“Then that lets me out, Dr. Marlowe!” The Duke’s voice was a cracked falsetto, hoarse with strain. It wasn’t me, it couldn’t-”
“Agreed, Cecil, it wasn’t you. Apart from the fact that you were another poisoning victim I don’t think-well, I’m not being physically disparaging but I’d think it very unlikely that you could have hoisted that rock that was used to kill Strvker. Mr. Gerran, too, is above suspicion: not only was he poisoned but he was in the cabin here at the time of Stryker’s death. Allen obviously, could have had nothing to do with it and neither did Mr. Goin here, although you’ll have to take my word for that.”
“What does that mean, Dr. Marlowe?” Goin’s voice was steady.
“Because when you first saw Stryker’s body you turned as white as the proverbial sheet. People can do lots of things with their bodies but they can’t switch on and off the epidermal blood supply at will. Had you been prepared for the sight you saw you wouldn’t have changed colour. You did. So you weren’t prepared. Our two Marys here we’ll have to leave out of the reckoning for it would have been a physical impossibility for either of them to have attacked Stryker with that rock. And Miss Haynes, of course, doesn’t come into the reckoning at all. Which, by my count, leaves thirteen potential suspects in all.” I looked round the cabin and counted. “That’s right. Thirteen. Let’s hope it’s going to be a very unlucky number for one of you.”
“Dr. Marlowe,” Goin said. I think you should consider withdrawing your resignation.
“Consider it withdrawn. I was beginning to wonder what I’d do for food anvway.” I looked at my now empty glass then at Otto. “Seeing that I’m now back on the strength, as it were, would it be in order–”
“Of course, of course.” Otto, looking stricken, sunk heavily onto a providentially sturdy stool and insofar as it was possible for over two hundredweights of lard to look like a punctured balloon, he looked like a punctured balloon. “Dear God, this is ghastly. One of us here is a murderer. One of us here has killed five people!” He shivered violently although the temperature had by this time risen well above freezing point. “Five people. Dead. And the man who did it is here!”
I lit a cigarette, sipped a little more of Otto’s Scotch and waited for some further contributions to the conversation. Outside, the wind had strengthened until it was now a high and lonesome moaning sound that set the teeth on edge, a moan that regularly climbed up the register into a weird and eldritch whistling as the wind gusted and fell away: everyone appeared to be listening to it and listening intently, a weirdly appropriate litany for the fear and the horror that was closing in on their minds, a fit requiem for the dead Stryker. A whole minute dragged by and no one spoke so I took up the conversational burden again.
“The implications will not have escaped you,” I said. “At least, when you have had as much time to think about them as I’ve had, they won’t. Stryker is dead-and so are four others. Who should want them dead? Why should they have dieX Is there a reason, a purpose behind those slayings? Have we a psychopathic murderer amongst us? If there is a purpose, has it been achieved:” If it hasn’t-or if the killer is a psychopath-which one of us is going to be next? Who is going to die tonight? Who is going to go to his cubicle tonight knowing that anyone, a crazed killer, it may be, is going to enter at any time-or even, possibly one’s own roommate may be waiting his turn with a knife or a suffocating pillow? In fact, I should think that the roommate possibility might be by far the more likely-for who would do anything so crazily obvious as that? Except, of course, a crazy man. SO, before us, we have what you might call a sleepless vigil. Perhaps we can all keep it up for one night. But for twenty-two nights-can we keep it up for twenty-two nights? Is there any one of us here who can be sure of still being alive when the Morning Rose returns?”
From their expressions and the profound silence that greeted this last question it was apparent that no one was prepared to express any such certainty. When I came to consider it myself, instead of just asking them to do so, I realised that the question of continued existence applied more particularly and more strongly to myself than to any of the others for if the killer were no wayward psycho who struck out as the fancy took him but was an ice-cold and calculating murderer with a definite objective in view then I was convinced that I was first on his calling list. I didn’t for a moment think that any attempt to dispose of me would be because that was any part of the kilICT’S preconceived plans but solely because I represented a threat to those plans.
“And how are we going to comport ourselves from now on?” I said. “Do we now polarize into two groups, the nine acknowledged innocent giving a very wide berth and a leery eye to the thirteen potentially guilty even although this is going to be a mite hard on, say, twelve of the latter? Shall we be like oil and water and resolutely refuse to mix? Or about your shooting plans for tomorrow. Mr. Gerran and the Count, I believe, are heading for the fells tomorrow, a goodie and a potential baddic-Mr. Gerran is going to make sure that he has at least another goodie along with him to watch his back? Heissman is taking the workboat to reconnoitre possible locations along the Sor-Hamna and perhaps a bit farther south. I believe Jungbeck and Heyter here have volunteered to go along with him. Three of those, you note, whose innocence is not proved. Any white sheep going to go along with black wolf or wolves who may come back and sorrowfully explain that the poor sheep fell over the side and that in spite of their heroic efforts the poor fellow perished miserably. And those splendid precipices at the south of the island-one little well-timed nudge, a deft clicking together of the ankles-well, sixteen hundred feet is a considerable drop, especially when you bear in mind that it’s straight down all the way. A perplexing and a difficult problem, isn’t it, gentlemen?”
“This is preposterous,” Otto said loudly. “Absolutely preposterous.”
“Isn’t it?” I said. “A pity we can’t ask Stryker his opinion about that. Or the opinions of Antonio and Halliday and Moxen and Scott. When your pale ghost looks down from the limbo, Mr. Gerran, and watches you being lowered into a hole in the frozen snow-do you think it will still look preposterous?”
Otto shuddered and reached for the bottle. “What in God’s name are we going to do?”
“I’ve no idea,” I said. “You heard what I just said to Mr. Goin. I have reverted to the position of employee. I haven’t got my shirt on this film as I heard Mr. Goin say to Captain Imrie that you had. I’m afraid this is a decision to arrive at at a directorial level-well, the three directors that are still capable of making decisions.”
“Would our employee mind telling us what he means?” Goin tried to smile but it didn’t come off, his heart wasn’t in it.
“Do you want to go ahead with shooting all your scenes up here or don’t you? It’s up to you. If we all stay here in the cabin permanently, at least half a dozen awake at any given time, looking with all their eyes and listening with all their ears, then the chances are high that we’ll all still be in relatively mint condition by the time the twenty-two days are up. On the other hand, of course, that means that you won’t get any of your film shot and you’ll lose all your investment. It’s a problem I wouldn’t like to have to face. That’s excellent Scotch you have there, Mr. Gerran.”
“I can see that you appreciate it.” Otto would have liked a touch of asperity in his voice but all he managed to do was to sound worried.
“Don’t be so mean.” I helped myself. “Those are times that try men’s souls.” I wasn’t really listening to Otto, I was barely listening to myself. Once before, since leaving Wick, on the occasion when the Count had said something about a surfeit of horse-radish, certain words had had the effect of a touch-paper being applied to a train of gunpowder, triggering off a succession of thoughts that came tumbling in one after the other almost faster than my mind could register them, and now the same thing had happened again, only this time the words had been triggered off by something I’d said myself. I became aware that the Count was speaking, presumably to me. I said: “Sorry, mind on other things, you know.”