The Unicorn Murders

Author:John Dickson Carr [carr, john dickson]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Dell
Published: 1935-03-14T18:30:00+00:00

Fowler, who had been sitting on the bed contemplating his shoes in an abstracted way, jumped up.

"He was asked a short time ago," D'Andrieu went on, "to compare two signatures. One was the clumsy copy I had made, with a signature which would not have deceived a child who knew Flamande's handwriting; the other was the signature on the note dropped in this gallery a while ago. Well? He did not state flatly that my copy was a poor forgery. On the contrary, he said it was a very good forgery; so clever, in fact, and so like the real, that it would have passed inspection with anyone who did not know the real. It was a forgery, yes; but it was very good. That I knew to be untrue."

D'Andrieu held up his hand sharply.

"Please do not speak yet. When I opened my house to guests to-night, I did not bargain on murder. I am not aiding Flamande now. Since Gasquet is dead, I am going to do my poor best to catch Flamande and send him to the guillotine. Do you understand that, all of you?

"Very well. In the second letter, to whom were we referred as to whether the first was genuine? To Mr. Fowler. On whose typewriter was the note written, it being carefully pointed out the machine was stolen? Mr. Fowler's. But how could that typewriter have been stolen? All the luggage was placed in the rooms beforehand; but Mr. Fowler, by his own statement, was the first of all of us to go upstairs, since he wished to watch M. Gasquet's door. Which brings us to the final point:

"Shortly before the murder, the lights were switched off from inside the linen-closet, and the typewriter placed there. Mr. Fowler, by his own testimony, was watching the gallery all the time. You may have noticed that the door of his room is directly across the gallery from the door of the linen-closet. If he were in fact watching all the time, he could not conceivably have failed to see anyone who went into the linen-closet, carrying the typewriter, to turn off the lights. Well, did anyone go in there? You will notice that he has made no mention of that, although it would immediately have occurred to him. I suggest that at least it calls for some little explanation."

The rain continued to patter softly. Fowler, who had been standing with his fingers tapping just as softly on the foot of the bed, straightened up. You could tell by the way he cleared his throat, and the sallowness of his dark face, that he was nervous. But it seemed rather the nervousness of the

superior debater who finds himself unexpectedly pinned in a corner. His eyes shifted and shone. He was almost smiling.

"Indeed?" he said with a sort of polite contempt. "Vive la logique. All right. I'll try to be logical as well. And I'll give you explanations, possibly in a way you won't like. Do you have those

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