When Muller reached the house where Mrs. Klingmayer lived he ordered the cabman to wait and hurried up to the widow’s little apartment. He had the key to Leopold Winkler’s room in his own pocket, for Mrs. Klingmayer had given this key to Commissioner von Riedau at the latter’s request and the commissioner had given it to Muller. The detective told the good woman not to bother about him as he wanted to make an examination of the place alone. Left to himself in the little room, Muller made a thorough search of it, opening the cupboard, the bureau drawers, every possible receptacle where any article could be kept or hidden. What he wanted to find was some letter, some bit of paper, some memoranda perhaps, anything that would show any connection existing between the murdered man and Mrs. Bernauer, who lived so near the place where this man had died and who was so greatly interested in his murder.
The detective’s search was not quite in vain, although he could not tell yet whether what he had found would be of any value. Leopold Winkler had had very little correspondence, or else he had had no reason to keep the letters he received. Muller found only about a half dozen letters in all. Three of them were from women of the half-world, giving dates for meetings. Another was written by a man and signed “Theo.” This “Theo” appeared to be the same sort of a cheap rounder that Winkler was. And he seemed to have sunk one grade deeper than the dead man, in spite of the latter’s bad reputation. For this other addressed Winkler as his “Dear Friend” and pleaded with him for “greater discretion,” alluding evidently to something which made this discretion necessary.
“I wonder what rascality it was that made these two friends?” murmured Muller, putting Theo’s letter with the three he had already read. But before he slipped it in his pocket he glanced at the postmark. The letters of the three women had all been posted from different quarters of the city some months ago. Theo’s letter was postmarked “Marburg,” and dated on the 1st of September of the present year.
Then Muller looked at the postmark of the two remaining letters which he had not yet read, and whistled softly to himself. Both these letters were posted from a certain station in Hietzing, the station which was nearest his own lodgings and also nearest the Thorne house. He looked at the postmark more sharply. They both bore the dates of the present year, one of them being stamped “March 17th,” the other “September 24th.” This last letter interested the detective most.
Muller was not of a nervous disposition, but his hand trembled slightly as he took the letter from its envelope. It was clear that this letter had been torn open hastily, for the edges of the opening were jagged and uneven.
When the detective had read the letter—it contained but a few lines and bore neither address nor signature—he glanced over it once more as if to memorise the words. They were as follows: “Do not come again. In a day or two I will be able to do what I have to do. I will send you later news to your office. Impatience will not help you.”—These words were written hastily on a piece of paper that looked as if it had been torn from a pad. In spite of the haste the writer had been at some pains to disguise the handwriting. But it was a clumsy disguise, done by one not accustomed to such tricks, and it was evidently done by a woman. All she had known how to do to disguise her writing had been to twist and turn the paper while writing, so that every letter had a different position. The letters were also made unusually long. This peculiarity of the writing was seen on both letters and both envelopes. The earlier letter was still shorter and seemed to have been written with the same haste, and with the same disgust, or perhaps even hatred, for the man to whom it was written.
“Come to-morrow, but not before eight o’clock. He has gone away. God forgive him and you.” This was the contents of the letter of the 17th of March. That is, the writer had penned the letter this way. But the last two words, “and you,” had evidently not come from her heart, for she had annulled them by a heavy stroke of the pen. A stroke that seemed like a knife thrust, so full of rage and hate it was.
“So he was called to a rendezvous in Hietzing, too,” murmured Muller, then he added after a few moments: “But this rendezvous had nothing whatever to do with love.”
There was nothing else in Winkler’s room which could be of any value to Muller in the problem that was now before him. And yet he was very well satisfied with the result of his errand.
He entered his cab again, ordering the driver to take him to Hietzing. Just before he had reached the corner where he had told the man to stop, another cab passed them, a coupe, in which was a solitary woman. Muller had just time enough to recognise this woman as Adele Bernauer, and to see that she looked even more haggard and miserable than she had that morning. She did not look up as the other cab passed her carriage, therefore she did not see Muller. The detective looked at his watch and saw that it was almost half-past four. The unexpected meeting changed his plans for the afternoon. He had decided that he must enter the Thorne mansion again that very day, for he must find out the meaning of the red-shaded lamp. And now that the housekeeper was away it would be easier for him to get into the house, therefore it must be done at once. His excuse was all ready, for he had been weighing possibilities. He dismissed his cab a block from his own home and entered his house cautiously.
Muller’s lodgings consisted of two large rooms, really much too large for a lone man who was at home so little. But Muller had engaged them at first sight, for the apartment possessed one qualification which was absolutely necessary for him. Its situation and the arrangement of its doors made it possible for him to enter and leave his rooms without being seen either by his own landlady or by the other lodgers in the house. The little apartment was on the ground floor, and Muller’s own rooms had a separate entrance opening on to the main corridor almost immediately behind the door. Nine times out of ten, he could come and go without being seen by any one in the house. To-day was the first time, however, that Muller had had occasion to try this particular qualification of his new lodgings.
He opened the street door and slipped into his own room without having seen or been seen by any one.
Fifteen minutes later he left the apartment again, but left it such a changed man that nobody who had seen him go in would have recognised him. Before he came out, however, he looked about carefully to see whether there was any one in sight He came out unseen and was just closing the main door behind him, when he met the janitress.
“Were you looking for anybody in the house?” said the woman, glancing sharply at the stranger, who answered in a slightly veiled voice: “No, I made a mistake in the number. The place I am looking for is two houses further down.”
He walked down the street and the woman looked after him until she saw him turn into the doorway of the second house. Then she went into her own rooms. The house Muller entered happened to be a corner house with an entrance on the other street, through which the detective passed and went on his way. He was quite satisfied with the security of his disguise, for the woman who knew him well had not recognised him at all. If his own janitress did not know him, the people in the Thorne house would never imagine it was he.
And indeed Muller was entirely changed. In actuality small and thin, with sparse brown hair and smooth shaven face, he was now an inch or two taller and very much stouter. He wore thick curly blond hair, a little pointed blond beard and moustache. His eyes were hidden by heavy-rimmed spectacles.
It was just half-past five when he rang the bell at the entrance gate to the Thorne property. He had spent the intervening time in the cafe, as he was in no hurry to enter the house. Franz came down the path and opened the door. “‘What do you want?” he asked.
“I come from Siemens & Halske; I was to ask whether the other man—”
“Has been here already?” interrupted Franz, adding in an irritated tone, “No, he hasn’t been here at all.”
“Well, I guess he didn’t get through at the other place in time. I’ll see what the trouble is,” said the stranger, whom Franz naturally supposed to be the electrician, he opened the gate and asked the other to come in, leading him into the house. Under a cloudy sky the day was fading rapidly. Muller knew that it would not occur to the real electrician to begin any work as late as this, and that he was perfectly safe in the examination he wanted to make.
“Well, what’s the trouble here? Why did you write to our firm?” asked the supposed electrician.
“The wires must cross somewhere, or there’s something wrong with the bells. When the housekeeper touches the button in her room to ring for the cook or the upstairs girl, the bell rings in Mr. Thorne’s room. It starts ringing and it keeps up with a deuce of a noise. Fortunately the family are away.”
“Well, we’ll fix it all right for you. First of all I want to look at the button in the housekeeper’s room.”
“I’ll take you up there,” said Franz.
They walked through the wide corridor, then turned into a shorter, darker hall and went up a narrow winding stairway. Franz halted before a door in the second story. It was the last of the three doors in the hall. Muller took off his hat as the door opened and murmured a “good-evening.”
“There’s no one there; Mrs. Bernauer’s out.”
“Has she gone away, too?” asked the electrician hastily.
Franz did not notice that there was a slight change in the stranger’s voice at this question, and he answered calmly as ever: “Oh, no; she’s just driven to town. I think she went to see the doctor who lives quite a distance away. She hasn’t been feeling at all well. She took a cab to-day. I told her she ought to, as she wasn’t well enough to go by the tram. She ought to be home any moment now.”
“Well, I’ll hurry up with the job so that I’ll be out of the way when the lady comes,” said Muller, as Franz led him to the misbehaving bell.
It was in the wall immediately above a large table which filled the window niche so completely that there was but scant space left for the comfortable armchair that stood in front of it. The window was open and Muller leaned out, looking down at the garden below.
“What a fine old garden!” he exclaimed aloud. To himself he said: “This is the last window in the left wing. It is the window where Johann Knoll saw the red light.”
And when he turned back into the room again he found the source of this light right at his hand on the handsome old table at which Mrs. Bernauer evidently spent many of her hours. A row of books stood against the wall, framing the back of the table. Well-worn volumes of the classics among them gave proof that the one-time nurse was a woman of education. A sewing basket and neat piles of house linen, awaiting repairs, covered a large part of the table-top, and beside them stood a gracefully shaped lamp, covered by a shade of soft red silk.
It took Muller but a few seconds to see all this. Then he set about his investigation of the electric button. He unscrewed the plate and examined the wires meeting under it. While doing so he cast another glance at the table and saw a letter lying there, an open letter half out of its envelope. This envelope was of unusual shape, long and narrow, and the paper was heavy and high-glossed.
“Your housekeeper evidently has no secrets from the rest of you,” Muller remarked with a laugh, still busy at the wires, “or she wouldn’t leave her letters lying about like that.”
“Oh, we’ve all heard what’s in that letter,” replied Franz. “She read it to us when it came this morning. It’s from the Madam. She sent messages to all of us and orders, so Mrs. Bernauer read us the whole letter. There’s no secrets in that.”
“The button has been pressed in too far and caught down. That seems to be the main trouble,” said Muller, readjusting the little knob. “I’d like a candle here if I may have one.”
“I’ll get you a light at once,” said Franz. But his intentions, however excellent, seemed difficult of fulfilment. It was rapidly growing dark, and the old butler peered about uncertainly. “Stupid,” he muttered. “I don’t know where she keeps the matches. I can’t find them anywhere. I’m not a smoker, so I haven’t any in my pocket.”
“Nor I,” said Muller calmly, letting his hand close protectingly over a new full box of them in his own pocket.
“I’ll get you some from my own room,” and Franz hurried away, his loose slippers clattering down the stairs. He was no sooner well out of the room than Muller had the letter in his hand and was standing close by the window to catch the fading light. But on the old servant’s return the supposed electrician stood calmly awaiting the coming of the light, and the letter was back on the table half hidden by a piece of linen. Franz did not notice that the envelope was missing. And the housekeeper, whose mind was so upset by the events of the day, and whose thoughts were on other more absorbing matters, would hardly be likely to remember whether she had returned this quite unimportant letter to its envelope or not.
Franz brought a lighted candle with him, and Muller, who really did possess a creditable knowledge of electricity, saw that the wires in the room were all in good condition. As he had seen at first, there was really nothing the matter except with the position of the button. But it did not suit his purpose to enlighten Franz on the matter just yet.
“Now I’d better look at the wires in the gentleman’s room,” he said, when he had returned plate and button to their place.
“Just as you say,” replied Franz, taking up his candle and leading the way out into the hall and down the winding stair. They crossed the lower corridor, mounted another staircase and entered a large, handsomely furnished room, half studio, half library. The wall was covered with pictures and sketches, several easels stood piled up in the corner, and a broad table beside them held paint boxes, colour tubes, brushes, all the paraphernalia of the painter, now carefully ordered and covered for a term of idleness. Great bookcases towered to the ceiling, and a huge flat top desk, a costly piece of furniture, was covered with books and papers. It was the room of a man of brains and breeding, a man of talent and ability, possessing, furthermore, the means to indulge his tastes freely. Even now, with its master absent, the handsome apartment bore the impress of his personality. The detective’s quick imagination called up the attractive, sympathetic figure of the man he had seen at the gate, as his quick eye took in the details of the room. All the charm of Herbert Thorne’s personality, which the keen-sensed Muller had felt so strongly even in that fleeting glimpse of him, came back again here in the room which was his own little kingdom and the expression of his mentality.
“Well, what’s the trouble here? Where are the wires?” asked the detective, after the momentary pause which had followed his entrance into the room. Franz led him to a spot on the wall hidden by a marquetry cabinet. “Here’s the bell, it rings for several minutes before it stops.”
The light of the candle which the butler held fell upon a portrait hanging above the cabinet. It was a sketch in water-colours, the life-sized head of a man who may have been about thirty years old, perhaps, but who had none of the freshness and vigour of youth. The scanty hair, the sunken temples, and the faded skin, emphasised the look of dissipation given by the lines about the sensual mouth and the shifty eyes.
“Well, say, can’t your master find anything better to paint than a face like that?” Muller asked with a laugh.
“Goodness me! you mustn’t say such things!” exclaimed Franz in alarm; “that’s the Madam’s brother. He’s an officer, I’d have you know. It’s true, he doesn’t look like much there, but that’s because he’s not in uniform. It makes such a difference.”
“Is the lady anything like her brother?” asked the detective indifferently, bending to examine the wiring.
“Oh, dear, no, not a bit; they’re as different as day and night. He’s only her half-brother anyway. She was the daughter of the Colonel’s second wife. Our Madam is the sweetest, gentlest lady you can imagine, an angel of goodness. But the Lieutenant here has always been a care to his family, they say. I guess he’s quieted down a bit now, for his father—he’s Colonel Leining, retired—made him get exchanged from the city to a small garrison town. There’s nothing much to do in Marburg, I dare say—well! you are a merry sort, aren’t you?” These last words, spoken in a tone of surprise, were called forth by a sudden sharp whistle from the detective, a whistle which went off into a few merry bars.
A sudden whistle like that from Muller’s lips was something that made the Imperial Police Force sit up and take notice, for it meant that things were happening, and that the happenings were likely to become exciting. It was a habit he could control only by the severest effort of the will, an effort which he kept for occasions when it was absolutely necessary. Here, alone with the harmless old man, he was not so much on his guard, and the sudden vibrating of every nerve at the word “Marburg,” found vent in the whistle which surprised old Franz. One young police commissioner with a fancy for metaphor had likened this sudden involuntary whistle of Muller’s to the bay of the hound when he strikes the trail; which was about what it was.
“Yes, I am merry sometimes,” he said with a laugh. “It’s a habit I have. Something occurred to me just then, something I had forgotten. Hope you don’t mind.”
“Oh, no, there’s no one here now, whistle all you like.”
But Muller’s whistle was not a continuous performance, and he had now completely mastered the excitation of his nerves which had called it forth. He threw another sharp look at the picture of the man who lived in Marburg, and then asked: “And now where is the button?”
“By the window there, beside the desk.” Franz led the way with his candle.
“Why, how funny! What are those mirrors there for?” asked the electrician in a tone of surprise, pointing to two small mirrors hanging in the window niche. They were placed at a height and at such a peculiar angle that no one could possibly see his face in them.
“Something the master is experimenting with, I guess. He’s always making queer experiments; he knows a lot about scientific things.”
Muller shook his head as if in wonderment, and bent to investigate the button which was fastened into the wall beneath the window sill. His quick ear heard a carriage stopping in front of the house, and heard the closing of the front door a moment later. To facilitate his examination of the button, the detective had seated himself in the armchair which stood beside the desk. He half raised himself now to let the light of the candle fall more clearly on the wiring—then he started up altogether and threw a hasty glance at the mirrors above his head. A ray of light had suddenly flashed down upon him—a ray of red light, and it came reflected from the mirrors. Muller bit his lips to keep back the betraying whistle.
“What’s the matter?” asked the butler. “Did you drop anything?”
“Yes, the wooden rim of the button,” replied Muller, telling the truth this time. For he had held the little wooden circlet in his hands at the moment when the red light, reflected down from the mirrors, struck full upon his eyes. He had dropped it in his surprise and excitement. Franz found the little ring in the centre of the room where it had rolled, and the supposed electrician replaced it and rose to his feet, saying: “There, I’ve finished now.”
Franz did not recognise the double meaning in the words. “Yes, it’s all right! I’ve finished here now,” Muller repeated to himself. For now he knew beyond a doubt that the red light was a signal—and he knew also for whom this signal was intended. It was a signal for Herbert Thorne!—Herbert Thorne, whom no single thought or suspicion of Muller’s had yet connected with the murder of Leopold Winkler.
The detective was very much surprised and greatly excited. But Franz did not notice it, and indeed a far keener observer than the slow-witted old butler might have failed to see the sudden gleam which shot up in the grey eyes behind the heavy spectacles, might have failed to notice the tightening of the lips beneath the blond moustache, or the tenseness of the slight frame under the assumed embonpoint. Muller’s every nerve was tingling, but he had himself completely in hand.
“What do we owe you?” asked Franz.
“They’ll send you a bill from the office. It won’t amount to much. I must be getting on now.”
Muller hastened out of the door and down the street to the nearest cab stand. There were not very many cab stands in this vicinity, and the detective reasoned that Mrs. Bernauer would naturally have taken her cab from the nearest station. He had heard her return in her carriage, presumably the same in which she had started out.
There was but one cab at the stand. Muller walked to it and laid his hand on the door.
“Oh, Jimmy! must I go out again?” asked the driver hoarsely. “Can’t you see the poor beast is all wet from the last ride? We’ve just come in.” He pointed with his whip to the tired-looking animal under his blanket.
“Why, he does look warm. You must have been making a tour out into the country,” said the blond gentleman in a friendly tone.
“No, sir, not quite so far as that. I’ve just taken a woman to the main telegraph office in the city and back again. But she was in a hurry and he’s not a young horse, sir.”
“Well, never mind, then; I can get another cab across the bridge,” replied the stout blond man, turning away and strolling off leisurely in the direction of the bridge. It was now quite dark, and a few steps further on Muller could safely turn and take the road to his own lodging. No one saw him go in, and in a few moments the real Muller, slight, smooth-shaven, sat down at his desk, looking at the papers that lay before him. They were three letters and an empty envelope.
He took up the last, and compared it carefully with the envelope of one of the letters found in Winkler’s room—the unsigned letter postmarked Hietzing, September 24th. The two envelopes were exactly alike. They were of the same size and shape, made of the same cream-tinted, heavy, glossy paper, and the address was written by the same hand. This any keen observer, who need not necessarily be an expert, could see. The same hand which had addressed the envelope to Mrs. Adele Bernauer on the letter which was postmarked “Venice,” about thirty-six hours previous—this hand had, in an awkward and childish attempt at disguise, written Winkler’s address on the envelope which bore the date of September 24th.
The writer of the harmless letter to Mrs. Bernauer, a letter which chatted of household topics and touched lightly on the beauties of Venice, was Mrs. Thorne. It was Mrs. Thorne, therefore, who, reluctantly and in anger and distaste, had called Leopold Winkler to Hietzing, to his death.
And whose hand had fired the shot that caused his death? The question, at this stage in Muller’s meditation, could hardly be called a question any more. It was all too sadly clear to him now. Winkler met his death at the hand of the husband, who, discovering the planned rendezvous, had misunderstood its motive.
For truly this had been no lovers’ meeting. It had been a meeting to which the woman was driven by fear and hate; the man by greed of gain. This was clearly proved by the 300 guldens found in the dead man’s pocket, money enclosed in a delicate little envelope, sealed hastily, and crumpled as if it had been carried in a hot and trembling hand.
It was already known that Winkler never had any money except at certain irregular intervals, when he appeared to have come into possession of considerable sums. During these days he indulged in extravagant pleasures and spent his money with a recklessness which proved that he had not earned it by honest work.
Leopold Winkler was a blackmailer.
Colonel Leining, retired, the father of two such widely different children, was doubtless a man of stern principles, and an army officer as well, therefore a man with a doubly sensitive code of honour and a social position to maintain; and this man, morbidly sensitive probably, had a daughter who had inherited his sensitiveness and his high ideals of honour, a daughter married to a rich husband. But he had another child, a son without any sense of honour at all, who, although also an officer, failed to live in a manner worthy his position. This son was now in Marburg, where there were no expensive pleasures, no all-night cafes and gambling dens, for a man to lose his time in, his money, and his honour also.
For such must have been the case with Colonel Leining’s son before his exile to Marburg. The old butler had hinted at the truth. The portrait drawn by Herbert Thorne, a picture of such technical excellence that it was doubtless a good likeness also, had given an ugly illustration to Franz’s remarks. And there was something even more tangible to prove it: “Theo’s” letter from Marburg pleading with Winkler for “discretion and silence,” not knowing (“let us hope he did not know!” murmured Muller between set teeth) that the man who held him in his power because of some rascality, was being paid for his silence by the Lieutenant’s sister.
It is easy to frighten a sensitive woman, so easy to make her believe the worst! And there is little such a tender-hearted woman will not do to save her aging father from pain and sorrow, perhaps even disgrace!
It must have been in this way that Mrs. Thorne came into the power of the scoundrel who paid with his life for his last attempt at blackmail.
When Muller reached this point in his chain of thought, he closed his eyes and covered his face with his hands, letting two pictures stand out clear before his mental vision.
He saw the little anxious group around the carriage in front of the Thorne mansion. He saw the pale, frail woman leaning back on the cushions, and the husband bending over her in tender care. And then he saw Johann Knoll in his cell, a man with little manhood left in him, a man sunk to the level of the brutes, a man who had already committed one crime against society, and who could never rise to the mental or spiritual standard of even the most mediocre of decent citizens.
If Herbert Thorne were to suffer the just punishment for his deed of doubly blind jealousy, then it was not only his own life, a life full of gracious promise, that would be ruined, but the happiness of his delicate, sweet-faced wife, who was doubtless still in blessed ignorance of what had happened. And still one other would be dragged down by this tragedy; a respected, upright man would bow his white hairs in disgrace. Thorne’s father-in-law could not escape the scandal and his own share in the responsibility for it. And to a veteran officer, bred in the exaggerated social ethics of his profession, such a disgrace means ruin, sometimes even voluntary death.
“Oh, dear, if it had only been Knoll who did it,” said Muller with a sigh that was almost a groan.
Then he rose slowly and heavily, and slowly and heavily, as if borne down by the weight of great weariness, he reached for his hat and coat and left the house.
Whether he wished it or not, he knew it was his duty to go on to the bitter end on this trail he had followed up all day from the moment that he caught that fleeting glimpse of Mrs. Bernauer’s haggard face at the garden gate. He was almost angry with the woman, because she chanced to look out of the gate at just that moment, showing him her face distorted with anxiety. For it was her face that had drawn Muller to the trail, a trail at the end of which misery awaited those for whom this woman had worked for years, those whom she loved and who treated her as one of the family.
Muller knew now that the one-time nurse was in league with her former charge; that Thorne and Adele Bernauer were in each other’s confidence; that the man sat waiting for the signal which she was to give him, a signal bringing so much disgrace and sorrow in its train.
If the woman had not spied upon and betrayed her mistress, this terrible event, which now weighed upon her own soul, would not have happened.
“A faithful servant, indeed,” said Muller, with a harsh laugh.
Then maturer consideration came and forced him to acknowledge that it was indeed devotion that had swayed Adele Bernauer, devotion to her master more than to her mistress. This was hardly to be wondered at. But she had not thought what might come from her revelations, what had come of them. For now her pet, the baby who had once lain in her arms, the handsome, gifted man whom she adored with more than the love of many a mother for the child of her own blood, was under the shadow of hideous disgrace and doom, was the just prey of the law for open trial and condemnation as a murderer.
Muller sighed deeply once more and then came one of those moments which he had spoken of to the unhappy woman that very day. He felt like cursing the fatal gift that was his, the gift to see what was hidden from others, this something within him that forced him relentlessly onward until he had uncovered the truth, and brought misery to many.
Muller need not do anything, he need simply do nothing. Not a soul besides himself suspected the dwellers in the Thorne mansion of any connection with the murder. If he were silent, nothing could be proven against Knoll after all, except the robbery which he himself had confessed. Then the memory of the terror in the tramp’s little reddened eyes came back to the detective’s mind.
“A human soul after all, and a soul trembling in the shadow of a great fear. And even he’s a better man than the blackmailer who was killed. A miscarriage of justice will often make a criminal of a poor fellow whose worst fault is idleness.” Muller’s face darkened as the things of the past, shut down in the depths of his own soul, rose up again. “No; that’s why I took up this work. Justice must be done—but it’s bitter hard sometimes. I could almost wish now that I hadn’t seen that face at the gate.”
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