“But you still weren’t out of the woods,” remarked Mr. Queen. “Because Goossens and Rummell and I had seen you bald, toothless, clean-shaven, and without glasses — really quite denuded, Mr. De Carlos — at the time you passed yourself off as Cole. Obviously, in abandoning your plan, you had to plan to present yourself in our society looking entirely different! You had to get yourself a wig — in Cuba, was it? — put back your plate and glasses, and of course it was immediately after Cole told you he had left you a million that you began to grow a beard.”
“Wait a minute.” Beau frowned. “There’s one thing I don’t get — that handwriting business. This worm did write out a check, signing Cole’s name to it, and the bank did pass it. How come? Even the signature on the will—”
“Ah,” said Mr. Queen, “that was the beautiful part of it — the part that was so slick and pat that upon it we based a wholly erroneous theory. That handwriting business was the crux of your illusion, wasn’t it, De Carlos? It made the whole fantastic project possible. Who would dream that the man who visited us was not Cole when we saw him sign Cole’s name before our eyes and the check went through the bank without a hitch?
“But Captain Angus has already given us the answer to that.” De Carlos slumped in his seat, drunk and sullen. “Cole’s arthritis! Arthritis deformans is a crippling disease of the joints for which, once it has fully developed — and it develops very quickly — there’s no known cure. It’s accompanied by a great deal of pain—”
“Pain?” The Captain made a face. “Mr. Cole used to go near crazy with it. He took from sixty to a hundred and twenty grains of aspirin a day for relief as long as I knew him. I used to tell him he ought to leave the sea, because the damp air only made the pain worse, but I guess he was too sensitive about his crippled hands to go back to a landsman’s society.”
Ellery nodded. “And the Captain said his hands were so badly misshapen that he had to be fed — couldn’t even handle a knife and fork. Obviously, then, he couldn’t write, either.
“But if he couldn’t write, that was the answer to the handwriting problem. Cole was an immensely wealthy man and, even though he had retired, his far-flung holdings must have necessitated an occasional signature on a legal paper. And of course there was the problem of signing checks. He couldn’t carry his fortune about with him in cash. Solution? Good Man Friday, who’d been with him for more than twenty-five years.
“Certainly at the time arthritis struck him — which must have been just before he made his post-War killing in Wall Street — De Carlos had been Cole’s trusted lieutenant long enough to serve as a useful pair of hands in place of the hands Cole found useless.
“So he had De Carlos begin signing the name ‘Cadmus Cole’ to everything, including checks. To save tedious explanation, and because he was sensitive about his deformity, as Captain Angus has indicated, he wished to keep his condition a secret. He had you open new accounts in different banks, didn’t he, De Carlos? So that from the beginning of his monastic existence, his name in your handwriting wasn’t questioned!”
“You mean to say,” demanded Captain Angus, “that De Carlos didn’t tell you gentlemen that?”
“Overlooked it,” said Beau dryly.
“But I don’t see— Why, he signed Cole’s will for the old gentleman! He had to, because Mr. Cole couldn’t even hold a pen, as Mr. Queen says. After I typed out the will, I signed as witness and took the will to the radio operator’s cubby, where Sparks signed, too. Then I brought the will back to Mr. Cole’s cabin, and he sent for De Carlos, and De Carlos signed Mr. Cole’s name, I suppose, after I left. I noticed while I was there,” the Captain chuckled, “that Mr. Cole didn’t let De Carlos see what was in the will. Having his little joke to the last.”
“Just the same,” retorted Beau, “it seems to me for a smart hombre Cole was taking one hell of a chance letting this De Carlos potato sign his checks!”
“Not really,” said Ellery. “I imagine Cole kept a close watch on you, didn’t he, De Carlos? Probably supervised the accounts, and then you were at sea practically all the time, where you couldn’t get into mischief even if you wanted to.”
“Hold!” said Beau. “Hold. There’s another thing. This monkey tried to buy us off. Offered us twenty-five grand to quit poking our noses into the case. Why?”
“Excellent question,” agreed Mr. Queen. “Why?” De Carlos squirmed. “Then I’ll tell you. Because you’d lost most of Cole’s legacy by gambling, ill-advised market speculation, night-clubbing, the cutey route, general all-around helling — it didn’t take you long to run through what was left of the million after taxes were deducted, did it, De Carlos? And so there you were, almost broke, and the golden goose lying fathoms under. You conceived another brilliant idea.”
“You’re the devil himself,” said De Carlos thickly.
“Please,” protested Mr. Queen. “Is that fair to the Old ’Bub? With the woman who posed as Margo Cole dead, and with Kerrie Shawn, the other heiress, arrested and — you fervently hoped — slated for conviction and execution, that left the huge principal of the Cole estate free of heirs and completely in the hands of its trustees. And who were they? Goossens and your worthy self! Does that suggest anything, Mr. De Carlos?”
Beau stared. “Don’t tell me Mr. Smart was going to make another deal to milk the estate — with Goossens, this time!”
“The firm of Ellery Queen, Inc. being out of the picture,” murmured Mr. Queen, “I daresay that was the general idea. And I’ve no doubt whatever but that Mr. Goossens is as ignorant this moment, De Carlos, of your second plan as the good Captain here was of your first.”
De Carlos struggled to his feet. “You’ve been very clever, Mis — Mis’er Queen—”
“Incidentally,” remarked Mis’er Queen, “let me congratulate you on your forbearance. Of course you knew from the very first that Beau Rummell wasn’t Ellery Queen, because you met us both three months, ago in our proper identities, when you were pretending to be Cole. But you couldn’t unmask us without revealing how you came to know, so you maintained a discreet silence. Truly a Chestertonian situation!”
“What you go — going to do about it?” demanded Mr. De Carlos, leering. “Huh, Mis’er Queen?”
“For the present, nothing.”
“Thought sh — so!” said De Carlos contemptuously. “Jus’ a lot o’ wind. Farewell, gen’l’men. C’m’up an’ see me shome — some time!”
He staggered to the door and disappeared.
“I think,” said Captain Angus with a certain grimness, “I’ll accept his invitation right now. Help you keep an eye on him. I’ve nothing better to do, anyway.”
“That would be fine, Captain,” said Mr. Queen heartily. “We can’t have him leaving on a sudden jaunt to Indo-China, can we?”
The Captain chuckled, snatched his coat and hat, and hurried after De Carlos.
“Now that we’re back where we started from, what are we going to do?” Beau hurled a paper-knife at the opposite wall. It stuck, quivering.
“Good shot,” said Mr. Queen abstractedly. “Oh, we’re doing it.”
“Doing what?”
“Sitting here engaged in a furious cerebration. At least I am, and I suggest you buckle down, too. We haven’t much time. We promised dad a prisoner in twenty-four hours, and that gives us only until late tomorrow morning.”