Swan Song (24 page)

Adam gulped. The colour flooded back to Elizabeth's face, and she began, almost unnoticeably, to cry with relief. Fen, observing this, experienced a twinge of conscience.

‘Now, now,' he said ineffectually. ‘Now, now.'

‘Two traps . . .' Adam stammered.

Fen glanced at the others. ‘Yes. There are two murderers in this case.'

‘For God's sake,'
said Peacock suddenly. His hands were trembling uncontrollably.

‘And both of them,' Fen went on quietly, ‘are dead.'

‘Shorthouse and Stapleton!' Adam exclaimed.

‘Certainly. Stapleton murdered Shorthouse. And Shorthouse, intending to kill
you,
murdered Stapleton. It's a curiously ironic situation – isn't it? That Shorthouse should revenge himself after his death.'

‘But – but what about the attacks on me?' Elizabeth demanded.

‘They were made, of course, by Stapleton, because of a remark you made in the “Bird and Baby” the other
morning. You said, referring to the manner of Short-house's death: “
It's as though the laws of gravity were suspended
”.'

‘I still don't see . . .'

‘I'll show you in a minute just how that applies. Let's first of all clear up the loose ends in the Stapleton murder. I was convinced from the first that Judith hadn't done it; she was too much in love with him for such an explanation to be conceivable. But apparently she was the only person who had the slightest opportunity of regularly doping his food or drink. Plainly, then, the arsenic must have been administered in some other way, and rather belatedly I remembered that it has effect if applied externally – for example, there are quite well-known instances of poisoning as the result of arsenic in face-cream, depilatories, soap, and so forth. Thinking back, I recollected that Stapleton was practising make-up – Judith herself told me so – and further, that in the “Bird and Baby” I heard that Adam had lent a jar of removing-cream to him. This evening, after inquiring what brand it was, I searched for it in the chorus dressing-room, and having found it, took it home and applied the Reinsch test. Even in the small amount which remained I found a good deal of powdered white arsenic. So evidently Stapleton had, in a sense, killed himself.

‘Naturally, my first suspicion was of you, Adam. But I couldn't see, in the first place, why, if you were guilty, you had been so frank and open about giving him the removing-cream, and in the second place, why should you have wanted to kill him at all. You'd never met him before this production; you apparently weren't jealous of him on account of Judith; in fact, there seemed to be no possible advantage which you could get from his death. So unless you were some kind of homicidal maniac, or a disinterested killer like the man in Aiken's
King Coffin
, the explanation had to be sought elsewhere.

‘It wasn't difficult to find. When Shorthouse visited
your dressing-room during
Don Pasquale,
you came upon him meddling with the removing-cream. Actually he was substituting the poisoned cream for your own, since he still hated you as the result of your marriage with Elizabeth. It's small wonder that you thought his apology unconvincing . . . It wasn't a bad plot – though intended, I fancy, to hurt rather than kill, since he must have known that as soon as the stuff made you really ill you'd go to a doctor. For him, of course, it was a most unlucky chance that you caught him with the poisoned cream in his hand. If he attempted to restore the original jar you would naturally be suspicious, while if he didn't you would be even more suspicious when the symptoms began to show. There's only one thing I don't understand, and that's why he didn't
subsequently
remove the poisoned jar and put the other back.'

‘That's easily explained,' said Adam. ‘After I discovered him playing about in my dressing-room, I decided to keep it locked unless I was actually in it myself.'

‘Ah. Then I think he must have been considerably relieved – though also, I suppose, puzzled – when this unpleasant scheme hadn't any results.'

‘Thanks to Elizabeth,' Adam interrupted. ‘If she hadn't that day bought me a superior brand of cream, and if I hadn't started at once to use it in place of the other, things would have become unpleasant . . . Though I might have saved Stapleton's life,' he added thoughtfully.

‘Only temporarily,' said Fen. ‘If he hadn't died of arsenic poisoning, he would have been hanged . . . I should add for the sake of completeness that I did just consider the possibility that Adam had killed Stapleton because Stapleton knew that Adam was guilty of Short-house's murder. But apparently the poisoning had begun
before
Shorthouse died – and in any case, it was soon obvious that Stapleton, and Stapleton alone, must have killed Shorthouse.'

Adam spoke hesitantly, ‘You said that I –'

‘You sprang the trap. But it was Stapleton who set it.' Karl Wolzogen voiced the query that was in all their minds. ‘But how was this thing done?'

‘Come upstairs,' said Fen, ‘and I'll show you. Mudge, will you prepare the scene?'

TEN MINUTES LATER
they had all crowded, somewhat uncomfortably, into Edwin Shorthouse's dressing-room.

‘As regards Judith,' Sir Richard said to Adam, ‘we shan't, if you don't mind, prefer any charges. She'll recover more quickly at home with her parents than in any sort of mental institution. And once she knows the truth, there'll be no further danger to you.'

Charles Shorthouse spoke cautiously. ‘I feel,' he announced, ‘that this is in all probability a portentous moment, but I must confess that at present the exact meaning of it all eludes me . . .'

‘If you feel tired, Master,' said his paramour, ‘you must lie down.'

‘No.'

‘It doesn't do to exhaust yourself.'

‘Kindly be silent, Beatrix.'

Mudge was fussing with the skeleton which had been found in the property-room; Adam noticed that the wire which held together the cervical vertebrae had been straightened. On the floor lay three lengths of rope and some cotton waste. Fen assumed a didactic expression and called for silence.

‘Now, we know,' he said,
‘why
Stapleton intended to kill Edwin Shorthouse. It was because of the attempted rape of Judith Haynes. But you must realize that he'd no intention of being connected with the crime if he could possibly help it, and so, having a twisted and ingenious mind, he conceived a twisted and ingenious
plan. That plan he tested, in advance, with this skeleton.

‘His first job was to screw that hook in the ceiling – the one from which we found Edwin Shorthouse hanging. There would, of course, be plenty of opportunity for that, and the only danger was that Shorthouse would notice the thing. Even if he did, however, he could hardly suspect its purpose.

‘Stapleton's next step was to steal the Nembutal which he knew was in Joan's dressing-room, and to dope the gin which Shorthouse kept in here, and it was over this that he made his one mistake. The Nembutal had, of course, to be put in the
bottle,
where it would certainly arouse suspicion if found. I think there's no doubt that he intended to rearrange that part of his setting – by substituting an innocuous bottle for the doped one – while he was in here,
and that when it came to the point, he forgot.
It's the dreariest of platitudes to say that every murderer makes at least one mistake, but unlike most platitudes, that one happens to be true.

‘Well, then; as usual, Shorthouse comes up here to drink after he's finished his round of the pubs. Stapleton waits until it's safe to assume that the drug has taken effect, and then goes up to the roof above here, with a good length of rope. On the way, he makes sure that the lift is at the second and not at the ground floor. He knows that Furbelow, being in fear of such contraptions, won't touch it, and he doesn't expect anyone else to be in the theatre at that late hour. The machinery of the lift, you'll remember, is not far from that skylight there.'

‘Oh,' said Adam, suddenly enlightened.

‘Yes, exactly,' Fen agreed. ‘But of course if
you
hadn't taken the lift,
Stapleton
would have done so, so you needn't be unduly distressed. He must have been considerably startled when you did that part of his job for him.

‘One end of his rope, then, he attaches to the machinery of the lift, or to the top of the lift itself. Its length has been
nicely calculated, for he mustn't run the risk of pulling the unfortunate man's head off . . . The other end he takes with him to the little skylight. Through that skylight he drops into the room two further lengths of rope (unattached), some cotton waste, and the end of the rope which is attached to the lift. A stool of exactly the right height has been placed in the room previously. Immediately beside the skylight, on the roof, he fits up some temporary projection – perhaps a small nail. Have you done that, Mudge?'

‘Yes, sir.'

‘Good . . . Now he's ready. An appointment to discuss his opera score with Shorthouse has already been made, so as to minimize subsequent suspicions. He comes in here at five to eleven, observed by Furbelow, knowing perfectly well that nothing on earth will make the old man put his nose into the room while Shorthouse is there. And he makes his final arrangements . . . Mudge, go and drop a length of rope through the skylight, will you. You needn't bother to attach it to the lift, but hang on to your end, and heave away when I give the word.' Mudge departed on this errand. ‘As you see,' Fen continued, ‘the other materials are already here.'

In due time the rope appeared through the skylight, accompanied by a sound of muffled panting from Mudge.

‘Now,' said Fen, ‘observe what Stapleton does. The skeleton represents Shorthouse, now unconscious from the drug.'

He took a piece of chalk from his pocket, and with it very lightly marked two points on the seat of the stool. Then, holding it where the marks were, he carried the stool to the skeleton and pressed the bones of the fingers and thumb against the wood in several carefully selected places.

‘We now have finger-prints,' he said, ‘appropriate to the theory of suicide.'

Putting the stool aside, he picked up the shorter length of rope from the floor, stood on a chair, and tied one end
of it firmly to the hook in the ceiling. The other end he arranged in a running noose, with a knot placed where the angle of the jaw would be. Then he climbed down, took the longer piece of rope, tied it round the wrists of the skeleton, and after a moment untied it again.

‘What on earth . . . ?' said Adam, mystified.

‘Ah,' said Fen. ‘That took me in, too. You see, Stapleton's plan involved tying Shorthouse's
ankles,
a fact which was quite impossible to conceal. The tying of the wrists too was merely a camouflage – the best he could devise. It wasn't bad, either. Anyway, it filled my head with quite a number of imbecile theories . . .'

He now fixed the longer rope around the waist of the skeleton, passed the free end over the hook and hauled. Drooping, the skeleton rose into the air. When it had reached a sufficient height, Fen tied his end of the rope to the door handle, took the stool, and adjusted it so that the feet of the skeleton rested on it. Then he again mounted his chair, and put the noose which hung from the ceiling about the neck. He inserted the cotton padding, and pulled the rope fairly tight.

‘Suicides often like to make themselves comfortable,' he said indistinctly over his shoulder, ‘which was a very good thing for Stapleton. It was most important that Shorthouse should not be strangled prematurely.'

He climbed down and took away the rope from the skeleton's waist. It sagged forward, the feet resting on the stool, the neck supported from the hook in the ceiling.

‘As you see, it needs a good deal of care,' said Fen. ‘But
given
care, Shorthouse could live quite a long time, even suspended in that fashion. The real problem is to avoid pushing the tongue back against the pharyngeal wall, and also to avoid putting pressure on the carotid sinus and the vagus nerves. But you'll notice that quite a lot of weight is taken by the feet.'

He now took the end of the rope which was hanging through the skylight and fastened it round the skeleton's ankles, with the knot at the back. A handkerchief from
his pocket served to remove his finger-prints from the chalk-marked places at which he had touched the stool. Finally, he untied the remaining length of rope from the door-knob and fastened it round one leg of the stool.

‘This,' he announced, pink with effort, ‘is a knot called the Highwayman's Hitch. You have to keep both ends in your hand. One of them will bear any amount of strain, but if you pull the other the whole knot comes undone.'

As he spoke, he was making rough loops in the two ends. With these in his hand, he climbed on to the chair for the last time, pushed them through the skylight, and hung them on the nail on the outside which Mudge had provided. The last thing he did was carefully to wipe the seat and back of the chair he had been using.

‘Now,' he said, ‘everything's ready. Stapleton leaves the room, and is conducted by Furbelow from the theatre. After a short interval he goes to a public box and telephones Dr Shand, saying that Shorthouse is in urgent need of medical help – for he must have a medical witness on the spot immediately after he has sprung his trap, or all this effort is wasted: that's to say, some reliable person must be there to swear that Shorthouse had
only just
died – ha died, in fact, long after Stapleton left the dressing-room. Stapleton can calculate, with some certainty, how long it will take Shand to get here – and if
he's
not available, there are other doctors whose addresses are in the telephone book. Then, just previous to the psychological moment, he re-enters the theatre, intending to lower the lift – only to find, my dear Adam, that you're engaged in doing it for him.'