The Exploits of Juve Part 24

"Professor Ardel demonstrates scientifically the same doubts to which a rough inspection led me. How did the murderer go to work? It becomes more and more of a mystery."

"It is so much so," declared Professor Ardel, "that even by postulating the worst complications I really cannot conceive of any machine capable of thus crus.h.i.+ng a human being."

"I do not believe," declared the magistrate, "that we have any more to see here. It is plain, Juve, that this corpse cannot furnish any clues to you and me for the inquest."

"The corpse, no," cried Juve, "but there is something else."

Then, turning to the professor, he asked:

"Could you have brought to us the clothes this woman wore?"

"Quite easily."

From a bag that an attendant handed him Juve drew out the garments of the dead woman. The shoes were by a good maker, the silk stockings with open-work embroidery, the chemise and the drawers were of fine linen and the corset was well cut.

"Nothing," he cried, "not a mark on this linen nor even the name of the shop where it was bought."

He examined her petticoat, her bodice, a sort of elegant blouse, trimmed with lace, and the velvet collar which had several spots of blood upon it. He then drew a small penknife from his pocket and, kneeling on the floor, proceeded to probe the seams. Suddenly he uttered a m.u.f.fled exclamation:

"Ah! What's this?" From the lining of the bodice he drew out a thin roll of paper, crumpled, stained with blood, torn unfortunately.

"Goodness of G.o.d in whom I trust--I do not wish to die with this remorse--I do not wish to risk his killing me to destroy this secret--I write this confession, I will tell him it is deposited in a safe place--yes, I was the cause of the death of that hapless actor! Yes, Valgrand paid for the crime which Gurn committed....

Yes, I sent Valgrand to the scaffold by making him pa.s.s for Gurn--Gurn who killed Lord Beltham, Gurn, who I sometimes think must be Fantomas!"

Juve read these lines in an agitated voice, and as he came to the signature he turned pale and was obliged to stop.

"What is the matter?"

"It is signed--'Lady Beltham.'"

In order that Doctor Ardel, understanding nothing of Juve's agitation, might grasp that import of the paper just discovered he would have had to call to mind the appalling tragedy which three years before had stirred the whole world with its b.l.o.o.d.y vicissitude and mystery, one not solved to that hour.

"Lady Beltham!"

At that name Juve called up the whole blood-curdling past! He saw in fancy the English lady[A] whose husband was murdered by the Canadian Gurn, who perhaps was her lover.

And Juve, following his train of thought, pondered that he had accused this same lady of having, to save her lover, the very day the guillotine was erected on the boulevard, found means to send in his stead the innocent actor, Valgrand.

And here in connection with this affair of the Cite Frochot he found Lady Beltham involved in the puzzle of which he was so keenly seeking the key.

Juve again read the momentous paper he had just unearthed.

"By Jove, it was plain," ran his thought, "the lady, criminal though she might be, was first and foremost Fantomas' pa.s.sionate inamorata. And this paper he held in his hands was the tail end of her confession--the remains of a doc.u.ment in which in a fit of moral distress she had avowed her remorse and made known the truth."

And taking line by line the cryptic statement, Juve asked himself further:

"What do these phrases signify? How extract the whole truth from these few words? 'I do not want him to kill me in order to destroy that secret'! When Lady Beltham wrote that she was angry with Gurn. Then again what did this other doubtful expression mean?--'Gurn who I sometimes fancy may be Fantomas.' She did not know then the precise ident.i.ty of her lover! Oh, the wretch! To what depths had she sunk?"

Then as he put this query to himself, Juve shook from head to foot. Like a thunderclap he thought he grasped the truth he had followed so eagerly. What had become of Lady Beltham? Must he not come to the conclusion that this woman whose face had been crushed out of all recognition by the murderer was none other than the lady? How else explain the discovery in her bodice of the betraying doc.u.ment? Who but she could have had it in her possession? Who else could have so sedulously concealed it?

Juve read over another clause: "I will tell him it is deposited in a safe place."

Feverishly Juve took up the garments trailing on the ground, carefully explored the fabric, made a minute search.

"It is impossible," he thought, "that I should not find another doc.u.ment. The beginning of this confession--I must have it!"

All at once he stopped short in his search. "Curse it all!" And he pointed out to M. Fuselier, disguised in the lining of a loose pocket in the petticoat--a fresh hiding place, but torn and alas! empty.

This woman had split up her confession into several portions. And if she was killed it was certainly to strip her of these compromising papers.

Well, the murderer had attained his object.

"Look, Fuselier, this empty 'cache' is the proof of what I put forward, and chance alone allowed the page concealed in the collar of this bodice to fall into my hands."

Long did the detective still grope and ponder, heedless of the questions the professor and the magistrate kept asking him. He rose at last, and with a distracted gesture took the arm of M. Fuselier, and dragged him before the stone slab on which the corpse, but recently unknown, smiled a ghastly smile.

"M. Fuselier, the dead woman has spoken. She is Lady Beltham. This is the body of Lady Beltham!"

The magistrate recoiled in horror. He murmured:

"But who then can Doctor Chaleck be? Who can Loupart be?"

Juve replied without hesitation.

"Ask Fantomas the names of his accomplices!"

And leaving him and Doctor Ardel without any farewell Juve rushed from the Morgue, his features so distorted that as they pa.s.sed him people drew aside, amazed and murmuring:

"A madman or a murderer!"

XVIII

FANToMAS' VICTIM

"You understand my object, Fandor? Hitherto I have worked unaided. I wanted to unearth Fantomas and bring him to Headquarters, saying to my superiors, 'For three years you have maintained this man was dead; well, here he is! I have put the darbies on the most terrible ruffian of modern times.' Well, I must forego my little triumph. We must now work in the open. Public opinion must come to our aid."

"Then you want me to write my article?"

"Yes, and tell all the details; wind up by putting the question squarely. 'Is not Fantomas still alive?' Then sum up in the affirmative.

Now, be off. I want to read your article this evening in the _Capital_."

Fandor had just left his detective friend when old Jean, the only servant that Juve tolerated in his private quarters, entered the room.

"Don't forget the person who is waiting in the parlour, sir."

"Ah, yes, to be sure. A person who comes to see me at home, when n.o.body knows my address should be interesting. Show him in, Jean."