not always measured by sober truth; so she started up and ran to the
mirror, still dreading that the ugly visage of an old woman would meet
her gaze. Meanwhile the three gentlemen behaved in such a manner
as proved that the water of the Fountain of Youth possessed some
intoxicating qualities, unless, indeed, their exhilaration of spirits
were merely a lightsome dizziness, caused by the sudden removal of
the weight of years. Mr. Gascoigne's mind seemed to run on political
topics, but whether relating to the past, present, or future could not
easily be determined, since the same ideas and phrases have been in
vogue these fifty years. Now he rattled forth full-throated sentences
about patriotism, national glory, and the people's rights; now he
muttered some perilous stuff or other, in a sly and doubtful whisper,
so cautiously that even his own conscience could scarcely catch the
secret; and now, again, he spoke in measured accents and a deeply
deferential tone, as if a royal ear were listening to his well-turned
periods. Colonel Killigrew all this time had been trolling forth a
jolly battle-song, and ringing his glass toward the buxom figure of
the Widow Wycherley. On the other side of the table Mr. Medbourne
was involved in a calculation of dollars and cents, with which was
strangely intermingled a project for supplying the East Indies with
ice, by harnessing a team of whales to the polar icebergs.
As for the Widow Wycherley, she stood before the mirror, courtesying
and simpering to her own image, and greeting it as the friend whom she
loved better than all the world beside. She thrust her face close to
the glass to see whether some long-remembered wrinkle or crow's-foot
had indeed vanished. She examined whether the snow had so entirely
melted from her hair that the venerable cap could be safely thrown
aside. At last, turning briskly away, she came with a sort of dancing
step to the table.
"My dear old doctor," cried she, "pray favor me with another glass!"
"Certainly, my dear madam, certainly!" replied the complaisant doctor.
"See! I have already filled the glasses."
There, in fact, stood the four glasses, brimful of this wonderful
water, the delicate spray of which, as it effervesced from the
surface, resembled the tremulous glitter of diamonds. It was now so
nearly sunset that the chamber had grown duskier than ever; but a mild
and moon-like splendor gleamed from within the vase, and rested alike
on the four guests, and on the doctor's venerable figure. He sat in a
high-backed, elaborately carved oaken chair, with a gray dignity of
aspect that might have well befitted that very Father Time, whose
power had never been disputed, save by this fortunate company. Even
while quaffing the third draught of the Fountain of Youth, they were
almost awed by the expression of his mysterious visage.
But the next moment the exhilarating gush of young life shot through
their veins. They were now in the happy prime of youth. Age, with its
miserable train of cares, and sorrows, and diseases, was remembered
only as the trouble of a dream, from which they had joyously awoke.
The fresh gloss of the soul, so early lost, and without which the
world's successive scenes had been but a gallery of faded pictures,
again threw its enchantment over all their prospects. They felt like
new-created beings in a new-created universe.
"We are young! We are young!" they cried, exultingly.
Youth, like the extremity of age, had effaced the strongly marked
characteristics of middle life, and mutually assimilated them all.
They were a group of merry youngsters, almost maddened with the
exuberant frolicsomeness of their years. The most singular effect of
their gayety was an impulse to mock the infirmity and decrepitude of
which they had so lately been the victims. They laughed loudly at
their old-fashioned attire--the wide-skirted coats and flapped
waistcoats of the young men, and the ancient cap and gown of the
blooming girl. One limped across the floor like a gouty grandfather;
one set a pair of spectacles astride of his nose, and pretended to
pore over the black-letter pages of the book of magic; a third seated
himself in an arm-chair, and strove to imitate the venerable dignity
of Doctor Heidegger. Then all shouted mirthfully, and leaped about
the room. The Widow Wycherley--if so fresh a damsel could be called a
widow--tripped up to the doctor's chair with a mischievous merriment
in her rosy face.
"Doctor, you dear old soul," cried she, "get up and dance with me!"
And then the four young people laughed louder than ever, to think what
a queer figure the poor old doctor would cut.
"Pray excuse me," answered the doctor, quietly. "I am old and
rheumatic, and my dancing days were over long ago. But either of these
gay young gentlemen will be glad of so pretty a partner."
"Dance with me, Clara!" cried Colonel Killigrew.
"She promised me her hand fifty years ago!" exclaimed Mr. Medbourne.
They all gathered round her. One caught both her hands in his
passionate grasp--another threw his arm about her waist--the third
buried his hand among the curls that clustered beneath the widow's
cap. Blushing, panting, struggling, chiding, laughing, her warm breath
fanning each of their faces by turns, she strove to disengage herself,
yet still remained in their triple embrace. Never was there a livelier
picture of youthful rivalship, with bewitching beauty for the prize.
Yet, by a strange deception, owing to the duskiness of the chamber and
the antique dresses which they still wore, the tall mirror is said
to have reflected the figures of the three old, gray, withered
grand-sires, ridiculously contending for the skinny ugliness of a
shrivelled grandam.
But they were young: their burning passions proved them so. Inflamed
to madness by the coquetry of the girl-widow, who neither granted
nor quite withheld her favors, the three rivals began to interchange
threatening glances. Still keeping hold of the fair prize, they
grappled fiercely at one another's throats. As they struggled to and
fro, the table was overturned, and the vase dashed into a thousand
fragments. The precious Water of Youth flowed in a bright stream
across the floor, moistening the wings of a butterfly, which, grown
old in the decline of summer, had alighted there to die. The insect
fluttered lightly through the chamber, and settled on the snowy head
of Doctor Heidegger.
"Come, come, gentlemen!--come, Madame Wycherley!" exclaimed the
doctor, "I really must protest against this riot."
They stood still and shivered; for it seemed as if gray Time were
calling them back from their sunny youth, far down into the chill and
darksome vale of years. They looked at old Doctor Heidegger, who sat
in his carved arm-chair, holding the rose of half a century which he
had rescued from among the fragments of the shattered vase. At the
motion of his hand the rioters resumed their seats, the more readily
because their violent exertions had wearied them, youthful though they
were.
"My poor Sylvia's rose!" ejaculated Doctor Heidegger, holding it in
the light of the sunset clouds; "it appears to be fading again."
And so it was. Even while the party were looking at it the flower
continued to shrivel up, till it became as dry and fragile as when the
doctor had first thrown it into the vase. He shook off the few drops
of moisture which clung to its petals.
"I love it as well thus as in its dewy freshness," observed he,
pressing the withered rose to his withered lips. While he spoke, the
butterfly fluttered down from the doctor's snowy head, and fell upon
the floor.
His guests shivered again. A strange dullness, whether of the body or
spirit they could not tell, was creeping gradually over them all. They
gazed at one another, and fancied that each fleeting moment snatched
away a charm, and left a deepening furrow where none had been before.
Was it an illusion? Had the changes of a lifetime been crowded into so
brief a space, and were they now four aged people, sitting with their
old friend, Doctor Heidegger?
"Are we grown old again so soon?" cried they, dolefully.
In truth, they had. The Water of Youth possessed merely a virtue
more transient than that of wine. The delirium which it created had
effervesced away. Yes, they were old again! With a shuddering impulse,
that showed her a woman still, the widow clasped her skinny hands over
her face, and wished that the coffin lid were over it, since it could
be no longer beautiful.
"Yes, friends, ye are old again," said Doctor Heidegger; "and lo! the
Water of Youth is all lavished on the ground. Well, I bemoan it not;
for if the fountain gushed at my doorstep, I would not stoop to bathe
my lips in it--no, though its delirium were for years instead of
moments. Such is the lesson ye have taught me!"
But the doctor's four friends had taught no such lesson to themselves.
They resolved forthwith to make a pilgrimage to Florida, and quaff at
morning, noon, and night from the Fountain of Youth.
THE PURLOINED LETTER[1]
[Footnote 1: The pattern in method for all detective stories.]
_Edgar Allan Poe_ (1809-1849)
At Paris, just after dark one gusty evening in the autumn of 18--, I
was enjoying the twofold luxury of meditation and a meerschaum, in
company with my friend, C. Auguste Dupin, in his little back library,
or book-closet, _au troisième_, No. 33 Rue Dunôt, Faubourg St.
Germain. For one hour at least we had maintained a profound silence,
while each, to any casual observer, might have seemed intently and
exclusively occupied with the curling eddies of smoke that oppressed
the atmosphere of the chamber. For myself, however, I was mentally
discussing certain topics which had formed matter for conversation
between us at an earlier period of the evening; I mean the affair of
the Rue Morgue, and the mystery attending the murder of Marie Rogêt.
I looked upon it, therefore, as something of a coincidence, when
the door of our apartment was thrown open and admitted our old
acquaintance, Monsieur G----, the Prefect of the Parisian police.
We gave him a hearty welcome; for there was nearly half as much of the
entertaining as of the contemptible about the man, and we had not seen
him for several years. We had been sitting in the dark, and Dupin now
arose for the purpose of lighting a lamp, but sat down again, without
doing so, upon G----'s saying that he had called to consult us, or
rather to ask the opinion of my friend, about some official business
which had occasioned a great deal of trouble.
"If it is any point requiring reflection," observed Dupin, as he
forebore to enkindle the wick, "we shall examine it to better purpose
in the dark."
"That is another of your odd notions," said the Prefect, who had the
fashion of calling everything "odd" that was beyond his comprehension,
and thus lived amid an absolute legion of "oddities."
"Very true," said Dupin, as he supplied his visitor with a pipe, and
rolled toward him a comfortable chair.
"And what is the difficulty now?" I asked. "Nothing more in the
assassination way, I hope?"
"Oh no, nothing of that nature. The fact is, the business is _very_
simple indeed, and I make no doubt that we can manage it sufficiently
well ourselves; but then I thought Dupin would like to hear the
details of it, because it is so excessively _odd_."
"Simple and odd," said Dupin.
"Why, yes; and not exactly that, either. The fact is, we have all been
a good deal puzzled because the affair is so simple, and yet baffles
us altogether."
"Perhaps it is the very simplicity of the thing which puts you at
fault," said my friend.
"What nonsense you _do_ talk!" replied the Prefect, laughing heartily.
"Perhaps the mystery is a little _too_ plain," said Dupin.
"Oh, good heavens! who ever heard of such an idea?"
"A little _too_ self-evident."
"Ha! ha! ha!--ha! ha! ha!--ho! ho! ho!" roared our visitor, profoundly
amused, "Oh, Dupin, you will be the death of me yet!"
"And what, after all, _is_ the matter on hand?" I asked.
"Why, I will tell you," replied the Prefect, as he gave a long,
steady, and contemplative puff, and settled himself in his chair. "I
will tell you in a few words; but, before I begin, let me caution you
that this is an affair demanding the greatest secrecy, and that I
should most probably lose the position I now hold were it known that I
confided it to any one."
"Proceed," said I.
"Or not," said Dupin.
"Well, then; I have received personal information, from a very high
quarter, that a certain document of the last importance has been
purloined from the royal apartments. The individual who purloined it
is known; this beyond a doubt; he was seen to take it. It is known,
also, that it still remains in his possession."
"How is this known?" asked Dupin.
"It is clearly inferred," replied the Prefect, "from the nature of the
document, and from the non-appearance of certain results which would
at once arise from its passing _out_ of the robber's possession--that
is to say, from his employing it as he must design in the end to
employ it."
"Be a little more explicit," I said.
"Well, I may venture so far as to say that the paper gives its holder
a certain power in a certain quarter where such power is immensely
valuable." The Prefect was fond of the cant of diplomacy.
"Still I do not quite understand," said Dupin.
"No? Well, the disclosure of the document to a third person, who shall
be nameless, would bring in question the honor of a personage of the
most exalted station, and this fact gives the holder of the document
an ascendancy over the illustrious personage whose honor and peace are
so jeopardized."
"But this ascendancy," I interposed, "would depend upon the robber's
knowledge of the loser's knowledge of the robber. Who would dare--"
"The thief," said G----, "is the Minister D----, who dares all things,
those unbecoming as well as those becoming a man. The method of the
theft was not less ingenious than bold. The document in question--a
letter, to be frank--had been received by the personage robbed while
alone in the royal _boudoir_. During its perusal she was suddenly
interrupted by the entrance of the other exalted personage from whom
especially it was her wish to conceal it. After a hurried and vain
endeavor to thrust it in a drawer, she was forced to place it, open as
it was, upon a table. The address, however, was uppermost, and, the
contents thus unexposed, the letter escaped notice. At this juncture
enters the Minister D----. His lynx eye immediately perceives the
paper, recognizes the handwriting of the address, observes the
confusion of the personage addressed, and fathoms her secret. After
some business transactions, hurried through in his ordinary manner, he
produces a letter somewhat similar to the one in question, opens it,
pretends to read it, and then places it in close juxtaposition to the
other. Again he converses, for some fifteen minutes, upon the public
affairs. At length, in taking leave, he takes also from the table
the letter to which he had no claim. Its rightful owner saw, but of
course, dared not call attention to the act, in the presence of the
third personage who stood at her elbow. The Minister decamped, leaving
his own letter--one of no importance--upon the table."
"Here, then," said Dupin to me, "you have precisely what you demand to
make the ascendancy complete--the robber's knowledge of the loser's
knowledge of the robber."
"Yes," replied the Prefect, "and the power thus attained has, for some
months past, been wielded, for political purposes, to a very dangerous
extent. The personage robbed is more thoroughly convinced, every day,
of the necessity of reclaiming her letter. But this, of course, cannot
be done openly. In fine, driven to despair, she has committed the
matter to me."
"Than whom," said Dupin, amid a perfect whirlwind of smoke, "no more
sagacious agent could, I suppose, be desired, or even imagined."
"You flatter me," replied the Prefect; "but it is possible that some
such opinion may have been entertained."
"It is clear," said I, "as you observe, that the letter is still in
the possession of the Minister; since it is this possession, and
not any employment of the letter, which bestows the power. With the
employment the power departs."
"True," said G----; "and upon this conviction I proceeded. My first
care was to make thorough search of the Minister's hotel; and here
my chief embarrassment lay in the necessity of searching without his
knowledge. Beyond all things, I have been warned of the danger which
would result from giving him reason to suspect our design."
"But," said I, "you are quite _au fait_ in these investigations. The
Parisian police have done this thing often before."
"Oh yes, and for this reason I did not despair. The habits of the
Minister gave me, too, a great advantage. He is frequently absent from
home all night. His servants are by no means numerous. They sleep at
a distance from their master's apartment, and, being chiefly
Neapolitans, are readily made drunk. I have keys, as you know, with
which I can open any chamber or cabinet in Paris. For three months a
night has not passed during the greater part of which I have not
been engaged, personally, in ransacking the D---- Hotel. My honor is
interested, and, to mention a great secret, the reward is enormous. So
I did not abandon the search until I had become fully satisfied that
the thief is a more astute man than myself. I fancy that I have
investigated every nook and corner of the premises in which it is
possible that the paper can be concealed."
"But is it not possible," I suggested, "that although the letter may
be in the possession of the Minister, as it unquestionably is, he may
have concealed it elsewhere than upon his own premises?"
"This is barely possible," said Dupin. "The present peculiar condition
of affairs at court, and especially of those intrigues in which D----
is known to be involved, would render the instant availability of the
document--its susceptibility of being produced at a moment's notice--a
point of nearly equal importance with its possession."
"Its susceptibility of being produced?" said I.
"That is to say, of being _destroyed_," said Dupin.
"True," I observed; "the paper is clearly, then, upon the premises. As
for its being upon the person of the Minister, we may consider that as
out of the question."
"Entirely," said the Prefect. "He has been twice waylaid, as if by
footpads, and his person rigidly searched under my own inspection."
"You might have spared yourself this trouble," said Dupin. "D----, I
presume, is not altogether a fool; and, if not, must have anticipated
these waylayings, as a matter of course."
"Not _altogether_ a fool," said G----; "but, then, he is a poet, which
I take to be only one remove from a fool."
"True," said Dupin, after a long and thoughtful whiff from his
meerschaum, "although I have been guilty of certain doggrel myself."
"Suppose you detail," said I, "the particulars of your search."
"Why, the fact is, we took our time, and we searched _everywhere_. I
have had long experience in these affairs. I took the entire building,
room by room, devoting the nights of a whole week to each. We
examined, first, the furniture of each apartment. We opened every
possible drawer; and I presume you know that, to a properly trained
police-agent, such a thing as a '_secret_' drawer is impossible. Any
man is a dolt who permits a 'secret' drawer to escape him in a search
of this kind. The thing is so plain. There is a certain amount of
bulk--of space--to be accounted for in every cabinet. Then we have
accurate rules. The fiftieth part of a line could not escape us. After
the cabinets we took the chairs. The cushions we probed with the fine
long needles you have seen me employ. From the tables we removed the
tops."
"Why so?"
"Sometimes the top of a table, or other similarly arranged piece of
furniture, is removed by the person wishing to conceal an article;
then the leg is excavated, the article deposited within the cavity,
and the top replaced. The bottoms and tops of bedposts are employed in
the same way."
"But could not the cavity be detected by sounding?" I asked.
"By no means, if, when the article is deposited, a sufficient wadding
of cotton be placed around it. Besides, in our case, we were obliged
to proceed without noise."
"But you could not have removed--you could not have taken to pieces
_all_ articles of furniture in which it would have been possible to
make a deposit in the manner you mention. A letter may be compressed
into a thin spiral roll, not differing much in shape or bulk from a
large knitting-needle, and in this form it might be inserted into
the rung of a chair, for example. You did not take to pieces all the
chairs?"
"Certainly not; but we did better--we examined the rungs of every
chair in the hotel, and, indeed, the jointings of every description of
furniture, by the aid of a most powerful microscope. Had there been
any traces of recent disturbance we should not have failed to detect
it instantly. A single grain of gimlet-dust, for example, would have
been as obvious as an apple. Any disorder in the gluing--any unusual
gaping in the joints--would have sufficed to insure detection."
"I presume you looked to the mirrors, between the boards and the
plates, and you probed the beds and the bedclothes, as well as the
curtains and carpets."
"That, of course; and when we had absolutely completed every particle
of the furniture in this way, then we examined the house itself. We
divided its entire surface into compartments, which we numbered, so
that none might be missed; then we scrutinized each individual square
inch throughout the premises, including the two houses immediately
adjoining, with the microscope, as before."
"The two houses adjoining!" I exclaimed. "You must have had a great
deal of trouble."
"We had; but the reward offered is prodigious."
"You include the _grounds_ about the houses?"
"All the grounds are paved with brick. They gave us comparatively
little trouble. We examined the moss between the bricks, and found it
undisturbed."
"You looked among D----'s papers, of course, and into the books of the
library?"
"Certainly; we opened every package and parcel; we not only opened
every book, but we turned over every leaf in each volume, not
contenting ourselves with a mere shake, according to the fashion of
some of our police officers. We also measured the thickness of every
book-_cover_, with the most accurate admeasurement, and applied to
each the most jealous scrutiny of the microscope. Had any of the
bindings been recently meddled with, it would have been utterly
impossible that the fact should have escaped observation. Some five or
six volumes, just from the hands of the binder, we carefully probed,
longitudinally, with the needles."
"You explored the floors beneath the carpets?"
"Beyond doubt. We removed every carpet, and examined the boards with
the microscope."
"And the paper on the walls?"
"Yes."
"You looked into the cellars?"
"We did."
"Then," I said, "you have been making a miscalculation, and the letter
is _not_ upon the premises, as you suppose."
"I fear you are right there," said the Prefect. "And now, Dupin, what
would you advise me to do?"
"To make a thorough research of the premises."
"That is absolutely needless," replied G----. "I am not more sure that
I breathe than I am that the letter is not at the hotel."
"I have no better advice to give you," said Dupin. "You have, of
course, an accurate description of the letter?"
"Oh yes!" And here the Prefect, producing a memorandum book, proceeded
to read aloud a minute account of the internal, and especially of the
external, appearance of the missing document. Soon after finishing
the perusal of this description, he took his departure, more entirely
depressed in spirits than I had ever known the good gentleman before.
In about a month afterward he paid us another visit, and found us
occupied very nearly as before. He took a pipe and a chair, and
entered into some ordinary conversation. At length I said:
"Well, but, G----, what of the purloined letter? I presume you have at
last made up your mind that there is no such thing as overreaching the
Minister?"
"Confound him, say I--yes; I made the re-examination, however, as
Dupin suggested--but it was all labor lost, as I knew it would be."
"How much was the reward offered, did you say?" asked Dupin.
"Why, a very great deal--a _very_ liberal reward--I don't like to say
how much, precisely; but one thing I _will_ say, that I wouldn't mind
giving my individual check for fifty thousand francs to any one who
could obtain me that letter. The fact is, it is becoming of more and
more importance every day; and the reward has been lately doubled. If
it were trebled, however, I could do no more than I have done."