St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1888-02-18

* &c even HelBIlLeneU by
the chilly sleet, which, falling, rem
dered Kaleidoscope force to the scene.
But to the belated pedestrian or drivers
Of vehicles the fairy-like surroundings
had no charms, us life and limb were
in constant danger.
On this cherries night even the brill
liant Boulevard HauSman wuS deserted,
save by a solitary fiacre driver, who,
having alighted from his box, was beat
ing his hands and arms upon his chest
and at each blow shower of frozen
particles fell upon the ice-cOated pave
ments, making weird music as the Jehu
kept his lonely vigil.
AS the distant bells rang out the ar
rival OF midnight, the weary driver NUT
tered, with curse:
'Well, my gentleman won't appear
tonight. He was to have come at half
past II, and it's now IL. [ should have
secured his address. Well, either the
rough weather or some charming girl
settle has detained him with her allure
mentS.. I'll hunt him up, however, and
no doubt secure my pay
So saying, he mounted the box, and
| drove OFF at a cautious gait:
The ordinary incidents related above
might have passed, like many others of
a similar nature, unrecOrded, had it not
STRANGE AND MYSTERIOUS CASE,
the solution of which rested, to a great
degree, upon the non-arriyal of the gen
| tleman above mentioned and the mex
pllcable force that impelled the fiacre
driver, almost through no will of his
own, to, for time, act as a prominent
| player in one of those bloody dramas of
which Paris is so often the stage.
On the following morning, namely,
| Feb. II, 1874, NJ. Louis Gallaudet, who
had resided at No. II Rue de Fouarre
for twelve years, carrying on the jew
eiry trade and having apartments above
his place of business, was found dead
upon the floor of his bed chamber, with
| his skull fractured.
The usual formal police investigation
| showed the following:
That, from the character and position
| OF the wound on the back of the head,
| just below the base of the brain, the
death blow had been dealt with some
blunt instrument, taking the victim UNI
| aWareS from behind.
The body lay i'll front and to one side
of the safe which NJ. Gallaudet had in
his sleeping apartment, in which he
| kept the more valuable portion of his
stock of jewels, etc.
The safe was open, and showed that
several packages of material were miss
| ing, but no papers Or other OF mOnsieur's
| effects were disturbed. 1t was evident
! that, as the jeWeler was bending over to
lock the safe for the night,
| THE FATAL BLOW
had been inflicted. In the opinion of
the cOmmissary, who conducted the eX-
animation of the premises, death had
| resulted Immediately Oh the delivery of
| the blow.
| fhn Of L.
| portance, owing to the wealth and
favorable reputation of Monsieur Gal
laudet, the commiSSary had, previous to
his inspection, dispatched messenger
to Francois, as he was called, a noted
detective. then in the employ of the
| Secret Bureau.
When the latter Individual arrived, he
| began a minute inspection of the sur
| roundings from point directly opposite
| from where the magistrate had begun.
| He noticed that there was small
| pool of blood almost in front of the safe,
| from which faint trail led to where
the body lay. near the wall, distance
of about three feet. In the space be-
tween the body and the wall, distance
of one foot, was found a small bunch
of keys, evidently belonging to the I'M
| fortunate man, as one of them fitted the
| inner section Of the safe.
AS the detective picked up the bunch
of keys he noticed that they were
specked with fine white powder. On
the floor between the carpet and the
surbase were traces of similar powder
Now thoroughly interested, Francois
| began an inspection of the body. Care
fully he scanned the inanimate form.
He was finally rewarded by discovering
that beneath the finger nails of the fore
! finger and thumb of the left hand were
particles of the same white powder.
| The detective now stepped back few
steps from the corpse and meditated for
few seconds. While so doing, his
eyes ran over the wall near the body,
and from the peculiar angle at which
| he stood, the light was reflected so that
| his attention was attracted to what ap-
| peared to be
A FEW SCRATCHES ON THE WALL,
| about two feet above the surbase.
| At first he gave them no atten-
ton, but as the white powder OH the
keys flashed across his mind. he bent
down and scanned the irregular scrawls
intently. After much difficulty he was
| rewarded i'll deciphering the faint
marks into three imperfect letters
"Vig."
81 have it, monsieurl" exclaimed the
| now eXultant detective, addressing his
| superior. Mr.. Gallaudet was attacked
| from behind while locking up his valu-
able stock for safe-keeping during the
| night. When he fell his assassin, think
ing he had effectually settled his victim.
seized the packages from the safe and
| fastened to make his escape. eXulting
that the blow had been so effective and
that detection would be impossible, as
the dead tell no tales. But in this he
was mistaken, for consciousness re-
| turned to monsieur sufficiently long to
enable him to recognize his assassin,
| and see," said the detective, pointing
| to the scrawls on the wall, "With SUI
perhuman effort he dragged himself to
the wall ana with the keys that lay
upon the floor near at hand he had
written for us the first three letters of
the murderer's name. when death in
terfered. But we have enough; we will
examine each and every servant and
visitor, and it will not be long before we
have our murderouS bird safely caged.n
Separately the concierge and servants
were Searchingly examined. Their
statements, when fitted together. re-
suited in the following:
M. Gallaudet had been a bachelor
up to his forty-siXth year, when he had
met and married Mile. Pauline Debarry,
who at the time of her marriage was
some twenty years monsieur's Junior.
They had lived happily together, the
only cause of any unpleasantness being
that madame insisted on visiting rela-
tives at POisSy and remaining away
from home two or three days at time.
When the concierge was examined,
her statement really startled both the
cOmissary and the detective. On being
asked who had called upon the dead
man the previous evening, she stated
that several persons had called on bust
ness, but that the last one that she had
let out was one of monsieur's trusted
agents,
MONSIEUR HENRI vIGEoT.