A detective outside shouted a message of failure, a shout carried away by the wind under the bright cold moon.
“See,” said Ellery softly, “how everything fell into place. If this White House we were in was not the same White House in which we had slept that first night, but was a twin house in a different position in relation to the sun, then the Black House, which apparently had vanished, had not vanished at all. It was where it had always been. It was not the Black House which had vanished, but we who had vanished. It was not the Black House which had moved away, but we who had moved away. We had been transferred during that first night to a new location, where the surrounding woods looked similar, where there was a similar driveway with a similar garage at its terminus, where the road outside was similarly old and pitted, where everything was similar except that there was no Black House, only an empty clearing.
“So we must have been moved, body and baggage, to this twin White House during the time we retired the first night and the time we awoke the next morning. We, Miss Mayhew’s chromo on the mantel, the holes in our doors where locks had been, even the fragments of a brandy decanter which had been shattered the night before in a cleverly staged scene against the brick wall of the fireplace at the original house... all, all transferred to the twin house to further the illusion that we were still in the original house the next morning.”
“Drivel,” said Dr. Reinach, smiling. “Such pure drivel that it smacks of fantasmagoria.”
“It was beautiful,” said Ellery. “A beautiful plan. It had symmetry, the polish of great art. And it made a beautiful chain of reasoning, too, once I was set properly at the right link. For what followed? Since we had been transferred without our knowledge during the night, it must have been while we were unconscious. I recalled the two drinks Thorne and I had had, and the fuzzy tongue and head that resulted the next morning. Mildly drugged, then; and the drinks had been mixed the night before by Dr. Reinach’s own hand. Doctor — drugs; very simple.” The fat man shrugged with amusement, glancing sidewise at the stocky man in blue. But the stocky man in blue wore a hard, unchanging mask.
“But Dr. Reinach alone?” murmured Ellery. “Oh, no, impossible. One man could never have accomplished all that was necessary in the scant few hours available... fix Thome’s car, carry us and our clothes and bags from the one White House to its duplicate — by machine — put Thome’s car out of commission again, put us to bed again, arrange our clothing identically, transfer the chromo, the fragments of the cut-glass decanter in the fireplace, perhaps even a few knickknacks and ornaments not duplicated in the second White House, and so on. A prodigious job, even if most of the preparatory work had been done before our arrival. Obviously the work of a whole group. Of accomplices. Who but everyone in the house? With the possible exception of Mrs. Fell, who in her condition could be swayed easily enough, with no clear perception of what was occurring.”
Ellery’s eyes gleamed. “And so I accuse you all — including young Mr. Keith, who has wisely taken himself off — of having aided in the plot whereby you would prevent the rightful heiress of Sylvester Mayhew’s fortune from taking possession of the house in which it was hidden.”
Dr. Reinach coughed politely, flapping his paws together like a great seal. “Terribly interesting, Queen, terribly. I don’t know when I’ve been more captivated by sheer fiction. On the other hand, there are certain personal allusions in your story which, much as I admire their ingenuity, cannot fail to provoke me.” He turned to the stocky man in blue.
“Certainly, Captain,” he chuckled, “you don’t credit this incredible story? I believe Mr. Queen has gone a little mad from sheer shock.”
“Unworthy of you, Doctor,” sighed Ellery. “The proof of what I say lies in the very fact that we are here, at this moment.”