“Your father a murderer!” her lover echoed. “Impossible.”
“Let me speak,” Mariette interrupted, hastily. “Two winters ago I met in Nice a wealthy young Englishman named Holroyde. We saw one another often at Monte Carlo, and our acquaintance ripened into love. He offered me marriage, and I accepted; but one night, after winning a considerable sum, he returned to Nice about eleven o’clock, was waylaid in a narrow lane running from the Promenade des Anglais into the Rue de France, robbed and murdered. Thus was the man I loved cruelly snatched from me just at the moment when happiness was in my reach; just within a few weeks of making me his wife. This villa, which I have since bought, he designated as our home, and this ring upon my finger is the one he gave me. The crime, enshrouded in mystery, has not yet been forgotten either by the police or the people of Nice. It seemed amazing that such a dastardly assassination could take place so swiftly without a single person hearing any cry, yet the police had no clue. The murderer, who had no doubt accompanied or followed his victim from Monte Carlo, must have struck him down with unerring blow and escaped, leaving no trace behind. Yet there was nevertheless a witness of the deed—a witness who is present.”
“A witness!” gasped Liane.
“Yes,” Mariette said. “Max Richards will tell you what he saw.”
The man indicated, still standing with his back to the door, smiled triumphantly at Zertho, then said,—
“Yes, it is true. I witnessed the murder of Charles Holroyde. On that night I had left the Café de la Régence, and crossing the road overtook, in the Avenue de la Gare, Nelly Bridson, Captain Brooker’s adopted daughter. We had met before on several occasions, and after she had told me that she had been to a chemist’s to obtain something for Liane, who was not well, I offered, as it was late, to accompany her as far as her house in the Rue Dalpozzo. To this she made no objection, and we walked together along the Rue de France as far as the corner of the street wherein she lived. The moon, however, was bright upon the sea, and at my suggestion she consented to accompany me for a stroll along the Promenade. To reach the latter we had to pass through a narrow lane, which we had just entered, when we saw straight before us figures of men struggling together. Instantly I dragged Nelly back into the deep shadow where we could see without being observed. Suddenly I heard one of the men cry in English ‘My God! I’m stabbed!’ and he staggered back and fell. Then, discerning for the first time that the man had been attacked by two assailants, I rushed forward, but already they had bent and secured the contents of their victim’s pocket, and as I approached one of them threw the knife away. That man I recognised in the moonlight as Captain Brooker!”
A low groan escaped the lips of the pale-faced, agitated man who had been thus denounced, and he stood paralysed by fear, clutching the back of a chair for support.
“The man, however, who threw away the knife he had snatched up, was not the murderer,” Richards continued, in a clear, calm voice. “Both Nelly and myself were afterwards in complete accord that it was his companion who had, in the mêlée, struck the fatal blow. The murderer was the man there—Zertho d’Auzac.”
“It’s a lie!” cried the man indicated, “a foul, abominable falsehood! Brooker crept up behind him and tried to gag him with a scarf, when, finding that he was too powerful for him, he struck him full in the breast. In an instant he was dead.”
“Your story is an entire fabrication,” Richards answered, in a deprecatory tone. “We were both quite close to you, and saw your murderous face in the moonlight at the moment when you killed your victim. To us it seemed as though you alone had acted with premeditation, and that instead of assisting you, Brooker was endeavouring to release Holroyde, for I heard him cry in dismay, ‘Good God! Zertho, what are you doing?’ It was you who bent and secured the notes, while Brooker snatched up the knife, held it for an instant in hesitation, then seeing me approach in the darkness, flung it away and fled after you. I sped along the Promenade for some distance, leaving Nellie beside the prostrate man, but you both escaped, and when I returned she had gone. She had, I suppose, rushed home, fearing to be discovered there. But the young Englishman was already lifeless, therefore I left the spot hurriedly. Next morning, when the town was in a state of great excitement over the murdered Englishman, Nelly called at my rooms and begged me to say nothing to the police, because she felt certain the Captain would be arrested and convicted as an accessory. Therefore, in obedience to her wish, I have kept my knowledge secret until such time as I should choose to make the truth known.”