FAMOUS DETECTIVE'S AMAZING EXPLOITS.

NZ Truth, Issue 150, 2 May 1908, Page 8

FAMOUS DETECTIVE'S AMAZING EXPLOITS.

M. LECOQ'S REMARKABLE WORK.

The Country House Tragedy.

:OHiAPTER I.— MARRIAGE BYi REQUEST. Some years ago there lived at Orcival—a little town on the banks of tie Seine some miles from Paris— a gentleman named Sauvresy. Though a young man of great wealth, and the owner of the largest estate m the neighborhood, he fell m love with and married the daughter of the local schoolmaster. Bertha— such was the name of his wife^-en joyed to the full the almost magical change m i~x fortunes. She had only to express a desire to find it immediately gratified. It was her husband's delight to spend money like water on her every whim.

They had been married for three years when Sauyresy brought to his beautiful country house at Orcival his great friend, Count Hector. Hector, who had led a very dissipated life m Paris, had ]ust exhausted the considerable fortune he had inherited and was seriously meditating suicide as an alternative to the debtor's prison, when Sauvresy intervened. He begged the Count to make Orcival Ms home, and, on his invitation ~ being; accepted, busied himself ii> trying to retrieve some of bis friend's more serious losses.

His solicitude for the Count's interests led him to arrange a match between' his friend and Lamra Courtois, the heiress of the Mayor of Orcival, M. Courtois.

The proposed, marriage never came to anything, for at the end of 18 months Sauvresy was taken ill, and, feeling that he was about to die, "begged the count to marry Bertha as soon as he should have passed away, the Count fulfilled the dying renuest of his friend, and Bertha and he became man and wife.

They had been married scarcely a year when the terrible catastrophe hanpened which resulted m mv being called upon to investigate one of the most mysterious and intricate problems with which I 'have ever been faced.

Oh Wednesday. July 8, the count re-

ceived a considerable sum o.f;Ln?onev;^ -from his bankers. The sjim^ Jevening^ his servants, with the perini|Ji&n cfo their master, attended the Carriage; of- .one of their - number m Paris;' arid^j inconsequence, the count £nd ? coun-^ tess were lf fl alone m the house. : The following morning, at about 3 o'clock, two poachers found the horribly mutilated body of the unfortunate,countess near the river bank. They' immediately summoned the mayor and the nearest . justice of the peace, M. Plantat, who arrived with ail speed to examine t?he scene of the crime. The unfortunate, woman was cJ^d m evening dress, and' m her left lwnri she gripped a strip of common cloth. All. around Jv » spot where her body was found the sand and grass had been trampled upon as if m the^ course of some violent, struggle. The discovery of the count's slippers m the grounds of the house appeared to point to a dfcmble traged/. When the representatives of the law arrived at the house they were met by the party of servants returning, from Paris, all unconscious of the terrible tragedy that had taken place m their absence. The only member of the party missing was the gardener, Gespin, who, it ap&eared, hod left his companions at the railway • station the previous evening. > Shortly afterwards Ctespin put m an appearance, and being usable to rive a proper account of himself, and being found to have a considerable sum of money m his possession was promptly arrested on, suspicion. The .subsequent inquiries seemed to confirm these suspicions;. A blood-stain-ed vest was foun/3 m the grounds, with a piece torn from it corresponding m size to tfre strip of material gripped m the dead woman's hand. The vest was shown to be Gespin's. Prompt inquiries m Paris by telegraph disclosed the fact that the man had gone to an ironmonger's m the city soon after his arrival m Paris, and there purchased with a £20 note a parcel of tools, one of them a. large sheath knife or dagger. Meanwhile a. telegram had summoned me to the . scene. When I arrived I found that the mayor and the examining magistrate had quite made up their minds that Gespin was the murderer. On the other hand, it was . obvious, from the manner of M. Plantat,, that he opposed this theory. I, Lecoq, as usual, preserved an open" mind. • Inside the house the evidences of the crime were appalinp and seemed tp lend support to the contention of tie mayor and the examining magistrate that the brutal deed had been the work of a gang of miscreants led by Gespin.

KBy. LADBROK'E BLACK).;

In the entrance ball there was a pool of Wood, and all .the way up the staircase the woodwork was stained and crimsoned. On the door of the countess's boudoir was the imprint of a blood-stained hand. In the boudoir itself nothing unusual was to be noticed, hut m the bedroom beyond the Hcenc of disorder was frightful. Tt was as if a furious, metniac had smashed and trampled upon every article of furniture. A small tea-table m the -middle of the floor lay broken, surrounded by lumps of. sugar and fragements of porcelain cups. The lamps with which the room was lit had been hurled to the ground, and near by lay the clock, which, m falling, had stopped at 20 minutes past 3 f Even the curtains had been torn froni the bed, which was all tußubled and disordered . In the rooms on the upper floor the same scene of devastation presented itself. Even the coverings of chairs had been cut away, and the stuffing within scattered about the floor. Every book/ had been taken from its place on the shelves, and all the chests of drawers were lying open-. \k-hc middle of the floor of one of *'s?%£v- -opms I found a hatchet. Down-■;^#**^^V^ipn'-rg-room it; appeared

send me baclc to Paris there and then, considering further inquiry unnecessary. But, fortunately for me, just at this moment there arrived an express messenger from the mayor's wife. It announced the terrible news that their daughter Laura, who was' stavina: "with an aunt m Paris, had written a letter, the last she ever intended to write, declaring she found life unsupportable, and was determined to commit suicide. Faced with this domestic tragedy M. Courtois forgot his public character, and hurried away grief-strick-en, leaving me to make what investigations I liked. I began to. make them carefully and skilfully, attended only by M. Plantat, who seemed curiously interested and excited as I : announced my deductions one by one.

CHAPTER II.— A TELL-TALE CLOCK. I turned my attention first to the debris of the tea-table m the bedroom. Kneeling down I felt the carpet where it was strewn with the broken porcelain. It was very damp. The tea, therefore had wot all been drunk when the cups were broken, and hence the count or countess must have been taking tea when the murder occurred. But the clock had stopped at 20 minutes past SI., Was it likely that the countess, fully dressed, would, be taking; tea at such an hour? It is not at all, likely, I told myself.

Filled with ' an inspiration, I opened the' clock face, and moved the long hand to the figure of half-past three. The clock promptly struck 11. Clearly the assassins had tried to covei their traces by giving a false idea v of the time. They had pushed the hands on, but had forgotten to put the 'striking part of the mechanism m harmony. The clock fell when the murder took place, and then stopped. Hence the /crime must have been comTiittedv between half-past 10 and 11. At suohlaar;;iiour the count and count-' tess were not likely to be m bed: The fact that the countess was i.dressed'was proof at least that she bac! not retired. How. then, to account for the disorder of the bed ?

': I examined it carefully. The sheets, jia/d been thrown back, and the pil--lows had been tumbled, but the bolster and the undersheet were not rumpled at all, which they must have been had somebody }am m the bed. Therefore, somebody had purposely disarranged the bed clothes ; and, therefore, the count and countess had not gone to bed, and Hence the murder must, m all human probability, have taken place between half-past 10 and 13

A towel lying on the floor caught my eye. Examining it closely, I discovered that somebody had wiped a razor on it after shaving himself. In a drawer hard by there was' a case of razors, one of which had been recently used.

Turning my attention to the hatchet m the upper room. I detected at once from marks on the carpet, that this weapon had been hurled to the floor with great violence. This violence betrayed great anger on the part of the assassin. But why was he angry ? Clearly, I argued, all damage done to the furniture could only be explained by the person responsible for it being anxious to discover something. Probahly, failing to find what he sought, he hurled the hatchet to the floor m a fit of antrer.

m the dining-room I next examined the rive glasses, and by holding them up to the light, one by one, I saw that nobody had drunk from any of them. Smelling them, I detected, to my surprise, that vinegar, and not wine, had been poured into them. The bottles on the table were all emmtv. except one, which contained vinegar. From the count's valet I learnt that the other bottles were merely "empties," and had never contained wine. Hence this elaborately prepared supper-table was, simply another ruse of the assassin to deceive the trackers— a ruse so clumsily planned that, m trying to show that s\ band of five persons had been .responsible for the murder by leaving five half-filled glasses on the table, he \w-* actually poured into them vinegar, instead of wine.

After what I\ had learnt of the crime m the house I was not surprised at the facts I was able to read into the traces and footprints m the grounds. I found that the countess's body had been dragged from the house across the lawn, and that m all probability she was already dead at the time. The seeming; evidences of a struggle near the spot where the body was found had, ( I discovered, been made by the assassin. These deductions of mine were corroborated by the medical evidence, the" doctor informing me that the blow which bad killed the countess had been delivered from behind, and that the other wounds on the body had been made some hours after she was dead.

Returning to the house I summoned the count's valet, and set him to sco if a pair of his master's boots was missing. He came back a few secconds later with the information that one pair was massing. To complete my investigations I asked to see a portrait of the count. Qne was shown me, and I saw that Count Hector had always worn a full beard. There was no necessity to • make any further inquiries. .

In the grounds they were still searching for the count's body, but I knew they would never find it, for the very simple reason, so I told myself, that it was the count who had murdered his wife and then fled.

All the time I had. been, making mv investigations I had been struck with the excitement and interest evinced by M. Plantat. He had asked m& to dinner, and as we sat at the taible I felt convinced that he knew more about the tragedy than he cared to say. Unable to make him speak, I determrtned to give him my confidence by reciting mv own theory ,of the berime, m the hope that by so doing SB&lK'ht encourage a like frankness on ,1 sara, relating my some document ■'•■'■■■ • ne COUI)t She . ; '■--.■' • <*" H "'" s^%%«=-l icr husband, '^^^ all casts

to obtaim possession of it, carefully and deliberately planned the murder of his, wife. So that the crime he meditated rnxglat appear to be the work of thieves , he let it bo generally- known that a lar^e sum of money, sent from his bank, was m the house.

Then he got rid of his servants by. sending them away for the night to Paris, and to avert all suspicion from himself, gave his gardener G-es-pin a 20-pound note with instructions to buy a knife and return the change. (Left alone m the great country house with Ms victim.., the count stabbed her from, behind as she was sitting at the tea-tables .Then he set about searching the house thoroughly for the compromising papers. His quest proving fruitless, bis anger got the better of him, and ho hurled the hatchet, with which he had been breaking open cupboards and drawers, violently ori the floor.

Terror next seized him, and he began to think of hiding the evidences of his guilt. First shavine; off the full beard that he wore m order to disguise himself, he dragged the body of his wife down to the riverside. There he stabbed the corpse several times, and carefully trampled down the sand as if to show there 'had been a struggle.

Obtaining one of.Gespiri's vests, he had torn a piece out and placed it m the dead woman's hand. The rest of the garment, soaked m blood, he left where it could easily be found. His own shoes he also left m the garden to give the idea that he also had been murdered. But he forgot, m the excitement of his terror, that the fact that a pair of boots were missing would prove that he could not have been wearing slippers, and that therefore this ruse was not only futile, but actually strengthened the proofs of his guilt.

CHAPTER III.— 'DEAD HUSBAND'S REVENGE. When I had finished M. Plantat, with evident signs of emotion, rose from his seat and took from a secret drawer m his writing-table a packet of papers. "I have determined to tell you everything," he, said, turning to me, "and to place myself entirely m your hands. I would not have spoken had not 3'our wonderful eenius for investigation enabled you to read tragedy aright. Count Hector is the murderer. Listen !"

He began to read from the papers, and for an hour I listened to one of the most dramatic stories I ever recollect hearing.

While Sauvresy was still alive his wife Bertha had fallen m love with count, and the count had nothesitated- to betray the friend to whom he owed . so much. By chance Sauvresy discovered their gu'iltv secret, and by chance, also. Bertha learnt that he knew the truth.

Maddened by her love for -the coun+ she determined to make away wit-h her husband. From a cmack' doctor m Orcival she obtained, for the sum of i' ! r 'VO, some aconite, a noison the t;f ; " ■'■•; of which were little Unov'i m those days. Sauvresy was takers suddenly ill. After being: confined to his- bed for a fortnight he bes;an to suspect the truth, and, watching h's wife carefully, at last' detected liftdoctoring his medicine. with the poison. .!

He managed ■to obtain one of the bottles containing the aconite, awl. tliousr 1 ! (tying, planned .a horrible revenge. Summoning up -all his strength he wrote out a full account of ; the true of his case, and. sealir;.?: this up with the botile^of poison, entrusted it to the hands of M. Plantat.

lie knew that Bertha loved the count, hut that the count, on his part, loved Laura Courtois to distraction. Sauvresy realised that tho greatest punishment he ' could inflict upon his guilty wife and his false friend was to force them to marry vrhen he was dead.

Summoning them to his bedside, he told them that unless they married M. Plantat had instructions to fortrard the packet of papers to the police, a step which would certainly laafl both of them to the scaffold. Should they marry, however, the truth would never be disclosed, and the papers would be given into Bertha's hands on the day of the marriage. Sauvresy realised that Bertha would always seek to keep tftese papers from the count, knowing that he loved Laura yCourtois, and that once she -yas deprived of this hold over him he would leave her.

According to his instructions M. Pl n ntat delivered the sealed packet mco the hands of the countess onihe day of her marriage./ She immsliateiv secreted it, and' the count,' mad with rage m vain attempted to lind its, hiding place. At last the rcuntess, fearful lest her husband Uiculd take from her the one thing that kept him faithful to her, returned the documents to the keeping of M. Plantat.

All might have gone well with the guilty couple had not M. Plaivtat imself been deeply m love with Laura. One night the old justice of the peace saw the count and the girl he loved alone together. Mad with jealousy, he broke the trust that had been reposed m him, and read the contents of the sealed package, which/ he half suspected reflected upon the count.

Appalled though he was by what he read of his rival's crime, he dared not use his knowledge. He had to stand quietly by and see Laura deluded and betrayed by the count.

"And now Laura is dead," M. Plantat said m a trembling voice as he brought his narrative to a conclusion, '''and I care no more for life."

But I, Lecoq, guessed the truth. The letter to yher parents, stating that she was going to commit suicide I felt certain had been dictated b-o- the count, with whom Laura had fled. Within 24 Hours I discovered the place of their retreat. The murderer was already mmy grasp. I had but to put out my hand nnd the scaffold' would have claimed him. But I held back.

My heart had be.en moved by M. Plairtat's story. I knew N what he suffered from the thought that the girl he still loved would be associated with such a vile murderer m all the o-lare of a public trial. I allowed the count time to commit suicide, and having sent him to the HiVhiest Tribunal of all, interfered to prevent Laura, now cured of her mad infatuation, from following her betrayer. .

To all this tragedy and mystery there was a barmy ending. I need not relate it. It is enough +n say that TVT. Lecoq, the detective, nowiif*re receives a warmer welcome ! +bo-T> at the" quiet country house at n.-nivjU where live M. and Mme. Plantat.