My Memoirs Part 60

"She is sobbing as she speaks, and holds her head between her hands as if she feared that it would bunt with the pain that she is enduring.

'If Couillard is not guilty and can say nothing, I thought, I will confess to having placed the pearl in the pocket-book and he will be released. Besides, when the letter was found on him, he exclaimed: "I am caught. I shall not speak except before the judge." Was not this suspicious, and was it not natural that in my anxiety to discover the murderers, I should jump hastily to conclusions? I am speaking the truth; I fear nothing.'

"THE PRESIDENT. 'You had no right to act as you did.'

"MADAME S. 'Does not the law use similar methods? I know something about it.'

"THE PRESIDENT. 'I forbid you to insult the Law. You are here in Court.'... (General uproar; M. Trouard-Riolle, M. de Valles and Maitre Aubin all speak at the same time.)

"MADAME S. 'I know, I tell you I know. Examining magistrates torture their prisoners, whether there exist proofs of their guilt or not, and are ready to do anything to tear a confession from their victims.'

"THE PRESIDENT. 'You are speaking foolishly, Madame. For the honour of the Law, I protest.'

"MADAME S. 'I have spoken the truth. I ought to know something about examining magistrates....'"

Then the Advocate-General attacked me, and said that I was lying. My counsel jumped up and shouted excitedly: "Sir, I forbid you to insult my client!" There was another uproar, and when it had subsided, I explained at length why I had accused Couillard and Wolff....

A few moments afterwards, the hearing came to an end, and I found myself in my little cell at the _Depot_, surrounded by the kind Sisters of _Marie Joseph_ and their _cornettes_ and wimples, and their long pale-blue veils.

M. Desmoulin came to see me, and also Pastor Arboux, who, alas! through some inconceivable injustice, was not allowed to be present in Court!

One of the Sisters gave me a special potion to soothe my nerves and to help me to sleep. But at about 2 A.M. batches of street women were brought in, and their cries, their insults to the Sisters, awoke me as I lay restless, sleepless, on my straw-bed, for the rest of the night, thinking of Marthe and wondering when the end of this terrible nightmare would come. I wrote to my counsel, giving him further explanations, beseeching him to say this or that.... And then I went to the chapel of the Sisters. Not far from this pretty little chapel were the cells in which Bailly, Danton, Camille Desmoulins, Madame Roland, and other great figures of the Revolution had awaited execution.

With the fifth hearing--on Sat.u.r.day, November 7th--began the examination of the various witnesses. The first on the list was Remy Couillard, my former valet. He walked quickly to the witness bar, a spare figure, with slit-like eyes, a long nose, hollow cheeks, hair cut very short, large awkward hands, and wearing the uniform of a dragoon--for he was serving his term in the army now.

Couillard took the oath amid an impressive silence--for, as I had been told, he was generally considered as the "pivot of the accusation." He began to tell quickly, the story of how he heard me, on May 30th, 1908, at 5.45 A.M., cry "Remy, Remy!" and how he found me bound on the bed in my daughter's room. To every one's amazement, my former valet made statements entirely different from those he made on the morning after the night of the crime. He said, for instance, that he had first undone the cords binding my feet to the bed-posts, and then those with which my wrists were secured; that a blanket and a sheet covered me entirely; that my hands were placed "over one another and resting on the stomach,"

and that there was no rope round my body....

Maitre Aubin, of course, reminded Couillard that he had stated, on May 31st, 1908, that my clothes had slipped up round my neck, that my hands were tied behind and above my head to the bed-posts, that a rope was pa.s.sed over my body and under the bed, and that after he had first of all undone the cords fastening the wrists, he had with M. Lecoq's a.s.sistance undone those round my feet.

Intense excitement prevailed in Court, as Couillard swore he had just spoken the truth, and as my counsel read to him the doc.u.ment written on the morning after the crime under Couillard's dictation, as it were, and _signed_ by him.

These complete contradictions in my former valet's statements were naturally most favourable to me.

Indeed, it is not the least strange fact about that extraordinary trial, which was crowded with incidents, that the evidence given by most of the "witnesses for the Prosecution" was so obviously malicious and partial or clashed to such an extent with evidence previously given by these witnesses that it greatly told in my favour and proved my innocence, whilst, on the other hand, a number of so-called "witnesses for the defence" in their anxiety to serve me, went too far, and by their exaggerations, rather harmed than helped my cause!

As for Remy Couillard, he had been five days in Prison because I had accused him and had placed a pearl in his pocket-book. I owed him a public apology, and I made it in all sincerity. "I know how I wronged you. You hate me, but I have suffered terribly. I repeat I regret what I did to you. Forgive me." My former valet turned to me and replied: "It's all right, Madame, I have nothing against you."...

After the written evidence of M. Lecoq had been read--for this engineer who had first heard Couillard's calls for help, was then travelling in America--there walked to the witnesses' bar, M. Albert Bonnot, a painter of nearly sixty, who in 1880 had married one of M. Steinheil's sisters.

His studio was only separated from our garden by a small wall.

M. Bonnot explained that at one time his wife and he had been on affectionate terms with me, until some ten years before, when they severed their relations, but he remained the friend and collaborator of his brother-in-law. He then went on to state that "M. Steinheil, a few months before the crime, was profoundly depressed," and added that "when her husband was ill, Mme. Steinheil never looked after him but went away, anywhere, for three or four months at a time."

This was more than I could stand and, jumping up, under the sting of this false accusation obviously uttered to ruin me in the eyes of the jury, I exclaimed vehemently: "When my husband was ill, _Monsieur_, I nursed him with a devotion to which doctors and others will no doubt pay a tribute in this court, when the time comes."

M. Bonnot continued: "I saw my poor brother-in-law kneeling and his head hanging back. He was cold and stiff.... His clothes were neatly folded on a chair. Everything was in perfect order. There was no blood and no traces of steps.... I also saw the body of Mme. j.a.py. Then I left the place."

THE PRESIDENT. "You saw those two corpses and left without going to Mme.

Steinheil?"

M. BONNOT. "I disliked her."

M. Bonnot forgot to say to the Judge that on that very day (May 31st, 1908), he had angrily exclaimed, in the veranda before a number of witnesses--who all repeated it to me: "There's no mistake about it; that wretched woman upstairs did the deed!" M. Buisson, M. Boeswilwald and several other persons who heard this shameful remark were so disgusted, that, losing their temper, they threatened to throw M. Bonnot bodily out of the house.

The next witness was M. Adolphe Geoffroy, a sculptor, who had also married a sister of M. Steinheil. He too made a bitter attack on me.

That painful hearing, during which I had been insulted by members of my late husband's own family, ended with the depositions of M. Bertillon, the world-famous anthropometrical expert, who declared that it had been impossible to identify several of the finger-prints on the brandy-bottle, and of Dr. Lefevre who denied having ever said, "It is all a sham," concerning the way in which I was bound, but that he thought I had been securely bound.

After the hearing had been adjourned, barristers, doctors, officers, and guards eagerly pressed around me and congratulated me. "It is going splendidly; you'll win; there's nothing against you; the Prosecution will never recover from the blows it has received."... They all seemed to speak about some wrestling bout or boxing match.... I could not understand. To me it seemed so obvious that the Prosecution could not help realising the truth: my complete innocence.... And at the same time I thought of M. Andre, who, months ago, had heard the same evidence, and yet had not hesitated one second to conclude that I was guilty of having murdered my husband and my mother! And the awful thought entered my head that possibly the jury would share in his blindness, and that, in spite of my evident innocence, I would be condemned to death... or to lifelong imprisonment!...

I shuddered, hastily thanked all these unknown friends, all these sympathisers around me, and hastened to my cell, where the Sister Superior joined me and comforted me.

The Director of the _Depot_ also stayed a short time in my dreary cell and spoke very kindly to me, and later I listened to the Sisters singing in the chapel of the _Conciergerie_, just as I had listened for a whole year, night after night, to the Sisters at Saint-Lazare.

The next morning, as every morning, came Pastor Arboux. Afterwards I saw the Sister Superior, but most of that endless Sunday I was left alone and walked about in one of the yards... in order to warm myself, the cell being bitterly cold.

The next day, Monday, November 8th, after M. Arboux's visit, I went to the chapel as usual, until I was told that "my" two guards were waiting for me.

When the Judge and his colleagues entered after the usher had shouted "_La Cour, Messieurs_" (The Court, Gentlemen!), everybody rose and then sat down again, but I remained standing--and I did so all through the trial--in order to hear M. de Valles tell me: "Sit down, _Madame_." That one word "Madame," instead of the word "Accused," usual in such cases, was a source of great joy to me. It almost reconciled me with the world and with my terrible position.

"Madame," only a little word, but it seemed to show that in the eyes of my Judge I was not yet found guilty, that the dreadful accusation had not yet been proved, and that to him at least I was still a woman--and a lady.... And day after day I waited for those welcome, refreshing words, "_a.s.seyez vous, Madame_."

A number of witnesses came and gave evidence, including my doctor, M.

Acheray, who contradicted himself once or twice, and thus roused the anger of the Advocate-General, who exclaimed: "You are constantly contradicting yourself. It is really amazing, and (here, a wild gesture)... you can go!"

A great uproar ensued; there were exclamations of protest, and M.

Trouard-Riolle, turning to the public, cried with a sneer: "I do as I please, and laugh at your comments!" which remark only increased the uproar....

I wondered how it would all end. What did it all mean? Everybody was talking at the same time; I could hear and see men speak excitedly and even laugh. Why those personal discussions between the prosecution and witnesses?... And all the time I was enduring an unspeakable agony, which increased with each hearing. Did everybody then, except myself, forget that I was accused of a ghastly murder?...

I wept.... And then doctors and experts succeeded one another at the witnesses' bar.... It was horrible to listen to those gruesome details.... Dr. Courtois-Suffit declared that he believed my mother had been killed before my husband, and that there was more than one murderer. Dr. Augier stated that he utterly failed to find any trace of poison or narcotic in the bodies of the victims, and Dr. Balthazard made a lengthy lecture about the autopsy, the spots found on the carpet, the cotton wool gags and what not.... It was all technical, so far-fetched, so useless, that I tried not to listen, and for once my eyes wandered to the left of the Court, where barristers, journalists and the public were densely packed.

I saw M. Renouard, M. Scott, M. Sem and other artists making sketches, and various photographers furtively taking snapshots. There was M.

Claretie, Director of the _Theatre Francais_; M. Bernstein, the well-known playwright; M. Paul Adam, the gifted author.... I saw several of the Inspectors who, for months, had followed clues and done their best to a.s.sist me.... I saw the white-haired Rochefort, the famous journalist whose inexhaustible fund of combativeness was allowed, decade after decade, to attack anybody and everybody. In the days of Napoleon III he was attacking M. de Morny and the Imperial Government in the _Figaro_; later, he attacked the Republic. He had been a frenzied Boulangist and a frenzied Anti-Dreyfusard; now he was a frenzied Anti-Steinheilist, if I may invent this word. _Day after day, during my trial_, he published an article against me. Later, I saw some of these articles, and found they were written in the most abusive, rankling and savage style. There was hardly an insult that was not hurled at me in those exasperated--and exasperating--onslaughts, and the irrepressible "Rochefort," the Marquis of Rochefort-Lucay, after exhausting his usual vocabulary of scorn, defamation and scurrility, found a wonderful name for me, an elegant, refined, picturesque name, which he repeated in all his articles; he called me "the Black Panther"!...

After the hearing--and between the brief adjournments which the Judge granted when I was too exhausted or too ill--batches of letters were handed me.... Among them were love-letters, including daily messages from an important personage in the Court, and an "ardent admirer."...

The bitter irony of it all!...

I was so excited and demoralised that the next day, finding that I was being once more tortured with questions, to which I had already answered again and again, I exclaimed: "Do not exasperate me any more.... So far, I have shown complete discretion, but if I am driven to it, I shall cease to be discrete!" My counsel jumped up from his bench in front of me and beseeched me to be calm, I even think he threatened to leave the court if I talked that way again.... Poor Maitre Aubin! How glad he must have been when the trial was over!...

At that sixth hearing, a number of minor witnesses were heard; M.

Souloy, the jeweller, from whose evidence the fact stood out that of the twelve jewels belonging to me and the eleven belonging to my mother, eighteen were never found; M. Boin who admitted that in some cases, at least, I possessed double sets of identical jewels; M. and Mme.

Chabrier, and others.... But the chief depositions were those of M.

Hutin and M. de Labruyere of "Night of the Confession" fame!

M. de Labruyere spoke in a doleful way, but M. Hutin made an attempt at cheap humour. He said, for instance: "Madame Steinheil was in a terrible state of depression--so was I," and "One may be a journalist and still be a man, especially in the presence of a woman."

After he had politely bowed in my direction, M. de Labruyere gave evidence and made a narrative of the "Night of the Confession" which was transferred, as it were, from M. Hutin's speech, and of course he denied that he or his colleague had in the least bullied me.

I may state here that the whole "audience"--excepting, naturally, the magistrates--gave vent to unmistakable expressions of indignation at the conduct of certain "enterprising" journalists in my case.