“There’s a way of proving it, you know,” said Ellery with a sort of pity. “In the desk in the study downstairs there’s Tolland Stuart’s will, and that will is signed with Tolland Stuart’s signature. Shall we ask you, Mr. Park, to write the name Tolland Stuart for comparison purposes?”
Dr. Junius said: “Don’t!” in a despairing burst, but the old man shook his head. “It’s no use, Junius. We’re caught.” He lay back on the pillows, closing his eyes.
“And there were other indications,” said Ellery. “The way Dr. Junius acted last Sunday. He put up a colossal bluff. He knew there was no Tolland Stuart upstairs. He was expecting Park; our sudden appearance must have made him frantic. When we finally came up here and found Park, who must have blundered about after sneaking into a house he’s never been in before, found Stuart’s room, and hastily got into Stuart’s night-clothes, Junius was so surprised he fled. He hadn’t heard those airplane engines. Oh, it was all cleverly done; Mr. Park is an excellent actor, and he was told everything he must know to play his part perfectly. After Sunday, of course, he was given further instruction.”
“Then the doctor here was Bascom’s confederate?” asked the Inspector, open-mouthed.
“Of course. As was Mr. Park, although he’s the least culpable, I suspect, of the three.
“Now, convinced that Tolland Stuart was being impersonated, I could find only one plausible reason for it. Lew’s plans depended on Stuart’s remaining alive until after the murder of Blythe and Bonnie; if Tolland Stuart was being impersonated, then it could only mean that Tolland Stuart was dead. When had he died? Well, I knew Stuart had been alive four days before the murder of Jack—”
“How did you know that?”
“Because on that day, when Blythe and Jack visited here, she saw him, for one thing; she might have spotted an impersonation. But more important, he gave her a check for a hundred and ten thousand dollars, which she turned over to Jack. Would Stuart’s bank have honored Stuart’s signature if it had not been genuine? So I knew that four days before the murders Stuart had still been in the land of the living.
“Apparently, then, Stuart had died between that day and the following Sunday. Probably Saturday night, the night before the crime, because we know Lew got hold of Park Sunday, hurried him up here under the most difficult and dangerous conditions — something he would not have done Sunday had he been able to do it before Sunday. So I imagine Dr. Junius telephoned Lew Saturday night to say Tolland Stuart had suddenly died, and Lew thought of Park, and instructed the doctor to bury his benefactor in a very deep hole, and immediately got busy on the Park angle. Park left a suicide note to efface his trail and vanished — to turn up here the next day as Bonnie’s grandfather.”
“This is — extraordinary,” said Jacques Butcher, staring from Junius to Park. “But why? What did Park and Junius hope to get out of it?”
“Park? I believe I can guess. Park, as I knew from Lew himself long ago, is dying of cancer. He’s penniless, has a wife and crippled son back East dependent on him. He knew he couldn’t last long, and for his family a man will do almost anything — a certain type of man — if there’s enough money in it to insure his family’s security.
“Dr. Junius? I have the advantage of you there; I’ve read Tolland Stuart’s will. In it he engaged to pay the doctor a hundred thousand dollars if the doctor kept him alive until the age of seventy. From the wording of the will and its date — it was made out at the age of sixty and was dated nine and a half years ago — it was obvious that Stuart had died at the age of sixty-nine and a half. Dr. Junius had spent almost ten years of his life in a living hell to earn that hundred thousand. He wasn’t going to let a mere matter of a couple of murders stand in the way of his getting it. Nevertheless, he wouldn’t have risked his neck unless he felt reasonably certain Stuart wouldn’t live to reach the age of seventy. Consequently, I was convinced that, far from being a healthy man, Stuart was really a very sick man; and that Junius was putting on an act when he claimed his patient was just a hypochondriac. I was convinced that Stuart, who I knew had died suddenly, had died probably of his illness — not accidentally or through violence, since violence was the last thing Lew wanted in the case of the old man.”
“There’s something,” whispered Dr. Junius, “of the devil in you.”
“I imagine the shoe fits you rather better,” replied Ellery. “And, of course, it must have been you who supplied Lew Bascom with the morphine and the sodium allurate in the proper dose — no difficult feat for a physician.”
“I went into it with Bascom,” said Dr. Junius in the same whisper, “because I knew Stuart wouldn’t survive. When he engaged me nine and a half years ago he had a badly ulcerated condition of the stomach. I treated him faithfully, but he developed a cancer, as so often occurs. I felt... cheated; I knew he probably wouldn’t live to reach seventy. When Bascom approached me, I fell in with his scheme. Bascom knew, too, that the old man was dying. In a sense our — interests lay in the same direction: I wanted Stuart to live to seventy, and Bascom wanted him to live until after Blythe and Bonnie Stuart were...” He stopped and wet his lips. “Bascom had got the cooperation of Park, here, in advance, just in case the old man died prematurely, as he did. Park had plenty of time to study his physical rôle.”
“You animal,” said Bonnie.
Dr. Junius said nothing more; he turned his face to the wall. And the old man in the bed seemed asleep.
“And since Park had a cancer, too,” said Ellery, “and couldn’t live very long, it was just dandy all around, wasn’t it? When he died, there’d be nobody to suspect he wasn’t Stuart; and even an autopsy would merely have revealed that he died of cancer, which was perfectly all right. And by that time, too, he’d have grown real hair, instead of the false hair and spirit gum he’s got on his face now. Oh, an ingenious plan.” He paused, and then he said: “It makes me feel a little sick. Do you sleep well at night, Dr. Junius?”
And after a moment Glücke asked doggedly: “But Bascom didn’t know exactly when Stuart would die. You still haven’t answered the question of how he could control the old man before he died, how he could be sure the old man wouldn’t make out a new will.”
“That was simple. The old will, the present will, existed; all Lew had to do was see — probably through Junius — that the old man didn’t get his hands on his own will. Then, even if he did make out a new will, they could always destroy it, leaving the old will in force.
“When Stuart died prematurely, it was even simpler. There would be no question of a new will at all. Park, playing Stuart’s role, couldn’t make out a new one, even if he wanted to. The old will would remain, as it has remained, the will in force.
“Incidentally, I was sure Lew would fall for our trap today. With Park dying of cancer, his survival for even a short time doubtful, Lew couldn’t permit Bonnie and Ty to vanish for an indefinite period. If Park died while they were off on their honeymoon at an unknown place, Lew’s whole scheme was nullified. His scheme was based on Bonnie’s dying before her grandfather, to conceal the true motive. If he killed Bonnie — and Ty, as he would have to — after the death of Park-acting-as-Stuart, his motive would be clearly indicated. So I knew he would take any risk to kill Bonnie and Ty before they went away and while Park was still alive.”
Ellery sighed and lit a fresh cigarette, and no one said anything until Inspector Glücke, with a sudden narrowing of his eyes, said: “Park. You there — Park!”
But the old man in the bed did not answer, or move, or give any sign that he had heard.