THREE HUNDRED AND FIFTY-THREE DAYS IN PRISON
FROM A PRISON
The sky is o'er the wall's grey height
So blue, so clean;
A tree, above the wall's grey height,
Waves boughs of green;
From out the blue that greets my sight,
A faint bell rings;
Upon the tree that greets my sight,
A sweet bird sings.
O God! O God! dear life is there
Tranquil and sweet,
That peaceful soothing murmur there
Comes from the street.
What hast thou done in thy despair
Weeping apart,
What hast thou done in thy despair
With thy young heart?
"D'une Prison," VERLAINE; translated by
_Touchstone_.
When I returned to "my" cell at the Saint-Lazare prison, I had not lost
all hope. Maître Aubin, as I was on my way to the _Dépôt_, declared:
"There is absolutely nothing against you. You may be released at any
time, now. Never mind M. André! When the dossier of the _Instruction_ is
read by those who have power to decide whether you are to be set free or
tried in the Court of Assize, they will realise your innocence. The fact
that you did not obtain a favorable reply to your recent petition,
proves nothing."
The petition was a "_demande de liberté provisoire_" (provisional
liberty), which I handed to Judge André at the close of the last
_Instruction_ but one.
The exact contents of this petition may interest the reader, inasmuch as
it reveals various facts in connection with the crime, which I have
hardly mentioned so far:
(No. 342) March 8th, 1909. _Monsieur le Juge d'Instruction._
"Following public opinion, which is so terribly against me but which,
when it is better informed, will necessarily become again generous and
just, you have considered me a monstrous criminal. I have endured your
ten interrogatories, your sixty hours of questions, without flinching,
and have always asserted my innocence. You have not believed me--could
not believe me after all the foolish or extravagant things I have said
and done, and have been made to say and do--(this last sentence was
dictated to me by my counsel, who suggested that it would not be wise to
be too aggressive). My narrative of the crime seemed to you, as to other
people, fantastic and unacceptable; I was the only culprit, or I had an
accomplice whom I had influenced, or by whom I had been influenced! The
assassins, _Monsieur le Juge_, were those I said, and their number was
the number I gave. And it is your own experts in their reports, your
dossier in its final state, which prove it. I, the only criminal! To
think that such a gross and abominable idea should be held for one
moment! Why? To make it hang together it has been necessary to introduce
the theory of a sleeping-draught or of some poison! Now, after the
expert, Dr. Ogier, had declared that the bodies of the victims contained
no trace of narcotic or poison, comes Dr. Balthazard, who supplies this
irresistible argument: that my husband and my mother were so little
poisoned, so little under the influence of a narcotic, that the latter
got out of her bed and that the former rose and walked to the bath-room,
both victims having incontrovertibly been killed at the spot and in the
position in which their bodies were found. Thus is destroyed the odious
hypothesis of the 'Tragic Widow,' giver of poison or narcotic, and
slayer, with her own hands and without help, of her husband and mother.
"There remains the hypothesis according to which I am still guilty, but
had the assistance of an accomplice. Without insisting on the
imprudence entailed by the choice of any accomplice--an inadmissible
imprudence as you perceived, since you have continuously and
persistently regarded me as the only culprit--which facts in regard to
this theory has the _Instruction_ brought out? None. And yet it is not
for lack of investigations and clues; your dossiers are full of
inquiries concerning all the persons who knew me, from my most distant
acquaintances to my own brother. That is not all, and here again Reason
and Science supply some information. M. Bertillon and Dr. Balthazard
have succeeded in ascertaining the following facts: the small clock,
surely handled by one of the assassins and thrown into a cupboard, bears
finger-prints which have not been identified; the brandy bottle used a
few hours before the crimes for the grogs, brought up almost full in the
evening and found almost empty on the morning after the crime, bears
numerous unidentified finger-prints, especially around the neck, as if
the murderers had drunk from the bottle. On the carpet a number of
ink-spots were found, which came from the pool of ink in the _boudoir_
(where the murderers knocked over the ink-stand on the desk which
contained the money and the dummy bundle of documents); those spots had
dropped from the edge of some flowing garment, which could not have been
one of mine, since I had undressed on the Saturday night in the
bath-room, and since my clothes were found there on the Sunday morning,
without any ink-spots on them or under the hem. To whom did this long
loose garment, to whom did that gown which left its traces on the
carpet, belong? Was it not to the woman I denounced, or to one of the
murderers dressed as I have said? An ink-spot was found on my knee--was
it not made by one of the men when binding me to the bed?"...
(Then, I showed how the gowns stolen at the Hebrew Theatre must have
been those worn by the murderers, and I mentioned the extraordinary and
all-important discovery of the cards in the Underground, the day after
the crime, cards which pointed to the Hebrew Theatre and to the "stolen
gowns.")
..."Allow me to add that four letters which are in the Dossier
corroborate my narrative: Two letters from a certain Arthur Rewer, one
of which is dated June 2nd, three days after the crime, a letter posted
at Boulogne-sur-Seine, and the fourth written by an Italian woman and
sent from Oporto (Portugal). You have assuredly attached some importance
to them, especially to the two Rewer letters, since you appointed an
expert in handwriting and ordered all kinds of investigations and
inquiries. Now, in his letter of June 2nd, Arthur Rewer declared that on
the night of the crime, he had seen, and even followed (at about 12.30
A.M.), four men (I only saw three men on the fatal night, but the fourth
evidently kept watch downstairs) and a woman who left the Impasse Ronsin
with bags. And the writer gave a description of these people which
tallied with my own! I am endeavouring to submit to your high conscience
proofs of my own innocence taken from your dossier, and how many other
proofs there are which make my guilt impossible! And, reminding you how
much, for my own life and for my daughter I needed my husband, reminding
you of my love for my mother I protest to you once more: I am innocent!
"Besides, what motive could have led me to commit such a ghastly crime?
It was not a desire to be free to marry, since the person you know of,
would not and could not marry again for eight years! (M. Bdl. has often
said, and to others beside me, that he would never give a step-mother to
his children, and that before marrying again, he would wait till they
were all grown up, which meant about eight years.) For financial
reasons? How could one admit it, since, if the death of my mother
brought me a small income, my husband's deprived me of one far larger!
As regards the jewels which I declare to have been stolen, you know
that, contrary to the news spread abroad, it has been impossible to find
a single one, outside the four jewels I myself handed to M. Souloy on
June 12th, as I have already told M. Leydet, and also that not one of my
mother's jewels taken by the murderers, has been discovered.
"That is why, _Monsieur le Juge_, at the present stage of the
_Instruction_, I ask you to give me back my child, and to put an end to
this torture which is now more than useless and for which your
conscience may some day prick you. I have the honour to ask you to grant
me 'provisional liberty,' and I duly promise to remain at your disposal
and to help you with all my power in the search for the Truth.
"(Signed) MARGUERITE STEINHEIL JAPY."
Four days later, on March 12th, that is on the eve of the final
_Instruction_, my petition, was returned to me--rejected "purely and
simply."
Maître Aubin had told me that, after the dossier had been carefully
examined, I should probably be released; I believed him and tried to
wait--patiently....
* * * * *
I have interrupted the description of my life in prison to deal with the
_Instruction_, but I may now resume my narrative of the year of agony I
spent at Saint-Lazare. That agony was only relieved by the devotion of a
few persons, to some of whom I have already referred. The others I shall
mention in the course of this chapter.
On January 1st, 1909, several Sisters came to give me their good wishes,
but the traditional "A Happy New Year" sounded bitter and ironical to
me, alas!
Pastor Arboux came to see me that day, and gave me a Bible. M. Desmoulin
brought me a few tangerine oranges which Firmin and I thought the most
wonderful fruit we had ever tasted. Sister Léonide gave me her own lamp,
a very small and old lamp which she had treasured for many, many years.
No present could have touched me more, nor have been more useful. It
hardly gave more light than a candle, but the flame did not flicker, and
that meant so much to my eyes, worn out by needlework--and tears. With
the tissue paper and the silver-paper which had been wrapped round the
tangerines, I made a little lamp-shade for "my" lamp--my priceless lamp!
Who would have thought that I, who had always surrounded myself with an
orgy of light, and still never found a room sufficiently lit, would have
been overwhelmed with joy to possess a toy oil-lamp!
On the same day, through the kindness of a Benevolent Society, buns were
distributed among the prisoners, and it was pathetic to watch their
joy... and heartrending to see some of the mothers take the buns given
to the children, and devour them while the little ones screamed with
disappointment. Certain women in prison reach such a state of
degradation that they even lose their motherly instincts!...
After the _Instruction_ was over, Sister Léonide entered my cell one
day, and said: "The Director wishes me to ask you for one of your
boots... M. Hamard has applied for that." I complied with this strange
request, but send a message to my counsel asking him to lodge a
complaint against such arbitrary treatment. The _Instruction_ was over.
I had a right to be left in peace.
A few days later, Maître Aubin came to the prison. I had never seen him
so jovial or beaming. He laughed so much that he could hardly speak. At
last he spluttered out: "It's too funny, really!... The _Substitut_, the
_Procureur_, and other magistrates, are all studying the dossier of your
case. I suppose they are very much annoyed, since it clearly reveals
your innocence. They probably don't see how they are going to draw up an
indictment with the material at their disposal.... They wondered, and
suddenly they exclaimed: 'The boot: We will catch her by the boot!'...
"You don't understand? Nor did I, at first! well, it appears that on one
of the photographs, taken after the crime, of the floors in your
apartments, one can see a mark left by a heel. The boots of all who were
suspected of having any connection with the crime have been examined--in
vain. Then, they sent for one of your boots. It was at once seen that
the all-important heel-mark could not have been yours. But wait! The end
of the story is the most humorous part of it: they have found, beyond
any doubt, that the mark was made by the heel of the very photographer
who photographed the floor!"
Maître Aubin checked his hilarity, and in an earnest tone added: "Ah,
Madame, I almost hope the _non-lieu_ (no bill) you expect will not be
granted you. I know it sounds terrible... as it would mean, for you,
several weeks more in this prison. But, believe me, a _non-lieu_ in your
case would amount to the total wreck of your life and of Marthe's too.
If you were suddenly set free, the public would think that there was
some pact between you and the authorities. Suspicions would become
deeper and more general than ever. Your life would be made a misery,
whilst at a trial, people would follow the examination and the evidence,
and after your acquittal, which would be the inevitable conclusion of
the trial if there were one, you would be fully rehabilitated in the
eyes of the whole world."
Maître Aubin was sincere. I know he was not thinking--and if he had, it
would have been excusable--of the great speech he would make at the
trial, of the fame and glory his _rôle_ in the final act of the
sensational drama could give him. He merely thought of what was best for
me.... Alas, in spite of my acquittal, many people continued to believe
me guilty, and less than a month after I reached England, I heard a
number of people discuss the Steinheil affair and my personality in a
drawing-room, and most of them agreed that I was a dangerous and fatal
woman, and "very likely, a murderess." No one knew who I was; I had been
invited to that _soirée_ by an acquaintance who advised me to retain my
incognito, and who introduced me under another name. I took part in the
discussion about Mme. Steinheil. Men and women surrounded me because I
"seemed to have studied the case more thoroughly than they had," as one
lady put it, and I went so far as to tell them that I had met Mme.
Steinheil and had found her a typical Parisienne, perhaps a little
"weak" as a woman, but kind-hearted, artistically inclined, a devoted
mother, and altogether a person absolutely incapable of a cowardly or a
base action--still less, of course, of a crime.
"You may have met her, Madame," said an old gentleman, "but you don't
know her! Certain women, especially in your country, which is also the
country of the wretched murderess of whom we are speaking, are inclined
to be 'weak,' as you put it. But such weaknesses are pardonable in
certain circumstances, whilst murdering one's own mother and husband is
unspeakably monstrous."
"Of course it is," I said; "but how do you know she _did_ murder her
husband and her mother?"
"Why! The French newspapers said so. Besides, had she been innocent,
they would not have tried her for her life!"
"But she was acquitted...."
"Yes, yes... quite so!... All the same, beware of this person, Madame,
should you meet her again...."
Since then, I have often been in that drawing-room; the host, the
hostess, and all their friends know now who I am, and I believe that
although I am not a "fatal" woman, they would give their own life for
me. To win them to me, I had merely to be--myself. They knew me, and yet
I have only told them a very small part of my life-story. I hope and
believe that all those who once condemned me without hesitation, and
thought that I was guilty, just because "the French newspapers said so,"
will, after reading this painful account of my life and my "case," learn
at last to forget the "Tragic," or "Red Widow," and to know, and, I
trust, sympathise with, a woman who suffered unjustly the worst of
martyrdoms.
Firmin left Saint-Lazare a short time after my last _Instruction_.
When she heard the great, the wonderful news, Firmin exclaimed: "Oh!
Madame.... And I hoped so much you would be free long before me!" She
was sorry, intensely sorry; not to leave the prison, of course, but to
part from me. She packed her few belongings silently, then, when the
moment of saying good-bye had come, Firmin came to me and said: "Madame,
say you will grant me something... something I want to ask you and yet
don't like to ask."
"Yes, Firmin, I promise."
The poor young woman, with whom, for so many weeks, I had lived in the
same cell, eaten the same food, shared the same thoughts, the same
sorrows and the same hopes, hesitated a long time, and then at last,
turning a little paler, muttered: "I would like to kiss you before I go,
Madame."... She kissed my cheek, and I kissed hers, and then she
hurried away. The heavy door which had been opened was shut; I was
alone in that terrible cell, and I fell on my knees, and sobbed, crying
that word which I repeated day after day: Why?... why?...
Another prisoner took Firmin's place. She was a woman whom misery and an
awful illness had made sour, hypocritical, and treacherous. She remained
only a few weeks with me, but when she left Saint-Lazare I heard that
she went about selling samples of my work--which I had not given
her--and had also tried to sell "stories" about me....
A few hours after that poor woman's departure, Sister Léonide entered my
cell.
"I have good news for you," she began. "Your future companion, whose
name is Juliette, is a kind, able, active woman. She will be here with
you this afternoon. I know Juliette well. She is a good woman, full of
excellent qualities, but she is a thief. I suppose it is in her blood.
She has been here very often, and I can assure you that you will have
never been looked after so well as you will be by Juliette. She was a
teacher once. She can talk, and she is well read and well mannered. And
then, she has plenty of courage. She will not bewail her fate night and
day like our poor little Firmin, but will try to cheer and comfort you.
Juliette was recently sentenced to several years' imprisonment. They put
her downstairs, but the other women hated her and even threatened to
kill her, because she said she was convinced of your innocence. That did
not stop her. Day after day since her arrival here she has asked to
share your cell, and her request has been granted. And now, please,
thank Sister Léonide, Madame!"
She spoke these last words in that loud, deep voice which she assumed
when she wished to make me laugh.
Juliette came in. I had quite a surprise. Jacq and Firmin were small and
slim; Juliette was very tall and stout. One could see at a glance that
she was a clean woman. She looked about thirty-six years old. Her thick
dark hair was perfectly tidy, her nails well kept. Her complexion was
fresh and healthy. She was not beautiful, but there was a pleasant,
winning expression in her face. She exchanged a few remarks with Sister
Léonide, and I at once realised that Juliette had education and even
refinement. How could such a woman have become a thief!...
[Illustration: MY CELL
(Juliette, my fellow-prisoner, seated on her bed)
A sketch by Mme. Steinheil]
She read the question in my eyes, and after the Sister had left the
cell, she said to me: "Madame, don't think too badly of me. You don't
know... you cannot imagine... I was brought up by parents who worshipped
me. They were not rich, but they were able to give me a good, sound
education, and I became a teacher."... She told me the names of a few of
the families by whom she had been employed, and among them was that of a
Director at the Ministry of Finance whom I knew very well.... She had a
daughter of fifteen who was her all in all.
"Living in contact with wealthy people when I was a young governess,"
Juliette explained naïvely, "and belonging myself to a good family, I
grew used to comfort and luxury, and I wanted comfort and luxury not
only for myself, but also for my husband and my daughter. Then, one day
while I was shopping, I saw a well-dressed woman slip some lace into a
pocket hidden in her wide sleeves.... That lace must have been worth
several pounds a yard.... I told this to a woman I knew, to whom I sold
things when I needed money.... She said at once to me: 'I'll pay you
handsomely for anything you bring me.' I tried; I was successful. In one
week I had earned twenty times the amount I could have earned in one
year as a teacher.... Then there was the joy of lavishing pretty things
on my daughter, and the awful and wonderful fascination, too, of
stealing."...
Juliette read consternation on my face, but went on: "I assure you,
Madame, I am not a bad woman.... And think of the awful risks I have to
take! I have been caught. I am away from those I love, and I shall be
here for years!"
Sister Léonide was right when she said Juliette would prove a most
devoted companion. The _Instruction_ had worn me out, and the prison
doctor was seriously alarmed about my health.... Juliette saw at once
that I was in a bad way, and when, the next morning, I started washing
our cell, she snatched the cloth from my hand, carried me bodily to my
bed, rolled up her sleeves over her mighty arms and, without a word,
started scrubbing the tiles. Then she scrubbed the tables and cleaned
the shelves on the wall. Afterwards, she carried me to another bed,
looked at my sheets, and said: "You can't sleep in these!"
"There are no others in the prison, Juliette."
"Oh! yes there are! Just let me arrange things. I have been here so
often.... I know the place only too well, unfortunately!"
At Sister Léonide's next visit, Juliette asked if she might change my
sheets in the linen-room.
"But all the prison sheets are alike!" said the Sister.
"I know that, _ma soeur_. Only some are new and some are old. I want
to find the oldest pair there is. The older sheets are the thinner and
the smoother they are." And she added mischievously: "I know all about
sheets, I have stolen so many in my life!"...
Juliette soon returned with a pair of sheets that were full of holes.
She mended them, and when I went to bed, later on, she said
triumphantly: "Well, what does it feel like now, Madame?"
The change was indeed wonderful; I told Juliette so, and she clapped her
hands with delight.
Juliette was intelligent, but by living in contact with somewhat
suspicious characters she had acquired a strange personality: she
sometimes spoke like a lady of high intellectual attainments, but as a
rule her remarks were those of a woman without much education or
instruction. She would read aloud a chapter from some book--yellow and
grimy with the marks of hundreds of hands, for it was borrowed from the
prison library--Victor Hugo's "Notre Dame," for instance, and express
original views on life in the Middle Ages; then, for the rest of the
day, she would tell fortunes by cards. She raved about cards, and was
amazingly superstitious.... With bits of paper and a pencil she had made
for herself a pack of "cards," and would spend hours reading her fortune
in them! She grew so feverish over those cards that I smiled sometimes.
"Ah! Madame," she exclaimed: "Don't laugh! Cards know everything and
tell everything.... You look! I'll start over again. Just now they said
there is a fair woman near my husband and that he is going to travel....
Well, watch.... You see, this is my husband.... Now, there is that fair
woman again, with him!... I wonder who the wretch is!"...
She disliked going to mass on Sundays, but loved to listen to Pastor
Arboux when he visited me in my cell.
She talked to me about her daughter, and I told her about my own Marthe,
whom I saw twice a week. I taught Juliette all kinds of needlework, so
that, later on, she might spoil her daughter with pretty things without
stealing them. She was quick and clever, and soon learned not only to do
nice work, but to do it rapidly.
Meanwhile I did "tatting," or painted. The Sisters had supplied me with
some colours and brushes, and I painted for them flowers and landscapes
on scores of handkerchief-cases, cushions, glove-cases, and
lamp-shades.... This was far less of a strain to my eyes, but it seemed
strange to paint flowers in prison, where I never saw any.
The chaplain (Catholic) of the prison came often to see Juliette, whom
he, too, had known for many years. I had seen him before, on one or two
occasions when he had visited Firmin.
He was a man of about seventy-five, tall and handsome, still erect, and
he spoke in a soft, kind voice. "It is not so much what he says that I
like," Juliette once remarked, "as the way he says it." But what the
chaplain, M. Doumergue, said was well worth hearing.
He had travelled in the Near East, and knew Palestine well. Sometimes
after telling Juliette--and me, for I eagerly listened--one of the
parables, he would describe the place where the Son of Man had probably
spoken it.
I talked of music with him, for he had told me that he loved sacred and
classic music. He called J. S. Bach the "father of music," and seemed to
know every oratorio worthy of the name. I told him how much I loved the
singing of the Sisters, and once paid him quite unconsciously a
compliment: I remarked that the organ music on Sunday mornings in the
large Catholic chapel of the prison, though pleasant, was quite
different from the splendid, inspiring music I heard every Sunday
afternoon after vespers. Surely it could not be the same organist.
The old chaplain replied very simply. "The organist, Madame, is the
Sister of the _guichet_ (wicket). She plays while I say Mass, but at the
close of the afternoon I go to the chapel, and all alone there I play,
improvising and letting myself go at the organ."
From that day the kind old chaplain played in the chapel whenever he
could spare a moment, and thus gave me back one, at least, of the joys I
was deprived of in prison--the intense joy of hearing good music.
He talked to me of the Catholic religion sometimes. He knew that my
daughter had become a Catholic, and, in a broad-minded manner, told me
about the greatness, the unity, and the moral power of the Catholic
religion....
Under his influence and M. Arboux's, I gradually found some peace of
mind. Nothing could deaden my grief, but those two men killed all
bitterness in me. I could not resign myself to the awful thought that I
was accused of murder, but I considered it right that I should suffer
for my past weaknesses, and for having denounced men without having real
proof against them.
The wonderful example of the Sisters turned the pity I felt for the
wretched women, who had so long insulted me, into sympathy and almost
affection.... And a miracle--or at least I look upon it as a
miracle--took place: The women soon ceased calling me a murderess, and
shouting "Guillotine, guillotine!" at me.... They felt that I never
returned their insults, and they gradually began to respect me. One day,
one of them, while walking round the yard, cried: "I hope you will soon
be free--you, up there!" Then another made a kind remark, then a
third.... Another day a gypsy woman shouted: "Why don't you come down
into the yard, we won't hurt you! Why should you rot in your cell,
poor woman!" And another added: "We made a mistake about you, that's
all!"...
[Illustration: IN THE PRISON YARD AT SAINT LAZARE]
The trees were budding, the sparrows and the pigeons were more cheerful;
sun sometimes visited my cell. I had never realised so keenly the
extraordinary comfort that Light means. The cell was less cold, the days
were longer.... The women in the yard below came more frequently to do
their washing in the basin, and there was no longer any ice to smash.
The children had learned to know me. Through the iron bars of my window
I sent those little gypsies little paper packets containing tiny bits of
chocolate which Marthe brought me, and they shouted: "Morning, Madame,"
and then threw kisses. Sometimes, on my way to the room where I saw
Marthe or my counsel, I met some of those little bronzed, dark-haired
children... their big eyes looked bigger than ever as they watched me.
They followed me, and touched my dress, and said: "We love you, Madame."
The doctor ordered me to take an hour's exercise in the yard every day.
I trembled a little when I went down. The fresh air intoxicated me and I
faltered, but two or three prisoners rushed to my assistance. They spoke
kindly to me and made me sit on the edge of the basin.... And these were
the women who only a few weeks back had hurled shouts of execration at
me whenever they saw me! After a few days I knew the story of each of
them. One had sung and begged in the streets without a licence, another
had stolen bread for her children, a third had stolen because she had
been ordered to, a fourth had stabbed a policeman in order to save her
"man" and give him a chance to escape....
Sometimes, a woman who had been arrested only a day or two before
started insulting me when she was told who I was, but the others at once
stopped her, and soon afterwards the new prisoner came to me, timidly
apologised, and, to my intense surprise, started telling me the latest
news about my case. She had read the newspapers, she knew what was being
said and rumoured.... And invariably the woman made things out to be
brighter than they really were, just to give me hope and courage!
I must not forget to mention "_Blanc-Blanc_" (white-white), Sister
Léonide's cat. He was quite black save for a spot of white between the
eyes. He followed the Sister everywhere, and when she entered my cell,
he went under my bed. After Sister Léonide had gone, _Blanc-Blanc_ made
his appearance and touched me with his paw. I knew what that meant.
Juliette took our only plate--"our Sèvres dinner service," as she called
it--and we gave the cat some milk. When he heard the door being opened,
he took up a place against the wall. Then, before the door was closed
again, he slipped through and disappeared. Sister Léonide knew exactly
where the cat had been, but she exclaimed: "I wonder where Blanc-Blanc
has been spending the afternoon!"...
Juliette was vexed with the appearance of our cell. One morning she
suddenly declared that she had found a way of improving it beyond
description.
"We are going to make a beautiful couch!" she cried, and forthwith she
pulled the straw mattresses off the spare beds--each mattress was just a
bundle of straw inside a sack--and also the three straw bolsters (for
there were five beds in our cell). She placed the mattresses one on top
of another in the centre of the cell and covered the "couch" with a
spare sheet, and in front of it we put the "dressing-room" table, which
was now adorned not only with the photograph of my mother and my child,
but also with one of Juliette's daughter. We sat down, feeling almost
cheerful, on the improvised "_bergère_," and then... we heard the bolt
of the door being drawn and the key being turned. Sister Léonide
entered, followed by "our Mother." The former saw at once the piece of
furniture we had added to our small stock, and it was all that she could
do not to laugh. Then, "Our Mother" saw it too.... I forestalled the
coming reproaches by taking the Sister Superior by the hand and making
her sit on the _bergère_. She had to admit that it was considerably more
comfortable than the hard beds and the rush chairs in the cell.... But
prison rules were prison rules, and gloomily, Juliette and I started
undoing our great work.
Both "Our Mother" and Sister Léonide watched us despondently, and the
former suddenly said: "Don't do it just yet.... Rest a little on the
couch first."
* * * * *
On Good Friday, Pastor Arboux came to me and I received the Holy
Communion. He had brought the bread and the wine from his little chapel,
and we knelt down together afterwards on the tiles of the cell.
On Easter Day I felt unusually depressed. It was such a great day at
home. My mother and I hid eggs of all sizes and colours in the garden.
Each of them contained surprises, and Marthe spent most of the day
looking for them. When a child I gave her chicks and ducklings on that
occasion. She very soon learned to know them, and she gave them names.
One Easter Day she came into the drawing-room followed by all her
_protégés_, and her favourite cock, L'Effronté (Bold-face), a bird I had
given her the year before, flew on the grand piano and crowed!
I sang at the Temple of _l'Etoile_ on Easter Day, and in the evening
Marthe, one or two musical friends and I, gave a concert. The whole
family was gathered, and all the little roughnesses of life were
forgotten. My husband gave up painting and came down from his dear
studio, and played with Marthe, whom he adored.
M. Arboux came to Saint-Lazare, early in the morning, and although it
was on one of the busiest days of the year with him, he remained with me
longer than he intended to, for he saw how miserable I felt.
After vespers--Juliette had attended that service and had then gone to
the "parlour"--the Sister Superior entered my cell. I jumped off my bed,
where I was sobbing, and apologised. Gently "Our Mother" scolded me, and
said: "You will wear your eyes out; you must not cry.... I have brought
you some visitors."...
Several Sisters came in one by one, and my cell was lit up by all those
smiling faces and the white _cornettes_.
Sister Léonide gave me some primroses. "They will replace," she said,
"the faded mimosa on your little table. These primroses were sent us by
a poor girl who has not forgotten the little we were able to do for her
when she was a prisoner here.... 'Our Mother' has given me permission to
offer you those few flowers."
There were nine or ten Sisters in my cell now; they all spoke kindly to
me, and every one made me a little present. "Our Mother" handed me a
small photograph of a Raphael Madonna; another, two new-laid eggs sent
her by her parents, farmers near Paris.... One Sister, young, and with
mischievous eyes, gave me a very faded branch of "snow-balls," and said:
"Sister Léonide has told me that you can revive flowers that are almost
dead.... When can I come to see the miracle?"
"In a day's time," I replied. Our Mother asked me what my "secret" was,
and I told her that it merely consisted in nipping off the ends of the
stems and dipping them for a while in warm water, but one had to
instinctively guess how long they must be kept in the water, and how
warm the water must be. Two or three "baths" might be necessary.
The next day, the "snow-balls" looked fresh and beautiful, and the
Sister Superior spoke of "Resurrection."
I almost forgot, on that Sunday evening, that I was in prison, and when
the Sisters left my cell, it seemed to me that a great part of my sorrow
had been taken from me, and flew away on the great white wings of the
Sisters' _cornettes_.
I was no longer alone in my cell. I had the primroses and the
"snow-balls," and I laid them, as on a tomb, before my mother's
portrait.
* * * * *
Towards the middle of May, Maître Aubin came one morning, excited as I
had never seen him before.
He seized both my hands and exclaimed: "You are saved. The murderers
have been found. At least, it is an almost sure thing. At any moment you
may be set free. I have seldom been so happy!"
I had so often been disappointed that I dared not share my counsel's
enthusiasm.
"But, Madame, you must not be sceptical.... Listen!" And he told me that
a man called Allaire, who had already been denounced as one of the
Impasse Ronsin murderers in an anonymous letter received by M. Hamard,
had been arrested at Versailles, where he had been caught stealing at a
fair. Investigations had shown that Allaire had been concerned in a
burglary with a friend of his, called Tardivel, and a red-haired woman
called Batifolier. Allaire had denied his participation in the Steinheil
murder, but had admitted that Tardivel had told him all about that
murder, in which he, Tardivel, had played a leading part!
I was filled with hope, and yet I feared lest this new turn in events
might lead to nothing, as so many others had, and merely mean a
postponement of my release or my trial, a longer stay in prison....
I was right, alas! The Tardivel investigations lasted nearly _two
months_, and merely led to the discovery that Allaire was an epileptic,
that Tardivel was a lunatic, and that although both were burglars, they
had had nothing to do with the Impasse Ronsin drama. Tardivel, to
impress Allaire, had _boasted_ that he was the murderer of M. Steinheil
and Mme. Japy!
The Tardivel Dossier fills 234 pages and contains 36,000 words. That my
counsel had good cause to believe that at last the assassins had been
tracked down, may be gathered from the following extracts from the
Tardivel dossier:
"May 15th, 1909. We, Debauchey, Police-Commissary at Versailles... have
interrogated Allaire, Emmanuel, aged 27... about his alleged
participation in the murders of M. Steinheil and Mme. Japy....
_Answer._ "So far as I am concerned, I know nothing about the Steinheil
affair, except the declarations made to me by my friend Angello
Tardivel.... I knew Angello at the lunatic asylum at Rennes, where I was
placed at the same time as he. I left the asylum a little before he did,
wandered and worked in many places and came to Versailles at the end of
1907. On July 5th, 1908, at the 'Feast of the Work-Yards,' I met
Tardivel, and we had a drink together.... He told me about himself, and
said he was the author of many burglaries. He proposed that I should
join him, and said I would not lose by it, for burglaries paid well. I
met him again a few days later, and it was then that he said he was one
of the authors of the murder in the Impasse Ronsin. The widow Batifolier
was with me at the time, but that did not matter, for he knew that she
was deaf. However, I repeated to the widow, later on, what Tardivel had
told me. Tardivel said there had been four of them in the Steinheil
affair: himself, a man called Pierre Robert, aged 28 or 29, another
whose name he did not give, and a tall red-haired woman called Amélie
Brunot, who was Robert's friend.... Tardivel had lived in the Rue de
Vaugirard, close to the Impasse Ronsin, and he seemed to know the
Steinheil house perfectly well both inside and out. I cannot tell you
whether Tardivel was once a model.... He has long dark curls falling on
his shoulders, and is rather handsome. He speaks several languages,
including Italian, Spanish and English. He also told me that he had
acted as super in various theatres. He did not say how he and his
companions entered the Steinheil house, but I understand that he had
some skeleton keys, a crowbar, a revolver, and an electric lantern.... I
remember his saying that they found a woman in her bed.... The
red-haired woman went first, and the others followed.... They put some
wadding soaked with chloroform on the woman's face... and they bound
her. He said that the rope they used came from the girth of a saddle. He
did not say anything about M. Steinheil or the other lady, but merely
that they had stolen money... candlesticks and other things. When he
told me all this, Tardivel was a little drunk. What I have told you is
absolutely the truth...."
_Question._ "Do you not believe that Tardivel, when he told you all this
in confidence... was only boasting in order to impress you with his
ability, so that you would be led to accept his proposals? Do you
believe he was sincere, and had spoken the truth?"
_Answer._ "Yes, I believe he spoke the truth, and that he was really one
of the murderers...."
(_Dossier_ Cote 4)
The reader may imagine my feelings when I heard all those details from
my counsel!
Tardivel was traced. He proved that he "had had nothing to do with the
Steinheil affair," and that he was "the victim of Allaire's spite."
(_Dossier_ Cote 34)
* * * * *
Of course Marthe, too, believed in the Tardivel clue, and when she came
to the prison she told me to be patient "just a little longer." But
nothing happened. It was clearly demonstrated after weeks of
investigations, during which I could hardly eat or sleep, that neither
Allaire nor Tardivel could have had anything to do with the murder.
Meanwhile, journalists were once more besieging the house in the Impasse
Ronsin, and my daughter, finding that they stopped at nothing to gain
admittance, resorted to a very simple and effective method of getting
rid of them. She turned the garden hose on the invaders.
Scores of persons--especially foreigners--came to the house, and when
Marthe was absent the doorkeeper allowed herself to be bribed into
showing the visitors round the apartments!
* * * * *
Days went by; weeks, months... endless, weary months, and the Tardivel
clue yielded no results. It was a dreadful blow to me, but a worse was
to fall. Ever since March 30th, 1909, the _Procureur_ had had before him
all the documents of the "Steinheil case." On June 18th five magistrates
of the _Chambre des Mises en Accusation_, found a true bill against me,
and on July 8, nearly eight months after my arrest, I was informed, at
the request of the _Procureur_, that a release was out of the question,
and that I would be tried in the Paris Court of Assize....
The dreadful news was broken to me in the Director's room. M. Desmoulin
was there with M. Pons. They both looked very uneasy, but made merely
commonplace remarks. Then Maître Aubin rushed in with Maître Landowski.
"I am delighted, Madame!" he exclaimed. "I will vindicate you, I'll
prove your innocence. Rejoice, Madame, rejoice!"
I believed that I was going to be released. "When do I leave
Saint-Lazare?" I asked eagerly.
"Towards the end of October, I should think. You'll have been tried by
that time, and acquitted, of course."
I understood.... A trial.... Several months in prison.... I heard a
rumbling noise. Everything seemed to whirl around me and I swooned.
When I came back to my senses I saw Sister Léonide by my side. She
signed to me not to speak, and helped me back to my cell.
For several days I was a prey to the deepest despair. Then came the
relief of tears....
When I was well enough to get about again, I received a visit from
Maître Aubin. Somehow, the mere sight of him made me angry. I told him
that he was responsible for all that had happened; that he should have
allowed and even advised me to tell M. André everything about the Faure
documents and the necklace, about M. de Balincourt and the mysterious
"German." I accused him of having sold himself to the Government, of
having merely carried out their instructions....
Maître Aubin waited until I had flung my last accusation at him. Then,
quietly, he explained that he was an honest and independent man, and
that he feared no one. "You have only suspicions against M. de
Balincourt, just as you had against Wolff and Couillard; and you know
where those suspicions led you.... As for that German, although your
servants, Marthe and others, saw him, it would be well nigh impossible
to trace him. And you could not assert that he had something to do with
the murder.... Treat me as you choose; you have suffered so much that it
would be extraordinary if you had kept your full self-possession. All I
can say is that you will be triumphantly acquitted. There will remain no
trace of suspicion against you, and that is what is needed above all."
He spoke for a long time, and I apologised for my anger. Maître Aubin
was profoundly devoted, and I should never have turned on him as I had
done.
In spite of the hope my counsel gave me, in spite of Marthe's love, M.
Arboux's and the Sisters' exhortations, I fell seriously ill, and for
over three weeks there were serious fears for my life. After a time,
Marthe was allowed to visit me again, and she besought me to be brave,
to make a supreme effort. I had been eight months in prison, I should
try to grow used to the thought of remaining at Saint-Lazare three or
four months longer, since victory was at the end.
"But the victory," my daughter explained in deep, powerful tones that
contrasted so strongly with her slim, small figure, "can only be won if
you work on the dossier of your case. You will have to ask for that
dossier, and study it most carefully for your own defence. M. Aubin says
so, and he knows."
She compelled me to eat, to take the various remedies ordered by the
doctor and, seeing her so brave, I did my best to recover, and to call
up courage and hope in the ordeal before me.
Soon afterwards, I was told that M. de Valles would be the Chief Judge
at my trial, and M. Trouard-Riolle the Advocate-General (Public
Prosecutor).
I had never met M. de Valles, but I was informed that he was a viscount,
a grandson of Charles d'Hozier, "the last genealogist of France," and a
descendant of another famous genealogist, Pierre d'Hozier, who, at the
beginning of the seventeenth century, founded, with Renaudot and
Richelieu, the _Gazette_, France's first newspaper. I also heard that he
was an able archæologist, a learned Latinist, whose greatest joy was to
sit in his library in the company of Horace, Lucretius, or the immortal
Virgil, that he was a worthy, able, and extremely fair judge.
About M. Trouard-Riolle I needed no information. I had met him in
various drawing-rooms at intervals for some fifteen years. I had known
his beautiful and fascinating wife quite well, and I knew all about M.
Trouard-Riolle's career, from the days he had left the Lycée at Rouen
and had become a Doctor of Law, to the time when he was made an
Advocate-General.
A few days later I was called down-stairs to the Director's study. When
I entered the little room I knew so well, I saw, near M. Pons, a tall,
well-dressed man of about fifty with clean-cut features, clear eyes,
grey hair and beard, and an expression of great firmness and refinement.
The Director of Saint-Lazare said: "President de Valles."
The latter said: "Sit down, Madame." Those three words were spoken in a
cold yet polite tone, which was in sharp contrast to the coarseness of
another judge whom I had not yet forgotten. A _greffier_ read aloud a
document.... I thanked M. de Valles for having come to the prison, and
then said: "The thought of being tried publicly for a double murder of
which I am innocent is unendurable, but I still hope that light will be
thrown on the mystery. But what difficulties there are, _Monsieur le
Président_, for you as well as for me, in such a trial, for I understand
that certain facts must be left in the dark!"...
M. de Valles did not answer my remark, but said: "Public opinion,
Madame, is very much against you... and it is impossible not to
recognise that your husband loved you."
"No, _Monsieur le Président_, my husband did not love me, he adored me,
and since he did anything I wished, I obviously had no reason to kill
him. As for my mother, her letters to me and my letters to her ought to
have made it impossible for Judge André to maintain his accusation."
It was quite clear that M. de Valles did not care to discuss any point
in my case. He asked me to sign the document which his _greffier_ had
read, and said: "I advise you to be calm, very calm, Madame. I can
realise that the thought of the Court of Assize must be most painful to
you, but, in order that you may get used, as it were, to the atmosphere
of the Court, I intend, when your trial takes place, asking you first of
all a number of questions of no great importance about your childhood
and youth which you will find it easy to answer, however upset and
distraught you may be."
I thanked him and said: "Is it true that my trial will be a kind of
spectacle to which women will eagerly rush--and be admitted--to enjoy
the sight of my grief and pain? If so, I must tell you, _Monsieur Le
Président_, that I shall be unable to control my feelings."...
M. de Valles pretended not to have heard, and said: "Maître Aubin is an
able counsel, with a great heart and a high conscience. Follow the
advice he gives you, and since you say you are innocent, let your
innocence give you the strength and power to convince the jury."
M. de Valles rose and rang a bell. A warder came, and I was escorted to
my cell.