They arrived at their destination in the early hours of Tuesday morning, and Goold immediately ordered the trunk to be labelled "Charing Cross, London," and despatched there. Then with his wife he went to an hotel for rest and refreshment.
It was now the duty of the goods clerk at Marseilles Station to attend to the trunk, but when he came near it he was surprised by a fearful odour. Closer examination proved that blood was oozing from beneath the lid. Pons—that was the clerk's name—went at once to the hotel and saw the Goolds. They explained that the trunk was filled with poultry, hence the blood, but the railway official was not satisfied, and he called at a police station, where the inspector instructed him to inform the Goolds that the trunk would not be allowed to leave Marseilles until it had been opened and the contents examined in their presence.
Pons's first visit to the hotel had aroused doubts in Marie's mind, and she told her husband to get ready to steal out of Marseilles. He quickly obeyed, and they were actually emerging from the hotel when the goods clerk arrived for the second time. He conveyed to them the decision of the police, and Marie, conscious that they were in a tight corner, staked her life on bluff.
"Very well," she said haughtily, "we will take a cab and drive to the station, and when you have opened the trunk you can apologize for having been so impertinent as to doubt my word." The cab was called, and Marie and her husband with the large carpet-bag got in, but the woman's heart must have sunk when Pons entered after them, as though they were under arrest already.
The cab rattled along, and no one spoke until Mrs. Goold clutched the clerk's arm and whispered to him that she would be willing to pay ten thousand francs if he would let them go. Pons sat immovable. He was not to be bribed, and the attempt to do so proved that his suspicions were well-founded.
The examination of the contents of the trunk and carpet-bag indicated that a brutal murder had been committed, and before the two prisoners had time to confess the police identified the victim, and unravelled the whole story. Marie and her husband were accordingly sent back to Monte Carlo to stand their trial.
The woman was the chief figure in Court, her husband always presenting a shivering, weak-kneed appearance in the dock. Marie Goold was clearly the person who had murdered Madame Levin, and the sentence in her case was death. Her husband was consigned to penal servitude for life.
After a sensational trial they were removed to the French prison at Cayenne, and there in July, 1908, Marie Goold died of typhoid fever. Fourteen months later Vere Goold, driven insane by remorse and the deprivation of drink and drugs, committed suicide.
The fate of the niece was pathetic. She was so upset by her association with the murderers that despite every attention she faded away, dying before she attained her twenty-seventh birthday.