by Poe · Cluster: Short Story · Concealment Hidden Identity · Justice Right and Wrong
Abstract
A Dupin ratiocinative tale reconstructing the murder of a young Parisian shop-girl (mirroring the real Mary Rogers case) through probability, newspaper analysis, and armchair detection.
Testo / Text
Parti / Parts
- Part 1
- Part 2
- Part 3
- Part 4
- Part 5
- Part 6
- Part 7
- Part 8
- Part 9
- Part 10
- Part 11
- Part 12
- Part 13
- Part 14
- Part 15
- Part 16
- Part 17
- Part 18
- Part 19
- Part 20
- Part 21
- Part 22
Readability (prose)58.2 Flesch ease10.9 FK grade14.1 Fog12% complex23.3 words/sent
Connections
Archetypes: Detective, (Reputed) Fallen Woman Motifs: Death, Blood, River, Water, Grave, Letters and Writing Themes & Concepts: Ratiocination Detection, Appearance vs Reality, Deception, Justice Right and Wrong, Fate and Free Will, Terror and Horror Forms & Genres: Detective Fiction, Short Story Settings: Paris, City (2), Europe Characters: Sherlock Holmes Homage, C. Auguste Dupin, Marie Roget
Testo integrale / Full text
A SEQUEL TO “THE MURDERS IN THE RUE MORGUE.”
Es giebt eine Reihe idealischer Begebenheiten, die der Wirklichkeit
parallel lauft. Selten fallen sie zusammen. Menschen und zufalle
modificiren gewohulich die idealische Begebenheit, so dass sie
unvollkommen erscheint, und ihre Folgen gleichfalls unvollkommen
sind. So bei der Reformation; statt des Protestantismus kam das
Lutherthum hervor.
There are ideal series of events which run parallel with the real
ones. They rarely coincide. Men and circumstances generally
modify the ideal train of events, so that it seems imperfect, and
its consequences are equally imperfect. Thus with the
Reformation; instead of Protestantism came
Lutheranism.—_Novalis_.(*2) _Moral Ansichten_.
There are few persons, even among the calmest thinkers, who have
not occasionally been startled into a vague yet thrilling
half-credence in the supernatural, by coincidences of so
seemingly marvellous a character that, as mere coincidences, the
intellect has been unable to receive them. Such sentiments—for
the half-credences of which I speak have never the full force of
thought—such sentiments are seldom thoroughly stifled unless by
reference to the doctrine of chance, or, as it is technically
termed, the Calculus of Probabilities. Now this Calculus is, in
its essence, purely mathematical; and thus we have the anomaly of
the most rigidly exact in science applied to the shadow and
spirituality of the most intangible in speculation.
The extraordinary details which I am now called upon to make
public, will be found to form, as regards sequence of time, the
primary branch of a series of scarcely intelligible coincidences,
whose secondary or concluding branch will be recognized by all
readers in the late murder of Mary Cecila Rogers, at New York.
When, in an article entitled “The Murders in the Rue Morgue,” I
endeavored, about a year ago, to depict some very remarkable
features in the mental character of my friend, the Chevalier C.
Auguste Dupin, it did not occur to me that I should ever resume
the subject. This depicting of character constituted my design;
and this design was thoroughly fulfilled in the wild train of
circumstances brought to instance Dupin’s idiosyncrasy. I might
have adduced other examples, but I should have proven no more.
Late events, however, in their surprising development, have
startled me into some farther details, which will carry with them
the air of extorted confession. Hearing what I have lately heard,
it would be indeed strange should I remain silent in regard to
what I both heard and saw so long ago.
Upon the winding up of the tragedy involved in the deaths of
Madame L’Espanaye and her daughter, the Chevalier dismissed the
affair at once from his attention, and relapsed into his old
habits of moody reverie. Prone, at all times, to abstraction, I
readily fell in with his humor; and, continuing to occupy our
chambers in the Faubourg Saint Germain, we gave the Future to the
winds, and slumbered tranquilly in the Present, weaving the dull
world around us into dreams.
But these dreams were not altogether uninterrupted. It may
readily be supposed that the part played by my friend, in the
drama at the Rue Morgue, had not failed of its impression upon
the fancies of the Parisian police. With its emissaries, the name
of Dupin had grown into a household word. The simple character of
those inductions by which he had disentangled the mystery never
having been explained even to the Prefect, or to any other
individual than myself, of course it is not surprising that the
affair was regarded as little less than miraculous, or that the
Chevalier’s analytical abilities acquired for him the credit of
intuition. His frankness would have led him to disabuse every
inquirer of such prejudice; but his indolent humor forbade all
farther agitation of a topic whose interest to himself had long
ceased. It thus happened that he found himself the cynosure of
the political eyes; and the cases were not few in which attempt
was made to engage his services at the Prefecture. One of the
most remarkable instances was that of the murder of a young girl
named Marie Rogêt.
This event occurred about two years after the atrocity in the Rue
Morgue. Marie, whose Christian and family name will at once
arrest attention from their resemblance to those of the
unfortunate “cigar girl,” was the only daughter of the widow
Estelle Rogêt. The father had died during the child’s infancy,
and from the period of his death, until within eighteen months
before the assassination which forms the subject of our
narrative, the mother and daughter had dwelt together in the Rue
Pavée Saint Andrée; (*3) Madame there keeping a pension, assisted
by Marie. Affairs went on thus until the latter had attained her
twenty-second year, when her great beauty attracted the notice of
a perfumer, who occupied one of the shops in the basement of the
Palais Royal, and whose custom lay chiefly among the desperate
adventurers infesting that neighborhood. Monsieur Le Blanc (*4)
was not unaware of the advantages to be derived from the
attendance of the fair Marie in his perfumery; and his liberal
proposals were accepted eagerly by the girl, although with
somewhat more of hesitation by Madame.
The anticipations of the shopkeeper were realized, and his rooms
soon became notorious through the charms of the sprightly
grisette. She had been in his employ about a year, when her
admirers were thrown info confusion by her sudden disappearance
from the shop. Monsieur Le Blanc was unable to account for her
absence, and Madame Rogêt was distracted with anxiety and terror.
The public papers immediately took up the theme, and the police
were upon the point of making serious investigations, when, one
fine morning, after the lapse of a week, Marie, in good health,
but with a somewhat saddened air, made her re-appearance at her
usual counter in the perfumery. All inquiry, except that of a
private character, was of course immediately hushed. Monsieur Le
Blanc professed total ignorance, as before. Marie, with Madame,
replied to all questions, that the last week had been spent at
the house of a relation in the country. Thus the affair died
away, and was generally forgotten; for the girl, ostensibly to
relieve herself from the impertinence of curiosity, soon bade a
final adieu to the perfumer, and sought the shelter of her
mother’s residence in the Rue Pavée Saint Andrée.
It was about five months after this return home, that her friends
were alarmed by her sudden disappearance for the second time.
Three days elapsed, and nothing was heard of her. On the fourth
her corpse was found floating in the Seine, * near the shore
which is opposite the Quartier of the Rue Saint Andrée, and at a
point not very far distant from the secluded neighborhood of the
Barrière du Roule. (*6)
The atrocity of this murder, (for it was at once evident that
murder had been committed,) the youth and beauty of the victim,
and, above all, her previous notoriety, conspired to produce
intense excitement in the minds of the sensitive Parisians. I can
call to mind no similar occurrence producing so general and so
intense an effect. For several weeks, in the discussion of this
one absorbing theme, even the momentous political topics of the
day were forgotten. The Prefect made unusual exertions; and the
powers of the whole Parisian police were, of course, tasked to
the utmost extent.
Upon the first discovery of the corpse, it was not supposed that
the murderer would be able to elude, for more than a very brief
period, the inquisition which was immediately set on foot. It was
not until the expiration of a week that it was deemed necessary
to offer a reward; and even then this reward was limited to a
thousand francs. In the mean time the investigation proceeded
with vigor, if not always with judgment, and numerous individuals
were examined to no purpose; while, owing to the continual
absence of all clue to the mystery, the popular excitement
greatly increased. At the end of the tenth day it was thought
advisable to double the sum originally proposed; and, at length,
the second week having elapsed without leading to any
discoveries, and the prejudice which always exists in Paris
against the Police having given vent to itself in several serious
émeutes, the Prefect took it upon himself to offer the sum of
twenty thousand francs “for the conviction of the assassin,” or,
if more than one should prove to have been implicated, “for the
conviction of any one of the assassins.” In the proclamation
setting forth this reward, a full pardon was promised to any
accomplice who should come forward in evidence against his
fellow; and to the whole was appended, wherever it appeared, the
private placard of a committee of citizens, offering ten thousand
francs, in addition to the amount proposed by the Prefecture. The
entire reward thus stood at no less than thirty thousand francs,
which will be regarded as an extraordinary sum when we consider
the humble condition of the girl, and the great frequency, in
large cities, of such atrocities as the one described.
No one doubted now that the mystery of this murder would be
immediately brought to light. But although, in one or two
instances, arrests were made which promised elucidation, yet
nothing was elicited which could implicate the parties suspected;
and they were discharged forthwith. Strange as it may appear, the
third week from the discovery of the body had passed, and passed
without any light being thrown upon the subject, before even a
rumor of the events which had so agitated the public mind,
reached the ears of Dupin and myself. Engaged in researches which
absorbed our whole attention, it had been nearly a month since
either of us had gone abroad, or received a visitor, or more than
glanced at the leading political articles in one of the daily
papers. The first intelligence of the murder was brought us by
G——, in person. He called upon us early in the afternoon of the
thirteenth of July, 18—, and remained with us until late in the
night. He had been piqued by the failure of all his endeavors to
ferret out the assassins. His reputation—so he said with a
peculiarly Parisian air—was at stake. Even his honor was
concerned. The eyes of the public were upon him; and there was
really no sacrifice which he would not be willing to make for the
development of the mystery. He concluded a somewhat droll speech
with a compliment upon what he was pleased to term the tact of
Dupin, and made him a direct, and certainly a liberal
proposition, the precise nature of which I do not feel myself at
liberty to disclose, but which has no bearing upon the proper
subject of my narrative.
The compliment my friend rebutted as best he could, but the
proposition he accepted at once, although its advantages were
altogether provisional. This point being settled, the Prefect
broke forth at once into explanations of his own views,
interspersing them with long comments upon the evidence; of which
latter we were not yet in possession. He discoursed much, and
beyond doubt, learnedly; while I hazarded an occasional
suggestion as the night wore drowsily away. Dupin, sitting
steadily in his accustomed arm-chair, was the embodiment of
respectful attention. He wore spectacles, during the whole
interview; and an occasional signal glance beneath their green
glasses, sufficed to convince me that he slept not the less
soundly, because silently, throughout the seven or eight
leaden-footed hours which immediately preceded the departure of
the Prefect.
In the morning, I procured, at the Prefecture, a full report of
all the evidence elicited, and, at the various newspaper offices,
a copy of every paper in which, from first to last, had been
published any decisive information in regard to this sad affair.
Freed from all that was positively disproved, this mass of
information stood thus:
Marie Rogêt left the residence of her mother, in the Rue Pavée
St. Andrée, about nine o’clock in the morning of Sunday, June the
twenty-second, 18—. In going out, she gave notice to a Monsieur
Jacques St. Eustache, (*7) and to him only, of her intention to
spend the day with an aunt who resided in the Rue des Drômes. The
Rue des Drômes is a short and narrow but populous thoroughfare,
not far from the banks of the river, and at a distance of some
two miles, in the most direct course possible, from the pension
of Madame Rogêt. St. Eustache was the accepted suitor of Marie,
and lodged, as well as took his meals, at the pension. He was to
have gone for his betrothed at dusk, and to have escorted her
home. In the afternoon, however, it came on to rain heavily; and,
supposing that she would remain all night at her aunt’s, (as she
had done under similar circumstances before,) he did not think
it necessary to keep his promise. As night drew on, Madame Rogêt
(who was an infirm old lady, seventy years of age,) was heard to
express a fear “that she should never see Marie again;” but this
observation attracted little attention at the time.
On Monday, it was ascertained that the girl had not been to the
Rue des Drômes; and when the day elapsed without tidings of her,
a tardy search was instituted at several points in the city, and
its environs. It was not, however until the fourth day from the
period of disappearance that any thing satisfactory was
ascertained respecting her. On this day, (Wednesday, the
twenty-fifth of June,) a Monsieur Beauvais, (*8) who, with a
friend, had been making inquiries for Marie near the Barrière du
Roule, on the shore of the Seine which is opposite the Rue Pavée
St. Andrée, was informed that a corpse had just been towed ashore
by some fishermen, who had found it floating in the river. Upon
seeing the body, Beauvais, after some hesitation, identified it
as that of the perfumery-girl. His friend recognized it more
promptly.
The face was suffused with dark blood, some of which issued from
the mouth. No foam was seen, as in the case of the merely
drowned. There was no discoloration in the cellular tissue. About
the throat were bruises and impressions of fingers. The arms were
bent over on the chest and were rigid. The right hand was
clenched; the left partially open. On the left wrist were two
circular excoriations, apparently the effect of ropes, or of a
rope in more than one volution. A part of the right wrist, also,
was much chafed, as well as the back throughout its extent, but
more especially at the shoulder-blades. In bringing the body to
the shore the fishermen had attached to it a rope; but none of
the excoriations had been effected by this. The flesh of the neck
was much swollen. There were no cuts apparent, or bruises which
appeared the effect of blows. A piece of lace was found tied so
tightly around the neck as to be hidden from sight; it was
completely buried in the flesh, and was fastened by a knot which
lay just under the left ear. This alone would have sufficed to
produce death. The medical testimony spoke confidently of the
virtuous character of the deceased. She had been subjected, it
said, to brutal violence. The corpse was in such condition when
found, that there could have been no difficulty in its
recognition by friends.
The dress was much torn and otherwise disordered. In the outer
garment, a slip, about a foot wide, had been torn upward from the
bottom hem to the waist, but not torn off. It was wound three
times around the waist, and secured by a sort of hitch in the
back. The dress immediately beneath the frock was of fine muslin;
and from this a slip eighteen inches wide had been torn entirely
out—torn very evenly and with great care. It was found around her
neck, fitting loosely, and secured with a hard knot. Over this
muslin slip and the slip of lace, the strings of a bonnet were
attached; the bonnet being appended. The knot by which the
strings of the bonnet were fastened, was not a lady’s, but a slip
or sailor’s knot.
After the recognition of the corpse, it was not, as usual, taken
to the Morgue, (this formality being superfluous,) but hastily
interred not far from the spot at which it was brought ashore.
Through the exertions of Beauvais, the matter was industriously
hushed up, as far as possible; and several days had elapsed
before any public emotion resulted. A weekly paper, (*9) however,
at length took up the theme; the corpse was disinterred, and a
re-examination instituted; but nothing was elicited beyond what
has been already noted. The clothes, however, were now submitted
to the mother and friends of the deceased, and fully identified
as those worn by the girl upon leaving home.
Meantime, the excitement increased hourly. Several individuals
were arrested and discharged. St. Eustache fell especially under
suspicion; and he failed, at first, to give an intelligible
account of his whereabouts during the Sunday on which Marie left
home. Subsequently, however, he submitted to Monsieur G——,
affidavits, accounting satisfactorily for every hour of the day
in question. As time passed and no discovery ensued, a thousand
contradictory rumors were circulated, and journalists busied
themselves in suggestions. Among these, the one which attracted
the most notice, was the idea that Marie Rogêt still lived—that
the corpse found in the Seine was that of some other unfortunate.
It will be proper that I submit to the reader some passages which
embody the suggestion alluded to. These passages are literal
translations from L’Etoile, (*10) a paper conducted, in general,
with much ability.
“Mademoiselle Rogêt left her mother’s house on Sunday morning,
June the twenty-second, 18—, with the ostensible purpose of going
to see her aunt, or some other connexion, in the Rue des Drômes.
From that hour, nobody is proved to have seen her. There is no
trace or tidings of her at all.... There has no person, whatever,
come forward, so far, who saw her at all, on that day, after she
left her mother’s door.... Now, though we have no evidence that
Marie Rogêt was in the land of the living after nine o’clock on
Sunday, June the twenty-second, we have proof that, up to that
hour, she was alive. On Wednesday noon, at twelve, a female body
was discovered afloat on the shore of the Barrière de Roule. This
was, even if we presume that Marie Rogêt was thrown into the
river within three hours after she left her mother’s house, only
three days from the time she left her home—three days to an hour.
But it is folly to suppose that the murder, if murder was
committed on her body, could have been consummated soon enough to
have enabled her murderers to throw the body into the river
before midnight. Those who are guilty of such horrid crimes
choose darkness rather the light.... Thus we see that if the body
found in the river was that of Marie Rogêt, it could only have
been in the water two and a half days, or three at the outside.
All experience has shown that drowned bodies, or bodies thrown
into the water immediately after death by violence, require from
six to ten days for decomposition to take place to bring them to
the top of the water. Even where a cannon is fired over a corpse,
and it rises before at least five or six days’ immersion, it
sinks again, if let alone. Now, we ask, what was there in this
case to cause a departure from the ordinary course of nature?...
If the body had been kept in its mangled state on shore until
Tuesday night, some trace would be found on shore of the
murderers. It is a doubtful point, also, whether the body would
be so soon afloat, even were it thrown in after having been dead
two days. And, furthermore, it is exceedingly improbable that any
villains who had committed such a murder as is here supposed,
would have thrown the body in without weight to sink it, when
such a precaution could have so easily been taken.”
The editor here proceeds to argue that the body must have been in
the water “not three days merely, but, at least, five times three
days,” because it was so far decomposed that Beauvais had great
difficulty in recognizing it. This latter point, however, was
fully disproved. I continue the translation:
“What, then, are the facts on which M. Beauvais says that he has
no doubt the body was that of Marie Rogêt? He ripped up the gown
sleeve, and says he found marks which satisfied him of the
identity. The public generally supposed those marks to have
consisted of some description of scars. He rubbed the arm and
found hair upon it—something as indefinite, we think, as can
readily be imagined—as little conclusive as finding an arm in the
sleeve. M. Beauvais did not return that night, but sent word to
Madame Rogêt, at seven o’clock, on Wednesday evening, that an
investigation was still in progress respecting her daughter. If
we allow that Madame Rogêt, from her age and grief, could not go
over, (which is allowing a great deal,) there certainly must have
been some one who would have thought it worth while to go over
and attend the investigation, if they thought the body was that
of Marie. Nobody went over. There was nothing said or heard about
the matter in the Rue Pavée St. Andrée, that reached even the
occupants of the same building. M. St. Eustache, the lover and
intended husband of Marie, who boarded in her mother’s house,
deposes that he did not hear of the discovery of the body of his
intended until the next morning, when M. Beauvais came into his
chamber and told him of it. For an item of news like this, it
strikes us it was very coolly received.”
In this way the journal endeavored to create the impression of an
apathy on the part of the relatives of Marie, inconsistent with
the supposition that these relatives believed the corpse to be
hers. Its insinuations amount to this: that Marie, with the
connivance of her friends, had absented herself from the city for
reasons involving a charge against her chastity; and that these
friends, upon the discovery of a corpse in the Seine, somewhat
resembling that of the girl, had availed themselves of the
opportunity to impress the public with the belief of her death.
But L’Etoile was again over-hasty. It was distinctly proved that
no apathy, such as was imagined, existed; that the old lady was
exceedingly feeble, and so agitated as to be unable to attend to
any duty; that St. Eustache, so far from receiving the news
coolly, was distracted with grief, and bore himself so
frantically, that M. Beauvais prevailed upon a friend and
relative to take charge of him, and prevent his attending the
examination at the disinterment. Moreover, although it was stated
by L’Etoile, that the corpse was re-interred at the public
expense—that an advantageous offer of private sculpture was
absolutely declined by the family—and that no member of the
family attended the ceremonial;—although, I say, all this was
asserted by L’Etoile in furtherance of the impression it designed
to convey—yet all this was satisfactorily disproved. In a
subsequent number of the paper, an attempt was made to throw
suspicion upon Beauvais himself. The editor says:
“Now, then, a change comes over the matter. We are told that on
one occasion, while a Madame B—— was at Madame Rogêt’s house, M.
Beauvais, who was going out, told her that a gendarme was
expected there, and she, Madame B., must not say anything to the
gendarme until he returned, but let the matter be for him.... In
the present posture of affairs, M. Beauvais appears to have the
whole matter locked up in his head. A single step cannot be taken
without M. Beauvais, for, go which way you will, you run against
him.... For some reason, he determined that nobody shall have any
thing to do with the proceedings but himself, and he has elbowed
the male relatives out of the way, according to their
representations, in a very singular manner. He seems to have been
very much averse to permitting the relatives to see the body.”
By the following fact, some color was given to the suspicion thus
thrown upon Beauvais. A visitor at his office, a few days prior
to the girl’s disappearance, and during the absence of its
occupant, had observed a rose in the key-hole of the door, and
the name “Marie” inscribed upon a slate which hung near at hand.
The general impression, so far as we were enabled to glean it
from the newspapers, seemed to be, that Marie had been the victim
of a gang of desperadoes—that by these she had been borne across
the river, maltreated and murdered. Le Commerciel, (*11) however,
a print of extensive influence, was earnest in combating this
popular idea. I quote a passage or two from its columns:
“We are persuaded that pursuit has hitherto been on a false
scent, so far as it has been directed to the Barrière du Roule.
It is impossible that a person so well known to thousands as this
young woman was, should have passed three blocks without some one
having seen her; and any one who saw her would have remembered
it, for she interested all who knew her. It was when the streets
were full of people, when she went out.... It is impossible that
she could have gone to the Barrière du Roule, or to the Rue des
Drômes, without being recognized by a dozen persons; yet no one
has come forward who saw her outside of her mother’s door, and
there is no evidence, except the testimony concerning her
expressed intentions, that she did go out at all. Her gown was
torn, bound round her, and tied; and by that the body was carried
as a bundle. If the murder had been committed at the Barrière du
Roule, there would have been no necessity for any such
arrangement. The fact that the body was found floating near the
Barrière, is no proof as to where it was thrown into the
water..... A piece of one of the unfortunate girl’s petticoats,
two feet long and one foot wide, was torn out and tied under her
chin around the back of her head, probably to prevent screams.
This was done by fellows who had no pocket-handkerchief.”
A day or two before the Prefect called upon us, however, some
important information reached the police, which seemed to
overthrow, at least, the chief portion of Le Commerciel’s
argument. Two small boys, sons of a Madame Deluc, while roaming
among the woods near the Barrière du Roule, chanced to penetrate
a close thicket, within which were three or four large stones,
forming a kind of seat, with a back and footstool. On the upper
stone lay a white petticoat; on the second a silk scarf. A
parasol, gloves, and a pocket-handkerchief were also here found.
The handkerchief bore the name “Marie Rogêt.” Fragments of dress
were discovered on the brambles around. The earth was trampled,
the bushes were broken, and there was every evidence of a
struggle. Between the thicket and the river, the fences were
found taken down, and the ground bore evidence of some heavy
burthen having been dragged along it.
A weekly paper, Le Soleil,(*12) had the following comments upon
this discovery—comments which merely echoed the sentiment of the
whole Parisian press:
“The things had all evidently been there at least three or four
weeks; they were all mildewed down hard with the action of the
rain and stuck together from mildew. The grass had grown around
and over some of them. The silk on the parasol was strong, but
the threads of it were run together within. The upper part, where
it had been doubled and folded, was all mildewed and rotten, and
tore on its being opened..... The pieces of her frock torn out by
the bushes were about three inches wide and six inches long. One
part was the hem of the frock, and it had been mended; the other
piece was part of the skirt, not the hem. They looked like strips
torn off, and were on the thorn bush, about a foot from the
ground..... There can be no doubt, therefore, that the spot of
this appalling outrage has been discovered.”
Consequent upon this discovery, new evidence appeared. Madame
Deluc testified that she keeps a roadside inn not far from the
bank of the river, opposite the Barrière du Roule. The
neighborhood is secluded—particularly so. It is the usual Sunday
resort of blackguards from the city, who cross the river in
boats. About three o’clock, in the afternoon of the Sunday in
question, a young girl arrived at the inn, accompanied by a young
man of dark complexion. The two remained here for some time. On
their departure, they took the road to some thick woods in the
vicinity. Madame Deluc’s attention was called to the dress worn
by the girl, on account of its resemblance to one worn by a
deceased relative. A scarf was particularly noticed. Soon after
the departure of the couple, a gang of miscreants made their
appearance, behaved boisterously, ate and drank without making
payment, followed in the route of the young man and girl,
returned to the inn about dusk, and re-crossed the river as if in
great haste.
It was soon after dark, upon this same evening, that Madame
Deluc, as well as her eldest son, heard the screams of a female
in the vicinity of the inn. The screams were violent but brief.
Madame D. recognized not only the scarf which was found in the
thicket, but the dress which was discovered upon the corpse. An
omnibus driver, Valence, (*13) now also testified that he saw
Marie Rogêt cross a ferry on the Seine, on the Sunday in
question, in company with a young man of dark complexion. He,
Valence, knew Marie, and could not be mistaken in her identity.
The articles found in the thicket were fully identified by the
relatives of Marie.
The items of evidence and information thus collected by myself,
from the newspapers, at the suggestion of Dupin, embraced only
one more point—but this was a point of seemingly vast
consequence. It appears that, immediately after the discovery of
the clothes as above described, the lifeless, or nearly lifeless
body of St. Eustache, Marie’s betrothed, was found in the
vicinity of what all now supposed the scene of the outrage. A
phial labelled “laudanum,” and emptied, was found near him. His
breath gave evidence of the poison. He died without speaking.
Upon his person was found a letter, briefly stating his love for
Marie, with his design of self-destruction.
“I need scarcely tell you,” said Dupin, as he finished the
perusal of my notes, “that this is a far more intricate case than
that of the Rue Morgue; from which it differs in one important
respect. This is an ordinary, although an atrocious instance of
crime. There is nothing peculiarly outré about it. You will
observe that, for this reason, the mystery has been considered
easy, when, for this reason, it should have been considered
difficult, of solution. Thus; at first, it was thought
unnecessary to offer a reward. The myrmidons of G—— were able at
once to comprehend how and why such an atrocity might have been
committed. They could picture to their imaginations a mode—many
modes—and a motive—many motives; and because it was not
impossible that either of these numerous modes and motives could
have been the actual one, they have taken it for granted that one
of them must. But the case with which these variable fancies were
entertained, and the very plausibility which each assumed, should
have been understood as indicative rather of the difficulties
than of the facilities which must attend elucidation. I have
before observed that it is by prominences above the plane of the
ordinary, that reason feels her way, if at all, in her search for
the true, and that the proper question in cases such as this, is
not so much ‘what has occurred?’ as ‘what has occurred that has
never occurred before?’ In the investigations at the house of
Madame L’Espanaye, (*14) the agents of G—— were discouraged and
confounded by that very unusualness which, to a properly
regulated intellect, would have afforded the surest omen of
success; while this same intellect might have been plunged in
despair at the ordinary character of all that met the eye in the
case of the perfumery-girl, and yet told of nothing but easy
triumph to the functionaries of the Prefecture.
“In the case of Madame L’Espanaye and her daughter there was,
even at the beginning of our investigation, no doubt that murder
had been committed. The idea of suicide was excluded at once.
Here, too, we are freed, at the commencement, from all
supposition of self-murder. The body found at the Barrière du
Roule, was found under such circumstances as to leave us no room
for embarrassment upon this important point. But it has been
suggested that the corpse discovered, is not that of the Marie
Rogêt for the conviction of whose assassin, or assassins, the
reward is offered, and respecting whom, solely, our agreement has
been arranged with the Prefect. We both know this gentleman well.
It will not do to trust him too far. If, dating our inquiries
from the body found, and thence tracing a murderer, we yet
discover this body to be that of some other individual than
Marie; or, if starting from the living Marie, we find her, yet
find her unassassinated—in either case we lose our labor; since
it is Monsieur G—— with whom we have to deal. For our own
purpose, therefore, if not for the purpose of justice, it is
indispensable that our first step should be the determination of
the identity of the corpse with the Marie Rogêt who is missing.
“With the public the arguments of L’Etoile have had weight; and
that the journal itself is convinced of their importance would
appear from the manner in which it commences one of its essays
upon the subject—‘Several of the morning papers of the day,’ it
says, ‘speak of the _conclusive_ article in Monday’s Etoile.’ To
me, this article appears conclusive of little beyond the zeal of
its inditer. We should bear in mind that, in general, it is the
object of our newspapers rather to create a sensation—to make a
point—than to further the cause of truth. The latter end is only
pursued when it seems coincident with the former. The print which
merely falls in with ordinary opinion (however well founded this
opinion may be) earns for itself no credit with the mob. The mass
of the people regard as profound only him who suggests _pungent
contradictions_ of the general idea. In ratiocination, not less
than in literature, it is the epigram which is the most
immediately and the most universally appreciated. In both, it is
of the lowest order of merit.
“What I mean to say is, that it is the mingled epigram and
melodrame of the idea, that Marie Rogêt still lives, rather than
any true plausibility in this idea, which have suggested it to
L’Etoile, and secured it a favorable reception with the public.
Let us examine the heads of this journal’s argument; endeavoring
to avoid the incoherence with which it is originally set forth.
“The first aim of the writer is to show, from the brevity of the
interval between Marie’s disappearance and the finding of the
floating corpse, that this corpse cannot be that of Marie. The
reduction of this interval to its smallest possible dimension,
becomes thus, at once, an object with the reasoner. In the rash
pursuit of this object, he rushes into mere assumption at the
outset. ‘It is folly to suppose,’ he says, ‘that the murder, if
murder was committed on her body, could have been consummated
soon enough to have enabled her murderers to throw the body into
the river before midnight.’ We demand at once, and very
naturally, why? Why is it folly to suppose that the murder was
committed _within five minutes_ after the girl’s quitting her
mother’s house? Why is it folly to suppose that the murder was
committed at any given period of the day? There have been
assassinations at all hours. But, had the murder taken place at
any moment between nine o’clock in the morning of Sunday, and a
quarter before midnight, there would still have been time enough
‘to throw the body into the river before midnight.’ This
assumption, then, amounts precisely to this—that the murder was
not committed on Sunday at all—and, if we allow L’Etoile to
assume this, we may permit it any liberties whatever. The
paragraph beginning ‘It is folly to suppose that the murder,
etc.,’ however it appears as printed in L’Etoile, may be imagined
to have existed actually thus in the brain of its inditer—‘It is
folly to suppose that the murder, if murder was committed on the
body, could have been committed soon enough to have enabled her
murderers to throw the body into the river before midnight; it is
folly, we say, to suppose all this, and to suppose at the same
time, (as we are resolved to suppose,) that the body was not
thrown in until after midnight’—a sentence sufficiently
inconsequential in itself, but not so utterly preposterous as the
one printed.
“Were it my purpose,” continued Dupin, “merely to _make out a
case_ against this passage of L’Etoile’s argument, I might safely
leave it where it is. It is not, however, with L’Etoile that we
have to do, but with the truth. The sentence in question has but
one meaning, as it stands; and this meaning I have fairly stated;
but it is material that we go behind the mere words, for an idea
which these words have obviously intended, and failed to convey.
It was the design of the journalist to say that, at whatever
period of the day or night of Sunday this murder was committed,
it was improbable that the assassins would have ventured to bear
the corpse to the river before midnight. And herein lies, really,
the assumption of which I complain. It is assumed that the murder
was committed at such a position, and under such circumstances,
that the bearing it to the river became necessary. Now, the
assassination might have taken place upon the river’s brink, or
on the river itself; and, thus, the throwing the corpse in the
water might have been resorted to, at any period of the day or
night, as the most obvious and most immediate mode of disposal.
You will understand that I suggest nothing here as probable, or
as cöincident with my own opinion. My design, so far, has no
reference to the facts of the case. I wish merely to caution you
against the whole tone of L’Etoile’s suggestion, by calling your
attention to its ex parte character at the outset.
“Having prescribed thus a limit to suit its own preconceived
notions; having assumed that, if this were the body of Marie, it
could have been in the water but a very brief time, the journal
goes on to say:
‘All experience has shown that drowned bodies, or bodies thrown
into the water immediately after death by violence, require from
six to ten days for sufficient decomposition to take place to
bring them to the top of the water. Even when a cannon is fired
over a corpse, and it rises before at least five or six days’
immersion, it sinks again if let alone.’
“These assertions have been tacitly received by every paper in
Paris, with the exception of Le Moniteur. (*15) This latter print
endeavors to combat that portion of the paragraph which has
reference to ‘drowned bodies’ only, by citing some five or six
instances in which the bodies of individuals known to be drowned
were found floating after the lapse of less time than is insisted
upon by L’Etoile. But there is something excessively
unphilosophical in the attempt on the part of Le Moniteur, to
rebut the general assertion of L’Etoile, by a citation of
particular instances militating against that assertion. Had it
been possible to adduce fifty instead of five examples of bodies
found floating at the end of two or three days, these fifty
examples could still have been properly regarded only as
exceptions to L’Etoile’s rule, until such time as the rule itself
should be confuted. Admitting the rule, (and this Le Moniteur
does not deny, insisting merely upon its exceptions,) the
argument of L’Etoile is suffered to remain in full force; for
this argument does not pretend to involve more than a question of
the probability of the body having risen to the surface in less
than three days; and this probability will be in favor of
L’Etoile’s position until the instances so childishly adduced
shall be sufficient in number to establish an antagonistical
rule.
“You will see at once that all argument upon this head should be
urged, if at all, against the rule itself; and for this end we
must examine the rationale of the rule. Now the human body, in
general, is neither much lighter nor much heavier than the water
of the Seine; that is to say, the specific gravity of the human
body, in its natural condition, is about equal to the bulk of
fresh water which it displaces. The bodies of fat and fleshy
persons, with small bones, and of women generally, are lighter
than those of the lean and large-boned, and of men; and the
specific gravity of the water of a river is somewhat influenced
by the presence of the tide from sea. But, leaving this tide out
of question, it may be said that very few human bodies will sink
at all, even in fresh water, of their own accord. Almost any one,
falling into a river, will be enabled to float, if he suffer the
specific gravity of the water fairly to be adduced in comparison
with his own—that is to say, if he suffer his whole person to be
immersed, with as little exception as possible. The proper
position for one who cannot swim, is the upright position of the
walker on land, with the head thrown fully back, and immersed;
the mouth and nostrils alone remaining above the surface. Thus
circumstanced, we shall find that we float without difficulty and
without exertion. It is evident, however, that the gravities of
the body, and of the bulk of water displaced, are very nicely
balanced, and that a trifle will cause either to preponderate. An
arm, for instance, uplifted from the water, and thus deprived of
its support, is an additional weight sufficient to immerse the
whole head, while the accidental aid of the smallest piece of
timber will enable us to elevate the head so as to look about.
Now, in the struggles of one unused to swimming, the arms are
invariably thrown upwards, while an attempt is made to keep the
head in its usual perpendicular position. The result is the
immersion of the mouth and nostrils, and the inception, during
efforts to breathe while beneath the surface, of water into the
lungs. Much is also received into the stomach, and the whole body
becomes heavier by the difference between the weight of the air
originally distending these cavities, and that of the fluid which
now fills them. This difference is sufficient to cause the body
to sink, as a general rule; but is insufficient in the cases of
individuals with small bones and an abnormal quantity of flaccid
or fatty matter. Such individuals float even after drowning.
“The corpse, being supposed at the bottom of the river, will
there remain until, by some means, its specific gravity again
becomes less than that of the bulk of water which it displaces.
This effect is brought about by decomposition, or otherwise. The
result of decomposition is the generation of gas, distending the
cellular tissues and all the cavities, and giving the puffed
appearance which is so horrible. When this distension has so far
progressed that the bulk of the corpse is materially increased
without a corresponding increase of mass or weight, its specific
gravity becomes less than that of the water displaced, and it
forthwith makes its appearance at the surface. But decomposition
is modified by innumerable circumstances—is hastened or retarded
by innumerable agencies; for example, by the heat or cold of the
season, by the mineral impregnation or purity of the water, by
its depth or shallowness, by its currency or stagnation, by the
temperament of the body, by its infection or freedom from disease
before death. Thus it is evident that we can assign no period,
with any thing like accuracy, at which the corpse shall rise
through decomposition. Under certain conditions this result would
be brought about within an hour; under others, it might not take
place at all. There are chemical infusions by which the animal
frame can be preserved forever from corruption; the bi-chloride
of mercury is one. But, apart from decomposition, there may be,
and very usually is, a generation of gas within the stomach, from
the acetous fermentation of vegetable matter (or within other
cavities from other causes), sufficient to induce a distension
which will bring the body to the surface. The effect produced by
the firing of a cannon is that of simple vibration. This may
either loosen the corpse from the soft mud or ooze in which it is
imbedded, thus permitting it to rise when other agencies have
already prepared it for so doing; or it may overcome the tenacity
of some putrescent portions of the cellular tissue; allowing the
cavities to distend under the influence of the gas.
“Having thus before us the whole philosophy of this subject, we
can easily test by it the assertions of L’Etoile. ‘All experience
shows,’ says this paper, ‘that drowned bodies, or bodies thrown
into the water immediately after death by violence, require from
six to ten days for sufficient decomposition to take place to
bring them to the top of the water. Even when a cannon is fired
over a corpse, and it rises before at least five or six days’
immersion, it sinks again if let alone.’
“The whole of this paragraph must now appear a tissue of
inconsequence and incoherence. All experience does not show that
‘drowned bodies’ require from six to ten days for sufficient
decomposition to take place to bring them to the surface. Both
science and experience show that the period of their rising is,
and necessarily must be, indeterminate. If, moreover, a body has
risen to the surface through firing of cannon, it will not ‘sink
again if let alone,’ until decomposition has so far progressed as
to permit the escape of the generated gas. But I wish to call
your attention to the distinction which is made between ‘drowned
bodies,’ and ‘bodies thrown into the water immediately after
death by violence.’ Although the writer admits the distinction,
he yet includes them all in the same category. I have shown how
it is that the body of a drowning man becomes specifically
heavier than its bulk of water, and that he would not sink at
all, except for the struggles by which he elevates his arms above
the surface, and his gasps for breath while beneath the
surface—gasps which supply by water the place of the original air
in the lungs. But these struggles and these gasps would not occur
in the body ‘thrown into the water immediately after death by
violence.’ Thus, in the latter instance, the body, as a general
rule, would not sink at all—a fact of which L’Etoile is evidently
ignorant. When decomposition had proceeded to a very great
extent—when the flesh had in a great measure left the bones—then,
indeed, but not till then, should we lose sight of the corpse.
“And now what are we to make of the argument, that the body found
could not be that of Marie Rogêt, because, three days only having
elapsed, this body was found floating? If drowned, being a woman,
she might never have sunk; or having sunk, might have reappeared
in twenty-four hours, or less. But no one supposes her to have
been drowned; and, dying before being thrown into the river, she
might have been found floating at any period afterwards whatever.
“‘But,’ says L’Etoile, ‘if the body had been kept in its mangled
state on shore until Tuesday night, some trace would be found on
shore of the murderers.’ Here it is at first difficult to
perceive the intention of the reasoner. He means to anticipate
what he imagines would be an objection to his theory—viz.: that
the body was kept on shore two days, suffering rapid
decomposition—more rapid than if immersed in water. He supposes
that, had this been the case, it might have appeared at the
surface on the Wednesday, and thinks that only under such
circumstances it could so have appeared. He is accordingly in
haste to show that it was not kept on shore; for, if so, ‘some
trace would be found on shore of the murderers.’ I presume you
smile at the sequitur. You cannot be made to see how the mere
duration of the corpse on the shore could operate to multiply
traces of the assassins. Nor can I.
“‘And furthermore it is exceedingly improbable,’ continues our
journal, ‘that any villains who had committed such a murder as is
here supposed, would have thrown the body in without weight to
sink it, when such a precaution could have so easily been taken.’
Observe, here, the laughable confusion of thought! No one—not
even L’Etoile—disputes the murder committed _on the body found_.
The marks of violence are too obvious. It is our reasoner’s
object merely to show that this body is not Marie’s. He wishes to
prove that Marie is not assassinated—not that the corpse was not.
Yet his observation proves only the latter point. Here is a
corpse without weight attached. Murderers, casting it in, would
not have failed to attach a weight. Therefore it was not thrown
in by murderers. This is all which is proved, if any thing is.
The question of identity is not even approached, and L’Etoile has
been at great pains merely to gainsay now what it has admitted
only a moment before. ‘We are perfectly convinced,’ it says,
‘that the body found was that of a murdered female.’
“Nor is this the sole instance, even in this division of his
subject, where our reasoner unwittingly reasons against himself.
His evident object, I have already said, is to reduce, as much as
possible, the interval between Marie’s disappearance and the
finding of the corpse. Yet we find him urging the point that no
person saw the girl from the moment of her leaving her mother’s
house. ‘We have no evidence,’ he says, ‘that Marie Rogêt was in
the land of the living after nine o’clock on Sunday, June the
twenty-second.’ As his argument is obviously an ex parte one, he
should, at least, have left this matter out of sight; for had any
one been known to see Marie, say on Monday, or on Tuesday, the
interval in question would have been much reduced, and, by his
own ratiocination, the probability much diminished of the corpse
being that of the grisette. It is, nevertheless, amusing to
observe that L’Etoile insists upon its point in the full belief
of its furthering its general argument.
“Reperuse now that portion of this argument which has reference
to the identification of the corpse by Beauvais. In regard to the
hair upon the arm, L’Etoile has been obviously disingenuous. M.
Beauvais, not being an idiot, could never have urged, in
identification of the corpse, simply hair upon its arm. No arm is
without hair. The generality of the expression of L’Etoile is a
mere perversion of the witness’ phraseology. He must have spoken
of some peculiarity in this hair. It must have been a peculiarity
of color, of quantity, of length, or of situation.
“‘Her foot,’ says the journal, ‘was small—so are thousands of
feet. Her garter is no proof whatever—nor is her shoe—for shoes
and garters are sold in packages. The same may be said of the
flowers in her hat. One thing upon which M. Beauvais strongly
insists is, that the clasp on the garter found, had been set back
to take it in. This amounts to nothing; for most women find it
proper to take a pair of garters home and fit them to the size of
the limbs they are to encircle, rather than to try them in the
store where they purchase.’ Here it is difficult to suppose the
reasoner in earnest. Had M. Beauvais, in his search for the body
of Marie, discovered a corpse corresponding in general size and
appearance to the missing girl, he would have been warranted
(without reference to the question of habiliment at all) in
forming an opinion that his search had been successful. If, in
addition to the point of general size and contour, he had found
upon the arm a peculiar hairy appearance which he had observed
upon the living Marie, his opinion might have been justly
strengthened; and the increase of positiveness might well have
been in the ratio of the peculiarity, or unusualness, of the
hairy mark. If, the feet of Marie being small, those of the
corpse were also small, the increase of probability that the body
was that of Marie would not be an increase in a ratio merely
arithmetical, but in one highly geometrical, or accumulative. Add
to all this shoes such as she had been known to wear upon the day
of her disappearance, and, although these shoes may be ‘sold in
packages,’ you so far augment the probability as to verge upon
the certain. What, of itself, would be no evidence of identity,
becomes through its corroborative position, proof most sure. Give
us, then, flowers in the hat corresponding to those worn by the
missing girl, and we seek for nothing farther. If only one
flower, we seek for nothing farther—what then if two or three, or
more? Each successive one is multiple evidence—proof not _added_
to proof, but multiplied by hundreds or thousands. Let us now
discover, upon the deceased, garters such as the living used, and
it is almost folly to proceed. But these garters are found to be
tightened, by the setting back of a clasp, in just such a manner
as her own had been tightened by Marie, shortly previous to her
leaving home. It is now madness or hypocrisy to doubt. What
L’Etoile says in respect to this abbreviation of the garters
being an usual occurrence, shows nothing beyond its own
pertinacity in error. The elastic nature of the clasp-garter is
self-demonstration of the unusualness of the abbreviation. What
is made to adjust itself, must of necessity require foreign
adjustment but rarely. It must have been by an accident, in its
strictest sense, that these garters of Marie needed the
tightening described. They alone would have amply established her
identity. But it is not that the corpse was found to have the
garters of the missing girl, or found to have her shoes, or her
bonnet, or the flowers of her bonnet, or her feet, or a peculiar
mark upon the arm, or her general size and appearance—it is that
the corpse had each, and _all collectively_. Could it be proved
that the editor of L’Etoile _really_ entertained a doubt, under
the circumstances, there would be no need, in his case, of a
commission de lunatico inquirendo. He has thought it sagacious to
echo the small talk of the lawyers, who, for the most part,
content themselves with echoing the rectangular precepts of the
courts. I would here observe that very much of what is rejected
as evidence by a court, is the best of evidence to the intellect.
For the court, guiding itself by the general principles of
evidence—the recognized and _booked_ principles—is averse from
swerving at particular instances. And this steadfast adherence to
principle, with rigorous disregard of the conflicting exception,
is a sure mode of attaining the maximum of attainable truth, in
any long sequence of time. The practice, in mass, is therefore
philosophical; but it is not the less certain that it engenders
vast individual error. (*16)
“In respect to the insinuations levelled at Beauvais, you will be
willing to dismiss them in a breath. You have already fathomed
the true character of this good gentleman. He is a busy-body,
with much of romance and little of wit. Any one so constituted
will readily so conduct himself, upon occasion of real
excitement, as to render himself liable to suspicion on the part
of the over acute, or the ill-disposed. M. Beauvais (as it
appears from your notes) had some personal interviews with the
editor of L’Etoile, and offended him by venturing an opinion that
the corpse, notwithstanding the theory of the editor, was, in
sober fact, that of Marie. ‘He persists,’ says the paper, ‘in
asserting the corpse to be that of Marie, but cannot give a
circumstance, in addition to those which we have commented upon,
to make others believe.’ Now, without re-adverting to the fact
that stronger evidence ‘to make others believe,’ could never have
been adduced, it may be remarked that a man may very well be
understood to believe, in a case of this kind, without the
ability to advance a single reason for the belief of a second
party. Nothing is more vague than impressions of individual
identity. Each man recognizes his neighbor, yet there are few
instances in which any one is prepared to give a reason for his
recognition. The editor of L’Etoile had no right to be offended
at M. Beauvais’ unreasoning belief.
“The suspicious circumstances which invest him, will be found to
tally much better with my hypothesis of romantic busy-bodyism,
than with the reasoner’s suggestion of guilt. Once adopting the
more charitable interpretation, we shall find no difficulty in
comprehending the rose in the key-hole; the ‘Marie’ upon the
slate; the ‘elbowing the male relatives out of the way;’ the
‘aversion to permitting them to see the body;’ the caution given
to Madame B——, that she must hold no conversation with the
gendarme until his return (Beauvais’); and, lastly, his apparent
determination ‘that nobody should have anything to do with the
proceedings except himself.’ It seems to me unquestionable that
Beauvais was a suitor of Marie’s; that she coquetted with him;
and that he was ambitious of being thought to enjoy her fullest
intimacy and confidence. I shall say nothing more upon this
point; and, as the evidence fully rebuts the assertion of
L’Etoile, touching the matter of apathy on the part of the mother
and other relatives—an apathy inconsistent with the supposition
of their believing the corpse to be that of the perfumery-girl—we
shall now proceed as if the question of identity were settled to
our perfect satisfaction.”
“And what,” I here demanded, “do you think of the opinions of Le
Commerciel?”
“That, in spirit, they are far more worthy of attention than any
which have been promulgated upon the subject. The deductions from
the premises are philosophical and acute; but the premises, in
two instances, at least, are founded in imperfect observation. Le
Commerciel wishes to intimate that Marie was seized by some gang
of low ruffians not far from her mother’s door. ‘It is
impossible,’ it urges, ‘that a person so well known to thousands
as this young woman was, should have passed three blocks without
some one having seen her.’ This is the idea of a man long
resident in Paris—a public man—and one whose walks to and fro in
the city, have been mostly limited to the vicinity of the public
offices. He is aware that he seldom passes so far as a dozen
blocks from his own bureau, without being recognized and
accosted. And, knowing the extent of his personal acquaintance
with others, and of others with him, he compares his notoriety
with that of the perfumery-girl, finds no great difference
between them, and reaches at once the conclusion that she, in her
walks, would be equally liable to recognition with himself in
his. This could only be the case were her walks of the same
unvarying, methodical character, and within the same species of
limited region as are his own. He passes to and fro, at regular
intervals, within a confined periphery, abounding in individuals
who are led to observation of his person through interest in the
kindred nature of his occupation with their own. But the walks of
Marie may, in general, be supposed discursive. In this particular
instance, it will be understood as most probable, that she
proceeded upon a route of more than average diversity from her
accustomed ones. The parallel which we imagine to have existed in
the mind of Le Commerciel would only be sustained in the event of
the two individuals traversing the whole city. In this case,
granting the personal acquaintances to be equal, the chances
would be also equal that an equal number of personal rencounters
would be made. For my own part, I should hold it not only as
possible, but as very far more than probable, that Marie might
have proceeded, at any given period, by any one of the many
routes between her own residence and that of her aunt, without
meeting a single individual whom she knew, or by whom she was
known. In viewing this question in its full and proper light, we
must hold steadily in mind the great disproportion between the
personal acquaintances of even the most noted individual in
Paris, and the entire population of Paris itself.
“But whatever force there may still appear to be in the
suggestion of Le Commerciel, will be much diminished when we take
into consideration the hour at which the girl went abroad. ‘It
was when the streets were full of people,’ says Le Commerciel,
‘that she went out.’ But not so. It was at nine o’clock in the
morning. Now at nine o’clock of every morning in the week, _with
the exception of Sunday_, the streets of the city are, it is
true, thronged with people. At nine on Sunday, the populace are
chiefly within doors _preparing for church_. No observing person
can have failed to notice the peculiarly deserted air of the
town, from about eight until ten on the morning of every Sabbath.
Between ten and eleven the streets are thronged, but not at so
early a period as that designated.
“There is another point at which there seems a deficiency of
observation on the part of Le Commerciel. ‘A piece,’ it says, ‘of
one of the unfortunate girl’s petticoats, two feet long, and one
foot wide, was torn out and tied under her chin, and around the
back of her head, probably to prevent screams. This was done, by
fellows who had no pocket-handkerchiefs.’ Whether this idea is,
or is not well founded, we will endeavor to see hereafter; but by
‘fellows who have no pocket-handkerchiefs’ the editor intends the
lowest class of ruffians. These, however, are the very
description of people who will always be found to have
handkerchiefs even when destitute of shirts. You must have had
occasion to observe how absolutely indispensable, of late years,
to the thorough blackguard, has become the pocket-handkerchief.”
“And what are we to think,” I asked, “of the article in Le
Soleil?”
“That it is a vast pity its inditer was not born a parrot—in
which case he would have been the most illustrious parrot of his
race. He has merely repeated the individual items of the already
published opinion; collecting them, with a laudable industry,
from this paper and from that. ‘The things had all evidently been
there,’ he says, ‘at least, three or four weeks, and there can be
_no doubt_ that the spot of this appalling outrage has been
discovered.’ The facts here re-stated by Le Soleil, are very far
indeed from removing my own doubts upon this subject, and we will
examine them more particularly hereafter in connexion with
another division of the theme.
“At present we must occupy ourselves with other investigations.
You cannot fail to have remarked the extreme laxity of the
examination of the corpse. To be sure, the question of identity
was readily determined, or should have been; but there were other
points to be ascertained. Had the body been in any respect
despoiled? Had the deceased any articles of jewelry about her
person upon leaving home? if so, had she any when found? These
are important questions utterly untouched by the evidence; and
there are others of equal moment, which have met with no
attention. We must endeavor to satisfy ourselves by personal
inquiry. The case of St. Eustache must be re-examined. I have no
suspicion of this person; but let us proceed methodically. We
will ascertain beyond a doubt the validity of the affidavits in
regard to his whereabouts on the Sunday. Affidavits of this
character are readily made matter of mystification. Should there
be nothing wrong here, however, we will dismiss St. Eustache from
our investigations. His suicide, however corroborative of
suspicion, were there found to be deceit in the affidavits, is,
without such deceit, in no respect an unaccountable circumstance,
or one which need cause us to deflect from the line of ordinary
analysis.
“In that which I now propose, we will discard the interior points
of this tragedy, and concentrate our attention upon its
outskirts. Not the least usual error, in investigations such as
this, is the limiting of inquiry to the immediate, with total
disregard of the collateral or circumstantial events. It is the
mal-practice of the courts to confine evidence and discussion to
the bounds of apparent relevancy. Yet experience has shown, and a
true philosophy will always show, that a vast, perhaps the larger
portion of truth, arises from the seemingly irrelevant. It is
through the spirit of this principle, if not precisely through
its letter, that modern science has resolved to calculate upon
the unforeseen. But perhaps you do not comprehend me. The history
of human knowledge has so uninterruptedly shown that to
collateral, or incidental, or accidental events we are indebted
for the most numerous and most valuable discoveries, that it has
at length become necessary, in any prospective view of
improvement, to make not only large, but the largest allowances
for inventions that shall arise by chance, and quite out of the
range of ordinary expectation. It is no longer philosophical to
base, upon what has been, a vision of what is to be. Accident is
admitted as a portion of the substructure. We make chance a
matter of absolute calculation. We subject the unlooked for and
unimagined to the mathematical _formulae_ of the schools.
“I repeat that it is no more than fact, that the larger portion
of all truth has sprung from the collateral; and it is but in
accordance with the spirit of the principle involved in this
fact, that I would divert inquiry, in the present case, from the
trodden and hitherto unfruitful ground of the event itself, to
the contemporary circumstances which surround it. While you
ascertain the validity of the affidavits, I will examine the
newspapers more generally than you have as yet done. So far, we
have only reconnoitred the field of investigation; but it will be
strange indeed if a comprehensive survey, such as I propose, of
the public prints, will not afford us some minute points which
shall establish a direction for inquiry.”
In pursuance of Dupin’s suggestion, I made scrupulous examination
of the affair of the affidavits. The result was a firm conviction
of their validity, and of the consequent innocence of St.
Eustache. In the mean time my friend occupied himself, with what
seemed to me a minuteness altogether objectless, in a scrutiny of
the various newspaper files. At the end of a week he placed
before me the following extracts:
“About three years and a half ago, a disturbance very similar to
the present, was caused by the disappearance of this same Marie
Rogêt, from the parfumerie of Monsieur Le Blanc, in the Palais
Royal. At the end of a week, however, she re-appeared at her
customary comptoir, as well as ever, with the exception of a
slight paleness not altogether usual. It was given out by
Monsieur Le Blanc and her mother, that she had merely been on a
visit to some friend in the country; and the affair was speedily
hushed up. We presume that the present absence is a freak of the
same nature, and that, at the expiration of a week, or perhaps of
a month, we shall have her among us again.”—Evening Paper—Monday,
June 23. (*17)
“An evening journal of yesterday, refers to a former mysterious
disappearance of Mademoiselle Rogêt. It is well known that,
during the week of her absence from Le Blanc’s parfumerie, she
was in the company of a young naval officer, much noted for his
debaucheries. A quarrel, it is supposed, providentially led to
her return home. We have the name of the Lothario in question,
who is, at present, stationed in Paris, but, for obvious reasons,
forbear to make it public.”—Le Mercurie—Tuesday Morning, June 24.
(*18)
“An outrage of the most atrocious character was perpetrated near
this city the day before yesterday. A gentleman, with his wife
and daughter, engaged, about dusk, the services of six young men,
who were idly rowing a boat to and fro near the banks of the
Seine, to convey him across the river. Upon reaching the opposite
shore, the three passengers stepped out, and had proceeded so far
as to be beyond the view of the boat, when the daughter
discovered that she had left in it her parasol. She returned for
it, was seized by the gang, carried out into the stream, gagged,
brutally treated, and finally taken to the shore at a point not
far from that at which she had originally entered the boat with
her parents. The villains have escaped for the time, but the
police are upon their trail, and some of them will soon be
taken.”—Morning Paper—June 25. (*19)
“We have received one or two communications, the object of which
is to fasten the crime of the late atrocity upon Mennais; (*20)
but as this gentleman has been fully exonerated by a loyal
inquiry, and as the arguments of our several correspondents
appear to be more zealous than profound, we do not think it
advisable to make them public.”—Morning Paper—June 28. (*21)
“We have received several forcibly written communications,
apparently from various sources, and which go far to render it a
matter of certainty that the unfortunate Marie Rogêt has become a
victim of one of the numerous bands of blackguards which infest
the vicinity of the city upon Sunday. Our own opinion is
decidedly in favor of this supposition. We shall endeavor to make
room for some of these arguments hereafter.”—Evening
Paper—Tuesday, June 31. (*22)
“On Monday, one of the bargemen connected with the revenue
service, saw an empty boat floating down the Seine. Sails were
lying in the bottom of the boat. The bargeman towed it under the
barge office. The next morning it was taken from thence, without
the knowledge of any of the officers. The rudder is now at the
barge office.”—Le Diligence—Thursday, June 26.
Upon reading these various extracts, they not only seemed to me
irrelevant, but I could perceive no mode in which any one of them
could be brought to bear upon the matter in hand. I waited for
some explanation from Dupin.
“It is not my present design,” he said, “to dwell upon the first
and second of those extracts. I have copied them chiefly to show
you the extreme remissness of the police, who, as far as I can
understand from the Prefect, have not troubled themselves, in any
respect, with an examination of the naval officer alluded to. Yet
it is mere folly to say that between the first and second
disappearance of Marie there is no _supposable_ connection. Let
us admit the first elopement to have resulted in a quarrel
between the lovers, and the return home of the betrayed. We are
now prepared to view a second elopement (if we know that an
elopement has again taken place) as indicating a renewal of the
betrayer’s advances, rather than as the result of new proposals
by a second individual—we are prepared to regard it as a ‘making
up’ of the old amour, rather than as the commencement of a new
one. The chances are ten to one, that he who had once eloped with
Marie, would again propose an elopement, rather than that she to
whom proposals of elopement had been made by one individual,
should have them made to her by another. And here let me call
your attention to the fact, that the time elapsing between the
first ascertained, and the second supposed elopement, is a few
months more than the general period of the cruises of our
men-of-war. Had the lover been interrupted in his first villany
by the necessity of departure to sea, and had he seized the first
moment of his return to renew the base designs not yet altogether
accomplished—or not yet altogether accomplished by _him?_ Of all
these things we know nothing.
“You will say, however, that, in the second instance, there was
no elopement as imagined. Certainly not—but are we prepared to
say that there was not the frustrated design? Beyond St.
Eustache, and perhaps Beauvais, we find no recognized, no open,
no honorable suitors of Marie. Of none other is there any thing
said. Who, then, is the secret lover, of whom the relatives (at
least most of them) know nothing, but whom Marie meets upon the
morning of Sunday, and who is so deeply in her confidence, that
she hesitates not to remain with him until the shades of the
evening descend, amid the solitary groves of the Barrière du
Roule? Who is that secret lover, I ask, of whom, at least, most
of the relatives know nothing? And what means the singular
prophecy of Madame Rogêt on the morning of Marie’s departure?—‘I
fear that I shall never see Marie again.’
“But if we cannot imagine Madame Rogêt privy to the design of
elopement, may we not at least suppose this design entertained by
the girl? Upon quitting home, she gave it to be understood that
she was about to visit her aunt in the Rue des Drômes and St.
Eustache was requested to call for her at dark. Now, at first
glance, this fact strongly militates against my suggestion;—but
let us reflect. That she did meet some companion, and proceed
with him across the river, reaching the Barrière du Roule at so
late an hour as three o’clock in the afternoon, is known. But in
consenting so to accompany this individual, (_for whatever
purpose—to her mother known or unknown,_) she must have thought
of her expressed intention when leaving home, and of the surprise
and suspicion aroused in the bosom of her affianced suitor, St.
Eustache, when, calling for her, at the hour appointed, in the
Rue des Drômes, he should find that she had not been there, and
when, moreover, upon returning to the pension with this alarming
intelligence, he should become aware of her continued absence
from home. She must have thought of these things, I say. She must
have foreseen the chagrin of St. Eustache, the suspicion of all.
She could not have thought of returning to brave this suspicion;
but the suspicion becomes a point of trivial importance to her,
if we suppose her not intending to return.
“We may imagine her thinking thus—‘I am to meet a certain person
for the purpose of elopement, or for certain other purposes known
only to myself. It is necessary that there be no chance of
interruption—there must be sufficient time given us to elude
pursuit—I will give it to be understood that I shall visit and
spend the day with my aunt at the Rue des Drômes—I will tell St.
Eustache not to call for me until dark—in this way, my absence
from home for the longest possible period, without causing
suspicion or anxiety, will be accounted for, and I shall gain
more time than in any other manner. If I bid St. Eustache call
for me at dark, he will be sure not to call before; but, if I
wholly neglect to bid him call, my time for escape will be
diminished, since it will be expected that I return the earlier,
and my absence will the sooner excite anxiety. Now, if it were my
design to return at all—if I had in contemplation merely a stroll
with the individual in question—it would not be my policy to bid
St. Eustache call; for, calling, he will be sure to ascertain
that I have played him false—a fact of which I might keep him for
ever in ignorance, by leaving home without notifying him of my
intention, by returning before dark, and by then stating that I
had been to visit my aunt in the Rue des Drômes. But, as it is my
design never to return—or not for some weeks—or not until certain
concealments are effected—the gaining of time is the only point
about which I need give myself any concern.’
“You have observed, in your notes, that the most general opinion
in relation to this sad affair is, and was from the first, that
the girl had been the victim of a gang of blackguards. Now, the
popular opinion, under certain conditions, is not to be
disregarded. When arising of itself—when manifesting itself in a
strictly spontaneous manner—we should look upon it as analogous
with that _intuition_ which is the idiosyncrasy of the individual
man of genius. In ninety-nine cases from the hundred I would
abide by its decision. But it is important that we find no
palpable traces of _suggestion_. The opinion must be rigorously
_the public’s own_; and the distinction is often exceedingly
difficult to perceive and to maintain. In the present instance,
it appears to me that this ‘public opinion’ in respect to a gang,
has been superinduced by the collateral event which is detailed
in the third of my extracts. All Paris is excited by the
discovered corpse of Marie, a girl young, beautiful and
notorious. This corpse is found, bearing marks of violence, and
floating in the river. But it is now made known that, at the very
period, or about the very period, in which it is supposed that
the girl was assassinated, an outrage similar in nature to that
endured by the deceased, although less in extent, was
perpetuated, by a gang of young ruffians, upon the person of a
second young female. Is it wonderful that the one known atrocity
should influence the popular judgment in regard to the other
unknown? This judgment awaited direction, and the known outrage
seemed so opportunely to afford it! Marie, too, was found in the
river; and upon this very river was this known outrage committed.
The connexion of the two events had about it so much of the
palpable, that the true wonder would have been a failure of the
populace to appreciate and to seize it. But, in fact, the one
atrocity, known to be so committed, is, if any thing, evidence
that the other, committed at a time nearly coincident, was not so
committed. It would have been a miracle indeed, if, while a gang
of ruffians were perpetrating, at a given locality, a most
unheard-of wrong, there should have been another similar gang, in
a similar locality, in the same city, under the same
circumstances, with the same means and appliances, engaged in a
wrong of precisely the same aspect, at precisely the same period
of time! Yet in what, if not in this marvellous train of
coincidence, does the accidentally suggested opinion of the
populace call upon us to believe?
“Before proceeding farther, let us consider the supposed scene of
the assassination, in the thicket at the Barrière du Roule. This
thicket, although dense, was in the close vicinity of a public
road. Within were three or four large stones, forming a kind of
seat with a back and footstool. On the upper stone was discovered
a white petticoat; on the second, a silk scarf. A parasol,
gloves, and a pocket-handkerchief, were also here found. The
handkerchief bore the name, ‘Marie Rogêt.’ Fragments of dress
were seen on the branches around. The earth was trampled, the
bushes were broken, and there was every evidence of a violent
struggle.
“Notwithstanding the acclamation with which the discovery of this
thicket was received by the press, and the unanimity with which
it was supposed to indicate the precise scene of the outrage, it
must be admitted that there was some very good reason for doubt.
That it was the scene, I may or I may not believe—but there was
excellent reason for doubt. Had the true scene been, as Le
Commerciel suggested, in the neighborhood of the Rue Pavée St.
Andrée, the perpetrators of the crime, supposing them still
resident in Paris, would naturally have been stricken with terror
at the public attention thus acutely directed into the proper
channel; and, in certain classes of minds, there would have
arisen, at once, a sense of the necessity of some exertion to
redivert this attention. And thus, the thicket of the Barrière du
Roule having been already suspected, the idea of placing the
articles where they were found, might have been naturally
entertained. There is no real evidence, although Le Soleil so
supposes, that the articles discovered had been more than a very
few days in the thicket; while there is much circumstantial proof
that they could not have remained there, without attracting
attention, during the twenty days elapsing between the fatal
Sunday and the afternoon upon which they were found by the boys.
‘They were all _mildewed_ down hard,’ says Le Soleil, adopting
the opinions of its predecessors, ‘with the action of the rain,
and stuck together from _mildew_. The grass had grown around and
over some of them. The silk of the parasol was strong, but the
threads of it were run together within. The upper part, where it
had been doubled and folded, was all _mildewed_ and rotten, and
tore on being opened.’ In respect to the grass having ‘grown
around and over some of them,’ it is obvious that the fact could
only have been ascertained from the words, and thus from the
recollections, of two small boys; for these boys removed the
articles and took them home before they had been seen by a third
party. But grass will grow, especially in warm and damp weather,
(such as was that of the period of the murder,) as much as two or
three inches in a single day. A parasol lying upon a newly turfed
ground, might, in a single week, be entirely concealed from sight
by the upspringing grass. And touching that mildew upon which the
editor of Le Soleil so pertinaciously insists, that he employs
the word no less than three times in the brief paragraph just
quoted, is he really unaware of the nature of this mildew? Is he
to be told that it is one of the many classes of fungus, of which
the most ordinary feature is its upspringing and decadence within
twenty-four hours?
“Thus we see, at a glance, that what has been most triumphantly
adduced in support of the idea that the articles had been ‘for at
least three or four weeks’ in the thicket, is most absurdly null
as regards any evidence of that fact. On the other hand, it is
exceedingly difficult to believe that these articles could have
remained in the thicket specified, for a longer period than a
single week—for a longer period than from one Sunday to the next.
Those who know any thing of the vicinity of Paris, know the
extreme difficulty of finding seclusion unless at a great
distance from its suburbs. Such a thing as an unexplored, or even
an unfrequently visited recess, amid its woods or groves, is not
for a moment to be imagined. Let any one who, being at heart a
lover of nature, is yet chained by duty to the dust and heat of
this great metropolis—let any such one attempt, even during the
weekdays, to slake his thirst for solitude amid the scenes of
natural loveliness which immediately surround us. At every second
step, he will find the growing charm dispelled by the voice and
personal intrusion of some ruffian or party of carousing
blackguards. He will seek privacy amid the densest foliage, all
in vain. Here are the very nooks where the unwashed most
abound—here are the temples most desecrate. With sickness of the
heart the wanderer will flee back to the polluted Paris as to a
less odious because less incongruous sink of pollution. But if
the vicinity of the city is so beset during the working days of
the week, how much more so on the Sabbath! It is now especially
that, released from the claims of labor, or deprived of the
customary opportunities of crime, the town blackguard seeks the
precincts of the town, not through love of the rural, which in
his heart he despises, but by way of escape from the restraints
and conventionalities of society. He desires less the fresh air
and the green trees, than the utter license of the country. Here,
at the road-side inn, or beneath the foliage of the woods, he
indulges, unchecked by any eye except those of his boon
companions, in all the mad excess of a counterfeit hilarity—the
joint offspring of liberty and of rum. I say nothing more than
what must be obvious to every dispassionate observer, when I
repeat that the circumstance of the articles in question having
remained undiscovered, for a longer period than from one Sunday
to another, in any thicket in the immediate neighborhood of
Paris, is to be looked upon as little less than miraculous.
“But there are not wanting other grounds for the suspicion that
the articles were placed in the thicket with the view of
diverting attention from the real scene of the outrage. And,
first, let me direct your notice to the date of the discovery of
the articles. Collate this with the date of the fifth extract
made by myself from the newspapers. You will find that the
discovery followed, almost immediately, the urgent communications
sent to the evening paper. These communications, although various
and apparently from various sources, tended all to the same
point—viz., the directing of attention to a gang as the
perpetrators of the outrage, and to the neighborhood of the
Barrière du Roule as its scene. Now here, of course, the
suspicion is not that, in consequence of these communications, or
of the public attention by them directed, the articles were found
by the boys; but the suspicion might and may well have been, that
the articles were not before found by the boys, for the reason
that the articles had not before been in the thicket; having been
deposited there only at so late a period as at the date, or
shortly prior to the date of the communication, by the guilty
authors of these communications themselves.
“This thicket was a singular—an exceedingly singular one. It was
unusually dense. Within its naturally walled enclosure were three
extraordinary stones, forming a seat with a back and footstool.
And this thicket, so full of a natural art, was in the immediate
vicinity, within a few rods, of the dwelling of Madame Deluc,
whose boys were in the habit of closely examining the shrubberies
about them in search of the bark of the sassafras. Would it be a
rash wager—a wager of one thousand to one—that a day never passed
over the heads of these boys without finding at least one of them
ensconced in the umbrageous hall, and enthroned upon its natural
throne? Those who would hesitate at such a wager, have either
never been boys themselves, or have forgotten the boyish nature.
I repeat—it is exceedingly hard to comprehend how the articles
could have remained in this thicket undiscovered, for a longer
period than one or two days; and that thus there is good ground
for suspicion, in spite of the dogmatic ignorance of Le Soleil,
that they were, at a comparatively late date, deposited where
found.
“But there are still other and stronger reasons for believing
them so deposited, than any which I have as yet urged. And, now,
let me beg your notice to the highly artificial arrangement of
the articles. On the _upper_ stone lay a white petticoat; on the
_second_, a silk scarf; scattered around, were a parasol, gloves,
and a pocket-handkerchief bearing the name, ‘Marie Rogêt.’ Here
is just such an arrangement as would naturally be made by a not
over-acute person wishing to dispose the articles naturally. But
it is by no means a really natural arrangement. I should rather
have looked to see the things all lying on the ground and
trampled under foot. In the narrow limits of that bower, it would
have been scarcely possible that the petticoat and scarf should
have retained a position upon the stones, when subjected to the
brushing to and fro of many struggling persons. ‘There was
evidence,’ it is said, ‘of a struggle; and the earth was
trampled, the bushes were broken,’—but the petticoat and the
scarf are found deposited as if upon shelves. ‘The pieces of the
frock torn out by the bushes were about three inches wide and six
inches long. One part was the hem of the frock and it had been
mended. They looked like strips torn off.’ Here, inadvertently,
Le Soleil has employed an exceedingly suspicious phrase. The
pieces, as described, do indeed ‘look like strips torn off;’ but
purposely and by hand. It is one of the rarest of accidents that
a piece is ‘torn off,’ from any garment such as is now in
question, by the agency of a thorn. From the very nature of such
fabrics, a thorn or nail becoming entangled in them, tears them
rectangularly—divides them into two longitudinal rents, at right
angles with each other, and meeting at an apex where the thorn
enters—but it is scarcely possible to conceive the piece ‘torn
off.’ I never so knew it, nor did you. To tear a piece off from
such fabric, two distinct forces, in different directions, will
be, in almost every case, required. If there be two edges to the
fabric—if, for example, it be a pocket-handkerchief, and it is
desired to tear from it a slip, then, and then only, will the one
force serve the purpose. But in the present case the question is
of a dress, presenting but one edge. To tear a piece from the
interior, where no edge is presented, could only be effected by a
miracle through the agency of thorns, and no one thorn could
accomplish it. But, even where an edge is presented, two thorns
will be necessary, operating, the one in two distinct directions,
and the other in one. And this in the supposition that the edge
is unhemmed. If hemmed, the matter is nearly out of the question.
We thus see the numerous and great obstacles in the way of pieces
being ‘torn off’ through the simple agency of ‘thorns;’ yet we
are required to believe not only that one piece but that many
have been so torn. ‘And one part,’ too, ‘was the hem of the
frock!’ Another piece was ‘part of the skirt, not the hem,’—that
is to say, was torn completely out through the agency of thorns,
from the uncaged interior of the dress! These, I say, are things
which one may well be pardoned for disbelieving; yet, taken
collectedly, they form, perhaps, less of reasonable ground for
suspicion, than the one startling circumstance of the articles’
having been left in this thicket at all, by any murderers who had
enough precaution to think of removing the corpse. You will not
have apprehended me rightly, however, if you suppose it my design
to deny this thicket as the scene of the outrage. There might
have been a wrong here, or, more possibly, an accident at Madame
Deluc’s. But, in fact, this is a point of minor importance. We
are not engaged in an attempt to discover the scene, but to
produce the perpetrators of the murder. What I have adduced,
notwithstanding the minuteness with which I have adduced it, has
been with the view, first, to show the folly of the positive and
headlong assertions of Le Soleil, but secondly and chiefly, to
bring you, by the most natural route, to a further contemplation
of the doubt whether this assassination has, or has not, been the
work of a gang.
“We will resume this question by mere allusion to the revolting
details of the surgeon examined at the inquest. It is only
necessary to say that his published inferences, in regard to the
number of ruffians, have been properly ridiculed as unjust and
totally baseless, by all the reputable anatomists of Paris. Not
that the matter might not have been as inferred, but that there
was no ground for the inference:—was there not much for another?
“Let us reflect now upon ‘the traces of a struggle;’ and let me
ask what these traces have been supposed to demonstrate. A gang.
But do they not rather demonstrate the absence of a gang? What
struggle could have taken place—what struggle so violent and so
enduring as to have left its ‘traces’ in all directions—between a
weak and defenceless girl and the gang of ruffians imagined? The
silent grasp of a few rough arms and all would have been over.
The victim must have been absolutely passive at their will. You
will here bear in mind that the arguments urged against the
thicket as the scene, are applicable in chief part, only against
it as the scene of an outrage committed by more than a single
individual. If we imagine but one violator, we can conceive, and
thus only conceive, the struggle of so violent and so obstinate a
nature as to have left the ‘traces’ apparent.
“And again. I have already mentioned the suspicion to be excited
by the fact that the articles in question were suffered to remain
at all in the thicket where discovered. It seems almost
impossible that these evidences of guilt should have been
accidentally left where found. There was sufficient presence of
mind (it is supposed) to remove the corpse; and yet a more
positive evidence than the corpse itself (whose features might
have been quickly obliterated by decay,) is allowed to lie
conspicuously in the scene of the outrage—I allude to the
handkerchief with the name of the deceased. If this was accident,
it was not the accident of a gang. We can imagine it only the
accident of an individual. Let us see. An individual has
committed the murder. He is alone with the ghost of the departed.
He is appalled by what lies motionless before him. The fury of
his passion is over, and there is abundant room in his heart for
the natural awe of the deed. His is none of that confidence which
the presence of numbers inevitably inspires. He is alone with the
dead. He trembles and is bewildered. Yet there is a necessity for
disposing of the corpse. He bears it to the river, but leaves
behind him the other evidences of guilt; for it is difficult, if
not impossible to carry all the burthen at once, and it will be
easy to return for what is left. But in his toilsome journey to
the water his fears redouble within him. The sounds of life
encompass his path. A dozen times he hears or fancies the step of
an observer. Even the very lights from the city bewilder him.
Yet, in time and by long and frequent pauses of deep agony, he
reaches the river’s brink, and disposes of his ghastly
charge—perhaps through the medium of a boat. But now what
treasure does the world hold—what threat of vengeance could it
hold out—which would have power to urge the return of that lonely
murderer over that toilsome and perilous path, to the thicket and
its blood chilling recollections? He returns not, let the
consequences be what they may. He could not return if he would.
His sole thought is immediate escape. He turns his back forever
upon those dreadful shrubberies and flees as from the wrath to
come.
“But how with a gang? Their number would have inspired them with
confidence; if, indeed confidence is ever wanting in the breast
of the arrant blackguard; and of arrant blackguards alone are the
supposed gangs ever constituted. Their number, I say, would have
prevented the bewildering and unreasoning terror which I have
imagined to paralyze the single man. Could we suppose an
oversight in one, or two, or three, this oversight would have
been remedied by a fourth. They would have left nothing behind
them; for their number would have enabled them to carry all at
once. There would have been no need of return.
“Consider now the circumstance that in the outer garment of the
corpse when found, ‘a slip, about a foot wide had been torn
upward from the bottom hem to the waist wound three times round
the waist, and secured by a sort of hitch in the back.’ This was
done with the obvious design of affording a handle by which to
carry the body. But would any number of men have dreamed of
resorting to such an expedient? To three or four, the limbs of
the corpse would have afforded not only a sufficient, but the
best possible hold. The device is that of a single individual;
and this brings us to the fact that ‘between the thicket and the
river, the rails of the fences were found taken down, and the
ground bore evident traces of some heavy burden having been
dragged along it!’ But would a number of men have put themselves
to the superfluous trouble of taking down a fence, for the
purpose of dragging through it a corpse which they might have
lifted over any fence in an instant? Would a number of men have
so dragged a corpse at all as to have left evident traces of the
dragging?
“And here we must refer to an observation of Le Commerciel; an
observation upon which I have already, in some measure,
commented. ‘A piece,’ says this journal, ‘of one of the
unfortunate girl’s petticoats was torn out and tied under her
chin, and around the back of her head, probably to prevent
screams. This was done by fellows who had no
pocket-handkerchiefs.’
“I have before suggested that a genuine blackguard is never
without a pocket-handkerchief. But it is not to this fact that I
now especially advert. That it was not through want of a
handkerchief for the purpose imagined by Le Commerciel, that this
bandage was employed, is rendered apparent by the handkerchief
left in the thicket; and that the object was not ‘to prevent
screams’ appears, also, from the bandage having been employed in
preference to what would so much better have answered the
purpose. But the language of the evidence speaks of the strip in
question as ‘found around the neck, fitting loosely, and secured
with a hard knot.’ These words are sufficiently vague, but differ
materially from those of Le Commerciel. The slip was eighteen
inches wide, and therefore, although of muslin, would form a
strong band when folded or rumpled longitudinally. And thus
rumpled it was discovered. My inference is this. The solitary
murderer, having borne the corpse, for some distance (whether
from the thicket or elsewhere) by means of the bandage hitched
around its middle, found the weight, in this mode of procedure,
too much for his strength. He resolved to drag the burthen—the
evidence goes to show that it was dragged. With this object in
view, it became necessary to attach something like a rope to one
of the extremities. It could be best attached about the neck,
where the head would prevent its slipping off. And, now, the
murderer bethought him, unquestionably, of the bandage about the
loins. He would have used this, but for its volution about the
corpse, the hitch which embarrassed it, and the reflection that
it had not been ‘torn off’ from the garment. It was easier to
tear a new slip from the petticoat. He tore it, made it fast
about the neck, and so dragged his victim to the brink of the
river. That this ‘bandage,’ only attainable with trouble and
delay, and but imperfectly answering its purpose—that this
bandage was employed at all, demonstrates that the necessity for
its employment sprang from circumstances arising at a period when
the handkerchief was no longer attainable—that is to say,
arising, as we have imagined, after quitting the thicket, (if the
thicket it was), and on the road between the thicket and the
river.
“But the evidence, you will say, of Madame Deluc (!) points
especially to the presence of a gang, in the vicinity of the
thicket, at or about the epoch of the murder. This I grant. I
doubt if there were not a dozen gangs, such as described by
Madame Deluc, in and about the vicinity of the Barrière du Roule
at or about the period of this tragedy. But the gang which has
drawn upon itself the pointed animadversion, although the
somewhat tardy and very suspicious evidence of Madame Deluc, is
the only gang which is represented by that honest and scrupulous
old lady as having eaten her cakes and swallowed her brandy,
without putting themselves to the trouble of making her payment.
Et hinc illæ iræ?
“But what is the precise evidence of Madame Deluc? ‘A gang of
miscreants made their appearance, behaved boisterously, ate and
drank without making payment, followed in the route of the young
man and girl, returned to the inn about dusk, and recrossed the
river as if in great haste.’
“Now this ‘great haste’ very possibly seemed greater haste in the
eyes of Madame Deluc, since she dwelt lingeringly and lamentingly
upon her violated cakes and ale—cakes and ale for which she might
still have entertained a faint hope of compensation. Why,
otherwise, since it was about dusk, should she make a point of
the haste? It is no cause for wonder, surely, that even a gang of
blackguards should make haste to get home, when a wide river is
to be crossed in small boats, when storm impends, and when night
approaches.
“I say approaches; for the night had not yet arrived. It was only
about dusk that the indecent haste of these ‘miscreants’ offended
the sober eyes of Madame Deluc. But we are told that it was upon
this very evening that Madame Deluc, as well as her eldest son,
‘heard the screams of a female in the vicinity of the inn.’ And
in what words does Madame Deluc designate the period of the
evening at which these screams were heard? ‘It was soon after
dark,’ she says. But ‘soon after dark,’ is, at least, dark; and
‘about dusk’ is as certainly daylight. Thus it is abundantly
clear that the gang quitted the Barrière du Roule prior to the
screams overheard (?) by Madame Deluc. And although, in all the
many reports of the evidence, the relative expressions in
question are distinctly and invariably employed just as I have
employed them in this conversation with yourself, no notice
whatever of the gross discrepancy has, as yet, been taken by any
of the public journals, or by any of the myrmidons of police.
“I shall add but one to the arguments against a gang; but this
one has, to my own understanding at least, a weight altogether
irresistible. Under the circumstances of large reward offered,
and full pardon to any king’s evidence, it is not to be imagined,
for a moment, that some member of a gang of low ruffians, or of
any body of men, would not long ago have betrayed his
accomplices. Each one of a gang so placed, is not so much greedy
of reward, or anxious for escape, as fearful of betrayal. He
betrays eagerly and early that he may not himself be betrayed.
That the secret has not been divulged, is the very best of proof
that it is, in fact, a secret. The horrors of this dark deed are
known only to one, or two, living human beings, and to God.
“Let us sum up now the meagre yet certain fruits of our long
analysis. We have attained the idea either of a fatal accident
under the roof of Madame Deluc, or of a murder perpetrated, in
the thicket at the Barrière du Roule, by a lover, or at least by
an intimate and secret associate of the deceased. This associate
is of swarthy complexion. This complexion, the ‘hitch’ in the
bandage, and the ‘sailor’s knot,’ with which the bonnet-ribbon is
tied, point to a seaman. His companionship with the deceased, a
gay, but not an abject young girl, designates him as above the
grade of the common sailor. Here the well written and urgent
communications to the journals are much in the way of
corroboration. The circumstance of the first elopement, as
mentioned by Le Mercurie, tends to blend the idea of this seaman
with that of the ‘naval officer’ who is first known to have led
the unfortunate into crime.
“And here, most fitly, comes the consideration of the continued
absence of him of the dark complexion. Let me pause to observe
that the complexion of this man is dark and swarthy; it was no
common swarthiness which constituted the sole point of
remembrance, both as regards Valence and Madame Deluc. But why is
this man absent? Was he murdered by the gang? If so, why are
there only traces of the assassinated girl? The scene of the two
outrages will naturally be supposed identical. And where is his
corpse? The assassins would most probably have disposed of both
in the same way. But it may be said that this man lives, and is
deterred from making himself known, through dread of being
charged with the murder. This consideration might be supposed to
operate upon him now—at this late period—since it has been given
in evidence that he was seen with Marie—but it would have had no
force at the period of the deed. The first impulse of an innocent
man would have been to announce the outrage, and to aid in
identifying the ruffians. This policy would have suggested. He
had been seen with the girl. He had crossed the river with her in
an open ferry-boat. The denouncing of the assassins would have
appeared, even to an idiot, the surest and sole means of
relieving himself from suspicion. We cannot suppose him, on the
night of the fatal Sunday, both innocent himself and incognizant
of an outrage committed. Yet only under such circumstances is it
possible to imagine that he would have failed, if alive, in the
denouncement of the assassins.
“And what means are ours, of attaining the truth? We shall find
these means multiplying and gathering distinctness as we proceed.
Let us sift to the bottom this affair of the first elopement. Let
us know the full history of ‘the officer,’ with his present
circumstances, and his whereabouts at the precise period of the
murder. Let us carefully compare with each other the various
communications sent to the evening paper, in which the object was
to inculpate a gang. This done, let us compare these
communications, both as regards style and MS., with those sent to
the morning paper, at a previous period, and insisting so
vehemently upon the guilt of Mennais. And, all this done, let us
again compare these various communications with the known MSS. of
the officer. Let us endeavor to ascertain, by repeated
questionings of Madame Deluc and her boys, as well as of the
omnibus driver, Valence, something more of the personal
appearance and bearing of the ‘man of dark complexion.’ Queries,
skilfully directed, will not fail to elicit, from some of these
parties, information on this particular point (or upon
others)—information which the parties themselves may not even be
aware of possessing. And let us now trace the boat picked up by
the bargeman on the morning of Monday the twenty-third of June,
and which was removed from the barge-office, without the
cognizance of the officer in attendance, and without the rudder,
at some period prior to the discovery of the corpse. With a
proper caution and perseverance we shall infallibly trace this
boat; for not only can the bargeman who picked it up identify it,
but the rudder is at hand. The rudder of a sail-boat would not
have been abandoned, without inquiry, by one altogether at ease
in heart. And here let me pause to insinuate a question. There
was no advertisement of the picking up of this boat. It was
silently taken to the barge-office, and as silently removed. But
its owner or employer—how happened he, at so early a period as
Tuesday morning, to be informed, without the agency of
advertisement, of the locality of the boat taken up on Monday,
unless we imagine some connexion with the navy—some personal
permanent connexion leading to cognizance of its minute in
interests—its petty local news?
“In speaking of the lonely assassin dragging his burden to the
shore, I have already suggested the probability of his availing
himself of a boat. Now we are to understand that Marie Rogêt was
precipitated from a boat. This would naturally have been the
case. The corpse could not have been trusted to the shallow
waters of the shore. The peculiar marks on the back and shoulders
of the victim tell of the bottom ribs of a boat. That the body
was found without weight is also corroborative of the idea. If
thrown from the shore a weight would have been attached. We can
only account for its absence by supposing the murderer to have
neglected the precaution of supplying himself with it before
pushing off. In the act of consigning the corpse to the water, he
would unquestionably have noticed his oversight; but then no
remedy would have been at hand. Any risk would have been
preferred to a return to that accursed shore. Having rid himself
of his ghastly charge, the murderer would have hastened to the
city. There, at some obscure wharf, he would have leaped on land.
But the boat—would he have secured it? He would have been in too
great haste for such things as securing a boat. Moreover, in
fastening it to the wharf, he would have felt as if securing
evidence against himself. His natural thought would have been to
cast from him, as far as possible, all that had held connection
with his crime. He would not only have fled from the wharf, but
he would not have permitted the boat to remain. Assuredly he
would have cast it adrift. Let us pursue our fancies.—In the
morning, the wretch is stricken with unutterable horror at
finding that the boat has been picked up and detained at a
locality which he is in the daily habit of frequenting —at a
locality, perhaps, which his duty compels him to frequent. The
next night, without daring to ask for the rudder, he removes it.
Now where is that rudderless boat? Let it be one of our first
purposes to discover. With the first glimpse we obtain of it, the
dawn of our success shall begin. This boat shall guide us, with a
rapidity which will surprise even ourselves, to him who employed
it in the midnight of the fatal Sabbath. Corroboration will rise
upon corroboration, and the murderer will be traced.”
[For reasons which we shall not specify, but which to many
readers will appear obvious, we have taken the liberty of here
omitting, from the MSS. placed in our hands, such portion as
details the following up of the apparently slight clew obtained
by Dupin. We feel it advisable only to state, in brief, that the
result desired was brought to pass; and that the Prefect
fulfilled punctually, although with reluctance, the terms of his
compact with the Chevalier. Mr. Poe’s article concludes with the
following words.—Eds. (*23)]
It will be understood that I speak of coincidences and no more.
What I have said above upon this topic must suffice. In my own
heart there dwells no faith in præter-nature. That Nature and its
God are two, no man who thinks, will deny. That the latter,
creating the former, can, at will, control or modify it, is also
unquestionable. I say “at will;” for the question is of will, and
not, as the insanity of logic has assumed, of power. It is not
that the Deity cannot modify his laws, but that we insult him in
imagining a possible necessity for modification. In their origin
these laws were fashioned to embrace all contingencies which
could lie in the Future. With God all is Now.
I repeat, then, that I speak of these things only as of
coincidences. And farther: in what I relate it will be seen that
between the fate of the unhappy Mary Cecilia Rogers, so far as
that fate is known, and the fate of one Marie Rogêt up to a
certain epoch in her history, there has existed a parallel in the
contemplation of whose wonderful exactitude the reason becomes
embarrassed. I say all this will be seen. But let it not for a
moment be supposed that, in proceeding with the sad narrative of
Marie from the epoch just mentioned, and in tracing to its
dénouement the mystery which enshrouded her, it is my covert
design to hint at an extension of the parallel, or even to
suggest that the measures adopted in Paris for the discovery of
the assassin of a grisette, or measures founded in any similar
ratiocination, would produce any similar result.
For, in respect to the latter branch of the supposition, it
should be considered that the most trifling variation in the
facts of the two cases might give rise to the most important
miscalculations, by diverting thoroughly the two courses of
events; very much as, in arithmetic, an error which, in its own
individuality, may be inappreciable, produces, at length, by dint
of multiplication at all points of the process, a result
enormously at variance with truth. And, in regard to the former
branch, we must not fail to hold in view that the very Calculus
of Probabilities to which I have referred, forbids all idea of
the extension of the parallel—forbids it with a positiveness
strong and decided just in proportion as this parallel has
already been long-drawn and exact. This is one of those anomalous
propositions which, seemingly appealing to thought altogether
apart from the mathematical, is yet one which only the
mathematician can fully entertain. Nothing, for example, is more
difficult than to convince the merely general reader that the
fact of sixes having been thrown twice in succession by a player
at dice, is sufficient cause for betting the largest odds that
sixes will not be thrown in the third attempt. A suggestion to
this effect is usually rejected by the intellect at once. It does
not appear that the two throws which have been completed, and
which lie now absolutely in the Past, can have influence upon the
throw which exists only in the Future. The chance for throwing
sixes seems to be precisely as it was at any ordinary time—that
is to say, subject only to the influence of the various other
throws which may be made by the dice. And this is a reflection
which appears so exceedingly obvious that attempts to controvert
it are received more frequently with a derisive smile than with
anything like respectful attention. The error here involved—a
gross error redolent of mischief—I cannot pretend to expose
within the limits assigned me at present; and with the
philosophical it needs no exposure. It may be sufficient here to
say that it forms one of an infinite series of mistakes which
arise in the path of Reason through her propensity for seeking
truth in detail.
FOOTNOTES—Marie Rogêt
(*1) Upon the original publication of “Marie Roget,” the
foot-notes now appended were considered unnecessary; but the
lapse of several years since the tragedy upon which the tale is
based, renders it expedient to give them, and also to say a few
words in explanation of the general design. A young girl, Mary
Cecilia Rogers, was murdered in the vicinity of New York; and,
although her death occasioned an intense and long-enduring
excitement, the mystery attending it had remained unsolved at the
period when the present paper was written and published
(November, 1842). Herein, under pretence of relating the fate of
a Parisian grisette, the author has followed in minute detail,
the essential, while merely paralleling the inessential facts of
the real murder of Mary Rogers. Thus all argument founded upon
the fiction is applicable to the truth: and the investigation of
the truth was the object. The “Mystery of Marie Roget” was
composed at a distance from the scene of the atrocity, and with
no other means of investigation than the newspapers afforded.
Thus much escaped the writer of which he could have availed
himself had he been upon the spot, and visited the localities. It
may not be improper to record, nevertheless, that the confessions
of two persons, (one of them the Madame Deluc of the narrative)
made, at different periods, long subsequent to the publication,
confirmed, in full, not only the general conclusion, but
absolutely all the chief hypothetical details by which that
conclusion was attained.
(*2) The nom de plume of Von Hardenburg.
(*3) Nassau Street.
(*4) Anderson.
(*5) The Hudson.
(*6) Weehawken.
(*7) Payne.
(*8) Crommelin.
(*9) The New York “Mercury.”
(*10) The New York “Brother Jonathan,” edited by H. Hastings
Weld, Esq.
(*11) New York “Journal of Commerce.”
(*12) Philadelphia “Saturday Evening Post,” edited by C. I.
Peterson, Esq.
(*13) Adam
(*14) See “Murders in the Rue Morgue.”
(*15) The New York “Commercial Advertiser,” edited by Col. Stone.
(*16) “A theory based on the qualities of an object, will prevent
its being unfolded according to its objects; and he who arranges
topics in reference to their causes, will cease to value them
according to their results. Thus the jurisprudence of every
nation will show that, when law becomes a science and a system,
it ceases to be justice. The errors into which a blind devotion
to principles of classification has led the common law, will be
seen by observing how often the legislature has been obliged to
come forward to restore the equity its scheme had lost.”—Landor.
(*17) New York “Express”
(*18) New York “Herald.”
(*19) New York “Courier and Inquirer.”
(*20) Mennais was one of the parties originally suspected and
arrested, but discharged through total lack of evidence.
(*21) New York “Courier and Inquirer.”
(*22) New York “Evening Post.”
(*23) Of the Magazine in which the article was originally
published.