They finished their bacchic course, and the youth in the black tights escorted the panting, smiling girl to a seat, where he made a mock bow of the deepest reverence and went off. I kept my eye still fixed on the girl, who was smiling and fanning herself. Even then her little feet beat the floor to the sound of the music.
While she was sitting thus the monk came up and seated himself on a chair by her side. He made some remarks to her. She coquettishly answered them. Then to another she shook her head with playful determination. The monk pressed the point, for he bent forward, though I noticed that when she turned towards him he seemed to shrink back.
Finally Columbine sprang to her feet, took his arm, and with a half-regretful glance at the merry dancers left the room with him.
The next day the evening papers had a startling story. I have kept the newspaper account. It was this:
"A Sequel to the French Ball.
"Those who were at the French Ball last night in the Academy of Music may have remarked a young woman dressed as Columbine, who excited a good deal of attention by her graceful dancing. The giddy young thing will not dance at the next French Ball. She was lying at the morgue this morning, stone dead, waiting to be identified. It seems a cruel mockery, after her last night's gayety, to behold her now, in her ball dress of black and yellow velvet, lying till someone shall tell who she is. Failing all identification, some doctor's scalpel will dissect the corpse and study the muscles which worked so healthfully in the dance.
"The young girl was strangled to death last night in a carriage. She left the ball with some one dressed like a Franciscan monk, at two o'clock. The monk gave a card to the driver, after printing on it 'No. — 120th Street.' He also gave the driver a twenty-dollar gold piece. All this without a word. He was closely masked. The driver had only remarked that his hand was very white and large, and that he wore a heavy plain gold ring.
"The two got in and he drove off. While he was driving along the upper part of Madison Avenue he heard a sound which attracted his attention. On looking round he saw that the door of the carriage was open. He stopped, reached back with his whip, and banged it to. He supposed the couple inside were probably the worse for the wine they had taken at the ball, and had either failed to shut the door, which had worked open, or that the handle of the door had been fiddled with till it opened, and they were too far gone to notice it.
"At all events the twenty-dollar gold piece had made the driver disposed to be obliging, and he had pushed it to for them, and driven on. When he reached 120th Street, at the designated number, he got off the box and opened the carriage door.
"A lamp-post in front of the house lit up the carriage. The curtains of the carriage windows had been drawn. They were not drawn when the couple got in. What he saw terrified him. Columbine was lying, with her white wraps fallen about her, between the seats, and a monk's frock and a girdle of rope, together with a mask, were tossed on a seat. The monk had disappeared!
"The hackman shook the girl and tried to rouse her, but could not. He pulled her forward, and then saw that her face was frightfully red, and that the eyes were puffed out. On the throat were the marks of fingers where a terrible grip had been taken of her neck.
"The story was clear enough. The monk, whoever he was, had strangled the girl in the carriage, and had then thrown off his disguise and let himself out at the door while the carriage was still in motion.
"This savage crime was evidently premeditated. The masker had printed the address, had not spoken a word, and had paid the fare before entering the carriage. So there was not the sound of his voice, or his handwriting, to identify him, and his form and face had been completely hidden.
"The cabman drove at once to the nearest police-station and told his story. The body was taken to the morgue. The detectives are at work on the case, which promises to be a very pretty one. Known: a man masked as a monk who was at the French Ball, and who had a large white hand, on which he wears, or wore, a plain gold ring. Unknown: the murderer. Who is the detective that will run down the game?"
"Here he is," I said to myself, as I finished reading the account. I had more points than the paper gave. The scenes at the ball came back to me very vividly now. The sudden deathly paleness of the German stranger, and his departure with the Franciscan friar! There was a connection here that was too evident to be passed over.
I determined to find out who had murdered the pretty Columbine, who had won me so by her graceful dancing and smiling good-humor. Early the next morning I went to the morgue. There she lay, the dainty figure stretched out so stiff and cold in the big gloomy room. What a contrast to the scene in which I had seen her last! There was a damp cloth over her face. When it was removed I saw a round, full face, the features small and delicate. I gently pushed back the lids from her eyes. They were a dark blue. Her blond hair was her own, and not a wig. I pictured to myself the smoothly-rounded cheeks with the warm color of life in them. I glanced regretfully at her feet, still in their high-heeled golden shoes. They had tripped to their last dance, the dance of Death, and were motionless forever.
I found that a beautiful emerald which I noticed pinned in her corsage on the night of the ball was gone. It had been rudely plucked away, for the lace about the edge of her dress was torn and hanging. But a large ring of rubies and diamonds had been left on her finger, and was kept at the station-house. I had remarked the emerald because it had an old-fashioned setting in gold, and impressed me as a family jewel.