CHAPTER IX
THE DISAPPEARANCE OF MADAME VATROTSKI
I firmly believe the contessa had succeeded in fluttering the professor's heart, and I think it was fortunate that he was soon engaged upon another case. The fact that it was also connected with theatrical people may have made him go into it with more zest. The contessa had given him a taste for the theater.
The three of us were in the empty room, and after a lot of talk which had led nowhere, had been silent for some time.
"I never believe in any one's death until I have seen the body, or until some one I can thoroughly trust has seen it," said Quarles, suddenly breaking the silence.
"You have said something like that before," I answered.
"It still remains true, Wigan."
"Then you think she is alive?" Is it the advertisement theory you cling to, or do you suppose she is a Nihilist?"
"I suppose nothing, and I never cling; all I know is that I have no proof of death," said the professor, and he launched into a discourse concerning the difficulties of concealing a body, chiefly, I thought, to hide the fact that he had no ideas at all about the strange case of Madame Vatrotski.
The rage for the tango, the sensational revue, for the Russian ballet, was at its height when Madame Vatrotski's name first appeared on the hoardings in foot-long letters.
The management of the Olympic billed her extensively as a very paragon of marvels, but most of the critics refused to endorse this opinion. Perhaps they were anxious to do a good turn to the home artistes who had been rather thrust aside by the foreign invasion of the boards of the variety theaters; at any rate, they declared her dancing was a mere pose, not always in the best of taste, and that her beauty was nothing to rave about.
I had not seen this much-advertised dancer, but the Olympic management could have had no reason to regret the expense they had gone to. Whether her dancing was good or bad, whether her beauty was real or imaginary, the great theater was full to overflowing night after night; her picture, in various postures, was in all the illustrated papers, and paragraphs concerning her were plentiful.
From beginning to end actual facts about her were difficult to get; but allowing for all journalistic exaggeration, the following statement is near the truth.
She was an eccentric rather than a beautiful dancer, and if she was not actually a beautiful woman there was something irresistibly attractive about her. Her origin was obscure, possibly she was not a Russian, and if she had any right to the title of madame, no husband was in evidence. She was quite young; upon the surface she was a child bent on getting out of life all life had to give, and underneath the surface she was perhaps a cold, calculating woman, with no other aim but her own gratification, utterly callous of the sorrow and ruin she might bring to others.
All other statements concerning her must at least be considered doubtful. Her friends may have been too generous, her enemies unnecessarily bitter. Personally I do not believe she was in any way connected with one of the royal houses of Europe, as rumor said, nor that she was the morganatic wife of an Austrian archduke.
I have said that I had never seen her. I may add that I was not in the least interested in her.
Even when I read the headline in the paper, "Mysterious disappearance of Madame Vatrotski," I remained unmoved; indeed, I had to think for a moment who Madame Vatrotski was, and when the paragraph concluded that the disappearance was probably a smart advertisement I thought no more about the matter.
Before the end of the week, however, I was obliged to think a great deal about this woman. It was a tribute to the dancer's popularity that her disappearance caused widespread interest not only in London, but in the provinces, and it speedily became evident that her friends were legion.
She had dined, or had had supper, at various times, with a score of well-known men; she had received presents and offers of marriage from them; she had certainly had two chances of becoming a peeress, she might have become the wife of a millionaire, and half a dozen younger sons had kept their families on tenter-hooks.
It was said the poet laureate had dedicated an ode to her—that Lovet Forbes, the sculptor, was immortalizing her in stone, and Musgrave had certainly painted her portrait.
From all sides there was a loud demand that the mystery must be cleared up, and the investigation was entrusted to me.
From the outset it was apparent that Madame Vatrotski had played fast and loose with her many admirers. She had not definitely refused either of the coronets offered her, nor the millions. I say her behavior was apparent, but I ought to say it was apparent to me, because many of those who knew her personally would not believe a word against her.
This was the case with Sir Charles Woodbridge, a very level-headed man as a rule, and also with Paul Renaud, the proprietor of the great dress emporium in Regent Street, an astute individual, not easily deceived by either man or woman.
Both these men were pleased to believe themselves the serious item in Madame Vatrotski's life, and Sir Charles in hot-headed fashion, and Renaud, in cold contempt, told me very plainly what they thought of me when I suggested that the lady might not be so innocently transparent as she seemed.
Up to a certain point it was comparatively easy to follow Madame's movements. After the performance on Monday evening she had gone to supper with Sir Charles at a smart restaurant, and many people had seen her there. His car had taken her back to her rooms, and he had arranged to fetch her next morning at half-past eleven and drive her down to Maidenhead for lunch.
When Sir Charles arrived at her rooms next morning he was told she had gone out and had left no message. He was annoyed, but he had to admit it was not the first time she had broken an appointment with him.
It transpired that she had gone out that morning soon after ten, and half-an-hour afterwards was at Reno's. Paul Renaud did not see her there and had no appointment with her.
She made some trivial purchases—a veil, some lace and gloves, which were sent to her rooms later in the day, and she left the shop about eleven. The door-porter was able to fix the time, and was quite sure the lady was Madame Vatrotski. She would not have a taxi, and walked away in the direction of Piccadilly Circus. Since then she had disappeared altogether.
A taxi-driver came forward to say he believed he had taken her to a restaurant in Soho, but after inquiry I came to the conclusion that the driver was mistaken.
She sent no message to the theater that night, she simply did not turn up. To appease the audience it was announced that she was suffering from sudden indisposition; but, as a fact, the management did not know what had become of her, and the maid at her rooms confessed absolute ignorance concerning her mistress's whereabouts. I have no doubt the maid would have lied to protect Madame, but on this occasion I think she was telling the truth.
It was after I had told Quarles the result of my inquiries, and we had argued ourselves into silence, that he burst out with his remark about the body, and of course what he said was true enough. Still, I was inclined to think that Madame Vatrotski was dead. I did not believe she had disappeared as an advertisement: there was no earthly reason why she should, since her popularity had shown no signs of being on the wane, and to attribute the mystery to a Nihilist plot was not a solution which appealed to me.
"She may have returned to her rooms and met Sir Charles," Zena suggested, after a pause. "Perhaps she found him waiting in his car at the door and went off at once."
"Why do you make such a suggestion?" asked Quarles.
"She had plenty of time to keep the appointment; indeed, it almost looks as if she had arranged her morning on purpose to keep it. If she had gone with him at once her maid would not know she had returned."
Quarles looked at me.
"The same idea occurred to Paul Renaud," I said. "I can find no evidence that Sir Charles went to Maidenhead that day, and at three o'clock in the afternoon he was certainly at his club."
"Did he telephone to madame or attempt to communicate with her in any way?" Quarles asked.
"He says not."
"But you do not altogether believe him, eh?"
"My opinion is in abeyance," I returned. "It is only fair to say that Sir Charles suggested that Paul Renaud may have seen her at the shop in Regent Street. They are suspicious of each other. Renaud was certainly on the premises at the time she was there. Personally I do not attribute much weight to these suspicions. I believe both men are genuine lovers, and would be the last persons in the world to do the dancer any harm."
"Or the first," said Zena quickly. "Jealousy is a most usual motive for crime."
"I think the child strikes a true note there, Wigan," said Quarles. "We must keep the idea of jealousy before us—that is, if we are compelled to believe there has been foul play. Now, one would have expected Sir Charles to telephone to madame; that he did not do so is strange."
"His disappointment had put him in a temper."
"That hardly appeals to me as a satisfactory explanation," Quarles returned; "but there is indirect evidence in Sir Charles's favor. Had Madame Vatrotski intended to return to her rooms at once she would almost certainly have taken such a small parcel as her purchases made with her. That she did not do so suggests she had another appointment to keep. Have you a list of madame's admirers, Wigan?"
"I am only human, professor, and you ask for the impossible," I said, smiling. "I have a few names here, and I think they may be dismissed from our calculations. One of the strangest points in the case is the lack of reticence amongst her dupes."
"Dupes!" said Zena.
"I think the term is justified," I went on. "They all seem quite proud of having been allowed to pay for sumptuous dinners and expensive presents. Usually one expects a shrinking from publicity in these affairs, but in this case there is nothing of the kind. I have never seen Madame Vatrotski, but she must have had a peculiar fascination."
"I have not seen her either," said Quarles; "but I was at the Academy yesterday, and saw Musgrave's portrait of her. Go and see it, Wigan. I consider Musgrave the greatest portrait painter we have, or ever have had, perhaps. His opinion of the dancer might be useful. Judging from his canvases he must have a strange insight into character."
My opinion of pictures is worth nothing, and, to speak truthfully, I saw little remarkable in Musgrave's portrait of Madame Vatrotski. The mystery had caused a large number of people to linger round the portrait, and so far as I could gather the general impression was that it did not do her justice. Some even called it a caricature.
"You never can tell what a woman is really like across the footlights," I overheard one man say to his companion.
"Perhaps not," was the answer; "but I have seen her out of the theater. I dropped in at Forbes's studio the other day. He was finishing a bust of her, and she was giving him a sitting. It is a jolly good bust, but the woman—"
"Is she pretty?" asked the other.
"Upon my word, I don't know; what I do know is that I wanted to look at her all the time, and when she had gone life seemed to have left the studio."
I did not know the speaker, but I did not lose sight of him until I had tracked him to a club in Piccadilly and discovered that his name was Tenfield, and that he was a partner in a firm of art dealers in Bond Street.
When I repeated this conversation to Quarles he wondered why I had taken so much trouble over the art dealer.
"Looking for a clue," I answered.
Quarles shrugged his shoulders.
"What did you think of the portrait?"
"Frankly, not much."
"But you got an impression of Madame Vatrotski's character."
"I cannot say I got any great enlightenment. It made me wonder why she had made such a great reputation."
"The fact that it made you wonder at all shows there is something in the portrait," said Quarles. "Let us argue indirectly from the picture. You will agree that the lady was fascinating, since she had so many admirers, but in the portrait you discern nothing to account for that fascination. We may conclude that the painter saw the real woman underneath the superficial charm. She could not hide herself from him as she did from others. Now in that portrait I see rather a commonplace woman, essentially bourgeoise and vulgar, not naturally artistic. I can imagine her the wife of a small shopkeeper, or a girl given to cheap finery on holidays. I think she would be capable of any meanness to obtain that finery. Her face shows a decided lack of talent, but it also shows tremendous greed. The critics have said that her dancing was a pose and not in good taste."
I nodded.
"They are practically unanimous on this point. It was beyond her to appeal to the artistic sense, so she appealed to the lower nature, and therein lay her fascination. Just consider who the men are to whom she appealed. A millionaire with an unsavory reputation. To two or three peers who, even by the wildest stretch of imagination, cannot be considered ornaments of their order. To some younger sons of the Nut description who are ready to pay anything to be seen with a popular actress, and to the kind of fools who are always ready to offer marriage to a divorcee, or to a husband murderer when she comes out of prison. She appeals to a man like Paul Renaud, whose outlook upon life is disgusting, and who would not be able to keep a decent girl on his premises were it not for the fact that the whole management of the business is in the hands of his two partners. Sir Charles Woodbridge I do not understand. He is a decent man. I could easily imagine his killing her in a revulsion of feeling after being momentarily fascinated. Honestly, I have wondered whether this may not be the solution of the case."
"You are suspicious of Sir Charles?" I asked.
"I do not give that as my definite opinion. She may not be dead. Perchance some particularly mean exploit has made her afraid and she has gone into hiding; but if she is dead, I think we must look for her murderer—I had almost said her executioner—amongst the decent men who have been caught for a while in her toils."
"The only decent man seems to be Sir Charles," said Zena.
"And I am convinced he was genuinely in love with her," I said.
"Well, we are at a dead end," said Quarles. "I think I should go and see
Musgrave and ask his opinion of her. It may help us."
I went simply because there was nothing else to do, and I felt that I must; be doing something. The authorities seemed to think that I was making a great muddle over a very ordinary affair, possibly because rather contemptuous comments in the press had annoyed them, while the letters from amateur detectives had been more abundant than usual. Oh, those amateur detectives!
I found Musgrave quite willing to talk about Madame Vatrotski, and before I had been with him ten minutes I discovered that his opinion of her very nearly coincided with Quarles's.
He put it differently, but it came to the same thing.
"To tell you the truth, she rather appealed to me when I first saw her," he said. "It was at an artists' affair in Chelsea. She came there with a man named Renaud, who has a big shop in Regent Street, and had spent money on her, I imagine. She was interesting because she was something new in the way of vulgarity. It was for this man Renaud that I did the portrait, but when it was finished he repudiated the bargain. He said it wasn't a bit like her. You see, I was not looking at her with his eyes"
"Had she no beauty, then?"
"I cannot say that," Musgrave answered. "She had a beautiful figure, and her face—well, I painted it as I saw it. Renaud said it wasn't in the least like her, and I am bound to admit that most of the people who knew her and have seen the portrait in the Academy agree with him."
"You claim that you show her character, I suppose?"
"No; I merely say I painted what I saw."
"Can you account for the fascination she exerted?" I asked.
"I answer that question by asking you another. Can you account for the fascination which sin exerts over a vast number of people in the world? See sin as it really is, and it repels you; but sin seldom lets you see the reality, that is why it is so successful. A man requires grace to see sin as it really is, and that is his salvation. I was in a detached position when I painted Madame Vatrotski's portrait, and you have seen the result; had I been under her spell the result would undoubtedly have been different. I should have painted only the mask of the moment, and that would have satisfied her admirers, I imagine. I suppose you know that my ideas of the true functions of art have caused many people to call me a crank?"
"I know little of the artistic world," I answered; "but any man who takes himself seriously always appeals to me."
Musgrave smiled. I fancy he was about to favor me with his ideas, but concluded I was not worth the trouble. I had not got much out of my visit beyond the knowledge that Quarles was not alone in his estimate of Madame Vatrotski.
The professor's opinion combined with the artist's influenced me, and gave me a kind of rough theory. A man might be fascinated, then repelled, the repulsion being far stronger than the attraction.
To make this possible the man must normally be decent, and because Sir Charles Woodbridge seemed the only person who fitted all the conditions I gave his movements a considerable amount of my attention during the next few days. He had certainly been amongst the most assiduous of her admirers, and I discovered that he had put a private detective on to the business who was chiefly concerned in shadowing Paul Renaud.
Sir Charles was evidently convinced that Renaud was at the bottom of the mystery.
Nearly a month went by, and, except to those chiefly concerned, interest in the dancer's disappearance was fading out, when it was suddenly revived by the notice of a picture exhibition in Bond Street, at the gallery belonging to the firm in which Tenfield was a partner.
The pictures were the work of French artists of the cubist school, but also on view was a portrait bust of Madame Vatrotski by Lovet Forbes. It was evidently the bust I had overheard Tenfield speak about that day in the Academy, and I discovered that his firm had bought it as a speculation.
Lovet Forbes had been only a vague name until a few days ago, when a symbolic group of his had been placed in the entrance hall of the Agricultural Institution, and had at once attracted attention. The critics spoke of him as a new force in art, and a bust of the famous dancer by him was therefore, under the circumstances, an event.
"People will go to see it who wouldn't cross the road to look at a cubist's picture," said Quarles. "It is for sale, no doubt, and the dealers may clear a very nice little profit over it. Not a bad speculation, I should say; I wonder how much they paid the artist. We will go and have a look at it, Wigan."
The three of us went on the opening day. Zena in a dress I had not seen before, which suited her to perfection. She was much more interesting to me than Forbes's bust of Madame Vatrotski.
Quarles was right in his prophecy; the gallery was full, and the cubists were not the attraction. Sir Charles was there, so was Renaud, and many others whose names had been mentioned more or less prominently in this case, including the managing director of the Olympic; and before I got a view of the bust I heard whispers of the prices which had been offered for it; rather fabulous prices they were.
"But she is perfectly beautiful!" Zena exclaimed, when at last we stood before the bust.
She was right, and there was evidently something wrong somewhere. The difference between Musgrave's picture and Forbes's marble was tremendous, and yet they were unmistakably the same woman.
Where the essential likeness was I cannot say, nor can I explain where the difference lay, but the marble was charming, while the painting was horrible.
"Rather a surprise, eh, Wigan?" said the professor.
"Very much so."
"I hear Forbes is about somewhere. I should like to see him. He is one of the lucky ones; this mystery has helped him to fame."
"But his work is good, isn't it?"
"Yes; slightly meretricious, perhaps. I shall want to see more of his work before I express a definite opinion. I think we must go and see what he has done for the Agricultural Institute."
We not only saw Forbes, but had a talk with him. He was a man well on in the forties, carelessly dressed, a Bohemian, and not particularly elated at his success apparently. He smiled at the prices which were being offered for his work.
"It is the dancer they are paying for, not my genius," he said. "She seems to have fooled men in life; she is fooling them in death, if she is dead."
"Ah, that is the question," said Quarles. "I have my doubts."
"She is safer dead, at any rate, if only half they say of her is true,"
Forbes returned.
"How came she to sit for you?" I asked.
"Vanity. I was introduced to her one night at an Artists' Ball—the Albert Hall affair, you know—and I told her she had the figure of a Venus. I was consciously playing on her vanity for a purpose. In the thing I have done for the Agricultural Institute there is a recumbent figure, and I wanted the perfect model for it. The right woman is more difficult to get than you would imagine. Of course she agreed with me as to the perfectness of her figure, and then I began to doubt it. That settled the business. She fell into my trap and agreed to be the model."
"Posing in the nude?" I asked.
"Oh, that did not trouble her at all," answered Forbes. "I shouldn't be surprised if she had been a model in Paris studios before she blossomed out as a dancer. She spoke Russian, but I am inclined to think France had the honor of giving her birth. In return for her complaisance I promised to do a portrait bust of her for herself. That is it. If she is alive and comes to claim it I shall have to do her another one."
"She was evidently a very beautiful woman," said Quarles, glancing in the direction of the bust.
"Beautiful and bad, I fancy. Curiously enough, I did not hear of her disappearance until I telephoned to her flat two days after it had happened. She had broken an appointment to give me a final sitting, and I wanted to know why she hadn't come."
"Was the final sitting for the Agricultural group?" Quarles asked.
"No; for the bust there. I had to leave it as it was, but there is something in the line of the mouth which does not please me. What has become of her, do you suppose?"
"Possibly some one or something she is afraid of has caused her to go into hiding," said Quarles.
"Afraid! I doubt if she had any fear of devil or man. Have you seen
Musgrave's portrait of her?"
The professor nodded, and I thought it was curious that the Academy picture should be referred to so persistently.
"She was like that," said Forbes. "Musgrave's is a wonderful piece of work."
Involuntarily I glanced at the bust, and he noticed my surprise.
"Oh, she was like that too at times," he said.
"I should doubt if Musgrave ever saw her as you have represented her," said Quarles.
"Perhaps not. He claims to paint character; possibly I might succeed in chiseling character, but give me a beautiful model, and as a rule I am content to show the surface only. Besides, the bust was for her, and I made the best of my subject."
"And in the Agricultural piece?" asked Quarles.
"Naturally I idealized her."
"I suppose he is not the born artist that Musgrave is?" I said, when
Forbes had left us.
"I don't know," returned Quarles. "We will go and have another look at the bust, and I think on the way home we might drop in and have another look at Musgrave's picture."
"That portrait bothers me," I said. "One might suppose it was the key to the mystery."
"I am not sure that it isn't," Quarles answered.
Further acquaintance with the Academy picture had rather a curious effect upon me. I do not think I lost anything of my original sense of repulsion, but I was strangely conscious that there was something attractive in the face. I was astonished to find what a likeness there was between the portrait and the bust. The impression created by one became mingled with the impression made by the other.
I said as much to Quarles.
"That is tantamount to saying they are both fine pieces of work," he answered.
"And means, I suppose, that the real woman was somewhere between the two," said Zena.
"Possibly, but with Musgrave's idea the predominant truth," said Quarles.
"Why?" asked Zena.
Quarles shrugged his shoulders. He had no answer to give.
"The day after to-morrow, Wigan, we will go to the Agricultural
Institute."
"Why not to-morrow?"
"To-morrow I am busy. Did you know I was writing an article for a psychological review?"
On the following evening I took Zena to a theater—to the Olympic. I suppose I chose the Olympic with a sort of idea that I was keeping in touch with the case I had in hand, that if any one chanced to see me there they would conclude that I was following up some clue. It is hateful to feel that there is nothing to be done, more hateful still that people should imagine you are beaten or are neglecting your work.
Zena told me the professor had been out all day, but she did not know what business he was about. He was certainly not engaged in writing his article.
The Olympic was by no means full that night; the disappearance of the dancer was evidently having a disastrous effect upon the receipts.
The next day I went to the Agricultural Institute with Quarles. He had got a card of introduction to the secretary.
The building had recently been enlarged, and at the top of the first flight of the staircase stood a group representing the triumph of modern methods.
Standing or crouching, and full of energy, were figures symbolic of science and machinery, while in the foreground was a recumbent figure from whose hands the sickle had fallen.
The woman was sleeping, her work done; yet she suggested that there was beauty in those old methods which, for all their utility, was lacking in the new.
"It is probably the best work that Lovet Forbes has done," said the secretary, who came round with us.
"He is the coming man, they say," Quarles remarked.
"He has surely arrived," was the answer, "for the critics are unanimous as to the beauty of this."
"Yes, it is remarkable in idea and execution. I am told the famous dancer, who has recently disappeared, was the model for the recumbent figure."
"So I understand. The figure is the gem of the whole composition."
Quarles was not inclined to endorse this opinion, and the secretary was nothing loath to argue the point.
The discussion led to a close examination of the figure, Quarles arguing that it was out of proportion in comparison with the standing figures, a comment which the secretary met with some learned words on the laws relating to perspective.
They were both a little out of their depth, I thought, and after a few moments I did not pay much attention to them. My thoughts had gone back to Musgrave's picture and to Forbes's bust of Madame Vatrotski. Zena had said that the real woman was probably somewhere between the two, and as I looked at the figure for which the dancer had been the model I felt she was right.
I suppose the limbs were perfect, but it was the face which chiefly interested mo. It was like Musgrave's picture, but it was more like Forbes's bust, with something in it which differed entirely from the bust and from the picture.
It was a beautiful figure, and I think the face was beautiful, but I am not sure.
The secretary had just measured the figure, and the result seemed to have established the fact that Quarles's contention was right. This evidently pleased him, and he was inclined to give way on minor points of difference.
"No doubt the sculptor's perspective has something to do with it," he said; "but we must not forget that the group is symbolic. I should not be surprised if the figure in the foreground is larger to illustrate the fact that modern methods are of yesterday, while the sickle has reaped the harvests of the world from old time. The sickle is not broken, you observe, and the artist may mean that it will be used again in the time to come."
"You may be right," said the secretary. "I shall take an early opportunity of asking Forbes."
Soon afterwards, we left, and had got a hundred yards from the building when the professor suddenly found he had left his gloves behind in the library.
"I shall only be a minute or two, Wigan. Stop a taxi in the meantime."
He was longer than that, but he came back triumphant, waving the gloves, an old pair hardly worth returning for. He seemed able to talk of nothing but the symbolism of the group, finding many points in it which had escaped me entirely.
"It has given me an idea, Wigan."
"About Madame Yatrotski?"
"Yes; but we will wait until we get home."
We went straight to that empty room. Zena could not persuade the old man to have some tea first.
"Tea! I am not taking tea to-day. Bring me a little weak brandy and water, my dear."
"Don't you feel well?"
"Yes, but I am a little exhausted by talking to a man who thinks he understands art and doesn't."
"Oh, Murray doesn't pretend to understand it."
"Murray is not such a fool as he pretends to be, even in art; but I was thinking of the secretary, not Murray."
The brandy was brought, and then the professor turned to me.
"You suggested that perhaps Forbes was not the born artist that Musgrave is. What is your opinion now, Wigan?"
"I am chiefly impressed with the fact that Zena was right when she said the real woman was probably between Forbes's bust and Musgrave's picture."
"And I am chiefly impressed with the fact that they are both great artists," said Quarles. "I said Musgrave was, but I reserved my opinion of Forbes until I had seen this group. It has convinced me. Now, for my idea concerning the dancer. The first germ was in the notion that in Musgrave's picture lay the key to the mystery. Knowing something of the painter's power and ideals, I felt that the portrait must be true from one point of view. What was his standpoint? He explained it to you. He was detached, unbiased, putting on to his canvas that which he saw behind the mere outer mask. When I saw Forbes's bust, one of two things was certain: either he was incapable of seeing below the surface, or in this particular case he was incapable of doing so. I could not decide until I had seen other work of his. To-day I know he is as capable with his chisel as Musgrave is with his brush. You have only to study the standing and crouching figures in the group to see how virile and full of insight he can be."
"But the recumbent figure—" I began.
"You remember that he said it was idealized," Quarles said. "It is undoubtedly full of—of strength, but for the moment I am more interested in the bust. Why does it differ so widely from Musgrave's portrait? Well, I think Forbes was only capable of seeing Madame Vatrotski like that, and we have to discover the reason."
"Temperament," I suggested. "He said himself he was content as a rule to show the beautiful exterior."
"He also said one or two other interesting things," said Quarles, "For instance, he was certain she was dead, or he would hardly have sold the bust he had executed specially for her. Why was he so certain? Again, he suggested she was French and not Russian, scorned the idea of her being afraid of any one, and altogether he showed rather an intimate knowledge of her, which makes one fancy that she had been more open with him than she had been with others."
"The fact that she was sitting to him might account for that," said Zena.
"One would also expect that it would have made him come forward and give what help he could in clearing up the mystery." Quarles answered; "but he does nothing of the kind. We do not hear that he has used her as a model for his Agricultural group until we hear it casually on the day the bust was exhibited, and he tells us that he did not know of her disappearance until he telephoned to her rooms two days afterwards. Does that sound quite a likely story, Wigan?"
"I think you are building a theory on a frail foundation, Professor."
"It has served its purpose; I have built my theory—the artistic mind fascinated and becoming revengeful in a moment of repulsion. I think Madame Vatrotski had an appointment with Forbes that day, and more, that she kept it."
"Where?"
"At his studio. It may have been to give him a final sitting, or it may have been a lovers' meeting. Forbes could only see her beauty and fascination; he put what he saw into the bust. He loved her with all the unreasoning power that was in him; it is possible that in her limited way she loved him, that he was more to her than all the rest. Then came the sudden revulsion, perhaps because stories concerning her had reached Forbes, stories he was convinced were true. She was alone with him in the studio, and—well, I do not think she left it alive."
"But the body?" I said.
"Always the great difficulty," Quarles returned. "Yesterday I spent an interesting day in Essex, Wigan, watching the various processes used in making artificial stone, from its liquid and plastic state to its setting into a hard block. I was amazed at what can be done with it."
"You mean that—"
"It is impossible!" Zena exclaimed.
"It is not a very difficult matter to treat a body so as to preserve it, but to cover it with a preparation and with such precision that when it is set you shall see nothing but a stone figure is, of course, only possible to an artist."
"But she had sat for him, the figure must have been far advanced before—before she disappeared."
"I have no doubt it was, Wigan; but, far advanced as it was, that stone figure was removed and replaced by one that only superficially was stone."
"I do not believe it. It is absurd."
"Measurement proved that the recumbent figure was out of proportion in comparison with the other figures, accounted for by the stone casing. Of course with the secretary there I could not look too closely."
"No, or you would have found—"
"You seem to forget that I went back for my gloves," said Quarles. "I left them on purpose. I ran up to the library; no one was about. I had a chisel and hammer with me. By this time some one may have discovered that the group has been chipped. There are the pieces."
He took from his pocket some fragments of stone, pieces of a stone mold, in fact.
"Whether they will realize what it is that is disclosed where that piece is missing is another matter, but we know, Wigan. It is the body of Madame Vatrotski. Can you wonder, my dear Zena, that I felt more like a little brandy and water than tea?"
How far Quarles was right in his idea of the relations between Forbes and the dancer no one will ever know. When the police went to arrest him he was found dead in his studio. He had shot himself. How had he heard of Quarles's discovery? How did he know that his ingenious method of concealing the body had been found out?
It was so strange that I asked Quarles whether he had warned him.
"Do you think I should be likely to do such a thing?" was his answer.
He would give me no other answer, and all I can say positively is that he has never actually denied it.