“Frankly, no.”
Ellery sighed. “It’s simple, but tricky. Didn’t see it myself until the final line of reasoning convinced me the first was wrong and caused me to reexamine it. The fallacy is merely that we took Marco’s word for it that he was alone on the terrace at one o’clock. He said he was alone; but the fact that he said it — even granting that he was not lying, had no motive for lying — doesn’t make it true. He simply thought he was alone! Either condition — thinking he was alone or being actually alone — would have caused the same effect: his sitting down to write a personal letter. I stupidly neglected to take the illusory condition into account.”
“By Judas!”
“Now it was evident why the first ‘proof’ went wrong. If he merely thought he was alone, it was possible that he wasn’t alone at the time he wrote the letter; in other words, that he hadn’t come first at all, but that his murderer had come first and was hiding on the terrace, unknown to Marco, in ambush.”
“But where?”
“Behind one of those enormous Spanish jars, of course. It’s the most likely place. Big as a man; you could easily hide behind it. Besides, you’ll remember that the weapon employed to stun Marco was a bust of Columbus from a niche in the wall near one of these Arabian Nights’ jars. The murderer simply reached over, grabbed it, tiptoed — in bare feet — over to Marco from behind while Marco sat writing, and struck the foul fiend over the head. Then he took a coil of wire which he had been carrying around his own neck, or wrist or ankle, and strangled the unconscious man. The use of wire alone — in preference to a more orthodox weapon — was in a way a confirmation that the murderer had come from the sea. Wire would not hamper swimming; it’s light and won’t spoil, like a gun; nor is it as awkward to carry as a knife, which would probably have to be carried between the teeth, making breathing difficult. Of course, this last hazard is unimportant. The important thing was that this reconstruction substantially satisfied all the conditions.”
“But the sand, my boy,” cried the Judge. “It showed no footprints! Then how do you maintain he came—”
“You’re usually more perspicacious,” murmured Ellery. “For if the murderer came first, he may have come at any time before one o’clock, before the tide got so low, before the beach was uncovered to the extent of eighteen feet!”
“But that note,” retorted the old gentleman with a stubborn air. “He couldn’t have come much before one o’clock. The false note actually set the appointment with Marco for one. Why should the murderer have done that, forcing himself to come so early? He could just as easily have made the time—”
Ellery sighed. “Did the note say one o’clock?”
“Of course!”
“Now, now, don’t be hasty. If you’ll recall, there was a scrap of paper missing immediately after the figure 1 in the typed note. Unhappy accident, my dear Judge. The actual figure must have been 12. The 2 dropped off with the missing scrap!”
“Hmm. But how do you know it was 12?”
“It must have been. Had the figure been 11, or 10, Marco certainly wouldn’t have permitted himself to remain involved in a bridge game until half-past eleven. He would have quit early enough to keep his appointment. Obviously, then, the appointment was set for the hour nearest eleven-thirty in point of coming time — which is twelve.”
“I see, I see,” muttered the Judge. “Misfortune for Kummer. Kummer arrived at the terrace a little before midnight, expecting Marco at once. I suppose he swam in naked for the completest freedom of his limbs; and then too the less he had on the less chance there would be, he must have figured, of dropping a clue from his person. But Marco, delayed by Mrs. Godfrey in his room unexpectedly, was held back for a full hour. Imagine having to wait an hour outdoors at night by the sea without clothes on!”
“It was considerably more dreadful than that, from Kummer’s standpoint,” said Ellery dryly. “Apparently you don’t grasp the central implication. It was that unexpected delay of an hour that caused him to take the clothes! If Marco had been on time, there would have been no clue at all to Kummer.”
“Don’t follow,” growled the Judge.
“Don’t you see,” exclaimed Ellery, “that the criminal must have figured on the tides? If he came a little before midnight, the tide was high — at its highest. He could almost step from the water to the lowest step of the stairs leading up to the terrace. No footprints to leave in the sand at all. Had Marco been on time, he would have killed the man and returned by way of the sea — still without leaving footprints. For the tide would still have been high enough — that crime would have taken only a minute or two — for him to leap over the intervening stretch of sand into the breakers. But he was forced to sit helplessly by on the terrace, watching the tide go out; the beach grew larger, and larger still, and still Marco wasn’t there. Yes, yes, a very tough spot for Kummer. He chose to stay and take the hard way out, planning what to do while he waited. I suppose he felt that he wouldn’t have an opportunity again to decoy Marco to a place where the man might be murdered with impunity. The inspiration about taking Marco’s clothes must have arisen from his realization that he and Marco were of a size.
“At any rate, I knew then that the criminal had come from the sea, before midnight, naked. Well, was he living at the house of Godfrey during the immediate period of the murder? But if he was, why should he have swum in from the sea — the long, difficult way around — when the route by land over the path from the house itself would have been infinitely easier?”
The old gentleman scraped his jaw. “Why, if he actually was residing in the house at the time and yet chose to come in swimming, it could only be to make it appear that the murderer was an outsider, had been compelled to come in from the sea by the outside route. In other words, to cover up the fact that he was living at the house.”
“Perfectly put,” applauded Ellery. “But if this had been his motive, he would have made it plain that he had come from the sea, would he not?”
“If that had been his motive — certainly.”
“Of course. He would have emphasized the fact, left an open trail from the sea, forced us to believe what he wanted us to believe. Yet, on the contrary, the murderer had made every effort to conceal the fact that he had come from the sea!”
“I glimpse that vaguely. How do you mean?”
“Well, for one thing he hadn’t taken the obvious escape-route; that is, the way he had come — via beach to water. Had he taken that escape-route lie would have left outgoing footprints in the sand, which would have told us the story at a glance. No, no, he wouldn’t have minded at all leaving such footprints had he been residing in the house at the time. But what did the murderer do in actuality? He made desperate efforts to avoid leaving such footprints! For he undressed the dead man and put on the borrowed clothes — all for the purpose of making his escape by a route other than the sea... In other words, it was evident that the murderer had gone to great lengths to avoid leaving footprints in the sand, that he wanted to conceal the fact that he had come from the sea. But any one living in the Godfrey house during the murder-period would not have wanted to conceal the fact that he had come from the sea. Therefore the criminal was not living in the Godfrey house during the immediate period of the murder. Q.E.D.”