“Yes,” exclaimed Miss Forrest again, her eyes flashing, “and now that I come to think of it, Mr. Queen, there’s something fallacious in your reasoning. You claim that tearing the double-jack in half to achieve just one jack means the — the dead men were indicating one of two joined men. Suppose I say to you that the reason they tore the cards in half was to prevent anyone from believing that Francis and Julian did it? I mean that if they’d left just the jack, which shows two joined figures, somebody might think of the twins. By tearing the two figures apart they might have been saying: ‘Don’t think the twins did it. It’s just one unjoined person. That’s why I’m not leaving a whole card!’ ”
“Brava,” murmured Ellery. “That’s genius, Miss Forrest. But unfortunately you’re forgetting that the cards were diamonds, and that the only male Carreaus here are the twins.”
She subsided, biting her lip.
Mrs. Carreau said steadily: “The more I think of it the more convinced I am that somehow this is all a hideous mistake. Surely you don’t mean to... to arrest...” She stopped.
The Inspector, who was feeling uneasy, scratched his chin. Ellery did not reply; he had turned back to the window again. “Well,” the old man said, hesitating, “can you suggest another meaning for the card?”
“No. But—”
“You’re the detective,” said Miss Forrest with a rebirth of spirit. “I still maintain the whole argument is... is lunatic.”
The Inspector went to one of the windows and stepped out upon the terrace. After a moment Ellery followed.
“Well?” he said.
“I don’t like it.” The Inspector gnawed his mustache. “There’s a lot in what they say — not about the card business, but about that operation and all.” He groaned. “A hell of a lot. Why should one of those kids have bumped the doctor off? I tell you I don’t like it.”
“We discussed that, I believe, before we tackled them,” Ellery pointed out with a shrug.
“Yes, I know,” said the old man miserably, “but— Cripes, I don’t know what to think. The more I think the dizzier I get. Even if it’s true and one of the lads is a murderer, how the devil can we ever establish which one? If they refuse to talk—”
A gleam came into Ellery’s troubled eye. “The problem has its interesting points. Even if one of them confesses — we’ll suppose the most convenient theory — have you stopped to consider what a beautiful headache the case would give America’s prize legal talent?”
“What d’ye mean?”
“Well,” murmured Ellery, “let’s say young Francis is our man. He confesses on the stand, exonerating Julian who, it devolves, was under Francis’s thumb and was forced to stand by while Francis did the dirty work. Julian, we prove, was completely innocent in both intent and activity. So Francis is tried, convicted, and condemned to death.”
“Cripes,” groaned the Inspector.
“I see you envision the possibilities. Francis is tried, convicted, and condemned to death; and all the while poor Julian is forced to undergo extreme mental suffering, physical imprisonment, and finally the degradation of — what? Death? But he’s an innocent victim of circumstances. Surgery? Modern science — minus at least the voice of the late Dr. John S. Xavier — says that Siamese twins with a common major organ cannot be successfully disjoined; result, death to the innocent boy as well as to the guilty. So surgery is out. What then? The law says a person condemned to death shall be executed. Shall we execute? Clearly impossible without also executing an innocent individual. Shall we not execute? Clearly in defiance of the lex talionis. Ah, what a case! The irresistible force meeting the immovable barrier.” Ellery sighed. “I should really like to confront a group of smug lawyers with this problem — as neat a conflict of rights, I’ll wager, as the whole history of criminal law has to offer... Well, Inspector, what do you think would happen in your precious case?”
“Let me alone, will you?” mumbled his father. “You’re always raising the most ridiculous questions. How do I know? Am I God?... Another week of this and we’ll all be in a bughouse!”
“Another week of this,” said Ellery gloomily, looking at the frightful sky and trying to draw a breath without soiling his lungs, “and it begins to look as if we’ll all be cold cinders.”
“It does seem silly to break our heads about a matter of individual crime and guilt when we’re one step from the last furnace ourselves,” muttered the Inspector. “Let’s go back inside. We’ll have to take stock, organize, and do what we—”
“What’s that?” said Ellery sharply.
“What’s what?”
Ellery bounded off the terrace. He was down the steps in one leap and standing on the drive to stare up at the ruddy night sky. “That noise,” he said slowly. “Don’t you hear it?”
It was a faint rumbling roar and it seemed to emanate from a region of the heavens a great distance away.
“By George,” cried the Inspector, scrambling to the ground, “I believe it’s thunder!”
“After all this horrible waiting, it doesn’t seem...” Ellery’s voice trailed off in a mutter. Their faces were raised to the skies nakedly, two white blurs of hope.
They did not turn at the pound and clatter of feet on the terrace.
“What is it?” screamed Mrs. Xavier. “We heard... Is it thunder?”
“Glo-o-ory!” shrieked Miss Forrest. “If it’s thunder it’s rain!”
The rumble was growing appreciably louder. It possessed a curiously living quality, and there was something metallic in its overtones. It rattled...
“I’ve heard of such things before,” cried Dr. Holmes. “It’s an unusual meteorological phenomenon.”
“What is?” demanded Ellery, still craning at the sky.
“Under certain conditions of the atmosphere, clouds may very well form over the area of a widespread forest fire. Condensation of moisture in the updraft of air. I read somewhere that fires of this sort have actually been extinguished by the clouds they themselves generated!”
“Thank God,” quavered Mrs. Wheary.
Ellery turned suddenly. They were lined up at the rail of the terrace — a row of pale straining faces raised to the sky. On every face but one there was livid hope. Only on Mrs. Carreau’s delicate features sat horror, the horror of realization. If it were rain, if the fire were blotted out, if communication were re-established... Her grip tightened on the shoulders of her sons.
“Don’t thank Him yet, Mrs. Wheary,” said Ellery in a savage tone. “We were mistaken; it’s not thunder. Don’t you see that red light up there?”
“Not thunder?...”
“Red light?”
They squinted in the direction of his pointing arm. And they all caught sight of the rapidly moving, unwinking little pinprick of bright red against the dark wine of the heavens.
It was accompanied by the thunder, and it was headed for the summit of Arrow Mountain.
But the thunder was the sound of a motor, and the red pinprick was the night riding light of an airplane.
Chapter XVIII
The Last Refuge
They sighed en masse, a horrible sigh that held the death of hope. Mrs. Wheary uttered a heart-rending moan and Bones’s voice startled them with a sudden vicious curse that hissed through the moist air like brimstone.