The Darrow Enigma Part 20

Here Maitland whispered to Jenkins, who in turn spoke to the sheriff or some other officer of the court. I would have given a good deal just then to have been able to translate M. G.o.din's thoughts. His face was a study. Maitland immediately resumed:

"It has been positively stated by M. Latour that he gambled with Mr.

Darrow on Decatur Street between the 1st and 15th day of March. This is false. In the first place it can be shown that while Mr. Darrow occasionally played cards at his own home, he never gambled, uniformly refusing to play for even the smallest stake. Furthermore, Mr. Darrow's physician will testify that Mr. Darrow was confined to his bed from the 25th day of February to the 18th day of March, and that he visited him during that time at least once, and oftener twice, every day.

"Again; M. Latour a.s.serts that he never saw M. G.o.din till the day of his arrest, and M. G.o.din a.s.serts that he never entered M. Latour's rooms until that day. I have a photograph and here a phonographic record. The picture shows M. Latour's rooms with that gentleman and M. G.o.din sitting at a table and evidently engaged in earnest conversation. This cylinder is a record of a very interesting portion of that conversation--M. G.o.din will please not leave the room!"

This last was said as M. G.o.din started toward the door. The officer to whom Jenkins had recently spoken laid his hand upon the detective and detained him. "We may need M. G.o.din," Maitland continued, "to explain things to us.

"I invite your attention to the fact that M. G.o.din has testified that he was a.s.sisted in his search for Mr. Darrow's murderer by certain library slips which he saw M. Latour make out in two different names. He has also testified that he did not know even the names of any of the books procured on these slips, and that one of them, ent.i.tled 'Poisons, Their Effects and Detection,' he not only never read, but never even heard of. I shall show you that all of these books were procured with M. G.o.din's knowledge, and that most of them were read by him. I shall prove to you beyond a doubt that he has not only heard of this particular work on poisons, but that he has read it and placed his unmistakable signature on page 469 thereof beside the identical paragraph which suggested to Mr. Darrow's murderer the manner of his a.s.sa.s.sination!"

M. G.o.din started as if he had been stabbed, but quickly regained his self-control as Maitland continued: "Here is the volume in question. You will please note the thumb-mark in the margin of page 469. There is but one thumb in the world that could have made that mark, and that is the thumb you have seen register itself upon this letter. It is also the thumb that made this paint s.m.u.tch upon this slip of gla.s.s."

All eyes were turned upon M. G.o.din. He was very pale, yet his jaw was firmly set and something akin to a defiant smile played about his handsome mouth. To say that the audience was amazed is to convey no adequate idea of their real condition. We felt prepared for anything. I almost feared lest some sudden turn in the case might cast suspicion upon myself, or even Maitland. Without apparently noticing M. G.o.din's discomfiture, George continued:

"M. G.o.din has testified that he sometimes plays cards, but only for a small stake--just enough, he says, to make it interesting. I shall show you that he is a professional gambler as well as a detective.

"The morning after the murder was committed I made a most careful examination of the premises, particularly of the grounds near the eastern window. As the result of my observations, I informed Miss Darrow that I had reason to believe that her father had been murdered by a person who had some good motive for concealing his footprints, and who also had a halting gait. The weight of this person I was able to estimate at not far from one hundred and thirty-five pounds, and his height as about five feet and five inches. I also stated it as my opinion that the person who did the deed had the habit of biting his finger nails, and a particular reason for sparing the nail of the little finger and permitting it to grow to an abnormal length. This was not guesswork on my part, for in the soft soil beneath the eastern window I found a perfect impression of a closed hand. Here is the cast of that hand. Look well at it. Notice the wart upon the upper joint of the thumb, and the crook in the third finger where it has evidently been broken. M. G.o.din says he never entered the yard of the Darrow estate, except on the night of the murder in company with Messrs. Osborne and Allen, and that then he merely pa.s.sed up and down the front walk on his way to and from the house, yet the paint-mark on this slip of gla.s.s was made by his thumb, and the gla.s.s itself was cut by me from the eastern window of the Darrow house--the window through which the murder was committed. This plaster cast was taken from an impression in the soil beneath the same window on the morning after the murder. The hand is the hand of M. G.o.din. You will note that one of this gentleman's feet is deformed and that he habitually halts in his walk."

We all glanced at M. G.o.din to verify these a.s.sertions, but that gentleman folded his arms in a way to conceal his hands and thrust his feet out of sight beneath the chair in front of him, while he smiled at us with the utmost apparent good nature. He would be game to the last, there was no doubt of that.

Maitland recalled our attention by saying:

"Officer, you will please arrest M. G.o.din!"

An excited whisper was heard from every corner, and many were the half-audible comments that were broken off by the imperative fall of the crier's gavel. So tense had been the strain that it was some time before complete order could be restored. When it was again quiet Maitland continued:

"Your Honour and Gentlemen of the Jury: We will rest our case here for to-day. To-morrow, or rather on Monday, we shall show the strange influence which M. G.o.din exercised over M. Latour, as well as M. Latour's reasons for his confession. We shall endeavour to make clear to you how M. Latour was actually led to believe he had murdered John Darrow, and how he was bribed to confess a crime committed by another. Of the hypnotic power of M. G.o.din over M.

Latour I have indisputable proof, though we shall see that M. G.o.din by no means relied wholly upon this power. We shall show you also that sufficient time elapsed to enable M. G.o.din, by great skill and celerity, to make away with the evidences of his guilt in time to enable him to be present with Messrs. Osborne and Allen at the examination. In short, we shall unravel before you a crime which, for cleverness of conception and adroitness of execution, has never been equalled in the history of this community."

Maitland having thus concluded his remarks by dropping into a courteous plural in deference to Mr. Jenkins, the court adjourned until Monday, and I left Gwen in Maitland's charge while I hurried home, fearful lest I should not be the first to bring to Jeannette the glad news of her father's innocence, for I had not the slightest doubt of Maitland's ability to prove conclusively all he had undertaken.

I need not describe to you my interview with Jeannette. There are things concerning it which, even at this late day, when their roseate hue glows but dimly in the blue retrospect of the past,--it would seem sacrilege for me to mention to another. Believe me, I am perfectly aware of your inquisitive nature, and I know that this omission may nettle you. Charge it all up, then, to the perversity of a bachelor in the throes of his first, last, and only love experience. You must see that such things cannot be conveyed to another with anything like their real significance. Were I to say I was carried beyond myself by her protestations of grat.i.tude until, in a delirium of joy, I seized her in my arms and covered her with kisses, do you for a moment fancy you could appreciate my feelings?

Do you imagine that the little tingle of sympathy which you might experience were I to say that, instead of pus.h.i.+ng me from her, I felt her clasp tighten about me,--would tell you anything of the great torrent of hot blood that deluged my heart as she lay there in my arms, quivering ecstatically at every kiss? No! a thousand times no! Therefore have I thought best to say nothing about it.

Our love can keep its own secrets.--But alas! this was long ago, and as I sit here alone writing this to you, I cannot but wonder, with a heavy sense of ever-present longing, where on this great earth Jeannette--'my Jeannette,' I have learned to call her--is now. You see a bachelor's love-affair is a serious thing, and years cannot always efface it. But to return to the past:

Jeannette, I think, was not more pleased than Gwen at the turn affairs had taken. Indeed, so exuberant was Gwen in her quiet way that I marvelled much at the change in her, so much, indeed, that finally I determined to question Alice about it.

"I can understand," I said to her, "why Gwen, on account of her sympathy and love for Jeannette, should be glad that M. Latour is likely to be acquitted. I can also appreciate the distaste she may have felt at the prospect of having to deal with M. G.o.din under the terms of her father's will; but even both of these considerations seem to me insufficient to account for her present almost ecstatic condition. There is an immediateness to her joy which could hardly result from mere release from a future disagreeable possibility.

How do you account for it, sis?" Alice's answer was somewhat enigmatical and didn't give me the information I sought. "Ned,"

she replied," I'll pay for the tickets to the first circus that comes here, just to see if you can find the trunks on the elephants."

Do my best, I couldn't make her enlighten me any further, for, to every question, she replied with a most provoking laugh.

Maitland called and spent most of the next day, which was Sunday, with us, and we all talked matters over. He did not seem either to share or understand Gwen's exuberance of spirits, albeit one could easily observe that he had a measure of that satisfaction which always comes from success. More than once I saw him glance questioningly at Gwen with a look which said plainly enough: "What is the meaning of this remarkable change? Why should it so matter to her whether M. Latour's or M. G.o.din's death avenges her father's murder?" When he left us at night I could see he had not answered that question to his own satisfaction.

CHAPTER III

The Devil throws double sixes when he turns genius heliward.

The next morning after the events last narrated I was utterly dumfounded by an article which met my gaze the instant I took up my paper. It was several moments before I sufficiently recovered my faculties to read it aloud to Gwen, Alice, and Jeannette, all of whom had noticed my excitement, and were waiting with such patience as they could command. I read the following article through from beginning to end without pause or comment:

M. G.o.din Antic.i.p.ates the Law.--The Real Murderer of John Darrow Writes His Confession and Then Suicides in His Cell.--Contrived to Mix His Own Poison Under the Very Nose of His Jailer!-- The Dorchester Mystery Solved at Last.--Full Description of the Life of One of the Cleverest Criminals of the Century.

At 4.30 this morning M. G.o.din was found dead in his cell, No. 26, at Charles Street Jail. The manner of his death might still be a mystery had he not left a written confession of his crime and the summary manner of his taking off. This was written yesterday afternoon and evening, M. G.o.din being permitted to have a light on the ground that he had important legal doc.u.ments to prepare for use on the morrow. We give below the confession in full.

"I am beaten at a game in which I did my own shuffling. I never believe in trying to bluff a full hand. Had I had but ordinary detectives with whom to deal, I make bold to say I should have come off rich and triumphant. I had no means of knowing that I was to play with a chemist who would use against me the latest scientific implements of criminal warfare. It is, therefore, to the extraordinary means used for my detection that I impute my defeat, rather than to any bungling of my own. This is a grim consolation, but it is still a consolation, for I have always prided myself upon being an artist in my line. As I propose to put myself beyond the reach of further cross-examination, I take this opportunity to make a last statement of such things as I care to have known. After this is finished I shall sup on acetate of lead and bid good-night to the expectant public.

"Lest some may marvel how I came by this poison, and even lay suspicions upon my jailers, let me explain that there is a small piece of lead water-pipe crossing the west angle of my room. This being Sunday, I was permitted to have beans and brown bread for breakfast. I asked for a little vinegar for my beans, and a small cruet was brought to me. I had no difficulty in secreting a considerable quant.i.ty of the vinegar in order that I might, when occasion served, apply it to the lead pipe. This I have done, and have now by me enough acetate of lead to kill a dozen men. This form of death will not be particularly pleasant, I am aware, but I prefer it to its only alternative. So much for that.

"I was horn in Ma.r.s.eilles, and my right name is Jean Fouchet. My father intended me for the priesthood, and gave me a good college education in Paris. His hopes, however, were destined to disappointment. In college I formed the habit of gambling, and a year after my graduation found me at Monte Carlo. While there I quarrelled with a gambling accomplice and ended by killing him.

This made my stay in France dangerous for me, and I took the first opportunity which presented itself to embark for America.

"Familiarity with criminals had made me familiar with crime, and I added the occupation of detective to my profession of gambling.

These two avocations had now become my sole means of support, and I plied my trades in New York, Boston, and Philadelphia for several years, during which time I became a naturalised citizen of the United States.

"When the Cuban rebellion broke out I could not restrain my longing for adventure, and joined a filibustering expedition sailing from New York. I did this from no love I bore the Cuban cause, but merely for the excitement it promised. While handling a heavy shot during my first engagement I accidentally dropped it upon my left foot, crus.h.i.+ng that member so badly that it has never regained its shape.

This deformity has rendered it impossible for me to conceal my ident.i.ty. Three months after this accident I was taken prisoner by the Spanish and s.h.i.+pped to Spain as a political malefactor. A farce of a trial was granted to me, not to see whether or not I was guilty, but simply to determine between the dungeon and the garrote. It would have been far better for me had I been sentenced to the latter instead of the former.

"As a political offender I was doomed to imprisonment at Ceuta, an old Moorish seaport town in Morocco, opposite Gibraltar and upon the side of the ancient mountain Abyla. This mountain forms one of the 'Pillars of Hercules,' the Rock of Gibraltar being the other.

It is almost impregnable, and is used by Spain as Siberia is used by Russia, only it is far, far more horrible. The town was built by the Moors in 945, and nowhere else on earth are there to be found an equal number of devices for the torture of human beings. If anyone thinks the horrors of the Inquisition are no longer perpetrated let him get sent to Ceuta: I have good cause to believe that the Inquisition itself is far from dead in Spain. Alas for the person who is sent to Ceuta! The town is small, and, to guard against possible attack, the Moors constructed a chain of fortresses around it. It is in the black cellars of these disintegrating fortresses that the dungeons are located. They are in tiers to the depth of fifty or sixty feet, and are hewn out of the solid rock.

They are reached through narrow openings in the stone floors of the fortresses, and when one of these horrible holes is opened the foul odor of filth and decomposition is utterly overpowering. Some of these dungeons contain as many as thirty or forty men. I was placed in a cell reserved for solitary confinement. I have never been a man who regarded life seriously, or feared to risk it upon sufficient occasion, but my heart froze within me when the horror of my situation was revealed to me. A stone box perhaps eight feet square --as I lay upon the floor I could touch its opposite sides with my hands and feet--had been prepared for my entrance by cutting a slit in one of its walls just large enough for the pa.s.sage of my body.

Through this narrow opening I was dropped into the total darkness within. A blacksmith followed and welded my fetters, for locks and keys are never used. A chain having a heavy weight pendant from it was riveted to my ankle, and an iron band was similarly fastened to my waist. This band was fastened by a chain to an iron ring deeply sunk in the solid rock. When these horrible preparations were completed the blacksmith left me and a mason bricked up the slit through which I had entered, leaving only a hand-breadth of s.p.a.ce for air and the thrusting through of such sc.r.a.ps of food as were to be allowed me. Language is powerless to describe the feelings of a man in such a position. He realises that his only hope is in disease --disease bred of the darkness, the dampness, the starvation, and the horrible filth. He says to himself: 'How long, O G.o.d! how long?'--For hours I remained p.r.o.ne and inert--how long I do not know; night and day are all one in the dungeons of Ceuta. Then I began to think. Could I escape? I felt that all power of thought, all cleverness would soon desert me, and I said to myself: 'If anything is to be done, it must be done at once.' I knew not then what long-drawn horrors a mortal could endure. Whenever I attempted to walk the iron ma.s.s fastened to my leg would 'bring me up short,'

often, in my early forgetfulness of it, throwing me p.r.o.ne upon my face. After a little I learned to move with a halting gait, striding out with the free limb and pausing to pull my burden after me with the other. This habit, learned in the squalor and darkness of the dungeon h.e.l.ls of Ceuta, I have never been able to unlearn.

"It was many days before I could see how anything short of a miracle could enable me to escape. I tried to calmly reason it all out, and every time came to the same horrible conclusion, viz.: I must rot there unless help came to me from without. This seemed impossible, and all the horrors of a lingering death stared me in the face.

Every two or three days one of the jailers would come to the slit in the masonry and leave there a dish of water and a few crusts of bread. I tried on one occasion to speak with him, but he only laughed in my face and turned away. Finally I hit upon a plan which seemed to offer the only possible means of escape. In my college days I was well acquainted with M. Charcot, and even a.s.sisted in some of his earlier hypnotic experiments. The subject interested me, and I followed it closely till I became something of an adept myself. There were in those days but few people I could not mesmerise, provided sufficient opportunity were allowed me for hypnotic suggestion. I determined to see if any of this old power still remained with me, and, if so, to strive to render my jailer subservient to my will. But how should I keep him within ear-shot long enough to work upon him? Clearly all appeals to pity were useless. I must excite his greed, nothing else would reach him.

This was not an easy thing to do without a sou in my possession, yet I did it. When I heard his step I crawled to the opening in the wall and mumbled in a crazy sort of a way about a hidden treasure. At the word 'treasure' I saw him pause and listen, but I pretended not to be aware of his presence and rambled on, in a loose, disjointed fas.h.i.+on, about piracies committed by me and the great amount of booty I had secreted. My plan worked perfectly.

The jailer came to the aperture in the wall and called me to him.

Muttering incoherently, I obeyed. He asked me what offence brought me there, and I, with a good deal of intentional misunderstanding, told him I was a pirate and a smuggler. He asked me where the treasure I had been talking about was hidden. My reply,--I remember the exact words in which I couched it,--made him mine completely. I said: 'We buried it near Fez-- Treasure? I don't know anything about any treasure.'

"To all the many questions he then asked me I returned only incoherent replies, but I was careful to be again raving about buried riches upon the next visit. In this way I kept him by me long enough to influence him, and in less than a month he was completely subject to my will. I tested my power over him in divers ways. Any delicacy I wished I compelled him to bring me. In this way I was enabled to regain a portion of my lost strength. When I concluded the time had come for me to make good my escape, I caused him to come to my cell at midnight and remove the bricks from the slit while I put on the disguise he had brought me. Once out of my stone tomb we carefully walled it up again and then departed to find my imaginary hidden treasure. We made our way without trouble to Algiers, for my companion had money, and sailed thence via Gibraltar for England. During the trip my companion jumped overboard and was drowned in the Bay of Biscay. Thus I was completely freed from Ceuta and its terrible pest-hole.

"From England I sailed to New York, reaching America penniless and in ill health. Things not going to my liking in New York, I came to Boston and took up my old callings of gambler and detective. It was at this time that I saw John Darrow's curious notice in the newspaper, offering, in the event of his murder, a most liberal reward to anyone who would bring the a.s.sa.s.sin to justice.

"Mon Dieu! How I needed money. I would have bartered my soul for a t.i.the of that amount. It was the old, old story, only new in Eden.

Ah! but how I loved her! She must have money, money, always money!

That was ever her cry. When I could not supply it she sought it of others, and this drove me mad. If, I said to myself, I could only get this reward! This was something really worth working for, and if I could but get it, she should be mine only. I at once set to work upon the problem.

"It was not an easy thing to solve. I might be able to hire a man to do the deed for me, but he would hardly be willing to hang for it without disclosing my part in the transaction. It was at this time that I first met M. Latour on Decatur Street. He at once impressed me as being just the man I wanted, and I began to gradually subdue his will. In this circ.u.mstances greatly aided me. When I found him he was in very poor health and without any means of sustenance. His daughter was able to earn a little, but not nearly enough to keep the wolf from the door. Add to this that he had a cancer, which several physicians had a.s.sured him would prove fatal within a year, that he was afflicted with an almost insane fear that his daughter would come to want after his death, and you have before you the conditions which determined my course. My first thought was to influence him to do the deed himself, but, recalling the researches of M. Charcot in these matters, I came to the conclusion that such a course would be almost certain to lead to detection, since a hypnotic subject can only be depended upon so long as the conditions under which he acts are precisely those which have been suggested to him. Any unforeseen variations in these conditions and he fails to act, exposes everything, and the whole carefully planned structure falls to the ground. When, therefore, the time came which I had set for the deed, I found it possible to drug M.

Latour, abduct him from his home, and to keep him confined and unconscious until I had killed Mr. Darrow in a manner I will describe in due course. As soon as I had committed the murder and established what I fondly believed would be a perfect alibi in my attendance at the examination, I secretly conveyed the still unconscious M. Latour to his rooms and awaited his return to consciousness. I then asked him how he came in such a state and what he was doing in Dorchester.

He was, of course, ignorant of everything. Little by little I worked upon him till he came to believe himself guilty of John Darrow's murder.

"I had availed myself of his interest in the subject of cancer to get him to the library. It is one of my maxims never to take an avoidable risk, for which reason I made Latour apply for the books I wanted, as well as for the medical works he desired to peruse.

As he was ambidextrous, I suggested the use of the two names Weltz and Rizzi, the former to be written with his right and the latter with his left hand. I was actuated in all this by two motives.

First, I was manufacturing evidence which might stand me in good stead later, as well as minimising somewhat my own risk in getting the information I needed; and, secondly, I was getting Latour into a good atmosphere for my hypnotic influence. Not a word of all these matters did he relate to his daughter, whom he loves with a devotion I have never seen equalled. Indeed, it was this very affection that made my plan feasible. When I had convinced him he was a murderer I showed him Mr. Darrow's curious advertis.e.m.e.nt offering a reward, should he be a.s.sa.s.sinated, to anyone bringing about the conviction of his a.s.sailant.

"'In a year,' I said to him, 'you will die of cancer, if your crime be not previously discovered and punished. Your daughter will then be penniless. How much better for you to permit me in a few months to accuse you of the murder. You then confess; I claim and secure the reward and secretly divide with you; you are sentenced; but as considerable time will transpire between this and the date set for your execution, you in the meantime will die of cancer, leaving Jeannette well provided for.'