Chapter 15 Chapter 14 Ivory Keyboard

The study had been tightly sealed since the morning after Bratt's humiliated body was discovered.At this time, Professor Megara, Bonn, Esham, Ellery, and Professor Yadori walked into the study in a mighty manner.Captain Sweet had already returned to the pier, while Bratt, mother and daughter, and Lincoln stayed in their rooms, and Dr. Dunpaolo had disappeared for a long time. Megara stepped back and thought while everyone was searching—this time it was no longer a superficial routine inspection, but a large-scale, carpet-like search.Esham turned the desk over and searched carefully. The documents and papers on the desk were scattered all over the floor; Bonn also took the initiative to check every piece of furniture; Professor Adori came to the grand piano and carefully flipped through the music scores displayed on the shelf.

Immediately there was a discovery - no!Maybe it can't be called a discovery, this thing may be the clue that Velluja Kloshak deliberately revealed.But let’s just call it a discovery!This should be a major key.Ellery, who was pacing up and down beside the police officer, by chance, not really by chance, but by a sudden inspiration, dragged the corner of the bench to the wall of the bookshelf, and dragged the legs of the chair, which had been resting on the floor, to the Chinese rug. At this moment, he let out a voiceless cry, squatted down quickly, and stared at the "thing" hidden under the chair. Both Esham and Professor Adori came over, and Mr. Megara only slightly The probe looked at it, and it didn't mean to move at all.

"what is this!" "What a mistake!" murmured Bonn, "to leave this stain in such an obvious place!" "It's blood!" whispered Ellery. "If 'experience' the 'teacher' isn't as bad as the professor, I don't think it's wrong." The carpet on the floor is as rough and unattractive as sealing wax, and it is quite eye-catching. Within a few inches nearby, there are four corner marks imprinted by heavy objects, which are caused by the table or chair being placed in a fixed place for a long time. However, judging from the shape of the mark, it is definitely not caused by the legs of the reclining chair.

Ellery looked around the room, and suddenly stopped at the opposite desk. "This must be—" At this point, he moved the recliner to the center of the room.There was another identical mark three feet from the stain. "This stain..." Esham frowned, "Why is it under the recliner? When he first came here, Stallings said that the furniture hadn't been moved at all!" "It's obvious..." Ellery said, standing up. "Nothing has been moved except the rug. However, it's not easy for Stallings to notice that." Ella Li looked around the study room, his eyes suddenly lit up, yes, his guess was correct.The only piece of furniture in the room that matched the dent was the desk leg.He raised the legs of the desk, and under the legs there were the same marks as the square indentation he had found.The only difference is that this mark is not as deep as the previous one.

"Let's have an interesting experiment!" said Ellery, stretching out his arms. "Now move this rug!" "Look around?" Esham asked. "Why?" "Just restore it to the state it was in before it was moved by Kloshak on Tuesday." Police officer Bonn was overjoyed and said loudly, "Bastard!" He exclaimed triumphantly, "I finally know that Kloshak wanted to cover up the blood, but he was afraid that it would not be able to completely remove it, so that's why he made such a bad move, right?" "But officer, you may only get part of the answer right!" Professor Adori said, "if Ellery's guess is correct."

"That's right!" Ellery said calmly. "To understand the truth, let's move the table! The rest is much easier." Megara still stood in the corner and silently listened to everyone's conversation.He didn't mean to help.Born easily lifted the table and moved it into the corridor.After a while, the four people each pulled a corner of the carpet and turned the carpet around, so that the part under the lounge chair returned to its original place—that is, the opposite direction of the room—at this moment, anyone can clearly judge , the correct position of these two dents is at the foot of the desk, and that piece of dried blood...

Esham opened his eyes wide and said, "Behind the long chess table." "Well, the stage has become a real stage now," muttered Ellery.The bloodstain was next to the desk, two feet in front of the folding chair. "It was hit hard from the rear." Professor Yadori said to himself, "He was hit when he was playing that deadly chess alone. Alas! He should know that getting too addicted to this kind of thing will cause trouble. " "Mr. Megara, what do you think?" Ellery suddenly looked back at the silent navigator and asked. Megara shrugged and said, "That's your job."

"To save time," Ellery said, sitting down and lighting a cigarette, "sir, let's analyze it! What do you think?" "I still can't figure it out!" said Bonn complaining. "Why did he turn the rug around? Who is he trying to hide from? As you say, if he didn't deliberately use Mr. Megara's The pipe, dragging us from the thatched hut to the study, won't it never be unraveled?" "Wait a minute, Sergeant, let me think for a moment... um! It's now very clear to everyone, obviously, that Croshak had no intention of hiding this study forever. In fact, he , and lead us into this room after everything has been arranged; and he also knows that we will find this bloodstain in this carpet search, and if he wants to hide this fact forever The trace of the pipe was deliberately left in the hut, and at the same time, he would not be stupid enough to let this bloodstain remain in its current form. Because you see!" Ellery pointed to the edge of the table, "Besides the bloodstain Above are two bottles of ink; if Kloshak had knocked over one of the bottles on purpose, the police would have mistook it for the blot by Bratt or someone else, and not noticed the blood beneath the blot . . . Instead of this naive and simple method, he went to great lengths to shift the direction of the rug so that the police ignored it during the initial inspection, and when Megara mentioned that the pipe was his, he pulled the police back At the scene, after a careful search, this bloodstain was found. Therefore, think about it, it is impossible for Kloshak to use such a complicated method to be useless, at least he will earn a lot of time."

"The analysis is really wonderful!" Professor Yadori said with a little anxiety, "I just want to know why Kloshak let us discover this. As long as you let me know the reason, even if I want to go back to my hometown, I will have nothing to do." complain." "Master!" Ellery replied, "Please don't be so hasty. All this is my speculation. If I were in ancient times, I would have no room to speak at all. However, the times are different! I am good at reasoning, I believe that in this field, I will not lose to anyone, ha! ha! In short, let’s continue talking!” He put away his smile, “Kloshak didn’t want to cover up the crime scene forever, he just wanted to Delaying time—why is that? There are three reasons I can think of; listen carefully—especially Mr. Megara, because we need your help.” Megara nodded and sat heavily on the couch.

"First, there is something in this room that is dangerous to Kloshak, but for some special reason, he has not been able to remove it... Second, in this room, there is something that is dangerous. What Kloshak brought, or wanted to put back, may have been on the night of the murder, and time would not allow him to do so..." "Stop, please!" interposed the prosecutor. "The two reasons you mentioned are not very reasonable, because both of them lead everyone to believe that the summer hut is the first scene, and they distract everyone from the study. , that is to say, during this period of time, the suspect can approach this room without any scruples."

"That's an orderly contradiction, Mr. Ersham," said Ellery. "Crowshak must have anticipated the following, first, by his own plan, to make the police ignore There were bloodstains, and it made everyone think that the thatched cottage was a murder scene... But I repeat, he had planned all of this in advance. Even if the police don't think this study is a murder scene, this room will definitely be tightly sealed , so it is impossible to freely go in and out of this room to take out or put back things. "If Kloshak wants to come back here again, and make the hut temporarily the first site, wouldn't it be better to make it the permanent site? That way, he has unlimited time to use; but he doesn't In doing so—he intentionally left clues to get us back to this room—if I guess correctly, he would never be so stupid, so the first two reasons cannot be established.” "It's getting on my head!" said Bonn disapprovingly. "It's so queer!" "Shut up!" Esham scolded him, "This is different from the police's rough investigation method! Now, I also admit that doing this is not the right way to solve the case. But now that the facts are clear, everyone must change direction , so please keep talking, we are all listening." "Officer! You will be publicly condemned!" Ellery went on grimly. "The third possibility—there must be something in this study that existed on the day of the murder—that Croshak deliberately made the police Knows about it, but he wishes to hide it temporarily until Mr. Megara returns." "Wow!" Bonn clapped his hands and walked forward, "Get me out of here! I can't stand it!" Megara turned sideways and kept watching here: "Please continue talking! Mr. Ellery." "We'd better respect the intention of the murderer." Ellery continued, "Mr. Megara, now, we need to find out what the murderer wants the police to find when Mr. Megara is present... You know ’” he went on slowly, in a meditative tone, “the more manipulative the suspect is, the more fallible he is, and I believe you agree with that, Sergeant! Call Stallings, please.” When the policeman at the door called "Stollings", Stallings walked over quickly without losing his majesty. "Stollings!" said Ellery suddenly, "you know everything about this room!" Stallings cleared his throat and said, "Yes, I dare say I know as much as Mr. Bratt." "That's great, please take a good look!" Ellery looked around meekly. "Is there something added, or something that shouldn't be here, but is here?" Stallings smiled faintly, and walked around the study steadily. He knocked on the corners, opened the drawers, or flipped through the things on the desk. It took him about ten minutes to check, and said: "This room is the same as the last time I The furnishings are exactly the same. There is only one thing, except that the table is missing!" Everyone fell silent and asked no more questions. But Ellery insisted, "Is there really nothing more or less?" Stallings shook his head violently. "No, there's only one thing that's different, and that's the stain." He pointed to the carpet. "That stain didn't exist before I left the house on Tuesday. And the voyage The chess table..." "How about a chess table?" Ellery demanded sharply. Stallings shrugged his shoulders elegantly and said, "It's the position of the chess pieces! Of course, Mr. Blatter will continue to play chess after I go out, so what I said has not changed at all, that's why!" Ellery breathed a sigh of relief: "You really deserve to be Stallings. You have the talent to be Sherlock Holmes, and at the same time you have the eyes of a camera...Okay, that's enough." Stallings glanced at Mr. Megara who was smoking against the wall, and there seemed to be resentment in his eyes. "Now..." Ellery said energetically, "let's break up!" "But what are you looking for?" said Bonn reluctantly. "What are you talking about! Police officer, if we know, we don't need to look for it!" Afterwards, the atmosphere in the room is believed to be funny to everyone except Mr. Megara, because Mr. Megara seems to be the only one missing "laugh "Cell.The four big men in the room were lying on the ground, leaning over the wall, knocking on the floor, or checking the contents of the cushions, the soles of the feet and handles of chairs, recliners, desks, chess tables, etc... The way they are desperately searching is like a scene in "Alice in Wonderland".Fifteen minutes of fruitless searching, Ellery sat down exhausted and sweating, with a dejected look on his face, but soon lost himself in the realm of self-reflection.His daydreams seemed like nightmares. On the other hand, the professor, who didn't know what fear was, was still searching intently. He bent his tall body, lying on the carpet and looking around, and seemed quite happy. When he looked up at the ancient chandelier on the ceiling, "Oh! This might be a unique hiding place, let me have a look!" He murmured, moved a stool, and climbed up to fiddle with the crystal decoration on the mercury lamp.Suddenly, as if a wire or a light had leaked somewhere, he jumped down with a yelp. Mumbling, Bonn picked up another piece of paper and examined it under the light.The police officer was probably thinking that there might be some invisible ink words emerging!Esham looked through all the floor-to-ceiling curtains carefully, and he had already removed all the curtains.Police officer Bonn also turned out the inner part of the oil lamp for inspection. All the actions seemed pedantic, ridiculous and impractical. Naturally, these actions were all in vain. All four of them once looked at the collection of books on the bookshelf, but no one was willing to reach out to investigate; thinking of so many books, flipping through them one by one, and such a huge project, everyone lost the courage to face it. Ellery suddenly leaned on the bench, talking to himself: "We are so stupid! As stupid as a puppy chasing its own tail... Since Croshak wants us to come back to this room to find this Therefore, it is absolutely impossible to put it in a place where only a genius magician and a psychic police dog can find it. Of course, it is impossible to put it in a place where it can be found casually. .But, it won’t be a hidden place that can’t be found after a thorough investigation. Hey! Teacher, Klossak is not so familiar with the cracks of the lamp, so you are just wasting your energy looking for the lamp.” "Well! That's a very clever place, but it's by no means a hidden place that can't be found." "Wow! It's the best speech ever!" Bonn mocked, "But, where will it be?" He was completely soaked, looking extremely embarrassed, "Mr. Megara, do you know any good hiding places?" When Megara shook her head, Professor Adori's beard rose. Ellery said: "My father, Mr. Cronin, the acting prosecutor, and I worked on a similar case in the investigation into the murder of bad lawyer Mand Brook - remember? - at the time. The performance of "Dragonlance" took place in the Roman theater—" The professor's eyes suddenly lit up, and he walked quickly to a corner of the grand piano. This place has been investigated by Esham just now, but the professor didn't even look at the music stand, but opened the piano cover, and began to follow the scale, the first step Terrace flicked with his fingers, his face was solemn, just like the scene Ellery saw in school, with a kind of majestic expression. "Very clever analysis, Ellery!" he tapped each note. "So I've had a good idea... Suppose I'm Croshak, and I'm hiding a small and Flat thing, I have only a short and finite time, and know very little about this room, so where should I hide it?" He stopped playing the piano - because he was playing the wrong note, and then he pressed it a few more times. , found that it was just a change of key, so he continued to play, "Kloshak wanted us to find out, but he didn't want to be found out too early, so I noticed the piano, thinking about it at this juncture. Now, who is in the mood to play the piano in the dead man's study? However, it will be discovered sooner or later, right?..." "It's perfect, sir!" cried Ellery. "Even I can't make such a wonderful reasoning!" I can't even move. "Eureka."——Professor Adori couldn't help but say something in Italian. At this time, his facial expression was like that of a magician who has just learned magic. He was extremely surprised to see that his first experiment was successful. And have an incredible feeling. Everyone leaned over, and Mr. Megara became as enthusiastic as everyone else.The keys are stuck at about a quarter of the height, neither up nor down. Ellery said excitedly and sharply, "Wait a minute!" He took out a small tool box from his pocket, took out a small screwdriver, inserted it into the gap between the keys, and soon, the end of a piece of paper was exposed from the gap. Everyone breathed a sigh of relief, and slowly straightened their backs. Ellery carefully took out the remaining part of the paper.Everyone surrounded Ellery and returned to the sofa chair in the study, waiting for the announcement. The paper was pressed extremely flat, and Ellery gently flipped the paper over. There was no strange expression on Megara's face, and the rest of the people, including Ellery, could not explain what was written in handwriting on the scrap of paper: The letter was signed—the signature matched the writing on the desk—Thomas Bratt.

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