Dr. Poggioli: Criminologist (The Lost Classics Book 14) Read online

  “Well, you might have been hypnotized,” said the psychologist. “Hypnotized?” cried Olsen.

  “Hypnotized—” wavered Mordag.

  “Yes, damn it, hypnotized,” ejaculated the psychologist in an annoyed tone. “Merely because hypnosis is somewhat unusual, you want to rule it out of the evidence. He has hypnotized you, hasn’t he, Mordag?”

  “That was a long time ago, sir.”

  “Really,” said Olsen, “this is getting too melodramatic even for the Dispatch.” There was nothing more to be found on that side, and the three men walked back to Mordag’s room. Poggioli went at once to the window with a hole in it. The bullet seemed to have entered from the outside. He lifted the sash and looked at the outside of the pane. Then he saw the putty had been pried out of the mullions and the pane taken out and reversed. This reversed the apparent course of the bullet.

  He then examined the body of Tapper in the chair by the bed. A stain on the carpet which must have trickled down one of the chair legs fitted to a leg with no stain on it. The stained leg was at the opposite corner of the chair. He showed these things to Olsen.

  “You see, the window pane and the chair have been reversed.” The reporter stood nodding slowly to these findings.

  “That’s one of the cleverest tricks I ever heard of.”

  “It seems to be a crime of some complication,” admitted the docent. “For example, why should a man who can disappear so easily take all these pains to shift the direction of his bullet?”

  “I don’t think he disappeared so easily,” said Olsen. “Climbing up or down a skyscraper isn’t easy.”

  “He didn’t climb a skyscraper.”

  “Why didn’t he?”

  “Because there were no marks on the dust on the ledge.” The reporter went blank.

  “You—you don’t suppose the fellow had some sort of pocket parachute so he could jump out?”

  “No, I think you can rule that out.”

  “Then he escaped somehow inside the closet—it was really he holding that door?” inquired Olsen incredulously.

  “Apparently—and, also, apparently that is how he entered this apartment last night and shot Tapper; through the closet. If he had ever come out of the closet, you know, Tapper, sitting there watching, would have moved.”

  Olsen pondered—

  “Then I see just one thing left for us to do, Mr. Poggioli.”

  “What’s that?”

  “See if he comes out of this closet tonight.”

  “You mean, watch as Tapper did?”

  “With greater precautions, of course. We understand it’s dangerous now. We’ll be on our guard.”

  At this point he was interrupted by a sudden knocking at the door. It startled all three of the men. The next moment the bolt clicked and the door swung open. Three policemen, the coroner, the hotel clerk, the floor matron, and behind them a rabble blocked off the room. One policeman kept the crowd out of the doorway.

  “The paper is out,” said Olsen in an aside to the docent. “We kept this quiet until the 1:15 edition.”

  Sure enough, from the court, they could hear a newsboy shrilling: “Mysterious murder of reporter! Newspaper sleuth shot by Professor Herman La Plesse from empty room across court! All about the new murder in the Gaylord Morning mystery!”

  V

  The late evening editions of all the Columbus papers carried a revised version of the Tapper murder mystery. The origin of the bullet was located not across the court of the Vendig, but in Gaylord Morning’s own clothes closet. The coroner’s verdict was that Tapper met death at the hands of an unknown person.

  Newsboys were crying these new facts up and down the streets. Their calls echoed now plainly, now faintly, in the tall, chimney-like court of the hotel.

  A drizzling rain set past the windows of Mordag’s apartment, a gray descending veil with its suggestion of some melancholy eternity.

  Three men sat in the apartment, watching the man in bed. Each was buried in his own thoughts concerning the sinister surroundings. The sick man was asleep. “What I don’t see,” said Olsen at last, “is how Mr. Morning gets to sleep— expecting a terrible visitation the moment he drops off—yet he always does and seems to rest profoundly.”

  “Rests?” questioned the third man sitting by the bed—he was a physician. “Sleep is supposed to rest one,” said Olsen.

  “Look at him now; does he look like a man who has been getting rest?”

  Both Olsen and Poggioli glanced at the emaciated figure on the bed. The man had grown more drawn even within the forty-eight hours Poggioli had known him.

  “Is there really nothing physically the matter with him, Doctor?” inquired Olsen incredulously.

  “Complete exhaustion, that’s all. No organic weakness; heart, lungs, nerves normal within the physical limitation of his exhausted condition.”

  “So all that troubles him is shock and fear?”

  “That’s enough,” said the physician dryly. “It has killed thousands of men and will kill thousands more. It would not surprise me greatly if he doesn’t get through the night.”

  “Would the fact that he thinks he is going to die tonight have a bad influence?” asked Olsen.

  “Why certainly.”

  “Even when he is sound asleep, as he is now?”

  “I would hazard that his fear would operate more devastatingly, more uncontrolled asleep than awake.” The physician stared out into the darkening drizzle. “It has sometimes occurred to me that what you might call reality is not the houses and air and men and women which surround us. They are more in the nature of walls cutting off reality, making us, for the moment, oblivious to reality.”

  “Then what is reality?” queried the reporter.

  “It is our unconditioned selves, our subconscious. When we sleep we are lost in reality; possibly, when we die.”

  Olsen shook his big shoulders.

  “I think I’ll stick around with the unreal boys and girls as long as I can.” He paused a moment and then added gloomily, “If he dies of simple fright after all this melodramatic prologue, that will be one hell of an anticlimax from a journalistic point of view.”

  The physician arose and smiled.

  “There’s a lot of journalistic waste goes on in the world . . . Well, I don’t believe there is anything further that I can do here, and I certainly don’t care to sit here all night considering the surroundings. You gentlemen mean to?”

  “That is our intention,” said Poggioli.

  “You have a better courage than I have. I certainly hope nothing untoward happens tonight.”

  “Thanks, Doctor.”

  The medical man bowed slightly and let himself out the door. Olsen looked after him in the gloom.

  “Untoward—he hopes nothing untoward happens tonight. I like that untoward; it certainly is a hell of a decent wish he made us.”

  “Scholastic,” said Poggioli. The docent arose briskly.

  “Well, let’s make ready to receive our guest in event he does come, and try to see that nothing untoward does happen here tonight.”

  “What are you going to do?”

  “First, I’d like to find out exactly what is in this room.”

  “What’s the idea?”

  “You may remember that was Mordag’s own knife that fell off the transom. It had been given to him by La Plesse.”

  “That’s true.”

  “Well, doesn’t it seem odd that a man who came into an apartment intending foul play should depend upon his enemy to furnish him a knife?”

  “He visits the apartment every night; he knew about the knife.”

  “But he writes his notes on strips of Mordag’s newspapers. Apparently if Mordag would just hide his things he would have this fellow checkmated.” Olsen nodded in the gloom and made a note in his book.

  “I wonder if he has used anything else?”

  “That’s why I want to search the apartment—to find out.”

  The two men set to
work, paying no attention to the figure on the bed. There was no use in asking the thin man’s permission. When Mordag had discovered no flying machine was to be provided him he had collapsed.

  In the room was a box with a green cover. The docent searched Mordag’s pockets, found his keys and opened the box. It contained a number of bizarre red and black suits which the thin man evidently had worn during his employment as the magician’s famulus. A lower tray contained a pot-pourri of used magical equipment. Probably La Plesse gave his discarded equipment to his assistant.

  In one compartment were bottles of chemicals, and among these was a vial of prussic acid.

  The docent picked it up.

  “This would have disposed of the cat without a quiver,” he said. Olsen looked at the tiny bottle in surprise.

  “You don’t really suppose La Plesse comes here empty handed?” he asked. “He had a pistol last night,” said the docent.

  “Well, there’s nothing more in this box. Let’s see if we can find it somewhere else.”

  The room obviously contained nothing else, so they went into the closet. Here was a wardrobe trunk. The docent swung it apart and began going through the drawers. Pretty soon he paused with a whistle.

  “All right, here it is.”

  “The gun—the automatic?”

  “Yes, a .38; that’s the caliber.” The reporter shook his head.

  “That’s ridiculous. You know a criminal wouldn’t enter a room hoping to find a pistol to commit a murder with!”

  “La Plesse didn’t come into this apartment last night to commit a murder,” argued the docent. “He came to terrorize Mordag. When he saw Tapper in here he resorted to violence.”

  “But how did he get this pistol if it was locked up?”

  “Mordag says bolts and locks are not in his way. He probably got the automatic out of this trunk as easily as picking it up off a table.”

  “This may not be the gun after all,” said Olsen. “There must be thousands of .38 automatics.”

  “No, it may not be.” The docent drew out his handkerchief, made a twist and thrust it into the muzzle. The cloth came out clean. He said, “Smokeless powder leaves almost no fouling at all.”

  “You mean it may have been fired.”

  “It’s clean, but I’m not sure.”

  “We could fire it, get its bullet and compare its rifle lines with the one you found.”

  “That would be microscopic work for a technical man,” said Poggioli. “We couldn’t get a report for another forty-eight hours.”

  “And this performance concludes tonight,” said the reporter.

  “Yes, and tonight I’m going to hold this particular automatic in my hand. If La

  Plesse shoots me he will have to bring something with him for once.”

  “I imagine,” said Olsen slowly, “that he will bring it.” After their search the two men fell silent. As night deepened in the windows on the court, the watchers could hardly distinguish each other.

  At last Poggioli said— “What had we better do about lights?”

  “My idea is to stay as much in the dark as we can. Tapper had a bright light.”

  “There are two spots I want brightly lighted,” said the docent in an undertone. “Where’s that?” inquired Olsen. “The closet and the door?”

  “The closet’s one,” assented the docent softly, “but I don’t believe he comes in the door—the matron never has seen him enter.”

  “How does he get in then?”

  “Haven’t the faintest idea.”

  “Well, we’ll light up the closet.”

  The dark bulk of Olsen moved silently across the gloom and a moment later the closet was full of light. The reporter repassed against it in silhouette.

  The light in the closet gave the creepy impression that it was about to be used and that it was really the entrance to the room.

  “Look here,” whispered Olsen. “He got out of the window on the other side. Better put our second light there.”

  “He got out of the closet on the other side,” stated the psychologist. “You felt him twisting the bolt against you, didn’t you?”

  “Ye-es—Then he isn’t human,” ejaculated the reporter.

  “Now you’ve seen dozens of illusionists do cabinet tricks on the very same principle,” whispered the docent satirically, “but when you see a single instance off the stage, you say it isn’t human.”

  “They were trick cabinets,” said the reporter in an injured tone.

  “You assumed they were trick cabinets.”

  “Why, they have to be.”

  “Did you ever hear of the fourth dimension?” The reporter remained silent a moment.

  “I hope you are not going to bring that in.”

  “Why not? We have every mathematical proof that it exists. It is mathematically no more difficult to step inside of a completely enclosed cube than it is to step inside a completely enclosed square drawn on the floor.”

  “Oh, my God!” whispered the reporter.

  “That is if a man has the intelligence to do it, and, possibly, some practice.” The reporter gave a grunt of stifled mirth.

  “Must be hell—getting the practice.”

  At that moment a faint noise in the closet snapped off the low conversation. The psychologist arose noiselessly with that tightening of his muscles that precedes violent action. He moved around the closet door to see inside. The faint noise continued. Presently Poggioli stood looking steadfastly at something.

  “What is it?” whispered Olsen at last. “A mouse.”

  After another wait, the reporter whispered a trifle nervously— “Well—what of it?”

  “Why if a man should step through the wall it would be no more terrifying to the mouse than if he stepped through the door. What it feels isn’t in our realm of consciousness at all.”

  “Of course not,” agreed Olsen in a nervous tone. “I wish you wouldn’t—” He broke off and finally added, “Expecting to be killed by a superman is bad enough. I don’t want to sit here and wonder what a mouse would think about it.”

  “Excuse me, when I’m excited and nervous I—I think of things.” Both men broke off in a silence tense with listening and watching.

  “I wish I knew the sort of tricks La Plesse could do,” whispered Olsen. “I never realized before what a touchy job it would be trying to catch a—”

  “By the way!” rapped out Poggioli in an undertone, “that second light—I want it over Mordag’s bed.”

  “Mr. Morning’s bed!”

  “Yes, the person who visits this apartment has really never harmed Mordag in any way.”

  “No, that’s true,” agreed the reporter.

  “Whoever it is comes in here writes notes, leaves poison, shoots poor Tapper;

  but the man he ostensibly wants to murder has slept through it all—slept.”

  “Hypnotized as you suggested,” said Olsen.

  “I don’t know about that. At any rate he has never received a scratch or a blow.”

  “What do you make of it?”

  “At present I don’t make anything of it. But that is my reason for wanting Mordag’s bed in full light—his reading lamp will do.”

  The psychologist moved across to the bed to turn on the light when the faint noise stirred in the closet again. It caused both men to start, when at the next moment a blurred tapping began at the window.

  Poggioli instinctively got the automatic out of his pocket.

  “That’s the buzzer of our private line,” explained Olsen sharply. He strode across to it in the shadows.

  “Hello . . . hello . . . hello . . .” he began saying in a barely audible voice. “This is Olsen, Mr. Morning’s apartment....What? . . . You don’t mean—”

  He broke off; Poggioli could see his bulk standing motionless with the receiver to his ear. Finally he turned to the docent and said in a bleak voice:

  “Manderby, the city editor says—” he began speaking in the receiver again— “
you say you have received a facsimile of the burial certificate by telegraph?”

  “What is it? Who’s buried?” cried Poggioli, staring at the shape of the reporter.

  “Manderby’s been tracing down La Plesse,” whispered Olsen in a shocked voice. “The fellow died three years ago. He’s buried in the cemetery at Olagoula, Louisiana.”

  The psychologist made a single step across and switched on the reading lamp at the head of Mordag’s bed. The bed was empty.

  What happened next Poggioli never clearly knew. Olsen shouted: “He’s in the closet! Got a gun! Dodge!”

  The docent made a headlong leap to get out of range of the door. He heard two deafening reports. He saw Mordag firing the pistol from the brightly lighted small room. Olsen lunged at him from the shadows. His powerful form went straight into the thin man. The two crashed back into the closet out of sight.

  Poggioli suddenly became aware that the pistol he had had in his hand was gone. He lunged into the closet where the two men were struggling. He saw Olsen trying to twist the automatic from Mordag, who was trying to fire it. Poggioli rushed in as the reporter wheezed out—

  “For God’s sake get that gun!”

  The psychologist bent aside from the muzzle of the automatic, caught the body of the weapon and began trying to break it loose from the thin man’s fingers.

  Olsen suddenly loosed the gun hand and struck at the fellow’s jaw, evidently hoping to knock him out. The next moment all three men were down on the closet floor with Poggioli being swung back and forth by the terrific arm that held the automatic. It might have been a beam of some machinery. The thin man was prodigious. Poggioli curled up and got the wrist in the crotch of his legs and began twisting the gun in the man’s steely fingers. Olsen was under Poggioli trying to get a strangle hold on this devil of a man. The two had him at full length with his head out the closet door.

  “Get a rope! Get a strip of sheet! Get something!” panted the reporter. “Got to get this gun!”

  “Hell, haven’t you got that gun yet!”

  “Not yet.”

  Olsen detached a hand from the business of choking the thin man and reached up to help.