Drury Lane’s Last Case (36 page)

Rowe looked about quickly. But the scene was peaceful; the spires and turrets of The Hamlet loomed serenely above the treetops.

Patience said in a strangled voice: “Where is Mr. Lane, Quacey?”

Quacey's batrachian little eyes twinkled. “Sunning himself in the west gardens, Miss Thumm. He'll be surprised to see you, I dare say. I know he wasn't expecting anybody.”

The men jumped out of the roadster and, rather stiffly, Patience stepped down to the gravel. Between them, with Quacey pattering quietly along at their heels, she began to stroll across the velvet grass toward the west gardens.

“You see,” she said so softly that they had to strain their ears, “the hacker did betray himself. He made no mistakes; he didn't know he was making mistakes; Fate made them for him. Fate in the shape of a cheap alarm-clock.”

“Alarm clock?” muttered the Inspector.

“When we examined the study and came upon Maxwell's alarm-clock on the mantel above the fireplace, we saw that its alarm
was still set
. What did this mean? That the alarm went off at the time it was set for—twelve o'clock, midnight, of the night before (because we examined it before noon of the following morning and Maxwell had set it before midnight the previous evening). The little lever still pointed to
Alarm
, you'll remember, when we examined it. But if we found the lever still pointed to
Alarm
, then the alarm must have
rung
. But what's significant about the fact that the alarm rang? The fact that, if it rang and we found the alarm still set,
then it must have rung itself out
. Had it been stopped, while it rang, by a human hand, we should have found the little lever at
Silent
, not
Alarm
. So it was
not
turned off; the alarm rang and rang until it exhausted itself, the spring of the alarm unwinding; and died off, spent, with its lever still set at
Alarm.…
”

“But what the devil does that mean, Patty?” cried Rowe.

“Everything. We know the hacker was in the room precisely at midnight; so he must have been in the room when the alarm began to ring. We know this from two facts: Maxwell said he kept all the clocks perfectly synchronized, and the grandfather-clock had been shattered exactly at twelve.”

Rowe stepped back a little, quietly; he was very pale.

“All right, I'll follow along,” growled the Inspector. “Why didn't this axe-wielder of yours turn off the alarm when it started to ring? Must have made him jump. Anyone prowling about somebody else's house would have jumped like a shot and turned it off, whether there was anyone to hear it or not.”

They paused under an ancient oak and Patience felt rather blindly for the rough bark. “Exactly,” she whispered. “The fact remains that even though he was in the same room, even though every instinct would have impelled him to turn the alarm off,
he didn't
.”

“Well, it's too much for me,” muttered Thumm. “Come on. Come on, Gordon,” and he strode past the tree. The other followed slowly. Not far away, over a low wall of privets, they saw the quiet shrunken figure of Lane seated on a rustic bench, his back to them.

Patience made a sick little sound and the Inspector turned sharply. Rowe, death in his eyes, bounded forward and caught her about the waist.

“What is this?” said the Inspector slowly.

“Father, wait,” sobbed Patience. “Wait. You don't understand. You don't see. Why didn't the hacker discover that ticking bomb in the cellar when he took Hamnet Sedlar's dead body down there? Why did he hack at the walls of the study in the first place? He was obviously looking for hollow places. What's the normal way of looking for hollow places? Rapping for them, rapping for them, father! Why didn't he tap those panelled walls?”

Thumm looked from one to the other, baffled, uneasy. “Why?”

Patience put a trembling hand on his big arm. “Please. Before you—see him. The hacker didn't stop the alarm-clock's ringing, he didn't investigate the ticking of the bomb in the cellar, he didn't tap the walls—for the same reason, father. Oh, don't you see? It struck me so hard, such a horrible blow, that I ran, blindly, like a child; I wanted to get away, anywhere.… He couldn't
hear
the alarm. He couldn't
hear
the tick of the bomb. He couldn't
hear
a hollow sound even if he did tap. He was deaf!”

The little glade was quiet. The Inspector's jaw dropped like the iron floor of a portcullis; a concentrated horror of realization charged into his eyes. Rowe stood stonily, his arm a rigid brace about Patience's quivering torso. Quacey, hovering in the background, suddenly uttered a choking, squealing animal cry and sank like dead to the grass.

The Inspector took an unsteady step forward and touched Lane's quiet shoulder. Patience whirled and buried her face in Rowe's coat, sobbing as if her heart would break.

The old gentleman's head was sunk on his breast; there was no response to Thumm's touch.

More swiftly than it seemed possible for a man of his bulk and weight, the Inspector charged around the bench and grasped Lane's hand.

It was icy cold, and a small stained empty phial dropped from its white fingers to the green grass.

FINIS

All rights reserved, including without limitation the right to reproduce this ebook or any portion thereof in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.

These is a works of fiction. Names, characters, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Copyright © 1933 by Barnaby Ross

Copyright renewed by Ellery Queen

Cover design by Kat Lee

ISBN: 978-1-5040-1662-9

This 2015 edition published by
MysteriousPress.com
/Open Road Integrated Media, Inc.

345 Hudson Street

New York, NY 10014

www.mysteriouspress.com

www.openroadmedia.com

THE DRURY LANE MYSTERIES

FROM
MYSTERIOUSPRESS.COM
AND OPEN ROAD MEDIA

Available wherever ebooks are sold

MYSTERIOUSPRESS.COM