“Yes, I got your message,” Marjorie said. “We’re all in to-night. Not that we should have gone out anyway. What is it?”
“We’re very sorry, miss,” Bostwick told her, “to interrupt your wedding-night.” He could not seem to leave off harping on the subject: it had become a kind of obsession. “But we won’t trouble you long, and then we’ll leave you to it.”
He broke off muttering, at the cold and angry look Major Crow gave him.
“Superintendent”
“Sir?”
“This lady’s private affairs need not be discussed. Is that quite clear? Thank you.” Though Major Crow was not at ease, he tried to speak cheerfully to Marjorie. “However, Bostwick is right about one thing. We’ll clear out as soon as we can. Ha, ha, ha. Yes. Definitely. Where was I? Ah, yes. Will you take us to the others?”
Whatever else the Major was, he was no actor. Marjorie glanced at him, glanced at the large box Stevenson was carrying by a handle, and said nothing. Her colour was high; she had clearly taken brandy with dinner.
The same atmosphere met them in the library to which she took them. It was at the back of the house, a pleasant conventional room with open book-shelves and a big rough-stone fireplace. A log fire was burning pleasantly there. On the hearth-rug had been set up a card-table, at which Dr. Chesney and Professor Ingram were playing backgammon. Harding lounged in a chair with a newspaper, his head carried unnaturally stiff by the wadding of bandages across the back of his neck.
Both Dr. Chesney and Harding were a little drunk. Professor Ingram was coldly and easily sober. Only bridge-lamps illuminated the room, which was very hot and full of the scent of coffee, of cigars, and of brandy in fat-bowled glasses. All pretence of a backgammon game had been given up, though Professor Ingram held the dice and continued to roll them idly on the board.
Putting his hands flat on the table, Dr. Chesney peered round with a red and freckled face.
“All right,” he growled. “What is it? Get on with it.”
At a nod from Major Crow, Elliot took over.
“Good evening to you, sir. And you. And you. I think you’ve all met Dr. Fell at one time or another. And you all know Mr. Stevenson, of course.”
“We know him,” said Dr. Chesney, still peering round and conquering the brandy-induced huskiness in his speech. “What’s that you’ve got there, Hobart?”
“His cinema-projector,” answered Elliot.
“This afternoon, sir,” Elliot went on to Professor Ingram, “you were very keen to see the film that was taken of Mr. Chesney’s show. I’d like to suggest that, if it’s convenient for you, you all have a look at it. Mr. Stevenson has very kindly consented to bring his camera and the other materials along; and I’m sure you won’t have any objection if we set them up here.” He spoke in that manner which Superintendent Hadley had drilled into him. “I’m afraid it won’t be very pleasant for you to look at, and I apologise. But I can assure all of you that it will help us, and you as well, if you do see it.”
There was a slight, sharp rattle as Professor Ingram rolled the dice across the board. He glanced at them briefly to see the score, picked them up, and looked at Elliot.
“Well, well, well,” he murmured.
“Sir?”
“Come, now,” said Professor Ingram. “Be fair. Is this”—he rolled the dice again—“is this a kind of French-police reconstruction of the crime, at which the guilty wretch is supposed to scream out and confess? Don’t talk such nonsense, Inspector. It will get you nowhere, and it’s bad psychology: In this case, at least.”
His tone was light, but his underlying meaning was serious. Elliot smiled, and was relieved when Professor Ingram also smiled. He hastened to reassure them.
“No, sir, word of honour it’s nothing like that. We don’t want to scare anybody. We only want you all to
see
the film. We want you to see it so that you can convince yourselves——”
“Of what?”
“—convince yourselves who Dr. Nemo really was. We’ve made a rather careful study of that film. And if you look closely, and in the proper place, and in the right way, you can tell who killed Mr. Chesney.”
Professor Ingram dropped the dice into their cup, shook it, and rolled again.
“So it gives him away, does it?”
“Yes. We think so. That’s why we want you all to see the film, and to see if you agree with us: as we’re certain you will agree with us. It’s plain in the film itself. We saw it ourselves the first time we showed the film, even if we didn’t notice what we saw; but we think you’ll notice first off. And in that case, of course, everything will be simple. We’re prepared to make an arrest to-night.”
“Good God,” said Joe Chesney. “You don’t mean you’re going to take somebody and hang him for this?”
He spoke with a kind of simple surprise, as though he had heard some startling fact whose possibility had not yet occurred to him. And his face grew more fiery.
“That’s for the jury to decide, Dr. Chesney. But do you have any objection? To seeing the film, that is?”
“Eh? No, no, not a bit. Tell you the truth, I want to see it.”
“Have you any objection, Mr. Harding?”
Harding ran his fingers round nervously inside his collar, touching the bandage. He cleared his throat. He reached for the brandy at his elbow and drained the glass.
“No,” he decided. “Er—is it a good film?”
“A good film?”
“Clear, I mean.”
“Clear enough. Have you any objection, Miss Wills?”
“No, of course not.”
“Has
she
got to see it?” demanded Dr. Chesney.
“Miss Wills,” said Elliot slowly, “is the one person of all who must see it, even if nobody else does.”
Again Professor Ingram rolled the dice and contemplated their spots idly. “Speaking for myself, I am more than half inclined to sulk about this. I was extremely keen (as you say) to see the film. I got a fine snub for my pains to-day. I am therefore inclined,” his bald forehead shone in the heat of the room, “to tell you to go to the devil. But I can’t. That infernal blow-pipe dart haunted me all night. The real height of Dr. Nemo haunted me all night.” He banged the dice-cup on the table. “Tell me. Does the film show how tall Dr. Nemo was? Can you tell his height from it?”
“Yes, sir. About six feet.”
Professor Ingram put down the dice-cup and looked up. Dr. Chesney first looked puzzled, then curious, then jovial.
“That’s established?” asked the professor sharply.
“You’ll see for yourself. That isn’t what we want to direct your attention to, chiefly; but you can take it as established, yes. Now: do you mind if we use the Music Room to show the film?”
“No, no, anywhere you like,” thundered Joe Chesney. He had evidently been shaken like medicine in a bottle; and, like certain medicines, he frothed and changed colour. He was all hospitality. “Shall I show you the way? Let me. Get some drinks in there too. See it through to the end, but we ought to have a drink.”
“I can find my way, thanks.” Elliot grinned at Professor Ingram. “No, sir, you needn’t look like that. Holding it in the Music Room isn’t a form of French third-degree. It’s because you will see certain things better there, I think. Mr. Stevenson and I will go along, and Major Crow will bring the rest of you in about five minutes.”
He never realised, until he got out of the room, how hot his forehead had been. But he realised, too, that he had not been thinking about the murderer at all; he knew the murderer; the murderer had no more defences now than a pared onion. He was thinking about other considerations that made him feel half sick.
The hall was chilly, and so was the Music Room. Elliot found the light-switch behind the Boule cabinet. He drew the grey curtains; mist was rising outside the windows. He went to the radiator and turned on the steam heat.
“Your screen,” he said, “can go in the space between the double-doors. Get the projector fairly close, if you can; I’d like as large a picture as possible. We can roll out that radio-gramophone and use it as a table to support the projector.”
Stevenson nodded, and they went to work in silence. The sheet was tacked up on the frame of the doors; the projector connected with the same electric socket that had been used for the gramophone. But it seemed a long time before a big square of light flashed out on the screen. Beyond it was the dark office, the office where Marcus Chesney had sat, and in which the clock was still ticking loudly. Elliot arranged the brocade arm-chairs so that two were on either side of the screen.
“Ready,” he said.
And he had hardly said it before a queer little procession came into the Music Room. Dr. Fell, he saw, was now in charge of the ceremonies. Marjorie and Harding were taken to the two chairs at one side of the screen. Professor Ingram and Dr. Chesney to the two chairs at the opposite side. Major Crow (as last night) leaned against the grand piano. Bostwick took up a position at one side of the door. Elliot at the other side. Dr. Fell stood behind Stevenson at the projector.
“I acknowledge,” said Dr. Fell, wheezing heavily, “that this is not going to be easy for you—particularly Miss Wills. But will you, Miss Wills, please pull your chair just a little closer to the screen?”
Marjorie stared at him, but she obeyed without a word. Her hands were trembling so much that Elliot went over and moved the chair for her. Though well to the side, she was within a foot of the sheet between the open doors.
“Thank you,” grunted Dr. Fell, whose face was not quite so ruddy as usual. His voice roared out. “And amen! Let her go.”
Bostwick switched out the lights. Again Elliot noted the intense darkness, broken when Stevenson switched on the light of the projector. It dimly touched the faces of those just outside it. Since the projector was within five feet of the screen, the image on the sheet, while not quite life-size, would be enormous.
The rhythmic humming began, and the screen flashed to darkness. It was easy to hear people breathe now. Elliot was conscious of Dr. Fell’s huge bandit shape towering over those who sat down, but conscious of it only as a background: he was concentrated on the images they were to see again, the meanings that were so plain if you once stopped to think of them.
Down the blackness of the screen crept the vertical blur of light, flickering at its edges. Again phantom doors were being pushed open. Out of that blur gradually emerged a sharp picture of the actual room behind the double-doors at which they were staring. And, as they saw the glimmering mantelpiece, the white light on the table, the whitefaced clock, Elliot had an uncanny feeling that they were looking into the real room rather than at a picture of it. It was as though they saw the real room through a transparent veil, a veil which washed all colours to grey and black. The illusion was aided by the ticking of the real clock. Its ticking fitted into the switch and swing of the pendulum on the spectral clock. Before them was a hollow room, a looking-glass room, with a real clock recording last night’s time and windows open to last night’s air.
Then Marcus Chesney looked out at them from the office.
It was not surprising that Marjorie cried out, for the figure was nearly life-size. Nor was the effect caused by Chesney’s ghoulish appearance under the effect of lights; it came from the mere illusion of reality among them. In the looking-glass Chesney went gravely about his business. He sat down to face them, pushed the grey-patterned chocolate-box to one side, and began his pantomime with the two small articles on the desk.…
“O blind as a bat,” whispered Professor Ingram, straining forward so that his skull touched the beam of the projector. “I see. Blow-pipe dart, eh? I see now! I see——”
“Never mind that!” snapped Dr. Fell. “Don’t bother with that. Keep your mind off it. Watch the left side of the screen. Dr. Nemo is coming on.”
As though summoned, the tall lean figure in the top-hat appeared, turning round to face them as soon as it appeared; and they looked at close range into the blind black spectacles. Details were sharpened and enlarged. You noted the worn nap of the top-hat, the fuzzy scarf with a crack opening across the nose, and Nemo’s curious stride as he moved in the hollow room. Striding to the desk with his back now partly turned to them, he went through his swift substitution of the chocolate-boxes.…
“Who is it?” demanded Dr. Fell, as the figure moved. “Take a good look. Who is it?”
“It’s Wilbur,” said Marjorie.
“It’s Wilbur,” she repeated, getting up from her chair. “Don’t you see? Can’t you tell that walk? Look at it! It’s Wilbur.”
Dr. Chesney’s voice was powerful but dazed. “The girl’s right,” he insisted. “My God, it’s as sure as you’re born. But it can’t be Wilbur. The boy’s dead.”
“It certainly looks like Wilbur,” admitted Professor Ingram. Out of the gloom his whole personality seemed to sharpen; he shifted and grew intent; they felt it. “Wait! There’s something wrong here. This is a trick. I’m willing to swear——”
Dr. Fell cut him off. The steady humming of the projector dinned in their ears.
“Now we’re coming to it,” Dr. Fell interrupted, as Dr. Nemo moved to the other side of the table. “Miss Wills! In about two seconds your uncle is going to say something. He’s looking at Nemo. He’s going to say something to Nemo. Watch his lips. Read his lips for us, and tell us what he says. Steady!”
The girl was standing by the screen, bent forward so that her shadow almost touched it. Now it was as though they could not even hear the hum of the projector. It was a silence, an unnatural silence. As Marcus Chesney’s grey lips moved in the looking-glass room, Marjorie spoke with them. Her voice was of an unnatural pitch, as though her thoughts were not there at all. It was a soft, ghostly voice, following a sort of rhythm in itself.
It said:
“
I do not like you, Doctor Fell;
The reason why I cannot tell,
But
——”
A sort of uprising had taken place in the group.
“What the devil’s all this?” snapped Professor Ingram.
“What are you saying?”
“I’m saying what he’s saying, or said,” cried Marjorie.
“I do not like you, Doctor Fell—”
“I tell you this is a trick,” said Professor Ingram. “I’m not mad enough to believe that. I was here, watching and listening to him. And I know he damned well never said anything like that.”