THE GRIM CHARMER.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVI, Issue 20420, 23 November 1929, Page 2 (Supplement)

THE GRIM CHARMER.

LANDRU AND HIS DEEDS.

MURDER AS AN ADJUNCT,

NOTEBOOK'S EVIDENCE,

BODIES- DISPOSED OF BY FIRE. In 1879 Desire Landru was born. He came of eminently respectable parents, and during the earlier part of his life his behaviour was admirable. He was a clever boy and did well at school, and thereafter he was engaged as a clerk in various' business offices, lie was, how-

ever, an unusual young man in many ■ways, and the first indication of those amorous propensities which later were to make notorious, was an intrigue with bis own cousin, whom he subsequently married.

This was in 1391, and it appears to have inaugurated \an entirely new phase in Landru's psychology. Where formerly lie had (been a docile and respectable member of society, having even for some time been --engaged in service in a religious institution, he now appears to have manifested a marked degree of instability afid ail anti-social tendency from which lie neyer apparently recovered. It is therefore extremely interesting to observe that his father committed suicide, and it. is reasonable to suppose that it was fl - om that branch of his family that lie derived those mental qualities ■which, in ttie end, made him that borderline type of individual which he undoubtedly became. Landru was tall and extremely gaunt, "with a marked degree of premature baldness, which with his high-domed head and deeply sunken eyes, his large hook-jd nose and sallow skin, gave him an appearance which, though undeniably striking, •was too reminiscent of a bird of prey to bo entii;elv satisfactory to the observer. He had a flowing beard and moustache of an almost brick-red colour, and of this adornment he -was extremely vain—as, indeed, he was of his personality as a whole. - ' He had that suave and insinuating typo of mind which is traditionally associated ■with the swindler, and ho bears a very marked resemblance to Mr. Smith, of lbidts in Uio Bath fame, in so far as he probably • undertook murder as an unavoidable adjunct to his swindle. Middle-aged Dupes.

Like Smith, also, the unusual animalism of his make-up prompted him to select, for purposes of his swindles, members of the opposite sex: and, as a further resemblance to his famous prototype, lie was meticulously businesslike in , lis methods. Before 1914 Landru served a number >f terms of- imprisonment, but on the ou break of the war he disappeared, and I jgan that more carefully phase of his' business which distinguished his later years. Tho broad lines of his enterprise had never varied,, and consisted of the extremely simple procedure of securing some credulous middle-aged lady or other, making love to her, relieving her of her possessions,- and departing. The sole source of error in this entirely admirable scheme lay in the irritating tendency on the part of some of these ladies to follow up the transaction with complaints tc the police, which on several occasions were most inconvenient lor

Landru. It was clear, then, that, with quite a trifling alteration in his technique, he could obviate entirely this source of inand between 1914 and 1915, bv means of ail advertisement in a matrimonial paper, he had business associations of tlie most gratifying character >vith a large number of women. In 1915 Landru entered into negotiations with a woman named Mmc. Col]omb, who was engaged as a typist in ..Paris—. She was a ..widow and had saved "a little' money, but she was 44 years of age at the time and was clearly of that type who resented living alone. She had already met a man who was prepared to assist her in this matter of company, but, it had become increasingly clear to her that her friend was becoming a little bored and was likely to leave her soon. When, therefore, Landru's advertisement caught,ber eye it appeared to be just ■what she wanted. She met him by appointment and was enraptured. Chance Identity.

Landru was tender and in every way --charming; and he appeared, indeed, to be • the only individual who, in the opinion of Mme. tollomb, .had ever adequately appreciated her. She was quite prepared, at his invitation, to accompany him to a 'little villa at Gambais, outside Paris, and live with him. A short time after she had been installed in the villa she unaccountably disappeared, as also, curiously enough, • did her furniture and savings, which she had handed over to her protector. Her relatives called in the police, and it so happened that another young lady who had set up house in similar circumstances in the neighbourhood had also vanished; and her friends, in turn, wero worrying the police with their inquiries. Needless to say, neither of these ladies knew the man of their choico by the name of Landru, but the coincidence of their cases impressed the police. 'Then, by the merest possible chance, Landru was dramatically identified. A sister of one of the missing women saw the man she was looking for enter a shop in Paris'. Ho had a stylishly dressed young "woman on his arm, and she heard him 'order a dinner-set to be sent to his ad'dress. She informed the police, and Landru was discovered at the address he ] had given, living with his stylish corn- • panion as man and wife. i

Charming Young Lady. The lady, this time, was quite voting v find charming, and she gave her occupation as a " lyric artist." which, as a synonym for a shop assistant, has undoubtedly much to commend it. Landru, from (he first, protested his innocence, but as soon as the police identified him as an old criminal, and-,,began to question him as to his life at the villa, he instantly adopted that policy of silence from which he subsequently never deviated. 'On his arrest he had made a frenzied effort to destroy a small black notebook which he bad in his possession, tut the police succeeded in securing it, and its contents were certainly damning. In it were found the names of ten women and the son of one of them', to- ■ gctlier with a series of very significant ■hours and days of the week, and in every case the police found these individuals wero missing. There' were other entries recording the expense of transporting these people from Paris to the villa, and it was not withj out significance that on several of these occasions Landru had purchased a return ticket for himself and a single one for the woman. The villa was searched, but, although «very inch of the premises was scrutinised and the entiro garden dug over and sifted, no proof was found, at, any rate at first, of any murder. A Plausible Explanation. Landru's .explanation of the names in liis book was transparently simple and plausible. He said that lie was in business as a furniture dealer, and had evolved a scheme for supplying families in the devastated areas with furniture bought from such ladies as he could secure who had 110 more use for it. He had got into touch with these clients through a matrimonial advertisement because that appearei*. to him to be the simplest method of doing it, and the fact that he had subsequently lived with a number of them he explained to be due to' nothing more than the traditional practice of a business man of entertaining a client as a preliminary to .1 " deal." Landru adhered to this furniture dealer fantasy in spue of the most rigid cross* • examination, and, in view of the fact " that it. was then 1910 and his last-known victim had been dead more than three

years, it was excessively difficult for any Witness to lie secured directly to controvert this statement.

The police, however, continued their researches, and before very long they made certain discoveries of an extremely sinister character. They found, in certain heaps of ashes in the garden of the villa, fragments of hone which skilled anatomists whom they consulted had no hesitation in defining as human. Landrn had liooh seen •by some burning what looked life a coffin »in a largo fire in the garden; evil-smelling smoke and flume had, it. appeared, poured almost continually.'from the.villa chimney; and it. was Landru's invariable custom, it seemed, to stroll around the countryside in the evening with sinister bundles under his arm.

Owing to the extremely tedious inquiries which the police luul to undertake in securing the names of all those with whom Landru had had dealings, it was not until November, 1921, that Landru's trial opened at the Palais do Justice, Versailles, and the crowd which assembled to hear the case exceeded anything previously heard of. Landru was a central figure, in a farce, and lie certainly tried to plav np to it. He replied to questions in the traditional manner of a cross-talk comedian, and he was never at a loss for some clownish interruption which might set the court in a roar.

On one occasion when some lady complained that she had been ousted from her seat by another, Landru loaned forward from the dock and with a twinkle in his deep-set. eyes remarked: "If any lady would care for my place 1 should be happy indeed to oblige her."

After the first day's hearing, when Landru returned to his prison, he was the recipient of a gigantic mass of correspondence which must have made the returns from his matrimonial advertisements appear sadly disappointing. Women of every age and station hastened to assure him of the warmth of their feelings toward him.

Day after day the prosecution marshalled their overwhelming evidence. Their theory was thai in all ten eases In which Landru was accused of murder he bad disposed of the bodies of his victims to a large extent by burning. They produced the stove from the villa at Gambais, and they produced expert evidence with regard to the possibility of disposing of masses of flesh by such a means.

The detence consisted almost entirely of Landru's statement. lie had, in liis capacity as a furniture dealer, admittedly done business with these women; he had. quite innocently and in the course of business, had illicit relations with a considerable number; - but in every case, when the business was concluded, they had parted with mutual regard and esteem, and he had never seen them again. When (lie jury returned to the court it resembled Bedlam. People wer; fighting and screaming with rage as others sought to thrust them from their places. Landnt, pale as death, but composed, looked down at thein from the dock. When order was restored and the verdict given he appeared to be even relieved, lie smiled, with all his old charm, to his counsel and, with a note of sympathy for the other's obvious distress, observed: " There it is, my dear fellow. All that work for nothing. However, 1 shall sleep better to-night than recently."

This arch-villain went to the guillotine with the same nir of jaunty self-posses-sion, and, indeed, his finest specimen of humour was reserved for the last minute. With the guillotine within a yard of him he was asked by a high official if lie would not confess.

With the utmost courtesy Lartdru looked this official up rtnd down. Then lie turned gravely to the others, and with an exquisite air of slight embarrassment si-id: " This gentleman has not been Introduced to me," Those were Landru's last words.