“Doyle, you can do whatever tests you like,” I responded, running my thumb gently along the crease in the centre of the picture. “This is a photograph of a girl surrounded by some drawings of fairies—nothing more! Now, admittedly, I suppose, she’s used some guile in remembering to attach her pictures to cardboard or something so they don’t just flap about in the wind—but, even still…”
“You can think what you like about them, Mr. Hart,” Doyle muttered contemptuously, his pale-blue eyes fixing on mine. “As a fervent materialist—though I will continue to try and respect your views—I find I can no longer agree with them. Especially in light of last week’s miraculous event in Broadstairs…
“And, on that point—whilst I have no particular wish to embarrass you in front of these two gentlemen—may I remind you that, when you had read my account of what happened on the beach, you told me that you would explain how it was done. Something, Mr. Hart, which you have so far failed to do.
“Since you are apparently unable to admit that Mr. Beasant performed a miracle, then please—once and for all—enlighten us!”
Looking at him thoughtfully, I frowned for a moment. Pushing my hand into my jacket, I took out my cigarette case and, opening it, placed a Dragoumis between my lips.
“All right,” I shrugged, lighting the cigarette and drawing heavily on it. “But you’re not going to like it.”
“I suppose the best place to start would be my journey to Kent,” I announced, throwing forth a pall of smoke. “On the train, I actually shared a compartment with Price. Obviously, this was a fairly unpleasant experience—and, for the most part, involved myself and Price arguing on the subject of the supernatural.”
Shaking his head, Price murmured: “What has this got to do with anything now?”
“Over the course of our conversation, Price attempted to silence my arguments against spiritualism by performing a parlour trick with a handkerchief. It involved balling his hand and pushing in a white handkerchief in the crevice at the top, before pulling it out again from the bottom—suddenly deep red in colour.”
Price grunted dismissively: “I was just trying to make a point.”
“Yes, but, unfortunately for you, your efforts were largely counter-productive. Though they in no way advanced the case for spiritualism, they did, in fact, tell me a great deal about what sort of person you are.
“I have always found that parlour tricks—when taken apart—are actually incredibly mundane things. The only reason they work at all, is that audiences tend to underestimate the amount of time and resource that the performer puts into doing something that is…” I paused, as I cast around for the right word, “…pointless.”
At this, Price glared back at me, whilst Beasant suddenly looked up and began to take an interest.
“And, in fact, in many cases, making the trick seem entirely spontaneous is an integral part of the act. When I saw the air of forced nonchalance in Price’s manner as he produced the handkerchief from his pocket, I knew instantly that there was more going on.
“Though I was only shown a white handkerchief, there was also the corresponding red one and another piece of apparatus that was kept permanently hidden from me—a tube that remained inside his palm and which was kept hidden from my view.”
“What is the relevance of any of this, Mr. Hart?” Doyle interrupted.
“Is it not obvious?”
“No, it isn’t—not to me, anyway.”
“Well, you see, there’s only really one way in which the ‘miracle’ on the beach could have been done. And oddly enough, the explanation involves many of the same principles as Price’s parlour trick—a pretence of spontaneity, some pieces of hidden apparatus, and a number of tightly-rehearsed sequences. Something that, at end of the day, a cynical person might not think entirely coincidental…”
Doyle sighed: “Please, Mr. Hart, I don’t know what this is all about, but do you think you could confine yourself to talking about the events on the beach?”
“Fine,” I said, rolling the tip of my cigarette around the rim of a nearby ashtray. “Well, the first thing to say is that there was nothing of particular interest about the structure on the beach—it’s just ten feet of solid brick—and, consequently, extremely difficult to walk through.
“When you first mentioned the flagstones in your report, Doyle, I thought that they might be there to disguise, or support, some kind of tunnel, but—though they are of some minor significance—it was nothing of that kind.”
“So far you have not told us anything we do not already know, Mr. Hart,” Doyle remarked imperiously. “I am well aware that the monument is solid—I paid for its construction!”
“I examined it as well, Doyle, and, what’s more, I think we can assume that most of the crowd there that day—having heard of Beasant’s intentions—would also have spent some time doing the same. I take it the work was completed by a firm of local building contractors?”
Doyle nodded.
“That makes sense. In a small town like Broadstairs word would get around quite quickly.
“So then, there’s the crowd…” I said wistfully, rubbing at the side of my face, and turning back to Doyle. “Remind me, what time did you say that Beasant arrived and started to address them? Sometime in the middle of the afternoon, was it not?”
“At around quarter-to-four.”
“Right. Not quite ‘broad daylight’ then? Four in the afternoon during the dead of winter is going to be fairly dark, which it obviously needed to be in order that the lamp should be effective…
“So, then, Beasant arrives before the crowds and announces that he is about to attempt to walk through the monument. And goes on to explain that he is unsure how he will do this or even if it will work at all—or, at least, something to that effect, is that not correct?”
“Yes,” Beasant answered, dropping his head and staring down at his lap.
“Thank you,” I responded. “The implication being, of course, that you had never attempted to do it before—so then, we have our spontaneity!
“After saying a few words to his assistants—whom we can assume were local men selected as much for their physical strength as their lack of discretion—Beasant walks up to the monument and presses his hands to the brickwork, apparently satisfying himself that it is solid.
“Then he calls for the platform to be brought out. The platform was—as I understand it—created using specifications handed down to Beasant by his Spirit-Guide? That is what you said in your report?”
Doyle nodded: “The platform and the steps.”
Getting suddenly to his feet, Beasant knocked unsteadily into the side of Price’s chair and stumbled forward. Doyle stood up instantly and was obliged to take him by the arm.
“Are you all right, Mr. Beasant?”
For a moment, Beasant made no response. Then, with a wavering glance, he said in a forced deliberate manner: “Wondering if I could get another drink?”
Doyle looked steadily at him: “I think it might be as well if you left it for a while?”
“You might be right,” Beasant responded, nodding to himself. Then, taking a shambling step in reverse, he flopped back into the chair.
“You should probably have inspected the platform and the steps, Doyle—I expect you would have found them quite interesting.”
“Nonsense,” Price protested, turning his eyes from mine to address Doyle directly. “I have examined them, Sir Arthur. Apart from a somewhat unusual outward design, there is nothing of any great interest about them.”
“Mr. Hart, it strikes me that this is all in the realm of conjecture,” Doyle said, turning to me again. “What exactly are you basing this on?”
“Doyle, everything I am about to say is based on your account of the proceedings, Price’s photographs, and some fairly dull reasonin
g. If you could just let go of the idea of the ‘miracle’ for one minute, I am trying to explain how it was done…”
“Aye,” Doyle muttered, “well, if you think you can reduce what I saw to smoke and mirrors, then I’d like to hear it.”
“When the covers were put in place at the top of the platform, there was a delay before the light at the back was turned on. This short interval is important, because it gives a second man—a double—secreted beneath the floor of the platform time to get out of his hiding place and into position.”
“A double?” Doyle laughed. “Mr. Hart, if you are drawing on my report for this, let me state it plainly—it was definitely Mr. Beasant that I saw enter the platform on one side of the structure and then emerge at the other.”
“I’m sure it was, Doyle,” I sighed, my irritation at his repeated interruptions beginning to show. “The double in this instance would only have needed to be of an equivalent size and shape to Beasant.
“Before the light is turned on, the double emerges from his hiding place within the floor of the platform—which was fairly obviously, in fact, a shallow box with a number of trapdoors. This is what its strangely bulky design was concealing. He then moves into position at the rear of the podium above the steps—where he knows Beasant will enter.
“The double, crouching down at the back of the podium, waits whilst the lamp is pushed through the panel in the material of the back frame. When it is—because the lamp is now inside the podium—by pressing his body flush to the back panel, he is able to remain outside the range of its beam—which is concentrated on the front screen. Consequently, the double casts no shadow and the platform still appears to be entirely empty.
“Outside, Beasant—having waited for the ‘appointed moment’—then walks up the steps and pushes himself between the two back screens and, with some apparent hesitancy, steps onto the platform. As soon as he is inside, the double immediately gets up and steps forward into the glare of the light, and it is his—not Beasant’s—silhouette that is then observed by the crowd.
“If you recall, in your report, Doyle, you wrote that, when the lamp was first turned on, Beasant attempted to silence the discontented crowd by pushing his hand through the gap in the fabric between the front and centre panels? He did not do this at the far end of the platform because his silhouette would have been displayed—yet, curiously, it is through the back that he later chooses to enter.”
Price leaned further forward in his chair: “So, let me get this straight, we now have two men on the platform, do we, Mr. Hart?”
“Exactly.”
“And, yet, when the screens are taken away minutes later there are none!”
“That’s right. You see, with the crowd outside watching the silhouette of the double on the front panel, Beasant—remaining outside the range of the light’s beam—now opens a trapdoor at the back of the platform.
“You’ll remember, Doyle, that the steps were brought in and pushed beneath the podium, with the top step jutting out? The trapdoor must have opened over the steps, and, with the audience’s attention directed onto his double, Beasant then set about lowering himself into a slim hollow concealed in the back of them.
“The steps were then removed from the platform by two of the assistants—an action which you interpreted as being in an effort to show that whatever Beasant was about to do, he was now doing it on his own—not so.”
“Mr. Hart, if you’ll permit me to interject again,” Doyle said cautiously. “We all saw a man walking through the wall, how could you possibly explain that?”
“Very easily,” I responded. “You thought you were viewing Beasant’s silhouetted-form disappearing into the walls of the brick monument? Actually, you were watching was Beasant’s double going through a very well-rehearsed pantomime.
“Though it looked as though he were pushing himself into the walls, what he was actually doing was thrusting his body against the brickwork and—at the same time—retreating slowly from the front panel. With the light’s beam fixed directly onto it, as he moved further away, his form became smaller and less distinct—until, finally, his body flush to the wall, he side-stepped out of the light completely. Viewed from the outside, this would give the effect of him melting into the wall.
“Once outside the light’s beam, the double now gets back into his original hiding place in the floor at the back of the platform.
“Moments later, when the assistants—following what we can assume are a fairly extensive set of instructions—removed the shades from the platform, of course, it appeared entirely empty again.
“The assistants then set about collecting up the three sets of shades, the lamp and—of course—the steps, transporting them past the shocked audience to the corresponding platform set up on the other side of the monument.
“The steps, having been withdrawn from the platform whilst ‘Beasant’ was still clearly visible on top of it, are naturally beyond suspicion.
“The flagstones, I think we can assume, were put in place in order to aid the assistants in transporting the steps from one side of the monument to the other. After all, it would be a damned awkward thing to explain if, say, one of them lost their footing in the sand and it came crashing down—only for Beasant to come tumbling out from inside…
“On the other side of the monument, the steps are pushed into position once again, with their back proud of the base of the platform. Once the shades were placed back around it, all Beasant needed to do was lever himself up through another concealed trapdoor, before the lamp was turned on, and push himself against the back panel of the screen—on the side next to the monument.
“When the lamp is turned on, Beasant waits for the right moment and then slides his arm across the brickwork. Very slowly, he then pushes it out from the wall at an angle—until his fingers are hit by the lamplight and their shadow is projected onto the front panel.
“Then, by a process of edging nearer the front panel of the platform, and simultaneously twisting his body away from the wall, Beasant was able to make it appear that he was extricating himself from the brickwork.”
“Well, there you have it,” I said, looking across at the pale glances of Doyle and Price. Stubbing out my cigarette in an ashtray, I then picked up my glass of brandy. “No smoke, no mirrors—and, no miracle, I’m afraid.”
Glancing at Doyle’s strained expression, I shrugged: “Said you wouldn’t like it.”
“It’s a very interesting theory,” Price said, his eyes turned on me and blinking slowly. “But I’m afraid it’s not borne out by the facts.”
“How do you mean?”
“I have two photographs in my collection taken on the day, which show—quite distinctly—that there are two separate sets of steps—one on either side of the monument.”
“Yes, Price,” I said, smiling. “I was painfully slow in seeing through that.”
“Seeing through what?” Doyle asked mutedly; a shiver of protest still running through him.
“If you take Price’s photographs at face-value, the event on the beach-front is genuinely impossible—and for a while, I don’t mind telling you, they did throw me.
“It was only when I was travelling back to London with you, Doyle, and I saw the way in which you were looking at those fairy photographs that it suddenly occurred to me where I had lost my way—I had put far too much stock in Price’s photographs.
“It was only when I went back to your report, Doyle, that I realised that somewhere something was out of joint.
“For some reason it seemed that—with the entire focus of the crowd fixed on Beasant removing himself from the brickwork on the other of the monument—someone had had a duplicate set of steps moved into the position next to the platform on the far side.”
Doyle scoffed: “Who would do that?”
I looked across at Price.
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“Someone taking photographs…?” I said softly. “Someone that knew how the trick was done because they’d devised it themselves and wanted to make it seem genuinely impossible? Perhaps for a series of newspaper and magazine articles they were intending to write?”
“I don’t believe it,” Doyle snorted. “Whilst this might be theoretically possible—–”
“—–It’s the only explanation.”
“Only from a materialist point of view, is that true,” Doyle said sharply, pushing his hand through his thin, white hair in an impatient gesture. “But, may I remind you, Mr. Hart, that I’ve sat in circles with Mr. Beasant—and many other mediums—hundreds of times and have often seen things that would defy any materialist explanation. What of your own experiences at the séance? Can you explain that now?”
“I’ve been thinking about that a great deal, as a matter of fact.”
Turning to the bar, I signalled to Horrocks.
“Could you come here a moment?”
At once, Horrocks threw down his chamois and, venturing out from behind the bar, strode across the room to join us.
“Tell me,” I said, as Horrocks reached our table. “During my time in Kent, did you receive a cablegram or telephone communication from anyone enquiring after me?”
Thoughtful for a moment, Horrocks then shook his head: “No, sir.”
“Really? Nothing?”
“No, sir.”
“No communication about me at all? From anyone?”
Horrocks shook his head.
“Not a letter…?”
“I’m afraid not, sir.”
There was a pause, during which time Horrocks coughed lightly and shifted his weight from one foot to the other.
“Will that be everything now, sir?”
“Yes…” I managed. “Everything, I suppose.”
Moving a few steps forward, Horrocks suddenly seemed to falter—and, coming to a halt, turned back.
Conversations with Spirits Page 24