THE MONTE CARLO TRUNK MURDERESS
When a young woman deliberately embarks upon a career of crime she is
certain of a fair amount of success, provided she is pretty enough to
attract men to her side. A beauty, however black her record may be,
need never want for male assistance. If she is clever and designing
she can, as a rule, lay her plans with such discretion that if arrest
follows she is able to plead that she was merely the tool of a
designing man.
The trick has succeeded nine times out of ten. Juries naturally pity
the "weaker sex," and at the Old Bailey I have seen women let off with
a few months' imprisonment whilst their really less culpable partners
in wrongdoing have been sent to penal servitude for no other reason
than that they were of the masculine gender. Thus, it will be admitted
that the female criminal has at least one advantage over her male
colleague.
But Marie Goold never was a beauty. As a young girl she was
plain-looking and her manner repelled. She made no friends, and the
passage of time did not bring any improvement in her appearance. She
was clever and resourceful, however, and when a desire to mix in
fashionable circles and to acquire riches quickly determined her to
turn criminal she relied solely on her brains and not on her face. Yet
she married three times, and on each occasion above her own position,
and from first to last she always had at least one man in tow who was
completely dominated by her and obeyed her implicitly.
Her first marriage was the result of pique on her part. There was a
youth in her native village--she was born in France--who for some
quaint reason fell in love with her. He may have admired her vitriolic
tongue and her fearlessness, but the fact remains that he proposed.
Marie Girodin refused him, but the youth did not tell his parents of
his failure, and they, in their anxiety to save him, began a campaign
of calumny against the "charmer." It was a fatal move on their part,
for Marie, just to spite them, married their son and then discarded
him, because she decided that he could be of no use to her. He was
wretched and unhappy, but so hypnotized by his wife that when she
returned to him after a long absence he was almost delirious with joy,
and promptly handed over his savings. Marie had been in Paris and
London in the meantime, but she only remained at home for three months.
Her husband died suddenly, and the widow immediately went abroad again.
It was perhaps merely a coincidence that the young man expired just
when Marie had made up her mind that she would accept the gallant
English army officer who had been courting her under the impression
that she was free.
Once more Marie ventured on the matrimonial sea. Her second marriage
was an improvement on the first, and for a while she was content to
spend money and enjoy herself. The captain's means, however, would not
stand the strain, and Marie left for a Continental tour by herself. She
stopped for a couple of days at Nice and then departed; and when she
had gone two thousand pounds' worth of jewellery disappeared with her.
There was no proof of her guilt, and she was not molested, but Marie's
poverty ceased abruptly, and for a few months she was able to indulge
herself.
Then the captain died, for Marie had, curiously enough, grown very
tired of him too. His ideas of honour and honesty had disturbed her.
She knew that he sternly disapproved of theft and forgery, and to
obtaining money by false pretences--one of her little hobbies--the
captain was fanatically opposed. Therefore, his death came as a welcome
release to her. Black suited her, and if money was scarce she had a
collection of jewellery which was her precaution against a "rainy day."
She was now nearer thirty than twenty, and it required all the art of
which she was capable to make herself presentable. Her face was thin
and marked, her eyes were black and repellent, and her skin sallow.
People shrank from her until she began to talk, for then her rippling
voice poured forth stories of adventures in which names of famous men
and women in France and Great Britain appeared with her own.
Strangers were impressed by her. She never asserted that she was on
intimate terms with Presidents and Cabinet Ministers, but she inferred
it, and the credulous crowded round her. Once she got them interested
she held them. She was clever enough to be able to do that.
But talking did not produce money, and Marie, who owed thousands, began
to feel a draught. She did not ask for loans. Such a procedure would
be tantamount to suicide, but she resorted to trickery to replenish
her purse. Thus she flattered and coaxed an English lady into giving
her the position of secretary-companion. Marie protested that she only
wanted companionship herself, and that she would not accept a salary,
as she had plenty of money lying at her bankers. The English woman,
captivated by her chatter, agreed, and a few weeks later was lamenting
the loss of six hundred pounds which had "gone astray" while she and
her "companion-secretary" were travelling to San Sebastian.
The day after the disaster Marie told her that she had been summoned
to Paris to consult her lawyers about some property left to her by
her husband. She parted from her employer with tears in her eyes, but
she did not go to the French capital. She fixed upon Marseilles, and,
taking up her headquarters in the leading hotel there, had a riotous
time on the money she had stolen from the English lady.
The six hundred pounds and Marie were soon separated, and once more she
was penniless. She still had her jewellery, but she was loath to sell
it, and in desperation she set on foot various swindles. They all came
to nothing, and at last, feeling that the police were watching her,
she became panic-stricken, and fled to London. They could not harm her
there, as she was, by virtue of her second marriage, a British subject.
In London she was friendless, while hotel managers were hard-hearted
and would allow no credit. Poor Marie was compelled to work, and,
of course, she hated the prospect, but necessity compelled her to
dispose of her jewellery, and with the money to start a dressmaker's
establishment. She found a coy-looking shop in an unobtrusive street in
the West End of London, and with a small and select stock began her new
career.
The woman, a criminal to the finger-tips, utterly unscrupulous and
merciless, had no intention of settling down to the drudgery of a
dressmaker's life. She regarded her establishment as a spider must
regard his web. Money was not to be earned legitimately, but by
trickery. Money and more money was all Marie thought of, and, with the
aid of her crafty tongue, she extracted various sums from trusting and
sympathetic clients.
She could ingratiate herself into the confidences of middle-aged
English ladies who were losing their attractions by grossly flattering
them, and, because she was no rival so far as looks were concerned,
they became friends of hers rather than clients.
Her first exploit in London was a great success. A well-to-do woman
of fifty, who had been fascinated by "Madame's" promise to keep her
young, called to see her, and found the dressmaker in tears. The usual
question ensued, and then Marie whispered that the broker's men were in
the next room, and that she was ruined. The sympathetic customer paid
the amount which Marie said was owing, and as the whole story was a lie
the "dressmaker" was sixty pounds to the good.
Hitherto Marie's criminal activities had centred on obtaining money by
means of fraud. Her first two husbands may have died under suspicious
circumstances, but it was only suspicion after all, and it was not
until she was a British subject and a resident in the West End of
London that she soared to greater criminal heights.
The widow began to think of marrying again. A husband would be
decidedly useful in London. The English were inclined to regard her
with suspicion because she had no man attached to her, and Marie
meant to abandon the dressmaking business because the comparatively
small sums which she obtained from confiding customers were of little
use to her. She wanted thousands now, for she had become a confirmed
gambler, and the luck as a rule went against her. She therefore, as a
preliminary, commenced a campaign to find a husband, and she had not to
wait long for success.
It was said at the time of the final catastrophe that Marie first met
Vere Goold when the latter called to pay an account for a relative, but
there was no confirmation of this, and there is reason to believe that
she made his acquaintance at a restaurant in the West End.
Vere Goold was an Irishman of good family, who devoted his time to
absorbing intoxicating liquors. A man of education and some ability,
drink and drugs had robbed him of all his will power. He had been
sent to London by friends and relations who were anxious for him to
reform, and they made him a small allowance, hoping that he would find
it impossible to live on it, and would, therefore, seek some form of
employment.
Goold, however, was content to take the part of the shabby genteel
"loafer," and for some years he was well known in most of the
taprooms in the West End. When he was in funds he was in the habit of
entertaining acquaintances in one of the cheap Soho restaurants, but
these rare appearances in the rôle of host were invariably marked by
ejection from the particular restaurant. Now and then he paid a small
fine at Marlborough Street for being "drunk and disorderly," but on
the whole Vere Goold had only one enemy, and that was himself. He
was otherwise quite inoffensive until he came into the life of the
adventuress.
The moment she decided to become Vere Goold's wife there was no way of
escape for him. The woman was a human snake, and he was the frightened,
timid rabbit. She dosed him with liquor and did all the thinking for
him. When she led him to the nearest register office he plaintively
said "Yes" to everything, and it took his drink-soddened mind some
hours to realize that he was a married man, the husband of Marie, the
woman with the evil face and the tongue of honey.
Marie Goold was delighted with her third husband. She compiled a list
of his relatives, most of them of good social position, and, what was
more important, she discovered there was a baronetcy in the family, and
that if only certain persons died her husband would succeed to it and
she would become Lady Goold! Ambition and vanity caused her to make her
husband assume the baronetcy. By now the dressmaking business had been
disposed of, and the married couple had about a hundred pounds between
them. Marie voted for a protracted honeymoon on the Continent, and, to
lend distinction to their adventures, it was as Sir Vere and Lady Goold
that they left London for Paris, "her ladyship" plentifully stocked
with clothes which she had obtained from the wholesale houses without
troubling to pay for them.
But when their funds vanished they experienced many vicissitudes of
fortune, and Vere Goold, who waited on his wife like a slave, came in
for much abuse. He would listen meekly to her upbraidings, and then
wander forth, hoping to meet an acquaintance on the boulevards whom he
might "tap" for a few francs. They were turned out of several hotels
and boarding-houses. Once Goold borrowed a little money and gave it
to Marie. She promptly took a room at an hotel, and as the manager
insisted upon cash down, even for their meals, she let her husband go
without food, whilst she enjoyed the excellent cuisine of the hotel.
They experienced occasional bursts of sunshine when Marie succeeded in
extracting loans from confiding hotel acquaintances, but the inevitable
sequel to these minor triumphs was flight to escape prosecution for
fraud. The helpless husband followed her about like a tame dog, and
when she told him that she had found a way out of all their troubles he
believed her, and declared his acquiescence in everything she said and
did.
I have mentioned that Marie Goold was a gambler, and in the darkest
hour she remembered Monte Carlo. She was positive that she knew the way
to break the bank. Given a little capital, she was confident that she
would make them both rich beyond the dreams of avarice.
The adventuress craved for big money now. For years she had lived by
her wits, and the result was misery, mental and physical. She had
swindled scores of acquaintances, and it was hardly safe for her to
appear in London, Paris and other cities. She knew that the police
of several countries had her name on their books, and for all her
cleverness she had nothing to show except a weak-minded drunkard of a
husband and her own ill-nourished condition. But she felt certain that
Monte Carlo would prove their salvation. It was her last hope. She had
expended all other sources of income, and now everything would depend
on her cleverness as a gambler and the system she had invented.
For ten days they were held up in Paris owing to lack of funds, but
Vere Goold wrote pitiful letters to friends in England, and a few of
them responded, while Marie, making the most of her assumed title of
"Lady Goold," obtained on approval a diamond ring from a jeweller. She
was to have it on approval for twenty-four hours, and then, if she
decided to keep it, was to pay cash down. But before the twenty-four
hours elapsed the ring was pawned and she and the "baronet" were in the
express for the Riviera, exulting over the good time coming. She had
worked out an infallible system with which she could smash the bank,
and henceforth they were--so she assured him--to have no difficulty in
living up to their "baronetcy."
Marie was so anxious to keep as much of her small store of money as
possible for the tables in the Casino that she became economically
minded, and, instead of going to an hotel, took apartments in a Villa.
She sent for her niece to act as a sort of housekeeper, because she
would have to spend her days in the gaming-rooms. The niece, who was
only twenty-four, was delighted to accept the invitation. She had not
experienced much pleasure in her life, and the prospect of a season at
Monte Carlo enchanted her.
It is not difficult to guess Marie Goold's experiences as a would-be
breaker of the bank at Monte Carlo. The "infallible system," which had
worked out so well on paper, proved a delusion and a snare, and Marie
returned from the Casino in a towering rage with everybody. For hours
her husband had patiently waited outside the Casino to accompany her
home. He was not allowed to enter by his strong-minded wife, who had
ordered him to hang about outside until she was tired of playing. Vere
Goold would have willingly allowed her to use him as a door mat, and he
was quite content to take her to the Casino and remain in the grounds
until she was ready for him. He had a vague idea that his clever wife
would overcome all difficulties, for he believed her to be a genius.
Four visits to the Casino resulted in Marie being penniless again.
The position was desperate. They had obtained the rooms at the Villa
Menesimy without the formality of rent in advance or references, the
landlord having been overwhelmed by the honour of "Sir Vere and Lady
Goold's" acquaintance. Nevertheless, at the end of the month he would
demand what was owing, and the sum was so small that inability to pay
it would arouse his suspicions, and then they would have to fly from
Monte Carlo, and Marie would be unable to test her system further. But
she refused to admit that her system was faulty. Her reverses she put
down to sheer bad luck.
Marie had to search Monte Carlo for a likely victim to provide funds.
In this way precious hours were wasted. She told her husband that she
ought to be at the Casino coining money instead of lunching as cheaply
as possible in expensive hotels and restaurants, but it was necessary
for the vulture to go after her prey, and the loss of time could not be
helped.
She achieved her object with characteristic cunning. One afternoon she
"accidentally" stumbled against a lady in the hall of an hotel, and
instantly apologized very humbly. From apology to general conversation
was an easy step, and the stranger was fascinated by Marie's ready
tongue. When they had made their names known to one another, "Lady
Goold" begged to be allowed to present her husband "Sir Vere," to
Madame Levin, and the latter, who was the widow of a wealthy Stockholm
merchant, gladly accorded permission. She had social ambitions, and she
welcomed "Sir Vere and Lady Goold" with more than ordinary cordiality.
Marie, fashionably dressed and with her sallow cheeks lightened by a
skilful use of powder, deferred in the most alluring manner to the rich
widow. That she was wealthy was obvious from her display of jewellery,
for Madame Levin carried thousands of pounds worth with her and frankly
invited the admiration of strangers.
Marie Goold thought that Madame Levin would prove a source of income,
and she was, therefore, surprised and exasperated when she discovered
that the lady was close-fisted. Instead of obtaining hundreds it took
Marie a fortnight to borrow forty pounds from her rich friend, and
in return for that small loan she had to bow and scrape to her, and
agree with everything she said. In fact, the clever adventuress had to
subordinate her own opinions to the clumsily-expressed and frequently
irritating statements to which the widow gave vent.
Her experiences leading up to the borrowing of that forty pounds should
have convinced her that Madame Levin would prove a worrying creditor.
The loan eventually passed into the keeping of the owner of the Casino,
and Marie once again had to try and "raise the wind."
It maddened her to think that Monte Carlo was crowded with wealthy
persons of both sexes on whom she was unable to practise any of her
money-raising tricks, simply because they would not have anything to do
with her. "Sir Vere and Lady Goold" were for some unexplained reason at
a discount, and squabbles and hysteria were of frequent occurrence at
the Villa Menesimy when Marie came back from the gaming-tables without
a sou.
Then Madame Levin began to press for repayment, and when her debtor
pleaded temporary embarrassment owing to non-receipt of a large
remittance from her husband's agent in London she showed her teeth.
Clearly Madame Levin regarded forty pounds as a very large sum, and
she pestered "Lady Goold" every time they met. The adventuress was at
her wit's end. She had to look pleasant and chat amiably with the rich
widow, and ignore her insults, and yet she longed to get her white
hands round the throat of her persecutor. She hated the Stockholm widow
with a ferocity that was akin to madness, for Madame Levin was angrily
demanding payment of the debt while Marie was actually in want of money
to buy the necessaries of life.
The two women had a violent quarrel, and Marie must have unconsciously
revealed something of her real self, for Madame Levin became afraid of
her. Perhaps she saw murder in the evil eyes of the adventuress. She
had been told already that Marie Goold was not entitled to the prefix
"Lady," and from a trustworthy source she had ascertained that they
were a couple of needy adventurers with a very shady and shadowy past.
After that Madame Levin seldom saw her, though she continued to write
angry letters asking for the return of her money. Marie Goold ignored
these appeals and threats. She was too absorbed in her own immediate
difficulties now. Even poor Vere Goold, that helpless incompetent, was
feeling the strain. For some days he was actually obliged to keep sober
owing to the shortage of ready money.
Every day made matters worse. The Casino was not mentioned, and the
Goolds were living in dire poverty, chained to the Villa Menesimy by
their penniless condition. Then it was that the wolfish woman thought
out the second great plan which she declared could save them.
She did not condescend to take her husband into her fullest confidence,
but she gave him an outline of her latest plans. He agreed, of course.
It was too late now for this weak-minded sot to try and emancipate his
soul from the thraldom of his domineering wife, and as usual he was
content to leave everything to her.
The first move was to get Marie's niece to spend a couple of days
away from the apartments in the Villa Menesimy. This was accomplished
easily. Then Marie called on Madame Levin with a smile and an apology,
and asked her to come to the Villa Menesimy on the following Sunday to
have tea with herself and her husband, and receive the forty pounds to
which she was entitled.
Madame Levin hesitated. She disliked Vere Goold, the victim of drink
and drugs, and she was afraid of Mrs. Goold, who was obviously a person
who would stick at nothing. But when Marie emphasized her willingness
to settle her debt the widow forgot her fears. She had arranged to
leave Monte Carlo within a few days, and she was anxious to recover her
forty pounds before she took her departure.
The Sunday came, and at half-past four Madame Levin entered the
apartments the Goolds occupied at the Villa Menesimy. She was never
seen alive again, for Marie Goold in inviting her to tea did so to take
her life. Vere Goold, his faculties paralysed by drugs, opened the door
to Madame Levin, and presently Marie emerged from the kitchen to greet
her and to explain laughingly that her niece had been called away,
and that she was compelled to prepare the tea herself. She placed a
chair for her visitor, and returned to the kitchen, whilst Vere Goold,
his whole body trembling, sat facing Madame Levin, trying to make
conversation.
The widow forgot her doubts and fears, and chatted brightly to the
accompaniment of the pleasant jingle of tea-things from the kitchen.
Goold mumbled answers to her remarks, but the widow thought that his
nervousness and distracted condition were due to drink and drugs, and
she did her best to put him at his ease.
The noise in the kitchen ceased abruptly, but Madame Levin did not turn
her head. She talked on of her home in Stockholm and of her future
plans, and her voice was the only one heard as Marie Goold crept from
the kitchen with a formidable-looking poker in her right hand. Madame
Levin's back was towards the kitchen door, and she never heard the
footfalls of her murderess.
Vere Goold sprang to his feet as the poker was raised by his wife and
brought down with terrific force upon the head of the unfortunate
visitor. She collapsed without a sound, and then Marie finished her off
with a knife, her husband looking on dazed and stupefied.
She roused him with an oath, and, realizing that they were both in
danger, he worked as she commanded. They had a big trunk in the
bedroom, and this was hauled out. A large carpet-bag was found which
could hold the head and legs of the murdered woman, and the rest of the
corpse was packed in the trunk.
Late that night the niece returned, and she noticed at once that the
carpet and curtains of the sitting-room were splashed with blood, but
her aunt anticipated questions by informing her that her uncle had had
a fit, during which he had vomited blood.
The next evening--the murder took place on Sunday, August 4, 1907--the
guilty couple prepared for flight. They could not leave the trunk
and the carpet-bag behind them, and they took both with them, Goold
carrying the latter. The trunk was conveyed in a cab to the railway
station, and tickets taken for Marseilles.
They arrived at their destination in the early hours of Tuesday
morning, and Goold immediately ordered the trunk to be labelled
"Charing Cross, London," and despatched there. Then with his wife he
went to an hotel for rest and refreshment.
It was now the duty of the goods clerk at Marseilles Station to attend
to the trunk, but when he came near it he was surprised by a fearful
odour. Closer examination proved that blood was oozing from beneath
the lid. Pons--that was the clerk's name--went at once to the hotel
and saw the Goolds. They explained that the trunk was filled with
poultry, hence the blood, but the railway official was not satisfied,
and he called at a police station, where the inspector instructed him
to inform the Goolds that the trunk would not be allowed to leave
Marseilles until it had been opened and the contents examined in their
presence.
Pons's first visit to the hotel had aroused doubts in Marie's mind,
and she told her husband to get ready to steal out of Marseilles. He
quickly obeyed, and they were actually emerging from the hotel when
the goods clerk arrived for the second time. He conveyed to them the
decision of the police, and Marie, conscious that they were in a tight
corner, staked her life on bluff.
"Very well," she said haughtily, "we will take a cab and drive to the
station, and when you have opened the trunk you can apologize for
having been so impertinent as to doubt my word." The cab was called,
and Marie and her husband with the large carpet-bag got in, but the
woman's heart must have sunk when Pons entered after them, as though
they were under arrest already.
The cab rattled along, and no one spoke until Mrs. Goold clutched the
clerk's arm and whispered to him that she would be willing to pay ten
thousand francs if he would let them go. Pons sat immovable. He was not
to be bribed, and the attempt to do so proved that his suspicions were
well-founded.
The examination of the contents of the trunk and carpet-bag indicated
that a brutal murder had been committed, and before the two prisoners
had time to confess the police identified the victim, and unravelled
the whole story. Marie and her husband were accordingly sent back to
Monte Carlo to stand their trial.
The woman was the chief figure in Court, her husband always presenting
a shivering, weak-kneed appearance in the dock. Marie Goold was clearly
the person who had murdered Madame Levin, and the sentence in her case
was death. Her husband was consigned to penal servitude for life.
After a sensational trial they were removed to the French prison at
Cayenne, and there in July, 1908, Marie Goold died of typhoid fever.
Fourteen months later Vere Goold, driven insane by remorse and the
deprivation of drink and drugs, committed suicide.
The fate of the niece was pathetic. She was so upset by her association
with the murderers that despite every attention she faded away, dying
before she attained her twenty-seventh birthday.