Strange Tales of French Crimes

Star (Christchurch), Volume XLIV, Issue 522, 3 August 1932, Page 11

Strange Tales of French Crimes

By . . •

DR. EDMOND LOCARD and H. ASHTON-WOLFE.

ELEVENTH OF SERIES.

THE MYSTERY OF THE POISON BULBS

In two murders in Berlin powdered glass had been found on the clothing

I of the victims—Violette Dufour and | Baron Floatoff. Wolfe, happened to be •• studying at the Berlin police at the ! time, and he got into touvh with Ber- ; tillon to find out what he thought about ■ the powdered glass. Eventually BerI tillon went to Berlin. Alexander is the ; head of the Berlin police, and lleine- • man is one of their clever detectives. J Ranesco was the Rumanian secretary of J FlostotT, and at first was supposed to • have murdered his employer. Rosa I Varech, a handsome Russian, was the ; decoy who lured Flos toff from the in- . famous Hansa Club, a gambling hell. I Wolfe and Heineman visit Ranesco liid--1 ing at the Moabit. a squalid quarter, i and he tells them that Rosa had asked • if any glass dust had been found on £ the Baron's clothes. Ranesco said he • was on the track of the murderer, and ; the police promised to answer Tils call • to raid the notorious Kauipf tavern J when he gave the signal. PART 11. The next morning when I opened the door of Herr Alexander's office I received the surprise of my life. Bertillon, dresqed in unofficial tweeds, lolled lazily in a big armchair, whilst Heineman and his chief stood respectfully by his side. Obviously he had only just arrived in Berlin. "Como in,” his pleasant voice drawled. “We were waiting for you. I could not keep out of this any longer, so when 1 received your wire relating the queer meeting with Ranesco I took the night express.” "1 am afraid you’ve come too toon. Ranesco is undoubtedly mad. Herr \levander exclaimed boisteroush . Our men located Rosa Varech this morning, however, on the off chance, and I feel confident she cannot make a move wit out my knowledge. A postman, a cabby and a couple of typical street urchins ■will follow wherever she goes. I hey have orders to relieve each other regularlv to avoid rousing suspicion. We are also investigating the wbman s past, but I do not feel hopeful.’’ “I fancy vou are right, Bertillon remarked thoughtfully. “This unfortunate Rumanian is probably suffering from delusions. Let me know if there is any development. I am staying at the Kaiserhof. A short rest will do me good”—and after a few- polite phrases Bertillon took his leave. As he passed me, however, I felt a slight tug at my sleeve, and as soon as I could get away I rejoined him at the famous hotel. He had lunched in his room and was lazily puffing at a cigar and gazing out of the window when I entered. “Rosa Varech is a Russian, I suppose,” were his first words • 1 and the cabman who followed you and has drawn up opposite looks like a Tartar or a Cossack also. I’m beginning to think there may be something in Ranesco s story after all.” .... “Followed?” I exclaimed, startled. “You mean —” . “Undoubtedly. I must say I admire their methods. They know already of mv arrival. Have a peep at the fellow.” Peering cautiously at the hurrying throng below, I was aware of a strange thrill as my gaze fell on a tall, bur.y cabman, ostensibly examining his engine, the while his eyes roved constantly up and down the street. There was a knock at the door, and a moment later Heineman, dressed as usual in rusty black, sidled into the room. “The laboratory expert’s report on the glass dust came half an hour ago,” he said apologetically. “I thought you might like to know that he definitely considers it to be the debris of an electric bulb. The fragments are green in tint, and analysis has revealed very faint traces of arsenic, but our man is of the opinion that arsenic was probably used by the makers to obtain the green colour.”

“Very interesting,” my chief said, adding abruptly: “Do you know anyone whom this description fits?” and he related the incident of the taxi driver who had followed me, and described bim once more.

“I’ll go through the records,” Heincman cried excitedly. “The audacity of the fellow! You’ll admit now that it’s a case of murder, eh?”

“Unless someqne with, a guilty conscience thinks I am after him; you have other inquiries pending, I suppose. Anyhow, you will do well to give this description to your identity department.”

I returned at once to headquarters with Heineman. for I sensed that the appearance of the mysterious spy had made Bertillon thoughtful and that he wished to be alone. Whatever it was he had wished to tell me would have to wait.

Twice during the afternoon an officer came to the laboratory in search of Alexander or his subordinate. Someone had telephoned again and again, and finally left a message to say that we were urgently needed in the Heringsgasse. That could only be Ranesco. and as time passed I began to grow anxious. When at seven the officer came once more, I called up Bertillon 'to ask whether he thought I should go to Moabit.

“Come to the hotel at once.” my chief said hurriedly. “ I am expecting Heineman any minute. If he doesn’t turn up soon, we’ll go there together.” Since at eight o’clock there was still no sign of the detective, Bertillon left a note with the hotel porter, sent another to headquarters, and, calling a taxi, ordered the man to drive to the Heringegasse. As usual, the unsavoury alley was throbbing with secret activity, but Bertillon paid no attention to the men and women who eved us askance as we passed. With pistols handy, our hats pulled Well down to hide our features, we climbed the creaking stairs of number nineteen and gave the signal, a double ring three times repeated. The house was silent as the grave. Again I rang, and again, with no better result, and at last Bertillon struck the door a blow, and to my horror the weight of his hand caused it gently to swing inwards. “We’d better go in,” my chief muttered, drawing an electric torch. So saying, he tiptoed down the passage, his light flickering over the walls. He had taken perhaps six steps, when with a muffled cry he dropped to his knees. There, sprawling grotesquely across the threshold of the room in which wo had met for the first time, lay Ra nesco—dead!

“The glass dust again,” Bertillon exclaimed hoarsely, pointing to the Rumanian's shoulder, and I perceived that on the front of his dressing-gown was a patch of glittering white, which eerily as the beam of the torch

caught it. Mastering his instinctive reluctance, Bertillon bent low and sniffed at the pallid lips, then he gazed fixedly into the staring, eyes. “I begin to have a vague idea of what it means,” he muttered. “A violent, unknown poison, judging by the poor fellow’s appearance. Quick, shut the door, there is someone outside.” Before I could move, a sudden clatter of running feet came from the stairs. “I-fimmcl, wliat has happened?” a voice cried excitedly, and Heineman, followed by his chief, came stumbling down the passage.

“Good God—it’s Ranesco!” burst from him. “He has been murdered like the others. We followed Rosa Varech to the Hansa Club and your message onlyreached us 10 minutes ago. You see, mein Herr!” and he pointed dramatically at the rigid, twisted body. “Yes—l see,” Alexander replied. “I’ll send for a doctor and ray instruments. There is a smell of charred paper in the air. Have you searched this place? No—then let us do it at once.”

We quickly found the reason for the smell, the tiny stove in the front room was full of grey and crumbling flakes, all that remained of many sheets of paper.

“I’ll wager poor Ranesco had at last ferreted out the truth, and when we failed to come, wrote out a report for us,” Bertillon exclaimed. “He paid for his temerity with his life. The murderer must have come on him unawares. But what is it he uses? Ha —” and he suddenly ran across the room, and dragged a wedge of paper from under the leg of a broken table, which, deprived of its support, at once toppled to one side. He unfolded the sheet and smoothed it on his knees.

“I thought so,” he muttered. “Poor devil, he foresaw his end, and hoped that we should search more thoroughly than his enemies. Listen to this —” and with toneless voice he read the dead man’s message:

“I am uneasy. They know lam here. Perhaps Rosa saw me 6lip in.. All day that horrible Cossack, Treganowski, has been up and down the stairs, and once I caught him peeping through the keyhole. Is he the mysterious assassin, I wonder? I’ve sent my friend the pickpocket to telephone. If the police don’t come soon I am going into that hellhole opposite with him. He has found out that there is someone hiding in a cellar under the store-room, whom Rosa, in disguise, visits every day.” Bertillon looked up, a grim expression on his face.

“He was not so mad after all. What do you know of the Russian he calL> Treganowski ? It may be—” “Treganowski—” Heineman interrupted. “That’s the fellow you noticed waiting outside the Kaiserhof, dressed as a taxi-driver. I found his chart in the records, thanks to your description. Formerly a famous surgeon at the St. Peter Hospital in Moscow, he had to flee and become an exile because several patients died most mysteriously whilst under his care. Although clever, the fellow nearly starved when first he came to Berlin, but finally managed to get a job in a pharmaceutical laboratory. The man came under our notice because of his revolutionary activities. Lately, however, he appeared to live quietly enough, and we heard he was even making a little money.” “Well, I suggest that an official version of Ranesco’s death be given to the papers at once, with a strong hint that Inspector Heineman has a definite clue, and to-morrow night expects to test the correctness of a theory lie has formed. You understand—the unknown criminal will probably swallow the bait and try to kill Heineman, and we shall catch him in the act.”

The next day the reporters found the police exceptionally affable, and every paper printed flamboyant and optimistic articles about Chief Inspector Heineman. We, however, were all on tenterhooks, and every loiterer in the streets leading to headquarters aroused our suspicions. We managed not to lose sight of the little detective for a minute, yet in spite of all our precautions, Death brushed him with his sable wings. Disdaining bur warnings, he had gone openly towards midnight to the Heringsgasse, hoping to catch a glimpse of the Russian; the street for once seemed deserted. Bertillon and I were close behind, when, without warning, something bright and round flashed from out an open window, missed Heineman’s face by an inch, and burst with sullen report against the wall behind him.

I have never seen Bertillon move so swiftly. IJis stick whistled through the air at the same instant, hitting the detective a terrific blow on the shoulder and sending him staggering into the road, where he collapsed in a heap. He was up in a moffient; whistles shrilled from all sides; the door of the house from which the sinister missile had issued gave way under our united rush, and we raced along the corridor just in time to see a dark, agile figure vanish through a door at the rear. A minute later Kampf’s tavern was surrounded and a dozen police were savagely driving the inmates into a corner, whilst cycle police rushed to bar the Heringsgasse at each end. Among the creatures captured was the woman Rosa, dressed as a man and armed with an automatic pistol. Bertillon had meanwhile obtained a powerful acetylene lamp from a police car and was busy on his knees collecting what remained of the strange object hurled from the window. ‘*l am sorry, Herr Heineman,” he said grimly when we gathered found him. “I probably hurt your neck.” “You had your reason, no doubt,” the little fellow replied with a groan, tenderly rubbing a large bruisC. Bertillon pointed to a tiny heap of minute, glittering fragments he had scraped together and placed on a sheet of paper. “You recognise this, eli ? The mysterious glass dust. It still reeks of a chemical something like garlic. The devil used thin glass bulbs filled with some preparation of compressed hydrogen arsenide. These terrible bombs he evidently threw into an intended victim’s face, thus causing the gas to enter the lungs as they burst. *A whiff would be enough to cause instant death. T had to prevent you somehow from inhaling any of the poison. That is why I knocked you down.” “Thanks —but perhaps the gas would have been less painful,” Heineman said ruefully. “What do you suggest now?”

“Raid the crazy * Cossack’s underground retreat at once. He has probably a stock of these things, and will use them. But if you hold small shields in front cf yen, and tie scarves over mouth

and rose, you be able to ihsli the fellow without v

I followed the police into the foul, illlit tavern, - which in the drizzly mist of dawn looked strangely unreal. Jn a short time all was ready, and Heine man, accompanied by three burly detectives, prepared to descend into the cellar where the Russian was doubtless crouching like some wild beast in its lair, for by now he would know that the end was near. Suddenly my heart contracted, aa a long grating screech sounded from a corner, where the police were pushing aside several heavy casks. With sudden jerk the foremost quickly wrenched back a eliding door and dropped out of sight. The others at once did likewise. There ensued a moment of tense eilence, and then, as I peered down the opening, came a wild yell, lie splintering of wood and a crashing of heavy bodies, followed by the spiteful spang of a pistol. Instantly the orderly attack became, a nightmare of horror.

I heard a shrill scream and saw Heineman stagger into the circle of light from my torch, clawing frenziedly at tli© muffler over his face, and uttering short, inhuman howl:; the while, like a hurt dog. Yelling to the men behind me to hold my legs, I threw myself flat on the edge, seized the tortured man under the armpits, and was dragged back, gripping him with'all my strength, until we both sprawled on the floor above. Even during the few seconds I had hung head down over the hole, I had been overcome by a terrible nausea; the walls spun round in a mad, fantastic dance, became a blinding wheel of light that burst abruptly with a roar like a storm at sea; and then, as in a dream, I found myself in the open street, felt the bite of icy water, and perceived Bertillon bending over me. “A near thing, my friend,” he said, seeing my eyes open. “Heineman- is dead! God knows what’s happened to the others. Here, take a nip of this. We are waiting for the fire brigade to bring oxygen masks. That devil evidently fired a bullet into a container full of his poisonous mixture. The place is a death-trap.”

With an effort I raised myself slowly to a sitting posture. My skin tingled from the alcohol with which my friends had rubbed me, and, glancing at my hands, I saw that the veins and fingertips were blue and swollen. Fortunately the dizziness was wearing off, although all the chimes in Christendom were still ringing in my head. Five minutes later, with clanging bell and furious clatter, the emergency squad ffom the Moabit fire station slid to a halt before the door of Kampf’s tavern, and, despite my chief’s remonstrances, I donned one of the goggle-eyed asbestos masks and helmet, and clambered after Herr Alexander, who was already similarly protected. On the threshold of a room littered with bottles, retorts and chemicals lay the three unfortunate detectives, their clothes glittering with the familiar powdered glass, of which fragments crunched beneath our feet as we advanced. A huge metal and glass cupola lay shattered on the floor, and sprawling beside it in an ungainly heap, his flat, Mongolian face ghastly and contorted, was Treganowski. One hand etill gripped the pistol with which he had fired at his reservoir of poison, thereby killing himself and those who had come to take him.

In a corner of his den, shining weirdly in the rays of a sizzling-arc lamp, I saw a heap of jlass bulbs ready for use, whilst clamped in a mechanic’s vice was a queer cylindrical apparatus, something like an air pump, at which the Russian had evidently been working. When the place had been cleared of its deadly fumes, and we could examine everything in detail, we found this to be a spring gun, fitted at one end with a chamber to hold the poison bulbs, which could thus be propelled with great velocity to a distance of many yards.

It was thus finally established what the gas really was the Russian had used. Let me say merely that each bulb contained nearly half a cubic foot of compressed poison, enough, even if it burst within a yard of an intended victim, to cause instant death.

We recovered most of the stolen jewellery and money, and Rosa Varech was sent to prison for life, for it*was definitely proven that she had been Treganowski’s accomplice. Series continued Next Saturday with “ The Mystery of Orly Highway.”