' That was when the real shot was fired. That Was when a bullet drilled through this window, smashed the Battle-of-Waterloo picture over the fireplace there, and buried itself in the wall.
'This is the loneliest of neighbourhoods after midnight. He didn't think it likely that anybody would hear the shot. Sam De Villa, in a drugged sleep upstairs, certainly wouldn't As a matter of fact, Lord Ashe up at the Hall did happen to hear the shot in the middle of the night, because he tells me he mentioned it to you...' Again Dr Fell looked at Dick.
'... when he saw you early next day. But Lord Ashe confused it in his mind with another shot he heard at shortly after five o'clock in the morning. As for Middlesworth, the first part of his game was now secure. He closed the curtains on all the windows in this cottage, switched on all the lights so they would be certain to burn out before morning, and then went quietly home.
' No harm had been done. Not yet.
'Chance might have wrecked Middlesworth, because he got a sick-call in the small hours of the morning. But the sick-call was to Ashe Hall, where one of the maids was taken ill; and it was admirable for his purpose. He could keep an eye on things.
'He left Ashe Hall at twenty minutes to five in the morning - speaking rather wildly to Lord Ashe about his intention of driving straight to Hastings - and drove his car to the High Street There he abandoned the car for the moment, and walked once more into Gallows Lane. I can imagine him coming along here through the first ghostly grey of morning; and I can imagine that his heart was as cold as his hands.
'Long ago, of course, he had glanced in through a lighted wall of windows at Mr Markham's, and seen Mr Markham asleep on the sofa with a full, untouched whisky-bottle and syphon on the desk. I fancy he glanced in once again, to make sure. Then he went on to this cottage here.
'The electricity here had burned itself out long before. The place was dark; it was chilly; it was almost the hour of the murder and the illusion. Middlesworth found De Villa still in a drug-sleep upstairs. If the victim had been awake, Middlesworth was ready to tie him with a soft dressing-gown-cord which would leave no marks, and gag him with a handkerchief and sticking-plaster.
' But it wasn't necessary. He carried De Villa downstairs -
De Villa was a little chap, and Middlesworth a big man -and propped him up in that easy-chair, so that the course taken by the already-fired bullet passed just across the top of De Villa's head.
.'And then, just as the first eerie glow of dawn was lighting up this room, he rolled back the sleeve of De Villa's dressing-gown and with gloved hands emptied the hypodermic of prussic acid into his victim's left arm.'
Dr Fell paused.
Despite that warm afternoon, Dick Markham was cold to the heart. He seemed to see shadows moving at dawn, evil shadows in this room: the gloved physician, the corpse that jerked once, the stir of birds outside in the trees.
'He next,' said Dr Fell, 'locked up the room. He could do this, don't you see, because there was now a bullet-hole in the window. We kept talking about this room being "sealed". But, by thunder, it wasn't sealed! That's the whole point! De Villa had spoken truly when he remarked that you can't have a sealed room when there's a bullet-hole in the wall.
'Middlesworth took a box of drawing-pins, and spilled it artistically on the floor at the dying man's left hand. He locked and bolted the door on the inside. Finally, he... will you oblige, Hadley?'
Superintendent Hadley nodded with more than a litde grimness. He got up and went out of the room.
'I burbled away on Friday night,' continued Dr Fell, 'with a little discourse on windows. Please observe this particular window and this particular bullet-hole. The bullet-hole - as I face it now - is below the line of the joined sashes, some three inches below and to the left of the metal catch. Very well I
'I take an ordinary drawing-pin, like this one in my hand now. I stick this drawing-pin into the frame of the window - the horizontal frame facing me, marking the line of the joined sashes - above the bullet-hole and a little farther to the left.
' I then take a piece of very heavy black thread, a long piece like this one' - it appeared in conjuring fashion from Dr Fell's capacious side pocket - 'and this I prepare for my trick.'
The figure of Superintendent Hadley appeared outside the window. The lower sill of the window, as Dick had been able to notice before, was not much above the level of a man's waist.
Dr Fell unlocked the window by pushing its metal catch to the right, so that it lay flat back. Folding the long pieces of thread, he fastened its loop round the thumb-grip of the catch. He ran the ends of the thread along to the left and over the drawing-pin, as though over a pulley. Then he ran the ends downwards, threading them both through the opening of the bullet-hole so that they now hung outside the window.
' Since I am of somewhat more than modest dimensions myself,' Dr Fell said apologetically, 'you will excuse me if I don't execute the movement myself. But I raise the window. Like this!'
He pushed up the window, the long loop of thread running with it but its position remaining undisturbed.
' Imagine, now, that I climb out as Middlesworth did. I climb out, I close the window after me' - down it came with a soft bang - 'and I am all ready. I have only to take diose ends of the thread which now hang outside the window, and pull them downwards as Hadley is doing.
' Pressure on that loop of thread, run over the drawing-pin to act as a pulley, pulls the thumb-catch of the window outwards, towards me, moving slowly outwards until it is at right angles; and the window is now locked.
'Once this is done, a very strong downwards jerk on my drawing-pin-pulley dislodges the drawing-pin from the frame; it falls inwards and bounces somewhere on the floor of the room. I pull one of the ends of my loop of thread, so that I draw the thread outside the window like a snake, and have it outside the window in my hand. No trace now remains. The drawing-pin will be found in the room, of course. But it will not be noticed if I have already spilled a box of drawing-pins on the floor. All right, Hadley!'
The window-catch, pulled over by that thread, had slid into the locked position. Hadley, outside the window, gave now a sharp downwards yank. The drawing-pin, pulled loose, fell upon the inside sill, and flew out into the room. It landed on the carpet...
'Not far, you observe,' said Dr Fell, pointing, 'from another drawing-pin which seemed to have rolled wide from the spilled box we found here Friday morning. You perhaps recall I had my eye on it while we were here during the afternoon? Hadley almost stepped on it.'
Hadley, pulling at one end of the thread, was now drawing it outside the window into his hand.
'That's all there was to Middlesworth's dodge,' said Dr Fell.' It takes a few minutes in the telling; but in execution it can be done in thirty seconds. The room was sealed. Middlesworth was now ready for the last, most important thing - to convince you, Mr Markham, that there was no bullet-hole in the window until you arrived.
'He went to the telephone in the hall, and sent that frantic whispering message. It was certain to draw you, and it did. He imagined how long it would take you to leave the house. He dropped a shilling into the electric meter, having left the switch turned on in this room; and a light came on here. He dodged across the lane - some distance eastwards, from the orchard to the coppice, where Miss Drew saw him - and all was ready.
'When you got well in sight, he made a conspicuous clatter with the rifle by rattling it against the wall. He drew your attention to it. As you shouted out to that marksman, he aimed at the window and fired... ?'
'A blank cartridge,' supplied Dick.