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Authors: Kel Richards
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afternoon?’
‘There’s little room for doubt,’ boomed Jack in his confident lecture room voice. ‘There’s room for unanswered questions, room for perplexing puzzles, but no room for doubt that Morris and I saw exactly this wound inflicted.’
Sergeant Drake scribbled this down in his notebook.
Inspector Locke stood for a moment in silent contemplation—and it wasn’t hard to imagine what must have been racing through his mind. He had undoubtedly seen violent death before, but never like this, and never surrounded by the baffling story that surrounded this one.
‘Drake,’ he said, snapping out of his reverie.
‘Yes, sir,’ replied his faithful sergeant, all eager attention.
‘We’ll start by understanding something about the victim—and that means talking, in the first instance, to the Head Master. And gentlemen,’ he added turning to us, ‘if you’ll hold yourselves available I’ll have some more questions for you shortly.’
With these words the inspector and his sergeant strode off purposefully back through the archway to the close, leaving Jack, Warnie and me standing in the middle of the now deserted gravel road.
Jack relit his pipe, which had gone out, as Warnie scratched his chin and looked first up at the stone balustrade above our heads and then at the spot where the body had, eventually, fallen.
‘John Dickson Carr,’ he said at last. ‘Detective writer fellow. Writes about “impossible crimes”. This would suit him to a tee. A corpse that floats invisibly in mid-air overnight and then tumbles to the ground in the morning . . . huh . . . he’d come up with a cracking solution for that.’
‘Unfortunately, he’s not here to spin out some elaborate and clever explanation for us,’ I grumbled.
Warnie started pacing down the length of the road, keeping a close eye on the gravel beneath his feet as he walked, perhaps hoping it might reveal its secrets if only he looked at it hard enough and long enough.
Left alone with Jack, I said, ‘Did you notice how deeply that knife had been thrust into poor Fowler’s stomach? That looked like a powerful, angry blow to me.’
Jack nodded as a look of deep sadness came over his face. ‘That, young Morris,’ he said, ‘is what human nature at its most violent, most angry and most evil can do.’
‘Come on, Jack!’ I protested. ‘Surely you can’t really believe it’s normal to do something like that to a fellow human being?’ I paused to gather my thoughts. ‘Who can do that? Who can strike a blow like that into the body of another human being? Despite what you say about human nature being defective, I just can’t believe that a murderer is “normal” or has “normal human nature” in any sense of that word.’
‘So you would describe murder as being “unnatural”, I take it?’
‘Yes, yes, that’s a good word to use to describe such an act of evil—it’s “unnatural”. Not just murder—killing, any killing. In fact, any act of real, genuine evil, I believe, is against nature. At least against human nature.’
‘We need to be quite clear about such things—so how, exactly, would you describe human nature when in its “natural” or unspoiled state?’
I thought for a moment before I replied. ‘Our nature inclines us to want to see things go well, both for ourselves and for others. We are distressed by suffering we see in much the same way as we are discomforted by our own sufferings. From this, I take it, human nature, in the normal course of things, is kindly, sympathetic and basically . . . well, for want of a better word, good.’
‘And you are not, of course, on your own,’ said Jack. ‘Many, perhaps most, would agree with you. Sadly, the evidence seems to be otherwise. Chesterton was fond of saying that the one doctrine that never needs defending is the doctrine of original sin—since the evidence for its truth surrounds us every day.’
‘Well, Chesterton was a blockhead then! His doctrine of
‘There’s little room for doubt,’ boomed Jack in his confident lecture room voice. ‘There’s room for unanswered questions, room for perplexing puzzles, but no room for doubt that Morris and I saw exactly this wound inflicted.’
Sergeant Drake scribbled this down in his notebook.
Inspector Locke stood for a moment in silent contemplation—and it wasn’t hard to imagine what must have been racing through his mind. He had undoubtedly seen violent death before, but never like this, and never surrounded by the baffling story that surrounded this one.
‘Drake,’ he said, snapping out of his reverie.
‘Yes, sir,’ replied his faithful sergeant, all eager attention.
‘We’ll start by understanding something about the victim—and that means talking, in the first instance, to the Head Master. And gentlemen,’ he added turning to us, ‘if you’ll hold yourselves available I’ll have some more questions for you shortly.’
With these words the inspector and his sergeant strode off purposefully back through the archway to the close, leaving Jack, Warnie and me standing in the middle of the now deserted gravel road.
Jack relit his pipe, which had gone out, as Warnie scratched his chin and looked first up at the stone balustrade above our heads and then at the spot where the body had, eventually, fallen.
‘John Dickson Carr,’ he said at last. ‘Detective writer fellow. Writes about “impossible crimes”. This would suit him to a tee. A corpse that floats invisibly in mid-air overnight and then tumbles to the ground in the morning . . . huh . . . he’d come up with a cracking solution for that.’
‘Unfortunately, he’s not here to spin out some elaborate and clever explanation for us,’ I grumbled.
Warnie started pacing down the length of the road, keeping a close eye on the gravel beneath his feet as he walked, perhaps hoping it might reveal its secrets if only he looked at it hard enough and long enough.
Left alone with Jack, I said, ‘Did you notice how deeply that knife had been thrust into poor Fowler’s stomach? That looked like a powerful, angry blow to me.’
Jack nodded as a look of deep sadness came over his face. ‘That, young Morris,’ he said, ‘is what human nature at its most violent, most angry and most evil can do.’
‘Come on, Jack!’ I protested. ‘Surely you can’t really believe it’s normal to do something like that to a fellow human being?’ I paused to gather my thoughts. ‘Who can do that? Who can strike a blow like that into the body of another human being? Despite what you say about human nature being defective, I just can’t believe that a murderer is “normal” or has “normal human nature” in any sense of that word.’
‘So you would describe murder as being “unnatural”, I take it?’
‘Yes, yes, that’s a good word to use to describe such an act of evil—it’s “unnatural”. Not just murder—killing, any killing. In fact, any act of real, genuine evil, I believe, is against nature. At least against human nature.’
‘We need to be quite clear about such things—so how, exactly, would you describe human nature when in its “natural” or unspoiled state?’
I thought for a moment before I replied. ‘Our nature inclines us to want to see things go well, both for ourselves and for others. We are distressed by suffering we see in much the same way as we are discomforted by our own sufferings. From this, I take it, human nature, in the normal course of things, is kindly, sympathetic and basically . . . well, for want of a better word, good.’
‘And you are not, of course, on your own,’ said Jack. ‘Many, perhaps most, would agree with you. Sadly, the evidence seems to be otherwise. Chesterton was fond of saying that the one doctrine that never needs defending is the doctrine of original sin—since the evidence for its truth surrounds us every day.’
‘Well, Chesterton was a blockhead then! His doctrine of
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