XXIV. UNDER LOCK AND KEY
After the preliminary examination as to his identity and so on, Gurn hadbeen transferred to the Sante prison. At first the prisoner seemed tohave terrible difficulty in accustoming himself to the rigours ofconfinement; he suffered from alternate paroxysms of rage and despair,but by sheer strength of character he fought these down. As a prisoneron remand he was entitled to the privilege of a separate cell, alsoduring the first forty-eight hours he had been able to have his mealssent in from outside. Since then, however, his money had given out, andhe was obliged to content himself with the ordinary prison dietary. ButGurn was not fastidious; this man whom Lady Beltham had singled out, oraccepted, as her lover had often given proofs of an education and anintelligence above the average, yet now he appeared quite at ease in theatmosphere of a prison.
* * * * *
Gurn was walking quickly and alone round the exercise yard, when abreathless voice sounded in his ear.
"'Gad, Gurn, you know how to march! I was going to join you for a bit,but I could not keep up with you."
Gurn turned and saw old Siegenthal, the warder in charge of hisdivision, in whose custody he was particularly placed.
"My word!" the old fellow panted, "anybody could tell you had been inthe infantry. Well, so have I; though that wasn't yesterday, nor yet theday before; but we never marched as fast as you do. We made a fine marchonce though--at Saint-Privat."
Out of pity for the decent old fellow Gurn slackened his pace. He hadheard the story of the battle of Saint-Privat a dozen times already, buthe was quite willing to let Siegenthal tell it again. The warder,however, wandered to another point.
"By the way, I heard you were promoted sergeant out in the Transvaal: isthat so?" and as Gurn nodded assent, he went on: "I never rose above therank of corporal, but at any rate I have always led an honest life." Asudden compassion for his prisoner seized the old man, and he laid akindly hand on Gurn's shoulder. "Is it really possible that an oldsoldier like you, who seem to be such a steady, serious, kind of man,can have committed such a crime?"
Gurn dropped his eyes and did not reply.
"I suppose there was a woman at the bottom of it?" Siegenthal saidtentatively. "You acted on impulse, in a fit of jealousy, eh?"
"No," Gurn answered with sudden bluntness, "I may as well own up that Idid it in anger, because I wanted money--for the sake of robbery."
"I'm sorry," said the old warder simply. "You must have been desperatelyhard up."
"No I wasn't."
Siegenthal stared at his prisoner. The man must be utterly callous totalk like that, he thought. Then a clock struck and the warder gave acurt order.
"Time, Gurn! We must go back," and he conducted the unresisting prisonerup the three flights of stairs that led to the division in which hiscell was. "By the way," he remarked as they went, "I forgot to tell youthat you and I have got to part."
"Oh?" said Gurn. "Am I to be transferred to another prison?"
"No, it's I who am going. Just fancy, I have been appointed head warderat Poissy; I go on leave to-night, and take up my new post in a week."Both halted before the door of cell number 127. "In with you," saidSiegenthal, and when Gurn had obeyed he turned to go. Then he wheeledround again quickly, and put out his hand hurriedly, as if half afraidof being seen. "Put it there, Gurn," he said; "no doubt you are amurderer and, as you have confessed yourself, a thief; but I can'tforget that if you had kept straight, you were the sergeant and I shouldhave had to obey you. I'm sorry for you!" Gurn was touched and murmureda word of thanks. "That's all right, that's all right," Siegenthalmuttered, not attempting to hide his emotion; "let us hope thateverything will turn out well," and he left Gurn alone in the cell tohis meditations.
Twice, Gurn reflected, relying on the sympathy which he knew he hadevoked in the old warder's heart despite the number of criminals who hadpassed through his hands, he had been on the point of broaching aserious and delicate matter to him; but he had not actually spoken,being deterred by some undefinable scruple, as well as half suspectingthat his application would be made in vain. And now he was glad he hadbeen so cautious, for even if the warder had been amenable, hisapproaching removal to another prison would have prevented the idea fromcoming to fruition.
* * * * *
A sing-song voice echoed in the corridor.
"Number 127, you are wanted in the barristers' room. Get ready," and thenext minute the door of the cell was thrown open, and a cheery-lookingwarder, with a strong Gascon accent, appeared. Gurn had noticed himbefore: he was the second warder in this division, a man named Nibet,and no doubt he would be promoted to Siegenthal's place when the chiefwarder left. Nibet looked curiously at Gurn, a certain sympathy in hisquick brown eyes. "Ready, Gurn?"
Gurn growled an answer and pulled on his coat again. His counsel wasMaitre Barberoux, one of the foremost criminal barristers of the day;Gurn had thought it prudent to retain him for his defence, moreespecially as it would cost him nothing personally. But he had noparticular desire to talk to him now; he had already told him everythinghe intended to tell him, and he had no intention of allowing the case tobe boomed as a sensation; quite the reverse indeed: in his opinion, theflatter the case fell, the better it would be for his interests, thoughno doubt Maitre Barberoux would not be of the same way of thinking.
But he said nothing, and merely walked in front of Nibet along thecorridor towards the barristers' room, the way to which he was alreadyfamiliar with. On the way they passed some masons who were at work inthe prison, and these men stopped to watch him pass, but contrary toGurn's apprehensions they did not seem to recognise him. He hoped itmeant that the murder was already ceasing to be a nine days' wonder forthe public at large.
Nibet pushed Gurn into the barristers' room, saying respectfully to theperson in it already, "You only have to ring, sir, when you havefinished," and then withdrew, leaving Gurn in presence, not of hiscounsel as he had expected, but of that personage's assistant, a younglicentiate in law named Roger de Seras, who was also a most incredibledandy.
Roger de Seras greeted Gurn with an engaging smile and advanced as if toshake hands with him, but suddenly wondering whether that action mightnot suggest undue familiarity, he raised his hand to his own headinstead and scratched it; the young fellow was still younger in hisbusiness, and did not rightly know whether it was etiquette for abarrister, or even a barrister's junior, to shake hands with a prisonerwho was implicated in a notorious murder.
Gurn felt inclined to laugh, and on the whole was glad that it was thejunior whom he had to see; the futile verbosity of this very younglicentiate might possibly be amusing.
Maitre Roger de Seras began with civil apologies.
"You will excuse me if I only stay for a few minutes, but I am mostfrightfully busy; besides, two ladies are waiting for me outside in mycarriage: I may say confidentially that they are actresses, old friendsof mine, and, just fancy, they are most frightfully anxious to see you!That's what it means to be famous, M. Gurn; eh, what?" Gurn nodded, notfeeling unduly flattered. Roger de Seras continued. "Just to please themI have made any number of applications to the governor of the prison,but there was nothing doing, my dear chap; that beast of a magistrate,Fuselier, insists on your being kept in absolute seclusion. But none theless, I've got some news for you. I know heaps: why, my friends at theLaw Courts call me 'the peripatetic paragraph!' Not bad, eh, what?"Gurn smiled and Roger de Seras was encouraged. "It's given me no end ofa boom, my leader acting for you, and my being able to come and see youwhenever I like! Everybody asks me how you are, and what you are like,and what you say, and what you think. You can congratulate yourself onhaving caused a sensation in Paris."
Gurn began to be irritated by all this chatter.
"I must confess I'm not the least interested in what people are sayingabout me. Is there anything new in my case?"
"Absolutely nothing that I am aware of," Roger de Seras repliedserenely, witho
ut stopping to think whether there was or not. "Isay--Lady Beltham----"
"Yes?" said Gurn.
"Well, I know her very well, you know: I go out a frightful lot and Ihave often met her: a charming woman, Lady Beltham!"
Gurn really did not know how to treat the idiot. Never one to sufferfools gladly, he grew irritable and would almost certainly have saidsomething that would have put the garrulous young bungler in his place,had not the latter suddenly remembered something, just as he was on thepoint of getting up to go.
"Oh, by the way," he said with a laugh, "I was nearly forgetting themost important thing of all. Just fancy, that beast Juve, the marvellousdetective whom the newspapers rave about, went to your place yesterdayafternoon to make another official search!"
"Alone?" enquired Gurn, much interested.
"Quite alone. Now what do you suppose he found; the place has beenransacked dozens of times, you know; of course I mean somethingsensational in the way of a find. I bet you a thousand----"
"I never bet," Gurn snapped. "Tell me at once what it was."
The young fellow was proud of having caught the attention of hisleader's notorious client, if only for a moment; he paused and waggedhis head, weighing each word to give them greater emphasis.
"He found an ordnance map in your bookcase, my dear chap--an ordnancemap with a bit torn out of it."
"Oh! And what then?" said Gurn, a frown upon his face.
The young barrister did not notice the expression on the murderer'scountenance.
"Well, then it appears that Juve thought it was very important. Betweenyou and me, my opinion is that Juve tries to be frightfully clever andsucceeds in looking a fool. How, I ask you, can the discovery of thatmap affect your case or influence the decision of the jury? By the way,there is no need for you to worry about the result; I have had afrightful lot of experience in criminal cases, and so be assured you areall right: extenuating circumstances, you know. But--oh, yes, there isone thing more I wanted to tell you. A fresh witness is going to becalled at the examination; let me see, what's his name? Dollon: that'sit: the steward, Dollon."
"I don't understand," said Gurn; his head was bent and his eyes castdown.
A glimmer of light dawned in the young licentiate's brain.
"Wait, there is some connection," he said. "The steward, Dollon, is inthe employment of a lady who calls herself the Baronne de Vibray. Andthe Baronne de Vibray is guardian to the young lady who was staying withLady Beltham the day, or rather the night, when you--you--well, youknow. And that young lady, Mlle. Therese Auvernois, was placed with LadyBeltham by M. Etienne Rambert. And M. Etienne Rambert is the father ofthe young man who murdered the Marquise de Langrune last year. I tellyou all these things without attempting to draw any deductions fromthem, for, for my own part, I haven't the least idea why the steward,Dollon, has been summoned in our case at all."
"Nor have I," said Gurn, and the frown on his brow was deeper.
Roger de Seras hunted all round the little room for his gloves and foundthem in his pocket.
"Well, my dear chap, I must leave you. We have been chatting for a wholehalf-hour, and those ladies are still waiting for me. What on earth willthey say to me?"
He was about to ring for the warder when Gurn abruptly stayed him.
"Tell me," he said with a sudden air of interest, "when is that mancoming--what's his name? Dollon?"
The young barrister was on the point of saying he did not know, when abrilliant recollection came into his mind.
"'Gad, how frightfully stupid I am! Why, I have a copy of the telegramhe sent the magistrate in my portfolio here now." He opened theportfolio and picked out a sheet of blue paper. "Here it is."
Gurn took it from him and read:
"Will leave Verrieres to-morrow evening by 7.20 train, arriving Paris 5A.M...."
Gurn appeared to be sufficiently edified: at all events he paid noattention to the rest of the message. Lord Beltham's murderer handed thedocument back to the barrister without a word.
A few minutes later Maitre Roger de Seras had rejoined his lady friends,and the prisoner was once more in his cell.