An Oxford Tragedy

by J. C. Masterman

  ‘Wasn’t it natural that I should bend all my energies to prevent that cursed marriage? Wasn’t I justified a hundred times over in trying to do so? Day by day the conviction became stronger that, by fair means or foul, I would stop him from ruining Mary’s life. But how could I do it? There’s too much of the Hamlet in every one of us; I thought and schemed and brooded, but I couldn’t screw up my courage to act. Time and again I rehearsed all that I might – that I must – say, and time after time I could not bring myself to the scratch. I saw in anticipation all too vividly how he would receive me. He would sneer at my interference and bludgeon down my arguments. How could I, who had always failed, hope to find words to move Hargreaves, who had always dominated, always succeeded, always had his own way? I felt the miserable burden of my own weakness – I loathed my own incompetence and powerlessness. So for weeks I hesitated, torn between timidity and overwhelming hatred.

  ‘Last week I knew that I could not delay much longer. Come what might, I must put it to the touch, or I should go mad under a strain which never eased. On that fatal Wednesday evening I had at last come to a decision; I came down to Hall with the fixed intention of speaking to Hargreaves that night. Some time later I would go to his rooms; I would tell him how much I knew of his manner of life; I would threaten, whatever the consequences, to spread abroad the scandals of his private affairs unless he would take steps to terminate his engagement. And if he refused to listen to me, if he threw me out of his rooms, as I half anticipated that he would, I would translate my threat into action, come what might.

  ‘You remember the conversation at dinner that night, and all that Brendel said? Of course you do. Anyone would have been interested, but for me his words had a special and a personal significance. When he spoke of the psychology of the murderer I realized the extent of my own hatred of Hargreaves; when he described the murderer watching and studying his victim I realized how I had watched and studied my own enemy. Yet, as I sat in Common Room, there was no thought of murder in my mind. I swear to you that then, at least, I had no thought of that. When I left you at nine o’clock my intentions were clear and innocent enough. I would go to my Lab. and think out again for the thousandth time just what words I should use to Hargreaves. I could not sit quietly waiting in Common Room – I had to get away somewhere where I could be alone until the time came to speak.

  ‘It was here in my Lab. – here where you will find my body, and where perhaps you will read all this – that I became a murderer in my heart. On my table was lying Wimpfheimer’s account of his discovery, the discovery which might have been mine. I glanced at it again, and I realized how the merest chance had robbed me of reputation, and now the work of four years and more that I had done in that very room was utterly wasted. I had failed, and I should always fail. Twice I had seen the hope of a lifelong happiness, and twice I had missed my opportunity; once fame had been within my reach, and I had been too slow to grasp it. Was it not certain that I should fail again in my mission to Hargreaves that night? What use was I to the world, or ever would be? And then suddenly, blindingly, the thought of murder filled my mind. I saw the loaded revolver lying on the octagonal table as Hargreaves had described it; I saw the destined victim sitting in his chair. One sudden irrevocable act would destroy the whole edifice of doubt and difficulty. The death of Hargreaves would solve every problem. Mary would grieve for a while, but time heals and her life was still before her. Of myself I thought little. I had nothing to live for, and for a man in my position and with my knowledge suicide would be easy. I need only wait a few days, and quietly give myself the fatal dose. A mental breakdown, a moment of madness, overwork, over-strain – how easy it would be to explain, how easy to excuse! No one would be the poorer by my going.

  ‘My brain, when once the decision was made, worked with amazing clearness. There were three possibilities and I considered them all. Hargreaves might not yet have returned to his rooms. In that case the oak would still be sported, and I must go away till a later hour. Or again he might be in his rooms, but not alone. If that was so I should hear voices inside when I reached the outer room, and I could depart unobserved to wait a better opportunity. The third possibility was the one for which I hoped, and on which indeed I counted. The oak would be open, the lights would be on, and Hargreaves would be sitting alone in his rooms.’

  My throat was growing tired, and for a moment I paused in my reading. Brendel spoke for the first time.

  ‘Prendergast argued very clearly, but he never noticed that Mottram had left the Common Room before Shirley went up to Hargreaves’ rooms – and yet everything turns on that. Go on, if you will.’

  Chapter Sixteen

  I took up the manuscript again, and continued to read it aloud.

  ‘If he was alone, what then? I visualized quite clearly what would happen. He would be sitting reading or working, either at his writing-table or in his arm-chair by its side. I would fling open the door, pick up the revolver off the table, take a couple of paces forward and shoot him as he sat there, without a second’s pause or hesitation. No one would notice a shot on an evening when undergraduates were letting off fireworks and firing revolvers in the Quad. Two minutes after I had shot him I should be sitting in my own room … It only takes five minutes in the car from my Lab. to the college, but during that drive I killed Hargreaves a hundred times. I went through every detail in my plan until I could have done it all blindfold, and not one thought of pity or remorse crossed my mind. When I’d parked the car outside I took a bunch of keys from my pocket to open the Fellows’ door. I noticed then that I’d put on a pair of gloves in the car without thinking what I was doing. They were an old pair of wash-leather gloves which I always keep in the car, for it’s cold going up and down to the Lab. at night-time. I was just putting them into my pocket when I thought of fingerprints and pulled them on again. If I hadn’t thought of them then I suppose there would have been enough evidence to hang me. Somehow the fact that I’d so nearly made a fatal slip gave me new confidence; I felt that nothing else could go wrong, that some outside agency was guiding me. I felt cool and determined and certain of my prey. Yes – that was my state of mind. All doubts and inhibitions had left me; I was the beast of prey crouching before its kill.

  ‘Very quietly I walked up Hargreaves’ stairs. His oak was open, so I knew that he was in. There was no sound, so I knew that he was alone. In the outer room I paused for a moment to gather myself together. I remember thinking – how oddly the mind works! – that Hargreaves had loved in Common Room to lay down the law about the theory of games to a sycophantic audience. “Keep your eye on the ball is the secret of all games. Brain and eyes and muscles will work in perfect harmony if you observe that simple principle.” What rubbish such talk had always seemed to me, but now I reflected with grim humour that I would follow the advice of my own victim. I must think of nothing and look at nothing except the revolver in the half-second after my entry. Once it was in my hand I must take two paces forward for the shot which could not miss.

  ‘I grasped the handle and pushed open the door; I seized the revolver and stepped two paces forward. As I shot him he was sitting in the large leather arm-chair next to the writing-table. Over the back of it only his head was visible, and of that only the outline, for he was reading by the aid of a reading-lamp on the writing-table, and all the other lights were out. He half turned his head as I stepped forward – there was no time for more.’

  For the second time Brendel’s voice interrupted me, but this time he seemed to be talking to himself.

  ‘Yes, it is quite true; I have made that experiment to see. If you put a reading-lamp on the far side of a man in an armchair you will see only the bare outline of his head; he sits in his own light. And Mottram was a myope, too. But Cotter made his one mistake there. He never considered that the other lights might have been turned on after the murder. Go on, if you are ready.’

  Again I took up Mottram’s manuscript.

  ‘At the very moment t
hat I pulled the trigger I knew that there was some hideous mistake, and as the body sagged in the chair I saw that it was not Hargreaves but Shirley who lay dead before me. No words, Winn, can describe to you what I felt then. If all the tortures of the damned were concentrated for you into one short minute you could not suffer more than I suffered then. I sprang to him, tore off my gloves, and undid his shirt to feel his heart, but I knew that he was dead before ever my hand touched him. Then I sat down on a chair and thought what I should do.

  ‘It was the reading-lamp that had betrayed me. You can’t see a man’s features when he’s between you and it, when there’s no other light. Besides I’m short-sighted at the best of times. Remember I’d done it all in far less time that it takes to tell. Go to that room; stand beside that table; put the arm-chair where it stood that Wednesday night; place the reading-lamp on the corner of the writing-table – and you will see that his head was in a straight line – a dead straight line – between me and the lamp. I swear to God that it happened like that. Murder was in my heart, but I would have harmed no human creature except Hargreaves. Yet think what I had done! I had shot almost my only friend; I had left Ruth a widow; I had made Mary’s unhappy marriage even more certain than before.

  ‘My first instinct was to drive straight back to the Lab. and end it all then and there, but gradually as I sat gazing at that dead body another plan formed in my mind. No one, apparently, had heard the fatal shot. In the far Quad I heard the sound of distant revellers, like an echo from a different world. Why should I not go as I had come, and leave the crime a mystery? And then in some way or other I would still bring about what I most desired; somehow I would still stop Hargreaves from marrying Mary. Then, and only then, I could put an end to my wretched life with the assurance that I had done at least one good deed to set in my account against this hideous crime. I put on my gloves again; I turned on all the lights to make sure that I had left no traces; I put the revolver back in its place on the octagonal table; I walked down the stairs and out of the college; I drove back to the Lab.

  ‘What happened next is hard even for me to understand. I sat down and began to work. You’ll hardly credit that, but it’s true nevertheless. I had to steady my mind, and I turned instinctively to what I had always done. I suppose it was sheer force of habit. A few minutes afterwards Holt of Magdalen, who works in the same building, came in to see me. What he said I’ve not the faintest idea, but I imagine that he noticed nothing out of the ordinary. After he left I sat here until midnight, and then I drove back to college. I went to bed, and went to sleep. Yes, for eight hours I slept like a tired child – as though I’d never slept before. But I’ve never slept properly for an hour since then.

  ‘You won’t want me to describe the next few days to you; it doesn’t need much imagination to fill in the gaps there. Everything happened as I had expected, for my alibi was no worse than that of all the rest. Only I felt that Brendel guessed my secret, and sometimes I thought that Cotter did too. I made up my mind that I’d tackle Hargreaves after the funeral. If I failed then I must abandon hope.

  ‘Winn, you surprised us at the end of that interview; so you can guess how he took it. If ever I saw a man’s naked soul I saw it then. I told him what he was – somehow the words came and I didn’t spare him – and I told him that I’d bare his character to the world if he dared to marry Mary. Could he face it if all his acquaintances knew of his philanderings and of his disease? I gave him two days to break that engagement – two days and not an hour more. And when I finished he just crumpled – pitifully, miserably! He began with bluster, and he ended in collapse. How wretched these strong men are when they break down! He was selfish enough to sacrifice Mary to himself, but he wouldn’t face publicity or criticism. He surrendered without conditions, but he blurted out one paltry request: Couldn’t it all be kept secret for a time at least? He would break the engagement at once if I would pledge myself to silence, but no one need know what had been done. Later he would get permission from the college to take a term’s leave of absence, and the public announcement could be made then. I agreed to that. It didn’t matter to me whether the rest of the world knew or not. I stipulated only that I should know from Mary herself that the engagement was broken. As we talked I knew what I had guessed before – I knew that he never really loved her. He wanted a wife to make a comfortable home for him; he wanted someone who would be a credit to him and to his house; he thought that when Vereker’s days as President ended he would stand more chance to succeed him as a married man – and particularly as a man who had married Mary Vereker. I could read him like an open book. I said before that I saw his naked soul – I saw it again in every bare and mean and selfish detail. When you left me that night, Winn, I laughed, yes, laughed like a fiend in Hell. For I know now that if I’d gone to him at the beginning and said my say he’d have given in just as he gave in then. And I’d killed Shirley and condemned myself to death because I’d been afraid to tackle him. He’s a rotten man and bogus and a coward, but I’d been a coward too.

  ‘I believe that he went to see Mary that same evening, but he’d reckoned without her spirit. I can’t tell what passed, but I can guess. When she saw him as he really was she must have swept all his mean excuses and prevarications aside. It wasn’t in her to act a lie to save his face and avoid comment, and so she sent that notice to The Times that you read this morning.

  ‘There’s not much more to tell. Mary sent me a little stiff formal note on Tuesday – her engagement had been broken off and she was going away for a few days; she thought that I might like to know this for I had always been a friend; there would be an announcement in the papers shortly. I knew that I had won then, but I waited to read the announcement, and when I saw it I knew a moment’s happiness again. But I knew too that my part was played out and that I must go. I was still looking at The Times this morning when Brendel came in, and asked me to drive with him over the Downs. I don’t know quite why I agreed, except that one can’t refuse him when he’s in earnest. We got out of the car somewhere near Wootton Bassett and then we walked over the downland. He’ll tell you what we said to one another. Somehow I’d always felt that he guessed from the beginning.

  ‘A man like myself hasn’t any affairs to set in order. I’ve no one dependent on me and no friends. That makes it all easy. And I know I’m right. How could I go on living, knowing all the time that I was a murderer? I couldn’t face it. Brendel knows what I mean to do, I’m sure of that, though I’ve not told him. I’ve asked him to bring you up to-night, and he must know what I mean by that. He thinks I’m right, too, though he wouldn’t say so. One sees pretty clearly when one’s waiting for the end.

  ‘That’s the whole story. Someone had to hear it, and you’ve always tried to be kind to me, though I don’t think you ever saw very deep. Besides, there’s one thing I want you to do. You must make quite sure that Mary is saved from any unnecessary grief or scandal. There’s another letter here, which I’ve written for the rest of them all to read. It’s the letter I ought to have written if I’d been the ordinary suicide. A nervous breakdown due to the failure of my research and the shock of the death of my friend Shirley – that is what they must all think. After all what could be more natural? Overwork and overstrain, disappointment and a temporary loss of mental balance. A brilliant young scientist cut off on the threshold of his career! My God, I could make the Coroner’s speech myself! Above all, Winn, never let Mary know; she has enough to bear without that.’

  The letter stopped as abruptly as it had begun. I looked up and observed that Brendel was wiping his glasses with meticulous care just as he had done on that fatal evening a week before. When he spoke his voice was curiously gentle.

  ‘Yes, I knew that he meant to destroy himself, and I believe that he was right to do so. How could he go on living? It would have been a drawn-out torture, a daily death. But I was afraid that his nerve might fail him at the end. For he’s right – there is too much of Hamlet in most of us, and thoug
h Mottram was a brave man in a way he was a weak man too. Twice perhaps he might have won happiness if he’d had the strength of will to grasp it, and twice he waited and did nothing. And then his work. Do you realize that if he’d stuck to that instead of allowing this hatred of Hargreaves to obsess him he, and not Wimpfheimer, would probably have been first with this discovery, and his name would be known now to every scientific man in Europe? No, fate forgives much, but it never forgives weakness. Read me that other letter.’

  I opened the second envelope and read the contents aloud, but I cannot transcribe them. Mottram was a weakling, perhaps, but he had carried out his plan to the end. The latter was, as he had promised, the letter which he ought to have written – the letter of a nervous, hypersensitive man who had momentarily lost his mental equilibrium. To a coroner’s jury it would appear pathetic enough, but to me who knew the truth it seemed a last superb gesture, a piece of the finest acting, infinitely tragic.