The Waxworks Murder

almost strangers. She was active, gay; a different generation.' He pressed his hand hard to a spot just over his eyes, staring at the past. 'The last time I saw her was at dinner yesterday evening. On the same day, once a month, I always go to the home of the Marquis de Cerannes to play cards. It is a ritual we have observed for nearly forty years. I went last night about nine o'clock. At that time, I know, she was still in the house, for I heard her moving about in her room.'

'Do you know whether she had intended to go out?'

'I do not, monsieur. As I have said,' his mouth tightened again, 'I did not follow her doings, I left my instructions with her mother as to what Claudine should do, and I rarely observed. This - is - the - result.'

Watching madame, I saw a bright, rather pitiful expression come into her face. An old-school father and a doting, rather simple-minded mother. From what I had been able to deduce earlier, Claudine Martel was not at all like Odette. She would be able to get away unsuspected with almost anything. I saw that the same thought was in Bencolin's mind, for he inquired:

'You were never in the habit of waiting up for her, I take it?'

'Monsieur,' the old man said, coldly, 'in our family we have never thought it necessary.'

'Did she entertain her friends here frequently?'

'I was compelled to forbid it. Their noise was unsuited to our home and I feared it might disturb the neighbours. She was permitted, of course, to invite her own friends to our receptions. She declined. I discovered that she wished to serve our guests with what are called "cocktails" ... ' A faint, contemptuous smile, which twisted the thick muscles of his jaw. 'I informed her that the Martel wine-cellar was unsurpassed in France, and that I did not feel called on to insult my old friends. It was the only time we ever had words. She asked me, in an almost screaming voice, whether I had ever been young. Young!'

'To return, monsieur. You say you saw your daughter at dinner. Did her behaviour seem as usual, or should you have said there was anything on her mind ?'

M. Martel fingered one end of his long moustache, his eyes narrowed.

'I have thought of that since. I noticed it. She was - upset.'

'She wouldn't eat!' shrilled his wife, so abruptly that Bencolin turned to stare at her. The colonel had spoken in a low voice, and both of us wondered how she had heard.

'She is reading your lips, monsieur,' our host explained. 'You need not shout. ... That is true, Claudine scarcely ate at all.'

'Should you say that her behaviour was due to excitement, or fright, or precisely what?' 'I do not know. Both, perhaps.'

'She wasn't well!' cried madame. Her sharp face, which once must have been beautiful, turned from side to side, and her faded eyes looked at us appealingly. 'She hadn't been well. And the night before that I heard her crying in the middle of the night. Sobbing!'

Every time that queer, high voice, hovering on the edge of tears, trembled from the shadows under the rain-splattered windows, I felt an impulse to grip the edge of my chair. I could see that her husband was fighting to keep his self-control; his mouth was pulled down and the lids fluttered over harsh eyes.

‘I heard her! And I got up, and went into her room just as I did when she was a baby, and she was crying in bed.' After a gulp the woman went on: 'And she didn't snap at me. She was nice to me. And I said, "What's the matter, dear? Let me help you." And she said, "You can't help me, mother; nobody can help me!" She was like that all the next day, and last night she went out. . . .'

Fearing an outburst, Colonel Martel had turned to regard her again; his one big fist clenched and his empty left sleeve trembled. Bencolin took care to fashion his words carefully with his lips when he addressed her:

'She told you what was troubling her, madame?'

'No. No. She refused.'

'Had you any idea?'

'Eh?' A blank look. 'Trouble her? What would trouble a poor little child ? No.'

Her voice had become a whimper. The booming and decisive tones of her husband took up the gap.

'A little more information, monsieur, I learned from speaking to her and to Andre, our butler. In the neighbourhood of nine-thirty o'clock, Claudine received a telephone message. Shortly after that she seems to have left the house. She did not tell her mother where she was going, but promised to return by eleven.'

'A message from a man or a woman ?'

'They do not know.'

'Was any part of the conversation overheard?'

'Not by my wife, naturally. But I questioned Andre closely on that point. The only words he overheard were these : "But I didn't even know he was back in France !" '

' "I didn't even know he was back in France," ' the detective repeated. 'You have no idea to whom these words referred?'

'None. Claudine had many friends.' 'She took a car?'

'She took the car,' asserted the other, 'without my permission. It was returned to us this morning by a man from the police; I understand it had been left close to the waxworks where she was found. Now monsieur!'

His fist pounded slowly on the table, shaking the edifice of dominoes. His eyes had a dry glitter as they fixed Bencolin.

'Now, monsieur!' he said again. 'The case is in your hands. Can you tell me why my daughter, why a Martel, should be found dead in a waxworks in that dingy neighbourhood ? That is what I want most to know.'

'It is a formidable problem, Colonel Martel. At the present moment I am not sure. You say she had never been there before?'

'I do not know. In any event' - he made a heavy gesture - 'it is clearly the work of some thug or sneak-thief. I want him brought to justice. Do you hear, monsieur? If necessary, I will offer a reward large enough to — '

'I hardly think that will be necessary. But it brings me to the chief question I wanted to ask. When you say "the work of a thug" you perhaps know that your daughter was not robbed - robbed, I mean in the ordinary sense. Her money was untouched. What the murderer took was some object which hung on a slender gold chain round her neck. Do you know what it was ?'

'Round her neck?' The old man shook his head, frowning and biting at his moustache. 'I can't even imagine. It was certainly none of the Martel jewels. I keep them locked up, and they are worn by my wife only on formal occasions. Some trinket, perhaps; it could scarcely be anything of value. I never noticed ..."

He glanced over inquiringly at his wife.

'No!' she cried. 'Why, that's impossible! She never wore anything like a necklace or a locket; she said it was old-fashioned. I'm sure! I would know, monsieur!'

Every lead seemed to end in a blind alley, every clue produced nothing. We were silent for a long time, while the rustle of the rain grew to an uproar and the windows blurred to darkness. But, instead of disappointing Bencolin, this last piece of information appeared to stimulate him. He had an air of repressed exultation; the light of the lamp made long triangles of shadow under his cheek-bones and showed a gleam of teeth in a smile between small moustache and pointed beard. But his long eyes were still sombre as they moved from M. Martel to his wife. With a whir of weights the grandfather clock began to chime twelve. Each hoarse note beat with a slow finality, as of the grave, and intensified the nervous tension. M, Martel looked at his wrist, frowned, and then glanced up at the clock in a polite intimation that it was growing late.

‘I do not think,' Bencolin observed, 'that we need question you any further. The solution does not lie here. Any attempt to go into Mademoiselle Martel's affairs farther than we have done will, I think, be futile. I thank you, madame, and you, monsieur, for your help. Rest assured that I will keep you informed of our progress.'