because of the aches of indigestion nor of the indefinable miseries of
neurasthenia, worries and ailments common enough in French Vanity Fair—it
was not, I say, for any of these reasons that fashionable and financial
Paris, sporting and theatrical Paris, certain worldly lights of literary
and artistic Paris, and the extravagant, feverish _demi-monde_ of Paris,
woke up on the morning of the 3rd November[5] in an exceedingly bad
temper. Nor yet was their displeasure occasioned by the weather—London
weather—all fog, damp and gloom. The fact was, at noon was to begin the
first sitting of the great Steinheil trial, to which the above-mentioned
ornaments of _le Tout Paris_ had been excitedly looking forward for many
a month. All that time they had been worrying, agitating, intriguing to
obtain the official yellow ticket that would entitle them to behold with
their own eyes—O, dramatic, thrilling spectacle—the “Tragic Widow’s”
entrance into the dock, and to hear with their own ears—O palpitating,
overwhelming experience—the secret history of an essentially Parisian
_cause célèbre_. The trial would be the event of the autumn season, a
function no self-respecting _mondain_, _mondaine_ or _demi-mondaine_
could afford to miss. And so, as the accommodation in the Court of
Assizes is limited, the campaign to secure cards of admission became
ardent, fierce, and then (as the sensational day of the 3rd November
approached) delirious. Off, by footmen, chauffeurs, special messengers,
went scented little notes to judges and famous lawyers, and to deputies,
senators and ministers, imploring those distinguished personages to
“remember” the writer when the hour arrived for the precious yellow
tickets to be distributed. “_Mon cher ami_,” wrote Madame la Comtesse de
la Tour, “if you forget me I shall never, never forgive you.” Then, with
a blot or two, and in a primitive, scrawling handwriting, Mademoiselle
Giselle de Perle of the half-world: “_Mon vieux gros_, I count upon you
for the trial. If you fail me, your little blonde Pauline will show
her claws. And the claws of this blonde child can be terrible.” (It
is shocking to think that blonde Giselle de Perle should be on such
familiar terms with gentlemen in high places; but as a matter of fact she
and her sisters play a very important rôle in the life of the Amazing
City.) As for stout, diamond-covered Baronne Goldstein (wife of old
bald-headed Goldstein of the Bourse), she invited judges and deputies
to rich, elaborate dinners, at which the oldest, the mellowest, the
most comforting wines from her cellars were produced; and when M. le
Juge and M. le Député had been rendered genial and benevolent by those
rare, warming vintages, she led them into a corner of Goldstein’s vast
gilded _salon_, and there besought them, while breathing heavily under
her breastplate of diamonds, to procure for her “just one little yellow
ticket.” Naturally, all these State officials replied with a bow: “I
will do my best. Need I say that it is my dearest desire to oblige you?”
And our ornaments of _le Tout Paris_ were satisfied; already regarded
that ticket of tickets as being safe and sound in their possession.
When October dawned, Madame la Comtesse, lively Pauline Boum and stout
Baronne Goldstein ordered striking dresses and huge, complicated hats
for the Steinheil _cause célèbre_. In their respective _salons_, over
their “five o’clock’s” of pale tea, sugared cakes, and crystal glasses of
port, malaga and madeira, they excitedly described how they had driven
to the tranquil, ivy-covered villa in the Impasse Ronsin where Madame
Steinheil’s husband and mother had been assassinated on the night of
the 30th-31st May eighteen months ago. And how, after that expedition,
they had proceeded to beautiful Bellevue, seven miles out of Paris, to
stare at that other villa, the “Vert Logis,” where the “Tragic Widow”
received her lovers. How they gossiped, too, over the intrigue between
the accused woman and the late President Félix Faure; and what fun they
made of certain high State dignitaries who were said to be in a state of
“panic” because they had been habitués of the Steinheil villas! “I would
not miss the trial for the largest and finest diamond in the world,”
declared these ladies. “It will be extraordinary, overwhelming, supreme,”
exclaimed the male guests at these tea-and-madeira afternoon parties. “We
shall still be discussing it this time next year.”
Suddenly, however, consternation, indignation, fury, hysteria, in _le
Tout Paris_. In an official decree, M. de Valles, the judge appointed to
preside over the Steinheil “debates,” intimated that all those scented
notes had been written, all those elaborate dinners had been given, all
those striking dresses and complicated hats had been ordered, and tried
on I don’t know how many times—_in vain_. “I have,” stated M. de Valles,
“received over 25,000 applications for tickets of admission, and every
one of them I have refused. Only the diplomatic corps, the Bar, and a
certain number of French and foreign journalists will be admitted. Let
it be clearly understood that this decision of mine is irrevocable.”
Gracious powers, the commotion! _Le Tout Paris_ protested, raged, until
it wore itself out with anger and hysteria. “I have made thousands of
enemies. Even my wife’s friends refuse to speak to me,” said M. de Valles
to an interviewer. True to his word, the judge remained inexorable.
Passionate letters to him remained unanswered; to all visitors he was
invisible. Hence the exceedingly bad temper of _le Tout Paris_ on that
foggy, gloomy morning of the 3rd of November. And thus for the first
time on record the heroine of an essentially Parisian _cause célèbre_
entered the dock of the dim, oblong, oak-panelled Court of Assizes,
secure from the laughter, the mockery, and the opera-glasses of French
Vanity Fair.
An extraordinary woman, Madame Steinheil. Imagine Sarah Bernhardt in
some supremely tragical rôle—pathetic, threatening; tender, violent;
despairing, tearful; wrecked with indignation, suffering and exhaustion,
and you will gain an idea of the “Tragic Widow’s” demeanour during the
ten days’ dramatic trial. Her voice, like the incomparable Sarah’s,
was now melodious and persuasive, then hoarse, bitter, frenzied; when
she wept, it subsided into a moan or a broken whisper. Never even in
Paris (where a widow’s weeds are perhaps excessively lugubrious) have
I seen deeper mourning: heavy crape bands round the accused woman’s
black dress, stiff crape bows in the widow’s cap, a deep crape border
to the handkerchief which she clenched tightly, convulsively, in her
black-gloved hand. Then, under her eyes, dark, dark shadows, which turned
green as the trial tragically wore on. Her face, deadly pale, but for
the hectic spot burning fiercely in each cheek. Her eyes, blue. Her
hair, dark brown. Her ears, small and delicate; her mouth, sensitive,
tremulous, eloquent. Her only _coquetterie_, the low, square-cut opening
in the neck of her dress.
Wistfully, wretchedly, she glanced around the court, after M. de Valles,
the presiding judge, had given her permission to sit down. Then her eyes
fell upon a grim table placed immediately beneath the Bench: and she
shuddered. It was grim because it contained the _pièces à conviction_—the
alpenstock found near the late M. Steinheil’s body, the coil of rope with
which he and his mother-in-law had been strangled, the famous bottle
of brandy with the innumerable finger-prints, the wadding lying on the
floor by the side of Madame Japy’s bed. Then, M. de Valles, in his
rasping voice, asked the “Tragic Widow” the usual preliminary questions
concerning her parentage, domicile and age. Almost inaudibly, Madame
Steinheil replied. And the trial began.
Unfortunately, I have neither the space nor the time at my disposal
to render even a tolerably satisfactory account of this overwhelming
_cause célèbre_. “Impressions” are all I can offer, mixed up with
brief descriptions of what the French journalist calls “incidents in
court”; and even these “impressions” and “incidents” must necessarily be
compressed and disconnected. For the slightness of my recital, I beg the
indulgence of my readers.
“Messieurs les Jurés, I swear I am innocent. Messieurs les Jurés, I
adored my mother. Messieurs les Jurés, do not believe the abominable
things the President is saying about me,” was the “Tragic Widow’s” first
passionate outburst. Then, turning round upon M. de Valles: “You are
treating me atrociously.”
“I am treating you as you deserve,” was the reply.
For the first two days, M. de Valles assumed the office of public
prosecutor, or rather of high inquisitor—and the “Tragic Widow” was
on the rack. The judge in the black-and-red robes sneered, stormed,
threatened, bullied; and turned constantly to the jury with a shrug of
the shoulders as though to say: “She denies everything. She has never
told anything but lies, and now she is lying again.” Over again and
again he brutally accused Madame Steinheil of having assassinated her
mother, but never did the accused woman fail to leap up from her chair
with the cry: “I adored my mother. Messieurs les Jurés, I swear I adored
her.” Another shrug of M. de Valles’ shoulders, and another cynical
smile at the jury, when Madame Steinheil spoke of her devotion to her
eighteen-year-old daughter. “I love her, and she loves me more fondly
than ever—because she believes in my innocence. She has written me the
tenderest letters and has visited me constantly in prison. She helped to
make the black dress I am wearing.” And further gestures expressive of
impatient incredulity on the part of M. de Valles when the “Tragic Widow”
shrieked: “Yes; I have been a bad woman. Yes; I have been an immoral
woman. Yes; I made false, wicked accusations against Remy Couillard and
Alexandre Wolff. But I am not an assassin, a fiend. And only a fiend
could murder her mother.” Here the shriek stopped. For some moments
the “Tragic Widow” cried bitterly. Then, in Sarah Bernhardt’s melodious
voice, she thus addressed the jury: “Gentlemen, I am deeply repentant for
all the wrong I have done. Please realise that I was mad—that I was being
tortured—when I made those false, atrocious accusations. I was being
tortured by the examining magistrate and by the journalists who invaded
my villa and refused to leave it until they had obtained sensational
‘copy’ for their papers. These journalists told me that nobody believed
in my story, and that I had better tell a new one. They said my villa
was surrounded by a hostile mob, come there to lynch me. It was they
who suggested that I should accuse Alexandre Wolff and Remy Couillard.
They tortured me until they made me say what they liked. It was no doubt
splendid material for their papers: but the result was disastrous for
me. Do you know, gentlemen of the jury, that it was actually in a motor
car belonging to the _Matin_ that I was driven to the St Lazare prison?”
And the “Tragic Widow” collapsed in her chair, covered her face with
her hand, sobbed convulsively. At this point the two or three hundred
barristers in court murmured compassionately: and M. de Valles called
them to order by rapping his paper-cutter on his massive silver inkstand.
(M. de Valles, by the way, was for ever rapping his paper-cutter, for
ever wiping his brow with a huge handkerchief, for ever sinking back in
his handsome, comfortable fauteuil, and then suddenly darting forward to
hurl some savage remark at the accused.) Irritated by the compassionate
demonstration of the barristers, unmoved by the shaking and sobbing
of the black-dressed woman in the dock, M. de Valles pointed to the
grim table containing the _pièces de conviction_, and cried: “Look at
that horrible table, and confess; and shed real, not crocodile, tears.
You have stated that on the night of the crime you were bound down
and gagged by three men in black robes and by a red-headed woman, who
entered your room with a dark lantern and then—after they had bound and
gagged you, and after you yourself had lost consciousness—assassinated
poor M. Steinheil and the unfortunate Madame Japy. Nobody believes you;
your story is a tissue of falsehoods. It was you who, with the help of
accomplices, murdered your husband and your mother.”
But let us not be too hard upon M. de Valles for his savage treatment
of Madame Steinheil. He had considerately protected her from the cruel
curiosity and impertinence of _le Tout Paris_; and then it was his
legitimate rôle to attempt by continuous ruthless bullying to extract
a confession from his pale-faced, exhausted martyr. For in France the
word “judge,” as we understand it, is a misnomer. The French judge is
the real public prosecutor, the chief cross-examiner; save for the
jury, he would be all-powerful. But as the twelve men “good and true”
are chosen from the justice-loving French people at large, M. le Juge’s
drastic, brutal insinuations and accusations cannot alone bring about
a condemnation. It is for the jury to decide. It remains with the jury
to condemn. And at one o’clock in the morning of the 14th November the
jurors in the Steinheil _cause célèbre_—workmen, mechanics, _petits
commerçants_—demonstrated their inherent love and sense of justice by——
But I am anticipating events. Let us return to the crowded, stifling
Court of Assizes; and then take a stroll in the marble corridors of the
Paris Law Courts, where, throughout the Steinheil trial, wooden barriers
barred the way to all those not provided with the precious yellow ticket;
and where groups of policemen, and of Municipal and Republican Guards
were discussing—like every other soul in Paris—this incomprehensible,
amazing _cause célèbre_.
A change in M. de Valles on the third day of the trial. Respecting
her tears, refraining from shrugging his shoulders at her repeated
protestations of innocence, the judge treated the “Tragic Widow” as a
human being; even with courtesy and compassion. This metamorphosis was
due, I believe, to a hint received from high quarters, where (so I have
since been assured) the strong protests of the Paris correspondents of
the English and American newspapers against the French judicial system,
had made an impression. But in the opinion of Henri Rochefort, Madame
Steinheil’s savage assailant in the columns of the Nationalist _Patrie_,
the “judge had been bought.” With his gaunt, yellow face, tumbled white
hair, angry grey eyes, the ruthless old journalist and agitator was
the most conspicuous figure in the press-box. To his colleagues and to
the barristers around him, he also accused Madame Steinheil of having
murdered the late Félix Faure. “She was in the pay of the Dreyfusards,”
he said, in his hoarse voice, “and the Dreyfusards knew that so long as
Faure lived there would be no revision. So they commissioned the woman
Steinheil, his mistress, to assassinate him.” After which he sucked
lozenges (fierce old Rochefort is always and always sucking lozenges in
order to ease the hoarseness in his throat), and next proceeded to begin
his article for the _Patrie_, in which he referred to Madame Steinheil as
the “Black Panther”! I fancy, too, that it was Rochefort’s bold design to
magnetise—even to mesmerise—the jury! At all events, when not writing or
accusing, he kept his angry grey eyes fixed hard on the foreman. A good
thing the “Tragic Widow” could not see him from her seat in the dock.
Henri Rochefort’s gaunt yellow face, when lit up luridly with hatred and
vindictiveness, is enough to make anyone falter and quail.
But as M. de Valles was calm, Madame Steinheil felt more at ease; and,
apart from occasional tears and comparatively few outbursts, the “Tragic
Widow” remained composed during the six long, stifling afternoons
occupied by the evidence of the eighty-seven witnesses. Of these, of
course, I can take only the most important. Let us begin with Mr
Burlingham, an American painter and journalist, aged twenty-eight.
Poor, poor Mr Burlingham! It will be remembered that Madame Steinheil
described the assassins of her husband and mother as three men in black
robes, and a red-headed woman. Well, just because Mr Burlingham had
hired a black robe from a costumier’s for a fancy-dress ball a few
nights before the murder, he was suspected, shadowed and worried by the
detective police. One day the police stationed Madame Steinheil outside
his door, and when he sauntered out and walked off, the “Tragic Widow”
exclaimed: “Yes, that is one of the assassins. I recognise him by his
red beard.” But as on the night of the murder Mr Burlingham was far away
in Switzerland with two friends on a walking-tour, he had no difficulty
in establishing a decisive _alibi_. Nevertheless, Mr Burlingham became
notorious. His photographs appeared in the newspapers. He was followed
here, there and everywhere by Yellow Reporters: who described him as
the “enigmatic Burlingham,” and the “sinister Burlingham”—and yet Mr
Burlingham, with his light red beard, gentle green eyes, low voice and
kindly expression is, in reality, the simplest and mildest-looking
mortal that ever breathed. What humiliations, what indignities,
nevertheless, had Mr Burlingham to endure! His landlord gave him notice,
his tradespeople ceased calling for orders; when out walking in the
neighbourhood he inhabited, concierges exclaimed: “There goes the
famous Burlingham,” while little boys cried: “Here comes the sinister
Burlingham.” Once, after calling on a friend who was out, he left his
name with the concierge—and the concierge, panic-stricken, fled her
lodge, and, rushing into the next house, breathlessly told her neighbour
that she had seen the “terrible Burlingham.” In fact, an intolerable time
of it for mild, simple Mr Burlingham.
“I have narrowly escaped the guillotine,” were his first words to the
judge; and the Court laughed. The American should have engaged an
interpreter: his French and his accent were deplorable. “This Steinheil
affair is not clear,” he continued, naïvely, and everyone shook with
delight. “I am very sorry you have been so badly treated,” said M.
de Valles, “but you fell under suspicion because you had eccentric
habits, and mixed with eccentric people.” M. de Valles’ idea of
“eccentric” habits and “eccentric” people was in itself eccentric. For Mr
Burlingham’s friends and associates during his sojourn in Paris have been
painters, sculptors, and journalists of talent and honourable standing.
As for his habits, they have been those of a firm believer in the “simple
life.” Sandals for Mr Burlingham; no hat; terrific walking-tours. Then
a diet of rice, grapes and nuts. (In the buffet of the Law Courts Mr
Burlingham, when invited to take a “drink,” ordered grapes: he consumed
I don’t know how many bunches a day, to the stupefaction of the waiters
and customers.) Well, after having received apologies from the judge, Mr
Burlingham received those of counsel for the defence and the prosecution.
“Excuses are scarcely enough,” replied the witness; “I should like to
say something about the French judicial system.” At which, M. de Valles,
rapping his paper-cutter, sternly requested simple, unfortunate Mr
Burlingham to “retire.”
Murmurs, exclamations, excitement in court when M. Marcel Hutin, of the
_Echo de Paris_, and MM. Labruyère and Barby, of the _Matin_—the three
journalists who bullied and “tortured” Madame Steinheil in the Impasse
Ronsin Villa on the night previous to her arrest—strode up to the short
wooden bar that takes the place, in France, of a witness-box.
No confusion, no shame about them; and yet their conduct in the
drawing-room of the Steinheil villa twelve months ago was despicable.
Calmly they admitted having advised the “Tragic Widow” to “tell a new
story,” as no one in Paris believed in her account of how the double
crime had been committed. They also admitted having lied to the wretched
woman, when they had told her that the villa was surrounded by a hostile
mob, “come there to lynch her.” Madame Steinheil, they continued, was
exhausted, out of her mind. She called for strychnine, with which to
poison herself. Downstairs in the kitchen the cook, Mariette Wolff,
was discovered on her knees, striving to cut open the tube of the
gas-stove—to asphyxiate herself. The cook then produced a revolver, and
cried: “Here is the only means of salvation.” Later on, tea was served
in the drawing-room. M. Marcel Hutin and his two colleagues continued to
browbeat Madame Steinheil. One of the Yellow Reporters cried: “I shall
not leave this house until I know the truth.” Mariette Wolff entered the
drawing-room and tried to soothe her mistress. And——
“So you tortured Madame Steinheil in her drawing-room. You drank her
tea. You were her guests, she was your hostess,” interrupted M. de
Valles, scathingly, indignantly. The “Tragic Widow,” leaning forward on
the ledge of the dock, looked gratefully, thankfully, at the judge. The
three Yellow Reporters strode out of court, each of them provoking angry
exclamations from the barristers as they importantly passed by.
And then, the cook—Mariette Wolff, who had been in Madame Steinheil’s
service for over twenty years; and who, according to the Yellow Press,
“possessed all the secrets of the palpitating Steinheil Mystery.” Henri
Rochefort, M. Arthur Meyer (director of the _Gaulois_, very Jewish in
appearance, but a strong Anti-Semite and an ardent Catholic in politics),
Madame Séverine (the famous woman journalist), four very charming
lady barristers, all their male confrères—everyone, in fact, sprang
up excitedly when Mariette made her long-expected appearance. She has
since been described as a peasant out of one of Zola’s novels, and as
“the double of Balzac’s fiendish Cousine Bette.” She has also been
termed “a fury,” and “a rat” and “a monster.” For my part, when first I
saw her through the open door of the witness-room, sipping a steaming
grog and chatting and laughing with her son Alexandre, I summed her up
as the French double of a typical English charwoman. She was wearing a
battered black bonnet and a seedy black dress, and came to me more as a
Dickensonian than a Zolaesque or a Balzacien character. But Mariette,
happily drinking grog, and Mariette, facing a jury and judge, are two
very different persons. In court, Madame Steinheil’s ex-cook was defiant,
vindictive, violent. As she defended her former mistress, her beady,
black eyes flashed, her chin and nose almost met—her yellow, knotted hand
beat the air. Yes, she was a “fury”; yes—to use the French journalist’s
pet epithet—she looked “sinister.” And, oh dear me, her abuse of the
Yellow Reporters! Mariette’s crude language cannot be reproduced here.
It became particularly strong when she related how she had ordered MM.
Hutin, Barby and Labruyère out of the Impasse Ronsin Villa. It grew even
stronger when she denied their allegations that she intended first of
all to asphyxiate herself, and then to blow out her brains. She denied
everything. “My mistress is innocent,” she cried. “She accused my son
Alexandre of being a murderer, but it was those —— journalists who made
her do that, and I forgive her: and so does Alexandre.” True, Alexandre
Wolff, a horse-dealer’s assistant, with huge red hands and a neck like
a bullock’s, told M. de Valles he bore Madame Steinheil “no grudge.” And
the “Tragic Widow,” leaning forward, murmured melodiously: “Thank you,
Alexandre.”
Full of incoherencies, contradictions, was the evidence of Remy
Couillard, the late M. Steinheil’s valet, into whose pocket-book the
“Tragic Widow” had placed the incriminating pearl. “I bear her no
grudge,” blurted out the young man. “I beg your pardon, Remy,” said
Madame Steinheil, always melodiously, when the valet (attired, since he
was accomplishing his “military service,” in a cavalry uniform) withdrew.
But, a moment later, she fell back in her chair, closed her eyes; and the
black-gloved hands in her lap twitched convulsively, madly.
M. Borderel had stepped forward to give evidence: M. Borderel, the
lover Madame Steinheil had declared twelve months ago to the examining
magistrate to be the one and only man she had ever truly loved.
A hush in court as the middle-aged, red-eyed, broken-down widower from
the beautiful country of the Ardennes, related the history of his
intrigue with the “Tragic Widow.”