“The man has committed criminal acts,” Mr. Schuyler was saying, “and I can prove it. He was not so clever as he thinks!” He pointed to a security camera high on the wall behind the librarian’s desk. “You see? I have the evidence. And will you believe, children? He returned to the library the very same day! Well! What do you think happened?”
“You called the police,” Reynie said, privately admiring Mr. Benedict’s ingenuity, for it was plain to him what Mr. Benedict had done. First he’d determined whether Mr. Curtain had ever seen these papers (that was why he’d asked if the librarians recognized him). Then he’d tried to make sure that if his twin ever did come to the library, he would be arrested.
“Indeed,” said Mr. Schuyler. “I called the police. Nor was it the first time I had called them that day, for earlier the men with the briefcases had come. You have heard about these men?”
“The Ten Men?” asked Constance, and the other children tried not to show their alarm. Constance instantly realized she had spoken imprudently, but it was too late.
Luckily Mr. Schuyler was too interested in hearing himself speak to pay close attention to what a tiny girl said. “Ten men?” he repeated absently. “No, you have heard wrong. There were only two. Although they were as dangerous as ten, perhaps even more. They arrived soon after the American man and the pencil woman had left. I was in the courtyard — my position requires much coming and going from the museum, you see —” (The children understood this to mean Mr. Schuyler often went into the courtyard to smoke his pipe and read the paper.) “— and I saw them enter the gate, but I thought nothing of them until I heard the screams.”
At this Mr. Schuyler turned to give Sophie’s hand a comforting pat, but Sophie quickly withdrew her hand, so Mr. Schuyler patted the arm of his chair, as if this were a perfectly normal thing and just what he’d intended to do.
“The men demanded to see any materials connected to the name ‘Benedict,’” Sophie interjected, “as well as anything that had been requested by previous visitors to the library that day. I knew what they must be seeking, but as I told you, I was at first too frightened to speak. And then —”
“Yes, the screams were terrible,” Mr. Schuyler continued, as if Sophie hadn’t spoken at all, “but they did alert me to the situation, and when these men came out again, I charged at them from behind the bench —” (From this the children gathered that Mr. Schuyler had peeked over the top of the bench, behind which he was no doubt cowering in terror.) “— but one of them pointed a deadly device at me. My reflexes are excellent, and I ducked my head, though not quickly enough to avoid injury.” Gingerly he touched the white bandage on the crown of his head. “I suffered a great loss of blood, and of course, all of my hair.”
The children raised their eyebrows, and Kate stifled a snicker. Judging from the size and placement of the bandage, there couldn’t have been more than a half-dozen hairs on Mr. Schuyler’s head to begin with. But it did appear he had sustained injury.
“They said I should be glad I was not taller,” Mr. Schuyler reflected. “Then they laughed and went away, and I called the police.”
“Actually, it was Eda who called the police, Mr. Schuyler,” said Sophie quietly. “You called the ambulance. Because of your injury.”
Mr. Schuyler made an irritated gesture with his pipe. “The details are unimportant. And it was most certainly I who called the police the next time, children, when the American man returned. He was using a wheelchair now, just as he’d told me he sometimes does, and he was accompanied by an awkward young man with large feet, as well as a teenaged girl with long, shining black hair and a very rude temperament. Very rude indeed! I do not care to repeat what she called me when she left.”
Reynie and the others exchanged furtive glances. They hadn’t the least doubt that Mr. Schuyler was describing S.Q. Pedalian and Martina Crowe — the other Executives who had fled the Institute with Mr. Curtain. And of course the man in the wheelchair had been Mr. Curtain himself.
“The American man,” Mr. Schuyler went on, “asked to see all the materials he had examined that morning. He said he understood there had been an unfortunate incident at the library and wished to verify that the materials were still here. As if he had not committed a crime himself! As if he had never called me on the telephone admitting to it! The nerve of this man!”
Mr. Curtain certainly didn’t lack for nerve, Reynie thought, but this was an instance of cunning rather than bravado. Clearly he’d wanted to find out why Mr. Benedict had visited the museum library, and when his Ten Men failed to secure the answer, he had resorted to duplicity.
“Well, as you might suppose, I was clever,” said Mr. Schuyler. “I gave no sign of distress, the better to lay my trap. He seemed in a hurry this time, and he wanted to photocopy everything — every single page of the journal and letters — to take with him. I told him that with such delicate materials we must use a special machine, and a librarian must make the copies. This is actually true, but that does not make my plan less clever. Not when you consider that as Sophie made the copies, I secretly called the police and told them to come at once, but not to use their sirens. Do you see what I was up to, children? This way there was no warning! When the copies were finished, and the man and his companions took the elevator to the lobby, they were met by the police. It was all very clever, I assure you.”
“So what went wrong?” asked Reynie, for they all knew perfectly well that Mr. Curtain had escaped.
Mr. Schuyler spluttered his lips in disgust. “Despite all I had done, the police let the man escape. He leaped from his wheelchair — greatly surprising them — and did something . . . well, it isn’t known exactly what he did. He appeared simply to touch the police officers, and they dropped to the floor and lay helplessly for several minutes. The villain fled with his companions, not to be seen again.” He shook his head and looked over his pipe at the children.
“That’s a remarkable account, Mr. Schuyler,” said Reynie, when it became clear Mr. Schuyler expected such a comment. “These are very curious and frightening incidents. May I ask one more question about them?”
Mr. Schuyler pretended to check his watch, then sighed indulgently, as if he did not care to keep talking and talking but would do so for the children’s sake. “Very well, young man. What is it?”
“The documents that were stolen. What were they?”
“The documents? Oh, they were maps of some kind.”
“Maps?” Reynie repeated, though of course he already knew that. He was hoping Mr. Schuyler might have some clue about where the island was located. “Maps of what, exactly?”
Mr. Schuyler seemed to dislike this question. Frowning, he tapped his pipe impatiently against the table top. “We do not know. The materials had been filed and recorded more than a year ago, and no one had reviewed them since.”
“Who filed and recorded them?” Reynie persisted, glancing between Mr. Schuyler and Sophie. “May we speak with that person?”
Sophie looked at Mr. Schuyler, and Reynie understood. Obviously Mr. Schuyler was that person. And obviously he had not examined the maps.
“I cannot be expected to commit to memory everything I see!” said Mr. Schuyler in an exasperated tone. “I am quite busy with my duties here, children.” He rose abruptly from his chair. “In fact, I have duties to attend to at this very moment. Good day, all of you. I hope you will cooperate with the police. Please behave with the proper respect.”
“The police?” they all cried.
Mr. Schuyler smiled. “Oh, yes, you must wait here for them, of course. The police wish to question anyone in connection with the attack. You have asked to see these papers, so you must be questioned. Sophie, you have called the police, I assume.”