Chapter 8

Herr Carovius and Jordan were sitting in the Paradise Café.

“How things change, and how everything clears up and straightens out!” remarked Jordan.

“Yes, the open graves are gaping again,” said Herr Carovius cynically.

“So far as I am concerned,” continued Jordan, without noticing the aversion his affability had aroused in Herr Carovius, “I can now face death with perfect peace of mind. My mission is ended; my work is done.”

“That sounds as if you had discovered the philosopher’s stone,” remarked Herr Carovius sarcastically.

“Perhaps,” replied Jordan gently and bent over the table. “You are after all not entirely wrong, my honoured friend. Do you wish to be convinced? Will you honour me with a visit?”

Herr Carovius had become curious. They paid their bills and left for Ægydius Place.

Having entered Jordan’s room, the old man lighted a lamp and bolted the door. He then opened the door of the great cabinet by the wall, and took out a big doll. It was dressed like a Swiss maid, had on a flowered skirt, a linen waist, and a little pink apron. Its yellow hair was done up in braids, and on its head was a little felt hat.

“All that is my handiwork,” said Jordan, with much show of pride. “I myself took all the measurements and made the clothes, including even the shoes. And now watch, my dear friend.”

He placed the doll in the middle of the room. “She will speak,” he continued, his face radiant with joy, “she will sing. She will sing a song native to her beloved Tyrol. Will you be so good as to take this chair? I would rather not have you so close to it, if I may, for there are certain noises which I still have to correct. The illusion is stronger when you are some distance away.”

He crouched down behind the doll, did something at its back, and the buzzing of wheels became audible. The old man then stepped out to the front of the doll, and said: “Now, my little girl, let’s hear what you can do!”

An uncanny, hoarse, somewhat cooing voice rang out from the body of the doll. It sounded like the vibrations of metallic strings accompanied by the low tones of a water whistle. If you closed your eyes, you could at least imagine you were hearing a song sung by some one in the distance. But if you looked at the thing closely with its lifeless, mask-like kindly, waxen face, and heard the shrill, muffled sounds, without either articulation or rhythm, coming from within, it took on a ghostly aspect. Herr Carovius in fact felt a cold chill creep down his back.

When the machine ran down, the doll’s eyelids and lips closed. Jordan was looking at Herr Carovius in great suspense. “Well, what do you think of it?” he asked. “Be quite frank; I can stand any amount of criticism.”

Herr Carovius had great difficulty to keep from bursting out laughing. His mouth and chin itched. Suddenly, however, scorn and contempt left him; he fell into a disagreeably serious frame of mind, and a softness, a mildness such as he had not felt since time immemorial stole over his heart. He said: “That is a perfectly splendid invention! Perfectly splendid! Though it does need some improvement.”

Jordan nodded zealously and with joyous approval. He was on the point of going into a detailed description of the mechanism and its artistic construction, when the two men heard a strange noise in the adjoining room. They stopped and listened. They could hear some one moving the furniture; there were steps back and forth; they heard a hammering and pounding as if some one were trying to open a box. This was followed by a sound that resembled the falling of paper on the floor; it lasted for some time, bunch apparently following bunch. Listen! Some one is talking in an abusive voice! What’s that? A gruesome, sing-song voice repeating unintelligible words: “I-oi! huh, huh! I-oi, huh-huh!” There is a sound as if of crackling fire. The flames cannot be seen; but they can be heard!

Old Jordan jerked the door open, and cried like a child.

Philippina was standing in the midst of a pile of burning papers. She had forced Daniel’s trunk open, thrown every one of his scores on the floor, and set them on fire. She was a fearful object to behold. Her hair hung down loose and straggly over her shoulders, she was swinging her arms as if she were working a pump-handle, and from her mouth poured forth a volley of loud, babbling, gurgling tones that bore not the faintest resemblance to anything human. Her face, lightened by the flames, was coloured with the trace of fearful voluptuousness. Herr Carovius and old Jordan stood in the doorway as if paralysed. Seeing them, she began to hop about, and stretched out her upraised arms to the flames, which were leaping higher and higher.

Herr Carovius, awakening from his torpidity, saw that it was high time to make some effort to escape. Shielding his face with his hands, he fled as fast as his feet could carry him to the hall door and down the steps. Tears were gushing down Jordan’s cheeks; fear had made it impossible for him to reflect. He ran back into his room, opened the window, and called out to the people on the square. Then he chanced to think of his beloved doll. He rushed up to it and took it under his arm. But when he tried to leave the room, the smoke blew into his face, benumbing and burning him. He staggered, reached the top of the stairs, made a misstep, fell headlong down the steps, still holding the doll in convulsive embrace, twitched a few times, and then lay lifeless on the hall floor.

Heart failure had put an end to his life.

Dorothea, who had been in the house packing her things, hastened, luggage in hand, past the corpse. Her face was ashen; she never looked at the dead body of Inspector Jordan. She was soon lost in the crowd of excited people. She had vanished.