Ellery Queen - Roman Hat Mystery

“The other disturbing factor concerning Frances — the discovery of her bag in Field’s clothes — was plausibly explained by her dropping it in the natural excitement of the moment when the drunken lawyer approached her. This was later confirmed by Jess Lynch’s testimony to the effect that he saw Field pick up Frances’ bag. Poor girl — I feel sorry for her.” The Inspector sighed.

“To get back to the hat — you’ll notice we always return to that blasted top piece,” resumed Queen, after a pause. “I never knew of a case in which a single factor so dominated every aspect of the investigation... Now mark this: Of the entire cast Barry was the only one who left the Roman Theatre Monday night dressed in evening clothes and tophat. As Ellery watched at the main door Monday night while the people were filing out, his mind characteristically registered the fact that the entire cast, except Barry, left the theatre wearing street clothes; in fact, he even mentioned this to Sampson and me in Panzer’s office later, although at the time neither of us realized its full significance... Barry was therefore the only member of the cast who could have taken away Field’s tophat. Think this over a moment and you will see that, in view of Ellery’s hat deductions, we could now pin the guilt to Barry’s shoulders beyond the shadow of a doubt.

“Our next step was to witness the play, which we did the evening of the day on which Ellery made the vital deductions — Thursday. You can see why. We wanted to confirm our conclusion by seeing whether Barry had the time during the second act to commit the murder. And, amazingly enough, of all the members of the cast, Barry was the only one who did have the time. He was absent from the stage from 9:20 — he opened the business of the act and left almost at once — until 9:50, when he returned to the stage to remain there until the act ended. This was incontrovertible — part of a fixed and unchanging time schedule. Every other player was either on the stage all the time or else went on and off at extremely short intervals. This means that last Thursday night, more than five days ago — and the whole case took only nine days to consummate — we had solved our mystery. But solving the mystery of the murderer’s identity was a far cry from bringing him to justice. You’ll see why in a moment.”

“The fact that the murderer could not enter until 9:30 or thereabouts explains why the torn edges of LL32 Left and LL30 Left did not coincide. It was necessary for Field and Barry, you see, to come in at different times. Field could not very well enter with Barry or even at a noticeably later hour — the matter of secrecy was too important to Barry, and Field understood, or thought he did, how necessary it was for him to play the secret game.”

“When we pinned the guilt on Barry Thursday night, we resolved to question subtly the other members of the cast as well as workmen backstage. We wanted to find out, of course, whether any one had actually seen Barry leave or return. As it happened, no one had. Everybody was busy either acting, redressing, or working backstage. We conducted this little investigation after the performance that night, when Barry had already left the theatre. And it was checkmate, right enough.”

“We had already borrowed a seating plan from Panzer. This map, together with the examination of the alleyway on the left and the dressing-room arrangement backstage — an examination made directly after the second act Thursday night — showed us how the murder was committed.”

Sampson stirred. “I’ve been puzzling my wits about that,” he confessed. “After all, Field was no babe-in-the-woods. This Barry must be a wizard, Q. How did he do it?”

“Every riddle is simple when you know the answer,” retorted the Inspector. “Barry, whose freedom began at 9:20, immediately returned to his dressing room, slapped on a quick but thorough facial disguise, donned an evening cloak and the tophat which was part of his costume — you’ll remember he was already dressed in evening clothes — and slipped out of his room into the alley.

“Of course you can’t be expected to know the topography of the theatre. There is a series of tiers in a wing of the building backstage, facing the left alley, which is made up of dressing rooms. Barry’s room is on the lowest tier, the door opening into the alleyway. There is a flight of iron steps leading down to the pavement.”

“It was through this door that he quitted the dressing room, walking through the dark alley while the side doors of the theatre were shut during Act II. He sneaked out into the street, since there was no guard at the head of the alley at that time — and he knew it — nor had Jess Lynch and his ‘girl’ arrived, luckily for him; and entered the theatre brazenly through the regular front entrance, as if he were a latecomer. He presented his ticket — LL30 Left — at the door, muffled in his cloak and of course well disguised. As he passed into the theatre he deliberately threw away his ticket stub. This appeared to him to be a wise move, since he figured that if the ticket stub were found there, it would point to a member of the audience and directly away from the stage. Also, if his plans fell through and he were later searched carefully, the finding of the stub on his person would be damning evidence. All in all, he thought his move not only misleading but protective.”

“But how did he plan to get to the seat without being ushered to it — and therefore seen?” objected Cronin.

“He hadn’t planned to evade the usher,” returned the Inspector. “Naturally, he had hoped, since the play was well on and the theatre dark, to gain the last row, the nearest to the door, before the usher could approach. However, even if the usher forestalled him and escorted him to the seat he was well disguised and the blackness of the theatre was proof enough against recognition. So that, if things turned out as badly as possible for him, the most that would be remembered was that some man, unknown, barely describable in general contour, arrived during the second act. As it happened he was not accosted, since Madge O’Connell was luckily seated with her lover. He managed to slip into the seat next to Field without being noticed.

“Remember, what I’ve just told you,” went on the Inspector, clearing his dry throat, “is not the result of deduction or investigation. We could have no means of discovering such facts. Barry made his confession last night and cleared up all these points... Knowing the culprit was Barry, of course, we might have reasoned out the entire procedure — it follows simply and is the natural situation if you know the criminal. It wasn’t necessary, however. Does that sound like an alibi for Ellery or myself? Hmph!” The old man barely smiled.

“When he sat down next to Field he had a carefully planned idea of his course of action. Don’t forget that he was on a strict time schedule and could not afford to waste a minute. On the other hand, Field, too, knew that Barry had to get back so he made no unnecessary delays. The truth of the matter, as Barry has told us, is that he expected to have a more difficult time with Field than he actually did have. But Field was sociably amenable to Barry’s suggestions and conversation, probably because he was quite drunk and expected to receive a huge sum of money within a short time.”

“Barry first requested the papers. When Field cannily asked for the money before he produced the documents, Barry showed him a wallet bulging with apparently genuine bills. It was quite dark in the theatre and Barry did not take the bills apart. Actually they were stage money. He patted them suggestively and did what Field must have expected: refused to hand over the money until he had checked the documents. Bear in mind that Barry was an accomplished actor and could handle the difficult situation with the confidence imparted to him by his stage training... Field reached under his seat and to Barry’s utter astonishment and consternation produced his tophat. Barry says that Field remarked: ‘Never thought I’d keep the papers in this, did you? As a matter of fact, I’ve dedicated this hat to your history quite exclusively. See — it has your name in it.’ And with this astounding statement he turned back the band! Barry used his pocket pencil flashlight and saw his name inked in on the underside of the leather sweatband.”