“I agree with you,” said Poe, and turned to Ellery. “The only light in this hall is the lamp on the table. And I don’t think any of us was watching everyone else as we took our cups of coffee from the tray.”
“What do you mean, Poe?” asked Ellery.
“You were the first to pick up a cup. You could easily have had some poison hidden in your hand, and dropped it into one of the other cups. What about it, magician?”
“Haha. Very good.” A bitter smile appeared on Ellery’s calm face. “All I can say is that I didn’t do that.”
“And of course, we can’t just take your word for it. But there are other possibilities, too. The poison could have been given to Carr before the coffee, for example.”
“A slowly dissolving capsule?”
“Precisely.”
“Yes, but regardless of how the poison was administered, surely suspicion falls on you, Doctor. If you think about it, no amateur could easily get his hands on poisons like arsenic and strychnine… Perhaps Van of the science faculty or Agatha of the pharmacy faculty, but Leroux and I are from the humanities. We don’t have anything to do with labs full of dangerous drugs and strong poisons.”
“Anyone could steal some poison if they really wanted to,” objected Poe. “The security of the labs and experiment rooms at our university is laughable. It’s the same with the agriculture and engineering faculties. If you just pretend you belong there, you can walk right on in. Also, it was none other than you, Ellery, who once said he had relatives in O— City who ran a pharmacy.”
Ellery gave a little whistle.
“That’s a good memory you have.”
“Basically, it’s pointless for us to sit here discussing where the poison came from.”
Poe leant forward slowly.
“And there’s still another possibility as to how the poison was administered. I can’t believe it hasn’t occurred to you. It could have been smeared on one of the cups beforehand. Then any one of us could have done it.”
“Precisely.”
Ellery brushed back his unruly lock of hair and smiled. Agatha stared at him, perplexed.
“You thought of that, Ellery?”
“Of course. Don’t think I’m stupid.”
“Yet you still accused me of being the murderer.”
“I was also planning to go after the others and tease them a bit.”
“Well, I think you’re horrible.”
“We’re not in a normal situation here, so you can’t expect me to act normally.”
“You—”
“By the way, Agatha, there’s something I want to ask you.”
“What now?”
“Tell me, did you wash the cups before you made the coffee?”
“No, I didn’t.”
“And when were they last washed?”
“We drank tea after we came back from exploring the island, remember? They were washed then. I placed the washed cups on the counter.”
“Together with the seventh cup, Orczy’s?”
“No, I put Orczy’s cup back in the cupboard. I just couldn’t look at it any more.”
“Hm. That’s all right. That makes it more plausible that the cup was poisoned beforehand. You’d just have to go into the kitchen in the evening and smear some poison in one of them. Anyone could have done that.”
“But Ellery,” Leroux said, “how would the murderer then know which of the cups was poisoned? There was nobody here who didn’t put their lips to their cup.”
“There must have been some sort of mark.”
“A mark?”
“Yes. A chip or a scratch or something,” said Ellery. He picked up Carr’s moss-green cup and began to examine it.
“Anything?”
“Wait a sec… Oh, that’s strange.”
Ellery cocked his head in surprise and passed the cup to Leroux.
“You take a look. I don’t think it looks any different from the others, though.”
“Really?”
“Not even a small crack?” Agatha asked.
“Nothing at all. Maybe you’ll find a little crack under a microscope.”
“Stop joking. Give me that.”
The cup was passed to Agatha.
“You’re right. There’s nothing here that could serve as a mark.”
“So does that mean that the cup wasn’t poisoned beforehand?” Ellery stroked his hair with a dissatisfied look on his face. “Here are the three current theories: Agatha’s the murderer, or I’m the murderer, or someone who made Carr swallow a poisoned capsule is the murderer.”
“Whoever it is, we won’t be able to determine the method and the identity of the murderer here,” Poe said. Ellery reached out for Carr’s cup, which Agatha had placed on the table and contemplated it.
“If it was someone from outside, then it wouldn’t matter whether there was a mark or not.”
“What did you say, Ellery?” asked Poe.
“Nothing…” Ellery looked away. “What bothers me is the motive. I think we can assume that the person who killed Orczy and Carr and the person who arranged those plates are one and the same. That means that he, or she, is serious about taking the lives of at least five of us here on the island. Five, assuming that ‘the Detective’ won’t end up as ‘the Sixth Victim’ too.”
“But a motive for that…” muttered Leroux, shaking his head weakly.
“There has to be one,” Ellery said decisively, “however weird it might be.”
“The murderer must be mad, insane!” Agatha shrieked. “How can we understand the thoughts of a madman?!”
“Insane…” repeated Ellery, and he lifted his left hand to look at his watch. “It’s almost morning. What should we do?”
“We need to sleep. We won’t get any answers if we just keep discussing while we’re all as tired as this.”
“I agree, Poe. I can’t go on much longer either.”
Ellery rubbed his eyes, got up unsteadily and walked to his room.
“Wait, Ellery.” Poe stopped him. “Wouldn’t it better if we all slept together here?”
“I don’t want to!” Agatha looked at everybody with frightened eyes. “What if the person next to you is the murderer? He could just reach out with his arms and strangle you. That thought alone is enough to frighten me.”
“I doubt the murderer would do something as stupid as strangling the person next to him. He’d get caught immediately.”
“Can you be absolutely sure, Poe? What if he kills us all in our sleep?”
Agatha almost burst into tears as she stood up, knocking her chair over.
“Agatha, wait.”
“No! I can’t trust any of you.”
She fled to her room. Poe let out a long sigh.
“She’s in bad shape.”
“It’s only natural,” said Ellery with a shrug. “To be honest, I feel the same as Agatha. I’ll sleep alone, too.”
“Me too,” added Leroux. The eyes behind his glasses were red. Van followed as well, leaving Poe, who was running his hands through his hair, alone.
“Make sure you lock your doors, everyone.”
“Oh we will,” said Ellery, looking briefly at the front entrance. “Even I’m afraid to die.”
SIX
The Third Day on the Mainland
Dusk was approaching.
The sea was turning dark. Kawaminami was standing on an embankment, peering at the faraway shape of an island floating in the sea. Shimada’s lean body was crouching on a flight of steps leading down to the water. He was chatting to some children who were fishing there.
They had finally come here—to S— Town.
Could Nakamura Seiji still be alive? They had come in t
he hope of finding a clue that could support the theory they had arrived at last night. They had also wanted to take a look at Tsunojima.
But after half a day spent questioning local people and fishermen, all they had unearthed was a bunch of ghost stories. Having discovered nothing that could further their investigation, the two had come to this place down by the harbour to relax a little.
Kawaminami put a cigarette to his lips, sat down and stretched his legs. He watched Shimada and listened to the waves rolling in. Dressed in blue jeans and a green bomber jacket, casting with the fishing rod lent to him by the kids, laughing in his childish voice, Shimada didn’t seem like a man in his late thirties at all.
Strange guy, Kawaminami thought. Then he recalled how the discussion last night between Shimada and Morisu had unexpectedly taken an awkward turn, and let out a deep sigh.
Shimada and Morisu had completely opposite personalities, in a way. If Morisu was yin, then Shimada was yang. In the eyes of the serious and introverted Morisu, Shimada, who simply followed his own interests and instincts, must have seemed an inconsiderate busybody. And Shimada was a lot older than Kawaminami and Morisu. That must have rubbed him up the wrong way, too. Shimada in turn seemed to be disappointed by Morisu’s goody-two-shoes act, which threatened to spoil his fun.
“Mr Shimada, isn’t it about time to go?” Kawaminami stood up and yelled to him. “The trip back will probably take another hour.”
“Let’s go then.”
Shimada gave the children their fishing rod back and waved goodbye. His long legs brought him back to Kawaminami in a few steps.
“You seem to like children.”
“Well, yes,” Shimada said without any hesitation. “Don’t you think it’s wonderful to be young?”
The two walked side by side along the path next to the embankment.
“We didn’t discover anything today,” said Kawaminami.
“Oh, really?”
Shimada grinned.
“We gathered some ghost stories, didn’t we?”
“Those are just the sort of rumours you hear everywhere. Stories like that always go round when people die under unusual circumstances.”
“I disagree. No matter how strange it may sound, I think that the truth might be hidden somewhere in those stories.”
A swarthy, well-built young man was repairing a net on the side of the road with expert fingers. He was probably not even twenty. There was something childlike about his enthusiasm for the job in hand.
“You know, Conan,” Shimada said, “I can only hope that your comrades—no, ex-comrades—don’t fall under the spell of the Tsunojima ghost.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean that the ghost of Tsunojima might well be none other than the man thought to be dead, Nakamura Seiji. Perhaps Seiji is still alive and on the island. And your ex-comrades unwittingly paid him a visit.”
“But that’s—”
“Sorry.” A voice they didn’t know interrupted them. Surprised, they turned around. It was that of the young man repairing the net.
“You friends of those students who went to the island?” the young man asked in a loud voice, his hands still holding the net.
“Yes,” answered Shimada immediately. He walked up to the man. “Do you know them?”
“Father and I took them to the island. We’re going to pick them up again next Tuesday.”
“That’s interesting,” said Shimada enthusiastically, and crouched down next to the man. “Was there anything strange about the group that went to the island?”
“Not really. They were all excited to be going out there. Don’t know what’s so interesting about that island though.”
The young man spoke bluntly, but his eyes, fixed on Shimada, seemed friendly. He ran his hand through his short hair and spoke again, showing his bright white teeth.
“You trying to find something about them ghost stories?”
“Ah, yes. Something like that. Have you seen the ghost?”
“No. That’s just a rumour. I don’t believe in no monsters.”
“Ghosts and monsters are different things.”
“That so?”
“You know who the ghost is?”
“That Nakamura Seiji guy, right? They say his wife’s haunting the place too.”
“Well then, have you never considered the possibility that Seiji might still be living on the island?”
The young man raised an eyebrow in surprise.
“Still living? Didn’t he die? That’s why he’s a ghost.”
“He might not have died,” Shimada said gravely. “For example, that story about the lights going on in the Decagon House: it might be Seiji himself who puts on the lights there. Those stories of people seeing Seiji—isn’t it more sensible to suppose that he’s really still alive, rather than that they saw his ghost? I also heard a motorboat sank near the island. What if Seiji killed those fishermen and sank the boat because he had been seen?”
“You’re a funny lot.” The young man chuckled in amusement. “But you’re wrong about the boat. ’Cause I saw the boat get turned over.”
“What?”
“The waves that day were high, you see, and I happened to be here when they were getting ready to go out, so I warned them. I told them it was dangerous and there was nothing but small fish to find around that island. But they didn’t listen and went off. And they had just left here and hadn’t even come close to the island when a high wave caught them. Old folk might say a ghost sank the boat, but that was just an accident.
“And you said the ghost killed the fishermen, but in truth nobody died. All the men on the boat were saved.”
Kawaminami, who was standing listening to the two men, suddenly burst out laughing. Shimada pouted his lips.
“Then I’ll take back the thing about the boat. But still, I think that Seiji might be alive.”
“Alive and living on the island, you mean?” asked Kawaminami. “What’s he eating, then?”
“He could have a motorboat hidden somewhere. He could leave the island sometimes to get provisions.”
“Well now,” the young man looked doubtful.
“You think it’s impossible?”
“I guess it’s possible if he came up at the other side of J— Cape in the night. Nobody goes out there. But if he just tied his boat there, somebody might discover it, don’t you reckon?”
“He probably hides the boat somehow. Anyway, as long as there’s no storm you could get to shore in a motorboat, couldn’t you?”
“Yeah. With the weather right now, you could manage with a dinghy with an outboard motor, even.”
“I see, I see.”
Shimada hummed happily and jumped up.
“Thank you very much. Yes, I learnt something good.”
“Really? You’re a funny one,” laughed the man.
Shimada waved to the young man and walked to the car parked further down the road. Kawaminami ran after him.
Shimada grinned. “Great catch we made, don’t you think, Conan?”
Kawaminami was not sure what part of Shimada’s discussion with the fisherman could be called a “great catch”. But he was sure Shimada wasn’t ready to abandon the theory of Nakamura Seiji still being alive.
“Yes, right,” he agreed half-heartedly.
But whatever he’s thinking, Kawaminami thought, looking at the lingering sun above the sea on the other side of the embankment, they’re out there on that island now. Ah well, what’s the worst that could happen?
The black shadow of Tsunojima melted silently into the twilight.
SEVEN
The Fourth Day on the Island
1
The sound of people talking.
The voices were
not loud, nor did they come from close by. Familiar tones, familiar intonations. And, as background music, the constant pounding of waves. Waves? Yes, the sound of waves…
Slowly, he was dragged out of sleep. And then…
He opened his eyes and awoke on top of the hard bed. His hands searched for his glasses and he turned to lie on his back. He put the glasses on and a white ceiling came into focus. He sighed wearily.
I’m in the Decagon House.
His throbbing temples ached. With each beat, things he didn’t care to remember flashed through his mind.
Moving his tender head slowly, he got out of bed and put on his clothes, fumbling with the buttons on his shirt. Then he went over to the window and untied the belt that held both handles in place. He unlocked the window and pushed it open, together with the shutters.
The overgrown lawn. The leaning pine trees. The dark, inky sky.
He stretched his arms and managed to take a deep breath. After inhaling some fresh air he closed the window, locked it once again and tied the belt around the handles. Then he finally left his room.
Ellery and Van were the people he had heard talking in the hall. Agatha and Poe were also already up and standing in the kitchen.
“Morning, Leroux. I’m glad to see you’re all right,” Ellery said without any hint of humour, pointing at something behind Leroux.
“What?”
Leroux turned round, pushed his glasses up his nose and saw, to his surprise:
The plate was on the door of Carr’s room.
It was hanging at eye level, covering Carr’s own nameplate, exactly like the one on Orczy’s door.
“Our murderer is a reliable fellow,” said Ellery. “Glad he went to all that trouble for us.”
Leroux backed away, turned around, and looked at Ellery, who was sitting on one of the chairs with his long legs crossed.
“You returned the remaining plates to the cupboard drawer, I assume?” Leroux asked.
“Yes,” replied Ellery. “You’re going to suggest we get rid of them, I suppose?”
The Decagon House Murders Page 13