The warning I received last night leaves me no doubts on that head. Since the guilty person thinks it necessary to ask me to keep quiet, it is evident he fears my intervention; if he is afraid of that it is because it must be hurtful to him; if disastrous to him, a criminal, it is evident that it must be useful to honest folk. My duty, then, is to go straight ahead at all costs. … "

There was another motive besides this of duty which incited him to follow more closely the vicissitudes of the rue Norvins drama, a motive still indefinite, vague, but nevertheless terribly strong. …

Jérôme Fandor had sworn to Elizabeth Dollon that he would get at the truth.

He recalled the girl's entreaty, her emotion; and when he closed his eyes, now and again, he seemed to see before him the tall, graceful, fair and fascinating sister of the vanished artist. … All Fandor would admit to himself was a chivalrous feeling towards her—Elizabeth Dollon was worth putting himself out for—that was all!

Our journalist spent the entire morning seated at his writing-table, his head between his hands, smoking cigarette after cigarette, arranging his plans for investigating the Dollon case:

"What I have to find out is how the dead man left the Dépôt. It is the first discovery to be made, the first impossibility to be explained—yes, and how am I to set about it?"

Suddenly Fandor jumped up, marched rapidly up and down his room, whistled a few bars of a popular melody, and in his exuberant gaiety attempted an operatic air in a voice deplorably out of tune.

"There are eighty chances out of a hundred that I shall not succeed," cried he; "but that still leaves me twenty chances of arriving at a satisfactory result—let us make the attempt!"

As Fandor was hurrying off, he called to the portress in passing:

"Madame Oudry, I don't know whether I shall be back this evening or no. Perhaps I may have to leave Paris for awhile, so would you be kind enough to pay particular attention to any letters that may come for me—be very particular about them, please!"

Fandor went off. A thought struck him. He turned back. He had something more to say to the good woman:

"I forgot to ask you whether anyone called to see me yesterday afternoon!"

"No, Monsieur Fandor, no one!"

"Good! If by any chance a messenger should bring a letter for me, look very carefully at him, Madame Oudry. I have a colleague or two who are playing a joke on me, and I should not be sorry to get even with them!"

This time Fandor really went off, having set his portress on the alert. In the rue Montmartre he hailed a cab:

"To the National Library! And as quick as you can!"

"By Jove! It's three o'clock! I've not a minute to lose!" cried Fandor as he got back his stick from the cloak-room of the National Library: he had handed it in there some hours ago. He entered the rue Richelieu. Now for an ironmonger's shop! He caught sight of one and went in:

"I should like fifty yards of fine cord, please; very strong and very pliable," said Fandor.

The shopkeeper stared at the smart young man:

"What do you want it for, sir? … I have various qualities."

Without the trace of a smile, and as if it were the most natural thing in the world, he replied:

"It is for one of my friends: he wants to hang himself!"

A shout of laughter was the response to this witticism, and the amused shopkeeper forthwith displayed various samples of cords. Fandor promptly made his choice and left the shop.

"Now for a watchmaker's!" said our journalist. He entered a jeweller's close by:

"I want an alarum clock—a small one—the cheapest you have!"

Provided with his alarum, Fandor looked at his watch again:

"Confound it all! It's half-past three!" he cried. He signalled to a closed cab:

"To the Palais de Justice! As hard as you can lick!"

Directly Fandor was well inside the vehicle, he drew down the blinds; took off his coat; unbuttoned his waistcoat! …

The great clock of the Palais de Justice had just struck four, and its silvery tones were echoing harmoniously along the corridors when Jérôme Fandor entered the tradesman's gallery. He turned to the right, and gained the little lobby in which the cloak-room is. He quietly entered it. Barristers were coming and going, full of business, throwing off their gowns, inspecting the letters put aside during the sittings of the Courts. Fandor made his way among the groups with the ease of custom. He seemed to be looking for someone, and finished by questioning one of the women employed in the cloak-room:

"Is Madame Marguerite not here?"

"Oh, yes, monsieur, she is down below."

Madame Marguerite was an old friend of Fandor's. She was head of the cloak-room staff, and by her kind offices she had often obtained an interview for our journalist with one or other of the big-wigs of the bar, who generally object strongly to being questioned by journalists. When she appeared, Fandor told her he only wanted a little bit of information from her.

"Oh, yes, I know all about that! There is someone you wish to see, and you want me to manage it for you!"

"No! Not a bit of it! What I want to know is, where these gentlemen of the Court of Justice robe and unrobe? I mean the Justices of the Assize Courts!"

This seemed to astonish Madame Marguerite considerably:

"But, Monsieur Fandor, if you wish to interview one of the puisne judges, it would be ten times quicker for you to go and see him at his own home: here, at the Palais, it's almost certain he will refuse to answer you. … "

"Don't bother about that, Madame Marguerite! Just tell me where these worthy guardians of order, defenders of right and justice, divest themselves of their red robes?"

Madame Marguerite was too much accustomed to our young journalist's ridiculous questions and absurd requests and remarks to argue with him any longer.

"The robing-room of these gentlemen," said she, "is in one of the outer offices of the court, near the Council Chamber."

"There is an assistant in that room, isn't there?"

"Yes, Monsieur Fandor."

"Ah! That is just what I wanted to know! Many thanks, madame," and Fandor, grinning with satisfaction, made off in the direction of the Court of Assizes. He ran up the steps leading to the Council Chamber, and spying the messenger asked:

"Can President Guéchand see me, do you think?"

"Monsieur le President has gone."

Fandor seemed to be reflecting. He gazed searchingly round the room. As a matter of fact, he was verifying the correctness of Madame Marguerite's information. All round the room Fandor saw the little presses where the men of law kept their red robes. Yes, it was the robing and unrobing room of the puisne judges, the magistrates, right enough!

"So the President has gone? Ah, well … " Fandor hesitated: he must think of some other name. He noticed the visiting cards nailed to each press, indicating the owner. He read one of the names and repeated it:

"Well, then, could Justice Hubert see me—could he possibly? Will you ask him to let me see him for five minutes?"

"What name shall I say?"

"My name will not tell him anything. Please say it is with reference to the—er—Peyru case—and I come from Maître Tissot."

"I will go and see," said the messenger, moving off.

Whilst he was in sight Fandor walked up and down in the regulation way, murmuring:

"Maître Tissot! … The Peyru case! … Go ahead, my good fellow! You will have a nice kind of reception down below there—with those made-up names."

Some minutes later, the messenger returned to his post, prepared to inform the importunate young man that he could not possibly be received by Justice Hubert. He stopped short on the threshold: not a soul was to be seen!

"Wherever has that young man got to? Taken himself off, most likely! … I expect he was one of those lawyer's clerks—confound them! A nice fool I should have looked if his Honour, Justice Hubert, had said he would receive him!"

With this reflection the messenger went back to his newspaper, not without having ascertained that it was four o'clock, and therefore he had still an hour to wait before he could have his coffee and cigar at the "Men of the Robe."

Through the great windows of the Court of Assizes, carefully closed as they were, not a ray of moonlight filtered into the court room. And this obscurity lent an added terror to a silence as profound as the grave, a silence which, with the falling shades of night, assumed possession of the vast hall, where so many criminals had listened to the fatal sentence—the sentence of death.

When the Court had risen, the assistants had, as usual, proceeded to put the place in order; then the police sergeant had made his rounds, and had gone away, double locking the doors behind him. After this the chamber had gradually sunk into complete repose: a repose which would be broken the following morning when the bustling routine of the legal day commenced once more.

Little by little, too, the many and varied noises, which had echoed and re-echoed the whole day through in the galleries of the Palais de Justice, had died down, and sunk into silence.

The custodians had made their last round; the barristers had quitted the robing-room; the poor wretches who had slunk in to warm themselves at the heating apparatus in the halls had shuffled back to the cold street, and the whistling blasts of the north wind. The immense pile was entirely deserted.

A clock began to strike.

Then, hardly had the last stroke of eleven sounded, awakening the echoes of the empty galleries, than in the Court of Assizes itself, under the monumental desk, before which the justices sat in state by day, a noise made itself heard, long, strident, nerve-racking—the noise of an alarum clock!

Just as the alarum ceased its raucous call, a loud yawn resounded through the empty spaces of the chamber. The sleeper, who had selected this spot that he might indulge, all undisturbed, in a revivifying sleep, evidently took no pains to smother the sound of his voice, for, after yawning enough to dislocate his jaws, he uttered a loud: "Ah!" He accompanied his yawns with exclamations:

"It's a fact, the Republic doesn't do things up to the scratch! The rugs here are of poor quality! … I'm aching all over! … The floor is strewn with peach kernels—surely? … At any rate, it's a quiet hotel, and one is not disturbed—a truly delectable refuge to have a jolly good snore in!"

The sleeper sat up:

"What's the time exactly? Let us have a light on it!" A match was struck, and a tiny flare of light shone from under the desk of the presiding judge:

"Ten past eleven! I've still five minutes to be lazy in—and I shall need all of it, for I've a rough night before me! I can rest awhile, and think things over!"

The speaker calmly lay down again, trying to find a comfortable position on what he christened mentally: "The administrative peach kernels":

"Let me see, now!" he went on aloud. "At five in the afternoon it was known that Jacques Dollon had committed suicide; was probably innocent, and that his corpse had disappeared. Yesterday, at half-past five, La Capitale announced that he had a very pretty sister. … To-night at ten past eleven behold me, shut up quite alone in the Palais de Justice, free to proceed to the little investigation I think of making. … Jérôme Fandor, my dear friend, I congratulate you! You have not managed badly! …

"Yes," went on our journalist, "what a joke it is! Here have I got myself shut up in the Palais without the slightest difficulty! It is true, that if the assistant had been obliged to open, and verify, the contents of all the robing-rooms of all the judges, he would never have finished. As for me, in my cupboard, I followed all the good fellow's movements, and he never suspected my presence. If I am to be congratulated, he cannot be blamed for it! There I was, there I remained, and now I must be off!"

Fandor drew a small wax taper from his pocket and lighted it with a match.

"What's to be done with the alarum?" he went on. "To leave it will be to betray my having passed this way—what of it? … In any case, even if this reporting job fails, I shall make a story out of it … and how can they accuse me of stealing if I leave my cloak as a gift for his judgeship!"

Laughing, Fandor piled up the law books lying on the desk, and placed the alarum on the top; that done, he went to the principal entrance, the only one with double doors. He seized the heavy iron bar placed across the door and worked it loose. He drew the two leaves of the door towards him; and, although it had been locked as usual, he effected his escape, after a considerable trial of strength.

Out on the stairs, lighted taper in hand, the laughing Fandor closed the two leaves of the door with the utmost care, and went forward whistling a marching tune. His objective was a certain little staircase leading to the top story of the Palais, and this he mounted with vigorous determination. There was no likelihood of chance encounters, for there was not a soul in the vast building: the police were making their rounds outside it. Our adventurous journalist did not make his way upwards with stealthy tread—there was no need for that. Having gained the top floor, he went straight to a corner where an ebony ladder was ensconced, a ladder which had long been the joy and pride of the grand master of this part of the Palais, the amiable Monsieur Peter.

"Pretty heavy!" grumbled Fandor, as he carried it upwards. Under the roof he caught sight of a skylight, rested his ebony ladder against it, and climbed briskly on to the roof.

From thence Fandor had a view that was fairy-like. Spread out in the distance were the sparkling lights of Paris. He was divided from them by the vast mass of roofs about him, by a gulf of empty space, and beyond, by a dark blur—the two arms of the Seine flowing on either side of the Palais de Justice. … The mysterious darkness! The fascination of the sparkling points of light! … Fandor gave himself a mental shake. … This was no moment for dreaming under the stars!

From his pocket he took a tiny, folding dark lantern; from his pocket-book he drew a paper, which he spread out and proceeded to study. As he bent over it, he murmured:

"A bit of good luck that I was able to get hold of a complete and detailed plan of the Palais de Justice! Without it I never could have found my way among these roofs!"

He examined the plan for some minutes; made a note of various landmarks; then refolding it, he gained one of the sloping roofs facing the quay of the Leather Dressers:

"Now," thought Fandor, "I must be just above the Dépôt! And now to find out how Jacques Dollon, dead or living, has got out of the Dépôt! No use thinking of a window, for the cell has not got one! Fuselier has reason on his side when he declares that you do not get out of the cells of the Dépôt, nor out of the Palais! … Well, now—to carry off Dollon, dead or living, by way of the Palais Square, or by the boulevard, is out of the question: there are too many people about! … To carry him off by one of the exits, on to either of the quays, is equally out of the question: there are the sentries, in the first place, and then comes the Seine—then Jacques Dollon has left the Dépôt, or he has not, or, at any rate, he is still somewhere in the Palais—unless … "

Fandor interrupted his cogitations to light a cigarette: smoking helped him to think things out:

"It is equally certain that if Dollon is still in the Palais, he cannot be in the Dépôt, for the Dépôt has been rigorously searched since his disappearance, and he would most certainly have been found, had he been anywhere about the Dépôt. It is also certain that he is not inside the Palais, because the only means of communication between the Dépôt and the Palais is a single staircase, and it is certain that a corpse could not have been taken that way unperceived. … Then it follows that Jacques Dollon must have got out by the only ways which are in communication with the Dépôt: that is to say, the drains and the chimneys!"

"How could he have got out, or been got out by the drains? As far as I know, there is no system of pipes large enough to allow of the passage of a man through the pipes which join the main sewers; but, as a set-off to that, there is a chimney—the ancient chimney of Marie Antoinette—which communicates with the Dépôt, and the roof I am now on: it must have been by this chimney that the escape was made! Let us see whether this is so or not!"

By the light of his tiny dark lantern Fandor studied afresh the plan of the Palais, and tried to identify the various chimneys about him. He soon picked out the orifice of Marie Antoinette's chimney. After a considering glance at it, he remarked:

"That's odd! Here is the only chimney whose opening is below the ledge of the roofs! It is certain that unless one had been warned, and had examined this roof from some neighbouring building, the orifice of this chimney would not be noticed. If Jacques Dollon passed out by it, no one would notice his exit!"

Our journalist continued his examination, full of excitement. Surely he was on the right track!

"Ah! Ah! Here are stones freshly scraped and scratched!" he cried delightedly. "And this white mark is just the kind of mark which would be made by a cord scraping against the wall! And look what a size this chimney is! It's not only one Jacques Dollon who could pass out by it, but two! But three! A whole army! Ah, ha, I believe I am on the right track! Now for it!"

Fandor bent over and looked down the interior of the chimney; and, at the risk of toppling over, he managed to reach something he saw shining in the darkness of the opening; he drew himself up, radiant:

"By Jove! There are irons fixed in the walls of the chimney to climb up and down by; and, what is more, they bear traces of a recent passage—the rust has been rubbed off here and there! … Yes, it is by this way Dollon has come out! … To whom else could it be an advantage to use this as an exit from the interior of the Palais, on to the roofs?"

Fandor was keen on the scent! Here, indeed, was matter for an article which would bring him into notice—good business for a journalist!

"If Dollon had been alive," reflected Fandor, "it is evident that, once on the roofs, he had a choice of three ways to escape: he could do what I have just done, but the other way about; he could break a skylight, jump into a garret, and lie hidden under the tiles, awaiting the propitious moment when he could gain the corridors below and, mingling with the crowd, slip unobserved into the street; or, he could hide among the roofs, and stay there; or, he could search for an opening—one of those air holes which put the cellars and drains in communication with the exterior. … But I have come to the conclusion that Dollon is dead! Then his corpse could only remain up here; or, it has been put down into some place where nobody goes. The garrets of the Palais are so incessantly visited by the clerks and registrars that no corpse could remain undiscovered in any of them. Therefore, either Jacques Dollon's corpse is somewhere on the roofs of the Palais, or there is some sort of communication between the roofs and the drains—it is obvious!"

Evidently the next step was to search every hole and corner of these same roofs. Armed with revolver and lantern, Fandor started on his tour of investigation; but prudently, for he was now almost certain that there were a number of accomplices involved in this Dollon affair.

To go carefully over the enormous roof of the Palais de Justice was no light task! One has only to consider the immensity of this monumental pile, its complicated architecture, the numberless little courts enclosed within its vast confines, to understand the difficulties with which our intrepid journalist had to contend. But Jérôme Fandor was not the man to be discouraged in the face of difficulties: he was determined to brave them—conquer them! He examined, minutely, the entire roofing of the Palais; he did not leave a corner or a morsel of shadow unexplored; there was not a gutter which he had not searched from end to end. When, after two hours of strenuous exertion, he returned to his starting-point, the chimney of Marie Antoinette, he was fain to confess that if Jacques Dollon had mounted to the roof of the Palais de Justice he certainly had not remained there.

Fandor unfolded his plan once more. It fluttered in the night breeze, as he carefully numbered all the chimneys opening on to this roof; then, one by one, he identified them with the real chimneys before his eyes. He exclaimed joyfully:

"There, now! It's just what I suspected!"

He had discovered there was one chimney not down on the plan: "Whither did it lead?" At all costs he must find out—make sure. He hastened to this extra chimney. Its orifice was large enough to allow of the passage of a man; also, here again, stones had been recently loosened, and a rope had rubbed against them:

"What the deuce is this chimney?" thought Fandor. "Another mystery! This chimney is not a chimney; there is not a trace of soot on it, even old soot!"

After a moment's reflection, he added:

"Can it be for ventilation only? But a ventilation hole could only communicate with one of the apartments in the Palais itself, and how the deuce could they drop a corpse down there? It would have been in the highest degree imprudent to attempt it! No, it is not by that road they have carried off Dollon's body! But then by what way?"

He glued his ear to the chimney. After a while, Fandor could make out a vague, intermittent sound—could catch a little, far-away, plashing sound.

"Can the chimney communicate with the Seine?" he asked himself. "No, we are too far off it. Why this opening, then? … Ah, I have it! It is a drain, a sewer, it communicates with!"

To verify that, there was nothing for it but to descend this chimney, which was no chimney! So be it! … Fandor took off his coat, and uncovered the long, fine cord, rolled round and round his middle. Weighting the cord with a flint, he let it slide down the chimney, testing the straightness of the descent by the balanced oscillations of the stone, and so ascertaining the even size of the opening, as far as the line would go. This was the work of a few minutes.

Fandor did not hesitate: he was eager to embark on the descent.

"After all," he murmured, "though I may find myself face to face with a band of assassins—what of it? It is all in the night's risks!"

He fastened the end of the cord to one of the neighbouring chimneys—fastened it firmly; then, his revolver handily stuck in his belt, Fandor seized the cord, twisted it round his legs, and let himself slowly down through the narrow opening.

It was a perilous descent! Fandor did not know whether his cord was long enough, and, lost in the darkness, with only the gleam of light from his lantern to guide him, he was naturally afraid of reaching the end of his rope unawares, and of falling into the black void beneath. But what he observed in the course of his descent excited him so much that he almost forgot the danger he was running. To those at all practised in police detective work, it was clear as daylight that men had passed this way, and recently.

"Here is a dislodged stone," muttered Fandor. "And here are scrapes and scratches—fresh … and … that mark looks like blood!"

Pushing his knees and his shoulders against the wall to support himself and stay his movements, he examined the mark. There was no doubt possible: Fandor's sharp eyes and the lantern's light had picked out a little red patch, which sullied one of the projecting stones in the chimney walls:

"This," reflected our amateur detective, "only confirms Dollon's death: if the wound which caused this mark had been made by a living body, the mark would have been larger, and there would have been others, for it must come from an abrasion of the skin made during the descent. But this blood mark has resulted from a dead body knocking against the stones of the wall: it is not a mark make by flowing blood, but by blood crushed out."

He descended a few yards further:

"Here's a find!" he cried. He had just perceived some hairs sticking to the rough surface of the stones. Again, with arched shoulders and bent knees, he supported himself against the wall, examined his discovery, left half the hairs where they were, took the rest, and carefully placed them in his pocket-book:

"The police must not be able to say that I have arranged this for their benefit," Fandor remarked. "Cost what it may, if I do not come across Dollon's corpse below, I must find out to-morrow whether these hairs resemble his."

Fandor went on descending, and first in one place, then in another, he saw on the walls of this chimney whitish patches such as might have been caused by the passage of a heavy mass or body, hanging at the end of a rope, and striking against the walls on its way down. Whilst he still believed himself to be some distance off the end of his downward journey, he felt a point of resistance beneath his feet. At first he mistook it for firm ground, much to his surprise. He was about to leave go of his cord when a remnant of prudence restrained him:

"How do I know there is not an abyss depths upon depths below me—down into the very bowels of the earth! I had better take care!"

What Fandor had taken for firm ground was nothing but an iron staple projecting from the wall. Fandor seized it, stopped for a minute or two's breathing space, ascertained, by drawing it up, that of his cord there were only a few yards remaining; but he also perceived, and with what relief, that from where he was resting, downwards the chimney was, as far as he could see by his lantern's light, marked off into regular spaces by these iron staples which are sometimes placed there for the use of chimney cleaners and masons. Fandor found them a most convenient kind of ladder. The descent now became easy, and in a short time our adventurous journalist reached the bottom of the chimney. At first he could not understand where he had got to. In the thick gloom around him his lantern's gleam of light showed him a kind of vaulted wall of massive masonry. He advanced a step or two with noiseless tread, listening, on the alert. Not a sound could he hear: he decided to expose the full light of his lantern.

The brighter light showed him that the chimney from which he was now standing some yards away ended in a kind of sewer, evidently no longer in use; and the plashing sound he had heard on the far up heights of the Palais roofs proceeded from a thin and muddy stream of water flowing in the middle of the sewer channel in the direction of the Seine. Kneeling at the foot of the chimney Fandor could distinguish marks of steps made by human feet; much deeper and very different indentations were visible also:

"Not only have men passed this way but a short while ago," he murmured, "but they were carrying a heavy burden: there are two kinds of footmarks, made by two kinds of shoes, and the heels have made much deeper marks in the soil than have the tips—yes, these men bore a heavy burden!"

Fandor was so pleased that he mentally rubbed his hands over this discovery. His quest was a success so far: he was on the track of Dollon's body! And what copy for La Capitale! Then a sad thought came to dim his delight:

"Poor, poor Elizabeth Dollon! I swore to her I would get at the truth—and a lamentable truth it is! Her brother is dead: he died in the Dépôt: he was done to death—it was no suicide!"

Whilst talking to himself Fandor was scrutinising every inch of the ground as he moved forward: there might be fresh clues:

"It's a queer kind of sewer," he went on. "This streamlet is as much mud as water, is almost stagnant. Evidently this underground sewer way is no longer used—has been abandoned!"

A horrid spectacle struck him motionless. His lantern made visible a struggling, heaving mass of rats, fighting tooth and claw, enormous rats devouring some hidden thing!

Fandor's stomach rose at the sight.

Oh, horror! Could it be Jacques Dollon's body?

Fandor snatched up a stone and flung it furiously among the unclean beasts. They fled. On the ground he could distinguish a mass, a red, formless mass, saturated with congealed blood:

"Assuredly, if the corpse has disappeared, it is there the assassins must have cut it in pieces, that they might carry it more easily, and those vile creatures are in the thick of feasting on the poor victim's remains! … Pouah!"

Fandor moved on, only to discover another pool of blood almost as large, also besieged by rats:

"Evidently I shall find nothing else," thought Fandor: "the corpse no longer exists!"

He continued his advance, determined to find out what this underground way ended in. His lantern was flickering to a finish when he arrived at the end of the sewer and found, as he had foreseen, that its opening had been cut in the steep bank of the Seine:

"That's a bit of luck! I can get out this way instead of having to climb back the way I came, up to the Palais roof and down again!"

It was still night; darkness reigned save on the far horizon, where a faint, whitish line indicated the early dawn of an April day.

Fandor was just asking himself by what gymnastic feat he could regain the quay, and he was leaning over the opening of the sewer, his body bending far forward over the inky waters of the Seine. Before he had time to turn, before he could regain his balance, a brutal blow from behind half stunned him, and a vigorous thrust precipitated his body into the Seine.