Murder Is Suggested (6 page)

“I'd think so,” Bill told him.

Then, Elwell might have given Hunter the posthypnotic suggestion—instruction—that he destroy the clock, to see how far Hunter could be got to go.

“We could ask Hunter himself,” Bill said. “Or—would he know?”

That was difficult to answer; for that answer they needed somebody who really knew something about the subject. If Carl Hunter had been an active participant, rather than merely a passive subject, in the experiments—if he was himself something of an expert—he might recognize his destruction of the clock as a result of posthypnotic suggestion. He might recognize that, and still rationalize by contending that the clock was worthless, running slow. Or, it might be that the suggestion had included the explanation—that Elwell had himself, during Hunter's hypnosis, offered the worthlessness of the clock as a means of breaking down, in advance, Hunter's block against vandalism.

“Phew,” Jerry North said, and went to the sideboard and mixed himself a moderate drink.

“We'll ask, probably,” Bill said. “After I read this damned book. At Elwell's—did you meet a tall, pale girl, a girl with very large blue eyes, named Faith? Faith Oldham?”

“The poor child,” Pam said. “Yes.”

“Poor?”

“Who,” Pam said, “wants to be named Faith? It was revenge, really. Her mother's named Hope, you know. Got her own back. She's very nice, though—Faith, I mean. Not bitter or anything that I could see. Jamey was very fond of her. Treated her—well, as if she were his own daughter. Don't tell me she—”

Bill was not, he pointed out, telling her anything. Faith Oldham could have got to Elwell's office without going through the—call it the main house. So, conceivably, given a key, could almost anyone else. Faith and Carl Hunter were, at the least, good friends.

“She felt toward Jamey,” Pam said, “as if he were her father. I'm sure—” She stopped, considered. “No,” she said. “I'm
really
sure.” She looked at Jerry. “And,” she said, “we'll have no loose talk of intuition, of either sex.”

“As a matter of fact,” Jerry said, “I feel the way Pam does. Without, of course, being able to prove it. You know about his own daughter—Elizabeth, her name was? She was killed in a car accident before we met Elwell. And—”

“Yes,” Bill said. “We know about her. You mean that, after that, Elwell in a sense adopted Faith Oldham? Emotionally, I mean?”

They didn't know. It seemed possible.

The telephone rang. “Oh dear,” Dorian said, and went across the room to answer it. She said, “All right, sergeant,” and beckoned with the handpiece.

“Only,” Dorian told her husband, as he took the telephone from her, “remember that even detectives have to sleep sometime.”

He nodded. He said, “Yes, sergeant?” and then, for some time without saying anything further, listened.

“Right,” he said, finally. “The morning will do. Tell him, around nine-thirty. And I'll meet him at the club. Have somebody check out the accident Elwell's daughter got killed in—about six months ago. On the Merritt somewhere. And you might nudge Barney a little about the check out on Elwell's records.” He paused. “Don't I know he'd rather we did,” Bill said. “Good night, Mullins.”

He turned back. Dorian looked at him. “I remembered,” he told her. “Detectives have to sleep.”

“I think,” Pam said, “somebody's hinting. We'll—”

But they loitered with intent.

“Just that Elwell's brother would rather wait until morning to tell us he knows nothing about this ‘shocking business,'” Bill said. “And—preliminary findings on the autopsy.” He paused, seemed to consider. “Probably won't get us anywhere,” Bill said. “Except give us another thing to check on. Elwell wouldn't have lived more than six months or a year. Even, the M.E. thinks, with an operation.”

Pam said, “Oh,” and there was shock in her voice. “Did—did he know?”

Bill shrugged. Whether Jameson Elwell had known how much his life drew in was something they, perhaps, would never know. They would try to find a doctor he might have gone to, who might have told him.

“But,” Bill said, “the M.E. says there needn't have been any symptoms yet. So, unless he was in the habit of having regular checkups—and pretty thorough ones at that—” He ended with a shrug.

It was odd, Pam thought, that this somehow should make it worse, since Jamey was dead in any case—dead, it could be assumed, far more quickly, with a sudden flare of pain instead of pain endlessly smoldering. But—it did. Unfairness added to unfairness, in some fashion not altogether clear. Dear Jamey—

Jerry was closing the door behind him when Pam North said, “Wait a minute,” and turned back.

“Bill,” she said. “There was a tape recorder in the laboratory. Was there anything on the tape?”

“No,” Bill said. “There wasn't anything on the tape, Pam. As Mullins said—we don't get the easy ones.”

*
“Organized medicine in the United States has taken more than a century to accept the use of hypnosis. At last, the American Medical Association has reported (in its September 1958 Journal) that hypnosis ‘has a recognized place' in the medical armory, including surgery.”—
Harper's
Magazine, November, 1958.

4

From the other bed there were small sounds—sounds chiefly of rustling. There were also certain sighing sounds, and a small—obviously smothered—cough. Jerry North lengthened his breathing, approximated a mild snore. There was, from the other bed, the slight sound of someone turning over. This was followed by a somewhat louder sign. Jerry, under the covers, looked at the illuminated dial of his wrist watch. It showed twenty minutes of three.

“Oh, dear,” Pam North said, in the soft voice of one who, driven almost beyond endurance, is still considerate of those more fortunate, those who can sleep. There were further sounds. Pam had, evidently, turned over on the other side. There was a swishing sound. Pam had, undoubtedly, thrown off excess covering. There was silence for a few minutes, but Jerry did not sleep. Jerry waited. There was a louder sigh, and a longer sigh. There was a small sound of creaking. Pam was sitting up in bed, preparatory—it must be assumed—to pulling the covers back again.

“All right, Pam,” Jerry said, and sat up in his own bed, and turned on the light between their beds. At which Pam said, “Ouch!” and covered her eyes. “I tried not to wake you up,” Pam said and turned to look at him. He said nothing. “All right,” she said. “I tried to wake you up. Inadvertently.”

“I know,” Jerry said. “It's all right. I'll—”

“
Jerry!
” Pam said. “Of all the—
no
.” Jerry put his legs back in bed. “Anyway, not yet,” Pam said.

Jerry shook a cigarette loose from a package on the night table and held it out to Pam, who took it. He lighted hers, lighted one for himself.

“All right,” he said. “I don't know who killed Jamey. And I feel the same way about it you do. And—I'm as wide awake now as you are. And—you've thought of something. At”—he consulted his watch again—“fifteen minutes of three.”

“I can't help that,” Pam said. “And probably it's all wrong. But—this posthypnotic whatever it is.”

“Oh, lord,” Jerry said. “Suggestion. You want to read the book?”

“Why should I?” Pam said. “It's a very long book. And you've read it. Division of labor, sort of. That sharing which is part of every true—”

“Pam!”

“—except that some people can sleep through anything.” Pam said.

For a moment Jerry had the uneasy feeling that he had carried things too far. He looked at Pam. She wasn't cross. Intent, but not cross.

“Whatever I knowest, thou shalt know,” Jerry said. “Or we'll get the book and read it aloud to each other.”

“All right,” Pam said. “You can get somebody to break a clock. Could you get somebody to—kill?”

“You,” Jerry said, “think of the damnedest things. At three o'clock in the morning. No, according to Elwell, and he says that that's the consensus.”

“Are they sure?”

“Of course they—” Jerry said, and stopped. “Well—” he said.

They were sure enough, and a long series of experiments had been made—including several by Elwell himself. But there was one flaw in all the experiments. They weren't real—couldn't, obviously, be real. The only real experiment would involve real murder, which would be carrying things rather far. So they had tried to duplicate reality without actually achieving it. They had tried it with rubber daggers—but rubber daggers would hardly feel real to anyone, let alone to a person in hypnosis when, many think, perceptions are heightened. They had tried it with real daggers, but the “victim” behind a barrier of “invisible” glass. But—was the glass really invisible? They had tried it with guns loaded with blanks. But—did the operator unconsciously reveal to the subject that the gun held only blanks?

Under these simulated conditions, some subjects apparently tried to kill. Most authorities doubted that, with actual killing possible, any subject would murder—unless, presumably, he had murder already in his mind.

“So?”

“Suppose,” Pam said, “this Mr. Hunter, under posthypnotic suggestion, broke a valuable clock because Jamey had told him the clock wasn't any longer valuable. Was worthless.”

“All right,” Jerry said. “Supposed.”

“Suppose Jamey did know that he—he was going to die. That he—he wasn't any longer valuable. To himself. That for somebody to kill him would be—what's the long word?”

“Euthanasia. No, I doubt it, Pam. And—it would have been a dirty trick. Jamey didn't play dirty tricks.”

“Oh,” Pam said, “he'd leave a record of some sort, exonerating whoever did it. Because—that would be the point, wouldn't it? Of the final experiment? To prove that, under certain circumstances—very special circumstances—a person who had been hypnotized could be told to kill?”

Jerry doubted several things—one, that any explanation Jamey might leave behind would, legally, exonerate the person who killed him. Two—that anyone, most of all Jameson Elwell, would think the point important enough for so drastic a proof. Three—that it would have worked anyway.

“‘Hold then my sword and turn away thy face,

  ‘While I do run upon it. Wilt thou, Strato?'

and Strato did, as I remember it.”

“But before that somebody—I forget who—had said, ‘Not on your life.' Said—wait a minute—‘That's not an office for a friend, my lord.'” Jerry spoke with some triumph.

“It could be,” Pam said, “that Strato was the better friend, my lord. My God—I'm beginning to talk like Shakespeare.”

Blank verse, Jerry told her, is infectious. It happens even to writers of prose—unwary writers of prose.

“All right, Pam said. “What I said can still be true. And—the more somebody loved Jamey, the more likely he would be to—to do what Jamey wanted. Save him from—from long pain. Pain without hope.”

“I doubt—” Jerry said, and stopped. “All right,” he said. “I still don't believe it. I'll admit—” He stopped again. “Damn,” Jerry said, in a tone aggrieved. “He would have left a statement,” he said.

“Of course. In his files. Or—
Jerry.
Perhaps he made it orally—on the tape recorder and—and
somebody wiped it off!
Or whatever you do to a tape.”

“You can,” Jerry said, “think of the damnedest things.” He said if not without admiration. He ground out his cigarette and at once lighted a fresh one, having, it occurred to him, thought of a damnedest thing himself.

“Suppose this,” he said. “Suppose somebody—anybody you like; this man Hunter for example—killed Elwell, just in the ordinary course of events. And—”

“
Jerry!
” Pam said. “The
ordinary
course—”

“Ssh,” Jerry said. “You've had
your
supposes. This man doesn't want to be caught. But—suppose he is. With overpowering evidence against him. He says it certainly looks bad but he doesn't remember anything about it. And then—‘If I did it, it was because he'd hypnotized me and made me do it, and I can prove that he did hypnotize me often and once made me break a clock.' I don't know whether it would get him off entirely, but if he could make it stick it would be—well, an extenuating circumstance, at the least.”

He looked at Pam, who nodded, who said, “That's a very good suppose, dear,” but seemed to be thinking of something else—something that smudged the clarity of her mobile face. He waited.

“Faith Oldham loved him,” Pam said, slowly. “We both felt that—as a girl might love a father. A very good father—a wise father. I think she might have done almost anything he asked, feeling he knew best. And—I wonder if he ever hypnotized her, Jerry? And if—”

Her clear voice faltered a little.

“I hope it isn't that way,” Pam North said. “Will you get me a phenobarbital, Jerry?”

Bill Weigand got to his office at a little before nine Thursday morning. Sergeant Mullins had been there earlier; Sergeant Mullins had been active, on two fronts.

Precinct detectives, who had been active even earlier, had got the name of a doctor from Professor Elwell's address book. Mullins, by telephone, had run the doctor to earth—specifically, to his hospital rounds. Yes, he had been consulted by Professor Elwell from time to time, over a period of years. If they wanted more than that—how did the doctor know Mullins was who he said he was? If he was, didn't the police know that doctors do not talk about patients?

Mullins himself was patient, tactful. Professor Elwell was dead. So the point of secrecy was hardly relevant. He had been shot to death, so the previous condition of his health had nothing to do with the end of his life. So—