The Eight of Swords

ginch, but for some reason he found he couldn't.

'All sorts of queer things' she repeated, evidently satisfied by this logic. 'Anyway, Fd be a hypocrite— and so would most of us — if we pretended we'd miss Mr. Depping. I mean, I'm jolly sorry he's dead, and it's too bad, and I'm glad they've caught the man who killed him… but there were times when I wished he'd move away, and — and never come back.' She hesitated. 'If it hadn't been for Betty, the few times we've seen her, I think we'd all have flown against Dad and Mr. Burke and said, 'Look here, throw that blighter out''

They were skirting the boundary wall, and she slapped at it with sudden vehemence. It was beginning to puzzle Hugh all the more.

'Yes,' he said. 'That's the queerest part of it, from what I've seen…'

'What is?'

'Well, Depping's status. There doesn't seem to be anybody who more than half defends him. He came here as a stranger, and you took him up and made him one of you. It sounds unusual, if he was so unpopular as he seems to be.'

'Oh, I know! I've had it dinned into me a dozen times. Mr. Burke is behind it. He puts Dad up to speaking to us about it. Dad sidles up with a red face and a guilty look, and says, 'Burpf, burpf, eh, what?' And you say, ‘What?' Then he splutters some more, and finally says, 'Old Depping — very decent sort, eh?' And you say, ‘No.' Then he says, 'Well, damme, he is!' and bolts out the most convenient door as though he'd done his duty. It's Mr. Burke's idea, but he never says anything at all.'

'Burke? That's-'

' 'M. Yes. Wait till you meet him. Little, broad-set man with a shiny bald head and a gruff voice. He always looks sour, and then chuckles; or else he looks just sleepy. Always wears a brown suit — never saw him in anything else — and has a pipe in his mouth. And,' said Patricia, embarked on a sort of grievance, 'he has a way of suddenly closing one eye and sighting at you down the pipe as though he were looking along a gun. It takes some time to get used to him.' Again she gave the little gurgle of pleasure. 'All Fm sure of about J. R. Burke is that he hates talking books, and he can drink more whisky with absolutely no change of expression than any man I ever saw,'

Hugh was impressed. That' he declared, 'is a new one.' He pondered. 'I always had a sort of idea that everyone connected with a publishing house had long white whiskers and double-lensed spectacles, and sat around in darkish rooms looking for masterpieces. But then I also thought Henry Morgan — I've met him, by the way — that is, the blurbs on the jackets of his books said…'

She gurgled. 'Yes, they're rather good, aren't they?' she inquired complacently. 'He writes them himself. Oh, you're quite wrong, you know. But I was telling you about Mr. Depping. I don't think it was so much the money he'd invested, though I gather that was quite a lot. It was a sort of uncanny ability he had to tell what books would sell and what books wouldn't. There are only about half-a-dozen people like that in the world; I don't know where he got it. But he always knew. He was invaluable. The only thing I ever heard Mr. Burke say about him was once when Madeleine and I were giving him what-for, and J. R. was trying to sleep in a chair with the Times over his face. He took the paper away and said, 'Shut up'; and then he said, The man's a genius,' and went back to sleep again… '

They had come out into the main road now, cool and shadowy under the trees that lined it, and the high hedges of hawthorn. Almost opposite were the gables of Hangover House. As they approached the gate there became audible an energetic and muffled rattling, which appeared to proceed from a cocktail shaker.

'Light of my life,' said an argumentative voice, between rattles, 'I will now proceed to expound to you the solution of this mystery as it would be explained by John Zed. to begin with—'

'Hullo, Hank,' said Patricia, 'may we come in?'

A very pleasant little domestic scene was in progress on the lawn before the house, screened by the high hedge. Madeleine Morgan was curled up in a deck chair under the beach umbrella, an expression of bright anticipation on her face. Alternately she raised to her lips a cocktail glass and a cigarette, and she was making noises of admiration between. In the faint light of the afterglow, the newcomers could see her husband pacing up and down before the table; stopping to administer a vigorous rattle to the shaker, wheeling round, slapping the back of his head, and stalking on again. He turned round at Patricia's greeting, to peer over his spectacles.

'Ha!' he said approvingly. 'Come in, come in! Madeleine, more glasses. I think we can find you a couple of chairs. What's up — anything?'

'Didn't I hear you say,' remarked Patricia, 'that you were going to explain the murder? Well, you needn't. They've found that American, and everything seems to be finished.'

'No, it isn't,' piped Madeleine, with a pleased look at her husband. 'Hank says it isn't.'

Chairs were set out, and Morgan filled all the glasses. 'I know they've found the American. I saw Murch on his way back from Hanham. But he isn't guilty. Stands to reason. (Here's loud cheers — down she goes! — )'

A general murmur, like the church's mumbled responses when the minister reads the catechism, answered the toast. The Martini's healing chill soothed Hugh Donovan almost at once. He relaxed slowly. Morgan went on with some warmth:

'Stands to reason, I tell you! Of course, I'm interested in truth only as a secondary consideration. Chiefly I'm interested in how this murder ought to work out according to story standards, and whether a plot can be worked up around it. You see—'

'I say, why don't you?' interrupted Patricia, inspired. She took the glass away from her lips and frowned. 'That's a jolly good idea! It would be a change. To date,' she said dreamily, 'you have poisoned one Home Secretary, killed the Lord Chancellor with an axe, shot two Prime Ministers, strangled the First Sea-lord, and blown up the Chief Justice. Why don't you stop picking on the poor Government for a while and kill a publisher like Depping?'

'The Lord Chancellor, my dear girl,' said Morgan with a touch of austerity, 'was not killed with an axe. I wish you would get these things right. On the contrary, he was beaned with the Great Seal and found dead on the Woolsack… You are probably thinking of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, in The Inland Revenue Murders. I was only letting off a little steam in that one.'

'I remember that one!' said Hugh, with enthusiasm. It was damned good.' Morgan beamed, and refilled his glass. 'I like those stories,' Hugh pursued, 'a lot better than the ones that are so popular by that other fellow — what's his name? — William Block Tournedos. I mean the ones that are supposed to be very probable and real, where all they do is run around showing photographs to people.'

Morgan looked embarrassed.

'Well,' he said, 'you see, to tell you the truth, I’m William Block Tournedos too. And I thoroughly agree with you. That's my graft.'

'Graft?'

'Yes. They're written for the critics' benefit. You see, the critics, as differentiated from the reading public, are required to like any story that is probable. I discovered a long time ago the way to write a probable and real story. You must have (1) no action, (2) no atmosphere whatever — that's very important — (3) as few interesting characters as possible, (4) absolutely no digressions, and (5) above all things, no deduction. Digressions are the curse of probability… which is a funny way of looking at life in general; and the detective may uncover all he can, so long as he never deduces anything. Observe those rules, my children; then you may outrage real probability as much as you like, and the critics will call it ingenious.'

'Hooray!' said Madeleine, and took another drink.

Patricia said: 'You've whipped your hobbyhorse to death, Hank. Go back to the problem… Why couldn't this be a story; I mean, from your own preferences in stories?'

Morgan grinned, getting his breath. It could,' he admitted, 'up to and including the time of the murder. After that…' He scowled.

A sharp premonition made Hugh look up. He remembered that this was the person who had told them to look for the buttonhook.

'What do you mean, after that?'

'I don't think the American is guilty. And,' said Morgan, 'of all the motiveless and unenterprising sluggards to gather up as suspects, the rest of us are the worst! At least, in a crime story, you get a lot of motives and plenty of suspicious behavior. You have a quarrel overheard by the butler, and somebody threatening to kill somebody, and somebody else sneaking out to bury a blood-stained handkerchief in the flower bed… But here we've nothing of the