Isabella Ramsden was shaking as she recalled the events of that final night of her husband’s life. In an agitated voice she continued her story.
‘I froze, for a moment, before being pushed from behind. Edgar was steering me towards the door. Prodding me into action. He was yelling, “The key, where’s the bloody key?” My hands were trembling and I struggled to get the key in the lock. There seemed to be pandemonium everywhere. Cook was rushing from the kitchen and I could hear the front door opening and closing. Conrad and Mabel were barging into the hallway and “old” George was almost colliding with Victor who seemed to be coming from the lounge. When I finally turned the key and opened the door, I saw...Jack! He was lying, on the floor, to the left and just in front of the bookcases with his head turned to look at my portrait. He was holding his chest and there was blood on his hands. Not very much; but it was the colour! Edgar shouted, “I’ll get the girls", and dashed off up the stairs. I was the first person at Jack’s side after he was shot. He seemed very composed and was speaking in a whisper.’
’What did he say and please be as accurate as you can? It could be vitally important!’
‘He said, “I didn’t mean it to end like this,” then he started to cough. He coughed a couple of times but didn’t seem to be in great pain!’
‘Endorphins!’ muttered The Prof, under his breath.
‘What did you say?’
‘Nothing, I was thinking of something a medical professor once told me. Please go on!’
‘Jack was trying so hard to speak again but I had to go very close to him to hear what he was saying. And what he said next made no sense at all! He looked up at me and said, "Did you see Dr. Hyde?” He closed his eyes and never spoke again!’
‘He was in shock, Isabella! He’d be confused and desperate to remain lucid.’
‘Yes, I suppose so. As I was saying Jack closed his eyes but he was still breathing. I rose and said I would phone for an ambulance but Victor stopped me and said it had already been done. I looked around at everyone who’d crowded into the room; Laura was there in her bare feet and wearing a bathrobe; Sally, with a towel on her head, was clinging to Edgar and asking if he was dead; Conrad and Mabel were at the door, holding hands, and Mrs Gardner, having crossed over to the windows, announced that the windows were still locked and the curtains still drawn.’
‘Where was Mr. Gardner? Were you aware of his presence?’
‘Oh, he was talking to Victor. Victor had rushed over to the gun on the stand and, as he was coming back, I heard him suggesting that perhaps I should lie down. Victor had a word with cook and she took me to the lounge and poured me a brandy. Laura and Conrad made Jack comfortable until the ambulance arrived. They took Jack to Dumfries but I was told that he never regained consciousness!’
Isabella Ramsden’s words were reduced to a barely audible croak.
‘And then what?’
‘When the police arrived they searched the room and interviewed everybody. The gun was still fixed on the stand. The windows and safe were checked. They were locked. There was a smudge of blood on the locking device of the safe, which later turned out to be Jack’s No explanation was ever given as to how it might have got there.’
Isabella Ramsden sighed deeply at this point and appeared exhausted.
‘Can I get you anything, Isabella? Something to drink, perhaps?’
‘No, I’ll be all right in a moment or two!’
‘There are some questions I must ask, at this stage. If you don’t know the answers please say so. It really is important that I know exactly what was found in the library immediately after the shot was fired.’
‘I’ll do my best!’
‘Was anything found on the library floor close to where Jack was lying; I mean something that wasn’t there when you were searching the room earlier?’
‘No, not to my knowledge!’
‘No bullet or something resembling a bullet?’
‘No, definitely not! You see, when Jack was shot the bullet was apparently still lodged in his body!’
‘Hmm! At the post-mortem did the pathologist find a second bullet in the body .say in the stomach or gullet?’
‘No! Only one shot was fired! I thought I made that clear!’ Mrs Ramsden appeared slightly puzzled at this line of questioning.
‘You say the gun was still fixed on the stand after the shot was fired!’
‘Yes.’
‘Did the police find any fingerprints on the gun other than those of your husband?’
‘No! Only Jack’s!’
‘But didn’t you say that Victor examined the gun before he left the room? Surely his prints were on the gun?’
‘Victor did examine the gun but I’m not sure if he touched it. I can’t recall him doing that.’
There was silence in the lounge on that Saturday morning; that is, except for the sound of The Prof’s pencil as he made a few more notes.
‘Can we go back to what you heard coming from the library before you heard the shot! I mean, from what you said, it seems you only heard Jack speak?’
’That’s not strictly true! I was sure I heard two people talking in the room. It’s just that I...’
‘Well?’
‘.It’s just that I could only make out what Jack was saying! I still swear I could hear two people talking to each other!’
‘He couldn’t have been talking like a ventriloquist does, could he? You know - making it sound as if there were two when, in actual fact, he was the only one there!’
‘You mean...throwing his voice?’
‘Yes, I couldn’t put it better myself!’
‘I don’t think so, but....’
‘We’ll come back to that. You mentioned that he was very excited about performing a transformation scene with Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde as the theme...do you know more about his plan? I mean .was he going to change from one to the other or have both in the same room at the same time?’
‘I rather got the impression that he intended to change from one to the other with such a marked difference in the appearance of the two characters that they couldn’t possibly be the same person! Then he planned, I think, to introduce both at the same time before getting Hyde to vanish into thin air/ We never reached the part of the performance when the two individuals were together, yet I swear.’
‘Yes?’
‘.Believe me, I swear I could hear the two of them talking to each other. No, that’s not quite right. I could hear Jack talking to someone. He sounded angry and irritated that, for whatever reason, his arranged plan was not being properly carried out. Jack was talking but it seemed to be a one-way conversation. The other person didn’t answer. I got the strange feeling that the other person didn’t want to answer. Either that, or it was so muffled, it didn’t register!’
‘So you don’t know if the other person in the room was male or female - or even if he or she was in the room at all?’
‘No, but someone or something fired that gun. And Jack’s blood! On the locking mechanism of the safe! That didn’t get there by itself, unless.’
‘Unless, what?’
‘...Unless Jack managed to reach the safe, open it and hide whatever it was and then.. ’
’And then get back to where you found him slumped on the floor in front of the bookcases! I’m sorry, Isabella but the inside of the safe is too small to hold anything large and anyway, when you heard the shot...’ The Prof looked back over his notes before resuming, ‘.. .when you heard the shot this was followed by a dull thump, presumably the sound of Jack falling to the floor. You see there just wasn’t time for him to move to the safe and back again!’
‘I suppose you’re right!’
The Prof closed the notebook.
‘Thank you, Isabella, that wasn’t easy for you! You said, at the beginning, that what happened didn’t make too much sense and that you were sure you’d missed something. That it was possible that you might have got things in the wrong order and jumped to the wrong conclu
sions. Now can you be more specific; can you possibly pinpoint something that leads you to make such statements?’
Mrs. Ramsden was silent for a few seconds.
‘Yes, I think I can,’ she said. ‘Something Jack said that night has puzzled me for almost fourteen years. Despite all the experts saying that Jack would be confused and in shock after being shot I know that he would never have blundered with his final words to me! When he said, "Did you see Dr. Hyde?” he really did mean what he said...but why?’
The Prof looked at the matriarch of Maskelyne Hall and his blue eyes took on a steely determination.
‘That’s what I intend to find out. Now if you’ll excuse me, Isabella, I’ll begin my investigations!’
Chapter 5
THE IRON MAIDEN
Having eaten a late breakfast The Prof excused himself from lunching with Laura and her mother and retired to his bedroom to look over his notes. The meeting with Isabella had provided much food for thought; the others would have to be consulted and statements taken and compared, but he was rapidly coming to the conclusion that he had more questions than answers.
The items found in the safe had a significant part to play in the whole chain of events. He was sure of that! Time enough for decisions to be made. After all it was almost fourteen years since Jack’s mysterious death. Time was on his side! A few days, weeks or even months wouldn’t make a lot of difference.
The contents of the safe set an intriguing puzzle. Golden Anniversary and SAM were easy! Logic told him that SAM was likely to be The Society of American Magicians. Strange though that the name Sam should come up again after “old” George had told him about Sam the Hunter - Samson by name.
The Hotel Statler was, presumably, where the Golden Anniversary Convention had been held and the Map of Boston, Massachusetts, U.S.A, an absolute giveaway! A few phone calls would soon confirm if The Society of American Magicians had indeed held their 1952 Convention in Boston with The Hotel Statler as the venue, but the initials K.A.and the cryptic words about a bottle opener might not be so easy to solve! Boston seemed to hold the key, but that would have to wait! The key? He produced it from his pocket. It was the key to the cellar of Maskelyne Hall. And the cellar was where Jack had stored all his magical props and where he had lovingly designed and made his furniture of illusion and magic.
Giles had asked for the key when he’d excused himself from having lunch. The cellar was probably where the gun could be found. The gun was one of the items, from that fateful night, that wasn’t still in the library!
What else had been missing? The stand, of course, on which the gun had been fixed! He’d like to examine that as well!
Looking over his scribbles he was struck by the fact that, if Isabella had been telling the truth, every one of the others at Maskelyne Hall, apart from Jack, and Edgar who had remained with Isabella had been, singly or in pairs, in a different place at the time of the murder! If it was murder! Any one of them could have killed Jack or worked with an accomplice to commit the crime assuming he, she or they could get into the room without being noticed by the others. Unless.! A new thought occurred. Unless Jack had been killed from. outside the room!
There was one other possibility! Jack’s pre-performance arrangements, the suggestions about Jekyll and Hyde and the voices heard by Isabella Ramsden might all have been part of an elaborate plot to end his own life, but something didn’t ring true! He would have to examine that gun and stand.
The door to the cellar was at the rear of the house under the back stairs and not far from the kitchen area. Young Giles Dawson had been allowed to visit the cellar, on one occasion, under the supervision of Jack Ramsden, a long time ago. He remembered the place as an Aladdin’s cave of theatrical mystery that had helped to fire his imagination and love of magical presentation.
There had been one other time, one other visit to the cellar grotto. Someone had stolen the key, he couldn’t remember whom: they had all used the cellar for one of their games. They had played Murder on that occasion and, when their misdemeanour was discovered, all had been reprimanded with the parental warning that such an area was definitely not a playground, but a space abounding with danger! A space where an accident could mean death!
The Prof turned the key in the lock, opened the cellar door and switched on the lights. Closing the door behind him he descended the stone steps into the cellar that ran the entire length and breadth of Maskelyne Hall. The atmosphere was dry and pleasantly warm as he looked around him. At one end of the cellar, at the front of the house, was the workshop; the inner sanctum where Jack had elegantly fashioned a wealth of furniture used by stage magicians. Works of art, of all shapes and sizes, designed to create doubts in the minds of audiences prepared to suspend their disbelief had been made there. The door to the workshop was locked; it required a separate key and he did not have it.
He really didn’t need to gain access though: the windows, the only windows in the place, which allowed someone working on the inside to see the storage area of the cellar, gave him the chance to look inside at the lathes, circular saws, work benches and hand tools of a dead craftsman. There was nothing there for which he was searching.
Picking his way carefully along the lines of magical artifacts he made towards the other end at the rear of the house, passing the brick pillars which supported the ceiling throughout, to where the reason for the dry and pleasantly warm atmosphere became clear.
A wall of concrete blocks enclosed an oil-fired heating system that obviously supplied at least some parts of Maskelyne Hall. He now knew the answer to what had puzzled him since his earlier visit to the library. What had been niggling him was how the library had been so comfortable despite the installation of the safe, which had put the fireplace and chimney out of commission.
With the initial inspection over, he began to wander in and out of the lanes of props and attempt to identify each and every one with the relish of a connoisseur. The main purpose of his task was to find the gun and its stand, but nothing in this treasure-trove was going to be overlooked.
He felt he was with friends! The subdued hum of the heating system disguised the profound silence of the cellar without disturbing his concentration, making him feel that he wasn’t alone. It was a feeling he was beginning to enjoy. As he surveyed everything around him the terrifying thought manifested itself that perhaps he wasn’t alone; that perhaps someone or something was stalking him! But no such thoughts were entering his head at this stage. Not yet!
His first stop was at a set of wooden shelves on which rested countless boxes containing soft-core ropes, Chinese Linking Rings, chains and hand cuffs, Chinese lanterns, packs of playing cards, dice, Cups and Balls of varying sizes, ribbons, handkerchiefs and larger cloths of coloured silks. Each box was labelled and some even exhibited the names of prominent performers associated with many of the items of close-up magic.
He moved along past plinths, baskets and pedestals then stopped again at a large wardrobe. As he inspected the contents of full-length robes, black cloaks with hoods and gloves, conical hats and all the paraphernalia that created images in the minds of receptive audiences, he became interested in the assortment of masks available. He had just picked out a couple and had them in his hands when he thought he heard the sound of a door closing. He stopped, put the masks back and looked around the vast storeroom. There were no signs of anyone, or anything, just row upon row of boxes, crates, large items of furniture and those brick pillars that, if memory served him correctly, had made excellent hiding places on one occasion during his childhood.
Looking towards the ceiling he noted the pulleys and weights hanging from above. They were secured by ropes and tied to hooks attached to the wall. There was nothing to concern him there except...a feeling of unease!
He picked up the masks again; either could’ve been Mr.Hyde. That, at least, explained one problem. There was something else that had to be there! Now where was it? There had to be one! Every magician, of that era, could produce o
ne, and every magician could produce almost anything, out of one! The top hat!
To have really been authentic Jack, as Dr. Jekyll, would have worn a top hat. Or was he being over influenced by the Hollywood version and Spencer Tracy’s portrayal in the 1941 film? It had to be here somewhere! He lifted some fans from a drawer and smiled as he recognised one that might have been used in the portrait that was hanging in the library. The top hat could wait. It would have to wait! Much more important than the hat was the gun; he had to find the gun!
The next port of call brought an even bigger smile. He was stopped in his tracks at the sight of a galvanized iron milk can complete with fixing straps and, beside it, a large metal-lined mahogany tank with a plate-glass front, similar to the one Houdini had used when he broke a bone in his foot!
As he turned away from the replicas of those great escapes, he heard a noise that raised the hair on the back of his neck. It was a whisper, almost inaudible and meaningless yet, at the same time, diabolical and threatening. It came from God-knows-where like a darting movement of furtive feet or the sound of someone who did not wish to be heard. The quickening of his pulse combined with the stop-go action of his lungs brought beads of cold sweat to his brow. Where had the noise come from?
‘Who’s there?’ he called out, but words that came from a parched larynx were met with impending silence.
He looked at his watch and realised he’d been in the cellar for the best part of an hour. He moved more rapidly, glanced at boxes of theatrical posters, the memorabilia of a golden age of magic, mentally noted a bathing hut on wheels, swept past several gigantic playing cards hanging from a rail and closed in on an arsenal of swords and knives. Straight swords, curved scimitars, a miscellaneous collection of knives in a cabinet and, what he’d been looking for since he’d entered the cellar, a stand supporting a rifle.
He felt infinitely safer having the swords within easy reach but it was the rifle that grabbed his attention.
The Statue of Three Lies Page 6
