EQMM, September-October 2009

by Dell Magazine Authors

  "Detective Tramone.” the man said curtly. He nodded at Jacques and Rand and then offered an incongruously shy smile and a gigantic paw. “You're Mr. Queen, right? I'm a big fan. Pleased to meet you, although I wish the circumstances were better.” The paw engulfed Ellery's right hand, the touch firm but, surprisingly, not the bone crunch for which Ellery had braced. The detective extended a plastic bag in his other hand and Ellery could see that it contained a small pistol. “Any of you gentlemen recognize this?” Tramone asked.

  Ellery, Jacques, and Rand shook their heads in unison.

  "Compact little gun and silencer,” Tramone continued. “It's recently been fired. We had to pull it out of Miss Stuart's clenched fists when we loaded her onto the stretcher."

  "So you think she was the one who fired it?” asked Rand.

  Tramone shook his head. “Miss Stuart never fired this gun. She was wearing gloves, the kind ladies used to wear in the nineteen forties. If she fired the gun there should be powder stains on the gloves, and there aren't. Also, at least when we found her, she was holding the other end of the gun, and with both hands, like she was trying to use it as a club or something. In any event,” the detective continued, “she couldn't tell us anything. She's unconscious and in pretty poor shape.” He sighed and glanced at his watch. “Almost midnight. We're going to speak with some of the folks inside, and then we'll post a couple of uniforms here for the night. Needless to say, I don't want anyone leaving this house. And I'd like to talk to you gents again first thing in the morning."

  * * * *

  Ellery awoke the next morning with a headache and with the sense of unreality that often follows a night of disaster. He shook his head, hoping that this would somehow clear a bad dream. When it didn't, he quickly dressed and headed for the kitchen.

  Detective Tramone was already there, armed with a cup of coffee. “Hope you don't mind. I helped myself.” The burly detective smiled. Ellery forced his own smile and sat down at the table. “How's Bonnie?” he asked. Tramone shook his head. “It's pretty grim. We figure she either was pushed or fell from the second floor. She landed on her head."

  Ellery shook his head glumly. “How's your investigation going?"

  "Lots of dead ends so far.” Tramone pulled a notepad from his pocket and scowled down at his own longhand. “The gun's going to be a dead end. Serial numbers have been filed off. We do know that Mr. Royle was shot sometime shortly after nine o'clock. Bonnie and Jerri Swanson left the party early. Ty stuck around a little longer, still drinking, but when he left a little before nine he announced that he was tired and was not going to work on the script any more that night. Rand volunteered to let Bonnie know. He called Bonnie's room and relayed the message to Jerri Swanson right around nine o'clock. But according to Swanson, Miss Stuart pooh-poohed the phone message and headed off for Ty's wing of the house anyway. That was the last anyone saw of her."

  "Swanson claims she watched the rest of your show, which sounds right—she can recount the whole plot.” Tramone shuffled through his notes and continued. “Charles Roethke and Ty's assistant, Taylor Brandt, left shortly after the show started, to go drinking—a pattern the two of them have fallen into over the last couple of days. You, Mr. Canyon, and Mr. Butcher were watching the television show in the library. And ‘Madame Sojourner,'” he continued—spitting the word “madame” as though it were an epithet, “says she was in her room the whole evening and persists in claiming that she warned Bonnie that something like this would happen and that she never should have made the trip down here in the first place."

  Ellery looked across the table at the detective and then removed a folded piece of paper from his pocket. “That reminds me. I think you should see this,” he said. “I received it anonymously yesterday.” Detective Tramone unfolded the paper and read the poem, looking up afterwards, perplexed. “What's this all about?” he asked. “Alice in Wonderland?"

  Ellery extended his palms, shrugged, and shook his head. “I honestly don't know,” he replied. “But as Alice might have observed, when you study this poem it gets curiouser and curiouser. Yesterday I figured it was just some silly prank, but I studied it closer last night.” Ellery and Tramone hunched over the paper as Ellery continued.

  "The first stanza refers directly to Alice in Wonderland, and the third stanza references an incident (although a rather trivial one) that takes place at the beginning of Through the Looking-Glass. The second stanza also seems to be taken from the Wonderland book, with the exception of the first line—its reference to ‘rehearsals’ that are ‘intriguing’ seems to bear no relation to Carroll, but could well refer to the enterprise we've been engaged in—the filming of the teaparty episode. And this equally could be said of the final two stanzas—which each alludes to a re-teaming, precisely what Ty and Bonnie were poised to undertake. And the reference, in fact ‘warning,’ that there must be ‘two on the throne’ seems, again, to squarely refer to Ty Royle and Bonnie Stuart. And, as I pointed out yesterday to Jacques Butcher, the poem employs a well-known Lewis Carroll word game—the first letter of each line forms an acrostic and, when read down, the letters reveal a hidden message: ‘trip required no chances.’ Here virtually everyone warned Ty and Bonnie against taking this trip to Hollywood. That advice, of course, now seems prescient."

  "But what does it mean?" the detective snorted.

  "I have no idea,” Ellery sulked. “I was up half the night trying to puzzle it through. The poem doesn't really explain much of anything."

  The two sat quietly for several minutes before Ellery spoke again. “There is a riddle in Alice in Wonderland," he finally said, “posed by the Mad Hatter, the part Ty's character was going to portray in the tea-party episode. The riddle is, ‘Why is a raven like a writing desk?’”

  "I give up. What's the answer?” Detective Tramone muttered.

  "That's the point,” said Ellery. “There is no answer, at least none that Dodgson, writing as Carroll, ever offered. Others have hypothesized answers—my own favorite is ‘They are alike because Poe wrote on both'—but the point is that no answer appears in the book, and the riddle itself, although part of the book, is a dead end. Ultimately it has absolutely nothing to do with the plot."

  "In other words, a red herring?"

  "Precisely. I thought you should know about the poem, but I'm not certain that it has anything to do with your investigation. Like the Mad Hatter's riddle, it sort of hangs out there, on its own."

  "What did the acrostic in the Carroll story ultimately reveal?” the detective finally asked.

  "Well, the name of the real Alice,” Ellery answered.

  "So this poem is more obscure than the original one. At least with Carroll's poem, when you figured out the acrostic the relevance was clear—you had a name, not just another riddle."

  Ellery was quiet for an instant, but then his eyes widened.

  "What ...?” Detective Tramone exclaimed, but Ellery shushed him with a hand. The burly detective watched as Ellery's eyes then narrowed. Ellery templed his fingers and bowed his head in thought. His eyes closed and his lips moved faintly. After long minutes he shook his head, as though awakening, and blinked across the table.

  "Amazing,” he said, and smiled back at the completely uncomprehending detective. “Detective Tramone, my first instincts were correct. You can forget entirely about this poem. The solution to what happened to Ty and Bonnie lies elsewhere, and I think I know where. I have to do a little work in the library, and then we will need to discuss this further. And I'm afraid I may need to ask you for a little professional assistance."

  * * * *

  Later that afternoon Ellery entered the parlor of the mansion behind the detective. Tramone parted from Ellery, who wandered to stand next to Rand Canyon and behind Jacques Butcher's chair. Jerri Swanson and Charles Roethke shared opposite ends of the couch, separated by a very cold distance, while Taylor Brandt lounged in a wing chair with a snifter in his hand. Madame Sojourner sat at the desk, mumbling over a deck of
cards. Tramone approached the fireplace at the far end of the room and cleared his throat loudly as seven pairs of eyes turned in his direction.

  Fumbling self-consciously, Tramone, in an unexpectedly soft voice, addressed the room. “I know,” he said, “that all of you have been concerned about what happened to Miss Stuart and Mr. Royle. I just wanted to let you know that we do have some encouraging news. Miss Stuart has made significant progress today. The doctors are now optimistic that she should be able to make a complete recovery. She is still in a medically-induced coma, but they believe they can begin bringing her out of that as early as tomorrow morning.” The detective shuffled self-consciously and continued, “Anyway, that's why I called you all together here. We knew that you all were concerned....” Tramone paused, searching for a way to close. Ultimately he settled on a curt nod. Thrusting his hands into his pockets, he shuffled out of the room.

  That night, shortly before midnight, a tall figure dressed in medical scrubs walked purposefully down the hall of the fourth floor of the Cedars-Sinai Medical Center. The figure clasped a chart in one hand and wore an operating mask. It stopped in front of Room 423, consulted the chart, entered, and then approached the bed, strung with monitors and an intravenous line. The figure set the chart down on the bedside table, drew a vial from a pocket, and reached for the intravenous line just as a meaty paw grasped its arm. The lights flicked on in the room and from behind Detective Tramone, Ellery Queen said, “Rand, why don't you take off the mask?"

  Rand Canyon complied, shoulders slumped.

  "Well, I always wanted to play a doctor,” he replied quietly, in a defeated voice. Rand turned and looked back toward the bed, realizing for the first time that he was standing not beside a patient but a pile of pillows arranged under the sheet. He turned, uncomprehending.

  "Where ... where's Bonnie?” he stammered.

  It was Ellery who answered. “Bonnie died this afternoon, Rand. She died without ever regaining consciousness."

  As Rand Canyon was led away, Tramone turned to Ellery and shook his massive head in disgust. “No wonder he was just a bit player,” the detective muttered. “The poor schmo doesn't even know that doctors only wear masks in the O.R."

  * * * *

  Ellery was on his third cup of coffee a scant seven hours later when Jacques Butcher shuffled into the kitchen and slid into a chair. Butcher poured his own cup and slumped over it in silence for long minutes, rubbing red eyes.

  "You could have blown me over with a light wind when I heard,” he finally said, looking across the table at Ellery. “Why in the world would Rand kill Ty and Bonnie?"

  Ellery set his coffee cup down and shrugged. “It was just as you said. Bonnie and Ty were going to remarry, and that was going to upend a lot of lives, particularly Rand's, since, as you noted, he and Ty have never gotten along. He'd given up everything, his career, even his home, when he signed on as Bonnie's companion and confidant. Where was this going to leave him when the two of them took up where they had left off twenty-five years ago?"

  Butcher shook his head, trying to understand. “But why would Rand kill Bonnie as well? That makes no sense."

  "You're right. And since it makes no sense, it was never intended to happen."

  "What do you mean it wasn't supposed to happen?” Butcher responded in some exasperation. “She's dead, isn't she?"

  "Oh yes, she's dead,” Ellery responded sadly. “But Rand didn't kill her, or certainly didn't plan to. That was the last thing he wanted, at least at the time. He wanted his life to return to normal, and for that he needed Bonnie alive. No doubt it went something like this. At around nine o'clock Bonnie left for Ty's room to go over lines. She probably walked in on Rand just about the time he shot Ty. There could have been a tussle between Bonnie and Rand, but in any event, Bonnie somehow ended up with the gun and ran down the hall. Those damned high heels she always wore must have tripped her on the stairs and she tumbled over. Rand checked the body, presumed she was dead, and moved Bonnie and the gun to the closet, where I found her later."

  Butcher still looked sceptical. “It seems to me that you have two huge problems with your theory. First, all you have is motive, and it's a motive that almost everyone in the house shared—a marriage between Ty and Bonnie would upset a lot of lives. There's nothing in what you have said that ties Rand to the murder. Plus, how do you get opportunity? The murder took place during the Ellery Queen mystery episode that we watched, and Rand was in the room with us the whole time. We heard Rand on the telephone with Jerri Swanson and it was after that call, when Rand was with us, that Ty was shot."

  Ellery looked back across the table. “Let's deal with your observations in order. First, we do have a clue that ties Rand to the crime. In fact, we have a dying message from Bonnie."

  Jacques Butcher raised his eyebrow inquiringly. “That's news to me."

  "Remember,” Ellery continued, “that Bonnie and the gun ended up in the closet. Sometime after Rand left, Bonnie must have regained consciousness, because she left us the only clue she could think of to identify the murderer."

  Butcher shook his head and extended both hands out, palms up. “I'm lost,” he said.

  "Bonnie didn't grab the gun by the butt or handle, as you would expect,” Ellery continued. “Remember, Detective Tramone said she was holding the gun like a club. So she grabbed the other end. In other words, with both hands she grabbed the..."

  Butcher slapped the side of his head with an open palm. “Of course. She was holding the barrel of the gun. And Rand Canyon's given name was—"

  "Beryl,” Ellery interjected. “Beryl Snatt. When I realized what she was trying to tell us, I pretty well knew that it was Rand who killed Ty. Of course, as you pointed out, that still leaves a huge problem—opportunity. Ty was killed during the Ellery Queen television episode that we watched with Rand, and at first blush that seemed about as airtight an alibi as I could imagine. But as I thought about it, it occurred to me that something was wrong.

  "Jerri Swanson did in fact receive a call from Rand asking her to tell Bonnie that Ty didn't want to go over the lines that night. And Detective Tramone told me that Jerri was sure of the timing of the call. She also was going to watch the Ellery Queen show, and while she was on the phone the Elmer Bernstein theme music for the show was just beginning. But after Rand hung up the telephone and turned on the television in the library we heard the announcer's opening statement setting up the murder. The formula for the Ellery Queen television show is very precise: the announcer's opening setup of the murder always precedes the Elmer Bernstein score. So what we saw took place before the theme music began, in other words before the call to Jerri had even occurred."

  "Well, that can't be right,” Butcher replied. “Obviously someone is mistaken."

  "Not necessarily,” smiled Ellery. “This is nineteen seventy-five. We live in a marvelous age. Walk down the hall with me,” he said, beckoning across the table.

  Ellery led Jacques down the hall and into the library. He crossed to the bar next to the telephone, slid a panel aside, and revealed a flat box sporting intricate knobs and buttons. Butcher looked at it in confusion. “What is it?” he asked.

  "Jacques, you are living an entirely too isolated life up at your winery,” Ellery replied. “This is the newest technological marvel. It's called a Betamax, and it's made by Sony. It allows you to record a television show and then watch it later. It's only good for one-hour shows, although RCA is supposed to have a competing version out this winter that will record two hours."

  "So we were watching a show that was already over?” Jacques asked. “How could Rand have worked that out?"

  "Well,” replied Ellery, “it wasn't easy, and it certainly wasn't foolproof. But you actually provided him with his biggest chance to succeed. You pride yourself on paying no attention to time, and you played that silly game—right in front of Rand—of taking away my watch. And my time sense is still out of sync from the cross-country flight. So when Rand came in to remi
nd us that the show was about to start neither of us realized that it was, in fact, an hour later. We watched an episode that Rand had programmed this device to record at nine o'clock, but we watched it later, probably shortly after ten. So at the time Rand turned on the episode, the murder had already been committed. That happened while you and I were going over the ‘Mad Tea Party’ script."

  "But we saw Rand call Jerri Swanson....” Butcher protested.

  "We saw Rand speak into the telephone. But in fact the actual telephone call he placed to Jerri Swanson was an hour earlier. Rand originally made the call to make certain that Bonnie didn't show up in Ty's room. But his plan could have gone wrong in a hundred different ways. The way it did go wrong was that Bonnie ignored the call, went to Ty's room anyway, and stumbled upon the murder in progress. When everything went south, and when Bonnie fell after catching Rand in the act, all Rand could do was to revert to his original plan—stage a second faked call to Jerri, and then establish what he hoped would be an alibi by watching the episode with us. What we heard was Rand speaking into a dead phone. And as long as Bonnie couldn't tell us otherwise, the whole house of cards might have stood.

  "But you are correct, in any event,” Ellery continued. “The case against Rand was hardly airtight. When I went back to the library and discovered the Betamax, there was no tape in it. It had already been removed by Rand. That's why I needed Detective Tramone's help. I told him what I had surmised and shortly afterwards the hospital called to report that Bonnie had, in fact, died without ever regaining consciousness. I convinced Tramone that our only hope was for him to participate in a little ruse aimed at forcing Rand to show his hand. Obviously, if Bonnie was alive, and if she was about to regain consciousness, she could identify the murderer of Ty, and Rand couldn't let that happen. The last thing Rand wanted originally was to lose Bonnie, but that was before—before she caught him in the act of killing Ty. All Tramone and I had to do was commandeer the room at Cedars-Sinai, and wait."

  Jacques Butcher shook his head in amazement. “This is horrible. All of this has been like a madhouse.” He sighed and then with some disgust looked at the wrist watch he now sported on his left wrist. “Yeah, I know,” he said, glaring at Ellery sheepishly. “I had to start wearing one now that I don't have Rand anymore. So now I'm the scheduler and we have a ten o'clock call at Universal."