“Hear, hear!” barked Miss Gardiner.
“It has been a peculiarly difficult case for us to solve, not because there was any unusual subtlety behind the outrages or because the motive for them was far to seek, but because of the irrelevances that crept in and the impossibility under the circumstances of collating alibis. One of the irrelevances was the affair that has led to Perry’s having his arm in a sling: those who know the facts of that affair have been sworn to silence, and I am not allowed to say anything more about it than that it has no reference to the business of this afternoon.”
There was a marked stir, and mystified glances were exchanged by several of the company. Miss Gardiner drew herself up, as if to deliver a reprimand, but catching a cool look from Nigel she subsided again.
“The other irrelevance I shall come to in a minute,” he went on. “As I say, owing to the great number of visitors here and the informal way in which they turn up to meals, wander in and out and around, and so on, it would have been impossible to establish alibis for most of the occasions when the Mad Hatter was laying his little snares. Besides this, Captain Wise was prevented from conducting really stringent inquiries in the earlier part of the week by his natural fear of upsetting his guests. It was out of the question for me to examine the alibis of each of these four hundred or so people for several different occasions, since the important thing was to catch up with the Mad Hatter quickly. I had to adopt other methods. I looked first for motive. There were several possible motives. First, that X was a practical joker just for the fun of the thing: second, that he was a case of split personality: third, that he had some reason for destroying the reputation of Wonderland: fourth, that he had launched a series of practical jokes as a smokescreen for a more serious attack upon some single individual.
“The first motive could be dismissed fairly soon. A practical joker pure and simple would not persist in his tricks when he realised how violently public opinion had turned against him: nor is it likely that he would have communicated his campaign step by step to the Press. The fourth motive also is put out of court, by the simple fact that no serious attack has been made upon anyone here.”
“Oy, oy!” protested Teddy Wise. “If one of the little chaps may interrupt—what about the bullet that just missed imbedding itself in my brother’s bulging brain?”
“That brings me to the second irrelevance I mentioned.”
“It wasn’t so irrelevant for me,” said Captain Wise, stroking his bandaged ear.
“Irrelevance?” said Esmeralda Jones. “Do you mean it wasn’t the Mad Hatter who shot Captain Wise?”
Nigel glanced blandly round the table. “Captain Wise,” he announced, “was of course shot by Albert Morley.”
The sensation was terrific. Miss Gardiner leapt in her seat and took up a knife, as if to defend herself against the rosy-faced, chubby little killer who sat next her. Sally looked as if she would like to take a knife to Nigel. Captain Wise stared at his alleged assailant with incredulity. Paul Perry jerked round to look at Albert, hurt his wounded arm and drew in his breath sharply. Even Miss Jones’s impassive mannequin’s face showed emotion. As for Albert himself, his mouth fell open and he froze quite still like a small animal trying to evade notice. At last Teddy Wise exclaimed, with a not very convincing jocularity:
“Oh, Albert, you naughty little man! Hey, wait a minute, though! You’ve drawn the wrong number, Strangeways. Albert couldn’t have done that. He’s a hopeless shot. He couldn’t hit a haystack.”
“Albert hit Captain Wise because he was such a bad shot,” replied Nigel, whom an Oxford education had imbued with regrettable leanings towards the paradox.
“Give me air!” exclaimed Teddy.
“I think you’re talking boloney,” said Sally.
“Albert was the only person to be found near the scene of the crime,” Nigel continued. “He walked out to meet me from a clump of trees beyond the shooting-gallery. Now Albert has many admirable qualities; but they do not include, I fancy, the kind of nerve to carry off a bluff like that—supposing he had really intended to kill Captain Wise. The fact is that, as I might have gathered at once from the horror he showed when I told him that Captain Wise had been shot, he had no intention to hit him at all. I was faced with this contradiction: the only person who, geographically speaking, could have fired the shot, was such a bad shot that it was a thousand to one against his hitting the target. I left that aside, and asked myself why should Albert have fired at all. Mr. Thistlethwaite ingeniously suggested that he’d mistaken Captain Wise for his brother, against whom he might reasonably have a certain ill feeling. But the impromptu nature of the crime, together with Albert’s knowledge that he was a hopeless marksman, put this suggestion out of the running.
“I approached the question from another angle. I had heard from Sally that she’d told Albert how Perry was worrying himself to death believing he might be the Mad Hatter—or was suspected of being. Albert would do anything for Sally. Albert knew that Perry was going for a long walk yesterday. That was the set-up. Then Mr. Thistlethwaite, in another context, used the phrase ‘the romance of crime,’ and I saw in a flash the one explanation that would account for everything. Albert Morley is an incorrigible romantic. He has been brooding about how to take this load of anxiety off Sally’s mind and Paul’s. He happens to be by the shooting-gallery when Captain Wise appears up on the balcony. Albert says to himself in a twinkling, ‘If I fire up at the balcony, the shot will be assumed to come from the Mad Hatter. Paul is away from camp on a long walk. Therefore the shot will prove that he is not the Mad Hatter. Q. E. D.’
“Mind you, anyone might have argued in those terms, but only a hardened romantic would have acted on them. I should add that Albert, having been given an alibi by Mr. Thistlethwaite for the dead-animals joke, believed that he was quite safe—shot or no shot—from being suspected of the Mad Hatter outrages. Anyway, he ups and fires, meaning the bullet to whiz harmlessly and at a respectful distance past Captain Wise’s head. But his excitement aggravates his fault of jerking at the trigger instead of squeezing it, the muzzle is jerked to the right, and the bullet takes a chip out of our resident manager. That’s so, isn’t it, Albert?”
“I—yes, I’m afraid it is. It was awfully stupid of me, I’m afraid,” Albert Morley stammered. He added, with ludicrous formality, “I must take this opportunity, Captain Wise, of expressing my deepest regrets. I——”
“That’s all right, Morley. No bones broken.” The manager turned to Nigel. “So we’re back where we started?”
“Yes. In a sense. Perry has not got the alibi which Albert tried to give him, and Mr. Thistlethwaite told me last night that Albert’s own alibi for the dead-animals stunt has a hole in it. So we all start from scratch again.”
Sally’s face was white with indignation. But she had been told that no word of Paul’s experience yesterday must get out; so, biting her lip, she refrained from speech.
Nigel now gave a brief outline of the case, on the same lines as the one he had given to Mr. Thistlethwaite last night. When he had finished, he said:
“There are the facts. We now come to theory.”
“Just a minute, Mr. Strangeways,” said Miss Gardiner, in a voice a little louder than she generally used. “Let me get this clear. What is your object in having us all to listen to this? Am I to assume that, amongst those sitting round the table, is the Mad Hatter himself?”
A knock at the door made everyone start. It rapped on nerves suddenly tautened by Miss Gardiner’s question. But the person who entered was only an attendant bringing in the trays of tea-things. Putting them down on the sideboard, she retired.
“Ah, tea,” said Nigel, rubbing his hands together. “It’ll make a nice break. Between the fact and the theory,” he intoned, in the manner of a young lady from a school of elocution rendering one of Mr. Eliot’s choruses, “comes the cucumber sandwich.”
There was a general movement and polite jostling as the men helped to place the
tea-things on the table. There were plates of sandwiches, some covered dishes, and two teapots.
“Your chef has done us proud,” said Nigel, beaming at the array of food.
Miss Gardiner appeared to be having some difficulty with the first teapot.
“It won’t pour,” she said; and, lifting the lid, peered inside. The next moment, with a curious little scream, she banged the teapot down on the table again and jumped on to her chair. Everyone stared at her. Pince-nez awry, cheeks puffed out, she pointed dumbly towards the teapot. A scrabbling noise came from it; and presently a sizeable white mouse poked its head out, quivered its whiskers, looked round nervously at the company, and withdrew again from sight.
There was a moment’s complete silence. Then Miss Jones, with a shaky laugh, exclaimed:
“God! It’s the dormouse! The dormouse they put into the teapot! This is the Mad Hatter’s tea party.”
Captain Wise sprang towards the door that led into his office. The door was locked.
“Who the devil?—I’ll go out on the balcony and see if there’s anyone below. This is outrageous.”
“Just a minute, Captain Wise,” said Nigel. “There’s no special hurry. Let’s all sit down and see what this adds up to. Allow me.” He decanted the mouse out of the teapot, seized it and placed it outside on the balcony. Miss Gardiner descended from her chair with considerably less agility than she had mounted it. Albert Morley, helping her down, remarked:
“There was no cause for alarm. It was a tame mouse. I used to keep white ones like that when I was a boy.”
“I am not interested, Morley, whether you kept white mice or white elephants,” the schoolmistress replied in rasping tones. “One thing is perfectly clear, that this specious detective has been duped again. The Mad Hatter is not in this room——”
“Why should you assume that he was?” asked Nigel mildly.
“He has made a complete fool of us. It’s the most humiliating position to be in—I will not tolerate it—let me out.”
“Now, now, now. The only way you can get out is to jump off the balcony. Let’s all keep cool.”
“I suggest we should go on with our tea. Ha! Muffins, I fancy,” said Mr. Thistlethwaite: and, suiting the action to the word, lifted the cover from one of the dishes. It was not muffins. It was a small, forked piece of wood.
“What on earth is this?” he asked, gingerly taking it out. “A catapult?”
“Great Scot!” exclaimed Captain Wise. “The rocket stick!”
“Mortimer!” Miss Jones’s voice cut through the clamour like a whip. Everyone turned to her. “He must have—quick, what’s in the other dishes?”
There was a moment of hesitation. It seemed that no one wanted to lift off the covers. Then Paul Perry, pushing back the lock of hair that fell over his forehead, said:
“Well, I’ll try the next surprise-packet.”
He raised a lid. Beneath it lay the body of a dead thrush.
“Oh, this is horrible!” Sally hid her face in her hands. Soon the remaining covered dishes were exposed, revealing severally a small bottle labelled “Strychnine,” two halves of a tennis ball filled with treacle, and a .22 bullet embedded in a piece of cotton wool.
“Well now, this is most interesting,” declared Nigel. “The case is certainly beginning to look up. Our practical joker is a symbolist. But surely there’s something missing? Yes, the duckings. That was the one joke he couldn’t put under a lid, so to speak. Unless——” he giggled—“I say, What’s in that other teapot?”
Teddy Wise went over to the sideboard and fetched it. “Doesn’t look like tea,” he said. He put his finger inside, licked it cautiously, and exclaimed: “Christmas! It’s salt water!”
“Ah! That rounds it off. Splendid!” said Nigel, taking another sandwich. It was too much for Captain Wise, who burst out irritably:
“Look here, Strangeways. The thing’s preposterous. The fellow must have bribed that waitress to bring all this stuff in, and lock the door on us. We’ve only got to break out and get hold of her, and I’ll soon find out who the chap is.”
“Get hold of her? Did you notice her face? Your back was turned. Did anyone pay attention to her?”
No one, it turned out, had done so.
“Gosh!” said Sally. “Was she the Mad Hatter in disguise?”
“We’re all being slightly ridiculous,” Miss Jones said tartly. “Tea was ordered for ten minutes ago. If that waitress was the Mad Hatter in disguise, where’s the real one that should have been sent up from the kitchen? Were these dishes substituted on the way? How——”
“Perhaps the proper waitress was intercepted on her way here, and dealt with,” suggested Mr. Thistlethwaite in blood-curdling tones.
“Now, we mustn’t let ourselves get rattled like this,” said Nigel. “There’s quite a simple explanation for all these death’s-heads at the banquet. Let’s go back to the point at which we left off. I gave you a statement of the case. Before I offer my own interpretation of it, I should like to hear any theories you may have. You can speak without prejudice, as the lawyers say, because nothing that is said need go beyond this room.”
“This is most irregular,” declared Miss Gardiner.
“Are you asking us to say who we think the Mad Hatter is?” asked Teddy Wise.
“Yes. From the facts I’ve given you, it ought to be apparent.”
The joke which had just been played on them, after the first nervous shock was over, seemed to create a kind of irresponsibility among them. Tension was relaxed, for the grotesque objects that lay in the dishes before them made the whole atmosphere unreal. The tacit assumption was that this joke could only have been played by someone outside the room, and thus to accuse anyone inside it became a harmless and academic matter.
Miss Gardiner repeated her lecture on the psychology of the practical joker, and pointed out how well it fitted the character of Albert Morley. Captain Wise, indicating the clues which seemed to incriminate Paul Perry, said apologetically that he had suspected Paul of the outrages for some time. Then Mr. Thistlethwaite arose and unfolded the case against Captain Wise and Miss Jones, as he had put it last night to Nigel.
“… And now,” he said at last, “I come to the question of motive. Why should these two, whose fortunes might seem to stand or fall with those of Wonderland, kill—if I may so express it—the goose that laid the golden eggs? The answer is that the eggs were not big enough. Miss Jones, the daughter of a millionaire, accustomed to a life of idle luxury, finds herself working for her living on the pittance of a secretary. Captain Wise, whose salary we have been told by several people is by no means commensurate with his abilities or ambitions, and is certainly not adequate to the running of a Lagonda, the purchase of the gold wrist-watches, cigarette cases and other trinkets that he sports——”
“Really, Mr. Strangeways,” exclaimed Esmeralda Jones icily, “aren’t you letting this go too far? It’s in abominably bad taste.”
“So were the practical jokes, Miss Jones. Don’t forget that.”
The atmosphere in the room, which had been imperceptibly growing more tense, shedding little by little its unreality, was now taut to breaking point. Nigel’s tone, as he made this last remark, brought up every head with a jerk. All their eyes turned on Miss Jones. Bold chin lifted, red lips curling disdainfully, she stared back at Nigel. She did not give an inch. Captain Wise’s fingers drummed on the table: he looked strangely ineffectual and shrunken, out of his depth altogether.
“The motive,” said Nigel, “is as Mr. Thistlethwaite has stated. Captain Wise, I learnt, ran through a considerable legacy a few years ago. He does run through money; and so does Miss Jones. Several of us have noticed that he lives more expensively than his salary warrants: but, his brother told me, he has no private means.”
“Strangeways, this is the grossest impertinence. I——”
“So here we have this ambitious, luxury-loving couple, perhaps already in debt, certainly on the look-out for so
me way of bettering themselves. At this point a Mr. Leyman comes into the picture. He is the man behind the big holiday-camps company that runs the place at Beale and is Wonderland’s chief rival. Miss Arnold told me that she had seen Leyman talking to Captain Wise and Miss Jones in a London restaurant some months before. Now there was nothing necessarily suspicious about that. But, when I mentioned it to Miss Jones, she at once volunteered a great deal of information about Leyman. She had known him in her palmier days, she said; and, when things went wrong, he tried to take advantage of her unfortunate position. This again may have been true: though I cannot easily imagine her hobnobbing in a restaurant with a man who had shown up in that light. But why should she give me this information at all? There was no need for it, unless she had to divert my attention from some different relationship between her and Leyman. That relationship, I suggest, was our dear old friend, the cash-nexus. Leyman had agreed to set up Jones and Wise for life, if they in return smashed the company which was his chief rival.”
“For sheer fantasy,” said Miss Jones, “this beats the Mad Hatter every time. Does anyone here really imagine that respectable business companies conduct themselves like the villains in a pantomime?”
“Of course they do. If they can’t get what they want in any other way. Look at the bribery and cloak-and-dagger stuff that goes on in the armament trade. Look at the methods some big newspaper-owners have adopted to push old-established provincial papers out of competition. Oh, no, there’s nothing fantastic about the motive. The fantastic method of operations that was adopted is quite another matter. I attribute it to Miss Jones, who has great intelligence and a highly-developed sense of mischief. She was the comic genius behind the Mad Hatter: I think she was also the moving spirit behind the whole affair—I doubt if Captain Wise would have undertaken it without her prompting. But, like many intelligent criminals, she overreached herself.”