The Red Lottery Ticket

"We didn't come here to talk," interrupted Puymirol. "This fellow is going for the commissary of police; you had better come upstairs with us, and remain until he brings some official back with him."

The doorkeeper assented; the valet hastened off; and the two friends, having again ascended the stairs, this time with the cerberus of the house, re-entered the apartments where nothing had been disturbed during their absence. Not caring to approach the body, they all three of them remained in the ante-chamber. "Are you well acquainted with this valet?" Puymirol inquired of the doorkeeper.

"Yes, sir. He has been in Monsieur Dargental's employ for three years. I assure you that he is quite incapable of a crime, and fully deserves all the confidence my unfortunate tenant placed in him. This very morning, Monsieur Dargental gave him a letter for the Countess de Lescombat, his intended wife. I was standing at my door as he passed out, and Jean stopped for a moment to chat with me. While we were talking, he said: 'Ah! Monsieur Pinchon, I am so attached to my master that – '"

The sound of footsteps upon the stairs cut M. Pinchon short. The valet was returning, bringing with him in lieu of the commissary, who was absent from his office, that functionary's secretary, an intelligent, wide-awake-looking young man. Having been enlightened on the way by the servant, the secretary walked straight to the body, examined it carefully but without touching it, and said curtly: "This chair is not in its accustomed place."

The other chairs were, in fact, arranged in lines along the walls, but this one stood in the middle of the room, and almost directly opposite the door. "This is the first time I ever heard of a man sitting down to shoot himself," continued the official.

"Do you suspect a crime, then?" inquired Puymirol.

"I have formed no opinion as yet. A doctor will come with the commissary, and make a report. In the meantime, gentlemen, will you have the kindness to give me your names and addresses, for it does not seem necessary that you should be present at the investigation. You will be questioned later on, if needful."

"I am named Adhémar de Puymirol; my friend's name is George Caumont, and we live together, at No. 14, in the Rue de Medicis."

"Very well," said the secretary, as he entered the names in his note-book. "You were very intimate, I believe, with this Monsieur – "

"Monsieur Pierre Dargental," concluded Puymirol. "We certainly knew him very well; I especially. He had invited us to lunch with him this morning in company with Monsieur Charles Balmer, who resides, I believe, in the Rue Auber, and an actress named Blanche Pornic, who lives in the Avenue de Messine."

"Was the lunch ordered by Monsieur Dargental?"

"Yes, and we ate it without him. Afterwards we called here, my friend and myself, to ascertain what had become of him, and we were ringing at his door when the valet, who happened to come upstairs, opened it for us."

"I am aware of that. You must have been greatly surprised on entering. To what cause do you attribute this suicide?"

"I know no cause for it. Dargental was about to be married; besides, it seems to me very strange that he should have killed himself just as we were expecting him to celebrate the close of his bachelor life."

"Yes, and all the stranger as he was quite ready to go out. See, his hat has rolled behind the chair, and his cane has fallen upon the floor. All this does not seem to harmonize with the care he appears to have taken in seating himself."

"That is true. The whole affair is incomprehensible. Dargental must have momentarily lost his mind."

"In that case he must have had a revolver in his pocket at the time; but that weapon there is not one of the sort a man usually carries upon his person. It is too large and too heavy for that."

"All I can say is that the weapon belonged to him. I have often seen it hanging, with others, against the wall of his bedroom. I am certain that it must bear the name of the dealer who sold it to him – Galland."

"That point will be verified by the commissary, and the doctor will tell us if the blood could have spouted a distance of two yards from the arm-chair. See, here is a pool of it upon the floor, almost at my very feet." Puymirol hastily recoiled, for he perceived, for the first time, that he was almost stepping in it. "One more question, sir," said the 'secretary.' "Had Monsieur Dargental any enemies?"

"Not to my knowledge. On the contrary, he had many friends. Besides, no one could have anything to gain by his death, for he had no fortune."

"Oh, no," sighed the doorkeeper. "An execution was put in only the other day by one of his creditors."

"Nevertheless, he lived in handsome style," replied the secretary, "and it is very probable that he had more or less money in the house or about his person; in fact, judging from the apparent disorder of his clothing, it seems more than likely that his pockets were searched after his death. But I will detain you no longer, gentlemen. You will hold yourselves, of course, at the disposal of the authorities – I have your address."

"Certainly, sir," said Puymirol, who had had quite enough of this covert examination. George Caumont was also anxious to get away, for this talk in the presence of his friend's lifeless body made him sick at heart. The valet was about to beat a retreat with them, but the dismissal was not for him, for the secretary remarked drily: "Remain. The commissary will want to talk with you."

"I hope you have no further need of me," now said the doorkeeper.

"Yes, I have, but I shall not keep you long."

M. Pinchon's dismay was pitiful to behold, and the two friends hastily availed themselves of the permission to depart. "What do you think of this catastrophe?" inquired Puymirol, as soon as they reached the street.

"I really don't know what to think of it, and I must admit that I shall make no attempt to solve the mystery. The authorities will take charge of that."

"Well, Dargental did me many good turns, and I should like to avenge his death, for I really believe he was murdered."

"Indeed! But whom do you suspect? And what do you suppose was the object of the crime? Robbery?"

"No, he had nothing but debts. The porter, you recollect, told us that his furniture had been attached. Some woman committed the murder. A woman who was or who had been in love with him."

"Then she killed him from jealousy, you think?"

"Jealousy or revenge, which amounts to about the same thing. It must have been one of his recent flames, probably the last one."

"What, Blanche Pornic? But she lunched with us."

"It is just because she lunched with us that I suspect her. She came to the restaurant merely to prove an alibi. She may very well have killed Dargental at eleven o'clock and yet have reached the Lion d'Or before noon. Balmer can tell us at what hour she arrived. Besides, she may have hired some other person to commit the crime in her stead. By the way, have you forgotten what she said during lunch? Despite her sweet words one could guess that she hated Dargental."

"Indeed! why should she hate him?"

"Because he was going to marry Madame de Lescombat. She could not forgive him for preferring the countess to herself. And by the way, if the inquiry proves that Dargental has really been murdered, Blanche would be delighted should her rival be accused of the crime."

"Well, she certainly didn't act in the right way to divert suspicion from herself. It is strange that she should have treated us to that narrative of the countess's career quite unsolicited; and if she is as shrewd as you pretend – "

"Did you notice her strange manner during the repast, and her abrupt departure afterwards? She heard us say that we were going to Dargental's to find out what had become of him, and she did not care to await the result. She knew the cause of his absence only too well."

"You may call these indications, if you like," replied George, "still they hardly prove that Mademoiselle Pornic instigated the murder, and I don't think her capable of such baseness. Dargental must have committed suicide."

"Oh, a man doesn't kill himself like that with his hat on his head and a cane in his hand. It occurs to me now that his shirt was not scorched as much as it would have been if the pistol had been placed against it. The shot must have been fired from a distance of a few yards, and Dargental probably fell just where we saw the pool of blood. The murderer afterwards raised him up and seated him in the arm-chair."

"That's possible," muttered George, somewhat shaken in his convictions.

"Ah, you are coming round to my way of thinking, at last. Well, I return to my first injunction. Look for the woman. Where is the woman?"

"Well, if you feel so positive that a woman is mixed up in the affair," said Caumont, after a long pause, "I am surprised that you don't think of that countess whose first husband ended so badly."

"That's absurd!" exclaimed Puymirol. "The first husband committed suicide, and his widow certainly had no reason to make away with the man she meant to take as his successor."

"You know nothing about that."

"Mademoiselle Pornic's inuendoes will rankle in your mind, I see. You certainly place a deal of confidence in that venomous creature."

"I might retort that you seem to feel a great deal of confidence in the countess. Do you think of offering yourself as a substitute for Dargental?"

"No, but the countess is no worse than many other women, and your suspicions are too ridiculous to be entertained for a moment. Don't you recollect that telegram in which Madame de Lescombat said: 'I don't wish to interfere with your farewell entertainment to your friends of both sexes, but come and see me immediately afterwards.' So she must have known that Dargental was breakfasting with one or more of his old flames, and feeling no jealousy on that account, she had no grievance against him."

"Did she really say 'your friends of both sexes?'"

"Those were the very words, my dear fellow, as you shall see for yourself. I put the telegram in my pocket, you recollect, with the intention of giving it to Dargental. Here it is." And Adhémar, after rummaging in his pocket, drew from it not only the telegram, but also the mysterious pocket-book. Then, turning suddenly, he dragged George behind one of the newspaper kiosks on the boulevard, along which they were now walking. "Didn't Blanche say that Dargental had just been invested with the title of marquis?" he asked.

"Yes, and she must have told the truth, for the valet said, 'Monsieur le Marquis,' in speaking of his master."

"Blanche also said, did she not, that Dargental had altered his name to D'Argental?"

"To please the Countess de Lescombat. The news did not surprise me. For ennobling one's self by means of an apostrophe is a very common thing in these days."

"Well, look at this pocket-book. Here is a marquis's cornet, and a capital A; that is to say, Marquis d'Argental."

"What! you think that this case belonged – "

"To our friend Pierre. And now I understand his death. He was killed by some one who wished to regain possession of the letters he kept in this case. So the crime was committed, or at least instigated, by a woman."

"I admire your bold reasoning, though I think it decidedly paradoxical. The scoundrel who stole this pocket-book would not have thrown it into our cab."

"You told me yourself that he was closely followed by two persons who seemed to be watching him. He perhaps feared that he would be arrested and searched; and he did not know that we were intimate with Dargental. He thought that we should keep the pocket-book, and burn the letters which could be of no possible interest to us, and which he was anxious to get rid of at any cost."

"Then, according to you, that man intended to return these letters to the various women they compromised. You must admit that this supposition is absurd in the extreme."

"Oh! he was only acting on behalf of one of the women."

"Which one? There are three letters, but each of them is written in a different hand. You said so yourself."

"I may have been mistaken. I think I will examine them more closely. Let us take a seat in front of that café. I see a table in a corner where we shall be comparatively alone."

George Caumont assented to the proposal, and as soon as the friends were seated in a little niche in front of the Café Américain, Puymirol opened the pocket-book. "Let us proceed systematically," he remarked. "Here is the first letter. It is not long, but it is expressive. 'My adored one,' it says, 'I am ready to leave everything to follow you, and to sacrifice, for your sake, all that I prize most in this world, my children and my good name. When shall we start? Say the word, and I will join you. Take me to the end of the world, and make me your slave. I shall be only too happy, for I cannot live apart from you.' I have skipped the kisses. There are too many of them," concluded Adhémar, sneering.

"My children!" repeated George, ironically. "Then Blanche certainly did not write that letter. She has no children."

"Nor has Madame de Lescombat any. But let us examine the next missive: 'My friend, I have loved you, I love you still; but if you go on in this way, I shall no longer love you. I shall even hate you, and I do not conceal from you that there lurks in my heart a feeling that you would do well not to arouse. Have you ever seen Sardou's "Hatred" played? Well, I am a Florentine Parisienne, and I should know how to avenge my wrongs, as Italian women revenged theirs in the middle ages. These are no meaningless threats, my dear. To extricate you from a terrible predicament I once committed an act that might have sent me straight to the Assizes, and I mean to be rewarded by your devotion. You must choose between her and me. You understand me, do you not? I await in reply, not words, but acts. I shall expect you to-morrow, you bad fellow, whom I love so much. Bring me what you swore to return to me, or there will be bitter war.'"

"The deuce!" exclaimed George, "that woman doesn't bandy words. I should think her quite capable of conniving at Dargental's murder to regain possession of a letter in which she owns that she had committed a crime. She does not state what crime, but she may have committed forgery; and if Dargental profited by the deed, as she says clearly enough, he certainly had good reason to fear her vengeance."

"Then, if this letter came from Blanche Pornic, you would be inclined to think that the murder was committed by her orders, and for her benefit?"

"I would not swear that such was the case; but it would seem very probable."

"Well, I know her; and I am sure that she was the writer of this threatening missive. 'You must choose between her and me.' 'Her' is Madame de Lescombat, her rival; and I would wager almost any amount that the letter is not a week old. A day or two after it was written, Dargental's intended marriage was announced. He had refused to fulfil his promise, and Blanche avenged herself accordingly."

"But if they had quarrelled to that point, he would not have invited her to lunch with us this morning."

"There is nothing to prove that she did not invite herself, in order to throw us off the track. But let us pass on to the third letter." So saying, Puymirol drew it from the pocket-book, unfolded it, and uttered an exclamation of astonishment. "What is the matter?" asked George.

Puymirol, instead of replying, proceeded to unfold the telegram, which he had drawn from his pocket, with the Russian leather case, and spread it out upon the table beside the third letter, which he had not yet read. "This last missive certainly comes from Madame de Lescombat," he grunted. "The handwriting is precisely the same as that of the telegraphic note."

"Then Madame de Lescombat was probably as deeply interested as her rivals in regaining possession of her correspondence. You must admit that."

"Yes; but as Dargental was about to marry her, he would have returned her the letter, had she desired it."

"Who knows? Read it, and let me know your opinion afterwards."

Puymirol complied, though somewhat reluctantly, for he was afraid he would be obliged to change his first opinion. He read as follows: "'My king, my love, my life, I am intoxicated with happiness. What blissful hours I have spent with you! When will they return? Why did I allow you to depart? I feel a mad desire to hasten after you, and throw myself in the arms that clasped me so fondly. Before I met you I never knew what it was to love. Now, however, my happiness is perfect, and I have proved to you how ardent is my affection. I have placed myself in your power by confiding my great secret to you. In a word, you might ruin me. And if I write this, it is in order that you may have in your possession a proof, a confession. If I deceived you, if I ceased to love you – But I am blaspheming! I shall love you until my latest breath. But if I ever give you any cause of complaint, show me no mercy, crush me, deliver me up; I shall have deserved my fate. Oh, when will the day come when I shall be able to acknowledge you as my lord and master before all the world? When shall I bear your name? It seems to me that day will never come. Eight months longer to wait! Eight months during which we must conceal our love, and pretend to mourn a being I loathed. And what if you learned to love another in the meantime? What if your infatuation should return for the woman I hate the most because it was she whom you most loved. Ah! I should die. It would kill me; but I should not die without being avenged upon that creature.'"

"Well, what do you think of that?" asked George.

"I think that the lady was desperately in love with Dargental, and that she was out of her mind when she wrote that letter."

"It was evidently written just two months after her husband's death, for she deplores the fact that her happiness must be deferred eight months longer, and the law does not allow a woman to marry again until ten months of widowhood have expired."

"But it is at the least two years since Lescombat died of apoplexy."

"Or of something else. Well, the marriage was deferred for some reason or other, which is conclusive proof that the courtship was stormy. The countess has had plenty of time to change her mind."

"She did not change it, as she meant to marry Dargental next week."

"I admit that; but perhaps she was not so much in earnest as formerly. Dargental, in spite of his promises, had not severed his connection with Blanche Pornic, and Madame de Lescombat may have regretted saying, and above all, writing, so much; she herself could not break the engagement, as he had her completely in his power."

"And you fancy that she could devise no other means but murder to escape him. That is absurd, my dear fellow."

"Less absurd than your suspicions respecting Blanche, for this letter is certainly from the countess; and we are by no means sure that the other comes from the actress." Puymirol hung his head. He was obliged to confess that George was right, though it cost him a struggle to admit it. "However, I don't see," added Caumont, "why we should devote our attention to this mystery. The authorities will take charge of that. You have only to hand the letters to the commissary of police, and state how you came into possession of them."

"I shall not do that," said Adhémar quickly. "I don't want to inform on any one."

"But you talk about avenging Dargental's death."

"Quite so, and when I learn who the guilty party is, I will decide on my course. I shall begin my search after the truth to-morrow. Before doing so, however, I want to know the result of the inquiry now in progress."

"How will you learn that result?"

"We shall be summoned as witnesses; and the questions put to us will indicate how the magistrate views the affair. But we can not stay here forever. Shall we go to the club? Balmer will be there by about four o'clock; and there are some questions that I should like to ask him. He was very intimate with Dargental, so he may be able to enlighten me respecting certain circumstances."

The two friends thereupon rose up and repaired to their club, a second-rate establishment in the Avenue de l'Opéra hard by. They had been elected members, thanks to Dargental. On arriving, they found that Balmer had not yet put in an appearance, so they sat down in a corner to wait for him. Their thoughts followed very different channels. Puymirol, while regretting Dargental, to whom he was indebted for many little services, hoped to profit by his death, without knowing exactly how. He had, however, more ambition than scruples, and though he would not have stooped to blackmailing, he did not hesitate about fishing in muddy waters. He said to himself that Madame de Lescombat, whether innocent or guilty of the murder, would give almost anything to regain possession of her letter, and that she would be disposed to assist any man who might restore it to her; now, why should he not be the man? These intentions were certainly not very laudable; but when a fellow wishes to succeed at any cost, he must not be over fastidious. Caumont, on his side, did not feel the slightest interest in the countess, and had only undertaken Blanche Pornic's defence from a sense of justice. He had never liked Dargental, though he had seen a good deal of him, having been dragged into his society by Puymirol. He regretted his untimely death, but felt no desire to avenge it; indeed, he was sorry that he had become mixed up in the affair of the pocket-book and the letters. In point of fact, he had other thoughts in his mind. He had recently met a young lady whom he greatly admired, and whom he wished to marry.

While the two friends thus sat side by side on a sofa, smoking in silence, Charles Balmer suddenly appeared looking considerably excited. "Do you know what has happened?" he asked, in a husky voice. "I have just come from Dargental's."

"We went there in advance of you. He is dead," said Adhémar.

"He was murdered, my dear fellow. I fell into a nest of detectives, magistrates, and physicians, and I thought for a while that they were going to arrest me. They confined themselves to questioning me, however."

"Have they discovered the culprit?" asked Adhémar.

"Well, they have arrested the valet, who stoutly denies any knowledge of the crime. I know him, and I would stake my life upon his innocence. Besides, Dargental's pocket-book was stolen, and it certainly was not Jean who took it, for he was searched, and only thirty-seven sous were found upon him. They are going to keep him in jail, all the same, but I am convinced that his innocence will be established sooner or later on."

"But how do they know that the pocket-book was stolen?"

"Dargental always carried it in his breast-pocket. Jean himself told the commissary so, and the pocket was empty. Poor Pierre! when I think how we blamed him for keeping us waiting! He was just starting off to lunch with us when he was killed – by whom, no one can tell." With these words Balmer left the two friends to approach the card tables and inform the other members present of the violent death which had befallen one of the boldest players of the club.

"Well," said George to Puymirol, "after what you have just heard, do you still persist in your determination to usurp the functions of the police?"

"I not only persist in my determination, but I shall begin work this very evening," replied Adhémar, taking up his hat. "You can return home if you like; I mean to call on the countess."

II

Every April the horse-show, held annually at the Palais de l'Industrie in the Champs Elysées, is one of the favourite resorts of Parisian society; and on the day when the chargers parade, ridden by lieutenants and sub-lieutenants, quite prepared to break their necks in order to attract the attention of the ladies, a large crowd is invariably present. The attractive gathering took place that year a fortnight after Dargental's tragical demise. Both George Caumont and Adhémar de Puymirol were there, having met each other by appointment at the door. Since their friend's death they had not seen nearly so much of each other as usual. They still lived in the same house, and upon the same floor, but in the morning, instead of going out together as formerly, each of them went his own way, for George had refused to help Adhémar in discovering the murderer, and spent his time in a manner more congenial to his tastes. The fact that Dargental had not committed suicide was now established, but, otherwise, no progress had been made with the investigation. The valet was still in prison, but stoutly protested his innocence, and there was really no evidence against him. Puymirol, who might have furnished a clue as to the truth, remained obstinately silent. Upon being questioned by the magistrate, on the day following the crime, he had contented himself with relating the incidents of the lunch. George Caumont had been equally reticent, and so had Balmer and Blanche Pornic, who were also questioned; and as the valet persisted in his denials, it would be necessary to set him at liberty sooner or later.