Minute Mysteries [Detectograms]
_The Professor Sees Through It_
‘Let’s go in to dinner—it’s twenty minutes after six, and I’m starved,’
said Hawkins.
‘Right!’ responded Professor Fordney, his train companion, ‘I’m hungry,
too.’
The two men had met only a few minutes before, as casually as travelers
do, but already seemed to find each other agreeable company.
At dinner Hawkins explained he was a conductor on another railroad and
bemoaned the loss of passenger traffic. Fordney, too, decried the
depression and its effects.
When the conductor came through, Hawkins tendered a pass with a friendly
remark, and Fordney, who said he had boarded the train in such a hurry
he didn’t have time to purchase a ticket, paid a cash fare. Neither he
nor the conductor having proper change, he borrowed fourteen cents from
Hawkins.
After an enjoyable dinner, they went back to the club car for a smoke
and continued their chat.
‘Ever been in Savannah, Mr. Hawkins?’ asked Fordney.
‘Why, yes. Several times. Why?’
‘Oh, nothing in particular. Charming city, isn’t it?’
‘Yes, it is, but I like the quaintness of New Orleans better, myself.’
And so they chatted through a pleasant evening until Hawkins, with a
yawn, said: ‘Well, it’s a quarter to eleven. Bedtime for me. See you in
the morning. Good-night, Professor. I’ve enjoyed knowing you.’
‘Good-night,’ responded Fordney. ‘I’ll give you the fourteen cents in
the morning. Don’t let the fact that I’m aware of your deception keep
you awake!’
‘What?’ cried the amazed Hawkins.
What did Fordney mean?
71
_The Kidnapers’ Cleverness_
‘There are times,’ mused Professor Fordney from the depths of the most
comfortable chair in the lounge of the University Club, ‘when the
criminal does show ingenuity of a high order. I recall a most
interesting and baffling case on which I worked ten years ago.
‘A wealthy man whose daughter had been kidnaped had been warned that, if
he appealed to the police, she would be killed. Consequently, it was
difficult to get his coöperation in running down the criminals. However,
upon receiving the following note delivered in an express package 12″ ×
12″ × 12″ he sought my advice.
Send us, by the means herein given you, $5,000 in cash, at exactly
midnight tonight. If you do so, your daughter will be returned
unharmed.
‘My client did as directed and his child was returned safely next day.
‘Do you know, Jim,’ asked Fordney of his fireside companion, ‘what means
the kidnapers employed that made trapping of them, or discovery of their
whereabouts, absolutely impossible? There’s a nice little problem in
deduction for a rising young attorney,’ he laughed.
After ten minutes of deep silence on Jim’s part, he said, ‘I can’t
figure it out, Professor. What was it?’
SOLUTIONS
1. _A Crack Shot_
It was a dark, starless, moonless night. The nearest habitation was five
miles. The eyes of no animal ever shine in the dark unless there is a
light by which they can be reflected, and a man’s eyes never shine under
any circumstances.
Therefore, Butler could not possibly have seen any eyes shining at him
in the dark. It was clearly murder.
And thy deep eyes, amid the gloom,
Shine like jewels in a shroud.
Longfellow.
2. _On the Scent_
Not even a prohibition agent would use alcohol in an automobile radiator
in or about Miami!
The oil and wine of merry meeting.
Irving.
3. _Fatal Error_
The Professor knew it would take a keener pair of eyes than Bronson’s to
see a nod in the dark.
The lights had not been turned on. Remember?
Darkness visible.
Milton.
4. _The Poison Murder Case_
Unless Bob Kewley had returned home after telling the Professor he was
going to the theater, he could not have known the library door was
locked. The fact that he did, coupled with the strong motive, naturally
directed suspicion to him. He inadvertently gave himself away.
Error will slip through a crack, while truth will stick in a doorway.
Shaw.
5. _A Strange ‘Kidnaping’_
Had Johnson wound his watch immediately before 2 A.M. Friday, the time
of his alleged kidnaping, it would not have been running Sunday
afternoon when he recovered consciousness and said he heard it ticking.
No standard-make watch will run sixty hours without winding.
This act is an ancient tale new told;
Being urged at a time unseasonable.
Shakespeare.
6. _A Valuable Formula_
In a small room the intruder would _unquestionably_ have heard Hyde
dialing Headquarters, and therefore could not have been unaware of his
presence.
As Hyde had obviously lied about this, Fordney was convinced he had
fabricated the entire story in order to sell the formula twice.
Don’t tell me of deception; a lie is a lie, whether it be a lie to the
eye or a lie to the ear.
Dr. Johnson.
7. _Strangled_
There had been a dry, hot spell at that place for twenty-two days. Irene
Greer’s hair was matted with mud; therefore, she must have been attacked
elsewhere.
The face of things appeareth not the same far off and when we see them
right at hand.
Euripides.
8. _Death in the Office_
Gifford could not have been shot at the time he called Fordney, as he
was found with a bullet through his heart. The Professor’s theory was
that Gifford wanted his death to appear as murder in order to protect
his heavy insurance.
The heart does not lie.
Alfieri.
9. _They Usually Forget Something_
The note, although misspelled, poorly expressed, and written by a
seemingly illiterate hand, was punctuated properly, in two places. A
semicolon and a comma would not have been used had the writer been an
uneducated man.
Force of habit had betrayed him!
You write with ease to show your breeding,
But easy writing’s curst hard reading.
Sheridan.
10. _The Professor Gives a Lesson_
Cardoni said he saw the kidnapers around a table as he peered through
the keyhole. Yale locks do not have keyholes.
Kelley was justified in throwing him out, don’t you think? The class
found this an easy one—did you?
Since your eyes are so sharpe that you cannot onely looke through a
milstone, but cleane through the minde.
Lyly.
11. _Upstairs and Down_
The policeman ran through the hall and unlocked the kitchen door.
The doors to the porch and cellar were locked on the inside. Had the old
lady committed suicide, she could not have locked the door leading to
the hall from the outside.
The murderer, in leaving, locked this door and forgot to remove the key.
The inevitable slip!
A blockhead cannot come in, nor go away, like a man of sense.
Bruyère.
12. _Class Day_
The student readily recognized the absurdity of the Professor’s story
which he had given to his class to test their quick detection of a
glaring inconsistency. If it must be explained, an orchestra under
personal leadership does not play during the showing of a ‘talkie.’
Right?
Wit marries ideas lying far apart, by a sudden jerk of the
understanding.
Whipple.
13. _A Hot Pursuit_
Smith said he _ran_ after the burglar. Had he done so he could not have
known the cellar window had been chiseled open. Therefore, his story was
obviously faked.
A lie never lives to be old.
Sophocles.
14. _A Question of Identity_
As Diana Lane was walking down the corridor with her back to Nora, it
was impossible for the servant to know Diana was wearing her famous
emerald pendant.
There is an alchemy of quiet malice by which women can concoct a
subtle poison from ordinary trifles.
Hawthorne.
15. _A Yachtsman’s Alibi_
As Picus said there was no breeze, the distress flag would have hung
limp against the mast, and the Captain could not have seen, at that
distance, whether or not the flag was upside down.
That’s all the Professor needed to determine the falsity of his alibi.
However, Picus was a poor sailor. While the International Distress
Signal is a flag flown upside down, it is by custom and regulation
always flown at half-mast.
... And the sea charm’d into a calm so still
That not a wrinkle ruffles her smooth face.
Dryden.
16. _Murder at Coney Island_
Jasper said he found the woman sitting _up_ in the _middle_ of the
chariot. The motion of the merry-go-round would have made it impossible
for a dead body to remain upright in the middle of the chariot.
Sir, you are giving a reason for it; but that will not make it
right....
Johnson.
17. _Too Clever_
The murderer tried to give the impression that Dawson had died before
finishing the incriminating note. Had he written it and died before
completing it, he could not have put the pen back in the tray where it
was found.
In his effort to incriminate Lynch, the murderer had been too cautious.
A costly oversight.
Man’s caution often into danger turns,
And his guard falling crushes him to death.
Young.
18. _Bloody Murder_
The Professor knew it was not suicide, because Thompson’s coat, which
was flung _across_ the room, was blood-stained. Quite impossible if he
had taken his own life.
Blood, though it sleep a time, yet never dies.
Chapman.
19. _Death Back-Stage_
There were _no_ finger-prints on the gun which killed Claudia Mason. She
could not have shot herself in the temple and then wiped off the
revolver.
The murderer neglected to get her fingerprints on the gun.
A fool cannot be an actor, though an actor may act a fool’s part.
Sophocles.
20. _An Easy Combination_
It would have been impossible for Fellows to have hastily dialed a
number in the _dark_. Try it!
Haste trips up its own heels, fetters and stops itself.
Seneca.
21. _A Modern Knight_
The fact that the bullet was found in the body and the only trace of its
firing was the hole in the curtain _below_ the window-sill proved
conclusively the shot could not have been fired from within the room.