The Wonderful Scheme of Mr. Christopher Thorne, page 47
“Marceau, moreover,” went on Thorne coolly, “admitted to Kolster he was going under another name. I presume he thought Kolster had heard about the criminal proceedings in New York. Which Kolster evidently never had—judging from his letter to me. Marceau gave Kolster that name—and some address in Paris, at which he could be reached, claiming that he was leaving Liverpool himself in a day or so. I myself have never known the name—or the address. Nor would they, under the circumstances, be of any utility to the British police. As I shall explain.
“Marceau, of course, asked Kolster if he ever saw me, and Kolster told him that he did—at intervals of every few years.
“So Kolster left. Marceau, I imagine, must have been completely flabbergasted at the complete upset of his plans to kill his uncle. He had probably smuggled the chimpanzee into the place through the back way, under cover of darkness. No one in the world had known about his ownership of it. And now Kolster knew! Probably Marceau dropped the whole murder scheme pronto. I don’t know. But that evening luck turned for him—so he thought! For the British papers carried the news of a wreck on the Liverpool-Bristol Express—and the death of Hugh Kolster, an American. So Marceau was able to go ahead with whatever he had in mind with perfect safety.
“But Kolster, it seems, down at Lime Street Station, in supervising the loading of some of his salesman’s sample trunks, contacted a man loading some animals. Bears and snakes. A dealer—yes. He talked to the latter. Found the fellow could use a trained chimpanzee. At a price of 100 pounds, too. Got his address—somewhere in the south of England. And, my young optimist, this is what is most important in your problem: in Kolster’s letter to me, he said he had just written to Marceau—to that address in Paris—to tell him about this animal-buying chap. And—now get this!—he said he had mentioned to Marceau that he had just written to me in Chicago.
“But Kolster died, as the clipping there tells you. And, as we both know, Marceau committed that murder next night on schedule. He probably rented a car next day—transported the chimpanzee out to Lymewich—under the seat of the car. Chained it in the woods. Returned the rented car to Liverpool. We know the rest. As for the chimpanzee, Marceau doubtless shoved him into the channel. But hiding in Paris there, he undoubtedly got Hugh Kolster’s letter. For I got mine nine days after. And when Marceau got that letter, he must have cleared out immediately—when he read about Kolster’s having written to me—for he knew that Kolster’s letter would be across the Atlantic in a week or thereabouts and I would assuredly have something to give the British police. Probably later, when his panic cooled down, and nothing happened, he realized the real facts: that it was checkmate—that I’d naturally not help to have him caught—only to have him sue me thereupon for a rebate on that annuity. But that if he ever did come forward with such suit—I’d immediately have him locked up as André Marceau’s murderer—and with evidence enough to convict him sure.”
Erskine was dazedly silent.
“Well,” he said at length, “to dispose of my hopes for good and all, then, I’d like to ask one more question. If this Xenius Jones comes forward and tries to rivet that murder on somebody else—will you produce your proofs?”
Thorne gave a helpless shrug of his shoulders. “Having had to give you the inside facts to clear myself of your ridiculous charges about collusion with Marceau, I suppose I’ll naturally have to. For you’ll shoot your mouth off—and my letter from Kolster will be claimed as evidence by the British consul—and myself cited to give a deposition. Otherwise, I wouldn’t raise so much as my little finger to interfere. For I doubt that anybody in England would be in any danger of losing his neck on the wild deductive structure of a nit-wit Beefeater, who couldn’t solve anything, at best, more than a childish puzzle.”
“We-e-ell,” countered Erskine cheerlessly—and still considerably dazed, “it’s possible—here and now—to know exactly what his guess is, anyway. And maybe, at that, he’s arrived at the true facts. And, if so—he maybe has Oliver Edward Marceau under his thumb. Or knows that the man is lodged safe and tight somewhere in Europe—in some prison, maybe, where he can’t possibly slide out from under Jones’s thumb. And if these suppositions of mine are true, I could at least file suit—service Marceau by registered cable in Old Bailey—or wherever he sits—and then attach anything he’s got—or ever hopes to have.”
Thorne smiled scornfully. “Meaning, no doubt, his purely hypothetical rights to a rebate on that annuity. You’d have to work pretty fast, I’d say—with a note expiring in 48 hours! And as for his rights to a rebate—don’t forget the courts would have to affirm that—and that would take only about ten years or so! Plus plenty of expense, believe me.”
Erskine sighed deeply.
“And how,” Thorne asked derisively, “can you find out, anyway, before the magic day of February 25th—the day when it’s to be given forth, on a golden platter, to the press of the world!—what the Beefeater’s solution of the case is?”
Erskine’s face lighted up.
“Thanks to the fact,” he told the older man, “of my having created a little pseudo-detective agency some time back in order to get information on a private matter which otherwise might have been refused me—and to my having signed a pink slip, when I had my phone installed, for the Chicago Chamber of Commerce—and to the fact that the International Criminological Data Service picks up regularly the names of possible clients from those slips—and the fact that its head, Scutters Jones, is a brother of Xenius Jones—and last, but not least, to the said I.C.D.S. Company’s sending me, as a prospective client, free gratis and costing nothing, a complete clearance report—so they call it—of the André Marceau Murder Case—in commemoration of the 50th anniversary of their existence. Which seems to be the 24th day of February—1937—a. d.!”
“Anniversary? And brothers, eh? And so that was the third and hidden reason why this Beefeater set February 25th for the release of his vaporings to the Press of the world? So-o?” Thorne nodded contemptuously. “He did say—yes—that the date was determined conclusively because, only because—yes—today—the 24th—yes—could he reach a couple of men to corroborate something; but I remember quite well his statement in the Star-Graphic that he had a more important third reason.”
“Well, that was it!—to give his brother’s agency the chance to scoop all the like services, newspapers and whatnot all over the world. With something pristine—something that hadn’t already been dished up in the newspaper of each client’s city.”
Erskine drew from his breast pocket the quadrifolded report with the blue backing that he had received by special delivery an hour or so before in the Dearborn Building.
“Since I’m here,” he asked morosely, “to settle my—well, peculations—in full—with good hard cash—$49,000 cash, anyway—all of which is here safely under guard—do you mind if I look this over?—to find out, once and for all, whether your dope has been uncovered by Jones—and whether I’ve found my man Marceau or not?” He unfolded the report as he spoke, and speculatively riffled the edge of the sheaf of onion-skinned foolscap sheets with his thumbnail. “It may take ten minutes,” he cautioned, “for me to read it through; but then we’ll both know, maybe—for good and for all!—about our mutual opponent, Oliver Edward Marceau. After all, you know, you’re as interested a person as I!”
Thorne sighed. And reached forward into his desk. “Then add this,” he grunted, “to your report! The Beefeater’s solution—of that pipe-puzzle.”
Erskine leaned forward. “The devil you say? He—he really did solve it? Alic—your daughter, that is—told me—you had sent it to him—and that he—or rather so you thought—did a ‘crawl-out.’”
Thorne had a folded paper in his hands. “Well, it looks now—from what you’ve just told me—that he didn’t want to release anything prior to that report you’ve got there. Anyway, he did solve it—and the solution got here this morning—and had evidently been entrusted to some one here in Chicago—probably this brother you speak of—to mail last night.”
He passed it to Erskine, disgruntledly—yet at the same time a bit triumphantly; and Erskine knew, as the other did so, that Thorne was subduing his own chagrin about having failed to solve that puzzle in order to witness the face of another man who had also failed at it.
The reply, or solution, just whatever it was, was evidently typewritten on a single sheet of foolscap, for it was folded four ways, and Erskine could see the lines of the typewriting—and deeper lines as of India ink, too—showing through the paper.
Curiously—for that puzzle had cost him many a sleepless night—he unfolded the single sheet, and rapidly read the few words encompassing the two drawings on it. It ran:
To be mailed, in Chicago, on February 23rd,
1937, by a relative of the writer’s!
Mr. Christopher Thorne,
3001, West Jackson Boulevard,
Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A.
Dear Sir:
A bit belatedly, to be sure, I send you the solution-drawing, presenting the answer to the puzzle which you so kindly tendered me, by mail, last November 21st, 1936, concerning Messrs. Smith, Brown and Johnson. When I wrote you, December 3rd last, acknowledging the receipt of the puzzle, I had then, of course, a crude drawing, in pencil, of that solution. I take pleasure now, however, of drawing it in meticulously with my draughting instruments, in the space below—thus:
You will observe, in the above, that Mr. Smith, Mr. Brown and Mr. and Mr. Johnson all derive oil, water and gas from the three specified stations: that no pipe crosses over a pipe; that no pipe crosses under a pipe; that, in short—as specifically called for by your premises—the center-lines of all pipes lie in the same horizontal plane. Also, it will be noted, I feel confident, that but 18 holes are drilled in bungalows and stations for egress and ingress of pipes.
In case, by any chance, it should be a little obscure as to how the pipe running from the water station to Mr. Smith’s bungalow, first through the oil station, and thereafter within the oil-pipe itself—how, rather, this arrangement could practically convey oil and water to Mr. Smith, I take the liberty also of showing, below, the actual terminal end of the “pipe within a pipe”—as it might lie within the walls of Mr. Smith’s bungalow—thus:
It will easily be seen in the above, however—and before even plumbing fixtures, “double-aperture” caps, and double-faucets, have been applied!—how both oil and water are seen to be flowing to Mr. Smith quite unmixed.
Last but not least, Mr. Thorne, I should like to add that, outside of running a pipe within a pipe—which does not make the solution fail to comply with all the given conditions—there are no other solutions for the puzzle—since any solution can be shown to be, outside of that method, a geometrical paradox.
May I again add, as I did last November, that your puzzle gave me great pleasure, and may I again express my appreciation that you thought of me, and my undoubted desire to add this puzzle to the many which I have solved, and which today form part of my collection of such?
Very truly,
Xenius Jones.
Erskine looked up, solution in hand.
“Well, I’ll be—”
“—damned!” put in Thorne for him. “Yes. I quite understand.” He replaced the sheet, as Erskine tendered it bewilderedly back to him, in his desk. “However, just because a man can solve a—a—a downright infantile puzzle that three other people failed at, doesn’t mean that he can solve a world-famous crime.”
“No—true enough,” granted Erskine. “But give me ten minutes,” he begged, “to read these foolscap sheets—in this so-called Clearance Report—and we’ll learn the answer to that for good and for all.”
Thorne sighed again.
“Go ahead,” he said. “And let’s get it over with. So we can handle the main issue.” He pulled out a huge stack of bookkeeper’s ruled balance sheets from the top drawer of his desk, and took up a lead pencil. “I’ve a few hundred figures here to check—with the original entries thereto—but don’t spend all day, if you please, reading fairy tales. For you’ll find out exactly what I’ve told you: that the Beefeater probably hasn’t as many brains, criminologically, as that chimpanzee Marceau had in Liverpool—and that therefore I’ll never have to pass a single red penny back to any murderers or his heirs—simply because the Beefeater hasn’t got him!—and, not having him, the said murderer won’t ever dare show up to claim anything from me.”
He spoke convincingly. Erskine stared at him. Then turned his attention to the onion-skin sheets. And the silence thereafter was broken only by the slight scratch of Thorne’s pencil making v-shaped check-marks after figures in interminable columns, that corresponded evidently to figures in other like columns; and by the louder rustle of paper, as Erskine turned the thin foolscap sheets, one by one.
CHAPTER XXXV
A Bombshell
Erskine looked up, after fifteen minutes, from the last multigraphed sheet of the long report—from the undermost of the two final pink ones, in fact.
“Nope!” was his first audible comment. Thorne, too, at once looked up, expectant, pencil in hand. “To boil it all down,” Erskine went on, “it’s—” He tossed the sheaf of sheets over onto the ledge of Thorne’s antique desk. “But it’s a bit too much for me to try and boil down here and now. There it is—and more or less as you’ll get it yourself in all of tomorrow morning’s papers—maybe one or two of this evening’s, too—those, that is, that catch a phone tip on the report from a friend, and that are willing openly to violate copyright and get jerked up in court for heavy damages. But to state the chief things in it that concern you and me—André Marceau was not murdered by Oliver Edward Marceau. The proof of which, moreover, is 100 per cent conclusive! Nor is Oliver Edward Marceau involved—even to the thousandth degree—with the affair at Little Ivington. For he—but you can read the whole report yourself, if you’ve a mind. I can wait.”
“No,” said Thorne, tossing his red and black ruled balance-sheets back into the top drawer of his desk. “I’ll read it tonight at bedtime. The connection—or non-connection—of Oliver Marceau with the affair is all that I’m interested in, anyway.” He paused, a deep frown between his eyes. “And I am to take it as conclusive, then,” he queried, “that Oliver Edward Marceau’s presence in Liverpool—with that chimpanzee—has nothing to do with the death of his uncle?”
“None.”
“And they don’t even know Oliver Marceau was the son of a midget woman?”
“Yes, they do,” Erskine assented. “For it seems that if for no other reason than that he had contacted André Marceau at one time in the latter’s life—and was, therefore, part of André Marceau’s ‘first concentric sphere of contacts,’ as Jones terms it—Oliver Marceau’s history—at least, what little of it was available—was investigated over here by one of Scutters Jones’ men working out from the New York office. When you read the report itself, however, you’ll see that this line of investigation could have reached nothing criminologically—although its result, just the same, is included in a number of ‘addenda’ items, collated by the I.C.D.S. Jones and not by the Scotland Yard Jones, for American newspaper use only—and so headed—on those two pink sheets following the report. It says, in short, that—” But here Erskine reached forward and took up the report again. And turned to those addenda paragraphs on the pink sheets—each one of which was, in a sense, a complete human interest story—at least for any newspaper editor who might happen to have spare space to fill.
“It says,” Erskine went on, now reading: “‘News Item II: Amidst such a background of midgets as was provided by the Marceau Case, it would be expected that anyone having ever had contact with André Marceau, and possessing a midget parent, would be a logical suspect in the latter’s death. Such, exactly, was the case of Oliver Edward Marceau, the American nephew of André Marceau, who, as old newspaper files will show, was indicted in New York in 1927 for swindling a Chinese named Kwan Yung out of $31,250, and was never seen again thereafter. The curious feature of his having had a midget mother was, however, unearthed through purely routine investigation conducted from the eastern office of the I.C.D.S., in helping Mr. Xenius Jones, at London, to develop this report. No family connections of the tiny lady were obtainable, however. All that was elicited was that she was of sufficiently small size to have been, at one time or another in her life, a valuable addition at least to some traveling circus, carnival or freak show. The ascertainment of her size was not a particularly difficult fact to unearth, for the said Oliver E. Marceau’s birth certificate is on file today in Brooklyn; and though the physician in the case—Dr. Lucullus James—has been dead for many decades, the latter’s records are still stored in the attic of his grandson, Willard C. Tarleson, a salesman for a surgical instrument company, residing at 2022 Albemarle Road, Brooklyn; and a brief penciled case-history report of the delivery in question indicates that the unusual patient had been but 33 inches high, and corresponding in all other dimensions; and that some of the instruments used on a normally sized woman for delivery of a child—even by Caesarian operation—had not been at all utilizable in this case. The train of investigation was not carried further, however, because of subsequent and more vital developments in other lines of investigation centering entirely in England, all of which are set forth fully in the report appended to these addenda sheets; and also because it would have required the search of the few available—if available!—records of hundreds of American traveling shows of the late 70’s and early 80’s—all of which shows are defunct and forgotten today.’”
Erskine looked up. “Your Beefeater friend, it seems, Mr. Thorne, didn’t get all hot and bothered just because he uncovered this fact!”
“Apparently,” said Thorne, a bit nonplussed. “And,” he asked, suddenly, “did he really have any other reasons for deferring the holding out of his solution till February 25th—other than giving his veal-eating brother over here a chance to pull an advertising stunt?”
“Marceau, of course, asked Kolster if he ever saw me, and Kolster told him that he did—at intervals of every few years.
“So Kolster left. Marceau, I imagine, must have been completely flabbergasted at the complete upset of his plans to kill his uncle. He had probably smuggled the chimpanzee into the place through the back way, under cover of darkness. No one in the world had known about his ownership of it. And now Kolster knew! Probably Marceau dropped the whole murder scheme pronto. I don’t know. But that evening luck turned for him—so he thought! For the British papers carried the news of a wreck on the Liverpool-Bristol Express—and the death of Hugh Kolster, an American. So Marceau was able to go ahead with whatever he had in mind with perfect safety.
“But Kolster, it seems, down at Lime Street Station, in supervising the loading of some of his salesman’s sample trunks, contacted a man loading some animals. Bears and snakes. A dealer—yes. He talked to the latter. Found the fellow could use a trained chimpanzee. At a price of 100 pounds, too. Got his address—somewhere in the south of England. And, my young optimist, this is what is most important in your problem: in Kolster’s letter to me, he said he had just written to Marceau—to that address in Paris—to tell him about this animal-buying chap. And—now get this!—he said he had mentioned to Marceau that he had just written to me in Chicago.
“But Kolster died, as the clipping there tells you. And, as we both know, Marceau committed that murder next night on schedule. He probably rented a car next day—transported the chimpanzee out to Lymewich—under the seat of the car. Chained it in the woods. Returned the rented car to Liverpool. We know the rest. As for the chimpanzee, Marceau doubtless shoved him into the channel. But hiding in Paris there, he undoubtedly got Hugh Kolster’s letter. For I got mine nine days after. And when Marceau got that letter, he must have cleared out immediately—when he read about Kolster’s having written to me—for he knew that Kolster’s letter would be across the Atlantic in a week or thereabouts and I would assuredly have something to give the British police. Probably later, when his panic cooled down, and nothing happened, he realized the real facts: that it was checkmate—that I’d naturally not help to have him caught—only to have him sue me thereupon for a rebate on that annuity. But that if he ever did come forward with such suit—I’d immediately have him locked up as André Marceau’s murderer—and with evidence enough to convict him sure.”
Erskine was dazedly silent.
“Well,” he said at length, “to dispose of my hopes for good and all, then, I’d like to ask one more question. If this Xenius Jones comes forward and tries to rivet that murder on somebody else—will you produce your proofs?”
Thorne gave a helpless shrug of his shoulders. “Having had to give you the inside facts to clear myself of your ridiculous charges about collusion with Marceau, I suppose I’ll naturally have to. For you’ll shoot your mouth off—and my letter from Kolster will be claimed as evidence by the British consul—and myself cited to give a deposition. Otherwise, I wouldn’t raise so much as my little finger to interfere. For I doubt that anybody in England would be in any danger of losing his neck on the wild deductive structure of a nit-wit Beefeater, who couldn’t solve anything, at best, more than a childish puzzle.”
“We-e-ell,” countered Erskine cheerlessly—and still considerably dazed, “it’s possible—here and now—to know exactly what his guess is, anyway. And maybe, at that, he’s arrived at the true facts. And, if so—he maybe has Oliver Edward Marceau under his thumb. Or knows that the man is lodged safe and tight somewhere in Europe—in some prison, maybe, where he can’t possibly slide out from under Jones’s thumb. And if these suppositions of mine are true, I could at least file suit—service Marceau by registered cable in Old Bailey—or wherever he sits—and then attach anything he’s got—or ever hopes to have.”
Thorne smiled scornfully. “Meaning, no doubt, his purely hypothetical rights to a rebate on that annuity. You’d have to work pretty fast, I’d say—with a note expiring in 48 hours! And as for his rights to a rebate—don’t forget the courts would have to affirm that—and that would take only about ten years or so! Plus plenty of expense, believe me.”
Erskine sighed deeply.
“And how,” Thorne asked derisively, “can you find out, anyway, before the magic day of February 25th—the day when it’s to be given forth, on a golden platter, to the press of the world!—what the Beefeater’s solution of the case is?”
Erskine’s face lighted up.
“Thanks to the fact,” he told the older man, “of my having created a little pseudo-detective agency some time back in order to get information on a private matter which otherwise might have been refused me—and to my having signed a pink slip, when I had my phone installed, for the Chicago Chamber of Commerce—and to the fact that the International Criminological Data Service picks up regularly the names of possible clients from those slips—and the fact that its head, Scutters Jones, is a brother of Xenius Jones—and last, but not least, to the said I.C.D.S. Company’s sending me, as a prospective client, free gratis and costing nothing, a complete clearance report—so they call it—of the André Marceau Murder Case—in commemoration of the 50th anniversary of their existence. Which seems to be the 24th day of February—1937—a. d.!”
“Anniversary? And brothers, eh? And so that was the third and hidden reason why this Beefeater set February 25th for the release of his vaporings to the Press of the world? So-o?” Thorne nodded contemptuously. “He did say—yes—that the date was determined conclusively because, only because—yes—today—the 24th—yes—could he reach a couple of men to corroborate something; but I remember quite well his statement in the Star-Graphic that he had a more important third reason.”
“Well, that was it!—to give his brother’s agency the chance to scoop all the like services, newspapers and whatnot all over the world. With something pristine—something that hadn’t already been dished up in the newspaper of each client’s city.”
Erskine drew from his breast pocket the quadrifolded report with the blue backing that he had received by special delivery an hour or so before in the Dearborn Building.
“Since I’m here,” he asked morosely, “to settle my—well, peculations—in full—with good hard cash—$49,000 cash, anyway—all of which is here safely under guard—do you mind if I look this over?—to find out, once and for all, whether your dope has been uncovered by Jones—and whether I’ve found my man Marceau or not?” He unfolded the report as he spoke, and speculatively riffled the edge of the sheaf of onion-skinned foolscap sheets with his thumbnail. “It may take ten minutes,” he cautioned, “for me to read it through; but then we’ll both know, maybe—for good and for all!—about our mutual opponent, Oliver Edward Marceau. After all, you know, you’re as interested a person as I!”
Thorne sighed. And reached forward into his desk. “Then add this,” he grunted, “to your report! The Beefeater’s solution—of that pipe-puzzle.”
Erskine leaned forward. “The devil you say? He—he really did solve it? Alic—your daughter, that is—told me—you had sent it to him—and that he—or rather so you thought—did a ‘crawl-out.’”
Thorne had a folded paper in his hands. “Well, it looks now—from what you’ve just told me—that he didn’t want to release anything prior to that report you’ve got there. Anyway, he did solve it—and the solution got here this morning—and had evidently been entrusted to some one here in Chicago—probably this brother you speak of—to mail last night.”
He passed it to Erskine, disgruntledly—yet at the same time a bit triumphantly; and Erskine knew, as the other did so, that Thorne was subduing his own chagrin about having failed to solve that puzzle in order to witness the face of another man who had also failed at it.
The reply, or solution, just whatever it was, was evidently typewritten on a single sheet of foolscap, for it was folded four ways, and Erskine could see the lines of the typewriting—and deeper lines as of India ink, too—showing through the paper.
Curiously—for that puzzle had cost him many a sleepless night—he unfolded the single sheet, and rapidly read the few words encompassing the two drawings on it. It ran:
To be mailed, in Chicago, on February 23rd,
1937, by a relative of the writer’s!
Mr. Christopher Thorne,
3001, West Jackson Boulevard,
Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A.
Dear Sir:
A bit belatedly, to be sure, I send you the solution-drawing, presenting the answer to the puzzle which you so kindly tendered me, by mail, last November 21st, 1936, concerning Messrs. Smith, Brown and Johnson. When I wrote you, December 3rd last, acknowledging the receipt of the puzzle, I had then, of course, a crude drawing, in pencil, of that solution. I take pleasure now, however, of drawing it in meticulously with my draughting instruments, in the space below—thus:
You will observe, in the above, that Mr. Smith, Mr. Brown and Mr. and Mr. Johnson all derive oil, water and gas from the three specified stations: that no pipe crosses over a pipe; that no pipe crosses under a pipe; that, in short—as specifically called for by your premises—the center-lines of all pipes lie in the same horizontal plane. Also, it will be noted, I feel confident, that but 18 holes are drilled in bungalows and stations for egress and ingress of pipes.
In case, by any chance, it should be a little obscure as to how the pipe running from the water station to Mr. Smith’s bungalow, first through the oil station, and thereafter within the oil-pipe itself—how, rather, this arrangement could practically convey oil and water to Mr. Smith, I take the liberty also of showing, below, the actual terminal end of the “pipe within a pipe”—as it might lie within the walls of Mr. Smith’s bungalow—thus:
It will easily be seen in the above, however—and before even plumbing fixtures, “double-aperture” caps, and double-faucets, have been applied!—how both oil and water are seen to be flowing to Mr. Smith quite unmixed.
Last but not least, Mr. Thorne, I should like to add that, outside of running a pipe within a pipe—which does not make the solution fail to comply with all the given conditions—there are no other solutions for the puzzle—since any solution can be shown to be, outside of that method, a geometrical paradox.
May I again add, as I did last November, that your puzzle gave me great pleasure, and may I again express my appreciation that you thought of me, and my undoubted desire to add this puzzle to the many which I have solved, and which today form part of my collection of such?
Very truly,
Xenius Jones.
Erskine looked up, solution in hand.
“Well, I’ll be—”
“—damned!” put in Thorne for him. “Yes. I quite understand.” He replaced the sheet, as Erskine tendered it bewilderedly back to him, in his desk. “However, just because a man can solve a—a—a downright infantile puzzle that three other people failed at, doesn’t mean that he can solve a world-famous crime.”
“No—true enough,” granted Erskine. “But give me ten minutes,” he begged, “to read these foolscap sheets—in this so-called Clearance Report—and we’ll learn the answer to that for good and for all.”
Thorne sighed again.
“Go ahead,” he said. “And let’s get it over with. So we can handle the main issue.” He pulled out a huge stack of bookkeeper’s ruled balance sheets from the top drawer of his desk, and took up a lead pencil. “I’ve a few hundred figures here to check—with the original entries thereto—but don’t spend all day, if you please, reading fairy tales. For you’ll find out exactly what I’ve told you: that the Beefeater probably hasn’t as many brains, criminologically, as that chimpanzee Marceau had in Liverpool—and that therefore I’ll never have to pass a single red penny back to any murderers or his heirs—simply because the Beefeater hasn’t got him!—and, not having him, the said murderer won’t ever dare show up to claim anything from me.”
He spoke convincingly. Erskine stared at him. Then turned his attention to the onion-skin sheets. And the silence thereafter was broken only by the slight scratch of Thorne’s pencil making v-shaped check-marks after figures in interminable columns, that corresponded evidently to figures in other like columns; and by the louder rustle of paper, as Erskine turned the thin foolscap sheets, one by one.
CHAPTER XXXV
A Bombshell
Erskine looked up, after fifteen minutes, from the last multigraphed sheet of the long report—from the undermost of the two final pink ones, in fact.
“Nope!” was his first audible comment. Thorne, too, at once looked up, expectant, pencil in hand. “To boil it all down,” Erskine went on, “it’s—” He tossed the sheaf of sheets over onto the ledge of Thorne’s antique desk. “But it’s a bit too much for me to try and boil down here and now. There it is—and more or less as you’ll get it yourself in all of tomorrow morning’s papers—maybe one or two of this evening’s, too—those, that is, that catch a phone tip on the report from a friend, and that are willing openly to violate copyright and get jerked up in court for heavy damages. But to state the chief things in it that concern you and me—André Marceau was not murdered by Oliver Edward Marceau. The proof of which, moreover, is 100 per cent conclusive! Nor is Oliver Edward Marceau involved—even to the thousandth degree—with the affair at Little Ivington. For he—but you can read the whole report yourself, if you’ve a mind. I can wait.”
“No,” said Thorne, tossing his red and black ruled balance-sheets back into the top drawer of his desk. “I’ll read it tonight at bedtime. The connection—or non-connection—of Oliver Marceau with the affair is all that I’m interested in, anyway.” He paused, a deep frown between his eyes. “And I am to take it as conclusive, then,” he queried, “that Oliver Edward Marceau’s presence in Liverpool—with that chimpanzee—has nothing to do with the death of his uncle?”
“None.”
“And they don’t even know Oliver Marceau was the son of a midget woman?”
“Yes, they do,” Erskine assented. “For it seems that if for no other reason than that he had contacted André Marceau at one time in the latter’s life—and was, therefore, part of André Marceau’s ‘first concentric sphere of contacts,’ as Jones terms it—Oliver Marceau’s history—at least, what little of it was available—was investigated over here by one of Scutters Jones’ men working out from the New York office. When you read the report itself, however, you’ll see that this line of investigation could have reached nothing criminologically—although its result, just the same, is included in a number of ‘addenda’ items, collated by the I.C.D.S. Jones and not by the Scotland Yard Jones, for American newspaper use only—and so headed—on those two pink sheets following the report. It says, in short, that—” But here Erskine reached forward and took up the report again. And turned to those addenda paragraphs on the pink sheets—each one of which was, in a sense, a complete human interest story—at least for any newspaper editor who might happen to have spare space to fill.
“It says,” Erskine went on, now reading: “‘News Item II: Amidst such a background of midgets as was provided by the Marceau Case, it would be expected that anyone having ever had contact with André Marceau, and possessing a midget parent, would be a logical suspect in the latter’s death. Such, exactly, was the case of Oliver Edward Marceau, the American nephew of André Marceau, who, as old newspaper files will show, was indicted in New York in 1927 for swindling a Chinese named Kwan Yung out of $31,250, and was never seen again thereafter. The curious feature of his having had a midget mother was, however, unearthed through purely routine investigation conducted from the eastern office of the I.C.D.S., in helping Mr. Xenius Jones, at London, to develop this report. No family connections of the tiny lady were obtainable, however. All that was elicited was that she was of sufficiently small size to have been, at one time or another in her life, a valuable addition at least to some traveling circus, carnival or freak show. The ascertainment of her size was not a particularly difficult fact to unearth, for the said Oliver E. Marceau’s birth certificate is on file today in Brooklyn; and though the physician in the case—Dr. Lucullus James—has been dead for many decades, the latter’s records are still stored in the attic of his grandson, Willard C. Tarleson, a salesman for a surgical instrument company, residing at 2022 Albemarle Road, Brooklyn; and a brief penciled case-history report of the delivery in question indicates that the unusual patient had been but 33 inches high, and corresponding in all other dimensions; and that some of the instruments used on a normally sized woman for delivery of a child—even by Caesarian operation—had not been at all utilizable in this case. The train of investigation was not carried further, however, because of subsequent and more vital developments in other lines of investigation centering entirely in England, all of which are set forth fully in the report appended to these addenda sheets; and also because it would have required the search of the few available—if available!—records of hundreds of American traveling shows of the late 70’s and early 80’s—all of which shows are defunct and forgotten today.’”
Erskine looked up. “Your Beefeater friend, it seems, Mr. Thorne, didn’t get all hot and bothered just because he uncovered this fact!”
“Apparently,” said Thorne, a bit nonplussed. “And,” he asked, suddenly, “did he really have any other reasons for deferring the holding out of his solution till February 25th—other than giving his veal-eating brother over here a chance to pull an advertising stunt?”
