`I think I understand.'
`Very well. You dismissed me after the questioning, you will recall, and I went outside. The door of the room in which you had been talking to me was not quite closed. It was very dark and quite misty under the arch of the Tower there. I stood outside the door to accustom my eyes to the gloom. As it was, I was terrified. I could with difficulty make a good exit from the room. There was a; warder on duty, but he stood at some distance from me. I could hear you talking in the room I had left….
`Then Inspector,' said Arbor, bending forward with fist clenched, `I think I received the most horrible shock of my life. In the room I had not noticed it, I suppose, because the influence of personalities had overborne the impressions of my hearing.
`As I stood there in the dark, I heard a voice speak from the room. It sounded little louder than a whisper or a mumble. But I knew that the voice I heard from that room was the same voice which had spoken to me on the telephone the day before, and offered to sell me the Poe manuscript.'
19. Under the Bloody Tower?
This astounding intelligence did, not seem to affect Dr Fell in the least. His wonderfully sharp dark eyes remained fixed on Arbor.
`I suppose,' he said at length, `the voice really, came from that room?'
`I assume so. There was nobody else about' who could have spoken, and the words were not addressed to me; they were a part of a conversation, it seemed to me.'
`What did the voice say?'
Again Arbor became tense. `I cannot tell you. I have tried until I am ill, but I can't remember. You must understand the shock of hearing that voice… He moved his arm, and the fist clenched spasmodically. `To begin with, it was like hearing a dead man's voice. I had been willing to swear that the voice over the telephone belonged to Bitton's nephew. Then Bitton's nephew was dead. And suddenly this hideous whisper..' 'Listen, Inspector. I told you that the telephone voice seemed disguised; gruffer, as it were; and I had attributed it to Driscoll. But this was the telephone voice. Of, that I am absolutely certain now. I don't know what it said. I only know that I put my hand against the wall of the tower and wondered whether I were going mad. I tried to visualize with whom I had spoken in the room, and I discovered that I could scarcely remember who had been there. I could not remember who had talked, or who had remained silent; it was impossible to think which one of you had uttered what I heard.
`Try to consider what my position was. I thought I had spoken to Driscoll; yet here was the voice. I had been speaking in that room to somebody… certainly a criminal and in all probability a killer. I had outlined completely my position as owner of the manuscript. And somebody (I had forgotten which one) made it clear that if I had employed a thief to take my own property, he could expect only pay for his thievery and not the immense sum I had mentioned I would pay. I… well, to tell you the truth, I was not thinking at all. I was only feeling. I felt certain, without knowing why, that the "voice" had killed Driscoll. Everything had gone mad, and, to make it worse, if I could believe my ears this "voice" was one o f the police.
`Otherwise I should have gone back immediately and confessed the whole business. But I was afraid both of having the police on my side, and of having them against me. I suppose I acted insanely. But I could think of nothing else to do. It was only late this evening, when I was certain I heard somebody trying to get into my cottage, that I determined to end the suspense, one way or the other.'
He sat back, bewildered, dejected, with his handkerchief again at his forehead.
`Still,' said Dr Fell, musingly, `you could not swear the voice came from that room?'
`No. But’
`And there is not one word you can definitely remember its having said?'
'I'm afraid not.'
Dr Fell drew back his chins and pushed out his chest in a meditative fashion.
`Now, I've heard you out, Arbor, and I've got a few words to say. We're all alone here. Nobody has heard your story; but Sergeant Rampole and myself. We can forget it, that's our business when no crime has been done; but I shouldn't advise you to repeat it to anybody else. You would be in grave danger of being confined either in gaol or in a lunatic asylum…. Do you realize what you've said, he inquired, slowly lifting-his cane to point. `There were four people in that room. You must, therefore, accuse the voice as being either the chief inspector of the C. I: D., one of his highest and most trusted officers, or the deputy governor of the Tower of London. If you retract that statement, and decide that the voice actually was Driscoll, you lay yourself open to grave trouble in connexion with a murder case. Your status is that of madman or suspected criminal. Do you want to take your choice?'
`But I'm telling you the truth, I swear, before…!'
`Man,' said Dr Fell, with a thunder of earnestness in his voice, `I have no doubt you think you're telling the truth.. You heard a voice. The question is, what voice, and where did it come from?'
`All right,' Arbor said, despondently. `But what am I going to do? I wish I'd never heard of Poe or manuscripts or any … besides, I'm in potential danger of my life… What the devil are you laughing at Inspector?'
`I was merely smiling,' said Dr Fell, 'at your fears for your own skin. If that's all you're worrying about, you can stop. We have the murderer, safely. The "voice" can't hurt you, I guarantee that. And you don't want to be tangled up in this affair any farther, do you?'
`Good God, no!… You mean you have caught..!'
`Arbor, the murder had no concern with your manuscript. You can forget it. You'll feel like forgetting your fears, too, in the morning. The murderer is'dead. Any inquest on Driscoll will be a private and perfunctory thing; it'll be kept out of the press because it can't serve any useful purpose. So you needn't worry. Go to a hotel and get some sleep; And, if you hold your tongue, I'll promise to hold mine.
'But the man trying to get at me to-night…!'
`He was one of my own constables, to scare you into telling what you know. Run along, man! You never were in any danger in the world.'
`But!’
`Run along, man! Do you want Sir William to walk in here on you and make trouble?'
It was the most effective argument he could have used. Arbor did not even inquire too closely into the identity of the murderer. So long as the murderer had no designs on
him, his aura conveyed that he was averse to the gruesome details of a vulgar murder. When Dr Fell and Rampole walked with him to the front door they found Hadley, who had shortly dismissed the two constables, in the front hall.
`I don't think,' the doctor said, `that we need detain Mr Arbor any longer. I have his story, and I'm sorry to say it doesn't help us. Good-night, Mr Arbor.'
`I shall walk,'- said Arbor with cool dignity, `to a hotel. Good-night, gentlemen.'
`You dismissed him damned quickly,' growled the chief inspector, but, without much interest, `after all the trouble he gave us. What did he say?'
Dr Fell chuckled. `Driscoll phoned him and offered him the manuscript. He thought he might get mixed up as some sort of accessory;. '
`But, good God! I thought you said…"
`Blind panic, my boy. Driscoll would never have done it, you can rest assured. And, as you pointed out, it was in blind panic that he burnt the manuscript…. Then Arbor had some sort of wild idea that he heard, the dead man's voice talking to him. You know, Hadley, if I were you I should never bring that man before a coroner's jury. He'd snake us all sound mad… But you don't need him, do you?'