When the American Civil War came to an end it set free from discipline thousands of rough, lawless men, many of whom subsequently adopted crime as a profession. Amongst them was the father of Belle Star. He was a tall, powerfully-built man, with rugged features and gorilla-like arms, a crack shot and a fearless horseman, and during the four years Star had fought on behalf of the Southern against the Northern States he had revelled in the conflict. Peace had no charms for him, and when the rival parties settled their differences he decided to make war on both. In other words, he took to the bush with half a dozen tried and trusted comrades, and for several years the gang, which steadily grew in numbers, terrorised the country-side.
Belle, his only child, was born near a battlefield and within sound of the booming of the guns. The mother did not long survive her birth, but, although nearly always on the march, Belle was well looked after. She was a pretty, fairy-like child, with blue eyes and an engaging manner, and she was the pet of the camp. The Southern soldiers called her their mascot, and before she was five she could handle a pistol, and by the time she was ten she was expert in the use of the lasso, carbine, bowie knife, and revolver.
When Star turned bushranger Belle was only twelve, but she was already well qualified to be a prominent member of his gang. Only her father excelled her as a shot, and in horsemanship she was without a rival. Wild and apparently untamable steeds that Star himself dare not mount became docile as soon as Belle took them in hand. Animals loved her; men feared and respected her.
She grew into a beauty, slim and fragile-looking, yet in reality very strong, intelligent, audacious and clever. When she was only fifteen she was once left in charge of the headquarters of the outlaws for a whole day whilst they rode to a certain town and held up the bank. During their absence a tramp attempted to rob the camp, but although he took Belle by surprise she soon had him on the defensive, and instead of killing her she killed him with her small white hands, slowly forcing the thief backwards with her hands around his throat; then down on his knees, and, finally, left him a corpse at her feet. On the return of the outlaws she told her father what had happened, and he there and then named Belle as his successor in the leadership of the gang, and every man present swore to obey her when her turn came to reign over them.
Reared amid bloodshed, taught every day to regard human life as anything but sacred, and educated to believe that it was no sin to rob, it is not astonishing that at the age of eighteen Belle, for all her beauty, was a thorough-paced criminal. She had already shot down at least half a dozen men; like her father she feared nothing, and flying along on a swift horse she was capable of hitting any human target within sight.
More than once her marksmanship had saved the gang from being surrounded and overpowered, and during the last two years of her father's life it was really her brain that guided the band of outlaws.
But the inevitable day came when Star, the terror of Texas, was slain in a running fight, and Belle succeeded to the vacant leadership.
Only those who knew what she really was could have taken her seriously in her new capacity. She was eighteen, with refined, delicate features, lovely blue eyes, a pair of rosy lips, and a slim figure. By now the gang consisted of twenty men, all veterans in vice and crime, big, brawny, evil and coarse. Not one of them would have hesitated to cut the throat of his own mother, yet Belle during her reign held them in the hollow of her hand.
They never dared to disobey her. There was never any talk of mutiny, as there had been in her father's lifetime, and animated by this perfect loyalty the gang went on from success to success, and Belle Star, the greatest of all female bushrangers, kept in subjection scores of villages and towns.
One of the first acts of the bloodthirsty spitfire was to "avenge," as she called it, the death of her father. Star had sent to their last account at least forty men and women, but Belle would have it that his death had been undeserved, and that because he had never robbed the very poor the Sheriff had no right to shoot him for trying to evade arrest. So she marked down the Sheriff for execution, and with six of her followers set out for the lonely farm belonging to the county official.
Despite the fact that she knew that the Sheriff was keeping a sharp watch for her, Belle did not hesitate to wreak vengeance on him. It was in the early hours of a June morning that she and her six followers rode out of the camp, and for five hours they travelled, only stopping when within half a mile of the Sheriff's residence. Then they dismounted, carefully tethered their horses in a wood, and did the remainder of the journey on foot, Belle leading the way, revolver in hand.
It was a lovely day, and as the Sheriff inspected his farm workers, a score of sturdy men devoted to his interests, he could hardly have suspected danger. He was fully protected and well armed in case of attack, and, feeling secure, he wandered aimlessly towards the most remote corners of his property. He was idly sauntering in the direction of a tool-shed, when two men sprang at him, and before he could utter a sound had him on his back, gagged and bound.
Half an hour later the Sheriff was led before Belle Star, who was standing under an old tree waiting for him. There was very little beauty in her face now. Her eyes shone like a tigress', and her small white hands were clenched.
Belle was smelling blood and gloating in the coming murder of the man who had executed justice upon her father.
The outlaw chieftainess called it a "trial," but the Sheriff was doomed from the first. As they were out of earshot she allowed the gag to be removed from his mouth, and then he was mockingly asked if he could suggest any reason why he should not be suspended from the tree under which they had assembled.
The Sheriff was a brave man, and he knew that his fate was sealed. He did not, therefore, make any plea for mercy, but in the curtest tones told Belle that he was merely one more victim of hers, but that in time his murder would be avenged. He was proceeding to taunt her with her disgraceful life, when she flushed angrily, and ordered him to be strung up.
Her commands were obeyed, and Belle's last act was to scribble on a piece of paper, "Executed by Belle Star," and pin it to his coat, before she rode away with her six ruffians.
The murder of the Sheriff aroused the country, and it seemed that Belle's career must be a short one. Rewards were offered for her death or capture amounting to more than ten thousand dollars.
All classes organized to hunt down the notorious female criminal. Respectable citizens enrolled themselves as patrols to guard their homes, and for miles around there was not a town or village without its special defence. But Belle had her own system of obtaining information, and she learnt early all about the preparations that were being made to capture her, laughing and derisively boasting that she would outwit all her foes.
It was her fearlessness and audacity allied to success that held the gang in subjection. Belle could do no wrong. When any of them attempted a job on their own account they invariably failed. Thus when Belle injured her arm, and had to travel two hundred miles disguised in order to see a doctor, four of her followers thought they would rob a jewellery establishment and keep the "swag" for themselves. They found courage in drink, and proceeded to attack the shop, but everything went wrong from the start. They were surprised by a patrol, and a fight ensued, in the course of which two of them were shot dead. The others escaped, and reached the camp in an exhausted condition, and when Belle returned she punished them by making them do all the dirty work of the camp for a month, and fined the discomfited scoundrels by refusing to allow them to participate in the results of the next expedition.
That a young girl could dominate a gang of bloodthirsty ruffians in this manner would be incredible if the story of Belle Star's life was not fully authenticated.
With her usual cunning Belle waited until the enthusiasm of the numerous Defence Committees was cooled by inaction before resuming hostilities. For several weeks nothing was seen of her gang, and rumours began to circulate that she had fled with her followers to a less highly organized district, having realized that the good people of Texas were too clever for her.
Disguised as a man, Belle would visit various towns, and in the market places and hotels listen to legends about herself. She would laugh the loudest when the leading citizens eloquently depicted her fate if they got her into their hands. She had a sense of humour, and she could stroll into a local Court and watch petty thieves being sentenced, and applaud moral sentiments uttered by the presiding judge, who could not know that the notorious female bushranger was sitting a few feet away from him!
But her greatest exploit, apart from her many crimes, was the winning of two races on the same day in full view of thousands of spectators. It happened that a town which had often suffered from her depredations decided to hold a special race meeting, and amongst several prizes two large sums of money were offered to the winners of two particular races, one being for male and the other for female jockeys.
Belle, realising that she was an expert rider, determined to enter for both events, and as the one for men took place an hour before that for the ladies, she assumed male attire, and as a handsome young man rode on to the racecourse. After giving a false name she was permitted to take her place at the post, and as her horse was the fleetest, and she was the most skilful jockey, victory followed as a matter of course.
She received the stakes from the local mayor, made a speech of thanks, and then retired. When she reappeared she was dressed as a country girl, and this time she was leading another horse.
She looked so simple and sweet that the stewards were only too delighted to accept her entry for the race for female jockeys, and loud was the applause when the young beauty came in an easy first. Once more Belle attended before the élite of the town to receive a considerable sum of money, and she was cheered to the echo by the huge crowd, amongst whom there were hundreds of men who had sworn to capture Belle Star alive or dead.
The funds proved very useful to the gang, but, better than that, the men were so surprised and delighted by her double exploit that they became more slavish in their devotion to her. Belle was supreme. She knew now that if she led them into the very jaws of hell they would not draw back or complain.
Owing to her father's depredations having created a reign of terror amongst the country banks, a rule had been made requiring all cashiers to keep a fully loaded revolver on their desks, whilst if any suspicious stranger entered the premises one of the other clerks was to cover him unostentatiously with a revolver, and shoot at the first sign of danger. This innovation having reduced considerably the number of bank "hold-ups," it created a belief that it had succeeded in frightening away Belle Star's gang, but Belle proved that that was a great mistake.
Adopting her usual disguise of a young farmer, Belle went alone to Galveston to pick up gossip, and she was fortunate enough to overhear at one of the principal hotels a conversation between two merchants which revealed the interesting fact that a week later the National Bank was due to receive a consignment in gold amounting to one hundred and twenty-five thousand dollars.
That was the sort of thing that fired Belle's imagination, and although she knew that the National Bank was well guarded, and that the manager and cashier transacted business fully armed, she resolved to capture that consignment of gold.
She returned to her headquarters to give final instructions to her followers, and then she went back to Galveston, but this time she had assumed the character of a little old woman with a thin voice and a hesitating manner. She "fluttered" in the approved fashion of nervous old ladies, and more than one polite citizen of Galveston hastened to help her across the road when they saw her shrinking from lumbering cart horses.
It was exactly ten minutes before closing time when Belle timidly entered the National Bank and presented a cheque, which she asked the cashier to change for her. She looked so pathetic in her black clothes, and was so apologetic and yet friendly, that the cashier felt quite sorry when he had to tell her that he could not oblige her for the simple reason that the cheque was drawn on the bank's branch at Austin, the capital of Texas. Perhaps some of his politeness was inspired by a glance at the signature on the cheque, which was that of a well-known United States diplomat.
The poor old lady looked greatly distressed, and when at last she fully understood that she was not to have the money she showed signs of collapsing. The cashier and one of the clerks hastened to come to her assistance, and they assisted her into the manager's office, where she sank on to a chair, and huskily whispered that she would be all right in a few moments.
Manager, cashier and clerk were glancing at one another when they were startled to hear the command—"Hands up!" The next moment the "little old lady" was covering them with her revolver, whilst six of the outlaws under her command entered the building, closed the door of the bank, and made all the officials prisoners. Then they visited the vaults and the strong-room, and, having waited until darkness had fallen, took the gold out and packed it in the van brought for the purpose, eventually riding away leisurely.
It was not until the early hours of the following morning that the trussed-up and gagged bank staff were discovered and released. By then Belle Star was far away, and for the next two days the gang were busy changing their quarters in case they had been tracked to their camp. This single exploit made them all rich, but, of course, there was no limit to their greed, and no sooner was it accomplished than Belle began to plan others equally daring.
But she had a woman's vanity, and she brooded over insults and taunts which a man would have ignored, and she sometimes risked her own safety and that of her followers to avenge a petty slight.
She once happened to be in a populous town near Austin, when she heard the local judge declare that he knew Belle Star by sight and that he would shortly arrest her, and have her publicly whipped before handing her over to the Lynchers. The girl brigand and the judge were actually seated next to one another at the table d'hôte dinner at the hotel when he said this.
Belle smiled at his delusion, but when he proceeded to speak of her in opprobrious terms and gave her credit for more crimes than murder and robbery her anger nearly led her into revealing her identity. But she maintained control of herself, and after a little reflection decided to wait until the following morning before punishing the boastful judge.
Next morning after breakfast—she had registered as a man, and, of course wore male clothes—she mounted her horse in front of the hotel, and then sent a servant to tell the judge that a stranger wished to speak to him. At this time of day everybody was at work, and the hotel staff were busy indoors and in the stables. When the judge appeared he and Belle were practically alone, as she knew, and without hesitating she blandly informed him that she was Belle Star, and then raised her whip and lashed him in the face.
The judge was so astounded that he was unable to escape her until she had lacerated him considerably, and, half blind and smarting from pain, his shrieks for help were unanswered until Belle had reached a place of safety.
It is a well-known fact that when a woman deliberately embraces crime as a profession she is generally more brutal and merciless than the average male criminal. It was so with Belle Star. The fair-haired girl with the sunny smile and the lovely lips could in cold blood sentence to death a young man whose only offence was that he had tried to defend his property and his life.
Belle, too, was in the habit of accepting her own suspicions as full proof. Once a well-laid scheme came to naught because at the last moment the owner of the shop that had been marked down for attack awoke to a realization of his danger and secured reinforcements. The outlaws were driven off, and Belle, savagely discontented and disappointed, came to the conclusion that her plans had been betrayed by a young farm hand who had been in her pay as a spy.
She, therefore, sent two of her followers to arrest him, but the suspect gave them no trouble, for he came willingly. Then Belle coldly told him of his offence. He swore he was innocent, but she cut him short by drawing her revolver and putting a bullet in his brain, and the gang buried the suspected traitor with as much nonchalance as they would have interred a dog.
It is impossible, however, to relate all her exploits. She personally led onslaughts on banks, stores, private houses, and public buildings.
She had a solution for every problem and a way out of every difficulty. When one of her men was arrested and was in imminent danger of death, Belle, finding that the judge could not be kidnapped, proceeded to make a prisoner of his wife, and the judge subsequently found a note pinned to his pillow, informing him that unless the captured outlaw was allowed to go free the lady would be murdered. He was given only twenty-four hours to save her, but, as the town was in a ferment over the excesses of the gang, the judge, guessing that he dare not acquit the prisoner, had to connive at his escape in order to prevent the murder of his wife. He had a bad time of it when his fellow-citizens heard how they had been cheated of their prey, and he was compelled to resign, but as his wife was returned safe and unharmed he was not sorry that he had placated the outlaw.
Belle had plenty of friends who worked secretly for her. They did not take any part in the raids, but they were very useful in supplying information and warnings, and more than once the gang escaped, thanks to the timely advice of these spies. Thus when Belle was heading an expedition to rob a bank, she looked for and found a certain mark on the bark of a particular tree within a couple of miles of the town. That told her that the bank had obtained the protection of the authorities, and would be more than a match for the outlaws. She proceeded no farther, and she afterwards learned that the proprietor of the bank had planned to capture the gang. Their disappointment when she and her followers never turned up at all was a source of amusement to her, and compensated for the collapse of her plans.
For a long time, however, the Government would not take any action against the marauders, maintaining that the local authorities ought to be able to deal with them. But, when within the space of a month five banks and six shops were burgled and nine innocent lives were lost, the Government realized that this was no local problem but a national affair after all. Belle Star was terrorizing the country in no unmistakable manner. Her word was law, and the State was ignored.
Hundreds of small farmers paid her weekly tributes to save them from being robbed of their all, and things came to such a pass that some mean-spirited persons actually proposed that each town should pay ransom money to Belle if she would only promise to keep away!
When the troops took the field against her Belle's days were numbered, although she refused to admit this, and she issued proclamations inviting the soldiers to come on. Certainly the initial encounters ended favourably for Belle. She added to her recruits, provided them with plenty of ammunition, and, setting an example of fearlessness, led them against the soldiers, and drove them off.
She had by now her headquarters in the midst of a forest, and it was possible for travellers to pass within a few yards of the huts without knowing that they were there. Beyond the huts was a miniature fortress which commanded the approach to the forest, and, as it could be attacked from one side only, it was easy for half a dozen desperate men, all expert marksmen, to hold hundreds at bay.
Despite the fact that a regiment of soldiers was searching for her and her gang, Belle refused to lie low. Her raids continued, and when a spy of hers appealed for help she promptly responded, although it involved great risks. This spy, a woman employed as a cook in an hotel, had a husband who had been arrested for a trivial offence, but as he had a bad record it was certain that if the judge discovered it he would give the fellow a long sentence.
As the prisoner had come from New York, the police of the latter city were asked for particulars of his career, and they responded by sending a list of his previous convictions to the judge at Galveston.
But the damaging papers arrived on a Friday night, and before the judge could see them Belle personally entered the post office, held up the staff, examined the correspondence, and, having found the bulging packet from the New York Chief of Police, took it away and destroyed it. The result was that the spy's husband was treated as a first offender, and let off with a nominal fine.
The day after this exploit Belle was riding alone near her camp, when she was attacked by two soldiers, who suspected her identity. They followed, thinking that they could capture the famous brigand easily. But Belle's object was to separate them, and when the man on the swifter horse outdistanced his comrade Belle turned in her saddle and, despite the pace at which she was going, killed him with her first shot. His corpse had scarcely struck the ground when a second bullet ended the career of the other soldier.
These exploits gained for her a great deal of sympathy. The Texans were essentially a sporting race, and they argued that if a regiment of soldiers could not overcome a slip of a girl and a score of brigands then they deserved to be beaten. This was extraordinary, in view of the fact that Belle had robbed and pillaged all alike. The very poor she had spared for the reason that they were not worth robbing, but it was accounted a virtue unto her, and numerous acts of benevolence by her enhanced her reputation.
The fact was that Belle was as cunning as she was unscrupulous. She distributed money and provisions amongst the poor and worthless not because she had any pity for them, but because it was the cheapest way of obtaining the support at critical moments of a large portion of the population. Every gaolbird looked up to Belle as a subject does to a Sovereign, and they respected her all the more when they knew that she admitted to membership of her gang only the best experts in the criminal line.
At least four pitched battles were fought between the outlaws and the Government soldiers before the final encounter. Belle seemed to bear a charmed life. She always headed her colleagues and took the greatest risks, and when she emerged without a scratch from the fiercest encounters her ignorant and superstitious followers began to believe that she was not mortal. They had often seen her ride at a troop of armed soldiers and coolly pick off the officers, while all the time a perfect hail of bullets had sung around her fair head without touching her.
Whenever the battle was going against the outlaws it was Belle who revived their drooping courage, and she twice turned defeat into victory by her marvellous shooting. The outwitted and beaten commanders were compelled to send for reinforcements, and, so variable is human nature, when a hundred weary and dust-strained troopers entered Austin, the town they had come to save, they were jeered at by the ungrateful inhabitants, who had learnt that in a pitched battle with Belle Star's outlaws the soldiers had been worsted.
Belle's end was fittingly dramatic. She was celebrating a run of success against banks and shops with a feast when news came that two hundred and fifty soldiers under the command of a major were advancing to storm the fort. Instantly she sprang to her feet and ordered every man to his place.
She was sobered in a moment by the news, which was as unexpected as it was unpleasant; and there were several of her followers who had drunk too much to be of use. In vain did Belle shake and curse them and even implore them to wake up. They could only stagger forward a few paces and collapse. One man, in a fit of drunken hilarity and bravado, began to fire indiscriminately, thereby revealing the hiding-place of the outlaws, and Belle was so enraged that she brained him with her carbine. There was no time to remove the corpse, for the soldiers could be heard approaching now, and Belle, realizing that this time it was going to be a fight to a finish, put herself at the head of her garrison, and prepared to conquer or die.
The outlaws were well entrenched, and had a plentiful supply of ammunition, but they were up against equally desperate men now. At last, seeing that if they remained in the fort those who were not killed outright would be captured, Belle personally led a sortie against the enemy, hoping to escape in the confusion. The men followed her gladly, remembering their previous victories, but most of them were still fuddled by drink, and in the circumstances could not be expected to show to advantage.
Belle was the only one to fight at her best. She displayed amazing courage, time after time heading attacks on the troopers, who were so flustered as to show signs of panic. But the commander rallied them, and as by now the troopers regarded Belle Star as a demon and not as a human being they pressed forward to destroy her without being affected by her sex or age. When things were going against her she collected a few of her followers, and made one last desperate attempt to break through the ring of soldiers, but her luck failed her, and she fell riddled with bullets. It was the death she had always desired.
Jeanne Daniloff was reared in an atmosphere of mystery, intrigue and squalor. Her father was one of the many victims of Russian tyranny, and he had been forced to wander about Europe, going from one cheap boarding-house to another, accompanied by a wife who resented his lack of worldly success, and by a daughter who, as she grew older, rebelled against the squalid isolation of the life they were leading.
But Jeanne was not the sort of girl to accept her fate quietly. She had inherited her father's fanaticism, though she never applied it to political purposes, and also her mother's temper, and, becoming tired of the frequent quarrels between her parents, she eloped to Paris with an old gentleman. Jeanne was not sixteen, well developed, hardly a beauty, but possessed of a pair of remarkable eyes. She was well described later as "The woman with the fatal eyes." Jeanne was not destined to live many years, and yet during her brief career she hypnotized to their ruin three men, all of whom were, presumably, persons of education and position.
The ambitious, fiery-natured Russian girl meant to have a good time. Jeanne Daniloff was a curious mixture of pride and self-abasement. She hated poverty and she loved love. In her opinion the world ought to have been populated only by handsome men able to provide her with every luxury, with a sprinkling of women to flatter her by their jealousy. Warm-hearted and warm-blooded, reared in poverty and trouble, Jeanne Daniloff was born to play a tragic rôle on the stage of life.
Her first escapade did not last longer than six months and by the time her elderly friend had deserted her Jeanne was an orphan. At that moment her fate was trembling in the balance, and she might have been left in her loneliness to sink to the lowest depths had not her grandmother, who had always loved the reckless and irresponsible girl, offered her a home. Jeanne accepted, and went to live at Nice, encouraged, no doubt, by the knowledge that Nice had many carnivals, and was a resort of the rich.
Her grandmother, who kept a boarding-house, was soon cured of her delusion that Jeanne would help her in the conduct of her establishment. Household work was not to the liking of the young girl, who thought only of dresses and dances and men, and while the old lady was left to look after her boarders Jeanne spent the days reading novels and the nights dancing. She became a well-known figure at the numerous dancing halls in Nice, and most men forgot her rather plain features once they came under the spell of her "fatal eyes." Jeanne had only to look at a man to bring him to her feet. Once she realized her power she revelled in it, and, despite her aptitude for doing nothing, she managed to educate herself to hold her own in the best society, into which she sometimes strayed.
There is always at least one critical turning point in the careers of women of the Daniloff type, and Jeanne's came unexpectedly at a ball at Nice. She was chatting with a couple of friends between dances when the master of ceremonies begged to be allowed to present a newcomer to her. A few moments later Jeanne Daniloff was face to face with a tall, pale young man with a weak mouth and a nervous manner. Jeanne looked at him with her fatal eyes, and he was her slave.
Weiss was a lieutenant in the French Army, of good family, and with a future. In that crowd of adventurers and witlings he was a somebody, and when the following day he called on Jeanne at her grandmother's boarding-house he thrilled her with a proposal of marriage. It was not unexpected. Jeanne must have known that she had fascinated him, but she was nevertheless pleased at the prospect of becoming Madame Weiss, and in her usual manner she flung herself impetuously into the arms of her lover.
Her happiness was short-lived, however. Weiss's mother, when she heard of her son's intention, made it her business to interview Jeanne. Madame Weiss was not to be fascinated by the "fatal eyes," and she summed up the character of the boarding-house siren in terms that left no doubt in her son's mind that she would never consent to the union. As according to the law of France the young officer could not marry without his mother's permission the brief engagement between him and Jeanne came to an end.
The Russian girl quickly recovered her spirits and once again abandoned herself to the gaieties of Nice. The prospect of losing her turned Weiss's love into a burning passion. He attended balls just to catch a glimpse of her; and it maddened him to see her smiling into the faces of men he imagined to be his rivals. Daily he pestered his mother to give her consent, but she held out against him, and at last Weiss had to resort to desperate measures.
With his promotion to the rank of captain he received orders to go to Oran in Algiers. The night before he was due to leave Nice he sought out Jeanne and implored her to elope with him. Of course he was in complete ignorance of the fact that the girl had already had that "affair" with that elderly gentleman which had terminated in Paris. Young Weiss used all the eloquence of which he was capable, unable to realize that he was addressing one to whom elopement appealed irresistibly because it was an adventure.
They left together for Oran, and shortly after their arrival set up housekeeping under the soft, alluring skies of Algiers. The humid climate suited Jeanne. The mysticism and romantic beauty of North Africa captivated her; she revelled in the colour, the movement and the variety of the native towns and villages. As the reputed wife of Captain Weiss she mixed in the best society, and Jeanne was soon a popular hostess, whilst her fascination for men was as remarkable as ever it had been.
Meanwhile, the much-in-love Weiss had not ceased to pester his mother, and she, feeling that it would be foolish to resist any longer, gave her consent, and Captain Weiss and Jeanne Daniloff were married.
The ceremony had a curious effect upon Jeanne. She became deeply religious. Every morning she read the Bible, and her prayers were never neglected. She took to visiting the poor and her charity was boundless. Her husband was delighted. He was her most devoted admirer, and as he possessed qualities which made him an ideal husband she ought to have been very happy.
For a time Jeanne mastered herself sufficiently to appreciate him and to show her devotion by living only for him. His abilities had by now been recognized by the French Government, which had permitted him to retire from the army and take a well-paid civil appointment in the Algerian service. There was, therefore, no lack of money, and when in course of time Jeanne was the mother of two fine children, a son and a daughter, she seemed to be the happiest wife and mother in Oran.
She had the means to give dinner-parties and garden-parties, and the very best people were amongst her intimate friends. It was, indeed, a decided change from the boarding-house at Nice and the cheap dancing halls.
Soon after the birth of her second child—in the early part of 1889—Captain Weiss bought a charming house and grounds at Ain-Fezza, near Oran. It was an ideal residence, and everyone envied Madame Weiss her home, her children and her husband. She had the reputation of being a most devout Christian and a good wife and mother.
The Paris elopement seemed to belong to another world. The reckless pleasure-seeking Jeanne Daniloff might never have existed, yet the time was fast approaching when her real self was to come to the surface again. Nothing could have prevented her being herself. She could not help her own nature. The daughter of the Russian revolutionaries, a veritable child of storm, could not maintain the character she had earned in Oran; and when all appeared well with her she plunged into a murderous intrigue which cost her everything—home, children, husband and life!
In the year 1889 an engineer of the name of Felix Roques came to Ain-Fezza to work on the Algerian Railways. He had not been long in the place when he was compelled to listen to glowing accounts of Madame Weiss, in which her piety and love for her family were dilated upon. Roques's curiosity was aroused. It seemed impossible that the world should contain so perfect a creature as they told him Madame Weiss was. At this time Jeanne was only twenty-one, and in the full possession of her powers, physical and mental.
Felix Roques had no difficulty in making her acquaintance. In common with the principal employés of the company that was constructing the railway, he was invited to a garden-party at Madame Weiss's, and there he was introduced to her by her husband. For some extraordinary reason the sight of Felix Roques aroused in Madame Weiss's breast all those doubtful passions which had lain dormant since her flight from Nice. In a moment she was Jeanne Daniloff again. She fell straightway in love with the handsome engineer. Home, husband, children and reputation became as nothing to her. She dropped the mask and was the wild child of nature again. All the blood of her fanatical, revolutionary ancestors coursed through her veins, warmed by the balmy African sun.
She was really in love at last. That was what she told herself. She had married Captain Weiss to escape from the dreary boarding-house and the commonplace persons her grandmother catered for. She had tolerated him because he gave her social position, and she had accepted boredom because she wished to be with her children. But now she was in love, and Felix Roques, whose features were regular without making him startlingly handsome, fell under the spell of the fateful eyes, and was never the same man again.
The lovers had many secret meetings, and even when they met at parties could not conceal their affection. Friends warned Weiss; but he only laughed at them. Was not his wife the most religious woman in Oran? Had he not the evidence of his own senses that she was devoted to him and to their little boy and girl? "You are talking nonsense, my friend," he would answer calmly, and go about his duties, and once, to show his confidence in his wife, asked Felix Roques to take her to an evening party because business would detain him at his office.
The time came, however, when Madame Weiss and Felix Roques decided that it was impossible for either of them to be content with simple dalliance. The hypnotized engineer declared that Jeanne must give herself completely to him.
The suggestion was met with a pleased laugh. Jeanne liked a strong, determined lover, and not a milksop of a husband who let her have her own way in everything. I will give her own description of this scene with her lover. It reveals the temperament of the woman in a remarkable way.
"I loved Monsieur Roques as the master of my thoughts, of my intelligence, of my body, of every fibre of my being, as a master whom I worshipped, and in whose presence I myself ceased to exist," she wrote. "When he asked me for the first time to appoint him an assignation we were walking with some other people. Instead of saying yes or no I took out a coin and said to him, 'I don't wish to take on myself the responsibility of a decision; you know that if once we begin to love it will be no light thing for me. I shall lead you far, perhaps farther than you think. If it comes down heads it shall be yes; if tails, no.' He looked very astonished; he blushed very deeply and said, 'So be it.' I spun the coin; it came down heads, and I was his."
The astounding nature of this female criminal is proved by the fact that to celebrate her downfall she had a ring engraved with the date, November 13, 1889!
Once she was committed to him her love became a mania. She wrote to him daily, and at night, when she had superintended the putting to bed of her children, she would sit down beside their cot and scribble pages of ecstatic praise of the young engineer.
Some of those letters have been preserved, and I will give one or two specimens.
"Dearest," she wrote a fortnight after she had betrayed her husband, "you do not know how I hold to life now. Does it not promise to me in the future days of radiant happiness, intimacy, affection growing daily stronger, with you, my beloved, you to whom I am proud to belong, you for whom I am capable of any sacrifice, any act of devotion? How I love you, Felix! Take all the kisses I can give you and many more. I embrace you with all the strength of my being.—Your wife, Jeanne."
Several months passed, and everybody in the district except Weiss knew of the intimacy between his wife and Roques. The infatuated man refused to believe a word against her, and his wife rewarded him by eventually coming to the conclusion that he was in her way, and that she must "remove" him in order to attain to the fullest happiness with Felix Roques.
The guilty couple often discussed the possibility of murdering Weiss without having to pay the penalty. Like everybody else they had been fascinated by the lurid English drama known as "The Maybrick Case." They had read full details of the "removing" of James Maybrick by arsenic, and the very complete French reports of the sensational Liverpool trial introduced Jeanne Weiss to many of the mysteries of arsenical poisoning. She knew that there were ways of obtaining poison without having to name that dread word, and when the fatal step was resolved on she voted for Fowler's solution as the medium.
A remarkable correspondence led up to the opening act of the drama. She sent Roques a letter, in which she said, "I am beset with sad and depressing thoughts. What I am about to do is very ugly."
Later she wrote, "I prefer Fowler's solution to begin with. It is agreed, Felix. You shall be obeyed. Have I ever hesitated before anything except the desertion of my children? Crimes against the law don't trouble me at all. It is only crimes against Nature that revolt me. I am a worshipper of Nature."
Another remarkable reference to the forthcoming attempt on her husband's life must be quoted, "I have been playing the Danse Macabre as a duet. My nerves must be affected, for it produced a gloomy effect upon me. I thought of death and of those who are about to die. Can it be that this feeling will return to me? But it is so sweet to think that I am working for our nest."
The last letter she penned before the actual poisoning began was an outburst of love and hysteria.
"Oh, Felix, love me, for the hideousness of my task glares at me. I want to close my heart and my soul and my eyes. I want to banish the recollection of what he has done for me, for I worship you. I feel such a currency of complete intimacy between you and me that words seem unnecessary. We read each other's thoughts as in an open book. To arrest this current would be to arrest my life. I may shudder at what I am doing after it is done, but go back I cannot. Comfort and sustain me; help me to get over the inevitable moments of depression, bind me under your yoke. Make me drunk with your caresses, for therein lies your own power. I will be yours, whatever happens. So long as you give me your orders I will carry them out. But it seems to me I am doing wrong. I love you terribly."
Weiss became ill in October, 1890, mysteriously ill, for the local doctor was greatly puzzled. The patient's young wife—she was only twenty-two—nursed him with apparent devotion. She would allow no one else to give him his food, and, of course, her reason for this was the fact that no one else could be relied upon to mix arsenic with it!
When friends of the family called Jeanne's distress touched their hearts. She was implored not to risk a breakdown herself by overdoing the day and night nursing of her ailing husband, and they advised her to employ professional help. With a wan smile Jeanne announced her determination to nurse him tenderly herself, and sacrifice her own life if necessary for him. There had been adverse rumours concerning Jeanne Weiss in Oran and the neighbourhood, but in the face of this unexampled devotion to her husband they seemed to be the inventions of unscrupulous enemies.
The doctor grew more puzzled. Just when his patient seemed to be improving he would have a relapse, and there was a curious ill-luck about the ministrations of Madame Weiss. He did not see that Jeanne was only acting the part of the distressed and anxious wife. It was her pale face and tearful manner that kept his eyes closed to the truth.
It happened, however, that Weiss had a secretary, Guerry, whose wife was a friend of Mademoiselle Castaing, the postmistress at Ain-Fezza, a lady whose bump of curiosity was abnormally developed, for she was in the habit of passing her time by opening the letters that came through her office, and reading the contents.
Mademoiselle, in fact, knew more about the intrigue between Madame Weiss and Felix Roques than anyone else, and it was only by exercising the rarest self-control that she refrained from publishing far and wide the news that Roques had gone to Spain to be out of the way when Weiss died, and that Madame Weiss was to join him later in Madrid with her children. She knew also that months before Jeanne had refused to elope with Roques, because that would have meant parting from her children, the custody of whom would be given to her deserted husband by the Court. It was because she wished to keep her children that she decided to murder her husband instead of simply leaving him.
Guerry, the secretary, was devoted to his employer. When Weiss became worse he reported the fact to Madame Guerry, and that lady sniffed meaningly and finally blurted out the gossip she had heard from the postmistress.
Instantly the secretary's suspicions were aroused. He felt certain that Jeanne was poisoning her husband, and when on October 9 his wife hinted that Madame Weiss had posted an important letter addressed to Felix Roques at Madrid, and that the letter was still lying in Mademoiselle Castaing's post office, he promptly went down to see the lady whose curiosity was the direct means of saving a wronged man's life.
It was, of course, against the regulations for the postmistress to discuss her duties with outsiders, and Guerry, unwilling to put her in an embarrassing position, cut the Gordian knot by stealing Madame Weiss's letter. When he got home he read it, and a more remarkable document was never penned.
"You may as well know what a fearful time I am going through at this moment—in what a nightmare I live," Jeanne wrote. "Monsieur has been in bed four days, and the best half of my stock is used up. He fights it—fights it by his sheer vitality and instinct of self-preservation, so that he seems to absorb emetics and never drains a cup or a glass to its dregs. The doctor, who came yesterday, could find no disease. 'He's a madman, a hypochondriac,' he said. 'Since he seems to want to be sick, give him some ipecacuanha, and don't worry. There's nothing seriously the matter with him.'
"The constant sickness obliges me to administer the remedy in very small doses. I can't go beyond twenty drops without bringing on vomiting. Yesterday from five in the morning until four in the afternoon I have done nothing but empty basins, clean sheets, wash his face, and hold him down in the bed during his paroxysms of sickness. At night when I have got away for a moment I have put my head on Mademoiselle Castaing's shoulder and sobbed like a child. I am afraid, afraid that I haven't got enough of the remedy left, and that I shan't be able to bring it off. Couldn't you send me some by parcel post to the railway station of Ain-Fezza? Can't you send four or five pairs of children's socks with the bottle? I'll take care to get rid of the wrapper. Hide the bottle carefully.
"I'm getting thinner every day. I don't look well, and I am afraid when I see you I shan't please you. Did you get the photograph?
"Forgive my handwriting, but I am horribly nervous. I adore you."
The secretary handed the letter to the Public Prosecutor at Oran, and immediately Jeanne Weiss was arrested. The police were only just in time. Another day's delay and Weiss must have died, for the doctors had to work desperately before they could report that he was mending. When she was put in prison Jeanne tried to commit suicide, but a strong emetic preserved her life. Then followed a genuine illness, and for six months she was in the prison infirmary.
She had been allowed to take her infant with her, but it sickened in goal and died, greatly to her distress, for although Jeanne could plot to receive arsenic with which to poison her husband, and could ask her lover to hide the bottle in children's socks, she was devoted to her babies. A curious contradiction, yet it was because of this that, instead of deserting Weiss, she chose rather to poison him.
A perusal of Madame Weiss's papers left no doubt in the minds of the authorities that Felix Roques was her guilty accomplice, and the services of the Spanish police were utilized to effect his arrest in Madrid. Roques, however, had no intention of facing the music, and he contrived to smuggle a revolver into the Spanish goal, and with it he blew out his brains. The young Russian woman was left, therefore, to answer alone the serious charge of having attempted to murder her husband.
The trial did not take place until the last week in May, 1891, when Jeanne Weiss was just twenty-three. She had, indeed, lived her life. In experience and intrigue she was an old woman, and it was hard to credit the story of her career as laid before judge and jury by the prosecutor. During her incarceration she had composed a sort of autobiography in which she attempted to put all the responsibility on Felix Roques, and when tired of that she persuaded herself that her husband had forgiven her, and that he would save her from punishment by giving evidence on her behalf. It was sheer invention, but it enabled her to enter the Court without a tremor, and feel hopeful of an acquittal.
The trial was conducted with all the emotion of which a French Court can be capable, and had it not been for the proofs in the prisoner's own handwriting her youth and her "fatal eyes" might have saved her from conviction. Jeanne's chief hope was that the sight of her distress might reawaken the love her husband first bore for her, the love that had once caused him to quarrel with his own mother. But Weiss had been sickened to the soul by the realization of her treachery. He could not look upon her without shuddering with horror, and from the moment he had been convinced that she had tried to murder him he declined to give her his name. Henceforth she was Jeanne Daniloff, and not Madame Weiss, and he would not permit anyone to speak of her as his wife.
Jeanne, who had decided to commit suicide if she was convicted, came into Court with a handkerchief which she constantly pressed against her face. No one knew that in the corner of it was a piece of cigarette paper which contained a dose of strychnine. This was to be her last resource if the verdict of the jury went against her.
The critical moment came when Weiss stepped into the witness-box. Now that Felix Roques was dead Weiss was the only person who could tell the inner history of the intrigue. Jeanne hoped that he would suppress everything likely to damage her, and all the time he was being questioned she kept her eyes on him.
But it was too late. Weiss was an older and a wiser, if sadder man now. Jeanne's eyes were no longer capable of hypnotizing him, and he simply told the truth. When he was given permission to leave the box he turned abruptly towards the jury and addressed them.
"I desire, gentlemen," he said, "to make the following declaration: I speak that I may reply to certain calumnies that have appeared in the press. I have never forgiven Jeanne Daniloff. I do not, and I never will, forgive her. Henceforth she is nothing to me. Whatever her fate, I stay near my children. I only wish never to hear her name again."
That statement sealed the doom of the accused. She uttered a gasp of terror, and would have fallen had not the wardress clutched her, and although the trial continued for several hours longer she scarcely understood what was happening.
It was at four o'clock in the morning when the jury returned a verdict of guilty, "with extenuating circumstances," and but for the latter the convict would have been sentenced to death.
The fatal eyes had, in fact, saved her; but Jeanne Weiss had no desire for life. To her, death was far more preferable than existence within prison walls, and when the judge's sentence was still ringing in her ears she bit her handkerchief as though trying to steady her nerves, though in reality she was swallowing the dose of strychnine she had concealed in the hem. A request to the wardress for a glass of water was instantly complied with, and Jeanne then washed the fatal poison down. A few moments later she was shrieking in agony.
They carried her into an adjoining room, and a doctor administered an emetic, but already the deadly dose was accomplishing its task. Jeanne Weiss was dying, and those who had assisted to bring her to justice stood around her as she passed into another world.
The manner of her going was in keeping with her character. Wild, turbulent, passionate, fierce and unscrupulous, Jeanne Daniloff was a revolutionary, one who rebelled against the laws of mankind. She took her own life gladly, and her last words were references to her children and to the man for whom she had sacrificed so much.
She appeared anxious to spare her children the disgrace of having a convict for a mother, but it was really her husband's repudiation and the knowledge of her lover's death that had inspired her to revise the sentence of the Court and execute herself.
Anybody who has sufficient self-assurance to set up as a "beauty specialist" will never want for clients as long as there are middle-aged and ugly women in existence and vanity continues to be one of the most common weaknesses of humanity. But when Rachel Leverson, an unscrupulous London Jewess, claimed to have discovered a process by which she could make members of her own sex beautiful for ever she struck out into a new line, and one that proved eminently successful until the police intervened.
Madame Rachel, as she called herself, had no pretensions to good looks. She was, to tell the truth, repulsive in appearance, being stout, with a greasy skin, irregular features, eyes that repelled, and a manner that was generally familiar and always irritating. But just as men will buy a hair-restorer from a bald-headed barber so will women flock to an ugly creature to learn the secret of beauty. Madame Rachel was ugly in mind as well as in body; she was rapacious and unscrupulous, and yet for years she prospered as a "beauty doctor."
It was a very risky business that Madame Rachel brought into existence, but, despite her audacious frauds, it was not without difficulty that she was convicted in a court of law and punished for her crimes.
Before starting as a "beauty specialist" Rachel Leverson had tried fortune-telling, but the profits had been too small and clients too few, and she quickly retired from it to strike out on new lines, and she did not have to wait very long before her bank balance justified her enterprise.
The woman's headquarters were in a house at the corner of Maddox Street and New Bond Street, and were, therefore, right in the heart of fashionable London.
Her methods were a mixture of quackery, blackmail, subserviency and bullying, and, realizing that most people do not value anything which is not costly, she charged enormous fees. Whenever she quoted them she did so in a reluctant manner, as if to suggest that she personally got nothing out of the business, and was, in fact, really a philanthropist. Of course, she relied principally on her knowledge of the weaknesses of her sex, and those would-be clients whose financial position obviously precluded them from adding to her profits she skilfully used to advertise her merits.
On one occasion the widow of a Civil Servant, a lady in the fifties, who had lost her good looks many years earlier in the hot suns of India, applied to Madame Rachel to be made beautiful for ever, being unaware that the Jewess charged a hundred guineas for the preliminary treatment only and that she required a thousand guineas for the full course. But as the lady was in society Madame Rachel did not drive her away with contumely, as she had persons of low degree. She merely surveyed her caller, and then announced that she could not accept less than five hundred guineas "on account."