“And so must this meeting,” said Inspector Block, tapping an impatient toe.
“I’m sorry. Yes… well, I went on taking pictures till the crowd surged in and there was nothing to take but the backs of their heads. So then I suddenly thought about the shooting and I peeked over the parapet and there to my horror I saw the tip of a gun, the barrel, just showing beyond the window sill. To this day I don’t know why I did it, but I dropped all my gear and ran along the ledge to the trap door, to get down and — I don’t know, do something, I suppose. Sheer madness, because imagine if the murderer had still been there! But anyway, I couldn’t get the trap door open. I tugged and I kicked but — well, we know now that it had been bolted from the inside. So I ran back to where I’d seen the gun and what was in my mind then, I think, was that there it still was, still pointing down at all those helpless people—”
“He’d have cleared out long before,” said the young man scornfully, “while you were taking pictures and running up and down.”
“Well—” He spread artistic, explanatory, jingly hands. “I mean, one isn’t exactly a man of action, is one? I daresay what I thought didn’t make much sense. But I did imagine him crouching there with that gun in his hands — of course I didn’t know then about the tripod and all that — and all those poor dear people in danger down below. And suddenly I started smashing at the slates, bashing at them with the heel of my shoe, clearing a little hole so that at least I could look down and see what he was doing — perhaps frighten him off, make him clear out.”
But he had cleared out long ago — cleared out, vanished into thin air. Nobody was there except two policemen, staring back, astonished, into Mr. Photoze’s startled face. “One said, ‘What are you doing up there?’
“ ‘He had permission. To take photos. I know him,’ said P.C. Robbins. ‘He’s all right.’ ”
“My poor father — little did he think!” said the young man.
Mr. Photoze collapsed into his chair with an air of giving up. “I don’t know. What can you do? The facts, you silly boy, I’ve just given you the facts! I was up on the roof, I couldn’t get down — it was your own father who pulled the bolt and locked me out. How could I have committed the murder, how could I have fired the gun? Even if I’d wanted to, how could I have done it? We’ve all just given you the facts.”
The trapped animal, head turning from side to side, seeking a way out. And then — the release. The young man was absolutely still, struck mindless for a moment by the immensity of the idea. He blurted out at last, “The apples!”
“The apples?”
“Who ties a bag of apples at the neck with string? And… yes, there was other string in that room, wound round the tripod and the butt of the rifle, a long piece of string. What for? The rifle was already tied into place with the rope.” He said to Inspector Block, “Was there a nail in the wall opposite the window?”
“There were nail holes,” said Block. “They were everywhere.”
“The rifle fixed steady, tied by the rope, aligned on the spot.” The dark was receding from his face, he was alive with excitement. “And tied to the rifle — to the trigger of the rifle — the string; tied with a slip noose, easy to undo afterwards, and the other end of the string tied with a slip noose to a nail in the wall opposite the window. And a bag of apples — an innocent-looking bag of apples that no one will worry about too much. A little light refreshment for the murderer while he waits?” he suggested to Inspector Block with a fine contempt.
“I was a plain copper in those days,” said Block, “and not in the close confidence of my superiors. But I don’t think they took it all quite so easily as that. On the other hand, murderers are funny animals, they have all sorts of cockeyed reasons for what they do. He could, for example, have been a smoker and didn’t want to draw attention to the fact — leaving ashes and stubs around. So he supplied himself with something to munch, to fill the gap.”
“Are you a smoker?” said the young man nastily to Mr. Photoze.
“I have no idea what either of you is talking about,” said Mr. Photoze.
“A bag of apples is a funny thing,” said the young man. “Sort of — nobbly. Of course other things would have done as well, but the presence of a bag of apples on the scene could be explained in lots of ways — for example, something to stop the murderer from wanting to smoke.” His face, growing white and pinched now where the dark had been, stared, ugly with spite, at Mr. Photoze. “I was sure you must have done it,” he said, “because I knew my father hadn’t. But now I know. Because I know how.” And his hands described it, stretched apart, holding taut an imaginary string. “One end tied to the trigger, one end fixed to the wall. At the right moment something heavy falling on the string, jerking it down, yanking back the trigger, firing the shot.”
Absolute silence had fallen in the big room. Mr. Photoze said at last, shakily, “I was on the roof. How could I have dropped the bag of apples down?”
“You admit you made a hole in the slates,” said the young man. “You dropped it down through that.”
Silence again. Inspector Block said quietly, “Very ingenious. But your father was in the room within two minutes or less after the shot was fired. The string was wound round the tripod when he first saw it. Who took it down and wound it there?”
“Perhaps his precious father did,” said Mr. Photoze, a trifle viciously, “having fixed it all up himself. He was supposed to be on duty at the entrance. But no one could see him. Who knows that he was really there?”
“He was seen going up the stairs after the shot was fired,” said Mr. Mysterioso reasonably.
“That’s right. To take down string before Block arrived and saw it.”
The young man was unafraid. “How could he have got it to work? He was outside the door, three stories down — we know that because he was seen coming up. So… Mr. Mysterioso, you’re the magician here. How could my father have got the trick to work?”
“There are ways,” admitted Mr. Mysterioso reluctantly. “Blocks of ice and melting wax and timing machines — after all, he only had to be the first one on the scene to clear the evidence away.”
“Curiously enough,” said Block, “the police thought of some of these little ideas too. Considering the length of the string — just the width of the room — and the uselessness of it where we found it, as the young man rightly points out, just wound round the tripod, not even knotted — well, we did just think about it. Though I admit that I don’t think anyone read this particular significance into the bag of apples. But I do assure you that the place was searched for candle grease and damp patches and timing clocks, till we thought we never wanted to see an unfinished building again. And Robbins, of course, was examined from head to toe, inside and out till he couldn’t have had so much as a spent match concealed about him. You can take it from me — inside and outside, both the building and P.C. Robbins — absolutely nothing.”
“So where does that leave me?” said Mr. Photoze, and immediately answered himself. “On the roof, dropping a bag of apples through a hole which wasn’t there until after the shot was fired; when two policemen, including your own dear parent, stood there and watched me make it.”
“For the second time,” said the young man.
Up there on the roof — out of sight, if anybody had been looking that way which, in the nature of things they wouldn’t be — a photographer fiddling about with the tools of his trade. A slate removed, two slates or three or four — enough to allow him to slip down into the room below, fix up the tripod and the rifle and the taut string, all prepared and left ready previously. Back again, using the tripod as a step to hoist yourself up through the hole and back onto the roof; the bag of apples in his hand. And the shot fired by dropping the bag of apples to pull sharply on the string — then down through the hole again, quickly twist the string round the tripod, and back on the roof, covering the hole over with the slates before P.C. Robbins even gets up the stairs. Covering the hole over roughly — anyone entering the little room will be intent on the rifle and the tripod, not looking up. And before they get around to the roof — start battering and scrabbling, smashing the slates, making the hole again—