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Remarkable Rogues: The Careers of Some Notable Criminals of Europe and America

<h2 class="vspace">CHAPTER XVI PIERRE VOIRBO</h2> The case of Pierre Voirbo, the murderer of Désiré Bodasse, an old man who had been his friend, is one of the most remarkable of French crimes. It established the reputation of Macé, the famous detective, who devoted a book to explaining how he succeeded in tracing the murderer from the first clue—a pair of human legs—to the last, when, by a simple experiment, he located the very spot where the murder had been committed. If Macé had not been an exceedingly clever man Voirbo must have escaped, for he took every precaution to cover up his tracks, and was undoubtedly assisted by luck. But the strong arm of the law triumphed in the end. Voirbo was by trade a tailor, and by inclination a devotee of pleasure. He worked when he felt inclined, and if he could borrow or steal he preferred either as a source of income to the small profits derived from the making and repairing of clothes. He frequented low-class cafés, and gambled whenever he could, and, in addition, he had a pretty taste in wines. Yet for all his laziness and dissipation it was often remarked that Pierre Voirbo seemed never to be without money. He neglected his work until customers became few and far between, but he was never behindhand with his rent, and he could afford to employ an old woman to keep his rooms tidy. The time came, however, when Voirbo thought of214 marriage. The hero of many conquests, he had not really been attracted by the opposite sex until he met a good-looking girl with a dowry of fifteen thousand francs. Then he found the good looks and the dowry irresistible attractions. He considered himself not wanting in appearance and ability, though he was actually below the medium height, had black hair and eyes, and a thin, cruel mouth. Eyes and mouth bore witness to his dissipation, but the girl evidently was blinded by love, for she agreed to marry Voirbo. When her parents were told they gave their consent on the condition that the bridegroom-to-be brought into the marriage settlements at least ten thousand francs. Voirbo instantly expressed his ability to provide that amount, and he was thereupon formally acknowledged to be the girl's fiancé by her parents, who did not know that, so far from being in possession of ten thousand francs, the tailor owed many thousands already, and had not a hundred francs to call his own. Voirbo, however, believed that he would be able to raise the money. Penury had sharpened his wits and endowed him with self-confidence. A vague idea now occurred to him of borrowing the money, exhibiting it to the girl's parents, and then returning it when he got his hands on his wife's dot. It was a pretty scheme, but its weak point was that, owing to his reputation, there was no one in the country who would lend him a franc, and after a little consideration he abandoned the scheme. But he was determined to have the girl's marriage dot no matter what the cost. Fifteen thousand francs meant a fortune to him. It would last a long time, and when it was gone it would be quite easy to desert his bride, and seek another elsewhere. It was, indeed, a pretty plan he conceived, though he knew that the first obstacle—raising that sum of ten thousand francs—would prove the most difficult of all. 215 Amongst his friends was an old man, Désiré Bodasse, a worker in tapestry, who had been Voirbo's companion in more than one midnight spree. Bodasse, however, had never opened his purse to pay. It was Voirbo who always paid for their food and drink, the spindle-legged little man, with the dry cough, chuckling to himself as he saw the young fool throw his money away. Bodasse boasted that for every franc he spent he saved three, and he naturally despised anyone who spent his money on others. Voirbo, however, had taken a fancy to Bodasse, and was very often seen in his society, while everybody marvelled at the strange partnership between two men who were so dissimilar. It was to Désiré Bodasse that Voirbo went with the story that he must raise ten thousand francs at once. The younger man painted a glowing picture of the wealth of his future wife exaggerating her fifteen thousand francs until it became a dot four times as great. Bodasse listened with a thin smile on his thinner face, and when Voirbo's outburst was over congratulated him sarcastically. The tailor ignored the sarcasm, and, after a pause, boldly asked Bodasse to lend him ten thousand francs. He knew that the old fellow had that sum and more in the box under his bed, for Bodasse had been saving for years, and was a rich man, and, Voirbo argued, the time had come when Bodasse could show that he was not ungrateful for the entertainment he had enjoyed for years at his expense. The worker in tapestry, however, was not the man to part with his money. It was all he lived for; it was all he thought about; and in a few curt words he gave Voirbo to understand that if his marriage depended on the success of his application he had better forget all about it at once. In short, he would not lend him ten francs, much less ten thousand. There was no one else to whom he could apply, and216 Bodasse's refusal filled Voirbo with dismay, but he had to pretend to be indifferent after the first shock of disappointment was over, and an hour later both men appeared to have forgotten the incident when they sat in a café and drank wine to one another's health. But Voirbo's brain was on fire. He had regarded the capture of the girl's fifteen thousand francs as a certainty, and he could not bear to admit to himself that he was going to lose her fortune after all. Where could he raise ten thousand francs? Besides his ostensible occupation of tailor he was one of the numerous agents of the Paris secret police. He had used his official position in the past to blackmail inoffensive citizens, but he knew that it would take him more than a year to raise ten thousand francs by that method. Bodasse, unconscious of his companion's thoughts, continued to drink at Voirbo's expense, while the latter was rapidly summing up to himself the risks he would have to run if he murdered the man sitting opposite him. He knew all about Bodasse's life—the fellow's miserly habits; his lack of friends because he had been afraid that if he made many they might cost him money; his unpopularity in the neighbourhood in which he lived, and the well-known fact that his greatest wish was to be left alone. Voirbo recalled, too, that Bodasse was in the habit of disappearing from human sight for weeks at a time, when he either shut himself up in his room or went into the country. In the former case he was wont to provide himself with sufficient food to last out his spell of seclusion, and if letters came they were pushed under his door so that he might not be disturbed by having to open it. With murder in his heart, Voirbo thought over this, and came to the only possible conclusion—the murder of Désiré Bodasse would be about the easiest crime to commit and the chances of escape would favour him. The bottle of wine finished, Voirbo suggested an217 adjournment to his rooms, where he had often provided Bodasse with food. The old miser agreed with alacrity, and shortly afterwards they were in an apartment at the top of a high house. From outside the murmur of traffic faintly reached their ears, and from the stairs came occasional voices, but, for all that, the two men were quite alone, and Bodasse was absolutely at the mercy of the younger and stronger man. The temptation was irresistible. Voirbo looked at the small body and wizened face, the thin, scraggy neck and the lustreless eyes. Life seemed to be half-way out of his body already, and it would be easy to let the other half out too. Bodasse was sitting with his back towards Voirbo, who had risen and was walking irresolutely about the room. Suddenly the fellow found the courage to put his thoughts into acts. A heavy flat-iron, such as tailors use, was lying handy. He picked it up, poised it for a moment, and then brought it down upon the old man's head with a fearful crash, which sent him in a heap on the floor. There he finished him by cutting his throat. The first act in the drama was accomplished. Until the murder was done Voirbo had not thought of locking the door, but now he ran to it and turned the key. There were at least a dozen persons in the building at the time, for it was let out in apartments, but Voirbo, with extraordinary self-possession, proceeded to make arrangements for disposing of the body. He could not carry it out as it was, and, therefore, like many other murderers, he decided to divide it into several pieces. The head is, of course, the most important part of the body, because it is the easiest to identify. Get rid of the head and identification is rendered a hundred times more difficult. Voirbo gave it his special attention, and he disposed of it by filling the eyes and mouth with lead and dropping it into the Seine. The rest of the body was carted away in pieces,218 but on his second journey he had a very narrow escape, and disaster would have resulted early on had he not formed his plans with the utmost thoroughness. He undoubtedly proved himself efficient in small matters as well as in large, as his unexpected meeting with the police showed. With a hamper and a large parcel, both containing portions of the murdered man's body, he left the house one dark December night, with the intention of pitching them into the Seine at a spot where there would be no one to notice him. The hamper and the parcel were heavy, cumbrous and conspicuous, but Voirbo knew that on such a night there would be few pedestrians, and any who noticed him would think that he had been doing his Christmas shopping, and was taking the Christmas dinner and some presents home to his family. Owing to the weight of his double burden progress was slow, but Voirbo was not nervous. Nobody gave him a second glance, and he had the satisfaction of meeting more than one late shopper carrying big parcels too. But just as he was congratulating himself on complete success he was horrified to see two policemen coming straight towards him. His legs trembled, and for a moment he thought of dropping hamper and parcel and taking to flight, but before he could make up his mind the two officers of the law had stopped in front of him, and one was actually resting a hand on the hamper. "Who are you, and what's inside your parcels?" said one of the policemen suspiciously. There had been numerous robberies in the district lately, and the police had received special instructions to keep a sharp look out for midnight marauders. In fact, these two officers were looking for a burglar or a street robber. They never thought of aiming as high as a murderer. 219 With difficulty Voirbo found his voice. "I—I couldn't get a cab at the station, messieurs," he said, with a smile, "and so I've been compelled to carry home my purchases. This parcel contains two hams. You can feel how heavy it is! The hamper—see the label. It arrived for me by train." The officers examined the label on the hamper. It apparently had been addressed at a distant suburb and consigned to Paris. The label certainly looked genuine enough, and the explanation of hams in the parcel accounted for its unusual weight. The policemen consulted in whispers. They had been impressed by Voirbo's frankness, and eventually they permitted him to pass on. Had they examined the contents of either hamper or parcel they would have been able to arrest there and then as cruel a murderer as France has ever known. It was characteristic of Voirbo's cleverness that he should have labelled the hamper before emerging into the open with it. Gradually he got rid of the rest of the body, the last expedition being to the well of an apartment house close by, where he left the legs of his victim. As an agent of the secret police Voirbo was conversant with police methods, and also had access to their offices. He knew that he would be one of the first to hear if the authorities had been advised of either Bodasse's disappearance or the discovery of any portion of his body. For some days after the crime he frequented the police offices, and what he saw there convinced him that he could never be brought to account for his crime. Discovery was impossible, and he was quite safe. But so thorough was he in his methods that he did not stop at disposing of the body and robbing his victim. It was necessary to make the people in the house where Bodasse had lived believe that the old tapestry worker was still alive, though invisible behind the locked door. Accordingly, Voirbo, having filled his pockets with220 Bodasse's savings—they amounted to about thirty thousand francs, mainly in the form of Italian bonds payable to bearer—proceeded to impersonate his victim. For days and nights after Bodasse was murdered the woman who lived in the room underneath heard footsteps over her and, well aware that Désiré Bodasse never received visitors, told her friends that the old man, though he had not been seen for some days, was hiding in his room as usual. Whenever letters came for him they were pushed under the door, and, of course, opened and read by Voirbo. The murderer, however, would not remain in the room all night, and when darkness fell he left, having first placed a lighted candle near the window so that anyone who looked up would say that Bodasse was at home. Each candle burned for three hours before spluttering feebly out. Every night for a fortnight the lighted candle was seen and commented on, and, furthermore, the shadow of a man's head was occasionally seen across the blind. The neighbours gossipped about him, telling one another that Monsieur Bodasse was at home. No one expected to see him in the flesh for weeks, for it was understood that he had given way to one of his fits of solitude and would resent a call. Voirbo, confident, triumphant, careless, and revelling in his own cleverness, went to his prospective father-in-law and told him that he was now ready to produce the ten thousand francs which he required as evidence of his position. This promise he carried out, and, the girl's dot being brought into the common fund, the marriage was fixed to take place a few days later. "My rich friend, Père Bodasse, will attend me," he said proudly to the family into which he was marrying. He spoke, of course, after the murder of the old man. "He is a bit of a miser, but I expect a handsome present from him." 221 They little knew he had already murdered and robbed Bodasse. The family, impressed by Voirbo's fortune, expressed themselves as most anxious to make the acquaintance of Monsieur Bodasse, and they were looking forward to that honour when, on the day of the wedding, Voirbo told them that Bodasse had meanly run off to the country to avoid buying him a wedding present. "He will not get himself a new coat, the old miser!" he added in angry contempt. "And that is why he is not here. He knows his clothes are too shabby. I have spent much money on him in the past, but never again." It was, however, a small incident, and in no way spoilt the happiness of all concerned. There was a banquet at an hotel, and afterwards the married couple left for a short honeymoon. They were not to return to Voirbo's apartments, for he had given them up and had taken a house elsewhere. With his wife's fortune he had now over forty thousand francs and the newly married couple set up housekeeping on an ambitious scale, because Voirbo declared that he could earn quite a large income from his trade, so, when the honeymoon finished, realizing that it would be risky to parade his prosperity, he settled down to work. He had taken measures to conceal the stolen property, and, secure and confident, he lived from day to day, expecting that in time Bodasse's disappearance would lead to an inquiry, but utterly fearless of the consequences to himself. And all the time his young and pretty girl-wife never suspected that there was anything wrong. The third week of that new year—1870—was drawing to a close when Voirbo heard that the legs he had thrown into the well belonging to the restaurant in the Rue Princesse had been found. He received the news calmly, and offered no comment until he was told that Macé,222 then in charge of the police department of the quarter where the remains had been discovered, was commissioned to unravel the mystery. Now Voirbo knew Macé, and had never had a good opinion of his ability. "He'll never solve it," he said, with a laugh that reflected his own satisfaction. He felt that he was lucky not to have one of the leading detectives on the case. He feared the proved, tried men who had unravelled the dark mysteries of the past. But as for Macé, well, he was young and inexperienced, and Voirbo was prepared to make him a present not only of the legs, but of the rest of the body, if it could be found. Nevertheless, curiosity, mingled with some anxiety, induced Voirbo to pay a visit to Macé's office. He was, of course, able to stroll in whenever he liked, because he was in the police service himself, and, naturally, his interest in the mystery of the Rue Princesse excited no suspicion. There was nothing remarkable about his inquiries. All Paris was roused by the discovery of the legs, and Voirbo was as anxious as anyone to hear the latest news. On the occasion of his first visit he was told the result of the medical examination, and how he must have grinned in secret when he was informed that two doctors, experts in the art of identifying human remains, had given it as their opinion that the legs belonged to a woman. Their thinness, the size of the feet, and the fact that they were clothed in stockings, gave rise to this mistake, which caused the police to spend a long time looking for the body of a woman. The one clue they had was the letter "B" marked between two crosses. That was all the detectives had to go upon, and for days the police inquired if anyone had missed a girl whose Christian or surname began with B. And Pierre Voirbo continued to laugh at them! Macé worked day and night on the mystery. During the previous three months eighty-four women had been223 reported as missing, and after the most careful examination into each case the detective selected three as being most likely to help in the solution of the puzzle. Great was his amazement to discover all three alive and well! Meanwhile other parts of the body of Bodasse were picked up, though, as Macé was searching for a woman, all these parts were not assumed to belong to the legs. Half a dozen mysteries seemed likely to be manufactured out of one, when Macé had the good fortune to think of submitting the legs to another expert. It was only by chance that he did this, but when Dr. Tardieu unhesitatingly affirmed the legs to be those of a man the detective realized that he had been working on the wrong lines altogether. The fixing of the sex was a most important and valuable matter, although even now the mystery seemed quite unfathomable. Macé, however, was determined that the murderer should be brought to justice. He meant to devote all his time and ability to the task. His first examination of the cloth in which the legs had been wrapped before being cast into the well had convinced him that the parcels had been made up by a tailor. They bore certain marks, and the string used as well as the cloth confirmed him in this opinion. He started at the house in the Rue Princesse, making diligent inquiries as to whether a tailor had ever resided there, but was informed that a tailor had never been one of the tenants. The detective was not satisfied, and he got the old woman who acted as concierge to chat to him about the tenants, past and present. The woman, glad of an audience, entered into a minute account of the habits of the scores of men and women she had met in that house. Most men would have been bored to distraction, and would have ended the interview abruptly, but Macé listened patiently, only interrupting when the old woman casually mentioned224 a girl of the name of Dard, whose claim on fame was that, although she was now on the variety stage, she at one time lived in the house as a humble seamstress. The detective looked up at the mention of the word "seamstress." Here, then, was somebody who had worked for a tailor. It was but a slight clue, yet it might be worth something. The old woman gabbled on. "She gave me a lot of trouble, monsieur," she said, in a croaking voice. "Some one was always bringing her work, and their dirty boots meant that I had to wash down the stairs after them. There was one man, too, who always carried water from the well upstairs for her. He used to spill it, making more work for me." "What was the name of the man?" asked the officer quietly. The woman did not know; but before he left the Rue Princesse the detective had established the facts, that Pierre Voirbo was the man's name, and that he had lived close by, and was a tailor by trade. All trivial clues, and based on conjecture, but Macé considered them worth his trouble. He felt that he was getting on, and when he discovered that Pierre Voirbo had had a friend named Bodasse—Mademoiselle Dard told him this—who had not been seen for a long time, he congratulated himself, recalling the initial on the stocking. But there yet remained the difficulty of identification. Step by step he delved into Voirbo's life, and simultaneously set going the inquiries that ended in the finding of an old lady who was Bodasse's aunt. She was instantly taken to the Morgue to view the stocking with the initial on it, and, greatly to the delight of the police, immediately identified it as belonging to her nephew. She had the best of reasons for her statement, for she had marked the stockings herself. It appeared that, as Bodasse suffered from cold legs, he had had225 the upper part of a woman's stockings joined to the feet of a man's socks. This accounted in a measure for the mistake of the doctors who had certified the human legs to be those of a woman. The aunt said that she had not seen her nephew for a month, but had not felt alarmed on this account. She was used to his ways, and she illustrated them by relating how once when Bodasse had been unwell he had entered a hospital under a false name so that he might receive care and attention free of cost to himself. Madame, however, was of further use, as she was able to describe the appearance of Bodasse's friend, Pierre Voirbo. She gave information as to his habits, and Macé quickly had the story of the marriage, the ten thousand francs, the change of address, and all else of importance that concerned Voirbo at his finger-ends. There only remained now the task of proving that Désiré Bodasse had disappeared on a certain date, and the detective went to the apartment house where Bodasse had lived. Here he met with a most unexpected rebuff. The concierge actually informed him that Monsieur Bodasse was at home at that very moment! The night before she had seen a light in his room, and had noticed his shadow across the blind. If her word was doubted, she added the indisputable evidence that that very morning she had seen Bodasse in the street! The witness was undeniably respectable, and Macé had to accept her word, and, now that Bodasse was not the victim, he had to pursue his investigations elsewhere; but before he left he deposited a letter with the concierge to be handed over to the old miser when he returned. But Macé never forgot Pierre Voirbo. The man might be innocent, but there was suspicion enough to justify his being kept in sight. Even if Bodasse was not the man whose legs they had found in the well,226 it was just possible that Voirbo had got rid of the miser for the sake of his savings. For that reason he was shadowed, and, when, after a long wait and no sign of Bodasse's return, the police determined to break into his room they discovered that whoever had inhabited it recently it had not been the tenant, for a robbery had taken place. The mystery became complicated, and yet simpler. Who was the mysterious person who had walked about Bodasse's room, and who had come every night to light the candle? The bed had not been slept in for weeks. It was, therefore, obvious that the thief had not remained there all night. Macé had one answer only, and that was Pierre Voirbo. The fellow had a very bad record, and his association with the secret police did not earn for him any prestige in the eyes of the law. He was a dissipated loafer, ready to betray friend and foe alike, and Macé was well aware that Voirbo was quite equal to murdering Bodasse for much less than ten thousand francs. Yet the detective hesitated and it was only after tracing Italian securities belonging to the murdered man to Voirbo's possession that Macé decided to arrest him. Time had been lost in investigating certain clues suggested by Voirbo himself, but there could be little doubt now that they had been merely blinds to distract suspicion from himself. Voirbo must have realized that his position was growing worse every day. He had begun by affecting to despise Macé, but by now he knew that the young officer had proved himself to be a past-master in the art of detection. By a coincidence the very morning appointed by Macé for Voirbo's arrest saw the suspected man walk into the detective's office, apparently quite unconscious of his fate. He had come, as usual, to offer his opinion on the great mystery, and to accuse more innocent men. Macé kept him waiting for half an hour, and when he227 eventually turned to speak to him Voirbo dropped a card from his pocket-book. Macé picked it up for him, and as he did so saw at a single glance that Voirbo had booked a passage on a ship leaving France, and had given a false name. Ten minutes later Voirbo was under arrest. He swore that he was innocent, and reviled Macé horribly. But the detective was unmoved, although there was much to be accomplished before legal proof was forthcoming. A visit was paid to Voirbo's wife, an innocent girl, whose heart was broken when she learned the truth. She produced the box where her and her husband's marriage dots were kept. Macé opened it, and showed that it was empty. He had robbed his wife as well as Bodasse. The officer, however, was determined to find the securities Voirbo had stolen from Bodasse's room, and he began a thorough search. When he reached the cellar he found two casks of wine. A strict examination of these revealed a piece of black string tied to a bung above the head of one of the casks. Macé drew it out, and at the end found a thin metal cylinder, neatly soldered. Inside were the missing securities. Another experiment remained. Voirbo was taken by the police to the room where it was suspected the crime had been committed. Here Macé had him forcibly seated in a chair, and in his presence the detective tested the slope of the floor by pouring water on it. The water instantly dribbled towards the bed, finally settling in a particular spot. The boards were taken up, and congealed blood found. Macé had argued that during the murder of Bodasse much blood had been spilt, and that some of it must have sunk between the boards at a point where the slope had brought it to a standstill. Voirbo had washed the top of the boards, but had forgotten to wash underneath. 228 This simple experiment had such an effect upon Voirbo that he instantly confessed to the crime, telling everything without reservation. He did not, however, go to the guillotine, for before his trial, and after one abortive attempt to escape, he cut his throat in prison. The knife with which he took his own life was smuggled into the gaol concealed in a loaf, and although Macé strove valiantly to discover the person who had sent it to Voirbo he never succeeded. <hr /> 229 <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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