'Wait a minute!' protested Rampole. `They're coming over the plate too fast for me You mean… '
`Just what I say,' the doctor answered, testily. `Nobody could have doubted it from the first. I had proof of it here to-night; but I had to come here and get the proof before you would have believed me.
`Consider. Here's a crazy young fellow with a sense of humour and lots of intelligence. He wants to make a name for himself as a newspaperman. He can turn out a good, vivid news-story when he has, the facts; but he has so little news-sense that one managing editor swears he wouldn't scent a wedding if he walked through an inch of rice in front of a church.
`That's not only understandable, Hadley, but it's a further clue to his character. His long suit was imagination. The very imaginative people never make good straight reporters, they're looking for the picturesque, the bizarre, the ironic incident; and very often they completely neglect to bother about essential facts. Driscoll would have made a thundering good columnist, but as a reporter he was a failure. So he resolved to do what many a reporter has done before him: to create news, and the sort of news that would appeal to him.
'In every one of these important hat-thefts there was a sort of ironic symbolism, as though the stage had been arranged by an actor. Driscoll loved gestures, and he loved symbolism. A policeman's helmet is propped on a lamp-standard outside Scotland Yard; "Behold the power of the police!" says the Byronic Mr Driscoll, with the usual cynicism of very young people. A barrister's wig is put on a cab-horse, which was the nearest approach Driscoll could get towards underlining Mr Bumble's opinion that the law is an ass.'
Dr Fell paused to settle more comfortably. Hadley stared at him, and then the chief inspector nodded.
`Now I shouldn't go into this so thoroughly,' the doctor went on, `except that, it's a clue to the murder, as you'll see. He was preparing for another coup, a real and final coup, which couldn't help making — in his eyes — the whole of England sit up.' The doctor pawed among the papers he had taken from Hadley's brief-case. `Here's his notebook, with those notes which puzzled you so much. Before I read them to you again; let me remind you that Driscoll himself gave the whole show away. You recall that drunken evening with Mrs Bitton, which Mrs Larkin described for us, when Driscoll prophesied what was going to happen a week before it did begin to happen? He mentioned events which were shortly to occur, and which would make his name as a newspaperman. An artist, when comfortably filled with beer, can talk at length about the great picture he intends to paint, without exciting the least surprise. But when a newspaperman casually mentions what corking stories he is going to turn out about the murder which is to take place next week, there is likely to be considerable curiosity about his powers of foresight.
`But let's return to this big stroke Driscoll was planning, after having built up to it by degrees with lesser hats. First, you see, he carefully stole the crossbow bolt out of Bitton's house…'
`He did what?' shouted the chief inspector.
`Oh, yes; I must tell you about that,' Dr Fell said, frowning as though he were a trifle annoyed with himself: `It was Driscoll who stole it. By the way he rummaged on the floor at the side of his chair, and brought up the tool-basket. After fumbling inside it, he produced what he wanted… `by the way, here's the file he used to-sharpen it. It's rather an old file, so you can see the oblique lines in, the dirt-coating where lie sawed at the barbs of the head. And here are the straighter marks to show where he had started effacing the Souvenir de Carcassonne, before somebody stole the bolt from him to use for another purpose… Hadley took the file and turned it over. `Then I asked you, you know, why that engraving hadn't been entirely obliterated, provided the person who had sharpened the bolt was really the murderer. Let's suppose it had been the murderer. He started in to do it, so why in the name of madness didn't he go on? It was obvious that he didn't want the bolt traced, as it would have been and as it was. But he stopped after a neat job on just three letters. It was only when I realized what was up — an explanation provided by those abstruse notes in Driscoll's notebook that I realized it wasn't the murderer's doing at all. It was Driscoll's. He hadn't finished his job of effacing when along came the murderer: who didn't care where the bolt came from, or whose it was. But, actually this bolt was planned as a part of Driscoll's most daring venture.’
`But, good God, what venture?' demanded Hadley. `There's no way to associate it with the hats.'
`Oh yes, there is,' said Dr Fell. `Hadley, who is the man, above all you can think of, who ranks in the popular eye as England's leading jingo? Who is the man who still makes speeches in private life, as he used to do in public life, about thee might, of the sword, the longbow, the crossbow, and the stout hearts of old? Who is always agitating for bigger armaments? Who is for ever attacking the Prime Minister as a dangerous pacifist? Who, at any rate, is inevitably the person Driscoll would think of in that role?'
`You mean — Sir William Bitton….'
`I mean just that,' nodded the doctor. A grin creased up his chins. `And that insane nephew of his had conceived a design which satisfied all the demands of his sensation-loving soul…. He was going to steal Sir William Bitton's hat and nail it with a crossbow bolt to the door of Number 10 Downing Street.'
Hadley was more than shocked. He was genuinely outraged. For a moment he could only splutter; and Dr Fell contemplated him with amiable mockery.
`Look here.' The doctor opened Driscoll's notebook. `See how he's musing about, this scheme. He hasn't quite worked it out yet. All he has is the idea of fastening Sir William's hat with this warlike instrument in some public place. So he writes, inquiringly: "Best place? Tower? But, of course, that won't do; it's much too easy, and a crossbow bolt in the Tower would be as conspicuous as a small bit of coal at Newcastle. However, he's got to have his properties first, and writes, "Track down hat," which is obvious. Then he thinks about Trafalgar Square again, as he inevitably must. But that won't do, because he certainly can't drive his bolt into the stone of the Nelson monument. So he writes, "Unfortunate Trafalgar, can't transfix!" But it wasn't so unfortunate, for his burst of inspiration comes and you note the exclamation points to denote it. He's got it now. He notes down Number 10 home of the Prime Minister. The next, words you can easily see. Is the door made of wood? If it's steel-bound, or something of the sort, the scheme won't work; he doesn't know. He must find out. Is there a hedge, or anything that will screen him from observation while he does it? Are there guards about, as there are likely to be? He doesn't know this, either. It's a long chance, and a risky one; but he's jubilant about the possibility, and he means to find out.'
Dr Fell put down the notebook.
'Thus,' he said, 'I outline to you what I, like Driscoll, intend to call symbolically the Affair of the Rubber Mouse.
Let's see what came of it. You do see, don't you Hadley?' Again the chief inspector was pacing the room.
'I suppose I do,' he snapped. 'He waited for Sir William's car in Berkeley Street; let's see, that was Saturday night?' `Saturday night,' affirmed the doctor. 'He was still youthful and hopeful and all the rest of it. And, incidentally, here's another ingenious feature of the scheme. In most cases there wasn't an enormous amount of risk. He stole the hats of the dignified people who wouldn't make a row about it. They certainly wouldn't report the theft to the police, to begin with. And if he were in a tight spot, it's unlikely the victim would give serious chase. That's the cunning feature. A man like Sir William would run half-way across London in pursuit of a man who'd picked his pocket of half-a crown. It would be outraged justice. But he wouldn't run a step, for fear of looking a fool, after a man who stole a two guinea hat…. Well, reconstruct, Hadley.'
'H'm. He waited for Sir William's car in Berkeley Street. Any sort of telephone call to the house, which he could properly have made in his own character, would have got him the information he wanted where, Bitton was that night, and the rest of it. And let's see. Bitton said, I think, that the chauffeur slowed down to let a blind man with some pencils get across the street
`Any sort of vendor,' agreed the doctor, 'would have crossed the street for a shilling. And Driscoll got the hat. He bargained on it that Bitton wouldn't give chase. He was right. Still, everything was fine and fair, until… '
He peered up inquiringly at Hadley.
`Until Sunday night,' Hadley said, slowly. 'Then everything; came down on him at once when he called at the house.'
'We're on debatable ground now. But it's not a question of great importance. H'mf. It's unlikely he discovered until Sunday night that he'd unwittingly pinched the manuscript,' said Dr Fell. 'You don't pay much attention to paper inside a hatband.
'But here's the point. On Sunday evening they told him about the theft of the manuscript. Whether he suspected something then I don't know. Undoubtedly he knew all about the manuscript, from Bitton's hints beforehand. But the other affair crashed down on him. Laura Bitton and her husband were back; Laura must have conveyed some hint of the state of affairs; there was a whispered row; Driscoll went wildly out of the house before Laura could make an appointment with him. Otherwise she would have made her appointment then, and not bothered to write.'
`Up again, down again,' muttered Hadley. `He was afraid of the scandal, of being cut off by his uncle…'
Dr Fell nodded sombrely.
`And a million other fancies that would come into a, head like his. Mr Dalrye said this flat was full of his presence,' the doctor said suddenly, in a louder voice. `What must it have been like when he came home here and discovered, with one of the sickest feelings of horror he ever had, that he'd unintentionally stolen his uncle's most cherished possession? How could he explain it? Here was his uncle raving, and here he was with the manuscript how had it got into the hat to begin with? Not by any stretch of madness could he have imagined his uncle deliberately putting that fragile thing into a hat of his own accord, and wearing it about the streets. And, worst of all, Driscoll wasn't supposed to know about the manuscript in the first place!’
`Imagine that wild, red-headed kid running about here like a bat trying to get out! A moment before, he'd been the reckless adventurer. Now he was threatened with a hellish scandal, with the price of swaggering, and worst of all with his ugly-tempered uncle.'
'If he had been sensible,' the chief inspector growled, `he'd have gone to his uncle, and…' Would- he?' Dr Fell frowned. 'I wonder if even a sensible person would have done that: at least, with Sir William Bitton. What could Driscoll say? "Oh, I say, uncle, I'm sorry. Here's your Poe manuscript. I pinched it bymistake at the same time I pinched your hat" Can you imagine the result? Driscoll wasn't supposed to know about the manuscript; nobody was. Bitton imagined he was being very sly and clever, when he was advertising its presence all the time. To begin with, he wouldn't have believed Driscoll. What would you think of somebody who walked in and said, "By, the way, Hadley, you know that thousand-pound bank-note you've been hiding away from everybody in your
drawer upstairs? Well, when I was stealing your umbrella last night, I accidentally discovered the bank-note hanging by a string from the handle of the umbrella., Odd, what?" No, my boy. You'd scarcely have been in a receptive mood. And if, to cap the business your brother later came in and observed, "Yes, Hadley, and the curious thing is that I discovered in that chap's flat not only your umbrella and. your thousand pound note, but also my wife, I venture to suggest, old man, that you would have thought your friend's conduct at least a trifle eccentric:
Dr Fell snorted.
`Perhaps that's what the sensible man would, have done. But Driscoll wasn't sensible. Call him anything else you like, but not a clear thinker.'
Dr Fell bent forward and prodded the rubber mouse with his forefinger. It ran round in a circle on the table and bounced off.
`For the Lord's sake,' cried the exasperated chief inspector, 'let that mouse alone and get on with it! So he wrestled 'with- this thing all night, and in the morning he telephoned Mr Dalrye here and determined to tell him everything?'
'Exactly.'
Dalrye, who had been sitting quietly all through this, turned a puzzled face.
`Yes, but there's another thing,' he observed. `I say, Doctor, why didn't he come to me straight. away? If he were as upset as all that, he would have come down to the Tower immediately, wouldn't he?'
`No,' said the doctor. `And I shall now expound to you, children, why. It is the point which confirmed my suspicions of the whole affair. I mean the second attack on Sir William Bitton.'
`Good Lord, yes…!'' Hadley stopped his pacing. `If Driscoll did all this, why did he steal a second hat from Bitton? That wasn't precisely the way to get him out of the scrape, was it?'
`No. But it was a piece of remarkably quick thinking in an emergency.'
`Maybe it was,' the chief inspector admitted, gloomily. `But it would seem to me somewhat to complicate matters. He'd have another explanation to add to his uncle when he'd finished the ones. you were outlining a; minute ago.'
`Be quiet and let me talk. He was going to get Mr Dalrye's help, but, before he did, he intended to make one last effort to help himself. You see, I rather wondered why he had definitely, made the appointment at the Tower for one o'clock when he could easily have gone down there in the morning. And, having made the appointment,' he didn't appear, until nearly twenty minutes past one! What held him up? If anything, you would have, expected him to be ahead of time… What he was going to do was make an attempt to return the manuscript, unknown to his uncle.
`That was rather more difficult an undertaking than it sounds. He knew positively, from what he had heard at the house, that his uncle didn't connect the theft of the manuscript with the theft of, the hat. Suppose, then, Driscoll simply put it into an envelope and sent it back to his uncle by post? Too dangerous! Driscoll knew Arbor was in the house. He had heard Arbor's broad talk at the dinner table. He knew that his uncle would never believe Arbor had first stolen the manuscript, and then posted it back again. And if Arbor were eliminated… you:' see?’
'Yes. If Arbor were eliminated, the only person who could have stolen it was a member of his own household.'
`Then what follows? Sir William would know it hadn't been one of the servants; he ridiculed that idea when he talked to us. There would remain Lester Bitton, Laura Bitton, Sheila, and Driscoll. Lester and Laura Bitton were definitely several hundred miles away when it was stolen. Only four people could have known about that manuscript, and two of them were in Cornwall; Of the other two, Sheila could hardly have been regarded as the culprit. Inevitably Driscoll must come to be suspected, and be thought to have sent it back in a fit of conscience — which would be precisely like Driscoll, anyway. Rest assured Driscoll knew all this, and he knew that his uncle would suspect it if he posted back that manuscript. But what was he to do? For the same reasons, he couldn't slip into the house and drop the manuscript somewhere so that it would be found. Sir William knew damned well it hadn't been mislaid.'
`I'm hanged if I can see what he could do,' the chief inspector confessed. `Unless he simply sat tight and let his uncle suspect Arbor. But a nervous type like Driscoll would always have the horrible fear that his uncle might, somehow find out. What he'd want most to do would be get the thing out of his hands — quickly.'
`Precisely! And that,' said Dr Fell, rapping his stick on the floor, `is where, for a second, he completely lost his head. He wanted to get it out of his hands. It was almost literally burning his fingers. He went out, on that misty day, and paced the streets. And with every step he was gravitating towards his uncle's house, with possibilities multiplying and whirling in his brain, until he lost his head altogether.
`Hadley, do you, remember what time Sir William arrived this afternoon at the bar where he met us? It was close on two o'clock. And when he described the theft of his second hat to us, he said, "It happened an hour and a half ago, and I'm still boiling."' It happened, then, roughly, at about twenty minutes to one. Sir William was ready to make his monthly round of calls, as he told us and, as he also told us, they rarely varied. It was the afternoon for his monthly call on Driscoll, by the way. I believe be pointed that out…. His car was standing in the mist at the kerb. His chauffeur had gone down to buy cigarettes, and Sir William had not yet stepped out of the house. And Driscoll was there at the corner, watching it.'
`I'm beginning to remember a lot of things Bitton said,' the chief inspector answered grimly. `He told us he saw somebody with his arm through the window of the car,
fumbling with the side pocket' You mean — `Driscoll couldn't stand it any longer; and he wanted to shove the manuscript into the pocket of the car?'
`I do. And he was prevented by Sir William's instant arrival on the scene. Sir William thought he was a sneak-thief. He didn't mind chasing sneak-thieves: He yelled, "Hi!" and charged — and Driscoll (probably instinctively) did the only piece of quick thinking I've known him to-do yet. He snatched Sir William's hat and darted away in the mist,
'You mean…'
`Instinctive experience, my boy. Because he knew the old man wouldn't chase him.'
`Good,' said Hadley, in a low voice, after a pause. `Damned good. But you're forgetting one thing. He may really have put that manuscript into the pocket of the car and it may still be there.'
Dr Fell blinked sadly at the mouse he had resurrected' from the floor:
`Sorry, I'm afraid you're about eleven hours too late. You see, even in the rush of going to the Tower in Bitton's car, I didn't neglect to examine the pockets this afternoon. It wasn't there. Driscoll never put it in.'
There was a faint smile on Hadley's face.
`Now, then, let me reassemble my facts,', he suggested. 'You say Driscoll went out comparatively early this morning and never came back?'
`Yes.'
`He took the manuscript. But the stolen top-hat was here?'
`probably.'
`Also… the crossbow bolt was here?' `Yes.'.
`Then,' said Hadley, with sudden grimness, `our case is complete. Lester Bitton came over here to see Driscoll this morning, when Driscoll was out. He let himself in with a key he borrowed from his brother, and returned to his home at noon, where Miss Bitton saw him coming in… what did she say?…. "shaken and laughing".
`Anybody could have taken that crossbow bolt from the Bitton house. But only Lester Bitton could have stolen it from this flat. Anybody might have stolen Sir William's top hat. But, only Lester Bitton could have taken that top-hat from this flat to put on the head of the man he stabbed at the Tower of London, so that he could give Driscoll the fulfilment of his wish. And Driscoll did die in, a top-hat, with at least one woman to weep at his grave.'
Dr Fell let his glasses fall on their black ribbon, and,massaged his eyes fiercely. `Yes,' he said from between his hands, in a. muffled voice. `I'd thought of that, too. I'm afraid it rather sews him up. That's why I asked Miss Bitton whether he was carrying anything when he returned.'
They had not realized, in the slow passing of hours, how imperceptibly the night noises of London had faded. Even the muted roar, always in the background, had died until their voices sounded unnaturally loud. They had not been aware of the creaking of boards, or how sharply rose the singing of tyres when a late car hummed in the square. But even through a closed door they could hear the telephone bell.
Sheila Bitton's voice could be heard, too, when she answered it. And in a moment she thrust her face round the door.
`It's for you, Mr Hadley,' she said. `Something about a Mr Arbor. Is that our Mr Arbor?'
Hadley almost broke into a run.