The American Gun Mystery (Death At the Rodeo)

12: Private Screening

It is said in Ecclesiastes that the sleep of a laboring man is sweet; perhaps this points a stern moral to those who presume to labor with their brains rather than their muscles, for it is certain that after a prodigious effort of the cerebral cells the night before Mr. Ellery Queen crawled out of his bed of pain unrefreshed, ache-boned, cotton-mouthed, and already fifteen minutes late for his appointment with Major Kirby.

He gulped down two raw eggs, a steaming pannikin of coffee, an excited regurgitation of the preceding evening’s events issuing from Djuna’s chattering mouth, and then dashed downtown to Times Square.

The newsreel offices, adjunct of a large motion picture producing company, occupied the twelfth floor of a beehive building. Ellery emerged breathless from the elevator and found himself in the reception room just forty-five minutes late.

Major Kirby hurried out. “Mr. Queen! I thought something had happened to you. We’re all set.” The Major, remarkable man! exhibited no least sign of his all-night session; he was spruce, fresh, and his flat shaven cheeks were a healthy pink.

“Overslept,” groaned Ellery. “How do you do it? By the way, did you have any trouble with your editor, Major, over the excessive footage?”

Kirby chuckled. “Not a bit. He was tickled to death. We got the jump on every outfit in town. This way, Mr. Queen.”

He conducted Ellery through a large, noisy chamber filled with lounging men. It was thick with cigaret smoke; its typewriters clacked like Chinese firecrackers; a large peculiar-looking ticker-like machine was being studied by a group; boys rushed in and out.

“Quite like a newspaper office,” remarked Ellery as they pushed their way through.

“Worse,” said the Major dryly; “it’s a newsfilm office. And newsreel cameramen are just about one thousand percent more hard-boiled than newspaper reporters. This is a tough bunch; but they’re mighty sweet lads on the pick-up!”

They went through a doorway down a rather depressing corridor lined with doors. Somewhere there was a deep whirr of machinery. Coatless men rushed by.

“Here we are,” announced the Major. “One of our projection rooms. Use it for rushes. Come on in, Mr. Queen. Don’t mind the smell, do you? It’s the celluloid.”

It was a bare-walled room with two rows of removable seats. In the rear wall several square orifices framed the snouts of motion picture projectors. The opposite wall was largely covered by a pure white screen.

“Sit down,” said the Major in a cordial tone. “I’m ready when you are—”

“Would you mind holding up a bit? The Inspector left for Headquarters before I awoke this morning, but he left word that he would stop in here if he could break away.”

“You’re the boss.” The Major sat down against the wall at a small table studded with buttons and lighted by a tiny powerful lamp. “Anything new?”

Ellery stretched his aching legs. “I’m afraid not,” he replied ruefully. “You know, Major, we’re face to face with an extremely metaphysical puzzle. Modern witchcraft! Problem: What happened to the automatic which fired the shot which killed Buck Horne? It can’t have been slipped out of the Colosseum, and yet it isn’t there. Apparently. Figure that one out.”

“Sounds like something out of the Arabian Nights,” smiled the Major. “I’ll admit it’s a poser. But I agree with Mars — heavens, man, it’s the only reasonable theory! — that somehow, in some way, the murderer managed to sneak the gun out of the building. Either personally or through an accomplice.”

Ellery shook his head. “We’re certain from indisputable testimony that not a living soul wriggled out of the place from the moment after the crime took place. And everybody thereafter — no exceptions, mind you — was thoroughly searched. No, Major, the answer is considerably more subtle than that. In fact,” he frowned, “I wish it were as simple as you say. Because I’ll have to confess I haven’t the least notion of what’s really happened to the hardware... Ah, dad! Top o’ the mornin’!”

Inspector Queen, looking smaller, thinner, and grayer than ever, appeared in the doorway of the projection room, flanked by Sergeant Velie and Detective Hesse. “Morning, Major. So you did get out of bed finally, did you?” He dropped wearily into one of the chairs, and waved his aides into others. “From the way you were tossing and groaning, you must’ve been havin’ nightmares... All right, Major. We’re ready if you are.”

Major Kirby twisted his head and yelled toward the largest orifice in the rear wall: “Joe!”

A bespectacled face popped into sight in the square window. “Yep, Major?”

“We’re ready, Joe. Shoot ’er along.”

Instantly the lights went out and they were left in a velvety, palpable darkness. There was a whirr and clacking roar of machinery from the operator’s booth behind. Suddenly a title materialized on the screen, accompanied by a stock blare of dirge-like introductory music. The title read:

The title flicked off, and another came on — a long passage:

The title vanished, and the first view of the Colosseum the night before leaped onto the screen, accompanied by the newsreel announcer’s voice.

“Here you see the vast crowd who packed the Colosseum,” boomed the voice, as the scene slowly shifted from tier to tier of seats in the amphitheatre, “before the fatal shooting. The occasion was the grand opening at this world-famous sport arena in New York City of Wild Bill Grant’s Rodeo... Twenty thousand persons were enjoying the colorful spectacle of leaping horses, whooping cowboys—” The voice stopped and a burst of sound came from the amplifier as the cameras darted from one part of the arena to another, catching the sights and sounds of the preliminary events the Queens had witnessed the night before, including a brief glimpse of Curly. Grant laughing and showing his teeth as he popped the little glass balls out of existence with careless shots from his long-barreled revolver. Suddenly there was a hush; the arena emptied; the camera swung and fixed on the huge western gate. Out pranced Wild Bill Grant on his horse; the camera followed him to the center of the oval. It caught his gallop, his sliding stop in a group of flying dirt-clods, his wave of the Western hat, his smile, the applause and stamping of feet, Grant’s signal-shot toward the roof, and his bloodcurdling cowboy yell to gain silence. Then his opening bellow: “La-dees and Gentlemen, per-mit me to welcome you to the Grrrand Opening of Wild Bill Grrrant’s Rrrrodeo! The Larrrgest Ag—” The roaring continued. Then the dramatic appearance of Buck Horne on his magnificent mount, Rawhide, the yelling entrance of the forty-one riders, the signal-shots, the swirl of the start of the gallop around the tanbark track...

They leaned forward tensely as the events of the preceding evening recreated themselves with such startling faithfulness on the screen... Someone sighed tremulously as there was a hasty glimpse of Buck Horne twisting sideways from his saddle at the instant of the thunderous fusillade — this was a long, indistinct volley — his fall, the wild confusion of milling horses and the screams of the spectators... They sat silently as the camera leaped from long shots of personalities, of the Mars box, of the dismounted horsemen, of the rodeo doctor, and one of the blanketed body...

When the lights flashed on again, no one moved for some time. Then the Major called in a low voice: “All right, Joe, that’s all,” and the spell was broken.

“Fast work, eh?” went on the Major with a grim smile. “That reel’s in the State Theatre right now.”

“Very enterprising,” murmured Ellery absently. “By the way, how long does this run? It seemed to me longer than the usual newsreel episode.”

“I should say it is. Naturally we’ve made this a special. Takes the same importance,” chuckled Kirby, “as earthquakes and wars. Runs to just about a reel. About ten and a half minutes.”

The Inspector stirred. “Nothing there we didn’t get ourselves. I can’t see, Ellery—”

Ellery, sunk in deep reverie, did not reply.

“Well, is there?”

“Eh? Oh, no, no. Perfectly right,” sighed Ellery. He turned to Kirby. “You’ve been a trump, Major. I wonder if I could prevail upon you to spend some more of your company’s money? Is it possible for you to wangle your apparatus so that we can get a still-photograph — close-up — of Horne at the instant the bullet entered his body?”

Kirby frowned. “Well... It’s not impossible. It will be considerably blurred, you know; blow-ups of film always are. Besides, this was a long shot — not focused for close-up...”

“Nevertheless I want it most particularly. Be a good fellow.”

“Anything you say, old man.” Major Kirby rose and quietly left the projection room.

“These birds sure do work fast,” rumbled Sergeant Velie.

“Ellery,” said the Inspector, “what’s this hocus-pocus for, anyway? I’m busy, drat it—”

“It’s important.”

And so they waited. Several men poked their heads in. Once a large fat gentleman with an autocratic air marched in, introduced himself as the editor of the newsreel company, and asked if Inspector Queen would like to “say a few words” about the shooting into the microphone — there was a studio a few steps down the corridor... The Inspector shook his head.

“Sorry. I’d have to get the Commissioner’s permission, and he’s out of town. He doesn’t like his officers making stabs at publicity.”

“Oh, he doesn’t?” said the large fat gentleman dryly. “I take it the regulation doesn’t apply to himself? Say, I know that publicity hound! ’Scuse me, Inspector. Some other time, maybe, when His Nibs feels better. See you later.” And he hurried like the White Rabbit out of the room.

They continued to wait. Ellery was deep in the waters of cogitation. Detective Hesse closed his eyes, folded his hands, rested his head on the back of the seat, and instantly fell asleep. He snored frankly. Sergeant Velie cocked an eye at his superior, decided he might chance it, and proceeded to snatch a few winks himself.

Outside there was bedlam. In the room quiet.

When Major Kirby returned, he was triumphantly waving a set of damp photographs, eight inches by ten. Sergeant Velie started, and opened his eyes. Detective Hesse snored on.

The Queens bent over the wet prints; eagerly, very eagerly.

“Did our best,” said the Major apologetically. “I told you they would be out of focus. But we got the best magnification consistent with clarity.”

There were ten photographs in a series, the difference between the positions of the subjects in the successive photographs being infinitesimal. That they had been enlarged from motion picture celluloid was apparent from the film-frame visible around the pictures. The prints were consistently blurred, covered with a sort of grayish lambency which was the result of distorted focus. Nevertheless, details were discernible.

They showed Buck Horne on Rawhide at the approximate time of the man’s death, head-on to the camera, in a perfect frontal position — so that in the first picture the magnificent head of the animal stared directly into the lens, with the rider’s body looming behind it and facing similarly into the camera. All the pictures were in a sort of middle focus, so that the entire body of the horse was visible. It was plain from the photograph that Rawhide’s long-barreled body had been consistently parallel to the tanbark track during the entire time-period of the murder.

Five of the pictures revealed Horne an instant before his death. In this series the action was clear: in the first the victim had been sitting perfectly erect in the saddle, in the second he had begun to bend over in the saddle sideways to his left; in the third the leaning was more pronounced; and so on, until at the fifth his torso, still facing the camera, was leaning off the perpendicular to his left at an angle of thirty degrees. In comparison, Rawhide was in much the same position as in the first of the series; the horse’s leaning to the left was microscopic. Three photographs revealed Horne at the instant of death, and two as he began to crumple in the saddle and slip toward the floor. In all the pictures his hat was on his head, his left arm was elevated in clutching the reins, and his right arm flourishing the revolver high above his head.

“If you’ll recall the scene,” muttered Ellery, intent on the damp prints, “he began to topple from the saddle just after Rawhide rounded the northeastern turn of the track. That accounts for his pronounced leaning toward the right — his left — in these pictures. Isn’t that a sort of balance-compensation caused by centrifugal force, Major? Or am I being ridiculously unscientific again?”

They concentrated on the three photographs showing Horne at the very instant of death. Thanks to the victim’s predilection for white satin shirts, it was possible to study the effect of the shot very closely. The first of the three pictures revealed a small black spot beneath the rider’s crooked, elevated left arm, and a little toward the front at the level of the heart. The second revealed a slightly larger spot in the same place, and the third the largest of all — although the difference among the three was minute. These black spots were undoubtedly photographs of the bullet-hole.

On all the last five photographs the expression of the face was of shock, strain, distortion, lightning pain. Facing straight out toward the camera, as if its lens were the glaring eye of Death, he died again before their eyes.

Ellery looked up, and his eyes were veiled. “What a blind fool I’ve been,” he said thoughtfully. “And how simple this problem was after all.”

There was an astounded silence, and Major Kirby’s jaw dropped an inch.

“Was?” cried the Inspector.

Ellery shrugged. “There are two things I don’t know,” he said with a sad smile, “two things of vast importance, by and by, which must be explained before the case is complete. But there’s one thing I do know. Yes, there’s one thing I do know, and there’s no shadow of a question about its truth...”

The Inspector clamped his lips shut, and glowered.

But Major Kirby said eagerly: “What’s that? What’s that, Mr. Queen?”

Ellery tapped the falling figure on the last photograph with an impersonal fingernail. “I know who killed this poor old exhibitionist!”