‘You see, the real problem was to find out who had committed the crime and why, not to try and guess how it was done. Your efforts to explain the puzzle only impeded its solution. As for the rest of you, the disciples of Edgar Allan Poe,’ he went on, turning to Pierre and his colleagues, ‘you should have remembered the detective story is a mystery novel, strange in appearance but simple in concept. Because the most important element in a mystery is that the secret be simple. The ingenuity of the construction has as its sole objective the concealment of the truth. So, good folk, do you know what my reaction was when I plunged into the witness’ depositions? I said to myself: “Don’t bother with the set-up, old chap. Focus on the crux of the matter and forget about all the wild goose chases.” And I say the same thing to you: “Get to the heart of the problem and forget all the tall stories.”’
‘No!’ declared Lippi categorically. ‘It’s just a bit too easy… We were all prepared to hear you out to the end. But you’re restricting yourself to theoretical considerations that we all know by heart. I’ve elected myself spokesman of those whom you have chosen to denigrate: we’re getting a stronger and stronger impression that this whole business is actually beyond you, that it’s outside your area of competence and that it was stupid on our part to think you’d be able to crack it.’
The old gentleman locked eyes with him and literally began to swell with anger.
‘He’s joking, Sir Arthur,’ Pierre called out, without waiting for the first rumblings of the storm. ‘You stressed the fact that someone prepared a plan along the lines of a detective story….’
The response was a growl.
‘I did indeed.’
‘But maybe you don’t know who prepared the plan?’
‘What!’ roared Carter Gilbert, eyes flashing. ‘Would you care to make a bet?’
At last Sir Arthur was penned in. All that remained was to give him his head. His anger subsided like an overcooked soufflé and he stretched out in his chair, hands across his waistcoat and thumbs twiddling. His little eyes surveyed the audience once more. He seemed amused, even though there was a wrathful expression on his face. Suddenly his eyes half closed.
‘Well, then, I’ll tell you,’ he said, as if he’d decided to impart a confidence. ‘I haven’t said anything so far because I naively assumed you’d all guessed. It was Dr. Karl Hoenig.’
Lippi fell back on his chair, mouth open. A hubbub arose in the auditorium, punctuated by exclamations of astonishment. The Swiss, usually slow to show emotion, were visibly agitated. Only Brenner managed to keep calm. He adopted an expression of ironic amusement and forced himself to adopt the tone of one intent on being reasonable:
‘If I understand correctly, Sir Arthur, you’re saying that Hoenig was responsible for organising a stage production down to the last detail, in such a way that he could be peacefully murdered?’
‘That’s perfectly correct, Superintendent,’ replied Carter Gilbert in the same reasonable manner. ‘Except for the small detail that the good doctor did not intend to be murdered. The killer simple took advantage of a situation handed to him on a plate.’
‘And do you also claim that, once murdered, he locked himself in the bungalow?’
‘Precisely. If he hadn’t been double-locked inside, how could he have proved to the world that someone else had succeeded in doing…what he was planning to do himself?’
‘And what exactly was he planning to do?’ asked the Superintendent, whose calm façade was starting to crack, in an unnaturally calm voice.
Laboriously, Carter Gilbert pushed his chair back and put his feet up on the table. He looked defiantly at the “No Smoking” sign on the wall and extracted a cigar from his pocket which he proceeded to light with a match he struck against his heel. The cigar went out almost at once, but he continued to draw on it as if he hadn’t noticed. Outside the hall, the rain had started to come down again. It lashed the windows of the auditorium. The dark and sparse foliage of the trees moved with an eerie slowness against the background of grey fog. Someone went to turn on a switch and Sir Arthur waited until the light came on before he continued.
‘I think it’s high time to clear up this mystery. It started right here, in this very hall: this peaceful place where, exactly one week ago, the learned Professor Lippi of Bologna – a fine dialectician – gave a lecture. I have the minutes in front of me, and for those of you who were not present I shall briefly give the gist of it. The professor held forth on the subject of inoffensive crimes imagined by an elite and conceived with sophistication, by which we – busy bees and delicate tasters – all make our honey. My own master, the noble Gilbert Keith Chesterton, to whom I humbly tip my hat, caused his Father Brown – a man of God able to reconcile miracles with logic, and the most brilliant detective in the history of detective fiction – to say: “A crime is a work of art,” and “The criminal is an artist; the detective is only a critic.” You’re free to smile, take offence, or simply marvel at the paradox. Professor Lippi took it as his own and embellished it with all the facets of his scholastic talent.
‘Here, in a few words, is Professor Lippi’s thesis: he puts forward the notion that the detective story, considered as a work of art, is not an imitative art. He rejects the burden of reality and only ever expresses his own point of view. In this bizarre world where crime disguises itself as fiction, real objects lose their natural function so as to play the role of accessories in the service of the illusionist, the manufacturer of false miracles that is the creator of the detective fiction in question. In the ingenuity of the concept as much as in the strangeness of the form, plausibility is deliberately sacrificed to aesthetics. The probable is no longer what it has every right to be considered as: the surest guarantor of fiction. Instead, the reader, manipulated and mystified, is led to reject it out of love of the improbable. He only has eyes for lies, optical effects and illusions.’
Sir Arthur struck another match. But the phosphor broke off and fell out of reach. He gave up lighting his cigar and let his eye wander around the hall. His gaze fell on Lippi who was looking at him thunderstruck, for he could not remember having said all that, and so well. Sir Arthur frowned and asked him in a loud and treacherous voice:
‘I hope I construed your ideas correctly, Professor?’
In response to a jab in the ribs from from Pierre, the Italian leapt to his feet and responded with a mumbled sound that Sir Arthur chose to take as approval. He took from his pocket a large handkerchief covered in red squares the colour of his socks, and proceeded to blow his nose forcefully. He continued:
‘And then you changed your tone. You couldn’t help amusing yourself at the expense of detective fiction. You caricatured the clichés and the norms. Sacrilege! You dissected impossible situations under the rubric of “hermetically sealed rooms” and you mocked the hocus-pocus, the bizarre techniques and the far-fetched solutions that authors such as I have produced in abundance in our works. You asserted vigorously that “This kind of thing can’t happen in real life.”
‘All that for what? So as to affirm that those who try to extend the field of detective fiction into the everyday world are victims of a complete and total aberration?’
‘Exactly,’ exclaimed Lippi, folding his arms. ‘That’s precisely what I think.’
‘And I’m not too far away from your way of thinking,’ said Carter Gilbert approvingly, an expression of benevolent understanding on his face. ‘We have never pretended, I and my colleagues, that our little inventions, our clever tricks, our shady schemes, would find a place in real life crime. Nevertheless, something’s bothering me.’
He lowered his large head on to his chest, tapped his forehead with the tips of his fingers, and looked up abruptly.
‘Tell me, my boy,’ he asked as if making a Herculean effort to remember, ‘aren’t you the same Umberto Lippi from Bologna who has put forward in numerous intellectual publications the idea – borrowed, between ourselves, from that rascal Oscar Wilde – that literature
serves as a model for life and makes it in its image?’ He pointed an accusing finger. ‘Haven’t you written that life imitates fiction far more than fiction imitates it: that the copy is the reflection? And that one can interpret it in light of the rules and conventions that govern narrative speech?’
Lippi tried to stand up, but he was not given the chance.
‘Stay where you are, sir. I have the floor. I’m not going to be dragged into a byzantine argument. Paradoxes are extremely dangerous things. They are reversible by their very nature and one can prove anything from them.’ His expression softened and a conciliatory smile appeared on his face. ‘Don’t get me wrong, my friend. I’m not trying to beat you into submission. I’m simply trying to show that those who listen to you can only be befuddled by the apparent discrepancies in your discursive thought; and that the good Dr. Hoenig, who was lying in wait during your lecture for the slightest error in reasoning, jumped in with both feet.’
He leant forward and wagged a finger at the audience at large:
‘Don’t think that Dr. Hoenig could have believed for a second that there was a single case in the annals of crime that could be tied to a locked room problem. Because, for heaven’s sake, such a thing doesn’t exist. And he made the claim for the sole purpose of contradicting you, confident that the strength of his reputation would suffice to hide the lie. It’s the kind of shameless bluff practised by his master, Adolf Hitler. But it failed in this instance because his adversary wouldn’t back down. The professor challenged him to provide proof of his claim. The good doctor collapsed like a pricked balloon and our friend rubbed it in by ridiculing him and denying him any means of escape. Which, let me tell you, isn’t a wise thing to do when faced with someone so unquestionably evil.
‘It was intolerable for that runt claiming to be a member of the master race to be publicly humiliated in that way. He marched off, his face red as a beetroot from anger and shame, only too aware that he had provided a free spectacle for the crowd of intellectuals and academic pedants he despised so much. He was going to show them how a genius of crime could introduce the famous problem of the locked room into a real-life situation, setting all those great minds to work in search of the solution. If everything had turned out as planned, he would have extracted a spectacular revenge, which was his intention.
‘Now, for it to work he needed an accomplice. I should say two, for it was the second one who betrayed him. But more of that later. Once you grasp the essential thread of this affair – in this case the fact that Karl Hoenig needed someone to play the lead role in the play he was planning to stage – everything else follows. You see, good people, I saw straight away that the whole story was a fabrication. I could make out the main thread of Hoenig’s plan: a feigned attack on him by his accomplice. But who would be mad enough to accept a role in this farce unless they were obliged to? He needed someone he could hold in his power, an innocent puppet dancing at the end of a string without asking too many questions about what was going on around him.
‘Luckily for him, but unfortunately for us, the good doctor stumbled upon the ideal accomplice, someone who would fulfil all the necessary conditions better than anyone else: a woman whose name I shall withhold for now. Some of you know her and some of you have spoken to her, and she has been unjustly suspected. If truth be told, she is the real victim of this sinister plot. And, listen to me the rest of you….’ Here he pointed his finger at the group of police officers. ‘I strongly advise you to leave her alone. Otherwise I shan’t hesitate to broadcast to the four corners how you jumped with both feet into a trap that anyone with half a brain could have seen right away was a set-up. For you see, fellows, just because you’ve seen someone commit a murder doesn’t make them guilty!’
He nodded his head slowly and chuckled. Then, with a superhuman effort, he managed to re-light his cigar. He took a long puff and continued:
‘Let’s talk a bit about this woman: she’s very pretty, elegant and possessed of a charming naivety. Thirty years old, or thereabouts: the ideal age of femininity. She has enormous admiration and respect for her husband. She likes to swim, to dive, to laugh, to play tennis and to drive fast cars. She’s perfectly sane and healthy. Her only problem is to have committed a number of youthful indiscretions that attracted the attention of the police and caused a slight scandal in polite society. In addition – and I’m not going into detail – she is an adopted child and is ashamed of her origins. And, to cap it all, she has never discussed her past with her husband, whom I believe to be a decent man and who would, had she told him everything, immediately have given her a kiss of absolution. Are you beginning to get the picture?
‘Let us now go back in time a few days, to the evening Hoenig set eyes on her. This monster has an elephantine memory – without wishing to cast aspersions on those amiable and gracious pachyderms. She hasn’t changed much in twelve years. He recognises her, or rather identifies her, immediately. Without losing a moment – he’s a policeman at heart – he telegraphs his office to send him her file. It might come in useful. And come in useful it certainly does, beyond his wildest expectations. He’s found the centrepiece of his little machination. He threatens to expose her to her husband, and frightens her out of her wits. He gets the young woman exactly where he wants her. She agrees, under considerable duress, to play the part of the murderess in his macabre little play.
‘For it really is a play he’s putting on: a horrifying spectacle worthy of the Grand Guignol. Imagine a locked room murder taking place under footlights, on a brilliantly illuminated set, under the eyes of two spectators with front row seats, who won’t miss a second of the show. I’m speaking, of course, about the two agents posted in the bungalow opposite, whom Hoenig has known about for some time, and whose presence is vital to the success of the spectacle. What gets me really upset,’ he growled, blowing a large puff of smoke towards Brenner, ‘what gets me really angry, is that you could have unravelled this whole business straight way if you’d paid attention to the revealing comment they made right there in their report: “We had the impression of being at the theatre,” they said. And they were bloody well right!
‘Getting back to the role of the woman. Obviously it was important she not be recognised. Her sex appeal had to be hidden during the entire performance. Her figure would be concealed under a raincoat too large for her, she would wear a brunette wig under her scarf to hide her real hair and she would have no make-up. Funny how a couple of locks of hair and an absence of make-up can transform a face. She would appear smaller as well because she customarily wore high heels. Do you gentlemen remember how small your wives appeared the first time you saw them without high heels? So, what do you think? Not a bad job of work, was it?’
He took off his pince-nez and polished the glasses. For a few seconds he appeared perilously close to falling backwards.
‘Now you’ve got some idea of the overall scheme,’ he continued, recovering his balance and placing the pince-nez on the end of his nose once more, ‘let’s get into more of the detail. Our charlatan needs an assistant. He takes Strahler into his confidence – poor Strahler, the lost soul, the slave he leads about by the nose. He asks him to go to Milan and bring back one of those trick knives whose blade collapses into the handle and squirts out fake blood. I know for a fact you can find cheap ones in those little shops around La Scala. So. Now you have a grasp of some of the details. But, believe me, you’re a long way from understanding the whole thing.
‘Having got the woman’s role sorted out, Hoenig will now go after the husband. Why? He had nothing to do with the humiliation Hoenig had suffered. But he took the professor’s side and is supposed to be his friend. And anyway, he’s a decent young man, intelligent and sensitive, with perhaps a little too much imagination. The ideal prey for this manipulative creature, capable of torturing an innocent and peaceful individual for the sole pleasure of having fun with him. He tells Pierre about his wife’s past and the minor misdemeanours she has wrongly concealed from him
. But that’s not enough for his creative spirit. He weaves into his account an outrageous and wholly fabricated story of mysterious unsolved crimes of which the unfortunate woman is supposed to be guilty. And our gullible friend, his nose buried in the detective stories which fill his imagination, swallows it all hook, line and sinker. When he learns on Monday morning of the events of the night before, how could he not suspect the woman in the bungalow of being his wife? Didn’t she have an excellent motive? Hoenig was going to unmask her and had to be killed. Don’t laugh, my friends! We would have fallen for it the same way, you and I, existing as we do on a diet of fantasy. Dr. Hoenig, you see, understood our psychology perfectly. He knew how to hit the right nerve and he derived pleasure from hearing us squeal. It was the most terrifying, the most diabolical trait of his character.’
Very gingerly, Carter Gilbert placed his feet back on the platform. In the silence that followed, several in the hall thought they heard the creaking of old joints. The atmosphere in the hall was stifling. The windows were steamed up. A cloud of black smoke hung over Sir Arthur’s head. He crushed his cigar under his heel and continued in a flat voice.
‘I shan’t spend much more time on the least important and most obvious part of the business: the grotesque drama played out in the lounge of the bungalow, behind the well-lit glass, just like the mannequins in a shop window. The night, the drizzle, the fine rain that left imperceptible droplets on the glass: all contributed to making the scene credible. Add to that the evil atmosphere that emanated from Dr. Hoenig and you have a fair idea of the impact of the scene on the two witnesses. Having said that, let’s examine what happened after the “murderess” finished her act. One might have thought that, to the extent that she manifests any emotion at all, she would leave the scene at once – she is, after all, supposed to have killed a man – but no. She calmly opens the windows, leans out to grab hold of the shutters, then shuts them very carefully. The gestures, in fact, of an actress who has just finished a performance and is now pulling the curtains closed so as to prevent the spectators seeing how the tricks were executed.
The Riddle of Monte Verita Page 20
