The History and Romance of Crime 14

The History and Romance of Crime 14

About this same date a murder was committed in Paris, which will always

fill a prominent place in French criminal records, from the hideous

personality of the principal performer. Few members of the race of Cain

are more widely known than the bloodthirsty monster, Lacenaire, of whom

the saying is preserved: “I think no more of slaying a man than of

taking a drink of water.” His detection and delivery to justice were

due to the help afforded by treacherous confederates, who played the

_musique_. The circumstances, with some account of the central figure,

and the methods pursued, may well find a place here.

 

On December 14, 1834, an old woman, the Widow Chardon, residing in the

passage Cheval Rouge of the rue St. Martin, was brutally done to death,

and her son, who lived with her, was also killed. Both had been struck

down with the same hatchet. The state of the premises, locks forced,

furniture smashed, their contents strewed about the room, showed

plainly that robbery had been the motive of the murder. A fortnight

later another murder was attempted, and was all but successful, upon

a banker’s clerk, who called, in the French fashion, to collect money

on a bill or note of hand, which had been due, and was payable at

the private address given by the acceptor, by name Mabrossier, No.

66, rue Montorgueil. The clerk climbed to the fourth floor, where he

found the name Mabrossier inscribed in white chalk upon the outer

door. He knocked, and was admitted into an empty room, where two men

were evidently awaiting him. The door was slammed, and he was attacked

murderously. The clerk was young and muscular, and fought sturdily for

his life, uttering such loud cries for help that the miscreants were

alarmed, and fled down-stairs out of the house.

 

The only clue to the outrage was the name Mabrossier, and he was known

sufficiently well to the concierge, who gave a description of him.

The machinery of the police was set in motion, by which the names

of all who pass the night in hotels and common lodging-houses are

inscribed day by day on the register, and the name Mabrossier was found

finally in a low den kept by one Pageot. Close to it was another name,

Ficellier, recorded the same day, and the landlord remembered and

described his visitor. The portrait exactly fitted a certain François,

at the time in custody, having been arrested within the last few days

for fraud. The landlady, when pressed, also admitted that Mabrossier

had previously been a lodger under the name of Baton.

 

The police pieced together the scraps that were coming to hand. M.

Cauler, who was in charge of the case, openly taxed François with being

Ficellier, and, on the shrewd suspicion that Baton was Mabrossier,

arrested him, but was forced to release him for want of more definite

evidence. Then a prisoner in La Force volunteered the fact that Baton

was the intimate of one Gaillard, who sometimes passed under the name

of Baton, but who, in one of his disguises, corresponded exactly with

the much wanted Mabrossier. The next step was a hunt for Gaillard,

and the name was soon found on another hotel register. They knew him

well, there, and when asked whether he came often, or had left any

traces, a bundle of songs was produced and a letter, said to be in his

handwriting, containing an offensive diatribe on the prefect of police.

Suddenly a light broke in on the police. The writing of the word

“Mabrossier,” chalked upon the door in the house, where the assault was

committed, was identically the same as in this letter.

 

It was now well known that Gaillard was wanted, and assistance was

offered by another inmate of La Force, Avril by name, who declared

that if let out for a week he would put Gaillard into the hands of

the police. Nothing came of this boast, and Avril went back to gaol.

Recourse was again had to François, who was fetched from the prison

to be interrogated at the Prefecture. In the cab, en route, François

made a clean breast of everything. He knew all about the murder of

Mother Chardon; he had heard the whole story from the principal actor,

Gaillard, who had thus a second and more serious crime to his charge

than the attack on the bank clerk.

 

Gaillard’s identity was next placed beyond all doubt. Avril, the same

prisoner who had fruitlessly sought Gaillard through Paris, confided

to the police that the murderer had an aunt of the same name, a

well-to-do person, who lived in great retirement. A visit was paid to

her, and inquiries made as to her nephew, “Gaillard.” “His real name is

Lacenaire,” she replied, “and I never wish to see or hear of him again.

He is a miscreant, and I constantly go in fear of my life for him.” So

the search was narrowed down to the real man Lacenaire, who fortunately

was arrested at this very moment under the name of Levi Jacob, on

attempting to pass a forged bill of exchange. He was brought at once to

Paris, and, when visited in his cell by the head of the police, readily

confessed himself the author of the crimes, of which he was suspected.

When asked to name his accomplices, he refused until he heard that both

François and Avril had informed against him, when he turned upon them

and gave them completely away. They had betrayed him, and he would not

spare them! It served him right for taking accomplices!

 

This was the burden of his recital in the many interviews he had with

the police. “Always work alone, it is the only safe method. Partners

and comrades can never be trusted.” Lacenaire gave many proofs of this

from his own personal experience. Once at Lyons he was returning home

from an orgie, when he met on the bridge of Morand a well-dressed

gentleman, upon whose white waistcoat glittered a fat gold chain. The

man staggered slightly, and was clearly under the influence of drink.

They were quite alone together upon the bridge, and Lacenaire fell upon

him, seizing his throat with one hand and emptying his pockets with the

other. Then, after he had secured the watch and chain and well-filled

pocketbook, he lifted the victim in his arms and threw him bodily into

the river Rhone, which flowed rapidly beneath. “I never heard who this

man was, nor did I think of the incident again,” said he. “Having

worked alone, I was never discovered.” Again, when residing in Paris,

just after his release from prison, he frequented the gaming-house,

Palais-Royal, and watched the lucky players with the idea of following

them in the street to rob and murder them. He followed a man, who had

won 30,000 francs, and, catching him in a lonely place, threatened

him with his life unless he surrendered at once the contents of his

pockets. The approach of a passing patrol frightened Lacenaire, who

took to his heels without the plunder. He escaped because he was alone.

Had he been trammelled with an accomplice they would probably have got

into each other’s way, or at least Lacenaire would have been obliged to

think of some one beside himself. “Had I not worked with Avril in the

murder of Mother Chardon, he would never have been able to betray me.”

 

The life and death of Lacenaire attracted considerable attention. There

was much to interest the public, albeit unhealthily, in the personal

record of this remarkable criminal, who came of decent parents, had

been well educated, and yet yielded to the most ignoble passions; who

from petty thief passed through all the phases of commonplace crime

until he threw off all restraint and became a wholesale murderer.

While honest society viewed him with horror, he became a hero to his

fellows, who would have imitated him had they dared, but were satisfied

to glorify him, to tattoo his name upon their breasts and to accept

him as their chief and model. He was born in a village near Lyons, and

graduated with honors at the college. Then he went to Paris and read

law. When his father’s failure in business left him without resources,

he enlisted, served for a time, came back to Paris and soon lapsed into

crime. He could not bear the idea of an empty pocket, and was ready

for any evil deed, that would fill it. The first committal to prison

introduced him to friends, by whom he was willingly led astray, and

prepared him for the criminal designs that took possession of him.

When finally tried for his life, he was no more than thirty-five, and

had been guilty of at least thirty heinous offences. His execution

undoubtedly rid the world of a monster.

 

Some of the more atrocious and abominable crimes of French evil-doers

will fitly find a passing reference here. They are mostly characterised

by the traits peculiar to the worst side of the Frenchman,--of devilish

ingenuity in design, savage resolution in performance, cynical apathy

and indifference in the face of the forthcoming results, alternating

often with sham emotion and hypocritical grief. Types re-appear

constantly, crimes are repeatedly reproduced, generation after

generation, by criminals who lack all originality in their actions,

generally inspired by the same motives. The greed for gold, the craving

for sensual self-indulgence, consuming passion and bitter jealousy

and an unappeasable thirst for revenge, have at all times influenced

the weakly moral sense and accomplished the most diabolical deeds. In

murder cases, the disposal of the body is one of the chief difficulties

that faces the perpetrator of the crime. It may be possible sometimes

to leave the tell-tale evidence upon the theatre of the crime, but the

danger of detection is greatly enhanced thereby, and murderers have

therefore usually adopted some other plan of concealing or removing the

corpse. There is nothing new under the sun, and some of these methods

of disposal are to be met with in the earliest criminal records, and

have found imitators down to the present day. One case may be quoted

in which a number of workmen repairing the Pont de la Concorde fished

a large parcel out of the water, and on opening it found it contained

human remains. The bundle had been cleverly packed and tied in a common

corn-sack, with an outer cover of packing-cloth. Shortly afterwards a

second parcel, exactly similar in form and contents, was found at no

great distance from the first. It was presently learned that a woman

named Ferraud, otherwise Renaudin, who had lived in the street des

Egout Saint Martin, had recently changed her domicile, and had been

helped in the move by a certain L’Huissier, a furniture maker. Nothing

more had been heard of him until a near neighbor vouchsafed his new

address. L’Huissier was found there, in bed, surrounded by the effects

of the murdered woman. He had let her an apartment in the same house,

and accompanied her there; had secured her property and promptly killed

her. Then he had made up his parcels, and, hiring a hand-barrow,

wheeled his burden to the river, to which he consigned it. The case is

interesting as one of the first instances of dismemberment as a means

of disposal.

 

Forty years later human remains were found in the bedroom of a hotel

in the rue de Poliveau, and were presently discovered to be those of a

milkwoman, who employed Barré, a notary’s clerk, who concerned himself

with the investments of any one who would trust him. The milkwoman

was one of the number. She had come to Barré’s rooms to charge him

with the sale of certain scrip, but was murdered when off her guard.

Other similar cases were those of the “Woman of Clichy,” whose husband

murdered her and buried her on the banks of the Seine. The criminal

here was an old soldier, wearing the military medal, and nicknamed the

“decoré.” A third case was that of Prévost, a police sergeant, who had

killed a tailor’s traveller, who had called upon him in the hopes of

disposing of some of his stock. When arrested and brought to trial it

was proved that this was the second murder of which Prévost had been

guilty. His first victim had been a housekeeper to a gentleman, who

had made her his heir. She desired to buy the good-will of a small

business, and consulted Prévost, at whose advice she realised part of

her property, and brought it to him to complete the purchase. She dined

with Prévost, having the money in her pocket, and was put out of the

way that he might secure it.

 

The most famous case of all is one of the most recent, and made the

reputation of M. Macé, the well-known chief of the French detective

police. Here a suspicious parcel had been found in a well in the

centre of an apartment house. A second parcel was presently recovered,

with identical contents. Both parcels were tied up in black glazed

calico, the ends of both were knotted in a peculiar way, and both

were stitched with black cotton. These facts threw suspicion upon

some journeyman tailor. It was soon discovered that an inmate of the

apartment house, who was a working sempstress, received the visits

of a tailor, who brought her work. Attention was thus directed to

this man Voirbo. His antecedents were investigated, and it was found

that an aged man, a miser with means, often in Voirbo’s company, had

disappeared. The crowning point in this case was the cleverness shown

by M. Macé in discovering that the dismemberment had taken place in

Voirbo’s own rooms. The tiled floor in the living room sloped in

one direction, and M. Macé, readily judging that if a body had been

disposed of in the room, the blood would have flowed that way, at once

emptied a decanter upon the floor. The running water led him to a spot

under which, when laid bare, a quantity of dark matter, proved later

to be dry human blood, was disinterred. Voirbo was challenged with the

crime, and confessed, but before execution committed suicide.