The Classic Mystery Collection - Arthur Conan Doyle [4251]
"Most interesting!" remarked Monsieur Dax.
Monsieur Rouletabille asked about the reticule. Neither Monsieur Stangerson nor Daddy Jacques had seen it for several days, but a few hours later we learned from Mademoiselle Stangerson herself that the reticule had either been stolen from her, or she had lost it. She further corroborated all that had passed just as her father had stated. She had gone to the poste restante and, on the 23rd of October, had received a letter which, she affirmed, contained nothing but a vulgar pleasantry, which she had immediately burned.
To return to our examination, or rather to our conversation. I must state that the Chief of the Surete having inquired of Monsieur Stangerson under what conditions his daughter had gone to Paris on the 20th of October, we learned that Monsieur Robert Darzac had accompanied her, and Darzac had not been again seen at the chateau from that time to the day after the crime had been committed. The fact that Monsieur Darzac was with her in the Grands Magasins de la Louvre when the reticule disappeared could not pass unnoticed, and, it must be said, strongly awakened our interest.
This conversation between magistrates, accused, victim, witnesses and journalist, was coming to a close when quite a theatrical sensation--an incident of a kind displeasing to Monsieur de Marquet--was produced. The officer of the gendarmes came to announce that Frederic Larsan requested to be admitted,--a request that was at once complied with. He held in his hand a heavy pair of muddy boots, which he threw on the pavement of the laboratory.
"Here," he said, "are the boots worn by the murderer. Do you recognise them, Daddy Jacques?"
Daddy Jacques bent over them and, stupefied, recognised a pair of old boots which he had, some time back, thrown into a corner of his attic. He was so taken aback that he could not hide his agitation.
Then pointing to the handkerchief in the old man's hand, Frederic Larsan said:
"That's a handkerchief astonishingly like the one found in The Yellow Room."
"I know," said Daddy Jacques, trembling, "they are almost alike."
"And then," continued Frederic Larsan, "the old Basque cap also found in The Yellow Room might at one time have been worn by Daddy Jacques himself. All this, gentlemen, proves, I think, that the murderer wished to disguise his real personality. He did it in a very clumsy way--or, at least, so it appears to us. Don't be alarmed, Daddy Jacques; we are quite sure that you were not the murderer; you never left the side of Monsieur Stangerson. But if Monsieur Stangerson had not been working that night and had gone back to the chateau after parting with his daughter, and Daddy Jacques had gone to sleep in his attic, no one would have doubted that he was the murderer. He owes his safety, therefore, to the tragedy having been enacted too soon,--the murderer, no doubt, from the silence in the laboratory, imagined that it was empty, and that the moment for action had come. The man who had been able to introduce himself here so mysteriously and to leave so many evidences against Daddy Jacques, was, there can be no doubt, familiar with the house. At what hour exactly he entered, whether in the afternoon or in the evening, I cannot say. One familiar with the proceedings and persons of this pavilion could choose his own time for entering The Yellow Room."
"He could not have entered it if anybody had been in the laboratory," said Monsieur de Marquet.
"How do we know that?" replied Larsan. "There was the dinner in the laboratory, the coming and going of the servants in attendance.