The Sleeping Sphinx dgf-17

by John Dickson Carr

  Locke's immaculate hat gloves, and walking stick dropped to the floor.

  "Is this true, Dr. Fell?" he demanded.

  "As far as it goes, yes."

  "As far as it goes?"

  "For if it is true," interposed Holden, "it means this was a crime at long distance. The murderer needn't have been in the house at all."

  "Oh, yes, the murderer was," said Dr. Fell.

  "In the house?" whispered Locke through dry lips.

  "Yes."

  "But "

  "Didn't I tell you," exclaimed Dr. Fell testily, "that the true hysteric never commits suicide? Margot Marsh passionately wanted a hysteric's suicide for love, yes. She believed she could go through with it, yes. She would even have drunk the poison, yes."

  "Well then!"

  "But, when she felt the effects of the poison coming on, the true hysteric couldn't have held out. She couldn't have faced death. She would have screamed for help, and used it as a weapon, a lever, to force Thorley Marsh into granting what she wanted. She wouldn't really have died, unless . . ."

  "Go on!"

  "Unless," said Dr. Fell, "someone crept in and struck her down unconscious. Unconscious, you see! So that the poison could do its work. Oh, yes. The murderer was in the house."

  "Thank God!" Locke blurted out the words. They could see the veins standing out in his neck. "Thank God!"

  "Why do you say that?"

  "It is villainous to say so. It is wicked to say so." Locke controlled himself. "But I do say it. The murderer was in the house! It must have been Thorley Marsh (no, that couldn't be). Or Celia Devereux. (No! That couldn't be either!) Or—Derek Hurst-Gore."

  "Not necessarily," said Dr. Fell.

  "For the love of heaven, man," exploded Dr. Shepton, "say what you do mean!"

  "As you like," assented Dr. Fell. "Shall I show you the murderer now?"

  "Where?" asked Locke, looking wildly round the room.

  "From Celia Devereux's story, you see," said Dr. Fell, "there were certain blazing indications as to where to look for the murderer. When I went to Caswall on Thursday evening, I asked a number of questions and got the replies I wanted. By thunder, I got more than I wanted."

  Slowly Dr. Fell hoisted himself to his feet pushing back the big Jacobean chair.

  "As to the murderer being in the house ..."

  "Whoever it was," said Locke, "couldn't have got into the house from outside!"

  "Why not?"

  "Every night," retorted Locke, "that place is locked up like a fortress front and back. Round it is a moat thirty feet wide and a dozen feet deep."

  'Yes," said Dr. Fell. "That is what I mean."

  "What you mean?—Where is this murderer?"

  "He's here," said Dr. Fell.

  Into the room, now, fell another shadow: the shadow of a tall middle-aged man who entered from the door to the front room. It was, in fact, Superintendent Hadley of the Criminal Investigation Department. But such is the effect of suggestion that every listener jumped up and turned toward Hadley as though ...

  "You are looking," observed Dr. Fell, "in the wrong direction."

  "Wherever we are looking," cried Locke, "get on with this! You say the murderer is here?"

  "As a matter of fact," said Dr. Fell, "he has been here all the time. That's why I had the nerve to call Hadley and force the issue. Our poisoning friend was rather badly smashed about in a fight with Thorley Marsh. He crawled in to get water, and collapsed."

  "Crawled. . . ?"

  "Into the bathroom."

  Slowly Dr. Fell lumbered to the rear wall. Drawing back one of the black-velvet curtains, he disclosed the door of the little bathroom beside the kitchenette.

  Dr. Fell opened the door. The light inside, which formerly had been switched off, was now burning.

  And Celia screamed.

  A man stood just inside, on shaking legs; and in his hand was the small, sharp blade from a safety razor. They saw it glitter as it went up to his own throat. Dr. Fell, lurching forward, cut off the view. But not before they had-seen the white face, the staring eyes, the dark hair tumbled over the forehead.

  For the murderer was young Ronald Merrick.

  CHAPTER XX

  It was the following evening, in the big drawing room at Number 1 Gloucester Gate, that the whole of the story came to be told.

  At the moment only Celia, Holden, and Dr. Fell were present. The room, Holden thought, looked just at it had looked when he stepped through the balcony window four nights ago: only the one table lamp lighted beside the large white-covered sofa, where Dr. Fell sat in vastness, frowning guiltily at a cigar.

  Celia, facing him, was perched on the arm of Holden's chair.

  "Ronnie Merrick," Celia said flatly, "was Margot’s lover. And he murdered her."

  "Oh, ah," grunted Dr. Fell, without raising his eyes.

  "I think I guessed everything," Celia bit at her under lip, "when I saw his name in the note Margot wrote. But . . . Ronnie! He wasn't quite twentyl"

  "That," said Dr. Fell, "is the whole point."

  "How do you mean?"

  "Merrick," said Dr. Fell, "was the vain, spoiled, unstable son of an eminent peer. He was too young, psychologically speaking, to realize quite what he was doing. But the law can take no cognizance of that. It's a good thing he—"

  "Did away with himself?" supplied Holden. And then, with an effort: "Tell us about it."

  "Dash it all!" complained Dr. Fell.

  He reared back, so that the lamp rocked on its table and threw unsteady gleams across the green-painted walls and the marble mantelpiece with the great Venetian mirror. At Dr. Fell's knee there was a little table bearing a decanter of whisky, glasses, and a jug of water. But for the time being Dr. Fell did not touch them. He blinked round vaguely for an ash hay. Finding none, he tipped most of the cigar ash into his side pocket and let the rest float over his waistcoat as he settled bade Perturbed, he fiddled with his eyeglasses, took several puffs at the cigar and looked straight at Celia.

  "Your sister," he said, "liked young people." "I know." Celia nodded.

  "That is the starting point," said Dr. Fell. "You stressed it in your own narrative. Your first thought, when you found Margot lying dead, was, 'She was so fond of young people.' I heard it ring in your voice when you said it. If we were looking for a man in the case, it was far more reasonable to look for a handsome youngster than anyone else. But put that aside, for the moment

  "Two points in that story of yours—both relating to the Murder game at Widestairs, and both concerning real-life criminals—struck me as perhaps of great significance.

  "The first was that Margot wouldn't, in that game, play the part of Old Mother Dyer. No! On that particular night (strung up, having made her decision) she insisted on being Mrs. Thompson. You will recall, of course, that Mrs. Thompson was executed for connivance in the murder of her husband, because of her passion for her lover Frederick Bywaters: a boy much younger than herself?

  "Coincidence? I hardly thought so.

  "The other was that Ronnie Merrick (of all people) had been chosen to play the part of Dr. Robert Buchanan or New York. Are you familiar with the case?"

  "No, no, no!" groaned Celia, shaking her head violently. From the arm of the chair she looked down at Holden and smiled.

  "I understand," she added, "they were going to make out a terrific case against me for dreaming I was Maria Manning being hanged while people sang 'Oh, Susannah.' But really and truly I'm not guilty! Derek—Derek told me that bit in the car on the way back home from the party!"

  "Exactly!" boomed Dr. Fell.

  "How do mean, 'exactly?' "

  Dr. Fell pointed with his agar.

  "I agreed with Holden on Friday' he said, "that it was nothing, it was tuppenny-ha'penny evidence, it was a trifle which might be explained in half a dozen ways. But, if people pitched on that, it seemed amazing nobody had noticed the real howler which was made that night Do you remember the Murder game?"

 
"Horribly well!"

  "Young Merrick was cast as Dr. Buchanan. You descrribed him as 'dithering.' He said to you something like: 'My name's Dr. Buchanan; but I don't know who the hell I am or what I'm supposed to have done; can you help me?' Correct?"

  "Yes."

  "But I myself," pursued Dr. Fell, "went down to Caswall to ask some questions. In the Long Gallery (follow the line of attack here!) I put questions about the Murder game to Sir Danvers Locke, to Doris Locke, and Thorley Marsh. And I learned this from Locke:

  "Locke hadn't anticipated his surprise game by telling anyone about it beforehand. But he had unobtrusively seen to it that every single person, with the exception of yourself, and necessarily the stranger Hurst-Gore, was very well read in his or her part. Got it? Very well read—he even presented them with his own file on each case.

  "Now there seemed no earthly reason for Locke to tell a lie there. All other testimony corroborated it. He would be especially sure young Merrick, his protege, the boy he hoped to have as a son-in-law, had read the case of Dr. Buchanan. Why, therefore, should Merrick have 'dithered' and blurted out that unnecessary lie when unexpectedly faced with this role?

  "Well! Consider the facts.

  "Dr. Buchanan, in 1893, poisoned his wife: a middle-aged hysteric He poisoned her with a large quantity of morphine and a small quantity of belladonna, because the belladonna would offset the only outward symptom of morphine poisoning: contracted eye pupils. The belladonna would also, in morphia unconsciousness, produce hysterical symptoms. And the attending physicians would make no difficulty about certifying death from cerebral hemorrhage. That is what they did."

  Dr. Fell bent forward.

  "Just" he added, "as Dr. Shepton had no doubt about the cause of death in the case of Margot Marsh. Eh?

  "In my interpretation, this lady's lover feared her horribly and wished her dead. At her own suggestion, they formed a suicide pact Each, at a given time but in a different place, was to drink poison. And this was his chance.

  "Incidentally, from certain letters to be dealt with in a moment we now know something else. The morphine was provided by the lady herself, hoarded from various prescriptions, for her lover to make into a liquid solution. She thought it would be morphine alone, which is painless. The belladonna, easily procurable, he added to it With full directions before him in the trial of Dr. Buchanan, even the callowest of criminals could not go wrong.

  "But the murderer couldn't trust to that alone, even if he had been dealing with a normal woman. Suppose she backs out? Suppose she swallows the poison and then shrieks for help? He must make sure; he must be there, on the spot

  "When I questioned Sir Danvers, Doris, and Thorley Marsh in the Long Gallery, certain evidence emerged with great clarity. Have you forgotten that on the afternoon before the crime Ronnie Merrick fell into the water?"

  Celia stared down at Holden, and then perplexedly across at Dr. Fell.

  "Oh, come!" Dr. Fell pointed his cigar at Holden. 'You recall the episode in the afternoon, when Merrick fell into the trout stream. The fascinating point was not that Thorley Marsh walked across a log with his eyes shut. The fascinating point was that an agile young man rather clumsily fell in.

  "But suppose, that same night yon intend to invade Caswall Moat House secretly. You can't get in by the front or back door, both are too heavily secured. Your only course it to . . . Eh?"

  "To swim the moat," Holden said thoughtfully.

  "Yes. The clue is water. It's not practicable to leave your clothes behind and invade the house naked, even if it weren't a bitter cold December night. Yet you must provide some explanation next morning, to hosts or servants, of why you have a suit of clothes completely soaked. And if you get it soaked beforehand, who will suspect it next day of a double immersion?

  "Next evidence! Thorley Marsh, telling his detailed story of the night of the murder, walloped me in the eye with another bit. You recall his statement that Margot—in the middle of the night—must have taken a bath?

  "He knew this, he said, because the floor of the bathroom was all wet and there was a towel thrown over the edge of the tub.

  "But his interpretation wasn't feasible. For what had I overheard, on Wednesday night from no less than two witnesses? That the hot-water system at Caswall was out of order. It did not get repaired until next day. Even the water for washing had to be carried up in little cans."

  Dr. Fell looked at Celia.

  "Do you, my dear, believe your sister would have taken a cold bath in the middle of a December night?"

  "It's—it's absurd!" cried Celia. "Margot loathed cold. I remember telling you so myself, when we were in the churchyard."

  "Ah!" grunted Dr. Fell. "And what else did you tell us?"

  "What else?"

  "In your original statement You said, I think, that the bathroom window couldn't be locked?"

  "Y-yes! It’s a swing-together window that never would fit or latch properly."

  "And what," inquired Dr. Fell, "is just outside that bathroom window?"

  It was Holden who answered.

  "A vertical terra-cotta drainpipe. A heavy one." He stared at the past. "I remember noticing it from the oriel window in the Long Gallery, just under that bathroom, when I was reading the note you gave me!"

  "Should you (hurrum!) should you say that Ronnie Merrick, as a young man, is probably an agile climber?"

  "He damn well is an agile climber. He can go all over Caswall Church."

  "So we perceive," observed Dr. Fell, "that the wet floor wasn't caused by anyone taking a bath. But unfortunately, Thorley Marsh put on his slippers before going on to his wife's bedroom and sitting room. Archons of Athens," groaned Dr. Fell, "if only he hadn't worn his slippersl

  "For then, you see, he would have stepped in more wet tracks. The tracks of someone who came in through that unlocked window. The tracks of someone from the moat. The tracks of a desperate youth, half-screaming with hatred for his mistress, and bent on murder."

  Celia slipped off the arm of Holden's chair and stood up.

  "Dr. Fell," she breathed, "you really are a devil."

  Dr. Fell, who resembled nothing so much as a perturbed Old King Cole, blinked at her over .his eyeglasses.

  "Hey??'

  "You build up a case," Celia shivered, "bang, bang, bang, point after point as complete and awful as—I was going to say, as a hangman's rope. But please! Never mind your evidence. What I want to know is: why?"

  "Oh, ah," said Dr. Fell.

  "Why did they all behave like that? Why did Ronnie do such an awful thing? Why did Margot ... oh, everything! The human motives!"

  "Ah, yes," murmured Dr. Fell. "Ronnie Merrick." - He was silent for a long time, his thoughts far away.

  "Here is a young man," he said, "Byronicaly handsome, very callow but admittedly of great talent who has been indulged in every whim of his life. Everything he has wanted has been given to him. And now he wants Doris Locke.

  "Please understand that He was sincerely, blindly, idealistically in love with Doris. He exalted, of course, a girl who did not exist; but that is of no matter, because it happens to all young men. Very deeply he loved Doris; and hoped to marry her; never forget it; it is the mainspring of the murder.

  "As for your sister ..." Dr. Fell hesitated. "Dr. Fell" said Celia. "Please. No delicacy. I want to know."

  "The story of their affair you may read in that long series of letters she wrote, and never posted; like a diary. I read them all today. But I suggest you don't read them. By thunder, it's a good thing they won't have to be read in court!”

  "As for the boy, he was at fust flattered. Proud of being a conqueror! Captivated, too, for a time; because he was dizzy with the strongest of all stimulants in this world. But then—and it always will happen to immature people brought up in public-school traditions—he began to feel debased. He contrasted this with what he felt, or believed he felt, toward Doris Locke.

  "And he began to hate Margot.”

  "On
her side, the infatuation was only increasing. As he grew lukewarm, she grew more obsessed. To the boy's horror, she began talking about marriage.

  "Thorley Marsh, who quite manifestly had learned of the whole thing, was only a little less horrified.

  "Didn't you two ever wonder why Thorley Marsh always felt so intensely bitter toward young Merrick? When he was first giving you," Dr. Fell looked at Holden, "an account of his wife's death, he burst out into a tirade against Merrick in the middle of it You may recall other occasions as well."

  "Yes," agreed Holden. "Even when Thorley and Doris were telling Locke they meant to get married, Thorley noticed Merrick and got as black as thunder. Thorley as good as ordered him out of the house."

  "Oh, ah? But why should he feel like that? Because of any jealousy he may have felt for Merrick as a rival in Doris's affections? Great Scott, no! He knew he was the favored suitor. Nobody could mistake that. When you are the one-and-only, you don't detest the fallen rival. You are more inclined to think him an excellent fellow who is a little to be pitied. I (harrum!) indicated as much to you with a question about your own attitude towards Derek Hurst-Gore.

  "Do you see now why Thorley Marsh wanted to keep everything hush-hush, and would never have agreed to a divorce?"

  "I think I see," murmured Celia. "It—it would have made him look a fool."

  "A thundering fool, in his own eyes! Whether she officially divorces him, or he divorces her, the truth will be flying round for the amusement of all his acquaintances and mends.

  " 'Marsh's wife,' he could hear them saying at his club, with whoops of hilarity, 'is throwing him over for a boy not quite twenty. What ho! If ever he tried to explain that his wife is a hysteric who can't stand his touch, at best it will sound caddish and at worst it will provoke more amusement."

  Another scene returned to Holden in sharp colors of memory.

  " 'Show himself a fool,'" he repeated. "That was what Hurst-Gore said! It was when you were deviling Thorley to admit the whole truth, and nearly did get him to admit it. Hurst-Gore intervened, and shut Thorley up. Do you think our Derek knew everything?"

  "That is my belief. He was Thorley's tutor in that gentleman's political ambitions. However, consider the situation just before Margot Marsh's death.