Four Possibilities
(Wednesday, September 12; evening)
When Vance finished speaking, there was a long silence. Markham,
impressed by the other’s earnestness, sat in a brown study. His ideas
had been shaken. The theory of Skeel’s guilt, to which he had clung
from the moment of the identification of the finger-prints, had, it
must be admitted, not entirely satisfied him, although he had been
able to suggest no alternative. Now Vance had categorically repudiated
this theory and at the same time had advanced another which, despite
its indefiniteness, had nevertheless taken into account all the
physical points of the case; and Markham, at first antagonistic, had
found himself, almost against his will, becoming more and more
sympathetic to this new point of view.
“Damn it, Vance!” he said. “I’m not in the least convinced by your
theatrical theory. And yet, I feel a curious undercurrent of
plausibility in your analyses. . . . I wonder——”
He turned sharply, and scrutinized the other steadfastly for a moment.
“Look here! Have you any one in mind as the protagonist of the drama
you’ve outlined?”
“’Pon my word, I haven’t the slightest notion as to who killed the
lady,” Vance assured him. “But if you are ever to find the murderer,
you must look for a shrewd, superior man with nerves of iron, who was
in imminent danger of being irremediably ruined by the girl—a man of
inherent cruelty and vindictiveness; a supreme egoist; a fatalist more
or less; and—I’m inclined to believe—something of a madman.”
“Mad!”
“Oh, not a lunatic—just a madman, a perfectly normal, logical,
calculating madman—same as you and I and Van here. Only, our hobbies
are harmless, d’ ye see. This chap’s mania is outside your
preposterously revered law. That’s why you’re after him. If his
aberration were stamp-collecting, or golf, you wouldn’t give him a
second thought. But his perfectly rational _penchant_ for eliminating
_déclassées_ ladies who bothered him, fills you with horror: it’s not
_your_ hobby. Consequently, you have a hot yearning to flay him
alive.”
“I’ll admit,” said Markham coolly, “that a homicidal mania is my idea
of madness.”
“But he didn’t have a homicidal mania, Markham old thing. You miss all
the fine distinctions in psychology. This man was annoyed by a certain
person, and set to work, masterfully and reasonably, to do away with
the source of his annoyance. And he did it with surpassin’ cleverness.
To be sure, his act was a bit grisly. But when, if ever, you get your
hands on him, you’ll be amazed to find how normal he is. And able,
too—oh, able no end.”
Again Markham lapsed into a long thoughtful silence. At last he spoke.
“The only trouble with your ingenious deductions is that they don’t
accord with the known circumstances of the case. And facts, my dear
Vance, are still regarded by a few of us old-fashioned lawyers as more
or less conclusive.”
“Why this needless confession of your shortcomings?” inquired Vance
whimsically. Then, after a moment: “Let me have the facts which appear
to you antagonistic to my deductions.”
“Well, there are only four men of the type you describe who could have
had any remote reason for murdering the Odell woman. Heath’s scouts
went into her history pretty thoroughly, and for over two years—that
is, since her appearance in the ‘Follies’—the only _personæ gratæ_ at
her apartment have been Mannix, Doctor Lindquist, Pop Cleaver, and, of
course, Spotswoode. The Canary was a bit exclusive, it seems; and no
other man got near enough to her even to be considered as a possible
murderer.”
“It appears, then, that you have a complete quartet to draw on.”
Vance’s tone was apathetic. “What do you crave—a regiment?”
“No,” answered Markham patiently. “I crave only one logical
possibility. But Mannix was through with the girl over a year ago;
Cleaver and Spotswoode both have water-tight alibis; and that leaves
only Doctor Lindquist, whom I can’t exactly picture as a strangler and
meretricious burglar, despite his irascibility. Moreover, he, too, has
an alibi; and it may be a genuine one.”
Vance wagged his head.
“There’s something positively pathetic about the childlike faith of
the legal mind.”
“It does cling to rationality at times, doesn’t it?” observed Markham.
“My dear fellow!” Vance rebuked him. “The presumption implied in that
remark is most immodest. If you could distinguish between rationality
and irrationality you wouldn’t be a lawyer—you’d be a god. . . . No;
you’re going at this thing the wrong way. The real factors in the case
are not what you call the known circumstances, but the unknown
quantities—the human _x’s_, so to speak—the personalities, or natures,
of your quartet.”
He lit a fresh cigarette, and lay back, closing his eyes.
“Tell me what you know of these four _cavalieri serventi_—you say
Heath has turned in his report. Who were their mamas? What do they eat
for breakfast? Are they susceptible to poison-ivy? . . . Let’s have
Spotswoode’s _dossier_ first. Do you know anything about him?”
“In a general way,” returned Markham. “Old Puritan stock, I
believe—governors, burgomasters, a few successful traders. All Yankee
forebears—no intermixture. As a matter of fact, Spotswoode represents
the oldest and hardiest of the New England aristocracy—although I
imagine the so-called wine of the Puritans has become pretty well
diluted by now. His affair with the Odell girl is hardly consonant
with the older Puritans’ mortification of the flesh.”
“It’s wholly consonant, though, with the psychological reactions which
are apt to follow the inhibitions produced by such mortification,”
submitted Vance. “But what does he do? Whence cometh his lucre?”
“His father manufactured automobile accessories, made a fortune at it,
and left the business to him. He tinkers at it, but not seriously,
though I believe he has designed a few appurtenances.”
“I do hope the hideous cut-glass olla for holding paper bouquets is
not one of them. The man who invented that tonneau decoration is
capable of any fiendish crime.”
“It couldn’t have been Spotswoode then,” said Markham tolerantly, “for
he certainly can’t qualify as your potential strangler. We know the
girl was alive after he left her, and that, during the time she was
murdered, he was with Judge Redfern. . . . Even you, friend Vance,
couldn’t manipulate those facts to the gentleman’s disadvantage.”
“On that, at least, we agree,” conceded Vance. “And that’s all you
know of the gentleman?”
“I think that’s all, except that he married a well-to-do woman—a
daughter of a Southern senator, I believe.”
“Doesn’t help any. . . . And now, let’s have Mannix’s history.”
Markham referred to a typewritten sheet of paper.
“Both parents immigrants—came over in the steerage. Original name
Mannikiewicz, or something like that. Born on the East Side; learned
the fur business in his father’s retail shop in Hester Street; worked
for the Sanfrasco Cloak Company, and got to be factory foreman. Saved
his money, and sweetened the pot by manipulating real estate; then
went into the fur business for himself, and steadily worked up to his
present opulent state. Public school, and night commercial college.
Married in 1900 and divorced a year later. Lives a gay life—helps
support the night clubs, but never gets drunk. I suppose he comes
under the head of a spender and wine-opener. Has invested some money
in musical comedies, and always has a stage beauty in tow. Runs to
blondes.”
“Not very revealin’,” sighed Vance. “The city is full of
Mannixes. . . . What did you garner in connection with our _bon-ton_
medico?”
“The city has its quota of Doctor Lindquists, too, I fear. He was
brought up in a small Middle-West bailiwick—French and Magyar
extraction; took his M.D. from the Ohio State Medical, practised in
Chicago—some shady business there, but never convicted; came to Albany
and got in on the X-ray-machine craze; invented a breast-pump and
formed a stock company—made a small fortune out of it; went to Vienna
for two years——”
“Ah, the Freudian motif!”
“—returned to New York, and opened a private sanitarium; charged
outrageous prices, and thereby endeared himself to the nouveau riche.
Has been at the endearing process ever since. Was defendant in a
breach-of-promise suit some years ago, but the case was settled out of
court. He’s not married.”
“He wouldn’t be,” commented Vance. “Such gentry never are. . . .
Interestin’ summary, though—yes, decidedly interestin’. I’m tempted to
develop a psychoneurosis and let Ambroise treat me. I do so want to
know him better. And where—oh, where—was this egregious healer at the
moment of our erring sister’s demise? Ah, who can tell, my Markham:
who knows—who knows?”
“In any event, I don’t think he was murdering any one.”
“You’re so prejudicial!” said Vance. “But let us move reluctantly
on.—What’s your _portrait parlé_ of Cleaver? The fact that he’s
familiarly called Pop is helpful as a starter. You simply couldn’t
imagine Beethoven being called Shorty, or Bismarck being referred to
as Snookums.”
“Cleaver has been a politician most of his life—a Tammany Hall
‘regular.’ Was a ward-boss at twenty-five; ran a Democratic club of
some kind in Brooklyn for a time; was an alderman for two terms, and
practised general law. Was appointed Tax Commissioner; left politics,
and raised a small racing-stable. Later secured an illegal gambling
concession at Saratoga; and now operates a pool-room in Jersey City.
He’s what you might call a professional sport. Loves his liquor.”
“No marriages?”
“None on the records.—But see here: Cleaver’s out of it. He was
ticketed in Boonton that night at half past eleven.”
“Is that, by any chance, the water-tight alibi you mentioned a moment
ago?”
“In my primitive legal way I considered it as such.” Markham resented
Vance’s question. “The summons was handed him at half past eleven:
it’s so marked and dated. And Boonton is fifty miles from here—a good
two hours’ motor ride. Therefore, Cleaver unquestionably left New York
about half past nine; and even if he’d driven directly back, he
couldn’t have reached here until long after the time the Medical
Examiner declared the girl was dead. As a matter of routine, I
investigated the summons, and even spoke by phone to the officer who
issued it. It was genuine enough—I ought to know: I had it quashed.”
“Did this Boonton Dogberry know Cleaver by sight?”
“No, but he gave me an accurate description of him. And naturally he
took the car’s number.”
Vance looked at Markham with open-eyed sorrow.
“My dear Markham—my very dear Markham—can’t you see that all you’ve
actually proved is that a bucolic traffic Nemesis handed a
speed-violation summons to a smooth-faced, middle-aged, stout man who
was driving Cleaver’s car near Boonton at half past eleven on the
night of the murder? . . . And, my word! Isn’t that exactly the sort
of alibi the old boy would arrange if he intended taking the lady’s
life at midnight or thereabouts?”
“Come, come!” laughed Markham. “That’s a bit too far-fetched. You’d
give every law-breaker credit for concocting schemes of the most
diabolical cunning.”
“So I would,” admitted Vance apathetically. “And—d’ye know?—I rather
fancy that’s just the kind of schemes a law-breaker would concoct, if
he was planning a murder, and his own life was at stake. What really
amazes me is the naïve assumption of you investigators that a murderer
gives no intelligent thought whatever to his future safety. It’s
rather touchin’, y’ know.”
Markham grunted.
“Well, you can take it from me, it was Cleaver himself who got that
summons.”
“I dare say you’re right,” Vance conceded. “I merely suggested the
possibility of deception, don’t y’ know. The only point I really
insist on is that the fascinatin’ Miss Odell was killed by a man of
subtle and superior mentality.”
“And I, in turn,” irritably rejoined Markham, “insist that the only
men of that type who touched her life intimately enough to have had
any reason to do it are Mannix, Cleaver, Lindquist, and Spotswoode.
And I further insist that not one of them can be regarded as a
promising possibility.”
“I fear I must contradict you, old dear,” said Vance serenely.
“They’re all possibilities—and one of them is guilty.”
Markham glared at him derisively.
“Well, well! So the case is settled! Now, if you’ll but indicate which
is the guilty one, I’ll arrest him at once, and return to my other
duties.”
“You’re always in such haste,” Vance lamented. “Why leap and run? The
wisdom of the world’s philosophers is against it. _Festina lente_,
says Cæsar; or, as Rufus has it, _Festinatio tarda est_. And the Koran
says quite frankly that haste is of the Devil. Shakespeare was
constantly belittling speed:
‘He tires betimes that spurs too fast betimes’;
and
‘Wisely, and slow; they stumble that run fast.’
Then there was Molière—remember ‘Sganarelle’?—: ‘_Le trop de
promptitude à l’erreur nous expose._’ Chaucer also held similar views.
‘He hasteth wel,’ said he, ‘that wysely can abyde.’ Even God’s common
people have embalmed the idea in numberless proverbs: ‘Good and
quickly seldom meet’; and ‘Hasty men never want woe——’”
Markham rose with a gesture of impatience.
“Hell! I’m going home before you start a bedtime story,” he growled.
The ironical aftermath of this remark was that Vance did tell a
“bedtime story” that night; but he told it to me in the seclusion of
his own library; and the gist of it was this:
“Heath is committed, body and soul, to a belief in Skeel’s guilt; and
Markham is as effectively strangled with legal red tape as the poor
Canary was strangled with powerful hands. _Eheu_, Van! There’s nothing
left for me but to set forth to-morrow _a cappella_, like Gaboriau’s
Monsieur Lecoq, and see what can be done in the noble cause of
justice. I shall ignore both Heath and Markham, and become as a
pelican of the wilderness, an owl of the desert, a sparrow alone upon
the housetop. . . . Really, y’ know, I’m no avenger of society, but I
do detest an unsolved problem.”