The Film Mystery Read online

  Produced by Charles Franks and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team

  THE FILM MYSTERY

  BY

  ARTHUR B. REEVE

  AUTHOR OF

  "The Soul Scar" "The Adventuress" and Other Craig Kennedy ScientificDetective Stories

  CONTENTS

  CHAPTER

  I. A CAMERA CRIME II. THE TINY SCRATCH III. TANGLED MOTIVES IV. THE FATAL SCRIPT V. AN EMOTIONAL MAZE VI. THE FIRST CLUB VII. ENID FAYE VIII. LAWRENCE MILLARD IX. WHITE-LIGHT SHADOWS X. CHEMICAL RESEARCH XI. FORESTALLED XII. EMERY PHELPS XIII. MARILYN LORING XIV. ANOTHER CLUE XV. I BECOME A DETECTIVE XVI. ENID ASSISTS XVII. AN APPEAL XVIII. THE ANTIVENIN XIX. AROUND THE CIRCLE XX. THE BANQUET SCENE XXI. MERLE SHIRLEY OVERACTS XXII. THE STEM XXIII. BOTULIN TOXIN XXIV. THE INVISIBLE MENACE XXV. ITCHING SALVE XXVI. A CIGARETTE CASE XXVII. THE FILM FIREXXVIII. THE PHOSPHORUS BOMB XXIX. MICROSCOPIC EVIDENCE XXX. THE BALLROOM SCENE XXXI. PHYSOSTIGMIN XXXII. CAMERA EVIDENCE

  THE FILM MYSTERY

  I

  A CAMERA CRIME

  "Camera!"

  Kennedy and I had been hastily summoned from his laboratory in the cityby District-Attorney Mackay, and now stood in the luxurious, ornatelibrary in the country home of Emery Phelps, the banker, at Tarrytown.

  "Camera!--you know the call when the director is ready to shoot a sceneof a picture?--well--at the moment it was given and the first andsecond camera men began to grind--she crumpled--sank to thefloor--unconscious!"

  Hot and excited, Mackay endeavored to reenact his case for us with allthe histrionic ability of a popular prosecutor before a jury.

  "There's where she dropped--they carried her over here to thisdavenport--sent for Doctor Blake--but he couldn't do a thing for her.She died--just as you see her. Blake thought the matter so serious, soalarming, that he advised an immediate investigation. That's why Icalled you so urgently."

  Before us lay the body of the girl, remarkably beautiful even as shelay motionless in death. Her masses of golden hair, disheveled, addedto the soft contours of her features. Her wonderfully large blue-grayeyes with their rare gift for delicate shades of expression wereclosed, but long curling lashes swept her cheeks still and it was hardto believe that this was anything more than sleep.

  It was inconceivable that Stella Lamar, idol of the screen, beloved ofmillions, could have been taken from the world which worshiped her.

  I felt keenly for the district attorney. He was a portly little man ofthe sort prone to emphasize his own importance and so, true to type, hehad been upset completely by a case of genuine magnitude. It was asthough visiting royalty had dropped dead within his jurisdiction.

  I doubt whether the assassination of a McKinley or a Lincoln could haveunsettled him as much, because in such an event he would have had thewhole weight of the Federal government behind him. There was noquestion but that Stella Lamar enjoyed a country-wide popularity knownby few of our Presidents. Her sudden death was a national tragedy.

  Apparently Mackay had appealed to Kennedy the moment he learned theidentity of Stella, the moment he realized there was any question aboutthe circumstances surrounding the affair. Over the telephone the littleman had been almost incoherent. He had heard of Kennedy's work and wasfeverishly anxious to enlist his aid, at any price.

  All we knew as we took the train on the New York Central was thatStella was playing a part in a picture to be called "The Black Terror,"that the producer was Manton Pictures, Incorporated, and that she haddropped dead suddenly and without warning in the middle of a scenebeing photographed in the library at the home of Emery Phelps.

  I was singularly elated at the thought of accompanying Kennedy on thisparticular case. It was not that the tragic end of a film star whosework I had learned to love was not horrible to me, but rather because,for once, I thought Kennedy actually confronted a situation where hisknowledge of a given angle of life was hardly sufficient for his usualanalysis of the facts involved.

  "Walter," he had exclaimed, as I burst into the laboratory in responseto a hurried message, "here's where I need your help. You know allabout moving pictures, so--if you'll phone your city editor and ask himto let you cover a case for the Star we'll just about catch a train atOne Hundred and Twenty-fifth Street."

  Because the film world had fascinated me always I had made a point ofbeing posted on its people and their activities. I remembered the veryfirst appearance of Stella Lamar back in the days of General Film, whenpictures were either Licensed or Independent, when only two companiesmanufactured worth-while screen dramas, when any subject longer than areel had to be of rare excellence, such as the art films imported fromFrance for the Licensed program. In those days, Stella rose rapidly toprominence. Her large wistful eyes had set the hearts of many of us tobeating at staccato rate.

  Then came Lloyd Manton, her present manager, and the first of a newtype of business man to enter the picture field. Manton was essentiallya promoter. His predecessors had been men carried to success by thegrowth of the new art. Old Pop Belman, for instance, had been afifth-rate oculist who rented and sold stereopticons as a side line.With blind luck he had grasped the possibilities of Edison's newinvention. Just before the break-up of General Film he had become manytimes a millionaire and it was then that he had sent a wave of laughterover the entire country by an actual cable to William Shakespeare,address London, asking for all screen rights to the plays written bythat gentleman.

  Manton represented a secondary phase in film finance. Continent Films,his first corporation, was a stockjobbing concern. Grasping the immensepopularity of Stella Lamar, he had coaxed her away from the old studioout in Flatbush where all her early successes had been photographed.With the magic of her name he sold thousands of shares of stock to apublic already fed up on the stories of the fortunes to be made inmoving pictures. When much of the money so raised had been dissipated,when Continent's quotation on the curb sank to an infinitesimalfraction, then it developed that Stella's contract was with Mantonpersonally. Manton Pictures, Incorporated, was formed to exploit her.The stock of this company was not offered to outside investors.

  Stella's popularity had in no way suffered from the business methods ofher manager. Manton, at the least, had displayed rare foresight in hisestimation of public taste. Except for a few attempts with establishedstage favorites, photographed generally in screen versions oftheatrical classics and backed by affiliations with the producers ofthe legitimate stage, Continent Films was the first concern to make thefive-reel feature. Stella, as a Continent player, was the very firstfeature star. Under the banner of Manton Pictures, she had neversurrendered her position of pre-eminence.

  Also, scandal somehow had failed to touch her. Those initiated to theinner gossip of the film world, like myself, were under no illusions.The relations between Stella and Manton were an open secret. Yet thepicture fans, in their blind worship, believed her to be as they sawher upon the screen. To them the wide and wistful innocence of herremarkably large eyes could not be anything but genuine. Theartlessness of the soft curves of her mouth was proof to them of thereality of an ingenuous and very girlish personality.

  Even her divorce had helped rather than harmed her. It seemed irony tome that she should have obtained the decree instead of her husband, andin New York, too, where the only grounds are unfaithfulness. Thetestimony in the case had been sealed so that no one knew whom she hadnamed as corespondent. At the time, I wondered what pressure had beenexerted upon Millard to prevent the filing of a cross suit. Surely heshould have been able to substantiate the rumors of her associationwith Lloyd Manton.

  Lawrence Millard, author and playwright and finally scenario writer,had been as much responsible for the success of hi
s wife as Manton, andin a much less spectacular way. It was Millard who had written herfirst great Continent success, who had developed the peculiar type ofstory best suited for her, back in the early days of the one reel andGeneral Film.

  It is commonly known in picture circles that an actress who screenswell, even if she is only a moderately good artist, can be made a starwith one or two or three good stories and that, conversely, a star maybe ruined by a succession of badly written or badly produced vehicles.Those of us not blinded by an idolatrous worship for the girl condemnedher severely for throwing her husband aside at the height of hersuccess. The public displayed their sympathy for her by a burst ofrenewed interest. The receipts at the box office whenever her filmswere shown probably delighted both Manton and Stella herself.

  I had wondered, as Kennedy and I occupied a seat in the train, and ashe left me to my thoughts, whether there could be any connectionbetween the tragedy and the divorce. The decree, I knew, was not yetfinal. Could it be possible that Millard was unwilling, after all, tosurrender her? Could he prefer deliberate murder to granting her herfreedom? I was compelled to drop that line of thought, since it offeredno explanation of his previous failure to contest her suit or to startcounter action.

  Then my reflections had strayed away from Kennedy's sphere, the solvingof the mystery, to my own, the news value of her death and the eventsfollowing. The Star, as always, had been only too glad to assign me toany case where Craig Kennedy was concerned; my phone message to thecity editor, the first intimation to any New York paper of Stella'sdeath, already had resulted without doubt in scare heads and an extraedition.

  The thought of the prominence given the personal affairs of pictureplayers and theatrical folk had disgusted me.

  There are stars against whom there is not the slightest breath ofgossip, even among the studio scandal-mongers. Any number of girls andmen go about their work sanely and seriously, concerned in nothing buttheir success and the pursuit of normal pleasures. As a matter of factit had struck me on the train that this was about the first time CraigKennedy had ever been called in upon a case even remotely connectedwith the picture field. I knew he would be confronted with a tangledskein of idle talk, from everybody, about everybody, and mostly withoutjustification. I hoped he would not fall into the popular error ofassuming all film players bad, all studios schools of immorality. I wasglad I was able to accompany him on that account.

  The arrival at Tarrytown had ended my reflections, andKennedy's--whatever they may have been. Mackay himself had met us atthe station and with a few words, to cover his nervousness, had whiskedus out to the house.

  As we approached, Kennedy had taken quick note of the surroundings, thelocation of the home itself, the arrangement of the grounds. There wasa spreading lawn on all four sides, unbroken by plant or bush ortree--sheer prodigality of space, the better to display a rambling butmost artistic pile of gray granite. Masking the road and the adjoininggrounds was thick, impenetrable shrubbery, a ring of miniature forestland about the estate. There was a garage, set back, and tennis courts,and a practice golf green. In the center of a garden in a far corner asummerhouse was placed so as to reflect itself in the surface of aglistening swimming pool.

  As we pulled up under the porte-cochere Emery Phelps, the banker,greeted us. Perhaps it was my imagination, but it seemed to me thatthere was a repressed animosity in his manner, as though he resentedthe intrusion of Kennedy and myself, yet felt powerless to prevent it.In contrast to his manner was the cordiality of Lloyd Manton, justinside the door. Manton was childishly eager in his welcome, so much sothat I was able to detect a shade of suspicion in Kennedy's face.

  The others of the company were clustered in the living room, throughwhich we passed to reach the library. I found small opportunity tostudy them in the rather dim light. Mackay beckoned to a man standingin a window, presenting him to Kennedy as Doctor Blake. Then we enteredthe long paneled chamber which had been the scene of the tragedy.

  Now I stood, rather awed, with the motionless figure of Stella Lamarbefore me in her last pitiable close-up. For I have never lost thesense of solemnity on entering the room of a tragedy, in spite of thelong association I have had with Kennedy in the scientific detection ofcrime. Particularly did I have the feeling in this case. The death of aman is tragic, but I know nothing more affecting than the sudden andviolent death of a beautiful woman--unless it be that of a child.

  I recalled a glimpse of Stella as I had seen her in her most recentrelease, as the diaphragm opened on her receiving a box of chocolates,sent by her lover, and playfully feeding one of them to her beautifulcollie, "Laddie," as he romped about upon a divan and almost smotheredher with affection. The vivacity and charm of the scene were in sadcontrast with what lay before me.

  As I looked more carefully I saw now that her full, well-rounded facewas contorted with either pain or fear--perhaps both. Even through themake-up one could see that her face was blotched and swollen. Also, themuscles were contorted; the eyes looked as if they might be bulgingunder the lids; and there was a bluish tinge to her skin. Evidentlydeath had come quickly, but it had not been painless.

  "Even the coroner has not disturbed the body," Mackay hastened toexplain to Kennedy. "The players, the camera men, all were sent out ofthe room the moment Doctor Blake was certain something more than anatural cause lay behind her death. Mr. Phelps telephoned to me, andupon my arrival I ordered the doors and windows closed, posted mydeputies to prevent any interference with anything in the room, left myinstructions that everyone was to be detained, then got in touch withyou as quickly as I could."

  Kennedy turned to him. Something in the tone of his voice showed thathe meant his compliment. "I'm glad, Mackay, to be called in by some onewho knows enough not to destroy evidence; who realizes that perhaps theslightest disarrangement of a rug, for instance, may be the only clueto a murder. It's--it's rare!"

  The little district attorney beamed. If he had found it necessary towalk across the floor just then he would have strutted. I smiledbecause I wanted Kennedy to show again his marvelous skill in tracing acrime to its perpetrator. I was anxious that nothing should be done tohamper him.