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The Secret Door

The Secret Door image
Parent Issue
Day
14
Month
April
Year
1876
Copyright
Public Domain
OCR Text

A Strange Story of the Scquel to ■■. Ct-lme. The pólice of Paris havo recently sfcumbled across the sequel to a very romarkable tragedy which occurred over twenty years ago, and has remained until the present an impenetrable mystery. To bring all the f acts of the case fully before the reader, it will be necessary to go back to a comparatively remóte period. At tho beginning of the year 1852, a family named D'Eimer became the owners of the Vertneuve estáte, on the Saone, between Chalón and Dijon. Chateau Vert, the residence, was a very large old mansion, situated on a rising ground on the right bauk of a small tributary of the Saone. The locality was roman tically beautiful, and the new tenants, who were wealthy, spoedily resuscitated the gardens and transformed the decayed and deserted dweiling into a comfortable and attractivo homestead. The D'Eimer family consisterl of Mons. D'Eimer, a gentleman of about fifty ; Madame, a motherly lady of about the same age, and three daughters and one son - the latter a boy of flfteen, and the youngest of the family. Within three months of their eettïing at the chateaa, the three daughters and the mother died of typhus f ever. Moas. D'Eimer was sunk in profound grief, and some time eiapsed before he was able to look after his affairs. The following year young D'Eimer formed an acquainbince with a very beautiful but uncultivated girl, named Jeannette Foille, the daughter of a charooai burner, to whom Mons. D'Eimer had rented & traet of woodland. Foille was a strunger in the locality, but appeared to be industrious and honest. He was a widower - so he said - and his daughter had charge of the small dweiling in which they resided. Charles D'Eimer, the son, spent much of his time with Jeannette, and the f act came to his father 's knowlèdge. He expostulated with his son. and an estrangeinent was the resul t. After this Mons. D'Eimer was frequeritly absent from home, anJ. in the autumn of 1854 he retumed. with a young wife, whom he installed as mistress of the chateaii. After this his behavior to his son was as kind as'before, and he supplied him liberally with funds, although he knew that Charles' acquaintance witli the daughter of the charcoal burner continued, aud that she had given birth to a chüd. On themorning of December 27, 1854, Mons. D'Eimer's domestics found him and his young wife murdered in their bed. They had been stabbed in several places, and the crime had evidently been perpetrated while they were asleep. In-. vestigation3 disclosed certain extraordinary facts. 1. The door of the bedroom was fastened on the inside. 2. The windows of the bedroom and the adjoining dressing room were also fastened within, and were, moreover, at least fifty feet from the ground, which sloped abruptly to the river, and afforded scarcely sufficient foothold for a goat. 3. Nothing was displaced in Mons. D'Eimer's aparrments, and no marks of any kind existed to show which way the murderer had come or gone. In the bedroom, however, was another door, which led into a suite of apartments occupied by Charles D'Eimer, the room adjoining Mons. D'Eimer's bedroom having been used as a library and the one beyond that as the son's sleeping apartment. The door leading into the library was locked and the key could not bo found. Charles' bedroom opened on the corridor, and the door of that was also locked. The butler, however, produced the key, and acknowledged that Charles was in the habit of ieaying it with him when he went to the charcoal burner with the intention of remaining all night, as he had done the previous eveniug. While the first investigation was in progresa Charles returned home, and was sttickon with horror at the scène that awaited him. His amazement and grief were very great, and, later on, when the authorities made a soarcbing inquiry, and he was conscious that they suspected him of the crime, his indignation was deep, and his denial of any participation in the dreadful deed alrnost contemptuous. Suspicion next fixed itself on the butler, who had had the keys of Charles' room in his keeping, but Charles pointed out to the pólice the ntter absurdity of supposing that the bedroom had been entered from the study, as the dust around the door was undisturbed, and tlie lock had not been used since his father had purchased the property. In addition to this, it was shown that the butler was nenrly eighty yea of age, and had been in tke empïoy of Mons. D'Eimer and his father before him for over sixty years. The authorities were greatly puzzled to fix the crime on any one, or to discover a cine to the perpetrator. The prevailing suspicion was agaiust Charles D'Eimer, and the faet of his having been on bad terms with his father for a long time, and the probability of there being a new family of children tp share tha patrimony with him, were confddered as presumptive evidence against him. He was not arrested, however, but the neighbors, who haü before been on friendly terms, began to hun him, and even the domestics qnitted his service. Withm a reasonable time after the murder, ChwlcB broiiBh Tewinette liTHa 5)i&t4)AU ncl Jastu4 her h mistres, giving out that they were man and wif e, which turned out to be aotually the case. At the same time the charcoal burner disappeared f rom the neighborhood. Af ter residing for about six months at Cnateau Vert, Charles D'Eimer and his wife discharged their domestica and removed to Neufchatel, in Switzerland. The chateaci was left in charge of a steward, and was only once visited by its owner in twenty years. As bef ore stated, the sequel to this almost unprecedented tragedy has just been disclosed, and in order to complete the story it is necessary to give the particulars of a crime of a later date. On February 24, 1875, one Monsieur Lecoq, a wealthy bachelor of Avignon, disappeared under singular circumstances. He resided in a small detached house in the snburbs, and kept two domestics - an old woman and her daughter. He had been a resident of Avignon about seven years, and had come there, it was generally supposed, iroin Paris, where ho had been in business and amassed a fortune. On the day named, two men called at his houao and were closeted with Mm for an hour. He directed his housekeeper to prepare a valise, and then quitted the house with the strangers, saying he might be absent a week. Half an hour after he had left, one of the two men returned and in formed the housekeeper that he was a detective, that Monsieur Lecoq had been arrested for a crime coinniitted in Paris many years before, and that he had come for certain documents in Monsieur Lecoq's possession which would tend to establish his innocence. He showed the keys whieh Monsieur Lecoq, he said, had given him, and said his direotions were to place the housekeeper and her daughter in a secure place untü the next morning. He conconducted them to an upper room in the i rear of the dweiling, and fastened them [ in. There they passed a miserable night, and waited disconsolately until noon the nest day for deliverance. Weary and hungry, they then managed to burst open the door, and on descending discovered that their master's bureaus and safe had been rifled of everything of vaiue. Their suspieion of foul play was for the flrst time aroused, and they gave the alarm. It was soon clear enough thet the arrest of Monsieur Lecoq and the pretended seareh for documents was the scheme of expert and audacious thieves, and measures were taken to secure their capture. They had nearly j twenty-four hoiirs, however, m which to make good tlieir escape, and there was little hope of their immediate arrest. It was likewise difficult to get any accurate description of the men, and the pólice had to" work on the most meager information. There was little doubt, however, that the men would seek refuge in Paris, and the pólice of that city were soon in possession of all the facts, and occupied in seeking for a clue to the perpetrator of the crime. Nothing, however, was heard of . them or Monsieur Lecoq for over three months, when the old gentleman unexpectedly made his appearance, and ltarned for the first time that he was the victim of a conspiracy. It seems that in 1840 he had in his employ, aa clerk, a man named Dunesme. This man had a very beautiful wife, of whora Lecoq became enamoured. He dispatched Dunesme to Eussia, as his agent, and in his absence endeavored to seduce his wife. He represented to her that Dunesme had robbed him of a large sum, and that unless she acceded to his desires he would send her husband to the galleys. She yielded to save the man whom she loved, but overeóme by remorse she lost her reason, and Lecoq awoke, one morning, to rïnd the woman by his side a corpse, with a stiletto in her broast. He paid the woman who acted as Madame Dunesme's servsnt a heavy bribe to keep his presence in the house a secret, and returned unobserved to his own residence. The evidence showed that Madame Dunesme had taken her own life, and the terrible nows was sent to her husband. Immediately on his arrival in Paris he was arrested for embezzling his employ er's funds, aud aft-jr a speedy trial sent to the galleys. The woman who had been his wife's servant took care of his only child, and Dunesme served out his ten year's s?ntence. On his liberation he found that the woman had a short time beforo nürried, amd turned over his daughter to his sister, irom whom he claimed the child, but the former custodian could not be found. At the close of last year Dunesme suddenly came upon the person whom he had given up all hope of ever seeing again. She was in poverty and he aided her, and in return she told him the story of his wife's wrongs, aud gave utterance to the suspicion that Lecoq had himself murdered her. Dunesme, who was a lawless man, then concocted the plot which bas been ( already treated of. Two of his companions played the part of detectives, and arrested Lecoq, as they said, for the nrarder of Madame Dunesme over thicty years ago. He was taken to Paris and. kept there in seclusion, the supposed officers assuring him that, for a large sum oí money which he had drawn from his bankers, they would secure his ultímate safety. At length he was released, and returned hom., havingbeen assured bythe sham detectives that hisinnocence had been established to the satisfaction of the pólice, and that he would suffer no further molestation. When the outrage perpetrated on Monsieur Lecoq was made known to the police, the most strenuous exertions were put forth to capture the offenders. Lecoq was summoned to Paris, and after several days spont in perambulatiug the city, he at length ñxed on a street which he believed was that in which he had been conflned." The pólice watched it thoroughly for several days, and ultimately axrested a man of suspicious behavior as he was entering one of the domiciles early in the morning. Lecoq positively ideutified him as one of the sham detectives, and a room into which he was going when taken as the apartment in which he had been imprisoned. There was a memorandum written in pencil on the wall by Lecoq, which left no doubt as to its beiug tho place. Thero were letters on the man ai-rested ■which led to the securing of the other shum detective, and finally to the capture of Dunesme. The latter was in the last stage of disease, and made revelations of an astounding nature. Among other things he detailed the facts respecting his wife and Lecoq already given, bnt his most important confesión related to the dreadful tragedy of which Chateau Vert was the scène. After his discharge from the galleys and the restoration of his daughter he rented a tract of woodland from Monsieur D'Eimer at the Chateau Vert There he went under the name of Foille. It was he who encouraged the visits of. young D'Eimer to his dwelüng, and procured bis marriage to hie daughter ! nett! Whw Moi'eíen'I'Fiiw.e'bvjugb.t home his young wife, Foille saw the hope of one day seeing his child tke mistress of the chatean and the mother of children who would inherit vast wealth cut oñ. Tho thought preyed upon his mind untü he became alrnost demented. The woodland which Foille rentad was in the reaf of the ohateau, and within it were tho ruins of a srnall chape!. While searching them one day he partially removed a large and saw a deep hole underneath. He raised the block, and a flight of stone steps was discovered. Procuring a lantern and a flint and steel, he explored the subterranean opening, and soon found himself in the vaults of the chateau. More than one skeleton lay around, and here and there rusty bolts and chains,' which showed that tho place liad once been used as a prison. In one corner of the yault he discovered an opening and winding staircase, which he ascended. After a while it became narrow and straight, and evidently ran inside tho walls of the chateau. Having ascended some distance he carne to a landing, and to the right saw what resembled a wooden door. He gave it a gentle push and it shook. A careful searoh disclosed a small knob in the wood, and a shght pressure upon it sent the door ajar, and a flood of daylight poured in. He was somewhat startled, and drew the door toward hun. Hearing no indication o J any one's being on the other side, he opened the door, and saw that he was on the threshold of what he knew at a glance must be Monsieur D'Eimer's bedroom. The door was a panel of thewainscot extending from almosfc the top of the room to within n ! foot of the floor. He retired and closed the door, and thought little of the discovery until the dread of his daughter's children boing robbed of a splendid ininheritance dwelt on his inind like a horrible nightmare. To shorten a horrible confession, Foille resolved to murder the eider D'Eimer and his young wife, and entering the room by the secret stairwav, i complished hw design only too eiïectually. As soon as his daughter and her husband were seeurely domiciled in the chateau Foillo disappeared, his son-inlaw having first made arrangements by which he was secured an income anaply sufficient for his ordinary wants. Foille, however, became a gambler, and finally got mixed up with a lawless gang, wlio assisted him subsequently in carryiug out his designs on Lec;q. He died within a month of his confession, and the two sham detectives are now undergoiug a ñfteen year's eentence. There is every reason to believe that aeither Charles D'Eimer nor his wife ever had the slightest suspicion of Poille's having any hand in the long unJxplained murder of the eider D'Eimer.

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Subjects
Old News
Michigan Argus