The Waxworks Murder

'You never even saw a person whose identity you suspected?'

'I have been there so few times! I have heard, though' -he looked round cautiously - 'that there is a sort of inner circle where the members are well known to one another, and that there is a woman who makes a regular business of getting new members. But I don't know who she is.'

Another silence, while Bencolin tapped the key against his palm.

'Imagine!' Robiquet said suddenly. 'Imagine going there masked, and meeting a girl, and - finding she was the girl you were engaged to. Oh, it's too dangerous for me! Never again! And murder. .. . '

'Very well. Now, monsieur, I will tell you what the price of my silence to the newspapers is to be. You shall lend me this key'

'Keep it! Murder!'

' — for a few days. Then I shall return it. I suppose the news of your return to France will be among the — er — social notes of the papers?'

'Why, I suppose so. But why?'

'Good ! Very good ! H'm. Number nineteen: is that across from or beside number eighteen?'

Robiquet reflected. 'I never paid attention, believe me! But it's beside it, I think. Yes!' He made an elaborate pantomime to himself, as though to get the location straight, 'Beside it, I remember.'

'Windows?'

'Yes. All the rooms look out on a sort of airshaft. But please — !'

'Better and better!' Bencolin put die key in his pocket and buttoned up his coat. Again he fixed a stern eye on Robiquet. 'Now, I don't need to warn you not to breathe a word of what you've told us to anybody. Is that clear?'

'I?' demanded the young man, incredulously. '‘ speak about it? Ha! What do you take me for? But you swear to me that you will keep your promise?'

'I swear!' said the detective. 'And now, my friend, a thousand thanks. Look at this afternoon's papers if you want to see who was killed. Good-day!'

The House of the Dominoes

Out in the street the wind had turned noticeably colder and the whole sky was murkily shot with black. Bencolin turned up the collar of his coat, grinning sideways at me.

'We have left a very much worried young man,' he commented. ‘I hated to do that, but this key . .. Invaluable, Jeff, invaluable! For the first time, we have luck. What I wanted to do we could have arranged without the aid of the key, but now it is a million times more simple.' He strode along with a fierce energy, chuckling to himself. 'Now you are going to tell me that Galant has made an appointment, after the Moulin Rouge show, with Mademoiselle Prevost. Aren't you?'

'I see you caught my hint.'

'Caught your hint? My dear fellow, I've been preparing for it all day! He tried to steal a march on me by coming to that house; but I anticipated that. Now she'll be afraid to see him for the rest of the day. He found out from the concierge at her place where she had gone. The concierge was instructed to tell him. Ho! We want him to have a long interview with her - to-night, where we can hear it.' He laughed in his deep, almost soundless fashion and slapped me on the shoulder. 'The old man's wits still work, in spite of what Galant said. . . . '

'That was why you had her come to Madame Duchene's?' -'Yes. And why I so carefully told Galant last night that we were not going to expose his club. Because he'll meet her there, Jeff. Do you see why it has been inevitable? More than that, do you see the sequence of events, likewise inevitable, which lead up to it?'

‘I do not.'

'Well, I'll give you an outline at lunch. But first tell me exactly what they said to each other.'

I told him, omitting, so far as I could remember, scarcely a word. At the end of it he slapped his hands together triumphantly.

'Better than I had hoped for, Jeff. Ah, but we're being dealt the right cards! Galant thinks that Mademoiselle Prevost knows who the murderer is, and he is determined to find out. He couldn't find out last night, but in the right rendezvous - it exactly squares with my theory.'

'But why this interest in law and order on Galant's part?'

'Law and order? Use your wits! It's blackmail. With the hold of a murder charge over somebody, Galant would add the tidiest threat of all to his collection of blackmail material. I've suspected this. ...'

'Wait a minute,' I said. 'Granted even a suspicion that Galant might meet this girl somewhere - though how you came to believe that, God knows! - granted that, why pick on the club? I should think that would be the last place he would go, knowing you suspect it.'

'On the contrary, Jeff, I thought it would be the very first place. Think a moment! . .. Galant has no idea we suspect Gina Prevost, or any other woman, of being tangled up in this; he said so himself, from what you tell me. Undoubtedly he strongly suspects that he is being shadowed by my men. (A shadow has been put on his trail, as a matter of fact, with orders to make himself as conspicuous as possible.) Now, if he meets Gina Prevost anywhere - at her apartment, or his house, or any public theatre or dance-place, we are almost bound to see her! We then commence to ask ourselves, he will reason "Who is the mysterious blonde lady?" We investigate, we find who she is, we discover she was near the scene of the murder ... and Galant has betrayed both of them! On the other hand, the club is safe. There are only a hundred keys, the lock is practically burglar-proof, and the police cannot get in to spy. Moreover, in an establishment of that sort they could both go in at different times, and police spying on the outside door would never in the world connect them with each other. ... Do you see?'

'Then,' I said, 'you deliberately played in to his hands and told him all you knew about the club, so that he would bring about a meeting between liimself and this girl?'

'A meeting which I could overhear! - or one of my operatives could overhear, anyhow. Yes.'

'But why such an elaborate plan?'

He scowled. 'Because, Jeff, Galant is an elaborate criminal. Question him, grill him, torture him even, and you would learn just what he wanted you to know, not a word more. We're dealing with superlatively nimble wits, and our only hope is to outmanoeuvre him. I knew he would meet that girl again, before I even knew who the girl was.'

'Meet her "again",' I said gloomily. 'Yes, Granted you knew he had met her the first time.'

'Oh, that was clear! You shall hear it in good time. Now, thanks to our friend Robiquet, we have overcome our difficulties easily. The stronghold could be entered but tliis key makes it child's play. We have the room next to his, a window giving on an airshaft. ... Jeff, he'll have to possess magical powers if he divines it. Do you know,' he asked, abruptly, 'what was the most significant point in his conversation with Gina Prevost ?'

'Her knowing very probably who committed the murder.'

'Not at all. I could have told you that. It was the statement of hers, "It was dark." Remember it! Now for a little visit to the rue de Varenne before lunch. We are going to see Mademoiselle Martel's parents.'

We had stopped at the corner of that winding street, which runs through the heart of the Faubourg Saint-Germain. I hesitated, and said:

'Look here. These scenes with hysterical parents .. . they make me squirm. If we're to go through anything like that one a while ago, I'd prefer to be absent.'

Slowly he shook his head, staring at a lamp-bracket in one dark-stained wall. 'Not with tiiese people. Do you know them, Jeff?'

'Heard the name, that's all.'

'The Comte de Martel is of the oldest, most unyielding stock of France. "Family honour," with them, is an almost morbid thing. But, for all that, the old man is a fierce republican; don't, by the way, make the mistake of addressing him by his title. They come of a line of soldiers, and he is prouder of his rank of colonel than anything else. He lost an arm in the war. His wife is a little old woman, almost completely deaf. They live in a gigantic house, and they spend their time playing dominoes.'