by Van Powell
Chapter 25 SCORE ONE FOR THE MYSTERY WIZARD
Grover stood up. His eyes were bright with some inner fire as he walkedforward, turned and faced his attentive audience.
"You have overlooked a number of points shown in that picture," beganthe laboratory Chief.
"In the first place, assuming that a shot had been fired, you see thatthere is no inkwell on the desk and that the picture of my sister hasbeen knocked over or has fallen over."
"You mean, the shot was fired from another direction, and not by the manwhose back is turned." The detective spoke.
"Can you see any other explanation for the disclosed conditions?"
"The inkwell was in a pool of ink on the floor when I got here," saidRoger, excitedly, "and the picture of Auntie was on its face."
"The shot was fired from a gun behind Astrovox," said Potts.
"No," Grover corrected him, "because the smoke is closer to the otherman than to Astrovox. In fact, it is up around his side of the desk."
"But his hands----"
"He did not fire a gun," answering the policeman, Grover clarified hisdeduction. "But--think! Where in that office could a man be, and nothave the camera register his presence? Granting that he could lift thegun above his head and still keep it out of sight of the lens."
"Can't be," cried Potts.
"Can." Roger almost shouted in his interest. "He could crouch on theside of the desk _toward_ Astrovox, and shoot at the man behind thedesk, and the puff of smoke would shoot out toward the man."
"Yes," Grover agreed, but suddenly he jumped as his nerves reacted to anew idea.
"But--wait! A gun at that angle could not discharge a bullet to smashthe inkwell."
They stared, and then admitted his sensible reasoning.
"Back where we started," growled the detective.
"It is a 'composite' picture, perhaps," said Ellison. "You know--onepart taken at one time, another exposed elsewhere, or at another time."
"Possible, not probable," volunteered Doctor Ryder. "Indouble-exposures, wouldn't the smoke be--I don't know the phrase----"
"Not in register," cried Roger. "It can't be double- or triple-exposed.Everything is all together, the smoke over the desk, and the menproperly distinct."
"It just must be some trick picture," argued Ellison.
"Did no other camera operated by some one having entered--they all ranfor three minutes--did none have the shot recorded?" asked Grover, andPotts displayed films.
"They all did. Some fainter."
"We can test for distance, with a sort of applause-volume machine,"suggested Ellison.
"But, first, let us come back to Astrovox," urged Grover. "He is gone.Why? How? Did the man at the desk take him?" He turned and scanned thegroups intently. "The fellow with his back turned has your shoulders,Ellison."
"But not my suit."
"You could change suits."
"You certainly want to 'pin it on' me."
"We want to find Astrovox."
The electrician made a grunting sound.
"I can't help, there."
Grover, though, did not pursue the argument. He seemed buried inmeditation.
"Here is something we overlooked, too." He spoke slowly, searching forhints in his own inner processes. "Look at the smoke. The light in thatoffice, according to the picture itself, was the overhead dome. Now,with that small actinic quality, the camera with a daylight type offilm, would have recorded only in exposures amounting to at least asecond. It _would_ have been possible for the man to have fired, droppedthe gun. Possibly if he snatched it up and let it drop--no. The flashwould have been filmed! Let's work at this!
"Notice--the edge of the smoke is duller, less distinct, but the lowerpart of the smudge is thick and dense, as though--the smoke had beensettling during the exposure."
"So, where does that get us?" asked Ellison.
"To this. The man at the desk is extremely clear. Astrovox is lessdistinct, recognizable but still a trifle hazy. We assumed it was thesmoke. It isn't. It is the fact that when he heard the shot, Astrovoxwas just outside the doorway. He ran in, too fast to be recorded in thatbrief exposure that caught him just pausing. Now, that accounts for theother camera's proving that a shot was fired.
"It was fired at the man behind the desk. Then Astrovox ran in, and hehad to be there an appreciable fraction of time to be registered. He gotin just about half-way through the exposure, and his pause imprinted hisimage just before the shutter closed. Now--what would have been hisnatural, subsequent procedure?"
Frightened by the past sound of the Voice of Doom, he went on, the manhad been about to leave, and was merely waiting for Potts.
"He ran in, saw the source of the shot, saw the man crouched under thedesk after his shot had hit the inkwell instead of his mark, the otherman. He turned, and ran. But the man who had crouched would know that hehad been seen, must think the old man ran for help.
"He went after Astrovox--to silence him!"
The auditors, spellbound by his train of reasoning, had literally hungin suspense.
"The man evidently had a gun," Grover went ahead with his thought,speaking slowly. "He took only a fraction of time to leap up and pursue.He would not have let Astrovox get far.
"Let us search the areaways nearby," he concluded, seriously.
They scattered, the police officers and the detective organizing thesearch.
It was "score one" for the Mystery Wizard.
Sound had been his deductions, as events showed.
Only in one point had he been mistaken.
The old astrologer had not been shot. His limp body, brought in from itsplace within an old packing case across the street, showed that not themuzzle had been used to make of him a target. The butt of the weapon hadleft its mark.
"Adrenalin--we may bring him back!" shouted Doctor Ryder.
Potts raced for the nearest drug-store, while the police called anambulance.
"Let me work with him," pleaded Doctor Ryder.
But Tip did not secure the heart stimulant, so seldom, and yetoccasionally able to restore heart action after it has seemed to cease.
They took him away, and Grover, stunned at his own accurate deductions,hopeful that he had reasoned so accurately in time, went too.
The rest hung around the telephone.
At last came word.
"He will probably live!"