A Puzzle for fools (25 page)

The following silence was taut and expectant. Everyone shifted in his chair; glances met glances and flicked uneasily apart. It had been a long, winding trail, but I could see the goal very close now.

John Clarke had moved across the room and was pausing by Dr. Lenz' assistant psychiatrist. He held out his hand and when he spoke, his tone was incisive.

"You'd better give me that paper, Dr. Moreno."

Moreno did not move. His dark face remained studiedly impassive. There was nothing to betray his feelings except the faintest gleam in his eyes.

Everyone else in the room was staring at him now— staring either in astonishment or apprehension. I myself felt slightly nervous. However strong one's convictions, it is not pleasant to accuse a man of murder.

Only Dr. Lenz seemed completely composed. His bearded face was alert as he watched Clarke move a little nearer the young psychiatrist

"I said you might as well hand it over, Dr. Moreno."

Moreno lifted an eyebrow. "Am I supposed to understand what you mean?"

"I think you will find it in your breast pocket," said Clarke softly. "Of course, if you want help, I can ..."

With an elaborate shrug, Moreno felt in his pocket and brought out a sheaf of papers. He glanced through them and finally selected one.

"This does not belong to me," he said, handing it casually to Clarke. "Perhaps it is what you are looking for."

The detective read through the paper and carried it in silence over to Green. Then he produced a large envelope from which he took two handkerchiefs.

"This is the handkerchief used to gag Mr. Geddes," he said quietly. "The other I found among Dr. Moreno's personal belongings. They're obviously the same make."

The captain examined the handkerchiefs carefully and then read the document. "So all the money was to go to Miss Brush," he grunted, "I guess this will's not worth much, but I can see why Laribee's son-in-law'd want to get hold of it." His gaze settled on Moreno. "Have you anything to say?"

The young psychiatrist shook his head. "Nothing that isn't so childishly obvious that it's scarcely worth mentioning."

"Even so," said Green grimly, "I should mention it."

"Very well." Moreno shot me a cold, indifferent look. "Mr. Duluth is my patient and the regulations of this institution state that the patient must always be right. But as Mr. Duluth by his histrionic ability seems to have put himself outside the category of patients, I presume I can tell him frankly what I think of his accusation."

"I'd be delighted," I said.

"In the first place, Mr. Duluth, your evidence seems rather trivial. You yourself have invested this sanitarium with a murderer who can practice everything from voice throwing to the most dexterous sleight-of-hand. Surely it would be simple for so talented an individual to plant the will in my pocket and also to borrow one of my handkerchiefs for his own purposes." He smiled a trifle maliciously. "The very fact that I still have the will in my possession should prove that I am not this versatile conjuror. If I had been, I should doubtless have secreted the document in Dr. Lenz' beard or Captain Green's pocket by this time."

I felt slightly nonplussed.

"And as for the will itself," continued Moreno, "Captain Green admits that it is almost certainly invalid. I cannot believe that your intelligent murderer would have risked so much to retrieve so worthless a document from your quaintly termed musical place. Personally I would never have dreamed of doing such a thing, particularly after you had told me that implausible story about Miss Powell and the will. In fact, if I may criticize your whole scene, I would call it so much theatrical poppycock."

"It's easy to deny you took the will," I retorted angrily.

"But the fact remains that you haven't been here long. You did come from California. You are a medical man, and at one time you were an actor. That seems like quite a lot of coincidences, doesn't it?"

"Quite a lot, Mr. Duluth." To my surprise, Miss Brush had turned toward me with the brightest of her bright smiles. Her voice was soft and sweet "I think you have worked out a splendid theory. I also admit that Dr. Moreno fills the bill very nicely. As you say, he comes from California, he is young, he is an excellent psychiatrist and at one time he was a very promising actor. But, unfortunately, he fails in the final test, Mr. Duluth. He is not Mr. Laribee's son-in-law."

I gazed at her stupidly. Green barked:

"How d'you know that?"

"I'm afraid I have indulged in no brilliant deductions," replied Miss Brush lightly. "I can't even lay any particular claims to feminine intuition. But I do know Dr. Moreno isn't Mr. Laribee's son-in-law for one very adequate reason. You see, he happens to be—my husband."

My self-assurance which, during the past few minutes, had been slipping fast, now collapsed completely. I went very red and felt as conspicuous a fool as I had ever felt in my life.

"Of course," continued the day nurse, switching on once again her disarming smile, "we have only been married two months. I should hate to suspect Dr. Moreno of bigamy, but you never can tell with these Latin races, can you?"

The awkward silence which followed this remark was mercifully short-lived. It was broken by a stifled, male laugh. I looked up to see John Clarke blowing his nose with that intensity which is always adopted to cover inappropriate amusement. Once more his laugh broke out, clear, unmistakable. With an apologetic glance at Captain Green, he rose and hurried out of the room.

My embarrassment turned to a sensation of complete desertion. My one remaining ally had now abandoned me.

"I seem to have amused him," said Miss Brush mildly.

There was another brief pause in which Green turned sharply to Dr. Lenz.

"Is what she says true?" he asked.

The director's eyes were twinkling. "To the best of knowledge. I myself attended the wedding and had great honor of giving the bride away."

"But why—why does she call herself Miss Brush?"

"She does so at my suggestion. It is a purely psychological move. Miss Brush's personality has an excellent therapeutic effect upon the patients. We all feel she would have less curative value if she were known to be a married woman." The director smiled benignly upon the day nurse. "Any man might be forgiven for considering bigamy after knowing Miss Brush. But I do not think that happened in the case of Dr. Moreno. Not only was he graduated with the highest distinction, he also has excellent record from every other point of view."

By now I realized I had met my Waterloo. But once suspicion had arisen in the captain's mind, he could not dismiss it lightly. He had turned back to the will and was reading it through again.

"I guess we may have to count Dr. Moreno out Laribee's son-in-law," he said suddenly. "But this will leaves over a million to Miss Brush. Strikes me that if he’s her husband, he has a pretty darn good motive for killing Laribee anyway."

"As you seem to be anxious for suspects and motives", broke in Miss Brush with alarming sweetness, "why not consider me, captain? After all, I should have an even stronger motive than my husband."

"This is no time to be funny," snapped Green.

"That's what I should have thought," continued the day nurse imperturbably. "But really, it was you who started it. You must admit that it's ridiculous to take that crazy will seriously. Why, if I murdered every patient who left me money, I'd have a dozen deaths to my credit already. Only last month a distinguished banker bequeathed me the Empire State Building. And sometime in December I was offered a check that would have balanced our national budget." Her voice grew crisp, official. "Don't you see you're wasting your time with that foolish will?"

She rose like a good-humored but very gorgeous tigress and strolled across the room. Before Green had time to do anything, she had plucked the document from his hand and was tearing it into tiny pieces. She tossed them like artificial snow to the carpet.

"That's what I think of the will," she remarked cheerfully. "Material evidence, or no material evidence."

For a moment Green stared at her dumbfounded. Then his neck went very red.

"I've had about enough of this monkeying around," he exclaimed truculently. "This isn't a circus, and if anyone else starts acting up, I'll have them arrested right away." He swung round on the director. "What I want is some straight evidence, Lenz. Do you or do you not think Dr. Moreno's the guilty party?"

"Frankly, I do not." The director shot me an indulgent glance. "I think Mr. Duluth has given us a brilliant précis of the motives behind these crimes. I also believe he is right on practically every point. His only mistake, as I see it, was to suspect Dr. Moreno."

This was the first sympathy I had received since my collapse. I felt grateful, though still extremely crestfallen.

"No," Lenz was continuing, "I cannot think Dr. Moreno guilty. Mr. Duluth, very naturally, stressed the theatrical side of this affair. And I am inclined to stress the medical. It is clear to me that the man we are looking for is not a very sound psychiatrist, and Dr. Moreno is an extremely accomplished one. No expert would have been as ambitious as Mr. Duluth's exposition has shown the murderer to have been. Dr. Moreno knows far too much, for example, ever to have attempted to influence Miss Pattison in that particular manner."

"I am grateful for the appreciation," remarked Moreno whose facial rigidity had relaxed slightly now. "It is a relief to have this business discussed intelligently."

The director did not move his gaze from me. His expression was rather apologetic now. "There is also one other rather conclusive fact which Mr. Duluth overlooked. Mr. Laribee was on the walk when he heard his broker's voice. In our daily routine none of the psychiatrists ever accompany the patients when they take their exercise. In that particular instance Dr. Moreno could not possibly have been present."

Lenz had found the worst flaw in my argument against Moreno and I saw that once and for all he had blown it higher than a kite.

His voice was running on placidly. "You have yet to witness my strait-jacket demonstration, captain. I think that should make things a little clearer."

He rose and moved into the adjoining examination room. Soon he returned.

"In all this excitement, we have forgotten our patient," he said. "Mr. Geddes has recovered from his attack. He should soon be with us and then I shall be free to use the strait-jacket to explain my point."

"To hell with the strait-jacket and your demonstration!" cried Green whose patience was rapidly slipping from its monument. "I don't give a damn about who got who into a strait-jacket. All I want to know is—if you don't suspect Moreno, who do you suspect?"

"You will remember," replied the director mildly, "that before Mr. Duluth began his exegesis, I sent Warren downstairs to keep an eye on a particular inmate of this sanitarium. My own deductions had led me up a similar path to that of Mr. Duluth. I, too, felt that the murderer must be Mr. Laribee's son-in-law, but instead of suspecting Dr. Moreno, I suspected this other individual. Perhaps if Mr. Duluth had had more time to think, he might have come to the same conclusion. Like Dr. Moreno, this other man is young. He comes from California. And I surmise he must have some knowledge of medicine. You will see for yourself that he is a most accomplished actor."

Amid suitably impressed silence, Dr. Lenz leaned over the desk and put his finger on the bell.

"I told Warren to bring this man here when I rang," he explained pleasantly.

The director had built up to a far more sensational climax than mine. His sonorous voice had instilled into his audience a dramatic intensity. We all started when, almost immediately after he rang the bell, the door opened to reveal Clarke and Geddes.

"Ah, Mr. Geddes, I do hope you feel better now," exclaimed Lenz. "You and Mr. Clarke are in time to witness the demonstration, after all. I was just telling these people what an admirable plan you and Mr. Duluth worked out. My only criticism is that I believe you had the wrong son-in-law."

"It's quite possible," said the Englishman with a sleepy smile. "We were both pretty mixed up anyway."

As the two newcomers crossed to the wall and stood there together, the director turned back to Captain Green. "You have an extremely intelligent young man on your staff," he said with seeming irrelevance. "Personally I should strongly recommend Mr. Clarke for promotion, for it was he who really gave me the clue to this mystery."

"What d'you mean?" asked the captain.

"This afternoon when we had our session here," continued Lenz, "he asked me if one could pretend insanity convincingly enough to delude the authorities. I told him one could but, on thinking the matter over, I realized that there was one particular thing which no one could do. It is easy enough to simulate symptoms, but however skilled in medicine one may be, it is practically impossible to fake a convincing reaction to treatment, especially when one does not know what treatment one is getting. My own candidate for son-in-law has been doing just that. Ever since he came here, his response to treatment has been puzzling all of us on the staff."

While half-audible queries sputtered like damp fireworks from his audience, the director rose pontifically to his feet.

"We are ready now for the demonstration," he announced. "As you recall, it was my contention that a person could get out of a strait-jacket unaided. Well, look."

He crossed to the door of the little examining room and threw it open. His gesture was so dramatic that I completely forgot how Geddes' reappearance in the director’s office had already proved his point.

The others seemed to have been affected in the same way. We all crowded around Lenz and eagerly followed the direction of his pointing finger.

The examining room was, of course, empty. On the settee, gray and limp, lay the strait-jacket.

"As you see—" Lenz was tapping the walls, a solemn, satisfied wizard—"there is no second door to this room, no secret panel. Of course, the window was open and someone might conceivably have come through it to assist Mr. Geddes' escape. But that drain-pipe is very difficult to climb up."