The Lonely House Part 3

You were a witness yesterday evening of my quarrel with Captain Pollenz and my clerk. Precisely on this account I do not wish to include in my official paper a suspicion which I myself hold to be entirely groundless. I promise you that I will neglect nothing that will lead to the discovery of the murderer, that I will investigate every step which Herr Schorn has taken to-day, and will have him watched by a thoroughly competent detective. If he is guilty, I shall discover his guilt; but I do not believe he is so, and because I am his foe I will not attach any suspicion to him which, while the true murderer remains undiscovered, might ruin his life, merely because at the time of the murder he had been seen near the scene of the crime. Promise me, Herr Professor, that you will tell no one at present of your meeting with Franz Schorn.

Should there be other and more important grounds for suspecting him, I shall request you to give me your account officially."

I pressed the Judge's hand cordially, and joyfully gave him the promise for which he asked. How unjustly I had judged this man! How I had misunderstood him! I was ashamed of the reluctance I had felt to tell him of my meeting with Franz Schorn.

"I must now make out a short official account of your information," the District Judge continued. "You can hardly believe how difficult this is for me. Your account has agitated me so profoundly that I can scarcely control myself. I was very familiar with old Pollenz. He had indeed many disagreeable qualities. Toward others he was often hard and unyielding, but I never had anything to complain of in his behaviour to me. He has often shown me favours. He was indeed almost a friend, and now I must prepare a paper which shall show him to be the victim of a horrible crime, which I must take the first steps to investigate. It must be done. It is my duty. In spite of the pain which my right hand gives me in writing, I will do it immediately."

He took a sheet of paper; pens and ink were at hand, and seated himself on the sofa behind the large table to write. His hand could not have been very painful, for it did not prevent his writing swiftly and clearly. Now and then, without interrupting his writing, he addressed some brief, leading question to me, and in scarcely ten minutes the paper was finished. He read it aloud to me. It was wonderfully concise and clear, without saying one word too much or too little, and I signed it without an alteration. After he had added his own signature, he said, "I must now beg you, Herr Professor, to accompany me to the Lonely House. I shall immediately summon my a.s.sistant, as well as the District Physician and the captain of gendarmes, to inspect the premises. You, too, Herr Professor, must be present. You must testify that nothing in the house has been altered in your absence. This is important for further investigation. Can I count upon you!"

"Most certainly."

"Then pray hold yourself in readiness. In half an hour, at the latest, I shall have notified the other gentlemen. The time of waiting, if I may advise you, should be employed by you in strengthening yourself with food and drink. Yon may not feel the need of refreshment at present, but we have some sad hours before us."

How kind and thoughtful! I certainly had cause to ask pardon in my heart of the District Judge for the prejudice he had created.

CHAPTER IV.

THE INVESTIGATION.

It was four o'clock in the afternoon when Herr Foligno called for me in the dining-room, where I was sitting with the Captain. It had taken him almost an hour to a.s.semble those who were to inspect the scene of the murder in the Lonely House. I had informed the Captain, a near relative of the murdered man, of my terrible discovery, and he had been deeply moved. He said:

"I was never intimate with old Pollenz, although he was my first cousin. He was a hard usurer and a miser. He loved no one in the world save his daughter, but that his end has been so horrible is certainly very sad. Poor child, my dear little Anna! How will she bear this fearful shock! I saw her about twelve o'clock here in Luttach with her old maid, Johanna. She had been paying a visit to an aged aunt, and she is probably still there. I must see if it be so. I do not willingly visit the malicious old gossip, but if Anna is still with her, I must go to prepare the poor child for the sad news that awaits her."

He sent Mizka to old Frau Lancic's, and in a few minutes she returned to say that Fraulein Anna had been with the widow, but that she had left about a quarter of an hour before to make some purchases in the village and then to return home.

Upon hearing this, the Captain determined to accompany the officials to the Lonely House, for which he received permission from the District Judge.

Soon after four o'clock we began our walk; not by the steep rocky path, which was rather too difficult for the old District Physician, and might prove dangerous, but in accordance with the Judge's directions, by the longer way past the village of Oberberg.

We could make but slow progress, for the heat was still oppressive. The old physician gasped and panted as we ascended the mountain. The Judge with kindly consideration, begged him to walk slowly, although he himself was trembling with impatience to reach our goal.

We met various people on the way. They greeted us politely and looked after us with surprise. Intelligence of the murder had not yet reached the village of Oberberg, and people could not imagine what so many persons, accompanied by the captain of gendarmes, could have to do in the little village. I walked first with the Captain. The Judge and his clerk followed, and, naturally, very little was said as we pursued our way; all were oppressed by a sense of what lay before them.

We had turned into the path by the crucifix leading on the left to the Lonely House, and were but a short distance from the spot to which we were tending, when the Captain suddenly stood still and said in a faltering voice, "There comes my poor little Anna."

She came towards us hurriedly from the Lonely House. She was called pretty Anna in the country round, and indeed she deserved the name. I have scarcely ever in my long life seen so beautiful a girl. Even her expression of intense anxiety could not distort her charming face. When she recognized the Captain she flew towards him.

"Oh, uncle, my dear kind uncle, thank G.o.d you are here!" she cried. "I am dying with anxiety; my father will not open the door. For a quarter of an hour Johanna and I have been knocking in vain. Something must have happened to him, or he would hear us and open the door for us."

The Captain put his arm round the lovely child and pressed a kiss upon her white forehead. "My poor little girl!" he murmured. His voice failed him; he could say no more; his eyes filled with tears; he tried to control himself, but the compa.s.sion which he felt for the girl in his arms was too intense; it mastered him; he could hardly utter a word.

"Good heavens! What has happened?" cried Anna, extricating herself from the Captain's embrace and gazing at him, her large black eyes dilated with horror. "You call me your poor girl? There are tears in your eyes.

For G.o.d's sake tell me what it means! Has anything happened to my father? Oh, answer me, uncle! I would rather hear the worst than suffer such suspense."

The Judge answered instead of the Captain, who could not control his voice. "Compose yourself, Fraulein Anna," he said with grave kindliness, "you need all your courage, all your self-control to endure the misfortune which G.o.d has sent to you. Unfortunately your anxiety is justified. Something has indeed happened to your father, my lifelong friend."

"He is dead!" the girl cried, with what was almost a shriek; overcome with grief, she tottered and would have fallen to the ground if the Captain had not thrown his arms about her. The Judge took her hand with deep sympathy, but she s.n.a.t.c.hed it away and pushed him from her with a gesture expressive of the most profound aversion.

"Do not touch me; I hate, I despise you!" she cried, as she cast herself again into the Captain's arms. "Uncle, my dear kind uncle, you tell me what has happened. I can hear the worst from you, but not from that man."

The Judge, thus rudely repulsed, was deeply offended, but was too magnanimous--his pity for the unfortunate girl was too profound to admit of his expressing his resentment by a harsh word.

"You do me bitter wrong, Fraulein Anna," he said gently. "I sympathize sincerely with your pain, but I will not thrust my pity upon you. I pray you, Captain, to inform her as mercifully as possible of what has happened."

It was a hard task for the Captain, but it was his duty to fulfil it.

He motioned to the Judge and to myself to withdraw for a few steps, and then took Anna's arm in his and, walking on before us, spoke to her in the most sympathetic and loving way. He told me afterwards that in all his life he had never had so hard a duty to perform. He searched in vain for kindly words to soften the horror; he feared that the delicate girl could hardly endure the frightful truth which he was forced to tell her; but to his great surprise Anna showed a remarkable degree of composure. She had not succ.u.mbed, he said, to pain and grief; she had become ghastly pale and her dark eyes had gleamed with a strange flickering fire, as, almost in a whisper, not to him, but to herself, she had murmured, "Foully murdered and robbed; murdered for the sake of his wretched money. He sacrificed his soul and now has given his life for money." She shed no tear; her grief was too great, too heart-breaking; but she trembled violently; her little hand shook as it rested on her uncle's arm, and as he put his arm round her and tenderly drew her to him, he could feel the violent beating of her heart. He told her everything that he had heard from me. When he had finished, she looked at him with flaming eyes.

"The vile murderer will be discovered," she said in a hoa.r.s.e voice; "I trust in G.o.d's justice."

Her composure was really remarkable, and gave great cause for anxiety.

I had lingered behind with the Judge and his clerk. We slowly followed the Captain and Anna about twenty steps in the rear.

"I certainly am most unfortunately situated," said the Judge, turning to me confidentially. "You heard the harsh words which the poor girl, half crazed with pain and horror, spoke to me. I know what those words mean. I am well aware that Fraulein Anna is prejudiced against me. She thinks that the hostility which her father showed to Herr Franz Schorn was partly my fault. That she does so is well known in Luttach, and I commit no indiscretion in telling you that there is an attachment between Fraulein Anna and Herr Schorn, of which old Pollenz disapproved. Fraulein Anna knows that Herr Schorn is my bitter enemy.

She has sided with him against me, but that her prejudice is as intense as the words she has just spoken testify, I confess surprises me. Never before have I seen in her the least sign of dislike. Imagine my position. My official duty compels me to play the part of a disinterested investigator. I cannot spare her pain, but I shall have to subject her, with her old maid, to an examination. I must inquire how it happened that the Lonely House was left unlocked, perhaps by herself; every child in Luttach knows that old Pollenz always locked the front door securely. I would give much, very much, to spare the young lady this examination."

"If you would depute me to make it, Judge, such an act on your part would be entirely justified by the peculiar relations in which you stand to Fraulein Anna Pollenz." The Clerk uttered these words very quietly and in a businesslike tone, but the District Judge was not pleased. He cast a sinister glance at the Clerk and asked, "What do you mean by peculiar relations, sir?"

"Nothing but what you yourself indicated, and what, to use your own words, every child in Luttach is familiar with," was the quiet reply.

"You allude to the foolish gossip which makes me the young girl's rejected suitor? There is not one word of truth in it."

"Then old Pollenz lied, for he stated this, not as a secret, but quite openly, in Luttach. At all events, such a report does exist, and it will be confirmed unless you make use of your right to depute to me the examination of the young lady."

"No, that I will not do. My standard of official duty is too exalted to permit my neglecting it out of regard for my own feelings. I might perhaps take your advice if I were forced to play the part of examiner during the entire legal process, which must ensue upon this murder, but, fortunately, that is not so; only the preliminaries are our duty.

Capital crimes," the Judge said turning to me, "do not come within the domain of the District Judge. They are the business of the tribunal of the country. Subsequent investigations will take place in Laibach. The preliminary examination alone is my task, which, whatever it may cost me, I will fulfil."

The Clerk made no reply; he simply bowed in sign that he had no further remarks to offer. We now reached the goal of our wanderings. The Lonely House stood before us. The Captain and Anna were standing near the locked door, and upon a wooden bench beside it sat an old woman, old Johanna, "The only servant of the house," the Judge whispered to me.

The Captain had just told her of the murder of her master. Paralyzed with horror, incapable of speech, she was gazing up at him. When she tried to rise, she sank back helplessly. The Judge opened the front door with the key which I had given him.

Scarcely had he done so when Anna released herself from the Captain's arm and would have been the first to rush into the house, had not the Judge barred her way.

"Let me go," cried Anna. "I must go to my poor father. You dare not hold me back."

She would have pressed past him, but he prevented her from doing so, and with quiet resolve, in a perfectly judicial manner, said, "You must not see your father yet, Fraulein Anna. My official duty compels me to exclude you from the room in which the crime has been committed until it has been thoroughly searched. The traces which the murderer has perhaps left behind must not be interfered with. You must either stay here outside, or, if you wish, wait in your own room until it is permitted you to see your father. Captain Pollenz, I pray you to remain with your relative and to prevent Fraulein Anna from making an attempt to disturb the investigation by going into the murdered man's room. I cannot permit it."

Anna retired. As the Judge forbade our entrance into the house, her eyes seemed to flash with anger, but she controlled herself, only bestowing upon Herr Foligno a glance of dislike and antipathy.

"I obey," she said, recovering her composure wonderfully. "I will wait in my room with Johanna and my uncle. You shall have nothing to reproach me with. I pray _you_, sir," she said, turning to the Clerk; "I entreat _you_ to search, investigate. The blood of my poor father cries to heaven. I must doubt its justice should you not succeed in discovering the ruthless murderer."

"Rest a.s.sured, Fraulein Anna, that I shall leave nothing undone----"

"I did not address you," Anna interrupted the Judge; "I entreat _you_, the a.s.sistant, to fulfil your duty; search for the murderer, whoever he may be, deliver him to the vengeance of the law. I trust you. You will not be influenced by fear or considerations of any kind. Do not answer me; I trust you; I know you will do everything to discover the criminal, even though you do not promise me. Come uncle, come Johanna, we will wait in my room."

While Anna was speaking, Herr Foligno's expression was, strangely enough, that of timidity and embarra.s.sment; his lips moved; he seemed to wish to reply but could not. He retreated silently, as Anna, without looking in his direction, pa.s.sed him. She entered the room at the left of the hall, her own apartment, and the Captain and the old maid, still half paralyzed with terror, followed her silently.

The Clerk also made no reply to Anna's strange words; he had been much astonished by them, as were all who heard them. With a keen searching look he regarded the Judge. Not until the door had closed behind Anna and the Captain did he say, whispering so softly that only I and the Judge could hear, "If you do not feel sufficiently well, Herr Foligno, to undertake the examination and will delegate me to conduct it, I am quite ready to do so."