She smiled faintly, and replied: "Rene invented many peculiar things, like the robot, now used in all New York subway and railroad stations, where the traveler's usual questions are answered by a phonographic voice, by simply pressing a button. He had a great fear of fire, of being trapped by fire. Some months ago, he installed a safety device, in case of fire, on our roof."
"What was it like?" I asked, eagerly.
"Simply a heavy wire stretched tautly from the roof to the ground, and terminating at some distance away from the house, to make the descent more gradual," she replied. "In case of fire, you step into a sort of trapeze, which is attached to the wire by a grooved wheel, and your descent to the ground is something like the 'slide for life,' often seen at the circus, or in film melodramas. I can see how, in the dark, it would give the illusion of flying."
XXX
After the concerted gasp of surprise over LaRauche's weird method of escape from the roof had died away, McGinity put another important question: "How did you first discover that your husband was implicated in these Martian revelations, and that they were a fraud? Did you find anything—papers?"
"Something like that," she replied.
She took out of the little bag, which lay in her lap, a charred slip of paper, which she handed to McGinity; and while he passed it round for our inspection, she continued: "I found this paper in the charred rubbish, in the log fire-place, in my husband's laboratory, which Orkins had neglected to clean out. You'll recognize the lettering it contains as a portion of the code used for the radio messages from Mars, and its deciphering into English. After I had studied this, I began a secret investigation on my own, and gradually the scheme was unveiled to me."
"This detecting business must have been a new and novel experience," Henry remarked, good humoredly.
"Not exactly," Mrs. LaRauche replied. "You probably don't know—not many do—that I have written several mystery novels under the pen name of Martha Claxton."