by Osie Turner
"I was the voice which drove the poor idiot on, the voice which turned the love in his undeveloped nature into a seething inferno of jealous hatred. And then, when he murdered her, when I saw her fall bleeding on a carpet of soft white snow, I stole out of the bushes where I had concealed myself and made a sketch of her. You remember the painting, I think. It was a vivid portrayal, but rather crude in its color scheme."
Martin broke off and regarded me intently. Seeing the horror written on my face, no doubt, he attempted to explain and thereby made his crime all the more revolting.
"To say that I felt no compassion for her would be to lie," he continued. "As I told you, Smithers, I was fond of the girl—dangerously fond. Otherwise I would not have driven the idiot to kill her. A dozen times I was on the point of leaping forward, of rescuing her before it was too late; and a dozen times the voice of reason whispered: 'Fool, fool, would you refuse art your first human sacrifice? It is necessary to tear out the heart so that the head may rise above the stars.' That voice spoke the truth, Smithers; it was the voice of my destiny.
"When the girl was lifeless, strange to say, all compassion vanished. I was once more the artist, calm and smiling; she, the model who might inspire me to Herculean effort. I strode forward to where she lay in an ever-widening stain of Hood and, drawing out paper and pencil, went to work in a mental daze of creation. The idiot had fled. I had nothing to disturb me—only the white snow-petals which fell softly on her upturned face and formed themselves into a spotless bandage for her severed throat. The shadows of night were gathering in before I left her. Already she was partly covered by a glistening counterpane which would hide all telltale traces by dawn.
"But now you are trembling, Smithers! Why are you trembling? Are you cold? Perhaps I had better not speak of Paul."
"Yes, tell me of Paul!" I cried in a kind of desperation. "You murderer, tell me of Paul! You killed him because you were fond of him, I presume? Oh, if my hands weren't tied!"
"Calm yourself, Smithers," Martin said. "You must hear me out before you can judge. I did not kill Paul because I was merely fond of him. Ah, no. You, who have shared your affections with the mob, can scarcely understand the feeling I had for him. He was as wife, brother and friend to me—the personification of all my earthly affection—the single link which still held me to humanity.
"From the first, I knew that this friendship was fatal to art. To develop the ego, one must travel alone. Loving hands hold us back; they seek to bind us with the ropes of affection, mercy, generosity. We must thrust them aside, we must crush them if need be, to reach our goal. All tender emotions clog the stream of inspiration. I could only create by forming myself into a machine devoid of all the warmer instincts of nature. Paul must go!
"But I was weak. I lacked the resolution to leave him. I dodged the issue. Why could I not follow my career and still keep this single affection, I asked myself. Surely it was possible. Before now many a man had led a double life. Art would not demand a complete excommunication from my fellows. As long as Paul remained, I would never be quite alone.
"Thinking that I could serve two masters at once, I engaged lodgings on Tyndall Place and soon was on intimate terms with the scrapings of the neighborhood —men who would slice a throat for slight compensation and often for the merest whim. Before many weeks had passed, I gathered about me a band of the most bloodthirsty rascals unhung. They nicknamed me 'The Boss' and were overjoyed to have a leader who could plan their little escapades skillfully and who sought no material gain for himself.
"Under my leadership a dozen murders were perpetrated and the police in every case failed to apprehend the assassin. I witnessed all of these crimes and they are reported faithfully in my first book. Yet each murder was a torture to me; and the remorse I felt when I visited Paul, was almost more than I could bear. You scarcely realized my true emotions, Smithers, on the night when we met on Tyndall Place. No doubt you thought I was calm and collected; but, in reality, I was suffering far more than you. Every blow which descended on that writhing body, fell on my soul as well. As never before, Paul's influence was about to gain the ascendancy. For one mad moment I was tempted to throw myself beneath that shower of clubs and perish with my victim.
"Although 'Many Murders' was acclaimed a great success by the leading critics, it was in reality a miserable failure. I had succeeded in writing several vivid descriptions of violent death, but they were written from the standpoint of the spectator. I had only succeeded in portraying the sensations of an eyewitness— the commonplace form of narration in horror writing. Surely there was room for great improvement in my next book. Could I not probe far deeper into the subject? Now, if I could describe accurately and vividly the thoughts and sensations of the assassin as he struck the fatal blow, I would be accomplishing a unique effect in literature. But, unfortunately, I was not blessed with an imagination. In order to write a series of such stories, I must first commit a series of such crimes. I could no longer depend on my band of cutthroats to create models for me; I must shed human blood with my own hands. Who could know the sensations of the assassin but the assassin? It was necessary for me to become an actual murderer.
"Several days after I had come to this decision, I attempted to kill a man. He had been drugged and was lying unconscious in my crime studio on Tyndall Place. I was alone with him. Stealing up beside the bed where he lay, I poised a needle-pointed stiletto above his heart. A single movement of my arm and he would have been a corpse; yet, try as I would, this simple act was beyond me. Thinking that I saw a resemblance to Paul on his white, upturned face, I sank to my knees and burst out into uncontrollable sobs. Defeated, broken, I crouched there until my intended victim awoke.
"That night I fought a great and final battle. All through the dark hours the struggle raged. At one moment my love for Paul, and all the human weaknesses which followed in its train, would gain the ascendancy; at the next, the calm and radiant goddess, Art, would hold my will in the hollow of her hand. It was not until the gray light of dawn descended on the city that the victory was won.
"'I must sever the last link which holds me to humanity,' I told myself. 'Paul must be sacrificed, as others have been sacrificed, on the funeral pyre of genius. Brave men have starved for it, shall I turn back? Kind men have forfeited their loved ones for it, shall I be weak? No, Paul, my dear friend, you must die!'"
XX
Martin paused and passed his hand across his forehead. Great drops of perspiration had formed there, which at any moment threatened to run down into his eyes. Evidently the memory of these mental sufferings could still move him. I might have pitied the man, had I not had such a hearty detestation and horror of him.
"Three weeks later Paul and I went to the woods together," he continued. "I had shipped a barrel of whisky to the camp several days before. It was child's play for me to overcome your brother's scruples and start him drinking again. For five days I kept him in a drunken stupor by passing him my flask when he showed signs of returning reason. On the sixth day I hid the barrel in the spring and refused to give him any more whisky. When he came to himself, he had an attack of violent melancholia,. Sick in body, he was sicker yet in mind.
"As you know, Paul's fits of mental depression were rather dangerous. Before this he had always had someone to cheer him up, someone to drag him bodily out of the slough of despondency. But now I did just the opposite. Instead of trying to lighten his mind, I burdened it with all the weary weight of remorse. I gave him no hope to cling to. I told him that what had happened here in the woods would happen again and again; that there was no hope of ultimate cure for a drunkard; that he was predestined to die with delirium tremens. I even described his death rather vividly. I had always had a mental ascendancy over Paul; now I used this ascendancy as a weapon to destroy him. When I left him by the camp fire that night, I knew that the thought of immediate suicide was implanted in his whisky soaked brain.
"But how I suffered as I lay in the dark cabin waiting for
the end! All my other sufferings were as nothing compared to this. When I finally saw his hand slide silently in through the doorway and clutch the barrel of a shotgun which stood against the wall, I seized the sides of my bunk and literally held myself down. 'Only a moment now,' I told myself. 'Only a moment!'
"And then, when I heard the loud report of the gun, something seemed to snap in my brain—some chord of feeling which, having parted, left me as cold as ice. Since that day I have felt nothing—neither love nor pity, fear nor hate. Strange, isn't it, Smithers? What was it that died with Paul? Whatever it was, it left me free to go my own way."
"Your way shall lead to the gallows if I once get out of here alive!" I cried defiantly. "You'd better murder me now and have done with it!"
"I doubt if the courts would hold me responsible for your brother's death," he said quite calmly. "Crimes committed by the mind are beyond the reach of the law. However, hear me out, Smithers, and you'll have ironbound proof.
"After Paul's death, I began creating material for my new book. Patiently, cleverly, I arranged a murder in which I played the chief role and did the actual killing with my own hand. I committed that crime, calmly, coolly, without the slightest compunction. The description of it appeared in 'The Confessions of Constantine.' That book, if you remember, described my sensations—the sensations of the murderer—in the most minute and realistic fashion.
"During the next three days I committed twelve murders in all. I limited myself to that number because I was not actuated by a love for shedding blood alone. Ah, no, I destroyed life merely for art's sake. And I naturally refrained from wholesale slaughter, as I feared that my sensations would soon become dulled by over usage and that I would no longer be able to record them so vividly and with such artistic feeling. In a word, I fostered my talent.
"Soon after 'The Confessions of Constantine' was published, I began to read the papers with avidity. But I never turned to the literary sheet—the book reviews. I was tired of words; I wanted deeds. And I was not disappointed, as you know. 'The Confessions of Constantine' passed the supreme test; it was responsible for a wave of crime that swept the country from end to end. This was a triumph for art. I not only appealed to the minds of my readers; I conquered their minds. I was the maker of men's destinies, the angel of death.
"What exultation filled me during those few short months when 'The Confessions of Constantine' wandered through the world and whispered its red secrets to all mankind! How I gloated over this signal victory —a victory which no other artist had accomplished. Surely I was destined to dwell forever on the sunlit heights of great achievement. And then, just as the world seemed mine to play with at will, the roof of the heavens fell on my proudly lifted head. You know what happened, Smithers. 'The Confessions of Constantine' was condemned by the government!
"I made inquiries and soon learned who was responsible for my downfall. I did not underestimate Wilbur Huntington for an instant. The man was a brilliant psychologist and capable of doing big things as a criminal expert. He had already traced the crime-wave to 'The Confessions of Constantine,' would he not soon compare it with 'Many Murders' and make some startling deduction? Suppose he should learn that I had no imagination? Would I be safe?
"Thoughts such as these, prompted me to write that letter which he received in your studio. Before he came that night, I made my preparations. Securing the services of three murderers who could be relied upon, I hid them behind the portieres in my apartment. No sooner was he well inside, before they leaped upon him and pinioned his arms behind his back. He was helpless.
"'So you decided to get me out of the way, Martin,' he said with surprising calmness. 'I thought it might come to this.'
"In spite of the great wrong the man had done me, I could not help showing him a certain amount of respect. There he stood, with a boyish smile on his face, while those assassins were nearly tearing his arms out of their sockets. He seemed as careless to pain as he was to death. Your friend cut an heroic figure, Smithers.
"'You are quick to see the truth,' I said. 'If you wished to live, you should not have treated a great book in such a manner. It may be years before I can write another equally as good.'
"'That's what I came to see you about—your art!' he cried with strange enthusiasm. 'You're going to kill me immediately, I presume?'
"'Most certainly,' I answered. 'I never waste time when I am anxious to be at work.'
"'Then hear me first,' he broke in excitedly. 'I want to speak of your work.'
'"Well?' I asked.
"'You have described crime from the standpoint of the onlooker and from the standpoint of the assassin,' he said. 'That is true, is it not?'
"'Yes,' I assented.
"'But you have missed the great situation—the truly artistic situation!' he continued quickly.
"'How so?' I demanded hotly.
"'Why, you have never written a story from the standpoint of the victim!' he cried. 'In other words, what is the exact sensation of death?'
"'What is the exact sensation of death?' I repeated dully.
"'To be sure!' he shouted almost gleefully. 'You're worse than a failure, Martin, for you are only a partial success! You, whom they call the recorder of sensations, have missed the only unknown sensation—that mysterious sensation of death! There is material beyond your reach. Till you have mastered it, you will remain a living lie. I will know that secret, but it will not be mirrored in my dead eyes! You will have to go further, Martin—further!'
"And then, Smithers, the truth of his words flashed through my brain like lightning. What was the sensation of death? All my life I had been straining toward that unknown knowledge without realizing it; all my life I had known instinctively that dead things guard a precious secret. Without this secret, I was a mere scribbler forced to give shopworn offerings to the muse. What was the sensation of death? If I knew that, unborn millions would live to fear me; my shadow would rest like black plumage over the world; and life, once gay and carefree, would shudder on the brink of the tomb!
"But now red rage flamed up in me—blind rage at my own impotence. How I hated this man who had pointed out the truth! My only thought was to destroy that brain which had grappled and was grappling with mine.
"Grasping the heavy poker which leaned against the grate, I struck him on the head with all my might The iron bit into his skull and he fell senseless at my feet. But blind fury still possessed me. I struck again and again till his face was beaten into an unrecognizable mass.
"And then I stopped, ashamed. I knew that he had escaped; that my first blow had opened the door for him; that he was now safe from me, quite safe and the possessor of a priceless knowledge. And I dared not look into his eyes for fear that I would see that relentless question: 'What was the sensation of death?'
"You know the rest, Smithers. I dressed his body in my clothes. I slipped my ring on his finger and later that night I had him thrown into the river. Then I left the city by stealth. Solitude has always appealed to me. I took to the woods, grew a beard and soon became familiar with my new life."
He paused and regarded me solemnly for a moment. "Tell me," he muttered, "why did Huntington call me a failure? Do you think that I am a failure, Smithers? I have tried so hard and now…" He shook his head sadly. "We, who serve, must give everything—everything!"
And now a new terror was added to my others. There remained no doubt in my mind. Looking up into his thin, convulsed face, I realized that Burgess Martin was mad. There he sat, his eyes fixed on mine with a speculative stare—a madman with the red stain of murder in his brain! How long before his slender, crimson finger tips would be at their wonted trade? How long had I to live?
XXI
"All that I have told you happened such a long, long time ago," Martin resumed in a weary voice. "Now nothing amuses me—nothing! For ten unbearable years that relentless question has burned my brain like molten lava. The world, no doubt, would think me mad, but the moon knows better. To-night, as I sat b
y the fire, she bent down from the heavens and whispered to me, telling me how I could find the answer and be as wise as she and other cold things. Just think what it must mean to be wise as the moon!
"But do not imagine that I seek to learn this truth for myself alone. Ah, no, I do it for Art—I do it so that she may become all-powerful, so that she may rule over the dead as over the living. I shall leave a message behind which will open those dark portals. No longer shall the breath from the tomb be heavy laden with mystery. The time has come for my last sacrifice!"
All this time his eyes had been fixed on me; his face had been so close to mine that I could feel his hot breath on my cheek. But now he rose and straightened himself to his full height. Slowly his right hand stole downward till it rested on the hilt of the hunting knife suspended from his belt. A moment later I saw the sharp blade gleam dully in the feeble lamplight.
"Tell me," he said softly, bending forward as a mother might stoop to caress her sleeping child. "Tell me, would you not like to go? Paul has trod that path; Huntington laughed as I struck him down. Surely you will not remain behind?"