Tales of Terror and Mystery
recognized him by the cords which he held in his hands, and she at once
held out her own hands to him, looking at him from head to foot without
uttering a word.' How's that?"
"Yes, it was so."
"'She gazed without wincing upon the wooden horse and rings which had
twisted so many limbs and caused so many shrieks of agony. When her
eyes fell upon the three pails of water, which were all ready for her,
she said with a smile, "All that water must have been brought here for
the purpose of drowning me, Monsieur. You have no idea, I trust, of
making a person of my small stature swallow it all."' Shall I read the
details of the torture?"
"No, for Heaven's sake, don't."
"Here is a sentence which must surely show you that what is here
recorded is the very scene which you have gazed upon tonight: 'The good
Abbe Pirot, unable to contemplate the agonies which were suffered by
his penitent, had hurried from the room.' Does that convince you?"
"It does entirely. There can be no question that it is indeed the same
event. But who, then, is this lady whose appearance was so attractive
and whose end was so horrible?"
For answer Dacre came across to me, and placed the small lamp upon the
table which stood by my bed. Lifting up the ill-omened filler, he
turned the brass rim so that the light fell full upon it. Seen in this
way the engraving seemed clearer than on the night before.
"We have already agreed that this is the badge of a marquis or of a
marquise," said he. "We have also settled that the last letter is B."
"It is undoubtedly so."
"I now suggest to you that the other letters from left to right are, M,
M, a small d, A, a small d, and then the final B."
"Yes, I am sure that you are right. I can make out the two small d's
quite plainly."
"What I have read to you tonight," said Dacre, "is the official record
of the trial of Marie Madeleine d'Aubray, Marquise de Brinvilliers, one
of the most famous poisoners and murderers of all time."
I sat in silence, overwhelmed at the extraordinary nature of the
incident, and at the completeness of the proof with which Dacre had
exposed its real meaning. In a vague way I remembered some details of
the woman's career, her unbridled debauchery, the cold-blooded and
protracted torture of her sick father, the murder of her brothers for
motives of petty gain. I recollected also that the bravery of her end
had done something to atone for the horror of her life, and that all
Paris had sympathized with her last moments, and blessed her as a
martyr within a few days of the time when they had cursed her as a
murderess. One objection, and one only, occurred to my mind.
"How came her initials and her badge of rank upon the filler? Surely
they did not carry their mediaeval homage to the nobility to the point
of decorating instruments of torture with their titles?"
"I was puzzled with the same point," said Dacre, "but it admits of a
simple explanation. The case excited extraordinary interest at the
time, and nothing could be more natural than that La Reynie, the head
of the police, should retain this filler as a grim souvenir. It was
not often that a marchioness of France underwent the extraordinary
question. That he should engrave her initials upon it for the
information of others was surely a very ordinary proceeding upon his
part."
"And this?" I asked, pointing to the marks upon the leathern neck.
"She was a cruel tigress," said Dacre, as he turned away. "I think it
is evident that like other tigresses her teeth were both strong and
sharp."
The New Catacomb
"Look here, Burger," said Kennedy, "I do wish that you would confide in
me."
The two famous students of Roman remains sat together in Kennedy's
comfortable room overlooking the Corso. The night was cold, and they
had both pulled up their chairs to the unsatisfactory Italian stove
which threw out a zone of stuffiness rather than of warmth. Outside
under the bright winter stars lay the modern Rome, the long, double
chain of the electric lamps, the brilliantly lighted cafes, the rushing
carriages, and the dense throng upon the footpaths. But inside, in the
sumptuous chamber of the rich young English archaeologist, there was
only old Rome to be seen. Cracked and timeworn friezes hung upon the
walls, grey old busts of senators and soldiers with their fighting
heads and their hard, cruel faces peered out from the corners. On the
centre table, amidst a litter of inscriptions, fragments, and
ornaments, there stood the famous reconstruction by Kennedy of the
Baths of Caracalla, which excited such interest and admiration when it
was exhibited in Berlin. Amphorae hung from the ceiling, and a litter
of curiosities strewed the rich red Turkey carpet. And of them all
there was not one which was not of the most unimpeachable authenticity,
and of the utmost rarity and value; for Kennedy, though little more
than thirty, had a European reputation in this particular branch of
research, and was, moreover, provided with that long purse which either
proves to be a fatal handicap to the student's energies, or, if his
mind is still true to its purpose, gives him an enormous advantage in
the race for fame. Kennedy had often been seduced by whim and pleasure
from his studies, but his mind was an incisive one, capable of long and
concentrated efforts which ended in sharp reactions of sensuous
languor. His handsome face, with its high, white forehead, its
aggressive nose, and its somewhat loose and sensual mouth, was a fair
index of the compromise between strength and weakness in his nature.
Of a very different type was his companion, Julius Burger. He came of
a curious blend, a German father and an Italian mother, with the robust
qualities of the North mingling strangely with the softer graces of the
South. Blue Teutonic eyes lightened his sun-browned face, and above
them rose a square, massive forehead, with a fringe of close yellow
curls lying round it. His strong, firm jaw was clean-shaven, and his
companion had frequently remarked how much it suggested those old Roman
busts which peered out from the shadows in the corners of his chamber.
Under its bluff German strength there lay always a suggestion of
Italian subtlety, but the smile was so honest, and the eyes so frank,
that one understood that this was only an indication of his ancestry,
with no actual bearing upon his character. In age and in reputation,
he was on the same level as his English companion, but his life and his
work had both been far more arduous. Twelve years before, he had come
as a poor student to Rome, and had lived ever since upon some small
endowment for research which had been awarded to him by the University
of Bonn. Painfully, slowly, and doggedly, with extraordinary tenacity
and single-mindedness, he had climbed from rung to rung of the ladder
of fame, until now he was a member of the Berlin Academy, and there was
every reason to believe that he would shortly be promoted to the Chair
of the greatest of German Universities. But the singleness of purpose
which had brought him to the same high level as the rich and brilliant
Englishman, had caused him in everything outside their work to stand
infinitely below him. He had never found a pause in his studies in
which to cultivate the social graces. It was only when he spoke of his
own subject that his face was filled with life and soul. At other
times he was silent and embarrassed, too conscious of his own
limitations in larger subjects, and impatient of that small talk which
is the conventional refuge of those who have no thoughts to express.
And yet for some years there had been an acquaintanceship which
appeared to be slowly ripening into a friendship between these two very
different rivals. The base and origin of this lay in the fact that in
their own studies each was the only one of the younger men who had
knowledge and enthusiasm enough to properly appreciate the other.
Their common interests and pursuits had brought them together, and each
had been attracted by the other's knowledge. And then gradually
something had been added to this. Kennedy had been amused by the
frankness and simplicity of his rival, while Burger in turn had been
fascinated by the brilliancy and vivacity which had made Kennedy such a
favourite in Roman society. I say "had," because just at the moment
the young Englishman was somewhat under a cloud. A love-affair, the
details of which had never quite come out, had indicated a
heartlessness and callousness upon his part which shocked many of his
friends. But in the bachelor circles of students and artists in which
he preferred to move there is no very rigid code of honour in such
matters, and though a head might be shaken or a pair of shoulders
shrugged over the flight of two and the return of one, the general
sentiment was probably one of curiosity and perhaps of envy rather than
of reprobation.
"Look here, Burger," said Kennedy, looking hard at the placid face of
his companion, "I do wish that you would confide in me."
As he spoke he waved his hand in the direction of a rug which lay upon
the floor. On the rug stood a long, shallow fruit-basket of the light
wicker-work which is used in the Campagna, and this was heaped with a
litter of objects, inscribed tiles, broken inscriptions, cracked
mosaics, torn papyri, rusty metal ornaments, which to the uninitiated
might have seemed to have come straight from a dustman's bin, but which
a specialist would have speedily recognized as unique of their kind.
The pile of odds and ends in the flat wicker-work basket supplied
exactly one of those missing links of social development which are of
such interest to the student. It was the German who had brought them
in, and the Englishman's eyes were hungry as he looked at them.
"I won't interfere with your treasure-trove, but I should very much
like to hear about it," he continued, while Burger very deliberately
lit a cigar. "It is evidently a discovery of the first importance.
These inscriptions will make a sensation throughout Europe."
"For every one here there are a million there!" said the German.
"There are so many that a dozen savants might spend a lifetime over
them, and build up a reputation as solid as the Castle of St. Angelo."
Kennedy sat thinking with his fine forehead wrinkled and his fingers
playing with his long, fair moustache.
"You have given yourself away, Burger!" said he at last. "Your words
can only apply to one thing. You have discovered a new catacomb."
"I had no doubt that you had already come to that conclusion from an
examination of these objects."
"Well, they certainly appeared to indicate it, but your last remarks
make it certain. There is no place except a catacomb which could
contain so vast a store of relics as you describe."
"Quite so. There is no mystery about that. I HAVE discovered a new
catacomb."
"Where?"
"Ah, that is my secret, my dear Kennedy. Suffice it that it is so
situated that there is not one chance in a million of anyone else
coming upon it. Its date is different from that of any known catacomb,
and it has been reserved for the burial of the highest Christians, so
that the remains and the relics are quite different from anything which
has ever been seen before. If I was not aware of your knowledge and of
your energy, my friend, I would not hesitate, under the pledge of
secrecy, to tell you everything about it. But as it is I think that I
must certainly prepare my own report of the matter before I expose
myself to such formidable competition."
Kennedy loved his subject with a love which was almost a mania--a love
which held him true to it, amidst all the distractions which come to a
wealthy and dissipated young man. He had ambition, but his ambition