Mike Ashley - The Mammoth Book of Perfect Crimes and Impossible Mysteries

Tarrant stood with his hands in his pockets, surveying this work of art. His gaze seemed focused upon the nail, incongruous in its strange position and destined to play so large a part in the tragedy. He was murmuring to himself and his voice was so low that I scarcely caught his words.

“Madman’s work… But why is the easel turned away from the room… Why is that…?”

It was late afternoon in Tarrant’s apartment and much activity had gone forward. The Homicide Squad in charge of Lieutenant Mullins had arrived and unceremoniously ejected everyone else from the penthouse, Tarrant included. Thereupon he had called a friend at Headquarters and been assured of a visit from Deputy Inspector Peake, who would be in command of the case, a visit which had not yet eventuated.

I had gone about my business in the city somewhat dazedly. But I had met Valerie for luncheon downtown and her presence was like a fragrant, reviving draft of pure ozone. She had left again for Norrisville, after insisting that I stay with Tarrant another night when she saw how excited I had become over the occurrence of the morning. Back in the apartment Katoh, who, for all that he was a man of our own class in Japan, was certainly an excellent butler in New York, had immediately provided me with a fine bottle of Irish whisky (Bushmills, bottled in 1919). I was sipping my second highball and Tarrant was quietly reading across the room, when Inspector Peake rang the bell.

He advanced into the room with hand outstretched. “Mr Tarrant, I believe?… Ah. Glad to know you, Mr Phelan.” He was a tall, thin man in multi, with a voice unexpectedly soft. I don’t know why, but I was also surprised that a policeman should wear so well-cut a suit of tweeds. As he sank into a chair, he continued, “I understand you were among the first to enter the penthouse, Mr Tarrant. But I’m afraid there isn’t much to add now. The case is cut and dried.”

“You have the murderer?”

“Not yet. But the drag-net is out. We shall have him, if not today, then tomorrow or the next day.”

“The artist, I suppose?”

“Michael Salti, yes. An eccentric man, quite mad… By the way, I must thank you for that point about the candles. In conjunction with the medical examiner’s evidence it checked the murder definitely at between one and two a.m.”

“There is no doubt, then, I take it, about the identity of the criminal.”

“No,” Peake asserted, “none at all. He was seen alone with his model at 10.50 p.m. by one of the apartment house staff and the elevator operators are certain no one was taken to the penthouse during the evening or night. His fingerprints were all over the knife, the candlesticks, the victrola record. There was a lot more corroboration, too.”

“And was he seen to leave the building after the crime?

“No, he wasn’t. That’s the one missing link. But since he isn’t here, he must have left. Perhaps by the fire-stairs; we’ve checked it and it’s possible… The girl is Barbara Brebant – a wealthy family.” The inspector shook his head. “A wild one, though; typical Prohibition product. She has played around with dubious artistics from the Village and elsewhere for some years; gave most of ’em more than they could take, by all accounts. Young, too; made her debut only about a year ago. Apparently she has made something of a name for herself in the matter of viciousness; three of our men brought in the very same description – a vicious beauty.”

“The old Roman type,” Tarrant surmised. “Not so anachronistic in this town, at that… Living with Salti?”

“No. She lived at home. When she bothered to go home. No one doubts, though, that she was Salti’s mistress. And from what I’ve learned, when she was any man’s mistress he was pretty certain to be dragged through the mire. Salti, being mad, finally killed her.”

“Yes, that clicks,” Tarrant agreed. “The lascivious picture and the nail driven through it. Mad men, of course, act perfectly logically. He was probably a loose liver himself, but she showed him depths he had not suspected. Then remorse. His insanity taking the form of an absence of the usual values, he made her into a symbol of his own vice, through the painting, and then killed her, just as he mutilated the painting with the nail… Yes, Salti is your man all right.”

Peake ground out a cigarette. “A nasty affair. But not especially mysterious. I wish all our cases were as simple.” He was preparing to take his leave.

Tarrant also got up. He said: “Just a moment. There were one or two things-”

“Yes?”

“I wonder if I could impose upon you a little more, Inspector. Just to check some things I noticed this morning. Can I be admitted to the penthouse now?”

Peake shrugged, as if the request were a useless one, but took it with a certain good grace. “Yes, I’ll take you up. All our men have left now, except a patrolman who will guard the premises until we make the arrest. I still have an hour to spare.”

It was two hours, however, before they returned. The inspector didn’t come in but I caught Tarrant’s parting words at the entrance. “You will surely assign another man to the duty tonight, won’t you?” The policeman’s reply sounded like a grunt of acquiescence.

I looked at my friend in amazement when he came into the lounge. His clothes, even his face, were covered with dirt; his nose was a long, black smudge. By the time he had bathed and changed and we sat down to one of Katoh’s dinners, it was near to half-past nine.

During dinner Tarrant was unaccustomedly silent. Even after we had finished and Katoh had brought our coffee and liqueurs, he sat at a modernistic tabour, stirring the black liquid reflectively, and in the light of the standing lamp behind him I thought his face wore a slight frown.

Presently he gave that peculiar whistle that summoned his man and the butler’s valet appeared almost immediately from the passage to the kitchen. “Sit down, doctor,” he spoke without looking up.

Doubtless a small shift in my posture expressed my surprise, for he continued, for my benefit, “I’ve told you that Katoh is a doctor in his own country, a well-educated man who is over here really on account of this absurd spy custom. Because of that nonsense I am privileged to hire him as a servant, but when I wish his advice as a friend, I call him doctor – a title to which he is fully entitled – and institute a social truce. Usually I do it when I’m worried… I’m worried now.”

Katoh, meantime, had hoisted himself on to the divan, where he sat smiling and helping himself to one of Tarrant’s Dimitrinoes. “Sozhial custom matter of convenience,” he acknowledged. “Conference about what?”

“About this penthouse murder,” said Tarrant without further ado. “You know the facts related by Inspector Peake. You heard them?

“I listen. Part my job.”

“Yes, well that portion is all right. Salti’s the man. There’s no mystery about that, not even interesting, in fact. But there’s something else, something that isn’t right. It stares you in the face, but the police don’t care. Their business is to arrest the murderer; they know who he is and they’re out looking for him. That’s enough for them. But there is a mystery up above, a real one. I’m not concerned with chasing crooks, but their own case won’t hold unless this curious fact fits in. It is as strange as anything I’ve ever met.”

Katoh’s grin had faded; his face was entirely serious. “What this mystery?”

“It’s the most perfect sealed room, or rather sealed house, problem ever reported. There was no way out and yet the man isn’t there. No possibility of suicide; the fingerprints on the knife are only one element that rules that out. No, he was present all right. But where did he go, and how?