Auguste Groner

“ JOHN.
“Oh, what does it all mean?” asked Eleonora, dropping the letter in her lap.
“It is as I thought,” replied Muller. “John Siders took his own life, but made every arrangement to have suspicion fall upon Graumann.”
“But why? oh, why?”
“It was a terrible revenge. But perhaps—perhaps it was just retribution. Graumaun would not understand that Siders could have been suspected of, and imprisoned for, a theft he had not committed. He must know now that it is quite possible for a man to be in danger of sentence of death even, for a crime of which he is innocent.” ”

“ The kindest-hearted man in the world, he is a human bloodhound when once the lure of the trail has caught him. He scarcely eats or sleeps when the chase is on, he does not seem to know human weakness nor fatigue, in spite of his frail body. Once put on a case his mind delves and delves until it finds a clue, then something awakes within him, a spirit akin to that which holds the bloodhound nose to trail, and he will accomplish the apparently impossible, he will track down his victim when the entire machinery of a great police department seems helpless to discover anything. ”

“ Muller’s official rank is scarcely much higher than that of a policeman, although kings and councillors consult him and the Police Department realises to the full what a treasure it has in him. But official red tape, and his early misfortune... prevent the giving of any higher official standing to even such a genius. Born and bred to such conditions, Muller understands them, and his natural modesty of disposition asks for no outward honours, asks for nothing but an income sufficient for his simple needs, and for aid and opportunity to occupy himself in the way he most enjoys. ”

“ Whether he wished it or not, he knew it was his duty to go on to the bitter end on this trail he had followed up all day from the moment that he caught that fleeting glimpse of Mrs. Bernauer’s haggard face at the garden gate. He was almost angry with the woman, because she chanced to look out of the gate at just that moment, showing him her face distorted with anxiety. For it was her face that had drawn Muller to the trail, a trail at the end of which misery awaited those for whom this woman had worked for years, those whom she loved and who treated her as one of the family. ”

“ A certain hardness and lack of amiability in Graumann’s nature made it difficult for him to win the hearts of others, but although he was not generally loved, he was universally respected. Through the signs of nagging fear, sorrow, and ill-health, printed clearly on the face before him, Muller’s keen eyes looked down into the soul of a man who might be overbearing, pitiless even, if occasion demanded, but who would not murder—at least not for the sake of gain. ”

“ While the detective was writing his message—it was one of the rare moments of humour that Muller allowed himself, and he wondered mildly what the stately Hungarian nobleman would think of it—a heavy farm wagon jolted over the country roads towards the little county seat. Sitting beside the driver and riding about the wagon were armed peasants. The figure of a man, securely bound, his face distorted by rage and fear, lay in the wagon. It was Gyuri Kovacz, who had murdered by the hands of another, and who was now on his way to meet the death that was his due. ”

“ He does not seem to know fatigue nor hunger; his whole being is absorbed by the excitement of the chase. He has done many a brilliant service to the cause of justice, he has discovered the guilt, or the innocence, of many in cases where the official department was as blind as Justice is proverbially supposed to be. Joseph Muller has become the idol of all who are engaged in this weary business of hunting down wrong and punishing crime. He is without a peer in his profession. ”

“ Muller’s head sank down lower over these mysterious words, and his eyes flew through the writing that followed. It was quite a different writing here. The hand that penned these words must have trembled in deadly terror. Was it terror of coming death, foreseen and not to be escaped? or was it the trembling and the terror of an overthrown brain? It was undoubtedly, in spite of the difference, the same hand that had penned the first pages of the book. A few characteristic turns of the writing were plainly to be seen in both parts of the story. But the ink was quite different also. ”

“ And as the door of the cell shut clangingly behind the man whose face was distorted in impotent rage and despair, Joseph Muller was standing in deep thought before the broken willow twig, which now hung brown and dry across the planks of the fence. He looked at it for a long time. That is, he seemed to be looking at it, but in reality his eyes were looking out and beyond the willow twig, out into the unknown, where the unknown murderer was still at large. Leopold Winkler’s body had already been committed to the earth. ”

“ But the second thought that came to him then, impelled by the unerring instinct that so often guided him to the truth, was the assurance that in a case of this kind, in a case of a quarrel terminating fatally, a man like Albert Graumann would be the very first to give himself up to the police and to tell the facts of the case. Albert Graumann was a man of honour and unimpeachable integrity. Such a man would not persist in a foolish denial of the deed which he had committed in a moment of temper. ”

“ The murderer must have made his thrust at once and his victim had sunk down dying on the floor of the room in which he had spent so many hours of quiet study, in which he had brought comfort and given advice to so many anxious hearts; for dying he must have been—it would be impossible for a man to lose so much blood and live. ”

“ But I doubt if I will ever forget these horrible days, when I had already come to accept it as a fact that—that I was to be murdered.”
“This is the man to whom you owe your escape,” said the commissioner, laying his hand on Muller’s knee. Asta did not speak, but she reached out in the darkness of the cab, caught Muller’s hand and would have raised it to her lips, had not the little man drawn it away hastily. “It was only my duty, dear young lady,” he said. “A duty that is not onerous when it means the rescue of innocence and the preventing of crime. ”

“ Herbert Thorne believed himself to be alone here... as far as a man can be alone over whom hangs the shadow of a crime. He groaned aloud and hid his pale face in his hands.
In his own distress he did not hear the deep sigh—which, just above him on the edge of the knoll, broke from the breast of a woman who was suffering scarcely less than he; he did not know that two pair of sad eyes looked down upon him. And now into the eyes of the watching woman there shot a gleam of terror. ”

“ Horn looked up at his superior, whom, in spite of his good nature, he knew to be a sharp, keen, capable police official. “I forgot you have known Muller longer than the rest of us,” he said. “What was that you said about his heart?”
“I said that it is one of those inconvenient hearts that will always make itself noticeable at the wrong time. Muller’s heart has played several tricks on the police department, which has, at other times, profited so well by his genius. He is a strange mixture. While he is on the trail of the criminal he is like the bloodhound. ”

“ And how long has Cardillac been here?”
“Cardillac? He has been here for almost three years.”
“For almost three years, and is it not almost three years—” Muller interrupted himself. “Are we quite alone? Is no one listening?” The doctor nodded, greatly surprised, and the detective continued almost in a whisper, “and it is just about three years now that there have been committed, at intervals, three terrible crimes notable from the cleverness with which they were carried out, and from the utter impossibility, apparently, of discovering the perpetrator.” ”

“ The poor man whom they have arrested in my place must not linger in the fear of death. I am ready, sir.
“My name is Muller—detective Muller.”
“Joseph Muller, the famous detective Muller?” asked Thorne with a sad smile. “I have had little to do with the police but by chance I have heard of your fame. I might have known; they tell me you are one from whom the truth can never remain hidden.”
“My duty is not always an easy one,” said Muller.
“Thank you. Dispose of me as you will. I do not wish any privileges that others would not have, Mr. Muller. ”

“ They did me the honour to believe that if I had taken the money at all, I had done so merely as a blind. At least they did not take me for a thief as well as a murderer. If the money is really missing, it was for its sake he was murdered I suppose.”
“Yes, that would be natural,” said Muller. “And you know nothing of any other relations or connections that the man may have had? Anything that might give us a clue to the truth?” ”

“ And yet, strange as is this circumstance, it is still more a riddle how the murderer could have escaped from the room where he had shot down his victim, for the keys in both doors were in the locks from the inside. We have evidently to do here with a criminal of very unusual cleverness and it is therefore not surprising that there has been no clue discovered thus far. The only thing that is known is that this murder was an act of revenge.
The entire city was in excitement over the mystery, even the police station was shaken out of its usual business-like indifference. ”

“ One cause is the fact that in early youth a miscarriage of justice gave him several years in prison, an experience which cast a stigma on his name and which made it impossible for him, for many years after, to obtain honest employment. But the world is richer, and safer, by Muller’s early misfortune. For it was this experience which threw him back on his own peculiar talents for a livelihood, and drove him into the police force. Had he been able to enter any other profession, his genius might have been stunted to a mere pastime, instead of being, as now, utilised for the public good. ”

“ Fellner was a little surprised that Muller, although he had already taken up his hat, did not go. The sick man had seen the light flash up in the eyes of the other as he named the sum. He thought he understood this excitement, but it touched him unpleasantly and he sank back, almost frightened, in his cushions as the detective bent over him with the words “Good. Do not forget your promise, for I will save Miss Langen or avenge her. But I do not want the money for myself. It is to go to those who have been unjustly convicted and thus ruined for life. ”

“ Our knowledge of a man’s character is often a far better guide than any circumstantial evidence.”
“My guardian is a man of the greatest uprightness of character. But he can be very hard and pitiless sometimes. And he has a violent temper which his weak heart has forced him to keep in control of late years.”
“All this speaks for the possibility that there may have been a quarrel ending in the fatal shot. But what I want to know from you is this—do you think it possible, that, this having happened, Albert Graumann would not have been the first to confess his unpremeditated crime? ”

“ I’ve wondered why he hasn’t done more for himself, with his gifts.”
“He never will,” replied the Chief. “He may win more fame—he may still go on winning triumphs, but he will go on in a circle; he’ll never forge ahead as his capabilities deserve. Muller’s peculiarity is that his genius—for the man has undeniable genius—will always make concessions to his heart just at the moment when he is about to do something great—and his triumph is lost.” ”

“ Upstairs in the pastor’s study, Muller sat in the armchair attentively watching the gyrations of a spinning top. The little toy, started at a certain point, drew a line exactly parallel to the scratch on the floor that had excited his thoughts and absorbed them day and night.
“It was a top—a top” repeated the detective to himself again and again. “I don’t see why I didn’t think of that right away. Why, of course, nothing else could have drawn such a perfect curve around the room, unhindered by the legs of the desk. ”

“ The commissioner could doubt no longer. Pedantic though he was, Commissioner von Riedau possessed sufficient insight to know the truth when it was presented to him with such conviction, and also sufficient insight to have recognised the gifts of the man before him. “But why... why?” he murmured, sinking back into his chair, and shaking his head in bewilderment.
“Winkler was a miserable scoundrel, sir, a blackmailer. Thorne did only what any decent man would have felt like doing in his place. But justice must be done.”
Muller’s elation vanished and a deep sigh welled up from his heart. ”

“ Is it at all likely that a murderer would go away leaving such evidence behind him? If Graumaun had killed Siders in a hasty quarrel, he might possibly, in his excitement, have left his revolver. But I have already disposed of this possibility. A man of sufficient brains to so carefully plan his suicide as to conceal every trace of it and cast suspicion upon the man who had made him unhappy, such a one would be quite clever enough to throw the pistol far away from his body and to leave no traces of powder on his coat or any such other evidence. ”

“ Franz bowed a farewell to this stranger who began to appear uncanny in his eyes, and shutting the gate carefully he returned to the house.
“What does the man want anyway?” he murmured to himself, shivering involuntarily. Without knowing why he turned his steps towards Mrs. Bernauer’s room. He opened the door hesitatingly as if afraid of what he might see there. He would not have been at all surprised if he had found the housekeeper fainting on the floor as before. ”

“ Muller rose from his chair. His slight figure seemed to grow taller, and the gentleness in his voice gave way to a commanding tone of firm decision.
“Our duty is to the living, not to the dead. The dead have no right to drag down others after them. Believe me, Miss Roemer, the purpose that was in your betrothed’s mind when he ended his own life, has been fulfilled. Albert Graumann knows now what are the feelings of a man who bears the prison stigma unjustly. He will never again judge his fellow-men as harshly as he has done until now. ”

“ Winkler met his death at the hand of the husband, who, discovering the planned rendezvous, had misunderstood its motive.
For truly this had been no lovers’ meeting. It had been a meeting to which the woman was driven by fear and hate; the man by greed of gain. This was clearly proved by the 300 guldens found in the dead man’s pocket, money enclosed in a delicate little envelope, sealed hastily, and crumpled as if it had been carried in a hot and trembling hand. ”

“ Some impulse of loyalty to her dead lover, some foolish feminine fear that I might have spoken against him in my earlier interviews with the commissioner had driven the girl to this step. A few questions sufficed to draw from her the story of her secret engagement, of its ending, and of my quarrel with John. I will say for her that I am certain she did not realise that all these things were calculated to cast suspicion on me. The poor girl is too unused to the ways of police courts, to the devious ways of the law, to realise what she was doing. ”

“ He saw the little anxious group around the carriage in front of the Thorne mansion. He saw the pale, frail woman leaning back on the cushions, and the husband bending over her in tender care. And then he saw Johann Knoll in his cell, a man with little manhood left in him, a man sunk to the level of the brutes, a man who had already committed one crime against society, and who could never rise to the mental or spiritual standard of even the most mediocre of decent citizens. ”

“ Grief and mental shock were preying upon this girl’s mind. “She is not the one to make a confidant of those around her,” thought Muller to himself. Then he added aloud: “If it does not distress you too much to talk about this sad affair, I will be very grateful if you will answer a few questions.”
“I will tell you whatever I can,” said the girl in the same low even tone in which she had first spoken. “Miss Graumann tells me that you have come from Vienna to take up this case. It is only natural that we should want to give you every assistance in our power.” ”