dozen times every day of his life without looking at it crookedly. He didn’t see it as a reminder of dinner or closing-hour or a dentist’s appointment; he didn’t even see a clock-hand. What he did see was a thin steel shaft, something under ten inches long, barbed with a sharp arrowhead and admirably weighted at the handle for stabbing. And so he used it.”
“You’re getting into your stride at last,” said Hadley. He knocked his knuckles against the table in irritable meditation. “You say ‘he.’ There are Ames’s last reports, and as much information as I could get about the department-store case. I was wondering …”
“About women? Certainly. That’s our objective. I use ‘he’ because it’s convenient, where I should have said ‘it.’ As that young chap on the roof did—and I tell you again he’ll be our star witness—when he said, ‘It had gilt paint on its hands.’”
“But that sounds like a real clock,” protested Hadley. “I tell you the fellow must have been delirious and got things mixed up. I hope you’re not trying to tell me that a clock is human and can get up and walk about on a roof?”
“Now I wonder—” muttered Dr. Fell, as though struck with an idea. “No, don’t snort. We’re trying to follow the workings of a very lucid crackbrain, and we shall be no forrader until we find out what he meant by using that sort of weapon. There is a significance, blast it! There’s got to be … Human? Look here, has it ever struck you that in fiction and poetry, even in everyday life, the clock is the only inanimate object that is considered human as a matter of course? What fictional clock doesn’t have a ‘voice,’ and even human speech? It speaks nursery rhymes, and clears the way for ghosts, and accuses of murder; it’s the basis of all startling stage-effects, and a note of doom and retribution. If there were no clocks, what would happen to the tale of terror?—And I’ll prove it to you. There is one particular thing, vide the cinema, which is good for a roar of laughter at any time—a cuckoo clock. You have only got to have that little bird popping out to warble, and the audience thinks it’s uproariously funny. Why? Because it’s a parody of something we do take seriously, a burlesque of the solemnity of time and clocks. If you will imagine of the effect on the reader provided Marley’s ghost had said to Scrooge, ‘Expect the first of the three spirits when the cuckoo clock chirps one,’ you will have some faint notion of my meaning.”
“Very interesting,” said Hadley, without enthusiasm. “But I can’t help wishing you’d tell me what happened here tonight, so that I could form my own theories. This metaphysical business may be all very well—”
Dr. Fell took out his battered cigar-case, wheezing.
“You want proof, do you,” he said, quietly, “that I’m not talking through my hat? Very well. Why were both hands stolen off that clock?”
Hadley’s fingers closed over the arms of the chair …
“Now, now, steady. I’m not hinting at more stabbings. But let me follow it up with another question. There’s probably nothing in your life that you’ve seen more frequently than clocks, and yet I wonder if you can answer one question with absolute certainty before you look: Which hand is outside and which inside, the long minute-hand or the short hour-hand?”
“Well—” said Hadley. After a pause he growled something and reached after his watch. “H’m. The long one is outside; on this watch, anyhow. Confound it, yes! Bound to be. Common sense would tell you that. It has the bigger arc of the circle to travel—the longer distance, I mean. Well? What about it?”
“Yes. The minute-hand is outside. And,” continued Dr. Fell, scowling, “Ames was stabbed with the minute-hand. A further fact: if in your childhood you ever spent joyous carefree hours taking apart your old man’s best parlour clock to see if you could make it strike
“You’re getting into your stride at last,” said Hadley. He knocked his knuckles against the table in irritable meditation. “You say ‘he.’ There are Ames’s last reports, and as much information as I could get about the department-store case. I was wondering …”
“About women? Certainly. That’s our objective. I use ‘he’ because it’s convenient, where I should have said ‘it.’ As that young chap on the roof did—and I tell you again he’ll be our star witness—when he said, ‘It had gilt paint on its hands.’”
“But that sounds like a real clock,” protested Hadley. “I tell you the fellow must have been delirious and got things mixed up. I hope you’re not trying to tell me that a clock is human and can get up and walk about on a roof?”
“Now I wonder—” muttered Dr. Fell, as though struck with an idea. “No, don’t snort. We’re trying to follow the workings of a very lucid crackbrain, and we shall be no forrader until we find out what he meant by using that sort of weapon. There is a significance, blast it! There’s got to be … Human? Look here, has it ever struck you that in fiction and poetry, even in everyday life, the clock is the only inanimate object that is considered human as a matter of course? What fictional clock doesn’t have a ‘voice,’ and even human speech? It speaks nursery rhymes, and clears the way for ghosts, and accuses of murder; it’s the basis of all startling stage-effects, and a note of doom and retribution. If there were no clocks, what would happen to the tale of terror?—And I’ll prove it to you. There is one particular thing, vide the cinema, which is good for a roar of laughter at any time—a cuckoo clock. You have only got to have that little bird popping out to warble, and the audience thinks it’s uproariously funny. Why? Because it’s a parody of something we do take seriously, a burlesque of the solemnity of time and clocks. If you will imagine of the effect on the reader provided Marley’s ghost had said to Scrooge, ‘Expect the first of the three spirits when the cuckoo clock chirps one,’ you will have some faint notion of my meaning.”
“Very interesting,” said Hadley, without enthusiasm. “But I can’t help wishing you’d tell me what happened here tonight, so that I could form my own theories. This metaphysical business may be all very well—”
Dr. Fell took out his battered cigar-case, wheezing.
“You want proof, do you,” he said, quietly, “that I’m not talking through my hat? Very well. Why were both hands stolen off that clock?”
Hadley’s fingers closed over the arms of the chair …
“Now, now, steady. I’m not hinting at more stabbings. But let me follow it up with another question. There’s probably nothing in your life that you’ve seen more frequently than clocks, and yet I wonder if you can answer one question with absolute certainty before you look: Which hand is outside and which inside, the long minute-hand or the short hour-hand?”
“Well—” said Hadley. After a pause he growled something and reached after his watch. “H’m. The long one is outside; on this watch, anyhow. Confound it, yes! Bound to be. Common sense would tell you that. It has the bigger arc of the circle to travel—the longer distance, I mean. Well? What about it?”
“Yes. The minute-hand is outside. And,” continued Dr. Fell, scowling, “Ames was stabbed with the minute-hand. A further fact: if in your childhood you ever spent joyous carefree hours taking apart your old man’s best parlour clock to see if you could make it strike
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