X. Jones—Of Scotland Yard

by Harry Stephen Keeler

  And so, getting back again to this “very special” clearance report of ours, it seems to me that we are sufficiently safe, Howard, as to the manner in which we propose to operate—with the completed report, that is—that not a possible leak can take place. And, prior to that—well—the manner in which the separate disjunct “parts” are to be neatly drawn together at the last moment will be a marvel of co-ordination. In the nature of things, I believe I can say that no leak is possible between now and the moment of this actual co-ordination—from the persons constituting the various “parts.” As you yourself ultimately will see. however, when you view the finished document.

  Of course it is always possible that someone, working independently, may come in ahead of X—and thus upset our entire applecart. Should that happen—well—there would be nothing else for us to do than to act exactly like the cat from whom the bird it has been stalking flies off; i.e., wash our face nonchalantly with our paws as though quite nothing has happened; and as though, in fact, we did not know there were such things as birds in the Universe. Either that—or light a boxcar full of those Murads! On the other hand, we might have a piece of good luck by having some sensational flare-up of the Marceau Case in the newspapers—though involving utterly and hopelessly false disclosures—just before we deal our own cards. That would definitely determine the pitch of the key of the day’s news as “Marceau”—and our presentation would then fall upon a newspaper world and public that had been put beautifully into mental vibration for it. But such luck as this is hardly to be anticipated, I’ll admit.

  The whole efficacy of our plan, it is true, rests upon the fact that we can today, in 1937, copyright our report 100 per cent against the newspapers and the news-syndicate, and make them pay through the nose if they violate that copyright by one jot or tittle. Until, that is, the hour for their use of the material in it comes, which of course will be midnight of the 24th. Though I have decided, Howard, to permit use of the material in such before-midnight papers as beat next day’s date in the running head. What particularly gratifies me about our proposed plan, Howard, is the arrangement you have been able to achieve with the Old Man himself there in the C. B. for copyright registration direct from your hands to his—and him personally recording same—without the report going through a single recording clerk.

  Anyway, Howard, this is the set-up as it now exists:

  The analysis, completely co-ordinated, will come through by cable, exactly as originally scheduled, some time in the extremely early morning of February 24th—before dawn here in Chicago, in fact—since the chap X has to see in Paris will be positively “seeable” there on or around noontime that day; which hour is a quarter to 6 in the morning, at Chicago. (The quarter to 6 being thanks, of course, to the fact that the upper courts but yesterday set aside the dictum of the 44 clowns in the Chicago city council who tried to dictate a year or so ago that Chicago would be permanently on Eastern Time. If only Chicago would emulate New York by building a few subways instead of trying to be “New Yorkese” in its time scheme, it might—but what’s the use? Back to my story!) As I was about to say, the analysis will come through exactly in the manner originally determined; in multiplicate—to the New York, Dallas, Frisco and home office here—and to yourself, of course, there at Washington. And will be decoded at each receiving point as received. By Smiley at New York: Frazin at Dallas, Burke at Frisco, myself here—and you there in Washington. The particular decoding key to be used I shall have to wire you all the evening before, since X believes that he may have to use a more rapid coding system than the one originally contemplated, because of additional material.

  I estimate that, as a clearance report, it will carry a serial number of approximately 38,500 to 38,550. Depending on how many regular clearance reports go out to our clients between now and the 24th.

  No change, in the slightest degree, will be made in X’s own version, as cabled by him. Though our report officially, you see, it will yet be, at the same time, his promised newspaper release.

  Once decoded, at each office, it will be multigraphed onto onion-skin foolscap sheets, the opening lines of it being run directly onto sheets the entire upper half of which will carry a scarlet-and-black printed forenote giving the full warning “low-down,” to all newspapers, on the copyright situation relating thereto, as well as the conditions governing free later reproduction, etc., etc., and not the least important factor in which forenote will be, of course, the copyright number the Old Man assigns to you in advance the night before, and which you will have wired back to me.

  Such prints and pictorial embellishments as may be required in the report will be printed here in advance, and distributed by air express to each district manager; they will be on thin gummed paper capable of being moistened and slapped readily upon the multigraphed pages where required.

  No employee, in any of the offices, of course, will be permitted to leave till around 4 that afternoon.

  The envelopes for mailing will be in readiness at each office, but all stamped for special-delivery for local districts, and airmail special for cities which lie in the further limits of the territory which that particular office covers. Each envelope will carry printed on it, in red, specifications restricting its local delivery to a certain hour only. The hour selected, Howard—that is, you understand, for the regular clients—is 2:30 p.m. Chicago time. Some deliveries are bound to be made, of course, a little before that time, and some naturally a little later—but 2:30 Central Standard will be a pretty fair approximation of the average delivery hour. The envelopes will carry the regulation stencil-printed addresses of our regular clients, but each office will type out in advance as many as are required for prospective clients of the service whom that office has not yet been able to get on. We would be rather remiss did we not use this special report in this way, when it is but a matter of cost of a little extra multigraphing and postage.

  Mailing will be carried out, Howard, exactly according to the system which governs for a “Class A-Rush” report. That is, the first envelopes to be stuffed and to go into the mailchutes will be those going out on trains bound to points of that office’s territory not accessible by mail planes; the next will be those going to points reachable by airmail; and the last for purely local delivery.

  No doubt you are querying as to exactly when the copies of the report intended for newspapers and news-syndicates will be delivered. Those we figure to have reach the various newspaper offices around 8 p.m., though local time in each case. That will be ample time for them to set, rewrite, or revamp as the case may he—for the next morning’s paper; or, if desired, for the pre-midnight papers with after-midnight dates.

  The hour decided upon for release to our clients is a compromise on a number of different angles covering the problem. We aim, primarily, of course, to give them the report fully one calendar date ahead of publication, in newspapers, of the facts therein. But to give it to them a full 24 hours (or more) ahead of the newspaper release hour would, of course, result in all the papers digging up their own stories—interviews, etc., etc.— from our facts—after which use of the facts would no longer constitute a clear-cut example of copyright violation; at least not such as could be made to stick in court. And the plan must, of necessity, insure newspaper use of our report. So—2:30 p.m. (Central Standard time) seems to me to be just about right. At that hour there will doubtlessly be leakage here and there to city desks—and a certain amount of pressure at city desks towards violation of copyright—in fact, if we released too early in the day, some of that pressure might actually break through here and there. But at 2:30 p.m. Central Standard time, it will be but a matter of 9 hours, more or less, when the report is free to the last comma therein—and also, incidentally, 2:30 is a bit late for any sheet to dig up anything really exclusive on its own hook, particularly in London, where midnight will be only a few hours off. Indeed, it is certain that it will be far more advantageous for any sheet to use our then “dead” (for commemorative purposes
anyway!) report than to try to get up something itself. Particularly since we propose to give newspaperdom everything that can be given on the Marceau Case.

  Our world’s greatest Nuisance here will probably querulously shove the story as far back in as it can—in view of the fact that it did not work it out itself—but that is okay with me, in view of the fact that Chicagoans, ever since the days when the Nuisance used to shove all the stories of returning prosperity far back in so as to minimize Roosevelt’s influence, have learned to read the paper backward, coming out last of all on the front page where the ballyhoo for our Nuisance-picked mayor always sits. The main point is that no sheet, I believe—including the Nuisance—will try to work up a story on its own. And as for a certain prospective arrest in Nebraska, with consequent extradition to England—and possibly one in London—and also one in Lancashire, England—well, that is something that does not concern us. We are a reporting agency—that, and no more.

  Incidentally, Howard, give me your opinion as to the feasibility of our raising our annual fee for the service from $150 to $200. Our old system of merely providing a single report that wrote “Finis” to this or that criminological case (a single report, incidentally, is all we shall provide on the Marceau Case) was not as costly as this new system where we’re providing also a separate standard filing card for each principal individual involved in a cleared case. I am wondering if we could tax clients an extra $50 per year. What do you think? Also, what in your opinion is the best handling of a matter involving several clients—several detective agencies, these, and not, as our other clients, police heads, criminological students, nor news editors, etc.— who, though they agreed in their contract with us to release to us, first of all, all their cleared cases, have failed to do so. It is a curious thing to me how no business seems ever to be perfect or free from irritations and problems. And how—but then, if it were—well—I suppose every Tom, Dick and Harry would be in it. And here—we are the only business of our exact kind in America. So I’d better quit grousing, I daresay.

  In fact, Howard, I’m going to sign off now. Though I do want to add, before doing so, that it seems to me that in our being able to release, as a clearance report to our clients, nothing less than the solution of the world-famous Marceau Case (the “semi-demi-hemi solution,” X disgruntedly insists yet on terming it!)—and by one calendar date ahead of newspaper publication thereof, is the business beat supreme—in addition to being about the most unique commemorative stunt on record. But the further vital elements, Howard, in the matter that every newspaper using a single fact or line of our report must carry a credit line for the International Criminological Data Service—well, Howard, that is an advertisement whose value simply cannot be computed.

  It is actually worth more than all the dividends i.e. profits!—earned by this organization in the whole 50 years of its existence. It’s the million-dollar advertisement—as I call it—for the I.C.D.S. Though most of all, oddly enough, I am glad for X’s sake. A lot of derision and newspaper ridicule was heaped on him here in America after that perhaps ill-advised advance announcement he gave there in London. After, rather, that huge story the All-America News Service ran on him. His concept of crime being an invisible stress pattern in a 4-dimensional medium is, I assure you, no wild absurdity—nor academic theory; his idea of defining the complete shape of the invisible stress pattern as the true picture of a crime is not the mere vaporing of a fantastic mind. For it works, Howard, to the ultimate degree. As will be proven by X’s analysis of the Marceau Case. And which analysis, I can assure you, will be a brilliant feat of sheer intellectuality designed, however, for intellectually minded people who possess an interest in seeing reasoning which happens to be based on concepts somewhat different than they are used to, applied to translating 3-dimensional phenomena into their correct 4-dimensional organization—or, more briefly, Truth! And perhaps, in this case, all and the whole of Truth.

  For, quite aside from the foregoing—and quite aside from possessing the type of mind he has, X is one of the most indefatigable searchers after the ultimate atom of “Truth” that the world has ever seen. Space and Time for him, though having equal statuses as dimensions of the Universe, have no significance whatsoever to him, seemingly, when it comes to the single unit (whatever that unit is!) by which they may be mutually measured. That is to say, Howard, if the sight of a hieroglyph written by Cheops 4000 years ago within his own pyramid were required by X in a case to—as he puts it—complete the stress-pattern!—I believe he would never sleep until he had found some way to peer through that wall of granite and obtain the hieroglyph; and if an initial, cut upon a tree in the densest part of some Amazonian jungle, were required to “complete truth,” I believe that he would somehow succeed in getting in touch, by radio, with some lone explorer near the region in question, and would somehow obtain what he needed, if only via tom-tom drums and smoke signals all the way back to civilization! His analysis, I assure you, Howard, will be a real piece of detective work—and will definitely assure you that man is not only a reasoning “simian”—but a simian who can devise systems of reasoning—in short, a man!

  Though here’s hoping that nobody rides in ahead of us on Mr. Rabbit Luck—Rabbit Luck being Tortoise Reasoning’s most formidable opponent, Aesop notwithstanding.

  I shall write again, especially if some slight change in the proposed general plan develops.

  Sincerely,

  Scutters.

  DOCUMENT XCVII

  Airmail letter of date February 14, 1937, from X. Jones, London, England, addressed “Count Friederich Von Schmutterling, Hotel Namur, Brussels, Belgium.”

  My Dear Mr. Ezekiah:

  Your letter, which was forwarded to me at my quarters, at 136 Grey’s Inn Road (I am no longer with the Yard, at least officially) was of more than great interest I assure you. It was because of that, in fact, that I wired you saying I would reply in full today, and for you to await same. One of the reasons your letter was of interest to me was because it restored, somewhat, my faith in my own ability to forecast coming events—for so early as last November I predicted that a “confession” would ultimately be rendered, by some Lilliputian wire-walker or ex-wire-walker, in the Marceau Case.

  The cause for my so thinking was the identical thing which you have now elicited: namely, that a straight line connecting the position of that imbedded anchor barb—and that left windowbox bracket—the section of it, that is, between windowbox and wall—passes exactly over the points where the Lilliputian footprints begin, and cease. That, plus my belief—at least at that time—that there were doubtlessly many wire-walkers in the world, and consequently more than a few Lilliputian wirewalkers. And even though I come from India, I know the predilection of those engaged in showmanship pursuits to “capture the headlines” as it were, if for no more than one edition! And thus I anticipated a “confession” eventually, which might at least stand up for 24 hours—and then collapse.

  And now it appears that something like that may be on the way!

  At least you ask me, quite definitely, where you stand. And just what you should do.

  But first, to quote from your letter to me: You say to me, in your second-from-the-last paragraph:

  “—for according to that story in that American paper, you have put yourself definitely on record as able to strip completely from the Marceau Mystery the entire veil that has hidden it—and to reveal the person guilty of Marceau’s death.”

  Well, I am sorry to say, Mr. Ezekiah, that, at the date of this writing, I am not able to “strip completely” from the Marceau Mystery “the entire veil that has hidden it.”

  For the Marceau Mystery is a very strange and unusual case. If for no other reason than that it possesses far-flung ramifications—and the “entire veil” that covers it would almost defy anyone’s grasp, by virtue of the scope of that veil in Space and Time. Nor—quoting your letter again!—can I yet truly say—at least at this time—that I am able to “reveal the person gu
ilty of Marceau’s death.”

  I am able to set forth today—and will be able to set forth no less than that on the day which was promised in that news-story—an analysis of that case which will cast, I am certain, more illumination upon it than has ever up to now been cast. Unless, perchance, that between now and the date in question I receive, from Canton, China, a—however, I will stick just now to the question at issue!

  Namely, what is your position—and what should you do?

  It is more than true, Ezekiah, that your inability to absolutely prove that you were hiding in Schmutterling’s walled-in villa both before, on, and after May 10, 1935, could cause you more than mere travail in any police station in the world today!

  But, on the other hand, the map of those grounds, as drawn by the correspondent Whittimore, is erroneous: for the garage did not stand, on May 10, 1935, where it is shown in that map: it stood a full 62½ feet to the east of the position shown; and anyone who might have crossed that lawn on a wire that night would have had to be a grasshopper indeed to have jumped to the points to which, theoretically according to that map, he but lowered himself and raised himself from. But to attempt to convince the police of a station house of that fact, in the face of that beautiful map, with a caption underneath it showing that it was drawn by an accomplished map-maker who conceivably checked up all his locations carefully with respect to their being correct for former dates, would be a long-drawn-out matter which would take at least 24 hours during which—well—you have, you say, been in America; and you have, you also say, seen some “third degrees”!