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The Mystery of the Yellow Room Chapter 22 - The Incredible Body · The Gaston Leroux Library

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  Speaker 1: Chapter twenty two of the Mystery of the Yellow Room.
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  Speaker 1: This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in
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  Speaker 1: the public domain. For more free audiobooks or to volunteer,
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  Speaker 1: please visit LibriVox dot Org. Recording by Simon Larois. The
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  Speaker 1: Mystery of the Yellow Room by Gaston LaRue, Chapter twenty two,
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  Speaker 1: The Incredible Body. I bent in great anxiety over the
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  Speaker 1: body of the reporter, and had the joy to find
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  Speaker 1: that he was deeply sleeping, the same unhealthy sleep that
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  Speaker 1: I had seen fall upon Frederic Larsan. He had succumbed
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  Speaker 1: to the influence of the same drug that had been
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  Speaker 1: mixed with our food. How was it then that I
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  Speaker 1: also had not been overcome by it? I reflected that
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  Speaker 1: the drug must have been put into our wine, because
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  Speaker 1: that would explain my condition. I never drink when eating,
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  Speaker 1: naturally inclined to obeseitce I am restricted to a dry diet.
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  Speaker 1: I shook Rouletabille, but could not succeed in waking him. This,
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  Speaker 1: no doubt, was the work of Mademoiselle Stangerson. She had
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  Speaker 1: certainly thought it necessary to guard herself against this young man,
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  Speaker 1: as well as her father. I recalled that the steward
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  Speaker 1: in serving us had recommended an excellent chablis, which no
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  Speaker 1: doubt had come from the professor's table. More than a
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  Speaker 1: quarter of an hour passed. I resolved, under the pressing circumstances,
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  Speaker 1: to resort to extreme measures. I threw a picture of
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  Speaker 1: cold water over Rouletabille's head. He opened his eyes. I
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  Speaker 1: beat his face and raised him up. I felt him
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  Speaker 1: stiffen in my arms, and heard him murmur, go on,
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  Speaker 1: go on, but don't make any noise. I pinched him
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  Speaker 1: and shook him until he was able to stand up.
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  Speaker 1: We were saved. They sent me to sleep, he said, Ah,
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  Speaker 1: I passed an awful quarter of an hour before giving way,
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  Speaker 1: But it is over. Now, don't leave me. He had
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  Speaker 1: no sooner uttered those words than we were thrilled by
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  Speaker 1: a frightful cry that rang through the chateau, a veritable
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  Speaker 1: death cry. Mallow roared Rouletabille. We shall be too late.
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  Speaker 1: He tried to rush to the door, but he was
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  Speaker 1: too dazed and fell against the wall. I was already
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  Speaker 1: in the gallery, revolver in hand, rushing like a madman
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  Speaker 1: towards Mademoiselle Stangerson's room. The moment I arrived at the
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  Speaker 1: intersection of the off turning gallery and the right gallery.
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  Speaker 1: I saw a figure leaving her apartment, which in a
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  Speaker 1: few strides had reached the landing place. I was not
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  Speaker 1: master of myself. I fired the report from the revolver,
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  Speaker 1: made a deafening noise, but the man continued his flight
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  Speaker 1: down the stairs. I ran behind him, shouting stop, stop,
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  Speaker 1: or I will kill you. As I rushed after him
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  Speaker 1: down the stairs, I came face to face with Arthur Rance,
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  Speaker 1: coming from the left wing of the chateau, yelling what
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  Speaker 1: is it? What is it? We arrived almost at the
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  Speaker 1: same time at the foot of the staircase. The window
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  Speaker 1: of the vestibule was open. We distinctly saw the form
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  Speaker 1: of a man running away. Instinctively we fired our revolvers
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  Speaker 1: in his direction. He was not more than ten paces
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  Speaker 1: in front of us. He staggered, and we thought he
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  Speaker 1: was going to fall. We had sprung out of the window,
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  Speaker 1: but the man dashed off with renewed vigor. I was
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  Speaker 1: in my socks and the American was barefooted. There being
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  Speaker 1: no hope of overtaking him, we fired our last cartridges
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  Speaker 1: at him, but he still kept on running. Going along
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  Speaker 1: the right side of the court, towards the end of
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  Speaker 1: the right wing of the chateau, which had no other
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  Speaker 1: outlet than the door of the little chamber occupied by
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  Speaker 1: the forest keeper. The man, though he was evidently wounded
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  Speaker 1: by our bullets, was now twenty yards ahead of us. Suddenly,
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  Speaker 1: behind us and above our heads, a window in the
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  Speaker 1: gallery opened, and we heard the voice of Rouletabille crying
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  Speaker 1: out desperately. Fire, Bernier. Fire. At that moment, the clear
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  Speaker 1: moonlight night was further lit by a broad flash. By
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  Speaker 1: its light we saw Daddy Bernier with his gun on
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  Speaker 1: the threshold of the Donjon d'Or. He had taken good aim.
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  Speaker 1: The shadow fell, but as it had reached the end
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  Speaker 1: of the right wing of the chateau, it fell on
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  Speaker 1: the other side of the angle of the building. That
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  Speaker 1: is to say, we saw it about to fall, but
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  Speaker 1: not the actual sinking to the ground. Bernier, Arthur Rance,
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  Speaker 1: and myself reached the other side. Twenty seconds later. The
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  Speaker 1: shadow was lying dead at our feet. Aroused from his
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  Speaker 1: lethargy by the cries and reports, Larsan opened the window
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  Speaker 1: of his chamber and called out to us. Rouletabille, quite awake,
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  Speaker 1: now joined us at the same moment, and I cried
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  Speaker 1: out to him, he is dead. He is dead, So
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  Speaker 1: much the better, he said, take him into the vestibule
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  Speaker 1: of the chateau. Then, as if on second thought, he said, no, no,
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  Speaker 1: let us put him in his own room. Rouletabille knocked
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  Speaker 1: at the door. Nobody answered naturally, this did not surprise me.
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  Speaker 1: He is evidently not there, otherwise he would have come out,
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  Speaker 1: said the reporter. Let us carry him to the vestibule. Then,
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  Speaker 1: since reaching the Dead Shadow, a thick cloud had covered
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  Speaker 1: the moon and darkened the night, so that we were
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  Speaker 1: unable to make out the features. Daddy Jacques, who had
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  Speaker 1: now joined us, helped us to carry the body into
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  Speaker 1: the vestibule, where we laid it down on the lower
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  Speaker 1: step of the stairs. On the way, I felt my
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  Speaker 1: hands wept from the warm blood flowing from the wounds.
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  Speaker 1: Daddy Jacques flew to the kitchen and returned with a lantern.
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  Speaker 1: He held it close to the face of the Dead Shadow,
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  Speaker 1: and we recognized the keeper, the man called by the
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  Speaker 1: landlord of the donjon Inn, the green Man, whom an
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  Speaker 1: hour earlier I had seen come out of Arthur Rance's
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  Speaker 1: chamber carrying a parcel but what I had seen I
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  Speaker 1: could only tell Rouletabille later, when we were alone, Rouletabille
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  Speaker 1: and Frederic Larsan experienced a cruel disappointment at the result
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  Speaker 1: of the Knight's adventure. They could only look in consternation
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  Speaker 1: and stupefaction at the body of the green man. Daddy
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  Speaker 1: Jacques showed a stupidly sorrowful face, and with silly lamentations,
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  Speaker 1: kept repeating that we were mistaken. The keeper could not
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  Speaker 1: be the assailant. We were obliged to compel him to
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  Speaker 1: be quiet. He could not have shown greater grief had
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  Speaker 1: the body been that of his own son. I noticed,
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  Speaker 1: while all the rest of us were more or less
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  Speaker 1: undressed and barefooted, that he was fully clothed. Rouletabille had
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  Speaker 1: not left the body kneeling on the flagstones by the
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  Speaker 1: light of Daddy Jacques's lantern. He removed the clothes from
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  Speaker 1: the body and lay bare its breast. Then, snatching the
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  Speaker 1: lantern from Daddy Jacques, he held it over the corpse
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  Speaker 1: and saw a gaping wound rising. Suddenly, he exclaimed, in
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  Speaker 1: a voice filled with savage irony, the man you believe
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  Speaker 1: to have been shot was killed by the stab of
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  Speaker 1: a knife in his heart. I thought Rouletabille had gone mad.
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  Speaker 1: But bending over the body, I quickly satisfied myself that
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  Speaker 1: Rouletabille was right. Not a sign of a bullet anywhere.
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  Speaker 1: The wound, evidently made by a sharp blade had penetrated
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  Speaker 1: the heart. End of Chapter twenty two. Recording by Simon
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  Speaker 1: Laois