Morgan shook his head.
"I suppose it's bad to run ahead of my story," he said, "but we've had so many mix-ups, setbacks, and dizzy confusions that one more out of place is comparatively small. The Etrusca arrived right enough, but Inspector Patrick isn't on her. He didn't sail at all. I don't know why; I don't make any sense of it at all; but the fact remains that if something isn't done the Barber will walk off that ship a free man in exactly three hours."
Dr. Fell sat back in his chair and for a moment he sat looking vacantly, and in a cross-eyed fashion, at the notes on the table.
"Um! H'm, yes! Hand me that A.B.C. on the tabouret there, will you? Thanks… What train d'jou take this morning? Seven fifty-three to Waterloo? So. Now, then… H'm yes! This would do it. I don't suppose by any chance you have a passenger-list of that ship with you?"
"Yes. I thought—"
"Hand it over." He flicked the pages rapidly until he found a name. Then he went very slowly through it, his
fingers following the list of cabins. When he found what he seemed to want, he made a comparison; but it was on the other side of the table and Morgan could not see precisely what had been done. "Now, then, excuse the old charlatan I moment. I am going to make some telephone-calls. Not Under torture would I reveal what I intend to do, or where's the fun of mystifying you, hey? Heh! There's no pleasure like mystification, my boy, if you can pull it off… As A matter of fact, I'm just going to wire the name of the murdered woman to Captain Whistler, with a few suggestions. Also it would be a good idea to ring up a branch of Victoria 7000 and make other suggestions. Have another bottle of beer."
lie lumbered across the room, chuckling fiendishly and Stamping his cane. When he returned, he was rubbing his hands in exultation behind a woman laden with the largest, most elaborately stocked lunch-tray Morgan had seen in a long time.
"Mash and sausage," he explained, inhaling sensuously. "Down here, Vida… Now, then. Let's get on with our story. There are several points on which I want to be enlightened, if you feel up to talking over the food. Your case, my boy, is the best surprise-package I've opened yet. With each separate event, I discover, there is no telling whether the thing is a water-pistol or a loaded automatic until you pull the trigger. In a way it's unique, because some of the best clues are only half-serious… "
"Question," said Morgan.
"1 exactly. Have you ever reflected," boomed Dr. Fell, tucking a napkin under his chin and pointing at his guest with a fork in the serene assumption that he had never reflected, "on old proverbs? On the sad state of affairs which makes old proverbs so popular, and so easy to quote, precisely because those old platitudes are the only maxims which to-day nobody believes? How many people really believe, for instance, 'honesty is the best policy'?—particularly if they happen to be honest themselves. How many people believe that 'early to bed and early to rise' have the e fleet designated? Similarly, we have the saw to the effect that many a true word is spoken in jest. A true application of
that principle would be too exciting; it would call for much more ingenuity and intelligence than most people are able to display; and it would make social life unendurable if; anybody for a moment believed that a true word could bespoken in jest — worse, for instance, than going out to] dinner with a crowd of psycho-analysts."
"What's all this?" said Morgan. "You can't hang a man on a joke.";
"Oh, they're not jokes. You have no idea as to the trend of this?"
"No." 1
Dr. Fell scribbled rapidly on a sheet of paper, and passed it over. i
"Here, for your further enlightenment," he said, frowning, "I have tabulated eight clues. Eight suggestions, if you; will. Not one of 'em is direct evidence — it's the direct evidence I'm looking for you to supply in your next instalment of the story. I feel fairly certain you will mention the evidence I want; and my hunch is so strong that I — like several others — will risk Whistler's official head on it. Eh?"
Morgan took the paper, which read
1. The Clue of Suggestion.
2. The Clue of Opportunity.
3. The Clue of Fraternal Trust.
4. The Clue of Invisibility.
5. The Clue of Seven Razors.
6. The Clue of Seven Radiograms.
7. The Clue of Elimination.
8. The Clue of Terse Style.
"It doesn't mean a devil of a lot to me," said Morgan. "The first two you could apply in any way you like… Wait! Don't puff and blow, sir! — I say 'you,' meaning myself. And I don't like to consider the suggestion of the third… But what about seven razors? We didn't find seven razors."
"Exactly," boomed the doctor, pointing his fork as though that explained it. "The point is that there probably were seven razors, you see. That's the point."
"You mean we ought to have looked for them?"
"Oh, no! The Barber would have got rid of the others. All you should have done was remember that they were seven. Eh?"
"And then," said Morgan, "this point about seven radiograms… What seven radiograms? There are only two radiograms I mentioned in my story."
"Ah, I should have explained about that," said Dr. Fell, skewering a sausage. "Seven — mystic number; rounded, complete, suggestive number with a curious history. I use it advisedly in place of the word 'several,' because we assume there were several. The interesting thing is that I Hill not referring to any radiograms you saw. You didn't see 'em. That's very significant, hey?"
"No, I'll be damned if it is," said Morgan, somewhat violently. "If we didn't see 'em—"
"Proceed, then," requested the doctor, waving a large flipper. "I feel positive that before you have finished I shall have noted down eight more clues — sixteen, say — by which we finish and round out our case."
Morgan cleared his throat and began.
PART TWO
13 — Two Mandarins
Among unthinking chroniclers it is much the fashion, at certain movements of mysticism, to embark on a reflection as to how, if it were not for such-and-such a small thing happening, then such-and-such a larger thing would not have happened, and so on until they have ultimately proved King Priam's bootblack responsible for the fall of Troy. Which is, demonstrably, nonsense.
Doubtless such a historian would say that all would yet have been well, when Curtis Warren was installed in a padded cell on D deck, if it were not for two tiny circumstances harmless in themselves. In proof of this he would point out that — if they had only known it — the conspirators were within an ace of catching the Blind Barber himself at least once that day; and there would have been no more lurid happenings aboard the Queen Victoria. The present chronicler does not believe it. Men go straight as a stream of liquid exterminator from the nozzle of the Mermaid Automatic Electric Bug-Powder Gun along the line (hat is determined by their characters, nor can any horseshoe nail affect their destinies. Curtis Warren, as may have been observed from time to time, was a fairly impetuous young man much influenced by the power of suggestion. If he had not got into more trouble one way, it would have been in another; and only a thoughtless quibbler could lay the blame on such excellent articles as a detective novel and a bottle of Scotch whisky.