Markham did not answer at once. He paused by the French windows and looked down into the street. Then he said:
“Yes, I think you’ve made out a case. … Extraordinary! I’ve wondered from the first what you were getting at; and your questioning of Platz yesterday impressed me as pointless. I’ll admit it never occurred to me to suspect her. Benson must have given her good cause.”
He turned and came slowly toward us, his head down, his hands behind him.
“I don’t like the idea of arresting her. … Funny I never thought of her in connection with it.”
He stopped in front of Vance.
“And you yourself didn’t think of her at first, despite your boast that you knew who did it after you’d been in Benson’s house five minutes.”
Vance smiled mirthfully, and sprawled in his chair.
Markham became indignant.
“Damn it! You told me the next day that no woman could have done it, no matter what evidence was adduced, and harangued me about art and psychology and God knows what.”
“Quite right,” murmured Vance, still smiling. “No woman did it.”
“No woman did it!” Markham’s gorge was rising rapidly.
“Oh, dear no!”
He pointed to the sheet of paper in Markham’s hand.
“That’s just a bit of spoofing, don’t y’ know. … Poor old Mrs. Platz!—she’s as innocent as a lamb.”
Markham threw the paper on the table and sat down. I had never seen him so furious; but he controlled himself admirably.
“Y’ see, my dear old bean,” explained Vance, in his unemotional drawl, “I had an irresistible longing to demonstrate to you how utterly silly your circumst’ntial and material evidence is. I’m rather proud, y’ know, of my case against Mrs. Platz. I’m sure you could convict her on the strength of it. But, like the whole theory of your exalted law, it’s wholly specious and erroneous. … Circumst’ntial evidence, Markham, is the utt’rest tommyrot imag’nable. Its theory is not unlike that of our present-day democracy. The democratic theory is that if you accumulate enough ignorance at the polls you produce intelligence; and the theory of circumst’ntial evidence is that if you accumulate a sufficient number of weak links you produce a strong chain.”
“Did you get me here this morning,” demanded Markham coldly, “to give me a dissertation on legal theory?”
“Oh, no,” Vance blithely assured him. “But I simply must prepare you for the acceptance of my revelation; for I haven’t a scrap of material or circumst’ntial evidence against the guilty man. And yet, Markham, I know he’s guilty as well as I know you’re sitting in that chair planning how you can torture and kill me without being punished.”
“If you have no evidence, how did you arrive at your conclusion?” Markham’s tone was vindictive.
“Solely by psychological analysis—by what might be called the science of personal possibilities. A man’s psychological nature is as clear a brand to one who can read it as was Hester Prynne’s scarlet letter. … I never read Hawthorne, by the by. I can’t abide the New England temp’rament.”
Markham set his jaw, and gave Vance a look of arctic ferocity.
“You expect me to go into court, I suppose, leading your victim by the arm, and say to the Judge: ‘Here’s the man that shot Alvin Benson. I have no evidence against him, but I want you to sentence him to death, because my brilliant and sagacious friend, Mr. Philo Vance, the inventor of stuffed perch, says this man has a wicked nature.’ ”
Vance gave an almost imperceptible shrug.
“I shan’t wither away with grief if you don’t even arrest the guilty man. But I thought it no more than humane to tell you who he was, if only to stop you from chivvying all these innocent people.”
“All right—tell me; and let me get on about my business.”
I don’t believe there was any longer a question in Markham’s mind that Vance actually knew who had killed Benson. But it was not until considerably later in the morning that he fully understood why Vance had kept him for days upon tenterhooks. When, at last, he did understand it, he forgave Vance; but at the moment he was angered to the limit of his control.
“There are one or two things that must be done before I can reveal the gentleman’s name,” Vance told him. “First, let me have a peep at those alibis.”
Markham took from his pocket a sheaf of typewritten pages and passed them over.
Vance adjusted his monocle, and read through them carefully. Then he stepped out of the room; and I heard him telephoning. When he returned he reread the reports. One in particular he lingered over, as if weighing its possibilities.
“There’s a chance, y’ know,” he murmured at length, gazing indecisively into the fireplace.
He glanced at the report again.
“I see here,” he said, “that Colonel Ostrander, accompanied by a Bronx alderman named Moriarty, attended the Midnight Follies at the Piccadilly Theatre in Forty-seventh Street on the night of the thirteenth, arriving there a little before twelve and remaining through the performance, which was over about half past two a.m. … Are you acquainted with this particular alderman?”
Markham’s eyes lifted sharply to the other’s face.
“I’ve met Mr. Moriarty. What about him?” I thought I detected a note of suppressed excitement in his voice.
“Where do Bronx aldermen loll about in the forenoons?” asked Vance.
“At home, I should say. Or possibly at the Samoset Club. … Sometimes they have business at City Hall.”
“My word!—such unseemly activity for a politician! … Would you mind ascertaining if Mr. Moriarty is at home or at his club. If it’s not too much bother, I’d like to have a brief word with him.”
Markham gave Vance a penetrating gaze. Then, without a word, he went to the telephone in the den.
“Mr. Moriarty was at home, about to leave for City Hall,” he announced, on returning. “I asked him to drop by here on his way down town.”
“I do hope he doesn’t disappoint us,” sighed Vance. “But it’s worth trying.”
“Are you composing a charade?”
