The French Powder Mystery

“Eh?” Weaver started at the sound of Ellery’s voice. “Oh, that! That’s a memo I sent around to the Board of Directors. Typed it yesterday afternoon, after the Old Man left for Great Neck.”

“How many copies did you make?”

“There were seven all told — one for each director, one for myself, and one for the files. This copy is the Old Man’s.”

Ellery spoke quickly. “How is it that I find it here on the desk?”

Weaver was surprised at the seeming inconsequentiality of Ellery’s question. “Oh, I say!” he protested. “Just a matter of form. I left it here so that the Old Man could see in the morning that I’d taken care of the matter.”

“And it was here — on the desk — when you left the apartment last night?” persisted Ellery.

“Well, of course!” said Weaver. “Where should it be? Not only that, but it was still there when I got in this morning.” He grinned feebly.

But Ellery was serious. His eyes glittered. “You’re sure of that?...” He half-rose from the swivel-chair in a strange excitement. He sank back. “Seems to fit with the rest of the jigsaw,” he muttered. “How beautifully it explains that one unexplained point!”

Thoughtfully he stowed the blue paper, uncreased, in a capacious wallet which he took from his breast-pocket.

“You’ll say nothing of this, of course,” he said slowly... Weaver nodded and relapsed into apathy. Ellery bent forward, placed his elbows on the glass top, his head in his hands. He stared before him... Something seemed to disturb his revery. His eyes, blank and preoccupied, focused by degrees on the books between the onyx book-ends, standing austerely on the desk in his direct line of vision.

After a moment, as if to satisfy a mounting curiosity, he straightened up and became entirely absorbed in the titles of the books. His long arm swooped down on one of them, carried it back for closer observation.

“By the wisdom of Bibliophilus!” he murmured at last, looking up at Weaver. “What a queer collection of volumes! Does your employer make a habit of reading such heavy stuff as An Outline of Paleontology, Wes? Or is this a text-book hang-over from your undergraduate days? I can’t recall your having a particular flair for science. It’s by old John Morrison, too.”

“Oh, that!” Weaver was momentarily embarrassed. “No, that’s the... the Old Man’s, I suppose, Ellery. His books entirely. Don’t think I’ve ever observed the titles, as a matter of fact. What did you say — paleontology? Didn’t know he went in for it.”

Ellery regarded him keenly for a brief moment, then replaced the book. “And what’s more — do you know,” he said softly, “this is fetching!”

“What?” asked Weaver nervously.

“Well, bend an ear to these titles: Fourteenth Century Trade and Commerce, by Stani Wedjowski. There’s a rare one for you, although it is fitting that a department store magnet be interested in the history of merchanting... And this one — A Child’s History of Music, by Ramon Freyberg. A child’s history, mind you. And New Developments in Philately, by Hugo Salisbury. A passion for stamps! Queer, queer, I tell you... And — good heavens! — Nonsense Anthology, by that surpassing idiot, A. I. Throckmorton!” Ellery lifted his eyes to Weaver’s troubled ones. “Dear young Dane,” he said slowly, “I can understand a chronic bibliophile having this bizarre collection on his desk, for some dark purpose of his own, but I’ll be immortally damned if I can make it jibe with my conception of Cyrus French, head of the Anti-Vice League and merchant prince... Your employer does not impress me as having the intellectual potentialities of a paleontological field worker, who is a stamp-collecting addict, who has a passion for medieval commerce, who knows so little of music that he must read a child’s history of it, and finally who indulges in the sickening horseplay of the year’s best — or worst — vaudeville jokes!.. Wes, old boy, there is more here than meets the vacillating eye.”

“I’m quite at sea,” said Weaver, shifting in his chair.

“And you should be, you should be, my child,” said Ellery as he rose and walked over to the bookcase on the wall to his left. He lightly hummed the thematic air of Marche Slav as he scanned the titles of the volumes behind the glass partitions. After a moment’s scrutiny he returned to the desk, where he sat down and again fingered the books between the book-ends in an absent way. Weaver’s eyes followed him uneasily.

“From the books in the case,” resumed Ellery, “my suspicions seem to be borne out. Nothing but works on social welfare and sets of Bret Harte, O. Henry, and Richard Harding Davis, et al. All of which compress nicely into the obvious intellectual stratum of your nice Old Man. Yet on the desk...” He mused. “And they show no signs of use,” he complained, as if disturbed further by this heinous crime against literature. “In two cases, where the volumes are bound that way, the leaves are still uncut... Westley, tell me truthfully, is French interested in these subjects?” He flipped his finger at the books before him.

Weaver answered immediately. “Not to my knowledge.”

“Marion? Bernice? Mrs. French? The directors?”

“I can answer positively in the case of the French family, Ellery,” replied Weaver, jumping from his chair and pacing up and down before the desk. “None of them reads such stuff. As for the directors — well, you’ve seen them.”

“Gray might be interested in this preposterous mélange,” said Ellery thoughtfully. “He’s the type. But that child’s history of music... Well!”

He bestirred himself. On the fly-leaf of the little volume in his coat pocket he made a careful memorandum of the titles and authors of the desk volumes. With a sigh he dropped the pencil back into his vest-pocket and once more began to stare blankly at the books. His hand played idly with one of the book-ends.

“Mustn’t forget to ask French about these books,” he murmured, more to himself than to Weaver, who still paced furiously up and down the room. “—Sit down, Wes! You disturb my train of thought...” Weaver shrugged, sat down quiescently. “Nice things, these,” Ellery said in a casual voice, indicating the book-ends. “That’s a very curious bit of carving on the onyx.”