Checking an Alibi
(Thursday, June 20; 10.30 a.m.)
The Chatham Arms, where Major Benson lived, was a small exclusive
bachelor apartment-house in Forty-sixth Street, midway between Fifth
and Sixth Avenues. The entrance, set in a simple and dignified façade,
was flush with the street, and only two steps above the pavement. The
front door opened into a narrow hallway with a small reception room,
like a _cul-de-sac_, on the left. At the rear could be seen the
elevator; and beside it, tucked under a narrow flight of iron stairs
which led round the elevator shaft, was a telephone switchboard.
When we arrived two youths in uniform were on duty, one lounging in
the door of the elevator, the other seated at the switchboard.
Vance halted Markham near the entrance.
“One of these boys, I was informed over the telephone, was on duty the
night of the thirteenth. Find out which one it was, and scare him into
submission by your exalted title of District Attorney. Then turn him
over to me.”
Reluctantly Markham walked down the hallway. After a brief
interrogation of the boys, he led one of them into the reception room,
and peremptorily explained what he wanted.*
* The boy was Jack Prisco, of 621 Kelly Street.
[Illustration: First floor of Chatham Arms Apartment in West
Forty-sixth Street. A plan of the ground floor of an apartment
building in West 46th Street. The entrance is on the south side, and
an entrance hall leads into a room with an elevator. Stairs wind
around an elevator shaft, and a small room containing a telephone
switchboard is next to the elevator doors, underneath the stairs. To
the left of the entrance hall is a reception room.]
Vance began his questioning with the confident air of one who has no
doubt whatever as to another’s exact knowledge.
“What time did Major Benson get home the night his brother was shot?”
The boy’s eyes opened wide.
“He came in about ’leven—right after show time,” he answered, with
only a momentary hesitation.
(I have set down the rest of the questions and answers in
dramatic-dialogue form, for purposes of space economy.)
Vance: He spoke to you, I suppose?
Boy: Yes, sir. He told me he’d been to the theatre, and said what a
rotten show it was—and that he had an awful headache.
Vance: How do you happen to remember so well what he said a week ago?
Boy: Why, his brother was murdered that night!
Vance: And the murder caused so much excitement that you naturally
recalled everything that happened at the time in connection with Major
Benson?
Boy: Sure—he was the murdered guy’s brother.
Vance: When he came in that night did he say anything about the day of
the month?
Boy: Nothin’ except that he guessed his bad luck in pickin’ a bum show
was on account of it bein’ the thirteenth.
Vance: Did he say anything else?
Boy (_grinning_): He said he’d make the thirteenth my lucky day, and
he gave me all the silver he had in his pocket—nickels and dimes and
quarters and one fifty-cent piece.
Vance: How much altogether?
Boy: Three dollars and forty-five cents.
Vance: And then he went to his room?
Boy: Yes, sir—I took him up. He lives on the third floor.
Vance: Did he go out again later?
Boy: No, sir.
Vance: How do you know?
Boy: I’d ’ve seen him. I was either answerin’ the switchboard or
runnin’ the elevator all night. He couldn’t ’ve got out without my
seein’ him.
Vance: Were you alone on duty?
Boy: After ten o’clock there’s never but one boy on.
Vance: And there’s no other way a person could leave the house except
by the front door?
Boy: No, sir.
Vance: When did you next see Major Benson?
Boy (_after thinking a moment_): He rang for some cracked ice, and I
took it up.
Vance: What time?
Boy: Why—I don’t know exactly. . . . Yes, I do! It was half past
twelve.
Vance (_smiling faintly_): He asked you the time, perhaps?
Boy: Yes, sir, he did. He asked me to look at his clock in his parlor.
Vance: How did he happen to do that?
Boy: Well, I took up the ice, and he was in bed; and he asked me to
put it in his pitcher in the parlor. When I was doin’ it he called to
me to look at the clock on the mantel and tell him what time it was.
He said his watch had stopped and he wanted to set it.
Vance: What did he say then?
Boy: Nothin’ much. He told me not to ring his bell, no matter who
called up. He said he wanted to sleep, and didn’t want to be woke up.
Vance: Was he emphatic about it?
Boy: Well—he meant it, all right.
Vance: Did he say anything else?
Boy: No. He just said good-night and turned out the light, and I came
on downstairs.
Vance: What light did he turn out?
Boy: The one in his bed-room.
Vance: Could you see into his bed-room from the parlor?
Boy: No. The bed-room’s off the hall.
Vance: How could you tell the light was turned off then?
Boy: The bed-room door was open, and the light was shinin’ into the
hall.
Vance: Did you pass the bed-room door when you went out?
Boy: Sure—you have to.
Vance: And was the door still open?
Boy: Yes.
Vance: Is that the only door to the bed-room?
Boy: Yes.
Vance: Where was Major Benson when you entered the apartment?
Boy: In bed.
Vance: How do you know?
Boy (_mildly indignant_): I saw him.
Vance (_after a pause_): You’re quite sure he didn’t come downstairs
again?
Boy: I told you I’d ’ve seen him if he had.
Vance: Couldn’t he have walked down at some time when you had the
elevator upstairs, without your seeing him?
Boy: Sure, he could. But I didn’t take the elevator up after I’d took
the Major his cracked ice until round two-thirty, when Mr. Montagu
came in.
Vance: You took no one up in the elevator, then, between the time you
brought Major Benson the ice and when Mr. Montagu came in at
two-thirty?
Boy: Nobody.
Vance: And you didn’t leave the hall here between those hours?
Boy: No. I was sittin’ here all the time.
Vance: Then the last time you saw him was in bed at twelve-thirty?
Boy: Yes—until early in the morning when some dame* ’phoned him and
said his brother had been murdered. He came down and went out about
ten minutes after.
* Obviously Mrs. Platz.
Vance (_giving the boy a dollar_): That’s all. But don’t you open your
mouth to anyone about our being here, or you may find yourself in the
lock-up—understand? . . . Now, get back to your job.
When the boy had left us, Vance turned a pleading gaze upon Markham.
“Now, old man, for the protection of society, and the higher demands
of justice, and the greatest good for the greatest number, and _pro
bono publico_, and that sort of thing, you must once more adopt a
course of conduct contr’ry to your innate promptings—or whatever the
phrase you used. Vulgarly put, I want to snoop through the Major’s
apartment at once.”
“What for?” Markham’s tone was one of exclamatory protest. “Have you
completely lost your senses? There’s no getting round the boy’s
testimony. I may be weak-minded, but I know when a witness like that
is telling the truth.”
“Certainly, he’s telling the truth,” agreed Vance serenely. “That’s
just why I want to go up.—Come, my Markham. There’s no danger of the
Major returning _en surprise_ at this hour. . . . And”—he smiled
cajolingly—“you promised me every assistance, don’t y’ know.”
Markham was vehement in his remonstrances, but Vance was equally
vehement in his insistence; and a few minutes later we were
trespassing, by means of a pass-key, in Major Benson’s apartment.
The only entrance was a door leading from the public hall into a
narrow passageway which extended straight ahead into the living-room
at the rear. On the right of this passageway, near the entrance, was a
door opening into the bed-room.
Vance walked directly back into the living-room. On the right-hand
wall was a fireplace and a mantel on which sat an old-fashioned
mahogany clock. Near the mantel, in the far corner, stood a small
table containing a silver ice-water service consisting of a pitcher
and six goblets.
[Illustration: Third floor of Chatham Arms Apartment in West
Forty-sixth Street. The floor plan of an apartment. The front door
opens into a hallway that leads past a bedroom door into a living
room. In the living room is a clock on the fireplace mantel, and a
round table in the far corner. In the bedroom is a bed facing the
door. A night table stands by the bed, and a lamp is on the night
table.]
“There is our very convenient clock,” said Vance. “And there is the
pitcher in which the boy put the ice—imitation Sheffield plate.”
Going to the window he glanced down into the paved rear court
twenty-five or thirty feet below.
“The Major certainly couldn’t have escaped through the window,” he
remarked.
He turned and stood a moment looking into the passageway.
“The boy could easily have seen the light go out in the bed-room, if
the door was open. The reflection on the glazed white wall of the
passage would have been quite brilliant.”
Then, retracing his steps, he entered the bed-room. It contained a
small canopied bed facing the door, and beside it stood a night-table
on which was an electric lamp. Sitting down on the edge of the bed, he
looked about him, and turned the lamp on and off by the socket-chain.
Presently he fixed his eyes on Markham.
“You see how the Major got out without the boy’s knowing it—eh, what?”
“By levitation, I suppose,” submitted Markham.
“It amounted to that, at any rate,” replied Vance. “Deuced ingenious,
too. . . . Listen, Markham:—At half past twelve the Major rang for
cracked ice. The boy brought it, and when he entered he looked in
through the door, which was open, and saw the Major in bed. The Major
told him to put the ice in the pitcher in the living-room. The boy
walked on down the passage and across the living-room to the table in
the corner. The Major then called to him to learn the time by the
clock on the mantel. The boy looked: it was half past twelve. The
Major replied that he was not to be disturbed again, said good-night,
turned off this light on this night-table, jumped out of bed—he was
dressed, of course—and stepped quickly out into the public hall before
the boy had time to empty the ice and return to the passage. The Major
ran down the stairs and was in the street before the elevator
descended. The boy, when he passed the bed-room door on his way out,
could not have seen whether the Major was still in bed or not, even if
he had looked in, for the room was then in darkness.—Clever, what?”
“The thing would have been possible, of course,” conceded Markham.
“But your specious imaginings fail to account for his return.”
“That was the simplest part of the scheme. He prob’bly waited in a
doorway across the street for some other tenant to go in. The boy said
a Mr. Montagu returned about two-thirty. Then the Major slipped in
when he knew the elevator had ascended, and walked up the stairs.”
Markham, smiling patiently, said nothing.
“You perceived,” continued Vance, “the pains taken by the Major to
establish the date and the hour, and to impress them on the boy’s
mind. Poor show—headache—unlucky day. Why unlucky? The thirteenth, to
be sure. But lucky for the boy. A handful of money—all silver.
Singular way of tipping, what? But a dollar bill might have been
forgotten.”
A shadow clouded Markham’s face, but his voice was as indulgently
impersonal as ever.
“I prefer your case against Mrs. Platz.”
“Ah, but I’ve not finished.” Vance stood up. “I have hopes of finding
the weapon, don’t y’ know.”
Markham now studied him with amused incredulity.
“That, of course, would be a contributory factor. . . . You really
expect to find it?”
“Without the slightest diff’culty,” Vance pleasantly assured him.
He went to the chiffonier and began opening the drawers.
“Our absent host didn’t leave the pistol at Alvin’s house; and he was
far too canny to throw it away. Being a major in the late war, he’d be
expected to have such a weapon: in fact, several persons may actu’lly
have known he possessed one. And if he is innocent—as he fully expects
us to assume—why shouldn’t it be in its usual place? Its absence, d’
ye see, would be more incriminatin’ than its presence. Also, there’s a
most int’restin’ psychological factor involved. An innocent person who
was afraid of being thought guilty, would have hidden it, or thrown it
away—like Captain Leacock, for example. But a guilty man, wishing to
create an appearance of innocence, would have put it back exactly
where it was before the shooting.”
He was still searching through the chiffonier.
“Our only problem, then, is to discover the custom’ry abiding place of
the Major’s gun. . . . It’s not here in the chiffonier,” he added,
closing the last drawer.
He opened a kit-bag standing at the foot of the bed, and rifled its
contents.
“Nor here,” he murmured indifferently. “The clothes-closet is the only
other likely place.”
Going across the room, he opened the closet door. Unhurriedly he
switched on the light. There, on the upper shelf, in plain view, lay
an army belt with a bulging holster.
Vance lifted it with extreme delicacy and placed it on the bed near
the window.
“There you are, old chap,” he cheerfully announced, bending over it
closely. “Please take particular note that the entire belt and
holster—with only the exception of the holster’s flap—is thickly
coated with dust. The flap is comparatively clean, showing it has been
opened recently. . . . Not conclusive, of course; but you’re so
partial to clues, Markham.”
He carefully removed the pistol from the holster.
“Note, also, that the gun itself is innocent of dust. It has been
recently cleaned, I surmise.”
His next act was to insert a corner of his handkerchief into the
barrel. Then, withdrawing it, he held it up.
“You see—eh, what? Even the inside of the barrel is immaculate. . . .
And I’ll wager all my Cézannes against an LL.B. degree, that there
isn’t a cartridge missing.”
He extracted the magazine, and poured the cartridges onto the
night-table, where they lay in a neat row before us. There were
seven—the full number for that style of gun.
“Again, Markham, I present you with one of your revered clues.
Cartridges that remain in a magazine for a long time become slightly
tarnished, for the catch-plate is not air-tight. But a fresh box of
cartridges is well sealed, and its contents retain their lustre much
longer.”
He pointed to the first cartridge that had rolled out of the magazine.
“Observe that this one cartridge—the last to be inserted into the
magazine—is a bit brighter than its fellows. The inf’rence is—you’re
an adept at inf’rences, y’ know—that it is a newer cartridge, and was
placed in the magazine rather recently.”
He looked straight into Markham’s eyes.
“It was placed there to take the place of the one which Captain
Hagedorn is keeping.”
Markham lifted his head jerkily, as if shaking himself out of an
encroaching spell of hypnosis. He smiled, but with an effort.
“I still think your case against Mrs. Platz is your masterpiece.”
“My picture of the Major is merely blocked in,” answered Vance. “The
revealin’ touches are to come. But first, a brief catechism: . . . How
did the Major know that brother Alvin would be home at twelve-thirty
on the night of the thirteenth?—He heard Alvin invite Miss St. Clair
to dinner—remember Miss Hoffman’s story of his eavesdropping?—and he
also heard her say she’d unfailingly leave at midnight. When I said
yesterday, after we had left Miss St. Clair, that something she told
us would help convict the guilty person, I referred to her statement
that midnight was her invariable hour of departure. The Major
therefore knew Alvin would be home about half past twelve, and he was
pretty sure that no one else would be there. In any event, he could
have waited for him, what? . . . Could he have secured an immediate
audience with his brother _en déshabillé_?—Yes. He tapped on the
window: his voice was recognized beyond any shadow of doubt; and he
was admitted instanter. Alvin had no sartorial modesties in front of
his brother, and would have thought nothing of receiving him without
his teeth and toupee. . . . Is the Major the right height?—He is. I
purposely stood beside him in your office the other day; and he is
almost exactly five feet, ten and a half.”
Markham sat staring silently at the disembowelled pistol. Vance had
been speaking in a voice quite different from that he had used when
constructing his hypothetical cases against the others; and Markham
had sensed the change.
“We now come to the jewels,” Vance was saying. “I once expressed the
belief, you remember, that when we found the security for Pfyfe’s
note, we would put our hands on the murderer. I thought then the Major
had the jewels; and after Miss Hoffman told us of his requesting her
not to mention the package, I was sure of it. Alvin took them home on
the afternoon of the thirteenth, and the Major undoubtedly knew it.
This fact, I imagine, influenced his decision to end Alvin’s life that
night. He wanted those baubles, Markham.”
He rose jauntily and stepped to the door.
“And now, it remains only to find ’em. . . . The murderer took ’em
away with him; they couldn’t have left the house any other way.
Therefore, they’re in this apartment. If the Major had taken them to
the office, someone might have seen them; and if he had placed them in
a safe deposit-box, the clerk at the bank might have remembered the
episode. Moreover, the same psychology that applies to the gun,
applies to the jewels. The Major has acted throughout on the
assumption of his innocence; and, as a matter of fact, the trinkets
were safer here than elsewhere. There’d be time enough to dispose of
them when the affair blew over. . . . Come with me a moment, Markham.
It’s painful, I know; and your heart’s too weak for an anæsthetic.”
Markham followed him down the passageway in a kind of daze. I felt a
great sympathy for the man, for now there was no question that he knew
Vance was serious in his demonstration of the Major’s guilt. Indeed, I
have always felt that Markham suspected the true purpose of Vance’s
request to investigate the Major’s alibi, and that his opposition was
due as much to his fear of the results as to his impatience with the
other’s irritating methods. Not that he would have balked ultimately
at the truth, despite his long friendship for Major Benson; but he was
struggling—as I see it now—with the inevitability of circumstances,
hoping against hope that he had read Vance incorrectly, and that, by
vigorously contesting each step of the way, he might alter the very
shape of destiny itself.
Vance led the way to the living-room, and stood for five minutes
inspecting the various pieces of furniture, while Markham remained in
the doorway watching him through narrowed lids, his hands crowded deep
into his pockets.
“We could, of course, have an expert searcher rake the apartment over
inch by inch,” observed Vance. “But I don’t think it necess’ry. The
Major’s a bold, cunning soul: witness his wide square forehead, the
dominating stare of his globular eyes, the perpendicular spine, and
the indrawn abdomen. He’s forthright in all his mental operations.
Like Poe’s Minister D——, he would recognize the futility of
painstakingly secreting the jewels in some obscure corner. And anyhow,
he had no object in secreting them. He merely wished to hide ’em where
there’d be no chance of their being seen. This naturally suggests a
lock and key, what? There was no such _cache_ in the bed-room—which is
why I came here.”
He walked to a squat rose-wood desk in the corner, and tried all its
drawers; but they were unlocked. He next tested the table drawer; but
that, too, was unlocked. A small Spanish cabinet by the window proved
equally disappointing.
“Markham, I simply must find a locked drawer,” he said.
He inspected the room again, and was about to return to the bed-room
when his eye fell on a Circassian-walnut humidor half hidden by a pile
of magazines on the under-shelf of the center-table. He stopped
abruptly, and going quickly to the box, endeavored to lift the top. It
was locked.
“Let’s see,” he mused: “what does the Major smoke? _Romeo y Julieta
Perfeccionados_, I believe—but they’re not sufficiently valuable to
keep under lock and key.”
He picked up a strong bronze paper-knife lying on the table, and
forced its point into the crevice of the humidor just above the lock.
“You can’t do that!” cried Markham; and there was as much pain as
reprimand in his voice.
Before he could reach Vance, however, there was a sharp click, and the
lid flew open. Inside was a blue-velvet jewel-case.
“Ah! ‘Dumb jewels more quick than words,’” said Vance, stepping back.
Markham stood staring into the humidor with an expression of tragic
distress. Then slowly he turned and sank heavily into a chair.
“Good God!” he murmured. “I don’t know what to believe.”
“In that respect,” returned Vance, “you’re in the same disheartenin’
predic’ment as all the philosophers.—But you were ready enough, don’t
y’ know, to believe in the guilt of half a dozen innocent people. Why
should you gag at the Major, who actu’lly is guilty?”
His tone was contemptuous, but a curious, inscrutable look in his eyes
belied his voice; and I remembered that, although these two men were
welded in an indissoluble friendship, I had never heard a word of
sentiment, or even sympathy, pass between them.
Markham had leaned forward in an attitude of hopelessness, elbows on
knees, his head in his hands.
“But the motive!” he urged. “A man doesn’t shoot his brother for a
handful of jewels.”
“Certainly not,” agreed Vance. “The jewels were a mere addendum. There
was a vital motive—rest assured. And, I fancy, when you get your
report from the expert accountant, all—or at least a goodly part—will
be revealed.”
“So that was why you wanted his books examined?”
Markham stood up resolutely.
“Come: I’m going to see this thing through.”
Vance did not move at once. He was intently studying a small antique
candlestick of oriental design on the mantel.
“I say!” he muttered. “That’s a dev’lish fine copy!”