Produced by Charles Franks and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team
THE FILM MYSTERY
BY
ARTHUR B. REEVE
AUTHOR OF
"The Soul Scar" "The Adventuress" and Other Craig Kennedy Scientific
Detective Stories
CONTENTS
CHAPTER
I. A CAMERA CRIME
II. THE TINY SCRATCH
III. TANGLED MOTIVES
IV. THE FATAL SCRIPT
V. AN EMOTIONAL MAZE
VI. THE FIRST CLUB
VII. ENID FAYE
VIII. LAWRENCE MILLARD
IX. WHITE-LIGHT SHADOWS
X. CHEMICAL RESEARCH
XI. FORESTALLED
XII. EMERY PHELPS
XIII. MARILYN LORING
XIV. ANOTHER CLUE
XV. I BECOME A DETECTIVE
XVI. ENID ASSISTS
XVII. AN APPEAL
XVIII. THE ANTIVENIN
XIX. AROUND THE CIRCLE
XX. THE BANQUET SCENE
XXI. MERLE SHIRLEY OVERACTS
XXII. THE STEM
XXIII. BOTULIN TOXIN
XXIV. THE INVISIBLE MENACE
XXV. ITCHING SALVE
XXVI. A CIGARETTE CASE
XXVII. THE FILM FIRE
XXVIII. THE PHOSPHORUS BOMB
XXIX. MICROSCOPIC EVIDENCE
XXX. THE BALLROOM SCENE
XXXI. PHYSOSTIGMIN
XXXII. CAMERA EVIDENCE
THE FILM MYSTERY
I
A CAMERA CRIME
"Camera!"
Kennedy and I had been hastily summoned from his laboratory in the city
by District-Attorney Mackay, and now stood in the luxurious, ornate
library in the country home of Emery Phelps, the banker, at Tarrytown.
"Camera!--you know the call when the director is ready to shoot a scene
of a picture?--well--at the moment it was given and the first and
second camera men began to grind--she crumpled--sank to the
floor--unconscious!"
Hot and excited, Mackay endeavored to reenact his case for us with all
the histrionic ability of a popular prosecutor before a jury.
"There's where she dropped--they carried her over here to this
davenport--sent for Doctor Blake--but he couldn't do a thing for her.
She died--just as you see her. Blake thought the matter so serious, so
alarming, that he advised an immediate investigation. That's why I
called you so urgently."
Before us lay the body of the girl, remarkably beautiful even as she
lay motionless in death. Her masses of golden hair, disheveled, added
to the soft contours of her features. Her wonderfully large blue-gray
eyes with their rare gift for delicate shades of expression were
closed, but long curling lashes swept her cheeks still and it was hard
to believe that this was anything more than sleep.
It was inconceivable that Stella Lamar, idol of the screen, beloved of
millions, could have been taken from the world which worshiped her.
I felt keenly for the district attorney. He was a portly little man of
the sort prone to emphasize his own importance and so, true to type, he
had been upset completely by a case of genuine magnitude. It was as
though visiting royalty had dropped dead within his jurisdiction.
I doubt whether the assassination of a McKinley or a Lincoln could have
unsettled him as much, because in such an event he would have had the
whole weight of the Federal government behind him. There was no
question but that Stella Lamar enjoyed a country-wide popularity known
by few of our Presidents. Her sudden death was a national tragedy.
Apparently Mackay had appealed to Kennedy the moment he learned the
identity of Stella, the moment he realized there was any question about
the circumstances surrounding the affair. Over the telephone the little
man had been almost incoherent. He had heard of Kennedy's work and was
feverishly anxious to enlist his aid, at any price.
All we knew as we took the train on the New York Central was that
Stella was playing a part in a picture to be called "The Black Terror,"
that the producer was Manton Pictures, Incorporated, and that she had
dropped dead suddenly and without warning in the middle of a scene
being photographed in the library at the home of Emery Phelps.
I was singularly elated at the thought of accompanying Kennedy on this
particular case. It was not that the tragic end of a film star whose
work I had learned to love was not horrible to me, but rather because,
for once, I thought Kennedy actually confronted a situation where his
knowledge of a given angle of life was hardly sufficient for his usual
analysis of the facts involved.
"Walter," he had exclaimed, as I burst into the laboratory in response
to a hurried message, "here's where I need your help. You know all
about moving pictures, so--if you'll phone your city editor and ask him
to let you cover a case for the Star we'll just about catch a train at
One Hundred and Twenty-fifth Street."
Because the film world had fascinated me always I had made a point of
being posted on its people and their activities. I remembered the very
first appearance of Stella Lamar back in the days of General Film, when
pictures were either Licensed or Independent, when only two companies
manufactured worth-while screen dramas, when any subject longer than a
reel had to be of rare excellence, such as the art films imported from
France for the Licensed program. In those days, Stella rose rapidly to
prominence. Her large wistful eyes had set the hearts of many of us to
beating at staccato rate.
Then came Lloyd Manton, her present manager, and the first of a new
type of business man to enter the picture field. Manton was essentially
a promoter. His predecessors had been men carried to success by the
growth of the new art. Old Pop Belman, for instance, had been a
fifth-rate oculist who rented and sold stereopticons as a side line.
With blind luck he had grasped the possibilities of Edison's new
invention. Just before the break-up of General Film he had become many
times a millionaire and it was then that he had sent a wave of laughter
over the entire country by an actual cable to William Shakespeare,
address London, asking for all screen rights to the plays written by
that gentleman.
Manton represented a secondary phase in film finance. Continent Films,
his first corporation, was a stockjobbing concern. Grasping the immense
popularity of Stella Lamar, he had coaxed her away from the old studio
out in Flatbush where all her early successes had been photographed.
With the magic of her name he sold thousands of shares of stock to a
public already fed up on the stories of the fortunes to be made in
moving pictures. When much of the money so raised had been dissipated,
when Continent's quotation on the curb sank to an infinitesimal
fraction, then it developed that Stella's contract was with Manton
personally. Manton Pictures, Incorporated, was formed to exploit her.
The stock of this company was not offered to outside investors.
Stella's popularity had in no way suffered from the business methods of
her manager. Manton, at the least, had displayed rare foresight in his
estimation of public taste. Except for a few attempts with established
stage favorites, photographed generally in screen versions of
theatrical classics and backed by affiliations with the producers of
the legitimate stage, Continent Films was the first concern to make the
five-reel feature. Stella, as a Continent player, was the very first
feature star. Under the banner of Manton Pictures, she had never
surrendered her position of pre-eminence.
Also, scandal somehow had failed to touch her. Those initiated to the
inner gossip of the film world, like myself, were under no illusions.
The relations between Stella and Manton were an open secret. Yet the
picture fans, in their blind worship, believed her to be as they saw
her upon the screen. To them the wide and wistful innocence of her
remarkably large eyes could not be anything but genuine. The
artlessness of the soft curves of her mouth was proof to them of the
reality of an ingenuous and very girlish personality.
Even her divorce had helped rather than harmed her. It seemed irony to
me that she should have obtained the decree instead of her husband, and
in New York, too, where the only grounds are unfaithfulness. The
testimony in the case had been sealed so that no one knew whom she had
named as corespondent. At the time, I wondered what pressure had been
exerted upon Millard to prevent the filing of a cross suit. Surely he
should have been able to substantiate the rumors of her association
with Lloyd Manton.
Lawrence Millard, author and playwright and finally scenario writer,
had been as much responsible for the success of his wife as Manton, and
in a much less spectacular way. It was Millard who had written her
first great Continent success, who had developed the peculiar type of
story best suited for her, back in the early days of the one reel and
General Film.
It is commonly known in picture circles that an actress who screens
well, even if she is only a moderately good artist, can be made a star
with one or two or three good stories and that, conversely, a star may
be ruined by a succession of badly written or badly produced vehicles.
Those of us not blinded by an idolatrous worship for the girl condemned
her severely for throwing her husband aside at the height of her
success. The public displayed their sympathy for her by a burst of
renewed interest. The receipts at the box office whenever her films
were shown probably delighted both Manton and Stella herself.
I had wondered, as Kennedy and I occupied a seat in the train, and as
he left me to my thoughts, whether there could be any connection
between the tragedy and the divorce. The decree, I knew, was not yet
final. Could it be possible that Millard was unwilling, after all, to
surrender her? Could he prefer deliberate murder to granting her her
freedom? I was compelled to drop that line of thought, since it offered
no explanation of his previous failure to contest her suit or to start
counter action.
Then my reflections had strayed away from Kennedy's sphere, the solving
of the mystery, to my own, the news value of her death and the events
following. The Star, as always, had been only too glad to assign me to
any case where Craig Kennedy was concerned; my phone message to the
city editor, the first intimation to any New York paper of Stella's
death, already had resulted without doubt in scare heads and an extra
edition.
The thought of the prominence given the personal affairs of picture
players and theatrical folk had disgusted me.
There are stars against whom there is not the slightest breath of
gossip, even among the studio scandal-mongers. Any number of girls and
men go about their work sanely and seriously, concerned in nothing but
their success and the pursuit of normal pleasures. As a matter of fact
it had struck me on the train that this was about the first time Craig
Kennedy had ever been called in upon a case even remotely connected
with the picture field. I knew he would be confronted with a tangled
skein of idle talk, from everybody, about everybody, and mostly without
justification. I hoped he would not fall into the popular error of
assuming all film players bad, all studios schools of immorality. I was
glad I was able to accompany him on that account.
The arrival at Tarrytown had ended my reflections, and
Kennedy's--whatever they may have been. Mackay himself had met us at
the station and with a few words, to cover his nervousness, had whisked
us out to the house.
As we approached, Kennedy had taken quick note of the surroundings, the
location of the home itself, the arrangement of the grounds. There was
a spreading lawn on all four sides, unbroken by plant or bush or
tree--sheer prodigality of space, the better to display a rambling but
most artistic pile of gray granite. Masking the road and the adjoining
grounds was thick, impenetrable shrubbery, a ring of miniature forest
land about the estate. There was a garage, set back, and tennis courts,
and a practice golf green. In the center of a garden in a far corner a
summerhouse was placed so as to reflect itself in the surface of a
glistening swimming pool.
As we pulled up under the porte-cochere Emery Phelps, the banker,
greeted us. Perhaps it was my imagination, but it seemed to me that
there was a repressed animosity in his manner, as though he resented
the intrusion of Kennedy and myself, yet felt powerless to prevent it.
In contrast to his manner was the cordiality of Lloyd Manton, just
inside the door. Manton was childishly eager in his welcome, so much so
that I was able to detect a shade of suspicion in Kennedy's face.
The others of the company were clustered in the living room, through
which we passed to reach the library. I found small opportunity to
study them in the rather dim light. Mackay beckoned to a man standing
in a window, presenting him to Kennedy as Doctor Blake. Then we entered
the long paneled chamber which had been the scene of the tragedy.
Now I stood, rather awed, with the motionless figure of Stella Lamar
before me in her last pitiable close-up. For I have never lost the
sense of solemnity on entering the room of a tragedy, in spite of the
long association I have had with Kennedy in the scientific detection of
crime. Particularly did I have the feeling in this case. The death of a
man is tragic, but I know nothing more affecting than the sudden and
violent death of a beautiful woman--unless it be that of a child.
I recalled a glimpse of Stella as I had seen her in her most recent
release, as the diaphragm opened on her receiving a box of chocolates,
sent by her lover, and playfully feeding one of them to her beautiful
collie, "Laddie," as he romped about upon a divan and almost smothered
her with affection. The vivacity and charm of the scene were in sad
contrast with what lay before me.
As I looked more carefully I saw now that her full, well-rounded face
was contorted with either pain or fear--perhaps both. Even through the
make-up one could see that her face was blotched and swollen. Also, the
muscles were contorted; the eyes looked as if they might be bulging
under the lids; and there was a bluish tinge to her skin. Evidently
death had come quickly, but it had not been painless.
"Even the coroner has not disturbed the body," Mackay hastened to
explain to Kennedy. "The players, the camera men, all were sent out of
the room the moment Doctor Blake was certain something more than a
natural cause lay behind her death. Mr. Phelps telephoned to me, and
upon my arrival I ordered the doors and windows closed, posted my
deputies to prevent any interference with anything in the room, left my
instructions that everyone was to be detained, then got in touch with
you as quickly as I could."
Kennedy turned to him. Something in the tone of his voice showed that
he meant his compliment. "I'm glad, Mackay, to be called in by some one
who knows enough not to destroy evidence; who realizes that perhaps the
slightest disarrangement of a rug, for instance, may be the only clue
to a murder. It's--it's rare!"
The little district attorney beamed. If he had found it necessary to
walk across the floor just then he would have strutted. I smiled
because I wanted Kennedy to show again his marvelous skill in tracing a
crime to its perpetrator. I was anxious that nothing should be done to
hamper him.
II
THE TINY SCRATCH
Kennedy, before his own examination of the body, turned to Doctor
Blake. "Tell me just what you found when you arrived," he directed.
The physician, whose practice embraced most of the wealthy families in
and around Tarrytown, was an unusually tall, iron-gray-haired man of
evident competency. It was very plain that he resented his unavoidable
connection with the case.
"She was still alive," he responded, thoughtfully, "although breathing
with difficulty. Nearly everyone had clustered about her, so that she
was getting little air, and the room was stuffy from the lights they
had been using in taking the scene. They told me she dropped
unconscious and that they couldn't revive her, but at first it did not
occur to me that it might be serious. I thought perhaps the heat--"
"You saw nothing suspicious," interrupted Kennedy, "nothing in the
actions or manner of anyone in the room?"
"No, when I first entered I didn't suspect anything out of the way. I
had them send everyone into the next room, except Manton and Phelps,
and had the doors and windows thrown open to give her air. Then when I
examined her I detected what seemed to me to be both a muscular and
nervous paralysis, which by that time had proceeded pretty far. As I
touched her she opened her eyes, but she was unable to speak. She was
breathing with difficulty; her heart action was weakening so rapidly
that I had little opportunity to apply restorative measures."
"What do you think caused the death?"
"So far, I can make no satisfactory explanation." The doctor shrugged
his shoulders very slightly. "That is why I advised an immediate
investigation. I did not care to write a death certificate."
"You have no hypothesis?"
"If she died from any natural organic disorder, the signs were lacking
by which I could trace it. Everything indicates the opposite, however.
It would be hard for me to say whether the paralysis of respiration or
of the heart actually caused her death. If it was due to poison--Well,
to me the whole affair is shrouded in mystery. The symptoms indicated
nothing I could recognize with any degree of certainty."
Kennedy stooped over, making a superficial examination of the girl. I
saw that some faint odor caught his nostrils, for he remained poised a
moment, inhaling reflectively, his eyes clouded in thought. Then he
went to the windows, raising the shades an additional few inches each,
but that did not seem to give him the light he wished.
In the room were the portable arcs used in the making of scenes in an
actual interior setting. The connections ran to heavy insulated
junction boxes at the ends of two lines of stiff black stage cable.
Near the door the circuits were joined and a single lead of the big
duplex cord ran out along the polished hardwood floor, carried
presumably to the house circuit at a fuse box where sufficient amperage
was available. Kennedy's eyes followed out the wires quickly. Then,
motioning to me to help, he wheeled one of the heavy stands around and
adjusted the hood so that the full strength of the light would be cast
upon Stella. The arc in place, he threw the switch, and in the
sputtering flood of illumination dropped to his knees, taking a
powerful pocket lens from his waistcoat and beginning an inch by inch
examination of her skin.
I gained a fresh realization of the beauty of the star as she lay under
the dazzling electric glow, and in particular I noticed the small
amount of make-up she had used and the natural firmness of her flesh.
She was dressed in a modish, informal dinner dress, of embroidered
satin, cut fairly low at front and back and with sleeves of some
gauzelike material reaching not halfway to her elbow, hardly sleeves at
all, in fact.
Kennedy with his glass went over her features with extreme care. I saw
that he drew her hair back, and that then he parted it, to examine her
scalp, and I wondered what infinitesimal clue might be the object of
his search. I had learned, however, never to question him while he was
at work.
With his eye glued to his lens he made his way about and around her
neck, and down and over her throat and chest so far as it remained
unprotected by the silk of her gown. With the aid of Mackay he turned
her over to examine her back. Next he returned the body to its former
position and began to inspect the arms. Very suddenly something caught
his eye on the inside of her right forearm. He grunted with
satisfaction, straightened, pulled the switch of the arc, wiped his
eyes, which were watering.
"Find anything, Mr. Kennedy?" Doctor Blake seemed to understand, to
some extent, the purpose of the examination.
Kennedy did not answer, probably preoccupied with theories which I
could see were forming in his mind.
The library was a huge room of greater length than breadth. At one end
were wide French windows looking out upon the garden and summer house.
The door to the hallway and living room was very broad, with heavy
sliding panels and rich portieres of a velours almost the tint of the
wood-work. Between the door, situated in the side wall near the
opposite end, and the windows, was a magnificent stone fireplace with
charred logs testifying to its frequent use. The couch where Stella lay
had been drawn back from its normal position before the fire, together
with a huge table of carved walnut. The other two walls were an
unbroken succession of shelves, reaching to the ceiling and literally
packed with books.
Facing the windows and the door, so as to include the fireplace and the
wide sweep of the room within range, were two cameras still set up, the
legs of their tripods nested, probably left exactly as they were at the
moment of Stella's collapse. I touched the handle of one, a Bell &
Howell, and saw that it was threaded, that the film had not been
disturbed. The lights, staggered and falling away from the camera
lines, were arranged to focus their illumination on the action of the
scenes. There were four arcs and two small portable banks of
Cooper-Hewitts, the latter used to cut the sharp shadows and give a
greater evenness to the photography. Also there were diffusers
constructed of sheets of white cloth stretched taut on frames. These
reflected light upward upon the faces of the actors, softening the
lower features, and so valuable in adding to the attractiveness of the
women in particular.
All this I had learned from visits to a studio with the Star's
photoplay editor. I was anxious to impress my knowledge upon Kennedy.
He gave me no opportunity, however, but wheeled upon Mackay suddenly.
"Send in the electrician," he ordered. "Keep everyone else out until
I'm ready to examine them."
While the district attorney hurried to the sliding doors, guarded on
their farther side by one of the amateur deputies he had impressed into
service, Kennedy swung the stand of the arc he had used back into the
place unaided. I noticed that Doctor Blake was nervously interested in
spite of his professional poise. I certainly was bursting with
curiosity to know what Kennedy had found.
The electrician, a wizened veteran of the studios, with a bald head
which glistened rather ridiculously, entered as though he expected to
be held for the death of the star on the spot.
"I don't know nothin'," he began, before anyone could start to question
him. "I was outside when they yelled, honest! I was seeing whether
m'lead was getting hot, and I heard 'em call to douse the glim, an'--"
"Put on all your lights"--Kennedy was unusually sharp, although it was
plain he held no suspicion of this man, as he added--"just as you had
them."
As the electrician went from stand to stand sulkily, there was a
sputter from the arcs, almost deafening in the confines of the room,
and quite a bit of fine white smoke. But in a moment the corner of the
library constituting the set was brilliantly, dazzlingly lighted. To me
it was quite like being transported into one of the big studios in the
city.
"Is this the largest portion of the room they used?" Kennedy asked.
"Did you have your stands any farther back?"
"This was the biggest lay-out, sir!" replied the man.
"Were all the scenes in which Miss Lamar appeared before her death in
this corner of the room?"
"Yes, sir!"
"And this was the way you had the scene lighted when she dropped
unconscious?"
"Yes, sir! I pulled m'lights an'--an' they lifted her up and put her
right there where she is, sir!"
Kennedy paid no attention to the last; in fact, I doubt whether he
heard it. Dropping to hands and knees immediately, he began a search of
the floor and carpet as minutely painstaking as the inspection he had
given Stella's own person. Instinctively I drew back, to be out of his
way, as did Doctor Blake and Mackay. The electrician, I noticed, seemed
to grasp now the reason for the summons which undoubtedly had
frightened him badly. He gave his attention to his lights, stroking a
refractory Cooper-Hewitt tube for all the world as if some minor scene
in the story were being photographed. It was hard to realize that it
was not another picture scene, but that Craig Kennedy, in my opinion
the founder of the scientific school of modern detectives, was
searching out in this strange environment the clue to a real murder so
mysterious that the very cause of death was as yet undetermined.
I was hoping for a display of the remarkable brilliance Craig had shown
in so many of the cases brought to his attention. I half expected to
see him rise from the floor with some tiny something in his hand, some
object overlooked by everyone else, some tangible evidence which would
lead to the immediate apprehension of the perpetrator of the crime.
That Stella Lamar had met her death by foul means I did not doubt for
an instant, and so I waited feverishly for the conclusion of Kennedy's
search.
As it happened, this was not destined to be one of his cases cleared up
in a brief few hours of intensive effort. He covered every inch of the
floor within the illuminated area; then he turned his attention to the
walls and furniture and the rest of the room in somewhat more
perfunctory, but no less skillful manner. Fully fifteen minutes
elapsed, but I knew from his expression that he had discovered nothing.
In a wringing perspiration from the heat of the arcs, but nevertheless
glad to have had the intense light at his disposal, he motioned to the
electrician to turn them off and to leave the room.
"Find anything, Mr. Kennedy?" queried the physician once more.
Kennedy beckoned all of us to the side of the ill-fated actress.
Lifting the right arm, finding the spot which had caused his
exclamation before, he handed his pocket lens to Doctor Blake. After a
moment a low whistle escaped the lips of the physician.
Next it was my turn. As I stooped over I caught, above the faint scent
of imported perfume which she affected, a peculiar putrescent odor.
This it was which had caught Kennedy's nostrils. Then through the glass
I could detect upon her forearm the tiniest possible scratch ending in
an almost invisible puncture, such as might have been made by a very
sharp needle or the point of an incredibly fine hypodermic syringe.
Drawing back, I glanced again at her face, which I had already noted
was blotched and somewhat swollen beneath the make-up. Again I thought
that the muscles were contorted, that the eyes were bulging slightly,
that there was a bluish tinge to her skin such as in cyanosis or
asphyxiation. It may have been imagination, but I was now sure that her
expression revealed pain or fear or both.
When I looked at her first I had been unable to forget my impression of
years. Before me there had been the once living form of Stella Lamar,
whom I had dreamed of meeting and whom I had never viewed in actual
life. I had lacked the penetration to see beneath the glamour. But to
Kennedy there had been signs of the poisoning at once. Doctor Blake had
searched merely for the evidences of the commoner drugs, or the usual
diseases such as cause sudden death. I recalled the cyanides. I thought
of curare, or woorali, the South American arrow poison with which
Kennedy once had dealt. Had Stella received an injection of some new
and curious substance?
Mackay glanced up from his inspection of the mark on the arm.
"It's an awfully tiny scratch!" he exclaimed.
Kennedy smiled. "Yet, Mackay, it probably was the cause of her death."
"How?"
"That--that is the problem before us. When we learn just exactly how
she scratched herself, or was scratched--" Kennedy paced up and down in
front of the fireplace. Then he confronted each of us in turn, suddenly
serious. "Not a word of what I have discovered," he warned.
III
TANGLED MOTIVES
"Do you wish to examine the people now?" Mackay asked.
Kennedy hesitated. "First I want to make sure of the evidence
concerning her actual death. Can you arrange to have the clothes she
has on, and those she brought with her, all of them bundled up and sent
in to my laboratory, together with samples of her body fluids as soon
as the coroner can supply you?"
Mackay nodded. This pleased him. This seemed to be tangible action,
promising tangible results.
Again Kennedy glanced about in thought. I knew that the scratch was
worrying him. "Did she change her clothes out here?" he inquired.
The district attorney brightened. "She dressed in a small den just off
the living room. I have a man posted and the door closed. Nothing has
been disturbed."
He started to lead the way without further word from Kennedy, proud to
have been able once more to demonstrate his foresight.
As we left the library, entering the living room, there was an
appreciable hush. Here were grouped the others of the party brought out
by the picture company, a constrained gathering of folk who had little
in common beyond the highly specialized needs of the new art of the
screen, an assembly of souls who had been forced to wait during all the
time required for the trip of Kennedy and myself out from New York, who
were compelled to wait now until he should be ready to examine them.
I picked out the electrician in the semi-gloom and with him his fellow
members of the technical staff needed in the taking of the scenes in
the library. The camera men I guessed, and a property boy, and an
assistant director. The last, at any event, of all those in the huge
room, had summoned up sufficient nonchalance to bend his mind to
details of his work. I saw that he was thumbing a copy of the scenario,
or detailed working manuscript of the story, making notations in some
kind of little book, and it was that which enabled me to establish his
identity at a glance.
In a different corner were the principals, two men and a girl still in
make-up, and with them the director, and Manton and Phelps. Apart from
everyone else, in a sort of social ostracism common to the studios, the
two five-dollar-a-day extras waited, a butler and a maid, also in
make-up. Oddly enough the total number of these material witnesses to
the tragedy was just thirteen, and I wondered if they had noticed the
fact.
Doctor Blake turned to Kennedy the moment we left the library.
"Do you feel it is necessary for me to remain any longer?" he asked. He
was apologetic, yet distinctly impatient. "I have neglected several
very important calls as it is."
Kennedy and Mackay both hastened to assure the physician that they
appreciated his co-operation and that they would spare him as much
notoriety and inconvenience as possible. Then the three of us hurried
across and to the little den which had been converted into a dressing
room for Stella's use.
Here were all the evidences of femininity, the little touches which a
woman can impart to the smallest corner in a few brief moments of
occupancy. It was a tiny alcove shut off from the rest of the living
room by heavy silk hangings, drawn now and pinned together so as to
assure her the privacy she wished. The one window was high and fitted
with leaded glass, but it was raised and afforded the maximum of light.
Stella's traveling bag sprawled wide open, with many of her effects
strewn about in attractive disarray. Her suit, in which she had made
the trip to Tarrytown, was thrown carelessly over the back of a chair.
Her mirror was fastened up ruthlessly, upon a handsome woven Oriental
hanging, with a long hatpin. Powder was spilled upon the couch cover,
another Oriental fabric, and her little box of rouge lay face downward
on the floor.
As we pulled the curtains aside I caught the perfume which still clung
to her clothes in the library beyond. As Mackay sniffed also, Kennedy
smiled.
"Coty's Jacqueminot rose," he remarked.
With his usual swift and practiced certainty Kennedy then inspected the
extemporized dressing room. He seemed to satisfy himself that no subtle
attack had been made upon the girl here, although I doubt that he had
held any such supposition seriously in the first place. In my
association of several years with Kennedy, following our first intimacy
of college days, I had learned that his success as a scientific
detective was the result wholly of his thoroughness of method. To watch
him had become a never-ending delight, even in the dull preliminary
work of a case as baffling as this one. Mackay also seemed content just
to enact the role of spectator.
Kennedy thumbed through the delicate intimacies of her traveling bag
with the keen, impersonal manner which always distinguished him; then
he found her beaded handbag and proceeded to rummage through that.
Suddenly he paused as he unfolded a piece of note paper, and we
gathered around to read:
MY DEAR STELLA: Have something very important to tell you. Will you
lunch Tuesday at the P. G. tearoom? LARRY.
"Tuesday--" murmured Kennedy. "And this is Monday. Who--who is Larry, I
wonder?"
I hastened to answer the question for him. It was my first opportunity
to display my knowledge of the picture players. "Larry--that's
Lawrence, Lawrence Millard!" I exclaimed. Then I went on to tell him of
the divorce and the circumstances surrounding Stella's life as I knew
it. "It--it looks," I concluded, "as if they might have been on the
point of composing their differences, after all."
Kennedy nodded. I could see, however, that he made a mental note of his
intention to question the girl's former husband.
All at once another thought struck me and I became eager. It was a
possible explanation of the mystery.
"Listen, Craig," I began. "Suppose Millard wanted to make up and she
didn't. Suppose that she refused to see him or to meet him. Suppose
that in a jealous fit he--"
"No, Walter!" Kennedy headed me off with a smile. "This wasn't an
ordinary murder of passion. This was well thought out and well
executed. Not one medical examiner in a thousand would have found that
tiny scratch. It may be very difficult yet to determine the exact cause
of death. This, my dear Jameson"--it was playful irony--"is a
scientific crime."
"But Millard--"
"Of course! Anyone may be the culprit. Yet you tell me Millard did not
contest her divorce and that it would have been very easy for him to
file a counter-suit because everyone knew of her relationship with
Manton. That, offhand, shows no ill-will on his part. And now we find
this note from him, which at least is friendly in tone--"
I shrugged my shoulders. It was the same blind alley in which my
thoughts had strayed upon the train on our way out.
"It's too early to begin to try to fasten the guilt upon anyone,"
Kennedy added, as we returned to the library through the living room.
Then he turned to Mackay. "Have you succeeded in gleaning any facts
about the life of Miss Lamar?" he asked. "Anything which might point to
a motive, so that I can approach the case from both directions?"
"If you ask me," the little district attorney rejoined, "it's a matter
of tangled motives throughout. I--I had no sword to cut the Gordian
knot and so"--graciously--"I sent for you."
"What do you mean by tangled motives?" Kennedy ignored the other's
compliment.
"Well!" Mackay indicated me. "Mr. Jameson explained about her divorce.
No one heard whom she named as corespondent. That's an unknown woman in
the case, although it may not mean anything at all. Then there's Lloyd
Manton and all the talk about his affair with Miss Lamar. Some one told
one of my men that Manton's wife has left him on that account."
"Did you question Manton?"
"No, I thought I ought to leave all that to you. I was afraid I might
put them on their guard."
"Good!" Kennedy was pleased. "Did you learn anything else?"
"This deputy of mine obtained all these things by gossiping with the
girl who plays the maid, and so they may not be reliable. But among the
players it is reported that Werner, the director, was having an affair
with Stella also, and that Merle Shirley, the 'heavy' man, was seen
with her a great deal recently, and that Jack Gordon, the leading man,
who was engaged to marry her as soon as her decree was final, was
jealous as a consequence, and that Miss Loring, playing the vampire In
the story and engaged to Shirley, was even more bitter against the
deceased than Gordon, Miss Lamar's fiance.
"That made eight people with possible motives for the crime. When I got
that far I gave it up. In fact"--Mackay lowered his voice, suddenly--"I
don't like the attitude of Emery Phelps. This is his house, you know,
and he is the financial backer of Manton Pictures, yet there seems to
be an undercurrent of friction between Manton and himself. I--I wanted
him to show me some detail of the arrangement of things in the library,
but he wouldn't come into the room. He said he didn't want to look at
Miss Lamar. There--there was something--and, I don't know. If he is
concerned in any way--that would make nine."
"You think Miss Lamar and Phelps--"
Mackay shook his head. "I don't know."
Kennedy turned to me, expression really serious. "Is this the way they
carry on in the picture world, Walter?" he asked. "Is this the usual
thing or--or an exception?"
I flushed. "It's very much an exception," I insisted. "The film people
are just like other people, some good and some bad. Probably
three-quarters of all this is gossip."
"I hope so." He straightened. "The only thing to do is to go after them
one at a time and disentangle all the conflicting threads. It looks as
though there will be any number of possible false leads and so we must
be careful and deliberate. I think I'll question each in turn--here."
He walked over to the fireplace, stopping for just a moment to glance
at the body of Stella. Then he pulled the blinds down halfway, so that
the room seemed somber and gruesome. He drew a chair so that the
different individuals as he examined them, would be unable to lose
sight of the dead woman. His arrangements completed, he faced the
district attorney.
"Manton first," he directed.
In an instant I caught the psychology of it--the now darkened library,
the beautiful body still lying on the davenport, the quiet and quick
arrival of ourselves. If anything could be extracted from these people,
surely it would be betrayed under these surroundings.
IV
THE FATAL SCRIPT
I had no real opportunity to study Manton when he greeted us upon our
arrival, and at that time neither Kennedy nor I possessed even a
passing realization of the problem before us. Now I felt that I was
ready to grasp at any possible motive for the crime. I was prepared to
suspect any or all of the nine people enumerated by Mackay, so far as I
could speak for myself, and at the very least I was certain that this
was one of the most baffling cases ever brought to Craig's attention.
Yet I was sure he would solve it. I waited most impatiently for the
outcome of his examination of Lloyd Manton.
The producer-promoter was a well-set-up man just approaching middle
age. About him was a certain impression of great physical strength, of
bulk without flabbiness, and in particular I noticed the formation of
his head, the square broad development which indicated his intellectual
power, and I found, too, a fascinating quality about his eyes, deeply
placed and of a warm dark gray-brown, which seemed to hold a
fundamental sincerity which, I imagined, made the man almost
irresistible in a business deal.
His weakness, so far as I could ascertain it, was revealed by his mouth
and chin, and by a certain nervousness of his hands, hands where a
square, practical palm was belied by the slight tapering of his
fingers, the mark of the dreamer. His mouth was unquestionably
sensuous, with the lips full and now and then revealing out of the
studied practiced calm of his face an almost imperceptible twitching,
as though to betray a flash of emotion, or fear. His chin was feminine,
softening his expression and showing that his feelings would
overbalance the cool calculation denoted by his eyes and the rather
heavy level brows above.
As he entered the room, taking the chair indicated by Kennedy, he
seemed perfectly cool and his glance, as it strayed to the lifeless
form of Stella, revealed his iron self-control. The little signs which
I have mentioned, which betrayed the real man beneath, were only
disclosed to me little by little as Kennedy's questioning progressed.
"Tell me just what happened?" Kennedy began.
"Well--" Manton responded quickly enough, but then he stopped and
proceeded as though he chose each word with care, as if he framed each
sentence so that there would be no misunderstanding, no chance of wrong
impression; all of which pleased Kennedy.
"In the scene we were taking," he went on, "Stella was crouched down on
the floor, bending over her father, who had just been murdered. She was
sobbing. All at once the lights were to spring up. The young hero was
to dash through the set and she was to see him and scream out in
terror. The first part went all right. But when the lights flashed on,
instead of looking up and screaming, Stella sort of crumpled and
collapsed on top of Werner, who was playing the father. I yelled to
stop the cameras and rushed in. We picked her up and put her on the
couch. Some one sent for the doctor, but she died without saying a
word. I--I haven't the slightest idea what happened. At first I thought
it was heart trouble."
"Did she have heart trouble?"
"No, that is--not that I ever heard."
Kennedy hesitated. "Why were you taking these scenes out here?"
It was on the tip of my tongue to answer for Manton. I knew that at one
time many fine interiors were actually taken in houses, to save
expense. I was sorry that Kennedy should draw any conclusion from a
fact which I thought was too well known to require explanation.
Manton's answer, however, proved a distinct surprise to me.
"Mr. Phelps asked us to use his library in this picture."
"Wouldn't it have been easier and cheaper in the long run to reproduce
it in the studio?"
Manton glanced up at Kennedy, echoing my thought. Had Kennedy, after
all, some knowledge of motion pictures stored away with his vast fund
of general and unusual information?
"Yes," replied the producer. "It would save the trip out here, the loss
of time, the inconvenience--why, in an actual dollars and cents
comparison, with overhead and everything taken into account, the
building of a set like this is nothing nowadays."
"Do you know Mr. Phelps's reason?"
Manton shrugged his shoulders. "Just a whim, and we had to humor it."
"Mr. Phelps is interested in the company?"
"Yes. He recently bought up all the stock except my own. He is in
absolute control, financially."
"What is the story you are making? I mean, I want to understand just
exactly what happened in the scenes you were photographing today. It is
essential that I learn how everyone was supposed to act and how they
did act. I must find out every trivial little detail. Do you follow me?"
Manton's mouth set suddenly, showing that it possessed a latent quality
of firmness. He glanced about the room, then rose, went to the farther
end of the long table, and returned with a thick sheaf of manuscript
bound at the side in stiff board covers. "This is the scenario, the
script of the detailed action," he explained.
As Kennedy took the binder, Manton opened it and turned past several
sheets of tabulation and lists, the index to the sets and exterior
locations, the characters and extras, the changes of clothes, and other
technical detail. "The scenes we are taking here," he went on, "are the
opening scenes of the story. We left them until now because it meant
the long trip out to Tarrytown and because it would take us away from
the studio while they were putting up the largest two sets, a banquet
and a ballroom which need the entire floor space of the studio." He
turned over two or three pages, pointing. "We had taken up to scene
thirteen; from scenes one to thirteen just as you have them in order
there. It--it was in the unlucky thirteenth that she"--was it my
imagination or did he tremble, for just an instant, violently?--"that
she died."
Kennedy started to read the script. I hurried to his side, glancing
over his shoulder.
THE BLACK TERROR
FEATURING STELLA LAMAH
SCENE 1
LOCATION.--Remsen library. This is a modern, luxurious library set with
a long table in the center of the room, books around the walls, French
windows leading from the rear, and an entrance through a hallway to the
right through a pair of portieres. Note: E. P. wishes us to use his
library at Tarrytown.
ACTION.--Open diaphragm slowly on darkened set as a spot of light is
being played on the walls and French windows in the rear. As the
diaphragm opens slowly the light vanishes, leaving the scene dark at
times and then brightened until, as the diaphragm opens full, we
discover that the light is that of a burglar's flash light, traveling
over the walls of the library. When the diaphragm is fully opened we
discover also a faint line of light streaming through the almost closed
portieres leading to the hallway outside. This ray of light, striking
along the floor, pauses by the library table, just disclosing the edge
of it but not revealing anything else in the room. The spotlight in the
hands of a shadowy figure roves across the wall and to the portieres.
As it pauses there the portieres move and the fingers of a girl are
seen on the edge of the silk. A bare and beautiful arm is thrust
through the portieres almost to the shoulder, and it begins to move the
portieres aside, reaching upward to pull the curtains apart at the
rings.