Murder Impossible Read online

  I sighed and slid the poster—the old carnival sideshow poster around on my desk so he could see Dillon's picture and read the words printed below it: STEAK AND POTATOES AND APPLE PIE IS OUR DISH; NUTS, BOLTS, PIECES OF WOOD, BITS OF METAL IS HIS! YOU HAVE TO SEE IT TO BELIEVE IT: THE AMAZING MR GEORGE, THE MAN WITH THE CAST IRON STOMACH.

  Sherrard's head jerked up and he stared at me open mouthed. 'That's right,' I said wearily. 'He ate it.'

  JACQUES FUTRELLE

  An Absence of Air

  Jacques Futrelle (1875-1912) was the first author to write prolifically in the Impossible Crime genre. A working journalist, for many years on the staff of the Boston based American, he wrote a good, clean, crisp prose and was an 'ideas' man at a time of great scientific and technological change. Fascinated by the rapid advances made in the worlds of applied and experimental science, he created one of the best of the early scientific detectives, Professor Augustus S.F.X. Van Dusen, the 'Thinking Machine', who brings his own brand of icy and remorseless logic to bear on all the problems presented to him. To Van Dusen there is nothing, however bizarre or impossible, that cannot be rationally explained.

  Van Dusen was not in the same league as R. Austin Freeman's Dr John Thorndyke (it's doubtful that Futrelle actualized his plots in the same way that Freeman personally carried out many of the experiments later used in the Thorndyke stories) although, while often utilizing the new technology, he was certainly more realistic in his approach than the only other contemporary scientific sleuth of any note, Arthur Reeve's wholly sensational and gadget addicted Craig Kennedy (just a few of whose exploits go rather a long way). Where the Thinking Machine does stand out is that he's one of the rudest, most misanthropic sleuths from the Classic era.

  Ironically, in 1912 Futrelle perished with the Titanic, then, supposedly, the most advanced liner in the world and a triumph of modern technology. In London, Futrelle had written ten Thinking Machine stories, the manuscripts of six accompanying him on the Titanic's maiden voyage (and thus lost forever). The remaining four stories were left in London.

  In the early 1940s Ellery Queen published one of the four as 'The Case of the Mysterious Weapon'. The impression given was that this was its first appearance in print, and perhaps it was—in America, and in the version printed. But the same story—the story that follows—had already appeared in England twenty years earlier, in an issue of The Storyteller, although in a somewhat different form.

  In The Storyteller version an editorial hand has altered the location of the story from America to England so that, for instance, Detective Mallory, a member of New York's Finest, is now an officer in Scotland Yard's CID (this sort of thing was always happening to second rights material: in a series of paperbacks published during the First World War, the great Nick Carter was transplanted across the Atlantic to, of all places,Manchester). I have changed the locale back to America. However, I have also indulged in a little editorial scene shifting myself. In the original version, Futrelle, for some inexplicable reason, has placed the solution to the mystery (or at least given the game away) halfway through the story, thus effectively sabotaging the denouement. With a modicum of tinkering (and I suspect I'm following in Ellery Queen's own footsteps here) I've moved this crucial scene to the end, with the addition of only one word. I hope the shade of Jacques Futrelle is nodding its head and not gnashing its teeth. I suspect—good journalist that he was—the former.

  JACK ADRIAN

  Certainly no problem that ever came to the attention of Professor Augustus Van Dusen required in a greater degree subtlety of mind, exquisite analytical sense, and precise knowledge of the marvels of science than did that singular series of events which began with the mysterious death of Miss Violet Danbury, only daughter and sole heir of the late Charles Duval Danbury, of Boston, in the state of Massachusetts.

  In this case Professor Van Dusen brought to bear upon an extraordinary mystery of crime that remarkable genius of logic which had made him the Court of Last Appeal in his profession. 'Logic is inexorable,' he has said; and no greater proof of his assertion was possible than in this instance where, literally, he seemed to pluck a solution of the riddle from the void.

  Shortly after eleven o'clock on the morning of Thursday, May 4, Miss Danbury was found dead, sitting in the drawing room of apartments she was temporarily occupying in a big family hotel in Beacon Street. She was richly gowned, just as she had come from the opera the night before, her marble white bosom and arms aglitter with jewels. On her face, dark in death as are the faces of those who die of strangulation, was an expression of unspeakable terror. Her parted lips were slightly bruised, as if from a light blow; in her left cheek was an insignificant, bloodless wound. On the floor at her feet was a shattered goblet. There was nothing else unusual, no disorder, no sign of a struggle. Obviously she had been dead for several hours.

  All these things considered, the first judgment of the police specifically, the first judgment of Detective Mallory, of the Criminal Investigation bureau—was suicide by poison. Miss Danbury had poured some deadly drug into a goblet, sat down, drained if off, and died. Simple and obvious enough. But the darkness in her face? Oh, that! Probably some effect of a poison he didn't happen to be acquainted with. But it looked as if she might have been strangled! Pooh! Pooh! There were no marks on her neck of fingers or anything else. Suicide, that's what it was—the autopsy would disclose the nature of the poison.

  Cursory questions of the usual nature were asked and answered. Had Miss Danbury lived alone? No; she had a companion upon whom, too, devolved the duties of chaperon—a Mrs. Cecelia Montgomery. Where was she? She'd left the city the day before to visit friends in Boston; the manager of the hotel had telegraphed the facts to her. No servants? No. She had availed herself of the service in the hotel. Who had last seen Miss Danbury alive? The hotel lift attendant the night before when she had returned from the opera, about half past eleven o'clock. Had she gone alone? No. She had been accompanied by Professor Charles Meredith of the University. He had returned with her and left her at the lift.

  'How did she come to know Professor Meredith?' Mallory inquired. 'Friend, relative—'

  'I don't know,' said the hotel manager. 'She'd only been in the city two months this time, but once, three years ago, she spent six months here.'

  'Any particular reason for her coming to town? Business, for instance, or merely a visit?'

  'Merely a visit, I imagine.'

  The front door swung open, and there entered at the moment a middle aged man, sharp featured, rather spare, brisk in his movements, and distinctly well groomed. He went straight to the inquiry desk.

  'Will you please 'phone Miss Danbury and ask her if she will join Mr Herbert Willing for luncheon at the country club?' he requested. 'Tell her I am below with my motor.'

  At mention of Miss Danbury's name both Mallory and the hotel manager turned. The boy behind the inquiry desk glanced at the detective blankly. Mr. Willing rapped upon the desk sharply.

  'Well, well?' he demanded impatiently. 'Are you asleep?'

  'Good morning, Mr. Willing,' Mallory greeted him.

  'Hallo, Mallory!' and Mr. Willing turned to face him. 'What are you doing here?'

  'You don't know that Miss Danbury is'—the detective paused a little—'is dead?'

  'Dead!' Willing repeated incredulously. 'What are you talking about?' He seized Mallory by the arm and shook him.

  'Dead,' the detective assured him again. 'She probably committed suicide. She was found in her apartments two hours ago.'

  For half a minute Mr. Willing continued to stare at him as if without comprehension; then he dropped weakly into a chair with his head in his hands. When he glanced up again there was deep grief in his keen face.

  'It's my fault,' he said simply. 'I feel like a murderer. I gave her some bad news yesterday, but I didn't dream she would—' He stopped.

  'Bad news?' Mallory urged.

  'I've been doing some legal work for her,' Mr. Willing explained. '
She's been trying to sell a huge estate in the country, and at the moment when the deal seemed assured it fell through. I—I suppose it was a mistake to tell her. This morning I received another offer from an unexpected quarter, and I came to inform her of it.' He stared tensely into Mallory's face for a moment without speaking. 'I feel like her murderer!' he said again.

  'But I don't understand why the failure of the deal—' the detective began; then 'She was rich wasn't she? What did it matter particularly if the deal did fail?'

  'Rich, yes, but land poor,' the lawyer elucidated. 'The estates to which she held tide were frightfully involved. She had jewels and all those things, but see how simply she lived. She was actually in need of money. It would take me an hour to make you understand. How did she die? When? What was the manner of her death?'

  Detective Mallory placed before him those facts he had, and finally went away with him in his motorcar to see Professor Meredith at the University. Nothing bearing on the case developed as the result of that interview. Mr. Meredith seemed greatly shocked, and explained that is acquaintance with Miss Danbury dated some weeks back, and friendship had grown out of it through a mutual love of music. He had accompanied her to the opera half a dozen times.

  'Suicide!' the detective declared as he came away. 'Obviously suicide by poison.'

  On the following day he discovered for the first time that the obvious is not necessarily true. The autopsy revealed absolutely no trace of poison, either in the body or clinging to the shattered goblet, carefully gathered up and examined. The heart was normal, showing neither constriction nor dilation, as would have been the case had poison been swallowed, or even inhaled.

  'It's the small wound in her cheek then,' Mallory asserted. 'Maybe she didn't swallow or inhale poison—she injected it directly into her blood through the wound.'

  'No,' one of the examining physicians pointed out. 'Even that way the heart would have shown constriction or dilation.'

  'Oh, maybe not,' Mallory argued hopefully.

  'Besides,' the physician went on, 'that wound was made after death. That is proven by the fact that it did not bleed.' His brow clouded in perplexity. 'There doesn't seem to be the slightest reason for that wound, anyway. It's really a hole, you know. It goes straight through her cheek. It looks as if it might have been made with a large hatpin.'

  The detective was staring at him. If that wound had been made after death, certainly Miss Danbury didn't make it; she had been murdered, and not murdered for robbery, since her jewels had been undisturbed.

  'Straight through her cheek!' he repeated blankly. 'By George! If it wasn't poison, what killed her?'

  The three examining physicians exchanged glances.

  'I don't know that I can make you understand,' said one. 'She died of absence of air in her lungs, if you follow me.'

  'Absence of air—well, that's illuminating!' the detective sneered heavily. 'You mean she was strangled or choked to death?'

  'I mean precisely what I say,' was the reply. 'She was not strangled—there is no mark on her throat; or choked—there is no obstruction in her throat. Literally she died of absence of air in her lungs.'

  Mallory stood silently glowering at them. A fine lot of physicians, these.

  'Let's understand one another,' he said at last. 'Miss Danbury did not die a natural death?'

  'No'—emphatically.

  'She wasn't poisoned? Or strangled? Or shot? Or stabbed? Or run over by a truck? Or blown up by dynamite? Or kicked by a mule? Nor,' he concluded, 'did she fall from an aeroplane?'

  'No.'

  'In other words, she just stopped living?'

  'Something like that,' the physician admitted. He seemed to be seeking a means of making himself more explicit. 'You know the old nursery theory that a cat will suck a sleeping baby's breath?' he asked. 'Well, the death of Miss Danbury was like that, if you understand. It is as if some great animal or—or thing had—' He stopped.

  Detective Mallory was an able man, the ablest, perhaps, in the Criminal Investigation bureau, but a yellow primrose by the river's brim was to him a yellow primrose, nothing more. He lacked imagination, a common fault of that type of sleuth who combines, more or less happily, a No. 11 shoe and a No. 6 hat. The only vital thing he had to go on was the fact that Miss Danbury was dead murdered in some mysterious, uncanny way. Vampires were something like that, weren't they? He shuddered a little.

  'Regular vampire sort of thing,' the youngest of the three physicians remarked, echoing the thought in the detective's mind. 'They're supposed to make a slight wound, and—'

  Detective Mallory didn't hear the remainder of it. He turned abruptly and left the room.

  On the following Monday morning, one Henry Sumner, a longshoreman, was found sitting in his squalid room. On his face, dark in death as are the faces of those who die of strangulation, was an expression of unspeakable terror. His parted hps were slightly bruised, as if from a light blow; in his left cheek was an insignificant bloodless wound. On the floor at his feet was a shattered drinking glass!

  'Twas Hutchinson Hatch, newspaper reporter, long, lean, and rather prepossessing in appearance, who brought this double mystery to the attention of Professor Van Dusen. Martha, the eminent scientist's one servant, admitted the newspaper man, and he went straight to the laboratory. As he opened the door Professor Van Dusen turned testily from his work table.

  'Oh, it's you, Mr Hatch. Glad to see you. Sit down. What is it?' That was his idea of extreme cordiality.

  'If you can spare me five minutes—' the reporter began apologetically.

  'What is it?' repeated Professor Van Dusen, without raising his eyes.

  'I wish I knew,' the reporter said ruefully. 'Two persons are dead two persons as widely apart as the poles, at least in social position, have been murdered in precisely the same manner, and it seems impossible that—'

  'Nothing is impossible,' Professor Van Dusen interrupted in the tone of perpetual irritation which seemed to be part of him. 'You annoy me when you say it.'

  'It seems highly improbable,' Hatch corrected himself, 'that there can be the remotest connection between the crimes, yet—'

  'You're wasting words,' the crabby little scientist declared impatiently. 'Begin at the beginning. Who was murdered? When? How? Why? What was the manner of death?'

  'Taking the last question first,' the reporter explained, 'we have the most singular part of the problem. No one can say the manner of death, not even the physicians.'

  'Oh!' For the first time the little professor lifted his petulant, squinting, narrowed eyes and stared into the face of the newspaper man. 'Oh!' he said again. 'Go on.'

  As Hatch talked the lure of a material problem laid hold of the master mind, and after a Utile Professor Van Dusen dropped into a chair. With his great grotesque head tilted back, his eyes turned steadily upward, and slender fingers placed precisely tip to tip, he listened in silence to the end.

  'We come now,' said the newspaper man, 'to the inexplicable after developments. We have proven that Mrs. Cecelia Montgomery, Miss Danbury's companion, did not go to Boston to visit friends; as a matter of fact, she is missing. The police have been able to find no trace of her, and today are sending out a general alarm. Naturally, her absence at this particular moment is suspicious. It is possible to conjecture her connection with the death of Miss Danbury, but what about—'

  'Never mind conjecture,' the scientist broke in curtly. 'Facts, facts!'

  'Further'—and Hatch's bewilderment was evident on his face— 'mysterious things have been happening in the rooms where Miss Danbury and this man, Henry Sumner, were found dead. Miss Danbury was found dead last Thursday. Immediately after the body was removed Detective Mallory ordered her room to be locked, his idea being that nothing should be disturbed, at least for the present, because of the strange circumstances surrounding her death. When the nature of the Henry Sumner affair became known, and the similarity of the cases recognized, he gave the same order regarding Sumner's room.'
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  Hatch stopped and stared vainly into the pallid, wizened face of the scientist; a curious little chill ran down his spinal column.

  'Some time Tuesday night,' he continued after a moment, 'Miss Danbury's room was entered and ransacked; and some time that same night Henry Sumner's room was entered and ransacked. This morning, Wednesday, a clearly defined hand print in blood was found in Miss Danbury's room. It was on the wooden top of a dressing table. It seemed to be a woman's hand. Also, an indistinguishable smudge of blood, which may have been a hand print, was found in Sumner's room!' He paused. Professor Van Dusen's countenance was inscrutable. 'What possible connection can there be between this young woman and this—this longshoreman? Why—'

  'What chair,' questioned Professor Van Dusen, 'does Professor Meredith hold in the University?'

  'Greek,' was the reply.

  'Who is Mr. Willing?'

  'One of our leading lawyers.'

  'Did you see Miss Danbury's body?'

  'Yes.'

  'Did she have a large mouth or a small mouth?'

  The irrelevancy of the questions, to say nothing of their disjointedness, brought a look of astonishment to Hatch's face, and he was a young man who was rarely astonished by the curious methods of the little professor. Always he had found that the scientist approached a problem from a new angle.

  'I should say a small mouth,' he ventured. 'Her lips were bruised as if—as if something round, say the size of a two shilling piece, had been crushed against them. There was a queer, drawn, caved in look to her mouth and cheeks.'

  'Naturally,' commented Professor Van Dusen enigmatically. 'And Sumner's was the same.'

  'Precisely. You say "naturally." Do you mean—' There was eagerness in the reporter's question.

  It passed unanswered. For half a minute or so the little scientist continued to stare into nothingness. Finally: