Chapter I: Become a Detective (3)

"As far as possible I took my samples from the table where Werner sat," Mackay explained. "When the prop. boy gets here with an empty bottle and cork I'll have a sample of the wine. I think it's the wine," he added.

Kennedy turned to me. "You've got--"

"In my pocket!" I interrupted. Then, rather breathlessly, I repeated the conversation I had overheard.

"Good Lord!" Mackay flushed. "There it is! Shirley's the man, and I'll take him now, quick, without waiting for a warrant."

"See!" I ejaculated, to Kennedy. "He killed Stella because she made a fool of him and then, when Werner discovered that and followed him to Tarrytown the other night, it probably put him in a panic of fear, and so, to keep Werner from talking--"

"Easy, Walter! Not so fast! What you overheard is insufficient ground for Shirley's conviction, unless you could make him confess, and I doubt you could make him do that."

"Why?" This was Mackay.

"Because I don't think he's guilty. At least"--Kennedy, as always, was cautious in his statements, "not so far as anything we now know would indicate."

"But his anger at Stella," I protested, "and Marilyn's remark--"'

"Miss Lamar's death was the result of a cool, unfeeling plan, not pique or anger. The same cruel, careful brain executed this second crime."

Mackay, I saw, was three-quarters convinced by Kennedy. "How do you account for the dialogue Jameson overheard?" he asked.

"Miss Loring told us that Shirley suspected some one and was watching, and would not tell her or anyone else who it was. It seems most likely to me that it is the truth, Mackay. In that case her remark means that she believes his silence in a way is responsible for Werner's death."

"Oh! If Shirley had taken you into his confidence, for instance--?"

"I might possibly have succeeded in gaining sufficient evidence for an arrest, thus averting this tragedy. But it is only a theory of mine."

I scowled. It seemed to me that Kennedy was minimizing things in a way unusual for him. I wondered if he really thought the heavy man innocent.

"It's still my belief that Shirley is guilty," I asserted.

A sound of confusion from the courtyard beneath the heavy studio windows caught Kennedy's ear and ended the colloquy. From some of those near enough to look out we received the explanation. The police had arrived, fully three-quarters of an hour after Werner's death.

"I'll get the little bottle of wine, sure," Mackay murmured, picking up the food samples he had wrapped and crowding the bulky package into a pocket.

"I don't see why that would have been any easier to poison than the food," was my objection. "Everyone was looking."

"Very simple. The food was brought in quite late. Besides, it was dished out by the caterer before the eyes of forty or fifty people or more and there was no telling which plate would go to Werner's place. The drinks were poured last of all. I remember seeing the bubbles rise and wondering whether they would register at the distance."

Kennedy did not look at me. "Did it ever occur to you," he went on, casually, "that the glasses were all set out empty at the various places long before, and that there might easily have been a few drops of something, if it were colorless, placed in the bottom of Werner's glass, with scarcely a chance of its being discovered, especially by a man who had so much on his mind at the time as Werner had? He must have indicated where he would sit when he arranged the camera stands and the location of the tables."

I had not thought of that.

Kennedy frowned. "If only I could have located more of that broken glass!" As he faced me I could read his disappointment. "Walter, I've made a most careful search of his chair and the table and everything about the space where he dropped. The poison must have been in the wine, but there's not a tiny sliver of that glass left, nothing but a thousand bits ground into the canvas, too small to hold even a drop of the liquid. Just think, a dried stain of the wine, no matter how tiny, might have served me in a chemical analysis."

Very suddenly there was a low exclamation from Mackay. "Look! Quick! Some one must have kicked it way over here!"

Fully twenty feet from Werner's place in the glare of the lights was the hollow stem of a champagne glass, its base intact save for a narrow segment. In the stem still were a couple of drops of the wine, as if in a bulb or tube.

"Can it be the director's glass?" Mackay asked, handing it to Kennedy.

Kennedy slipped it into his pocket, fussing with his handkerchief so that the precious contents would not drip out. "I think so. I doubt whether any other glass was broken. Verify it quickly."

The police were entering now with Manton. Following them was the physician. Mackay and I ascertained readily that no other glass had been shattered, while Kennedy searched the floor for possible signs that the stem was part of a glass broken where we had found it. Unquestionably we had a sample of the actual wine quaffed by the unfortunate Werner. Elated we strolled to a corner so as to give the police full charge.

"They'll waste time questioning everyone," Kennedy remarked. "I have the real evidence." He tapped his pocket.

The few moments that he had had to himself had been ample for him to obtain such evidence as was destroyed in so many cases by the time he was called upon the scene.

A point occurred to me. "You don't think the poison was planted later during the excitement?"

"Hardly! Our criminal is too clever to take a long chance. In such a case we would know it was some one near Werner and also there would be too many people watching. Foolhardiness is not boldness."

I took to observing the methods of the police, which were highly efficient, but only in the minuteness of the examination of witnesses and in the care with which they recorded names and facts and made sure that no one had slipped away to avoid the notoriety.

The actors and actresses who had stood rather in awe of Kennedy, both here and in Kennedy's investigation at Tarrytown, developed nimble tongues in their answers to the city detectives. The result was a perfect maze of conflicting versions of Werner's cry and fall. In fact, one scene shifter insisted that Shirley, as the Black Terror, had reached Werner's side and had struck him before the cry, while an extra girl with a faint lisp described with sobering accuracy the flight of a mysterious missile through the air. I realized then why Kennedy had made no effort to question them. Under the excitement of the scene, the glamour of the lights, the sense of illusion, and the stifling heat, it would have been strange for any of the people to have retained correct impressions of the event.

The police sergeant knew Kennedy by reputation and approached him after a visit to the dead man's body with the doctor. His glance, including Mackay and myself, was frankly triumphant.

"Well," he exclaimed, "I don't suppose it occurred to any of you SCIENTIFIC guys to search the fellow, now did it?"

Kennedy smiled, in good humor. "Searching a man isn't always the scientific method. You won't find the word 'frisk' in any scientific dictionary."

"No?" The police officer's eyes twinkled. There was enough of the Irish in him to enjoy an encounter of this kind. "Maybe not, but you might find things in a chap's pocket which is better." With a flourish he produced a hypodermic syringe, the duplicate of the one I had appropriated, and a tiny bottle. "The man's a dope," he added.

"I knew that," replied Kennedy. "I examined his arm, where he usually took his shots, and found no fresh mark of the needle."

"That doesn't prove anything. Wait until the medical examiner gets here. He'll find the fellow's heart all shot full of hop, or something. I guess it isn't so complicated, after all. He was a hop fiend, all right."

"Still, there's nothing to indicate that he was a suicide."

"Not suicide; accident-overdose," was the sergeant's reply.

"How could he have died from an overdose of the drug, when he hasn't taken any recently?"

"Well"--unabashed--"then he croaked because he hadn't had a shot--the same thing. Heart failure, either way. Excited, and all, you know, making the scene. Maybe he forgot to use the needle at that."

"Perhaps you're right." Kennedy shrugged calmly. What was the use of disputing the matter?

I started to protest against the detective's hypothesis. The idea of any drug addict ever forgetting to take his stimulant was too preposterous. But Kennedy checked me. All were now keenly listening to the argument. Better, perhaps, to let some one think that nothing was suspected than to disclose the cards in Craig's hand. I saw that he wished to get away and had not spoken seriously. He turned to Mackay.

"Walter and I will have to hurry to the laboratory. Would you like to come along?"

"You bet I would!" The district attorney showed his delight. "I was just going to ask if I might do so. There's nothing for me in Tarrytown to-day and this is out of my jurisdiction."

As we turned away the police sergeant saw us and called across the floor, not quite concealing a touch of professional jealousy.

"The three of you were here at the time, weren't you?"

"No," Kennedy answered. "Mr. Jameson and myself."

"Well, you two, then! You're witnesses and I'll ask you to hold yourself in readiness to appear at the hearing."

I thought that the policeman was particularly delighted at his position to issue orders to Kennedy, and I was angered. Again Craig held me in check!

"We'll be glad to tell anything we know," he replied, then added a little fling, a bit of sarcasm which almost went over the other's head. "That is," he amended, "as eye-witnesses!"

XXIII

BOTULIN TOXIN

Mackay drove us to the laboratory in his little car and it was dark and we were dinnerless when we arrived. Knowing Kennedy's habits, I sent out for sandwiches and started in to make strong coffee upon an electric percolator. The aroma tingled in my nostrils, reminding me that I was genuinely hungry. The district attorney, too, seemed more or less similarly disposed.

As for Kennedy, he was interested in nothing but the problem before him. He had been strangely quiet on the way, growing more and more impatient and nervous, as though the element of time had entered into the case, as though haste were suddenly imperative. Once the lights were on in the laboratory he hurried about his various preparations. The food samples he laid out, but he gave them no attention. The blood smears and stomach contents he put aside for future reference. His attack was upon the drop or two of liquid adhering to the stem of the broken champagne glass.

The entire chemical procedure seemed to be incomprehensible to Mackay and he was fascinated, so that he had considerable trouble at times keeping out of the way of Kennedy's elbow. Kennedy first washed the stem out carefully with a few drops of distilled water, then he studied the resulting solution. One after another he tried the things that occurred to him, making tests wholly unproductive of results. Slowly the laboratory table became littered completely with chemicals and apparatus of all sorts, a veritable arsenal of glass.

The sandwiches arrived, but Kennedy refused to drop his investigation for a moment. I did succeed in making him take a cup of strong coffee, and that was all. Over in a corner Mackay and I did full justice to the food, finishing the hot and welcome coffee and then refilling the percolator and starting it on the making of a second brew. The hours lengthened, and when Mackay grew tired of watching with intense admiration he joined me in the patient consumption of innumerable cigarettes.

Kennedy was filled with the joy of discovery. I noticed that he did not stop even for the solace of tobacco. It seemed to me that at times his nostrils dilated exactly like those of a hound on the scent. Finally he held up a test tube and turned to us.

"What is it?" I asked. "Some other poison as rare and little known as the snake venom?"

"No--something much more curious. In the stem of the glass I find the toxin of the Bacillus botulinus."

"Germs?" Mackay inquired.

Kennedy shook his head. "Not germs, but the pure toxin, the poison secreted by this bacillus."

"What does it do?" was my question.

"Well," thoughtfully, "botulism may be ranked easily among the most serious diseases known to medical science. It is hard to understand why it is not a great deal more common. It is one of the most dangerous kinds of food poisoning."

"Then the apple juice they used for the wine was bad, spoiled?"

"No, not that. Werner was the only one stricken. Somebody put the pure toxin in his glass. It was, as I suspected, deliberate murder, as in the case of Miss Lamar. Bacillus botulinus produces a toxin that is extremely virulent. Hardly more than a ten-thousandth of a cubic centimeter would kill a guinea pig. This was botulin itself, the pure toxin, an alkaloid just like that which is formed in meat and other food products in cases of botulism. The idea might also have been to make the death seem natural--due solely to bad food."

"Do you suppose it was used because it was quick and was colorless, so as not to be noticed in the glass?" I hazarded.

Kennedy paced up and down the laboratory several times in thought. "To me, Walter, this is another indication of the satanic cleverness of the unknown criminal in the case. First Miss Lamar is to be killed. For that purpose something was sought, probably, which could not be traced easily to the perpetrator. In snake venom an agent was employed which may be said to be almost ideal for the grim business of murder. It is extremely difficult to identify in its results, it is comparatively unknown, yet it is swift in action and to be obtained with fair ease.

"Differing from most poisons, it may be inflicted through a prick so slight as to be almost unnoticed by the victim. The scheme of fixing the needle in the curtain was so simple and yet so effective that the guilty person need never have feared its discovery under ordinary circumstances, or its association with the girl's death, if some one stumbled upon it accidentally. The idea of returning for the death-dealing point was only one of the many details of a precautionary measure upon which we have stumbled. Had I found it the next morning I would have been unable, in all probability, to identify it as belonging to or as obtained by any of our suspects.

"You must realize, Walter, that with all the scientific aids I have been able to bring to bear we possess almost no direct evidence. There are no fingerprints, no cigarette stubs, no array of personal, intimate clues of any sort to this criminal. These are the threads which lead the detective to his quarry in fiction and on the stage. Here we lack even the faintest description of the man, or woman if that is her sex. It is murder from a distance, planned with almost meticulous care, executed coolly and without feeling or scruple.

"After the death of Miss Lamar I was not so sure but that the selection of the snake venom was simply the inspiration of a perverted brain, the evolution of the detailed method of killing her--an outgrowth of someone's familiarity with studio life in general, with the script of 'The Black Terror' in particular. Now I realize that we are face to face with the studied handiwork of a skilled criminal. These two deaths may be his--or her--first departure into the realm of crime. But potentially we have a super-villain.

"I make that statement because of the manner of Werner's demise. It is evident that the director stumbled on a clue to the murderer. If my first hypothesis had been correct, if the use of snake venom and the unlucky thirteenth scene had been largely a matter of blind chance in the selection of poison and method, then we might have expected Werner to be struck down in some dark street, or perhaps decoyed to his death--at the best, inoculated with the same crotalin which had killed Miss Lamar.

"But let us analyze the method used in slaying the director. If he had been blackjacked there would be the clue of the weapon, always likely to turn up, the chance of witnesses, and also the likelihood in an extreme case that Werner might not die at once, but might talk and give a description of his assailant, or even survive. Much the same objections--from the criminal's standpoint--obtain in nearly all the accepted modes of killing a man. Even the use of venom a second time possesses the disadvantage of a certain alertness against the very thing on the part of the victim. Werner was a dope fiend, fully aware of the potency of a tiny skin puncture. I'll wager he was on constant guard against any sort of scratch.

"On the other hand, the few drops of toxin in the glass possessed every advantage from the unknown's standpoint. It was invisible, and as sure in its action as the venom. Also it was as rare and as difficult to trace. For, remember this. Botulism is food poisoning. If I had not found the stem of that glass it would be absolutely impossible to show that Werner died from anything on earth but bad food. That is why I do not even take time to analyze the stomach contents. That is why I say we are confronted by an archscoundrel of highest intelligence and downright cleverness. More"--Kennedy paused for emphasis--"I realize now the presence of a grim, invisible menace. It has just now been driven home to me. The botulin, with its deadly paralyzing power, sealed Werner's tongue even while he tried to tell me what he knew."

Mackay was tremendously impressed by Kennedy's explanation. "Does this mean," he asked, "that the guilty man or woman is some outsider? Those we have figured as possible suspects would hardly have this detailed knowledge of poisons."

"There are two possibilities," Kennedy answered. "The real person behind the two murders may have employed some one else to carry out the actual killing, a hypothesis I do not take seriously, or"--again he paused--"this may be a case of some one with intelligence starting out upon his career of crime intelligently by reading up on his subject. It is as simple to learn how to use crotalin or botulin toxin or any number of hundreds of deadly substances as it is to obtain the majority of them. In fact, if people generally understood the ease with which whole communities could be wiped out, and grasped that it could be done so as to leave virtually no clue to the author of the horror, they might not sleep as soundly at night as they do. The saving grace is that the average criminal is often clever, but almost never truly scientific. Unfortunately, we have to combat one who possesses the latter quality to a high degree."

"What is the invisible menace of which you spoke, Craig?" I inquired.

"The possibility of another murder before we can apprehend the guilty person or gain the evidence we need."

"Good heavens!" I imagine I blanched. "You mean--"

"Werner was struck down, apparently, for no reason but that he had guessed the identity of the villain. There is a second man in the company who has certain suspicions and is acting upon them. If he is on the right trail, by any chance--" Kennedy shrugged his shoulders soberly.

"Shirley?"

"Exactly! And there is still another possibility."

"What is that?"

"Here in this laboratory I have blood spots made on the portieres at the house of Phelps by the man who removed the needle, probably the unknown himself, possibly his--or her--agent. In any case it is a clue and--THE ONLY DIRECT AND INFALLIBLE CLUE IN EXISTENCE TO THE CRIMINAL! Also I have the evidence of the snake venom and of the botulin toxin here. Sooner or later the person who killed Werner because he suspected things will wake up to the fact that we possess tangible proof against him."

I grew pale. "You mean, then, that you may be attacked yourself? That even I--"

Kennedy smiled, unafraid. But from the expression in his eyes I knew that he took the thought of our possible danger very seriously.

XXIV

THE INVISIBLE MENACE

Mackay and I exchanged glances. Kennedy busied himself putting away some of the more important bits of evidence in the case, placing the tiny tubes of solution, the blood smears, and other items together in a cabinet at the farther corner of the laboratory. The vast bulk of his paraphernalia, the array of glass and chemicals and instruments, he left on the table for the morning. Then he faced us again, with a smile.

"Suppose you start up the percolator once more, Walter!" He took a cigar and lighted it from the match I struck. "I believe I've earned another cup of coffee," he added.

Mackay had been fidgeting considerably since Kennedy's explanation of the possible danger to Shirley, as well as to ourselves or even to others.

"Isn't there something we can do, Kennedy?" he exclaimed, suddenly. "Is it necessary to sit back and wait for this unknown to strike again?"

"Ordinarily," Kennedy replied, "on a case like this it has been my custom to permit the guilty parties to betray themselves, as they will do inevitably--especially when I call to my aid the recent discoveries of science for the detection and measurement of fine and almost imperceptible shades of emotion. But now that I realize the presence of this menace I shall become a detective of action; in fact, I shall not stop at any course to hurry matters. The very first thing in the morning I shall go to the studio and I want you and Jameson along. I"--his eyes twinkled; it was the excitement at the prospect--"I may need considerable help in getting the evidence I wish."

"Which is--?" It was I who interposed the question.

Kennedy blew a cloud of smoke. "There are three ways of tracing down a crime, aside from the police method of stool pigeons to betray the criminals and the detective bureau method of cross-examination under pressure, popularly known as the third degree."

"What are they?" Mackay asked, unaware that Kennedy needed little prompting once he felt inclined to talk out some matter puzzling him.

"One is the process of reasoning from the possible suspects to the act itself--in other words, putting the emphasis on the motive. A second is the reverse of the first, involving a study of the crime for clues and making deductions from the inevitable earmarks of the person for the purpose of discovering his identity. The third method, except for some investigations across the water, is distinctly my own, the scientific.

"In all sciences," Kennedy went on, warming to his subject, "progress is made by a careful tabulation of proved facts. The scientific method is the method of exact knowledge. Thus, in crime, those things are of value to us which by an infinite series of empiric observations have been established and have become incontrovertible. The familiar example, of course, is fingerprints. Nearly everyone knows that no two men have the same markings; that the same man displays a pattern which is unchanging from birth to the grave.

"No less certain is the fact that human blood differs from the blood of animals, that in faint variations the blood of no two people is alike, that the blood of any living thing, man or beast, is affected by various things--an infinite number almost--most of which are positively known to modern medical investigators.

"In this case my principal scientific clue is the blood left upon the portiere by the man who took the needle the night following the murder. Next in importance is the fact, demonstrated by me, that some one at the studio wiped a hypodermic on a towel after inoculating himself with antivenin. Of course I am presuming that this latter man inoculated himself and not some one else, because it is obvious. If necessary I can prove it later, however, by analyzing the trace of blood. That is not the point. The point is that whoever removed the needle pricked himself and yet did not die of the venom--unless it was a person not under our observation, an unlikely premise. Therefore, because of this last fact, and because again it is obvious, I expect to find that the same individual inoculated himself with antivenin and removed the needle from the portiere; and I expect to prove it beyond possibility of doubt by an analysis of his blood. A sample of the blood from this person will be identical with the spot on the portiere, and--much the easier test--will contain traces of the antitoxin.

"With that much accomplished, a little of the, well--third degree, will bring about a confession. It is circumstantial evidence of the strongest sort. Not only does a man take precautions against a given poison, but he is proved to be the one who removed the needle actually responsible for Miss Lamar's death.

"My handicap, however, is that I have no justifiable excuse for taking a sample of blood from each of the people we suspect, or feel we might suspect. For that reason I was waiting until one of the other detective methods should narrow the field of suspicion. Now that there is the menace of another attempt to take a life I am forced to act. To-morrow we will get samples of blood from everyone by artifice--or force!

"Meanwhile--" He hastened to continue, as though afraid we might interrupt to break his train of thought. "Meanwhile, to-night, let us see if it is possible to accomplish something by the deductive method.

"Already I have gone into an analysis starting from the nature of the crime and reasoning to the type of criminal responsible. The guilty man--or woman--is a person of high intelligence, added to genuine cleverness. But for the results accomplished in this laboratory we would be without a clue; our hands would be tied completely. Both Miss Lamar and Werner were killed by unusual poisons; deadly, and almost impossible to trace. There was a crowd of people about in each case; yet we have no witnesses. Now who, out of all our people with possible motives, are intelligent enough and clever enough to be guilty?"

Kennedy glanced first at me, then at Mackay.

"Manton? Phelps?" suggested the district attorney.

"The promoter," Kennedy rejoined, "is the typical man of the business world beneath the eccentricity of manner which seems to cling to everyone in the picture field. Ordinarily his type, thinking in millions of dollars and juggling nickel and dime admissions or other routine of commercial detail is apart from the finer subtle passions of life. When a business man commits murder he generally uses a pistol because he is sure it is efficient--he can see it work. The same applies to Phelps."

"Millard?" Mackay hesitated now to face the logic of Kennedy's keen mind. "He was Stella Lamar's husband!"

"Millard is a scenario writer and so apt to have a brain cluttered with all sorts of detail of crime and murder. At the same time an author is so used to counterfeiting emotion in his writings that he seldom takes things seriously. Life becomes a joke and Millard in particular is a butterfly, concerned more with the smiles of extra girls and the favor of Miss Faye than the fate of the woman whose divorce from him was not yet complete. A writer is the other extreme from the business man. The creator of stories is essentially inefficient because he tries to feel rather than reason. When an author commits murder he sets a stage for his own benefit. He is careful to avoid witnesses because they are inconvenient to dispose of. At the same time he wants the victim to understand thoroughly what is going to happen and so he is apt to accompany his crime with a speech worded very carefully indeed. Then he may start with an attempt to throttle a person and end up with a hatchet, or he may plan to use a razor and at the end brain his quarry with a chair. He lives too many lives to follow one through clearly--his own."

"How about Shirley?" I put in.

"At first glance Shirley and Gordon suggest themselves because both murders were highly spectacular, and the actor, above everything else, enjoys a big scene. After Werner's death, for instance, Shirley literally strutted up and down in that set. He was so full of the situation, so carried away by the drama of the occasion, that he failed utterly to realize how suspicious his conduct would seem to an observer. Unfortunately for our hypotheses, the use of venom and toxin is too cold-bloodedly efficient. The theatrical temperament must have emotion. An actor cruel and vicious enough to strike down two people as Miss Lamar and Werner were stricken, of sufficient dramatic make-up to conceive of the manner of their deaths, would want to see them writhe and suffer. He would select poisons equally rare and effective, but those more slow and painful in their operation. No, Walter, Shirley is not indicated by this method of reasoning. The arrangement of the scenes for the murders was simply another detail of efficiency, not due to a wish to be spectacular. The crowd about in each case has added greatly to the difficulty of investigation."

"Do you include Gordon in that?" Mackay asked.

"Yes, and in addition"--Kennedy smiled slightly--"I believe that Gordon is rather stupid. For one thing, he has had several fights in public, at the Goats Club and at the Midnight Fads and I suppose elsewhere. That is not the clever rogue. Furthermore, he had been speculating, not just now and then, but desperately, doggedly. Clever men speculate, but scientific men never. Our unknown criminal is both clever and intelligent."

"That brings you to the girls, then," Mackay remarked.

Kennedy's face clouded and I could see that he was troubled. "To be honest in this one particular method of deduction," he stated, "I must admit that both Miss Faye and Miss Loring are worthy of suspicion. The fact of their rise in the film world, the evidences of their popularity, is proof that they are clever. Miss Loring, in my few brief moments of contact with her on two occasions, showed a grasp of things and a quickness which indicate to me that she possesses a rare order of intelligence for a woman. As for Miss Faye"--again he hesitated--"one little act of hers demonstrated intelligence. When Shirley was standing guard in the set after Werner's death, and making a fool of himself, Millard evidently wanted to get over and speak to him, perhaps to tell him not to let me find him searching the scene as though his life depended upon it, perhaps something else. But Miss Faye stopped him. Unquestionably she saw that anyone taking an interest in the remains of the banquet just then would become an object of suspicion."

"Do you really suspect Marilyn or Enid?" I inquired.

"If this were half a generation ago I would say without hesitation that the crime was the handiwork of a man. But now the women are in everything. Young girls particularly--" He shrugged his shoulders.

Mackay had one more suggestion. "The camera men, the extras, the technical and studio staffs--they are not worthy of consideration, are they?"

Kennedy shook his head.

The odor of coffee struck my nostrils and I turned to find the percolator steaming. Kennedy leaned over, to take a whiff. Mackay rose. At that moment there was a sudden crash and the window-pane was shattered. Simultaneously a flash of light and a deafening explosion took place in the room, scattering broadcast tiny bits of glass from the laboratory table, splashing chemicals, many of them dangerous, over everything.

Kennedy hurried to the wreck of his paraphernalia. In an instant he held up a tiny bit of jagged metal.

"An explosive bullet!" he exclaimed. "An attempt to destroy my evidence!"

XXV

ITCHING SALVE

For once I rose with Kennedy. He preceded me to the laboratory after breakfast, however, leaving me to wait for Mackay. When the little district attorney arrived I noticed that he carried a package which looked as though it might contain a one-reel film can.

"The negative we took from the cameras at Tarrytown," he explained. "Also a print from each roll, ready to run. I've been holding this as evidence. Mr. Kennedy wanted me to bring it with me to-day."

"He's waiting for us at the laboratory," I remarked.

"He'll straighten everything up in a hurry, won't he?"

"Kennedy's the most high-handed individual I ever knew," I laughed, "if he sees a chance of getting his man." Then I became enthusiastic. "Often I've seen him gather a group of people in a room, perhaps without the faintest shred of legal right to do so, and there make the guilty person confess simply by marshaling the evidence, or maybe betray himself by some scientific device. It's wonderful, Mackay."

"Do you think he plans something of that kind this morning?"

I led the way to the door. "After what happened last night I know that Kennedy will resort to almost anything."

The district attorney fingered the package under his arm. "He might get everyone in the projection room then, and make them watch the actual photographic record of Stella's death--the scene where she scratched herself--"

"Let's hurry!" I interrupted.

When we entered the laboratory we found Kennedy vigorously fanning a towel which he had hung up to dry. I recognized it as the one I had discovered in the studio washroom immediately following the first murder.

"This will serve me better as bait than as evidence," he laughed. "I have impregnated it with a colorless chemical which will cling to the fibers and enable me to identify the most infinitesimal trace of it. We shall get up to the studio and start, well--I guess you could call it fishing for the guilty man." He fingered the folds, then jerked the towel down and flung it to me. "Here, Walter! It's dry enough. Now I want you to rub the contents of that tiny can of grease, open before you there, into the cloth."

He hurried over to wash his hands. I spread the towel out on the table and began to work in the stuff indicated by Kennedy. There was no odor and it seemed like some patent ointment in color. At first I was puzzled. Then, absently, I touched the back of one hand with the greasy fingers of the other and immediately an itching set up so annoying that I had to abandon my task.

Kennedy chuckled. "That's itching salve, Walter. The cuticle pads at your finger tips are too thick, but touch yourself anywhere else!--" He shrugged his shoulders. "You'd better use soap and water if you want any relief. Then you can start over again."

At the basin I thought I grasped his little plot.

"You're going to plant the towel," I asked, "so that the interested party will try to get hold of it?"

Evidently he thought it unnecessary to reply to me.

"Why couldn't you just put it somewhere without all the preparation," Mackay suggested, "and watch to see who came after it?"

"Because our criminal's too clever," Kennedy rejoined. "Our only chance to get it stolen is to make it very plain that it is not being watched. Whoever steals it, however, possibly will reveal himself on account of the itching salve. In any case I expect to be able to trace the towel to the thief, no matter what efforts are made to destroy it."

The towel was wrapped in a heavy bit of paper; then placed with a microscope and some other paraphernalia in a small battered traveling bag. Climbing into Mackay's little roadster, we soon were speeding toward the studio.

"Will you be able to help me, to stay with Jameson and myself all day?" Kennedy asked the district attorney, after perhaps a mile of silence.

"Surely! It's what I was hoping you'd allow me to do. I have no authority down here, though."

"I understand. But the police, or an outsider, might allow some of my plans to become known." He paused a moment in thought. "The film you brought in with you consists of the scenes on the rolls of negative in use at the time of Miss Lamar's collapse. It may or may not include the action where she scratched herself. Now I want the scenes up to thirteen put together in proper order, first as photographed by one camera, then as caught by the other. I'll arrange for the services of a cutter, and for the delivery to me of any other negative or positive overlooked by us when we had the two boxes sealed and given into your custody at Tarrytown. Will you superintend the assembly of the scenes, so that you can be sure nothing is taken out or omitted?"

"Of course! I want to do anything I can."

Upon arrival at the studio we detected this time all the signs of a complete demoralization. The death of Werner, the fact that he had been stricken down during the taking of a scene and on the very stage, had served to bring the tragedy home to the people. More, it was a second murder in four days, apparently by the same hand as the first. A sense of dread, a nameless, intangible fear, had taken form and found its way under the big blackened glass roofs and around and through the corridors, into the dressing rooms, and back even to the manufacturing and purely technical departments. The gateman eyed us with undisguised uneasiness as we drove through the archway into the yard. In that inclosure there were only two cars--Manton's, and one we later learned belonged to Phelps. The sole human being to enter our range of vision was an office boy. He skirted the side of the building as though the menace of death were in the air, or likely to strike out of the very heavens without warning.

We found Kauf in the large studio, obviously unhappy in the shoes of the unfortunate Werner. Probably from half-reasoned-out motives of efficiency in psychology the new director had made no attempt to resume work at once in the ill-fated banquet set, but had turned to the companion ballroom setting, since both had been prepared and made ready at the same time.

Kennedy explained our presence so early in the morning very neatly, I thought.

"I would appreciate it," he began, "if you could place a cutter at the disposal of Mr. Mackay. He has the scenes taken from the camera and sealed at the time of Miss Lamar's death. I would like to have any other film taken out there delivered to him and the whole joined in proper sequence. Then, Mr. Kauf, if you could arrange to have the same cutter take the film exposed yesterday when Mr. Werner--"

"You think you might be able to see something, to discover something on the screen?"

"Exactly!"

Kauf beamed. "Mr. Manton gave me orders to assist you in every way I could, or to put any of my people at your disposal. More than that, Mr. Kennedy, he anticipated you. He thought you might want to look at the scenes taken yesterday and he rushed the laboratory and the printing room. We'll be able to fix you up very quickly."

"Good!" Kennedy nodded to Mackay and the district attorney hurried off with Kauf. "Now, Walter!" he exclaimed, sobering.

I picked up the traveling bag and together we strolled toward the ballroom set. There most of the players were gathered already--in make-up and evening clothes of a fancier sort even than those demanded for the banquet. I saw that Kennedy singled out Marilyn.

"Good morning," she said, cheerfully, but with effort. It was obvious she had spent a nervous night. There were circles under her eyes ill concealed by the small quantity of cosmetic she used. Her hands, shifting constantly, displayed the loss of her usual poise. "You are out bright and early," she added.

"We've stumbled into a very important clue," Kennedy told her, with a show of giving her his confidence. "In that bag in Walter's hand is one of the studio towels. It contains a hint of the poison used to kill Miss Lamar and--of utmost consequence--it has provided me with an infallible clue to the identity of the murderer himself--or herself."

It seemed to me that Marilyn blanched. "Where--where did you find it?" she demanded, in a very awed voice.

"In one of the studio washrooms."

"It has been--it has been in the washroom ever since poor Stella's death?"

"No, not that! Jameson discovered it the same day but"--the very slight pause was perceptible to me; Kennedy hated to lie--"I haven't realized its importance until just this morning."

Enid Faye, seeing us from a distance, conquered her dislike of Marilyn sufficiently to join us. She was very erect and tense. Her eyes, wide and sober and searching, traveled from my face to Kennedy's and back. Then she dissembled, softening as she came close to me, laying a hand on my shoulder and allowing her skirt to brush my trousers.

"Tell me, Jamie," she whispered, her warm breath thrilling me through and through. "Has the wonderful Craig Kennedy discovered something?" It was not sarcasm, but assumed playfulness, masking a throbbing curiosity.

"I found a towel in one of the studio washrooms," I answered, "and Craig has demonstrated that it is a clue to the poison which killed Stella Lamar as well as to the person who did it."

Enid gasped. Then she drew herself up and her eyes narrowed. Now she faced Kennedy.

"How can the towel be a clue to the crime?" she protested. "Stella was--was murdered way out in Tarrytown! Mr. Jameson found the towel here!"

Kennedy shrugged his shoulders. "I cannot tell you that--just yet." He paused deliberately. "You see," he lied. "I have yet to make my analysis."

"But you know it's a clue to the--"

"That towel"--he raised his voice, as though in elation--"that towel will lead me to the murderer--infallibly!"

Merle Shirley had come up in time to hear most of the colloquy between Enid and Kennedy. At the last he flushed, clenching his fists.

"If you can prove who the murderer is, Mr. Kennedy," he exploded, "why don't you apprehend him before some one else meets the fate of Werner?"

"I can do nothing until I return to my laboratory this afternoon. I will not know the identity of the guilty person until I complete a chemical analysis."

One by one the various people possibly concerned in the two crimes joined the group. This morning all the faces were serious; most of them showed the marks of sleeplessness following the second murder. Kennedy walked away, but I saw that Jack Gordon hastened to question both the girls, ignoring their evident dislike for him. Among the others I recognized Watkins, the camera man, and his associate. Lawrence Millard came in and hastened to the side of Enid. As he drew her away to ask the cause of the gathering I wondered at his early presence. The scenario writer was typical of them all. The strange and unusual nature of the crimes, the evident relationship between them, had drawn the employees of Manton Pictures to the studio as a crowd of baseball fans collects before a public bulletin board. Not one of them but was afraid of missing some development in the case. In no instance could the interest of a particular individual be taken as an indication of guilt.

Phelps entered the studio from the door to the dressing rooms. Disdaining to join the other group, he approached us to ask the cause for the excitement. Kennedy explained, patiently, and I saw that Phelps looked at the black bag uneasily.

"I hope the guilty party is not a member of the company," he muttered.

"Why?" Kennedy's mouth tightened.

The financier grew red. "Because this picture has been crippled enough. First a new star; now a new director--if it wasn't so preposterous I'd believe that it was all part of a deliberate--" He stopped as if realizing suddenly the inadvisability of vague accusations.

"Don't you want justice done?" Kennedy inquired.

"Of course!" Phelps tugged at his collar uncomfortably. "Of course, Mr. Kennedy." Then he turned and hurried away, out of the studio.

Gordon and Millard detached themselves from the others, coming over.

"In which washroom was the towel found, Mr. Kennedy?" Gordon put the question as though he felt himself specially delegated to obtain this information.

I wondered how Kennedy would evade a direct answer. To my surprise he made no attempt at concealment.

"The one on the second floor of the office building."

Millard laughed, facing Gordon. "That puts it on myself--or the big boss!"

It struck me that the leading man was uneasy as he hurried back to the others. Millard, still smiling, turned to say something to us, but we were joined by Manton, entering from the other end of the big inclosure.

"Good morning," the promoter exclaimed, somewhat breathless. "I just learned you were here. Is--is there some new development. Is there something I can do?"

"I see you are not allowing anything to interfere with the making of the picture," Kennedy remarked. "All the people seem to be here bright and early."

A shadow crept into Manton's face. "It seems almost as cold-blooded as--as war," he admitted. "But I can't help myself, Mr. Kennedy. The company has no money and if we don't meet this release we're busted." All at once he lowered his voice eagerly. "Tell me, have you discovered something? Is there some clue to the guilty man?"

"He's found a towel," Millard put in, an expression of half amusement on his face as he faced the promoter. "In some way it's a clue to the identity of the murderer, an infallible clue, he says. He found it in the washroom by our offices. Since Werner is dead, that points the finger of suspicion at you or me."

Manton's jaw dropped. His expression became almost ludicrous, as if the thought that he could possibly be suspected himself was new to him. Millard's eyes sobered a bit at his superior's confusion.

"There's a door from the dressing rooms," Kennedy suggested. "Any of the actors or actresses could have used the place."

"Of course!" Manton grasped at the straw. "I had forgotten. There have been complaints to me about the players using that room."

"I have the towel with me, wrapped up in a paper in this grip," Kennedy went on. "It's so very valuable as a bit of evidence--I wonder if I could borrow a locker so as to keep it under lock and key until we're ready to return to the laboratory?"

"Sure! Of course!" Manton glanced about and saw the little knot of people still gathered in the set. "Millard! Go over and tell Kauf to get busy. He's losing time." Then he turned to us again. "Come on, Mr. Kennedy, we have some steel lockers out by the property room."

As we started across the floor I could see that Kennedy was framing a question with great care.

"Do you ever use snakes in films, Mr. Manton?" he asked.

"Why, no!" The promoter stopped in his surprise. "That is, not if we ever can help it. The censorship won't pass anything with snakes."

"You have used them, though?"

"Yes. Once we made a short-length special subject, nothing but snakes." Manton became enthusiastic. "It was a wonder, too; a pet film of mine. We made it with the direct co-operation and supervision of the greatest authority on poisonous snakes in the country, Doctor Nagoya of Castleton Institute."

XXVI

A CIGARETTE CASE

Kennedy's face betrayed only a remote interest. "Have you any copies of that particular film?"

"Just the negative, I believe."

"Could I have that for a few days?"

"Of course!" Manton seemed to wish to give us every possible amount of co-operation; yet this request puzzled him. "Would you care to go down to the negative vaults with me?"

Kennedy nodded.

First we stopped in a lengthy corridor in the rear building, where there were no great signs of life. Through a door I could see a long room filled with ornaments, pictures, furniture, rugs, and all the vast freak collections of a property room. Along the side of the hallway itself was a line of steel lockers of recent design.

Manton called out to an employee and he appeared after a long wait and unlocked one of them. At Kennedy's direction I put the traveling bag in the lower compartment, pocketing the key. Then we retraced our steps to broad steel stairs leading up and down. We descended to the basement and found ourselves in a high-ceilinged space immaculately clean and used generally for storage purposes.

"The film vaults," Manton explained, "are at the corner of the west wing. They have to be ventilated specially, on account of the high inflammability of the celluloid composition. Since the greatest fire risk, otherwise, is the laboratory and printing departments, and next to that the studios themselves with the scenery, the heat of the lights, the wires, etc., we have located them in the most distant corner of the quadrangle. The negative, you see, represents our actual invested capital to a considerable extent. The prints wear out and frequently large sections are destroyed and have to be reprinted. Then sometimes we can reissue old subjects. All in all we guard the negative with the care a bank would give actual funds in its vaults."

In our many visits to the Manton studios I had been struck by the scrupulous cleanliness of every part of the place. The impression of orderliness came back to me with redoubled force as we made our way around in the basement. Nothing seemed out of its proper position, although a vast amount of various material for picture making was stored here. We passed two projection rooms, one a miniature theater with quite a bit of comfort, the other small and bare for the use of directors and cutters.

Finally we saw the vaults ahead of us. The walls were concrete, matching the actual walls of the basement. There were two entrances and the doors were double, of heavy steel, arranged so that an air space would give protection in case of fire. At a roll-top desk, arranged for the use of the clerk in charge of the negatives and prints, was a young boy.

"Where's Wagnalls?" demanded Manton.

"He went out, sir," the boy replied, respectfully enough. "Said he would be right back and for me to watch and not to let anything get out."

The promoter led the way into the first room. Here on all four sides and in several rows down the center, like the racks in a public library, were shelves supporting stacks of square thin metal boxes or trays with handles and tightly fitting covers. Cards were secured to the front of each, by clamps, giving the name of the picture and the number under which the film was filed. I was surprised because I expected to find everything kept in ordinary round film cans.

"These are the negatives," Manton explained. He pulled out a box at random, opening it. "The negative is not all spliced together, the same length as the reels of positive, because the printing machines are equipped to take two-hundred-foot pieces at a time, or approximate fifths of a reel, the size of a roll of raw positive film stock. Then whenever there is a change in color, as from amber daylight to blue tint for night, the negative is broken because pieces of different coloring have to go through different baths, and that also determines the size of the rolls. The prints, or positives, in the other vaults, are in reel lengths and so are kept in the round boxes in which they are shipped."

Kennedy glanced about curiously. "The negative of that snake picture is here, you said?"

Manton went to a little desk where there was a card index. Thumbing through the records, he found the number and led us to the proper place in the rack. In the box were only two rolls of negative, both were large.

"This was a split reel," the promoter began. "It was approximately four hundred feet and we used it to fill out a short comedy, a release we had years ago, a reel the first part of which was educational and the last two-thirds or so a roaring slap-stick. We never made money on it.