"I certainly did not—but, of course, when they come to my apartment I can't very well stop Grace from being pleasant and good-humored about the whole thing."
"Well, there you are," said Avalon. "Steve might have some dim idea of getting even. After all, these are not great intellects you're dealing with, Mr. Kriss."
"They're decent men," said Kriss. "I wouldn't like to think Steve would do it for any such silly reason. The suggestion is not proof, you know."
"No, it isn't," admitted Avalon, "but we're not going to get proof unless one of them confesses."
"I wouldn't demand proof," said Kriss. "I'm not going to be reporting anyone to the police. All I want is to be satisfied in my mind who it was, and why."
Rubin said, "Just a thought. Are any of the four actually given to practical jokes? If any of them is given to pulling dumb stunts like this, they'd do it as a way of life. They wouldn't need reasons."
Kriss was thoughtful. "I can't recall that any of them ever told stories about practical jokes he'd played. Joe once palmed all four aces and let us play a game without them. Naturally, each one of us thought one of the others had the aces and when Joe started bidding we thought
he
might have them. He was able to take the pot with a nothing hand. As soon as it was over, he admitted what he'd done, we all gave him what-for, and he never tried anything like that again."
"Maybe not "said Rubin, "but it shows a bent of mind, you know."
Kriss shook his head. "That's not at all convincing."
"Look here," said Drake. "The point is that policemen were involved in this and it strikes me that not many people would try a practical joke that makes policemen as well as some innocent civilian the victims. You, Mr. Kriss, don't see the humor in it, and neither, I'm sure, did the police. If they found out who made the false report, they'd have good motivation for making life miserable for him."
"What are you driving at, Jim?" asked Avalon.
"It just seems to me that whoever did it must be sufficiently familiar with the police to be willing to take a chance. Did one of your poker mates ever have a run-in with the police to your knowledge, Mr. Kriss? Would he be trying to get at the police rather than at you?"
"Nothing like that was ever hinted at," said Kriss. Then, thoughtfully, "Ernie has a cousin, I think, who's a policeman. He mentioned that once or twice, it seems to me."
Trumbull said, "A relative in the police force would make it
less likely that a person would play games with the police, if you ask me."
"Unless," said Drake, "Ernie doesn't like his cousin."
"I don't think that's at all meaningful, either," said Kriss.
A silence fell around the table, and then Gonzalo said, "Listen, Arnie, is there anyone at the poker table that you don't particularly like?"
"No," said Kriss. "They're all nice guys. Or I always thought they were till the police appeared at the door."
"Then let me put it another way, Arnie. Even if you like all four, isn't there one you like the least?"
"Well," said Kriss cautiously, "there's Ken. There's nothing wrong with him, really, but he's got a hoarse voice that grates on my ear. My musical sense, I suppose. I just find myself wincing a little sometimes when he talks. What difference could that make?"
"Because I have a theory," said Gonzalo, "that dislike usually works both ways. You don't usually dislike someone who likes you and vice versa. Like and dislike make themselves felt in subtle ways even when you're not aware of it. If you wince at Ken, he's bound to wince at you, and maybe his dislike drove him to the deed."
"I don't believe it," said Kriss.
Avalon offered, "Well, we've managed to show that each one of the four has something about him that makes it possible he's the one who phoned the police. Steve has trouble with his wife and may be jealous of your marital bliss. Joe has a tendency to engage in practical jokes and may have done it to indulge in his caprice. Ernie has a cousin who is a policeman and may have done it either because he is hostile to policemen or unafraid of them. And Ken may have done it out of a vague dislike of you. The trouble is that not one of the four motivations is anywhere near convincing."
Kriss nodded. "That's it. So it ends up where it began. I can't trust anybody at the game and my one nonmusical recreation is probably gone. Is it any wonder I envy you six your stable get-togethers?"
"Not us six," said Gonzalo, "it's us seven. And nobody has asked Henry yet. —Can you make anything of this, Henry?"
Henry, from his post at the sideboard, smiled paternally. "I'm not at all sure I can shed any light on the situation, but I do have some questions to ask, if Mr. Kriss will permit me."
"Go ahead, Henry," said Kriss resignedly. "Everyone else has been at me."
Henry said, "Did the police know who you are, Mr. Kriss?"
"You mean that I'm a well known cellist? I'm sure they didn't. When Mario says I'm a celebrity, he's exaggerating, you know."
"Did they address you by name, or refer to your playing?"
"Not at all."
"Your name on the door must have meant nothing to them, then."
"That's right. I'm sure of that."
Henry said, "And your wife still uses her maiden name on the door?"
"Yes."
"When the police came, they said the incident had been clearly localized by address, apartment number, and name. Did they address you by name? Or did you announce your name?"
"They didn't use my name and I didn't announce it. My name is right there on the door. They saw it."
"But they saw two names, Mr. Kriss, G. Barron on top and A. Kriss on the bottom. Which name had been reported to the police?"
"Why, my name, of—" Kriss stopped cold.
"Exactly, sir. You have
assumed
it was your name that had been reported, but you don't know. No name was actually mentioned, either by the police or by you or, I suppose, by your wife. So it may have been your wife's last name that was reported, not yours. Isn't that right?"
"Oh, my God," said Kriss blankly.
"What difference would it make, Henry?" asked Gonzalo.
Henry said, "There doesn't seem to be any clear candidate for the role of having played this practical joke on Mr. Kriss. Might there be one who would have played it on Mrs. Kriss?"
Kriss groaned. "Of course—-there is. There's someone who has been harassing Grace for years, since long before I married her. He phones her frequently, he sends her letters—he won't leave her alone."
"Why?" asked Gonzalo.
Kriss shrugged. "He was a fellow student of hers once. Harmless enough, but somehow he never grew up, I imagine. He seems to have been in love with her back then. I suppose he's never found anyone else and she's his fantasy. He's always been quite harmless, so I didn't think of him in this connection. But, of course, it must be he. He knows Grace is married and resents it and fantasizes her husband might be cruel to her, I suppose.— How is it it never occurred to me it might be
her
name that had been reported?"
"It is my feeling," said Avalon, "that however seriously a male may intellectually accept the concept of his wife's equality, his feeling, viscerally, is that she is merely an appendage."
Kriss seemed too abashed to answer, but Henry said softly, "At least, Mr. Kriss, you can go back to your poker game in full enjoyment."
G |
eoffrey Avalon, host of the Black Widower banquet that month, gazed benignly at the five other seated Widowers, and at his guest for the evening, Marcellus DaRienzi. Henry, that unparalleled waiter, would soon be removing the main-course plates, when the last bit of the roast goose, red cabbage, and potato pancakes would be gone.
"I have a rather odd tale that I would like to tell you all before the business end of the meeting begins "Avalon said in his stately baritone.
Emmanuel Rubin looked up at him owlishly through the thick lenses of his glasses with an unaccustomed bonhomie, and patted a stomach full of goose. "Go ahead, Jeff, but don't be tedious."
"I shall try not to be," said Avalon gravely. "It happened two weeks ago. I was on a business trip and had taken a room in a hotel. I needn't mention the name of the hotel, or of the city, to avoid tedium for Manny, and because they have nothing to do with the story. My wife was not with me. That
is
essential.
"I had several hours one afternoon between appointments and I thought I might as well take a nap." He added defensively, "I don't know about the rest of you, but since I am past my first youth I find forty winks after lunch to be most helpful."
"We'll grant you that, Jeff," said Thomas Trumbull, scowling under the crisp, tight waves of his white hair. "I've been known to take such naps myself, and Jim Drake is taking one now."
"Not at all," said Drake indignantly, "I was just resting my eyelids."
263
"Let me go on," said Avalon. "I fell into a light doze and suddenly felt the poke of a finger on my shoulder, quite a hard poke. Naturally, I woke up at once and, in the confusion of sudden wakefulness, I cried out, "Who? What?" and sat up in bed. The room, as I suppose you can guess, was, except for me, empty. It was afternoon, the sunlight was slanting in—there were no dim corners, all was bright, and the room was empty. The door was securely locked, with an inner chain in place. The windows were locked and they were, in any case, sixteen sheer stories above the street."
"Did you look under the bed?" asked Mario Gonzalo, grinning and smoothing his ascot tie.
"No," said Avalon with a touch of hauteur, "I did
not
look under the bed. There was no room under the bed for a medium-sized dog, let alone a human being. However, I did inspect the bathroom and the closet. Nothing there. And there were no connecting doors to other rooms, by the way. I was alone, absolutely alone."
"So?" said Roger Halsted, pushing away his plate.
"So who poked me?"
"Oh, for God's sake," exploded Trumbull. "It was a
dream.
Haven't you ever dreamed, Jeff?"
"No," said Avalon, hunching his formidable eyebrows low, "it was
not
a dream. I
know
it was not a dream. Someone poked me."
"Listen," began Trumbull, "I've had dreams—"
"Never mind your dreams," said Avalon with unaccustomed abruptness, "this was not a dream."
Trumbull shook his head. "I've never known you to be this stubborn, Jeff, and this stupid."
The guest, DaRienzi, now spoke for the first time since the dinner had begun. He smiled down at his stewed pears and said, "What Jeff is doing here, gentlemen, is posing a locked-room puzzle. Something has happened in a locked room that could not have happened. My friend Jeff is an honest man who is presenting an honest problem and we—or at least you gentlemen of the
club—must puzzle out the solution. And saying it was just a dream is not an acceptable solution, is it, Jeff?"
"No," said Avalon, still testy. "I know the solution, and so do you, Marcellus, because I told you this earlier in the evening, but I want the Black Widowers to figure it out. I'm telling it to them in orderly fashion, if the idiots would only allow it."
Rubin said, "You're the host, Jeff—you control the evening. Order silence and go on."
Avalon glowered. "Silence! In the empty room, then, I was forced to consider the possibility of a supernatural warning."
The five other Widowers at the table, rationalists all, scrambled to their feet and, the order for silence forgotten, yammered their indignation. DaRienzi kept his seat and smiled.
Avalon raised his hands and thundered,
"Silence!
I don't say I accepted the supernatural as an explanation. I merely say I was forced to consider it. I don't believe in supernatural influences, but even my own firmest beliefs cannot be accepted by myself as unshakeable and invulnerable. Do you mind pursuing rationality that far?"
"As a matter of fact," said Roger Halsted quietly, as he mopped his high pink brow with his handkerchief, "our society is so permeated and drenched with supernatural beliefs of any number of kinds and sorts that even the firmest skeptic may be corrupted, at least momentarily, if the conditions are right."