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WALTER NICHOLS

Murder is easy, and the majority of murderers, by far, are never brought to justice.

Most people know and understand one or the other of these two propositions, but few are able to believe both. That is why the homicide rate, high as it is, is not still higher. It is easy to kill. And, according to police statistics, most killings remain on the books as unsolved. Simple enough.

A few clouds, white and heavy, slipped with immense silence and slowness across the sky that is always bluer than one can ever remember it. From the balcony on the fifth and topmost floor of Demarest Hall, overlooking the quadrangle of studios that from here seemed small, one could look into the floor of the valley beyond them, where the city of Endor, built by Demarests and still dominated by them, seemed yet more small and remote and unreal. Then beyond the valley rose the hills, to form a bright green crest, and back of them, darker and immeasurably distant, stood another range of higher and more slowly rolling hills.

In such a scene, always, the mind finds it hard to clutch at the things of its own concern, tending to relax and let go, to fall and drown in this impersonal sea. Murder. Something about murder. Back in the seventies and eighties there were plenty of people in that little anthill called Endor who would not have hesitated to do away with Clark Demarest, had they dreamed it was his resolve that the main line of the railroad should pass, not through this valley, but through the one beyond. But they had not guessed it, and by the time they knew, it was too late. Still, there were plenty of people down there today who would not stop at anything to break the hold that, even in death, the Demarests had upon their lives. “... provided the executors of this estate, hereinbefore mentioned,” ran the critical clause of the will, “and the trustees of Demarest Hall, designated in (I), shall at all times maintain and conduct the affairs of said Demarest Hall in a manner consonant with public laws, customs and morals ...” Then followed a lengthy but exact definition of these, as a rule, rather intangible affairs, concluding with: “... failing which, said holdings designated for this purpose (II) (III) and (IV) shall become the common property of the city of Endor, to be administered for the public welfare by the council, trustees, alderman or otherwise duly elected officers of said city of Endor.”

Public officials of Endor, like the majority of its citizens, would have liked nothing better than to discredit Demarest Hall, through just that clause concerning laws, customs, and morals, to the end that the political power of the Hall’s trustees, exercised through its huge holdings, would be broken, and these holdings would revert to the city. If they could prove in court of law that Demarest Hall was being conducted contrary to public custom, the politicians of Endor would vacate the power of the trustees, and open a combined gambling house and house of prostitution on every street in Endor, the week after said power had been vacated. There would be millions in it for a few, and thousands for many. Murder? Murder has been committed for less than a dollar and sixty-five cents.

From directly beneath me, but sounding flat and faint, came the slam of the Hall’s main door, steps descending the five stone stairs to the walk and the drive. Presently, the foreshortened figure of Christopher Bartel came into view, walking rhythmically and steadily away from the Hall, presumably toward his own studio.

The eye where his fist had landed still smarted somewhat, and no doubt would soon be a trifle blue, if not quite black. His was a completely disorganized personality, if a first impression could be trusted, and in this case there was no reason to think it could not be. The mind of a child in the body of a man. Nothing very interesting, there are millions like him in every walk of life.

The expensively costumed figure of Christopher Bartel glanced back once, but without looking up—people never look up—then disappeared into Vishnu Lodge, the studio building at the southern end of the quadrangle. The name itself showed the touch of the last Demarest widow, now long deceased, who had served on the board of trustees—as did many other appurtenances about the estate. All of the lodges were similarly named—Veda, Agni, Vach, Uma, and so on, though no one but the unfortunate Mr. Cooke, who was obliged to do so, gave formal recognition of the fact. The structure that housed Mr. Bartel was known, naturally, as the End Building. Brahma Lodge, at the southeastern corner of the square, where there had been persistent trouble with the plumbing and lighting, had long since been known as the Doghouse. To it, because of these defects, were assigned the lesser celebrities among the guests, and thus its nickname had become doubly justified.

There reached me, again, the subdued slam of the Hall’s front door. Presently, their steps crunching on the gravel, Miss Claribelle Zorn, novelist of Omaha City, appeared in the company of Harley Hale, residence and ultimate destination unknown. It was evident from their attire and the tennis rackets they carried, however, that Mr. Hale had no intention of forwarding, at least immediately, his magnum opus, a study of prison life, a piece of rubbish which I believe he already alluded to as “Four Gray Walls.” And speaking of murder, Hale had very nearly gotten away with that killing of his, a variation of the Wanderer, or ragged stranger case. The scheme had been basically simple—Hale had “accidentally” killed his business partner and a bandit in frustrating a robbery that he himself had framed. Why he had been let off with manslaughter, is one of those mysteries at least as profound as the mystery of life.

There are certain basic murder methods that can never be proven by direct, but must always rely upon circumstantial, and therefore shaky, evidence before murder can be proven. The drowned sweetheart method is one, and no matter how old or well known it is, the technique is still good and will be good until the end of time. A professional killing, by hired killers is still another—the familiar gangster method, in which neither victim nor murderer is personally known to each other, with consequent lack of direct motive. And still another method is that of simply pushing the victim off of a high cliff, into the path of a subway, or out of a high window, balcony, or other inaccessible place. And there are many more.

And so the subject is again murder. Because it is necessary, or at any rate desirable, that this murder now quite certainly about to take place shall be limited in the final result, as closely as possible, to those parties deserving, justly, to be involved. Naturally, I do not like to think that my fundamental plans shall miscarry. And then, of course, I have always loathed loose, illogical thinking, and the utterly meaningless, irresponsible action that cannot help issuing from it. Knowing this, I also realize, and must accept the fact that I am hampered—even in murder—by an alert and hyper-sensitive conscience. I do not like to think that anyone shall die, through any act of mine, who does not richly merit death.

But I refuse to hesitate, to hesitate and shrink, as no doubt the blooming Miss Zorn might, or as even Mr. Hale under most circumstances would shrink, from passing judgment upon my fellow members of the human race. If my conscience sits in judgment upon me, then I do not stop in allowing it to sit in similar judgment upon others. My New England conscience is not, in short, entirely a liability when it comes to a matter of murder. It works both ways.

Well, I am old-fashioned, and why deny it? However I may have derided, in private, the mentality and the purposes of the Demarests, their unspeakable romanticisms and incredible tastes, they were the builders and the masters of the only society for which I have ever cared. I know their world was ridiculous. I know that they pursued the phantom of gentility on the grand scale as a politician organizes parades and buys votes. I know that even their philanthropy resembled a bargain-day rush in a department store—but it was still gentility, and philanthropy, ideas if nothing more,—civilization, in short, a civilization that is today dead. And the slight risk I shall run in engineering at least one death, and possibly more, seems a ridiculous trifle in the face of that larger doom, which my act will, after all, though in a small way, avenge. It will be not only a personal, but a symbolic retribution as well.

All of which may not promote, though it may underlie, the motives of murder. Surely, no architect in death has ever been as plentifully supplied as we are today, at Demarest Hall, with deserving victims, glaring motives, and likely suspects. Among the victims, for example, who would hesitate to remove that blight and blot Harley Hale? Or Mr. Christopher Bartel? And why would anyone boggle at Mr. Cooke? Why shouldn’t the ubiquitous hoodlums of whom Mr. Dunn writes so copiously turn on him, suddenly, and make away with him before he wittingly or unwittingly blunders into print with some ghost-written truth that might prove dangerous to them?

As for suspects, the list would be an embarrassment of riches. Half the guests of the Hall this season deserve jail or worse for the simple fact of having been born. As the trustee who was more closely in touch than any other with the invitations issued, I can be sure of that.

I do not know what day or night, nor by what means precisely, the murder will be committed. But it cannot be long. And I only hope a method can be devised that is mercifully swift. The accomplice and dupe is all but ready-made. Perhaps he may even be induced to contribute one or two practical suggestions towards his own undoing.