The Fourth Side of the Triangle

Inspector Queen backed off until he was leaning against the jamb of Ellery’s study door. Ashton McKell placed both hands on the chair before him, gripping it. Lutetia, in the chair, set her glass down on the table, and it slopped a little. Judy leaned against Dane, who was watching Ellery like a dog.

“Here, once more, and for the last time,” said Ellery, “is the timetable of the night of September 14th:

“A few minutes to ten: Dane left Sheila Grey’s apartment.

“A few moments later: You, Mr. McKell, arrived. You were sent away about 10:03, almost at once.

“10:19: You, Dane, returned to the building.

“10:23: Sheila Grey was shot to death in her apartment.

“It took the first police officers only a few minutes to reach the scene, since the precinct man was able to put out a call practically at the moment of the shooting, from hearing it over the phone. The radio car men found Sheila Grey dead and began an immediate search of the apartment. They found the revolver. They found the cartridges. They did not find Sheila Grey’s note, describing Dane’s earlier visit and attack.”

The quiet in Ellery’s voice did not relax anyone. He seemed unaware of their tension and went on.

“Why didn’t the investigating officers, first on the scene, find the note? Obviously, because it had already been removed from the premises. Who removed it? Well, who do we know had it in his possession later, in order to be able to send it to the police? The blackmailer. There was only one way in which the blackmailer could have got hold of the note, and that was by taking it from the Grey apartment.

“Let’s tackle the same question temporally,” Ellery continued. “When did Sheila write the note? Between Dane’s first departure and Ashton’s arrival? Not likely: the time that elapsed could not have been more than five or six minutes, and some of that time Sheila must have spent recovering from the near-throttling she had suffered. Also, you told me, Mr. McKell, that when you walked into the apartment she was still terribly upset, too upset to have dashed off that longish letter to the police. I think, then, we can rule out the period between Dane’s departure and Ashton’s arrival as the time when she wrote the letter. She wrote it later.

“When? You left about 10:03, Mr. McKell. Then clearly the note must have been written between 10:03 and 10:23, when she was shot. And it had to have been taken from her workroom between the time she wrote it and the time the police got there. And just as clearly she had not given it to the blackmailer, for she addressed it to the police. So again we reach the conclusion: The blackmailer stole it from the apartment. And he could only have stolen it after it was written, which would place him in the apartment around the time of the murder. Let’s see if we can narrow this down further.”

Someone let out a breath stealthily. The Inspector glanced sharply around, but whoever had done it was again as rigid as the others.

“Who do we know now was in the apartment between the writing of the letter and the arrival of the police? The blackmailer. Who else? The murderer. Considering the short time involved, it’s a reasonable assumption that blackmailer and murderer were one and the same. But we know something else about this blackmailer-murderer. His attempted blackmailing of Dane was not his first such try. He had had a previous victim — you, Mr. McKell.” (And at this Inspector Queen cast such reproach at his son as should have withered him in his tracks had he been looking his father’s way; but he was not looking his father’s way, he was concentrating on his hypnotized audience.) “I’ve gone all through the reasoning that identifies each blackmail as the work of the same person, so I won’t repeat it.

“The keystone question is: What was the basis for his first blackmail, the blackmailing of Ashton McKell?”

Ellery addressed Lutetia directly, who sat twisted in the chair. “Forgive me if I have to call spades by their right name, Mrs. McKell. But we’re dealing with hard facts, and only hard words can describe them.

“The basis of the Ashton McKell blackmailing was the blackmailer’s knowledge of the relationship between Ashton McKell and Sheila Grey. Who knew or could have known of this relationship? How many persons? Who are they?”

He paused, and into the silence crept the sounds of New Year revelry from other apartments, the streets.