The Reader Is Warned

CHAPTER VII

It was the lifting of the hand that did it. Why, it might be wondered, was there a faint hint of the florid about Pennik this morning? His country tweeds were as solid and unobtrusive as Sam Constable's. His soft hat and crooked stick lay across the table. His manner (perhaps fiercely) was so repressed as to seem wooden. But on the little finger of his left hand was a ring set with a bloodstone.

Nothing could have exceeded the grotesque contrast between that ring and his surroundings: the country pub, the Sunday countryside with fowls in it, the sunlight through fresh curtains on Pennik's bullet head. The ring changed him; it lit him up.

Sanders saw it to such an extent that he missed the expression on Masters's face.

But he heard the tone of the chief inspector's voice.

'What's that you said?'

'I said / killed him. Didn't Dr Sanders tell you?'

'No, sir, he did nott So that's why you're here, is it?' Masters drew himself up. 'Herman Pennik: do you wish to make a statement about the death of Mr Constable?'

'If you like.'

'One moment! I must warn you that you are not obliged to make any statement; but that, if you do, anything -'

'That'll be quite all right, Inspector,' Pennik assured him; and Sanders saw peering out from behind those quiet features a huge amusement. But there was annoyance in it as well. 'I cannot understand, though, why Dr Sanders failed to tell you. Nor do I understand the cause of all the uproar. Dr Sanders will bear me out when I say that I carefully warned Mr Constable, in the presence of all the others, that I was going to try to kill him. I did not say it was certain, mind you, because I was not sure I could manage it. I only intimated that I meant to try. How there could have been any misunderstanding it is difficult to imagine. I certainly don't lay claim to supernatural powers; and nobody, so far as I know, has ever been able to read the future. I intimated that I would kill him, and I did kill him. Hence why all the fuss about it?'

'Goddalmighty,' said Masters, getting his breath. 'Let me get a word in edgeways, sir! I must warn you that you are not obliged to make any statement; but that, if you do -'

'And I repeat that it will be quite all right, Mr Masters. I am told that I can make whatever statement I like without danger to myself.'

'Who told you that?'

'My lawyer.'

'Your-'

'Or, rather,' Pennik corrected himself, 'he was my lawyer. (I mean Mr Chase.) He has since recoiled from me and said he thought I was joking. But I was not joking.'

'No, sir?'

'No. Before killing Mr Constable, I asked Mr Chase whether I could be charged with murder if I killed him under the conditions I described. Mr Chase said I could not. Otherwise I should not have done it. I have a horror of being shut up - it unnerves me; and the experiment was not worth while if I ran the risk of being tried for it.'

'I daresay not, sir. How do you feel about hanging, though?'

'Are you also under the impression that I am joking, Mr Masters?'

Masters cleared his throat powerfully. 'Now, now, sir! We've got to take it easy, you see. ... Excuse me, Doctor, but is this gentleman crazy?'

'Unfortunately, no,' said Sanders, briefly.

'Thank you, Doctor,' said Pennik, with great gravity; but behind that broad nose Sanders thought he detected a flash of malice, which was spreading to the whole face with the effect of flattening it.

'Well, why didn't you go to the local police with your story?'

'I did,' said Pennik.

'When?’

'As soon as they were called in. I wished to make sure that nothing could be done to me, you see.'

'And how did they.feel about it?'

'They agreed that nothing could be done.... As regards how they felt about it, that is a different matter. Colonel Willow, I believe, kept a straight bat and a stiff upper lip; but Superintendent Belcher is made of less stern stuff, and I understand that only the thought of a wife and four children prevented him from putting his head into the gas-oven.'

Masters turned round with dangerous calm.

'Is this true, Doctor?'

'Quite true.'

Then why the blazes didn't you tell me?'

'That's what I'm doing,' Sanders answered, patiently. 'That's why you're here. Like Mr Pennik, I warned you. It didn't seem wise to - er - give you the works all at once.'

'But, blast it all, the police can't be crazy tool'

'They are not,' Pennik assured him. 'Though at first they seemed to share your original view about me. However, I agree with you that Dr Sanders should have told you. I told Dr Sanders, and the other guests at Fourways, just as soon as the thing happened. For some curious reason they seem all except the doctor here - to regard me with a kind of superstitious terror. They even refused to eat a meal which I was at some trouble to prepare. I tried to explain, but they would not listen. Of course I was proud to have succeeded' -again there was a curious flash across his face - 'but I am a human being; I lay no claim to supernatural powers. Such ideas are nonsense.'

Masters corked himself down. For a moment he breathed slowly and steadily, as though counting. Then he raised his head.

'If you don't mind, sir,' he went on, with a kind of bursting suavity, 'we'll just take this thing from the beginning. Eh? Do you mean to sit there and tell me you killed Mr Constable?'

'I am afraid we can never get any further, Inspector, unless you at least try to consider that'as a possibility and stop asking the same question. .Yes. I killed him.'

'Right you are! Right you are! How did you kill him?'

'Ah, that is my secret.' Pennik grew thoughtful. 'I am suddenly beginning to realize what an important secret it might be in this world. You cannot expect me to betray that.'

'Can't I, by George! - No, wait, steady 1 Easy does it. Now. Why did you kill him?'

'There you are more easily answered. I regarded him as an ill-mannered imbecile, brutal to his wife, insulting to his guests, an obstruction to all mental or moral progress. Judged as a person, he had challenged me beyond all human patience. Judged as the subject of an experiment, he was a man whose loss would hardly be felt in the scheme of things. Even though Dr Sanders disagrees with me in everything else, he will agree with me in that. And so I made him the subject of an experiment.'

'An experiment!' repeated Masters. 'Come now, sir! About how you did it,' he spoke with broad persuasiveness, 'just what means did you use? Have you developed a new blow to the abdomen, now? One that always works? Or a new way of coshing, maybe? Or frightening the poor bloke?'

'So you have been hearing about the scientific possibilities,' observed Pennik, turning his light eyes towards Sanders.

'Well, which one of those ways did you use?'

'That is what you will have to find out for yourself,' smiled Pennik.

'Oh, ah ? So you admit you used one of those ways?'

'On the contrary. I used none of them, except in a certain sense.'

'Except in a certain sense? What do you mean by that?'

'That I certainly used a weapon which can strike and, if properly applied, kill. If you want a name for it, call it Teleforce - the power of drawing out or, conversely, crushing, from afar. I did not know’ - again the white look came round his eyes and gills - 'that it could be made quite so strong. Inspector, I am very tired. Do not try me too far now. But it is an extension of the same process which enables me to tell what you are thinking about at the moment.''

'So you know what I'm dunking about, do you?' inquired Masters, putting his head on one side.