Dr. Mabuse, master of mystery a novel
Then Wenk remembered that Privy Councillor Wendel had given him a
letter to Dr. Mabuse, and that the Count had used Wenk’s own telephone
to make an appointment with this doctor.
Wenk trembled as, struck by the horror of a strange suspicion, he
described to the footman the figure of Dr. Mabuse as he had seen it
recently at the Four Seasons Hall. He spoke of him as a tall man,
stooping slightly, without beard or moustache, with a broad face and
big nose and large grey eyes. When the man said, “Yes, he looked
exactly like that,” Wenk grew pale as death. In a moment all the
disconnected impressions, hazy ideas, vague recollections, half-defined
thoughts and images which had been partially obliterated, but not
altogether lost, gathered together in his mind. When Wenk had the hall
emptied, why had Dr. Mabuse not asked the reason for this measure?
Why had he not inquired whether he could continue his experiments
at another time? Why had Wenk, who had seen a man whose back he had
recognized go into the hall, not found him again inside? Why had the
two men who would not obey the detective’s order to move on, suddenly
done as they were told immediately Mabuse appeared? Why had Mabuse’s
eyes, in the brief moment he had looked into them, affected him so
powerfully, as if they sought to read something that lay hidden in his
very soul and was now almost forgotten?
He dismissed Count Told’s servant, and then tried to find Dr. Mabuse’s
number in the telephone book, but it was not given there. Yet Mabuse
had a telephone, for the Count had rung him up from this very house.
The Privy Councillor knew the number.
When Wenk, having obtained the telephone number from Herr Wendel, gave
it, there was no reply. Ringing up the exchange, he was told that the
telephone had been disconnected. He asked who had had it three weeks
before, but this could not be ascertained at once.
Again Wenk rang up the Councillor. Dr. Mabuse had changed his number;
did he happen to know his address? Wendel could give no information.
He only knew the telephone number, and spoke to him on the phone. Wenk
then asked at the Police Registry Office for Dr. Mabuse’s address, but
the name was not to be found anywhere among the arrivals in Munich,
and when, at the Municipal Registry, all the old telephone books were
searched to find Mabuse, he was again unsuccessful.
Thereupon Wenk repaired to the manager of the telephone exchange in
order to make a more thorough search. The manager took him to the
inquiry-room, where two young women were employed, and he asked them
to look again for the number he had telephoned about.
“What were you wanting?” asked the elder of the two, and Wenk explained
that he was seeking the address of a Dr. Mabuse, who three weeks before
had a telephone number that did not appear in the directory.
The girl said she could not find it anywhere, whereupon Wenk returned
to the manager with this information. He declared this was something
quite unheard of, and himself accompanied Wenk to the inquiry office.
He, too, made a search with the clerks, but could find nothing. While
the manager was looking through the lists without success, an idea
occurred to Wenk, and when he was informed that no one of the name
of Mabuse had been entered on the list at all for the last year, he
asked the manager for the telephone number and address of a man named
Poldringer. As he uttered this name he saw the elder girl start and
then immediately recover herself, but an instant later she told him
rudely that there were ever so many Poldringers in Munich, and without
the Christian name and the exact address she could not furnish any
information.
Then Wenk turned to the manager, saying politely, “I am sorry to have
to put you to some inconvenience, but I must take both these ladies
into custody!”
He at once took up a position between the girls and the telephone. “Be
so good as to sit down on these chairs till the detectives arrive;
you here, and your companion there!” The elder of the girls turned
as white as a sheet. The other blushed, and then began to cry. Wenk
said, turning to her, “It is only a formality. If you behave properly,
this matter can be carried through without exciting notice, and it is
probable that it will not be long before the mystery is cleared up.”
Then he rang up the Criminal Investigation Department and asked for
three detectives.
The manager looked through the list of Poldringers, for there were many
entries under the name, most of them being tradespeople. One, of whom
no further information was given, was living in the Xenienstrasse, and
another, without any professional status, in the Ludwigstrasse.
The girls were given in charge, and Wenk went to the Ludwigstrasse. He
came to a lodging-house, looked at the surroundings and inspected the
inside, and then went to the Xenienstrasse. Then suddenly his heart
stood still, for in the Xenienstrasse, at the address given under the
name of Poldringer in the telephone list, he saw on a professional
plate the words
DR. MABUSE,
_Neurologist_.
He hastened away, merely noting the numbers of the houses standing
near. The street consisted of detached villas. A mist swam before his
eyes, and the blood pounded in his pulses; there was a sound as of
pistols in his ears. He had his man. No, he had not got him, but at
last he knew who he was!
Before doing anything else he drove to the prison, for the time Cara
Carozza had demanded had now expired, and what she might tell him would
probably set the seal upon the success of his enterprise.
* * * * *
Early that morning, when it was time for the warder of the women’s
prison to make his first round, the door of Cara’s cell was opened. The
dancer was still asleep. She was shaken by the shoulder and, awaking
quickly, found the warder bending over her, yet it was not the warder,
it was Spoerri. Surely she was dreaming? But no, she was still in
prison. How came Spoerri to her bedside? She put her hand to her eyes
to shut out the vision, and yet she knew in her heart it was reality.
Spoerri was standing there. He said to her:
“Surely you know that I am in league with the warder?” She nodded.
“Then you know, too, that he told me what happened yesterday when the
State Attorney came to see you?”
“What did he tell you?” the girl asked breathlessly.
“That you are going to betray the master!”
The dancer sprang out of bed. “Who says so?” she shouted.
“Please don’t talk so loudly. The warder says so.”
“It is a lie.”
“The warder would have no interest in lying.”
“Did he tell the doctor so?” she asked anxiously, and Spoerri lied in
answer:
“Yes, of course he did, and the doctor sent me to you.”
“It is a lie,” cried Cara again, on the verge of tears; “I was going to
save him!”
“How can you prove that?”
“I was going to save him, I tell you. Spoerri, danger is threatening
him.”
“Danger is always threatening him. That’s mere nonsense. Can you prove
what you say?”
Cara hastily related what had passed between her and Wenk. Spoerri
answered indifferently:
“I mean, can you prove it beyond all shadow of doubt? But be quick,
please, for I must get away from here in five minutes.”
“What can I do to make the doctor believe me?” asked the girl in
despair.
“I must tell you that the doctor is very disturbed, for he could not
have believed it of you.”
“No, no, I could never have done it,” she stammered, thoroughly
downcast; “but how am I to prove that I didn’t ... how can I prove it?
Surely _you_ know, Spoerri, that....”
Then Spoerri with a smile drew out of his pocket a small flask. “The
proof lies there,” he said.
“Where?” asked the distracted girl.
“In here, my pretty one; don’t you see?”
“I don’t understand you,” said the dancer.
“Oh, you don’t need to understand, my child, only to drink. Just one
little mouthful to swallow and then the doctor will know your word was
to be relied on.”
Cara looked horrorstruck at the little flask. “What is it?” she asked.
“A heavenly drink, my pretty one, nothing that hurts one in the least.
The doctor himself made it up. But mind you throw the bottle out of
the window quickly! See, I am opening it for you. Be sure you don’t
forget that! And be quick about it, do you hear? Throw it away _at
once_, for if there’s no bottle to be seen, nobody will know what has
happened. That’s what the doctor expects of you; that is a proof that
no one can doubt. Besides, you know us. Even your husband....”
With that he drew a knife out of his pocket, playing with it lightly.
He threw it at the door, and it stuck there with the point transfixed.
He pulled it out and put it away again.
“Do you see that?” he said. “Now I must be going. Well, au revoir!”
He was about to leave, but Cara sprang towards him and clung to his
knees, sobbing.
“But I am still so young, and I love life. I have been very useful to
him. I was hoping to be set free ... by him. Set free at any rate, even
if he can never love me again.”
“Well, I can only tell you,” answered Spoerri, “that he is very much
disturbed about all this. You can take it or leave it.”
Then the girl said, “Then I will free myself of this existence. I will
show him, a thousand times over, that he can trust me. I will give my
life for him....”
“Oh, spare me your heroics!” said Spoerri roughly.
But the girl went on unheeding, “What am I after all?--a mere shadow
following him about and hiding out of his sight, but yet unable to part
from him. Yes, I will prove it, a thousand times over.... I will free
myself....”
“Well, if we are taken by surprise now, it will be a hanging matter
for us both; he told me so. And who knows whether they won’t even get
_him_?”
Then Cara became suddenly calm, and said quietly, “It is all right; you
can go. And tell him.... No, you needn’t say anything. I don’t want
anything more from him....”
Spoerri left hastily, leaving the little flask in Cara’s hand. It was
now warm from her fevered touch.
“He does not believe me,” she said to herself tremblingly. “The Doctor
will never believe me again. Strange--and yet, can there be any greater
proof to offer that I was always faithful to him? Oh life! base,
incomprehensible, disturbing life! This terrible life of mine! Come!”
she said, apostrophizing the flask; “we will show him there is nothing
to fear from me. We will prove it to you, you ... king of men ... you
enchanting murderer! you sublime destroyer! my horror and my bliss!...”
She shouted aloud, then she grew fearful lest her cries might endanger
the beloved life, and she snatched the stopper out of the bottle.
Standing upright in the middle of the cell, she drank, a moment later
throwing the bottle out of the window, where the sun streaming in
proclaimed the morning of a new day.
* * * * *
Wenk faced the curator of the women’s prison.
“Yes, sir, we were sorry to be unable to inform you, but it was not
possible to communicate with you. The doctor says it must have been a
heart-stroke, for she was found lying dead in her cell this morning.”
Amazed and horrified, Wenk entered the cell. It was empty, the straw
pallet bare. Cara’s clothing lay on a stool. Wenk looked round, and
was about to leave when he saw something shining on the window-ledge.
He went back and examined it, and found it was a small piece of glass,
rounded in shape, with a very strong odour clinging to it. Wenk jumped
on a chair and found another piece of glass outside. Then he went down
into the courtyard, and very soon had collected all the other pieces of
the bottle. It had broken against one of the window-bars. He had the
glass tested, and there were evidences of poison upon it.