The Perfume of the Lady In Black E-Book

Gastón Leroux

• Herausgeber: Dedalus
• Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 1998

Beschreibung

A highly imaginative sequel to The Mystery of the Yellow Room

Das E-Book The Perfume of the Lady In Black wird angeboten von Dedalus und wurde mit folgenden Begriffen kategorisiert:

Leseprobe

CONTENTS

Title

Chapter I Which begins where other novels end

Chapter II Which reveals the changing moods of Joseph Rouletabille

Chapter III The perfume

Chapter IV En route

Chapter V Panic

Chapter VI The Chateau Hercule

Chapter VII Concerning some precautions taken by Joseph Rouletabille to Defend the Chateau d’Hercule Against Attack by an Enemy

Chapter VIII Concerning the history of Jean Roussel-Larsan-Ballmeyer

Chapter IX The unexpected arrival of Old Bob

Chapter X The day of the 11th

Chapter XI The attack in the Square Tower

Chapter XII The impossible body

Chapter XIII Rouletabille’s terror begins to worry me

Chapter XIV The sack

Chapter XV The sighs of the night

Chapter XVI The discovery of Australia

Chapter XVII Old Bob’s terrible adventure

Chapter XVIII Noon, King of Terrors

Chapter XIX Rouletabille closes the iron gates

Chapter XX In which it is proved that there was a body too many

Epilogue

Afterword

Copyright

CHAPTER I

Which begins where other novels end

The marriage of M. Robert Darzac and Mlle Mathilde Stangerson took place in Paris at the church of St Nicholas du Chardonnet on 6th April 1895. It was a strictly private affair. Little more than two years had passed since the events which were the subject of a previous work, too short a period to have entirely erased all memory of The Mystery of the Yellow Room. Indeed, the events which had given rise to that mystery were still so fresh in the public’s mind that the church would doubtless have been filled by a sensation-loving crowd had not the wedding been veiled in secrecy – not so very difficult in such an out-of-the-way parish. Only a few intimate friends had been invited, myself amongst them. I happened to arrive early at the church and the first thing I did was to look for Joseph Rouletabille, the young reporter who had played such an important part in that famous case. I was a little disappointed not to find him there, though I knew instinctively that he would come. While I was waiting, I entered into conversation with Maître Henri-Robert and Maître André Hesse, who, in the solemn silence of the little church, were discussing the remarkable happenings at the Versailles trial and its dramatic finale, which the marriage of two of the main protagonists brought so vividly to the minds of those of us who had been present.

As they talked, I could not help but notice the depressing appearance of the church of St Nicholas du Chardonnet – decrepit, cracked, fissured, dirty, not with the august dirt of venerable age, but with the sordid, dingy grime peculiar to the Quartiers Saint-Victor and des Bernardins. The sky there seemed farther off than elsewhere and only a very dim light filtered through the age-old layer of filth coating the stained-glass windows. It was in this sombre atmosphere, amidst surroundings more suggestive of a funeral, that the marriage of Robert Darzac and Mathilde Stangerson was about to be celebrated. I could not shake off the depressing influence of my surroundings, and it seemed to me a bad omen.

Meanwhile Maître Henri-Robert and Maître André Hesse chatted on serenely. The first admitted to the second that he had never felt easy in his mind concerning the fate of Robert Darzac, even after the fortunate outcome of the Versailles trial, not until he had received official confirmation of the death of that pitiless enemy of both bride and bridegroom – Frédéric Larsan. It will be remembered, perhaps, that some months after Darzac’s acquittal the shipwreck of the great transatlantic liner La Dordogne took place. One night, in thick fog, the liner was rammed by a three-masted sailing vessel and sank in a matter of minutes. A score or so of cabin passengers, whose staterooms happened to be on deck, only just had time to make for the boats. They were picked up the following day by fishing smacks and brought into St John’s, Newfoundland. For days afterwards, the bodies of the less fortunate passengers were washed up along the coast, and among them they found that of Larsan.

The documents on the body – despite their being carefully hidden in the lining of his clothes – left no doubt as to his identity. Mathilde Stangerson was free at last from that preposterous marriage, which, due to the laxity of the American legal system, she had contracted in secret, the result of a momentary mad impulse. The dreadful scoundrel’s real name – which will henceforth be granted a place of infamy in the annals of crime – was Ballmeyer, though he had married Mlle Stangerson under the name of Jean Roussel. Now, however, he would no longer come between her and the man who had loved her for so many years with silent and heroic devotion. I set out the details of this extraordinary affair in The Mystery of the Yellow Room, one of the most remarkable of all court cases, and which would have ended in tragedy but for the timely intervention of an unknown, eighteen-year-old reporter, Joseph Rouletabille, who, alone, was able to see in the police detective, Frédéric Larsan, no less a person than Ballmeyer himself! The accidental and, one might rightly say, providential death of this wretch was surely a fitting end to that long series of dramatic events. And it played no small part in the rapid recovery of Mlle Stangerson, whose very reason had been shaken by the mysterious and horrific events she had recently experienced.

‘In life, it pays to be an optimist,’ said Maître Henri-Robert to Maître André Hesse, who was looking anxiously around the church. ‘Everything comes out all right in the end, even Mlle Stangerson’s troubles. But why do you keep looking behind you in that nervous fashion? Are you expecting someone?’

‘Yes,’ replied Hesse. ‘I’m expecting Frédéric Larsan!’

Henri-Robert laughed as heartily as the sanctity of the place allowed, but I did not, for I felt very much as Hesse did. It is true that I was far from foreseeing the terrible experience that awaited us, but since I was, of course, quite ignorant of all that was about to take place, I cannot but be struck by the curious emotion that the mere name of Larsan evoked.

‘Hesse was only joking!’ said Maître Henri-Robert, noticing, I suppose, my anxious look.

‘I know, I know!’ I replied uneasily, glancing behind me just as Hesse had done.

The truth is that Larsan, when he was known as Ballmeyer, had been reported dead so often that it seemed unreasonable that, as Larsan, he should die only once!

‘Hello! cried Henri-Robert. ‘There’s Rouletabille. I’ll bet he’s not half as worried as you are.’

‘He looks very pale, though,’ added Hesse.

The young reporter came over and absentmindedly shook hands with us.

‘Good morning, Sainclair. Good morning, gentlemen. I’m not late, I hope.’

It seemed to me that his voice was a little unsteady, and, having greeted us, he found a dark corner in the church and knelt down, burying his face in his hands, with a gesture which somehow struck me as childlike in its simplicity. I was surprised, because, frankly, I had never thought Rouletabille much given to piety. When he looked up, I noticed that his eyes were full of tears, a fact that he made no effort to hide, being too absorbed in his prayers and in his evident grief. But what grief could thus take possession of him on this of all days? Should not he, of all men, be rejoicing at the happiness of Robert Darzac and Mathilde Stangerson, a happiness which, in great measure, they owed to him and in which, consequently, he could take a legitimate pride? Perhaps the tears were tears of happiness, but somehow I did not think so, and as it was clear that he wished to remain alone and unobserved, I did not disturb his meditations.

A moment or two later, Mathilde Stangerson herself came into the church, leaning on her father’s arm. Robert Darzac was walking behind them. How changed he was! The drama at Glandier had left indelible traces on all three. But, strange to say, Mlle Stangerson seemed more beautiful than ever. It is true that she had lost some of her statuesque magnificence, the marmoreal air of an antique divinity, and that cold beauty which had drawn all eyes to her when she was obliged to attend official functions with her father.

It would seem that the tardy expiation of a youthful folly, bringing with it, as it did, a crisis of despair, had broken the stony mask behind which lay a nature at once delicate and tender. And it was this hitherto undiscovered character which was now uppermost; it shone in her serene face and in her sad, yet happy, eyes. They suddenly clouded, however, as, looking round, she evidently failed to find the object of her search. When, however, she discovered Rouletabille behind his pillar, her eyes again became serene, and, once more completely in command of herself, she smiled divinely at the young man. And we, in turn, watching the little scene, smiled too.

‘If you ask me, she still has the look of a madwoman!’

I turned suddenly to see who had made this abominable remark. It was Brignolles, a poor, feeble sort of a chap, whom Robert Darzac had, out of the goodness of his heart, taken on as an assistant at his laboratory at the Sorbonne.

Brignolles was vaguely related to the bridegroom. He was the only one of Darzac’s relatives that I had ever heard of. Darzac’s father and mother had long since died. He came from the south originally and, if he had relatives, he had evidently lost all contact with them in order to give himself over entirely to his work, satisfying his natural need for companionship and affection in his close relationship with Professor Stangerson and his daughter.

On arriving in Paris from Provence, Brignolles had gone straight to Darzac, and, making known his relationship, or his alleged relationship, had succeeded in persuading Darzac to give him the job I mentioned. Since Darzac was at the time overworked and only just recovering from the effects of the Glandier affair and the subsequent trial, he readily welcomed any assistance. It was expected that the help thus furnished would somewhat relieve Darzac and enable him to make more rapid progress towards a complete recovery.

However, it became clear that although Darzac did work less after his relative’s arrival, his health grew steadily worse. The arrival of Brignolles had equally unfortunate consequences for the laboratory: two serious accidents took place one after the other, during ordinarily harmless experiments. The first was caused when a Geissler tube exploded at a moment when it could easily have caused Darzac grave injury, though, fortunately, it did not; the second was caused by the explosion of an oil lamp – the result of sheer stupidity – just as Darzac was leaning over it. Again, no great harm resulted, but the Professor was within an inch of losing his eyesight, indeed, his eyes were badly affected for some time afterwards.

The Glandier business had, I admit, left me in a state of mind which caused me to regard the simplest occurrences with suspicion. I happened to be present on the occasion of the second accident just referred to, and afterwards, when Brignolles offered to accompany the Professor to the surgery to have his wounds attended to, I rather brusquely told him to stay where he was.

On the way to the surgery, Darzac asked me why I had been so sharp with Brignolles. I replied that his manner displeased and irritated me, and that I felt especially annoyed that day, since I felt that the accident had been entirely due to carelessness on Brignolles’ part. Darzac asked me how I could possibly think such a thing and laughed the matter off. He took the affair in a less lighthearted manner, however, when the doctor, having examined his injuries, assured him that it was a miracle that he had not lost his sight.

Perhaps the uneasiness which Brignolles aroused in me was groundless. In any case, there were no more accidents. However irrational it may have seemed, I nevertheless held Brignolles responsible for Darzac’s slow recovery. When winter came, Darzac appeared to get worse, and we finally persuaded him to go south. The doctors advised San Remo, and Darzac wrote from there after a week’s absence to say that he was feeling remarkably better. ‘Here I can breathe,’ he wrote, ‘in Paris I suffocate.’

This letter revived my unease, and I spoke to Rouletabille about it. He, too, had remarked on the odd fact that M. Darzac was always ill when Brignolles was around and perfectly well when away from him. We were afraid that Brignolles might follow Darzac, but he showed no signs of doing so. No sooner had Darzac left Paris than Brignolles took every opportunity to be near the Stangersons. Indeed, on one occasion, he managed to see Mlle Stangerson alone, but I had already told her what my feelings were towards him, and she too had experienced the same curious feeling of repugnance. At this I greatly rejoiced.

M. Darzac remained in San Remo for four months and returned almost completely restored to health. He still had some problems with his eyes, however, and was obliged to take the very greatest care of them. Rouletabille and I decided to keep a very close watch on Brignolles and were overjoyed when we learned that the marriage was to take place immediately, and that M. Darzac intended going on a long trip abroad with his wife, away from Paris and away from Brignolles.

On his return from San Remo, M. Darzac had asked:

‘Well, how did you get on with that poor devil, Brignolles? Have you changed your mind about him?’

‘Not in the least,’ I replied.

M. Darzac chaffed me for some time, speaking in the Provençal patois which his recent journey to the South had revived. I was delighted to see the man once more cheerful and lighthearted. He was evidently very happy and that morning in church he carried himself proudly and buoyantly.

‘The boss looks very pleased with himself,’ said Brignolles, with a leer.

I drew away, disgusted, and in doing so, brushed against M. Stangerson, who had sat with his arms folded throughout the ceremony, appearing neither to see nor hear anything. Even when the service was over, he stood there motionless, and someone had to tap him on the shoulder to wake him from his reverie.

In the vestry, Hesse heaved a sigh of relief and said:

‘At last it’s over. Now I can breathe easily!’

‘Why couldn’t you breathe easily before?’ asked Maître Henri-Robert.

Then Hesse admitted that, up until the very last minute, he had feared that some catastrophe, perhaps even death itself, would intervene in the happiness of these two people.

‘You may laugh,’ he added, ‘but it’s true. I just couldn’t believe that Frédéric Larsan was really dead.’

There were about a dozen of us in the vestry at that moment. The witnesses were signing their names in the church register, while the others were quietly congratulating the newly married couple. The vestry, it should be remarked, was even darker and dingier than the church itself, and it was doubtless because of this that I did not, at first, notice that Joseph Rouletabille was not there. What could that mean? Mathilde had already asked for him, and Robert Darzac begged me to go and look for him, which I did. But I was obliged to return to the vestry saying that I had been unable to find him.

‘That’s extraordinary,’ said Darzac. ‘Are you sure you’ve looked everywhere? He’s probably deep in thought in some out-of-the-way corner.’

‘I’ve looked everywhere; I even called out. He’s not in the building.’

But Darzac was not satisfied and started scouring the church for Rouletabille. He did not find him, but he did at least discover, from an old beggar standing at the door, that a young man, presumably Rouletabille, had left in a cab some minutes previously. When Darzac told his wife this, she looked inexpressibly hurt and upset. She beckoned to me, and said:

‘You know that we leave in a couple of hours from the Gare de Lyon. Do please find our young friend and send him to me. Tell him that his extraordinary behaviour has made me very anxious.’

‘I’ll do my best.’

And I immediately set to work to hunt down Rouletabille. However, two hours later, I turned up at the Gare de Lyon empty-handed. I could find no trace of him at his house, at his office or at the Café where he was in the habit of going to pick up the day’s gossip. None of his friends could tell me where he might be. You can imagine the Darzacs’ distress. I broke the news as gently as I could, adding that Rouletabille would doubtless turn up at the station before the train left; Mathilde was not to be consoled though.

‘No, no,’ she said, with tears in her eyes, ‘he won’t come! I doubt that I shall ever see him again.’ And, with great sadness, she got into the carriage.

And then, seeing how upset the new bride was, the insufferable Brignolles could not resist saying to Hesse with evident malice:

‘You can’t tell me those aren’t the eyes of a madwoman. Robert was wrong! He should have waited! He should have waited!’

Hesse promptly silenced him, but Brignolles had already said enough to inspire us all with horror and repugnance. There was no longer any doubt in my mind that Brignolles was both malicious and jealous. He evidently could not forgive his cousin for having given him such a lowly job. Brignolles’ very appearance – long, lean and sallow-skinned – were suggestive of bitterness and meanness. The only parts of his physique that were not lean and thin were his feet and hands, which were well proportioned and shapely.

Brignolles took Hesse’s stern rebuke in very bad part and left in high dudgeon, barely bothering to say goodbye to the newly married couple. Since I saw no more of him, I assume he left the station. There were still two or three minutes before the train was due to leave, and we were hoping that Rouletabille might yet turn up, boldly pushing his way through the hurrying crowd of travellers.

What on earth could have happened to him? We were still hoping against hope, even when the porters were already closing the doors and noisily urging the last lingering passenger to jump on board. With a shrill whistle, a waving of arms and a noisy burst of steam from the engine, the train began to move slowly out. And still no Rouletabille. It made the leave-taking fall quite flat and, indeed, those who were left behind were so surprised at our friend’s failure to turn up that we quite forgot to shout a ‘goodbye’. The train had already begun to gather speed and was almost at the end of the platform when Mlle Darzac leaned out of the window and gestured to me. Running up to her carriage, I received from her hand an envelope.

‘For him,’ she said. And then, her face contorted by some dreadful fear and her voice so shaken that one could not help but be reminded, despite oneself, of Brignolles’ dreadful words, she suddenly said: ‘Au revoir, my friends – or, rather, goodbye.’

CHAPTER II

Which reveals the changing moods of Joseph Rouletabille

Returning alone from the station, I could not explain the moody sadness that seemed to weigh upon me.

Ever since the Versailles trial, with which I had been so intimately involved, I had been very close to Professor Stangerson, his daughter and Robert Darzac. I ought to have been overjoyed at a development which was to ensure the happiness of all concerned. I thought that the absence of young Rouletabille from the station was the possible cause of some, at least, of the great unease which I felt.

Rouletabille had always been treated by the Stangersons and by Darzac as a sort of knight-errant, a saviour, and this had been particularly so after Mathilde had left the convalescent home where she had undergone several months’ treatment for the nervous strain brought on by the tragedy. When she fully understood that without the shrewdness and devotion of this youngster her life and the lives of those dearest to her would have been wrecked, she became almost like a mother to him. She shared his confidences, everything he did had for her a strange interest, and she wanted to know more about Rouletabille than Rouletabille knew himself. She was especially curious, albeit discreetly, concerning his birth and childhood, on which matter the young man had always maintained a reserved and haughty silence.

Despite Mlle Stangerson’s motherly attitude towards him, Rouletabille never emerged from his shell of reserve and, instead, affected an extreme politeness which was in striking contrast to the warmth and exuberance of spirits he had otherwise always shown in his likes and dislikes.

I had more than once touched on this in my talks with Rouletabille, but he was evasive on the subject. While he always expressed the profoundest admiration and esteem for her – feelings, he declared, that he had never before felt for anyone else – as well as his readiness to make any sacrifice for her should the occasion arise, these deep feelings did not prevent the most inexplicable changes of mood. For instance, he had seemed overjoyed at receiving an invitation to spend a few days with the Stangersons at the little country place they had rented for the season at Chenneviéres, on the banks of the Marne, for the Stangersons would never again stay at Glandier. Yet, when the moment came to leave with me, he suddenly changed his mind and refused to go, even though this abrupt decision greatly wounded the Stangersons. I was obliged to go alone, leaving him in the dingy room he occupied in a little hotel on the Boulevard Saint Michel, on the corner of Rue Monsieur-le-Prince. I was naturally annoyed at the way in which on this, as on one or two other occasions, he had hurt Mlle Stangerson’s feelings without any good or apparent reason.

I remember that, one Sunday, Mlle Stangerson, unable to make head nor tail of these moods of his, decided to beard the lion in his den and, accompanied by myself, went to his lodgings. We knocked, and, in reply to a mechanical ‘Come in,’ we opened the door and discovered Rouletabille hard at work, poring over some papers. As soon as he saw us, however, he turned so pale that I seriously thought he would faint.

‘Good heavens!’ cried Mlle Stangerson, running towards him. ‘Whatever …’

But before she had time to ask any questions, before, indeed, she had time to reach the table, Rouletabille had covered the papers with a leather writing case. Mathilde had, of course, seen this movement and stopped in some surprise.

‘We’re obviously disturbing you,’ she said, in a tone of mild reproach.

‘No, I’ve finished. I’ll show you at some later date. It is a masterpiece in five acts, for which I have not yet managed to find a suitable dénouement.’

He smiled feebly and, in a moment or two, was once more quite master of himself, and began, in teasing fashion, to thank us for coming to seek him out in his solitude and finally insisted on taking us out to dinner at a little restaurant in the Latin Quarter. And what a jolly time we had of it! Rouletabille had telephoned Robert Darzac, who joined us for coffee. Darzac was at that time quite well, and the vile Brignolles had not yet made his appearance. On that beautiful, quiet summer evening near the Luxembourg Gardens we were as happy as children.

Before leaving Mlle Stangerson, a boyishly penitent Rouletabille asked her to forgive him his occasional outbursts of bad temper and moroseness. He did have a very bad temper, he declared, however hard he tried to keep it under control. Mathilde forgave him in motherly fashion, kissing him as she might have done a little child. Robert Darzac gave his forgiveness too.

Rouletabille was so affected that he could not say a word to me as I walked home with him and, at his door, he all but fell upon my neck. What a strange young man, I thought to myself. If I had only known… How I reproach myself now for my occasional harsh judgements of him during that time.

I was thinking about all this, rather sad at heart, on my way back from the Gare de Lyon, wondering where I should find Rouletabille now, in order to give him Mathilde’s letter. I thought I could do no better than to go to his hotel, and, if he wasn’t in, to leave the letter there. As I went into his hotel, I was astonished to find my manservant carrying my travelling bag.

‘What the …’

But the good man declared he knew nothing about it and that I must ask M. Rouletabille.

I went up to his rooms four steps at a time and found him calmly and carefully packing his bags, for in the small things of life, Rouletabille was most punctilious and detested anything remotely resembling Bohemianism. Until his pyjamas and hairbrushes were properly packed, there was no getting a word out of him, but when the packing was at a sufficiently advanced stage, he informed me, with great aplomb, that since I was free and since his newspaper, L’Epoque, had granted him four days’ leave, we were going to take an Easter holiday at the seaside. And in order to help me to get away more easily he had gone (at the precise moment, be it noted, when I was hunting for him all over Paris) to my house in Rue de Rivoli, and ordered my servant to get my bag ready and bring it over to Boulevard Saint Michel! Will I be forgiven when I say that I was absolutely furious?

To begin with, I did not in the least want to go to the seaside in the present cold and dreary weather and, moreover, I should have liked at least to be consulted as to whether I wished to absent myself from home for the best part of a week. The only reply Rouletabille vouchsafed me was to take my bag in one hand, his own bag in the other, push me out into the corridor and down the stairs, thence into a cab which was waiting at the door, and, finally, into a first-class compartment on the Tréport train.

He barely spoke until we got to Creil, and then it was to say:

‘Why don’t you give me the letter you’ve got for me?’

He had evidently guessed that Mlle Darzac, hurt and anxious that he had not been there to say goodbye, had written to him. Well, there was nothing very clever in that. I replied:

‘Because you don’t deserve it.’

And then I opened the floodgates of my wrath at being treated in that cavalier fashion. I regret to say that he did not take the slightest notice of my homily. He did not even try to excuse himself, which made me even angrier. Finally, of course, I had to give him the letter. He looked at it, smelled the perfume with which it was scented, and then, instead of reading it, turned, with a look of sadness in his eyes, and looked out of the window.

‘Well, why don’t you read it?’

‘I won’t read it here, I’ll read it later.’ And he pointed in the direction of Tréport.

It was already night when we arrived at Tréport, in the vilest of weathers. An icy wind from the sea swept over the promenade. The only sign of life was the Customs official, in a hooded, waterproof cloak, walking back and forth across the canal bridge. A few mournful gaslights flared and flickered in the wind, and in the distance we heard the echo of some Tréport housewife’s clogs as she hurried home. The only thing that kept us from falling into the dock on our way to the sole hotel that was still open was that we were amply warned of its presence by the stench rising from its inky black waters. As soon as we got to the hotel, Rouletabille ordered supper and a fire, and when this was done, I said:

‘Now perhaps you will deign to let me know why we have come to this miserable little hole of a place, unless it is for the specific purpose of killing us both off with either rheumatism or pleurisy.’

For Rouletabille was at that moment coughing and shivering in the most alarming fashion. As soon as he had recovered his breath, he said:

‘I will tell you why we have come here. We have come here to find the perfume of the Lady in Black.’

And that, for the moment, was all I could get out of him. The phrase, however, kept me thinking. So much so that, what with my own thoughts and with the wind thudding on the sand dunes outside the town and whistling down the narrow streets inside, I did not get much sleep that night.

As I lay awake, I thought I heard my friend pacing up and down in the room beside me. I got up and opened his door. Despite the cold and the wind, he had opened his window and was standing in front of it, blowing kisses into the black night. I shut the door and discreetly retired to bed.

The following morning, I was awoken by Rouletabille, whose face was a picture of terror. He handed me a telegram which had been sent to him from Bourg, and which, according to the instructions he had left, had been forwarded to him from Paris. Here is what it said:

Come at once. Do not lose a minute. We have abandoned our trip to the East and are going to join Stangerson in Menton. He is with the Rances, at Rochers Rouges. Please let this telegram remain a secret between us. No one must be alarmed. Pretend that you are coming to spend a holiday with us, anything you like, but for Heaven’s sake, come! Send me a telegram: Poste Restante, Menton. Hurry, hurry, hurry! Am waiting for you. Yours in desperation, Darzac.

CHAPTER III

The perfume

‘Well,’ I exclaimed, jumping out of bed, ‘I’m not in the least surprised.’

‘Didn’t you believe he was dead either?’ Rouletabille asked, with what seemed to be unwonted emotion, even allowing for the most pessimistic interpretation of M. Darzac’s message and all the possible horrors of the situation.

‘No, not at all,’ I replied. ‘It was so vital that he should appear to be dead, that he could easily afford to sacrifice a few papers in the Dordogne disaster. But what’s the matter? You look faint. Are you ill?’

Rouletabille had sunk into a large armchair. He confessed, in a trembling voice, that he had not really believed him dead until the marriage ceremony was over. The young man could not reconcile himself to the idea that Larsan, had he been living, would have allowed a ceremony to take place that gave Mathilde Stangerson to M. Darzac. Larsan had merely to show himself to prevent the marriage going ahead and, however dangerous such a step might have been, he would not have hesitated to take that risk, knowing as he did Mlle Stangerson’s religious beliefs, and the fact that she would never have consented to give herself to another man while her first husband was still living, even though she was in every way legally free to do so. It would have been in vain to argue with her concerning the annulment of her first marriage according to French law. She would never have admitted any fact but this – that a priest had made her the wife of a scoundrel for ever.

Wiping the sweat from his brow, Rouletabille continued:

‘Alas, my friend! Remember this, that in the eyes of Larsan “the vicarage has lost none of its charm nor the garden its brightness”.’

I took Rouletabille’s hand. He was feverish. I tried to calm him, but he would not listen.

‘And now he has waited until after the wedding, until only a few hours after the wedding!’ he cried. ‘For, as far as I can see – and you agree with me, don’t you, Sainclair? – M. Darzac’s telegram can only mean one thing: the other man has come back!’

‘So it seems, but M. Darzac may be mistaken.’

‘Darzac isn’t a child to be frightened by shadows. However, we must hope against hope, mustn’t we, Sainclair, that he is mistaken? No, no, it isn’t possible! It would be too dreadful, too dreadful! Oh, Sainclair, it would be too dreadful…’

I had never seen Rouletabille so upset, not even under the most trying circumstances at Glandier. He stood up and walked feverishly about the room, picking up various objects at random and putting them down again. Every now and then, he would look at me and say:

‘Too dreadful! Oh, it’s too dreadful!’

I remarked that there was no sense in working himself up to such a pitch merely on the receipt of a telegram which proved nothing, a mere telegram, the sending of which might very well have been prompted by a passing hallucination. Besides, I added, this was a time when we needed all our wits about us and he must not give way to such terror, inexcusable, surely, in a lad of his mettle.

‘Inexcusable! Really, Sainclair! Inexcusable!’

‘Look here, my dear fellow, you frighten me What’s the matter?’

‘I’ll tell you. The situation is unbearable! Why isn’t he dead?’

‘How do you know that he isn’t?’

‘Because, don’t you see, Sainclair – hush! be quiet, be quiet, Sainclair! – because, don’t you see, if he is alive, then I would rather be dead!’

‘You’re a fool, a madman! If he is alive, all the more reason why you should be alive to defend her.’

‘Yes, that’s it, Sainclair! You’re quite right. Thank you! You have spoken the only word that can make me live – “her”! Can you believe it? I was thinking only of myself – only of myself!’

Rouletabille gave a horrible laugh. I put my arm around him. I begged him to tell me why he was so frightened and why he spoke of his own death, and why he laughed in that horrible way.

‘Speak as you would to a friend, to your best friend, Rouletabille, speak! Unburden yourself. Tell me your secret. Since it chokes you, let me know what it is. Open your heart to me.’

Rouletabille put his hand on my shoulder and looked me squarely in the eyes. He stood for a long time like that, strangely absorbed, as if trying to see into the very depths of my heart, and then he said:

‘You shall know everything, Sainclair. You shall know as much as I do, and you, too, will be frightened, my friend, because you are kind, and I know that you care for me.’

Then, just as I thought he was going to give vent to his emotions, he asked me for the railway timetable.

‘We shall start at one o’clock,’ he said. ‘There is no direct line between Eu and Paris in the wintertime. It will be seven o’clock before we arrive in Paris, but we shall have plenty of time to pack our trunks and catch the nine o’clock train for Marseilles and Menton.’

He was carrying me off to Menton, as he had carried me off to Tréport. He knew that under our present circumstances I would refuse him nothing. Moreover, he was in such an excited state that I would have gone with him even if he had not asked me to. Besides, it was holiday time, and my business at the law courts did not require my immediate attention.

‘So we’re off to Eu?’ I said.

‘Yes. We shall board a train there. It’s only about half-an-hour’s drive from Tréport to Eu.’

‘We haven’t had much of a stay here,’ I remarked.

‘Enough, I hope,’ he said. ‘Long enough to serve the purpose for which I came, alas!’

I thought of the perfume of the Lady in Black, and said no more. Had he not promised me that I would know everything? He led me along the pier. The wind was still blowing strongly, and we had to take refuge behind the light-house. He stood for a long time plunged in thought, looking out to sea, his eyes tight shut.

‘This was the end,’ he said at last. ‘I saw her for the last time here.’ He glanced towards the stone bench. ‘We sat there. She pressed me to her heart. I was a little fellow, nine years old. She told me to stay there, on the bench, and then she went away, and I never saw her again. It was at night – a soft summer night – the prizes had all been given out. Oh, she wasn’t there when that happened, but I knew she would come in the evening! The sky was all stars, and it was so bright, I hoped to be able to see her face. But she drew down her veil and sighed. And then she went away. I never saw her again.’

‘And you?’

‘Me?’

‘Yes. What did you do? Did you stay on the bench after that?’

‘I wanted to, but the coachman came for me, and I went back.’

‘Where?’

‘Why, to the school, of course!’

‘Is there a school at Tréport?’

‘No, but there’s one at Eu. I went back to the school at Eu.’ He signed to me to follow him. ‘We’re going there now,’ he said. ‘How can I tell her? There have been too many storms.’

Half an hour later we were at Eu. At the foot of Rue des Marronniers, our carriage rolled noisily across the cobbles of the cold, deserted square, while our coachman, cracking his whip with all his might, stirred up echoes in the slumbering little town with that strident music.

Over the roof-tops came the sound of a clock striking – the school clock, Rouletabille told me. Then all was still. Horse and carriage had come to a halt in the square. The cabman had disappeared into a wine-shop. We passed the chilly shadow of the Gothic church on one side of the square.

Rouletabille glanced at the chateau, with its pink bricks surmounted by vast roofs. The façade looked drab, as though it mourned the fate of its exiled princes. He cast a melancholy eye over the square town hall. He looked at the silent houses, at the Café de Paris (where the officers were wont to meet), at the barber’s shop and the bookseller’s. Was it not here that he had bought his first books paid for by the Lady in Black?

‘Nothing has changed!’ he whispered.

An old dog lay stretched out upon the bookseller’s door-step, resting its lazy head on frozen paws.

‘It’s Cham!’ cried Rouletabille. ‘I recognise him! It’s Cham, dear old Cham!’ And he called: ‘Cham! Cham! Here, boy!’

The dog got up and moved towards the voice calling him. He took a few halting steps, rubbed against our legs and returned to his doorstep, indifferent.

‘Oh !’ said Rouletabille. ‘It’s Cham, right enough, but he doesn’t recognise me any more.’

We went down a narrow, sloping alley, paved with sharp cobbles. He held me by the hand, and I could again feel how feverish he was. Presently, we stopped at a small Jesuit building with a stone porch.

Rouletabille pushed open a small, low door.

‘The school chapel,’ he whispered.

No one was there.

We passed through rapidly, and Rouletabille drew aside a small screen and looked out.

‘Good!’ he went on. ‘All’s well. If we go this way we shall get into the school without the porter seeing us. He would certainly have recognised me.’

‘What if he did?’

But just as I spoke, a man passed before the screen, bare-headed, with a bunch of keys in his hand, and Rouletabille drew back into the shadows.

‘It’s M. Simon. How he’s aged! He’s lost all his hair. He’s going to sweep out the small boys’ study. Everybody is at lessons now. We shall be quite free. There is nobody left but Madame Simon in the lodge, unless she is dead. Anyway, she can’t see us here. But, wait a moment, here comes M. Simon back again.’

Why was Rouletabille so anxious not to be seen? Why? I obviously knew nothing about this boy whom I thought I knew so well. Every hour I spent with him brought me some fresh surprise.

While we were waiting for M. Simon to go, Rouletabille and I succeeded, unperceived, in moving away from the screen. Hidden in the corner of a little garden behind some shrubs, we were able, by leaning over the brick wall, to look down upon the broad yard and the buildings of the school below. Rouletabille clung to my arm as if he were afraid of falling.

‘Oh, God!’ he exclaimed in a hoarse voice. ‘Everything is different! They have torn down the old study hall where I found the knife, and the playground where I hid the money has been moved. But the chapel walls are still there. Look, Sainclair, lean over. The door that leads to the underground part of the chapel belongs to the small boys’ classroom. How many times I went through that door when I was a little fellow! But never, never did I go through that door so joyfully as when M. Simon came to fetch me to the parlour where the Lady in Black was waiting for me. I only hope they’ve left the parlour untouched!’ He glanced back, and then thrust his head forward. ‘No, no! Look! There’s the parlour, just beside the arch, the first door on the right. That is where she used to come to me … There….We shall go there presently, when M. Simon is gone.’

His teeth were chattering.

‘I’m crazy,’ he said. ‘I think I’m going mad. What can you expect? I can’t help it, can I? The very idea that I’m going to see that parlour again, the parlour where she used to wait for me … Then I lived solely in the hope of seeing her, and when she was gone, though I promised her I would be sensible, such an overwhelming sense of depression would sweep over me that they feared for my health. The only way they could bring me back to my senses was to declare that if I fell ill I wouldn’t see her again. Until I did see her again, the memory of her presence and of her perfume was continually with me. As I had never seen her dear face distinctly, I used to try to absorb her perfume while she held me in her arms, and I lived more with the memory of that than with her image.

During the days following her visit, I used to escape when playtime came, and go into the parlour, and when it was empty, like today, I’d take long, deep breaths of the air she had breathed and I’d go away again, my heart steeped in her perfume. It was the most delicate, the subtlest and certainly the sweetest, most natural perfume in the world, and I was convinced that I should never know it again until the day I told you about, Sainclair, do you remember? The day of the reception at the Elysée Palace?’

‘The day, my friend, that you met Mathilde Stangerson.’

‘Yes,’ he answered, in a trembling voice.

Oh, if I had only known then that Professor Stangerson’s daughter, at the time of her first marriage in America, had had a child, a son who, had he been living, would be of Rouletabille’s age. Perhaps after that journey to Eu, I would, at last, have understood his feelings, his sorrow, his strange manner when he whispered the name of Mathilde Stangerson in the school, which the Lady in Black used to visit so often.

There was a moment’s silence, which I dared not break.

‘Did you ever find out why the Lady in Black never came back?’

‘Oh,’ said Rouletabille, ‘I’m sure the Lady in Black did come back! But I was not here!’

‘Who took you away?’

‘Nobody. I ran away.’

‘Why? Did you run away to look for her?’

‘No, no! I fled from her! I tell you I fled, Sainclair. But she came back. I’m sure she came back.’

‘She must have been in despair when she could not find you.’

Rouletabille raised his arms heavenwards and shook his head.

‘How do I know? Can anyone know? Oh, I am wretched! Hush, my friend, hush! M. Simon – there – he’s going at last. Let’s hurry to the parlour!’

We were there in three strides. It was a large, plain room, with white curtains at the windows. The furniture consisted of six cane-bottomed chairs, a mirror over the fireplace and a clock. It was somewhat dark.

As we went in, Rouletabille respectfully, piously removed his hat, as anyone might do on entering a sacred building. His face was flushed and he advanced hesitantly, nervously fingering his tweed cap. He turned towards me and spoke in an undertone, more softly even than he had done in the chapel.

‘Oh, Sainclair, this is the parlour! Here, hold my hand, it’s burning. I’m blushing, am I not? I always did when I came in here knowing that I should find her. I would feel as if I had been running, I’d be out of breath. I couldn’t wait, you see? Oh, my heart is thumping as it did when I was a little child! There, do you see? I used to get as far as that, by the door, and then I would stop, ashamed. But I could see her black shape in the corner. She used to hold her arms out to me in silence, and I would throw myself into them, and we would hug each other and cry. Oh, it felt good! She was my mother, Sainclair. She didn’t say so. On the contrary, she told me that my mother was dead and that she was her friend. But since she asked me to call her “mother” and cried when I kissed her, I knew perfectly well that she was my mother. She always sat there, in that dark corner, and always arrived late in the afternoon, before they had turned on the lights in the parlour. She used to put a parcel, tied up with pink string, on the window-sill. It was a bun. I love buns, Sainclair!’

When he had finished speaking, Rouletabille could no longer control his feelings. He leaned against the mantelpiece and wept bitterly. When he was a little calmer, he looked up at me, smiling sadly. Then he sat down, utterly exhausted. I was careful not to speak to him. I knew he was not talking to me, but to himself.