The Murderer Invisible

by Philip Wylie

  Carpenter understood the danger of being seen. He knew that the inhabitants of Sinkak hated him; he knew the superstition with which they regarded his experiments. He realized that the boy would carry to town a story parallel to Martin’s and that if the first would be discredited the second would result in some sort of action. He discounted the terrific effect of his appearance, however. And he did not conceive of the speedy and general activity to which it would give rise.

  He clambered from the underbrush into which he had fallen. The car was already out of sight. He composed himself and tried a second time to concentrate on the problem at hand—the disposition he should make of himself and his prisoners. His thoughts kept reverting to the fact that if Daryl had been horrified by him as an albino—her emotions at seeing him now would beggar imagining. He remained at the side of the road.

  He had no time in which to reflect on the ironic justice which had been meted to him for tampering with natural laws. He had no time for the formulation of placid schemes—such as the voluntary delivery of himself to some scientific society. He would not have entertained the latter thought even if it had crossed his mind in that crisis for it did not seem necessary. Unique he certainly was, but he was nonetheless human and so he persisted in his schemes and hopes full in the face of dreadful chaos.

  He heard the approach of the automobiles from Sinkak. He dodged back in the brush. The cars turned in at his drive. Then he knew what was happening. They would find Daryl and Baxter. Perhaps they would set the house on fire. He cut through the woods toward his property. It was a difficult passage but he made it quickly. When he emerged on the edge of the field they were hammering on his back door. If they found his prisoners and caught him afterward—his end was certain to be swift. He could perceive that by the very violence of their actions.

  In another moment they would be in the house. He took a desperate chance and shouted. His enormous voice stopped all activity. Some one turned a car headlight on him. He stood in its glare for a fraction of a second. There was complete silence. Then he turned and ran.

  A dozen men had seen him. Of them, one had the presence of mind to shoot at the figure. The shot went wide. By that strategy he drew them away from his house. He had the distance of the field as a head start. He had the whole out doors in which to choose his course. They would have to follow—in the dark.

  No one pursued him immediately. The Thing that had stood at the edge of the field had not been a variety of creature in pursuit of which a man willingly flings himself headlong. Instead, a number of guns were discharged and there was a wild hullabaloo of oaths, of mutual requests as to whether others had seen the ghost, and of commands. When the men started, they went forward in a body. Their lanterns advertised their movements. Not a man among them would have entered the Mortland woods alone or without a light.

  Carpenter rushed into the thicket, wheeled toward the river, reached its edge, raced through a mucky swamp disregarding the briars which ripped at his clothing, crossed an old wood road, came back on it, crashed heavily against a tree, picked himself up and went forward again. He stopped after a while. The din of pursuit was carried faintly to his ears. It was in his mind to round back to the house as soon, as possible. If he could do that and escape again he would have a better chance of eventual security.

  He caught his breath and walked on. The wood road was discernible as a dim aisle in the deeper dark. It followed a sequence of meaningless turns and emerged eventually on the dirt road that led to Sinkak. He reached his own driveway soon afterward and cautiously skirted it. When his darkened house came in view he perceived from the sound of voices and the aura of automobile lights that not all the men were hunting him. Some had either remained as a guard or had been too timid to accompany the rest. He crouched low and crept toward them. They were standing in the light, their arsenal ready for use. No further effort had been made to break into the house.

  The only ingress to his domicile was through the back door. He regretted the lack of foresight which had brought about that circumstance. One of the cars had been turned so that it illuminated the porch and entrance was impossible. He thought of his own automobile and cautiously maneuvered around the field toward the garage. A hundred miles from Sinkak was a second sanctuary. If he could gain that, he might be saved.

  There was no one on the dark side of the house—a mute evidence of the formless hecticity of the search in progress. Carpenter was able to cross the field walking upright. Far in the woods he heard the confusion of sound that came from the searchers there. On the other side of the Mortland dwelling rose the excited colloquy of those who waited. He took his keys from his pocket, opened the garage, climbed into his car, and started the motor. With the first sound of the motor the voices beyond the house were stilled.

  The car leaped from the garage. It was dextrously swung onto the rutty drive. It shot past the men in the circle of light. Their shots failed to stop it. Carpenter had effected his second escape. Lurching wildly, with the speedometer rising in continuous eccentric turns, he hurtled toward Sinkak and the main road. He did not hear the men behind who now leaped into their cars, sending one of their number to recall the beaters in the woods. They did not know who had left the Mortland place so suddenly—but they determined to catch his car.

  Precautions had been made for precisely such a situation in Sinkak, however, where a constantly increasing throng was milling about the store and sending recruits to the frontiers of action. Carpenter passed three cars moving toward his place. He swung around the last turn. A lookout had seen his approaching car, identified it, and as he rounded the corner a barricade consisting of a truck and wagon was formed across the road. The sides were precipitous. There was no alternative but to stop.

  Carpenter’s emergency brake screamed. He skidded and hit the barricade sidewise. In the same second he had jumped from the body of his car and raced up the side of the road. This time, however, they did not lose sight of him. He crossed four back yards, a score of men at his heels. His enormous body bounded over a long field. Directly ahead of him was the open gate of Wonderland—the amusement park. He rushed through it, scuttled around the first of the fantastic shapes which peopled it—and the last of his pursuers to pass through the gate had the presence of mind to close it.

  Wonderland was almost ready for its summer throngs. For weeks electricians, carpenters, painters, engineers had been reclaiming it from the incursions of winter. The merry-go-round had taken a practice spin; its dragons and milk white chargers wore fresh and gaudy trappings. The calliope had tooted through its new repertoire. A procession of cars had journeyed perilously through the sky on the roller coaster tracks. The chute-the-chutes had been given a trial splash in the shallow lagoon. The Mystery House was ready, its jiggling stairways and rolling barrels waiting to trap the first of the awkward and unwary who would visit Wonderland. Finally, the strings and groups of electric lights that would turn the tawdry shapes and colors into a cubistic maze waited only the upthrust of a half dozen switches.

  Carpenter rushed into Wonderland. Some one shut the gate. The watchman was swamped by the tide of unwonted visitors who had rushed into his premises. Word was passed around that the ghost was inside. A triple guard was posted at the entrance. The high fence and its barbed wire superstructure, intended to keep out an admission-dodging army of hoodlums, would be efficacious in holding Carpenter at bay until he could be captured.

  The guard at the gate opened it cautiously to admit the carloads of men who arrived at intervals from the original posse. Last to come were those who had courageously ventured into the woods.

  “It’s in here. Can’t get out. Hunt three together. Be careful not to shoot until you’re sure.”

  Then some one found the light switches and instantly Wonderland was bathed in a radiant glow. High arches and celestial stars flamed red, green, purple, yellow. A fountain near the gate squirted up like a rested geyser and its spreading plume took on the myriad colors of the lamps at its b
ase. The person who had located the power control room and smashed down its door was evidently a novice at his task. He was not content at turning on the main lights, but shot home every switch he could find on the huge bakelite board. The result was uncanny. With a good natured rumble the Mystery House began to play to a heedless public. The barrel rolled, the stairays jiggled, the polished discs at the foot of the chute commenced to spin.

  A single car on the roller coaster broke loose from its station and hurtled through the night above. The calliope inside the merry-go-round began to warble brassily.

  The psychological effect of this instantaneous light and activity was to add to the excitement of the searchers. If there was a ghost, if there was some esoteric Thing in the midst of this tumultuous grandeur—then certainly this was the place and the time to find it. A diabolic spectacle. The amusement park was virtually looted. Men ran through its lurid devices, firing their guns, whooping to each other. There was no order in the procedure. It might have been expected that Carpenter would escape—but he did not.

  The topography and architecture of Wonderland assured him of innumerable places of concealment in the dark. His desire now was only to escape the frenzy of the mob and the night. He thought of himself as himself, and not as a skeleton. He was like a criminal who is followed by a mob intent upon lynching him. He ran. He hid. He doubled on his tracks. His brain concentrated on the single idea of getting clear.

  When the lights went up, he was beating his way along the fence on the outskirts of the park. It had been put in perfect order. It could not be scaled, and if a man reached the top with the help of props and accessories, he would still have to contend with the wire. Carpenter dropped into a patch of uncut grass. It was sixteen or eighteen inches high and he might have remained there all night if some one had not stumbled upon him.

  Numbers of men came close to him and did not see his form. He raised his head occasionally and stared with his awful face at the mad hunt in progress. It was quite dark where he lay. When another band drew near, he merely pressed his nose into the sod like a soldier under fire. Some one kicked him before he was seen. He tried to get to his feet. Four men leaped upon him. They raised their voices. The four became twenty.

  They dragged him into an area of light. Their cries were stilled. Men came silently to the spot. Carpenter was torn, bleeding, black and blue. That could not be seen. He had been beaten almost into insensibility. The hands that clung to him were tenacious and at the same time queasy. One man, looking at him, was sick. Several others raced away from the place when they had seen him. They went to their homes, covered themselves in their beds, trembling and cursing.

  The station master pressed the muzzle of his shotgun against the bony chest and said in a strange tone, “Stand back, boys, and I’ll blow it to hell.”

  “Don’t!” Carpenter gasped. Most of the hands that held him let go at the sound of his voice.

  Judge Temple found himself close to the figure. He spoke with a tremulous solemnity. “What are you?”

  “I’m William Carpenter. I’ve had a terrible accident. Scientific. Take me to a doctor. I can explain it.”

  “Burn him,” some one else said.

  A second voice took up the words. “Yeah. Burn him.”

  “It’s the devil.” “It’s Carpenter all right. Same height.” “He’s got leprosy. Be careful how you touch him.” “He don’t feel like bones. Feels like a man.” “Burn him. Get a fire going. He’ll bewitch you.”

  Judge Temple again. He controlled the diverse emotions that welled within him. This was a matter beyond his ken. The need for immediate action was evident. He half believed that the ungodly figure was Carpenter. The thought that Carpenter in this form could have no legal rights occurred to him. The mob was ready for its kill. “William Carpenter you may have been. William Carpenter you no longer are. We’ll bum him, boys. Build a fire.”

  Carpenter’s rejoinder was frantic. “You fool! I’m a man. A man like you. I’ve had an accident that makes me look this way. It isn’t black magic. It’s science.” The jaws wiggled. The skull turned from side to side. Some one hit him on the head with a club. He sank to the ground. Some one else kicked him. Men sat upon him, held him down with their feet.

  Wood was piled up. Kerosene from a lantern was spilled on it. The flames rose.

  “Get wire. Wire him up and throw him on it.”

  Those near Carpenter were constantly displaced by others who wished against their inward crawling repulsions to look upon the horror. The fire was made of whatever could be brought to hand—planks from booths, legs knocked off the gay horses, seats from the grandstand around the arena. It grew vastly. The flames licked higher. And over it all came the perpetual voice of the calliope.

  Carpenter’s benumbed consciousness revived. He perceived that his last hour was at hand. They would bind him as soon as wire could be found and toss him into the flames. Their faces in the leaping light were pale and barbaric. They wanted to finish their mission, to get home, to have the light of day come back to earth, to sit and drink and talk about the Thing that had visited Sinkak. Judge Temple’s preemptory questions would suffice for justice. Their own fear would supply the motive. And Carpenter would feed the fire.

  His mind was listless. It passed through his dazed thoughts that this was to be the end of the greatest brain in the world—excepting possibly Rosoff. He wondered vaguely what had gone wrong with his last great experiment. He thought of Daryl and Baxter. What would they think and say when he was dead? Would the mob retain its fury long enough to commit them to the same destruction?

  Then, in a flash, his calculations spread out before him and he saw on the sheets of white paper an error. A simple error. A failure to multiply by two. The deduction that followed the discovery of that error accompanied the discovery itself: he had taken an underdose of his compound.

  Carpenter came to life again. The fire was not ready. The wire had not been brought. He had carried his bottle with him to assist in a possible crisis—one that he had imagined as much less formidable than this.

  Stealthily he released one hand. The number of men who held him made it easier—as they confused his motions with their own. His fingers touched the bottle in the bottom of his torn coat pocket. An instant later he brought it to his lips. With his teeth he pulled the cork. He swallowed once, twice, three times. The bottle slid to earth. Someone pinned his arm down a moment later.

  “Here’s the minister!”

  A voice from the outside came to Carpenter’s ears. “This is murder! Stand back!”

  “Take a look, parson. It’ll do you good.”

  “You cannot take human life——” then the minister saw Carpenter. “It is Beelzebub!”

  “Pray for me,” Carpenter said.

  The preacher drew back. He addressed the heavens. In a voice that rose and fell he committed this devil to omnipotent care. It was the seal of the church on the work in progress. Carpenter encouraged it by bowing his—skull. The act won him a little time. He watched his fingers which he spread before the fire light.

  The minister looked at the Thing on the ground. “Be gone!”

  “I go,” Carpenter answered.

  “You see—my friends—we have entertained a demon!”

  “Pray for me!”

  In a fine fury, provided with a supernatural inspiration gracelessly withheld from most modern spiritual mentors, the minister launched into a second prayer. The men listened, stirred to fervor. And Carpenter watched his fingers. The bones were becoming harder to see.

  They brought the wire. Room was made for those who were to bind him up—gingerly. There were less hands with which to contend. Carpenter sucked in a mighty breath. He stood. A number of men fell back. A few clung to him. What diabolical miracle might be expected, no one knew. Carpenter lashed at those who held him. They loosened their holds. He stripped off his coat, ripped away shirt and undershirt, tore open his belt. They made a retreating circle around him. Naked, he was
more grisly than they had imagined. No one had thought to predicate his body from his head and hands. Watching them, he removed his shoes.

  The fire was behind him. His bones had a vague, watery appearance. The minister’s prayer rose to a screech. Carpenter spread out his hands. The calliope coughed and beat out a new melody with drums and brasses.

  Carpenter’s mighty voice performed its office. “I go! Make way for me!”

  Men fell on the ground as he walked steadily toward them. The circle broke. He was outside it. He was more difficult to see now. The skeleton thinned away. Some one commenced to sob. A man ran toward him. Carpenter wheeled majestically and the pursuer stuck in his tracks.

  For a little while he stood as stiff as Lot’s wife become salt. The lights, the music, the babbling prayer, the fallen men, the frozen one who had chased the demon a short distance. Then Carpenter melted. Some said he went up. Some said he dropped into the earth. Every one ageed that he was gone—and there were none to follow him into the realm toward which they believed he had made his necromantic journey.

  In the eleventh hour Carpenter’s great experiment had succeeded.

  Objects upon the eastern horizon were silhouetted by an ascendant chiaroscuro. It was very near to dawn. The men in Wonderland gathered themselves together. The Judge uttered a lengthy pomposity over the place where Carpenter had stood. The minister prayed for a time and indulged in shadowy mysticisms of his own contriving. In disjoined groups they straggled back toward Sinkak—a feeling upon them of mingled relief and incubus. Broad daylight would make them incredulous. A legend had been founded. No one thought of going back to the Mortland place until the sun was high and reassuring.

  Eight hours had passed since Daryl had been locked in the cellar—hours of darkness and phantasmagorical adventure. For her they had been full of activity. Free for a time of Carpenter’s red eyes, his threatening arms, she had scarcely found it necessary to summon a courage that ran hot in her blood because of the uncertain jeopardy in which she imagined her lover to be laboring in the laboratory. She began immediately to make efforts toward escape. The condition of the floor gave her hope. Its cement had rotted, the foundation beneath was not impregnable. She muffled it with a rug and began to crack it along the base of the door.