A Man*sCRIPT DOCUMENT SENT TO SCOTLAND YARD BY THE MASTER
OF THE EMMA JANE, FISHING TRAWLER
From my earliest youth I realized that my nature was a ma** of contradictions. I
have to begin with, an incurably romantic imagination. The practice of throwing
a bottle into the sea with an important document inside was one that never failed
to thrill me when reading adventure stories as a child. It thrills me still - and for
that reason I have adopted this course - writing my confession, enclosing it in a
bottle, sealing the latter, and casting it into the waves. There is, I suppose, a
hundred to one chance that my confession may be found - and then (or do I flatter
myself!) a hitherto unsolved murder mystery will be explained.
I was born with other traits besides my romantic fancy. I have a definite sadistic
delight in seeing or causing d**h. I remember experiments with wasps - with
various garden pests... From an early age I knew very strongly the lust to k**.
But side by side with this went a contradictory trait - a strong sense of justice. It
is abhorrent to me that an innocent person or creature should suffer or die by any
act of mine. I have always felt strongly that right should prevail.
It may be understood - I think a psychologist would understand - that with my
mental makeup being what it was, I adopted the law as a profession. The legal
profession satisfied nearly all my instincts.
Crime and its punishment has always fascinated me. I enjoy reading every kind
of detective story and thriller. I have devised for my own private amusement the
most ingenious ways of carrying out a murder.
When in due course I came to preside over a court of law, that other secret
instinct of mine was encouraged to develop. To see a wretched criminal
squirming in the dock, suffering the tortures of the damned, as his doom came
slowly and slowly nearer, was to me an exquisite pleasure. Mind you, I took no
pleasure in seeing an innocent man there. On at least two occasions I stopped
cases where to my mind the accused was palpably innocent, directing the jury
that there was no case. Thanks, however, to the fairness and efficiency of our
police force, the majority of the accused persons who have come before me to be
tried for murder, have been guilty.
I will say here that such was the case with the man Edward Seton. His
appearance and manner were misleading and he created a good impression on
the jury. But not only the evidence, which was clear, though unspectacular, but
my own knowledge of criminals told me without any doubt that the man had
actually committed the crime with which he was charged, the brutal murder of
an elderly woman who trusted him.
I have a reputation as a hanging judge, but that is unfair. I have always been
strictly just and scrupulous in my summing up of a case.
All I have done is to protect the jury against the emotional effect of emotional
appeals by some of our more emotional counsel. I have drawn their attention to
the actual evidence.
For some years past I have been aware of a change within myself, a lessening of
control - a desire to act instead of to judge.
I have wanted - let me admit it frankly - to commit a murder myself. I recognized
this as the desire of the artist to express himself! I was, or could be, an artist in
crime! My imagination, sternly checked by the exigencies of my profession, waxed
secretly to colossal force.
I must - I must - I must - commit a murder! And what is more, it must be no
ordinary murder! It must be a fantastical crime - something stupendous - out of
the common! In that one respect, I have still, I think, an adolescent's
imagination.
I wanted something theatrical, impossible!
I wanted to k**... Yes, I wanted to k**...
But - incongruous as it may seem to some - 1 was restrained and hampered by my
innate sense of justice. The innocent must not suffer.
And then, quite suddenly, the idea came to me - started by a chance remark
uttered during casual conversation. It was a doctor to whom I was talking - some
ordinary undistinguished G.P. He mentioned casually how often murder must be
committed which the law was unable to touch.
And he instanced a particular case - that of an old lady, a patient of his who had
recently died. He was, he said, himself convinced that her d**h was due to the
withholding of a restorative drug by a married couple who attended on her and
who stood to benefit very substantially by her d**h. That sort of thing, he
explained, was quite impossible to prove, but he was nevertheless quite sure of it
in his own mind. He added that there were many cases of a similar nature going
on all the time - cases of deliberate murder - and all quite untouchable by the
law.
That was the beginning of the whole thing. I suddenly saw my way clear. And I
determined to commit not one murder, but murder on a grand scale.
A childish rhyme of my infancy came back into my mind - the rhyme of the ten
little Indian boys. It had fascinated me as a child of two - the inexorable
diminishment - the sense of inevitability.
I began, secretly, to collect victims...
I will not take up space here by going into detail of how this was accomplished. I
had a certain routine line of conversation which I employed with nearly every one
I met - and the results I got were really surprising. During the time I was in a
nursing home I collected the case of Dr. Armstrong - a violently teetotal sister
who attended on me being anxious to prove to me the evils of drink by recounting
to me a case many years ago in hospital when a doctor under the influence of
alcohol had k**ed a patient on whom he was operating. A careless question as to
where the sister in question had trained, etc., soon gave me the necessary data. I
tracked down the doctor and the patient mentioned without difficulty.
A conversation between two old military gossips in my Club put me on the track
of General Macarthur. A man who had recently returned from the Amazon gave
me a devastating resume of the activities of one Philip Lombard. An indignant
mem sahib in Majorca recounted the tale of the Puritan Emily Brent and her
wretched servant girl. Anthony Marston I selected from a large group of people
who had committed similar offences. His complete callousness and his inability to
feel any responsibility for the lives he had taken made him, I considered, a type
dangerous to the community and unfit to live. Ex-Inspector Blore came my way
quite naturally, some of my professional brethren discussing the Landor case
with freedom and vigour. I took a serious view of his offence. The police, as
servants of the law, must be of a high order of integrity. For their word is
perforce believed by virtue of their profession.
Finally there was the case of Vera Claythorne. It was when I was crossing the
Atlantic. At a late hour one night the sole occupants of the smoking-room were
myself and a good-looking young man called Hugo Hamilton.
Hugo Hamilton was unhappy. To a**uage that unhappiness he had taken a
considerable quantity of drink. He was in the maudlin confidential stage.
Without much hope of any result I automatically started my routine
conversational gambit. The response was startling. I can remember his words
now. He said:
"You're right. Murder isn't what most people think - giving some one a dollop of
arsenic - pushing them over a cliff - that sort of stuff." He leaned forward,
thrusting his face into mine. He said: "I've known a murderess - known her, I tell
you. And what's more I was crazy about her... God help me, sometimes I think I
still am... It's Hell, I tell you - Hell - You see, she did it more or less for me... Not
that I ever dreamed. Women are fiends - absolute fiends - you wouldn't think a
girl like that - a nice straight jolly girl - you wouldn't think she'd do that, would
you? That she'd take a kid out to sea and let it drown - you wouldn't think a
woman could do a thing like that?"
I said to him:
"Are you sure she did do it?"
He said and in saying it he seemed suddenly to sober up:
"I'm quite sure. Nobody else ever thought of it. But I knew the moment I looked
at her - when I got back - after... And she knew I knew... What she didn't realize
was that I loved that kid..."
He didn't say any more, but it was easy enough for me to trace back the story and
reconstruct it.
I needed a tenth victim. I found him in a man named Morris. He was a shady
little creature. Amongst other things he was a dope pedlar and he was
responsible for inducing the daughter of friends of mine to take to d**. She
committed suicide at the age of twenty-one.
During all this time of search my plan had been gradually maturing in my mind.
It was now complete and the coping stone to it was an interview I had with a
doctor in Harley Street. I have mentioned that I underwent an operation. My
interview in Harley Street told me that another operation would be useless. My
medical adviser wrapped up the information very prettily, but I am accustomed
to getting at the truth of a statement.
I did not tell the doctor of my decision - that my d**h should not be a slow and
protracted one as it would be in the course of nature. No, my d**h should take
place in a blaze of excitement. I would live before I died.
And now to the actual mechanics of the crime of Indian Island. To acquire the
island, using the man Morris to cover my tracks, was easy enough. He was an
expert in that sort of thing. Tabulating the information I had collected about my
prospective victims, I was able to concoct a suitable bait for each. None of my
plans miscarried. All my guests arrived at Indian Island on the 8th of August.
The party included myself.
Morris was already accounted for. He suffered from indigestion. Before leaving
London I gave him a capsule to take last thing at night which had, I said, done
wonders for my own gastric juices. He accepted it unhesitatingly - the man was a
slight hypochondriac. I had no fear that he would leave any compromising
documents or memoranda behind. He was not that sort of man.
The order of d**h upon the island had been subjected by me to special thought
and care. There were, I considered, amongst my guests, varying degrees of guilt.
Those whose guilt was the lightest should, I decided, pa** out first, and not suffer
the prolonged mental strain and fear that the more cold-blooded offenders were
to suffer.
Anthony Marston and Mrs. Rogers died first, the one instantaneously, the other
in a peaceful sleep. Marston, I recognized, was a type born without that feeling of
moral responsibility which most of us have. He was amoral - pagan. Mrs. Rogers,
I had no doubt, had acted very largely under the influence of her husband.
I need not describe closely how those two met their d**hs. The police will have
been able to work that out quite easily. Pota**ium Cyanide is easily obtained by
householders for putting down wasps. I had some in my possession and it was
easy to slip it into Marston's almost empty gla** during the tense period after the
gramophone recital.
I may say that I watched the faces of my guests closely during that indictment
and I had no doubt whatever, after my long court experience, that one and all
were guilty.
During recent bouts of pain, I had been ordered a sleeping draught - Chloral
Hydrate. It had been easy for me to suppress this until I had a lethal amount in
my possession. When Rogers brought up some brandy for his wife, he set it down
on a table and in pa**ing that table I put the stuff into the brandy. It was easy,
for at that time suspicion had not begun to set in.
General Macarthur met his d**h quite painlessly. He did not hear me come up
behind him. I had, of course, to choose my time for leaving the terrace very
carefully, but everything was successful.
As I had anticipated, a search was made of the island and it was discovered that
there was no one on it but our seven selves. That at once created an atmosphere
of suspicion. According to my plan I should shortly need an ally. I selected Dr.
Armstrong for that part. He was a gullible sort of man, he knew me by sight and
reputation and it was inconceivable to him that a man of my standing should
actually be a murderer! All his suspicions were directed against Lombard and I
pretended to concur in these. I hinted to him that I had a scheme by which it
might be possible to trap the murderer into incriminating himself.
Though a search had been made of every one's room, no search had as yet been
made of the persons themselves. But that was bound to come soon.
I k**ed Rogers on the morning of August 10th. He was chopping sticks for
lighting the fire and did not hear me approach. I found the key to the dining-
room door in his pocket. He had locked it the night before.
In the confusion attending the finding of Rogers' body I slipped into Lombard's
room and abstracted his revolver. I knew that he would have one with him - in
fact, I had instructed Morris to suggest as much when he interviewed him.
At breakfast I slipped my last dose of chloral into Miss Brent's coffee when I was
refilling her cup. We left her in the dining-room. I slipped in there a little while
later - she was nearly unconscious and it was easy to inject a strong solution of
cyanide into her. The bumblebee business was really rather childish - but
somehow, you know, it pleased me. I liked adhering as closely as possible to my
nursery rhyme.
Immediately after this what I had already foreseen happened - indeed I believe I
suggested it myself. We all submitted to a rigorous search. I had safely hidden
away the revolver, and had no more cyanide or chloral in my possession.
It was then that I intimated to Armstrong that we must carry our plan into
effect. It was simply this - I must appear to be the next victim. That would
perhaps rattle the murderer - at any rate once I was supposed to be dead I could
move about the house and spy upon the unknown murderer.
Armstrong was keen on the idea. We carried it out that evening. A little plaster
of red mud on the forehead - the red curtain and the wool and the stage was set.
The lights of the candles were very flickering and uncertain and the only person
who would examine me closely was Armstrong.
It worked perfectly. Miss Claythorne screamed the house down when she found
the seaweed which I had thoughtfully arranged in her room. They all rushed up,
and I took up my pose of a murdered man.
The effect on them when they found me was all that could be desired. Armstrong
acted his part in the most professional manner. They carried me upstairs and
laid me on my bed. Nobody worried about me, they were all too deadly scared and
terrified of each other.
I had a rendezvous with Armstrong outside the house at a quarter to two. I took
him up a little way behind the house on the edge of the cliff. I said that here we
could see if any one else approached us, and we should not be seen from the
house as the bedrooms faced the other way. He was still quite unsuspicious - and
yet he ought to have been warned - If he had only remembered the words of the
nursery rhyme, "A red herring swallowed one..." He took the red herring all right.
It was quite easy. I uttered an exclamation, leant over the cliff, told him to look,
wasn't that the mouth of a cave? He leant right over. A quick vigorous push sent
him off his balance and splash into the heaving sea below. I returned to the
house. It must have been my footfall that Blore heard. A few minutes after I had
returned to Armstrong's room I left it, this time making a certain amount of noise
so that some one should hear me. I heard a door open as I got to the bottom of the
stairs. They must have just glimpsed my figure as I went out of the front door.
It was a minute or two before they followed me. I had gone straight round the
house and in at the dining-room window which I had left open. I shut the window
and later I broke the gla**. Then I went upstairs and laid myself out again on my
bed.
I calculated that they would search the house again, but I did not think they
would look closely at any of the corpses, a mere twitch aside of the sheet to
satisfy themselves that it was not Armstrong masquerading as a body. This is
exactly what occurred.
I forgot to say that I returned the revolver to Lombard's room. It may be of
interest to some one to know where it was hidden during the search. There was a
big pile of tinned food in the larder. I opened the bottom - most of the tins -
biscuits I think it contained, bedded in the revolver and replaced the strip of
adhesive tape.
I calculated, and rightly, that no one would think of working their way through a
pile of apparently untouched foodstuffs, especially as all the top tins were
soldered.
The red curtain I had concealed by laying it flat on the seat of one of the drawing-
room chairs under the chintz cover and the wool in the seat cushion, cutting a
small hole.
And now came the moment that I had anticipated - three people who were so
frightened of each other that anything might happen - and one of them had a
revolver. I watched them from the windows of the house. When Blore came up
alone I had the big marble clock poised ready. Exit Blore...
From my window I saw Vera Claythorne shoot Lombard. A daring and
resourceful young woman. I always thought she was a match for him and more.
As soon as that had happened I set the stage in her bedroom.
It was an interesting psychological experiment. Would the consciousness of her
own guilt, the state of nervous tension consequent on having just shot a man, be
sufficient, together with the hypnotic suggestion of the surroundings, to cause
her to take her own life? I thought it would. I was right. Vera Claythorne hanged
herself before my eyes where I stood in the shadow of the wardrobe.
And now for the last stage. I came forward, picked up the chair and set it against
the wall. I looked for the revolver and found it at the top of the stairs where the
girl had dropped it I was careful to preserve her fingerprints on it.
And now?
I shall finish writing this. I shall enclose it and seal it in a bottle and I shall
throw the bottle into the sea.
Why?
Yes, why?...
It was my ambition to invent a murder mystery that no one could solve.
But no artist, I now realize, can be satisfied with art alone. There is a natural
craving for recognition which cannot be gain-said.
I have, let me confess it in all humility, a pitiful human wish that some one
should know just how clever I have been...
In all this, I have a**umed that the mystery of Indian Island will remain
unsolved. It may be, of course, that the police will be cleverer than I think. There
are, after all, three clues. One: the police are perfectly aware that Edward Seton
was guilty. They know, therefore, that one of the ten people on the island was not
a murderer in any sense of the word, and it follows, paradoxically, that that
person must logically be the murderer. The second clue lies in the seventh verse
of the nursery rhyme. Armstrong's d**h is a**ociated with a "red herring" which
he swallowed - or rather which resulted in swallowing him! That is to say that at
that stage of the affair some hocus-pocus is clearly indicated - and that
Armstrong was deceived by it and sent to his d**h. That might start a promising
line of inquiry. For at that period there are only four persons and of those four I
am clearly the only one likely to inspire him with confidence.
The third is symbolical. The manner of my d**h marking me on the forehead.
The brand of Cain.
There is, I think, little more to say.
After entrusting my bottle and its message to the sea I shall go to my room and
lay myself down on the bed. To my eyegla**es is attached what seems a length of
fine black cord - but it is elastic cord. I shall lay the weight of the body on the
gla**es. The cord I shall loop round the door-handle and attach it, not too solidly,
to the revolver. What I think will happen is this:
My hand, protected with a handkerchief, will press the trigger. My hand will fall
to my side, the revolver, pulled by the elastic will recoil to the door, jarred by the
door-handle it will detach itself from the elastic and fall. The elastic, released,
will hang down innocently from the eyegla**es on which my body is lying. A
handkerchief lying on the floor will cause no comment whatever.
I shall be found, laid neatly on my bed, shot through the forehead in accordance
with the record kept by my fellow victims. Times of d**h cannot be stated with
any accuracy by the time our bodies are examined.
When the sea goes down, there will come from the mainland boats and men.
And they will find ten dead bodies and an unsolved problem on Indian Island.
Signed
Lawrence Wargrave