Prince Zaleski Read online

induced tosee Maude Cibras, and during the morning of that day, with his ownhand, wrote a note informing her of his decision, Randolph handing thenote to a messenger. That note also has been made public. It reads asfollows:

  '"Maude Cibras.--You may come here to-night after dark. Walk to thesouth side of the house, come up the steps to the balcony, and pass inthrough the open window to my room. Remember, however, that you havenothing to expect from me, and that from to-night I blot you eternallyfrom my mind: but I will hear your story, which I know beforehand to befalse. Destroy this note. PHARANX."'

  As I progressed with my tale, I came to notice that over thecountenance of Prince Zaleski there grew little by little a singularfixed aspect. His small, keen features distorted themselves into anexpression of what I can only describe as an abnormal _inquisitiveness_--an inquisitiveness most impatient, arrogant, in its intensity.His pupils, contracted each to a dot, became the central _puncta_of two rings of fiery light; his little sharp teeth seemed tognash. Once before I had seen him look thus greedily, when, grasping aTroglodyte tablet covered with half-effaced hieroglyphics--his fingerslivid with the fixity of his grip--he bent on it that strenuousinquisition, that ardent questioning gaze, till, by a species ofmesmeric dominancy, he seemed to wrench from it the arcanum it hid fromother eyes; then he lay back, pale and faint from the too arduousvictory.

  When I had read Lord Pharanx's letter, he took the paper eagerly frommy hand, and ran his eyes over the passage.

  'Tell me--the end,' he said.

  'Maude Cibras,' I went on, 'thus invited to a meeting with the earl,failed to make her appearance at the appointed time. It happened thatshe had left her lodgings in the village early that very morning, and,for some purpose or other, had travelled to the town of Bath. Randolph,too, went away the same day in the opposite direction to Plymouth. Hereturned on the following morning, the 9th; soon after walked over toLee; and entered into conversation with the keeper of the inn whereCibras lodged; asked if she was at home, and on being told that she hadgone away, asked further if she had taken her luggage with her; wasinformed that she had, and had also announced her intention of at onceleaving England. He then walked away in the direction of the Hall. Onthis day Hester Dyett noticed that there were many articles of valuescattered about the earl's room, notably a tiara of old Brazilianbrilliants, sometimes worn by the late Lady Pharanx. Randolph--who waspresent at the time--further drew her attention to these by telling herthat Lord Pharanx had chosen to bring together in his apartment many ofthe family jewels; and she was instructed to tell the other servants ofthis fact, in case they should notice any suspicious-looking loafersabout the estate.

  'On the 10th, both father and son remained in their rooms all day,except when the latter came down to meals; at which times he would lockhis door behind him, and with his own hands take in the earl's food,giving as his reason that his father was writing a very importantdocument, and did not wish to be disturbed by the presence of aservant. During the forenoon, Hester Dyett, hearing loud noises inRandolph's room, as if furniture was being removed from place to place,found some pretext for knocking at his door, when he ordered her on noaccount to interrupt him again, as he was busy packing his clothes inview of a journey to London on the next day. The subsequent conduct ofthe woman shows that her curiosity must have been excited to the utmostby the undoubtedly strange spectacle of Randolph packing his ownclothes. During the afternoon a lad from the village was instructed tocollect his companions for a science lecture the same evening at eighto'clock. And so the eventful day wore on.

  'We arrive now at this hour of eight P.M. on this 10th day of January.The night is dark and windy; some snow has been falling, but has nowceased. In an upper room is Randolph engaged in expounding the elementsof dynamics; in the room under that is Hester Dyett--for Hester hassomehow obtained a key that opens the door of Randolph's room, andtakes advantage of his absence upstairs to explore it. Under her isLord Pharanx, certainly in bed, probably asleep. Hester, trembling allover in a fever of fear and excitement, holds a lighted taper in onehand, which she religiously shades with the other; for the storm isgusty, and the gusts, tearing through the crevices of the rattling oldcasements, toss great flickering shadows on the hangings, whichfrighten her to death. She has just time to see that the whole room isin the wildest confusion, when suddenly a rougher puff blows out theflame, and she is left in what to her, standing as she was on thatforbidden ground, must have been a horror of darkness. At the samemoment, clear and sharp from right beneath her, a pistol-shot rings outon her ear. For an instant she stands in stone, incapable of motion.Then on her dazed senses there supervenes--so she swore--theconsciousness that some object is moving in the room--moving apparentlyof its own accord--moving in direct opposition to all the laws ofnature as she knows them. She imagines that she perceives a phantasm--astrange something--globular-white--looking, as she says, "like agood-sized ball of cotton"--rise directly from the floor before her,ascending slowly upward, as if driven aloft by some invisible force. Asharp shock of the sense of the supernatural deprives her of orderedreason. Throwing forward her arms, and uttering a shrill scream, sherushes towards the door. But she never reaches it: midway she fallsprostrate over some object, and knows no more; and when, an hour later,she is borne out of the room in the arms of Randolph himself, the bloodis dripping from a fracture of her right tibia.

  'Meantime, in the upper chamber the pistol-shot and the scream of thewoman have been heard. All eyes turn to Randolph. He stands in theshadow of the mechanical contrivance on which he has been illustratinghis points; leans for support on it. He essays to speak, the muscles ofhis face work, but no sound comes. Only after a time is he able togasp: "Did you hear something--from below?" They answer "yes" inchorus; then one of the lads takes a lighted candle, and together theytroop out, Randolph behind them. A terrified servant rushes up with thenews that something dreadful has happened in the house. They proceedfor some distance, but there is an open window on the stairs, and thelight is blown out. They have to wait some minutes till another isobtained, and then the procession moves forward once more. Arrived atLord Pharanx's door, and finding it locked, a lantern is procured, andRandolph leads them through the house and out on the lawn. But havingnearly reached the balcony, a lad observes a track of smallwoman's-feet in the snow; a halt is called, and then Randolph pointsout another track of feet, half obliterated by the snow, extending froma coppice close by up to the balcony, and forming an angle with thefirst track. These latter are great big feet, made by ponderouslabourers' boots. He holds the lantern over the flower-beds, and showshow they have been trampled down. Some one finds a common scarf, suchas workmen wear; and a ring and a locket, dropped by the burglars intheir flight, are also found by Randolph half buried in the snow. Andnow the foremost reach the window. Randolph, from behind, calls to themto enter. They cry back that they cannot, the window being closed. Atthis reply he seems to be overcome by surprise, by terror. Some onehears him murmur the words, "My God, what can have happened now?" Hishorror is increased when one of the lads bears to him a revoltingtrophy, which has been found just outside the window; it is the frontphalanges of three fingers of a human hand. Again he utters theagonised moan, "My God!" and then, mastering his agitation, makes forthe window; he finds that the catch of the sash has been roughlywrenched off, and that the sash can be opened by merely pushing it up:does so, and enters. The room is in darkness: on the floor under thewindow is found the insensible body of the woman Cibras. She is alive,but has fainted. Her right fingers are closed round the handle of alarge bowie-knife, which is covered with blood; parts of the left aremissing. All the jewelry has been stolen from the room. Lord Pharanxlies on the bed, stabbed through the bedclothes to the heart. Later ona bullet is also found imbedded in his brain. I should explain that atrenchant edge, running along the bottom of the sash, was the obviousmeans by which the fingers of Cibras had been cut off. This had beenplaced there a few days before by the workman I spoke of. Severalsecret springs had been placed on
the inner side of the lowerhorizontal piece of the window-frame, by pressing any one of which thesash was lowered; so that no one, ignorant of the secret, could passout from within, without resting the hand on one of these springs, andso bringing down the armed sash suddenly on the underlying hand.

  'There was, of course, a trial. The poor culprit, in mortal terror ofdeath, shrieked out a confession of the murder just as the jury hadreturned from their brief consultation, and before they had time topronounce their verdict of "guilty." But she denied shooting LordPharanx, and she denied stealing the jewels; and indeed no pistol andno jewels were found on her, or anywhere in the room. So that manypoints remain mysterious. What part did the burglars play in thetragedy? Were they in collusion with Cibras? Had the strange behaviourof at least one of the