was squatting behind the window and couldn’t be seen from outside — even then Williams wouldn’t have run away. He would have drawn his pistol and waited to see what happened next. He might have decided not to go inside, but he would have kept his eye on the door and the window. Whatever he did, though, he wouldn’t have run away. Do you go along with this also?”
Gregory nodded his head again, staring at the floor plan on the desk.
“We have the same problem with the second variant. None of it is very probable except the part about how the perpetrator got inside, since it doesn’t depend on him hiding behind the boards as suggested in variant one. The snow could certainly have covered his footprints as you said. Let’s continue. From this point on, according to both variants, the incident took the same course. After Williams ran away, the perpetrator left the mortuary, pulled the corpse over to the door, and then escaped by way of the bushes and the stream. But what was the purpose of dragging the body through the snow — and in point of fact he didn’t drag it at all, as we both know very well, but did something quite peculiar: he made it look as if a naked man had been crawling around on his hands and knees. Right?”
“Yes.”
“Why would he do something like that?”
“The situation is much worse than after our first conversation…” Gregory said, his tone quite different from what it had been until now, as if he had an unexpected secret to tell. “It was easy enough to get inside the mortuary if all the factors were taken into account. He could easily have followed the constable — it was a dark, windy night and it was snowing — once inside the mortuary he could have waited, let’s say, forty-five minutes or an hour, in order to let the snow cover his footprints. But as for the rest… I couldn’t help thinking for a while that he wanted to produce the very effect you mentioned; in fact, once I accepted the idea of someone trying to set up a situation that would force the police to believe there had been some kind of resurrection, I thought our investigation had come to the end of the line. But now we can’t even consider that theory anymore. The perpetrator moved the corpse but then left it at the scene. Maybe something frightened him away, but why did he leave the corpse in the snow? One look at the corpse is enough to prove that it didn’t come back to life. He must have known that, but even so he moved it, and in a way that made it appear as if it had moved itself. None of it makes any sense — not in criminal terms and not in terms of insanity.”
“Maybe he did get frightened away, as you said just a minute ago. Maybe he heard the approaching car.”
“Yes, he could even have seen it, but—”
“Seen it? How?”
“When you turn off the expressway for Pickering, your headlights — the expressway is on somewhat higher ground, you see — shine into the cemetery and light up the roof of the mortuary. I checked it last night.”
“Gregory, that’s important! If the perpetrator was frightened by the lights of a car, and if that’s what caused him to abandon the corpse, we may have our explanation. Furthermore, it would be his first blunder, his first failure to carry out a well-planned act. He panicked and dropped the corpse. Maybe he thought the police were coming. That should be the basis of your reconstruction… At any rate, it’s an out!”
“Yes, it’s an out,” Gregory admitted, “but… I can’t take a chance on it. We’re dealing with a man who studies weather reports and plans his actions in accordance with a complicated mathematical formula. He would certainly have known that the lights of a car coming around the turn from the expressway would light up the whole area for a moment, including the cemetery.”
“You seem to have a great deal of respect for him.”
“I do. And I absolutely refuse to believe that anything frightened him away. An armed constable standing right there didn’t scare him. Would he have been afraid of a couple of headlights off in the distance?”
“Things like that happen. The straw that breaks the camel’s back… Maybe it took him by surprise. Maybe it confused him. You don’t think it’s possible? You’re smiling again? Gregory, you seem to be absolutely fascinated by this person. If you’re not careful, you’ll end up being… a disciple!”
“I suppose that’s a possibility,” said the lieutenant in a caustic tone of voice. He reached for the report but, discovering that his fingers were trembling, hid his hand under the table. “Maybe you’re right…” he said after a moment’s reflection. “I can’t help feeling that everything I found out there was exactly the way he wanted it to be; I don’t know — maybe I’m beginning to go crazy. Only… Williams wasn’t frightened by the corpse but by what was happening to it. Something happened to that body that made him panic. We may find out what it was, but will we ever know why…”
“There’s still the matter of the cat,” Sheppard mumbled as if talking to himself. Gregory lifted his head.
“Yes. And, to tell the truth, that’s a lucky break for me.”
“How do you mean that?”
“Right from the beginning this case has been characterized by a fantastic consistency — every incident has certain features in common with all the others — incomprehensible, perhaps, but definitely all following the same pattern. In other words, no matter how it looks, this business isn’t chaotic. It has to do with something real, although we haven’t the slightest idea of its purpose. Chief Inspector… I… even though, as you said, I myself…”
Uncertain whether he was making himself clear, Gregory began to feel nervous.
“I realize we can’t do anything except increase the surveillance. That is, we can’t do anything right now, but this case will come to a head once he uses up all his alternatives… He’s been relentlessly consistent so far, and one day we’ll turn that consistency against him. Sciss will help by telling us where to expect the next incident.”
“Sciss?” repeated Sheppard. “I just received a letter from him.”
He opened his drawer.
“He says there won’t be any more incidents.”
“What?” Completely flabbergasted, Gregory stared at Sheppard, who nodded his head quietly.
“According to him, the series is over, either indefinitely or… forever.”
“Sciss said that? On what basis?”
“His letter says he’s working on the documentation now, and would rather not explain anything until he’s finished. That’s all.”
“I see.”
Trying hard to regain his composure, Gregory took a deep breath, straightened his lanky torso, and studied his hands for a moment.
“I suppose he knows more than we do. Did he see the results of my investigation?”
“Yes. I turned them over to him at his own request. We certainly were obligated at least to that extent, since he enabled us to pinpoint the places where the incidents would take place.…”
“Yes, yes. Of course,” Gregory repeated. “This… this changes everything. There’s nothing else we can do, if…”
He stood up.
“Would you like to talk to Sciss?” asked Sheppard.
Gregory made a vague gesture: more than anything, now, he wanted to leave the Yard, to be by himself, to end this conversation as quickly as possible. Sheppard rose from his chair.
“I wish you wouldn’t be so impatient,” he said in a low voice. “In any case, please don’t take offense. So far as that goes, please…”
Gregory retreated toward the door. Somewhat disconcerted by the look of expectation on Sheppard’s face, he swallowed and said with some effort:
“I’ll try, Chief Inspector, but I don’t think I’m ready to talk to him yet. I don’t know. I still have to…”
He left without finishing. In the corridor the lights had already been turned on for the evening. The day seemed to be so indescribably long, Gregory thought; he felt as if the incident yesterday had taken place weeks before. He rode down in the elevator; then, surprising himself by his impulsiveness, he got off on the second floor, and headed for the laboratories, his steps muffled by a deep carpet. Here and there old-fashioned brass doorknobs glowed dimly, polished by the touch of thousands of hands. Gregory walked slowly, his mind a blank. Through an open door he saw some spectrographs mounted on stands; near them, a man in a white lab coat doing something with a bunsen burner. A few more steps and he reached another open door. Inside, covered from head to toe with white powder and looking more like a baker than a technician, he found Thomas. The room, jammed with long, even rows of strange-looking twisted blocks of hardened plaster, looked like the studio of an abstract sculptor. Thomas
