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Page 85
"Differing from most poisons, it may be inflicted through a prick
so slight as to be almost unnoticed by the victim. The scheme of
fixing the needle in the curtain was so simple and yet so
effective that the guilty person need never have feared its
discovery under ordinary circumstances, or its association with
the girl's death, if some one stumbled upon it accidentally. The
idea of returning for the death-dealing point was only one of the
many details of a precautionary measure upon which we have
stumbled. Had I found it the next morning I would have been
unable, in all probability, to identify it as belonging to or as
obtained by any of our suspects.
"You must realize, Walter, that with all the scientific aids I
have been able to bring to bear we possess almost no direct
evidence. There are no fingerprints, no cigarette stubs, no array
of personal, intimate clues of any sort to this criminal. These
are the threads which lead the detective to his quarry in fiction
and on the stage. Here we lack even the faintest description of
the man, or woman if that is her sex. It is murder from a
distance, planned with almost meticulous care, executed coolly
and without feeling or scruple.
"After the death of Miss Lamar I was not so sure but that the
selection of the snake venom was simply the inspiration of a
perverted brain, the evolution of the detailed method of killing
her--an outgrowth of someone's familiarity with studio life in
general, with the script of 'The Black Terror' in particular. Now
I realize that we are face to face with the studied handiwork of
a skilled criminal. These two deaths may be his--or her--first
departure into the realm of crime. But potentially we have a
super-villain.
"I make that statement because of the manner of Werner's demise.
It is evident that the director stumbled on a clue to the
murderer. If my first hypothesis had been correct, if the use of
snake venom and the unlucky thirteenth scene had been largely a
matter of blind chance in the selection of poison and method,
then we might have expected Werner to be struck down in some dark
street, or perhaps decoyed to his death--at the best, inoculated
with the same crotalin which had killed Miss Lamar.
"But let us analyze the method used in slaying the director. If
he had been blackjacked there would be the clue of the weapon,
always likely to turn up, the chance of witnesses, and also the
likelihood in an extreme case that Werner might not die at once,
but might talk and give a description of his assailant, or even
survive. Much the same objections--from the criminal's
standpoint--obtain in nearly all the accepted modes of killing a
man. Even the use of venom a second time possesses the
disadvantage of a certain alertness against the very thing on the
part of the victim. Werner was a dope fiend, fully aware of the
potency of a tiny skin puncture. I'll wager he was on constant
guard against any sort of scratch.
"On the other hand, the few drops of toxin in the glass possessed
every advantage from the unknown's standpoint. It was invisible,
and as sure in its action as the venom. Also it was as rare and
as difficult to trace. For, remember this. Botulism is food
poisoning. If I had not found the stem of that glass it would be
absolutely impossible to show that Werner died from anything on
earth but bad food. That is why I do not even take time to
analyze the stomach contents. That is why I say we are confronted
by an archscoundrel of highest intelligence and downright
cleverness. More"--Kennedy paused for emphasis--"I realize now
the presence of a grim, invisible menace. It has just now been
driven home to me. The botulin, with its deadly paralyzing power,
sealed Werner's tongue even while he tried to tell me what he
knew."
Mackay was tremendously impressed by Kennedy's explanation. "Does
this mean," he asked, "that the guilty man or woman is some
outsider? Those we have figured as possible suspects would hardly
have this detailed knowledge of poisons."
"There are two possibilities," Kennedy answered. "The real person
behind the two murders may have employed some one else to carry
out the actual killing, a hypothesis I do not take seriously,
or"--again he paused--"this may be a case of some one with
intelligence starting out upon his career of crime intelligently
by reading up on his subject. It is as simple to learn how to use
crotalin or botulin toxin or any number of hundreds of deadly
substances as it is to obtain the majority of them. In fact, if
people generally understood the ease with which whole communities
could be wiped out, and grasped that it could be done so as to
leave virtually no clue to the author of the horror, they might
not sleep as soundly at night as they do. The saving grace is
that the average criminal is often clever, but almost never truly
scientific. Unfortunately, we have to combat one who possesses
the latter quality to a high degree."
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