CHAPTER XVI

A WOMAN OF MYSTERY

It is a well-known fact that a sudden and powerful shock will have a remarkable counter-effect on a mind under the influence of alcohol and other stimulants. The shock is immediately succeeded by a numbness which in a few moments gives way to an astonishing clarity of thought.

Jacqueline went down the stairs of the Three Crowns and out into the street on the arm of a sergeant of police. She was in a trance, but before she had been taken a hundred steps from the door she had come to a full realization of her position. The officer who arrested her was a veteran, and knew full well that in the two or three minutes immediately after the commission of a great crime the criminal is more than likely to make startling admissions or give hints that lead to the discovery of the real motive. This does not, of course, apply to habitual criminals who seldom utter a syllable until their defense is totally prepared and tested.

On the way down the stairs Sergeant Fontaine asked the woman, point-blank, why she had killed her companion. In the voice of a somnambulist she replied that she had done it to prevent him from committing an "abominable act that would bring grief and shame on someone she loved." And after that she could not be induced to open her mouth.

They were followed to the police station by a curious and excited throng of men and women, the latter reviling the prisoner and threatening her with the extremity of punishment while the sergeant had to stop several times and threaten to draw his saber to keep some of the men from laying violent hands on her.

"The law's delay," upon which the high priests of jurisprudence have opened the floodgates of their wrath, generally proves a blessing in criminal cases. For, by a singular contradiction of a natural law, the laws of a civilized community rise above their source--a majority of the individuals. The commune is less cruel than its component parts. Let an ultra-civilized, hyper-refined man stand between the slayer and his victim and watch the life blood's fitful spurts from a wrecked artery, and all his Veneer of refinement and civilization is burned up in a blast of horror and rage. He does not know--does not care to know--whether there was justification for the deed. In a breath he is hurled back thousands of years, and he demands the instant and primitive justice of his tribal forefathers.

Fortunately, it is not then that laws are either made or executed. Men who have grown gray and wise in the analysis of the human brute sit far removed from scenes of violence and frame the laws, and they are executed when natural passions have cooled.

Of this latter type of man was Henri Valmorin, the public prosecutor of Bordeaux. He was remarkably able and ambitious, but his ambition did not take the form of worldly advancement. He had a comfortable income beyond his salary and enough reserve to give his daughter a handsome _dot_, so he did not feel the need of a higher position for the sake of money.

His office as public prosecutor appealed to him and he filled it so ably that he would have been advanced a dozen times had it not been known that he preferred this work to any other. He had a true and broad conception of his functions. His work was to protect the community and punish its enemies, but he never erred by falling into the habit of regarding every individual accused of a crime as a presumptive criminal. He was rather counsel for the defense until the police and examining magistrate placed in his hands the weapons of attack. Then he became the shrewd, skilful, uncompromising prosecutor.

M. Valmorin was in the office of his friend, M. Feverel, Examining Magistrate, when the woman of the Three Crowns was brought before him. He remained in the background and paid but little attention to the proceedings--for as much as a minute. Then his interest was keyed up to the highest pitch.

M. Feverel began with the usual questions as to name, age, place of birth, etc., which are to examiner and examined a mutual test of strength, as two pugilists dance around each other for the first round of a fight without striking a blow. To the surprise of both men the woman maintained an absolute and indifferent silence. There was nothing about her suggestive of sullen stubbornness. She looked over M. Feverel's head through an open window with an expression which indicated that she had not even heard the questions. M. Valmorin studied her face closely. Through the ravages of vice and the mask of despair his experienced eyes could see the wreck of a departed beauty and refinement of features that must have been once remarkable. M. Feverel, though less experienced, perceived also that there was apparently some deep and tragic purpose back of the silence that he had at first attributed to the sullen brutishness of her class. But how to break it down?

"Madame," he said, courteously, dropping his brusque professional manner, "you must see that your present course cannot but be prejudicial to your case. The authorities will have no difficulty in ultimately establishing your identity but you can readily save us much inconvenience by replying to these simple questions----Is your name Laroque? Was this man your husband?"

The woman gave no sign that she had heard. M. Feverel bit his lip. He had purposely used the most polished French and he was sure that she understood him. But he was apparently no nearer to making her speak.

"What did you mean by saying that you killed this man to prevent him from bringing grief and shame on someone you love?" he demanded suddenly.

The lips moved almost imperceptibly, and for a fraction of a second the eyes wavered and met the magistrate's sharp gaze. But she did not make a sound and the next moment her face was as impassive as before.

M. Valmorin, narrowly watching her, waited for the magistrate's next move. The latter had, at command, a voice as soft and persuasive as a woman's and many an evildoer had felt its spell and had been lured to confession.

"Do not think, madame," he began, his tone at once, respectful, inclusive and inviting, "that I would try to draw you into saying anything that can injure your cause! Do not consider me an enemy. I know that you shot this man Laroque in the Hotel of the Three Crowns and I am more than willing to believe that you had some good reason for this terrible act. Your words to the policeman who arrested you are an indication of that. It is not my duty to try to convict you of crime which was probably justifiable. The man that you killed was an ex-convict and society is well-rid of him. You have probably simply saved the State the expense of putting him in prison once more and keeping him there. I am more than willing to believe that your reasons for killing him were excusable, even in the eyes of the law.

"Look upon me as a friend!" he continued persuasively. "In my office there is no criminal, no judge. You are simply accused of a homicide which you undoubtedly committed. But the law holds that many forms of homicide are justifiable. Convince me that you had even a fairly good reason for shooting this man--and I won't be hard to convince--and it is likely that you may never even come to trial--that your story may be buried with the few who must know it. My stenographer and my friend, the prosecutor, will leave us here together and you can explain everything to me and to me, alone."

Valmorin rose with a bow and passed slowly out followed by M. Feverel's stenographer. Jacqueline's eyes met his as the door closed and he began to speak again.

"Now we are alone!" and the tone was even more inviting and confidential. "You can talk to me now without fear. I do not care to pry into the secrets of your past. You need not mention any names. But just to tell me as simply as you can the reason you killed this prison rat!"

The voice put them on the same level--made them allies against the dead. In its soft, gentle rise and fall, in the dark sympathetic eyes and clean, aquiline face there was something approaching hypnotic power, as several ladies of Bordeaux knew. She began to feel a strange sensation of rest and comfort and vaguely wished that he would go on. M. Feverel's trained eye caught the all but imperceptible relaxation of the rigid figure. A thrill of triumph ran through him. He was winning! But there was no sign of elation or impatience in his voice or words when he continued.

He begged her not to think that the machinery of the law was directed against her. Justice was not blind. She was clear-sighted. She was not sternly even-handed, but more frequently merciful. She had long since forgotten the bitter law of an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. She could make allowances for the frailty of humanity. She could understand that there might be many circumstances under which an assassination might be justifiable. Nay, more--when it became a duty to kill!

Twice when he paused, Jacqueline's lips trembled and her eyes looked into his with yearning. She seemed about to speak, but her lips closed firmly and her glance sought the window, without a word uttered.

Suddenly he rang a bell and a policeman appeared at the door.

"Remove the prisoner!" he commanded in a harsh, curt tone that fell on the woman like the blow of a whip. She hesitated and half-extended her hand as if to stop him and once more the magistrate thought that he had triumphed. But the impulse was conquered and she passed out of his office without having uttered a word.

M. Valmorin returned and in reply to his questioning look, the magistrate shook his head.

"She would not speak," he said, wearily. M. Valmorin's interest as an expert was aroused, and with the magistrate he went over the examination in detail. M. Feverel told him the impression that he had made once or twice and expressed the fear that she would never be forced to tell her story.

"You can see, my friend," he said, "that she is addicted to the use of drugs. She has now been without anything of the sort for forty-eight hours. That means that her nerves must be in a bad shape, and it also means that she has an iron will to conceal the fact so determinedly and foil the examination."

M. Feverel's prophecy proved true.

In the first few hours of her arrest Jacqueline's instinct told, her she would be helpless in a verbal duel with these trained men of the law. An apparently aimless question and a careless answer might be the combination to open the locked gates of her past and then she would have killed Laroque in vain. So, as the days passed and the examinations followed each other with nerve-wracking persistency, she wept, shrieked, and groaned for hours in her cell, begging for ether or morphine, but not a word of her story could be forced from her.

She refused counsel and when the court appointed an advocate she would not see him. At last, M. Feverel abandoned hope.

"You will have to try the case as a plain homicide," he told M. Valmorin. "The testimony of the servants and the policeman is ample for conviction but--what is back of it all?"

"And you could not even find out her name!" mused the prosecutor.

"Call her Madame X!" snapped the exasperated magistrate. "She is about as thoroughly and stubbornly mysterious and elusive as any quantify in the algebra of my youth!"

M. Valmorin laughed a little and told the story in the courts that day. The mysterious woman had already attracted some attention among the journalists who frequent the halls of justice, and when brilliant M. Feverel called her "Madame X," as an acknowledgement of defeat, her case in the three days became a _cause célèbre_ in Bordeaux. In the cafés, in the courts, in the homes, nothing else was talked about for weeks. In spite of the elaborate passport system and registry, here was a woman who absolutely defied the authorities to find a clue to her identity. The police of Buenos Ayres could not help them, and beyond that city her past was a blank. Who was she? Where had she come from? Why had she killed her companion? Was he her husband? These and a hundred other questions were asked every hour of the day. Scores of rumors were set afloat. She was the daughter of a noble house who had run away from a convent. She was the wife of a marquis, had left him and married an adventurer. She was the queen of a band of kidnappers. She was the leader of a secret society of murder.

She had served a sentence for counterfeiting in an American penitentiary. She was a nihilist, escaped from Siberia. And so on.

Dozens were turned away from the prison gate every day. Morbid women and curious men pleaded with the police for a chance to look at her, assuring the chief that they would be able to identify her. A number of hysterical women started! a fund for her defense, but this was firmly suppressed.

Advocates of established reputation, who had smilingly congratulated Maître Raymond Floriot on his first brief and expressed the hope that it would lead to something worth while, now regretted that they had not been appointed by the court to defend her, though it was an unprofitable and hopeless case.

But M. Valmorin was unaffectedly pleased. He was glad that young Floriot had stumbled into a position to attract so much attention, and was almost sorry that the young man had no chance to win his case. The reason is not far to seek. For several years M. Valmorin and M. Floriot, père, had seen that M. Raymond was in love with blue-eyed, sweet-faced Helene Valmorin. There was nothing remarkable about this, as numbers of young men in Bordeaux were in precisely the same state of mind. But what was important was that it was equally plain that Mademoiselle Helene was passionately in love with the dark-eyed, curly-haired young advocate. The fathers knew that it was only a question of a very short time when they would be formally requested to sanction the marriage. Hence M. Valmorin's desire to see his prospective son-in-law rise as rapidly as possible.

That the young man would rise, he was certain. He had inherited, as has been mentioned, his father's faultlessly logical mind and love of his profession and his mother's quickly sympathetic and emotional temperament. His mind was quick to grasp a situation or an unexpected point and equally quick to give it its true value. Coupled with these gifts he had a marked facility of expression and a smooth, vibrant voice. As Mademoiselle Helene said, he made love beautifully.

M. Valmorin was prepared to do what he could financially, and he knew that Raymond's father would strain himself to establish the young people properly, but the young man must look to success in his profession to raise a family.

M. Floriot had written that he would come over from Toulouse to watch his son handle his first case, and M. Valmorin planned to talk things over with him then.

It was to be a great day for Raymond and all who were dear to him had promised to be in court when he appeared for the first time on the firing-line. Rose had promised to take charge of Helene. His father, by request of the President of the Court of Bordeaux, would sit on the bench with the judges. "Uncle" Noel and Dr. Chennel were coming from Paris.

The young man worked hard all day on his case and told Helene about it in the evening, and then worked far into the night. He read parts of his speech to her, while her father pretended to be eavesdropping in the hall "to learn the secrets of the defense." He did not have any false notions about the strength of his battle-line. He knew that he had a bad case but he was determined to do as well as could be done. As he remarked, "it is hard work defending a homicide whose conduct is the best evidence for the prosecution."

As the day approached he was nervous, anxious, restless--but ready.